By D.R. STEWART, Staff Writer

Tulsa World

1/24/2012

Gov. Mary Fallin told 40 elementary school children and a couple dozen aerospace officials on Tuesday that Oklahoma’s aerospace industry needs talented science, technology, engineering and mathematics students.

Speaking at a press conference at the Tulsa Air and Space Museum to promote the 2012 Aviator Ball, Fallin said the future is bright for young people at the state’s 500 aerospace companies.

“As I look out over you children today, I will ask, ‘How many of you would like to fly this airplane?’” Fallin said, gesturing behind her at the museum’s Ranger 2000 trainer.

Forty young students from Celia Clinton Elementary School raised their hands.

“How many of you like to play video games?” Fallin asked.

Forty young hands shot skyward.

“If you like to play video games, the cockpits of these planes look a lot like video games,” the governor said. “You ladies and young men could be pilots, too, someday …. These are great opportunities ahead of you.

“The aerospace industry pays almost twice as much as a regular job …. It’s a great future for young people.”

Joining Fallin, an honorary co-chair of the 2012 Aviator Ball, were honorary co-chairs Meredith Siegfried, CEO of NORDAM, and Lindy Ritz, director of the FAA Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center in Oklahoma City.

Also speaking were Rachel Hutchings, corporate relations manager for American Airlines and chair of the Oklahoma Aerospace Alliance, and Steve Hendrickson, director of governmental relations at Boeing and board member of the Oklahoma Aerospace Alliance.

The 2012 Aviator Ball is a fundraising event of the Tulsa Air and Space Museum, which encourages students through its educational programs to pursue careers in aerospace by taking courses in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

The 2012 Aviator Ball will be held April 28 at American Airlines’ Hangar 80, just east of TASM, at Tulsa International Airport.

FierceGovernmentIT

1/22/2012

Turnover of top executives at the Federal Aviation Administration has led to a lack of institutional knowledge at the agency, said Toni Trombecky, a 31 year veteran of the agency serving out her final months there.

“It’s not that they’re making bad decisions–they’re making uninformed decisions, because they don’t have all the information that previous executives had,” said Trombecky, while speaking Jan. 20 at an event hosted by the Association of Government Accountants, in Washington, D.C. Trombecky, the manager of FAA strategic planning, has accepted a job as deputy performance improvement officer at the Veterans Affairs Department.

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The FAA, she noted, is in the midst of an extensive modernization effort known as NextGen; official estimates of the program’s cost place it at $40 billion.

Agency officials, she added, anticipate budget reductions that could cause them to cut programs now underway.

“We’re looking at what do we stop doing, what are the programs that we shut down,” she said. After the event, Trombecky said she doesn’t know which efforts may be on the chopping block, but said the agency is prepared to shut down entire programs.

“When you do these salami slices, you get to a point in any organization, government or not, that you cannot do the salami slices anymore. You have to make the tough decision of what programs, what things, got to get done,” she said.

 By ANDY PASZTOR and SUSAN CAREY

 The Wall Street Journal

 1/24/2012

The House plans to consider a short-term funding bill for the Federal Aviation Administration on Tuesday that lawmakers, airline-industry officials and labor leaders expect could quickly pave the way to multiyear funding for the agency.

The decision to take up the issue Tuesday reflects a bipartisan agreement reached last week over controversial labor provisions that have blocked passage of a full-blown FAA bill for years. Once endorsed by the House and Senate, the agreement is expected to result in more-stable FAA budgets and stronger policy direction for the agency.

In particular, it’s likely to provide momentum for upgrading the nation’s air-traffic control system, according to industry and union officials.

The lack of clear-cut marching orders or long-term budget guidelines from Congress has been among the reasons the FAA has had difficulty persuading U.S. airlines to invest heavily in equipment necessary to make the shift from aging ground-based, traffic-control systems to satellite-based networks that would save fuel and allow pilots greater flexibility in choosing routes.

A long-term funding plan also is expected to allow the FAA to address safety issues that have been in limbo for some time, including whether to mandate tighter federal controls on cargo airlines carrying lithium batteries.

The current short-term FAA funding extension runs out Jan. 31, and it is expected that one more interim extension will be approved. But by mid-February, lawmakers, congressional staffers, industry officials and labor leaders all expect approval of a full-blown reauthorization of the FAA, perhaps for as long as four years.

