In This Corner...

In a discussion sure to be more lively than we've seen out of the presidential debates so far, Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association president Phil Boyer is scheduled to square off Tuesday in a debate with the airlines' chief lobbyist, Air Transport Association CEO James May.

The topic at the Aero Club of Washington's monthly luncheon, as you may have guessed, will be user fees... and according to AOPA, Boyer "will expose airline and FAA misinformation about the need to radically change how the FAA is funded."

Strong words. However, Boyer -- armed with figures from the Government Accountability Office and the Inspector General of the US Department of Transportation, each saying the current system of ticket and fuel excise taxes will raise more than enough money to modernize the air traffic control system -- intends to convince Aero Club members that switching to a user fee-based system would force Congress to reliquish its oversight responsibility and control to an airline-dominated board.

"Take user fees off the table, then let's have a substantive discussion about how much the new system will cost," Boyer told the House aviation subcommittee in March, and he will reiterate that point in Tuesday's debate.

May enters the debate riding a wave of recent support for the ATA-backed FAA funding plan in several news outlets, as well as from such entities as Fox News pundit Brit Hume, and conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh.

"We absolutely have been overpaying. Our passengers should not be forced to continue to subsidize corporate aircraft," May said recently. But AOPA says that's a point May is flat-out incorrect on.

The notion that "the guy in the middle seat" is subsidizing corporate executives on their way to a golf outing, as the airlines would have you believe, is incorrect, Boyer intends to make clear.

Rather, according to the general aviation advocacy group, the cost of the air traffic control system is driven almost exclusively by the way the airlines use the system -- filling the skies around America’s busiest airports to the saturation point and beyond at peak hours.

Folks, this promises to be an interesting show. Stay tuned.

FMI: www.airlines.org, www.aopa.org, www.aeroclub.org