Cooperate, Coordinate, Collaborate: Reducing Barriers to Cross-Governmental Collaborations for Key Environmental Challenges

The Joint Subcommittee on Environment, Innovation and Public Health (“JEEP”) serves to provide coordination and guidance for interagency working groups (referred to as strategy teams) that were formed through legislative actions under the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal years 2020 and 2021 and the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act of 2022. Generally, these strategy teams have been tasked with identifying interagency research and research policy opportunities to address specific challenges in environment, innovation, and public health sectors. The strategy teams cover interrelated topic of contaminants of emerging concern, PFAS, sustainable chemistry and toxic exposures in the military. Further, the JEEP liaises with the National Toxicology Program, the Nanoplastics Interest Group, and the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring Systems. Since its inception in 2021 under the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC), the JEEP and strategy teams have published several key strategic documents including the Sustainable Chemistry Report on framing the federal landscape and the National Emerging Contaminant Research Initiative (NECRI), a PFAS report that describes current state of the science and identifies opportunities for new research. This presentation will provide a review of the exciting work that has been accomplished by the strategy teams but more importantly the lessons learned as the JEEP has built a collegial community of governmental scientists that is committed to solving key environmental challenges.

The views expressed in this presentation are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of their governmental agencies.

6PPD [N-(1,3-dimethylbutyl)-N'-phenyl-p-phenylenediamine] is a chemical commonly used in tires to protect the rubber from degrading and make the tire last longer. Concerns have been raised about the breakdown of 6PPD when it reacts with ozone and forms the transformation product 6PPD-quinone (6PPD-Q). 6PPD-Q can enter streams and water bodies and have potential environmental impacts and is of particular concern to Tribal communities. In early 2023, the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC, which is under the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy) Joint Sub-Committee on Environment, Innovation, and Public Health (The JEEP) identified 6PPD-Q as an emerging contaminant that would benefit from coordination across federal agencies. In response to this outreach, the National Toxicology Program (NTP) in coordination with the JEEP has formed a working group to share information about research and other activities occurring across the U.S. federal government on 6PPD-Q and facilitate coordinated efforts. The expectation of the working group members is that this information sharing will raise agencies’ awareness about the extent of federal research, identify activities that are complementary, reduce duplicative effort, and focus research on key data needs that advances scientific understanding around any potential adverse human health effects of 6PPD-Q exposure. While the working group has a focus on human health, the coordination effort is broad reflecting the diversity of activities and interests of the participating agencies. For the NTP, this new “operational model” provides a mechanism to foster cross-governmental collaborations for emerging environmental challenges in a timely and effective manner.  

Wildfires have been increasing in duration, area, and have devastating effects on the health of communities. Wildland fires often cross geo-political boundaries and collaboration across jurisdictions can be difficult.  Robust coordination and collaboration between the federal government, states, localities, and tribes are necessary to promote health and community resiliency.

While many efforts have been dedicated to land and forest management, before, during and after wildfires, less attention was paid on integrating public health needs and social justice in guiding these.  This panel will discuss how federal agencies are working together with state, local and tribal entities, to act in a planned and coordinated way to prevent, prepare, and mitigate. We will present on CDC partnerships across diverse array of federal agencies, leading work on integrating strategies on the data gaps, adaptations, and factors related to prevention of wildland fires; transitioning from research to coordinated interagency actions. Examples will include success stories and implications of our work with the Wildland Fire Management and Mitigation Commission; Wildland Fire Leadership Council; National Academy of Sciences; a 2023 Memorandum of Understanding among CDC, USDA, EPA and DOI. This panel will also highlight coordinated planning of 2025 International Environmental conferences with academic partnership, collaborations among Health agencies of the USA, Canada and the European Union on wildfire health guidance, funding, and messaging.

Introduction: Public-private partnerships (PPPs) can play a critical role in advancing our understanding of environmental exposures by maximizing cross-disciplinary expertise and resource-sharing among government, community, and industry researchers. However, experiences with PPPs associated with community environmental monitoring involving industry partners have not been well-documented. 

Goal: To build on existing literature combined with expertise of practitioners from various sectors to identify overarching elements and specific principles necessary for creating and sustaining successful PPPs for community environmental monitoring. 

Methods: A scoping literature review and 24 semi-structured interviews with diverse PPP stakeholders were conducted. Excerpts from the review were coded to successful/barrier elements. Interview transcripts were analyzed using thematic qualitative analysis to identify critical elements for successful PPPs. 

Results: Trust emerged as a foundational principle both in the literature review and interviews. After trust is developed, three critical principles for successful PPPs are: a sound organizational structure with sufficient resources to maintain the PPP; clear and inclusive approaches to communication; and developing scientifically robust data as the basis for decision-making. 

Conclusions: Community interviewees realized the value of PPPs but engaged in them cautiously given power imbalances and prior negative experiences. Our analyses confirm that historic events and power imbalances affect trust and participation of community partners, and that trust-building is a continuous process requiring honesty, bidirectional communication, sustained presence, and acknowledgment of prior activities adversely impacting the environment. A centralized repository or a professional-community society would facilitate sharing lessons learned. PPPs may benefit by including trained facilitators for equitable and participatory processes. 

There are about 18,000 – 19,000 synthetic turf fields in the United States, with 1,200 – 1,500 new or replacement installations each year. Most fields use tire crumb rubber as infill material, sometimes mixed with sand. Fields are at municipal and county parks; schools, colleges, and universities; professional sports stadiums and practice fields; and military installations. Concerns have been raised by the public about the potential health risks from playing on synthetic turf fields in the United States containing tire crumb rubber. To help address these concerns, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (CDC/ATSDR) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in collaboration with the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), launched a multi-agency research effort in February 2016. This multi-agency research effort, known as the Federal Research Action Plan on Recycled Tire Crumb Used on Playing Fields and Playgrounds (FRAP), focused on assessing potential human exposure, which includes both what chemicals are in the material and in what amounts, and identifying the ways in which people may be exposed to those chemicals based on their activities on synthetic turf fields. While the FRAP was primarily performed by the above agencies, collaborators included: Defense Centers for Public Health-Aberdeen (DCPH-A); NIH/NIEHS/National Toxicology Program (NTP); and the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA). Additional research activities included outreach to key stakeholders (industry; field owners including DOD; and the public). The presentation will provide lessons learned in reducing barriers to cross-governmental collaborations.