WASHINGTON
- U.S. President Barack Obama has named a second man previously considered for
NASA administrator to another post in the administration by reappointing Steve
Isakowitz to chief financial officer of the U.S. Department of Energy.
Obama
announced Isakowitz's nomination March 20, just as a group of Isakowitz
supporters rallied to keep the prospect alive that Isakowitz might be named the next
NASA chief. The loosely formed coalition of bipartisan supporters said
Isakowitz had been mischaracterized by opponents on Capitol Hill, and warned
that it could take three months or more to get a NASA administrator in place if
the administration had to begin a new search.
Obama's
reappointment of Isakowitz came two days after the president appointed retired
U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Scott Gration as special envoy to Sudan. Obama's
transition team had
floated Gration's name in January as the likely nominee to be NASA chief,
but some members of Congress balked at his lack of space experience.
Isakowitz,
chief financial officer of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) since June 2007
and former NASA comptroller and deputy associate administrator of exploration
systems, also faced opposition from lawmakers over a Feb. 13 U.S. Government
Accountability Office report critical of budget analyses used to justify the
restructuring of a DOE clean-coal power plant demonstration project called
Future Gen.
Obama said
March 11 that he would appoint a NASA chief "soon," but the process stalled
amid concern that Isakowitz was to blame for DOE estimates that Future Gen
costs had doubled. Future Gen costs had increased by 39 percent, the report
said.
Opponents
had characterized Isakowitz as a budgeter who lacks interest in human spaceflight.
Former
colleagues defended Isakowitz, saying he is the type of leader NASA needs to
steer the agency through difficult fiscal times and through the transition
from the space shuttle to the next astronaut-carrying vehicle aimed at
eventually returning Americans to the Moon. They also said he had nothing to do
with the decision to restructure Future Gen, and that he had been unfairly
blamed.
"He
doesn't have an ideological ax to grind at all, he's very creative, he's
obviously brilliant, but he doesn't come in with a lot of bias," said Jim
Muncy, a former congressional staffer who worked with Isakowitz when he was at
NASA. "He's a good analyst and clearly a good manager because he's inspired a
lot of people around him."
Brett
Alexander, president of the Personal Spaceflight Federation, an advocacy group
here, said Isakowitz had support from the science and human spaceflight
community, and worried that the lengthy process of vetting another candidate
could leave NASA without an administrator for another three months.
"We could
be back to square one, and I don't think that's good for anybody, particularly
shuttle and work force issues," Alexander said.
Meanwhile,
members of Congress, NASA staff and the space industry are growing frustrated
that NASA still does not have a permanent administrator, despite earlier hopes
that Obama would announce his pick before the end of January.
Michael
Coats, director of NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, said during a March
19 Space Transportation Association breakfast that the uncertainty over NASA's
future was "driving folks crazy" and that people do not have a clear sense yet
of the direction Obama's space policy will take.
"I know
Chris Scolese, the acting administrator, is reluctant to make anything that
might be perceived as policy decisions, and yet it's very hard when you're
running an agency to make a decision that isn't perceived as policy in some
way. So Chris is kind of in a tough spot, he's doing a great job ... but he needs
some help over there," Coats said. "We're trying to do everything we can at the
centers to support him but it would help if he could have an administrator and
a deputy administrator and some direction."
A day
earlier, 14 members of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida, Alabama,
Texas and California - all of which host major NASA facilities - sent a letter
to Obama March 18 urging the president to make a decision. The letter stressed
the importance of leadership given the planned
2010 retirement date for the space shuttle and the looming five-year gap
until NASA fields its next generation astronaut-carrying rocket.
"As you
know, this issue is linked to our economic recovery since the gap could result
in layoffs for several thousand highly skilled aerospace engineers and
technicians over the next two years," the letter said. "We urge you to keep
these issues in mind as you search for a NASA administrator candidate with the
right background, integrity and focus on minimizing the spaceflight gap and
preserving the agency's cutting edge science and aeronautics programs."
Sen.
Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), who chairs the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on
commerce, justice and science, which oversees NASA's budget, told a group of
600 gathered at the Maryland Space Business Roundtable March 16 that she is
disappointed that NASA does not yet have an administrator.
"We've met
with the transition teams, vetting teams - I'm ready to meet with the Maryland
basketball team," Mikulski joked. "So when the president makes his nomination I
want it to be a three-pointer. And like Maryland, you know you can count on the
women's team to make sure we're in the finals."
Mikulski
would not comment on prospective candidates, but said the NASA chief must meet
with her and be a strong manager and not a "Johnnie-one-note or a
Janie-one-note that's going to back any one part of the program."
"What is a
balanced space program? A commitment
to human spaceflight, a commitment to science - Earth, space, solar, the
universe - aeronautics and to education. You must support the president's
agenda," the senator said. "That's my criteria."
Sen. Bill
Nelson (D-Fla.), chairman of the Senate Commerce subcommittee on science and
space that would preside over the initial confirmation hearing for the NASA
administrator nominee, has endorsed former NASA astronaut and retired U.S.
Marine Corps Maj. Gen. Charlie Bolden. Nelson flew once on the shuttle and
Bolden was the pilot on that mission.
Shortly
after Gration was reported to be Obama's top pick, Nelson issued a statement
saying he wants NASA's top official to have the knowledge and experience of
former NASA Administrator Mike Griffin, an aerospace engineer who worked in the
aerospace industry for more than three decades. Griffin departed NASA in
January.
An aide to
Nelson said the senator "sees Charlie Bolden as an individual who sees the
agency in the context of being vital to national security, public safety,
science and technology, and a major contributor to human exploration."
However,
the aide said Nelson "absolutely would consider someone else as long as he felt
that individual would have that global view of NASA."
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