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Origins of the EPA: People, Policy and Politics

UPLOADED 02 December 2020

Timeline: Origins of the EPA

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A People’s EPA (APE) is a website for everyone — the public, students, activists, journalists — to understand the federal agency’s importance within the United States, and for the whole planet. Since its creation in 1970, Congress has charged the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with implementing laws that protect us from air pollution, dirty water, and hazardous waste, among other things. This process is complex. Our website provides a straightforward history of EPA’s programs, explains how it operates, and provides data and tools for you to explore and track the EPA in greater depth.

“A People’s EPA” is also meant to invoke certain ideals about what this agency should and could be. The EPA is the main federal agency in the US for shielding the living environments of millions of ordinary Americans from the pollution and other ecological damage that wealthy and powerful institutions can inflict. A properly functioning EPA does just that. It works for the people. It protects the air they breathe, the water they drink, the soil their food is grown on, and the places they recreate. To do so, it needs to incorporate the best possible science. And it needs to incorporate the people it is protecting in its decisions. As much as possible, the EPA needs to make its findings, data, and decisions accessible and understandable to the public. And it needs to include affected communities in its work in deep and meaningful ways.

This is an on-going project. Check back for updates.

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A People's EPA is a project of the Environmental Data & Governance Initiative.

The Environmental Data & Governance Initiative (EDGI) documents, analyzes, and advocates for the federal provision of environmental data and governance, from policies and institutions, to public access to information, to environmental decision-making. We seek to improve environmental information stewardship, to promote environmental democracy, health, and justice, and to better adapt these all to the digital age.

We have four major program areas: 1) investigating and analyzing the inner workings of federal environmental policy, through interviewing of agency staff, as well as data and documentary collection and analysis, 2) monitoring changes to, and exploring standards for, web-based information about the environment, energy, and climate provided by the federal government, 3) developing new ways of making federal environmental data more accessible to the public, and 4) imagining, conceptualizing, and moving toward Environmental Data Justice.

We publish white papers, academic papers, technical reports, public comments, blogs, and op eds. We also develop participatory civic technologies and infrastructures to make data and information more accessible and accountable to the public.

We are a network of more than 50 members from multiple academic institutions, non-profit and grassroots organizations, and professionals from a broad spectrum of work and life backgrounds. We work in collaboration with other organizations and communities concerned about climate change, science policy, good governance, and environmental and data justice.

EDGI formed in November 2016 to document and analyze changes to environmental governance that would transpire under the Trump Administration. EDGI subsequently became the preeminent watchdog group for material on federal environmental data issues on government websites, and a national leader in highlighting President Trump’s impacts such as declines in EPA enforcement. Our work is widely acknowledged, including hundreds of mentions in leading national and international media such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and CNN.

With an incoming Biden Administration, EDGI’s work has become more vital than ever. Actions by the Trump Administration laid bare many inadequacies in our federal environmental and information policies. Our damage assessments of what needs repair after the last four years have also pointed the way toward the many additional systemic improvements that are sorely needed. Federal environmental data, information, and management practices require major adaptations to our modern digital age. Only then can they also be made more accessible and more just. We look forward to pressing the new administration, Congress, and the larger public on how to advance our nation’s environmental data and governance.

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Contributors:

Leif Fredrickson, Co-Curator

Jessica Varner, Co-Curator

Christopher Sellers, EDGI Interviewing and Policy Coordinator

Steven Geofrey, Data Visualization

Marianne Sullivan, Site Contributor and Interviewer

Emily Pawley, Site Contributor

Charles Halvorson, Site Contributor

Jay Turner, Site Contributor

Chris Amoss, Interviewer

Mark Chambers, Interviewer

Alissa Cordner, Interviewer

Lindsey Dillon, Interviewer

Jill Harrison, Interviewer

Ellen Kohl, Interviewer

Katherine Kulik, Interviewer

Jennifer Ohayon, Interviewer

Website Design by Omnivore, Inc.

Website Development by Alfredo Gonzalez and Osvaldo Pulido

Fair Use Statement: Under U.S. copyright law, “fair use” allows for the free, unauthorized use of copyrighted materials for purposes including education, scholarship, research, commentary, criticism and news reporting. APE is a non-commercial, educational, and public history website. We use only that amount of copyrighted material necessary for our intended purposes and attribute the source of the work whenever possible. If you are the creator or rights-holder of any material on this site and would like to discuss this, please contact us at apeoplesepa@gmail.com.

Follow A People's EPA on Twitter

Check out Environmental Data & Governance Initiative EDGI

Email for any questions or comments EDGI

We recommend these resources for further information on the EPA:

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FOIA Environmental Repository Project

(Environmental Data & Governance Initiative)

This is a public repository of federal documents released over the last four years under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The FOIA Environmental Repository Project offers keyword-searchable access to thousands of federal documents successfully obtained by public interest groups from the Trump administration. The repository is a collaboration between EDGI, the “Toxic Docs” initiative of Columbia University and CUNY, and the Sierra Club-organized Environmental FOIA Coordinating Group. The documents reveal the inner workings and external interactions of major environmental agencies within the federal government, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of the Interior, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency, and others.

Environmental Enforcement Watch

(Environmental Data & Governance Initiative)

EEW is a collaborative project seeking to bring people together from different backgrounds to analyze and engage with the data from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) database.

Attacks on Science under the Trump Administration

(Union of Concerned Scientists)

A running list of attacks on science—disappearing data, silenced scientists, and other assaults on scientific integrity and science-based policy. The list provides a representative sample of threats to the federal scientific enterprise. EEW aims to make ECHO data more readily accessible and meaningful for impacted communities while highlighting how ECHO data can be improved.

Science Under Trump: Voices of Scientists across 16 Federal Agencies

(Union of Concerned Scientists)

A 2018 survey of thousands of scientific experts employed by the federal government. The severity of reported problems varied widely across agencies, with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Department of Interior (DOI) faring poorly and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) doing relatively well.

EPA Core Programs - Why They Matter

(Environmental Protection Network)

Brief description of what is at risk if budgets that support EPA's core work are severely cut.

Digitized archive of the EPA Journal

(EPA Alumni Association)

A digitized archive of many articles from the EPA Journal (an agency-produced publication). The articles have tags and the archive is searchable.

EPA Oral History Interviews

(EPA Alumni Association)

Oral histories with former EPA staff on subjects ranging from leadership and management to Superfund and underground storage tanks.

The Republican Reversal

(James Morton Turner and Andrew C. Isenberg)

This website focuses on how the Republican Party’s support for environmental protection weakened, especially after the 1980s. As a result, the party that created the Environmental Protection Agency became its greatest foe. The website includes numerous primary documents and other materials related to conservative opposition to environmental protection.

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