EPA Announces New Policy Designed to Increase Coordination of Civil and Criminal Enforcement
Posted by [email protected] on Apr. 25, 2024
Federal environmental enforcement can be civil, criminal, or both. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced a policy intended to better coordinate its civil and criminal environmental enforcement. The policy outlines measures to increase collaboration, enhance case screening, improve case management, and update training programs; it is effective immediately.
David Uhlmann, EPA’s head of the Office of Enforcement and Compliance & Compliance Assurance (OECA), the headquarters office responsible for setting enforcement policy, announced that the policy was intended to ensure greater consistency of enforcement actions across all EPA regions and to direct which programs should take the lead on certain matters. Typically, enforcement matters, whether they be criminal or civil, are handled in various EPA regions but in certain instances, OECA is the lead office. This new policy is designed to provide guidance to enforcement personnel as to what factors that EPA considers when evaluating whether to handle a matter civilly or criminally. The policy is detailed in a memorandum entitled “Strategic Civil-Criminal Enforcement Policy” released on April 17.
Shared with permission from ArentFox Schiff
