Getting toasted…
Posted by Paul Cox on December 22nd, 2009
Just in case you’re one of the few folks who is interested in FAA issues and hasn’t heard of this… be sure to watch ABC news tonight. They’re running a story on the ATO’s big manager pow-wow in Atlanta.
FWIW, every single supervisor that I’ve talked with at ZSE has said the Atlanta meeting was a huge waste of time and money. Many of them also thought the St Louis conferences were a big waste of time and money.
A couple of links to the story:
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/conversation-diane-sawyer-brian-ross/story?id=9402832
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/party-time-faa-critics-question-million-gathering/story?id=9390933&page=1
So there ya go. Tune in tonight!
December 22nd, 2009 at 3:51 pm
LMAO! Krakowski was totally caught off guard! Good for ABC, the FAA has no excuse to waste that kind of money when the flems could have learned all they need to know through CBIs.
December 22nd, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Wow! Great Article. Let the FIREWORKS begin as the FAA attempts to wiggle out of this one.
December 22nd, 2009 at 5:37 pm
It looked like they were enjoying themselves on the money they stole from my kids.
December 22nd, 2009 at 5:46 pm
That there was hilarious. And sad at the same time.
December 22nd, 2009 at 5:58 pm
Ok, so who was the guy that was looking for hookers (and willing to ‘reach for his wallet’)???? These are the kind of people in charge of facilities?? Gime me a big F’in Break.
December 22nd, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Anyone notice how fast Hank ditched the glass of wine?
This would be a great FOIA request to see what the real bill was for the hotel and if the FAA was buying the leeches drinks on the taxpayers hard earned money.
After all, “transparency” is one of the new buzzwords in the FAA.
Let’s see how well they use “transparency” and “integrity” in context on this.
Grump (ret.)
December 22nd, 2009 at 6:12 pm
Geez…They get off work and go to the bar. Damn, sounds like another group I heard about. Also covers 90% of people on business trips. Please don’t say “the gov’t paid for the drinks”, since we all use our travel money on food…RIGHT?
December 22nd, 2009 at 8:16 pm
I think everyone should contact their congressman or congresswoman and ask if someone is going to be held accountable.
December 22nd, 2009 at 8:39 pm
Nice party,you take off their ties and look at what happens. I guess you can’t blame them for getting drunk though, it would be the only way I could survive the week.
December 22nd, 2009 at 8:43 pm
Rangemark,
NATCA does not give travellers a flat rate. We have to submit receipts when we travel. There is no flat rate of $81 day. There are also rules on alcoholic beverages. The rest is paid for out of pocket. Also, just a point, no “Average Joe’s” taxpayer money is spent at a NATCA function. The expenses are paid by “Dues Paying Members”. If a member doesn’t like how their dues are paid, they can step up to make a change, or quit. You can’t quit paying your taxes, and the FAA will have another 3 week party in 3 years, unless they ask to, and NATCA agrees to extend the contract.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:05 pm
justacontroller
THEY WERE OFF WORK!!!!! The FAA did not buy the booze. The hotel hosted the food and booze. If they go to a bar after the day and buy drinks it comes from their own pocket not the tax payers. I have never seen a travel voucher that allowed me to claim my bar bill.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:32 pm
Rangermark you can’t see the forest for the trees. I couldn’t care less what they do during their off time, but they should not have been there in the first place! Every bit of this “contract training” could have been accomplished through TELCONS or CBIs. Just like almost all operational controller training is. For an agency that is supposedly broke how can they justify an expenditure of $5 million?
The secondary issue is the public behavior of some of the drunks there. The FAA employee’s guide conduct clearly explains what is and is not tolerated. Soliciting prostitutes and bragging “it’s better than work” while at public gathering of FAA managers is not acceptable.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:49 pm
Who cares who bought the booze… or the food, or the hotel. What matters here was the impression! ABC is gonna make serious hay of this one, I’m thinking, since they got a new anchor to make look really good with “hard-hitting journalism”. In a media situation, reality doesn’t matter, impressions do, and we just had a bad one.
To give the guy props, I honestly thought that Krakowski handled the ambush about as well as could be expected. He wasn’t falling-down drunk, and he talked to the guy somewhat intelligently, even if his positions weren’t really very defensible. Could have been worse, For example – the poor schlub who said “Cause I was gonna reach for my wallet”? His career? All over but the retirement paperwork.
Still… as I thought several months ago, the decision-making appears to have been poor here. The new contract briefing COULD have been handled on a regional level (or by telecon), right? … but that’s not how We Do Things. It seems that St Louis begat Atlanta, and so it goes. Rightly or wrongly, it’s another olive branch that wound up being whittled into a stake and shoved into the heart of the management-labor relationship.
Of course, now I understand why I got an email from the DOT about morale this afternoon. I’m guessing it’s not a coincidence.
Watching the reaction to this from the Adminstrator’s office, from the DOT, from the White House… that will be the real interesting part. I’m really hoping they don’t knee-jerk and put out some stupid restriction on travel… they need to understand what really happened here and why.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:56 pm
If any of you reading this are wondering whether anything will be done to the FAA Official who made the crude comment to an undercover female reporter, I’ll give you the short answer: No. An FAA manager can pretty much do and say what they want and figure nothing will be done about it. If a supervisor at Denver Center can have sex on duty, in the workplace, with a subordinate and nothing, or next to nothing is done about it, asking a woman if she’d trade sex for money at a party won’t even raise an eyebrow. Now, if a controller said that and a manager found out about it, the answer might be totally different.
December 22nd, 2009 at 10:04 pm
True, they were off work, but who do you suppose paid for the parties? The hotel manager? The desk clerk? Maybe the housekeepers all chipped in? In actuality, the FAA paid for them via the room rates. Obviously, the parties were a kickback for holding the conference there.
And another thing. How did they figure this only cost $5 million? I did some figuring, and assuming 3600 people for 5 days each, it comes to much more.
$81 per diem per person x 3600 ($1,458,000)
$145 hotel rooms ($2,610,000)
$250 airline tickets (probably a low estimate) ( $900,000)
And most important – their regular pay! Think of the loss of their “productivity” (try not to laugh). If you figure the average pay of the attendees was $60 per hour (this estimate is probably WAY low!) for 40 hours, it cost an additional $8,640,000. And this is to say nothing about travel time, or any overtime that was needed to cover their shifts back home. Add it all together, and my rough estimate comes to $13,608,000!!
Oh, and there is the small matter of the cost of putting on the actual training in the first place…
December 22nd, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Accountant, I’m sure most of these were refundable government fares at $1k a pop, so your estimate is probably low. Somebody should FOIA the total cost of this boondoggle.
December 22nd, 2009 at 10:23 pm
I read this someplace else and this is what matters. Back when I became a controller, things where different, the in 2006, the FAA took a big turn and I have seen people get time on the street for braking the FAA’s Employee Standards of Conduct, so If these had been controllers at an FAA function for training, do you think they would not be held accountable?
The FAA’s Employee Standards of Conduct.“It is also expected that employees will maintain professionaldecorum at all times while in a temporary duty travel status or otherwiseaway from their regularly assigned post of duty, such as telecommuting,whether at home or at a telecommuting site, or attending training.
“Those employees in direct contact with the public bear a heavy responsibility astheir conduct and professionalism significantly impacts the image of thefederal service and the FAA.”
“ Employees are also expected to conduct themselves off duty in a mannerwhich will not adversely reflect on the agency’s ability to carry out itsmission, cause embarrassment to the agency by the employee’s activityor behave in a manner that will cause the public and/or managers toquestion their reliability, judgment and trustworthiness in carrying outtheir responsibilities as employees of the federal government.”
“All employees whose duties involve the expenditure of public fundsmust have knowledge of and observe all applicable legal requirementsand restrictions. In addition, employees are expected to be prudent andexercise sound judgment in the expenditure of such funds.”
December 22nd, 2009 at 11:33 pm
Looks like it’s going to be power point training and sheetcake next time around for them.
BTW, what’s the over/under on Krakowski’s FAA career measured in days?
December 23rd, 2009 at 12:17 am
rangemark.
You do not get it. TRAVEL, HOTEL, and EXPENSES, to a NATCA function is not paid for by TAX DOLLARS!!! All costs incurred are payed by NATCA national, the local, or out of pocket.
You got $81 dollars a day of MY tax money.
I understand that there was a Wendys nearby. $2.99 value meal, $78 of taxpayer money for booze.
Just saying.
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:22 am
I liked the dancing best….them managers can really shake a leg.
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:36 am
The Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqAaqkVf2HA
I still want the name of the guy who is reaching for his wallet. What facility, and what is his name, cause we want to throw him a welcome home party.
I am thinking …banner tow….
And the guy who says “well, what are you gonna do?”
And especially the woman who shooed off the reporter. “Why don’t ya’ll leave?” Who is that lady?
Names please.
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:50 am
Hey Congress…these are the people that are selling you NEXTGEN!
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:57 am
I just checked the “City Pairs” website-
Average airfare from major cites is about $250 EACH WAY, plus taxes.
But from a LOT of cities, it’s over $600 EACH WAY, plus taxes.
My guess is that it’s a bit higher than $5 million, just for travel and per diem.
