by Donald Wood
Last updated: 12:30 PM ET, Wed December 20, 2023
The United States Senate passed a temporary funding extension
for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) through March 8.
According to the Washington Examiner, the temporary FAA
reauthorization passed without any objection and allows the Senate extra time to
work through issues from both sides of the aisle.
The bill helped avoid missing the December 31 reauthorization
deadline. Last week, the House of Representatives passed
its version of the bill, and the Senate must reconcile their version with
the House when it passes through the chamber.
As for the full FAA reauthorization bill, disputes over pilot
training requirements, pilot retirement age polices and perimeter rules for Ronald
Reagan Washington National Airport all must be resolved before the legislation
can fully pass through Congress.
The original bill was slated to reauthorize the FAA for five
years, starting on September 30, but scrutiny over a shortage of air traffic
controllers, an alarming number of near-misses and disagreements over funding
have resulted in two temporary extensions.
Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz (R-TX)
spoke openly last week about his frustration
with the delays in passing the reauthorization legislation.
“We now find ourselves having to pass a second short-term
FAA authorization in less than six months without having gotten the bill
through committee,” Sen. Cruz told the Washington Examiner. “This situation was
entirely avoidable.”
Throughout the process, the American Society of Travel
Advisors (ASTA) has been in the trenches regarding the FAA
reauthorization bill. Officials are pushing for a travel agency seat on the
Consumer Protection Advisory Committee, which was designed as a streamlined
system for fulfilling air consumer disclosure requirements during
"offline" transactions.
The ASTA is also seeking to clarify an agency's obligations
to issue a refund.
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