TSOJoe

I would imagine this would not be a popular opinion amoung my fellow "Officers", but the $1 billion of so spent on BDO stuff (and unproven science, at best) MIGHT be better spent to have a TSA fully trained/certified armed police officer at each checkpoint that needed it.

That said, I do not qulify to be armed and would not want to be.

tom911

Or just reimburse local law enforcement for providing an increased level of service. There's no need for a new federal police force to just stand around checkpoints.

How would you provide a TSA police force with the well-rounded experience a city or county police officer gets? Just standing around at a checkpoint all day long does not give you much skill handling domestic violence, crimes against property, or violent crimes.

WillCAD

But the question still stands: HOW would having an armed TSO at every c/p - or even two, one at the entrance and one at the exit - help in any way? Aside from flushing away tens of millions of dollars a year for something that makes people "feel" safer, how does having an armed officer sitting on his butt at the c/p do anything to stop an attack like the one at MSY? Or like the one at LAX?

I appreciate your admission that the BDO program is a waste (personally I think it's worse, it's a deliberate con job perpetrated on the American people), but I think you need to wake up and realize that merely having a guy with a gun sitting on a chair, standing in a corner, or hanging out around you does not make you any safer from a nutjob with a grudge.

To be perfectly honest, I think a lot of dedicated airport/port police agencies have that same problem. Their mandate is often to provide security at specific sites or installations, which doesn't give them that variety of experience you mention.

jkhuggins

Ah, but TSA tells us that ceremonial weapons are just as dangerous as real ones, right?

tom911

Around here all the airport police are branches of local PD/SO, be it SFPD, Alameda County Sheriff, San Jose PD, or Sacramento County Sheriff - so the airport is just one of many assignments open to them. I don't know what the selection process is for those slots and how long the assignment is. I know in my own PD officers were required to rotate out of bureaus after a couple years and could not camp out in them, so they were there for the short-term and not a lifetime, and there was regular movement in and out of new officers from other divisions.

Would be interesting if the TSA came up with a proposal to take over airport law enforcement as to whether local police would readily turn the entire airport over to them or want to run a split operation where the TSA polices only certain areas and airport police handle others. I've only seen a TSA union spokesperson advocate that they want their own armed officers at the checkpoints, but what's to stop it just at that level? Why not take over the entire airport if you think local law enforcement is not meeting the challenge?

You might think that a police officer assigned to a transit agency might have limited exposure to the type of crimes a city police officer would see, but from my time at BART it was just the opposite- they dealt with the same issues except the venue was moving trains, platforms, stations, parking lots, roadways, train yards and buildings. An airport is pretty similar with concourses, corridors, offices, parking lots/structures, lots of moving vehicles, roadways and lots of structures (all those airline-owned facilities including hangars and parts warehouses).

In any event, I don't see a demand, outside of the TSA union spokesman, for some type of independent TSA police force. For one, it would mean local police ceding turf, and that could mean layoffs/downsizing. Will be interesting if anyone in Congress jumps on the bandwagon to support the TSA union proposal.

chollie

You are looking and listening to the wrong people and asking the wrong questions.

Who stands to make $$ if TSOs are armed (and almost certainly 'militarized')?

Congress isn't going to quibble about spending money on something like this, because the people who will benefit most are campaign donors.

New uniforms, weapons, specially-priced-for-the-taxpayer training, probably SWAT gear and vehicles and lots of tech. This looks to be a TSA-style 'special ops' and I doubt that its mission will be limited to airports.

What next - drones patrolling the terminal and parking lots?

Boggie Dog

DFW has its own police department.

tom911

Could you ever see the DFW Airport Police, or for that matter the Port Authority Police that cover three NYC area airports, ever giving up those airports just so a TSA Police Department can step in? It's just not going to happen as those agencies would fight to retain their turf.

Probably not a bad idea. I know they've been testing drones here in the Bay Area and I could see them being of value in tactical situations. If Amazon can use them for deliveries, why not for checking out car burglaries in parking lots? You have no expectation of privacy in a parking lot and you're probably already being monitored by cameras anyway.

petaluma1

Does mega-surveillance prevent crime? I don't believe it does. Yes, it might help catch a perp, but it doesn't stop the crime from being committed.

ScatterX

Exactly. People don't have their undies in a constant wedgie state because they feel the US lacks the ability to investigate and prosecute people. They want the government to "find bad guys" and stop them before they do something. They want the Norman Rockwell reminiscent feeling of perfect safety. TSA feeds on this irrational fear.

Unfortunately, people are not only willing to give it up, but they willingly carry their freedom to the government as part of a trade in program. They rush to surrender their freedom; the government gives them a shiny new trinket of illusion®.

Unfortunately, too many people will go for this and think it's a good idea. Stupid Americans trading liberty for illusions (see above), Congress pandering to these people, and all the insiders padding their wallets. Illusion peddling is good business. @:-)

I like that you added "officers" in quotes.

Agree that BDO $$$s are a complete wastes. Disagree on arming TSA. The need for Arming TSA agents doesn't exists, the premise of doing so is illogical, and it will do more harm than good. TSA "officers" already have a job that they need to focus on. The LEOs/APDs have their job. There is no reason to arm TSA employees. This dilutes their attention, causes more problems than it will solve, and won't solve the "make checkpoints perfectly safe" problem anyway.

The premise behinds these "arm TSA" arguments is fatally flawed. The checkpoint is there to prevent WEI from getting on the plane. If TSA starts trying to prevent WEI from getting to the checkpoint, they will just create another layer of something farther out. Then they will want to protect that layer by adding another layer. Then they will want to protect that layer by adding another layer. Lather, rinse, and repeat. Even after these TSA layers have expanded out to cover people's homes, the bedroom gropers will still not be safe.

There are risks to living in a free society. Taking away all of our freedom does not take away all of the risks. It only takes away our freedom.