the committee on transportation and infrastructure will come to order for the second time today we meet today to review implementation of the water resources assistant hangs in the corner of the committee room job lot and they serve as chair of the committee for years served in the house twenty eight years and was the first chairman of the special investigating committee in the federal aid highway program estab lished at the direction of speaker rayburn three years after the state highway program was enacted to inquire into allegations of fraud option abuse in the implementation of the interstate program and the highway trust fund scattered reports of abuse of the right of way acquisition of construction practices of concrete not being poured that was not up to engineering standards bridges that were built that were not at sixteen feet lower elevation and speaker rayburn said i don't want this largest public works program in the history of the country maybe the history of the world to get off to a bad start and john locke was a combat paratrooper in world war two sir behind nazi things no states had internal audit review procedures for their highway programs they've never seen as much money as was coming out of the highway trust fund and they didn't ought to handle it and were prepared to handle it as a result  of those investigations every state adopted internal budget review management procedures furthermore thirty six people contractors state officials and federal high public roads personnel went to federal and state prison and lessons were learned in the contractor community but it was tough oversight by this committe meticulous thorough review of the work that kept the federal highway program on a straight path but we're not here to review corruption or fraud or abuse but branch directed to ensure that the executive does its job properly that the laws are implemented as intended by congress and also to learn lessons from implementation that may res further legislative changes we enacted the water resources development act on nov eighth two thousand and seven overriding a presidential veto in the history of the congress there's been one johnson who was chair of the water resources subcommittee i was in the hospital having my neck operated on stalling titanium rods overcome the adverse effects of bicycling accident twenty years earlier that  senate followed suit that day seventy nine fourteen that's a really strong affirmation of the principles of that bill go to some detail because it is this wasn't just an afterthought  of action that it was the culmination of seven years of pent up demand for projects for authorization of funding of the needs of navigation flood control  water resource water protection levees restoring the everglades and a whole host of other issues the bill had such enormous support because m worked together right at the outset of the session to scrub all the projects that had passed this committee in the three previous congresses but i've never been acted on at least in one session never acted on by the senate environment public works committee never passed the senate we never got to conference on those issues but they had passed the house so let's start there with the bill with the projects that we know and let's have a new process by which every member must sign a document that has no personal family financial interest in the project and put but all the projects on our committee web so we have complete transparency and openness among those nine hundred projects where new authorities for the florida everglades restoration of the coastal wetlands of louisiana and mississippi following hurricanes katrina  modernization of the water transportation system upgrading the five principal locks on the mississippi and one on the ohio river respectively from six hundred to twelve hundred feet intolerable that that barge traffic takes eight hundred twenty hours round trip from clinton iowa to new orleans the world's most important export facility because the locks on the mississippi  grain production in the upper midwest and the port of new orleans can't be as efficient as it as it is designed to be because it takes so long for product to get there so we included modernization of those locks in that legislation we also adopted reforms for the corps of engineers the old paradigm of damage digit drain which the corps of been accused of that my minnesota colleague republican colleague from minnesota southeastern minnesota and i co sponsored to require mitigation to be done concurrently with the construction because it was so often the case that the corps got to the end of the project we'd love to do that mitigation we ran out of money and we've completed the process we don't have time to do this and we just saw the dredge boils over the levee on the other side and  damn the consequences that's got to change and we had an amendment in a word a bill that would require mitigation to be done concurrently with construction of the funding to be done concurrently what hasn't been  to submit larger more controversy over projects to outside independent review to improve the quality of modeling and analysis results sound conclusions based on data based on sound analysis we direct to the court update how it plans and implement the project principles one hundred eighty three developed before the core had an environmental mission or before the net loss of wetlands was adopted that policy had to be updated and was directed to be done in seven to reflect sustainable development rather than an exploitive economic development such as the mississippi river gulf outlet to avoid unwise development o slow to implement and it has not followed the direct language of the statute and congressional intent today we released a report that highlights several  core shortcomings on improved mitigation independent review planning principles and guidelines these were major subjects of our discussions over a period of years they were the point of agreement between the house and the senate resulted in this and in this enormous vote that we had on both sides of the aisle corps guidelines guidance rather for implementing mitigation was not issued until august thirty one last year twenty one months after an accident or field offices during the interim try to implement the statute without clear direction without direction on formulating adequate mitigation plans consultation with state and federal resource agencies was not happening independent review the corps still has not supplied a definitive list of projects subject to the mandatory requirements the reviews that have been undertaken were done without public notice without public input even completed reviews are not routinely released publicly way behind schedule president's budget i was appalled to find out the revisions will be four years late and that's in part due to the council on environmental quality part the office of management and budget the corps has known and the assistant secretary prior to have known that this was the intent of congress this is a requirement of congress and should have been leading the charge the corps has in fact implemented its programs beyond the authority and beyond the intent of years ruled that the proposed project would have an acceptable adverse effect on the fishery areas wildlife adversely affecting sixty seven thousand acres of land and other waters of the united states and denied a permit  congress or gave the court gave the courts three years to change its operation or get new authority from congress there are other shortcomings from the guidelines application of davis bacon streamlining project formulation that's very important for people delivery process