Good last morning

[Larry Teller <teller.lawrence@epa.gov>]

It's EPA's mid-Atlantic region's pleasure to welcome all dialoguers on this final day. The number and weight of the comments since last Tuesday have far exceeded our expectations, which weren't high because of the mid-summer lull. Six of us in Philadelphia are your hosts today, and we're as anxious as you to learn more about how EPA can effectively evaluate our involving the public--both for agencywide rulemaking and for the site-specific permit, enforcement and cleanup decisions typically done in the regional offices. Two of us work in outreach and environmental education, two in media relations, one in Superfund community involvement, and one in web content, outreach and customer service.

After reading the early comments from our panelists today, I hope to raise some questions about how EPA might best use satisfaction feedback techniques to evaluate some of the agency's public involvement, and about the role of NEPA (federal and public review of federal projects and decisions under the National Environmental Policy Act)in involving the public.