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Independent Review Panel DEPARTMENT OF TOXIC SUBSTANCES CONTROL Gideon Kracov, J.D., Chair Mike Vizzier, Vice Chair Edmund G. Brown Jr. Dr. Arezoo Campbell, Member Governor

Results of DTSC Independent Review Panel October 2017 Survey of Selected Individuals on the Performance of DTSC Programs

November 14, 2017

At its September 11, 2017 meeting, the DTSC Independent Review Panel (IRP) decided to survey stakeholders about the performance of DTSC programs since the Panel began its work in November 2015. The IRP wanted this survey to be similar to a survey it sent out to stakeholders in August 2016, with the goal of comparing the results of the two surveys. Panel Member Arezoo Campbell volunteered to work with IRP support staff on the survey instrument at that meeting. Survey Instrument The questionnaire asked the survey respondents to rate the performance of seven DTSC programs and to explain the reason or reasons for their ratings. The seven programs correspond with those the Panel reviewed and submitted recommendations to improve during the past two years. This was identical to the approach of the 2016 survey, with one exception. Whereas the 2016 survey asked respondents to rate the source reduction and consumer products programs in one question, this survey asked respondents to rate these programs in two separate questions. The focused areas were as follows: (1) Permitting; (2) Enforcement; (3) Public Outreach; (4) Fiscal Management; (5) Site Mitigation (Brownfields and Environmental Restoration); (6) Source Reduction; and (7) Consumer Products Programs. The 2016 questionnaire asked the respondents to make recommendations for each DTSC program. This survey did not ask similar questions because the work of the IRP is nearly complete. As with the 2016 survey, the questionnaire asked the survey respondents to tell the IRP what they thought DTSC’s biggest challenge is. However, unlike the 2016 survey, it did not ask respondents to recommend solutions for that challenge. Similar to the 2016 survey, the respondents were asked to provide any other comments, questions, or concerns they had and to identify themselves by interest group or background. Like the 2016 survey, questionnaire gave respondents the opportunity to provide optional name and contact information. The 2017 survey asked one question that was not asked in 2016: Do you feel DTSC has become more transparent and/or engaged with stakeholders since the IRP was established? The survey questions are presented in Appendix 1.

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Survey Group A decision was made to send the survey to essentially the same individuals who were surveyed in 2016. This was done because the IRP’s stated objective was to compare the results of the two surveys. There were 73 individuals on the list of stakeholders that was used for the 2017 survey. Gideon Kracov, the IRP chair, contributed most of the names to the list in 2016. Among them were DTSC past and present employees, owners or employees of regulated facilities, representatives of regulated facilities, residents and representatives of communities impacted by a regulated facility, and non-DTSC public officials. Individuals on the IRP’s EList and those on its list of individuals who gave presentations or contributed comments at Panel meetings were not sent the questionnaire unless they happened to be on the stakeholder list of 73 individuals. Invitation to Participate in Online Survey IRP support staff put the questionnaire on SurveyMonkey, an online service, and sent an email message to the targeted individuals on October 12, 2017, inviting them to participate in the online survey by November 2, 2017. The invitation assured the targeted individuals that their responses would not be personally identifiable to the IRP unless they provided their name and contact information, and that if they chose to provide that optional information, their names would not be associated with any of the individual responses that would be shared with DTSC or the public. IRP support staff emailed a reminder invitation to participate in the survey to the target group on October 26, 2017. Survey Results and Analysis of Results Fourteen of the 73 contacts responded to the survey, a response rate of 19 percent. After presenting the performance rating for each program, this report presents the 2016 rating for comparison purposes. Panel Member Campbell and IRP support staff decided to handle the responses to the open-ended questions differently than was done with the 2016 survey. In the case of the 2016 survey, IRP support staff analyzed the open-ended responses by using a bucketing technique. Categories were created from response trends, and responses were placed in categories with like responses. In cases where an individual comment included multiple ideas, the responses were placed in multiple categories. Because there were so few responses to the open-ended questions, it was decided to list all of the responses as written for this report. The following summary does not draw any conclusions from the survey results. Instead, this report leaves that task to the IRP.

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Permitting

How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Permitting Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Permitting Program?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Permitting Program performance rating.

1. Performance metrics were established and the Division is working towards achieving the goals. However, gaps in the processes, collaboration, communication and transparency still exists.

