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cimorenefrom the national resources defense council, nrdc.org/onearth.
Bush's Stealth Attacks
by Laura Wright
Industry "experts" give the environment an ugly makeover
Every day the federal government receives a vast amount of scientific advice from appointed experts and advisory groups who help manage the technical complexities of our public affairs. Almost 1,000 official advisory committees guide scientific policy at the federal agencies alone; the Department of Health and Human Services has more than 250 such groups. Although we have laws -- most prominently, the Federal Advisory Committee Act, or FACA -- intended to protect the integrity of that process, they have been shamelessly flouted under the current administration.
Many scientists are alarmed. Among them is Lewis Branscomb, director of the National Bureau of Standards (now the National Institute for Standards and Technology) under President Nixon. He has advised in various capacities Presidents Johnson, Carter, and Reagan, and although he has seen abuses before, he says he's never seen such widespread interference with science. "Some cases are so egregious that there's just no way to excuse them," Branscomb says. When the White House asks scientists for advice, "it's clear that the administration already knows what it wants the answer to be," he says. "What's different about the current situation is the pervasive pattern."
In the shadows of the vast federal bureaucracy, science is taking a beating from industry. Advisory panels are stacked with corporate shills. Industry groups pose as scientific committees. These practices certainly violate the spirit of FACA, operating as they do in the gray margins of the law and sometimes crossing the limits of legality. Above are but a few examples of such malfeasance -- obscured from public view, but with visible effects on human and environmental health.
POLLUTED POLITICS
The EPA created a working group within the Clean Air Act Advisory Committee to evaluate the most effective way to reduce mercury emissions from power plants. In October 2002, the group presented three alternative models for the agency's consideration to Jeffrey Holmstead, assistant administrator for air and radiation. Some of the models proposed stringent -- and potentially costly -- control measures. But the agency didn't evaluate these recommendations. Instead the process was shelved entirely; the group's next meeting was postponed indefinitely, and the group itself was eventually disbanded. John Paul, supervisor of Ohio's Regional Air Pollution Control Agency and cochair of the working group, learned the news by chance -- in an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Paul believes the EPA simply allowed the panel to sit idle until its two-year charter expired, so that the agency would not have to examine recommendations it did not want to hear. Last December, the EPA proposed rules for reducing emissions from power plants that reflect two sets of recommendations from industry lobbyists, neither of which were submitted as a part of the formal working group process.
CANNED EXPERTS
The Federal Advisory Commitee Act (FACA) mandates that a group charged with making recommendations on an issue be a balanced assemblage of experts intimately familiar with the topic. So it's hard to see how the FDA's Food Advisory Committee was qualified to dish advice on the safety of eating mercury-laden fish. Last December, when the 20-person committee met to review recommendations from the FDA and EPA, only one toxicologist was among them. That lone expert, Dr. Vasken Aposhian of the University of Arizona, cited new evidence that the potential risks of mercury in fish -- at, for example, levels often found in albacore tuna -- are greater to children and women of childbearing age than was thought. For some groups, such as people with autism, small amounts of mercury-tainted fish can cause irreversible neurological damage. Under pressure from the tuna industry, however, the FDA and EPA gave their approval to consuming one can of albacore tuna per week, ignoring even their own findings to the contrary. "What's more important?" Aposhian asks. "The health of children or the American albacore industry?"
DRILLING FOR DOLLARS
In January, members of the oil industry scheduled a secret meeting with Bureau of Land Management (BLM) officials in New Mexico to plan drilling operations in the protected desert region of Otero Mesa. Fortunately, their shenanigans were uncovered just in time by the environmental watchdog group Earthjustice. Earthjustice and others filed a temporary restraining order against the agency, charging that the meeting would violate FACA's prohibition against precisely such secret gatherings. The 1.2-million-acre Chihuahuan Desert of Otero Mesa is home to endangered wildlife, including the aplomado falcon, and is one of the most diverse desert ecosystems on earth. In 1997, the Harvey E. Yates Co. discovered a massive natural gas reservoir in the region. Industry advisers to the BLM included representatives from the Yates family oil and gas empire, which owns one-quarter of all oil and gas leases in the area. Over the past four years, Yates family members and their companies have contributed more than $250,000 to President Bush and the Republican Party.
