Rebecca posted about this in April, but I'd just like to remind everyone that the EPA blog is open for comments THIS WEEK (June 9-13, 2008). This is a great opportunity to provide your comments to EPA. As always, we recommend that you couch your comments in terms of access, authenticity, preservation and privacy!!

EPA is holding an on-line discussion among state, tribe, and other federal partners of EPA, as well as the public to foster collaboration on information access. For this discussion, we are using a blog which is a more interactive and personal form of technology. Everyone is invited to use this site to identify and share their best resources, tools, and ideas for improving access to EPA’s environmental information. This is a key part of the National Dialogue on Access to Environmental Information – working with you to enhance information access.

This blog will be open for comment for one week (June 9-13, 2008). The blog will then be closed and a summary report will be posted on the “What We’ve Learned” section of the National Dialogue website by June 20th.

Well...this is a good sign. The EPA wants to know "what kind of environmental information you need, and how you want to get it". It's part of the National Dialogue on Access to Environmental Information and the EPA wants your input. You can contribute to their discussion board or submit a comment. I'm forwarding this link along to the Environmental Sciences Dept. faculty here where I work, among others. Spread the word!

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) issued a press release analyzing the March 26 EPA Report to Congress. PEER Associate Director Carol Goldberg says, “EPA is approaching the task of restoring its libraries grudgingly and appears to be trying to get by doing the bare minimum,”

• EPA to Re-Open Libraries by Fall - But They Won't Be the Same, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, March 28, 2008.

The press release says that the EPA report makes clear that:

• Re-opened libraries would be limited to “core reference materials” and unspecified “resources to meet specific local needs.” The one exception is the Kansas City–based regional library whose collection had not yet been disbursed;
• All EPA libraries will be operated under the direct control of a political appointee who will review whether requests for research materials and services “meet Network standards.” ...
• EPA is not indicating when, how or with whom it will consult in order to determine “stakeholder needs” that are supposed to guide services.

The Special Library Association (SLA) announced today that EPA plans to re-establish the closed libraries by September 2008.

SLA met with EPA officials today to review the agency's report to Congress on the future direction of its library network.

The report, submitted to Congress yesterday, includes a summary of the network standards developed with respect to physical space, on-site collections, staffing and services of EPA’s Regional and Headquarters libraries, as well as a plan for allocating resources from the the 1 million dollars given to them by Congress:

•Re-establish on-site libraries in Region 5, 6, and 7, and the consolidated EPA Headquarters Repository and Chemical Library in DC.
•Enable Regional EPA libraries to update their collections, facilities, and equipment to meet Network standards.
•Conduct a formal needs assessment for EPA library services to support future development.

I am glad to see that EPA took the hearing's recommendations to meet with affected stakeholders and library organization officials seriously, but I do not think they met with anyone before the report to Congress was due, as was recommended at the hearing. At least, I have not heard or read about any such meeting. Correct me if I'm wrong. Nevertheless, EPA states:

"Over the next few months, we will continue to engage affected stakeholders (including our employee unions) as we finalize our specific plans for each library. The Agency is committed to working with its employees and outside parties on its future digitization plans (based on the third party review), a customer needs assessment, and long term strategic planning efforts".

Information Today published an article on the recent hearing and issues surrounding the EPA library closures that I've been blogging about this week: "EPA Library Closures: Management Incompetence or Something More Sinister?". I was hoping they would discuss or speculate what exactly the author deemed "sinister" but it's basically just an in-depth summary of the hearing and witness testimonies. Read between the lines?

I watched the live webcast of the EPA library closures hearing at the House Committee on Science and Technology's website this morning (the webcast was recored and is still available for viewing at their website). The opening and witness statements are now transcribed and posted as well. A summary of the hearing is described in the committee's press release.

