Getting Government Agency Processes On Track
By: Doug Busselman, Executive Vice President
Part of the challenge in dealing with the things that government agencies (state and federal) do, involves working through the processes they use to do the doing. While we are strong advocates for the importance of public engagement in government actions, there are certain activities which have become twisted and non-operational, resulting in nothing resembling good outcomes, sound judgments, or even rewarding experiences of participation.
The shining example of a broken and misused process is the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
To best summarize the overall situation, I once heard a judge explain – “We’re not here to decide whether the decision made was a stupid decision. The purpose of this hearing is to determine whether the person who made the stupid decision had the authority and carried out the right steps in making the stupid decision.”
Over the last several years, we’ve seen the process of making decisions (good, bad or really ugly ones) bogged down with the process requirements of NEPA. Litigation and over-reaching courts have found ways of redirecting sound resource management into agenda-driven and even lucrative pursuits for those who wish to play to win cash and policy results, when they and their agenda deserve neither.
We saw this past fall the way NEPA was used as an extortion tool, extracting huge payments in return for the purchase of non-interference with the gas pipeline being dug across most of Northern Nevada.
We have also watched the way government agencies, particularly the Bureau of Reclamation, operate their version of the NEPA process to meet the agenda of harming irrigation projects that farmers depend on to produce their livelihoods. In one case (the Walker River) carrying out a sham of the process with no linkage to the legitimate policy considerations or economic impacts of taking water out of the irrigation system for the benefit of Walker Lake. In another case, they can’t seem to get off the dime in carrying out the process in order to meet the obligation of performing NEPA to fix the broken canal which delivers Truckee River Water (in accordance with a federal water decree) to the Newlands Irrigation Project. Their approach of manipulation of their system to achieve, what most believe to be, politically-inspired/directed outcomes was one of the motivations which caused Nevada Farm Bureau voting delegates to offer recommendation, through the American Farm Bureau Federation public policy development process, which gained national support and adoption January 11th.
AFBF policy already stated the organization’s support for “immediate simplification, improvement, streamlining of, as well as a comprehensive congressional review of NEPA”. The Farm Bureau outline for solutions to making the process work or be evaluated within a context of calls for requirements for federal agencies to give:
Part of the challenge in dealing with the things that government agencies (state and federal) do, involves working through the processes they use to do the doing. While we are strong advocates for the importance of public engagement in government actions, there are certain activities which have become twisted and non-operational, resulting in nothing resembling good outcomes, sound judgments, or even rewarding experiences of participation.
The shining example of a broken and misused process is the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
To best summarize the overall situation, I once heard a judge explain – “We’re not here to decide whether the decision made was a stupid decision. The purpose of this hearing is to determine whether the person who made the stupid decision had the authority and carried out the right steps in making the stupid decision.”
Over the last several years, we’ve seen the process of making decisions (good, bad or really ugly ones) bogged down with the process requirements of NEPA. Litigation and over-reaching courts have found ways of redirecting sound resource management into agenda-driven and even lucrative pursuits for those who wish to play to win cash and policy results, when they and their agenda deserve neither.
We saw this past fall the way NEPA was used as an extortion tool, extracting huge payments in return for the purchase of non-interference with the gas pipeline being dug across most of Northern Nevada.
We have also watched the way government agencies, particularly the Bureau of Reclamation, operate their version of the NEPA process to meet the agenda of harming irrigation projects that farmers depend on to produce their livelihoods. In one case (the Walker River) carrying out a sham of the process with no linkage to the legitimate policy considerations or economic impacts of taking water out of the irrigation system for the benefit of Walker Lake. In another case, they can’t seem to get off the dime in carrying out the process in order to meet the obligation of performing NEPA to fix the broken canal which delivers Truckee River Water (in accordance with a federal water decree) to the Newlands Irrigation Project. Their approach of manipulation of their system to achieve, what most believe to be, politically-inspired/directed outcomes was one of the motivations which caused Nevada Farm Bureau voting delegates to offer recommendation, through the American Farm Bureau Federation public policy development process, which gained national support and adoption January 11th.
AFBF policy already stated the organization’s support for “immediate simplification, improvement, streamlining of, as well as a comprehensive congressional review of NEPA”. The Farm Bureau outline for solutions to making the process work or be evaluated within a context of calls for requirements for federal agencies to give:
- Consideration of economic impacts to areas directly affected by regulations;
- Consideration of the cumulative impacts of all regulations proposed;
- Compliance by Native American Tribes with NEPA, regardless of whether the land is held in trust status by the Bureau of Indian Affairs; and
- Details of the time and costs involved in conducting environmental evaluations (Environmental Assessments and Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) should be publicly reported with an agency-by-agency accounting breakdown for the resources required for initial planning of NEPA activities.
Posted by Doug Busselman at 1/13/2011 10:18 AM 
Categories: Government
Tags: NEPA Government Agency decisions Resource management bureaucracy
Categories: Government
Tags: NEPA Government Agency decisions Resource management bureaucracy
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