PSA has big growth plans for Charlotte
Plus: A closer look at Tariq Bokhari's move to a top transit job in Washington
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After January’s deadly crash, PSA Airlines is re-engaging in its move to Charlotte; American subsidiary envisions 400 workers
PSA Airlines, an American Airlines subsidiary, is making moves to shift its headquarters to Charlotte. It flies under the American Eagle name and is led by CEO Dion Flannery (inset).
By Ted Reed
For the first time in two dozen years, Charlotte will again be the home to an airline headquarters.
PSA Airlines, a regional carrier wholly owned by American Airlines, will move from Dayton, Ohio, to the Water Ridge Office Park, three miles from Charlotte Douglas International Airport, in January.
PSA announced the move on Jan. 29. Just hours later, one of its flights — operating as American Airlines Flight 5342 — crashed at Reagan Washington National Airport, when a U.S. Army helicopter flew into its path. Sixty-four people aboard the plane, including four Charlotte-based PSA crew members, were killed, as were the three helicopter pilots.
Now, eight weeks later, the mourning continues, and CEO Dion Flannery has also re-engaged in overseeing the move to Charlotte. The 350 Dayton headquarters employees are being given 90-day notices and the opportunity to relocate to Charlotte. But it can be a tough decision.
“People are doing research, and we are answering questions,” Flannery said in an interview with Transit Time this week. He doesn’t know how many will move, but said, “We’re hopeful that a majority will find a way to continue their careers.”
PSA is “offering white-glove treatment for folks who want to take us up on it,” said Joe Horvath, director of communications and marketing.
Meanwhile, the carrier is actively seeking new employees in Charlotte, where it envisions a headquarters staff of about 400. The headquarters jobs are varied, including crew scheduling, maintenance control, dispatch, supply chain management, parts management and finance.
PSA has posted openings on its website www.PSAairlines.com. Headlines there include:
“PSA Announces Charlotte Move”
“Find Your Place At PSA: Join Our Talent Network”
“We’re Hiring in Charlotte”
An open house is scheduled for April 11. Said Flannery, “We will be hiring for a long time.”
North Carolina’s historic Piedmont Airlines, founded in Winston-Salem, began to build a hub in Charlotte in 1979. During the early 1980s, Piedmont was planning to move its headquarters to Charlotte. That never occurred. Rather, Piedmont merged with US Airways in 1989.
However, starting in the mid-1980s, Charlotte was the headquarters for CCAir, which operated as a regional partner for Piedmont Airlines. Following the 1989 merger, CCAir became a partner for US Airways. The carrier flew small aircraft such as the Shorts 360 and later Dash 8s and provided connections to Carolinas cities including Hickory and Kinston.
In 1999, CCAir was acquired by Mesa Air Group. In 2002, it shut down during a dispute with the Air Line Pilots Association. Most CCAir pilots moved over to Mesa.
Flannery envisions that PSA will emerge as a company with a strong Charlotte presence, operating out of spacious, newly renovated quarters in an office park at 2709 Water Ridge Parkway, three miles from Charlotte Douglas International Airport.
PSA will occupy nearly 80,000 square feet, providing room to accommodate growth as well as a lobby and an operations control center, where the movements of the carrier’s fleet of 140 CRJ 700s and 900s will be constantly monitored. (An additional 14 aircraft are scheduled to be added.)
PSA operates about 750 daily departures for American, including 180 in Charlotte, its largest base of operations. It also serves the hubs at Dallas, Washington National and Philadelphia.
The carrier employs 5,152 people including nearly 2,000 pilots, 1,600 flight attendants, 700 mechanics and its headquarters staff. Charlotte is already its training center for both pilots and flight attendants: Six CRJ simulators are located in the Charlotte training center, which annually trains about 600 new pilots, 250 upgrading pilots and others who undergo recurrent training. (PSA will retain crew bases in Dayton.)
Flannery looks forward to the day when he can regularly walk in to training classes in Charlotte. Employees like to see the CEO in the flesh, he says.
Coincidentally, Wednesday was a day of action for the PSA flight attendants, members of the Association of Flight Attendants, who staged demonstrations in Charlotte, Dayton, Philadelphia and Washington.
About 50 flight attendants demonstrated in Charlotte, according to Sean Griffin, president of the Charlotte local of the Association of Flight Attendants. He is also vice-president of the union’s master executive council.
PSA’s current flight attendant contract was signed in 2019 and became amendable in July 2023.
“The company has been slow with its proposals, which a lot of the time are insulting,” Griffin said. “Our members are getting upset with how long this process is taking.”
Talks have reached what is typically the final stage, where economic issues are negotiated. Pay scales at PSA and other regionals are generally about 45% below what American Airlines pays: New hires start at around $24,000 annually. Griffin said the union is seeking 30% raises: the company recently raised its offer to 5% from 3%.
