South Jersey meeting lets FAA workers express furlough exasperation

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, N.J. - At the end of their first week back after being abruptly furloughed during a federal budget stalemate, about 640 Federal Aviation Administration employees working on a critical national project got an opportunity Friday to express their angst about their two-week layoff to top officials.

Behind doors closed to reporters at the William J. Hughes FAA Technical Center, the town-hall-style forum, led by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, let the workers ask about back pay and whether they could end up in the unemployment line again when a short-term budget extension approved by the Senate last week expires Sept. 16.

The employees - mostly engineers, scientists, and support staff working on an overhaul of the nation's air traffic control system - were among about 4,000 "nonessential" FAA employees furloughed July 23 when Congress failed to extend the FAA's operating authority.

The stoppage delayed research and implementation of the Next Generation Air Traffic Control System, the nucleus of the work being conducted here, said Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R., N.J.), who also attended the meeting.

FAA workers at the center "didn't ask for this. . . . They didn't do anything to bring this on. They are doing important research that is not being done anywhere else in the country," LoBiondo said.

Two weeks ago, the Senate agreed on the short-term extension and President Obama signed the measure, which ended the furlough and restarted dozens of airport construction projects. The stalemate had also put tens of thousands of building-trades workers out of a job.

Transportation officials and some legislators have vowed, when the Senate returns to session next month, to push for back pay for the furloughed federal workers.

LaHood said he used the forum Friday to assure the FAA employees here of their value to the agency.

"I'm here today because I want our people to know they have three champions who understand the importance of making sure the FAA is fully funded, not in the short term but in the long term. We don't want this to ever happen again," LaHood told reporters, referring to himself, LoBiondo, and FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt, who accompanied him.

LaHood spoke at a training hangar after his meeting with the employees. He said he was pushing for a bill that would extend the FAA's operating authority for five or six years.

The FAA has been operating under its 21st short-term extension, Babbitt said, after its last long-term authority agreement ended in 2007.

Babbitt said the shutdown cost the FAA $400 million in lost airline-ticket tax revenue. The government may have to pay about $8 million if back pay is extended to furloughed FAA workers, he said.

LoBiondo said this week that he had introduced a bill that would provide back pay and benefits for the FAA workers, but that he could not include contractors and construction workers.

Bob Challender, president of American Federation of Government Employees Local 200, who represents about 360 employees at the tech center, said the rank and file seemed most concerned about unemployment. He said they also were worried about being furloughed a second time, again without much advance notice.

"They are very concerned about it," Challender said, "and without a long-term authority agreement in place, rightfully so."