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Stung by criticisms that its public affairs staff was stifling open and honest communications by its scientists, in particular its top climate scientist James E. Hansen, a new NASA policy announced by Administrator Michael D. Griffin expresses a "commitment to openness."

The new policy comes just weeks after Hansen had gone public to The New York Times about his long-standing complaints that NASA was improperly interfering with his communications involving the science of climate change (see EW article, Feb. 2006). Hansen's concerns prompted extensive coverage in a number of newspapers nationwide and widespread criticism within scientific circles. Hansen in a subsequent interview said his concerns extend also to NOAA and to EPA under the Bush administration, a view shared by a number of career civil servants and scientists at both agencies.

The 24-year-old public affairs staffer and former Bush campaign aid singled-out in those criticisms soon after resigned from the agency when it was learned he had concocted his resume to reflect a college degree he did not have.

Responding to the criticisms, Griffin had quickly assembled a team to assess the claims and, if necessary, move to address them. On March 30, the new "principles and policies on scientific openness" were announced and the policy was posted on NASA's web site.

The Times's Warren E. Leary quoted Hansen as saying the revised policy is "definitely better ... I'm very optimistic. Things have changed dramatically since this became a public issue." Hansen told Leary, "This has been a healthy exercise, and hopefully similar things will happen at other agencies that have had similar problems."

Announcing the policy, Griffin called it "a commitment to a culture of scientific and technical openness which values the free exchange of ideas, data, and information." The new policy says scientific and technical information from NASA concerning its programs and projects "will be accurate and unfiltered."

It says editing by public affairs staffers should be aimed at making communications well written and suitable for their audiences, but "shall not change scientific or technical data, or the meaning of programmatic content."

Only designated NASA employees "are authorized to speak for the agency in an official capacity regarding NASA policy, programmatic, and budget issues," but "journalists may have access to the NASA officials they seek to interview, provided those NASA officials agree to be interviewed." The policy encourages that public affairs staffs be present at such interviews "to the maximum extent practicable" so they can "attest to the content of the interview, support the interviewee, and provide post-interview follow-up with the media as necessary." It says interviews are to be "'on the record' and attributable to the person making the remarks .... Any person providing material to the press will identify himself/herself as the source."

Information provided by a NASA official to one medium is to be provided to other media if requested, the policy says.