Flannery said, “We’re in negotiations and we intend to move those along and to get the contract our flight attendants deserve.”
Ted Reed covers the airport and airlines for The Charlotte Ledger. He is a former Miami Herald and Charlotte Observer reporter.
Related article:
Analysis: Going deeper on City Council member Tariq Bokhari’s surprising move to become one of the country’s top transit officials
Bokhari on election night in 2023. He said this week that he’s leaving the Charlotte City Council to take a top transit job in the Trump administration in Washington. (Photo by Steve Harrison/WFAE)
This week, Republican Charlotte City Council member Tariq Bokhari said he will resign and take a new job in Washington, D.C., to serve as the No. 2 transit official in President Trump’s administration.
For additional insights, WFAE’s Nick De La Canal talked with reporter Steve Harrison, a longtime political reporter in Charlotte who was the first to report the move Tuesday afternoon.
Read a transcript of their discussion below — or listen to the 5-minute audio 🎧:
Q. Steve, this was out of the blue. Why Bokhari? Why was he picked?
It certainly was out of the blue.
Bokhari has been a City Council member since 2017, and he’s never been especially partisan on the dais. But he’s active in the state Republican Party and has a lot of connections in Raleigh. And the Trump administration has close ties to North Carolina — the co-chair of the Republican National Committee is Michael Whatley, who used to chair the state party in N.C., and Lara Trump is a North Carolina native.
So soon after Trump won, North Carolina Republicans floated Bokhari’s name as someone who could serve.
Q. He’s been a council member for eight years. Does that make him qualified for the job?
It should be said that many of these jobs can be very political in terms of who gets them. Remember, Democrat Anthony Foxx became U.S. Transportation Secretary in President Obama’s second term — in part as a thank-you for hosting a successful Democratic National Convention in Charlotte in 2012.
And Foxx had served in city government for eight years — the same amount of time as Bokhari. He was mayor for nearly four years, but in Charlotte’s form of government, the city manager runs things, the mayor and council have little real power.
Q. Bokhari may not have a lot of actual power on City Council, but he gets his voice heard.
Exactly. I think it’s fair to say that Bokhari is, in a way, a good fit personality-wise for the Trump administration, in that he sees himself as a disruptor.
He throws out disruptive ideas — like four years ago when he suggested the city partner with Elon Musk’s Boring Company to build tunnels to alleviate congestion. He often talked about the city needing to be prepared for future technology when building its transit plan, like drones and self-driving cars.
He’s had a podcast. He is outspoken. Sometimes profane.
Q. And there was the time [in 2023] that he hired an airplane on Election Day to troll his Democratic opponent.
Yes. There was a controversy over his opponent’s experience in airport management, and Bokhari paid for a private plane to fly across his south Charlotte district with a sign highlighting that fact.
Q. OK, so Bokhari will be the deputy administrator of the Federal Transit Administration. What will he be doing?
Transit is heavily subsidized by the federal government, and the FTA oversees how that money is awarded. Bokhari and Marcus Molinaro, who has been nominated as FTA administrator, will be creating guidelines for billions of dollars in grant money.
The U.S. Transportation Secretary has said the FTA will focus on cost-effectiveness — which means building projects that move a lot of people and don’t cost a lot of money. And the DOT has also said it wants to reward cities that have family-friendly policies, with high birth and marriage rates.
It’s unclear what that means for Charlotte.
Q. Charlotte has big transit ambitions. Is Bokhari in a position to help?
Perhaps. The city first needs to get the General Assembly to give it permission to place a one-cent sales tax on the ballot. Then it needs voters to approve the tax. Then, it needs to design these rail lines, like the Red Line commuter train to Lake Norman.
And after all that, then it can apply for billions of dollars in federal grants.
All that takes a lot of time.
The question is: Can Charlotte get all this done while Bokhari is at the FTA? We will see.
And just one more thing on that: The dynamics are going to be interesting in that Mayor Vi Lyles had entrusted the transit plan’s future to the council’s other Republican Ed Driggs, by naming him as chair of the transportation committee.
Bokhari had been somewhat shut out.
Q. And now he’s going to Washington.
Exactly.
Q. And finally, Steve, what does this mean for the City Council?
By state law, Mayor Vi Lyles and the City Council must appoint a member of his party to fill the seat, so it will be a Republican.
Bokhari’s wife, Krista Bokhari, has expressed interest in finishing his term, which ends in December. She ran unsuccessfully for a state House seat last November. And Democrats will surely try to pick up Bokhari’s seat this fall in the municipal elections now that it’s effectively open without an incumbent.
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