Thomas Readinger is the new Associate Director of the Offshore Minerals Management Program of the Minerals Management Service, an agency of the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Prior to this new appointment, Mr. Readinger was the Deputy Associate Director of OMM and was responsible for managing Outer Continental Shelf resources to ensure environmental protection, safe operations and receipt of fair market value for OCS resources. In that capacity, he also served as the chairman of the OMM Information Management Committee and led the OMM effort to develop the new e-Government Transformation proposal to increase the efficient and effective delivery of services to agency stakeholders.

Lucy Querques Denett, MMS Acting Director observed, "Tom Readinger brings to the position of Associate Director a wealth of knowledge and experience about the practices and processes of the Offshore Program that have helped to make the OCS a major contributor to the Nation’s energy and economic security."

Mr. Readinger has been involved with the OCS program for 26 years. He joined the Federal Government in 1976 as an economist with the Bureau of Land Management where he was responsible for developing bidding systems and bid adequacy procedures to ensure fair market value for OCS resources. From 1987 to 1997, he served as Program Director for the Office of OCS Program Development and Coordination, where he developed and implemented the OCS 5-year Oil and Gas Leasing Program for MMS.

In 1995, Mr. Readinger was awarded the Department of the Interior’s Meritorious Service Award for career-long contributions to the development of procedures to ensure fair market value for public resources. Since being promoted to the Senior Executive Service in 1987, he has received numerous performance awards for contributions to program management and information technology advancements.

Mr. Readinger received a B.S. degree in Business Management from the Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1972, and an M.A. degree in Economics from American University in 1974. He received his Senior Executive Certification in Public Administration from George Washington University in 1987.

Mr. Readinger is a native of Hershey, Pennsylvania. He currently resides in Herndon, Virginia with his wife, Karen, and his sons, Sam and Bert.

MMS is the federal agency in the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages the nation's oil, natural gas and other mineral resources on the outer continental shelf in federal offshore waters. The agency also collects, accounts for and disburses mineral revenues from federal and Indian leases. These revenues totaled nearly $10 billion in 2001 and close to $120 billion since the agency was created in 1982. Annually, nearly $1 billion from those revenues go into the Land and Water Conservation Fund for the acquisition and development of state and federal park and recreation lands.