Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Transit Fun pun headline of the day meets not-so-fun news item of the day
Posted by Gwynedd Stuart @gwynnstu on Wed, Aug 25, 2010 at 6:06 PM
From the AJC:
Airport manager finalists bring baggage
AAAAAAAAAAAhahaha. Airport managers. Baggage. Too easy.
Oh, wait. This actually isn't funny.
Mayor Kasim Reed has announced the final three candidates vying for the position of chief of Hartsfield-Jackson Airport: Louis Miller of Tampa, Lester Robinson of Detroit and John D. Clark of Indianapolis. Apparently, all three have created some form of controversy whilst managing airports in other cities.
The very tail end of an article posted yesterday noted:
Clark, Miller and Robinson each have encountered controversy in the past, over matters ranging from travel expenses in Clark’s case to zoning issues in Miller’s case, according to news reports in other cities. In Detroit, the airport authority declined to renew his contract after a long tenure, but praised him while announcing his departure.
Full disclosure: the paper I worked for in Jacksonville, FL, Folio Weekly, covered John Clark's tenure as director of Jacksonville International Airport (where he was employed before hitting the road for Indy in 2009), and there's more to the story than just some issues with travel expenses.
Clark was extremely unpopular among airport employees and Jacksonville residents, particularly those in the neighborhood where he attempted to ram through a proposal to extend the runway at Craig Airport to allow bigger jets to land even though an edict in the city's comprehensive plan had promised residents that wouldn't happen. Whenever criticized, Clark would threaten to downsize or privatize airport services — police, janitorial, etc. — much to the dismay of airport employees. Oh, and about the travel expenses, in a matter of one year, Clark jetted to Paris, London, Shanghai, Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo and Cairo, all on the airport authority's dime. On a trip to Brussels he stayed in a $435-a-night hotel, a $726-a-night hotel in Buenos AIres and a $582-a-night hotel in Paris. As of April, he was being investigated by Florida's 4th Judicial Circuit State Attorney Angela Corey for his expenditures.
Almost right off the bat, the AJC's oh-so-cleverly-titled article makes excuses for the candidates. The oh-so-cleverly-named Gerald FitzGerald, a former airport manager and aviation consultant, offered this interesting sound bite:
“Tell me an airport manager who doesn’t have a controversy and I’ll tell you he’s not doing his job,” said FitzGerald. Airport managers must take risks to solve problems, he said, and if they never encounter controversy, they’re “playing it too close to the vest."
Guess that's one way to look at it.
Comments (5)
Showing 1-5 of 5
Is there any surprise there is controversy in the city's handling of the airport? It's a mini-Chicago and I'm not referring to O'Hare. Look for a mini-Capone or mini-BlogOYovich to land this plum position.
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Whatever, dude. The republicans at the state house take the cake for controversy. I recall the speaker of the house resigning recently for sleeping with a lobbyist. Or how about the hall in the capitol where all the young female lobbyists hang out. We may as well rout out corruption and controversy at all levels of government.
And you don't even know half the story yet
http://tampa.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/…
The Atlanta airport already has all its employees outsourced to airline insiders who pay their employees a low enough wage to qualify for Medicaid benefits--saving tons of money for the company and airport. They then fire people before they can earn seniority with the increased wages and benefits associated with such.
How do I know this?
My wife used to work for one of these companies.
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