The NASA Advisory Council Is About To Shrink
Executive Order on Evaluating and Improving the Utility of Federal Advisory Committees, White House
“By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and consistent with the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), as amended (5 U.S.C. App.), it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Review of Current Advisory Committees. (a) Each executive department and agency (agency) shall evaluate the need for each of its current advisory committees established under section 9(a)(2) of FACA and those advisory committees established under section 9(a)(1) that are authorized by law but not required by statute (eligible committees).
(b) Each agency shall, by September 30, 2019, terminate at least one-third of its current committees established under section 9(a)(2) of FACA, including committees for which the:
(i) stated objectives of the committee have been accomplished;
(ii) subject matter or work of the committee has become obsolete;
(iii) primary functions have been assumed by another entity; or
(iv) agency determines that the cost of operation is excessive in relation to the benefits to the Federal Government.”
Keith’s note: The NASA Advisory Council (NAC) has 6 standing committees: Aeronautics, Human Exploration and Operations, Regulatory and Policy, Science, Technology, Innovation and Engineering, and STEM Engagement. Unless NASA can get a waiver two of them need to be dissolved. Odds are that the Regulatory and Policy and STEM Engagement committees would be the ones to go.
The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel was established “under Section 6 of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act of 1968, as amended (51 U.S.C. § 31101). The NASA Administrator hereby renews and amends the Panel’s charter, pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5 U.S.C. App. §§ 1 et seq.” and is likely to be unaffected by this executive order since it has a basis in law. However the NASA Advisory Council, formed in 1977, was established “pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), as amended, 5 U.S.C., App.” and is exactly what this executive order is talking about. Jim Bridenstine has to reply with his suggested cuts by 1 August 2019.
I’m trying to determine if this is good or bad. Since it’s considered an honor to be on one they tend to get fairly large so reducing it probably won’t hurt. As a rule of thumb in organization theory any committee larger than 10-12 usually gets bogged down in procedures and formality as it breaks into fractions that spend more time debating than deciding. The key of course is to pick the right ten to be on it to give informed and objective advice.
The subcommittees could also be combined so everything is covered properly. The four new advisory subcommittees could be 1) Aeronautical Technology, Innovation and Policy, 2) Space Technology, Innovation and Policy, 3) Science and Exploration, and 4) STEM.
Rinse, wash, repeat for every federal agency. Get rid of the dead wood.
Sometimes- as here- it’s just too easy…
Dr. M:
Couldn’t NASA use some advice of a different sort? Perhaps a voice driven less by the “how” of space-related activity? Perhaps a thoughtful consideration of “why,” or “what for”? (Terminal puncuation makes me crazy).
There is a lot to be said on this. The knowledge needed to build rockets of almost ny sort is plainly available, very widely available. It is so availale that we are witnessing stunning incremental improvements. And, yes, SX is a tiresome example, but here it is: fewer than 6 years passed between the germ of an idea and an object in orbit. Moreover, there’s hardly a paucity of companies nipping at similar low hanging fruit: the small sat market seems, at least to some, a rich one.
What’s needed here is a richer consideration of the “why” question. My own view is fairly simple: We are learning to explore space becase one day we will live there. Is this true? I don’t know.
Asking people a simple question can yield unhappy answers, if you are a space dork, like me.
Try the man-on-the-street: “Why are we going to Luna/Space/Mars/Europa” and the answer is just as likely “What is Luna?”
A much better elevator speech would be helpful. That’s the sort of advice that NASA could put to good use.
Historically technological progress starts always with a motive. The Age of Exploration started because Prince Henry decided it would help Portugal with its battles with Moors to cut off and/or interdict their gold supply. So he started sending ships down the coast of Africa to find it. When Constantinople fell the effort was expanded to fine a way to cut the Ottoman Empire off from the huge profits of the Spice Trade. The chain of technological progress it triggered created the modern world. A similar chain could have happened a thousand years before, or a thousand years later. Similarity the Steam Revolution might well have happened in Ancient Greece with Hero’s steam engine instead of early 18th Century England. SpaceX’s Starship might be seen by future generations as a similar tipping point if successful.
So yes, It would not hurt NASA to have a good hard science fiction writer or two serving on it. And maybe an economist or economic historian. Folks who see the big picture, the flow of history, and not just some nuts and bolts. Who might recognize which projects are dead ends and which might make the future.
If I recall James Michener served on it at one time in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s. Reading his novel “Space” or watching the associated mini-series is still one of the best ways to understand why Apollo happened, and it’s aftermath. It captures the spirit of the era.
“Blessed Saint Leibovitz keep them dreaming!”
Indeed this is your specialty- but I’ve long wondered why NASA doesnt pay more attention to the ‘why’ question. Perhaps they don’t have a very good answer.
I interact with the Department of Agriculture often, as well as with the Extension Office here in Florida. And these guys are all about making the case for why they are important and why the work product matters. It’s never direct, to be sure, but it hardly matters.
It’s true that NASA likes to squawk about ‘spin-offs’, many of which are marginal but undeniable. I like your idea of including SF writers, but I was thinking more about actual marketing folks able to draw parallels between space exporation and other enterprises.
It’s self-preservation, actually.
12 members is a little large for my preferences. As a piece of mathematical trivia, the number of relations or connections between n people is n(n-1)/2, so in that sense 12 is almost 50% worse than 10. And that assumes none of the members are of two minds on the subject, and can get into arguments with themselves. But the whole thing also depends critically on who is the committee’s chair. A good one can keep the debating from getting totally out of hand.
The organization of these committees is even more convoluted than it seems. I believe FACA specifically does not apply to National Academies committees. So things like the Committee on Astrobiology and Planetary Science do advise NASA, but they wouldn’t be affected by this executive order. And, in planetary science, there are the *AGs (Mars Exploration Analysis Group, Outer Planets Assessment Group, etc.) which were very specifically set up so that FACA doesn’t apply to them; that’s why the A in the acronyms never, ever stands for Advisory.