2. Arbitrary, capricious, too many administrative actions and not enough meaningful compliance. DTSC is a part of the feudal system at Cal EPA where the environment is all about administrative fines and not enough enforcement. Permitting is a process that should be handled in a uniform and consistent manner. In DTSC parlance, enforcement is controlled by permitting and does not have the ability to act in an independent manner. DTSC upper management ensures this dysfunction.

3. Permit renewals do not satisfactorily address environmental monitoring----deliberate. 10-year old permit conditions I put into Quemetco permit are still not addressed---and we are working on permit renewal. I won't list the concerns with post-closure permits.

4. because DTSC embraces dysfunctional, entrenched management persons who manage through fear and intimidation.

5. The new and improved permit review process (4-6 attempts) is still severely not functionally. Not all parts of the permit review process are reviewing or where informed of this new function. I have brought the idea for several years now that CalEPA needs to create a Permit Department to merge and consolidate all CalEPA permits. At this time, nothing will be done until the new administration arrives and all of the same issues will reappear.

6. Slow, arbitrarily stringent or lax, no management skills. 7. Very poor outreach on the U.S. Ecology permit they was issued in Vernon, CA. We did

a survey of neighbors and NGOs within two miles of the facility and none of them knew about the permit issuance.

8. A number of new staff have been hired and they have not been adequately trained. Their training has been left to support staff that get paid far less than they do. Also, the Excel tracking of the permit renewal process is a mess, again, support staff have to continually babysit the new permit project managers in order to make sure they keep on track with the required project deadlines and steps in the process. As far as I know, there is no central electronic tracking system other then relying on an Excel spreadsheet.

9. Lack of transparency. No meaningful role for communities. Captive to the priorities of business interests/polluters.

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Enforcement

How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Enforcement Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Enforcement Program?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Enforcement Program performance rating:

1. The Division staff appears to lack desire in positive collaboration, process-focus or lean mindset. New staff or staff in the regional offices appear to be not well informed.

2. You need accountability, responsibility, and transparency. The organization simply does not understand these concepts. It plays hide the ball with communities and does not engage in a health risk assessment process designed to find the real trouble spots of pollution within California communities. It's all lip service and nothing more. We need a strong centralized Cal EPA with the authority to make each of the agencies under it engage in a meaningful and transparent reporting process.

3. DTSC Enforcement needs to mimic the tenacity of SCAQMD inspectors----more time on-site and better understanding of the regulated processes.

4. Compare from 2015 to present: 1- Amount of funding for each program (did it go up or down, %); amount of personnel (increase or decrease) 2- Amount of settlement money for each program 3- EJ stakeholder satisfaction in 2015 and present.

5. Even when companies tell them which competitors are breaking the law, they do nothing.

6. They have been very difficult to get to respond to residents’ complaints at affected facilities.

7. The enforcement program spends more time investigating staff for the Office of Civil Rights than actually going out and doing their jobs.

8. Lack of leadership. Lack of clear priorities. Lack of essential enforcement tools to take administrative actions with penalties. Inefficient processes and lack of management will to change. Captive to corporate interests. Lack of transparency.

*One response is not included here to protect an individual’s privacy.

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Public Outreach How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Public Outreach Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Public Outreach Program?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Public Outreach Program performance rating.

1. Any step when climbing from the bottom is an improvement. DTSC has a long steep climb to win back the public's trust.

2. Improved but still basically dishonest. Driven by Sacramento political needs and appearances. One of the newer elements is actually causing major project to slow up----Tribal Outreach. The inclusion of investigations in the portfolio of the outreach folk is ridiculous and hamstrings staff. Soils gas investigations produce 2' or less diameter holes; soil matrix sampling 4' diameter holes and wells less than 12-inch diameter holes. This is not excavation.

3. very dysfunctional manager, manager's manager and others. 4. 1)They don't have a policy on when to issue press releases or they don't share. 2)

Since 2015 or after the new Public Outreach how many bad press compared to good press. 3) How many highlighted stories were generated by this program (who has more staff then enforcement programs). 4) How many times did they refuse or could not generate a press release from programs. A survey should be sent to all programs about their performance. There communications and they refuse to have their pictures on staff directories.

