Next to the computer monitor in my office is a button that reads "Information is the Currency of Democracy." I'm proud of that button. I'm proud of the fact that in the United States we place a premium on having an informed and educated public. I'm proud that our country was founded on a principle that there should be a free flow of information. And I'm proud that the federal government has encouraged use of the Internet to expand the public's right-to-know, which is this century's newest grand experiment in democracy.

I like to think OMB Watch has played a role in advancing public access to government information. In 1989, for example, OMB Watch helped to start RTK NET (www.rtknet.org), an online service providing access to various government databases, but mostly those dealing with pollution. RTK NET has been praised by Presidents, by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), by community groups across the country, and by many others. We have received many "thank you" notes from families who found RTK NET an easy way to learn about dangers that are present in their communities.

So I was surprised in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks to receive hostile email about RTK NET. One individual wondered "how much blood will be on your hands for posting" information about environmental dangers. "You are truly proof that sincerity is no guarantee for truth, and that education is no guarantee for wisdom." Many of these comments are not fit to print. However, some are and we have posted one in our most recent OMB Watcher. The person fears that someone will use the information on RTK NET to "create an explosion and chemical release."

These fears warrant careful consideration and thoughtful response. While "information is the currency of democracy," we certainly recognize the necessity to balance our right to access information with the nation's security and with the realization that some information may both create risks and provide needed facts to ensure public safety and security.

In an open society we run enormous risks. Any individual or group of individuals can cause great damage. We try to protect against such damage, but the potential remains. One way is to make ourselves as aware as we can of the risks and take steps to ameliorate them. An alternative is to limit the free flow of information, which is how totalitarian societies operate. While security may improve, the spirit of civil society is lost. We cannot let that happen here.

In the last ten days there has been an understandable, but we believe inappropriate, response to cut back on public access to government information.

We recognize the importance of this debate and believe that all parties are motivated by a hope to protect and serve all Americans. After careful review, we conclude:

• People deserve to know what dangers they are facing in their communities so that they can protect themselves. Thus, the right-to-know must prevail in an open society.

• Strong measures should be developed to protect plants that are using or manufacturing dangerous chemicals from attack as well as other types of facilities that could be sources for terrorism. Such measures will require federal funds to study site security and implement changes; it will require mandating safer substitutes for dangerous chemicals where possible; it will also likely call for smaller volumes of chemicals located on-site; and it calls for sharing more information with workers and families who face potential dangers.

• An on-going analysis of the threats faced by our society is needed so that the public can develop a sober, clear-eyed view of the realities and policies that may be necessary to deal with these threats.

Prior to September 11, the chemical industry fought tooth and nail to undermine the public's right to know about the risks to which they are exposed by chemical plants. In the aftermath of September 11, they will renew their arguments about the danger of information being used for the purposes of terrorism. However, the central issue before September 11 and after, remains the same -- right-to-know is about improving the safety of communities and workers. It is shocking to learn that hundreds of lives are lost each year from chemical accidents, causing untold sorrow for families across the country. Yet our sense of outrage is muted, possibly because the disaster comes in small amounts from routine chemical accidents. We thank goodness that it is not our family that is affected and in a matter of days forget about the news story -- and the accident behind the story.

Yet, we know that the disclosure of chemical dangers helps save lives. When a chemical plant accident in Pennsylvania damaged a nearby child care center, the parents of the children were thankful that the accident occurred when the center was closed and their children were at home. But they were upset that they did not know that such an accident could put their children in jeopardy. Don't these parents have a right-to-know?

Similarly, the September 21 explosion at a petrochemical plant manufacturing fertilizer and explosives in Toulouse, France, which killed at least 25 people and injured more than 200 (according to London's Independent newspaper, more than 2,000 people actually passed through hospitals and clinics after the blast), graphically demonstrates how the twin hazards of government laxity and public ignorance made an already dangerous situation worse. (There had been a previous ammonia explosion at the same plant in 1998.) Hiding information about the potential risks won't make them go away.

Paul Orum of the Working Group on Community Right to Know has done a great job in collecting reports about efforts at retrenching or eliminating the public's right-to-know about toxic pollution and health dangers. He has led an effort calling for safer chemical substitutes and for improved site security.

Examples that the Working Group has collected include:

• EPA has removed from its web site Risk Management Plans (RMP) that are collected under Section 112(r) of the Clear Air Act. These plans provide three elements about dangerous chemicals being used in plants: a hazard assessment, a prevention program, and an emergency response plan. RMPs created an enormous controversy two years ago when the first round of data was to be posted to the Internet. One section of the RMP provided an Offsite Consequence Analysis (OCA) that required chemical companies to describe what could happen under worst case scenarios. Needless to say, chemical companies did not want to disclose that nearby families were living or working by a place that could seriously injure or kill them. With encouragement from the chemical manufacturers, the FBI noted that posting the OCA data on the Internet would increase the chances of a terrorist attack. Congress quickly followed suit with a law to prohibit government from posting the OCA data unless the President decided otherwise. Accordingly, EPA posted the RMP, minus the OCA, to its web site. With extremely narrow permissions, the law and proposed subsequent regulations allowed the public to go to designated reading rooms where they could review, but not copy, a select number of the OCAs.

