WASHINGTON The entire U.S. civil space agency would have to close down and furlough its employees for three weeks if the proposed $1.4 billion cuts to its Fiscal Year 2000 budget are enacted, NASAs chief told Congress Thursday.
Administrator Daniel S. Goldin issued strong rebuttals to the cuts in letters to House Appropriations chair Rep. Bill Young (R- FLA) and the Democrats ranking committee member, Rep. David Obey (WI).
Goldin also claimed that the cuts would damage U.S. national security and economic strength. "The ultimate effect could be the loss of critical, long-term scientific and technological investment not only for space science, but also for the nations national security and economic well-being," Goldin wrote.
He predicted that the agency might be forced to "close NASA centers" and be pushed into the "forced separations" of unique and critical employee skills that took decades of experience to accumulate.
The three-week shutdown would be only one impact on employees, hundreds of which might be fired and others involuntarily transferred, Goldin said.
The space shuttle program, which took a proposed reduction of $150 million, would also be affected, according to Goldin.
He claimed that space shuttle missions would be canceled or deferred, and that the assembly schedule for the International Space Station would be thrown into chaos.
Safety of shuttle missions would also be at risk due to cancellation of programs that are aimed to enhance the winged crafts performance and safe space operations.
He also pointed out that NASA has already lost about 1/3 of its staff over the past six years, and with the cuts imposed by the Clinton administration during the same period had "returned to the U.S. Treasury" $35 billion in savings, virtually reinventing itself.
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