Here’s the city pairs link:
http://apps.fas.gsa.gov/citypairs/search/index.cfm?departing_from1=ATL&departing_from=&arriving_to1=&arriving_to=&search2010.x=Search+FY10
Most of these guys earn well north of 100K- many of them, if not the majority, over 150K.
And don’t forget, the way Marion always calculated it, salary was just a part of PC&Bs. You also got the insurance, the taxes, etc in personnel costs- so those 150K supervisors really make over 200K a year.
So I would put, as a good guess, someone around $12 to $14 million in salaries, and at least $6 million to $7 million in actual travel, per diem, and hotel.
No wonder the hotel threw a big bash for them, three times. The hotel alone racked in over 2.5 million just from this group.
Party time.
December 23rd, 2009 at 5:15 am
The piece that ABC aired didn’t show Krank saying “I don’t have that figure”, when Ross asked him what all of this cost. How can Krank on one hand defend the expenditure of taxpayer dollars as necessary (obvious bologna), but then not know how much was being spent ? Doesn’t COO stand for chief operating officer ?
December 23rd, 2009 at 6:20 am
Hey taxpayers….reach for your wallet.
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:14 am
Over the last few years FAA has been promoting less-than-30 year-olds to supervisor positions in air traffic facilities at 150K+ a year. Little to no experience at the actual job they supervise is required. Any Caveman could do it. They do nothing more than shuffle papers, answer phones and surf the internet while at work. The FAA is a rogue agency that is never held accountable, this story is just a small example of FAA abuse of power as well as the total lack of professionalism we see displayed on a daily basis by management at air traffic facilities across the country.
As the story at ABC mentions, there were 3600 (1200×3) management attendees. There are about 14-15,000 air traffic controllers in the field today. That is a 1-4 management to controller ratio. Total waste of funds, as often the job of the supervisor at facilities is done by a controller anyway (called a controller in charge/CIC). I believe the ratio at one time (before Bush/”W”) was close to 1-10, but today hiring for management/supervisor positions is in full swing.
FAA has needed to do some closet-cleaning for a long long time. Maybe this story will help them find their broom.
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:21 am
I hope that the boys knew enough not to charge for dinner that night…..funny….Al Capone killed at least 1000 people and never got caught. He was nailed on income tax evasion …..so the boys all had dinner on the hotel and should deduct the expense for dinner from the per-diem for the day.
I know it’s a small point but the government moves on small points…..like being slightly pregnant!!!!!!!!!
Oh Hank…by the way you looked guilty of something while being interviewed by ABC!!!!!!
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:08 am
Its probably a good thing ABC News never came to a NATCA training function. I can remember being escorted out of West Virginia by the State Police….
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:36 am
The guy making the wallet comment is actually a retired Supervisor and has been for a number of years. He doesn’t work for the FAA in any capacity anymore.Why he was at the meeting I don’t know. He lives in Georgia so I suspect he was visiting to see old friends. Just a guess.Doesn’t really matter the damage is done.
December 23rd, 2009 at 11:45 am
Was Hank was “comped” the Governors suite at 140 per diem?
Did he pay taxes on the real value of his hotel stay?
Hypocrites.
What are the parameters for gifts to government employees. Do these rogue Government managers have any ethical safeguards to keep them from selling out to private companies.
Why is it so easy to obviously buy favors from Government employees who make high dollar business decisions with tax payer money.
The real story is in all the free compensation these officials get to throw government contracts to cronies and prospective outside career interests
December 23rd, 2009 at 12:13 pm
When you do these cost accounting you leacve out another huge bill…….the cost to their home facility to send them away. At our mid level facility we spent at least 15 days of overtime to cover the holes in the schedule left by removing a flm to go to this dancefest. In addition many shifts were staffed by a CIC (Xtra 10% differential) when the partying Sup was absent so you could probably add a few extra milll to the cast for these expenses.
December 23rd, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Don Brown over at “Get The Flick” had an idea about how it could be worse. “It could be worse guys. John Carr could still be writing The Main Bang. Can you imagine what he would do with this story ?”.What a “Christmas Cheer” that would be! Merry Christmas Everybody!
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:41 pm
A couple of points that were left out:
1. THE most important part of the week was that the Secretary and the Administrator had a message that they wanted everyone to hear: things are changed in the FAA. Effective labor-management relationships are expected. The contract are words on a page, but the tenor of the FAA is a much different thing. To hear Rick Day, Walt Cochran, Steve Osterdahl, and Rick Ducharme say that this is a new era was critical, but what was equally important was the way they said it. There was no “Well we have a new president, and he told us he have to get along.” The group spoke numerous times on effective leadership within a different framework (working through collaboration) instead of one that was adversarial. If NATCA had an adversarial relationship with the management tean in your facility under the white book, it is imperative that team hear it from the Administrator all the way to the Directors of Operations that things have changed, and that the managers are expected to follow along.
2. I think it is unreasonable for people to get on this page and speculate that people are evading taxes, or engaging in a conflict of interest, or abusing their powers, simply because hors doeuvres were supplies by the hotel once each week for a reception for all to meet the senior leadership of the agency and discuss issues one-on-one. If there was any alcohol, it was purchased by the individual. I’d be willing to bet that NATCA has a similar reception at their national get togethers.
In all, I think the training was good for the managers as well as good for NATCA. It sent a clear message that managers are expected to collaborate with labor and put forth the effort necessary to try to seek mutually beneficial solutions to issues.
December 23rd, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Hank is not doing the right thing even though nobody is watching, even accepting a governor’s suite is fraud, plain and simple. Think he will show the “Free” room as compensation? I bet not.
No amount of banter will prove to the flying public and the tax payers that you NEED to talk face to face with peon level “managers” about a contract that is already in place. A simple power point and good briefing at the local level is how we do MAJOR changes that affect safety. A simple change in how we do business and a discussion of TWELVE of the 100 plus articles is senseless.
To put it bluntly if you need to see each and every manager face to face to go over a few items and take THREE FULL DAYS and millions of dollars in the process then we need to change the way we do business.
From what we saw at the “cash bar”, the drinks where provided for free at the “Free buffet”, one patron ordered a drink and got one and DID NOT EVEN LEAVE A TIP. Bottom line is part of that $81 per diem ended up spent on drinks in some bars. PERIOD. Another thing the free buffet was not free it was a perk that we ended up paying for one way or another, there are no free lunches. We most certainly did NOT need to spend $140 a night for lodging. You bring 3600 useless “managers” to a hotel at $140 a night Time 4 nights and they throw you a free buffet….really…..was that really free? They give you a free newspaper there too. No it is part of the cost INCLUDED with paying for the room. they say it is free, but if you asked to pay $1.00 less and not get the paper you, can’t you pay for the paper and the “Free” coffee in the room.
These are the people that are suppose to LEAD us into the future????
The Ahole asking about the hooker, He was not a current Supe, yes, he retired from ATL under speculation of guess what….Harassment, IMAGINE THAT. What is important about him? He was there as a Vendor for FAAMA, that jerk sell pins, t-shirt and mugs to moron supes in FAAMA. He paid for his trip on his own dime I am pretty sure, but he is a person dealing with other managers. THIS is the type of person FAAMA supports one way or another. If they continue to buy from this AHOLE then it proves me right, they won’t do the right thing. Our managers and any vendor in attendance represented us poorly. If a vendor comes to a party he needs to act accordingly or be escorted OUT. Oh that young deer in the headlights loser standing RIGHT next to him? A young pup Supe from ATL also. He took no effort to stop what he saw and let it go. THIS is what we have leading the FAA. He SHOULD have done the right thing and said, hey, that is not nice, ANYTHING except play along and laugh that the poor lady. Seriously, that is absolutely unacceptable.
Any “Manager” that comes here and explains this horrid example of your managers behaviors away is lying to themselves. This party was not needed and in poor taste the participants that did some of these things would be fired if they where in the private sector.
Remember a few short years ago we where so short on money we needed to freeze controller’s pay? Yet we can waste about $15 million in cost and compensation to have a meet and greet party to discuss 12 items from a contract that has been in effect for months. Those 12 items where almost identical to the green book articles so you are not talking about teaching people greek.
The case of teaching managers how to better to deal with controllers and NATCA. HOGWASH. Every supe that I have dealt with since the mind wash learned absolutely nothing from ATL and came back even stupider. The better part of a day was spent on how to keep these management numbers to these unprecedented levels by falsifying CRU-X and how to recruit even more idiots to the circus as if the 4-1 or 3-1 ratio was not crazy enough.
The FAA and its idiots management WILL get the President’s attention. He already stated don’t spend money frivolously and he already said he was looking for a more business like ratio for management to peon closer to 11 to 1 instead of the 5-1 ratio average in the rest of government. The FAA is thumbing their nose at him and I hope they get what is coming to them. The FAA has the worst ratio in the government right now, show me one that is worse.
December 23rd, 2009 at 6:52 pm
FAAGuy,
You’re saying that you need to be told by the faa administrator that “Effective labor-management relationships are expected”? Wouldn’t this be common sense to anybody who has the title of manager? It certainly isn’t to the guy who heads my area.
