Director, T.F. Green Airport.
Name: Joseph Salter
Position: Newly appointed Federal Security Director at T.F. Green International Airport and four airports on Cape Cod and the Islands.
Age: 57
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Background: Salter grew up in New York City, and worked as a police officer for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey from 1973 to 1991. He was an air-crash rescue firefighter and crash rescue crew chief at John F. Kennedy Airport, and worked as a criminal investigator at LaGuardia Airport. Salter also taught for four years in the Port Authority Police Academy, managed the pilot program for the Port Authority Police’s canine unit, and received SWAT team training. He was forced to retire from the Port Authority Police Dept. after sustaining a neck injury while arresting a violent suspect. Salter subsequently worked as director of grants and projects for U.S. Congressman Benjamin A. Gilman (R-NY).
Education: B.A., New York Institute of Technology. Has completed graduate-level work in teaching.
Residence: Rhode Island
Salter was appointed Federal Security Director at T.F. Green Airport by the Transportation Security Administration, a federal agency created last winter to oversee security at every public airport in the nation. Congress has mandated that by Nov. 19 all airport screeners be replaced with federal employees, and that all bags be screened for explosives by Dec. 31.
Salter began working at T.F. Green on July 22. Tomorrow (Aug. 13), 100 new, federally trained screeners began working at the airport. The process of hiring a mobile screening work force is still under way.
PBN: A few weeks into the job, what do you see as your greatest challenges at T.F. Green?
Salter: The greatest challenge is getting my people trained, in place, and making it happen. I’ve got to become operational in a very short period of time. I need to make sure my people are trained and the equipment is there. All the nuts and bolts and nitty-gritty things have got to be done. Some people, in the past, might have considered this window dressing. This is not just a window-dressing operation. This is going to be true security, and it’s going to be the best security that’s possible. The American people deserve no less.
Looking down the line a bit, in the next couple of years, there’s been a lot of talk about expansion of T.F. Green, and that’s by no means a done deal. But from a security standpoint, how does expansion of that airport look to you? Would expansion pose a risk?
That depends entirely on what you’re talking about when you talk about expanding the airport. There’s talk about lengthening the runways, there’s talk about moving the footprint beyond its present boundaries. Any changes that would be made to the airport of course I’m interested in, and I would have to make changes accordingly. Airports are dynamic – there’s not one airport that I know of in the country that’s not always going through some sort of growing pains. We have to be able to move with the flow, and that again involves planning. We’ll be ready for any changes that take place, if and when they do take place.
What about critics who say the new legislation federalizing airport security concentrates too much on passengers and ignores the thousands of caterers and cleaners and refuelers and other people who have access to airports and jets?
I don’t know who said that. I don’t know how much that person knows about current levels of airport security, and what the future levels of airport security will involve. I can assure you that there are measures in place at the present time, again which will be enhanced and modified as needs are identified. I can assure you that we’re working toward the goal of 100 percent security. Can we ever obtain 100 percent? Well, the answer is that we’re trying, and that is something beyond perhaps what was done before. Is it possible for something untoward to happen? Of course, it always is. But we’re going to be working like crazy to prevent those things from happening. I don’t know how else to present it to you.
On a more personal level, you’ve picked a real hot seat, and I wonder what makes it worthwhile for you. Why is this something you’ve agreed to take on?
Well, I have a neighbor of mine who said to me, oh, about a week ago – he says, ‘Joe, why did you want this job?’”
Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m wondering.
Well, I don’t know where you were on Sept. 11, but I know where I was. I know I saw the World Trade Center – a place I worked in a good part of my adult life – destroyed by a group of people who’ve made war on America. Thirty-seven Port Authority police officers were murdered on that day. I knew 25 of them, some of them quite closely. There were classmates of mine who were killed, guys that I worked with, guys that I worked for, people that I trained. I look at those pictures every day. I have the picture of our 37 guys in my pocket. I keep that picture there just to keep reminding me why I’m here.
And I’ll never forget them, and their souls will be on my mind forever – and how their lives were taken from them. I’m just going to work as hard as I can to make sure that never happens again.
How many hours a week have you been working?
If I told you I’m getting more than three or four hours (of sleep) a night – that’d be a lot. You want to put something in the article on the record? I went to the services for police officer George Howard, and I think it’s shield #1012 if I’m not mistaken. Don’t hold me to it. [Howard’s shield number was in fact 1012]. George was a Port Authority cop and President Bush is carrying his shield – his mother handed that shield over to him. These are the people that I knew personally that are no longer with us. And if it’s good enough for the President to carry his shield, it’s good enough for me to carry their banner forever. I’ll never forget these men and women and – well, what else can I tell you. Anybody who’s an American or anybody who’s just a good decent person felt that pain, and I don’t see how anybody can forget it. One thing that does upset me to a certain degree is that there seems to be a developing complacency in a lot of people, because nothing has happened recently, that this situation is over. And quite frankly, I think our President, Mr. Bush, has said on more than one occasion that a war exists between us and these terrorists, these evildoers. And I think folks should keep that on their mind every time they come into an airport. If they are delayed a little bit, there’s a reason for it.
Is public perception an obstacle for you in terms of your work at Green?
I wouldn’t refer to it as an obstacle. I think it’s something we have to work with, and work around, to change the perception. There’s the old jokes on the Leno show and in other places about airport security being less than perfect. And we’re going to try to work toward that goal of making it as perfect as possible, and those jokes will go away.
Do you feel pressure to keep airport lines moving?
I have no concerns about keeping lines moving other than the fact that we want to see the people move and there are requirements to keep the flow of commerce and traffic moving. But there’s nothing there that – if I think or my people think that there’s a danger presented then guess what – you’re going to wait.
There are some people worried that when you turn screening jobs into government and union jobs it will be hard to get rid of incompetent screeners. Is that a concern for you?
Any manager would be concerned about having less-then-adequate people working for them. I think, luckily, the process that these people have gone through has weeded out those types of people who would be a detriment to our operation. And for those who might have slipped by, that will be my job, as well as my managers,’ to ensure that if in fact there are problems like that, we take whatever steps are necessary to eliminate the problem. Anybody who thinks they’re coming in for a free ride is in the wrong place. You can take my word on that. You can take that to the bank.
