Summary of Communication and Outreach

Work Group Meeting

April 7, 1997

I. PURPOSE

A meeting of the Communication & Outreach Work Group took place on April 7, 1997 in Falls Church, VA, to discuss the status of the brochure, distribution lists, contacts for the issue paper summaries, the template for issue paper summaries, and development of the Plain English Guide to Implementation. Following is a summary of the discussion and proposed action items.

II. PARTICIPANTS

Work Group members in attendance:

Tom Curran, Co-chair, OAQPS/ITG

Ron White, Co-chair, ALA

Jan Kleeman, OAQPS/ITG

Bill Baker, EPA Region II

Alice Collingwood, PSAPCA

Kathy Ellis, DoD

Nancy Kruger, STAPPA/ALAPCO

Jayne Mardock, Clean Air Network

Richard Paul, AAMA

Caryl Pfeiffer, Kentucky Utilities Co.

Scott Thomas, Oklahoma DEQ

Work Group members not in Attendance:

Tad Aburn, MDE

Susan Bullard, EPA/OMS

Bruce Carhart, OTC

Margaret Cook, Intertribal Council of Arizona

Mike Kenyon, EPA Region I

Nancy Seidman, Massachusetts DEP

Quin Shea, NMA

Sandy Stash, ARCO

Others:

Deborah Amaral, EC/R Incorporated (EPA Contractor support)

III.	MEETING SUMMARY

Action items

1)	The liaison for an issue paper summary will take a draft of the issue paper summary, developed by the contractor, and review it to make sure it is written in Plain English.

2)	The issue paper summaries need a heading on top that says "Issue Paper Summaries," on both the cover and the summaries. They need to identify that they are part of a packet of summaries.

3)	Add information on how to obtain the full issue paper, and recognize that not everyone has Internet access. When steps are listed in the issue paper summaries, add the dates.

4)	If an issue paper has consensus, it should be highlighted in the summary. Use the cover sheet to describe the FACA process and explain that the issue papers are only recommendations to the EPA.

5)	The sentence from the Frequently Asked Questions Web pages that describes the FACA participants as "interested persons, representing . . ." should be used instead of either the term "experts" or "stakeholders."

6)	The time frame for turnaround for the comments on the issue paper summaries will be ten working days. Work group members may speak directly with the authors of the issue papers. The summaries and the comments need to go through the EPA. The schedule for the issue papers and the names of the authors are available on the Bulletin Board System.

7)	The group agreed to revise the fact sheet "How the New Proposed Standards Will Affect My City or County" to become a Plain English Guide to Implementation. It will be made more generic and state the standards are proposed. The revised version can be used until the standards are promulgated in July, and then it will need to be revised, again.

Other items to note:

1)	Schedule for upcoming meetings:

5/7/97	12:30 - 2:00 p.m. EDT	Call-in: (919)-541-4424

6/9/97	1:00 - 4:00 p.m. EDT	Face-to-face meeting in RTP

6/10&11/97	Subcommittee meeting in RTP

8/12-14/97	Subcommittee meeting in Portland, OR

IV.	SUMMARY OF DISCUSSION

Status of Brochure

The brochure will go to the printer the week of April 7, 1997. It was delayed because an error was found in the PM study, and the number of premature deaths predicted needed to be changed. The turnaround to get copies will be four to six weeks.

Distribution Lists

Distribution Plan for the Brochure

The original distribution plan indicated 200 copies of the brochure will be distributed to members of the Communication and Outreach Work Group. Not every member wanted to receive that many copies. EPA plans to print 10,000 copies.

The review of the brochure went very quickly. Everybody liked it, which is unusual given the diversity of participants in the FACA process.

Distribution Plan for the Phase 1 Report

Members discussed whether a media distribution plan is needed for the Phase I report from the Subcommittee. The report is necessary to document what has been done by the Subcommittee, but it is not news, as Phase I is behind us. The trade press will want copies, which may be anticipated by the EPA press office. As a report from the FACA to the CAAAC, is it appropriate for the EPA to do the press release?

Officially, the report goes to Carol Browner, but the unofficial route has already taken place. Lydia Wegman is preparing a "white paper" which she will discuss with the Subcommittee on 4/9/97. The paper is EPA's attempt to take what it has heard and put it in some context. People will be more interested in the "white paper" than the Phase I report.

Contacts for Issue Paper Summaries

The group discussed the role of the contact, or liaison, for an issue paper summary. The primary role is to review the draft of the issue paper summary, developed by the contractor, to make sure it is written in Plain English. The liaison may need to coordinate with the issue paper author from the workgroup to make sure the summary is technically correct.

