[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 85 (Wednesday, June 11, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1221-E1222]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           PAPERWORK AND REGULATORY IMPROVEMENTS ACT OF 2003

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. DOUG OSE

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 11, 2003

  Mr. OSE. Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to introduce a bill entitled the 
``Paperwork and Regulatory Improvements Act of 2003.'' I am pleased to 
have six other original co-sponsors of this bi-partisan legislation, 
including: John Tanner; Tom Davis, Chairman of Government Reform 
Committee; Dennis Moore; Bill Janklow, who is the Vice Chairman of my 
Subcommittee; Jim Matheson; and, Paul Ryan. The bill includes 
legislative changes to: (a) increase the probability of results in 
paperwork reduction, (b) assist Congress in its review of agency 
regulatory proposals, and (c) improve regulatory accounting.
  Background: In Fall 2001, the Small Business Administration released 
a report which estimated that in 2000, Americans spent $843 billion to 
comply with Federal regulations. This report concluded, ``Had every 
household received a bill for an equal share, each would have owed 
$8,164.'' The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) estimates the 
Federal paperwork burden on the public at over 8 billion hours. The 
Internal Revenue Service (IRS) accounts for 81 percent of the total. In 
its March 2002 draft regulatory accounting report, OMB estimated that 
the price tag for all paperwork imposed on the public is $230 billion a 
year.
  Because of Congressional concern about the increasing costs and 
incompletely estimated benefits of Federal rules and paperwork, in 1996 
Congress required OMB to submit its first regulatory accounting report. 
In 1998, Congress changed the annual report's due date to coincide with 
the President's budget. Congress established this simultaneous deadline 
so that Congress and the public would have an opportunity to 
simultaneously review both the on-budget and off-budget costs 
associated with each Federal agency imposing regulatory or paperwork 
burdens on the public. In 2000, Congress required OMB to permanently 
submit an annual regulatory accounting report. This provision requires 
OMB to estimate the total annual costs and benefits for all Federal 
rules and paperwork in the aggregate, by agency, by agency program, and 
by major rule, and to include an associated report on the impacts of 
Federal rules and paperwork on certain groups, such as small business.
  From September 1997 to February 2003, OMB issued five final and one 
draft regulatory accounting reports. All six failed to meet some or all 
of the statutorily-required content requirements. Part of the reason 
for this failure is that OMB has not requested agency estimates for 
each agency bureau and program, as it does annually for its Information 
Collection Budget (paperwork budget) and for the President's budget 
(fiscal budget).
  In 1980, Congress passed the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) and 
established an Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in 
OMB. By law, OIRA's principal responsibility is paperwork reduction. It 
is responsible for guarding the public's interest in minimizing costly, 
time-consuming, and intrusive paperwork burden. In 1995, Congress 
passed amendments to the PRA and set government-wide paperwork 
reduction goals of 10 or 5 percent per year from Fiscal Year (FY) 1996 
to 2001. After annual increases in paperwork, instead of decreases, in 
1998 Congress required OMB to identify specific expected reductions in 
FYs 1999 and 2000. OMB's resulting report was unacceptable. In 
response, in 2000, Congress required OMB to evaluate major regulatory 
paperwork and identify specific expected reductions in regulatory 
paperwork in FYs 2001 and 2002. Again, OMB's resulting report was 
unacceptable. The bottom line is that, despite explicit statutory 
directives to reduce paperwork burden on the public, there have been 
seven years of increases in paperwork burden.

  Since I became Chairman of the Government Reform Subcommittee on 
Energy Policy, Natural Resources and Regulatory Affairs in 2001, my 
Subcommittee has held multiple hearings that form the basis for the 
provisions in the bill. These include a March 11, 2003 hearing entitled 
``How To Improve Regulatory Accounting: Costs, Benefits, and Impacts of 
Federal Regulations,'' and an April 11, 2003 hearing entitled ``Mid-
Term Report Card: Is the Bush Administration Doing Enough on Paperwork 
Reduction?'' The witnesses at these hearings made several thoughtful 
recommendations, which are reflected in the bill.
  Bill: My bi-partisan bill makes improvements in processes governing 
both paperwork and regulations. With respect to paperwork, the bill 
requires OMB to have at least two full-time staff working solely on tax 
paperwork reduction. Currently, there is only one OMB employee working 
part-time on tax paperwork even though IRS accounts for over 80 percent 
of all government-imposed paperwork. In July 2002, the Appropriations 
Committee included a directive to OMB in House Report 107-575, which 
accompanied its 2003 Treasury-Postal Appropriations bill, to focus more 
of OMB staff attention on reducing IRS paperwork. In addition, I have 
repeatedly asked OMB to increase its staff effort devoted to tax 
paperwork to no avail.
  Also, the bill removes unjustified exemptions from various paperwork 
review and regulatory due process requirements in the Farm Security and 
Rural Investment Act of 2002. This law exempted certain Department of 
Agriculture regulations both from the Administrative Procedure Act's 
due process protections for affected parties and the PRA's required 
review and approval by OMB. Under the PRA, OMB is charged with assuring 
practical utility to all information collections imposed on the public. 
Also, the PRA includes a public protection clause, which assures that 
the public cannot be penalized for not providing information in 
unauthorized paperwork. The Department of Agriculture has one of the 
worst track records in terms of compliance with the PRA. The 
legislative history for this 2002 law includes no

[[Page E1222]]

justification for this significant change in regulatory and paperwork 
promulgation procedures.
  With respect to regulations, the bill makes permanent the 
authorization for the General Accounting Office (GAO) to respond to 
Congressional requests for an independent evaluation of selective 
agency regulatory proposals. To date, GAO has not hired staff for this 
function since the law only authorized a 3-year pilot project. To 
assume oversight responsibility for Federal regulations, Congress needs 
to be armed with an independent evaluation. What is needed is an 
analysis of legislative history, e.g., to see if there is a non-
delegation problem or backdoor legislating. Instructed by GAO's 
independent evaluations, Congress will be better equipped to review 
final agency rules under the Congressional Review Act. More 
importantly, Congress will be better equipped to submit timely and 
knowledgeable comments on proposed rules during the public comment 
period.

  In addition, the bill requires certain changes to improve regulatory 
accounting. These include: (a) requiring Federal agencies to annually 
submit estimates of the costs and benefits associated with the Federal 
rules and paperwork for each of their agency programs; (b) requiring 
OMB's regulatory accounting statement to cover the same 7-year time 
series as the President's budget; (c) requiring integration into the 
President's budget; and (d) establishing pilot projects for regulatory 
budgeting. Currently, the economic impacts of Federal regulation 
receive much less scrutiny than programs in the fiscal budget. 
Requiring OMB presentation using the same time series as the fiscal 
budget and being fully integrated into the fiscal budget documents, 
Congress will be better able to simultaneously review both the on-
budget and off-budget costs associated with each Federal agency 
imposing regulatory or paperwork burdens on the public. Lastly, the 
bill includes a pilot test to determine the feasibility of regulatory 
budgeting. This vehicle would help ensure that agencies address the 
worst societal problems first.
  I believe that the public expects and deserves paperwork reduction 
results. In addition, I believe that the public has the right to know 
if it is getting its money's worth from Federal regulation.

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