EPA OIG to Review Reopening Plans as House Subcommittee Calls for Increased Oversight
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced plans to review the agency’s reopening of offices across the country. The notice comes after the House Oversight and Reform Committee’s Government Operations Subcommittee wrote letters to 24 IG offices requesting they oversee agency reopening plans.
In an all-employee message on June 1, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler outlined the agency’s plan for a phased reopening.
“Our plan provides for a “rolling reopening,” so each facility will enter Phase 1 after two thorough reviews of health information that meets the gating criteria while keeping in mind any City, State, or County requirements as well. Once a facility enters any phasing period, we will stay in that phasing period for a minimum of two weeks. Once we are in a phase, we will continue to monitor local data and actions by state and local governments to determine if we should proceed in to the next phase. We can move forward, stay in a specific phase for a longer period than two weeks, or we can move backward,” the message explains.
According to GovExev reports, the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents almost 8,000 of EPA’s 14,172 total employees, has called for the agency to halt reopening plans because it feels the agency has failed to be adequately transparent.
In a July 1 Notification of Evaluation, the EPA OIG announced their intention to review the EPA’s response to the White House’s Guideline for Opening Up America Again- from which the agency built its reopening plans.
“This evaluation is self-initiated and is part of the OIG’s efforts to examine the impact of the coronavirus pandemic—that is, the SARS-CoV-2 virus and resultant COVID-19 disease—on EPA operations. Specifically, this evaluation will examine the measures that the EPA is taking to mitigate agencywide risks as it plans to reopen its facilities for operations,” the notice to the agency explains.
The OIG will be working with staff at the EPA Headquarters, offices at Research Triangle Park in North Carolina, Cincinnati offices, and offices in regions 1-10 with the objective of determining the EPA’s national strategy for implementing federal guidelines to protect the health and safety of its workforce when reopening the agency’s facilities that were closed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The OIG requested these offices provide, by July 10, 2020:
A list of all EPA facilities, their locations, and the number of EPA staff at each facility nationwide.
A copy of the plans for reopening each facility at the above-mentioned EPA locations.
A point of contact at each of those locations for following up with questions regarding the reopening plans
The OIG notice notes that “Although this work was self-initiated, the EPA OIG was one of 24 federal inspectors general that received a request from the Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Government Operations to review their respective offices’ re-opening efforts. “
On June 15, Subcommittee Chairman Gerry Connolly (D-VA) sent letters to the Inspector General (IG) offices of 24 federal agencies requesting they develop assessment plans for reviewing their agencies’ plans for reopening. The letters criticize a lack of cooperation with oversight bodies from the Office of Management and Budget and Office of Personnel Management.