5. What outreach program? 6. They have hired many new people who look much more like the people in affected

communities. However, many still report that outreach efforts at high profile sites like Exide and inadequate. For instance, in a door -to-door survey in the communities affected by Exide many people did not know about the free lead testing being offered to children by the state.

7. The public outreach program has no independent budget and resources, and technical branch chiefs and project staff continue to manipulate the level of public outreach for any given project. Also, some of the public outreach program management are ineffective and lack leadership qualities, which continues to degrade the moral of staff, and performance appraisal are still being used as a form of punishment for speaking out. Truly a pathetic situation that has gone on for many years, and the reason why public outreach staff keep leaving on a yearly basis.

8. Lack of meaningful participation by communities. Poor coordination with program and EJ office. Lack of leadership and lack of commitment by leaders.

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Fiscal Management How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Fiscal Management since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Fiscal Management Program?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Fiscal Management performance rating.

1. Fiscal system appears to have created delay in getting approval in the purchase requisition, budget and contracting process due to absence of clear process.

2. The backlog of projects that were kicked under the rug for years in Sacramento has been reduced---very good. A few are still issues. My concern comes from failure to address corrective action financial assurance in active permits, failure to address old LUCs without cost recovery provisions, failure to address the crooked practice of rolling over closure FR to unfunded corrective action, etc.

3. DTSC squandered more than 200 million dollars and the same persons who did the squandering are still in authoritative positions...want more, look deeper.

4. It was generated out of DTSC Administration, there is no creativity, accountability, or credibility within this office. The poor policies, poor hires and lack of service orientation within this Office might be causing 50-75% of DTSC issues. How many personnel suits, CalHR audit have been generated during this administration compared to other years. Quick fix has then send a satisfaction survey each time there is contact made with this unit.

5. Repeated requests by Legislators for an agency wide audit have been ignored. 6. No transparency regarding budget. FISCAL is a mess. Trying to purchase anything from

an outside vender can take half a year or more. 7. Lack of fundamental skillset with regard to medium to long range financial

management. Lack of accountability for financials, lack of management decision-making system and effective financial performance measurement system. Failure to address long-standing fiscal problems, or to identify and address root causes to develop strategic solutions. Lack of Executive management expertise in finance/budgets/performance management.

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Site Mitigation (Brownfields and Environmental Restoration)

How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Site Mitigation Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Site Mitigation Program?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Site Mitigation (Brownfields and Environmental Restoration) Program performance rating:

1. Still no exit strategy for sites. Internal communication remains poor, resources still misaligned and strategic planning has not been shared with staff.

2. DTSC has no understanding of how to present a public process related to Site Mitigation. A look at the Del Amo situation validates this. Still unaddressed clean up issues and other environmental concerns.

3. Read my letters on lead "cleanups" and ghost smelters, failure to address cesium 137 releases at Alco-Pacific, failure to set adequate lead cleanups for government-promoted inner city "urban agriculture" as opposed to "suburban residential", failure to protect ground water with soil cleanup goals, failure to go back over older cleanups that no longer are reasonable, failure to adequately address emission/deposition issues as outgrowth of site-conceptual models, absolute terror of addressing historical dioxin emission and dispersion, failure to look off-site from old half-assed cleanups, failure to reevaluate old cleanup numbers etc., etc.

4. Cypress is very good. Berkeley is ok. Chatsworth is lousy. Headquarters is subject to political influence and is worthless.

5. At the Santa Susan Field Lab an EIR just released is completely inadequate. The cleanup of Exide is still being investigated by the Attorney General, and the communities surrounding Exide are so dis-satisfied they are asking the Legislature to form a local cleanup agency and transfer the cleanup out of DTSC authority. The cleanup of Bay View Hunter's Point is also under for evidence tampering (just like at Exide). I could go on, but I fear I will run out of space.

6. Business as usual. Technical management continues to manipulate cleanup activities to suit their agenda. Again, no transparency in decision-making process. Support staff are treated like crap, and a number of staff seem to just sit around in their cubical all day and do much of nothing and bill time to who knows what. Site mitigation needs a complete over hall from the top down.

7. Lack of executive level leadership. Unclear priorities. Failure to utilize DTSC resources to effectively drive forward progress to proactively engage communities and project proponents to increase voluntary cleanups. Lack of performance measures/priorities to ensure efficient use of resources to optimize cleanup effectiveness/impact.

