The Center for Effective Government (formerly OMB Watch) ceased operations as of March 2016. The majority of work and materials has been passed on to the Project On Government Oversight (POGO). This site is being maintained as an archive of materials produced.
UPDATE (5/15/2015): Amtrak announced yesterday that it would have Positive Train Control up and operating on its heavily traveled Northeast Corridor routes before the end of the year. Amtrak officials also told members of Congress that Positive Train Control has been installed in the area of Tuesday's crash, but it was still undergoing testing and had not yet been activated.
"My asthma is highly reactive to ozone. On days like this I can hardly walk across the room. My quality of life is trashed by ozone." This is just one of hundreds of personal stories about the devastating health impacts of air pollution that are posted on the American Lung Association’s State of the Airwebsite.
Corporations that have reclassified themselves as “foreign-owned” received approximately $1 billion in federal contracts over the last five years. These companies profit from American tax dollars despite avoiding U.S. taxes themselves.
UPDATE (Oct. 8, 2015): This week, one of the alleged victims of DuPont’s toxic cover-up won a settlement against the company. Jurors found that Carla Marie Bartlett contracted kidney cancer as a result of being exposed to C8 and awarded her $1.6 million. Kidney cancer is one of at least six diseases linked to toxic C8 exposure. The Ohio woman previously resided next to the same river that was contaminated by DuPont’s West Virginia Manufacturing plant.
“Eco-friendly.” “Healthy.” “Responsible.” These are just a few of the labels used on household cleaning products to make them appear safe for consumers. But no one oversees how these terms are used or what they really mean. This becomes readily apparent when you scrutinize the ingredients on cleaning product labels to try to determine how safe and "green" they really are. One company – Procter & Gamble – is so bad at disclosing useful chemical information to consumers that it recently received an "F" from a national environmental health group.
The government of El Salvador was so concerned that its water was so fouled by mining companies that it passed a moratorium on new mines in 2008. Oceana Gold, an Australian corporation, didn’t like the law, so it sued El Salvador for $301 million, the amount the company said the policy cost it in lost profits.
On April 28, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works reviewed proposed legislation from Sens. David Vitter (R-LA) and Tom Udall (D-NM) to revise the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), our nation's primary chemical safety law. Despite numerous attempts to constructively amend the flawed bill, the committee failed to fix the legislation and sent it on to the Senate floor.
The House of Representatives gave 25 of the nation’s billionaires a $334 billion tax break on April 16 when it voted 240-179 to repeal the estate tax. The nearly 100-year old tax raises $27 billion a year for the U.S. government. Of the 2,662,000 Americans who died in 2013, just 3,700 of their estates paid any estate tax – one out of every 700 estates.
Last week, thousands of New York City residents completed an eight month-long participatory budget process in which they voted on how to allocate $25 million of their taxes in their communities. The city first experimented with participatory budgeting in 2011 when four City Council members allowed their constituents to decide how to use $1 million in discretionary funds provided by the city on community projects in their wards. This time around, 24 of New York City’s 51 Council members joined in the effort.
Every day, we are exposed to chemicals in our shampoo, body wash, hand sanitizer, toothpaste, lotion, and much more. We expect our government to ensure that the chemicals in products have been tested and are safe for us and our families.
