The House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources held an oversight hearing yesterday on the status of the Obama Administration’s rewrite of a coal mining regulations, the Stream Buffer Zone Rule, and heard testimony from Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) Director Joseph Pizarchik.

At the hearing, Members of the Subcommittee questioned Director Pizarchik on the Administration’s reckless and unnecessary rewrite that has gone on for almost five years and cost the American taxpayers nearly $9 million while producing no results. At the hearing, Director Pizarchik was not able to answer basic questions on how many more taxpayer dollars would be spent on this rewrite, how many jobs would be lost as a result of their proposed rule, or how economic impacts would be calculated.

The Obama Administration’s lack of answers to the Committee are just the latest in the Administration’s secretive process to rewrite the 2008 Stream Buffer Zone Rule that had undergone five years of environmental analysis and public review before being thrown out just days after President Obama took office. This Administration has spent millions of dollars to rewrite this rule, including hiring new contractors, only to dismiss those same contractors once it was publicly revealed that the Administration’s new proposed regulation could cost 7,000 jobs and cause economic harm in 22 states. The Administration has missed court ordered deadlines to produce a final rule and now has said it won’t be released until 2014.

Visit /oversight/coalregs to learn more about the Committee’s ongoing investigation into this rewrite.

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