The Texas commission requires self-studies by agencies, and even influential ones such as the Public Utility Commission and Texas Education Agency go through the process.
There is strong public participation -- some say too strong because lobbying has prevented sunset in some cases. Governing magazine reported that one commission member called the process "pet food for lobbyists."
The first sunset law was enacted in 1976 in Colorado, and some 36 others were in place by the early 1980s. But some commissions were sunsetted themselves when states found the process too expensive and time-consuming and that politically sensitive agencies were protected.
The administration plan calls for the Sunset Commission to evaluate an agency or program at least once every 10 years. The Results Commissions would focus on reorganization "where multiple federal programs have similar, related or overlapping responsibilities" and are under multiple agencies and congressional committees. Public hearings on the reorganizing could be held but are not required.
Exempt from review are rules that protect the environment, health, safety and civil rights, as well as enforcement programs.
Jeff Lubbers , former research director of the Administrative Conference of the U.S. and now an administrative law professor at Washington College of Law at American University , said the legislation would give the administration "the ultimate regulatory control mechanism."
Lubbers worried that decisions could be made without public input and would result in "ferocious lobbying" outside the public's view. Congress has the power to analyze programs, he said, during the reauthorization and appropriations process and in oversight hearings.
William L. Kovacs , vice president of regulatory affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce , has a different concern. Aggressive use of the commissions might result in abolishing programs and rules that have become established business practices, such as procedures for handling hazardous waste.
He said the chamber prefers that rules, not whole agencies, be reviewed to weed out "a couple hundred rules" that don't work well -- at least for the business community.
Maurice McTigue , director of the George Mason University Mercatus Center's government accountability project, said that some agencies have become "conglomerates" and that a review would help them decide whether they should get back to their "core" business. The process also provides discipline for Congress. "It forces legislators to reconsider the policies that set up the programs in the first place," he said.
Another backer is Thomas A. Schatz , president of Citizens Against Government Waste . He said Congress could reorganize and consolidate government programs, "but they never do that."
