Special Interest Groups

• WHAT IS ITS MISSION?
• HOW IS IT STRUCTURED?
• PRIMARY FUNCTIONS
• PROGRAMS
• BUDGET INFORMATION
• HISTORY
• FAST FACTS
• CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES
• FUTURE DIRECTIONS
• GROUP RESOURCES
• GROUP PUBLICATIONS
• BIBLIOGRAPHY

ESTABLISHED: 1931
EMPLOYEES: 260
MEMBERS: 53,000 at 51 airlines in the U.S. and Canada
PAC: Air Line Pilots Association Political Action Committee

Contact Information:
ADDRESS: 1625 Massachusetts Ave. NW Washington, DC 20036
PHONE: (202) 797-4600
FAX: (202) 797-4052
URL: http://www.alpa.org
PRESIDENT: Duane E. Woerth

WHAT IS ITS MISSION?

According to the organization, the mission of the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) is to "promote and champion all aspects of aviation safety throughout all segments of the aviation community; to represent, in both specific and general respects, the collective interests of all pilots in commercial aviation; to assist in collective bargaining activities on behalf of all pilots represented by the association; to promote the health and welfare of the members of the association before all government agencies; to be a strong, forceful advocate of the airline piloting profession, through all forms of media, and with the public at large; and to be the ultimate guardian and defender of the rights and privileges of the professional pilots who are members of the association."

HOW IS IT STRUCTURED?

The ALPA's national headquarters are divided between two offices, one in Washington, D.C., and one in Herndon, Virginia. It is governed by a board of directors, which meets twice per year to set overall policy for the association. The board is composed of local council representatives from all pilot groups. The ALPA is also headed by an executive board and executive council that provide interim guidance between board of director biennial meetings. Day-to-day policies are administered by four national officers—president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer.

The ALPA is divided into "pilot groups." Each group consists of all the pilots at a particular airline. Although the pilot groups get substantial help from the ALPA national office, they negotiate their own labor contracts and have considerable autonomy over their internal affairs. Each pilot group is governed by a Master Executive Council, which is composed of two or three elected representatives from each of the pilots' local councils. Local councils are located at individual airline headquarters.

PRIMARY FUNCTIONS

The ALPA functions both as a member organization and a public safety advocate and enforcer. To achieve its goals along both fronts, the ALPA undertakes a variety of initiatives. In order to protect its members' interests in Washington the ALPA is at the fore in lobbying members of Congress and government regulatory agencies, particularly the Federal Aviation Administration. The ALPA is especially concerned with matters such as flight safety, aircraft performance standards, and anti-terrorism measures. In addition, the ALPA's PAC wields a strong presence in congressional campaigns: in the 1995–96 election cycle, its PAC contributed $822,000 in campaign contributions ($633,000 to Democrats and $189,000 to Republicans).

The ALPA provides a wide range of services to its members including legal advice, representation in labor disputes and collective bargaining, education, and training. Specifically, the association's representation department has administrators that help local groups negotiate contracts.

Airline safety is a major goal of the ALPA; it devotes more than 20 percent of its dues income to support aviation safety. Approximately 600 pilots serve on national and local safety committees; they are assisted by a staff of aeronautics engineers and safety experts. The ALPA is usually granted "interested party" status in most major airline accidents, which means ALPA accident investigators assist National Transportation Safety Board staff in on-site accident investigations and participate in public hearings.

PROGRAMS

Most of the ALPA's programs focus on member support services, with a particular emphasis placed on training and education. For example the association has an annual negotiations training seminar for pilot negotiators. The seminar covers such topics as bargaining tactics and procedures, language drafting and preparation of proposals, and help with economic and legal issues relating to the collective bargaining process.

Other ALPA training programs include the Basic Safety School, the Basic Accident Investigation Course, and the Advanced Accident Investigation Course. The Critical Incident Response Program, established in 1994, provides crew members with help from mental health professionals in dealing with catastrophic events and the Human Intervention and Motivation Study, founded in 1974, is the ALPA's alcohol and drug prevention program.

BUDGET INFORMATION

The ALPA has an annual budget of approximately $100 million. The vast majority of its income (about 84 percent of the revenue in 1996) comes from membership dues. About half its expenditures in 1996 went for office and administrative expenses and salaries, with another 18 percent allocated to professional services and fees.

HISTORY

According to the Almanac of Federal PACs, the Air Line Pilots Association was founded in 1931 by David Behncke in Chicago, Illinois. Behncke, a Boeing Air Transport pilot, formed the group to protest Depression-era pay cuts, poor working conditions, and arbitrary management practices. The group's first political milestone came in 1933 when Congress extended the Railway Labor Act's job security provisions to airline employees. While this provision has greatly helped the ALPA's efforts to negotiate work agreements with airlines, to this day the association has been unable to negotiate a master contract with all airlines on behalf of all its members. This has led to a discrepancy in wages and working conditions at various airlines, and resulted in the creation of separate air industry labor unions.