POISONED PROCEEDINGS
A group of pesticide manufacturers calling itself an endangered species task force met last winter with EPA officials to push the agency to weaken pesticide safeguards under the Endangered Species Act. Environmental groups filed a lawsuit claiming that the EPA violated FACA by holding closed meetings with the task force, which includes Dow AgroSciences, DuPont Ag Products, Monsanto, and 11 other major chemical and pesticide manufacturers. The group, formed in 1994 to collect data on the use of pesticides and other chemicals, was never intended to serve in an advisory role to the agency, as it now appears to be doing in its meetings with the EPA. The upshot: In January, the EPA announced its intent to establish new Endangered Species Act rules that, among other things, eliminate the role of fish and wildlife experts in assessing the impact of pesticides on endangered species.
KEEPING THE LEAD IN
In the summer of 2002, the Centers for Disease Control's Advisory Committee on Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention was expected to recommend that the legal definition of lead poisoning be lowered by half. Abundant scientific research has shown decreases in IQ with very small increases in blood-lead levels. The change was never made. That fall, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson removed a highly regarded scientist from the panel and rejected the appointment of two others. Instead he stacked the committee with his own "experts," some of whom have no background on the issue but are friendlier toward the lead industry. One such expert believes that there is no lead poisoning epidemic -- a view at odds with the scientific consensus. Another appointee, William Banner, an Oklahoma pediatrician, has testified on behalf of a paint manufacturer that the amount of lead that must be present in a child's blood to incur harm is 10 times the federally recommended limit. Not surprisingly, the revamped panel refused to revise downward the level at which children are deemed lead-poisoned, leaving millions of American kids to suffer the consequences of inaction.
Bush's Stealth Attacks
by Laura Wright
Industry "experts" give the environment an ugly makeover
Every day the federal government receives a vast amount of scientific advice from appointed experts and advisory groups who help manage the technical complexities of our public affairs. Almost 1,000 official advisory committees guide scientific policy at the federal agencies alone; the Department of Health and Human Services has more than 250 such groups. Although we have laws -- most prominently, the Federal Advisory Committee Act, or FACA -- intended to protect the integrity of that process, they have been shamelessly flouted under the current administration.
Many scientists are alarmed. Among them is Lewis Branscomb, director of the National Bureau of Standards (now the National Institute for Standards and Technology) under President Nixon. He has advised in various capacities Presidents Johnson, Carter, and Reagan, and although he has seen abuses before, he says he's never seen such widespread interference with science. "Some cases are so egregious that there's just no way to excuse them," Branscomb says. When the White House asks scientists for advice, "it's clear that the administration already knows what it wants the answer to be," he says. "What's different about the current situation is the pervasive pattern."
In the shadows of the vast federal bureaucracy, science is taking a beating from industry. Advisory panels are stacked with corporate shills. Industry groups pose as scientific committees. These practices certainly violate the spirit of FACA, operating as they do in the gray margins of the law and sometimes crossing the limits of legality. Above are but a few examples of such malfeasance -- obscured from public view, but with visible effects on human and environmental health.
POLLUTED POLITICS
The EPA created a working group within the Clean Air Act Advisory Committee to evaluate the most effective way to reduce mercury emissions from power plants. In October 2002, the group presented three alternative models for the agency's consideration to Jeffrey Holmstead, assistant administrator for air and radiation. Some of the models proposed stringent -- and potentially costly -- control measures. But the agency didn't evaluate these recommendations. Instead the process was shelved entirely; the group's next meeting was postponed indefinitely, and the group itself was eventually disbanded. John Paul, supervisor of Ohio's Regional Air Pollution Control Agency and cochair of the working group, learned the news by chance -- in an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Paul believes the EPA simply allowed the panel to sit idle until its two-year charter expired, so that the agency would not have to examine recommendations it did not want to hear. Last December, the EPA proposed rules for reducing emissions from power plants that reflect two sets of recommendations from industry lobbyists, neither of which were submitted as a part of the formal working group process.
