Former Los Alamos National Laboratory business manager Craig Leasure will become the full-time vice president for national laboratories at the University of California on Oct. 1, after about eight months on the job in an interim capacity.
The university is a senior partner in the management contractors for two U.S. Energy Department nuclear-weapon labs.
“I have no doubt that Dr. Leasure is by far the best person to spearhead our continued collaboration with the federal government on nuclear security as well as the university’s research to address energy, environmental, infrastructure and health issues,” Janet Napalitano, University of California president and secretary of homeland security under then-President Barack Obama, said in a Sept. 19 statement.
Leasure succeeds Kim Budil, who left the University of California to in February take over the Weapons and Complex Integration directorate at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif.
As vice president for national labs at the university, Leasure will be the primary point of contact between the institution and the governing boards of Lawrence Livermore National Security and Triad National Security: respectively, the prime contractors that run the Livermore and Los Alamos labs for the Energy Department’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration.
After Budil left, the University of California said it would conduct a national search for her successor. The search evidently led the institution right back home.
Budil, as VP for national labs, had a seat on the Board of Governors for Lawrence Livermore National Security, and chaired Triad’s human resources and compensation committee. It was not known at deadline for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing whether Leasure would inherit those responsibilities.
Leasure came to the University of California last November after a nearly 30-year stint at Los Alamos, most recently as principal associate director for operations and business under former lab prime Los Alamos National Security.
Lawrence Livermore National Security, led by Bechtel National and the University of California, manages the Livermore lab under a contract awarded in 2007 and which, including options, is worth around $30 billion and expire in 2022.
Triad — led by the nonprofit trio of Battelle Memorial Institute, the University of California, and Texas A&M University — on Nov. 1, 2018, began work on the five-year base period of a Los Alamos management and operations contract expected to cost the NNSA about $20 billion over 10 years, including five one-year options.
