EPA watchdog?

Scott Pruitt clearly wants to shift the priorities of the agency he leads. The EPA administrator has also taken steps to repeal a rule that curbs pollution in our country’s waterways. He’s delayed the date by which chemical plants much comply with a rule

Sometimes it’s helpful to divide people who work in certain government jobs into three categories: Attack dogs, lap dogs and watch dogs.

Take, for example, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. As Oklahoma’s attorney general, he was an aggressive attack dog who won headlines in his state by criticizing and suing the Environmental Protection Agency. Now, as the man President Trump tapped to take charge of the EPA, he’s earning a reputation as a lap dog for the very industries he’s supposed to regulate.

Instead, we need him to become what we expect the EPA to be: a watchdog over our country’s environment.

His supporters give the man credit for jumping into his job with both feet. Legal experts tracking the EPA have told The New York Times that in just four short months, Pruitt has taken steps to undo, delay or block more than 30 environmental regulations. That’s the most dramatic rollback of rules in such a short period in the agency’s history, a record one environmental law professor calls “astounding.”

But it’s also horrifying to environmental activists watching as Pruitt dismantles much of the authority of the regulatory body we trust to protect our nation’s air, water and public health. Just this week, a coalition of states entered a legal challenge claiming Pruitt violated the law when he reversed a ban on a pesticide the EPA’s scientists say can damage the brain development of fetuses and children.

The EPA administrator has also taken steps to repeal a rule that curbs pollution in our country’s waterways. He’s delayed the date by which chemical plants must comply with a rule to prevent spills and explosions. He’s filed a proposal of intent to weaken the climate change regulations known as the Clean Power Plan. And he tried to delay a rule requiring oil and gas well owners to control leaks of methane.

Here in the nation’s energy capital, we’re all in favor of expediting the complex and difficult process of producing and refining hydrocarbon products. But we also believe in doing it in a way that’s compatible with protecting the environment.

What’s especially troublesome is that Pruitt is acting with almost no input from the EPA’s 15,000 employees. Instead, he’s farming out much of the work to outside lawyers, lobbyists and other industry allies like the Republican Attorneys General Association, a group that’s received more than $4 million in funding from the oil and gas industries. All of this would come as a surprise and a disappointment to a couple of former Republican presidents. Teddy Roosevelt, the most committed environmentalist ever to occupy the White House, was also a corporate trust buster who would’ve been mighty upset that a federal employee charged with protecting the environment is doing the bidding of industry he’s supposed to regulate. And even Richard Nixon, who founded the EPA, would have expected the agency’s boss to consult with his staff before precipitously rolling back environmental regulations.

Pruitt clearly wants to shift the priorities of the agency he leads. For example, he’s talked about putting more resources into cleaning up hazardous waste at old industrial sites. But at the same time, he proposes cutting the budget for cleaning up Superfund sites by about 25 percent.

The new EPA administrator needs to stop taking his cues from the industries he regulates. At the same time, he needs to talk with the professionals in his own agency — experts with decades of experience serving under presidents in both parties — before he impulsively rolls back environmental regulations. The attack dog who’s become a lap dog needs to evolve into a watchdog.