When the United States signed NAFTA, it also signed the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC), which allows, among other things, for citizens to submit complaints to the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) with claims that their own governments are failing to enforce environmental laws.
That key provision is in danger, a group of CPR Member Scholars say in a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. The letter was signed by CPR Member Scholars Rebecca Bratspies, Carmen G. Gonzalez, David Hunter, John H. Knox, Noah Sachs, Dan Tarlock, and Chris Wold.
The citizen submissions can result in investigative reports by the CEC Secretariat, which have in some cases led to real improvements in policy, particularly in Mexico, the Member Scholars write. The NAFTA governments, through the EPA Administrator and her counterparts, must approve, through a 2/3 vote, CEC Secretariat recommendations for reports. From 1996 to 2004, the Council took about five months, on average, to make decisions on recommendations. The letter today says that has changed:
In recent years, however, the Council has failed to make these decisions in a reasonable time. The trend began during the second term of the Bush Administration. In those four years, the average length of time for the Council to decide whether to approve Secretariat requests to prepare reports shot up to nearly two years. Shockingly, the trend has become worse – much worse – during the Obama Administration. When President Obama took office, three Secretariat recommendations for reports were pending. Over three years later, only one of those recommendations has been acted upon. The other two still await decision almost four and five years, respectively, after the Secretariat informed the Council that they warranted investigation. …
We ask that you instruct EPA officials to make clear that the United States (a) will insist on timely decisions (including immediate decisions on the two pending Secretariat requests) as part of a concerted effort to return to the prior two-year commitment, (b) will always support Council approval of Secretariat requests without drastically narrowing their scope, and (c) will encourage rather than oppose efforts by the Joint Public Advisory Committee to follow up reports.
The full letter is here.
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Ben Somberg | April 2, 2012
When the United States signed NAFTA, it also signed the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC), which allows, among other things, for citizens to submit complaints to the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) with claims that their own governments are failing to enforce environmental laws. That key provision is in danger, a group of […]
Alice Kaswan | March 28, 2012
With congressional action on climate change at a standstill, EPA’s new source performance standards (NSPSs) for greenhouse gases (GHGs) from new power plants should be applauded. As required by the Clean Air Act, the agency is doggedly moving forward to establish emission standards for GHGs, air pollutants that unquestionably endanger human health and welfare. EPA […]
Holly Doremus | March 26, 2012
Cross-posted from Legal Planet. Regular readers of this blog know that on January 13, 2011, EPA vetoed a Clean Water Act section 404 permit issued by the Corp of Engineers for valley fill at the Spruce No. 1 mountaintop removal mine project in West Virginia. This was only the 13th time EPA had used its […]
Joel A. Mintz | March 24, 2012
Earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its much-anticipated decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency. In a unanimous decision–key features of which are summarized in a thoughtful post by Nina Mendelson–the Court held that the plaintiff landowner had a right to challenge the Clean Water Act administrative compliance order (ACO) which EPA […]
Nina Mendelson | March 21, 2012
In the Sackett v. EPA decision today, the Supreme Court rejected a broad argument that the Sacketts’ constitutional due process rights had been violated when they could not go to court immediately to challenge an EPA order requiring them to remove fill and replant vegetation on their property. But the Court did hold that under the […]
Sidney A. Shapiro | March 20, 2012
House GOP leaders may vote as early as this week on legislation that would eliminate the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), a cost-saving measure that was established as part of the national health care reform Congress passed in 2010. House leaders have also attached national restrictions on the right of patients to recover damages for […]
Rena Steinzor | March 20, 2012
This post was written by CPR President Rena Steinzor and CPR Policy Analyst James Goodwin. Earlier today, OIRA Administrator Cass Sunstein released a new memorandum to agencies directing them to consider and account for the “cumulative” costs of their regulations. Attacking the cumulative costs of regulation has been a favored tactic among regulated industries and […]
Sidney A. Shapiro | March 19, 2012
On Tuesday, the House Judiciary committee is marking up the Regulatory Freeze for Jobs Act (H.R. 4078), which would block virtually any “significant regulatory action”—basically, any step toward promulgating any regulation that has a large economic impact or is otherwise controversial— as long as unemployment is over 6 percent. Rather than support initiatives that actually help […]
Daniel Farber | March 12, 2012
A conventional approach to safety is based on the concept of design events. A building code might say, for example, that a building should be able to survive a 7.0 earthquake. This approach has been basic to the regulation of nuclear reactors. As the interim report of the post-Fukushima NRC task force explains: The regulation […]