FAA History Lesson -- November 26

From the FAA Historical Chronology, 1926-1996...

”Nov 26, 1991: Administrator Busey announced a reorganization at FAA headquarters, including:

* A new Assistant Administrator for Information Technology position with responsibility for administrative and operational information resources. The Office of Management Systems at headquarters was abolished and its former director became Acting Deputy for the new Assistant Administrator.

* A new Assistant Administrator for Budget and Accounting position with responsibility for the Office of Budget and the Office of Accounting. These two offices had previously reported to the Associate Administrator for Administration, a position which was abolished.

* Retitling the Executive Director for Acquisition as the Executive Director for Acquisition and Safety Oversight and expanding this position’s responsibilities by the addition of: the Office of Aviation Safety, whose head was retitled an Associate Administrator rather than an Assistant Administrator; and the appraisal functions of the former Deputy Associate Administrator for Appraisal. (See Sep 30, 1991, and Nov 30, 1993.) “

I know. That’s five minutes of your life you’ll never get back. Sorry about that. But as usual, I do have a point. You can’t believe how many times the FAA has rearranged the deck chairs on the Titanic. It seems as if every time there is a new sheriff, they rearrange the office chairs. There are dozens and dozens of these type entries in the FAA’s history. The FAA is in the middle of another such move right now -- combining regional offices. And as far as I can tell, none of them have ever accomplished a thing. Kind of like most of the airspace redesign projects I’ve seen.

P.S. Admiral Busey was a honest-to-goodness war hero in Vietnam. If you watch the Military Channel you’ll see a show about his squadron -- The Saints -- sooner or later. It was the same squadron Senator John McCain flew in. Admiral Busey earned the Navy Cross just a couple of months before Senator McCain was shot down.

Don Brown
November26, 2007