OMB Orders Agencies to Review Regulations The Office of Management and Budget has directed federal agencies to examine 267 regulations that were nominated by the public as candidates for reform. The public comments came after President Bush encouraged citizens to send in ideas for eliminating unnecessary regulations. The comments are included in OMB’s 2002 Report to Congress on the Costs and Benefits of Federal Regulations. More than half of the nominations urge that existing rules be modified by increasing flexibility, including proposals to assist small businesses by encouraging competitive bids for federal contracts and reducing paperwork burdens, OMB said. Also included were a variety of rules relating to the environment, food safety and health care. Agencies were told to prepare to discuss the nominations by February 28. “We have an ambitious agenda ahead to address a thoughtful set of comments from the public,” said John Graham, administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at OMB. “This is a great opportunity for smarter regulation.” Now that Republicans control both houses of Congress, the administration should be able to move its regulatory agenda forward with less oversight. Sen. Joe Lieberman (D- CT), chairman of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee when Democrats controlled the Senate, had been a persistent critic of OMB’s cost-benefit approach to regulation. In a report last fall, he questioned whether that approach ignored public health and safety. The OMB report is available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/inforeg/regpolreports_congress.html.