Regulatory Policy

Regulatory safeguards play a vital role in protecting us from hazards and ensuring that companies that pollute, make unsafe products, and create workplace hazards bear the cost of cleaning up their messes and preventing injuries and deaths. Still, the regulatory system is far from perfect: Rules take too long to develop; enforcement is often feeble; and political pressure from regulated industries has led to weak safeguards.

These systemic problems are made all the more severe by the determination of the Trump administration to undercut sensible safeguards across virtually all aspects of federal regulation. Moreover, the President and his team have taken aim at the the process by which such safeguards are developed, aiming to take a system already slanted in favor of industry profit at the expense of health, safety and the environment, and make it even less protective. For example, where critics of the use of cost-benefit analysis see a system that understates the value of safeguards and overstates the cost of implementing them -- making it difficult to adopt needed protections -- the Trump administration seeks simply to ignore benefits of safeguards, pretending they do not exist. The result is a regulatory system that fails to enforce landmark laws like the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act and more.

CPR exposes and opposes efforts by opponents of sensible safeguards to undermine the regulatory system, fighting back against knee-jerk opposition to environmental, health, and safety protections. Below, see what CPR Members Scholars and staff have had to say in reports, testimony, op-eds and more. Use the search box to narrow the list.

Comments to the FDA on food safety rules for raw produc

Comments to the FDA on food safety rules for raw produce on several CPR Member Scholars and staff

Type: Letters to Agencies (Nov. 15, 2013)
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Author(s): Lisa Heinzerling, Thomas McGarity, Sidney Shapiro, Rena Steinzor, Michael Patoka
Comments to the FDA on preventive controls for human food production

Comments from several CPR Members Scholars and staff to the FDA on preventive controls for human food production, November 15, 2013

Type: Letters to Agencies (Nov. 15, 2013)
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Author(s): Lisa Heinzerling, Thomas McGarity, Sidney Shapiro, Rena Steinzor, Michael Patoka
Regulatory Backlog Threatens Health and the Environment

In The Hill, Rena Steinzor writes, "Over the last two years, we've seen a raft of bills aimed at hobbling federal agencies as they work to write regulations implementing such landmark legislation as the Clean Air Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and the Clean Water Act, as well as newer laws like the Affordable Care Act and the Dodd-Frank banking reform law. Their efforts are backed by a flood of anti-regulation rhetoric from think tanks and industry associations that warn of a tsunami of regulation under President Obama. A tsunami? Hardly. The truth is that the Obama Administration hasn't been anywhere near as aggressive as it could and should be."

Type: Op-Eds (Aug. 22, 2013)
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Author(s): Rena Steinzor
Toxic chemicals bill trumps state rights

Writing in The Hill, Rena Steinzor discusses the problems with the Chemical Safety Improvement Act, sponsored by the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg and his colleague Sen. David Vitter.

Type: Op-Eds (June 26, 2013)
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Author(s): Rena Steinzor
West Explosion Highlights Need for Regulatory Oversight

West Explosion Highlights Need for Regulatory Oversight, op-ed by Thomas McGarity

Type: Op-Eds (May 3, 2013)
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Author(s): Thomas McGarity
Federal Regulations Protect Our Communities

Federal Regulations Protect Our Communities, op-ed by Victor Flatt

Type: Op-Eds (April 30, 2013)
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Author(s): Victor Flatt

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