EPA

WASHINGTON – U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt signed a memorandum outlining a “Back-to-Basics” process for reviewing National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) under the Clean Air Act. This memo ensures that EPA and its independent science advisors follow a transparent, timely, and efficient process in reviewing and revising public health- and welfare-based NAAQS.

The reforms, advancing initiatives set out in President Trump’s April 12 Memorandum on Promoting Domestic Manufacturing and Job Creation – Policies and Procedures Relating to Implementation of Air Quality Standards, include incorporating important policy-relevant context, as required in the Clean Air Act, on issues like background pollution and potential adverse health, welfare, economic, energy, and social effects from strategies to attain and maintain the NAAQS. The memo commits EPA to begin the next review of the ozone NAAQS so it can finalize any revisions by the Clean Air Act deadline of October 2020. It also requires that the Agency complete its review of the particulate matter NAAQS by December 2020.

“The principles laid out in this memorandum will reform the process for setting national air quality standards in a manner consistent with cooperative federalism and the rule of law,” said EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. “Getting EPA and its advisors back on track with Clean Air Act requirements, statutory deadlines, and the issuance of timely implementation rules will ensure that we continue the dramatic improvement in air quality across our country.”

“These NAAQS process reforms better separate scientific judgments from policy decisions,” said former EPA Deputy Administrator (2005 – 2009) Marcus Peacock. “Setting air quality standards is murky enough without muddying the distinctly different duties of scientists and political appointees in protecting human health and the environment.”

“As Administrator Pruitt and I discussed early in his tenure at EPA, clean air is our common goal, the question is how we get there. Missed deadlines and delayed guidance don’t help achieve it. Having all the facts as we set these standards also provides useful insight as standards that impact wide swaths of the country are set,” said Rep. Pete Olson (TX). “I thank the Administrator and his team for taking this key step, and look forward to working with him as we continue to move toward standards that improve air quality while reducing unnecessary red tape.”

“These reforms are long overdue. Congress clearly understood that there would be tradeoffs involved in the Clean Air Act,” said Bracewell LLP Partner and former EPA Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation (2001 – 2005) Jeff Holmstead. “It’s good to see that the public will finally get an authoritative accounting of the adverse effects caused by some of EPA’s regulatory mandates. Policymakers, including members of Congress, need to understand the adverse public health, social, and economic effects of the actions that will be needed to meet inflexible air quality standards.”

“A consequence of EPA’s non-transparent National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) setting process (which the Administrator rectified last month), has been the establishment of some standards near background levels,” said Principal Scientist for Air Improvement Resource, Inc., and former Chairman of EPA’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (1992 – 1996) Dr. George Wolff. “The policy ramifications of this have not been fully appreciated. Setting the NAAQS at such low levels has also exacerbated unintended adverse impacts. The contributions to uncontrollable background levels and the nature of these adverse effects need to be better understood to inform policy making decisions. It is not only appropriate that CASAC be an integral part of these discussions, but it is also mandated by an often-overlooked section of the Clean Air Act.”

“I applaud the Trump administration’s efforts to improve implementation of the Clean Air Act,” said Sen. John Barrasso (WY). “These necessary reforms will give certainty to states and businesses. The reforms will also make sure the Environmental Protection Agency considers all relevant data and information when it makes decisions. That is just good government.”
“I applaud the EPA for taking this commonsense step to fix our broken process for setting and implementing ozone standards, which has caused confusion and stifled investment and job creation throughout the country,” said Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (WV). “I am encouraged that the EPA reforms are taking an approach similar to that in legislation that I have championed, the Ozone Standards Implementation Act.”

“I have been a participant and observer of the NAAQS review process since 1977 including serving as CASAC Chair and on Panels reviewing all of the criteria pollutants. The process has continued to improve over the decades, however, serious issues still remain. I applaud key principles outlined in the memo,” said Independent Advisor on Toxicology and Human Health Risk Assessment and former Chairman of EPA’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (1988 – 1992) Dr. Roger O. McClellan. “It is appropriate to commit to meeting the statutory deadline of completing the review of each NAAQS every five years. Coordinating the Ozone and Particulate Matter reviews so they are completed close to each other, in October 2020 for Ozone and December 2020 for PM, should increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the process. The focus needs to be on the policy relevant information that will inform the policy decisions the CAA requires the Administrator to make.”

