CPR President Rena Steinzor and board member Robert Glicksman sent a letter today to White House Science Adviser John Holdren and OIRA Administrator Cass Sunstein regarding OMB's role in EPA science decisions. The letter concerns two recent episodes involving OMB that we wrote about this week: one regarding the EPA's Endocrine Disrputor Screening Program (EDSP) and the other regarding the agency's Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS). From the letter:
Both of these episodes pre-date Professor Sunstein’s confirmation and may well be the product of staff steeped in the culture of OMB regulatory review under the Bush Administration. The episodes represent a direct assault on scientific integrity because they involve attempts to reverse conclusions by agency experts at the behest of regulated industries whose central objections were rooted in concerns about potential future compliance costs, not the accuracy of EPA’s science. Compounding the offensiveness of this interference is the fact that the decisions that were derailed involved efforts to analyze scientific research that were preliminary to any regulation of industry activities.
The letter asks Holdren and Sunstein to clarify the extent of OMB’s role in reviewing agency science.
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Ben Somberg | October 22, 2009
CPR President Rena Steinzor and board member Robert Glicksman sent a letter today to White House Science Adviser John Holdren and OIRA Administrator Cass Sunstein regarding OMB's role in EPA science decisions. The letter concerns two recent episodes involving OMB that we wrote about this week: one regarding the EPA's Endocrine Disrputor Screening Program (EDSP) […]
Christine Klein | October 21, 2009
As the recession grinds on, financial news continues to grab front-page headlines. The national deficit is a central flashpoint for controversy, triggering debate on the appropriate balance between spending today and increasing our children’s growing mountain of debt. In the midst of this battle, it is easy to overlook another looming problem: the growth of […]
Matt Shudtz | October 20, 2009
Greenwire and the Los Angeles Times ran pieces last week shining a light into a dark corner where staff at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs once again meddled in scientific regulatory programs where they do not belong, second-guessing EPA’s administration of the Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program (EDSP). The program, mandated by Congress under […]
Rena Steinzor | October 19, 2009
Before Cass Sunstein had spent much more than a week as the official director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), he invited us over to the White House to talk about how he wanted to shape his small office of economists and statisticians into a strong force for progressive policy within the […]
Shana Campbell Jones | October 19, 2009
The Chesapeake Clean Water and Ecosystem Restoration Act of 2009, introduced today by Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md), is a marked improvement from legislation in past years and demonstrates the Senator’s continued leadership on restoring one of this country’s greatest natural resources. The bill rightly emphasizes the implementation and enforcement of the Bay-wide Total Maximum Daily […]
Catherine O'Neill | October 16, 2009
With some fanfare, the EPA announced last week that it has selected a cleanup strategy for the Palos Verdes Shelf (PVS) Superfund Site off the coast of southern California – an area that has been termed “ the world’s largest DDT dump.” The EPA touts its plan as “a major milestone” that puts the site […]
Ben Somberg | October 15, 2009
The EPA today released a 15-page Clean Water Act Enforcement Action Plan prepared by the agency’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance. Back in early July, Lisa Jackson had directed the enforcmeent office to develop a plan, and to “report back to me within 90 days with your recommendations.” The EPA seems to be saying […]
Robert L. Glicksman | October 15, 2009
Just about a month ago, the New York Times published a story in which it documented an alarming failure on the part of federal and state officials to enforce the principal federal law designed to protect the quality of the nation’s surface waters, including rivers, lakes, and streams. According to that story, fewer than three […]
Holly Doremus | October 14, 2009
This item cross-posted from Legal Planet. On Friday, the New York Times carried a story about Tim DeChristopher, the economics student in Utah who bid on federal oil and gas leases at an auction last December as a form of protest against global warming. DeChristopher was the winning bidder on 14 parcels, but admits that […]