I know it would have been much more convenient to have held all committee meetings on this important piece of legislation in Washington, DC. I am most appreciative of you for bringing this committee hearing to the Natural State in the heartland of America, reaching out to receive testimony from many who would not otherwise have the opportunity to be heard by the full committee. This is governmen~t at its best. I believe your being here expresses your keen interest in the quality of life of all Americans to the benefit of present and future generations. I believe you and I share the view that the quality of life begins with the quality of the environment, and the quality of the environment depends on the commitment we individually and collectively have to that end. Economic growth is important and very necessary if we are to continue to be a great nation and provide meaningful job opportunities for generations to come. We can have good clean environment and continued strong economic growth only through common-sense laws and regulations. Mark Twain once said, "Common-sense is not too common." I believe that to be too often true in the development of federal environmental regulations. I commend Senator Michael Crapo and Senator Bob Smith, Committee Chair, for an excellently crafted common-sense bill, S. 2417. I believe passage of S. 2417 to be critical to the continued protection and enhancement of the environment and to the economic well-being of our people. This bill must surely be one that can be embraced by Republicans, Democrats, independents, and the public. You, as no other elected body recognize the urgency in addressing the critical issue of non-point source pollutant contributions to the waters of our nation. We must also recognize that agriculture and silviculture are not the only sources contributing to the sedimentation of our streams. Construction of highways, streets, roads, bridges, mining, and economic and housing development projects are major contributors of siltation. However, these sources can be controlled by stormwater permit requirements. Sto~rmwater is covered in federal laws that allow the issuance of National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits for these activities.
Section 3 of S. 2417: This section is critical to the success of the TMDL program. This is true in both the 106 and 319 programs. The 90% grant to eligible landowners is appropriate. We, the states, currently have to match the small amount of 106 federal money currently dedicated to the TMDL program with 40% state money. The states will be doing 90% or more of the TMDL work. Therefore, I recommend that the match for both 106 and 319 federal dollars require 10% cash match. State programs have matured. A recent study shows that states now have received authority to run 70% of the delegable environmental programs; states provide 75% to 80% of all enforcement of environmental laws and regulations and provide greater than 94% of all the data in the EPA data base. Even though the states are faced with rapidly growing environmental workloads and responsibility, the EPA continues to unnecessarily increase the number of staff in the Washington office. In light of EPA's isolating its salary and administrative costs in its appropriation behind a "Chinese wall," I am concerned about how much of the appropriation envisioned in Section 3 of the bill will be available to states.
Section 4 of S. 2417: I am pleased to see the requirement that the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency contract with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to carry out the provisions of Section 4. Limiting NAS to 18 months to complete its work and report to Congress may be optimistic. EPA has had 28 years to accomplish his and is still working on the guidelines for conducting TMDLs. The NAS involvement will instill a greater public trust ~the process.
When the bill first came to my attention, I assumed it would be prescriptive and for that reason would not be able to support it. However, after poring over it this past weekend, I support it. It has dawned on me that the current EPA Administrator has given interpretations to federal law that was never intended by the Congress. Many of those interpretations wrongly favor the EPA regulations. In view of EPA's dismal record of losing, in~ court, significantly over 50% of the challenges to such interpretation, I must concur with the prescriptiveness encompassed in S. 2417.
I strongly urge bipartisan support of S. 2417.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS
Mr. Chuck Fox, Assistant Administrator for Water, EPA, Washington, called me in early April. He asked what course I would recommend he take to address concerns raised about the proposed regulations that addressed TMDL and NPDES for agriculture and silviculture. My advice to Mr. Fox was that EPA should pull back the regulation and change the language to compost with what he and Administrator Carol Browner were saying about the regulation. Most of the concerns were addressed in an EPA send USDA meeting convened in April which resulted in the issuance of a joint statement May 1, 2000, by the EPA and USDA. The changes they proposed, in my New, make the regulation supportable. However, I have a major concern with the joint report. It appears that EPA accepts part of the ruling by a U.~S. District Court Judge on its authority concerning the TMDL initiative while ignoring the second part.
The court ruled that the EPA has the authority to include non-point pollution sources in a TMDL process. EPA agrees, as do I. However, the U.S. Dis~trict Judge ruled that although TMDLs are part of the Clean Water Act, :he TMDLs should only be advisory to the states. EPA tends to interpret its guidelines as a fact of law, even though many are adopted without having public input. District Judge Alsup also nailed that non-point sources of pollution should not be subject to mandatory regulations under the Clean water Act. Apparently, the EPA disagrees. The joint statement continues the discussion of requiring permits under certain circumstances. In my opinion, permits could only be required if the EPA changes the definition of which activities require a point source NODES) permit. The EPA has lost a significant majority of its legal challenges arising over its interpretation, rather its misinterpretation, of the environmental laws enacted by the U.S. Congress. It seems to me Hat He EPA would have to declare sheet runoff from rainfall to be a point source of pollution. Example, a section of land being farmed or having a silviculture activity carried out would have rainfall runoff for a distance of one mile. The EPA must not be allowed to circumvent the laws and intent of the U.S. Congress by defining such non-point source activities to be point source discharges.
I have every confidence in Mr. Chuck Fox's integrity and fully believe he will keep his commitments to honor the agreement EPA made with the USDA if he is allowed to do so.