Click here to view the full memo.

OJA

TOPEKA—The Kansas Supreme Court announced today that it has amended two rules to facilitate the requirement that all attorneys must electronically file documents in all state courts effective June 25, 2018.

The requirement applies to all Kansas-licensed attorneys who are permitted to practice law under Rule
208(a), and it applies to all case types processed by Kansas courts. Self-represented parties will continue to file paper documents.

“Electronic filing has been required in the appellate courts since November 2015, and many judicial districts have mandated efiling as well,” said Chief Justice Lawton Nuss. “This statewide mandate is an important step in our move toward centralized case management, which is part of our Kansas eCourt initiative, and the standardization that will come with it.”

To advance the efiling requirement, the Supreme Court amended two rules for district courts:

• Supreme Court Rule 119: Fax Filing and Service by Fax. This amended rule requires a Kansas-licensed attorney to follow the provisions of Rule 122 when filing any document with a district court.

• Supreme Court Rule 122: Electronic Filing and Service by Electronic Means. This amended rule requires a Kansas-licensed attorney who is permitted to practice law under Rule 208(a) to electronically file documents in the district courts, unless there is a failure of the filing attorney’s technology. Other amendments address electronic service, certificates of service, and filings made untimely if an efiling system is unavailable.

Notice of Electronic Filing

The Supreme Court also authorized modifying the notice of electronic filing generated by the Kansas Courts eFiling system to include a link that allows an attorney of record to directly access an electronically filed document. Currently, the notice of electronic filing alerts the attorney in a case that a document has been electronically filed, and the attorney must log in to the Kansas Courts eFiling system to access the document.

Once the enhancement is in place, the notice of electronic filing will include a link to the document if an unsealed document is electronically filed in the Kansas Courts eFiling system. If the document is sealed, the attorney will need to log in to the Kansas Courts eFiling system to access the document.

The enhancement to the notice of electronic filing is expected to be in place by fall, and attorneys will be notified as soon as it is available.

Documents Deemed Accepted on Submission

The Supreme Court also decided to work toward implementing policy that a document is deemed accepted as soon as it is filed, and it is immediately available for review, unless it is subject to an exception, such as a sealed document. Implementation of this policy is expected to coincide with the Kansas judicial branch’s transition to a new centralized case management system.

Attorneys Encouraged to Sign-up to Electronically File

Attorneys who have yet to start filing electronically are encouraged to visit the Kansas Courts Electronic
Filing web page on the judicial branch website to register to efile, access training videos, and enroll in webinars.

Since electronic filing’s inception in Kansas courts in 2013, more than 4.4 million documents have been efiled in district and appellate courts. Currently, 24 judicial districts representing 79 counties require attorneys to efile in some or all case types. The remaining seven judicial districts representing 26 counties accept documents filed electronically but do not require it.

Of the 11,700 Kansas-licensed attorneys who are registered as active, more than 6,000 have registered to efile. Some attorneys may never efile if they do not litigate in Kansas state courts.

Mandatory efiling important step toward centralized case management

Mandatory electronic filing is an important step toward centralized case management, which will allow all district and appellate case data to reside on a single web-based platform and transform the way the state court system serves the people of Kansas.

The primary goals of centralized case management are to:

• Improve case processing in the district and appellate courts.
• Increase the efficiency of information delivery to district and appellate court judges.
• Increase operational efficiency and effectiveness through automating certain activities and streamlining other operations.
• Improve data quality and integrity.
• Improve performance measurement, analysis, and reporting through enhanced information collection, storage, retrieval, and analysis.
• Enable work sharing between district courts, primarily among clerks and court services.
• Maintain and improve data sharing between various governmental and public entities.
• Maintain and improve the ability to process electronic payments.
• Enable web-based sharing of public information.

As a result of action by the 2014 Legislature, the centralized case management project is funded by a portion of the docket fees collected by the courts.

The conversion to the centralized case management system is expected to take three to four years. The order in which courts will be brought onto the new system is described in the fact sheet Kansas eCourt: Statewide Rollout Plan.