FAA Looks to Upgrade Tech, Staffing with Cash Infusion

There are plenty of changes going at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), with the nation’s airways under increasing scrutiny, especially following the fatal collision between an American Airlines jet and a military helicopter in January in Washington, DC.   

The agency has a new confirmed administrator, Bryan Bedford, former CEO of Republic Airways, and it’s also implementing some of the billions it received under the “Big Beautiful Bill” which was signed into law by President Trump in July.

Included in the bill was $12.5 billion to modernize the nation’s air traffic control (ATC) system. That includes nearly $5 billion for telecommunications infrastructure, $3 billion for radar replacements, as well as money for air traffic control towers, runway safety technology, training technologies, and more. 

Aviation experts are hopeful this large funding increase will help fix prior issues in overhauling ATC technology, which had been going on for two decades under piecemeal appropriations from Congress. 

Staffing Distribution

Another challenge is staffing. Federal Aviation Administration Managers Association (FAAMA) Executive Director Ron Eritano told Federal News Network that he plans on working closely with Administrator Bedford and Congress to address staff concerns.

“Staffing has always been a big need for us. We’re comprised of about 1,500 managers and supervisors within the FAA, a non-bargaining unit, and I can tell you this, we’ve always struggled with having enough to meet our numbers predominantly because you don’t become a manager until you’re older in life and there’s a mandatory retirement requirement of 56, age 56. So we’ve had some challenges and so we’re grateful to see that Mr. Bedford and others are focusing on how do we address the staffing concerns,” said FAAMA’s Eritano. 

The funding comes on the heels of a report that found that the staffing levels at air traffic control facilities are unevenly distributed.

The report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine says that 30 percent of FAA facilities are overstaffed, and that the FAA could better serve the flying public by transferring some of those personnel to understaffed facilities. 

But the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) disputed that, saying the FAA’s staffing model is broken and more controllers need to be hired. 

Aviation Safety Workforce Plan

The FAA also released its Aviation Safety Workforce Plan, which outlines ways to ensure a robust workforce for aviation safety roles over the next decade. 

The plan calls for using analytics to forecast staffing needs. It also calls for using hiring incentives, advanced training, and engagement strategies to recruit and retain the specialized workforce.