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TSA's Risk-based Approach to Security

George Naccara is betting that the lift of his risk-based reforms will overcome the drag of politics and bureaucracy. And the test bed for these innovations is Boston's Logan Airport

Terminal A in Boston's Logan International Airport is so new it still has that new terminal smell. It's absurdly spacious with ceilings of significant altitude. Trash bins, benches and planters (currently holding poinsettias)pretty and also designed to bear up against bomb blastsrun the length of the sparsely adorned building, parallel to massive (blast-resistant) panes of glass that make up the terminal's front wall and look out on a state police officer who tells lingering motorists to move along on this bright blue day just before Christmas. The terminal is subdued. A few passengers check in and watch as their checked bags are conveyed behind a curtain, out of sight. George Naccara, Logan's federal security director, the Transportation Security Administration's head man here, hustles past the counters and down an escalator. He's going where the bags are going.

At about the same time, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) is hosting a press event in Terminal B, an older facility with low ceilings and narrow hallways. Markey is introducing the Leave All Blades Behind Act, legislation that would prevent TSA from removing some scissors and tools such as screwdrivers from its banned-items list, which was scheduled to happen two days hence. This change is a small but controversial part of Naccara's broader, ambitious agenda to reinvent TSAat Logan anywayas a risk-based decision-making organization. By whatever small amount the banned-items list reduces risk, Naccara argues, it's not nearly proportional to the resources it requires.

Every month, Logan's TSA screeners confiscate 12,000 banned items from the traveling public. Pocket knives, knitting needles, scissors and the like make up the vast majority. Once in a while, a serious blade shows up, as does the occasional ice pick. Screeners have confiscated a can with the words "Time Bomb" stamped on the side. It was perfume. Every so often they'll seize a carburetor. Once, a research doctor tried to stow seven human heads in the overhead bin.

"But the point is, 11,995 of those items pose no risk at all," Naccara says. "They're people going about their business who say, 'I forgot that was in there.'"

A more effective security operation, Naccara argues, will not waste time looking for and confiscating scissors and knitting needles. It will watch the behavior of the people who carry scissors and knitting needles; and it will use technology to look for more serious threats in a way that's both less random and more comprehensive than current methods. Naccara's insistence on ending the confiscation madness and reinventing TSA comes off as a kind of benevolent belligerence. He's also received some support from his boss in Washington, D.C., Kip Hawley, who has similar ideas about managing risk.