Cirillo Probe Dropped
Rep. Frank Wolf withdrew his request that the Department of Transportation investigate Julie Cirillo, chief of the Department of Transportation’s truck and bus safety program
Rep. Frank Wolf withdrew his request that the Department of Transportation investigate Julie Cirillo, chief of the Department of Transportation’s truck and bus safety program.
Wolf agreed with DOT Inspector General Kenneth Mead that there is no need to pursue an investigation, according to Deputy Inspector General Ray DeCarli.
In a letter last month, Wolf had asked Mead to probe Cirillo’s handling of the transfer of the safety program out of the Federal Highway Administration.
Specifically, Wolf was angered by an e-mail Cirillo had sent to her staff listing safety enforcement activities they would have to stop due to a loss of funding connected with the transfer. The funding shut-off was Wolf’s way of ensuring the transfer of the Office of Motor Carrier Safety out of FHWA.
The memo was leaked to a Capitol Hill newsletter, and Wolf took it as part of an attempt to thwart his campaign to reform DOT’s truck and bus safety program.
Cirillo said she wrote the memo to inform her staff about the effect of the funding law that changed their status within DOT. Wolf thought the memo overstated the impact of the law, and asked Mead to investigate.
Following an interview with Cirillo, DeCarli said, the Inspector General determined that “there was nothing ill-found in her motives.”
Wolf has accepted the Inspector General’s view, and “the issue is resolved,” DeCarli said.
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