Senate plan to end FAA shutdown falls apart(The Seattle Times)

 Senate plan to end FAA shutdown falls apart

  WASHINGTON — Republicans late Monday blocked a bipartisan Senate plan to end the partial shutdown of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), making it increasingly likely Congress will be unable to resolve the legislative standoff before September.

  Having resolved the federal debt crisis, Congress is expected to leave at the end of the week for its August recess. If that happens, lost revenue from uncollected airline ticket taxes could exceed $1.2 billion before lawmakers return to work a month later, senators said.
 
  The Democrat-controlled Senate and the Republican-controlled House are at odds over proposals to cut rural air-service subsidies and to change a federal labor rule to make it more difficult for airline workers to unionize. As they were unable to resolve their differences, the FAA's operating authority was allowed to expire at midnight July 22.

  The showdown began last month when the House passed a GOP bill to extend the FAA's operating authority that cut air-service subsidies by $16.5 million. Democrats said the House was trying to impose policies that hadn't been negotiated with the Senate and using the subsidies as leverage to force them to cut a deal on the labor issue. The labor provision is in a separate, long-term FAA funding bill.
  
   On Monday, Sens. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., chairman of the committee that oversees the FAA, and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, the senior Republican on the committee, floated a proposal to restore full operating authority to the FAA while cutting air-service subsidies $71 million. The plan fell apart when Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., said he would use parliamentary procedures to tie up the Senate in an effort to prevent a vote on the measure.

   The subsidies program was created after airlines were deregulated in 1978 to ensure continued air service on less profitable routes to remote communities. The program has grown to provide service to about 150 communities, from Muscle Shoals, Ala., to Pelican, Alaska, and costs about $200 million a year. Critics say the subsides are too high and some of the communities are within a reasonable drive from a hub airport.

  The FAA's long-term operating authority expired in 2007. Since then, Congress has been unable to agree on a long-term funding plan. The agency has continued to operate under a series of 20 short-term extensions.
  
  When the FAA's operating authority expired, airlines also lost their authority to collect the ticket taxes that provide the majority of the trust fund's revenue, costing the government an estimated $200 million a week.
  
  The FAA has been forced to furlough nearly 4,000 employees and issue stop-work orders on more than 200 construction and other projects paid for with trust-fund moneys. Work on an additional $2.5 billion in airport-construction grants has stopped because employees who handle the grants have been furloughed. Tens of thousands of private-sector workers have been affected.
  
   The agency has a budget of more than $16 billion this year and employs 47,000 people. Air traffic controllers have remained on the job. Administration officials have vowed that safety won't be compromised and travelers won't be inconvenienced.
  
  But FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt revealed Monday that airport-safety inspectors nationwide have been working without pay and shouldering travel expenses themselves since the shutdown began.


http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2015794817_aviation02.html



⊙ Summary
: The articel says that repulican cut off a bipartisan Senate plan to end partial shutdown. The reason of shutdown is that House cut air-service subsidies. As the result, The FAA has been forced employees stop work orders on more than construction and project. The agency has budget.


⊙ Personal Response
: Because I'm interested in Air, I choose this article. But it's not good news, so I'm sorry. In this article, officials said that won't be compromised and travelers won't be inconveninced. This is good! But I care officials. This event was due to different of the Parliament opinion. Because of event, many officials were fired. The Parliament must solve probleoms that is control air-service subsidies and progress constructions and project. So many employees would work in good atmosphere and mind.


⊙ VOCA

* Republican : [ADJ] Republican means relating to a republic. In republican systems of government, power is held by the people or the representatives that they elect.

* Bipartisan:  [ADJ] Bipartisan means concerning or involving two different political parties or groups.a bipartisan approach to educational reform

*Parliamentary: [ADJ] Parliamentary is used to describe things that are connected with a parliament or with Members of Parliament.He used his influence to make sure she was not selected as a parliamentary candidate