San Francisco CA Feb 15 2019-During the partial government shutdown, screeners at two Silicon Valley airports, San Francisco and San Jose International, moved thousands of people through security checkpoints.
Operations at the airports, 35 miles apart, looked similar – uniformed officers reminding people to take off their shoes and put their laptops in plastic bins – but there was one major difference: Only the officers at the San Francisco airport were getting paid.
That’s because San Francisco International is one of nearly two dozen airports across the country that use private contractors instead of the Transportation Security Administration to conduct its security screening.As the shutdown stretched from days into weeks, more and more TSA workers stopped showing up.
At one point, 10 percent of TSA officers didn’t report for duty.The result: scattered staffing shortages across the country and anxiety for travelers. Airports in Baltimore, Houston and Miami were forced to temporarily close checkpoints. TSA officials conceded that many officers weren’t coming into work because of the financial hardship of working without pay.But in San Francisco?”Operations were normal,” said Doug Yakel, an airport spokesman.
There has long been a debate over whether airport screening should be provided by the federal government or by private companies. And the recent government shutdown – and the potential for a repeat if lawmakers can’t reach a deal with President Donald Trump by Friday – has some wondering whether anxiety over staffing may prompt more airports to consider switching to private contractors.
Before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, airport security was handled by private contractors and paid for by the airlines. But after 9/11, those duties were turned over to the newly created TSA, which is responsible for security screening at the vast majority of the nation’s 440-plus airports.But as part of that agreement, Congress also created a voluntary pilot program that allowed five airports to use private contractors for security screening.
The program, launched in 2002, eventually was open to all airports. Today, 22 airports, including the original five – in San Francisco; Kansas City, Missouri; Rochester, New York; Jackson, Wyoming; and Tupelo, Mississippi – participate. Why not more?
Proponents of the system say TSA hasn’t made it easy for airports to make the switch. The agency has final say on whether an airport can opt to have private screeners, and although requests are rarely turned down, the process could be time-consuming.
Others blame inertia, saying some airports are reluctant to tinker with an arrangement that works.”I don’t know why, but it’s just ingrained in our mind that this is the only way it’s done,” said David Inserra, a policy analyst for homeland security at the Heritage Foundation, who has long advocated for the shift to the use of private companies for screening.
Among the considerations once an airport has applied for the program: The cost of private screeners cannot be greater than what it would be if TSA remained at the airport. If approved, the TSA – not the airport – selects, pays and manages the contractor.