The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) released on May 6, 2026, a report on EPA’s fiscal year (FY) 2026 top management challenges. The report identifies what OIG considers to be the six most serious management and performance challenges facing EPA in FY 2026:
- Managing contracts, grants, and associated data systems;
- Meeting statutory requirements for ensuring the safe use of chemicals;
- Managing information technology modernization;
- Maintaining mission efficiency and effectiveness during organizational change;
- Managing cooperative federalism and state oversight; and
- Preparing for and responding to natural and manmade disasters.
The report states that EPA’s ability to identify the risks of using chemicals and pesticides is challenged by ongoing resource constraints, inefficient review processes, and stringent statutory deadlines. The work remaining includes:
- Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act (Lautenberg Act): The Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), as amended by the Lautenberg Act, requires EPA to assess and eliminate unreasonable risks to potentially exposed or susceptible subpopulations, including workers. The report states that it also requires EPA to make affirmative risk determinations on 100 percent of new chemical notices submitted under TSCA, representing “about a fivefold increase in the Agency’s workload.” The report notes that EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention’s (OCSPP) staffing level has not kept pace with the added workload demands. As reported in our August 7, 2023, memorandum, in August 2023, OIG reported that EPA’s new chemical reviews were not being completed within the statutory time frame because of a lack of staff resources. OIG recommended that EPA create a plan to review guidance documents for new chemical reviews regularly, assess periodically the effectiveness of the official recordkeeping system for TSCA, develop and implement a plan to identify root causes for frequent technical issues within the TSCA Confidential Business Information systems, and review periodically the New Chemicals Division workforce and workload analysis. According to the report, EPA agreed to all recommendations, and as of November 2025, “corrective actions were pending.”
- Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA): Under FIFRA, EPA is responsible for regulating the distribution, sale, use, and registration of pesticides to prevent “unreasonable adverse effects on the environment.” EPA reviews each registered pesticide at least every 15 years. The report notes that although a total of 799 pesticide cases were due for review by the end of FY 2026, “EPA has lagged in completing registration reviews, and the backlog prevents a reassessment of older pesticides.” According to the report, the expanded categories and new reporting requirements established by the Pesticide Registration Improvement Extension Act of 2018 may contribute to EPA’s “ongoing challenges in achieving timely registration and reregistration assessments of new and existing pesticide applications.” OIG states that if these challenges are not addressed, they may hinder EPA’s ability to protect human health and the environment effectively from pesticide risks.
- Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS): As reported in our August 3, 2022, blog item, a 2022 U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that available technologies were able to detect and quantify only about 50 of the thousands of PFAS in existence. OIG states that while EPA has recently taken several PFAS-related actions, “the Agency needs to continue its efforts to identify and address the risks from PFAS compounds, as well as continue its research on existing and potential PFAS destruction technologies.”
OIG concludes that to protect public health effectively from the risks of using chemicals and pesticides, EPA “will need to conduct credible and timely chemical risk assessments and reviews.” EPA is challenged, however, “by a lack of resources, stringent statutory deadlines, and continued research on PFAS.”
