This is a big day for the future of staffing in the FAA! Today NATCA announced a huge change in the way staffing is counted in each facility.
For a little bit of background information, the FAA Finance has been the one to fulfill the legal requirement to brief congress on the status of controller staffing. While still within the FAA, the finance department operates somewhat separately from Air Traffic. That means that while NATCA and the Agency have collaborated on staffing numbers, FAA finance basically just goes with whatever sliding scale number they want and furthermore, they have always counted trainees the same as CPCs. In fact, according to them and their current status briefing, the FAA is 103% staffed…
So, as a true testament to what can be done with collaboration and with the relationships NATCA has built within the FAA and with the rest of the aviation industry, FAA finance has been taken out of the equation when it comes to staffing numbers at the facilities. The most monumental change will be that we are no longer going to be counting trainees towards the number of CPCs in the building.
What comes next: Don and I will be given a survey to fill out shortly and send back to the Collaborative Resource Work Group (CRWG). This will include questions about how the floor will normally be staffed on the 37th busiest (90th percentile) traffic count day of the year (2019). That is why it is beneficial to continue opening sectors and not push back against utilizing the people that are here. If we send the message that we can do more with less, they will believe us. This survey is required to be done by January 31st, 2023 and the numbers will be re-evaluated every year until 2032.
If you did not get the email from National and would like some more details, let me know and I can forward it to you.
Amy