NRC shaken by court ruling

Last week, the National Research Council's worst nightmare came true. A decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia essentially declared an end to NRC's independence. NRC is the operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in Washington, D.C. The decision upheld an earlier ruling by a three-judge panel of the same court that NRC was subject to the 1972 Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). That law requires federal agencies to open their advisory panels to public scrutiny and participation. NRC is not a federal agency, but the contract work it does for agencies, according to the appeals court, effectively makes it one. NAS President Bruce M. Alberts, fearing that the ruling will destroy NRC's integrity, says the academy will appeal the judgment to the U.S. Supreme Court. Specifically at issue were academy procedures in a project NRC was doing for the Department of Health & Human Services. The ...