Republican Rep. John Mica of Florida, Chairman of the House Transportation Committee, on Monday said lawmakers were poised to “complete work on a few remaining issues” before final passage. Those range from the level of government subsidies for carriers serving rural airports to how many new slots—takeoff and landing assignments—airlines can get at Washington’s Reagan National Airport for flights longer than 1,250 miles.

Last week’s agreement over union-organizing rules ends a lengthy stalemate over FAA funding that has frustrated both airlines and their unions, and even raised the threat of a White House veto. The deal over union-organizing rules represents a rare legislative compromise between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, and Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the Republican House Speaker.

Hammered out late last week, the deal follows more than four years of partisan battles and nearly two dozen short-term FAA funding extensions, which temporarily shut down some agency offices last year and clouded the future of important aviation programs.

The compromise leaves in place a change in the way the National Mediation Board counts votes for unionization in the airline and rail industries. The 2010 shift allows a majority of those casting ballots to approve a union. By contrast, the old rule required a majority of all eligible workers to back the union, with those who failed to cast ballots counted as “no votes.” This made it harder for unions to gain a foothold in some airlines. House Republicans pushed for the new rule to be rolled back, while Senate Democrats wanted the rule to stand.

The agreement does require 50% of the employees to sign cards before a union election is scheduled, up from 35% today; it also calls for the NMB to hold runoff elections under certain circumstances, which could make it more difficult for unions to be certified. And under the compromise, the Comptroller General will regularly audit and provide independent review of unionization votes.

The main airline trade group and industry unions back the compromise.

The Transport Workers Union, which represents diverse airline employees including ground workers at AMR Corp.’s American Airlines and flight attendants at Southwest Airlines Co., supported the deal on Monday. “We can live within those rules,” said James Little, the union’s president.

The Air Line Pilots Association, which represents pilots at multiple U.S. carriers, applauded the House and Senate leadership on the breakthrough, as did the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, which represents air-traffic controllers.

Airlines for America, the main airline industry trade group, said the compromise “underscores the importance of this industry” and likewise urged Congress to “quickly resolve the remaining differences and pass a long-term bill.”

 Tulsa World

 1/24/2012

 The Transport Workers Union, which has objected to the hiring of labor consultant Bain & Co. in the bankruptcy case of American Airlines parent AMR Corp., will picket former Bain executive and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, union officials said Monday.

In the days leading up to the Florida primary election on Jan. 31, TWU members will picket outside Romney’s campaign offices in Florida, officials said.

“Mitt Romney is a job cremator, not a job creator,” said TWU President James C. Little. “He made a fortune snatching up companies, closing factories and laying off workers. Now, Bain & Co. – which still lines Mitt Romney’s pockets with their profits – has been hired to ax workers at AMR Corp.”

On Friday, the TWU filed an objection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York to AMR’s proposed employment of Bain.

The union’s lawyers said the New York-based firm is being hired to reduce jobs at AMR subsidiary American Eagle Airlines, a regional airline affiliate of American Airlines.

“The consulting firm was not hired to renegotiate aircraft leases, advise on financing or alter route structures; their sole function is eliminating employees,” the TWU said.

American Airlines and American Eagle workers are employed at 171 U.S. airports, including Tulsa International Airport, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Chicago O’Hare International Airport and John F. Kennedy International Airport.

“It’s outrageous that someone running for president as a ‘job creator’ is going to enrich himself by cutting pensions, cutting wages and destroying American jobs,” Little said. “Like so many on Wall Street, Mitt Romney earns his money by destroying the jobs of airline employees.

“We’re going to do our best to make sure voters in Florida and elsewhere know exactly where Mitt gets his money.”

 Tulsa World

 1/24/2012

AMR Corp., the parent of American Airlines, proposes to hire nine advisers and consultants at rates ranging to $1,365 per hour to assist in the company’s bankruptcy restructuring, court documents show.

The consultants include tax advisers, labor consultants, auditors, special aircraft counsel, employee benefits advisers and management consultants, court filings say.

AMR filed its Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization petition in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York on Nov. 29.

The filing listed assets of $22.87 billion and liabilities of $30.08 billion.

AMR’s applications to hire the advisers and consultants reveal the complexity and worldwide reach of its businesses as well as the enormous cost of the Chapter 11 bankruptcy restructuring.

The company, for instance, has asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane for authority to hire KPMG LLP as its tax consultant, at hourly rates from $200 to $590, and for tax compliance services, at rates from $146 to $1,365 per hour.

