Rep. John L. Mica is conservative, but he’s not what you would call a Tea Party conservative.
A member of Congress for almost two decades, the Florida Republican spearheaded the move to allow airline pilots to carry guns and wants to privatize a good chunk of airport security operations.
Fred Hiatt
Editor of The Post’s editorial page, Hiatt also writes a biweekly column and contributes to the PostPartisan blog.
But he isn’t against spending money now and then. He championed the Congressional Visitors Center. Recently he tried, without success, to persuade Florida’s new Republican governor to accept the money President Obama was offering for high-speed rail.
And as chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Mica has one more grand project in his sights: He wants to evict the Federal Trade Commission from its historic quarters at Pennsylvania and Constitution avenues and let the National Gallery of Art move in.
“You won’t believe me, but this is my only priority as chairman,” he says — a fact that has the commissioners sputtering.
“I know the commissioners have fourth-floor balconies with great views of the Capitol,” Mica says dismissively.
Which has the commissioners sputtering even more.
“I have no view,” exclaims Commissioner Tom Rosch, pointing out that (a) he is a Republican and (b) his term will expire before any eviction could take place. “And I suspect that Mica has a bigger office than I do.”
“We need to examine this gentleman’s motives,” Rosch continues. “Is it because he has a grudge against us? . . . Is it that he would like his picture emblazoned on their brochure? . . . Is it ego? . . . I don’t know.”
“I know the commissioners think I hate them,” Mica says, with the air of a man who’s not losing much sleep over that little misunderstanding. “That’s not the truth. . . . They’re an important agency. I’m not trying to kick dirt in their face.”
What he is trying to do, Mica says, is help the National Gallery rival the great museums of other world capitals: the Louvre, the Prado, the National Gallery in London. As an art lover, collector and frequent museum visitor, Mica explains, it pains him that much of the National Gallery’s collection has to be kept in the equivalent of the attic.
When I ask how his project will play among penny-pinching Republicans, Mica replies, “If they don’t like art, look at the finances.” By consolidating the FTC, which is leasing a couple of satellite sites, he argues, and by offloading to the National Gallery’s private donors the $200 million-plus cost of renovating the seven-decade-old FTC building, taxpayers will save money and the Federal Triangle will be enriched for visitors and Washingtonians.
“I don’t believe the savings are really there,” responds commissioner Edith Ramirez. The FTC denies that its building is in imminent need of an upgrade; worries that a new location would be inferior, and possibly still not consolidated; and maintains that its core mission of protecting consumers could be compromised.
“To disrupt this mission now, when consumers are suffering,” would be especially wrong, says commissioner Julie Brill. And, says commissioner William E. Kovacic, the mission would certainly suffer if the FTC were removed from a structure “that has become so identified with us and our brand.”
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