EPA Drops Court Fight Over Who Can Serve on Advisory Panels (1)

The EPA said Wednesday it won’t appeal a recent federal decision in New York in which the agency lost in its bid to keep people who receive grant money from the agency off its scientific advisory boards.

But the Environmental Protection Agency also said the February decision by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York doesn’t block the agency from regulating who gets to sit on its advisory committees, which serve as a check on the EPA’s work by conducting peer reviews of technical documents and analyses.

The court’s ruling also doesn’t question the EPA’s responsibility ...