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Goals v. funding
Q: A current assistant administrator recently observed that in 1991 the level of EPA funding was flat, but public expectations of the agency were rising. Is this situation unique, or is it something you faced in the early days?
MR. RUCKELSHAUS: It's a constant with EPA. The Congress constantly loads more and more responsibilities on the agency, but doesn't provide enough money to carry them out. In fact, I used to invite some of the authorization committee chairmen to visit the appropriation committee hearings if they wanted to know why I couldn't do all the things they loaded on me.
In the first place, there probably isn't enough money in the whole federal budget to do everything they assign to EPA. At the authorization level, they don't seem to pay much attention to the budgetary implications of what they tell you to do. They leave that up to the administrative branch and the other committees to wrestle with. Even members of Congress who were conservative in their willingness to spend money, still loaded on these responsibilities.
It is very frustrating because there is no way you can do everything Congress expects of you. I do think that when you testify before the committees, you must lay the groundwork for your inability to achieve their unrealizable goals. I simply told them "This is going to cost more money than I have. I don't have the resources to do this. You can give me this assignment, but I'll tell you right now I'm not going to achieve it." Then they'll make pledges about getting you the money and the resources, and it won't happen. When I returned to these committees in subsequent sessions, I said, "I told you. Here is my previous testimony; there wasn't any way under the sun I could accomplish this." Sometimes this is hard to do. But once you've been through a couple of rounds and realize what's happening, you realize you had better lay the groundwork. So, your AA is not unique. You will find in just about any part of the agency that there will be more responsibilities than resources to carry them out.
Q: Do you have any other advice on this subject?
MR. RUCKELSHAUS: You have to set priorities and defend them on the grounds of having the greatest social payoff. Then keep saying, "Here is the money and manpower I have to carry out the responsibilities you insist on, here is why I get the priorities the way I have. While I recognize my obligations, I don't have the resources to fulfill them."
Then you have an added complication: even though the administration isn't going to ask for the resources either, you have to defend the administration's position and its unwillingness to carry out the mandate of the Congress. I used to combat this by falling back on the game being played, which everybody understands. Congress lays on EPA more than they are capable of doing. The administration doesn't ask for enough money to accomplish EPA's whole program because, frankly, there's too much for any single agency to accomplish in the allowed timeframe. Members of Congress fail to testify on behalf of more money for EPA, making it impossible for the agency to execute what Congress itself mandated. Then the administrator appears before the committees and is attacked for not doing what he had no hope of doing in the first instance.
But when you repeat these steps back to the committees and remind them of your warnings of insufficient funding in previous testimony, they don't say anything; they calm down. They know you understand what's going on, and they have to be quiet or face further embarrassment from you.
When I returned to EPA after ten years absence, I faced the same thing. I told Congress, "I'll show you the testimony I gave ten years ago in which I said this was going to happen; and now it has." In the EPA job, you will miss deadlines and have assignments you can't carry out. It's all just a part of it. You do the best you can. But you are in a stronger position to do the best you can if you tell Congress ahead of time what you are going to do, what are the limitations on your capabilities, and then keep pointing back to what you predicted.