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258 thirty-three The Decisionmaking Process The history of liberty has largely been the history of the observance of procedural safeguards. —Justice Felix Frankfurter In the Ford administration, we were fully committed to restoring confidence and trust in the federal government as the nation healed from the Watergate trauma. Since my training and experience had been exclusively as a lawyer, the tools I brought to this task were a commitment to a process that is fair, rational, transparent, and understandable to the public. Too often decisions in Washington were made behind closed doors, influenced by powerful interests with deep pockets and special access, and explained with a distorted spin that only increased public distrust and cynicism. When I assumed office I faced a number of highly controversial issues. Should I approve the construction of a proposed eight-lane interstate highway through northern Virginia—I-66—that would feed traffic into the District of Columbia? Should I allow the European-made supersonic transport, the Concorde , to fly into the United States? Should I mandate air bags for passenger cars? Should I build a grand new airport for the St. Louis area across the Mississippi River in southern Illinois? In the past some of these decisions might have been made over a private lunch between a senator and a cabinet officer, perhaps as a quid pro quo for an increased appropriation for a pet project or some other earmarked piece of pork. There were times, of course, when I played my political cards. We used a profusion of political tools to negotiate a good policy result, especially when dealing with powerful congressional chairs. My use of the pool of unused interstate highway mileage is a case in point, although no interstate would ever actually be built without going through a rigorous review process. On major, controversial issues, however, in which there were strongly voiced conflicting views and for which public acceptance was critical, my lawyerly instincts for a fair and open process prevailed. 05-0488-1 part5.indd 258 9/9/10 8:26 PM The Decisionmaking Process / 259 One management tool that is second nature to a practicing lawyer but too often ignored in government is the setting of deadlines. Even statutory deadlines are often ignored. I was constantly setting tight deadlines that kept the civil servants scrambling. There was always the temptation to postpone controversial decisions, but by establishing due dates, I was able to bring a number of long-standing issues to resolution. To bring some sunshine into the decisionmaking process I decided as a first step to publish in the Federal Register the issues and alternatives under consideration . The issues often involved reconciling various public interest objectives , such as safety, environmental protection, job creation, promotion of new technologies, cost efficiency, quality of transportation services, and benefits to the economy. The second step would be to invite written comments from interested parties. Third, I would hold a public hearing, extending as long as six hours. Based on my reading of the written submissions, I would have some tough questions for the hearing participants. Finally, as the decisionmaker, I would write out the reasons for my decisions, explaining how I had analyzed and reconciled conflicting public interest considerations. i-66 The first controversial case I faced was the proposal by Virginia governor Mills Godwin to build an eight-lane freeway through northern Virginia to the Potomac River that would feed commuter traffic from the western suburbs over the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge into Washington. There was a lot of opposition to the highway from within the District of Columbia and close-in Arlington County, Virginia, and a lot of strong support from the further-out suburban communities whose residents faced increasing congestion in their commute to jobs in the capital. There were many conflicting considerations, some of which were set forth in a comprehensive environmental impact statement. The metropolitan area had committed to building a ninety-eight-mile fixed-rail rapid transit system and had transferred funds originally planned for District of Columbia freeways to the construction of the new subway. At that time the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries’ oil embargo had quadrupled the price of imported petroleum, precipitating an energy crisis. Air pollution was becoming a serious regional problem.The District of Columbia originally had planned to build the Three Sisters Bridge to accommodate the increased traffic flow across the Potomac to Virginia but had recently decided to withdraw the bridge from its transportation plan. Clearly there were...

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