Did you know that airports are not required to have TSA screeners checking passengers at security check points?
Rep. John Mica, who is the original author of the 2001 TSA bill has written over 150 airports nationwide telling them they should opt out of TSA screening in favor of private screeners.
"When the TSA was established, it was never envisioned that it would become a huge, unwieldy bureaucracy which was soon to grow to 67,000 employees. As TSA has grown larger, more impersonal, and administratively top-heavy, I believe it is important that airports across the country consider utilizing the opt-out provision provided by law," wrote Mica.
Mica feels that TSA is relying more on passenger humiliation and calls the added security measures "A big Kabuki dance."
Along with the employees that man the body-scanners and pat-downs they also have about 3,000 behavior detection officers across the country trained in a program called SPOT, Screening of Passengers by Observation, which has seen great success by the Israeli airline El Al.
Since the program began though, 17 known terrorists have flown passing through TSA security at SPOT airports, "but it is not the SPOT program that was faulty, says Mica, "it was the TSA that implemented a screwed-up model."
"It should actually be the person who's looking at the ticket and talking to the individual, instead, they've hired people to stand around and observe, which is a bastardization of what should be done," said Mica.
Currently there are 17 airports that have opted out and Montana's Glacier Park International Airport is hoping to become the 18th one.
GPI sees about 200,000 passengers annually and they were receiving a lot of complaints in 2007, and when TSA notified them they were going to reduce their screening staff in half, they knew complaints would grow, and decided to apply for the Screening Partnership Program (SPP) that would allow them to have private screeners do the security.
"People were commenting how rude the TSA employees were on a regular basis," Cindy Martin, the airport director for GPI told Airport Improvement Magazine. Though the airport's federal security director worked hard to address the problems but his hands were tied because federal employees are protected in so many ways."
Kansas City International Airport (KCI) was one of five original airports that are in the SPP pilot program established by the Aviation and Transportation Security of 2001 and have only used a private screener. The company in that the KCI uses is called, FirstLine, a private security company in Cleveland.
According to director of aviation Mark Van Loh the program works well because private screeners are able to move personnel around within a moment's notice.
Van Loh says "every once in a while you get an employee who's probably in the wrong line of work, With a private company, if something happens, say a weapon gets through, that employee is gone the next day. If you don't perform, you're out. It isn't' a job for life, as federal jobs sometimes seem to be."
FirstLine vice president of business development, Gary Smedile says, "By utilizing the SPP, you localize recruitment and training of screeners. Private companies also seem to have better business practices, testing processes and monitoring of their employees."
And what about liability? Section 44920 of Title 49, USC, states "an operator of an airport shall not be liable for any claims for damages filed in state or federal court (including a claim for compensatory, punitive, contributory or indemnity damages)," whether the screeners are federal or private.
The question is, now that airports know they can "ask" TSA to leave and bring in a private company to do the security, will they?
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