Low points. (Or high depending on your point of view.)
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) takes the BATFE to task for its woefull efforts at conducting background checks. The BATFE is apparantly not getting them all done amongst other problems.
The BATFE justified moving the explosives licensing operations from Atlanta based on their estimates of the flood of permit applications resulting from the Safe Explosives Act (SEA). Which never appeared. The current number of licensees is given as 12,152. Apparantly, those who could, hired contractors to handle their explosives work. So the BATFE has a new facility which still isn't handling all of the licensing activity and has no concrete plan for completing the process.
The basic gist of this part is that the BATFE isn't doing its job to make sure that evil prohibited persons don't gain access to explosives.
One of the sections deals with the issue of "Inadequate training for ATF Inspectors has resulted in a lack of explosives product knowledge and inconsistent regulatory enforcement." Which is certainly something that we have experienced. One of the examples given is of a garage suddenly becoming an "inhabited building" after not being one during 20 years of previous inspections.
Then they take the BATFE to task for making such a big deal out of explosives samples and then only collecting one sample. Of _a_ model rocket motor. (Yes, the OIG used the singular form.)We all know how that turned out although the OIG makes no mention of what happened. Best to keep such embarassments hidden I guess.
Then there comes the scary section. The OIG identified several other issues including: "The lack of ATF authority to regulate ammonium nitrate and some commonly used explosives,"
That concludes the executive summary part of the report.
In reading the body of the actual report I notice a few things. One is that the OIG apparantly didn't talk with anyone in the rocket hobby because they say:
"On the whole, every industry group we spoke with said the SEA was an important step toward increasing security. Group members said that they did not object to the new categories of prohibited persons created by the SEA and had few specific problems with the interim rule developed and published by the ATF. The group members stated that the ATF s licensing process did not disrupt their operations and that explosives licensees were generally informed about the SEA s requirements."
The report also discusses the mess the BATFE made of the explosives transportation business. I find it interesting that the complete shut down of explosives transportation by common carrier was characterized as voluntary.
The new limited permit is wildly unpopular. Only 416 were issued between May and Sept. 2003.
Hmmm. A BATFE official says... "He further stated that some Inspectors do not understand the rulemaking process. For example, the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking issued by the ATF prior to the SEA has been cited prematurely by Inspectors on numerous occasions as an in-force regulation."
I wonder which NPRM that was? My money is on number 968. Perhaps this explains the change in status of that garage as the BATFE proposed changing the definition there.
Back to the "other issues". This looks like the OIG thinks that regulating ammonium nitrate as an explosive is a good thing. It mentions the Ammonium Nitrate Security Act. Which has been reintroduced in this session of Congress.
The OIG also raises the exemption on up to 50 pounds of back powder as an issue. Since it will require an act of Congress and catching the NRA napping, I don't think this "issue" has much traction. And if you are gloating about using Pyrodex for ejection charges and not being effected by this, the OIG also takes aim at smokeless powder.
Amazingly, the OIG thinks that government agencies being exempt from explosives law isn't a good thing. At least as far as BATFE inspection of storage facilities goes. It mentions a now defunct bill, H.R. 5162, the "Law Enforcement Explosives Storage Enhancement Act." Except that I looked up that bill and it only applied to state and local government. The feds remain exempt.
It concludes this section (other issues) with
"We believe the ATF should critically consider the legislative proposals and coordinate with the Department s Office of Legislative Affairs on the Department s position with regard to these proposals."
The report is followed by comments from the BATFE on the report. And comments by the OIG on the comments.
The overall tone of the report is that the BATFE should work harder to keep "explosives" out of the hands of evil people and should even work to increase their regulatory reach to include black powder, smokeless powders, and ammonimum nitrate fertilizer.
What it looks like to me is that the BATFE isn't capable of handling the job they have now (manpower, budget, and management issues) but in spite of that, the OIG thinks the BATFE should be regulating even more materials. Typical.