Yes — that’s consistent with the historical record.
Jim Tozzi, while serving in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) during the Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan administrations, was deeply involved in building the White House’s centralized system for reviewing agency regulations.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, he began using (and promoting) the phrase “centralized regulatory review” to describe the process in which OMB—particularly its emerging regulatory office, later formalized as OIRA—would serve as the central authority to coordinate, review, and sometimes revise agency regulations before they were issued.
The term helped frame the practice as not just interagency consultation, but a structured, White House–level oversight mechanism—emphasizing control, consistency, and cost-effectiveness. Over time, this phrase became embedded in academic, policy, and legal discussions of regulatory oversight.
