President Obama will travel to Florida next month to host a conference on the future of America's space program, the White House announced Sunday.

The conference will be held April 15 in Florida, but the specific venue and time were not released. The White House statement said further details will be announced "as they become available."

"The president, along with top officials and other space leaders, will discuss the new course the administration is charting for NASA and the future of U.S. leadership in human space flight," the White House press release said.

The summit will likely be held on the Space Coast, where up to 23,000 jobs linked to the space program will be lost after the shuttle's retirement at the end of 2010.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said he hopes the space conference will be held at Kennedy Space Center. Nelson, a former space flier and longtime NASA supporter, is leading a growing chorus of lawmakers critical of the NASA policy.

The Obama administration unveiled its new plans for NASA during the Feb. 1 release of the White House federal government budget request for fiscal year 2011. The new vision terminates the troubled Constellation program being groomed to replace the space shuttle, defers plans to develop a new heavy-lift rocket, and turns over responsibility for orbital crew transportation to the private sector.

Advocates say the new NASA objectives provide a sustainable and affordable path for space exploration in the coming decade, but opponents point to staggering job losses in Florida and other key space states, plus a lack of coherency in the plan, among other issues.

According to the White House, the space conference will attempt to answer some of the lingering questions on the administration's vision for NASA.

"Specifically, the conference will focus on the goals and strategies in this new vision, the next steps, and the new technologies, new jobs, and new industries it will create," the statement said. "Conference topics will include the implications of the new strategy for Florida, the nation, and our ultimate activities in space."

Another feature of the administration's NASA policy includes increased funding for technology research, development and testing. The "game-changing" technologies will be necessary to mount long-duration missions to deep space.

"The president and the NASA administrator both believe that we have to be forward thinking and aggressive in our pursuit of new technologies to take us beyond low Earth orbit," the White House statement said. "The president's plan does this."

Sunday's announcement came days after all sitting members of the Florida congressional delegation signed a letter to President Obama expressing "deep concern" over the future of NASA.

Despite the administration's presentation of the NASA budget request, "serious questions remain regardings its goals, milestones, inherent cost and schedule risks, and severe disruptions to the workforce at our nation's premier spaceport," the delegation wrote in the letter, which is dated March 4.

Congressional representatives criticized the White House plan to cancel the Constellation program and called for President Obama to provide greater clarity on specific goals for NASA, including their impacts to Kennedy Space Center.

That is the goal of the Obama space conference, according to the White House.