Lutter succeeds Hubbard as FDA Associate Commissioner for Policy and Planning

03/07/2005

William Hubbard, FDA's Associate Commissioner for Policy and Planning, recently announced his retirement after over 14 years in this position and a long, distinguished career in the federal government. Randall Lutter, Ph.D., has been named as the new Associate Commissioner, succeeding Hubbard.

Hubbard joined the Department of Health and Human Services in 1973. During his career Hubbard attained many honors for his work, including the Department's Distinguished Service Award (four times), the FDA's Award of Merit (four times), a presidential citation in 1997, and the 1998 Presidential Meritorious Rank Award.

Hubbard has had a profound impact on FDA's public health mission, according to an Agency spokesperson. Hubbard was one of the principal designers of the nutrition label, which for the first time provided nutrition information on all food packages, and for which he was honored by the National Endowment for the Humanities with a national design award. He was a major originator of the Prescription Drug User Fee Act, a Presidential Initiative on Food Safety, and the redesign of the label for over-the-counter drugs.

Hubbard's successor Lutter, who joined FDA in 2002 as chief economist in the Office of Planning and has broad experience in determining the economic and policy aspects of FDA's work. As the new associate Commissioner for Policy and Planning he will be a senior advisor to Acting FDA Commissioner Lester Crawford on all major agency matters including regulations, policy and administrative programs. In particular, Lutter's office will assess the public policy implications of FDA's regulatory and administrative activities.

Before coming to the agency, Lutter worked as a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and a fellow with the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies. He served as a staff economist with the Office of Management and Budget from 1991 to 1997 and a senior economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisors from 1997 to 1998. He taught at the State University of New York at Buffalo upon earning his Ph.D in economics from Cornell University in 1986.