CAIB Hearing Transcript 6 March 2003 (Part 3)
GEHMAN: General
Hess?
HESS: General,
you’ve done a very good job this morning explaining to us how this highly
complex organization comes together and talked a little bit about the
structure and the resources that you have.
My question
would be, here, next year, the space station is supposed to be core complete.
And I’d like you to talk to the board a little bit about stresses to maintain
schedule and impacts that you see out there in the future.
HOWELL: Well,
we have been, at Johnson–I have to be very careful what I say because
I’ve been accused of being too success-oriented, and that’s sort of the
nature of the beast at our center.
One thing
we have going for us, though, is we have an administrator who is just
beating upon us how important safety is, and that it should be our first
primary consideration in everything we do. And he starts every meeting
saying that, and he ends every meeting saying that. We are very eager
and excited about getting this station assembled.
And the missions–I
got to be careful, I get carried away. You know, the complexity of these
assembly missions is astounding for me, watching how our people, with
the program, put these things together with the other centers, and take
this very huge complex machinery up into space, get it connected and operating.
It’s phenomenal.
I think it’s
one of the most greatest achievements in the history of humankind, frankly.
That’s my opinion. And so, I’m excited about that. And we’re eager to
get on with it and get that done.
However,
we understand the stakes. And we are not going to do anything, impress
anybody to press, you know, to put aside any kind of quality-assurance
or safety issues. I think that was very evident.
Our administrator
declared that, you know, we’re going to have core complete by February
of ’04, and we wanted to make that happen. However, we had a floor liner
crack and we came to parade rest until we got that done. That was several
weeks, almost months that we had the beaster (ph) ball issue. Stopped;
never a peep or a complaint from our administrator or higher headquarters.
They understood
that those things have to be resolved before we’re going to commit people
to flight.
So I’m just
very comfortable with the attitude of our whole organization, from the
top person down, of what is really important and what our priorities are.
HESS (?):
General Howell, I would, with some degree of hesitancy, speak for the
board here in which the general impression of the board is we have traveled
to all of the centers involved in the manned space flight center, walked
on the production floors and crawled through orbiters and met all levels
of NASA and contractor employees, that the board generally agrees with
your assessment of safety, what I would call tactical safety. If somebody
finds something wrong, there’s no pressure or hesitation to go fix it.
But critics
of NASA, while admitting that you have a very enviable and rigorous and
mature safety program, also sometimes say that NASA misses the big safety
issues–that is, that the process of repeatedly fixing things and then
certifying the fix to make sure that it’s better than original, that sometimes
you tend to miss the trends that you shouldn’t have ever had to address
that problem at all, that whatever it is that you’re working on was not
designed to fail, and the fact that you’re working on it is telling another
story.
Would you
just give me your views of whether or not this is not well-informed advice
or how you satisfy yourself that you’ve got an eye open, not only for
the snake that’s right at your ankle but what’s over the hill?
I know it’s
a hard question to get at, but I’d just like your personal views of whether
or not these critics are telling us something.
HOWELL: We
have, on a daily basis, when I meet–when I have a chance–I’ve got such
a great team–we sort of gather together in the end of the day and over
a cup of coffee and talk about things, and we discuss these types of things.
And I think
if the critics will look at us–you know, one thing, we are tactical because
we’re trying to support the programs and get their mission accomplished.
So that is–we focus on that. And I agree, we’re taking care of business
today.
At the same
time, I think people might fail to recognize that we have set up at NASA
headquarters and we have people on teams right now as we speak working
on future spacecraft, on modifications.
You know,
Mike Kostelnik has a very energized activity going on now, looking at
what it would take to have a service life extension for the shuttle to
take care of these things that might be popping up that we didn’t know
about, modifications, safety modifications and reliability modifications
we might do to this vehicle to keep it going to service the station.
Because we
realize our predictions are the station, to be viable, is going to need
a machine that can carry a lot of stuff up there. And that’s what the
shuttle does better than anything else that we come up with.
So you know,
these are not things that are on the headlines. These are things that
working groups are working on, and until we make decisions, they’re not
going to be in the press or in Aviation Week. But I assure you that there
are some very good minds working on this. Some of our best talent from
my center are up at headquarters working on these types of activities
we speak.
And we’re
working on an architecture for the future. And so, not only Sean O’Keefe
looking at what we can do to our present machines to improve them, the
next machines to be better, but we are also looking at what we’ll be doing
20 years from now. And so, I would hate to think that people are claiming
that we’re too short-sighted.
As far as
safety goes, you know, if we had you know, 200 more quality-assurance
people who could look over the shoulder of everybody, maybe we’d be safer.
There’s that balance that you know is on selling ships. If you keep all
the ships in the harbor, none of them are ever going to–you’re not going
to lose any of them.
And so, you
always have that terrible dilemma in a position of authority of how much
is enough, are we ready to go? I think we have some very serious people
and very well-educated and qualified people making these decisions. And
I’m just very–I feel very fortunate to be on this team.
GEHMAN: Just
a few more questions.
(UNKNOWN):
One question. Sir, if you could just comment and have an opportunity to
talk about the budget. And I know you’ve only been in the job for about
a year or so, but you know, how it’s transcended in your mind, and what’s
the prospect for the future. Particularly in any budget distinctions between
the shuttle and the space station that you might be able to comment on.
HOWELL: Well,
the–right before I got here–see, I can cast this stone because I wasn’t
here–it was obvious to many people that our budget at NASA had gotten
in disarray and it was very difficult for us to really identify what it
cost to do things, to get things done.
