goals, the faa needs a workforce that has the technical expertise to conduct effective oversight of manufacturers and airlines as well as technical experts who cacan help in the certificationf these new and novel technologies. this was a major focus of our efforts. for example, in the effort to boost the aviation workforce and provide more opportunities for america's veterans, this legislation makes it easier for military service members to transition to civil aviation careers. this comprehensive and bipartisan bill bolsters the faa at a time when the agency needs support. the aviation system is more strained than ever. millions of americans travel every single day. millions of americans depend on

this sector to earn their livelihood. the aviation sector is the gold standard of safety, and i'm proud of the improvements and reforms made in this bill and i look forward to working with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to advance the bill to final passage. thank you, and i yield the floor. >> we come to the floor my colleagues have already been out here today it's a great day for aviation because we have a product before the united states senate and members will be asked to vote to move forward on consideration on this important aviation safety legislation. as my colleagues have already said, this is a bipartisan, bicameral agreement on the faa reauthorization. it's important to reauthorize bothni the federal aviation administration and the national transportation safetyan board fr another five years. we are not only giving them direction and resources to improve safety, but we are

asking them to keep up-to-date e on the implementation of the latest technologies that help us do just that. ise want to thank my colleague, senator cruz, who was just on the senate floor for helping to negotiate this through the senate commerce committee and ranking member larsen, from my state, for their participation and dedication to producing this bicameral, bipartisan legislation and certainly, certainly want to thank senators duckworth and moran who chair the subcommittee on the aviation area for their important contributions to this legislation. i also want to thank president biden, the secretary, administrator would occur for helping us on all of the input as we move forward on this legislation and certainly want to thank senator schumer and thune and senator duckworth and cinema who helped negotiate the key provisions of this as it relates to pilot safety and training and i definitely,

definitely, definitely want to thank the very hard work of our committee majority staff and the committee, minority staff, for working diligently on this important legislation. i can't tell you how important it is at this point in time for us to show that we are paying attention to these issues. over the last 12 months, several incidences including a door plug blowout, close calls at airports have made the public question where we are with aviation safety. we need to show them that we are asking for, implementing and holding accountable to a gold standard for safety. these incidents underscore why we need a strong authorization bill, why we needed to implement safety improvements, why we need to invest in a safety workforce at the faa and why we need a strong consumer laws on the books that give consumers the right to a refund.

the authorization bill does all sthose things. it provides the direction, it provides the resources that help us build that aviation workforce and it helps us implement safety technology that will be part of the next system and improve aviation airport infrastructure nationwide. some of my colleagues may think faa, okay it's an aviation bill, but what is behind this? aviation contributes 5% of our gdp. that is $1.9 trillion of economic activity and 11 million jobs. getting this right is paramount. i think some people look at what happened during covid and says everyone has workforce shortages, everyone has problems, but workforce everywhere. when you have a workforce problem in aviation, it means

you don't have the highest standards for safety. that is why we have to pass this legislation. our bill gives the aviation workforce the tools and the platform they need. it's talking about machinists, engineers, mechanics, pilots, about flight attendants, baggage handlers, maintenance workers, the people who are really a part of the backbone of an aviation economy. it's simple this bipartisan bill puts safety first. it says we are authorizing over $100 billion so that the faa does meet that gold standard. we also are including a robust reauthorization of the national transportation safety board. this organization has and needs to do its job with the resources to hire investigators, conduct thorough investigations and produce the highest level of

critical analysis as to why we have had safety accidents. the ntsb needs to have the critical fundingut to carry out its important mission like investigating alaska airlines flight 1282 and the train derailment of east palestine. these are important missions that help inform us what is wrong with our system and how they should be improved. unless we have those inspectors atte ntsb, and we've lost them into some have retired, we need to continue to have these most critical investigators. these also fund the safety improvements of the system. it requires new and manufactured commercial aircraft to be equipped as my colleagues have mentioned with the 25 hour cockpit voice recorder. the standard today is just two

hours and what unfortunately happened in the alaska air door plug issues is in those two hours when people were in the aftermath of the confusion, that two hours was overwritten. now we are asking the national transportation safety board to investigate without the most critical information that would have told us exactly what was happening in the cockpit at that time, the voice recorder. this legislation is critical to have a mandate and never to have that overwritten in this time period so we have enough time to investigate. atls the ntsb also will strengtn its board and workforce. it investigates more than 2600 accidents every year, however, it is at the same number of people and staff for decades and hothat is why those 33 more investigators would beet better equipped and better able to

understand emerging technologies. io want to thank senator klobuchar for her leadership, she and her provision on runway traffic and landing safety technology is helping us to reduce collisions or near misses at airports. this and deploying that technology that accurately has been saving lives at various airports and says it needs to be more deployed across the entire country. these critical airport technologies will require all medium and large airports to implement it within the next few years. building on the aircraft certification and accountability act, the bill that we passed in the aftermath of the crashes, thison bill continues to make reforms in aircraft certification to ensure planes we fly meet the highest standards of the faa.

to further the reform certification, we require they provide public notice and opportunity to comment on a significantdu aviation product design changes. a lot of the confusion in the incident is people said they didn't know or didn't understand. this provision ensures the transparency for those proposed exemptions or the current airworthiness standard. it puts the flying public and unfortunately families who've have beenimpacted more in the dt of understanding what changes are being proposed to airplane certifications. it also requires the recurrent training and stronger standards for manufacturing representatives who act on behalf of the federal aviation administration as unit members understand the manufacturing process.and the manufacturing this includes strengthening the members understanding ofhe what

are the international aviation standards, the safety management system which is the gold standard for safety and the key recommendation of the expert reviews' panels report. to ensure safety concerns, also it includes an analysis of what are called service difficulty reports and regular updates to congress. service difficulty reports or information filed by pilots every day after the flight that tells somebody this happened in our carrier, this happened and we are strengthening the requirement for the faa to analyze that information early and frequently and if congress updates on this. again, something requested by the families of the crash incidents. additionally, we authorize

