Here’s the website with the list of Congressional members on the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies:

http://appropriations.senate.gov/subcommittees/commjust/topics.cfm?code=commerce

Obviously some Senators pay more attention to NASA issues given their districts, but you could also shotgun the list with the same letter body (just change the addressee and address).

Here’s a list of staffers on the overall Senate Appropriations Committee (and their salaries).

http://www.legistorm.com/office/Appropriations_Committee/1/2.html

It’s a huge list, but you could narrow it to just the professional staff members and shotgun them with the same letter body (and again change the addresses). Alternately, Allen Cutler and Paul Carliner (both on the list) have dealt with NASA issues in the past — no idea if they still do.

The point for Centennial Challenges is that prizes have been offered and won (to the benefit of both offerer and winner) many times in the past in similar situations. The idea doesn’t really need to be treated so gingerly, as if it were brand new and highly speculative. Some judgement in picking prizes to offer, some management skill, and of course some money are the main ingredients needed.

unless there is a significant materials breakthrough, i doubt the tether competition will be won.

so, hopefully, we can put on a good show for congress, prove that it was money well spent, and they will authorize funds.

personally, i’d like to see a BIG prize available. i went with prospace.org last march to talk with congress about a big, $100m prize… didnt get much of a response. but consider this, NASA has gotten priceless PRESS value, and they have not had to spend a single $ yet… and probably $1-1.5M has ACTUALLY been spent by teams working on this stuff. as a finance guy, that seems like a really strong return on investment….

http://launchmagonline.com/

— Donald

1) The problems with DARPA’s Grand Challenges program are different from those with NASA’s Centennial Challenges. In the former Congress redirected authority for granting prizes from the head of DARPA to his superior; in the latter, a Senate committee elected not to provide NASA with addtional prize money. Generalizing that this means that Congress is wavering in its support of prizes doesn’t, to this observer, seem warranted.

2) Even if Congress eventually decides not to provide additional funding for Centennial Challenges in FY07, the prize money previously allocated will still be available; NASA simply won’t be able to fund additional large prizes. So things like the tether strength competition can continue next year.

Navigation.

Rather than support a bold experiment that pays only for results, let’s shovel that remaining 0.001 percent of NASA’s budget out of the Treasury’s door, where hard-working taxpayers will never be able to reclaim it, even when contractors and grantees fail to deliver the products they’re paid for.

Forget space politics. What a pathetic statement about our appropriators’ general lack of fiscal rigor…

Hopefully this event and the Senate Appropriations Committee language on the Centennial Challenges is not the beginning of the end of the government’s dipping its toes in the “prize” waters.