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Susquehanna River Basin Commission

*a water management agency serving the Susquehanna River Watershed*

**U.S. House of Representatives**

**Committee on Agriculture**

**Subcommittee on Conservation, Credit, Energy, and Research**

**[USDA CONSERVATION PROGRAMS]{.underline}**

**April 19, 2007 Subcommittee Hearing**

**Thomas W. Beauduy**

**Deputy Director & Counsel**

**Susquehanna River Basin Commission**

Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee, ladies and gentlemen, thank
you for the opportunity to appear at today's hearing to present comments
on the USDA conservation programs now under review by the Subcommittee
as it considers 2007 Farm Bill legislation.

By way of background, the Susquehanna River Basin Commission is a
federal-interstate compact commission created in 1971 by the joint
adoption of its compact by the U.S. Congress, the States of Maryland and
New York, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Commission was
created for the express purpose of managing the water resources of the
basin through the joint exercise of the sovereign authority of its
signatory members.

The Susquehanna River Basin, comprising 27,510 square miles, is home to
some of the most productive agricultural lands in the United States and
provides over 50% of the fresh water flow to the Chesapeake Bay. The
river itself flows 444 miles, starting at its headwaters in Cooperstown,
New York, and empties into the Upper Chesapeake Bay at Havre de Grace,
Maryland. Along the way, it courses through Pennsylvania, where it
drains a full 50% of the land area of the Commonwealth.

As is the case in other regions around the country, agriculture is
central to the fabric of the basin. It comprises 21% of the land
resource base of the basin and is significant economically, culturally
and environmentally to the region. Coupled with forest lands, which
comprise 69%, these open-space land uses comprise 90% of our land
resource base and define the basin's rural identity. Beyond their
economic and cultural significance, these lands provide important
wildlife habitat, facilitate groundwater recharge, help to regulate
surface water flows, and naturally function to sequester carbon.

The conservation programs administered by USDA, particularly as they
were expanded by the 2002 Farm Bill, have become critical both to
sustaining agriculture and simultaneously minimizing its impact on the
water resources of the basin. This holds true for the receiving waters
of the Chesapeake Bay as well. In fact, the multi-jurisdictional
strategy for restoration of the Bay has been a significant driver for
both our regional reliance upon existing conservation programs and
support for their expansion under the 2007 Farm Bill.

The support for expansion of the conservation programs in our region
comes in no small measure from the fact that agriculture contributes 50%
of the nitrogen load, 60% of the phosphorus load, and 63% of the
sediment load.

Reducing the nonpoint source nutrient loads, particularly from
agriculture, are central to the tributary strategies of the member
states, both in the basin and Bay-wide. Why? As an earlier report of the
Chesapeake Bay Commission points out, five of the six most
cost-effective water quality restoration practices identified are
agricultural ("*Cost Effective Strategies for the Bay: Smart Investments
for Nutrient and Sediment Reduction for the Bay,*" December, 2004).

The reliance upon existing conservation programs and the desire for
their expansion, particularly in terms of funding level support, may not
be unique to the Bay region, but it is nonetheless uniquely critical to
the success of its restoration strategy. That need for expansion is
matched by an unmet demand that already exists from USDA's customer base
in the region under existing programmatic scope and funding levels.

I will admit to you that, unlike most of the organizations presenting
testimony here today, the Commission has not been actively engaged in
the current deliberations in Washington over the provisions of the 2007
Farm Bill. What we are engaged in is the active management of the water
resources of a significant eastern United States river basin, and from
that vantage point, we understand and support the efforts to enhance,
both programmatically and financially, USDA's conservation programs
under the 2007 Farm Bill.

We can well appreciate that perhaps the real challenge before you is to
sort through what programmatic modifications, and related funding level
authorizations, are appropriate to effectuate the enhancement of these
programs. We can also appreciate your challenge in sorting through the
emergence of various regional proposals, especially given the desire to
bring to fruition a truly national Farm Bill.

Having said that, and at the risk of sounding parochial, I can't help
but offer a few comments on the CHESSEA marker bill advanced by
Congressman Van Hollen of Maryland (Chesapeake's Healthy and
Environmentally Sound Stewardship of Energy and Agriculture Act of
2007). Given its unabashed attention to the Bay watershed, I should be
saying, "What's not to love about CHESSEA?"

But I won't. Instead, what I will say is that it contains a number of
creative approaches that can be built upon to target funding to regions
across the country, like the Chesapeake Bay region, where agriculture
plays a heightened role, not only on the water quality degradation side
but on the restoration side as well. Prioritizing at least some program
elements and funding for regions where agriculture plays that heightened
role is not parochialism in our view; it's good public policy.

Take for example, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)
provisions of CHESSEA. In addition to increasing funding from
\$1.3 billion to \$2.0 billion, it would direct the Secretary to give
priority to states that are part of interstate watersheds with nutrient
and sediment impairments and where the initiative has been taken to
develop state-approved plans to address such impairments.

Another example is the Regional Water Quality Enhancement Program
proposal, which will focus cooperative approaches to water quality
restoration on a regional scale for larger bodies of water across the
nation, providing a competitive grant source for these large-scale
conservation projects that demonstrate cost-effectiveness.

Under the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), the provision to set aside
a 7 million acre goal for the CRP continuous enrollment and the
Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP) with priority for
contracts given to riparian buffers, restored wetlands and other
habitats that improve water quality and are called for in state-approved
restoration plans likewise represents good policy. So too are the
provisions related to performance initiatives for states, rewarding
producers for environmental performance, and collaboration.

Adjustments to the funding levels for these and other programs,
including the Conservation Innovative Grants, Conservation Security
Program and Agricultural Management Assistance should also be supported.

In discussing programs designed to address water quality concerns, the
Commission believes that consideration should be given to an issue that
traditionally has been on the water quantity side of the equation. We
believe that ensuring programmatic coverage to acreage known as critical
aquifer recharge areas (CARA's) is important not only in a quantitative
sense, but in a qualitative sense as well.

In a geologic sense, these are areas that have very high recharge
productivity. They are land surface areas that are responsible for a
disproportionately large fraction of the groundwater recharge in an
area. Delineation and protection of these areas are significant not only
for regional groundwater availability, but for the maintenance of base
flow of streams.

During low flow conditions, that base flow is critical for aquatic
health, water supply, and importantly, for assimilative capacity related
to water quality. Also, because of their high recharge productivity,
they can unfortunately act as aggressive conduits for surface
contaminants, including nutrients, to the groundwater aquifer. That
degraded groundwater ultimately discharges as base flow and adds to the
nutrient load.

For all these reasons, we believe such areas genuinely constitute
environmentally sensitive acreage that is worthy of consideration,
whether in CREP or any other conservation program under which it would
be appropriate to advance water quality objectives. Importantly, it
would also advance a truly integrated approach to water resource
management.

As I noted at the outset, we appreciate the opportunity to present these
comments and would be happy to address any of your comments or concerns.
Thank you.