“To require the Office of Children's Health Protection to be maintained within the Environmental Protection Agency, and for other purposes.”
No CRS summary available for this bill.
This section requires the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to maintain the Office of Children’s Health Protection, headed by a Director appointed by the Administrator (considering recommendations from the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee) who reports to the Administrator and serves as co-chair of the President’s Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to Children (established by Executive Order 13045). (As background, the office advises EPA on environmental health protections for children, including integration into agency policies, programs, and standards.) The Director must (1) identify and assess environmental health and safety risks disproportionately affecting infants, children, and adolescents; (2) ensure federal policies address such risks, including unique environmental justice concerns; (3) coordinate related federal research and grant programs; (4) advise EPA offices and other agencies; (5) perform other duties as directed, including under Executive Order 13045; and (6) conduct national activities to reduce environmental impacts on children through rulemaking, safe chemicals guidance, community programs, health care provider training, contaminant trend evaluation, school environmental health resources, and other protections. The section directs transition of the preexisting office to conform to these requirements and authorizes appropriations of $7,842,000 for FY2026 and each fiscal year thereafter.
This section establishes the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee as a permanent advisory committee subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (chapter 10 of title 5, U.S. Code), exempt from the two-year termination requirement. The committee advises the EPA Administrator on (1) programs and activities of the Office of Children’s Health Protection, (2) regulations, research, and communications related to infants’, children’s, and adolescents’ health, and (3) implementation of Executive Order 13045 (i.e., Protection of Children from Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks). It further directs the President, acting through the EPA Administrator, to transition the existing committee established under Executive Order 13045 to conform to these statutory requirements.
This section provides definitions for purposes of the Act, including (1) the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee as the advisory committee maintained under section 3 of the Act; (2) Executive Order 13045 as Executive Order 13045 (relating to protection of children from environmental health risks and safety risks), published in the Federal Register on April 23, 1997 (62 Fed. Reg. 19885); (3) local educational agency as defined in section 8101 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 7801); and (4) Office as the Office of Children’s Health Protection maintained under section 2 of the Act.