potential change in ALPA’s Age 60 policy
Since Administrator Blakey’s announcement concerning Age 60 in January, your ALPA representatives at the local and national levels have been aggressively engaged in gathering and evaluating information regarding the implications of this proposed change. Members of our Association, including FedEx pilots, have participated in both the FAA Aviation Rulemaking Committee (ARC) and the ALPA Blue Ribbon Panel (BRP). Both groups were tasked with assessing the potential impact of an age change on labor, the airlines and the FAA. ALPA has previously received the ARC report and at the most recent ALPA Executive Council meeting the BRP presented its preliminary findings. Further briefings have been given by ALPA’s Government Affairs Department and the Wilson Center for Public Policy, the organization that is conducting the ALPA poll on Age 60.
ALPA’s successful track record of opposing any change to the regulated age is due in part to the landscape in which the Age 60 regulation has existed. It is clear now that landscape has shifted, and has been shaped by a number of forces. These include the raising of the ICAO regulated age to 65, the decision by our government to allow foreign pilots over the age of 60 to operate within the United States, the FAA’s announcement of a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to raise the regulated age to 65, and a United States Congress that is aggressively pursuing legislation to force the FAA to change the regulated age. Based upon all sources of information that your ALPA representational structure has available, the leadership believes that a change to the regulated age is inevitable, in spite of the Association’s longstanding policy opposing change.
This consensus has not been reached lightly. The Executive Council is comprised of a wide variety of pilots across the industry spectrum with divergent points of view on the subject at hand. Closer to home, your MEC representatives span the seniority of an entire pilot career and zealously guard the interests of their constituents within the FDX pilot group. Additionally, it appears that support within the membership is declining for maintaining the Association’s present policy. The Wilson Center phone poll returned results of 52% in favor of the status quo. With a 3% margin of error, that represents a statistical dead-heat. What your MEC feels is just as important is the 66% of pilots polled who responded that if the regulation is going to change, it is important for ALPA to have a role in that change. Furthermore, your representatives at both the national and local level believe that the Association’s present policy on Age 60 is hindering our ability to exert the maximum amount of influence possible on behalf of the membership. This is borne out by the fact that many previous Congressional supporters of ALPA’s policy are now co-signers of legislation that would force the FAA to change the regulated age.
In that vein, the Executive Council passed a resolution recommending to the Executive Board (comprised of all MEC Chairmen) that a change in the Association’s Age 60 policy is appropriate in order to “better influence current legislation and regulatory efforts”. This resolution is not binding on the Executive Board but nonetheless indicates a potential change in ALPA’s Age 60 policy. The full language of the resolution is available in a recent ALPA Fast Read communication.
Also contained in the resolution is recommended legislative language that appears to conflict with the seniority rights of some of our pilots should the age change. While in agreement with ALPA national representatives that the age change is inevitable and that ALPA’s strongest position is one in which we can provide positive influence over the change, your MEC is stridently opposed to any regulatory change that prohibits a pilot from exercising their seniority rights. Your MEC also believes that the most successful outcome of an age change will result from the FAA’s NPRM process and not through legislation. I will be attending the ALPA Executive Board meeting later in May and championing those two critical points.
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