Monday, July 22,
2002
DOT 69-02
Contact: Ben Langer
Telephone: 202-366-5580
U.S. Transportation Secretary Mineta Offers Electronic
Notification About Regulatory Activities
U.S. Transportation Secretary
Norman Y. Mineta today offered electronic notification to people who want an
easier way to follow U.S. transportation regulatory activities.
The new service responds to the Bush Administration’s strategy for
expanding electronic government to make it easy for citizens and businesses to
interact with the government, save taxpayer dollars and streamline
business-to-government transactions.
“This new process underscores
the U.S. Department of Transportation’s leadership in electronic democracy by
providing citizens easier access to our regulatory activities,” Secretary
Mineta said. “This service will
help make departmental activities more transparent to concerned citizens,
industry representatives and interest groups, and it will make it easier for
anyone, regardless of location, to participate in our rulemaking.”
The department’s current docket management system (DMS)
serves as a federal government model. It makes rulemakings, adjudication documents and public
comments on the rulemakings electronically accessible to the public.
The initiative announced today adds to that system by providing an option
to be notified every time a substantive, government document is posted in the
department’s docket. Users will
be able to select specific rulemakings or adjudicatory proceedings by their
regulatory identification number (RIN), docket number or operating
administration. Users also will be
able to select regulatory documents that have a federalism, tribalism or small
business or entity impact.
The President’s Management
Council in October selected the U.S. Department of Transportation to lead the
Online Rulemaking Initiative. The
objective of the initiative is to make it easier for the public to participate
in the rulemaking process, establishing a foundation for electronic democracy as
envisioned by the Bush administration. The
department’s new process takes the burden of looking for new regulatory
activities at the Department off citizens and replaces it with a more
citizen-friendly response to requests to be notified when something new is
available.
People who want to use the new service may sign up for it
by going to http://dms.dot.gov/ and selecting
“List Serve.” The system will
then prompt users to enter their email address.
Once the system verifies a user’s email address, he or she may then
select an “agent” which is an automatic document hunter.
The user tells the “agent” what to look for and, every 24 hours, the
agent will retrieve a list of documents matching the criteria selected by the
user.
Secretary Mineta said that the new service will enable members of the public to inform themselves better regarding DOT rulemakings and adjudicatory proceedings. Small businesses are expected to find it useful to receive notification regarding rulemakings that will impact them. In addition, state, local and tribal governments should benefit from the added feature of receiving notification of any rulemaking that has a federalism or tribalism impact. The enhanced accessibility also is intended to foster greater public participation in and knowledge of the DOT regulatory process.
###