Law Department notice on WTC document preservation, Oct 2001

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

Roles and Responsibilities Within EPA Need to Be Delineated

EPA needs to delineate roles and responsibilities for its various programs offices when responding to emergencies, including how these roles and responsibilities fit within the incident command structure. Despite the commendable actions of many EPA personnel, the Agency should outline roles and responsibilities for its program offices beforehand to provide a more efficient and coordinated response to future disasters.

For example, within 3 days of the disaster, EPA officials within the Office of Radiation and Indoor Air and the Office of Air Quality and Planning Standards had developed a web site with such captions as “Protecting Yourself from Asbestos Exposure,” “Health Effects of Dust and Smoke,” and “Strategies for Clean Up Inside Residences and Businesses.” However, this web site was not activated and made available to the general public. One EPA official told us there was an overwhelming amount of activity going on and that this information probably “got lost in the fray.” EPA Region 2 officials could not recall why the web site was not activated.

Also, although EPA’s National Exposure Research Laboratory team made it to New York on September 16 to help implement an ambient monitoring network, they were unable to gain access to the site and start monitoring until September 21. The Laboratory’s monitoring team’s abilities were especially needed since they had air monitoring equipment that could run on both electrical and battery power, and they had airborne particulate matter monitors.

In its lessons learned report, EPA Region 2 recommended that the Region identify a team of dedicated people who will respond in the event of a new crisis. In our opinion, other EPA regions should follow Region 2’s lead and identify specific areas of expertise that may be needed in the event of an emergency, and assemble teams of experts that can be mobilized to quickly provide this support. These areas may include specialized sampling techniques, exposure modeling and assessment, and risk assessment. Also, EPA Headquarters should develop national teams to support or augment Regional response when needed, including guidelines for determining when a response should be elevated to a national level.

Roles and Responsibilities With Outside Agencies Need to Be Delineated

A response to an event the size of the WTC incident requires the efforts and coordination of numerous government organizations, including Federal, State, and local governments. Our discussions with EPA and non-EPA officials, as well as WTC “lessons learned” reports from other organizations, indicated that there were overlapping and sometimes confusing roles and responsibilities for the various responding organizations. For example, early in the response, various agencies were conducting numerous sampling efforts. Particularly for asbestos, different

59 Report No. 2003-P-00012

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