I've been looking at the quick response forms, and the summaries, and I've decided that they just don't cover the overarching issues brought up by this discussion. So I'm going to write my own summary of what I think the important issues were. And add my own appeal to the group.
Most of the respondents in this discussion seem to understand, tacitly or otherwise, that libraries in general aren't rolling in unused funds. So many of the suggestions involve technical and distribution standards -- suggestions for what format or style an electronic document or Web page should be in, for instance, or whether documents need to be on paper, or how sites should link with each other -- that aren't that expensive.
But, since state government and especially EPA are perceived to have money for projects, many of the messages concern appeals for support. The types of support asked for are generally in the following categories:
1. requests to spend money on general capacity-building.
2. requests for states/EPA to make information more understandable.
3. requests for the release of raw data.
So far, I've just summarized the themes that people have talked about. Now, using this summary, I'm going to explain the major idea that I would most like people to carry away from this discussion.
There is currently an attempt to pit category 2 above against category 3. In fact, an industry lobbying group called the Coalition for Effective Environmental Information, headed by former EPA employee Mark Greenwood, has been formed for this very purpose.
The Right To Know movement has had the successes it has had so far because programs like TRI release raw data that can be used for real research, whether by an academic or a housewife. Now we're being told that people can't understand these data, or that they lower trust in EPA, or that they are being "misused".
I hope that the librarians here, at least, can see through this. Your basic mission is to archive and distribute information, not to interpret information.
Tell EPA that you'd like them to focus on distributing information through your libraries, not on writing summaries and how-to guides. And while you're at it, ask why EPA can't release those pesticide health effects reports, or real-time air data, or any of the other things that people have asked for here that currently exist within EPA but aren't making it out to the people your libraries serve.
Date
|