Action Alert: Please Urge Your Lawmakers to Support Airport Priorities in FY25 Transportation Appropriations Bill
March 28, 2024
With Congress finally completing action on the Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations bills, lawmakers are quickly gearing up for the FY25 appropriations process. As the budget process unfolds, we need your help as we urge lawmakers to increase funding for the Airport Improvement Program, provide additional funding for supplemental discretionary grants, increase funding for the FAA Contract Tower Program, and adopt other airport priorities.
The Biden administration recently released its FY25 budget request, which is a mixed bag for airports. As expected, it proposed the same $3.35 billion for AIP and failed to include additional funding for supplemental discretionary grants. The final FY24 spending package that contained funds for DOT and FAA included $532 million for supplemental grants with $482.4 million reserved for airport earmarks.
The FY25 DOT/FAA spending bill will be particularly important because we should have a real shot at increasing traditional AIP funding for the first time in many years. Both the House and Senate versions of pending FAA reauthorization legislation, which lawmakers are working to reconcile and finalize before May 10, propose to authorize $4 billion for AIP annually, opening the door for the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to follow suit and appropriate the same amount for AIP next year.
But convincing the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to increase AIP funding is by no means automatic. There is also no guarantee that Congress will appropriate enough funding for supplemental discretionary grants, which lawmakers have used to fund congressional earmarks in recent years. That's why it is critical that you weigh in with your elected officials to explain the importance of those and other airport priorities.
Request: Please reach out to the members of your congressional delegation and ask them to support airport priorities in the FY25 DOT/FAA spending bills. As a reminder, individual office deadlines for programmatic requests are closing soon. Contact information for your Representative is available via this link and for your Senators is available via this link.
Our list of airport priorities for the FY25 DOT/FAA spending bill is below, and a one-pager with these same items may be viewed here. Our list of priorities for the FY25 DHS/TSA/CBP spending bill may be viewed here.
FY25 DOT/FAA Appropriations Priorities
• Provide Full Funding for the Airport Improvement Program and Supplemental Discretionary Grants: The Airport Improvement Program provides federal grants to S. airports for projects to enhance airport safety, capacity, security, and to address environmental concerns. The program has a decades-long record of success in funding critical airport infrastructure. According to the FAA, airports have $62.4 billion in AIP- and BIL-eligible projects – or some $12.5 annually – through FY27. Those estimates do not include other non-eligible infrastructure projects and requirements, which increase total airport capital needs to more than $23 billion annually. AAAE urges Congress to fund AIP at $4 billion in FY25 consistent with pending House and Senate FAA reauthorization bills and provide supplemental discretionary funding so that airports can move forward with critical projects to enhance safety and security and upgrade facilities to meet the needs of the passengers and communities they serve. In recent years, congressionally directed airport projects have been funded via supplemental discretionary resources.
• Increase Funding for the Contract Tower Program: The FAA Contract Tower Program provides 264 smaller airports in 46 states with cost-effective air traffic control services that enhance aviation safety and help connect smaller airports and rural communities with our national air transportation The benefits of this program have been repeatedly validated by the DOT Office of Inspector General. Without this program, many small airports simply would not have tower operations that enhance aviation safety. AAAE urges Congress to provide robust funding for the Contract Tower Program to fund all 264 contract towers currently in the program and allow the FAA to add other airports to the program during this fiscal year.
• Help Small Communities Retain Commercial Air Service: In recent years, airlines have reduced or eliminated commercial air service to a number of communities across the county. To help mitigate the impacts of these reductions, Congress should increase funding for programs that help small communities maintain commercial air service. Specifically, we recommend increasing funding for Essential Air Service and the Small Community Air Service Development Both help to ensure that people who live in rural and less populated areas have access to our national aviation system. AAAE urges Congress to maintain sufficient funding for the Essential Air Service program and the Small Community Air Service Development Program consistent with authorization levels in pending FAA reauthorization bills.
• FAA Use of Space in Airport-Owned Facilities: In the past, proposals have emerged to force airports to provide free space to the FAA despite decades-old arrangements in which the agency has paid below-market rent for FAA facilities located on airport property. Recognizing the significant burden this change would impose on airports – particularly smaller airports – Congress in each year since FY01 has approved a general provision prohibiting the FAA from requiring airports to provide space at no cost. AAAE urges Congress to continue prohibiting FAA from requiring airports to provide space at no cost in FY25.
• Full Funding for the FAA Facilities and Equipment Account: National Airspace System (NAS) modernization, which is funded from the Facilities and Equipment account, is critical to enhancing efficiency and capacity throughout the aviation system. AAAE urges Congress to support funding for critical NextGen programs.
• Airport Cooperative Research Program/Aviation-Related Research and Development: Airport-related R&D offers great promise. The Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP) is of particular importance given the opportunity it provides to undertake key research and other technical activities in a variety of areas including design, construction, maintenance, operations, safety, security, policy, and AAAE urges support for ACRP funding in the FY25 DOT/FAA funding bill.