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Source Reduction and Consumer Products Programs

How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Source Reduction Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Source reduction and Consumer Products Programs?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your DTSC’S Source Reduction and Consumer Products Programs performance rating:

1. Lack of resource allocation for this program. 2. Director Raphael stated we would reduce waste disposal in landfills (3 years ago) but I've not

heard of any plan to reduce waste. 3. have not followed it. 4. Who are these people and what do they do? Absolutely no internal transparency on what this

program is doing. 5. What source reduction program? The program has been effectively eliminated. The former staff

have been dumped into jobs they did not want. Most have left or retired. The program was spun down to nothing and defunded to provide funding for the Safer consumer products program, which has been an enormous bureaucratic resource pit, with no foreseeable impact on community or environmental health.

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How would you rate the performance of DTSC's Consumer Products Program since November 2015?

Compare with how respondents answered the following question in August 2016: How would you rate the performance of the DTSC Source reduction and Consumer Products Programs?

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Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Consumer Products Program performance rating.

1. keep the lead out of the rubber duckies. 2. They need funding. Science is good. 3. It is heartening to see they FINALLY got the alternative assessment out! They are

looking at some products and I am hopeful they will be able to identify alternatives for lead acid batteries in the near term.

4. Again, very few internal updates on what these people are doing. 5. Smoke and mirrors. Lots of busy work, but, no substantive impact on public health or

the environment. No path to achieve any measurable benefits in the foreseeable future.

What do you think is the DTSC’s biggest challenge?

1. Earn the trust of its own employees due to diversity inclusion, professionalism, and consistency issues.

2. Poor leadership, very poor management, an out dated and ineffective structure, pending retirement of ~30 percent of the staff and no real plan to cope with the transition.

3. Understanding its mission and doing its job. 4. Separate communication needed. Judging by the sample vision/mission statements,

the people that run things have an extremely inflated sense of self-worth for the agency.

5. removing dysfunctional and entrenched management. 6. 1-DTSC HR 2-Everything that has been identified in the past still is pervasive in DTSC

from subtle discrimination to incompetency. 7. Funding. 8. Lack of leadership, failure to delegate to decent managers. The rot starts at the top. 9. Endemic racism and agency capture by regulated industries. 10. The entrenched management and the political manipulation from lobbyists at the

highest level of government. 11. Lack of executive level commitment, capability and capacity. The knowledge and

experience level is simply not up to turning around a complex regulatory agency that has devolved dramatically over the last 20 years.

Do you feel DTSC has become more transparent and/or engaged with stakeholders since the IRP was established?

1. Some support programs still lack consistent and visible processes. 2. The transparency, if achieved at all is temporary. It will cease as soon as the panel is

dissolved. Internal transparency has not improved at all. We took a survey a year ago and the results (what we said and the analysis) have not been shared. Clearly, we do not matter.

3. It's just another process by which the public is denied the transparency it deserves. 4. More transparent not necessarily more honest. My letters are not responded to and

my PRAs are ducked. 5. no. DTSC is a master of creating the illusion of transparency and good will.

Management, supervisors, and a particular branch manager bully staff on a regular basis then blame the belittled staff for whatever happens...

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6. It depends which stakeholders, EJ not at all, business polluters and same atty's status quo.

7. I don't really know. I work mostly with SCP, and they have always done a nice job of stakeholder engagement.

8. No. 9. Absolutely not, it has gone the other way. The Department is an agency of secrets.

More so than it ever has been. And its distain for the public is palatable. 10. No. The IRP has been fed a bunch of PR over the past two years and the real truth has

never been told. 11. DTSC works very hard on the superficial appearance of transparency, but, in reality

has become opaquer in its decision-making and its priorities. DTSC decision-making power has concentrated upward in the organization, and both staff and community members have been relegated to the role of onlookers, rather than players. The engagement is superficial, and the real power remains with the regulated community, and no fundamental changes in the regulatory infrastructure, executive level decision-making, or the organizational management culture have been accomplished.

Do you have any other comments, questions, or concerns?

1. In order to achieve highest transparency, DTSC should encourage Lean and Six Sigma culture within the organization, remove myth about Lean and Six Sigma, encourage lesson learned, improve internal process, engage the public and regulated community.

