Like Alice's adventure, the development of regulatory oversight in the Obama administration is becoming "curiouser and curiouser." President Obama selected Cass Sunstein to be the head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), a curious choice since Sunstein, although one of the country’s most distinguished academics, is in favor of extending the use of cost-benefit analysis, a position so popular with the business community that the Wall Street Journal endorsed his nomination. Sunstein's confirmation hearing was uneventful, probably because he avoided answering any difficult questions, but Sunstein's nomination is now being held by Senator John Cornyn, who objects to Sunstein's previous statements on animal rights -- an issue that the head of OIRA is highly unlikely to encounter.
In the meantime, the development of a new Executive Order on regulatory impact analysis has had its own curious journey. The new administration invited public comment on shaping the executive order, an unprecedented and welcome development. The administration also sought the input of agencies, although it has not made their comments public. That's defensible -- Presidents defend such secrecy as necessary to ensure that subordinates will be candid in giving advice -- but the administration missed an opportunity to fulfill its pledge to be more transparent since it is unlikely that agencies would have been affected had the comments been disclosed. To fulfill its transparency commitment, the administration also should have put out a draft Executive Order for public comment. In Republican administrations, OIRA review has been used to scuttle regulation, while OMB in the Clinton administration adopted a more benign attitude towards executive oversight. The ideal outcome would be to replace the current cost-benefit centered review process with a more pragmatic approach, a result CPR board members called for in March. But given Sunstein’s appointment, this outcome would be unexpected (but welcome). If a cost-benefit approach is to be retained, the devil will be in the details, all the more reason to invite public comment on a draft executive order.
It may not be too late to rectify this failure. The Hill has an "OMB official" saying: "The director has submitted a set of recommendations to the president, in compliance with the president’s memorandum and within the 100-day timeframe. As decisions based on those recommendations are approved, they will be made public." While decisions are pending, the administration could and should seek pubic input.
Once the Executive Order is out, the journey to presidential oversight of rulemaking is not finished. There is also the matter of how transparent the oversight process at OMB will be. After President Reagan put OMB in charge of the first executive order requiring cost-benefit centered regulatory impact analysis, the White House conducted its oversight in secret, opening the door for behind-the-scenes corporate lobbying to weaken regulations. President Clinton created better transparency when he revised the Executive Order on rulemaking oversight, and John Graham, who headed OIRA in the last administration, did likewise. But Graham’s OMB avoided these requirements by undertaking oversight before submission of a rule to OMB, the point at which the transparency requirements kicked in. It remains to be seen whether OMB will address this gigantic loophole, as CPR scholars have recommended, but a failure to address it would be the final curious development given the administration’s commitment to transparency.
Update: See also OMB Watch on this, "While Sunstein Nomination Is Delayed, Regulatory Reform Waits."
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Sidney A. Shapiro | July 30, 2009
Like Alice's adventure, the development of regulatory oversight in the Obama administration is becoming "curiouser and curiouser." President Obama selected Cass Sunstein to be the head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), a curious choice since Sunstein, although one of the country’s most distinguished academics, is in favor of extending the use […]
Sidney A. Shapiro | July 30, 2009
On Tuesday, the White House announced the appointment of Dr. David Michaels to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). An epidemiologist and a professor at George Washington University’s School of Public Health and Health Services, Michaels will bring substantial expertise and experience to the job. Besides being an active health research – he studies the health effects of occupational exposure to toxic chemicals – he has also written impressively on science and regulatory policy. His book, Doubt Is Their Product: How Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, offers extensive evidence of how regulatory entities spend millions of dollars attempting to dismantle public health protections using the playbook that originated with the tobacco industry’s efforts to deny the risks of smoking. He is also an experienced public health administrator, having served as the Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environment, Safety and Health in the Clinton Administration.
Daniel Farber | July 29, 2009
This item cross-posted by permission from Legal Planet. The White House is considering a new executive order to limit floodplain development. The proposal covers roughly the same federal licensing, project, and funding decisions as NEPA. The heart of the proposal is section 4, which unlike NEPA imposes a substantive requirement (preventing or mitigating floodplain development.) […]
Matt Shudtz | July 28, 2009
Last Thursday, EPA announced (pdf) that they would reconsider a rule on monitoring lead in the air that was published in the waning days of the Bush Administration. I wrote about the original announcement, criticizing EPA for turning its back on children in neighborhoods like mine, where certain sources of airborne lead wouldn’t be monitored […]
Rena Steinzor | July 27, 2009
Michael Livermore is right to suggest that environmentalists should be focused on Cass Sunstein’s first official day as regulatory czar for the Obama Administration. After months of delay over the Harvard professor’s eclectic and provocative writings, he will eventually take office if he can placate cattle ranchers concerned about his views on animal rights. Whatever […]
Yee Huang | July 24, 2009
This is the fourth and final post on the application of the public trust doctrine to water resources, based on a forthcoming CPR publication, Restoring the Trust: Water Resources and the Public Trust Doctrine, A Manual for Advocates, which will be released this summer. If you are interested in attending a free web-based seminar on […]
Matt Shudtz | July 24, 2009
The Bush Administration’s anti-regulatory henchmen in the Office of Management and Budget are at it again – fighting to keep EPA and state environmental agencies in the dark about how much pollution is being emitted into the air. On October 16, EPA announced that it was slashing the National Ambient Air Quality Standard for […]
Rena Steinzor | July 23, 2009
This post is co-written by CPR President Rena Steinzor and Policy Analyst Matt Shudtz. Just as the traditional media finished a breathless cycle of reporting on how prospective Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor had renounced her claim that a “wise Latina” would make different decisions than a white man, an article in USA Today reminded […]
Holly Doremus | July 22, 2009
This item cross-posted by permission from Legal Planet. Hardrock mining (as opposed to oil and gas drilling) on federal land is a topic that rarely hits the national news. And there are plenty of other high-profile items on the agenda in DC at the moment, like health care reform and climate legislation. So I was […]