Clarifying Permit Requirements for Certain Vessel Discharges
CLARIFYING PERMIT REQUIREMENTS FOR CERTAIN VESSEL DISCHARGES -- (House of Representatives - July 22, 2008)
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Mr. LaTOURETTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume.
Again, I want to praise a number of our colleagues, first and foremost among them, the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, who introduced just yesterday, I think, H.R. 6556, and, again, would indicate that anyone that followed the House schedule doesn't need to adjust their television set. We are, in fact, doing Senate 3298 and not House bill 6556.
Again, it's thanks to the pressure, and I didn't know I was citing a biblical verse before, but give thanks to the pressure exerted by Chairman Oberstar indicating that we were prepared to proceed.
Just a quick story about those 200 meters to the other side, there is a rather famous clock on the other side of the Capitol called the Ohio Clock. Every time I have been over there it doesn't seem to be working, but it's right twice a day, and I think once today at least and in passing these pieces of legislation, the United States Senate has sent us a good piece of legislation, which we can send on to the President.
I rise in support of Senate 3298, and this has been the result of bipartisan, bicameral discussions by a number of Members on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
The House is taking action to approve this bill in conjunction with the recreational boating measure that we just passed, the court decision which would require this permitting business that we have talked about that was never contemplated by the Clean Water Act.
The bill will exempt small commercial vessels and all fishing vessels from obtaining these permits for 2 years while the agency studies the nature of impacts and discharges that are normal to the operation of these vessels. Following the submission of the required report, Congress will have better tools to determine if these discharges should be regulated or exempted, as is the case with recreational vehicles.
Enactment of this legislation and its companion will carry out an agreement made with Chairman Oberstar to address the entire scope of vessels that will be impacted by the pending EPA permit program.
I, again, want to commend Chairman Oberstar, thank him for working with us, and on our side of the aisle someone who has been dogged, and, I think, concerned as Gene Taylor of Mississippi was on the Democratic side of the aisle, on our side of the aisle Mr. Young of Alaska and Mr. LoBiondo of New Jersey were afraid that because we have 14 million recreational boaters, perhaps we would deal with that issue and then leave this issue hanging in limbo.
But, again, as a result of the reaching across the aisle and across the Capitol, can-do spirit of Chairman Oberstar, we were able to come to this moment in time. I guess the only thing that we can hope, is if the reference to the slumbering dinosaur is accurate, that 2 years is enough time for them to again awaken from their slumber and solve this problem when this moratorium expires.
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