Encourage compliance before enforcement, especially for small business
What the document says“EPA should foster cooperative relationships with the regulated community, especially small businesses, that encourage compliance over enforcement.”
This is one of six principles the chapter sets out for restructuring the agency, alongside state leadership, measurable results, streamlined process, reducing economic costs on communities, and transparent science.
What the document actually says“EPA should foster cooperative relationships with the regulated community, especially small businesses, that encourage compliance over enforcement.”
The EPA should work with the firms it regulates. Help them follow the rules first.
The EPA can fine a firm that breaks a rule. The book says it should help firms follow rules instead. It names small firms in particular.
Read against the documents indexed here on August 26, 2026, and nothing was found that answers this. Executive Order 14405 of May 19, 2026 tells the heads of federal financial regulators to review regulations, guidance, supervisory practices and application processes that could be updated to help financial technology firms, particularly small and emerging ones. It is the nearest candidate on easing the path for small business, but it binds financial regulators, not the EPA, and it says nothing about preferring compliance assistance to enforcement. That is a record of a search, not a finding that nothing has happened: an act this site does not hold, or one that answers the proposal in words unlike its own, would not be caught by it.