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Goldin, NASA's longest-serving administrator, announces resignation

By Brett Davis

NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin announced Oct. 17 he is retiring next month, ending a record-setting, sometimes stormy tenure over the aerospace agency. Goldin, 61, will leave NASA Nov. 17 for an interim position as senior fellow for the non-profit Council on Competitiveness in Washington, before heading into the private sector.

Goldin was appointed by President George H.W. Bush on April 1, 1992, and then kept on through the Clinton Administration and nearly the first year of George W. Bush's Administration - the longest term of any NASA head. In a sometimes emotional speech to NASA employees, Goldin praised his workers and what they accomplished during his tenure.

"I love this agency, I wish I could be here for decades," Goldin said. "You are the greatest. It was easy being administrator. It's going to be very hard walking out that door."

Goldin spearheaded NASA's move to a "smaller-faster-cheaper" model, which helped the agency cut the cost of its spacecraft and launch more of them.

"He inherited a Cold War agency with no Cold War," said NASA observer John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, who said Goldin is NASA's greatest administrator. "[NASA] is in much better shape than it could have been."

Launch of 171 missions

During his tenure, NASA's workforce was cut by about one third, even as total agency productivity went up 40 percent, according to NASA. Critics of the agency said NASA cut too much. Goldin acknowledged mistakes during his farewell address, but said he presided over the launch of 171 missions, of which 160 were successful. "No other organization in the world has a record like that, and you did it," Goldin told NASA employees.

Goldin told reporters his brightest moment was the mission to "put a contact lens on the Hubble [Space Telescope]" and the worst was the realization that "we're not going to send astronauts to Mars for a long, long time."

Goldin was also the administrator who got the first pieces of the International Space Station into orbit. Goldin shepherded the station through numerous battles in Congress, where opponents tried to kill it, saying it costs too much and drains money from other science endeavors. The station still faces serious budget trouble, but Goldin defended it Oct. 17.

"That space station went together like a jigsaw puzzle," Goldin said. As for its budget problems, "I make no apologies, none." He said NASA has built it for the lowest possible price, and predicted, "we're going to solve that [budget] problem."

Goldin will still be at NASA's helm on Nov. 1 when an outside panel chaired by former Martin Marietta President Thomas Young delivers its assessment on dealing with the station's estimated $ 4.8 billion budget overrun.

Goldin's announcement, which has been expected for months, came just a day after Joe Rothenberg, the associate administrator for space flight, announced he will retire in December (DAILY, Oct. 17). Goldin said his announcement was not related to Rothenberg's, but they were "two independent actions." Although no successor has been named, Goldin said he will work with the White House to identify an acting administrator.

Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Science Committee, thanked Goldin for his work and said, "it is my hope that the White House will appoint a new NASA administrator as soon as possible, to ensure a smooth transition in management of the agency."