And that
was one of the first things, chores, that Sean O’Keefe did when he got
in here, was to pin us down as an organization and find out exactly what
it would take to achieve things that we said we were going to take and
what is it going to cost to do those things, and then to say, "Do
we have the budget to do those things?"
And so we
had to cut some things out because we really didn’t have the money to
pay for things we said we were going to do. And that’s just flat not good
business. You can’t do that in your household and you can’t do it at NASA
either.
So he brought
budgetary discipline to NASA. Came under a lot of criticism by people
because he says: I don’t need anymore money right now, I just want to
see how I can spend the money I have.
I think we
have come through that. And I think, if you look at the president’s budget
submission, he actually modified it to ensure that the shuttle and the
station both would have the adequate funding over the next couple of years
to accomplish the missions that we’ve set out for them over the next several
years.
Now, I think,
as we go forward, we are going to be in a lot better posture to predict
proper budgetary accounts toward these things so that we will have credibility
when we say we need this much for this and this much for that.
I think we’re
in good shape, because he, you know, he adjusted. We were concerned over
the next couple of years if we were really going to have adequate funding
for both shuttle and station operations that we had projected. And he
adjusted, within NASA, funds from other programs to ensure we could that.
So I think we’re in good shape.
(UNKNOWN):
Mr. Tetrault (ph)?
TETRAULT
(ph): I have a continuing question on the budget, just to be sure I understand
it. It was my understanding that the budget, or at least the budget for
the shuttle and the space station, are on a project basis–you got the
engineers or Johnson engineers, so there must be some transfer of funds
that goes back and forth between the projects and the center. So that’s
my first question.
My second
question is, it’s also my understanding that NASA is going to a full costing
basis, which they haven’t done before. And I’d like your ideas on what
kind of a difference that’s going to make in terms of how you operate.
HOWELL: The
first question first. We have a, you know, an institution with a certain
number of engineers. And we forecast a certain number of them will be
working for the different programs, and their budget’s paid for their
services for those people.
However,
there is a pool of talent in the different disciplines we have that is
funded by institutional money. So I actually have an institutional budget
that is separate from the program funding so that I can maintain certain
core capabilities that withstand, you know, the give and take and the
ups and downs of utilization or not.
So that’s
sort of my buffer to ensure that I can maintain a certain skill level,
whether or not the program needs them today or not, when they’re going
to need them tomorrow. So there’s that kind of give and take that goes
on. I don’t know if I can be more specific more than that.
However,
you know, a lot of budget decisions are made on what you did last year
and the year before and what you project. And so that’s the type of–you
know, we match our full-time equivalents, our civil servants, and then,
of course, the program–the contractors have to do the same thing with
their own businesses, what’s going to be needed by the programs. And then
we have to bargain with them over what we need to do to do the task that’s
given us. And then, they give us the money for that.
Does that
help you on that at all?
TETRAULT
(ph): Yes, it confirms what I thought.
HOWELL: OK.
OK.
And now on
the other aspect, full cost accounting, that’s going to be a great new
adventure for Johnson Space Center and for all of NASA. And we’re going
to roll into that into our next budget year. And I, frankly, I am learning
about it as quickly as I can. And I would hate to try to tell you what
I know about it right now because I’m very ignorant. So I’m afraid I can’t
really answer that question for you.
(UNKNOWN):
Thank you, General Howell.
I’ve got
one last question, and then we’ll let you get on for your travels.
As you have
indicated, over the years the great majority of work that’s done on the
space flight programs is now done by contractors, most of it under a great
omnibus contract with this USA alliance, this SFOC contract.
What’s the
NASA mechanism for determining the contractor’s performance, is there
a board or a committee? And who decides whether they get bonuses or penalties
and things like that?
HOWELL: Each
of the contracts has a contract official who grades them and manages them.
The programs themselves grade them on their performance.
Of course,
each contract is a little different, whether they get fee or whether it’s
fixed price or what have you. But each contract has a government official,
usually who’s with the program or project that they’re contracted to,
who actually grades them on their performance and determines their fee.
Now, the
fee-determining goes up to a next level for approval. And so, we are involved
in that because we have people on my staff, senior people, who are actually
reviewing officials to approve those determinations.
(UNKNOWN):
So what you’re telling me is really a series of smaller contracts?
HOWELL: Yes.
(UNKNOWN):
It’s a bunch of little contracts, each project.
And does
the center have a contract also, a support contract, I’m sure?
HOWELL: Yes,
we do. And we have several contracts of people who do work for us on the
center, and we also have fee-determining officials. And they are always
reviewed. And of course, we have to get our headquarters, has to put a
stamp of approval on it. So it’s always the higher headquarters reviews
these to make sure that we’ve made the right decision. And these folks,
if they are upset about it, they can protest and have it reviewed further.
(UNKNOWN):
Thank you very much, General Howell.
On behalf
of the board, we’d like to thank you for rearranging your travel schedule
to be here today. And we’d also like to thank you for the wonderful support
that JSC has provided to us during our two and a half weeks or three weeks
that we’ve been here in Houston. It has been wonderful and it continues.
The board’s
getting larger and we’re digging deeper into your backyard and we appreciate
your cooperation and the energy which all of your folks have supported
us. I want to go on record as saying the support has been outstanding.
Thank you
very much, and you’re excused.
HOWELL: Thank
you. We are at your service.
(UNKNOWN):
Thank you very much.
