U.S. Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-VA) applauded her fellow legislators for passing her Research and Development Efficiency Act legislation earlier this week.
The bill mandates reviews for all federal research regulations in an effort to clean up unjustified burdens, unnecessary requirements and duplication. It also provides recommendations for other cost-saving changes.
“I thank my colleagues for supporting this bipartisan commonsense piece of legislation that will let researchers actually do their jobs and not get bogged down by red tape,” Comstock said. “According to recent studies, researchers spend on average 42 percent of their time on administrative requirements while not conducting research. This bill ensures that more of our federal research dollars are spent on actual research.”
Specifically, the Research and Development Efficiency Act will require the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy to create a working group within the National Science and Technology Council, which will review federal regulations that deal with research universities and other independent researchers. With the overall objective of minimizing regulatory burdens in mind, the group will then make suggestions on how to consolidate, eliminate duplicates, and otherwise streamline federal regulations and reporting requirements.
“I thank Rep. Comstock for her good bipartisan bill,” Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TN), chairman of the Science, Space, and Technology Committee, said. “The non-partisan Government Accountability Office calculated that up to 40 percent of federal research dollars is consumed by researchers’ compliance with various federal rules and requirements. These redundant, overlapping and even unnecessary requirements consume significant time and resources at the expense of scientific research. The Research and Development Efficiency Act is a step in the right direction. It cuts through administrative red tape to ensure our nation’s research investments are efficient and effective.”