By Alex Knott
Data analysis by Helena Bengtsson
During that time, EPA officials took more than 10,000 privately sponsored trips totaling more than 40,000 days — a total of 110 years — away from their offices.
Although the EPA's authority is limited to the U.S., more than $6.6 million was spent on agency officials' trips to other countries. Agency employees took more than $1 million in trips to France, Germany and Italy during the study period.
East Asia was also a common place to travel; more than $1.4 million was spent on trips by EPA officials to China, Japan, Taiwan and Thailand, disclosure records showed. There were three trips to Havana, Cuba, as well.
"While EPA is a domestic agency, it has international responsibilities," said Jennifer Wood, EPA Press Secretary in a statement to the Center. "We face trans-boundary pollution issues with our neighbors to the north and south, and have a vital presence in global environmental issues."
While some of those trips were legitimate fact-finding missions paid for by companies, local governments, nonprofit organizations, universities and international environmental groups, many were funded by those with a financial stake in EPA decision-making, including groups and companies that receive EPA contracts and grants, groups lobbying the federal government and companies with ties to federally recognized toxic waste sites, according to disclosure documents.
The practice of private firms and institutions paying for trips taken by government officials has come under recent scrutiny. Following a similar Center study of privately sponsored travel for members of Congress and their aides called "Power Trips," lawmakers this year significantly restricted their ability to take privately funded trips.
The data used for this story and for the accompanying searchable database come from travel records maintained by EPA that the agency has disclosed to an executive branch ethics office.
Many of the domestic trips were to vacation destinations. Agency employees took more than 700 trips to Florida and Hawaii for various reasons, spending more than $625,000.
EPA officials accepted more than $90,000 in trips to gambling capitals, like Atlantic City, Las Vegas and Reno. The travel allowed them to take part in industry-sponsored workshops, seminars and conventions while staying at hotels such as the Atlantis Casino Resort Spa, Aladdin Hotel and the MGM Grand.
The Center found that more than 20 percent of the total number of all EPA trips were paid for by groups that lobby the federal government. Government watchdog groups say that some of this $1.8 million in travel for agency officials could be seen as an extension of lobbying.
"It sounds like corporations are really trying to buy the favor of EPA administrators rather than fund travel necessary for the agency to fulfill its mission," said Melanie Sloan, executive director for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).
The Center also examined the EPA's top contractors that received more than $25 million in 1998 to 2005. Twelve of those paid more than $25,000 for trips taken by EPA officials. Those companies received more than $2.7 billion from the EPA in contracts in fiscal years 1998 to 2005. Hundreds of nonprofits, universities and other organizations that received EPA grants also paid for travel taken by agency officials.
Trip sponsors linked to Superfund sites
The Center found that some EPA trips were underwritten by companies that the agency has identified as "potentially responsible parties" for pollution at the country's worst toxic waste sites. The Center obtained the EPA's list of 100 companies linked to the largest number of those Superfund sites and analyzed their spending on EPA travel. (See related story.)
At least 14 of the companies found on the list spent a total of more than $40,000 for agency officials' trips in the study period. The companies have been linked to at least 353 Superfund sites.
In one case, the baby food company Gerber, a subsidiary of Novartis, paid for almost $12,000 in travel for EPA officials. Novartis has been connected to 55 Superfund sites. About 30 trips were paid for by the pharmaceutical company's subsidiary.
Gerber often flew EPA officials to its crop locations in Colorado as part of the agency's Pesticide Environmental Stewardship Program, according to records of the trips.
Energy conglomerate BP p.l.c., another company on the EPA's list of possible polluters, spent more than $4,000 to send agency employees on trips during the 8 ½-year period.
BP, which acquired Amoco in 1998 and was formerly known as British Petroleum, paid the expenses of eight EPA employees to attend seminars and training in Alaska, according to EPA disclosure documents.
