DHS Retrospective Review of Existing Regulations

Today the Department of Homeland Security published a notice in the Federal Register (81 FR 70060-70061) requesting public input into the Department’s periodic retrospective review of existing regulations. The regulations included in this review are found in the following Code of Federal Regulations chapters:

• 6 CFR Chapter I;

• 8 CFR Chapter I;

• 19 CFR Chapter I;

• 33 CFR Chapter I;

• 44 CFR Chapter I;

• 46 CFR Chapters I and III; and

• 49 CFR Chapter XII

This includes the following regulations that may be of specific interest to readers of this blog:

• 6 CFR Part 27 - Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards

• 6 CFR Part 29 - Protected Critical Infrastructure Information

• 33 CFR Subchapter H - Maritime Security (Parts 101 - 107)

• 33 CFR Subchapter L - Waterfront Facilities (Parts 125 - 128)

• 33 CFR Subchapter N - Dangerous Cargoes (Parts 140 - 149)

• 33 CFR Subchapter O - Certain Bulk Dangerous Cargoes (Parts 150 - 155)

• 49 CFR Part 1520 - Protection of Sensitive Security Information

• 49 CFR Part 1572 - Credentialing and Security Threat Assessments

• 49 CFR Part 1580 - Rail Transportation Security

DHS notes that:

“DHS will afford significantly greater weight to feedback that identifies specific regulations, includes actionable data, or provides viable alternatives that meet statutory obligations and regulatory objectives. Feedback that simply states that a stakeholder feels strongly that DHS should change a regulation, but does not contain specific information on how the proposed change would impact the costs and benefits of the regulation, is much less useful to DHS. DHS is looking for new information and new economic data to support any proposed changes.” [emphasis in original]

DHS is soliciting public comment based upon specific principles and proposes a series of potential questions that such comments should address. Written comments can be submitted via the Federal eRulemaking Portal (www.Regulations.gov; Docket # DHS-2016-0072). Comments should be submitted by November 11^th, 2016.