Despite claims from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that it is complying with Congress' intentions and is reducing the burden of its paperwork requirements on the public, a new government report finds the contrary is true.

Moreover, the General Accounting Office (GAO) report, released March 23, 2000, cited EPA reduction claims as misleading and found that the agency artificially reduced its paperwork burden estimates by resorting to math errors, erroneous assumptions, and its own paperwork recalculations.

Specifically, the GAO report found that "the underlying reporting and record keeping requirements did not change, only EPA's method of measuring their effect," and the "EPA's revisions of agency paperwork estimates had no real impact on the burden being borne by the public."

Senator Christopher "Kit" Bond (R-Mo.), chairman of the Senate Small Business Committee and the appropriations subcommittee responsible for funding the EPA, expressed outrage at the deception and called for an honest accounting by the EPA.

"EPA's misleading claims short-change small business and the environment," said Bond, whose subcommittee commissioned the GAO report. "EPA has an obligation to the public to collect the information it needs with the least amount of paperwork burden imposed on the public, especially small businesses. Swimming against the tide of federal paperwork doesn't help families earn a living and doesn't help small business create new jobs to support the economy. Mandatory paperwork is one of the most time-consuming duties of operating a small business."

In addition, Bond is also concerned because "the environment also suffers when EPA does not honestly reduce paperwork burden. Because when new solutions are found to meet new or persistent environmental problems, people are not willing to take on additional information burdens if the Agency is still imposing old or unneeded requirements," Bond said.

According to government-wide statistics cited by GAO, EPA is one of only six non-Treasury agencies imposing more than 100 million paperwork burden hours on the public per year. EPA imposed 109 million burden hours in Fiscal Year 1995, increasing to about 119 million hours in Fiscal Year 1998.

GAO concluded that "EPA's claim that it had reduced its paperwork burden 'by streamlining processes, eliminating outdated provisions, or consolidating duplicative requirements' was misleading." According to GAO, "also misleading was EPA's statement that these reductions had saved businesses and communities hundreds of millions of dollars."

EPA, for its part, claimed this 10 million hour increase would have been higher by an additional 24 million hours but for EPA's reinvention and reduction efforts. The 1995-98 increase in paperwork burden came over the same time period the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 mandated a 25 percent reduction in federal agency paperwork burden.

Bond was particularly concerned that EPA misled Congress with its claims. "EPA Administrator (Carol) Browner testified before the House Appropriations Subcommittee just last week claiming a 24 million hour burden reduction and an $800 million savings for business. Agency officials made the same claims to my Small Business Committee this winter. Now we know those claims were misleading."

Bond pledged to take the matter up with Administrator Browner during EPA's next funding hearing before his subcommittee.

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