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Panel Weighs Proposed NASA Research Cuts

Posted on: Wednesday, 16 March 2005, 12:00 CST

WASHINGTON -- A congressional committee is examining what the national strategy should be for aeronautics research, following President Bush's recent proposal to overhaul NASA's aircraft programs through dramatic cuts in funding and staffing.

The president's focus on space exploration and a trip to Mars means the NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland could lose 700 jobs by the end of 2006. Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., could lose 1,000 jobs, under Bush's proposed budget.

Under Bush's plan, NASA Glenn's budget would be cut from $640 million currently to $520 million next year, eliminating two research programs that seek to reduce turbine engine emissions.

J. Victor Lebacqz, associate administrator for aeronautics at NASA, said in prepared remarks for the House Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics' Wednesday hearing that the agency's aeronautics program needs to be more focused.

"Our transformed aeronautics program will rely on a more focused set of facilities than exists today," Lebacqz said. "More needs to be done to avoid the perpetuation of marginal facilities through small, evolutionary change."

A National Research Council panel, asked to review the agency's aeronautics program, recommended that NASA reduce the number of aeronautics projects it's pursuing.

"NASA is trying to do too much within the available budget and resists eliminating programs in the face of budget reductions. Often, there are too many tasks to achieve research objectives in key areas," John M. Klineberg, chair of the panel, said in prepared remarks.

The National Research Council is part of the National Academies, which advise the government on science, technology and health policy.

A separate report from the Rand Corp., a nonprofit think tank, recommended selective consolidation and modernization of existing NASA facilities and a renewed reliance between the space agency and the Defense Department.

Meanwhile, researchers from Ohio State University and MIT warned that Bush's proposed budget cuts to aeronautics threaten the U.S. industry's leadership position in that field.

"NASA's effectiveness in helping to ensure the U.S. industrial competitiveness in civil aeronautics is unfortunately diminishing. The intellectual power is still there, the facilities are still there, and so is the will to do it; but the funding is not," said Mike Benzakein, chairman of the Aerospace Engineering Department at OSU, in prepared remarks to the committee.

Last year, Bush outlined a multibillion-dollar effort to return Americans to the moon as early as 2020 and use it as a waystation to Mars and beyond. That's driven up NASA's overall budget 2.5 percent to $16.45 billion in 2006, under Bush's plan, at the expense of aeronautics.

Ohio lawmakers have said the president's proposed cuts would devastate the northeast Ohio economy. NASA Glenn consists of 24 major facilities on 350 acres near Cleveland Hopkins International Airport and the 6,400-acre Plum Brook Station in Sandusky.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://www.nasa.gov  

NASA Glenn Research Center: http://www.grc.nasa.gov  

House Committee on Science: http://www.house.gov/science/

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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