  Both the FBI and Congress have acknowledged that disclosure through the Internet of the remainder of the RMP information presented no unique increased threats of terrorism. This is why EPA's decision to remove the entire RMP is quite startling.

• Angela Logomasini of The Competitive Enterprise Institute published a piece in the Washington Times on September 27 providing a "wake-up call" to re-evaluate disclosure of RMP information. The article criticizes Greenpeace for collecting the OCA data from 50 plants in Louisiana and producing a report on potential dangers. Rick Hind, the legislative director for the Greenpeace Toxic Campaign responded with a letter that noted that "[the idea that] greater restriction of this information will somehow prevent terrorist attacks is hopelessly naive." He adds, "Any cursory reading of chemical engineering text books will show that facilities making and using large amount of chemicals such as chlorine have the potential for a catastrophic leak of poison gas." He continues by suggesting the "ultra hazardous" chemicals that have safer substitutes be phased out as recommended by the International Joint Commission in 1992.

  Following on the heels of the CEI article, the American Water Works Association is planning a lobby campaign to stop access to the OCA data through the reading rooms. And at least one treatment plant in the Washington, D.C. area will no longer provide access to its RMP, even without the OCA data.

  On September 27, the National Review Online, which advertises itself as "America's Premier Conservative Website," provided a guest commentary from Jonathan H. Adler, an assistant professor at Case Western Reserve University, which criticizes OMB Watch for making the RMP executive summaries that are publicly accessible available through RTK NET. "Thanks to their efforts, it only takes a few minutes online to discover potential targets for terrorist activity. A quick perusal of the listings for Ohio -- from the AC Humko Columbus facility to the Zanesville Water Treatment Plant -- reveals information about propane storage facilities, pharmaceutical plants, chemical factories, and other inviting targets." Of course, he fails to mention that these facilities are also listed in the telephone book, on Internet search engines, and through many more sources.

  Adler continues: "At one facility, for example, the listed worst-case scenarios are: 1) an acrylonitrile spill exposing all within five miles to exposure levels above those deemed safe by EPA; and 2) a butadiene explosion in a rail car affecting 0.43 miles. Another RMP notes that nearby schools and churches will be within the radius of a worst-case chemical release." This is where good people can view things very differently: he sees this as evidence of helping terrorists; we view it as helping community residents better understand the potential dangers that exist near them, and as a means to allow residents to argue for improved security and safety at the plants.

  Adler concludes, "The EPA needs to reconsider its insistence on the public's "right to know," and Congress needs to revise Clean Air Act section 112r," which requires the collection and dissemination of RMP data. This suggests that the RMP data is just the beginning of an attack on right-to-know. The commentary is available online from the National Review.

• A lobby campaign was started by pipeline companies to remove legislative proposals that encourage community right-to-know, using the argument that such information would help terrorists. As anyone who has driven by pipelines knows, they are publicly marked with big signs. One environmentalist posted the following to an email list: "of what possible value to terrorists is public information about a pipeline company's pipeline integrity plans, past performance, spill data, testing results, etc.?" Referring to where he lives, he noted that "We... found that terror does not only come from abroad, and one way of reducing this type of terror [accidents] is by making company pipeline safety plans and performance more transparent to the public."

• The Office of Pipeline Safety within the Department of Transportation has posted a note to its web site saying that they "have discontinued providing open access to the National Pipeline Mapping System." Because of new security concerns about critical infrastructure systems, they will only provide pipeline data to pipeline operators, and federal, state and local government officials.

• The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry dropped from its web site a report that notes "security at chemical plants ranged from fair to very poor" and that "security around chemical transportation assets ranged from poor to non-existent." The report, Industrial Chemicals and Terrorism: Human Health Threat Analysis, Mitigation and Prevention, does not provide information about individual facilities.

• The Federation of American Scientists removed from its web page maps and floor plans about various facilities. They noted in public statements that they voluntarily removed the information because it did not create public benefits that outweighed potential risks and because the information was not available publicly anywhere else.

Amazingly, little has been done to address chemical plant security. (For more information, see "DOJ Must Complete Its Chemical Plant Site Security Study" from the September 17, 2001 OMB Watcher.) EPA did post a chemical safety advisory that "suggests that those who manufacture, distribute, transport or store hazardous chemicals should be especially vigilant regarding the physical security of those chemicals." We believe much more should be done to protect the public. The FBI, EPA, and the Departments of Energy and Transportation should be working on a coordinated plan to boost site security at chemical plants, nuclear facilities, water treatment plants, and other sites that present vulnerabilities. Congress should provide the resources to help companies and governments to implement such security measures, and require companies, when possible, to use an alternative to extremely hazardous chemicals.

Last week, on September 26, Reps. John Dingell (D-MI), Henry Waxman (D-CA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Diana DeGette (D-CO) sent President Bush a letter asking him to free up $7 million from the September 11 emergency money just approved by Congress to assess the vulnerability of the nation's chemical facilities. The letter summarizes some of the findings from ATSDR's report on plant security.

We recognize that these are tough issues in tough times. We continue to wrestle with the balancing that must go on between security and the public's right-to-know. In that vein, we invite you to share your thoughts with us -- E-mail OMB Watch staff.