Trump EPA Pick For Chicago Office Cut Enforcement, Climate Info In WI

"The Trump administration's pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency's Midwest office is a former Wisconsin state official who rolled back enforcement of anti-pollution laws, reduced funding for scientific research and scrubbed references to human-caused climate change from government websites.

Cathy Stepp, who since August has been a deputy regional administrator in the EPA's Kansas City, Kan., office, will take over the top spot at the agency's Chicago outpost less than two years after the Obama administration ousted a predecessor over the agency's lax response to the Flint, Mich., water crisis.

The Midwest office traditionally has been one of the agency's biggest and busiest, prosecuting companies that pollute the air, water and land in Illinois and five other states around the Great Lakes. The Trump administration has been pushing for deep cuts in the EPA's budget and proposing massive layoffs of agency employees."

Michael Hawthorne reports for the Chicago Tribune December 20, 2017.