I can’t tell you how much satisfaction I got from seeing the ABC News report. Diminish it all you and the faa’s other pseudo leaders want but it speaks volumes.
Kevin Gilmore
zmp
area 5
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:00 pm
“You’re saying that you need to be told by the faa administrator that “Effective labor-management relationships are expected”? Wouldn’t this be common sense to anybody who has the title of manager? It certainly isn’t to the guy who heads my area.”
I think you sorta agree with me then.
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:03 pm
“A simple power point and good briefing at the local level is how we do MAJOR changes that affect safety.”
What if you changed 75% of the 7110.65? Do you think a PP and a good briefer would be all that was needed?
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:40 pm
“What if you changed 75% of the 7110.65? Do you think a PP and a good briefer would be all that was needed?”
No, but I expect it would be more than I would have received from the FAA! Probably would be placed in the R&I for me to read prior to working a position. If I were lucky the changes would be highlighted.
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:40 pm
FAAGuy,
Maybe I’m misinterpreting your words but I read them to say that the most important part of the week were the words form the administrator that I quoted above. I’m sorry but to me that is common sense at its core and there should be no need to spend millions to get that message out.
The contract is in large measure a return to the Green Book. Again, was the expense associated with the Atlanta briefings the most cost effective way to accomplish what was done there? I think not.
We have managers who are the best penny-pinchers around when it comes to calling in overtime but then they have no problem with these sort of boondoggles (ATL) or huge amounts of money being spent on pie-in-the-sky Nextgen fantasies.
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:07 pm
Rangemark Says,
“since we all use our travel money on food”. Rangemark,You just don’t get it do you? It’s not your money it is the taxpayers money. You were on the taxpayers dime 24/7 and the people you were with had a responsibility to represent the FAA according to the code of conduct or is it that the code doesn’t apply to management.
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:53 pm
Hey FAA Guy, I don’t trust and never will trust the DuCharmes, Days and any other jerk off that served the Koolaid in STL in 2006. Their words mean NOTHING to me.
For you to think that they are SOMEBODY just leads me to believe you are either one of them or dumber than a box of hammers. the sooner people like them are GONE the better off the FAA will be.
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:56 pm
I think that if ABC news showed up and stuck a camera in your face, unannounced, 98% of us would come across as blithering idiots, whether you are a controller or management. It’s just not something that we are accustomed to and I imagine it’s quite intimidating. If ABC news sent in a hidden camera (for who knows how many hours) to secretly record people’s conversations, that’s hitting completely below the belt.
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:57 pm
“I don’t trust and never will trust the DuCharmes, Days”
Have you ever worked with any of them? Do you know them on a personal basis?
December 23rd, 2009 at 9:35 pm
FAAGuy,
If you heard the tapes from St. Louis, or heard those guys in person, as I think you did, you don’t need to know them on a personal basis. If you already forgot what they said, then that explains it.
December 23rd, 2009 at 9:46 pm
Could FAAGuy’s head be any FURTHER up his own ass?
December 23rd, 2009 at 9:57 pm
FAAGuy,
You’re right, 98% of us would be blithering idiots if a camera was shoved in our face in that situation. But, what kind of idiot voluntarily walks up to the camera like the two women who tried to throw the camera crew out. They were priceless. FAA management at its finest. Turn off the camera because I said so.
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:19 pm
FAAGUY, in message #33, uses the code word “Collaboration”.
FAAGUY- that word is a hold-over from the previous Afministration, and is not acceptable. Forget it.
WHAT IS COLLABORATION?
The term ‘collaboration’ has a definite meaning which does not always imply common aims, voluntary cooperation or equal partnership.
Marshal Petain, Head of State of Vichy France, for example, is generally held to have been a Nazi collaborator because he assisted the Nazis to do their dirty work in France, although it is not suggested that he actually had the common aim of wanting to see the Germans rule France, or that he was an equal partner, or that his collaboration was not the involuntary result of France being defeated in the war.
The point is that while most French people either resisted or just went about their business and did what they had to, to survive, Petain and his associates actively collaborated with the enemy that had occupied France, and for that they stand condemned.
Another term, ‘Quisling’, is sometimes used, especially in Israeli literature about Jewish collaborators with Nazism, although it should properly be applied only to collaborators who had exactly the same aims as the enemy.
It is well known within the Jewish community, although less widely known outside, that there were many Jewish collaborators with the Nazis, just as there were collaborators among all other people subjected to the Nazi jackboot. These included members of the so-called ‘Judenrat’, or Jewish Councils in the ghettoes, almost all the Jewish Police in the ghettoes, and all the Jewish Gestapo agents and concentration camp trustees or ‘Kapos’.
The only dispute is a semantic one as to whether ‘collaborator’ is the appropriate term for people who were not actually Quislings, and who usually collaborated primarily in order to save their own necks. There is no real dispute that ‘collaborator’ is the proper term in many of these cases; and it can be applied to certain Jews who actively assisted the Nazis, even though they did not have the same aims as the Nazis and were in many cases exterminated along with the rest when their usefulness had ended.
The word collaborator and collaboration first appeared in FAA Management’s lexicon in 2002, after G. Wl Bush and his jack-booted thugs took power, and did away with Clinton’s executive order on partnership.
No FAAGUY- we will not become COLLABORATORS. Not now, not ever.
Not EVER.
You have no idea FAAGUY how deeply this runs.
It’s time YOU take it up to senior management- to change the word- if you ever expect to make anything different.
We will not ever take part in, or label ourselves with the same word used to describe those who supported Nazis.
If you don’t understand that- no shindig in Atlanta will make one iota of difference.
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:20 pm
FAAGUY, in message #33, uses the code word “Collaboration”.
FAAGUY- that word is a hold-over from the previous Administration, and is not acceptable. Forget it.
WHAT IS COLLABORATION?
The term ‘collaboration’ has a definite meaning which does not always imply common aims, voluntary cooperation or equal partnership.
Marshal Petain, Head of State of Vichy France, for example, is generally held to have been a Nazi collaborator because he assisted the Nazis to do their dirty work in France, although it is not suggested that he actually had the common aim of wanting to see the Germans rule France, or that he was an equal partner, or that his collaboration was not the involuntary result of France being defeated in the war.
The point is that while most French people either resisted or just went about their business and did what they had to, to survive, Petain and his associates actively collaborated with the enemy that had occupied France, and for that they stand condemned.
Another term, ‘Quisling’, is sometimes used, especially in Israeli literature about Jewish collaborators with Nazism, although it should properly be applied only to collaborators who had exactly the same aims as the enemy.
It is well known within the Jewish community, although less widely known outside, that there were many Jewish collaborators with the Nazis, just as there were collaborators among all other people subjected to the Nazi jackboot. These included members of the so-called ‘Judenrat’, or Jewish Councils in the ghettoes, almost all the Jewish Police in the ghettoes, and all the Jewish Gestapo agents and concentration camp trustees or ‘Kapos’.
The only dispute is a semantic one as to whether ‘collaborator’ is the appropriate term for people who were not actually Quislings, and who usually collaborated primarily in order to save their own necks. There is no real dispute that ‘collaborator’ is the proper term in many of these cases; and it can be applied to certain Jews who actively assisted the Nazis, even though they did not have the same aims as the Nazis and were in many cases exterminated along with the rest when their usefulness had ended.
The word collaborator and collaboration first appeared in FAA Management’s lexicon in 2002, after G. W. Bush and his jack-booted thugs took power, and did away with Clinton’s executive order on partnership.
No FAAGUY- we will not become COLLABORATORS. Not now, not ever.
Not EVER.
You have no idea FAAGUY how deeply this runs.
It’s time YOU take it up to senior management- to change the word- if you ever expect to make anything different.
We will not ever take part in, or label ourselves with the same word used to describe those who supported Nazis.
If you don’t understand that- no shindig in Atlanta will make one iota of difference.
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:23 pm
I think FAA guy is right when he said ” but the tenor of the FAA is a much different thing. To hear Rick Day, Walt Cochran, Steve Osterdahl, and Rick Ducharme say that this is a new era was critical, but what was equally important was the way they said it.” I mean after all didn’t you guys jump all over Bruce Johnsom when he made his infamous remark about sending people home if they weren’t in compliance with the dress code?” That is a perfect example of what FAAGUY is talking about. It’s not as much what is said it’s how it is said. How many of you would have rolled your eyes and think that Bruce Johnson was a big turd if he put that message out via e-mail, and then not thought that much about it. You would have blamed your managers. And I know there were copies of him saying what he said floating around.
I think it was justified to some extent for the meetings, but the FAA as usual F’d it all up.
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:30 pm
The real meaning of “Collaborator”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborationism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pursuit_of_Nazi_collaborators
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-German_cooperation_with_nazis_during_World_War_2
Forget it, FAAGUY. We’re not going there- ever. Period.
December 23rd, 2009 at 10:53 pm
So..if you are the FAA, how do you defend against this?
Watch this folks- because this is mastery in action.
Atlanta-
ABC NEWS-
the word “ hooker”,
wallets,
free buffets,
governor’s suites,
lots of booze,
“almost got arrested”.
“dancing on tables”
and MILLIONS of taxpayer dollars.
How do you defend it?
If you’re the FAA- you don’t even try.
