WASHINGTON — Sacagawea helped Lewis and Clark find their way to the Pacific Ocean, but she's having trouble finding her own way into the nation's cash registers.
The image of the Shoshone Indian, Sacagawea, is featured on the struggling dollar coin that was launched with great fanfare and a multimillion-dollar advertising blitz just more than two years ago. It was supposed to be jingling in pockets and used in everyday transactions across the country by now.
Instead, millions of the golden-colored dollar coins have piled up in dark bank vaults because there hasn't been much demand. The mint has temporarily stopped making new Sacagaweas for circulation. But it is producing some for collectors.
Many people have never touched one.
"My contention is this is a failure," declared Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who said he has never received a Sacagawea dollar coin in change.
Dorgan, chairman of the Appropriation Committee's treasury and general government subcommittee, held a hearing Friday to see what might be done to turn the situation around. Dorgan — who noted that Sacagawea also was a North Dakotan — likes the coin and wants to see it thrive.
But banks say there hasn't been much demand for the coins by retailers and other businesses. Retailers and businesses say there hasn't been much demand from their customers.
Mint director Henrietta Holsman Fore, who appeared at Friday's hearing, believes there are a number of reasons the coin is struggling.
People who receive the coins as change keep them and don't spend them. Retailers say they don't have room in their cash registers for the coins. And businesses that want Sacagaweas sometimes have trouble getting them, she said. Fore blamed that on the Federal Reserve — the supplier of cash to the nation's banks — saying it mixes Sacagawea coins with their unpopular predecessor the Susan. B. Anthony coins when filling orders.
Louise Roseman, who oversees bank and payment operations at the Federal Reserve, said it's true that the Fed doesn't have the technology to separate Sacagaweas from Susan B's. But she said that banks that specifically request the Sacagaweas have been able to get them.
Some coin experts say the Sacagawea won't really catch on as long as the paper $1 bill is around. But neither Dorgan nor Fore were advocating getting rid of the greenback.
Fore said the mint will conduct research this year to find ways to improve distributing the Sacagawea coins to businesses and try to get the federal government to use the coins more. She also said that the mint is considering taking the Susan B — which is no longer made — out of circulation.
Under a recently signed deal, Sacagaweas will be dispensed at some NASCAR racetracks this year, which could result in 10 million or more of the coins getting into circulation, Fore said.
The Sacagawea coins do get used to buy snacks from vending machines, to tip people, and in cases where they are accepted, to feed parking meters, pay tolls and bus fares. And, people like to buy them for gifts.
Nonetheless, the mint ended fiscal year 2001 with about 324 million Sacagawea dollar coins in storage, according to a report by the Treasury Department's inspector general.
Sacagawea accompanied explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to the Pacific Ocean in 1805. The coins are referred to as either Sacagaweas or Golden Dollars because of their striking golden color.
Amy Mossett, a Sacagawea scholar and a member of the Three Affiliated Tribes of North Dakota, for years has been traveling around the country sharing the story of Sacagawea.
She said that in the cab ride over to testify on Capitol Hill Friday, she tipped the driver with a Sacagawea. He didn't know what it was, she said.
"I am quite surprised and perhaps more dismayed that so many people have never touched a Sacagawea dollar coin," said Mossett, who appeared at the hearing wearing traditional garb.