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R E G • W A T C H

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Reject White House Interference in Agency Rulemaking
The White House improperly forced the Environmental Protection Agency to put aquatic wildlife at risk at the behest of corporate special interests, OMB Watch told a federal court today.

The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) substantially weakened an EPA proposal to protect the trillions of fish and aquatic organisms that are sucked up and killed each year by power plants that use rivers, estuaries, and oceans to cool their systems. OMB Watch filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit today, calling on the court to reject OMB’s interference in the EPA rule.

“For some time now, OIRA has been interfering with agency rule-making,” explains Robert Shull, director of regulatory policy with OMB Watch. “We hope the court will finally do something about these political intrusions and allow agencies to do the job they were told to do by Congress.”

Read the press release
Download the brief

Posted by Robert Shull, 07:06:30 PM

Tuesday, July 12, 2005

Family & medical leave under attack
The New Standard is reporting that workers' rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act are under attack. Good piece, although one form of attack wasn't mentioned: the FMLA figured prominently on the White House's hit list of regs to be weakened or eliminated.

Posted by Robert Shull, 03:12:22 PM

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

The latest bad news

BushGreenWatch is reporting that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a permit last week that will allow the Coeur d'Alene mining company to discharge mining waste from a proposed gold mine into a lake in the Tongass National Forest near Berner's Bay in Southeast Alaska, paving the way for mining companies all over the country to follow suit. According to the mining company's environmental review, the barrage of chemicals in the lake will likely exterminate the fish population. Environmentalists criticized the change as a backdoor attempt to circumvent a court ruling that found that mining waste in Appalachian mountain streams violates the Clean Water Act.

The Congressional Research Service analyzed chemical security risks and learned that more than 100 facilities nationwide, in 23 different states, store large amounts of chemicals that are fatal or could actually melt your lungs -- and are located near communities of at least 1 million people. Meanwhile, the Bush administration's ties to the chemical industry leave the homeland unsecured.

A NewJersey food manufacturer is recalling a Spanish sausage product becasue of possible contamination by Listeria, the bacterium "that won't die." Weakening already weak safegaurds against Listeria, by the way, is a priority item on the White House's anti-regulatory hit list.

Posted by Robert Shull, 12:25:51 PM

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