United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2001-07-09 monographic deposited born digital 108 p. GA 1.13:GAO-01-821 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821 P0b002ee180376ee8 f:d01821 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-23 GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821 GAO-01-821 Airline regulation Commercial aviation Agency proceedings Air transportation operations Transportation safety FAA Core Compensation Plan FAA Flight Operational Quality Assurance Program Other Written Product A01381 The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) develops regulations to enhance aviation safety and security and to promote the efficient use of airspace. FAA's rulemaking is a complicated process intended to ensure that all aspects of any regulatory change are fully analyzed before the change goes into effect. Over the past 40 years, numerous reports have documented problems in FAA's rulemaking efforts that have delayed the formulation and finalization of it rules. This report reviews FAA's rulemaking process. GAO reviewed 76 significant rules and found that FAA's rulemaking process varied widely. These rules constituted the majority of FAA's workload of significant rules from fiscal year 1995 through fiscal year 2000. GAO found that FAA had initiated about 60 percent of the rulemaking projects by Congress and about a third of the rulemaking projects recommended by the National Transportation Safety Board within 6 months. However, for one-fourth of the mandates and one-third of the recommendations, at least five years passed before FAA initiated the process. Once the rule was formally initiated, FAA took a median time of two and a half years to proceed from formal initiation of the rulemaking process through publication of the final rule. In 1998, FAA implemented reforms to improve the rulemaking process and shorten the time frames for finalizing rules. These reforms included establishing a steering committee and a rulemaking management council to improve management involvement in setting priorities and resolving policy issues. GAO found that after the reforms were implemented, the median time for reviewing and finalizing a rule increased. This suggests that the productivity of FAA's rulemaking process for significant rules decreased after FAA's reforms. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821.pdf GAO-01-821 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-01-821 Other Written Product GAO-01-821; Aviation Rulemaking: Further Reform Is Needed to Address Long-standing Problems; Airline regulation Commercial aviation Agency proceedings Air transportation operations Transportation safety FAA Core Compensation Plan FAA Flight Operational Quality Assurance Program