KPMG’s tax consulting services will include determining the tax basis of AMR’s assets; analyzing the tax implications of AMR’s various reorganization scenarios; analysis of potential bad debt; analysis of the tax impact of any potential dispositions of assets in bankruptcy for U.S. federal and state income tax purposes; and analysis of tax implications of any potential merger and/or acquisitions with third parties, among more than a dozen other services, court documents show.

Tax compliance services provided to AMR include preparation of host country and, if required, home country individual income tax returns; preparation of state and local, provincial, communal and cantonal tax returns; preparation of U.S. estimated tax vouchers; and assistance with routine correspondence with the tax authorities including the review of tax assessments.

AMR’s application to employ McKinsey Recovery & Transformation Services U.S. LLC, McKinsey & Co. Inc. United States and McKinsey & Company Inc. Japan reveals that a company with global operations may consider multiple bankruptcy strategies depending on the location of its businesses.

AMR proposes to hire the McKinsey firms to evaluate AMR’s business plan, including financial projections.

The Fort Worth-based carrier proposes to pay the McKinsey companies from $100 to $985 per hour, depending on the level of expertise.

“McKinsey and its affiliates are a management consulting firm whose members have extensive experience in improving the operational performance of financially troubled companies,” AMR says in its application to employ. “McKinsey and its affiliates have considerable experience working with airlines, airports and other parties in the aviation industry.

“In the last five years, McKinsey and its affiliates worldwide have completed approximately 400 engagements and 600 consultant years serving aviation-related clients, including scheduled air transportation providers, and various airport authorities/operators and aviation authorities. This experience has given McKinsey and its affiliates a unique understanding of industry trends and of key strategic operational success factors.”

Sidney K. Swinson, an attorney who teaches bankruptcy law at the University of Tulsa, said AMR’s applications to employ the consultants reveal the complexity and high public profile of the case.

“In New York and Delaware, the (bankruptcy) courts are much more liberal about allowing a company to employ professionals because these cases are so huge,” Swinson said. “The hourly rates are the price you pay for having the case in New York.

“If that’s the going rate for attorneys in New York City, they are among the finest lawyers in the country.”

The Journal Record

1/24/2012

TULSA – Growing membership and pushing a narrow state legislative agenda are two goals for T. Hastings Siegfried, chairman-elect of The State Chamber of Oklahoma.

Siegfried, Nordam’s vice chairman and chief operating officer, takes the reins from current chairman Bill Burgess this summer.

Siegfried will be introduced during a chamber legislative kickoff reception on Tuesday at Southern Hills Country Club.

“Last year we saw a big movement toward business and tax reforms,” Siegfried said. “The challenges going forward will be collaboration, working with all the people who have different ideas about how to work for change that is good for Oklahoma.”

Coming from Tulsa as the incoming chairman is a big advantage to engage the Tulsa business community, Siegfried said.

“Tulsa needs a larger voice in the Capitol and we have such a large manufacturing workforce,” Siegfried said.

Siegfried expects to work in tandem with the Tulsa Metro Chamber.

“With all the relationships we’ve formed with the Tulsa chamber and regional chambers, we look for even more collaboration between these chambers,” Siegfried said.

Mike Neal, president and CEO of the Tulsa Metro Chamber, echoed Siegfried’s comments. Neal added that the Tulsa Metro Chamber and The State Chamber are not in competition.

“We are allies to create a business climate where we attract new companies and enable our existing companies to grow and expand,” Neal said. “The 2011 Agenda for Jobs, a joint effort between The State Chamber, Tulsa Metro Chamber and Greater Oklahoma City Chamber, is an example of how our collaborative partnerships support economic development success.”

Membership in The State Chamber was up 7 percent in 2011 to 2,100, compared to the previous year.

“There is always room to grow,” Siegfried said. “We want to step back and look at the structure as it is today and ask ourselves, ‘is there potentially a better way?’”

A potential focus would be northeast Oklahoma, Siegfried said.

“We’d like to raise our visibility in northeast Oklahoma,” Siegfried said. “We see it as a challenge to grow our influence in this part of the state.”

The State Chamber intends to have a narrow approach toward key legislative items, Siegfried said.

“The key will be more on helping the Capitol know what matters,” Siegfried said.

The State Chamber will still pursue issues regarding taxation, health insurance, economic development, lawsuit reform, energy, workers’ compensation, water, transportation and education. The difference is that there are fewer key issues than in the past.

“We’ll be focused on getting things moving,” Siegfried said.

After graduating from Notre Dame in 1994, Siegfried, who grew up in Tulsa, became a Tulsa police officer. Today he is a reserve deputy for the Tulsa County sheriff’s office.

