© Kevork Djansezian
The general manager of the Atlanta International Airport is threatening to privatize security and baggage screening duties, since the shortage of TSA staff is causing severe delays at the world's busiest airport.
Last year, the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in the US state of Georgia handled 22.7 million passengers, more than Beijing, Dubai or Tokyo. However, due to the lack of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) staff, many of those passengers experienced very long wait times.
Should the TSA refuse to increase the number of staff at the airport, Hartsfield-Jackson's management will have to privatize the screening staff, General Manager Miguel Southwell has said.
In a letter to TSA administrator Peter Neffenger, Southwell said despite efforts to decrease traveler wait times at security checkpoints, "things appear to be only getting worse."
"It is for this reason that we are giving serious consideration to your agency's Screening Partnership Program" (SPP), which allows US airports to apply for "qualified private contractors," he wrote in a letter sent February 12, and obtained by WSBTV on Thursday.
Hartsfield-Jackson staff have conducted "exhaustive research with current SPP airports," the manager said. "Barring the implementation of some transformational technology or a dramatic shift in staffing allowances in the next 60 days, Hartsfield-Jackson will take steps to launch SPP," Southwell said.
Comment: Delays caused by strip searches, unwarranted pat-downs and molesting passengers. Are there enough terrorists going to, or inside the U.S., to justify the existence of the TSA?