NO to Staff Cuts and Privatization of FAA and ATC

I urge you to block any attempt to further dismantle and/or privatize the FAA and Air Traffic Control. This Administration’s reckless disregard for consequences of their actions, especially in terms of firing key inspectors, controllers, etc. puts anyone flying at risk.   Therefore, we say NO to privatization, cuts or dismemberment of the current FAA and ATC systems. Instead, we urge you to add funds to the upcoming budget to close the gap in those areas of hiring and/or re-hiring that are needed to make safe the system.    If Musk and Trump carry out their plan, what is more likely to happen:   1.     The entire process would take years, and the hand-over of technology alone would be slow, negating any advantage that the Air Traffic Control unit might gain from implementing new technology. As someone that works in technology, I have seen first-hand how really difficult it would be with something as big as the U-S air industry. 2.     Spending billions in private industry modernization doesn’t guarantee results. What oversight would there be? The current plan has no details on how this public-private partnership will run, other than it will have a board of directors. 3.     Smaller airports and routes would become even less likely to get equal treatment, since economics would take over where investment goes when upgrading airports and safety equipment. 4.     How would any public-private partnership be funded evenly? This kind of arrangement makes the whole system vulnerable to peaks and valleys in the economy, and distorts every single airline pricing mechanism.   In short, while this might hold some possible efficiencies for technology upgrades at the Air Traffic Control level, I don’t trust that this particular administration will carry it out in the interests of anyone but big business, i.e. Space-X.   There must be some other way to carry out the upgrades and modernization needed to keep pace with other countries’ systems without having to privatize it. Isn’t that what the Secretary of Transportation is supposed to do?  Find ways to improve the system?