Conflict as DOT Meets the Hill
The NSC SIG (Space) decision group wasn’t the only party interested in choosing the “lead agency”. Congress also had an interest and a voice.
DOD, the launch vehicle manufacturers, and space launch entrepreneurs had not confined their lobbying efforts to just the White House. In addition, they had invested considerable time talking to House and Senate staff. In fact, the congressional staffs were much more accessible and interested in the space issues, in many respects, than was the White House. Thus, while there was an executive branch initiative to select a lead agency, a House congressional staff was busy preparing legislation to codify a lead agency. The launch industry, including SSI and Starstruck, was lobbying for the Department of Commerce to be the department overseeing the industry. According to an interview with Courtney Stadd years later, the industry had already realized that having the Federal Aviation Administration as the lead agency would not be healthy for the industry.
Like Congress, the industry was more interested in seeing legislation that would facilitate the privatization of expendable launch vehicles coupled with a lead agency than an Executive Order. An Executive Order is easily terminated or changed by a change in White House priorities or a change in administrations. Legislation, however, is more durable.
The problem was that the Administration was opposed to seeing legislation on this issue, and instructed DOT to follow that party line. For that reason, DOT had not even visited the Congressional staffs prior to the President’s selection of a lead agency.
The Hill staff was rather upset that DOT had gotten the lead agency role. Originally, the legislation it was drafting had named the Federal Aviation Administration as the “lead agency” because it had been tracking what was happening within the SIG working group in terms of “lead agency” selection.
Note the copy on right of the early draft legislation which names Commerce as the Agency responsible for commercial ELVs. Marks are from DOT suggesting where changes are needed.
One of Jenna Dorn’s first steps after DOT secured the lead agency role was to meet and talk to the Hill staff. Several of us went up to meet with Rich Efford and his staff. It was a meeting that was rather hostile. Because DOT had made its case to the SIG working group as a sudden decision reversal, the Hill was unaware of any of the reasoning behind our selection. In other words, the Hill had been left out.
Add to that injury the fact that we had no choice but to tell the Congressional staff we didn’t want legislation. This really angered the staff which had so much influence over the US space-related agencies in terms of missions, responsibilities, and funding, that the staff threatened to push the legislation forward naming the Department of Commerce as “lead agency”.
This first meeting became one of many designed to persuade the Hill staff that DOT indeed was the correct choice to be the “lead agency”. This was a really tough meeting. How do you establish a relationship with a powerful group that has been slighted in several different ways, especially a group that heavily influences space policy? How do you establish a relationship with a group that wants to give you legislation and you have to say you don’t want it, even while you are silently screaming “Yes!! Yes!! We need legislation!!!” Afterall, we could see that the Executive Order was virtually toothless. How do you connect with the Hill when your mouth is saying, “No” because it’s the party line, but your heart is saying, “Yes!”?
During the course of the meeting as we were trying to explain how DOT was in the best position to support the industry, one of the Hill staffers pulled me aside and asked skeptically, “So what are you doing to help Starstruck with its launch?”
Huh?!? We were totally blindsided. I went to Jenna and discovered she hadn’t heard of Starstruck!! At no time during any of the SIG decision group’s working meetings had there been any mention, to my knowledge at least, that a company was currently stuck in the regulatory morass trying to launch a rocket. Although I had come into the SIG working group process late, none of the DOT representatives who I had been talking to all the time up to that point mentioned hearing anything about an entrepreneurial launch company trying to get a launch approval. Had we, or I, known that while we were preparing our case for DOT to be the lead agency, it would have been possible to give a hands-on demonstration of how, as regulatory experts, we could make it easier on the industry than Commerce could.
We looked pretty bad to the committee staff at that moment. We didn’t even know a company was having problems. We got the name and number of the company, and names of the contacts from Starstruck who had been talking to the Hill staff. On the way back from that meeting, I was given a job to do.