CANNED EXPERTS
The Federal Advisory Commitee Act (FACA) mandates that a group charged with making recommendations on an issue be a balanced assemblage of experts intimately familiar with the topic. So it's hard to see how the FDA's Food Advisory Committee was qualified to dish advice on the safety of eating mercury-laden fish. Last December, when the 20-person committee met to review recommendations from the FDA and EPA, only one toxicologist was among them. That lone expert, Dr. Vasken Aposhian of the University of Arizona, cited new evidence that the potential risks of mercury in fish -- at, for example, levels often found in albacore tuna -- are greater to children and women of childbearing age than was thought. For some groups, such as people with autism, small amounts of mercury-tainted fish can cause irreversible neurological damage. Under pressure from the tuna industry, however, the FDA and EPA gave their approval to consuming one can of albacore tuna per week, ignoring even their own findings to the contrary. "What's more important?" Aposhian asks. "The health of children or the American albacore industry?"
DRILLING FOR DOLLARS
In January, members of the oil industry scheduled a secret meeting with Bureau of Land Management (BLM) officials in New Mexico to plan drilling operations in the protected desert region of Otero Mesa. Fortunately, their shenanigans were uncovered just in time by the environmental watchdog group Earthjustice. Earthjustice and others filed a temporary restraining order against the agency, charging that the meeting would violate FACA's prohibition against precisely such secret gatherings. The 1.2-million-acre Chihuahuan Desert of Otero Mesa is home to endangered wildlife, including the aplomado falcon, and is one of the most diverse desert ecosystems on earth. In 1997, the Harvey E. Yates Co. discovered a massive natural gas reservoir in the region. Industry advisers to the BLM included representatives from the Yates family oil and gas empire, which owns one-quarter of all oil and gas leases in the area. Over the past four years, Yates family members and their companies have contributed more than $250,000 to President Bush and the Republican Party.
POISONED PROCEEDINGS
A group of pesticide manufacturers calling itself an endangered species task force met last winter with EPA officials to push the agency to weaken pesticide safeguards under the Endangered Species Act. Environmental groups filed a lawsuit claiming that the EPA violated FACA by holding closed meetings with the task force, which includes Dow AgroSciences, DuPont Ag Products, Monsanto, and 11 other major chemical and pesticide manufacturers. The group, formed in 1994 to collect data on the use of pesticides and other chemicals, was never intended to serve in an advisory role to the agency, as it now appears to be doing in its meetings with the EPA. The upshot: In January, the EPA announced its intent to establish new Endangered Species Act rules that, among other things, eliminate the role of fish and wildlife experts in assessing the impact of pesticides on endangered species.
KEEPING THE LEAD IN
In the summer of 2002, the Centers for Disease Control's Advisory Committee on Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention was expected to recommend that the legal definition of lead poisoning be lowered by half. Abundant scientific research has shown decreases in IQ with very small increases in blood-lead levels. The change was never made. That fall, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson removed a highly regarded scientist from the panel and rejected the appointment of two others. Instead he stacked the committee with his own "experts," some of whom have no background on the issue but are friendlier toward the lead industry. One such expert believes that there is no lead poisoning epidemic -- a view at odds with the scientific consensus. Another appointee, William Banner, an Oklahoma pediatrician, has testified on behalf of a paint manufacturer that the amount of lead that must be present in a child's blood to incur harm is 10 times the federally recommended limit. Not surprisingly, the revamped panel refused to revise downward the level at which children are deemed lead-poisoned, leaving millions of American kids to suffer the consequences of inaction.
