Trump administration tells EPA to freeze all grants, contracts

/trump-administration-tells-epa-to-freez

  • Trump administration tells EPA to freeze all grants, contracts
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/01/23/trump-administration-tells-epa-to-freeze-all-grants-contracts

    The #Trump administration has instructed officials at the Environmental Protection Agency to freeze its grants and contracts, a move that could affect everything from state-led climate research to localized efforts to improve air and water quality to environmental justice projects aimed at helping poor communities.

    An email went out to employees in the agency’s Office of Acquisition Management within hours of President Trump’s swearing-in on Friday.

    [...] According to its website, each year the #EPA awards more than $4 billion in funding for grants and other assistance agreements. For now, it appears, that funding is on hold, casting a cloud of uncertainty over one of the agency’s core functions, as well as over the scientists, state and local officials, universities and Native American tribes that often benefit from the grants.

    • Trump Administration Restricts News from Federal Scientists at #USDA, EPA
      https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trump-administration-restricts-news-from-federal-scientists-at-u

      Pres. Donald Trump’s administration moved quickly this week to shore up its control over communications with the public and the press, as officials at the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Agriculture e-mailed staff to inform them that they may no longer discuss agency research or departmental restrictions with anyone outside of the agency—including news media. Both agencies also told their scientists and other staff that press releases and external communications about taxpayer-funded work would stop until further notice. It remains unclear if these will be temporary or long-term policies.

      #recherche #censure #sciences

    • Trump administration tells EPA to cut climate page from website : sources
      http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-epa-climatechange-idUSKBN15906G

      The employees were notified by EPA officials on Tuesday that the administration had instructed EPA’s communications team to remove the website’s climate change page, which contains links to scientific global warming research, as well as detailed data on emissions. The page could go down as early as Wednesday, the sources said.

      “If the website goes dark, years of work we have done on climate change will disappear,” one of the EPA staffers told Reuters, who added some employees were scrambling to save some of the information housed on the website, or convince the Trump administration to preserve parts of it.

      The sources asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the media.