[inaudible conversations] good morning. Today is the day we will examine the president s fiscal year for the epa joining with morning is administrator wheeler and acting chief Financial Officer. Welcome to both of you. Fiscal year 2021 the president s 66 billion to the epa but this request the presidency of what you were able to achieve on the fy 2020. And then to eliminate the new funding we provided to address pfas and the Clean Energy Funding grants c by 47 percent at 409 million fy 2020 also has money from the 3 billion we invested with our nations crumbling Water Infrastructure. Recently held a listening session and they would lose and what at what happened of these cuts were to go through the pollution control also proposed cuts to the clean water grant act air pollution and monitoring to have our communities back home included it would be an absolute catastrophe for clean water. And i directly heard about concerns with the budget with the pfas pollution it could be truly devastating if inactive but unfortunately this will not be enacted congress will which one reject these like we did the last three or so rather spending time talking about a request that will not be enacted i want to focus on how the agency will implement the fy 2020 appropriations and how you plan to work with congress as we craft fy 2021 bill administrator wheeler last year you talked about leaving the agency stronger than you found it. However it is my understanding they never reach the staffing target in 2019 and current staffing these we will below the 2020 target trying to ask you about your plans to make up for lost ground is equally important the epa employees out of respect the agency has behaved in a very confrontational way last july rather than negotiate contract on the employees the epa agreed to return to the bargainingd table. Im happy to hear that so we are watching the progress and hope the epa leadership canst keep up with the outcome so with those policies over the past decade a steady decline of Funding Resources p available for compliance and workforce weve also seen a steady decline over the same period in the number of compliance and Enforcement Actions experts go inside andr of outsie epa to tell us the two are directly related thats because epa enforcement budget is almost entirely used to pay for compliance and enforcement personnel fewer violations are detected if you are cases brought forth and to be extremely proud we could find the dollars to reverse the trend of declining compliance and fy 2020 agreement provided for enforcement and compliance the first increase in nearly a decade but the additional fourcent dollars for not only translate into a better environmental outcome. There needs to be the policy in place to achieve the objective i hope to score this further with you in the course of todays hearing. The administration with those efforts of climate protection we can see their ability. The proposal to undermine the mercury and toxic standards is universally to Public Health and the power sector and the proposal to roll back Greenhouse Gas standards will cost billions of dollars in progress for Climate Change the repeated efforts to science and health care based standards mean more strokes and match preventable death we have questions and find they want to touch briefly between the epa of this committee and there is the commodity between the appropriations branch we have been able to find ways Work Together constructively even when we disagree even when we strongly disagree. The epa had gotten away from that tradition the past few years and i hope that i continue to hope things will continue to improve and become even better. But we have not back to where we used toto be frankly or where we need to be by hope we have an honest and frank discussion in a way that brings us together and the American People to protect they health and air and water and now i would like to yield to our Ranking Member for his opening remarks. Thank you for yielding and holding this hearing the epa fiscal year 2021 budget request also administrator wheeler thank you for coming to the committee thank you for taking time to joinn us also at some point in time unfortunately we have other hearings are taking place at the same time they are no less or more important but the idea theres only four of us in three of us are on another subcommittee. Any offense. This december celebrating the 5h anniversary since this and the toxic substances controlling to create a healthier environment for all americans. In 2019 epa continue to uphold its mission to protect Public Health last year they deleted all superfund sites from the National Priority list the criteria declined leading the agency to have resources from emergingm contaminants to tackle the growing infrastructure backlog advance commonsense reform using those burdens the fiscal 2021 budget six. 58,000,000,000. 2. 