You duck and hope someone higher up can provide cover.
You very quickly have a VERY high level PR flack issue a press release, but you DON”T put that press release in the same location you put all the rest of the real press releases. This is not a “safety wasn’t compromised” run of the mill denial.
Instead- you get the top notch PR flack within your power- to do the dirty work on a “whole different level.” You feed the denial/detraction/deflection selectively to your Press friends, and hope the whole thing blows over.
At least, that’s what it appears like, when you let former CNN Senior Political Reporter- now turned Department of Transportation PR FLACK very well connected Sasha Johnson write the press release: … See More
Sasha’s very-well placed press release:
http://www.onenewsnow.com/AP/Search/World/Default.aspx?id=826060
Sasha’s last job, before moving to Department of Transportation a few months ago?
Political senior producer at CNN-
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/05/05/sasha-johnson-leaving-cnn/
I say “well connected”, because her husband is…. deputy political director of NBC News:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/fashion/weddings/30sjohnson.html
That’s some heavy firepower right out of the gate, don’t ya think?
To counter ABC News’s report, you resort to this-
Get your former CNN Senior Political Director hired gun PR Flack- to use her influence in the media to tone it down…that’s right-
Get the NBC’s News’ political director’s wife on your payroll, to debunk ABC news?
Power deflection in action.
Sweet move, FAA.
Score.
December 23rd, 2009 at 11:52 pm
This whole road show is just a quick look at how dysfunctional the FAA has become. It is incidents like this that remind me why I retired and have been trying to move on with my life. Some of you readers just don’t get it yet, the f double a don’t give a rats ass about controllers, or anyone else for that matter. The best thing that could happen, is congress just wipe the whole agency away, put atc under military or even contract it out, at least in the real world, incompetent managers get fired.
Oh yea, faaguy, your logic and opinion suck!
December 24th, 2009 at 5:34 am
FAA Stooge, errrr Guy. You’re lying in the weeds like the rest of the FAAMA, waiting for another Republican WH, so you can go back to your Bush Blakey white book ways. IOW what feels good and right to you and your ilk.
Did I ever work with Douch-arm ? No, but I know he tried to get an area rep at my facility fired for doing his rep job. I work with controllers who worked with him at PHL. And none of us forgot Bruce Johnson’s famous dress code rant from St Louis.
Now listen carefully you boot licking stooge, I don’t trust you or anyone else in career FAA managemnt. Why ? Because you showed your true colors when given the chance. You teed off on the controller workforce when Snakey gave you the green light to do so. But now you want to play nice because the current administrator is ordering you to, not because you want to. We’re just supposed to forget the IWRs, the pay cuts and the rest ?
You come here and defend the indefensible, as usual. No go answer the phone, approve a controller SL bang out, and get back to your minesweeper. You overpaid, gravy training FAA mouthpiece.
December 24th, 2009 at 5:39 am
$81 per diem per person x 3600 ($1,458,000)
$145 hotel rooms ($2,610,000)
$250 airline tickets (probably a low estimate) ( $900,000)
BAD MATH———–If a 145.00 hotel room X 3600=2.61 million, then I would think the 250.00(try 500-1000 for refundable gov’t tickets) is more like 2.70 million.
I bet when all costs are added up…….airfare, per diem, hotel, CIC pay for all the controllers picking up supe duties, overtime,etc, this friggin boondoggle cost the US taxpayer over 10-20 million dollars.
We have all had the copy of the contract(that went into effect Oct 1) since late August. These bozo’s should have just drank koolaid and not alcohol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
December 24th, 2009 at 5:52 am
“I don’t trust you or anyone else in career FAA managemnt.”
I guess that’s the difference between you and I. We can have political or professional differences of opinion, but it has no bearing on whether I think you’re trustworthy. In my opinion, the determination on whether someone is trustworthy only comes through a personal or professional relationship.
December 24th, 2009 at 6:29 am
“I guess that’s the difference between you and I. We can have political or professional differences of opinion, but it has no bearing on whether I think you’re trustworthy. In my opinion, the determination on whether someone is trustworthy only comes through a personal or professional relationship.”
LOL, sounds like some cue card from Palm Coast you’re reading off of. Typical delusional FAA management speak. We have a new set of marching orders, so lets just forget the last five years. Like I said, you’ll lie in the weeds, waiting for the next Republican WH. And then, you’ll employ the exact same “rationale” you’re using here, to justify more controller pay cuts (but not for you of course) and imposed work rules. I’ll be retired fortunately, but living off of a reduced pension thanks to your pals Bush and Blakey and their base pay cuts from January 2007 to January 2009.
December 24th, 2009 at 6:52 am
We forgot to thank the WHISTLEBLOWER!!…that reported this boondoggle to ABC.
GOOD JOB FRIEND HARASSED AND FIRED FAA PERSONNEL THANK YOU FOR EXPOSING THE JOKE THAT IS CALLED FAA MANAGEMENT.
December 24th, 2009 at 8:14 am
Dear Nicejobmanagers,
Don’t forget, the “managers” stayed more than one night. I arrived at the 2.6 million for hotel by multiplying $145 x 3600 for 5 days. And I picked $250 for flight costs and $60 per hour salary to be ultra conservative in my estimates. I agree this entire boondoggle had to have cost at least $15 million.
FAA Guy,
You usually make at least a little bit of sense in your posts, but you are losing credibility fast. I didn’t have to meet and get to know that guy Hasan who shot the soldiers at Ft Hood, but I’ll bet he’s an a**hole too. And I’ve known of Douche & Day and their MO long enough to believe that I am qualified to make a judgment on them. The gall of them making the presentation, and pretending to be sincere sickens me. It reminds me of a husband who beats his wife – “I’m really sorry honey, things are really gonna change this time”.
And one more thing. If the most important reason for the meetings was to see and hear the big shots themselves tell you how things are going to change, couldn’t that have been done over a webcast? It seems to be what webcasts were made for. To see and hear people speaking in their own words.
December 24th, 2009 at 8:32 am
Hey FAA Guy, You need to get checked for an overdose of Kool aid. You sir have been brain washed beyond repair. I work with several of your kind at SCT. The nice thing ,for now anyway,is they are keeping their pie holes shut. Deep down inside they cannot wait for a Republican WH so they can once again put their boots on the necks of the controllers.
DuCharme, Day and Johnson are the biggest pieces of **** out there. It is too bad people like you don’t hold them accountable like I do !
December 24th, 2009 at 9:03 am
any one want a good laugh it looks like Bruce “DICK” Johnson is gonna retire in jan and the FFA has a real funny article about what a great controller he is and how he loved being a controller on the FFA site.after reading it man this guy is my friggen hero now. HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA typical management idiot.
December 24th, 2009 at 9:34 am
The ATO operating budget is flush with cash, to include the dollars stolen from controller’s pay checks the last three years. Plenty of money for a feel good training conference/X-mas time party in Atlanta. And all completely necessary to hear Hank and FAA Guy tell it. And I’m not sure who’s morale needs lifting. Certainly not that happy bunch we saw in Atlanta.
December 24th, 2009 at 9:45 am
Another of the FAA’s veteran senior officials, Bruce Johnson, is retiring from the agency in January. Johnson has served in a number of roles, including the Air Traffic Organization’s vice president for terminal operations. He is currently the ATO’s VP for mission support integration. Here is an interview with Johnson from an FAA website – a really well-done piece that gives a great insight into Johnson’s distinguished career as a controller and then one of FAA’s ATC leaders.
December 22 —
A well-known ATO executive plans to retire next month after a 35-year FAA career that was sparked by a dinner conversation at the home of a college friend whose father worked at the Tulsa Flight Service Station.
Bruce Johnson was so intrigued by the depiction of the FAA’s air traffic control program that he took the FAA’s entrance exam a short time later while he was still in college.
“I didn’t think much of it after that,” recalled Johnson, who after graduation became a high school teacher and football coach. But two years later, he started receiving letters from the FAA about becoming an air traffic controller. He was apprehensive about changing jobs, but a trip to his future facility and an exciting brochure sold him on a new career.
“There was always this mystery with air traffic control, after I got into the industry that intrigue never stopped,” Johnson said.
The 59-year-old Oklahoma native will retire Jan. 1 after a career in which he started as a controller and rose through the managerial ranks in the field. In 2003, Johnson transferred to FAA headquarters in Washington, where he soon became director of air traffic services. Later, as the vice president for Terminal Operations, he played a key role in the formation of the ATO. He currently is vice president of Mission Support Integration.
After earning a degree in education from Northeastern State College in Tahlequah, Okla., Johnson was living in his hometown of Lawton, Okla., when he was contacted by the FAA.He remembers receiving a brochure about becoming an air traffic controller.
“It was a picture of a controller at a radar screen, the room was dark, the lights were bright, there were images of the planes on the screen, and I thought it looked so cool. I thought, ‘Wow! Wouldn’t that be neat?’” Johnson recalled in a recent interview in his memento-filled office.
He passed a physical exam and other tests and was ordered to report to the Albuquerque Air Route Traffic Control Center. But until he toured the Albuquerque facility, he still wasn’t sold on quitting his teaching job and leaving Lawton.
