By Michael Brooks

WASHINGTON — After four years, Commissioner Tony Clark’s last day at FERC will be Sept. 30, he said at his last, and 47th, open meeting Thursday.

Clark said that given the date would be the end of a week, pay period, quarter and the federal fiscal year, “this may be God’s way of telling me that that’s probably the right day to move on.”

The remaining days of his tenure will be mostly spent emptying his office, he said, though he would be available in case a quorum (a minimum of three commissioners) is needed for decisions in which another commissioner could not participate. Chairman Norman Bay recuses himself from issues he dealt with as head of the commission’s Office of Enforcement, and Commissioner Colette Honorable recuses herself from matters that were before her as a regulator in Arkansas.

Bay said he did not foresee any quorum problems following Clark’s official departure. “I feel like we’re on top of that. We’ve known for some time that Commissioner Clark would be leaving, and so we’ve been planning for the completion of any orders where his vote would be required.” Clark indicated in January that he would not seek another term.

A former North Dakota regulator, Clark is the lone Republican on the commission after the departure of Philip Moeller last year.

Clark’s three Democratic colleagues praised him for his meticulous thinking and ability to work through disagreements civilly.

“You’ve been an outstanding public servant,” Bay said. “I know that every place you’ve gone to, you have made [it] better with your thoughtfulness, your encyclopedic knowledge of policy, your reasonableness and your collegiality.”

Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur joked about her disappointment at not being able to influence Clark more after he joined the commission. “From the very first day you walked in, you were always on top of the issues, crystal clear in your thinking, pragmatic and very, very decisive,” she said.

“I have enjoyed working with him very much, even though we come from different places,” Honorable said. “But in many ways, we have been quite a lot alike, I would say, in terms of … our commitment to serving.”

Honorable joked that they agreed on many things, but not on their favorite president. Her parting gift to him was a mug featuring the Democratic nominees for president and vice president, Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine. Clark promptly hid the mug behind his name plate.

“Hopefully at FERC, people see an agency in a town that is sometimes dysfunctional, but an agency that I think is very functional,” Clark said. “Although we don’t agree on every item — that’s to be expected — … where we do disagree, we can do so without being disagreeable.”

Clark was nominated by President Obama after Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) forwarded his name to the White House. He said he has not heard anything about Obama nominating replacements for the two GOP vacancies. He speculated that new commissioners may be among a group of nominees submitted by the next president.

The best chance for a nominee to get confirmed by the Senate would be during the lame-duck session after the November elections as part of a package of nominees, said Dan Blair, CEO of the National Academy of Public Administration, a Congressionally chartered think tank that provides advice to public officials.

But there are many different permutations of what could happen based on the results of both the presidential and senatorial elections. For example, Blair said, if Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump wins the White House, McConnell, the majority leader, could defer to him on who should go to FERC.

Many federal agencies suffer member shortages while the White House and Senate negotiate over nominations. Obama may be holding out on nominating anyone to FERC until he can reach an agreement on a Democratic nominee for a different agency, Blair said. “There’s a lot of horse trading that goes on behind the scenes. You have to look outside the commission.”

When asked if he had heard anything about reinforcements, Bay said only, “The nomination process I leave to the White House and to the Senate.”

Nicole Daigle, communications director for the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said Chairman Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) “is concerned that FERC will be down to three commissioners.”

“It is important that we have a full complement of members on the commission,” Daigle said in a statement.

Daigle did not respond when asked whether Murkowski had suggested anyone to McConnell or whether McConnell had forwarded any names to Obama.

A spokesman for McConnell said the senator would not comment until the president submitted a nomination. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Clark said he was going to take some time to relax before spending the remainder of October thinking about his next job.