Obama's Budget: No User Fees!

That's right, as reported by the AOPA, President Obama's 2011 budget proposal does not contain any user fees for general aviation!

AOPA president Craig Fuller even prepared a video statement about the great news:

This is the best budget news that pilots have heard in a long time. It looks like the efforts of pilots all over the country are paying off. It can't have hurt that 118 members of Congress wrote the President earlier this year to express their opposition to user fees.

Although this is a victory worth celebrating, the fight against user fees may never be over. No matter what their political leanings are, the USA's leaders always seem to come up with new needs for funding. We should be sure to write out representatives and let them know how happy we are with the President's proposal and encourage them to follow his lead.

On another note, this proposal included significant funding for implementing the NextGen air traffic control system. I'm still not sure NextGen is intended or structured to do much for the bulk of GA pilots. However, I'm not opposed to modernizing the system as long as those running things are responsible enough to also develop the airport infrastructure that NextGen's increased traffic density will demand.