PHOENIX — John “Rick” Dearholt, a former Jacobs Engineering hand who has worked on uranium enrichment complex demolition at the Oak Ridge Site, could soon become the Energy Department’s assistant secretary for environmental management.
Reached by phone late Wednesday, Dearholt confirmed one of the biggest rumors circulating at the annual Waste Management Symposium here: that he had landed a job interview with newly confirmed Secretary of Energy Rick Perry for DOE’s top nuclear cleanup post.
However, the interview was cancelled before Dearholt made it back to Washington from the symposium, which he attended, Dearholt told Weapons Complex Morning Briefing by phone.
Dearholt’s name surfaced in the rumor mill as a possible Environmental Management boss not long before the Senate confirmed Perry as secretary of energy on March 2. A Marine Corps veteran who worked in and around the DOE weapons complex after leaving the service in the early 1990s, Dearholt is currently vice president of business development for data management provider Information International Associates of Oak Ridge, Tenn.
It was not immediately clear what Dearholt’s abruptly canceled call-up to Washington might mean for Gary Lavine, the New York attorney and former DOE lawyer who until lately was rumored to be a top choice to head DOE’s Environmental Management office.
A source at the Waste Management Symposium this week suggested Lavine’s star was fading in the Trump administration. Lavine himself could not be reached for comment this week and has not returned multiple requests for comments since his name surfaced as a possible assistant secretary for environmental management.
Editor’s note, 03/10/2017, 1:55 p.m.: The story was corrected to reflect that Dearholt’s job scheduled interview was cancelled.
