FAA Rejects Van Nuys Air Controllers’ Plea to Increase Staff and Pay : Aviation: Despite the airport’s high-traffic volume, the agency said its guidelines don’t allow raising the tower’s ‘visual flight’ grade level.
The Federal Aviation Administration has rejected appeals from air-traffic controllers at Van Nuys Airport, the nation’s busiest general aviation airfield, to increase salaries and staffing in the control tower there.
The request by the Van Nuys chapter of the National Air Traffic Controllers Assn. sought higher salaries for controllers to attract more experienced personnel to handle the airport’s high-traffic volume, said chapter President Michael McGarr, a Van Nuys Airport controller for eight years.
The airport was the fifth busiest in the nation last year in terms of takeoffs and landings, with 508,000, according to FAA statistics. It was the busiest airport for general aviation, which includes private, charter and business flights but not scheduled airline or military operations.
Yet seven of the last nine air-traffic controllers hired at Van Nuys came straight from the FAA’s training academy, McGarr said. The tower has 17 controllers.
McGarr said he is unsure how many additional controllers would have been added if the FAA had approved an upgrade in the airport’s status from grade 3 to 4. But he said the average controller’s salary of $35,000 a year would probably have been increased by between $8,000 and $10,000.
Los Angeles regional FAA officials said the request was denied because federal regulations lack any basis to upgrade the Van Nuys Airport tower.
“It is not within the purview of the regional office to alter national criteria,” FAA spokeswoman Elly Brekke said. “We are abiding by the criteria of the FAA.”
The controllers union and an association of airport tenants have written to California Sens. Alan Cranston and John Seymour urging them to pressure the FAA to change the criteria. McGarr said he hopes FAA officials in Washington can overturn the regional decision.
Although Van Nuys controllers must handle heavy traffic and more experienced controllers are needed, McGarr said, the airport’s tower has had a near spotless safety record for several years.
“I think the increased staffing would just help make our operations run smoother,” said Alice Hardison, a controller and vice president of the local chapter of the controllers union.
According to FAA guidelines, Van Nuys Airport’s control tower is already at the top grade level for an airport that operates under “Visual Flight Rules,” meaning pilots and air-traffic controllers rely primarily on eyesight to land and take off, not instruments alone or radar-guided instructions from a controller.
Under FAA guidelines, other airports that rely more on radar to guide landings and takeoffs are given the grade 4 rating that provides them with larger staffs and higher salaries, even though they may serve fewer aircraft.
For example, Burbank Airport, which serves many scheduled commercial passenger flights as well as general aviation, had 224,033 landings and takeoffs last year and has a staff of 23 controllers. Long Beach Airport, which had 439,325 takeoffs and landings last year, has a staff of 25 controllers.
McGarr and others say the federal criteria must be revised to take into consideration high-traffic general aviation airports like Van Nuys.
“The way they consider traffic is unfair and outdated,” he said.
The request for an upgrade was first made in October, 1991, by Van Nuys tower chief John Clancy. In a letter to FAA officials in Burbank, Clancy said: “Regardless of the number of operations this facility handles, Van Nuys tower will never be upgraded beyond the present criteria. Yet this facility must compete for competent individuals, just as one that works substantially less traffic.”
In the letter, he said the FAA should give special consideration to Van Nuys Airport because of the high level of activity and the complex nature of the air traffic.
The airport serves a mixture of helicopter, jet and propeller traffic in an area with mountains to the north and south and traffic from two nearby airports. Whiteman Airport is five miles to the northeast and Burbank Airport is six miles east.
Regional FAA officials in Los Angeles rejected the request in a letter Van Nuys Airport officials received Tuesday.
Phil Berg, president of the Van Nuys Airport Tenants Assn., said his group has written to key federal representatives in support of upgrading the airport’s tower.
“I think there is a need for more controllers in the tower,” he said. “The support is here from everybody from the community as well as the operators.”
But the proposal does have opponents. Don Schultz, president of Ban Airport Noise, a homeowners organization dedicated to reducing airport noise in the San Fernando Valley, said he is concerned that the upgrade would give the airport a convenient excuse to increase the number of jet operations. He said his organization will not support the request for an upgrade until he is assured it will not increase jet noise.
Schultz said his group has had no luck persuading the FAA to limit aircraft activity at the airport. “Writing letters to the FAA in Washington is a waste of stationery,” he said.
