Peer Review and OMB

Under the guise of promoting sound science, the Office of Management and Budget is advancing a far-reaching policy that will impede efforts to protect health and the environment and open the door to conflicts of interest in the regulatory process. Under the OMB proposal, agencies must develop a process for peer review of "significant regulatory information" and they must conform to an extensive prescribed peer review of "especially significant regulatory information" -- an unprecendented attempt by OMB to exert control over federal agencies.

On Dec. 15, 2003, calling the proposal a "wolf in sheep's clothing," Rep. Henry A. Waxman, Rep. John F. Tierney, Rep. Sherrod Brown, Rep. Eddie Bernic Johnson, Rep. Mark Udall, Rep. Brian Baird, and Rep. Michael M. Honda wrote OMB Administrator Joshua Bolten to urge the White House to substantially revise or drop this sweeping proposal to regulate scientific information.
- The Letter to OMB