The White House registered strong opposition Monday to water resources legislation the Senate is set to take up, saying it doesn't "currently support al of those key policies and principles" in the measure and chiding lawmakers for weakening "congressional involvement a and transparency."
The Statement of Administration Policy, issued minutes after an agreement among senators averted a cloture vote and cleared the way for the Senate to begin debating the bill (S 601) on Tuesday, stopped short of an outright veto threat. But the sharp criticism is likely to complicate efforts to pass the bipartisan legislation.
The bill would authorize Army Corps of Engineers water programs, including dredging and harbor maintenance projects. The White House joined environmentalists in criticizing provisions aimed at accelerating environmental reviews of water projects, urging further negotiations to "evaluate the full range of reasonable alternatives and to promote better environmental stewardship."
The administration also criticized lawmakers for failing to earmark specific projects for funding, saying the legislation as written would expand "federal obligations without ensuring that taxpayer dollars are targeted to achieve the highest overall return for our nation."
In addition, the White House reiterated objections to requiring the entire $1.6 billion collected each year for the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund to be spent on port projects. Allocating the money that way would increase the amount of matching federal dollars for projects, driving up the total cost by $15 billion over the next decade, the White House said.
A dispute over dedicating the trust fund proceeds to port projects was the hang-up that threatened to force a Senate cloture vote before proceeding with the bill. Appropriators objected that the language would intrude on their jurisdiction and force funding cuts to other government programs.
Under the bill, any attempt to cut Army Corps of Engineers spending below the previous year's level would be subject to a point of order, which would require a two-thirds Senate vote to waive.
Senate Appropriations Chairwoman Barbara A. Mikulski, D-Md., and three other appropriators warned in a letter last month that the provision could have "serious, negative, unintended consequences" by barring unspent trust fund money from offsetting unrelated government spending -- in this case energy research and development programs that include the national laboratories.
But groups such as the American Association of Port Authorities support the provision that would dedicate to port maintenance and expansion all the user fees contributed to the trust fund. Walling off the trust fund is considered critical to getting industry support for the bill.
Lobbyists and aides said a manager's amendment that would tweak the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund financing issue as well as some environmental language issues is expected Tuesday.
Alabama Republican Richard C. Shelby said negotiators are close to a deal that would settle the issue.
"We've been working with trying to put the final touches on it, but I think we basically worked out a deal that we can move forward with," Shelby said.
Inland-waterways advocates are still pushing to add separate legislation (S 407) addressing funding for rivers, locks and dams to the bill. The river bill's chief architect, Pennsylvania Democrat Bob Casey, is prepared to offer at least parts of his legislation as amendments to the larger water package, though barge operators say certain provisions, such as restructuring spending on an Ohio River locks project that has run over budget and past deadline, will be needed to secure their support. The industry has proposed increasing the tax on diesel that it pays if the funds are fully utilized on the inland waterways infrastructure.
The White House said in its statement that it wants to see inland waterways programs addressed in the final water bill, although it reiterated opposition to the diesel tax hike.
Meanwhile, Environment and Public Works Committee aides continued working to revise provisions designed to expedite permitting for water projects, which have drawn the wrath of environmental groups and some of their Senate allies.
The critics especially oppose language that would assess penalties on any agency with a role in the environmental permitting process that misses a deadline. Senators who oppose this language, including Commerce, Science and Transportation Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., and Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., say this could create a chilling effect on understaffed agencies that might stifle meaningful reviews.
Aides are trying to find ways to achieve the objective of speeding up the time it takes federal agencies to complete environmental studies of proposed water projects.
An aide said some affected departments have expressed concern that the current language could actually lead them to make more-conservative decisions about projects than they might if they had time for careful review.
"By not providing enough time, you're defaulting to err on the side of 'Let's not do anything' or 'Let's keep studying it,'" he said.
Environment and Public Works Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and the panel's ranking Republican, David Vitter of Louisiana, have made clear that any changes to the legislation that emerged from committee must satisfy them both.
"Whatever they come up with is going to be amenable to both of them," the aide said of the committee leaders.
Organizations like the National Wildlife Federation Action Fund have reached out to members to encourage them to oppose the provisions mandating faster permitting reviews.
Fiscal watchdog groups such as Taxpayers for Common Sense also oppose the bill, contending that it would spend too much money with insufficient congressional oversight. The organization, which was a leader in efforts to publicize congressionally mandated earmarks, contends that the lack of earmarks in the water bill is "in effect giving the Corps carte blanche to spend on projects of its own choosing."
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