Page 24 - Volume 16 Number 1

NATIONAL BUSINESS AVIATION ASSOCIATION • focusAviators Welcome Restoration of BARR’s Privacy ProtectionsOn November 17, 2011, the National an NBAA Member Company. Pierce flies aBusiness Aviation Association (NBAA)applauded final congressional passage of a comprehensive appropriations bill that included language reinstating the Block Aircraft Registration Request (BARR) program.It was an advocacy milestone after nearly a year of hard work by NBAA, its Members and many others across the general aviation (GA) community to win back the right to “opt out” from public tracking on the Internet for owners and operators of GA aircraft in U.S. airspace.The bill was signed by the President as soon as Congress approved it.“We are pleased that by including this language in an important appropriations bill, members of the House and Senate have demonstrated their understanding that the Administration’s effort to curtail the BARR program paves the way for unwarranted invasions of the privacy of aircraft owners and operators, threatens competitiveness for companies and poses a potential security risk for people aboard business airplanes,” said NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen. “The BARR is a congressionally enabled program, and it’s clear that Congress doesn’t want the government to limit it.”Shortly after the congressional measure was singed into law, NBAA was joined by the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) and the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) in welcoming a December 2, 2011 announcement by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that it was suspending its requirement that aircraft owners and operators provide a “valid security concern” in order to be included in the program.Cheers From the Flight Line“I am absolutely thrilled,” said Brad Pierce, president of Restaurant Equipment World,turbo Cirrus from his base in Orlando, FL, to destinations around the country, meeting with both vendors and customers. Like many NBAA Members, Pierce said he routinely used BARR to keep competitors from tracking his movements until he was no longer eligible for the program when the FAA moved to limit it on August 2.“Without the BARR, there were a number of flights we did not make to airfields right at our customers’ and vendors’ locations,” Pierce explained. “We have gone to alternate airfields that are less convenient. We had to drive further from the airport and lost efficiency that way.”Now, he said, “I’ll be the first to sign up for the new BARR program.”Path to BARR Program Reinstatement Was a Bumpy RideEarlier in the year, NBAA and AOPA filed a federal court challenge to the government’s curtailment of the program, and the EAA filed a friend of the court brief supporting the suit.Following a hearing in U.S. District Court in Washington, DC, in which a government attorney conceded that the FAA would no longer defend its revised policy, it appeared the case will conclude to the satisfaction of the three associations.The lawsuit’s goal was to win reinstatement of the BARR’s original intent: the right to privacy that an owner or operator could exercise by filing a request to block an airplane’s tail number from public view.In March, the FAA formally proposed to limit availability of the BARR program only to parties who could prove a “valid security concern.” The decade-old, congressionally enabled BARR program was established to provide aircraft22 • TWIN & TURBINE JANUARY 2012