The Commerce Department inspector general's office has notified NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco that the investigation sought by two Massachusetts congressmen into the influences of non-government organizations on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and its regional fishery management councils is going forward.
Inspector General Todd Zinser agreed to the probe last October in a letter to Congressmen John Tierney and Barney Frank. They had requested the investigation in an Aug. 17 letter to Zinser.
Ann C. Eilers, principal assistant inspector general for audit and evaluation, indicated the investigation would be national rather than regional in scope in a Jan. 10 memo to Lubchenco, NOAA General Counsel Lois Schiffer, Bruce Buckson, director of the Office of Law Enforcement, and nearly a dozen other high officials the agency.
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