EPA's Vessel General Permit and Small Vessel General

Regardless of whether an agency’s decision-making processes corresponds to the model
presented in Figure 1, five components of an agency’s decision-making process are critical to our
assessment of whether a general permit would be expected to insure that individual actions
authorized, funded, or carried out by the program comply with the requirements of section
7(a)(2) of the ESA. The first critical component is the screening process an agency applies to
specific actions authorized, funded, or carried out by a program. When we examine this
component of an Agency’s decision-making process, questions we ask include: What standards
apply to the screening process? How rigorous are those standards? How rigorously does the
Action Agency apply those standards? Are proposals assumed to comply with an Agency’s
statute barring evidence of non-compliance or vice versa? Which party (prospective permittees
or the Action Agency) bears the responsibility for presenting the evidence that supports their
position? Does an Agency’s record of performance allow us to conclude that the screening
process works as designed by filtering out proposals that do not satisfy applicable environmental
mandates, standards, criteria, and program purposes?
The second critical component is the information that forms the foundation for the agency’s
screening process (see Figure 1, Boxes D1.1, D2.1, and D2.2). When we examine this
component of an agency’s decision-making process, questions we ask include: Does the agency
assess the individual and cumulative impacts of specific proposals? Does the agency’s
methodology consider all of the variables that would have to be considered to determine whether
a specific proposal is likely to have adverse consequence for endangered or threatened species
and designated critical habitat? Do assessments employ data acquisition procedures that are
likely to identify, gather, and analyze all of the information that would be relevant to identify the
presence or absence of consequence for endangered or threatened species and designated critical
habitat? Does the assessment process incorporate quality assurance and quality control
procedures? Are those procedures designed to prevent Type I decision error (falsely concluding
that a proposal had an adverse impact), Type II decision error (falsely concluding that a proposal
had no adverse impact), or both?
The third critical component is an Action Agency’s decision-making process, which includes the
information and variables that inform the Agency’s decision on whether or not to authorize,
fund, or implement an action, the decisions the Agency makes, and any conditions or terms the
Agency attaches to its decision.
The fourth critical component is an audit function. Does the Action Agency regularly or
continuously audit the results of its actions? Are the monitoring and feedback loops (see Figure
1, lines M1 to M4 and F1 to F4) designed to allow the Agency to (a) collect empirical
information that allows them to insure that specific actions they authorize, fund, or carry out are
undertaken as designed (including any terms, conditions, or mitigation measures associated with
the proposal), (b) assess the actual effects of those actions, and (c) determine whether the
program is fulfilling its mandate, purposes, and goals.
The final critical component is the agency’s authority to modify its prior and subsequent
decisions when new information (particularly information provided by the audit function) reveals
that particular authorizations have not satisfied applicable environmental mandates, standards,
criteria, and program purposes (the applicable environmental mandates includes compliance with
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