Johnson, once the star quarterback of his high school football team, had married his high school sweetheart, Vicky, the homecoming queen.
Their move to Albuquerque “was hard for our families. We were the first ones to move away. If you were born in Southwest Oklahoma, you were expected to stay in Southwest Oklahoma,” he said.
Johnson began his training as an air traffic control specialist in 1974.
“I don’t think you can become a controller and not love it. Everyday you come to work you know you’re going to come across something you haven’t seen before,” he said. “We have an occupation where it is our job to keep the flying public safe. We have people’s lives in our hands.”
Johnson’s parents lived through the Depression and instilled a strong work ethic in him. “I was taught to do whatever it took to be successful, I had a lot of determination to make it,” Johnson said.
During the 1981 controller strike, Johnson was a supervisor assigned to work at the Fort Worth ARTCC, where additional help was needed. “I thought I was pretty good. I was pretty cocky,” he said.
Dallas/Fort Worth Airport had four corners and eight sections, and during Johnson’s second or third training on one of the corners, things quickly got out of control.
“I got so far behind. There was a big gaggle of airplanes that needed to be lined up. I had them turning and looping and in the wrong lanes. I had never worked that many planes. For about an hour I fought and fought to get everything back under control,” Johnson remembered. “By the end of the hour I had worked everything out but literally I had sweat from armpits to my belt!”
The supervisor observing Johnson hadn’t said a word during the entire ordeal.
“I was thinking in the back of my head, ‘this is so embarrassing, they’re going to send me back to Albuquerque,’” Johnson said.
Afterward, the supervisor walked up to Johnson, wrote something on a piece of paper and handed it to him. It said “Recommended for Certification.” Johnson was stunned.
“Anyone that can mess it up that bad and not have an operational error deserves to be certified,” the supervisor told him.
Johnson said the event was a “good learning experience. It whetted my appetite to know there was more to the air traffic system than just Albuquerque.”
Johnson became an area supervisor at the Fort Worth Center. From there, he moved to the Houston ARTCC as an air traffic manager. He served as the assistant air traffic division manager in the Great Lakes Region and was the air traffic division manager at the FAA’s Northwest Mountain Region, where he provided oversight air traffic policies and operations in seven states.
Not long after Johnson accepted a headquarters job, the director of air traffic services left and Johnson was selected for that senior position.
“I had literally gone from walking in to Albuquerque, not knowing how planes got from A to B, to becoming the director of all the controllers,” Johnson said. “It was one of the proudest moments of my life.”
A little later Johnson played an important role in the formation of the ATO as the vice president for Terminal Operations. Johnson says when the ATO was formed the overriding goal was to maintain system safety and efficiency. And it was important to control costs and “become good stewards of the taxpayers’ money.”
“The massive reorganization was huge. It was satisfying to pull it off,” Johnson said.
Now vice president of Mission Support Integration, he sees the Next Generation Air Traffic System transforming the national airspace system. When Johnson started in 1974, his facility still used “shrimp boat” markers to keep track of the identity, altitude and other data of aircraft because the radar scopes only showed the position.
“Now we’re going into NextGen, that’s pretty cool. For me, that’s when I knew it was time to step aside and let the new energy run with it,” Johnson said. “I’m a little envious and jealous of the controllers just starting. They’re coming into the greatest career field. The changes they’ll see, it’s going to be great.”
Looking ahead, Johnson says he is excited about taking some time off and learning new crafts. He plans to volunteer and take courses in gardening, photography and woodworking. He also will help his youngest son and grandchildren move to the area.
Johnson and his wife have two sons and two grandchildren. Vicky Johnson works at FAA Headquarters as the acting manager of the Business Management Group for Technical Operations.
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what a FXXK STICK
December 24th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Maybe there is a change in the air…..rumor now has it that a temp sup who was protrayed in the newscast is no longer a sup. Now if the FAA continues to show us that bad/illegal behavior from within their management ranks will not be tolerated then maybe we can start to make a change for the better.
December 24th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
What would scare me more than anything is Krakowski’s statement, “Sir, this was worth it because we have to get the front line managers onboard with what we’re trying to do.”
What ARE they trying to do? Are they telling the FLM’s how to circumvent the NATCA/FAA Agreement? Do they intend to NOT honor the Agreement?
I would be sure to call the question on this issue. To me that statement, in and of itself, is almost an ULP issue.
December 24th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
Question: Did any controller(otherwise known as a working professional) miss anyone of the 1200 higher skillsets gone for the past 3 weeks?
Answer: Nope, we didn’t miss em’, and we sure don’t need em’. Fire them all, go to a 14,000 to 1 ratio, instead of the current 3 or 4-1 total waste of taxpayer money ratio!
3600 supes and managers! That ought to get the attention of the Obama Administration as a source of funds for health care.
December 24th, 2009 at 6:20 pm
Question: Did any controller(otherwise known as a working professional) miss anyone of the 1200 higher skillsets gone for the past 3 weeks?
OOPS—-Meant 3600 of the dopes
December 24th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
lowskillset Says:
December 23rd, 2009 at 9:35 pm
FAAGuy,
“If you heard the tapes from St. Louis, or heard those guys in person, as I think you did, you don’t need to know them on a personal basis. If you already forgot what they said, then that explains it”.
Maybe FAAGuy helped make the tapes from STL. He certainly is an apologist for the ones that wronged the controllers….Day/Johnson/Douche-arm/Ventris/Lavey. It is wonderful to see the names on the list disappearing.
December 24th, 2009 at 10:37 pm
What amazes me is that many on this board wanted a change to the labor/management atmosphere for several years. When the leaders of the FAA stand up (from the Administrator on down) and say that change is mandatory, it seems to get some folks mad. If you want the leadership to change this organization, then let them speak of where we are going, and be glad it is in the direction many here have been advocating for several years. Seek the common ground where you can find it. There’s more now that in the recent past.
December 24th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
BTW, I hope everyone here has a merry Christmas and a happy New Year!
December 24th, 2009 at 10:49 pm
FAA guy…. To repeat another poster “I don’t think you have any idea how deep this thing runs”
I know of two different managers being taken down by a P.I. investigation out of controllers pockets. Even if it doesn’t get them fired there is satisfaction getting a managers pay docked by 4k per month combined alimony and child support.
And that’s not the least of the FAA problems.
You have trained your new workforce to despise and attack you at every turn. Some of my kids I was training were on W.I.C. just to feed their children with what you were paying them after you contractually offered them a salary 50k more per year then reneged after they had quit their military jobs giving up 75k+ bonuses to stay.
I can’t put it anymore simply to you than the next 20 years are going to be war. And it’s all your fault.
December 25th, 2009 at 12:20 am
FAAGUY,
You ask if you ever met these people. Yeah I met david bruce johnson. And I saw him lie under oath and laugh about all the controllers fired after the PATCO strike. And I met that asshole day too. They are both lying scumbags.
Didn’t I tell you about a year ago how they all deserve to die a horrible painful death? And their offspring too. Get their DNA out of the gene pool. They are not Human they are scum. Have you ever met them and worked with them? Then you should know. Some creatures deserve to die.
As a disclaimer I am not threatening them or their families. I just want to see them get painful cancer and die. Fuck them.
December 25th, 2009 at 12:25 am
Merry Christmas.
I have lost about $350000 over my life time due to these scum. Merry Christmas.
December 25th, 2009 at 1:47 am
It seems that with war, (real war with people dying) a global recession, and people going hungry … the real tragedy is that “Poor , Righteous, Air Traffic Controllers” had to wear a collared shirt for a few years and had a six figure salary frozen. I guess all of us have to sacrifice. Just remember that Jesus is the reason for the season and we will ALL be dead in 100 years.
December 25th, 2009 at 2:18 am
WowWee….that “Poor , Righteous, Air Traffic Controllers” had to wear a collared shirt for a few years and had a six figure salary frozen.
WowWee, I can guess what side that you are on. Watch Animal house. I know that is ancient history to a lot of you, but it was based on truth. Watch the end credits, and see what happened to those guys.
As a Union Rep, I amost always wear a NATCA shirt, with collars thank you very much. Damn, I wish I had a six figure salary when the pay was FROZEN. Now if I stay at my current facility and retire when able, I will never reach the promised 6 figure land.
I would say more, but I respect the BBS owner.
December 25th, 2009 at 4:57 am
Wee Wee says:
“It seems that with war, (real war with people dying) a global recession, and people going hungry … the real tragedy is that “Poor , Righteous, Air Traffic Controllers” had to wear a collared shirt for a few years and had a six figure salary frozen. I guess all of us have to sacrifice. Just remember that Jesus is the reason for the season and we will ALL be dead in 100 years.”
Oh, I see, controllers don’t have the right to be pissed off about getting screwed over, while those that were doing the screwing sacrificed nothing……all in the name of Jesus, war and recession. Wee wee, yea, I think I will.
December 25th, 2009 at 9:24 am
Has anyone submitted a FOIA asking how much money was spent (wasted) for the St. Louis love-fest just prior to the IWR’s going into effect?
December 25th, 2009 at 9:39 am
FAAGuy,
Labor/management relations are at an all time low in my 28 years with the agency and honestly, you guys could begin the road back with an apology but you and I know you’re all incapable of that. If Babbitt and others are sincere about putting this dysfunctional agency back together they could begin by freezing management wages for the next few years. That one move alone would do more than anything else imaginable.
