HHS GENERAL COUNSEL POST OFFERED TO COLUMBIA LAW PROF. HARRIET RABB

HHS GENERAL COUNSEL POST OFFERED TO COLUMBIA LAW PROF. HARRIET RABB, who is vice-dean and George Jaffin professor of law and social responsibility at Columbia University Law School. Rabb, who joined the university faculty in 1971, previously served as director of the Clinical Education department and oversaw student casework in employment rights, education law, and fair housing. Rabb has authored many articles focusing on equal opportunity law and in the 1970s represented a group of women in a publicized sex discrimination suit against the New York Times. She was a member of the Ford Foundation from 1977 through 1989, also sitting on the board of the legal and education fund of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Asia Watch, and Legal AID. HHS also is said to have offered the position of assistant secretary for human development services to Mary Jo Bane, currently the commissioner of the New York Department of Social Services. HHS must find a new candidate for assistant secretary for health following the withdrawal of James Mongan, MD. After having tentatively accepted nomination to the post ("The Gray Sheet" Feb. 8, p. 5), Mongan had second thoughts and submitted a letter to HHS Secretary Donna Shalala on Feb. 9 asking that his name be withdrawn "for personal and family reasons." He reportedly did not want to move his family from Kansas City, Missouri, maintain a second home in Washington or try to commute between the cities. The Office of Management and Budget has named Nancy-Ann Min to the newly created position of associate director for health care issues. Announced on Feb. 10, the appointment establishes a seventh associate directorship by breaking out health responsibilities from the OMB associate director for human resources, veterans and labor. During the Bush Administration, that position was held by Thomas Scully, who is now an attorney with the Washington firm Patton, Boggs & Blow. Min also is a lawyer and since 1991 has been with the Washington firm Covington & Burling, where she has been working on state and federal issues. Previously she was a commissioner in the Tennessee Human Services Department. She served in the Carter White House on the staff of the assistant to the president for political liaison before earning a Harvard law degree in 1983. After earning her BA from the University of Tennessee, Min, like a number of Clinton Administration appointees, was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship.