A 2007 study commissioned by TSA found that screening cost at SPP airports were 17% higher than at TSA screened airports. When using a broader base that included all 450 airports the cost were only a mere 9% higher.
The study also pointed out that TSA maintains redundant administrative staff and overhead at SPP airports and that those costs artificially inflate the estimated cost at SPP airports. (But not by much.)
Recommendations from the study recommended that TSA should:
Reduce its own administrative and general cost at SPP airports,
Use SPP at hard to hire airports or at airports with large seasonal requirements. (SFO does not meet either of these definitions.)
This report was not released but refer to GAO-09-27R
So, why is it that TSA doesn't want to federalize SFO?
-Howard Beale
A blog dedicated to the TSOs, LTSOs, and BDOs at San Francisco International Airport that work for Covenant Aviation Security, LLC (CAS).
It's the Airport making decision whether to use private contractor (like CAS) or Federal Gov't to do security screening in SFO, not TSA. San Francisco is an union town. Unions contribute millions of dollars to local politician to have strong influences on how city is ran. SFO being part of San Francisco, SEIU must have influenced the airport officials and lobbied congress/government to make SFO one of the SPP airports, so they can collect gazillions of dues and revenues from us.
ReplyDelete2) Do you really think Gomez &Co really want to get involved with HR, sked, staffing, and morale issues instead of sitting comfortably in their comfy and state of the art offices? Or pay some company like CAS to handle all that issues? And even if there are anything goes down, they can always point finger at CAS as a scapegoat and say "See, it's them who messed up, NOT us!!".
When was the last time you seen Ed Gomez and Co walking around checkpoints and BIRs to obersve operations and care for people's morale? I am sure they don't want to touch that at all!
You're right about the airport making the decision. But TSA has to sign off on it.
ReplyDeleteYou're point about the unions and San Francisco is well taken. Something we've never considered. It has been a puzzling thing as to why a private contractor is running security in an area that is virtually run by big union. Since TSA isn't yet unionized, it makes complete sense now that we think about your point.