Action Likely on Long-Proposed Airport Security Plans (washingtonpost.com)

Airlines, airports and Congress for years have fought over who would pay the costs of enacting the kind of beefed-up security measures proposed yesterday following Tuesday's unprecedented terrorist attack.

A series of critical federal and congressional audits over the past decade condemning airport security systems were not enough to force changes. Ramped-up fines after failed Department of Transportation inspections did little to change minds. Warnings from federal officials went unheeded.

Until Tuesday morning.

"What we're doing is dusting off proposals we've been making for years that have gone nowhere because of industry opposition and lack of substantial support from our colleagues," said Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.), a member of the House aviation subcommittee.

With questions surrounding how hijackers could board four separate jetliners at three airports, members were prepared for far-reaching measures that just days ago seemed too costly and politically implausible.

The Transportation Department plans to resume putting sky marshals on flights, while members of Congress were proposing a federal takeover of airport baggage-screening measures and tightened background checks of airport employees.

One long-running point of debate is the current baggage-screening process, which is arranged and paid for by the airlines through a competitive bid process that often results in what federal investigators called slipshod checks for weapons and contraband.

"At most airports the screeners do not strike you as a hardened security force, and we need to do better than a minimum wage person," said Mortimer Downey, a deputy transportation secretary in the Clinton administration. "Airports and airlines continually fight with each other on how to do it [screening] and who pays for it, but the one thing they agree on is that it should be as cheap as possible."

Congress last summer ordered the FAA to enact new security requirements for airports, rules that would improve training for baggage screeners while holding security companies accountable for their performance. After a yearlong process, the FAA had been tentatively planning to issue the new regulations next week.

Airport security experts said the proposed rules were an improvement, but some contend the regulations don't go far enough.

"The human element is still the weakest link in the chain," said Gerald Dillingham, the senior air transportation expert for the General Accounting Office.

As recently as last year, one of the largest companies in charge of screening carry-on bags pleaded guilty to criminal convictions. Argenbright Holdings -- which screens bags at Dulles International Airport, where one of Tuesday's hijacked flights took off -- agreed to pay at least $1.2 million in fines for allowing untrained employees, some with criminal convictions, to operate airport checkpoints in Philadelphia. Company executives could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Screeners have high turnover rates -- 126 percent per year on average at larger airports. The GAO reported 90 percent of airport screeners have less than six months experience and typically are paid minimum wage or close to it.

Robert Calhoun, a director of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, said it is time to reexamine using contractors to handle security checkpoints.

"All of this is going to cost money, and the airline industry is not in the best shape financially," Calhoun said. "Maybe the FAA should be doing it."

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