4 billion that is below the 202 inactive level we look forward to hearing from you will to build upon the prior year successes the advanced regulatory reforms to address the most critical environmentall and human health challenges. First and foremost to recognize the importance of great lakes they are one of the United States and ohios greatest Natural Resources providing one. 5 million jobs covering the fresh surface water and generating billions of dollars of wages every year and then to have sustained robust funding with the great lakes ecosystem with those inflation species to protect and preserve the lakes for future generations and that which is a school to the fiscal year level they also include funding to research and prevent and then to have though aging Water Infrastructure and then and then to be clean water but the funds so i could be leveraged to spill for the Infrastructure Environment there were 115 million to the additional grants and faith and tribes and then to address the Drinking Water like lead it also prioritizes over 1 billion of the Superfund Program to redevelop sites for economic development. And in 2019 the request is 82 million for remedial programsms. The Superfund National priorities list despite having funds for Water Infrastructure i suspect disagree with several proposed cuts to remain good stewards of our resources we must ensure the agency and his partners have the necessary resources and tools at their disposal the Budget Proposal other has other geographic Programs Research programs and protection grants and several other categorical. And then to study environmental threats. And to look forward to the tribe to update the agency and en protect the health and wellbeing we look forward to working with you over the coming months i appreciate you taking the time and i look forward to t your testimony i yield back. Thank you. Youu have five minutes with what you would like to share with the committee we do have your full statement and will be entered into the record. Thank you. Bcommittee. Joining me today is david bloom acting chief officer mr. Bloom it marks the 50th anniversary of the creation of the epa in 2020 we can all agree how far we have come over that time. Today the us is a Global Leader with respect to clean air and access to safe Drinking Water and to have contaminated lands at the fastest pace in over a decade we release to the review highlighting accomplishments and i encourage everyone to read the full report and be entered into the record. The Trump Administration is proving Environmental Protection and historic Economic Growth go hand in hand because those Environmental Issues disproportionately impact children of low income and minority communities we take strong actions to protect these populations the federal land action plan is a new costcutting and the epa will continue coordinating with federal state and tribal and Community Partners to protect the most vulnerable among us. For the first time in nearly 20 years epa has new tighter standards for lead dust in homes and childcare facilities across the country and for the first time in nearly three decades epa proposed a provision to lead and copper rule to ensure Water Systems have plans in place to rapidly respond to elevated levels of lead in Drinking Water in the most impacted areas in the country the budget request includes Additional Resources throughout epa to continue implementing the action plan to address chemicals of concern last month epa proposed regulatory determinations for Drinking Water and propose to close the loophole for those that have certain chemicals that are imported into our country. These with previous epa actions are key milestones of the extended efforts to implement the action plan the aging Water Infrastructure budget request includes 2 million continuing to have the state revolving funds for every dollar contributed to date millions have received 3 million of water structure investment return additionally the 25 million is expected to deliver more than 2 million and direct Credit Assistance purring for billion in total Infrastructure Investments the agency is improving the process and reducing the backlog 36 areas around the country lifting major regulatory burdens and in 2019 epa acted 366365 for backlog and just last week the final area reached attainment for the entire state to put into compliance these and achievements not only help Public Health but support greater growth that are is a priority for President Trump when it comes to enforcing the nations laws the epa is significantly increasing compliance and 2019 to receive voluntary disclosures at over 1900 facilities more than double 2016 the agency is determining to step up criminal cases which have increased in all categories for the First Time Since 2011 administrative civil and criminal fines were the highest in the last decade. The pa is cleaning up the largest contaminated sites and returning them to productive use the leading superfund sites the largest number deleted in the National Priorities list since 2001 the superfund enforcement tools can help with redevelopment and secured commitments to reduce or treat to eliminate 470 Million Pounds of pollution the highest of the past four years the budget request provides 130 million no less for those specifically targeted for opportunity zones to spur to economically distressed areas and those communities to receive those grants with more than 64,000,108 were opportunity zones to support Environmental Justice. As the epa celebrates we can proudly say americans today have significantly cleaner air and wind and water we continue this progress to make sure all americans no matter where they live share it. I look forward to answering your questions. Thank you very much we have other hearing so i command my colleagues on my side of the aisle trying to accommodate everyone. But i will hold everyone to the five minutes and let you know when you have one minute left. I greatly appreciate that madame chairman. Thank you for being here gentleman. My office asked you for a broke one a breakdown by Program Office and spending for region five in the last five years. Your Congressional Staff told me such data is not available. Can you generate this data . We will see what information we can provide to you. Somebody is