Kevin Gilmore
zmp
December 25th, 2009 at 10:01 am
FAAGUY…
You need to understand that after the IWRs and all the verbal bullshit that the FAA threw around about it being a ‘contract’ and ‘no one will be financially harmed’, etc., the simple fact is that WE DO NOT BELIEVE A WORD THAT COMES OUT OF FAA MANAGEMENTS MOUTH!. Period. And that’s ALL their fault and NONE of ours.
So you think we should give them the benefit of the doubt and believe the ‘change is mandatory’ mantra? Ok, can you explain the following about Krakowski in testimony before congress of Oct, 28, 2009?
“Congressman Boccieri followed up by asking, “Just to be clear sir, you’re saying that consolidations are not going to be on the table until you’ve had a chance to vet them and clearly refine that process?” Mr. Krakowski responded, “I’d say we’re putting them in abeyance right now until we get that process understood.”
However, even as the FAA spoke those words, and in the days and weeks since then, the FAA has continued work on the very facility realignments that they testified were being put “in abeyance”. In a bold affront to Mr. Boccieri and the rest of his committee, the FAA has very clearly forged ahead with their realignment plans, including the aforementioned consolidations in Ohio. It is infuriatingly clear that one of three disturbing and completely unacceptable scenarios is taking place:
· The FAA was not truthful in their statement to Congressman Boccieri.
· The FAA meant what was said but has proven either incapable or unwilling to order FAA personnel to temporarily stop all work on realignment projects.
· The FAA does not know what the term “in abeyance” actually means.”
I could give example after example of the FAA lying to it’s workers, but they do it to the public and to congress and they keep getting away with it. Read this slowly: THEY HAVE ZERO CREDIBILITY. Now, reread that again. And when you stand up and try to defend them, you get splattered with the fecal matter that the FAA is throwing around.
You wrote “When the leaders of the FAA stand up (from the Administrator on down) and say that change is mandatory, it seems to get some folks mad. If you want the leadership to change this organization, then let them speak of where we are going, and be glad it is in the direction many here have been advocating for several years. Seek the common ground where you can find it. There’s more now that in the recent past.”, I reply that it’s all TALK, LIES, AND BULLSHIT. Until I see them DO something that they’re saying, my outrage will continue, and I will continue to poison the new kids coming in so that they are never caught off guard by an agency that thinks they are the problem. But so far, all they do is talk (LIE), and continue to do whatever they want. “We do the right thing, even when no one is looking.”…..my ASS. These people wouldn’t know what ‘right’ was if it stuck a camera in their face and asked pointed questions. Oh wait….never mind.
Sadly, I don’t think anything will change. AS@SCT is right….they’re just hunkering down and waiting for the next Republican administration so that they can resume making their lives better at the expense of the very people who actually DO what we we hired and paid to do.
December 25th, 2009 at 11:59 am
FAA Guy,
That isn’t the issue of this blog. The issue was how it was done and whether or not taxpayer’s money could have been saved to accomplish it. Are you saying the only way for Hank’s or Babbitt’s message of change could only be accomplished through a face to face meeting? Don’t their telecon’s or memos have any weight to them. How about a nice DVD with their message on it sent to each facility? Why was it necessary to spend $5 mil to accomplish this. Why are they giving numerous reasons for this training. First it was briefing on the contract (of which very few articles changed), then it was for morale (oops, can’t use that one after all they are responsible for destroying morale), and now it’s for getting their new and improved message out for change.
Is there any doubt why the workforce distrusts management? They can’t seem to get their stories straight. Yes we are mad, yes change would be nice and a start would have been an apology for what most did during the past 3 years all in the name of taking back control (control which management always had but rarely enforced). Those in management helped create the poison atmosphere of the past 3 years and it isn’t wiped away overnight. We heard the tapes of STL, we heard the cheers and claps of those attending and you wonder why we are mad. We are told that management is held to a higher standard and we watch controllers getting fired for not checking a box, using a cell phone, or not making it into work during a blizzard and we watched when management was guilty of the same things or worse and nothing happens. We watched the ABC tapes and saw behavior that would have gotten most controllers disciplined and you wonder why we are mad. You know there is a new show coming on TV in which the CEO of a company goes to work in the field to see things for himself, to see what the average worker goes through. From the clips it looks like it was an eye opener for the boss–like the female garbage truck driver having to pee in a can. Wouldn’t it be nice if some unknown high ranker in the FAA did the same thing.
December 25th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
“Wouldn’t it be nice if some unknown high ranker in the FAA did the same thing”
Most wouldn’t check out, that’s why they are in management.
December 25th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
# FAAGuy Says:
December 23rd, 2009 at 7:03 pm
“What if you changed 75% of the 7110.65? Do you think a PP and a good briefer would be all that was needed?”
Dude, please give it a rest, you are in a deep hole and my advice would be to STOP DIGGING.
For the record, if 75% or 7.5% or 7.5 words of the 7110.65 were changed heres *exactly* what would happen: it would be put in the R & I binder, perhaps even a CBI, but no controllers would end up in a big ATL party at taxpayers expense.
PWONED.
Gotta Love it.
December 25th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
I don’t get it either VM, Christmas time and everything, this guy just does not get it.
POTUS tells agencies specifically DON’T WASTE money.
Yes, I want change in the FAA, point is this circle-jerkfest in ATL CHANGED NOTHING. So we package a vacation and Christmas party and call it contract briefing and see that we only need to discuss 12 articles so we add 2 1/2 days of other face time crap that has nothing to do with safety. You know I think many of us are sick and tired of Republicans wording things so there is no real answer to them other than what they want you to believe.
Yes, I want major FAA change, if you have to include that in your weak reply, then tell what change if any is taking place in the FAA? Please tell me, what change.
I have not seen anything, What I have seen is NATCA fight one facility after another only to have it go to upper level review just to get schedules and leave slots for their employees. I have seen on OCT first one moron supe after another say you can’t wear shorts and T-shirts then have to back off after 90% of the workforce comes in dressed that way anyhow. Fact is they did not know until AFTER Oct 1st themselves. I have seen staffing plummet and promotions continue in almost every facility in the nation. I have seen hiring stop and no guidance given to why to NATCA or anybody in the field.
We get a 30 minute briefing a couple days before Oct 1st so management needs a week of training and travel time 3 months later???
One last note, when has 75% of the 7110.65 ever changed at one time? I have seen major changes to the 7110.65 put into a drink stained binder in the hallway at work. I have seen serious changes to separation of refueling flights given by a dork lady with less than a year CPC that had no clue what she was even talking about. Questions asked and then blown off with no effort to get them (This person was in airspace and procedures office I kind of think that was her job, right??) No worries, she is now in management the land of no accountability now.
So yes, we get briefings on 7110.65 changes, if you are vacation then no effort is insured you EVER got that information though.
What was that change in management we hear is coming? Does it have something with lubing us first next time? That’s nice.
December 26th, 2009 at 9:32 am
I thought by the mere election of the “Messiah”, “Barack the Omnipotent”, that everything would be fixed? That all wrongs would be made right? How much longer does Bush get to own this? 6 months? Til the end of Barack’s Adventure’s in Socialism?
December 26th, 2009 at 11:11 am
Dont ener forget that George Bush started us down the path of socialism.
Where were your complaints when the republican party spent a trilion dollars on Medicare prescription coverage?
Where were your complaints when Comrade Bush bought out Wall street and the banks?
Go soak your tea bags in someone elses mouth “glad_to_be_FCT “
December 26th, 2009 at 11:12 am
and I really wish Paul’s site had a edit function…. ener=ever
December 26th, 2009 at 11:37 am
“I know of two different managers being taken down by a P.I. investigation out of controllers pockets. Even if it doesn’t get them fired there is satisfaction getting a managers pay docked by 4k per month combined alimony and child support.”
If the management team at a facility did that to a controller, what would you say? What if it was the FACREP?
December 26th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
“I thought by the mere election of the “Messiah”, “Barack the Omnipotent”, that everything would be fixed? That all wrongs would be made right? How much longer does Bush get to own this? 6 months? Til the end of Barack’s Adventure’s in Socialism?”
Krakowski was a Blakey selection…right ? Bush appointed Blakey…right ? How long will Bush have his hand in my pocket..the rest of my F-ing life, thanks to three years of base pay freezes.
I’m glad you’re FTC too.
December 26th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
I would say don’t do the wrong thing even though nobody is watching and there would never be a problem would there?
I know it is something that most management types ignore since they see very little of the golden rule in the workplace by their counterparts, but it works amazingly well. I love the hypocrisy of the FAA, only do the right thing if it is convenient.
I find it sickening that anyone would bring up the matter “what if it was someone else not paying child support”. Republican double speak is weak and does not apply. What would you say if that woman not getting payments was your sister or daughter? What would you say? You can twist it all around any way you want, WRONG IS WRONG, don’t do bad things and you have nothing to worry about, FAA management did bad things to their employees, we are pissed and will be for a long time to come. DEAL WITH IT. KEEP YOUR NOSES CLEAN. Maybe some of the management types need to take those mantras posted all over the walls to heart.
