Minutes of Senior Staff and Center Directors’ Meeting 7 August 2000

The following documents the discussions addressed at the Senior
Staff and Center Directors’ Meeting on August 7, 2000. Mr. Goldin did
not attend the meeting. Action assignments have been placed in brackets
[ ] for easy identification.

1. AA Reports

E/Hall: Ms. Hall reported that Mr. Reese is attending the Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission’s National Performance Review
Interagency Federal Task Force on Early Dispute Resolution, Data
Collection, Best Practices, and Dispute Prevention Strategies. This Task
Force was initiated by Congressman Albert Wynn (D-MD). Congressman Wynn
will be in attendance at this executive briefing.

W/Gross: Ms. Gross reported that several current reports by the NASA
Office of Inspector General (OIG) have identified noncompliance with
Agency policy regarding the screening of Agency and contractor personnel,
including foreign nationals, prior to establishing user accounts and
granting access to NASA information technology systems. These personnel
have privileged access for extended periods with no effort made to even
initiate the screening process. We cannot overemphasize the importance
of protecting Agency information through a rigorous security program
including appropriate security screening. Emphasis must be placed on
screening individuals before granting privileged or limited privileged
access. Appendix III to Office of Management and Budget Circular A130,
“Security of Federal Automated Information Resources,” requires screening
of individuals who are authorized to bypass significant technical and
operational security controls of the system, commensurate with the risk
and magnitude of harm they could cause. NASA Procedures and Guidelines
(NPG) 1620.1, “Security Procedures and Guidelines,” and NPG 2810.1,
“Security of Information Technology,” require that all individuals
requiring a privileged or limited privilege system account and access to
NASA systems complete an appropriate level of personnel screening. The
OIG will be following up with further reviews and audits.

P/Welch: Mr. Welch reported on the following items: 1) NASA will
provide live coverage of the Progress supply vehicle’s docking to the
International Space Station on Tuesday, August 8, beginning at 4 p.m. 2)
NASA Television carried images of the western wildfires taken by the
SeaWIFS spacecraft. Those images were carried by more than 100
television stations around the country. In addition, links to the
SeaWIFS Web site from the NASA Homepage increased traffic to the site by
a factor of 3. 3) The movie “Space Cowboys,” which was produced with
the cooperation of NASA, opened last weekend with $17.6 million earned at
the box office. USA Today quotes Warner Brothers this morning as saying
that this “is the biggest first weekend gross of any movie in Clint
Eastwood’s 45-year career.”

F/Novak: Ms. Novak reported on the following items: 1) The National
Partnership for Reinventing Government has announced that another
employee satisfaction survey will be conducted in September. The purpose
of this survey will be to show agency and Governmentwide trends between
1998, 1999, and 2000, and to establish a baseline for the next
administration. The names of 1000 randomly selected NASA employees will
be provided to us on August 11. This year’s sample size has been revised
upward from 760 to 1000. 2) On July 26, the President issued an
Executive Order requiring Federal agencies to hire 100,000 persons with
disabilities over the next 5 years. Agencies must submit their 5-year
hiring estimates to the Office of Personnel Management by August 25.
Additionally, no later than September 25, agencies must submit a specific
plan describing how they intend to increase opportunities for disabled
persons in the workforce including outreach efforts, hiring plans by
occupation/grade level, and training proposals. The Office of Human
Resources and Education (OHRE) will work closely with Center Human
Resources offices to identify recruitment and advancement strategies. A
memo was sent on Friday, August 4, asking the Enterprises to provide OHRE
with their hiring goals no later than August 23.

B/Peterson: Mr. Peterson reported that the Senate Appropriations
Committee approved the FY 2000 Operating Plan. NASA has not received a
response from the Authorization Committees.

K/Thomas: Mr. Thomas reported that the 9th Annual NASA/New England
Technology and Business Conference will be held from August 14-17, at the
Rhode Island Convention Center.

2. Center Reports

DFRC/Petersen: Mr. Petersen reported that DFRC enjoyed the visit from
MSFC/Art Stephenson and R/Sam Venneri.

