President-elect Barack Obama is looking at possibly appointing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head the Environmental Protection Agency, according to sources familiar with the process, though he is eying several other prominent environmentalists as well.
Kennedy founded and now chairs the Waterkeeper Alliance, which promotes water quality in the U.S. and abroad, while simultaneously serving as an attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council and a professor at Pace University School of Law. He backed New York Sen. Hillary Clinton in this year’s Democratic presidential primary, but his cousin Caroline co-chaired Obama’s vice presidential search committee.
Several sources familiar with the transition process, however, noted the new administration will be looking to appoint several women and people of color to high-profile positions and EPA would be a natural slot for such an appointment.
Other names under consideration for the administrator slot include: former Sierra Club president and environmental activist Lisa Renstrom; California Air Resources Board chair Mary Nichols; Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Kathleen McGinty; and Massachusetts Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Ian Bowles.
Nichols served as EPA’s assistant administrator for the office of air and radiation under the Clinton administration, and McGinty chaired the Council on Environmental Quality under Clinton.
Straight to the source…Washingtonpost.com