Testimony and Statements

NSB-98-65
(NSB/EC-98-13)

March 19, 1998

 

RESOLUTION OF THE NATIONAL SCIENCE BOARD

APPROVED BY THE NSB EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

AT ITS MARCH 19, 1998 MEETING

THE PROPOSED NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT

WHEREAS the National Science Foundation (NSF) was asked by the conference report accompanying the FY 1998 Appropriations Act to comment on the proposal to establish a National Institute for the Environment (NIE); and

WHEREAS the establishment of the NIE, as proposed, within the National Science Foundation would fundamentally affect NSF structure, programs, and priorities;

Be it RESOLVED that:

The NSB has considered the NIE proposal and agrees that there is need for expanded environmental research, education, and assessment;

NSF has a legitimate role in fundamental environmental research and education, that it actively supports such research, and has an opportunity to enlarge its role in the future;

NSF can most constructively exercise a legitimate leadership role in environmental research and education within an interagency framework coordinated by White House agencies and the various coordinating committees of the National Science and Technology Council; and that

A separate organization or entity would not be an effective means of achieving the intellectual goals connected with the proposed NIE because it could isolate environmental research from related science and engineering research, as well as be duplicative of the existing policy and management structure and entail unnecessary cost.

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