Source: The Houston Chronicle
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden sought to rally space workers to President Barack Obama’s proposed overhaul of the agency during an employees-only meeting Wednesday at Johnson Space Center.
Bolden told employees there were clear problems with the Houston-based Constellation rocket-building program, and that it was essential to change course.
Primarily, he said, this includes abandoning the immediate construction of rockets in favor of developing revolutionary new technologies that will allow NASA to fly humans beyond low-Earth orbit on sustainable budgets.
6,000 area jobs at risk
During his talk he did say that contractors would bear the brunt of the proposed changes to NASA.
According to JSC Space Center director Mike Coats, about 6,000 Houston-area jobs are at risk with the president’s decision to cancel the space shuttle program later this year, as well as the back-to-the-moon Constellation program.
Although the shuttle cuts were widely anticipated, many of these workers had been expecting to transition into an expanding Constellation work force.
“Sustainability” has become a NASA buzz word, as Bolden and other space agency officials have claimed then-President George W. Bush never supported the Constellation plan with adequate funding.
If NASA does not seize the present opportunity to change, Bolden told the space center employees, they may not get another chance to go beyond low-Earth orbit “in our lifetimes.”
Bolden’s visit to Houston, where he maintains a home and trained for four space shuttle flights, comes nearly two weeks after Obama visited Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
But unlike the president’s stop in Florida, where he offered to provide the work force there with $40 million in transition aid and made other concessions, Bolden announced no new initiatives that might benefit Johnson Space Center.
Push for Obama visit
Texas congressional members have been urging Obama to follow up with a similar visit to Houston.
“We appreciate the invitations,” said Matt Lehrich, a White House spokesman. “Nothing is on the schedule right now, but the president and other top members of his administration look forward to continuing to talk directly to folks in the Houston area.”
As part of Obama’s proposed changes, in place of Constellation, JSC would receive oversight of the smaller Flagship Technology Demonstrations program, a five-year, $6 billion plan to develop new technologies, such as new propulsion methods.
That program, along with Obama’s concession to save part of the Constellation program by converting its Orion spacecraft into a lifeboat for the International Space Station, do not go far enough to assuage concerns of some employees and some members of Congress.
“I’m happy with the progress we’ve made, but these are minor concessions,” said U.S. Rep. Pete Olson, a Republican whose district includes Johnson Space Center.
Olson said he is most concerned about flying beyond low-Earth orbit, and to do that he said NASA must develop a heavy-lift rocket.
To read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6980582.html