Also, the GAO released a report of Witness John Stephenson's statement, entitled "EPA Needs to Follow Best Practices and Procedures When Reorganizing Its Library Network". This coincides with a February 2008 GAO report entitled "EPA Needs to Ensure That Best Practices and Procedures Are Followed When Making Further Changes to Its Library Network". The main recommendations from these reports include: the creation of a comprehensive plan to guide library re-organization; creation of an outreach process for garnering opinions and needs assessments of library users; create mechanisms to oversee and monitor impact; and develop procedures for the proper handling of materials.

Charles Orzehoskie, aka Chuck O, testified on behalf of the American Federation of Government Employees Council of EPA Locals #238. He declared that:
"The Council tried to work with EPA management but was stonewalled. Management was apparently not interested in what the Agency engineers, risk assessors, and scientists had to say about EPA libraries. The Administration’s action in shuttering EPA Libraries appears penny wise, pound foolish and a step backwards in protecting the environment. Unfortunately, so many of the Administrator’s decisions appear to be based on the President’s Management Agenda, and not on the mandates of Congress, the will of the American people or what would be in the best interest of accomplishing EPA’s mission".

Jim Rettig, ALA's President-elect, testified and focused on two points: 1) "the vital importance of access to scientific, environmental, legal, and other government information for EPA employees, scientists and the American public. 2) the necessity of the information specialist – the staff librarian – to ensure the most effective access to this information. Because there are fewer libraries and professional library staff, scientists and the public will have limited access to this
information".

The Q & A session after the witnesses read their statements was the most entertaining portion of the hearing. View the last 20 minutes or so of the webcast to see Chairman Bart Gordan questioning (with some truly great quips and jabs) Molly O'Neill, CIO of EPA. Ms. O'Neill was rather vague and unsure of herself when asked to give specifics, bearing an uncanny resemblance to a wide-eyed deer in headlights. Lots of: "We have not done X yet but we are committed to doing so" or "I'll have to get back to you" or "I can't answer that question for the record". She was unable to answer the question by the Chairman in regards to exactly who is authoring the report for the committees on appropriations, due on March 26th. Witnesses were surprised that they had not been contacted by EPA for commentary on the report, although Ms. O'Neill claimed EPA was "working closely" with the EPA libraries and those affected by the regional library closures.

In conclusion, the committee ordered that the witnesses' organizational representatives meet with Ms. O'Neill and her staff for consultation and to offer input and commentary on the report to congress before March 26th. Chairman Gordan also had Ms. O'Neill state for the record that closed EPA libraries would re-open before the end of the fiscal year.

The House Committee on Science and Technology Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight will hold a hearing: “EPA Library Closures: Better Access for a Broader Audience?" today (Thursday, March 13th) at 9:30 a.m. in Room 2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building. You can view the hearing from your computer via a live webcast. I'll be watching and blogging about it afterwards.

Jim Rettig, President-elect of ALA, will be a witness at the hearing.

The five key questions to be addressed, as indicated in the Hearing Charter, include:

Did EPA Have a Plan for Maintaining Continuity of Library Services When the Plan Was Implemented in 2006?
Did EPA Realize Budget Savings Through Implementation of Their Plan?
Has EPA’s Effort to Digitize Library Holdings Resulted in Greater Access to Library Collections?
Did Implementation of EPA’s Plan Ensure Continuity of Library Services to EPA Employees and the Public or Improve Library Services?
What Is The Path Forward?

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) announced that Federal Labor Relations Board Arbitrator George Edward Larney ruled that the EPA acted in bad faith when it abruptly ordered to close seven of its ten regional libraries during the past two years.

The arbitrator did not order EPA to re-open the closed libraries, because Congress already ordered them to restore the libraries in pg. 35 of a statement attached to FY 2008 budget (H.R. 2764) passed on December 26th, 2007.

Later this month, the EPA is supposed to report to Congress as to how and when it will reopen the libraries with the $3 million that was allocated for them to do so. Hopefully, the EPA will pay heed to the public's input (including the library and depository community) in regards to planning the restoration of these libraries.

