by Bill Dawson

An Environmental Protection Agency contractor recently asked "influential editors" what they think about the EPA's scientific research.

An unknown number of journalists deemed to fit that description received e-mails from the contractor in November, seeking their participation in a brief survey to gauge "awareness of and opinions about EPA's scientific research program" (see text of the survey).

Despite repeated requests in December by Environment Writer, EPA officials would not comment on the survey for this article. However, agency spokeswoman Eryn Witcher on Jan. 5 told the online environmental publication Greenwire that "this survey is not an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars and was not authorized by any senior EPA official."

It appears that the survey may be related to a public relations initiative by EPA's Office of Research and Development (ORD), which is the focus of a review by the EPA's inspector general in response to allegations last summer by the advocacy group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

PEER issued a press release about the survey and posted a copy of it on the organization's website on Jan. 5, prompting the Greenwire article that was published the next day.

Questions posed in the survey address subjects such as how much importance the respondents assign to government research, their opinion of the EPA, and whether they are more concerned now than they were 10 years ago about the environment.

The survey was sent by a Washington-area marketing firm, JDG Communications, which received two public relations contracts totaling $150,000 last year for work on behalf of ORD.

Requests by Environment Writer for information about the survey were referred by the EPA headquarters press office in December to Donna Vincent Roa, an ORD official.

Roa initially agreed to be interviewed about the survey but then referred questions back to the press office, which did not respond.

In a July 18, 2005 story, The New York Times had reported that the two contracts awarded to JDG were related to a larger public relations campaign that the EPA's research office was considering undertaking.

In a public notice published last May 26, EPA said this broader "strategic communication" initiative could potentially run three to five years and cost up to $6 million. Possible activities included "enhanc(ing) the development of ORD's corporate image," carrying out "focus group and survey research," and "provid(ing) research, writing and editing of ORD articles for publications in scholarly journals and magazines."

The Times article noted that the two contracts were awarded to JDG "just months after the Bush administration came under scrutiny for its public relations policies," including payments to columnists.

PEER had obtained documents related to the ORD's PR initiative and provided them to The Times, also posting them on the organization's own website.

The EPA's investigator general subsequently agreed to investigate PEER's allegations regarding "the legality, conformance with EPA policy, and fiscal appropriateness of ORD's request for proposals 'to enhance ORD's corporate image.'"

Jeff Ruch, PEER's executive director, told Environment Writer that the editor survey appeared to be related to the contracts awarded to JDG. PEER has received information indicating the larger public relations effort proposed for ORD has been scaled back and changed to be less specific to that office, but the survey may have gone ahead because it was "too far along," he said.

The Times reported that one of the two contracts awarded to JDG, for $85,829.06, calls for development of two "perception specific indicators" to "show whether public relations efforts to create awareness and improve the reputation of EPA's research and development, its labs and its top-quality scientists has favorably influenced public perception."

The second contract, for $65,692.62, directed JDG to "develop feature article research and strategy" to support activities aimed at "identifying feature story ideas, creating slant, identifying consumer magazines to target and polishing the final article."

(Witcher told Greenwire that the survey cost about $1,000.)

PEER's major concern about ORD's PR initiative is that it involves "a diversion of funds from scientific research," Ruch said.

Witcher was quoted by The Times in response to this charge: "It's not spending money on communications at the expense of research but rather in support of it. This allows the results of EPA research to be shared with the general public."

(In October, the International Association of Business Communicators' Washington, D.C. Chapter gave Roa its top honor for the "Multi-Year Strategic Communication Plan" she developed for ORD.)

Witcher also told The Times that the two contracts awarded to JDG are for activities "very common throughout the entire federal government."

JDG's website indicates that its other projects for federal agencies include work for the Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Department of Agriculture. For instance, the firm helped the Fish and Wildlife Service mark the National Wildlife Refuge system's centennial anniversary in 2003 with "a campaign to heighten awareness and build enduring support with key stakeholders for refuges."

Federal agency surveying of reporters and editors is an extremely dicey and often controversial undertaking, and many reporters site ethical concerns with even responding to such surveys. Coming on top of other recent controversial strategies involving Bush administration agencies' use of video news releases, grants to columnists to support particular positions, and one effort by EPA to collaborate with independent TV news directors (see EW article, June 2005), this latest effort again prompted cries of concern from a number of journalism listserves and blogs.