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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Inspector General
At a Glance
13-P-0364
August 28, 2013
Why We Did This Review
During an Office of Inspector
General review of a hotline
complaint, we evaluated the
U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency's progress in
implementing certain
requirements of its agencywide
Scientific Integrity Policy. In
March 2009, the President
issued a memorandum to the
heads of all executive
departments and agencies for
taking action to guarantee
scientific integrity throughout the
executive branch. In the
memorandum, the President
instructed each agency to
implement rules and procedures
for ensuring the integrity of the
scientific process within their
agency. The EPA enacted its
Scientific Integrity Policy in
February 2012. The policy
provides a framework intended
to ensure scientific integrity
throughout the EPA, and
describes the role of an
agencywide committee of
scientific integrity officials to
implement this policy.
This report addresses the
following EPA Goal or
Cross-Cutting Strategy:
• Advancing science,
research, and technological
innovation.
For further information, contact
our Office of Congressional and
Public Affairs at (202) 566-2391.
The full report is at:
www.epa.aov/oia/reports/2013/
20130828-13-P-0364.pdf
Quick Reaction Report: EPA Must Take
Steps to Implement Requirements of Its
Scientific Integrity Policy
What We Found
Although an agencywide training program is required by the agency's Scientific
Integrity Policy, the EPA has not developed or implemented a program to
instruct the EPA's employees on the requirements and standards of scientific
integrity. In addition, the EPA has not generated and made publicly available
an annual report on the status of scientific integrity within the agency as
required by the policy. The policy makes the EPA's Scientific Integrity
Committee responsible for implementing these requirements. As a result of the
committee's lack of progress in implementing these requirements, the EPA is
less equipped to:
•	Provide leadership for the agency on scientific integrity.
•	Promote agency compliance with the Scientific Integrity Policy.
•	Keep the agency's senior leadership informed on and involved with
the agencywide status of scientific integrity.
•	Detect violations of scientific integrity.
What We Recommend and Agency Corrective Actions
We recommend that the EPA's Deputy Administrator direct the Scientific
Integrity Committee to (1) develop and implement agencywide training on the
Scientific Integrity Policy in a manner that will minimize further delay in the EPA's
adherence to policy requirements, (2) complete and issue an annual report on
the status of scientific integrity in the agency before its first formal review of the
policy, and (3) provide the Deputy Administrator with a written plan describing
the action plan and milestones for implementing and completing the training and
issuing the annual report.
We met with the EPA's current interim scientific integrity official in July 2013 to
discuss the findings and recommendations in our draft quick reaction report. In
response to our draft quick reaction report the EPA's interim scientific integrity
official included corrective actions with planned completion dates, or a statement
that actions were complete, in response to all three OIG recommendations. The
corrective actions meet the intent of our recommendations. Recommendations 1
and 2 are resolved with corrective actions underway. Recommendation 3 is
completed and closed. No additional agency response to this report is required.

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