Members discussed the process of coordinating with the issue paper author. The contractor should send the summary to the issue paper author for substantive review, but if the liaison has questions, he or she may go back to the author, as well.

Members were concerned about the number of iterations that would be required for review of the summaries, and questioned who will be responsible for signing-off on the changes. The responsibility for saying the product is an accurate representation of the issue paper should be with either the issue paper author, or the work group co-chairs, or the Subcommittee. The author is the most convenient choice.

The plain English summaries will not be limited to issue papers for which there is consensus by the Subcommittee. However, summaries will not be needed for the papers that are not going to receive full discussion by the Subcommittee, such as Population Weighted Averaging and Too Close to Call.

Members volunteered and assigned themselves to the issue papers, as follows:

Communication and Outreach Work Group Issue Paper Liaisons Issue Paper Contact/Liaison AOI's, Control Regions Scott Thomas Area and Mobile Source Incentives Richard Paul Areas at Risk Kathy Ellis Area of Violation Boundaries Kathy Ellis Attainment Dates Ron White Classifications Bill Baker Control Strategies Bill Baker Control Technology - Point and Area Sources Alice Collingwood General Economic Incentives Caryl Pfeiffer General Mobile Source issues - Fuels, I/M, Vehicle and Engine Standards Richard Paul Institutional Mechanisms Bruce Carhart Integrated Implementation Nancy Seidman Maintenance Planning/Contingency Measures Nancy Seidman Modeling Requirements, Emission Inventory, and Statements Tom Curran Monitoring SIPs Alice Collingwood NSR/Permitting Caryl Pfeiffer Pre-SIP RFP Jayne Mardock PM Designations Jan Kleeman RAMPs/AOIs Scott Thomas Reasonable Further Progress Ron White Rewards and Sanctions Quin Shea Trading Jayne Mardock Transportation Conformity Nancy Kruger Regional Haze Tom Curran

The review by the work group liaison should ask: is the summary understandable, and does it communicate to a lay audience? The audience is not the general public, but state and local officials. The summary will be in a two page format. Members debated whether the liaison would need to read the issue paper. Some argued that the liaison should not read it, others wanted the liaison to read the issue paper to make sure the emphasis in the summary is accurate.

Template for Plain English Issue Paper Summaries

The summaries need a big heading on top that says "Issue Paper Summaries," on both the cover and the summaries. They need to identify that they are part of a packet of summaries.

Give a "snailmail" address for the FACA, the AirLinks address, and the FACA homepage address. Recognize that not everyone has access to the Internet, or sufficient computing capability to use the Web pages. There are still 7,000 registered users of the TTN Bulletin Board.

Add information on how to obtain the full issue paper. Members described finding different information posted in two places, when the information should have been the same. This problem may have occurred as a result of the different time schedules for updating the TTN and the information posted on the Internet.

When steps are listed in the issue paper summaries, add the dates. Saying the "National Advisory Panel" saves a lot of space. The explanation of the FACA Subcommittee and work groups is on the cover, so it does not have to be repeated. The summary could get separated from the cover sheet. One member said summaries should be able to stand alone.

What should be in the first box? Given that not a lot of papers have a consensus, if one does, it should be highlighted. An asterisk could be used. The box is a summary of the summary. Members debated whether the motivation for the issue needs to be in the first box. Simple declarative sentences should be used. The block should answer "what is the issue and how was it resolved?"

Put on the cover sheet that this is a recommendation to the EPA, and not the law of the land. Also, describe the process on the cover sheet.

Members discussed the use of the terms "experts, "stakeholders," and "interest groups." It was agreed the sentence from the Frequently Asked Questions Web pages that describes the participants as "interested persons, representing . . ." should be used.

The Classifications issue paper summary has two subtitles, and several words and phrases that are not plain English, such as "hierarchy," "facilitates," and "a method of bump-up." It was stressed the samples were done to develop the structure, and not a lot of time was spent on the plain English. Members were impressed with the use of two pages.

The time frame for turnaround for the comments on the summaries will be ten working days. Work group members may speak directly with the authors of the issue papers. The summaries and the comments need to go through the EPA. The schedule for the issue papers and the names of the authors are available on the Bulletin Board System.

Plain English Guide to Implementation

The group reviewed the comments from the work group members on the document "How the New Proposed Standards Will Affect My City or County." EPA asked whether any of the comments were completely contradictory, and said the issue is the extent to which the agency wants to get into details of specific strategies.

Members advised against naming cities and OTAG. Some members suggested tabling the product until the standards are promulgated. The group agreed to revise the product to make it more generic and to say the standards are proposed. The revised version can be used until the standards are promulgated in July, and then it will need to be revised, again.