PEER Associate Director Carol Goldberg echoes this sentiment, stating that "EPA employees are not the only ones negatively affected by library closures; the public now has a much harder time learning about toxic sites in their neighborhoods, the effects of new chemicals or even their local ecological history...while this ruling is a welcome development, EPA should not continue to shut the public – which is paying all the bills – out of the planning for restoration of these invaluable assets."

The Special Libraries Association Government Information Division has an article on EPA Libraries Budget Info  on its blog.

The Government Printing Office recently posted a small sample of EPA documents harvested from the EPA web. I'm not writing about this effort today, but so far it looks promising and I commend GPO for sharing part of the results with the community. There will be more about this later.

Today I'm writing about one of the fruits of their web harvesting. One of the reports that GPO pulled and I hope is eventually widely distributed in print is:

Business case for information services : EPA's regional libraries and information centers
by United States. Office of Environmental Information.;  United States. Environmental Protection Agency. National Library Network.
EPA 260-R-04-001, Published January 2004

Because I'm uncertain what will happen to the current GPO page once the pilot is finished, I've elected to post this report to the Internet Archive at http://www.archive.org/details/BusinessCaseForInformationServicesEpasRegionalLibrariesAndCenters.

What really impressed me about this report, which might have been mentioned before, is how the authors found a strong financial benefit to EPA running regional libraries. Here is their Executive Summary (bolding mine):

The Environmental Protection Agency?s network of regional libraries and environmental center libraries provides substantial value to the Agency, its professional staff, stakeholders, and the public. Calculated conservatively, the benefit-to-cost ratio for EPA library services ranges between 2:1 and 5.7:1. Libraries and librarians are nonetheless a significant investment, costing the Agency roughly $6.2 million annually to operate and maintain. It is an opportune time to initiate an Agency-wide dialog on the extent and nature of library services at the Environmental Protection Agency.

The rest of this 24 page report basically expands on these findings. Unsurprisingly, time as well as money were saved. According to a table at page 16 of the PDF file, 2003 reference for EPA staff saved the agency over 16,000 hours and over 14,000 hours in serving external users.

So, speaking conservatively, keeping the EPA libraries open provide $2 of benefits for every dollar spent on the libraries PLUS freed up over 30,000 hours a year that EPA staff could spend on other tasks. Makes you wonder why the agency chose to close the libraries anyway.

According to Open WorldCat, there is only one paper copy of this report in the nation's libraries. Hopefully some of you will change that.

Courtney Holliday from the First Amendment Center reports that the Environmental Protection Agency is halting its library closures plan "in response to heavy criticism from lawmakers and advocacy groups":

"Under pressure from members of Congress and groups such as the ALA, the EPA announced in January that it would not close additional libraries until more public outreach was done, according to the Library Journal."

So it's not over yet, per se.

Rory Litwin of Library Juice reports that ALA's Washington, DC office and Committee on Legislation have started a Federal Libraries Wiki to cover government library closures. It's just beginning, so it needs some beefing up, but sadly, I'm sure that content will be added frequently.

Why would a federal agency trash its libraries?, by Jeff Ruch, High Country News, April 9, 2007.

Then, after it had already begun closing libraries, EPA discovered that copyright limitations prevented it from digitizing materials not written by EPA staff. As a result, hundreds of reports from the agency's contractors, as well as academic and corporate researchers, will remain in hard copy, but housed in one of three "repositories."

At times, EPA's actions have taken on an Orwellian cast, as thousands of documents and whole collections were hastily dispersed to anyone willing to accept them. The three repositories of documents have grown into giant information dumps whose contents will remain un-cataloged for years to come, and in Chicago, the largest regional library, furnishings -- shelves, desks and cabinets worth some $40,000 -- were sold for $327.

Thanks to Bernadine Abbott Hoduski for passing along this press release from a federal employees group regarding the EPA Library controversy:

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Contact: Carol Goldberg (202) 265-7337
EPA LIBRARY SYSTEM CONTINUES TO IMPLODE
Union Charges EPA with Unfair Labor Practice for Refusing to Consult on Closures
Washington, DC — Despite public pledges of cooperation, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is refusing to consult with its own employees about the effects of past or schedule of future library closures, according to an unfair labor practices complaint released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). In the face of growing congressional opposition, EPA continues to shutter libraries and make collections unavailable both to its own staff and the public.

