Prepared Statement of Susan E. Dudley:
Thank you, Chairman Lankford, Ranking Member Sinema, and Members of the Subcommittee for inviting me to share my thoughts on early public engagement and retrospective review of regulations. I am Director of the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center, and Distinguished Professor of Practice in the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration. From April 2007 to January 2009, I oversaw federal executive branch regulations as Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). I have studied regulations and their effects for over three decades, from perspectives in government (as both a career civil servant and political appointee), the academy, and private consulting.
I appreciate the Subcommittee’s interest in improving how the U.S. government develops and evaluates regulatory policy. Your efforts continue a long bipartisan tradition in the United States of efforts to make regulation well-informed, transparent, and accountable to the American people. By 1) engaging public input earlier in the regulatory development process and 2) providing for retrospective review of regulations to evaluate whether they are achieving their objectives, the bills you have proposed can help ensure that regulations are based on the best evidence available and that they are working as intended for the American people.
My testimony reviews the problems necessitating the practices required by your legislation and addresses and examines each bill’s requirements and impacts. It concludes with some crosscutting comments and observations.