Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Fall 2024 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action, especially since there will be a change in Administration in January. There are 68 rulemakings listed for DHS with 33 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for the Department.
DHS Active Rulemakings
The DHS portion of the Fall 2024 Unified Agenda lists 68 rulemakings, five of which will be covered here in this blog if/when any actions are taken on them. The table below shows those five rulemakings.
The Coast Guard rulemaking on “Claims Procedures Under the Oil Pollution Act of 1990” (1625-AA03) was added to the Unified Agenda. According to the entry for this rulemaking:
“The purpose of this project is to finalize the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA90) claims procedures at 33 CFR part 136. The OPA90 claims procedures, implementing OPA90 section 1013 (Claims Procedures) and section 1014 (Designation of Source and Advertisement), were established by an interim rule, titled "Claims under the Oil Pollution Act of 1990" (Interim Rule) that has not been substantively amended since it was published in 1992. This rulemaking supports the Coast Guard's strategic goal of protection of natural resources.”
One Coast Guard rulemaking on “TWIC--Reader Requirements; Second Delay of Effective Date” was removed from the Unified Agenda. The final rule was published on October 31st, 2024.
DHS Long-Term Actions
There is a separate section of the Unified Agenda for rulemaking actions that are on the minds of agencies, but for which there is no current intention by those agencies to take action, the Long-Term Actions list. Rulemakings move back and forth between the Long-Term Actions list and the main Unified Agenda listing, sometimes without rhyme or reason. There are currently three that would be covered here if the agencies were to act on those rulemakings.
There have been no changes to the rulemakings of interest list from the Spring 2024 Unified Agenda listing.
Inactive Rulemakings
In my post about the Spring 2024 Unified Agenda I mentioned that the “Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS)” (1670-AA01) had been moved to the ‘Inactive List’. The 64 items on the DHS portion of the Fall 2024 Inactive List contain those previously listed rulemakings that are no longer being considered by DHS. The CFATS rulemaking (which is still listed as ‘Pending Review’ on the OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs’ Regulatory Review list) remains on the Inactive List along with three other rulemakings that have been discussed here at one time or another:
Commentary
The Unified Agenda is an ongoing exercise in trying to keep track of the regulatory efforts of the Federal Government. Given the fact that the Executive Branch does not have enough people to complete all of the detailed work on developing and amending the regulations directed by the President, Congress and the Courts, it is not surprising that the ‘expected’ dates for the next stage of the rulemaking process are largely aspirational, and not actual predictions that can be tracked for their forecasting accuracy. With changes in administrations, especially the type change we are seeing this year, those expectations cannot even be called aspirational. Still, it is the tool that we have.