Obama names known troubleshooter as oil agency chief

To overhaul federal oversight of offshore drilling, President Obama has turned to a Washington lawyer with no experience in oil and gas issues, but who has a reputation for fixing broken government agencies.

Michael R Bromwich, a former federal prosecutor and inspector general for the Justice Department who is now a partner in the Washington office of a New York law firm, will head up efforts to restructure the former Minerals Management Service.

The agency has come under fire in recent years for failing to adequately monitor offshore oil and gas development. Part of the interior department, it has been the subject of two scathing inspector general's reports in the past two years, documenting how MMS officials have improperly accepted gifts from officials they regulate and have even engaged in illegal drug use and sexual activities with them.

"Bromowich's charge over the next few months is to build an organisation that acts as the oil industry's watchdog - not its partner," Obama said during his Oval Office address last night.

Obama did not announce what Bromwich's title will be. Interior secretary Ken Salazar has dissolved MMS, separated it into three parts and forced the resignation of the MMS director he had appointed, Liz Birnbaum. But Obama said in his speech that "the pace of reform was just too slow".

The MMS job did not require Senate confirmation, and Bromwich's would not involve confirmation unless Congress acts to change the status of the agencies Salazar has created.

Bromwich helped prosecute Oliver North in the Iran-Contra investigation in the late 1980s. After that, he was inspector general for the Department of Justice during the Clinton administration.

He then went into private practice at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson. But his most high-profile work at the firm has been leading turnaround efforts at troubled agencies like the Houston and Washington, DC police departments.

The Harvard-trained lawyer's sparkling resume has a notable gap - almost no energy experience. A document distributed by Interior says Bromwich "conducted many major internal investigations for companies ... in the energy, pharmaceuticals, public accounting, and private security industries, among others," but does not detail the energy work.