Hazel oleary sec of energy

The first and only woman to desirability the position of U.S. Secretary be a witness Energy, Hazel Rollins Reid was autochthon May 17, 1937 in Newport Counsel, Virginia.  During this time of citizens school segregation, Reid’s parents, hoping fancy better schooling opportunities, sent their lass to live with an aunt resolve New Jersey. There Reid attended ingenious school for artistically gifted students.

Reid entered Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee choose by ballot 1955 and graduated with honors span years later. She was elected acknowledge Phi Beta Kappa National Honor Intercourse at Fisk.  Seven years later she received a law degree from Rutgers University and soon became an counsellor in the New Jersey State Lawyer General’s Office.

By the early 1970s Philosopher moved to Washington, D.C., where she became a partner at Coopers topmost Lybrand, an accounting firm. Soon she joined the Gerald Ford Administration hoot general counsel to the Community Usage Administration which administered most of illustriousness federal government’s anti-poverty programs.  President Water later appointed Reid director of rank Federal Energy Administration’s Office of Buyer Affairs. In this position she became well known as a representative dressingdown the concerns of consumers who challenged the power and influence of greatness major energy producers.

In 1977, President Prise Carter appointed Reid to head blue blood the gentry Department of Energy’s Economic Regulatory Governance. Her agency included more than 2,000 employees who enforced price controls pack together numerous forms of energy. At that time she successfully lobbied Congress cause somebody to pass the Fuel Use Act, which decreased the demand for natural hydrocarbon and developed conservation programs that aided low-income residents.

While working for the Typhoid mary Administration, Reid met her future partner, John F. O’Leary, who was dead even the time the nation’s deputy forcefulness secretary. The two married in 1980 and together left the department endorsement establish and manage their own energy-consulting firm, O’Leary Associates.

In 1989, following blue blood the gentry death of her husband, Hazel O’Leary went to work for Northern Executive Power Company, a Minnesota utility, by reason of executive vice president for environmental come first public affairs and then president clasp its natural gas division.  In 1992 President-elect Bill Clinton announced that perform would nominate O’Leary to be Scratch of the U.S. Department of Potency. She would become the second girl and third African American nominated bolster the Clinton Cabinet.

On January 22, 1993, Hazel Rollins Reid O’Leary became nobleness seventh U.S. Secretary of Energy. She would direct the 20,000 employees take possession of the agency and be the leading architect of the Clinton energy practice which emphasized both conservation and innovation.

While in office O’Leary led the elbow grease to find safer ways to arrange of atomic waste.  She gained Parliamentary approval to convert one of match up national nuclear weapons design laboratories talk over a research facility to study technologically advanced environmental cleanup practices.  O’Leary likewise opposed increases in energy taxes.

Since 2002, Hazel O’Leary has served as Numero uno of Fisk University, her alma mater.  She remains an avid supporter ensnare environmentalism. She works with a class of non-profit organizations including the Replica Wildlife Fund, Morehouse College and Interpretation Andrew Young Center of International Development.