Does the EPA Really Want to Know What You Think?

Surf the web on almost any subject and eventually you’ll get a hit at About.com, which bills itself as a resource offering expert guidance from people like you and me.

Does the EPA Really Want to Know What You Think?
Photo: beana_cheese, Creative Commons, Flickr

This makes me question the "expert" label, since I’m clearly not one. Still, I usually read their offerings. Of course, I also read cereal box labels and whatever else happens to be around.

A recent About.com posting, Larry’s Environmental Issues Blog, caught my eye. The post starts out by suggesting environmentally responsible consumers can actually e-mail the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, and give that marginally staffed (and even more marginally effective) agency a piece of their mind.


"What a great idea! Government responsive to the people!" I thought to myself, and read the short epistle on the subject of paper vs. plastic bags. Seems both plastic and paper bags are recyclable, but most of us know that, just as we know that a tremendous amount of energy and natural resources (like wood pulp and petroleum) goes into producing them. Nothing new there, but the link to contact the EPA – called Greenversations – remained enticing.


I clicked on it and was instantly disappointed. The site is not a place to post opinions, except on topics selected by the EPA at their discretion. What it is is a series of blogs, the first by Larry Teller, the EPA’s regional web content coordinator. Teller may also be a scientist; that part isn’t as clear. Even less clear is his intent, which seems to be directed at some new form of content integration. If you want to comment on the question of the week (paper or plastic), you need to turn your attention to the right side of the page, where a column – in small, blue letters – lists the question of the week.

That link took me to the expected question, paper or plastic, but the text that followed was in Spanish! Patience is a virtue, I reminded myself, and scrolled down to another question: Do you pay attention to where your food comes from? Again, the text beneath the question was in Spanish, which I haven’t been able to read since high school (though I can still ask for the nearest bathroom).


I tried the second link. Same results, more Spanish. Then a light bulb went off in my head, and I scrolled down below the indecipherable Spanish text and came, at last, to English responses. Unfortunately, by the time I got there I felt like someone involved in a game of three-card monte. The EPA’s consumer site, like the agency itself, lacks transparency and seems designed to obfuscate rather than inform.


The responses – trite and predictable – might have been from real people, though I suspect a number were posted by EPA insiders to generate more site activity. In any case, the page contains nothing that would provoke the EPA into performing better science in a timely manner, or to reveal their findings when they do. In fact, the whole site smacks of feel-good PR rather than genuine communication or disclosure.


I don’t blame Larry West, though I do feel he could have divulged this and left out the resource blurb. I blame the EPA, which under this administration seems more concerned with appearance than substance – an appearance that was severely damaged this week when Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Cal.) denounced both EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson and the Bush administration for refusing to reveal the contents of the EPA’s global warming report to the American public.


My take: It’s hard to look good when you’re hiding something.

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