Advocacy

USHPA regularly interfaces with agencies and organizations to protect and promote free flight.

USHPA helps counter the threat of drones, works with federal land management agencies and partners to protect and expand access to federal land, supports chapters with local challenges, maintains exemptions with the FAA, and much more.

FAA

  • FAA tandem exemption: Every two years, USHPA renews its exemption with the FAA to allow certified members to continue flying tandem. This responsibility involves handling unexpected circumstances, such as when the FAA unexpectedly disallowed recreational tandems when renewing USHPA’s tandem exemption in 2018, temporarily prohibiting Tandem 1-rated pilots from flying with H1/P1 pilots and above. USHPA worked to revise the exemption language and keep it progressing through the FAA, resulting in the reauthorization of T1 training flights (with T1 pilots newly classified as Tandem Instructors-in-Training) on July 17, 2019. USHPA also created a brief informational webpage for tandem students to fulfill the FAA’s new requirement that flight students be provided access to FAA training materials.
  • FAA towing exemption: USHPA also maintains a towing exemption with the FAA.
  • FAA sectionals: USHPA helps coordinate site information (through chapter renewals) for updating FAA sectionals.

Access

  • Working with recreational partners: USHPA collaborates with recreational partners like the Outdoor Alliance on shared concerns for recreational use. This has included sharing flying site information with them in order to coordinate upcoming advocacy issues through their network, and vice versa. USHPA has been able to help protect sites through these efforts. One example was excluding an active site that was being proposed for inclusion in a wilderness bill. While the bill was still being drafted, USHPA was able to redraw the boundaries to exclude the flying site if the bill is passed. If members are aware of similar threats to flying sites, please contact USHPA to help coordinate advocacy efforts with our recreational partners.

USHPA is supported by: