Michael Regan rebuilt NC DEQ. Now he’s been asked to lead Joe Biden’s EPA.
On the morning of Jan. 7, 2018, Michael Regan stood in front of the Wilmington City Council. He was defending an agreement that he said offered North Carolina the best chance at protection against contamination from a chemical giant that, for decades, had been discharging a long-lasting chemical into the drinking water source for hundreds of thousands around Southeastern North Carolina.
Regan, the secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality, remained calm under sometimes intense questioning from council members who wanted to know why the agreement did not force Chemours to pay to filter drinking water downstream.
“If this company wants to stay in North Carolina and remain in North Carolina, there are some things that they have to do, some rules that they have to abide by,” Regan said. “We’ve set the foundation. This is a floor, and we’ll continue to investigate, we’ll continue to pursue.”
Nearly three years later, Regan stood in a different Wilmington, in Delaware. In a nearly empty theater, Regan accepted President-elect Joe Biden’s nomination to be administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. What can people expect if he is confirmed?
In North Carolina, Regan is widely seen as a keen listener and a pragmatic regulator, seeking out opinions from both activists and industry representatives before charting a path forward. Sometimes, this has led to friction with environmentalists who would have liked Regan to take more decisive action.
Regan’s confirmation hearing will be Wednesday in front of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. If confirmed, Regan would become the first Black man to head the EPA. During four years at DEQ, supporters say, Regan restored the confidence of an agency that had been left demoralized by cuts and anti-regulation priorities, much like the agency he may be leading next.
“My plan is to really promote transparency, science, use the power of convening and bring all of the affected parties and stakeholders into conversation so that we can think through: What are the best ways to protect the environment, the natural resources and grow the economy simultaneously?” Regan told The News & Observer.
Health shaped perspective
A Goldsboro native, Regan grew up taking fishing trips to Fort Fisher with his father and friends. That time outdoors could be cut, though, when Regan suffered asthmatic symptoms on days when pollutants reacted with high temperatures, making it hard for him to breathe.
“That really did shape my perspective,” Regan said.
After graduating from Goldsboro High, Regan attended N.C. A&T State University, where he studied Earth and environmental science. He wore the A&T logo on his lapel while accepting the nomination for EPA administrator.
Charryse Byrd, a childhood friend who also attended A&T, said she and Regan were extensions of each other’s families. While Regan can come across as serious in public, Byrd said, he always remembers the funniest moments, even those that others may have missed.
Regan is also intensely loyal to family and friends, Byrd said. After their freshman year at A&T, for instance, Regan made sure she was hired as the sole cashier at the swimming pool where he was a lifeguard.
EPA to DEQ to EPA
Regan’s first stint at the EPA began in September 1998 as a special assistant to the U.S. Administrator of Air and Radiation. Part of his role there was to help with research and development on environmental justice, which is the idea that all people deserve protection from pollution, as well as an equal say in rule-making and permitting decisions.
While Regan would hold several other air quality positions before leaving in 2008, he said something changed after the Clinton administration gave way to the Bush administration.
“What I saw and witnessed as an employee was less emphasis on these vulnerable communities,” Regan said.
Biden has vowed to update a Clinton-era executive order on environmental justice. Biden also plans to push for monitoring in communities near factories, refineries and other emitters, requiring community notification if toxic chemicals are released.
Regan would carry the lessons he learned at the EPA back to North Carolina, where he joined the Environmental Defense Fund to lead climate efforts in the Southeast. In 2017, Cooper tapped Regan to lead the Department of Environmental Quality.
It is a situation that environmentalists can’t help but compare to the one he would be inheriting at the EPA: an outgoing Republican administration that deprioritized science and, through legislative tinkering, lowered morale in an agency tasked with protecting the environment.
“He accomplished more than anyone could’ve expected from somebody in that position,” said former state Rep. Chuck McGrady, a Republican who often sponsored environmental bills in the legislature.
According to research conducted by Robin Smith, an environmental lawyer, DEQ lost 18% of its water quality and water resources staff during the McCrory administration, including 41% of the water quality or resources staff in regional offices.
Brian Buzby, the executive director of the N.C. Conservation Network, said Regan inherited an agency that had been distracted from its mission of protecting the environment and wasn’t seriously considering science in its decisions.
“It wasn’t engaging the public or a variety of stakeholders,” Buzby said.
Regan also sees similarities between the situations. When he came into DEQ, Regan said he emphasized to staff that the agency would again prioritize science and use the laws afforded to it. Regan also said that he made clear to staff that their opinions would be taken into account when working through complex regulatory issues.
He sees a similar path forward at EPA.
“The most important thing that we’ve done in North Carolina and that I hope to do as administrator of EPA is to really empower the people — staff at EPA — to embrace their calling to public service, really leverage their experience and their skill set,” Regan said.
Bill Holman, the North Carolina director of the Conservation Fund, said one of Regan’s big tasks will be repairing the EPA’s relationship with individual states. Regan agrees, saying the Trump administration’s EPA had “a lack of transparency, a lack of true partnership.”
“Since he’s coming from a state environmental agency, he’ll appreciate the important role that states play and work hard to restore that partnership with the states and EPA,” said Holman, who previously served as the state Department of Environment and Natural Resources secretary under Democratic Gov. Jim Hunt.
Coal ash cleanup
Ryke Longest, the co-director of Duke University’s Environmental Law and Policy Clinic, pointed to a shift in policy on coal ash as an example of the difference between DEQ under Regan’s leadership and before.
Coal ash is a byproduct of burning coal in power plants that contains arsenic, cadmium and other contaminants. It was historically stored in containment ponds near the plants that have sometimes leaked, notably in a 2014 spill from a Duke Energy basin into the Dan River.
During the McCrory administration, Longest said, Secretary Donald van der Vaart had prioritized keeping the costs of cleanup low. Under Regan, DEQ determined that basins at six Duke Energy sites must be excavated.
“My job was to really get the staff to crank up the machine and take a look at the science behind the most protective remedies for these coal ash ponds,” Regan said, noting that environmental groups deserved credit for pushing for that outcome for years.
After DEQ’s decision survived a legal challenge from Duke Energy, the state and company started working on a consent agreement along with the Southern Environmental Law Center. When the parties reached an agreement on Dec. 31, 2019, the almost 80 million total tons of coal ash to be removed represented the largest such cleanup in the country’s history.
“At the end of the day,” Regan said, “we kept everyone at the table.”
If confirmed, Longest said, he would urge Regan to take bold stances that protect the environment.
“He’s pulled an ox out of a ditch,” Longest said, “but the EPA is a much bigger ox, and it’s in a much bigger ditch.”
‘Courageous listening’
In late 2017, Jim Johnson, the director of UNC-Chapel Hill’s Urban Investment Strategies Center, gave a talk to Gov. Roy Cooper’s Cabinet about North Carolina’s shifting demographics that led to further conversations with Regan.
When Regan launched the Secretary’s Environmental Justice and Equity Advisory Board in May 2018, Johnson was its chairman. The effort was the first of its kind in North Carolina.
“One of the reasons for doing that was to be sure that we truly had all stakeholders at the table,” Regan said, “and to understand from the community’s perspective, as well as from the regulated community’s perspective, what the implications of our decisions were.”
Johnson called “courageous listening” one of Regan’s key traits.
“I’ve never seen him just summarily dismiss people’s concerns,” Johnson said, “and that’s what I always appreciated, particularly when you’re working across the political spectrum, when you’re working across the ideological spectrum, the race and class spectrum.”
Byrd, Regan’s childhood friend, said Regan gets his attentiveness from his parents.
“His mom and dad are exactly like that: They will hear you out before they say anything, whether they think you’re wrong or anything of the sort,” Byrd said.
Environmentalists and industry officials alike described feeling comfortable speaking freely with Regan.
Preston Howard, the executive director of the N.C. Manufacturers Alliance, said he would occasionally meet with Regan. During Regan’s time at DEQ, Howard said he saw agency officials adopting the secretary’s approach.
“While he’s open and engaging and just a pleasant person to be around, he is dead serious about protecting the environment, and you see that in the agency,” Howard said.
Last fall, Emily Donovan, a co-founder of Clean Cape Fear, created a petition calling for DEQ to force Chemours to provide Wilmington-area communities with relief from per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) contamination.
PFAS are a group of man-made chemicals that do not break down in water. They are used in a wide variety of products, including stain-proof carpets, non-stick pans and grease-resistant hamburger wrappers. GenX is a kind of PFAS that N.C. State and EPA scientists have found in extremely high levels in Wilmington-area drinking water.
“I was very impressed with that level of detail that he provided for me. Because he didn’t have to, he could have sent someone else to do it,” said Emily Donovan, a co-founder of Clean Cape Fear.
Several North Carolina organizers filed a petition in October calling on the EPA to study 54 different per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).
The petition was denied in the waning days of the Trump administration, but organizers told the USA Today Network that they plan to request the scientific studies again. Biden’s campaign platform included a vow to designate PFAS as a hazardous substance, set enforceable limits in drinking water and move forward with toxicity studies.
Environmentalists’ ‘mixed feelings’
Despite the formation of the environmental justice board and willingness to hear a variety of perspectives, some North Carolina activists believe DEQ came up short under Regan’s leadership.
Often, environmental justice reports showing that industrial plants were going into poor communities or places that have large Black and Latino populations were used to make a case for public hearings instead of telling a company that the location wasn’t right. Hearing outcry from community members, DEQ often added provisions to permits rather than rejecting them.
Naeema Muhammad, the organizing co-director of the N.C. Environmental Justice Network, said, “There are some mixed feelings about him from the community. Some felt like he could have done better and could have done more, and some people feel like he was doing the best he could do with what he had to work with, considering the fact that we have a General Assembly that will undercut you.”
Many of those mixed feelings are rooted in Eastern North Carolina, an area that has faced long-standing environmental challenges like hog farms and coal ash ponds, as well as new challenges like PFAS.
During Regan’s tenure, DEQ also approved permits for four wood pellet plants in the region, including the Active Energy Renewable Power plant in Lumberton. That plant was particularly controversial because it is the first to produce black wood pellets, a new kind of fuel source that can be sent directly to coal plants.
DEQ released an environmental justice report on the plant, stating that it is located in an area with a disproportionately high number of people living below the poverty line and a higher-than-average proportion of people of color.
Donna Chavis, the senior fossil fuel campaigner for Friends of the Earth and an Elder in the Lumbee Tribe, said DEQ could have done more to protect nearby residents.
“The department has not boldly used the tools at hand,” Chavis said.
Chavis pointed to Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which states that any agency receiving federal funding must avoid discriminating against people based on race, color or national origin. Accumulating so many different forms of pollution in places like Robeson County, activists argue, is tantamount to discrimination and should be considered in permitting.
On August 3, 2020, the same day the Active Energy permit was approved, Regan addressed North Carolina’s permitting process in a statement.
“We must strengthen our state laws and regulations to be more inclusive of communities of color and tribal concerns before a location is chosen and well before a permit application is submitted. This process highlights the allegations of systemic racism that zoning and business-friendly regulations perpetuate against communities of color,” Regan wrote.
Asked about that statement recently, Regan pointed to his work chairing the Andrea Harris Task Force’s Environmental Justice & Inclusion subcommittee. The committee recommended creating full-time environmental justice positions in several state agencies tasked with building and permitting decisions, as well as better incorporating environmental justice into regulatory decisions.
“We are all limited by the law or legislative changes that should occur at both the state and the federal level,” Regan said. “I’ll continue to work as EPA administrator with Congress and look at all of the laws governing environmental regulations. And when there are changes needed because of restrictions that prevent us from being as protective as we can be, I’ll work with Congress to make those changes.”
This story was originally published February 3, 2021 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Michael Regan rebuilt NC DEQ. Now he’s been asked to lead Joe Biden’s EPA.."