Mr. Alexander Cristofaro (MC-1804A)
Small Business Advocacy Chair
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
1200 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.
Washington, DC 20460

Subject: Effluent Elimination Guidelines and Standards for the Construction and Development Point Source Category; Small Entity Representative Recommendations

Dear Mr. Cristofaro:

I received your letter on August 8, 2008 regarding Effluent Elimination Guidelines and Standards for the Construction and Development Point Source Category, notifying us of the possibility of convening a Small Business Advocacy Review Panel under §609(b) of the Regulatory Flexibility Act, as amended by the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996.

After discussions with EPA about the list of small business representatives, we agree with the list that EPA has provided as an attachment to the formal notice letter, provided that EPA include all the representatives that are listed under the title “Trade Association Representatives/Consultants for Pre-Panel Activities.” As you may know, some of these same representatives and consultants provided excellent advice as small entity representatives during the 2001 panel process for the same rulemaking. With these additional representatives, the Panel would have a total of seventeen small entity representatives, which would provide adequate representation from all the affected industrial sectors. We are still seeking a representative from the local government sector, but do not have an individual at this time.

Since EPA provided an additional list of eleven names from the Associated General Contractors (AGC), we now have a surplus of small contractor firm representatives. We would recommend that EPA select among the eleven AGC and five National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) contractor firms now available to total approximately ten to twelve small entity representatives in order to preserve an appropriate size of the total advisory panel (about twenty). These two associations have many more member companies than the other industry sectors (which have either one or two), and we would like to maintain a balance.

Next Steps

We look forward to the completion of the outreach period on September 3. We hope to work with the agency to finalize the information for the formal small entity representatives soon after the convening of the Panel, now scheduled for early September.

Sincerely,

Thomas M. Sullivan
Chief Counsel for Advocacy