AASHTO Journal, 23 January 2015
President Obama has sent the Senate more names of officials he wants to re-nominate to agency positions, after the last Congress adjourned without the Senate voting to confirm them.
The AASHTO Journal reported Jan. 16 that Obama also re-nominated Therese McMillan to permanently lead the Federal Transit Administration, where she is currently acting administrator.
And Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has appointed his former chief of staff, Sarah Feinberg, to be acting chief of the Federal Railroad Administration pending a presidential nomination to replace Joseph Szabo, who left that post this month.
In a Jan. 13 announcement, the White House said Obama was renominating:
-Carlos Monje Jr. to become the Department of Transportation’s assistant secretary for policy;
-Dan Elliott to another term as a member of the Surface Transportation Board that he chaired until recently; and
-Mario Cordero to another term at the Federal Maritime Commission, which he chairs.
Monje, who was chief of staff at the president’s Domestic Policy Council from 2011 to 2014, has been counselor to Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx since February 2014. http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/08/28/president-obama-announces-more-key-administration-posts
At the STB, Elliott was chairman from August 2009 until he had to step down Dec. 31 after his term and a holdover period had expired. If the Senate confirms him, his new term on the board would continue to Dec. 31, 2018. The STB oversees economic regulation of railroads, and of the two remaining board members Deb Miller is currently acting chair. Miller was previously Kansas’ secretary of transportation.
Cordero has been on the FMC since April 2011. President Obama named him as its chairman nearly two years later. His new term, in confirmed, could keep him at the FMC through June 30, 2019.