December 26th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
AS@SCT,
Don’t take these tea baggers too seriously, all they do is go from one blog to another go WAY off base and post anti-Obama crap everywhere. Want to know why? Because they are too chicken$hit to do it public. Even when the braver ones do they have no solutions. I have asked these people, Then what is the solution? Duh, I dunno, NOT THIS. Ok, then what is? Duh, I dunno. You would think there are millions of them, when in fact it is literally HUNDREDS. It is the same people selling Mr. Big pills on every blog and pretty much gives the same results.
December 26th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
FAAGuy- this is not directed at you, per se. To your credit, you’ve got the guts to at least appear willing to engage in discussion here; however, because of this- you’re pretty much a proxy for FAA management in general, much as “Me” used to be. You do, however, echo some basic management yada-yada. Just know that when I write “you” it’s not necessarily you to whom I’m referring.
So, “things are changed in the FAA?” I assure you they are not. One of the topics at your conference should have been prepping sups for the long and tough road back to some semblance of normalcy. It will take years…many, many years of such excellent behavior on the part of management (a standard I believe mgmt is incapable of attaining), for the recent past to become the distant past. Only then, with time, will each person- at a time of their choosing- be able to set their grievances and grudges aside and move on. They will never forget. Some will retire still carrying their resentment(hatred), but years from now many will be able to let it go.
It has been said here time and again, “you have no idea how deep this goes.” Do yourself a favor and attempt to seek understanding.
You fought a war with your own employees…and won. No one overturned your move of questionable legality.(Read Title 49, 40122 and tell me what FAA did was legal) http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/uscode49/usc_sec_49_00040122—-000-.html
No arbitrator made restitution. The Blakey/Miniace/Whoeverelse strategy worked. Through loopholes, trickery, and sleight-of-hand, payroll is less now and forevermore than if the agency would have actually negotiated in good faith. Congratulations! Now, here we are in the aftermath…and the well is poisoned. Welcome to Reconstruction (Atlanta may have been an appropriate venue, huh?)
To have some high-level muckety-muck holdover simply declare “things are changed” is down-right hilarious wishful thinking of the highest order. It would have been worth the trip just to laugh out loud at the utterance. I could have been escorted out, laughing all the way- what irony!
So, did they cover how to lead from here? What to expect next? How to pretend this ugliness never happened or how to minimize it? Whether or not to apologize and what not/to apologize for? Apologize?- what was I thinking…after all, I didn’t do it, you didn’t do it, he didn’t and she didn’t, let’s just get on with it, shall we? If human beings were merely that uncomplicated. You (collectively) have a real challenge. If anything concerning this challenge was meaningfully discussed, $5M might be a real bargain, but I’d bet it wasn’t. Good luck.
December 26th, 2009 at 8:58 pm
This is from the same FAA that said Flight Service was too costly so they had to destroy it.
December 26th, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Amazing post.
December 26th, 2009 at 11:39 pm
“Don’t take these tea baggers too seriously, all they do is go from one blog to another go WAY off base and post anti-Obama crap everywhere. Want to know why? Because they are too chicken$hit to do it public. Even when the braver ones do they have no solutions. I have asked these people, Then what is the solution? Duh, I dunno, NOT THIS. Ok, then what is? Duh, I dunno. You would think there are millions of them, when in fact it is literally HUNDREDS. It is the same people selling Mr. Big pills on every blog and pretty much gives the same results.”
I couldn’t care less if some Obama hating contract tower controller posts his blog fodder here or anywhere else. This thread is primarily about Krakowski. He’s the COO (who apparently doesn’t know how much the Atlanta weenie rub cost the taxpayer) and the head of the ATO, and he is a Bush leftover. Could Babbitt have fired him ? Sure, I wish he would have and on day one. But no incoming adminstrator is going to truncate the person who’s leading the part of his federal agency that needs the most in the way of fixing…not on day one anyway. And this PR stink bomb may very well cost Krank his job in the long (or short) run.
December 27th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
Are there really any controllers or FLM’s, for that matter ,that think if McCain had been elected we would still have gotten an “equitable” contract ? Not only would we not have gotten a contract , we would have lost our pensions because we would be working for Lockmart. Everyones pay would have been cut just like FSS and nobody could do a damn thing about it. Our blogs would be about a totally different subject and you know it.
Apology accepted you right wingnuts !
December 27th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
Looks like Air Traffic Controller made the Yahoo List of best jobs without a college degree needed:
http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-make_30_an_hour_without_a_four_year_degree-1066
Luckily, they show a much more realistic salary this year, of $63,000 a year for 6 to 9 years of experience.
Not like the past few years where they jacked up the numbers to what Marion told them.
December 28th, 2009 at 6:42 am
My facility has about a dozen more MSS 2 or higher employees on the AT side, than we did four years ago. Some of this additional baggage are managers who didn’t want to have to move to Seattle in the ATO reorganization and found jobs at SCT (manufactured jobs in QA, Safety, FLMs, and Administration), benefiting from the additional operational funds available after FAA ripped off controllers on pay for three years and imposed the Bush Blakey B scale. Two positions were made up out of thin air to cope with the influx of zero background new hires/Raytheon incompotence, underbidding the training contract (can you say controller SMEs). I write this in light of the employee satisfaction survey being blogged about at great length over at the PCaUT. 10-20 percent increases in the number of managers at some facilities, yet FAA continues to rate among the very worst places to work in government. Shouldn’t more mangement mean happier employees, or does FAA career management really just not give a sh*t in actuality ? Their only real concern being their own self aggrandizement, career progression and pay increases. Care to weigh in on that FAA Guy ? Explain to us how the new “marching orders” you hyperventilate about here, are actually going to be implemented in a fashion different than the controller bashing ones from the Bush administration ? Or maybe you’ll blame controllers like former FAA boss Donohue did on FOX “News” recently in regrads to the ATL X-mas soiree (FOX News, we distort, you decipher). Don Brown is covering that rather nicely over at his blog.
December 28th, 2009 at 7:41 am
STFU you bunch of whiners. Do you think any of us over here on the management side give a flying rats a** how “hurt” you are or how “deep the resentment” goes? What are you going to do ? Go on strike? LOL At the end of the day you will be bellied up JUST LIKE I TOLD YOU TO BE. Whiners. You guys make me sick. How many of you will be down on your knees begging for AL or a schedule change. Every one of you swinging Richards that’s who. As long as there are controllers there will be supervisors there to reign them in and make them do what it is that I, the supervisor, told them to do. Get used to it. LOL. What a band of losers.
December 28th, 2009 at 7:53 am
Hey FAAGuy. I don’t think SUPE buys in regarding the new marching orders.
December 28th, 2009 at 7:54 am
A few points:
1: Thank you Paul Cox for letting everyone use your blog to converse on this issue.
2: Thank you to the person who emailed ABC news.
3: If any FAA employee sees an injustice, feel free to report. We have many options: news outlets (like ABC news), your Congressman or Senator, the FAA hotline, The FAA IG, The FLRA, or maybe even hire an attorney and sue the FAA. FAA managers are fearful for their jobs right now. You can be the one to show them out the front door.
4: It is very simple to identify “SUPE”. Do it Paul! Show him to the door!
December 28th, 2009 at 8:18 am
“STFU you bunch of whiners. Do you think any of us over here on the management side give a flying rats a** how “hurt” you are or how “deep the resentment” goes? What are you going to do ? Go on strike? LOL At the end of the day you will be bellied up JUST LIKE I TOLD YOU TO BE. Whiners. You guys make me sick. How many of you will be down on your knees begging for AL or a schedule change. Every one of you swinging Richards that’s who. As long as there are controllers there will be supervisors there to reign them in and make them do what it is that I, the supervisor, told them to do. Get used to it. LOL. What a band of losers.”
No, I don’t think you a give a flying rat’s a**. In fact most of you don’t, which is one reason why FAA finished 214 out of 216. And I look forward to rating you as a manager when Lahood orders FAA to allow the rank and file to have some input in to your performance appraisal. I’ve seen plenty of hard heads like you in the management ranks during the last 22 + years. Reign controllers in, beg for AL ? LOL, another FAA manager with delusions of grandeur. Now go answer the phone and approve my SL bang out.
December 28th, 2009 at 9:29 am
Supe , you are the main reason why the FAA sucks. It is people like you that will make me feel gald I retired in 8 months. Oh ya, one other thing. In 9 months I hope I see you at the mall or someplace off of FAA property. It is going to give me great pleasure to KICK YOUR STUPID ASS.
December 28th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
Supe, I can name at least 7 FLM’s at my facility that have your attitude. Every one of them is either led around by the nose at home, frustrated because they are afraid to come out of the closet or just a pussy that was pushed around all of their lives. I am sure you fit nicely in to one or more of those categories. I too cannot wait to retire and catch one of those F^&ks in public. I can only hope it is YOU !