The unfair labor practice complaint was filed on Monday, February 5, 2007 by the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) National Council of EPA Locals, Council 238 before the Federal Labor Relations Authority. The complaint centers on the closure of the EPA Regional Library in Chicago and charges that EPA has refused to bargain on the impacts this action has on scientists and other specialists. The complaint asks for intervention to force EPA to enter binding arbitration on the subject.

"EPA touts its outreach efforts but has refused to consult with its own professionals or anyone else prior to hacking apart its library system," stated PEER Associate Director Carol Goldberg. "It is ridiculous that our nation's top environmental professionals have to wage legal battle just to keep access to information."

This Tuesday, in an oversight hearing before the Senate Environment & Public Works Committee, EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson testified that only five of the 26-library network had been closed. In fact, additional libraries have been shut, including, most recently the EPA Regional Library in Atlanta (serving eight southeastern states) where virtually all services had been transferred to Cincinnati. When confronted by Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), the committee chair, Johnson said he knew nothing about this functional shuttering of the Atlanta facility.

The rationale for EPA's library shutdowns has shifted. Originally it was to save funds but agency studies show that its libraries produce cost savings several times their budgets by eliminating staff time that would otherwise be spent on tracking down documents. In addition, EPA's plan to digitize tens of thousands of documents will likely cost far more than the $1.5 million it estimated it might save.

Now, EPA claims that it wants to modernize its information system, even as its budget is being cut - the FY 08 proposed budget unveiled by President Bush this week would cut EPA's budget by 6.6%. The agency, however, has not described how the new system it is implementing on a piecemeal basis will ultimately function. Nor is it known how this still-developing new system will perform any better.

"EPA is forcing its entire staff to become their own librarians, wasting countless hours and sacrificing access to mountains of information formerly available," Goldberg continued. "These shuttered libraries handled tens of thousands of information requests each year, not the handful that EPA is now implying."

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More information and commentary can be found at the PEER website.

If EPA Officials authorized to speak on the record wish to comment on any of the claims above, especially:

"The rationale for EPA's library shutdowns has shifted. Originally it was to save funds but agency studies show that its libraries produce cost savings several times their budgets by eliminating staff time that would otherwise be spent on tracking down documents. In addition, EPA's plan to digitize tens of thousands of documents will likely cost far more than the $1.5 million it estimated it might save."

Please send an e-mail with a verifiable return address to admin AT freegovinfo.info and we will make an unedited blog posting out of your reply.

FGI has been tracking on the issue of the closings of Environmental Protection Agency libraries around the country for some time now. I reported on the many meetings that EPA officials had with librarians of the Government Documents Roundtable (GODORT) at last month's ALA conference in Seattle. Much of the talk revolved around esoteria like digitization, preservation and public service numbers -- terms that **yawn** don't necessarily resonate with the general public. I think the elephant in the living room that was missing from the ALA meetings was a discussion about the obvious political aspects of the Bush administration's overt attack on federal environmental protection laws and regulation.

Now here's an article that explains the political attack on EPA libraries in a way that will resonate with the public. Christopher Moraff's article in In These Times (2/1/07) is filled with budget slashing, EPA doublespeak and the shift in the political winds that may save the rest of the EPA libraries from the fate of EPA’s Region 5 facility in Chicago. Please read and distribute.

In February 2006, when President Bush unveiled his budget proposal for FY 2007, the EPA Library Network learned that its annual disbursement would be slashed 80 percent from 2006 funding levels—from $2.5 million to just $500,000. A month later, administrators at the EPA’s Region 5 facility in Chicago circulated an e-mail announcing it would be the first to close. By October, two other regional libraries were gone. Together, the three facilities had served the entire middle United States.