$66.7 billion to boost the faa staff and programs and resources to strengthen the oversight of the manufacturing process. this is critical in providing what are called to safety inspectors by the faa. these are people we hire and train. they go to a community college and take a safety course and they are required to understand what are the obligations of the manufacturer to implement the code the faa has. these air traffic, these individuals from the faa have in their ability to stay current on the latest end of the greatest t technology. to better support their oversight, the agency is required to revise and implement and update the safety inspector

models so that we can increase the responsibilities. in 2021, the inspector general, i'm sorry the department of transportation inspect are highlighted that staffing shortages by the faa flight standards certification management district offices were critical. mr. chairman, mr. president, i want to take a moment to give my condolences to the family of en who was one of these people who helped understand the certification process at what is called the seattle office, that is the office of the faa that oversees the certification. we need people to stand up like he did and said that the certification is only good when the faa says it's good and that's the kind of people we need in the system. we recently lost him to cancer but we will remember his dedication to getting aviation

right. the professional aviation safety specialist passed representing the safety and police estimates that the faa is currently experiencingex a 20% shortage of safety inspectors so implementing a revised model helps us to better capture the inspector workload, what it takes to ensure the next generation of technology is fully understood and to make sure operators and manufacturers are complying with the law. i also want to thank the senator for his helicopter toward safety provision many people know how many people traveled to the state of hawaii to travel on tours in and around those beautiful islands. about that important safety responsibility had to be clear to the operators that they are going to meet the highest standards when moving the public around. another safety provision by senator baldwin,

o-uppercase-letter, welch called the global aviation maintenance safety improvement act will strengthen the oversight for foreign repair stations and create a more level playing field. unfortunately as the maintenance went overseas and they didn'tnce have enough inspectors, where did they not inspect the maintenance and repair of aircraft in those overseas repair stations. but now we are taking away any incentive for someone to do that oversees because the faa will be there and will inspect and make sure that we are meeting the standards, so this will help us bring this back to the united states. there are nearly 1,000 a certified maintenance and repair stations operating outside of the united states, and we have to make sure that they are properly regulated. we are also in this legislation

making sure that the faa workforce is well-trained and advised to help the faa. it helps recruit skilled technical staff to ensure that manufacturers don't take shortcuts and it helps the faa do more direct hiring to quickly fill these positions and one of the most important aspects of the legislation is our most pressing workforce problem and that is the shortage of over 3,000 air traffic controllers. everyone knows that these air traffic controllers are what guide us every day to the safety of our destinations. the bill recognizes that we have shortchanged that investment with air-traffic controllers sometimes working as much as six days a week. we need a workforce that is going to continue to tackle these challenges in this bill and it makes the investment so that happens. we have seen the faa fall short

of the goals before in the workforce training, but this staffing model committed to in this bill will help us fill that gap. i want to thank senator's klobuchar, duckworth, warnock, oran, thune, peters and kelly further workforce development grant program in this legislation. it helps us grow, pilots, mechanics, engineers and technical workforce and to streamline the job pathways for veterans who have real skills in the military and can more easily help us build these aviation rules. our bill requires the gao to also study airport worker standards a step towards getting our baggage handlers and workers and aircraft cleaners the pay and benefits that they deserve. thede bill also does something r the first time for consumers.

it says that you deserve a refund after a three hour delay. even if you have a nonrefundable ticket. you also deserve a refund for an international flight if it's been delayed for six hours, and you can get that refund immediately by talking to the carrier, or if you decide you just don't want to be on the delayed flight, you can get a refund. i want to thank senators markey and vance for a mandate in the bill that says families get to sit together and you can't charge us more. if the airlines a break these rules, guess what happens, the dot assistant secretary is authorized to issue penalties up to $75,000 for fines and penalties to have a strong deterrence. i also want to thank the subcommittee chair for her leadership in making sure

airlines better accommodate passengers with disabilities. it's because of the unbelievable advocacy that we are going to reduce thank senator duckworth for her expertise in helping us. senators tester, fisher and sullivan are to be commended for their hard work to improve essential airs service programs for small and rural communities who need important economic lifelines to have aviation in their communities. we authorize a record $1.7 billion for that program. and overall airport infrastructure is getting a big boost. thank you to senators peter, baldwin and warnock for championing and making sure that airports to dispose of harmful chemicals that are harmful to all of us and i want to thank

senator hicken luther for chairing, senator rosen, morland, warner and wicker that usher in the next generation of technology through aviation, not just drones and air mobility aircraft, but also the research and development necessary to see the electric and hydrogen powered aircraft industry take off in the future. companies like zero in my state or universal hydrogen are leading the way with the next generation of strategies that will help us make these technologies a reality. .. to provide safe operating standards for advanced air mobility and safety for the 2028 olympics coming soon in los angeles. and i also thank senators thune

and warner for their legislation creating a pathway for drones to operate beyond the visual line of sight, which we also included in this bill and to make sure that senator rosen's hard work on the legislation for grants so states can improve the u.s. manufactured drones inspect and repair in critical infrastructure. my colleagues can see that this legislation is full of safety improvement. it helps address a huge part of our u.s. economy. it helps make the aviation system today work better and guarantee that we are going to continue to focus on this for the future. so i thank all my colleagues. i urge them to support the motion to move forward on this legislation that we will be taking shortly and get this to the house before the may 10 deadline. it is great bipartisan work,

bicameral work, but most importantly, it is safety improvement for our aviation --