Embattled TSA Administrator Peter Neffenger, who met with local officials in Chicago Friday morning over marathon airport security lines, admitted that summer will be a “challenge” despite higher staffing levels, and said more needs to be done.
“I think this summer is going to be a challenge,” said Neffenger, speaking about challenges facing the Transportation Security Administration at a news conference at O’Hare International Airport along with U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Mayor Rahm Emanuel and members of the Illinois congressional delegation. Neffenger said he still is working on growing back staff levels, which have fallen as passenger volume has gone up.
“We’re doing everything we can to alleviate that at the largest airports,” Neffenger said of the staffing shortage. “You’ll still see crowds in the airports. My goal is to keep it moving.” He said the agency cannot have a situation like it had at O’Hare last weekend, when hundreds of people missed their flights due to hourslong security lines, and some had to sleep at the airport.
Neffenger sounded contrite during the news conference, and Emanuel at times sounded like he was scolding the federal agency.
“This was known,” Emanuel said. “You could see it coming. Some of this could have been avoided.”
Emanuel also stressed that Chicago is “the linchpin of the nation’s aviation system.”
“It cannot be understaffed,” he said.
TSA leaders have encouraged travelers to sign up for its PreCheck expedited screening program as a way to get through lines quicker — an examination of airport lines Friday morning found that PreCheck users got through lines five times faster than other passengers. PreCheck costs $85 for a criminal background check, and is good for five years.
However, the agency has acknowledged enrollment in the program is nowhere near what it projected, and passengers have complained that the process is bogged down by delays.
Durbin suggested that the TSA should make it easier for people to sign up. “We have to make TSA and PreCheck much more approachable,” Durbin said.
U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., was not at Friday’s event, but in a news release issued by his office he repeated his call for the problem to be fixed before Memorial Day, or TSA leadership should change.
TSA has promised to get 58 TSA officers to O’Hare in the next couple of weeks, as well as additional canine units, which can help speed lines by sniffing for explosives. The agency plans to hire almost 800 more staffers nationwide.
Asked about an idea floated by some aldermen this week to privatize TSA services, Emanuel noted that the application process is long and would not solve the problem facing the airports now.
In statements after the news conference, Aviation Commissioner Ginger Evans noted that private contractors would still be under TSA supervision, so benefits would be “marginal.”
Evans also rejected telling airlines to waive fees to check bags for the summer in a bid to speed up security. Instead, Evans said it made more sense to have airlines more strictly enforce size limits for carry-on bags, forcing passengers to pay to check more bags.
