Subcommittee Marks Up Weather Forecasting Legislation, Democrats Continue to Push for Bipartisan Process

Press Release

Today, the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology's Subcommittee on Environment held a markup of H.R. 2413, the Weather Forecasting Improvement Act of 2013, which would reprioritize research initiatives at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR) among other things.

Subcommittee Democrats were disturbed by the lack of bipartisan work on the legislation.

Ranking Member Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR) said, "Because this markup was noticed immediately prior to the July 4th holiday, we have had very little time to turn these ideas into legislative language and, importantly, to vet that language with the weather community. I certainly hope that there will be time for that before moving to a Full Committee markup. As it stands, the bill we are marking up today remains flawed, a conclusion I reached listening to the testimony of the expert witnesses who were invited by the Minority and by the Majority. This is an area where we have a chance to do something good for the public and truly bipartisan if my colleagues in the Majority are willing…This bill is important to the safety of the public -- why rush it and risk not getting it right?"

The Subcommittee held two hearings on the legislation. At the second hearing and at the markup, Democratic Members noted that some improvements had been made to the bill but still emphasized a number of areas of concern including that the distinction between "weather" and "climate" research is counterproductive; that the National Weather Service is largely ignored with the focus instead on OAR, the line office responsible for research within NOAA; that the bill does an inadequate job of bringing better coordination across OAR and NWS; and that the bill appears to authorize unnecessary expenditures such as authorizing OAR to spend $20 million on a joint technology transfer initiative, while NWS currently already spends almost $80 million on research to operations activities.

Democratic Members offered a number of amendments.

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) offered two amendments to ensure a continued focus on hurricane forecasting enhancement. Both were accepted.

Rep. Donna F. Edwards (D-MD) offered an amendment to strike a section of the bill that requires a plan to be developed for high performance computing support of advanced research and operational weather prediction models. She was concerned that the requirements in the bill would have led to NOAA cannibalizing weather and climate research computing to enhance operational computing. The amendment failed by a party-line recorded vote.

Ms. Edwards said, "It has been clear on this subcommittee, as it has been clear in our full committee, that there is a deep animus to anything related to climate research. The reality is that climate is impacting weather and it impacts our weather forecasting. It is important for us as policymakers to stop having this silly debate and start providing agencies with the resources that they need to respond so that our communities are not further devastated by the impacts of future weather events. Our experts need to have the full knowledge and expertise about those impacts so that there can be better forecasting, so that it works for our farmers and our industries. To not to have the kind of capacity we need to save lives is very irresponsible. I suppose you can bury your head in the sand, if there is any sand left on the beach when another severe climate event happens, and our weather services are not able to keep up with that for the American public. When another community is devastated, whether it is this year, or next year, or the year after, I guess I would leave it to the scientists on this Committee to explain to the American public how we failed them."

Ms. Bonamici withdrew all of her amendments after the Chairman committed to her that he would work with Subcommittee Democrats on the legislation before it is considered by the Full Committee. She pushed for additional time to address problems with the legislation and incorporate ideas presented during testimony at the June 26th hearing.

She said, "It is my understanding that we are going to continue to work together with the goal of improving weather forecasting and create a bipartisan bill that I hope all members can support."

H.R. 2413 passed the Subcommittee by voice vote and was reported favorably to the Full Committee.

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