After its relationship with the ALPA became particularly contentious, the pilots of American Airlines broke off and formed the Allied Pilots in 1963. That same year, clerical and passenger service employees in the airline industry broke away to form an independent chartered affiliate, the Air Line Employees Association International. In 1973 flight attendants broke off and formed the Association of Flight Attendants.

A turning point for ALPA came after the deregulation of airlines in the late 1970s, which caused severe financial difficulties at some airlines. In 1983 Continental Airlines Chairman Frank Lorenzo filed for Chapter 11 and, in the process, extracted deep wage cuts from his 1,400 pilots. Other carriers began demanding concessions of their own, and the ALPA was spurred into action. The organization drew up collective guidelines designed to stop the down slide of pilot wages. When United Airlines balked in 1984, ALPA members staged a 26-day strike.

In recent years, the ALPA has supported pilot groups involved in a number of contentious contract negotiations, including American and US Airways. In 1997 the association merged with the Canadian Air Line Pilots Association.

CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES

In many ways the ALPA is a typical labor union, fighting for higher wages and better working conditions for its members. It is unique, however, because it has an equally important responsibility to ensure safety in the airways. To that end it is involved in all aspects of air safety from investigating flight accidents to modernizing the Air Traffic Control System. In many of its efforts, the ALPA works in collaboration with government regulatory bodies like the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration. An example is the association's crusade to crack down on disruptive airline passengers.

Case Study: Disruptive Airline Passengers

In 1996 the ALPA became concerned about an upswing in the number of airline passengers getting physically or verbally abusive with airline crews and fellow passengers. While it is illegal for passengers to disrupt the action of flight crew members, according to federal statistics, reports of passengers interfering with crews rose from 96 in 1993 to 174 in 1995. At a meeting of the security committee of the International Federation of ALPA in 1996, members from airlines around the world cited disruptive passengers as a growing threat to air safety.

Observers point to a number of reasons for this growing trend: increased frustration among the public, which was also being manifested on the ground in "road rage"; the elimination of smoking on flights, which may result in agitated passengers who might compensate by increased alcohol consumption; and overcrowding of flights. Said Capt. Steve Luckey, chairman of ALPA's security committee: "Put a nervous or a stressed-out passenger into a crowded airliner cabin, maybe add a little alcohol—or in some cases a lot—take away the cigarettes and, in some cases, the fear of prosecution, and almost anything can happen."

In April of 1997 the ALPA sponsored an International Conference on Disruptive Airline Passengers in Washington, D.C., to focus public and media attention on this issue. Among those testifying were members of Congress, social scientists, and representatives of several airlines. The conference generated widespread publicity. Part of the reason for the conference was to communicate to the flying public that airlines would have a zero tolerance policy for disruptive behavior. The ALPA was also seeking additional training in confrontation management for airline crews, tough prosecution and sentencing of disruptive passengers, stricter control over deportees being transported aboard airlines, and the creation of a national database to track incidents and perpetrators.

It is difficult to say how much impact the conference will have on public attitudes, but the concerns raised by the ALPA have already had some effect. For instance, the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys named a deputy director as the point of contact for coordinating cases involving disruptive passengers. In addition, United Airlines started a program called Protect Our Employees, under which flight attendants were given legal advice, paid absences, and other support to help them testify in criminal assault cases. Further, several cases in late 1998 involving disruptive passengers have resulted in heavy fines and imprisonment.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS

One problem the ALPA is grappling with is the fact that its political action committee has been waning during the late 1990s. In fact, according to the 1998 ALPA President's Report, 1997 marked the sixth straight year of decline. A 1998 Air Line Pilot article cited that PAC donations from ALPA members had dropped from $800,000 in 1990 to $551,000 in 1996. The article further noted, "A reduced campaign war chest translates into a diminished role for airline pilots in the federal election process and, eventually, a loss of effectiveness . . . we must get our PAC back on track." Initiatives to boost funds include a competition among all pilot groups to post the biggest increase in PAC contributions.

Another pending crises concerns the federal rule requiring commercial airline pilots to retire at age 60. The rule, which has been in place since 1959, has come under strong attack in recent years. The ALPA supports the rule, although some government officials who are against age discrimination want to end it. Many believe the ALPA is more concerned with protecting the interests of its younger members. In the early 1990s the organization prevailed upon Congress to quash a move by the Federal Aviation Administration to end the rule. It is uncertain how long the ALPA will continue to head off the ruling, especially when the trend throughout the rest of society is toward later and later retirements.

GROUP RESOURCES

The group's Web site at http://www.alpa.org was launched in 1997. It is aimed at ALPA members, but does include information of interest to the general public including speeches and testimonies, news releases, facts about the organization, highlights from the group's monthly magazine, and articles covering the latest issues involving the air industry. The site also includes extensive coverage of air safety with links to government regulatory sites.

GROUP PUBLICATIONS

The ALPA publishes Air Line Pilot, a glossy, full-color magazine published 10 times per year. The magazine, which has a 70,000 circulation, covers issues of concern to pilots and the airline industry and updates on labor issues. For information, call (703) 481-4468 or view full-length featured articles at the ALPA Web site.