Phoenix airport threatens to kick out TSA, hire private (unaccountable) contractors

[CLamb]

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is contemplating the same thing at JFK, LaGuardia, and Newark Liberty airports. http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2016/05/port_authority_gives_an_ultimatum_to_the_tsa.html

[fuzzyfungus]

Now, there’s an organization we can probably trust to make the feds look competent, incorruptible, and enviably efficient…

[p96]

Anxiety

[Mindysan33]

@Mister44

I guess I don’t see that the TSA is being held accountable for anything.

I don’t disagree, but do you think bringing in another layer of distance from us is really the answer, as opposed to putting serious pressure on the US government to make the TSA accountable. That, not privatization, would be the more effective way to ensure some accountablity, which would at the end of the day, lead to an end to security theater. A private company is only accountable to its shareholders.

@Mister44

NOTHING we are doing post 9/11 has made us safer other than the better doors to the cockpits.

I agree. I never said otherwise. The solution is the end of security theater and the way to that goal is political pressure. Privatization moves away from the ability to apply political pressure.

So, I think we agree on the core issue here - the problem with security theater. We seem to disagree on how to get there.

[euansmith]

Maybe I’ll put off visiting my brother in the USA for a few more years.

[Mindysan33]

@emo_pinata

And before anyone can misconstrue this - they are both shitty.

I think we all agree with that.

But we can’t politically pressure a private company. I don’t think that “voting with our wallets” is the same as political pressure. Especially given the opaque process that accompanies most public-private partnerships. Plus, a private company doesn’t have us as a customer, but individual airports.

As I mention to @Mister44 above, the goal should be the end of security theater, via political activism, and allowing a private corporations to take over this function, I think moves us farther away from that.

[Mister44]

@Mindysan33

So, I think we agree on the core issue here - the problem with security theater. We seem to disagree on how to get there.

If the airports are going to do away with it, there you go. No political pressure needed. If the cost of theater means they can’t get planes off on time, then they are going to want to alter things.

I am fine with the security measure from the late 90s, which even then had some silly inconsistencies, but weren’t ridiculous with the shoes and liquids.

I concede that they might screw it up further, but we got in this mess with the TSA thinking they could do better…

[Mindysan33]

It’s not an issue of screwing things up more - it’s an accountability issue, for me, at least. But as you and others have pointed out, the TSA hasn’t had much accountability to this point. I’d say just having airports handing things over to a private vendor doesn’t solve anything, it only moves the issue around and increases the complexity of actually dealing with the real problem.

[Phanatic]

I had a brand new camera smashed by a private screener at an SFO checkpoint and discovered that they were fully immunized from any liability for mishandling passenger property.

Huh? Who the heck told you that? Destruction of your property is a tort, and you could bring suit, and that would be accountability. The only thing that would prevent that if if there were some law passed saying you can’t, which is certainly possible given that it’s California. But even if you can’t sue, you can make noise. You can refuse to fly out of airports that use that company’s security services. You can use your voice to get other people to agree. If enough people care about that issue, that security company will need to change its practices, or it will lose its contract and get replaced with a competitor.

The notion that it’d be harder for a private company to fire screeners than it is for the TSA, that it’d be harder to sue a private company than it is to sue the TSA, that it would be harder to charge a private screener with sexual assault than it would be to charge a TSA screener, that it would be harder for an airport authority to affect the behavior of private screeners, and that private security companies would be less accountable than the TSA is totally ridiculous.

[L_Mariachi]

@Mindysan33

A private company is only accountable to its shareholders.

And by extension accountable to its clients. Underperform too badly or otherwise fuck up and it loses its contracts, or doesn’t get paid for them if there’s a performance mandate clause. No comparable pressure exists for the TSA; as annoyed as travellers may be at long lines and invasive security measures, it’s unlikely anyone is going to lose a Congressional seat for supporting “the Security of our Homeland.”

[JonS]

Wait, so are you now saying that flying and bussing are not exactly the same?

@Mister44

It is basically a fancy bus ride. That is all flying is. A fancy bus ride in the air. Turbulence is just pot holes in the road.

[JonS]

I’m going to the US for work, for the first time next month. I’m looking forward to being there. I am NOT looking forward to getting there. But, it’s for work, so I don’t have much choice.

For private travel, on the other hand, I have oodles of choice. I literally have a whole world to chose from. I have, and will continue, to chose the options with less pointless fuckwittery.

[JonS]

@incarnedine_v

once a tax is placed on something it seldom goes away.

The last couple of Republican administrations and congresses would tend to suggest that this old canard is not correct. At least, not for everyone.

[JonS]

@Phanatic

But even if you can’t sue, you can make noise. You can refuse to fly out of airports that use that company’s security services. You can use your voice to get other people to agree. If enough people care about that issue, that security company will need to change its practices, or it will lose its contract and get replaced with a competitor.

haha. Ooh, you are just so cute!

[Mindysan33]

@L_Mariachi

accountable to its clients

Which, again, is not us, it’s the airlines/ports. At what point have they shown that they have the same interests as us.

@L_Mariachi

No comparable pressure exists for the TSA; as annoyed as travellers may be at long lines and invasive security measures, it’s unlikely anyone is going to lose a Congressional seat for supporting “the Security of our Homeland.”

But there is a solution to that, which is political engagement. Once again, political pressure can create change in a way that can’t happen in a private sector that is as freed from consequences for their actions as it is now. There are too many layers for us as consumer to get through to make sure they are accountable to us.

[virgil]

@Cory: Respectfully, why the (accountable) neg? There was a problem at PHX with TSA. And they attempt to fix the problem by going with someone else. This should be a “YAY!”

[Mindysan33]

If you read upthread, you’d see we’ve already discussed the issue of going with a private vendor vs. the TSA. Feel free to weight in on the issue.

[hmclachlan]

@L_Mariachi

Underperform too badly or otherwise fuck up and it loses its contracts, or doesn’t get paid

Oh, please. You can’t possibly be that unaware of the way savvy federal vendors structure their contracts. An airport “security service” subsidiary of a U.S. federal contracting behemoth will have its legal department (or retained law firm) write up the contract so as to largely immunize them from penalties. They are often the “only” organization that has the suite of skills and practical experience to offer the service – or one of perhaps 3 “competing” vendors. As it nets out: the tax-funded pie is divvied up to the advantage of the “competitors” and we, the public, stand for hours in lines that would have embarrassed Khrushchev.

Federal contracting is one of the few issues on which traditional, paleo-conservatives and I agree. It is a cesspool of logrolling, self-dealing, under-performance. I’d like beatings to commence until morale disappears.

[billstewart]

The TSA already gets to add a “security” fee onto your tickets. They’re not providing the service we pay them for (not only not providing security, but also not providing enough hopelessly-underpaid staff to keep passengers moving.)

[billstewart]

After the San Francisco airports re-opened after 9/11, the change in “security” staff was really blatant. Suddenly a bunch of White People had taken over, wearing white shirts and with an aggressive staff that was 99% white (there was one black woman that I saw), instead of the screeners being the typical mix of Bay Area ethnic groups, with maybe a few more Filipinos than average.

And no, private contractors are not unaccountable - even if they’re not directly liable, this is America, so you can sue somebody when they misbehave, whether it’s their company or the airlines and airports that hire them, and judges can order them to obey laws, and they can’t do bogus things like searching the files on your computers/phones/etc.