Ongoing projects

The Interagency Roundtable meets every several months. Most meetings begin with a presentation by an agency official or outside expert, followed by a moderated discussion, on a topic to be announced in advance.

In 1991, the Conference adopted Recommendation 91-1, Federal Agency Cooperation with Foreign Government Regulators, which recommended practices such as information exchanges and establishment of common regulatory agendas to facilitate regulatory cooperation.

Recommendation 2024-7, Nonlawyer Assistance and Representation in Agency Adjudications provides best practices for agencies to increase the availability of nonlawyer representation and assistance to participants in their adjudicative systems.

Agency decision makers and private parties frequently require access to records maintained by federal agencies to decide cases and participate meaningfully in agency adjudications, investigations, and similar proceedings. In some contexts, a private party is responsible for obtaining a record from the government—sometimes by submitting a Freedom of Information Act request—and providing the record to an agency decision maker.

This project will study how agency adjudication offices are organized and managed and recommend best practices that promote fair, accurate, consistent, efficient, and timely decision making.

This project will study when agencies assert the good cause exemption and recommend best practices for public engagement when agencies find good cause to forgo notice-and-comment rulemaking procedures.

This project will recommend best practices regarding public participation in agency adjudicative proceedings.

This project examines agency approaches to regional administration of regulatory programs, including how much discretion and authority agencies delegate to regional offices, how agencies develop and disclose policies governing the relationship between regional and central offices, how regional offices develop and disclose local policies, and how agencies coordinate and oversee regional operations.

The Roundtable on Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Federal Agencies will help agencies develop and improve protocols and practices for using AI tools in their administrative processes. It will provide a forum for officials representing agencies across the federal government to exchange information and best practices related to uses of AI in rulemaking, adjudication, enforcement, and other administrative processes.

The administrative procedural practices of state and local governments might provide helpful lessons for federal agencies. ACUS is soliciting information about state- and local-government practices that federal agencies may wish to consider and could feasibly adopt. Examples may include: