Bromwich wants new culture for oversight of Outer Continental Shelf
Michael Bromwich has wasted no time in setting the tone for the direction he intends to take as the director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, the new agency for regulatory oversight of industrial activities on the U.S. outer continental shelf.
Just two days after being sworn in to his new job, Bromwich appeared in front of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment and Related Agencies on June 23 to announce the immediate formation of an investigation and review unit within his agency.
The new unit will have the capability to investigate any allegations of misconduct by agency staff, and to pursue any allegations that companies have violated the terms of their federal oil and gas leases or engaged in deception to acquire leases.
“I think it’s a very important capability and I feel proud to have created it,” Bromwich said.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has formed the Bureau of Ocean Management as part of the breakup of the U.S. Minerals Management Service into three new agencies, to separate the functions of oil and gas leasing and revenue collection from the function of regulatory oversight and enforcement within the Department of the Interior. There has been suspicion that a potential conflict of interests between the desire for resource development and the need for regulatory oversight within MMS has led to alleged lax oversight of the oil industry, perhaps contributing to the events leading to the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.
Some people have accused MMS staff of being too “cozy” with oil industry officials, thus compromising the agency’s OCS oversight role, and there have been instances of MMS employees receiving excessive gifts and other favors from oil companies. Bromwich wants to see a new culture in the new agency, with a clear agency mission and no tolerance for a cozy relationship with industry.
“If I find out about people who are not doing their job aggressively, there are consequences to that,” Bromwich said. “I have already started to send that message, but it’s not going to happen overnight. … It will take some instances of my making clear that I mean business for the culture to start to change.”
Salazar also told the Senate committee that the new bureau, to fulfill its function, will need a more than 200 new people with inspection and regulatory enforcement roles. Interior will prepare a funding request for the additional staff, he said.
—Alan Bailey
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