FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:Michael Buckley
202/628-9262
Washington, D.C. . . . The following statement was issued today by Edward Wytkind, President of the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO (TTD).
“A senior Bush Administration official’s claim yesterday that transit security on America’s public transportation systems is “outstanding” is both galling and dangerously divorced from reality.
“The statement made by the chief of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) yesterday before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee is the latest in a long line of distortions of the facts from an agency that has paid lip service to the nation’s most pressing transportation security needs.
“It’s time for the TSA to focus less on public relations and more on securing the riding public from security risks. In the four years since the September 11 terrorist attacks, transit security has been badly shortchanged in the President’s budgets; the TSA has refused to mandate and invest in uniform training for front-line mass transit and Amtrak workers; and the well-justified pleas by transit systems for $6 billion in federal security funding have fallen on deaf ears.
“The challenge of securing our transit systems from security risks will require a serious commitment of government resources and leadership from this Administration. Making distorted claims that everything is okay doesn’t protect a single transit passenger or worker.”
TTD represents 29 member unions in the rail, aviation, transit, trucking, highway, longshore, maritime and related industries. For more information, visit ttd.org.