Energy: 10 Staffers to Know

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Schmidt said she approaches this legislative task with the perspective of 15 years of working at the Environmental Protection Agency. “I think a lot about how we actually implement this once it’s enacted,” she said.

She joined the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s staff three years ago, under then-ranking member John Dingell (D-Mich.), when Democrats were in the minority.

“I fell into [this job], but I can’t imagine doing anything better,” she said. “Years ago, someone told me doing environmental policy in Washington was like playing a three-dimensional chess game. It’s important for what it means long term for the planet. And there’s a wonderful gamesmanship on how you anticipate and react to what the other players are doing.”

Schmidt said she and her colleagues on the committee “actively reach out to stakeholders” who have an interest in the bill. That includes everyone from environmental groups to oil companies. But, she concedes, her schedule hasn’t allowed for much interaction.

“Because of the very aggressive schedule the chairman has had us on, we haven’t had the opportunity to meet with nearly as many folks as we’d like to,” she said. “We need to be drawing on that specific expertise.”

Bob Simon, majority staff director, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
Age: 53
Birthplace: Philadelphia
Education: B.S., chemistry, Ursinus College; Ph.D., inorganic chemistry, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

As the top Democratic staffer on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee for the past decade, Bob Simon has already had a hand in shaping two major comprehensive energy laws — and is currently knee-deep in a third.

But it’s his work on creating a program to compensate federal workers sickened by their work on nuclear weapons that for him stands out as a highlight of his 15-year Senate career with Energy Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.).

“They were serving their country and I think being served very poorly by the system as it then existed,” Simon said of the thousands of sick workers helped by the legislation he helped steer into law in 2000.

Simon similarly has devoted his own professional career to public service, working for the Department of Energy and the National Academy of Sciences before coming to the Hill.

Aided by a background steeped in science, Simon is currently focused on the widespread deployment of clean energy technology.

“Being able to get things demonstrated at scale and mobilizing the financing that’s needed is really the biggest challenge,” he said. “That’s at the heart of a lot of these problems.”

He also has a message for the many lobbyists and interests groups waiting outside the committee’s door: Do your homework. “Your best bet is to come with a really good substantive case,” he said. “Details matter in energy policy. Members of this committee like to know the facts.”

Andrea Spring, professional staff member, House Energy and Commerce Committee
Age: 38
Birthplace: Baton Rouge, La.
Education: B.A., history, Yale University; master’s in public policy, Harvard University

Being a Republican aide on the House Energy and Commerce Committee while Democratic-led climate change legislation is the hottest priority can be more about stopping potential policies than writing the legislation.

That leaves little for Andrea Spring to point to as her finished product.

“You can spend years where you don’t enact major legislation, but a lot of what you do in terms of oversight, or not enacting legislation, all of that is very important,” she said.

It’s a sharp contrast to her first job out of college as an editor at Campaigns & Elections magazine. “The fun thing about being a journalist was having an actual physical product that I could say this is what I spent my month doing,” Spring said.

Before returning to the Hill to work on the committee, Spring served in the legislative affairs department at the Electric Power Supply Association. She had previously worked in the office of then-Rep. Ed Bryant (R-Tenn.).

“One of the nice things about working for a trade association was I got to really specialize in certain issues, and I got to spend a lot of time on electricity and get into the details,” she said.