GRC/Campbell: Mr. Campbell reported on the following items: 1) Global
Solar Energy has shipped 56 flexible, lightweight (less than 3 pounds
each) solar collector photovoltaic panels to “Operation Strong Angel.”
“Operation Strong Angel” is a maritime exercise in the Pacific Ocean
which is an unprecedented military and humanitarian exercise involving
the armed forces of seven countries, the Red Cross, United Nations, World
Food Program, Doctors without Borders, and Save the Children. 2) United
Airlines will be implementing the Honeywell Aviation Weather Information
(AWIN) System on scheduled line flights to be flown this fall. The
Honeywell AWIN System provides both graphical and textual weather
information to the pilot for improved decisionmaking. The Honeywell AWIN
System is being developed under a Cooperative Research Agreement with
NASA as part of the Aviation Safety Program Weather Accident Prevention
Project, which is managed out of GRC. 3) After having been dormant
since November 1999 because of star-tracker problems, the Deep Space 1
(DS1) ion engine was reactivated on June 21, 2000, for the journey to
encounter the comet Borrelly in September 2001. The xenon ion engine has
accumulated more than 4400 hours of thrusting to date.

JSC/Parsons: Mr. Parsons reported on the following items: 1) On orbit,
International Space Station operations are going well. 2) This
weekend’s Progess launch went as planned, as did the captive carry of the
X-38 131-R vehicle at DFRC. 3) They are tracking the direction of
Hurricane Alberto in the Atlantic Ocean.

KSC/Bridges: Mr. Bridges reported on the following items: 1) The
transfer of orbiter Atlantis to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) began
this morning at about 9:30 a.m.

By tonight, the orbiter will be mated to the external tank and solid
rocket boosters in VAB high bay 1. On August 12, the entire Shuttle stack
will be moved to high bay 2 as part of the final safe-haven fit checks.
The recently completed safe haven modification provides additional
storage space in the VAB for Space Shuttle elements in the event of a
tropical storm or hurricane. Shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to arrive on
Launch Pad 39B from VAB high bay 2 on the morning of August 14. KSC is
also keeping an eye on Hurricane Alberto.

LaRC/Creedon: Dr. Creedon reported that Mr. Tom Young visited the Center
and discussed the findings of the Mars Program Independent Assessment
Team.

MSFC/Stephenson: Mr. Stephenson reported on the following items: 1)
MSFC really appreciated Dr. Kathie Olsen’s, NASA’s Chief Scientist, visit
last week. 2) He thanked Mr. Peterson and his group at DFRC for the
visit last week. 3) DFRC will visit MSFC this week.

SSC/Estess: Mr. Estess reported that Mr. Rothenberg will visit SSC this
week to review operations and to participate in the Honor Awards Ceremony on
Wednesday.

NOTE: ACTION ASSIGNMENTS WILL BE TRANSMITTED UNDER SEPARATE COVER AND
TRACKED BY THE HEADQUARTERS CORRESPONDENCE MANAGEMENT OFFICE. SPECIFIC
QUESTIONS MAY BE ADDRESSED TO BRIDGET FENNER AT (202) 358-0909.

Officials-in-Charge of NASA Headquarters Offices:

AA/Mr. Heffernan

AI/Dr. Mulville

AB/Ms. Tagg

AC/Gen. Armstrong

AE/Mr. Keegan

AJ/Mr. Tam

AM/Dr. Nicogossian

AO/Mr. Holcomb

AS/Dr. Olsen

B/Mr. Holz

C/Mr. Christensen

E/Mr. Reese

F/Ms. Novak

G/Mr. Frankle

H/Mr. Luedtke

I/Mr. Schumacher

J/Mr. Sutton

K/Mr. Thomas

L/Mr. Heffernan

M/Mr. Rothenberg

P/Ms. Wilhide

Q/Mr. Gregory

R/Mr. Venneri

S/Dr. Weiler

U/Dr. Olsen (Acting)*

W/Ms. Gross

Y/Dr. Asrar

Z/Ms. Garver

Directors, NASA Centers:

ARC/Dr. McDonald

DFRC/Mr. Petersen

GRC/Mr. Campbell

GSFC/Mr. Diaz

JSC/Mr. Abbey

KSC/Mr. Bridges

LaRC/Dr. Creedon

MSFC/Mr. Stephenson

SSC/Mr. Estess

Director, Jet Propulsion Laboratory:

Dr. Stone

cc:

A/Ms. Stewart

AB/Ms. Saldana

AC/Ms. Landrus

AE/Ms. Moore

AI/Ms. Shaeffer

AI/Ms. Soper

AJ/Ms. Bloxon

AO/Ms. Wissinger

AS/Ms. Simms

CIC/Ms. Grimes

CIC/Ms. Hoover

CIC/Ms. Coates

CIC/Ms. Fenner

CIC/Ms. Maynor