Multitude of Public Comments at EPA Hearing on Proposed Transparency in Science Rule

On Tuesday, July 17th, EPA held a public hearing on its proposed rule – “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science”. There was a multitude of people that made public comments at the hearing – over 100 people had pre-registered to speak. The vast majority of commenters spoke out against the proposal, but a handful of people spoke in favor of the proposal.

Two Representatives (pictured) spoke out against the proposal – Rep. Paul Tonko (D-NY) who is the ranking member on the Subcommittee on the Environment for the House Energy and Commerce Committee and Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR) who is the ranking member on the Subcommittee on the Environment for the House Committee on Space, Science and Technology. It’s a little unusual for sitting members of Congress to provide testimony at an EPA hearing on a proposed regulation.

Comments are due on the proposed rule on August 16th and can be submitted to the docket for this proposed rule. As of July 18th, over 209,000 comments have already been submitted, and that’s a very large number of comments for a month ahead of the close of the comment period.