Secretary Ray LaHood announced to the employees of the Department of
Transportation (DOT) that after serving for four years in President Obama’s cabinet,
he would not be staying on for the second term. The secretary sent the
following email to DOT employees across the country, informing them of his
plans:
I have let President
Obama know that I will not serve a second term as Secretary of the U.S.
Department of Transportation. It has been an honor and a privilege to
lead the Department, and I am grateful to President Obama for giving me such an
extraordinary opportunity. I plan to stay on until my successor is
confirmed to ensure a smooth transition for the Department and all the
important work we still have to do.
As I look back on
the past four years, I am proud of what we have accomplished together in so
many important areas. But what I am most proud of is the DOT team. You
exemplify the best of public service, and I truly appreciate all that you have
done to make America better, to make your communities better, and to make DOT
better.
Our achievements are
significant. We have put safety front and center with the Distracted
Driving Initiative and a rule to combat pilot fatigue that was decades in the
making. We have made great progress in improving the safety of our
transit systems, pipelines, and highways, and in reducing roadway fatalities to
historic lows. We have strengthened consumer protections with new
regulations on buses, trucks, and airlines.
We helped jumpstart
the economy and put our fellow Americans back to work with $48 billion in
transportation funding from the American Recovery and Investment Act of 2009,
and awarded over $3.1 billion in TIGER grants to 218 transportation projects
across the Nation. We have made unprecedented investments in our nation’s
ports. And we have put aviation on a sounder footing with the FAA
reauthorization, and secured funding in the Moving Ahead for Progress in the
21st Century Act to help States build and repair their roads, bridges and
transit systems.
And to further
secure our future, we have taken transportation into the 21st century with CAFE
Standards, NextGen, and our investments in passenger and High-Speed Rail.
What’s more, we have provided the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy with the funding
and leadership it needs to prepare a new generation of midshipmen to meet our
country’s rapidly-evolving defense and maritime transportation needs.
Closer to home, we
also have made great strides. In December, the DOT was recognized as the
most improved agency in the entire Federal government in the 2012 “Best Places
to Work” rankings published by the Partnership of Public Service. Even
more impressive, DOT was ranked 9th out of the 19 largest agencies in the
government.
Each of these
remarkable accomplishments is a tribute your hard work, creativity, commitment
to excellence, and most of all, your dedication to our country. DOT is
fortunate to have such an extraordinary group of public servants. I look
forward to continuing to work with all of you as the selection and confirmation
process of the next transportation secretary moves forward. Now is not
the time to let up - we still have a number of critical safety goals to
accomplish and still more work to do on the implementation of
MAP-21.
I’ve told President
Obama, and I’ve told many of you, that this is the best job I’ve ever
had. I’m grateful to have the opportunity to work with all of you and I’m
confident that DOT will continue to achieve great things in the future.
Thank you, and God
bless you.
You can read the original DOT news release
here→.
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