Siegfried has followed the advice of his father, Ray Siegfried.

“Do what you can for your community,” Siegfried said.

Siegfried and his wife, Dianne, have three daughters: Hayden 13, Sydney 11 and Avery 8.

Oklahoma Gazette

1/18/2012

Oklahoma City officials are likely to consider by next fall an incentives package to Boeing for an anticipated 800 to 900 jobs being relocated from Wichita, Kan.

Earlier action is expected for an incentives package involving 550 Boeing jobs already coming to OKC from Long Beach, Calif. In March, the city’s Economic Development Trust will likely receive Boeing’s application for the second part of that incentives package.

Boeing announced Jan. 4 that it will close its Wichita facility, which employs about 2,160 workers, and shift many of those positions to Oklahoma City and San Antonio. In a media release, Boeing indicated its contracts in Wichita have matured, programs have come to a close and that site was not likely to maintain and win new business.

“The decision to close our Wichita facility was difficult, but ultimately based on a thorough study of the current and future market environment and our ability to remain competitive while meeting our customers’ needs with the best and most affordable solutions,” said Mark Bass, vice president and general manager for Boeing Defense, Space & Security’s Maintenance, Modifications and Upgrades division.

“We recognize how this will affect the lives of the highly skilled men and women who work here, so we will do everything possible to assist our employees, their families and our community through this difficult transition,” Bass said.

Most of the jobs are expected to arrive in Oklahoma City in 2013. Any incentives package application would not arrive before the city’s Economic Development Trust until later this year, said Robin Roberts Krieger, executive vice president of economic development with the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber.

“It’s really a wonderful addition to the community: highly skilled, highly paid positions,” she said. “It does a lot to increase our overall economic base. It creates opportunities for our citizens, as well as growth for the community.”

The city already has given the company $1.5 million through its strategic investment program when Boeing brought in 232 new jobs last year. Those positions came from Boeing’s C-130 avionics modernization program, which had been in Long Beach, Calif. With a payroll of around $20 million, the 232 jobs each have an average annual salary of $90,000. Around 318 more jobs from the company’s B-1 operations are expected to begin arriving soon.

Boeing almost has filled its current Oklahoma City facility, and is working on a 320,000-square-foot facility next door as part of its second phase, which is expected to open in April.

State funds also are involved in the Boeing jobs. The company is participating in the state’s 21st Century Quality Jobs program, which focuses on high-skilled, high-paying jobs. More than 250 new jobs created by Boeing have qualified it for as much as around $26 million over a 10-year period, according to the state Department of Commerce. The company also qualified for a maximum of approximately $6.5 million in rebates for 207 jobs created under a separate state initiative, the Quality Jobs program.

For the most recently announced jobs stemming from Wichita, there has not yet been a formal incentives offer from the city to Boeing.

“We just don’t know yet,” said Cathy O’Connor, president of the Alliance for Economic Development of Oklahoma City. “They’re saying around 800 jobs. Until we get the actual numbers and the amount of capital investment they plan to make and what those average wages are going to be, we really don’t know what their recommended amount for a local incentive will be.”

Still, Oklahoma City has confirmed that the company qualifies for the city’s incentives program, said Oklahoma City Economic Development Program Manager Brent Bryant.

The numbers break down to around $6,450 of offered city incentives for each Boeing job that already has come here.

If the same rate is offered by the city for the jobs coming from Wichita, incentives would be somewhere around $5.16 million.

However, that number does not take into account capital investment by the company, which would likely push incentives higher, Bryant said.

By Brian Brus, Oklahoma City reporter

The Journal Record

1/24/2012

OKLAHOMA CITY – Oklahoma City’s economic development leadership is basking in the promise of more than 800 engineering and program support jobs from the Boeing Co., but they’re also keenly aware of the painful lesson Wichita, Kan., recently learned.

“We were not so lucky with General Motors and Lucent Technologies,” said Roy Williams, president and CEO of the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber. “Sometimes you have zero control over what happens to companies in your community.

“But having said that, you do everything you can to establish a relationship and establish a rapport so that if there are issues looming out there, they have the trust and confidence to bring you in and talk about it,” he said.

Boeing officials this month announced that in order to stay competitive, the company would relocate hundreds of jobs from Wichita to Oklahoma City by the end of 2013. Those programs include the B-52, the massive jet-powered bomber designed for the U.S. Air Force. By the end of the transition, the city’s Boeing operations will number about 2,000 employees.

