Date: 2011-10-27
Speaker: JANE LUBCHENCO (democrat)
Chamber: H

Undersecretary for Oceans and Atmosphere. Department of Commerce. Washington. DC. DEAR DR. LUBCHENCO: I was disappointed by your recent remarks to the Guardian newspaper accusing congressional Republicans of endangering the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS). I want you to know that your reported accusations were neither accurate nor constructive. According to the article. "Republican budgetcutting measures would knock out that critical capacity by delaying the launch of the next generation polarorbiting satellites. said Jane Lubchenco." You are also quoted as saying. "It is a disaster in the making. Its an expression of the dysfunction in our system." Your remarks mirror similar comments made by deputy administrator Kathryn Sullivan to the Washington Post earlier this summer. Perhaps you are unaware that the Republicanauthored House FY 2011 bill recommended a higher level of funding for NOAAs satellite acquisition account than the Democratauthored Senate bill despite the House having a lower allocation than the Senate. Further. for FY 2012. the House Commerce -Justice- Science Appropriations subcommittee recommended $901 million. a nearly $430 million increase 910 above the FY 2011 level for JPSS. Despite having an allocation $2.5 billion higher than the House. the Senate recommended an amount only slightly above the House recommendation. $920 million. To my knowledge. you have never criticized Senate funding levels for JPSS. While the House did not provide the full $1 billion requested. the House level is a significant amount of funding given these austere budget times when other programs in the CommerceJusticeScience bill were significantly reduced or eliminated altogether. Finally. I would call your attention to the fact that any gap in satellite data is not due to lack of funding. "Republican budgetcutting measures" or "the dysfunction in our system." but rather years of poor interagency management that resulted in the cancellation of the National Polarorbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) satellite program after being more than five years behind schedule. twice as expensive with fewer satellites and less capability. The caution shown by the Congress with regard to funding the successor program. JPSS. is fully justified in light of this record of waste and mismanagement. I have noted below portions of September. 2011 GAO testimony to the Congress on NPOESS mismanagement. from GAO 11 945T: "When its primary contract was awarded in August 2002. NPOESS was estimated to cost about $7 billion through 2026 and was considered critical to the United States ability to maintain the continuity of data required for weather forecasting and global climate monitoring. However. in the years after the program was initiated. NPOESS encountered significant technical challenges in sensor development. program cost growth. and schedule delays. By November 2005. we estimated that the programs cost had grown to $10 billion. and the schedule for the first launch was delayed by almost 2 years. These issues led to a 2006 restructuring of the program which reduced the programs functionality by decreasing the number of planned satellites. orbits. and instruments. The restructuring also led agency executives to decide to mitigate potential data gaps by using NPP as an operational satellite. Even after the restructuring. however. the program continued to encounter technical issues in developing two sensors. significant triagency management challenges. schedule delays. and further cost increases. Faced with costs that were expected to exceed $14 billion and launch schedules that were delayed by over 5 years. in August 2009. the Executive Office of the President formed a task force. led by the Office of Science and Technology Policy. to investigate the management and acquisition options that would improve the NPOESS program. As a result of this review. the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy announced in February 2010 that NOAA and DOD would no longer jointly procure the NPOESS satellite system. instead. each agency would plan and acquire its own satellite system." Your reported inaccurate and partisan comments are unhelpful. I urge you to publicly correct these inaccurate statements. I await your prompt response. Best wishes. Sincerely.