Industry-funded travel
EPA officials accepted more than $90,000 in trips to Atlantic City, Las Vegas and Reno, where they stayed at hotels such as the Atlantis Casino Resort Spa, Aladdin Hotel and the MGM Grand (above). |
The American Chemical Society spent almost $50,000 on at least 50 trips taken by EPA officials. The professional organization, which calls itself "the largest scientific society in the world," has 160,000 members, including some employees of companies that the EPA has connected to Superfund sites. ACS's current president works for Rohm & Haas Co., which the EPA links to 39 sites, and a recent president worked for Occidental Chemical Corp. (40 sites).
ACS spent more than $2 million lobbying the government in 1998 to 2006 on a wide range of issues, and stated that it had lobbied the EPA on more than half of its disclosure records during that time.
Much of the lobbying was aimed at securing funding during a time when the EPA awarded more than $1.5 million in grants to ACS. Letters between the group and the EPA show that the group also pushed for less regulation of the industry, including conditional exemptions from (the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act) hazardous waste requirements for commercial generators. The group also lobbied for changes to EPA regulations to establish a "more flexible approach to managing wastes in laboratories."
ACS officials told the Center that the society is a scientific organization and that the trips it funded were to help EPA scientists take part in national meetings.
The American Petroleum Institute is another industry group underwriting EPA trips. API represents dozens of oil and gas companies including some that are on the EPA's list of companies linked to toxic waste sites.
While API was spending millions to lobby the federal government on behalf of some of these companies, it also spent more than $14,500 on travel throughout the country by EPA officials.
Dennis Beauregard, an EPA environmental engineer, went on at least 10 of the API-sponsored trips totaling more than $7,500 to destinations like Long Beach, Calif., Buena Vista, Fla., and Denver to attend API conferences, meetings and seminars.
Less than a month after one such trip to San Diego in April 1998, API and Beauregard separately announced an agreement between API and the EPA to allow API to use its own methods to measure and verify the amounts of petroleum evaporating into the air from above-ground storage tanks.
That certification technique could be used for everything from EPA permit applications to "regulatory compliance under the 1990 Clean Air Act." While API publicized the program through a press release, Beauregard personally wrote about the collaboration in an EPA newsletter.
Beauregard did not respond to numerous phone calls and e-mails from the Center requesting comment, but EPA spokesman John Millett said, "The travel was cleared by EPA ethics officials and met federal requirements." Millett would not elaborate on any of the trips or any potential conflicts of interest.
But to ethics and environmental watchdogs like Tyson Slocum, director for Public Citizen's Energy Program, a nonprofit public interest group, the API trips look "problematic."
"It creates the appearance that API influenced the regulatory process by sponsoring these trips for regulators," Slocum said. "API is the lobbying association for the petroleum industry. They are a membership-based organization, and these people pay dues to them to advocate on their behalf."
API officials told the Center that their organization paid for Beauregard's trips so he could participate on an API committee that addressed limits on how much petroleum evaporates into the air from above-ground storage tanks. The meetings were open to the public, according to API spokeswoman Jane Van Ryan.
EPA official defends three-week trip
One such international trip sent EPA team leader Charles Stafford on a three-week excursion to Australia, Hong Kong, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam. Agilent Technologies, which has received nearly $1.3 million in contracts from the EPA from 1998 to 2005, paid for the $13,750 trip, according to the travel database.
Agilent Technologies manufactures analytical instruments that are used in EPA pesticide labs. In trip approval forms submitted to EPA officials, Stafford said he had the ability to affect Agilent sales to the EPA if he decided to "recommend … the purchase of analytical equipment and supplies for use in our lab."
Stafford told the Center that he did not believe the trip was a conflict of interest. "I see it as the opposite." He said that an EPA official "did determine that it was in EPA's best interest for me to go and give kind of the straight scoop about the requirements for EPA methods. It was to teach scientists in each specific area how this new technology can assist them in pesticide analysis."
Marcia E. Mulkey, an EPA official who recommended approval of the trip, noted the possible conflict of interest in the approval request documents, stating, "There is a potential appearance of impropriety because Mr. Stafford works in a branch that uses the type of equipment that Agilent sells."
Mulkey, the director of the Office of Pesticide Programs, also stated in EPA documents regarding the trip, "Further, Mr. Stafford's participation as an EPA official could be viewed as indirectly helping Agilent Technologies market its equipment in the Far East."
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