Pinocchio Chronicles: Even Congress Doesn't Trust the FAA

Patch readers know that Carlsbad and Vista residents have tried to motivate San Diego County to operate McClellan-Palomar Airport (Palomar) in Carlsbad responsibly.

Unfortunately, a community group (Citizens for a Friendly Airport) had to sue the county between 2019 and 2021 to reverse the county plan to convert Palomar from an FAA-rated B-II airport to a larger D-III airport. C4fa won.

Yet behind closed doors the FAA and county since 2021 have continued drafting a Palomar Airport Layout Plan that gives an ultimate Palomar classification as a D-III airport. (See Bender March 24, 2024 article: Pinocchio Chronicles: FAA-County Palomar Backflip.)

The FAA continues to ignore the public and the city of Carlsbad, which in 2018 - 2019 adopted Council resolutions formally opposing converting Palomar to a D-III airport. The FAA wants what it wants. It routinely ignores the public, court decisions, Congress, and even common sense safety concerns. Need proof?

Here is what the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee said in 2020:

“FAA senior managers have not been held accountable for failure to develop and deliver adequate training in flight standards, despite repeated findings of deficiencies over several decades.

The FAA continues to retaliate against whistleblowers instead of welcoming their disclosures in the interest of safety. The Department of Transportation Office of General Counsel (DOT OGC) failed to produce relevant documents requested by Chairman Wicker as required by Article I, Section I of the Constitution.

The FAA repeatedly permitted Southwest Airlines to continue operating dozens of aircraft in an unknown airworthiness condition for several years. These flights put millions of passengers at risk.

During 737 MAX recertification testing, Boeing inappropriately influenced FAA human factor simulator testing of pilot reaction times involving a Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) failure.

FAA senior leaders may have obstructed a DOT OIG review of the 737 MAX crashes.”

[See Senate Commerce Committee Press Release at “Wicker Releases Committee’s FAA Investigation Report .”(https://www.commerce.senate.gov/2020/12/wickerreleases-committee-s-faa-investigation-report) .

The federal bureaucracy, the FAA in particular, is out of control. And it doesn’t look like even Congress can control it. Even replacing the FAA Administrator multiple times since 2015 hasn’t worked.

What might work is a law saying that each time Congress finds the FAA Administrator has failed to cooperate with Congress, the FAA Administrator’s salary (roughly $220,000) is cut by 10%.