2. DTSC has lost its purpose. The structure is bloated and self-perpetuating. It has not improved notably.

3. Give me 30 cops with peace officer authority. Place them under direct authority of Cal EPA and you might have an opportunity to do some real cross-media enforcement of the highest quality.

4. Separate communications needed 5. same dysfunctional manager is overseer of one particular office who has a second

overseer over admin staff...what a mess. And, I am going to answer #15 wrong...to close to home.

6. The dept. like always failed in seeing the potential in the IRP and instead sheltered in place. Next administration will not be so forgiving.se to home.

7. I am concerned that DTSC's future is cloudy due to funding and to low and non-competitive scientist salaries, which will keep it from hiring and maintaining the skills it needs in the long term. For example, SCP is hiring good folks because of its precedent-setting nature, but I fear that they will jump to industry after a few years due to the low salaries.

8. The Governor needs to follow the recommendations of the IRP and implement the reform package which the Legislature put before him including the Leyva bill. Too bad he vetoed the first bill on setting minimal inspection intervals this week. It's clear that the Governor does not care about communities affected by industrial toxins.

9. Yes. The organization needs to be broken up and the best parts farmed out to other agencies. DTSC has failed in protecting public health.

10. DTSC has been broken for quite a while. The superficial approach to "fix the foundation" was not the product of a systematic performance review model, and has not been an effective tool for guiding our inexperienced executive team. The are relying on canned approaches that do not recognize the fundamental nature of the dysfunction. The emperor has no clothes.

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Please check as many of the following as apply to you.

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Appendix

Questionnaire of Individuals on IRP Contact List

October 12, 2016

The Independent Review Panel (IRP), which was created by legislation in 2015 to review and make recommendations regarding improvements to the Department of Toxic Substances Control’s programs, is interested in your thoughts on the department’s performance since the Panel began its work in November 2015. Please take a few minutes to answer the following questions. The survey should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. Your responses will be anonymous unless you provide name or contact information. If you choose to provide this optional information, your name will not be associated with any of the individual responses that may be shared with the IRP, DTSC, or the public.1 1. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Permitting Program since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 2. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 3.

2. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Permitting Program performance rating.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Enforcement Program since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

1 Survey allows respondents as much space as needed for open-ended questions. Respondents must answer questions marked with an asterisk in order to continue with survey.

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If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 4. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 5.

4. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Enforcement Program performance rating.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Public Outreach Program since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 6. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 7.

6. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Public Outreach Program performance

rating. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

7. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Fiscal Management since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 8. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 9.

8. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Fiscal Management performance rating.

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________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

9. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Site Mitigation Program since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 10. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 11.

10. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Site Mitigation Program performance

rating. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

11. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Source Reduction Program since November 2015? * Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 12. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 13.

12. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Source Reduction performance rating.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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13. How would you rate the performance of DTSC’s Consumer Products Program since November 2015? *

Excellent Good Satisfactory Inadequate Very inadequate Don’t know

If respondent checks any of the first five boxes, he or she is directed to Question 14. If respondent checks the “Don’t know” box, he or she is directed to Question 15.

14. Please help us understand the reason or reasons for your Consumer Products Program performance

rating. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

15. What do you think is the DTSC’s biggest challenge?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

16. Do you feel DTSC has become more transparent and/or engaged with stakeholders since the IRP was established? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

17. Do you have any other comments, questions, or concerns? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

18. Please check as many of the following as apply to you: * DTSC employee Former DTSC employee Owner, operator, or employee of regulated facility Representative of regulated facility Responsible party of contaminated site Representative of responsible party of contaminated site

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Chemical or product manufacturer Representative of chemical or product manufacturer Member of community impacted by regulated facility Member of community impacted by contaminated site Representative of community impacted by regulated facility Representative of community impacted by contaminated site Representative of environmental or environmental justice organization Elected public official Non-elected, non-DTSC public official Other

19. Optional contact information: Name _________________________ Company/Agency _________________________ Address _________________________ City _________________________ US State _________________________ ZIP _________________________ Phone _________________________ Email address _________________________

Thank you for providing the IRP with important information. For more information on the IRP and its work to date, visit the Panel’s website at: https://www.dtsc.ca.gov/GetInvolved/ReviewPanel/Independent-Review-Panel.cfm