FAA Plans Air Security Crackdown

The Bush administration, acknowledging that security at U.S. airports remains deficient, Tuesday announced a “zero-tolerance” policy requiring agents to enforce rules that could halt airplane boarding and delay flights if violations are found.

Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta also instructed Federal Aviation Administration agents to shut down security checkpoints, if necessary, to correct any breaches they may discover in the screening of passengers and baggage.

“Someone may undergo strict screening in Kansas City, while someone else can slip a pistol by screeners in New Orleans,” Mineta said. “This is intolerable. . . . The result is a growing lack of confidence and increasing criticism of the actions taken by the FAA.”

His comments at a meeting of state and local transportation officials came as the FAA said it will ban private planes from flying over nuclear power plants and research reactors around the country.

On Capitol Hill, meanwhile, lobbying intensified over a new airport security bill as President Bush urged House members to oppose Senate-approved legislation that would require screeners at major airports to be federal employees.

The debate has turned the usual political alliances in Washington upside down. Several prominent Republicans support making the screeners federal employees, while some labor unions say private companies should continue to do the job, albeit under stricter supervision.

The FAA has more than 800 security agents, who are supposed to make sure airlines and airports comply with federal requirements. Whistle-blower agents have complained that enforcement is often weak, and that the agency tends to yield to airline demands that security not interfere with keeping flights on schedule.

However, industry officials said Tuesday they support Mineta’s order. “He’s saying that he intends to be diligent in his approach to compliance,” said Dick Doubrava, managing director of security for the Air Transport Assn. “We support that. We are at war now.”

The order deals with enforcement of rules already in place and does not encompass reforms being debated in Congress. FAA agents have previously had the authority to halt boarding or delay flights if needed but have rarely used it. Instead, they have opted to resolve violations by discussing them in a cooperative spirit with the airlines and, when that failed, by imposing fines.

Mineta spokesman Chet Lunner said FAA security agents will now “shut it down instead of writing a ticket” if they spot violations.

The effect on travelers depends on how aggressively security agents enforce the new rule, but the change could mean further delays and longer lines as the busy holiday travel season approaches.

Since the September attacks, security problems and lapses on planes and at airports across the country have alarmed passengers and authorities alike.

Last week, a man carried a loaded gun through security checkpoints at the New Orleans airport and boarded a flight to Phoenix, authorities said. The man said he did not realize he had the derringer in his briefcase and turned it over to a flight attendant. He was not charged because authorities said he had no intent to commit a crime, but an employee of the firm that provides security at the New Orleans airport was suspended.

This month, federal prosecutors alleged that the nation’s largest airport security company has continued to hire people with criminal records to screen passengers, despite a $1.2-million fine last year for failing to check employees’ backgrounds. The company, Argenbright Holdings Ltd. of Atlanta, employs 6,000 checkpoint personnel and screened 650 million people last year.

Authorities allege that Argenbright violated federal regulations on background checks at 13 major airports, including Los Angeles International, prosecutors said. The company has challenged prosecutors’ allegations and says it will contest inaccuracies in the findings.

At Oakland International Airport, spot checks in September found private guards asleep or missing from their posts in more than 30 instances. The airport brought in sheriff’s deputies to help increase security.

And critics contend that safety improvements recommended by a presidential commission that could have prevented the Sept. 11 attacks were slowed and weakened by federal bureaucracy and airline lobbying, a Times review found this month.

The White House Commission on Aviation Safety and Security, created in the wake of the 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800, recommended 31 steps to strengthen security at the nation’s airports--including stricter scrutiny of mail parcels and the use of computerized systems to detect potential terrorists.

Since Sept. 11, the FAA has imposed dozens of new security measures intended to disrupt any attempts to get weapons or bombs aboard commercial aircraft. The added security has led to long lines at many airports. But many travelers say the thoroughness of screening varies greatly from airport to airport.

Mineta said he wants to end the inconsistencies. “We must make sure the implementation of current security measures is done in an effective and consistent manner,” he said. “When we find ineffective or inadequate implementation of security measures, we must crack down.”

Even as Mineta spoke, a small group of House members came under increasing pressure--from the White House, party leaders and lobbyists--over whether the job of screening airport passengers and baggage should be turned over to federal workers.

Raising the pressure, Bush met with about a dozen House Republicans--whose votes are expected to be decisive--to push for a bill sponsored by the House GOP leaders. It would retain private security companies to do the screening, but raise standards and bring them under greater federal oversight. The vote is expected to be close when the House decides the issue Thursday.

“The president doesn’t think the solution to every problem in America is to put everybody on the federal payroll,” said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer. The administration is worried that if the screeners become federal workers, it will be difficult to discipline or fire anyone who isn’t properly doing their job.

Rep. James L. Oberstar (D-Minn.) said GOP lawmakers have been so heavily lobbied by their party leaders and private security firms fighting to hold on to their airport screening contracts that “arms have been twisted out of their sockets.”

People “want to see the badge of the United States on the person performing the screening,” said Oberstar, who believes federal security officers should do the job. “You wouldn’t contract out the Customs service, the immigration service, the Marines. . . . We aren’t asking Hessians to do our fighting overseas.”

Los Angeles Mayor James K. Hahn said he was glad to hear Mineta say security lapses at U.S. airports are unacceptable, but renewed his call for the House to pass the bill federalizing security screeners.

“We need to upgrade the quality and the training of the people who are responsible for that screening. People want to see the badge of authority of the federal government,” he said.

Just “as we wouldn’t privatize customs, we wouldn’t privatize the Border Patrol, I think we really have left ourselves vulnerable by having the airlines contract with the lowest bidder” for security.

Hahn, chairman of a task force on aviation safety established by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, said he believes all domestic checked baggage needs to be screened for explosives.

“We need to stand up to the airline industry and say: ‘You need to go along with the program. We need to have all domestic bags screened. We need to federalize the screeners.’ ”

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Times staff writer Jeffrey L. Rabin contributed to this report.