This Week in NATCA/Labor History
Wednesday, October 26, 2011

THIS WEEK IN NATCA HISTORY:

1992 — Air traffic facility reclassification: NATCA’s recently formed Reclassification Committee, chaired by Eastern Region Vice President Tim Haines, meets for the first time to discuss ways to change the classification system for air traffic facilities. The union hires Dick Swauger, a former PATCO member, and consultant Joe Kilgallon to work on the project. Both men were involved in PATCO’s reclassification effort in the mid-1970s, which ultimately elevated 21 high-density facilities to GS-14 pay scale.

The NATCA project ultimately replaces the Level I-V ranking system, which was based solely on traffic volume, with an ATC 1-14 scale that also includes complexity factors. This major effort helps pave the way for unprecedented pay increases for controllers when the union’s contract with the FAA takes effect in September 1998.

October 30, 1998 — NATCA on Capitol Hill: President Mike McNally and Rick White, union representative on the STARS modernization program, testify before the Transportation Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. They say that, until recently, controllers were not consulted on the program and that the equipment is not suited to the way TRACON controllers do their job. The Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System consists of color monitors, similar to the DSR displays in the en route centers, which will replace aging radarscopes.


THIS WEEK IN LABOR HISTORY:

1940: The 40-hour work week went into effect under the Fair Labor Standards Act, signed by President Roosevelt two years earlier.

1949: In what becomes known as the Great Hawaiian Dock Strike, a six-month struggle to win wage parity with mainland dock workers, ends in victory.