cutting the checks. Somebody has to know who is working there and how many you have paid in the last five years. You are looking for information for the last five years for region five. And under the Program Office. Yes sir. We will go back and pull that together and provide that to your staff. If you confront one provide that to the whole committee we would appreciate that. We would request that as wel well. Your predecessor epa Inspector General report issued last may nearly one year ago had spent more than 985,000 in travel in a ten month. There was a litany of violations by mr. Pruitt and the actions for constraining controls over the epa travel to prevent further waste and abuse 124,000 of taxpayer dollars that could be recovered for one from mr. Pruitt for inappropriate travel. With that 124,000 has that been recovered at this point in time . There were a number of errors in the report even though it was broken down to the specific sent the aig told me at the time it was a rough estimate they ignore the fact that half of the cost was protected detail and that is required to fly with the administrator wherever that happens to be. They ignore that part of the loss of a number should become in half. They did it specify what authority we would have with that money plus the fact the administrator at the tim time, security was put in place for his travel this all predated me before i joined the agency but there are a number of errors in that report the general counsel has been through that and there is no justification. Let me understand the dollar figure maybe half of that but your question is if you have the authority to go after any of that money. Normally if an agency spends money inappropriately it will happen again and someone in your agency does anyone have the authority to go after the money to that was inappropriately spent . The cfo reviewed every questionable expense and said no mount one amount should be recovered epa has taken immediate steps to take corrective action beyond what is required for any trip taken by the administrator over 5000 must be approved by the coo chief Financial Officer or chief of staff so the dollar amount that the ig identified was not justified in the report. Lets say it is half of that are one quarter of that do have the authority to go after that . If not does that mean you can sheet the United States out of dollars that we dont have the number one the ability to go after . Inspector general aired in the report whether or not he was justified to take firstclass travel. It was approved by several people at the time including security detail who approved the need to travel first class so there was no abuse. If nothing was wrong why did you have to put corrective action in place . We did above and beyond what was required to assure the public there is no issues and there will be no misuse of fund funds. We went above and beyond what the law requires. As opposed to going to the money that was inappropriately used. There was no finding there was a justifiable finding it was misused it was approved the travel was taken. Thank you chairman i would refer to mr. Stewart. Thank you Ranking Member is very gracious of you to pull your time. Some of us have two or three or four subcommittees so i do appreciate you giving me your time. Thank you for being here. Its a tough job its very partisan its very controversial in our society. Its very technical and with those questions that you deal with thank you for doing that. I will hit two things very quickly. First thank you for rolling back the previous regulations that have enormous importance in the ability of the federal government to regulate that and second there is no economic benefit 400 percent in the last year and those refineries in the district can you give me some hope and if there is something we can do . In the last couple of weeks it has gone up because of the tenth Circuit Decision we are working through the issues to decide the right path forward. You expect to appeal that decision . We are still working with that with the department of justice the decision has to be made by next week so we will be announcing something shortly. So short of that anything else that you can do . We are looking at other avenues to provide stability in the program and make sure we dont have those wild fluctuations. And with that great benefit especially for Social Security your veterans and others if you keep price of energy down and there is no real obstacle to that. If i could spend some time i am a farmer and a rancher and its quite important and then before they can be marketed and then to experience a significant number it is a very positive thing is good for everyone but we dont thank you have that ability to deal with the increase of the applications and moving toward accelerating the approval process for the biopesticides. Its very important with usda and all three with the website that has been created of the biopesticides and we are working very diligently we have a number that have to be by 2022 but to make sure we get them right and for the safe for environment and public consumption. And then to shortchange this you dont want to skip steps and there is no reason for that but it seems to me the delay that is longer than that do you agree we could do better and we need to anticipate the amount of time . We do have a plan in place with the deadline of 2022 but if we run into issues we want to make sure we get it right and then ends up being harmful to the environment. Thank you i yield back. We will recognize. Thank you very much for being here today. A couple of t