December 28th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Scared
scared of what? Doing my job LOL. Who do you think Management or the IG or the FLRA is going to beleive, a supe with ove 30 years in the agency or some whiner who keeps crying,”I’m going to tell on you to my senator wah wah wah.?” Cry me a freaking river. It is YOU who should be afraid of YOUR job. If I knew who you were I would make your life such a living hell you would want to quit. Get used to it, we have the power and you have none. And I bet half of you whiners here are either closet management wanna-be’s or rejects that couldn’t get selected to be a supervisor. And I tell what scared, you don’t have to ask Paul to identify me. I’ll do it myself as soon as you let us know who you are. Or are you too scared LOL
AS@SCT, Blah blah blah. Change the record will ya? For Pete’s sake you’re going to drive everyone insane with that ” one reason why FAA finished 214 out of 216″ Give it a rest will ya? Nobody, especially the FAA cares. LOL And oh yes I’ve had more than one controller beg for AL. It’s surprising what a kids recital or baseball game will make people do. To be honest if there was anyway I could approve it I would, but believe me the Agency comes first. I’ve disapproved many an AL request. As far as sick leave, there is a reason when people call in they call in when I’m not there. Because they know they can’t snow me. I’ve disapproved many more sick leave requests than I’ve approved. And you know what? 99% of those that I denied that actually came into work weren’t sick at all. Imagine that. And trust me when I tell you there have been more than one controller charged with AWOL when they didn’t come in after thier SL was diapproved.
SCT Controller, LOL tough guy eh? Well threatening people on an open forum isn’t too smart on your part. I’ll let it slide this time, but you’d better read your conduct and discipline order and see what it says about your behavior off duty. LOL Loser
December 28th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Heavy D, Wow did you think of all of that all by yourself? Let’s see we are all either p whipped, gay, or a “pussy” as you said. Wow man that really hurts. LOL I say take a look in the mirror pal. You know they say the sign of an inferior intellect is to either swear or insult. Another LOSER LOL. And if you catch me in public what are you going to do? Try and mount me??? LOL
December 28th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
And you know what? I’m not even going to hang around long enough for any of you guys “retorts” LOL See ya. Wouldn’t want to be ya
December 28th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
ROFL loser troll, don’t give him the time of day. Sore loser i should say. Having this contract IMPOSED on the agency and all ROFL. We see these low life jerkoffs at ZAB too, all too unhappy they don’t get to screw with us anymore.
Its over. Supe, fine with me, don’t come back, FAAGuY at leasts tries to communicate. For all I know you could be his evil twin. Doesn’t matter, pendulum is a swinging.
December 28th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
SUPE said he was leaving, and I hope he sticks to his word. Whether he is in management or not (hard to tell on an open forum like this) he gives us all a bad name.
Someone said that they know about 7 supervisors with an attitude like this in their facilities. Do not tolerate it. Talk to their bosses and if that doesn’t work, to their bosses. Help create the positive change you have been advocating for the last several years.
BTW, this idea of meeting someone in a parking lot and exacting revenge is a little over the top and does not do anything to improve the relationships that need healing.
December 28th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
Supe, My behavior off duty? How about my kicking your ass after I am retired ? I am so looking forward to that. I may never know who you are but I do know many like you and I guarantee they will get the beating of their life when the time is right.
December 28th, 2009 at 2:18 pm
Supe,
I find it extremely funny that the pot is calling the kettle black. Here you told a poster that they needed to review the code of conduct but yet you threaten the same poster. You could have taken the high road but instead dropped to a lower level. To see some of the problems within the FAA, all you have to do is look in the mirror. I’m sure that when the time comes for the employee to have a say in your eval the fun will begin. To say that the FAA will take your word, just because you have 30 yrs in the FAA, well that is the funniest part of all; I suggest that you get in touch with the FORMER ATM from DAB and see how that worked out for him.
You are a problem when you seem to take pride in causing misery to another expecially those under your command. I’m wondering if you took the course “Leading Edge 2.0″ from the FAA. In this course they have defined what is a leader and what is a manager. See the FAA wants to have more leaders and sadly you do not fall into any of it’s catagories. Instead you fall into the manager–a person who relies on control and focuses on compliance. See anyone can manage, but it takes a special person to be a leader. The FAA says it “Leads by Example”, I have to wonder what example you set for those that work around you. Do you set an example or make people the example? A true leader cares about his workforce and not the bottom line. A true leader does not take pride in making examples of their workers. A true leader tries to help those beneath them.
Have I begged for AL at some time, yep, what controller hasn’t, but what has that got to do with anything. Sure my son’s special moment has more weight in my life than my life in the FAA. I’m sure that 99% of controllers would agree that their family comes first, but instead of getting support or a leader who does his best in trying to help us we get you and you wonder why people are unhappy.
December 28th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Sure, don’t hang around to listen to this retort to your snort:
“AS@SCT, Blah blah blah. Change the record will ya? For Pete’s sake you’re going to drive everyone insane with that ” one reason why FAA finished 214 out of 216? Give it a rest will ya? Nobody, especially the FAA cares. LOL And oh yes I’ve had more than one controller beg for AL. It’s surprising what a kids recital or baseball game will make people do. To be honest if there was anyway I could approve it I would, but believe me the Agency comes first. I’ve disapproved many an AL request. As far as sick leave, there is a reason when people call in they call in when I’m not there. Because they know they can’t snow me. I’ve disapproved many more sick leave requests than I’ve approved. And you know what? 99% of those that I denied that actually came into work weren’t sick at all. Imagine that. And trust me when I tell you there have been more than one controller charged with AWOL when they didn’t come in after thier SL was diapproved.”
I said your attitude was one reason why FAA finished 214 out of 216, not the only reason. And it’s Lahood who’s going to change the record. He wants to know why FAA is a lousy place to work….one read of your egomanical rantings here explains a lot. And more to the point the DOT secretary wants the problems fixed. I haven’t had a SL request denied in 22 + years. You’re FOS and we all know it. Agency first….sounds more like you outsized ego first.
December 28th, 2009 at 6:39 pm
Supe is just trying to create a flame-war and all of you are taking the bait. Just ignore him/her.
After hearing a lot of opinions on this, here are my thoughts.
1. This conference was in no way a three-week Christmas party like ABC News would like you to think. This is just another incident where the media sensationalizes the news.
2. Managers were forced to attend this conference. I’m sure many did not want to go, considering that this conference was during the weeks leading up to Christmas and most people would choose to spend that time shopping, hanging up Christmas lights, buying a tree, babysitting their children on Christmas break…etc. If you want to get angry at someone, look to blame senior ATO leadership, not your own manager.
3. Most, if not all of this conference could have been conducted by video or audio teleconference or other distance-learning methods. Also, I’ve heard from others that the subject matter was rather basic and only really useful if you were a new manager.
4. $5 million is a lot of money, but just a drop in the bucket compared to other government waste. You could argue that this $5 million was really just another economic stimulus payment, but this one went to the “hospitality” industry.
5. Even after a new labor contract between the FAA and NATCA was ratified, the distrust between managers and employees must still run deep. It’s pretty obvious that it was an angry controller somewhere that wrote to ABC News to try to ruin this conference.
6. Some of those managers said some stupid and foolish things to the hidden and not-so-hidden cameras. However, controllers would have done the same thing. The only difference is that the controllers would be disciplined, but the managers would get a free pass.
December 28th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
ABC calls this news? The FAA holds a management conference once in 3 years, a few people party afterward, somebody hits on the news girl, and this is worthy of anybody’s attention?
And, by the way, nobody’s losing their jobs.
December 28th, 2009 at 10:01 pm
It’s pretty obvious that it was an angry controller somewhere that wrote to ABC News to try to ruin this conference.
Why do you say that? It could have been one of your peers, somebody from HQ, Tech Ops, Lockheed etc. The fact that you automatically assume it was some disgruntled controller is disgusting. Many of us are in fact disgruntled, and all you have to do is read some of the BS that jack@ss supe wrote to know why. Can you imagine dealing with that megalomaniac sociopath 5 days a week? Sadly some of us do.
December 28th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
The post by “SUPE” is good, only if our heroes LaHood/Babbitt would read these blogs. Nobody could understand the disassociation between labor(controllers) and management(sh*theads) until they read the controllers response to such management-supportive posts on this or any other similar blogs. When a “SUPE” puts in some kind of crap, the responses are so overwhelmingly anti-management that the higher ups LaHood/Babbitt should be able to guess that the solution to 214/216 starts with getting rid of each and every “SUPE”.
December 28th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
Ben,
“And, by the way, nobody’s losing their jobs.”
Rumor has it, one already has and I’m more inclined to believe my source than yours.
December 29th, 2009 at 6:17 am
Ben,
“somebody hits on the news girl”
“Are you a hooker?”
Is that your idea of hitting on a news girl? I bet you do well with the ladies.
December 29th, 2009 at 7:45 am
Any up-date on the $1000 reward for the escort services used during the ATL ” contract Christmas party” ? How about some names from the ABC news cast ?
December 29th, 2009 at 12:05 pm
27+ wearing sneakers Says:
December 29th, 2009 at 6:17 am
Ben,
“somebody hits on the news girl”
“Are you a hooker?”
Is that your idea of hitting on a news girl? I bet you do well with the ladies.
Sneakers: I’d be willing to bet that Bendover doesn’t like girls at all!
December 29th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
Comments a bit out of hand, and 118 of them is a record, so let’s shut ‘er down for now.