Why the long TSA lines at Austin’s airport? Local and federal officials trade blame.

Sepulveda directed KUT’s questions to the airport’s communications office, which remained tight-lipped about TSA staffing. It directed inquiries to the federal agency and quickly sought to tamp down expectations that any flights would be canceled.

“There is no precedent for the airport canceling or denying flights due to TSA staffing challenges,” airport spokesperson Sam Haynes said in an email. “The 17 TSA lanes across the four checkpoints can accommodate the volume of passengers. The Department of Aviation does not cancel flights.”

The TSA, meanwhile, fired back at Sepulveda’s claim that agents are refusing to move to Austin.

“That is NOT true,” TSA spokesperson Patricia Mancha wrote in an email. “Austin gets a fair share of voluntary transfers from all over the nation.”

“Like all other organizations and companies, TSA is in the process of hiring staff,” she said. “Our process is longer than that of other companies since we do an extensive background check and medical evaluation.”

Mancha in part blamed airport infrastructure for long early-morning lines. She said TSA forecast more than 3,200 passengers would come through its checkpoints next Monday, but it would need 22 lanes to process them.

“We only have 17 lanes, so the large number of passengers will obviously have to wait in line,” Mancha said.

But the TSA has struggled to keep the existing 17 lanes open at AUS. Last Monday morning, when TSA waits of over 90 minutes forced some passengers to rebook flights, the agency said it didn’t initially have enough agents to staff three new screening lanes airport staff opened late last year.

The TSA staffing situation at the airport is serious enough that city Aviation Department officials have asked TSA leadership to bring in even more emergency workers through the NDF. Local airport officials are also asking for help from Congress.

“The airport and TSA all need to be working together better and sooner to plan for events like this,” said U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat whose district includes AUS. “We don’t need finger-pointing back and forth. We need to solve the problem.”

Doggett pointed to President Joe Biden’s recommended budget for Fiscal Year 2023, which would increase TSA pay and benefits by about 29 percent to $7.1 billion. Doggett said he also supports House Resolution 903, a bipartisan bill to address high TSA turnover by offering front-line workers the same protections most federal employees already have.

“TSA workers have had many problems through the years and have felt they’ve been a second-class part of the federal workforce,” Doggett said.

Airport staff told the congressman last week that part of the problem was TSA had ended mandatory overtime right as the volume of travelers was increasing. An airport spokesperson said aviation staff had requested TSA do everything it can to help.

TSA’s Mancha said mandatory overtime is used off and on at the discretion of the federal security director at each airport based on need. TSA agents can be required to work up to six days a week.

“They’re not going to try to burn out their staff or make staff use mandatory overtime if there’s no need,” Mancha said.

But that very tool used to alleviate staffing shortages – mandatory overtime – could also be exacerbating them, according to union leadership.

TSA’s local union president did not respond to a request for comment Monday before this story was published.

But in the past, AFGE TSA Council 100 President Hydrick Thomas told KUT, inflexibility around scheduling mandatory overtime was causing people to leave TSA for other federal agencies, many of which pay better.

“How do you tell a single parent, we’re mandating you to come into work on your day off, and she has no one to watch the child?” Thomas said. “If the employees were getting paid decent wages, they wouldn’t mind working every day.”

This story was produced as part of the Austin Monitor’s reporting partnership with KUT. This story has been corrected since publication. Eugene Sepulveda was appointed to the commission by Council Member Pio Renteria, not Mayor Steve Adler, as was originally reported.

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