browner

Carol Browner

Carol M. Browner (born December 16 1955) served as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency during the Clinton Administration in the United States. She is the longest-serving administrator in the history of the agency, staying through both terms of the Clinton presidency.

Before the Clinton Administration

Browner received her undergraduate degree and law degree from the University of Florida in 1977 and 1979. In the early stage of her career, she worked for Citizen Action as its associate director and served as general counsel to the Florida House Committee on Government Operations.

Between 1986 and 1991, she served as a key aide to Senator Lawton Chiles and then-Senator Al Gore. Browner headed the Florida Department of Environmental Protection from 1991 to 1993.

During the Clinton Administration

When Republicans took control of Congress after the 1994 elections, she took the lead in the Clinton Administration in successfully fighting efforts by the Republicans, especially in the House of Representatives, to weaken the Clean Water Act. She was able to work in a bipartisan manner, though, with Congressional Republicans in helping craft amendments to strengthen the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Food Quality Protection Act.

Browner came from Florida with a reputation as someone who could work with the private sector. While at EPA, she expanded the Agency's flexible public-private partnerships as alternatives to traditional regulation through Project XL (designed to find common sense, cost effective solutions to environmental issues at individual facilities) and the Common Sense Initiative (targeted at efforts involving entire industry sectors).

In 1995, Browner generated controversy, after she and the EPA were charged by the House Government Reform and Oversight Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs with violating the federal Anti-Lobbying Act (18 U.S. Code § 1913) by faxing unsolicited material opposing the Republican-sponsored regulatory reform package to various corporations and public-interest groups.

As EPA Administrator, Browner also started the Agency's successful brownfields program, which, during her tenure, helped facilitate cleanups of contaminated facilities, especially in urban areas, and which leveraged more than $1 billion in public and private funds for cleanups.

Since 2001

After the Clinton Administration, Browner joined the Albright Group, a "global strategy group" headed by former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. As a Principal in that firm, Browner assists businesses and other organizations with the challenges of operating internationally, including the challenges of complying with environmental regulations.

Browner is currently the chair of the Audubon Society; her term expires in 2008.

Browner married former Congressman Thomas Joseph Downey on June 21, 2007, her third marriage.