^®: CRE Regulatory Action of the Week

The Center for Progressive Regulation Report On the Data Quality Act
The Center for Progressive Regulation (CPR) has written a detailed report discussing the Data Quality Act. Notwithstanding CPR's criticism of the Act, it is well documented and presents a number of issues for discussion. However, there is one particular inaccuracy in the CPR report that needs to be highlighted.

The report makes the often repeated misleading statement made by many critics of the DQA, namely that the Act was not subject to Congressional hearings. First, no provision of an Omnibus bill is ever subject to Congressional hearings; by definition an Omnibus bill is a compilation of a number of pending bills before the Congress. Consequently, it is correct to state that the DQA, and all other provisions of the bill, were not subject to Congressional hearings because the bill itself was not subject to hearings.

However, the real question is whether the organic legislation crafted into an Omnibus was subject to hearings. In the case of the DQA, the answer is a resounding "yes". CRE has detailed the public, multi-year process, including hearings on the DQA, in considerable detail. For the legislative history, please read DQA Legislative History.

The fact that the CPR report discussed only select elements of the history of the DQA while failing to describe both the lengthy explicit involvement of Congress in the DQA and the refusal of the Executive Branch to adhere to several Congressional directives on Data Quality over a number of years, undermines one of its two conclusions: its call for a repeal of the Act.

CRE does agree, however, with CPR’s other conclusion, NGOs should continue to monitor and comment on DQA petitions they believe to be inconsistent with the Act.