Environmental Quality Improvement Act - Major Provisions of The Act

Major Provisions of The Act

In Section 4372 (a), (b), and (c) of the act, the Office of Environmental Quality (OEQ) is established as an office within the Executive Office of the President of the United States with the Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) as the Director of the OEQ. In addition, the President of the United States also picks a Deputy Director for the OEQ who is also to be approved by the Senate. While the Director is allowed to employ the amount of people he may need to carry out the work of the OEQ, he is limited to hiring only ten specialists or experts. These specialists or experts also cannot be paid more than a GS-18 pay scale. The function of the OEQ is to provide support for the CEQ and to help the Director carry out his new duties as given in Section 4372 (d). The OEQ and the CEQ are simply known jointly as the Council on Environmental Quality and there is not a separate listing for the OEQ within the Office of the President or a separate website from the CEQ.

Another major area in the Environmental Quality Improvement Act was the creation of six new duties or functions given to the director of OEQ. Besides the director fulfilling the duties to the President of the United States and the CEQ under NEPA, the director had to make sure that the following provisions of U.S. Code 4372 (d) 2-7 were carried out as well:.

4372 (d ) 2: assisting the Federal agencies and departments in appraising the effectiveness of existing and proposed facilities, programs, policies, and activities of the Federal Government, and those specific major projects designated by the President which do not require individual project authorization by Congress, which affect environmental quality;

4372 (d) 3: reviewing the adequacy of existing systems for monitoring and predicting environmental changes in order to achieve effective coverage and efficient use of research facilities and other resources;

4372 (d) 4: promoting the advancement of scientific knowledge of the effects of actions and technology on the environment and encourage the development of the means to prevent or reduce adverse effects that endanger the health and well-being of man;

4372 (d) 5: assisting in coordinating among the Federal departments and agencies those programs and activities which affect, protect, and improve environmental quality;

4372 (d) 6: assisting the Federal departments and agencies in the development and interrelationship of environmental quality criteria and standards established through the Federal Government;

and 4372 (d) 7: collecting, collating, analyzing, and interpreting data and information on environmental quality, ecological research, and evaluation.

The last major provision is that the annual Environmental Quality Report required by NEPA (Public Law 91-190) will be sent to each standing committee that has jurisdiction over any part that might be contained in the report. The Environmental Quality Report, as described in NEPA, relates the status and condition of air, aquatic, and terrestrial environments, future and current trends in regards to those environments, how adequate those resources are for providing our economic needs, a review of significant activities all levels of governments, other entities, and individuals are doing in the area of conservation, effect on the environment, and in developing natural resources, and also how existing programs that are lacking will be improved along with recommendations for legislation. The preparation of this report would be an example of one of the duties from NEPA that the Director of the OEQ would be responsible for as well.