On June 19, 2018, 16 federal agencies, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), issued a final rule delaying until January 21, 2019, the general compliance date for 2017 revisions to the policy governing studies with human subjects that are sponsored or utilized for regulatory purposes by the federal government (83 Fed. Reg. 28497). These revisions to the human testing policy were adopted on January 19, 2017, in a final rule (82 Fed. Reg. 7149) that...
Archives
June 15, 2018
EPA to Publish NOA for WPS Training Materials; Employers Required to Provide Expanded Training within 180 Days
On June 14, 2018, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it will soon publish in the Federal Register a Notice of Availability (NOA) stating that worker safety training materials, including the expanded subject matter required by the 2015 Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) Worker Protection Standard (WPS) for agricultural workers and pesticide handlers, are available for use. The prepublication version of the NOA is available...
On May 30, 2018, two complaints were filed against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Both of these suits concern a decision by EPA to defer publication of a notice of availability (NOA) of training materials prepared pursuant to the Agricultural Worker Protection Standard (WPS), 40 C.F.R. Part 170. The WPS was originally promulgated in 1974, substantially amended in 1992, and then...
February 23, 2018
California District Court Vacates EPA Final Rule to Delay Compliance with Formaldehyde Emission Standards
On February 16, 2018, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California issued an order granting plaintiffs’, the Sierra Club and A Community Voice-Louisiana, motion for summary judgment. The court determined that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) final rule delaying the compliance date for the formaldehyde emission standards for composite wood products (Delay Rule) exceeded EPA’s authority under the Formaldehyde Standards in Composite Wood Products Act...
In a May 11, 2017, letter from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Acting Assistant Administrator Wendy Cleland-Hamnett to the CEO of the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture (NASDA) posted by Bloomberg’s BNA Daily Environment Report, Cleland-Hamnett states that it is appropriate to grant NASDA’s request to delay implementation of all revised provisions to the agricultural Worker Protection Standard (WPS) “until the necessary guidance and training have been...