Oklahoma City’s benefit is Wichita’s loss, however, as the company announced the closure of its Defense, Space and Security facility. Less than a year ago, Boeing executives said that if the company won a multibillion-dollar tanker refueling contract, Wichita would benefit from at least 1,500 new jobs. Over the years, that city’s leadership has helped the company with an estimated $4 billion in incentives such as tax breaks and municipal bonds. The company has been in Wichita for about 80 years and has been one of its largest employers.

So Wichita thought it had a relationship and rapport with Boeing, too, just as Williams said Oklahoma City has been developing. It may not be enough.

“We had a good relationship with General Motors; we met often with the GM president,” Williams said. “We thought we had a good relationship with Lucent Technologies as well. But sometimes corporate decision-making isn’t based on relationships. It’s based on economics; it’s based on management philosophy. … You do the best you can and you never take a relationship for granted.”

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett agreed that it’s impossible to predict or control the direction a company will turn, even with the best communication. He also echoed another of Williams’ points.

“All of our incentives here are performance-based. So they would be free to leave at any time, but their incentives would stop the moment they left,” Cornett said.

Cornett said the metro area has leverage that Wichita doesn’t in that the federal government has continued to show support for Tinker Air Force Base, which has allowed the local aeronautics industry to grow to a healthy size. Cornett said it would behoove the city to maintain a business-friendly culture at all levels of government.

The city has a program similar to the state’s Quality Jobs incentive that pays off on a percentage of a company’s payroll once a preset number of jobs are created at an agreed income level. Williams said earlier that Boeing hasn’t announced yet how much the Oklahoma City jobs will pay.

“Here, they don’t get the incentive until after they have produced,” Williams said. “We don’t front them resources and money and infrastructure, so we have much more of a relationship with them rather than an adversarial position if there’s a change in the business climate.”

And the chamber has beefed up its business retention and expansion program, with two full-time positions dedicated to call on the region’s top 250 to 300 employers to ensure they have access to resources and information, Williams said.

But even then, sometimes local management teams have no idea what their corporate headquarters have in mind, he said.

“Do I acknowledge that things can be cyclical?” Cornett said. “Yeah, Oklahoma City’s riding high today. But we haven’t always been that way, and we probably won’t always be that way. … Our economy will one day be at the other end, and companies like Boeing will have to make new decisions.”

-          Oklahoma City officials are likely to consider by next fall an incentives package to Boeing for an anticipated 800 to 900 jobs being relocated from Wichita, Kan. (Oklahoma Gazette)

-          Growing membership and pushing a narrow state legislative agenda are two goals for T. Hastings Siegfried, chairman-elect of The State Chamber of Oklahoma. Siegfried, Nordam’s vice chairman and chief operating officer, takes the reins from current chairman Bill Burgess this summer. (The Journal Record)

-          AMR Corp., the parent of American Airlines, proposes to hire nine advisers and consultants at rates ranging to $1,365 per hour to assist in the company’s bankruptcy restructuring, court documents show. The consultants include tax advisers, labor consultants, auditors, special aircraft counsel, employee benefits advisers and management consultants, court filings say. (Tulsa World)

-          The Transport Workers Union, which has objected to the hiring of labor consultant Bain & Co. in the bankruptcy case of American Airlines parent AMR Corp., will picket former Bain executive and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, union officials said Monday. (Tulsa World)

-          The House plans to consider a short-term funding bill for the Federal Aviation Administration on Tuesday that lawmakers, airline-industry officials and labor leaders expect could quickly pave the way to multiyear funding for the agency. (The Wall Street Journal)

-          Turnover of top executives at the Federal Aviation Administration has led to a lack of institutional knowledge at the agency, said Toni Trombecky, a 31 year veteran of the agency serving out her final months there. (FierceGovernmentIT)

-          Gov. Mary Fallin told 40 elementary school children and a couple dozen aerospace officials on Tuesday that Oklahoma’s aerospace industry needs talented science, technology, engineering and mathematics students. (Tulsa World)

Gov. Mary Fallin, NORDAM Group CEO Meredith Siegfried and aerospace officials are scheduled to hold a news conference at 10 a.m. Tuesday at the Tulsa Air and Space Museum to promote the 2012 Aviator Ball. 

Fallin, Siegfried and Lindy Ritz, director of the FAA Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center in Oklahoma City, are honorary co-chairs of the 2012 Aviator Ball, which is a fundraising effort of the Tulsa museum. 

The 2012 Aviator Ball will be held April 28 at American Airlines’ Hangar 80 at Tulsa International Airport, organizers said.