settlement management flexibility in financing projects all of those are going to be the is making in implementing the provisions of the water resource development act of two thousand and seven by the corps count there are seven hundred twenty six individual sections in two thousand and seven to be implemented most of these are projects that congress has authorized the corps to carry out some are policy provisions related to changes in how the corps conducts its planning process these provisions were very controversial in two thousand and seven was being developed we had a good debate on these issues and in the end not all members were content with the final outcome nevertheless war to two thousand and seven is now the law of the land and we all support it being implemented as written i will say that i support the course carrying out the provisions of war to two thousand and seven including the required schedules and if the administration finds that some provision laws unworkable is serious possibility come to the committee and ask for a legislative fix i'm not as he's as he's just done more interested and concerned about the direction ministration is heading as it carries out some of the policy issues of war to two thousand and seven mentioned just a couple section two thousand and three includes a generic credit provision that allows non federal partners to receive credit for any kind of work done on projects it's about the interesting frustrating administration that takes great liberty with this interpretation of staff statutory language under the principles and guidelines the secretary of the army to revise the water resources planning principles and guidelines as they relate to the corps of engineers the administration has ignored congressional direction and assigned the task of revising principals and guidelines to the council on environmental quality not the secretary of the army in addition the administration is has invited agencies not typically responsible for water project planning to actively participate in interpreting the statute this committee the congress and the corps of engineers itself has worked hard for decades to better understand the environmental impacts of water resources development and to minimizing the mitigate for that there is a system about contributing to the national economic development consistent with protecting the environment section two thousand and two thousand and thirty one of word of two thousand and seven established a national policy that water resources projects should encourage economic development and protect the environment by number one seeking to maximize sustainable economic development seeking to avoid the unwise use of flood plains and thirdly protecting and restoring toward the two thousand and seven objectives c q stated that the projects must protect and restore natural ecosystems while encouraging sustainable economic development clearly the administration is headed towards a new page a that has a bias in favor of environmental projects or a no action alternative and against economic praja this approach is contrary to the objectives stated in the section two money but our hope is that the extra process results in better projects that that is true but i will add that no other federal agency has to go through so much scrutiny and process to brings public works projects to the nation i think the most common complaint members of congress hear about the corps of engineers is not that they're planning principles have been wrong but that there are some are in process that it takes too long to get a decision out of them and i think all of us  here on the transportation committee and in congress could provide many many real life examples of that i'm afraid mr chairman that the way this administration is intervening the word of two thousand and seven provision driven as the p m g together with the additional law is being implemented as written and intended i am and will continue to be a strong supporter of increased investments in our nation's infrastructure as i see fit on the house floor during the debate on the conference committee report for two thousand and seven water resources development we do right by this country when we invest in its infinite structure including our critical water infrastructure came to be known as the preceding two thousand and seven as a core reinforcement this included strengthening the effectiveness of the corps mitigation program establishing requirements for independent review of proposed projects that we were that were large all controversy and revisiting revising the planning principles and lines that the corps uses to develop this project organization i was recently disappointed to learn that based on research conducted by our committee staff many of the repo norma's that this committee and ultimately congress approved have not been implemented i hope this hearing will shed li on why many of the mandates in the below still await action twenty eight months later and after the water resources building hackmen the corps was required to implement revised principles and guidelines within one year  we still have not seen them to encourage consistency and record keeping mandated we've mandated that the corps of run a unique tracking number for each water resource project and again our research shows it has not yet been implemented congress also included language to help improve and strengthen the corps mitigation program i was deeply disappointed to learn that the corps ignored congressional direction to implement mitigation in advance project construction the corps guidelines document on this issue makes no mention of understanding undertaking the mitigation before  construction on a project there are other examples that i could cite but i am eager to hear what our witnesses have to say in response to these lapses of our so i want to hear from them on what this committee can do to help them achieve the problematic changes of the water resources development act of two thousand and seven and again our nation's infrastructure is in critical need i stand ready to do all i can to get us back on the right track kyle thank you very much mr chairman and mr chairman i just want to reiterate your concern with respect to the army corps efficiency and credibility i believe that this is an extremely important hearing especially for the people of louisiana who live along the gulf coast region and i just want to point the army cor with a number of projects that we have in the district that the the i'm a corps has virtually missed all of the deadlines specifically a one is the violent diversion  section three thirty three required to be corps to design and construct the lot of diversion and the law requires the corps to complete design on the project by november of two thousand and nine this has been rolled based on my understanding to a larger marciano restoration under section seventy thirteen but has not been designed the second project is the h and c lock replacement section fifty eight the required courses submit supplemental for four project much alive first two thousand and eight the i asked what final submitted but that line was met the comprehensive stud section seven there was zero to require the court to develop a comprehensive plan for coastal louisiana by november two thousand and eight based on my understanding this comprehensive study was never started  the us army corps claims that funds were not specifically appropriated for initiating however a specific appropriation was not  necessary the fourth project or at least a number of projects concerned for for l c a additional projects section seven zero zero six required for feasibility studies be submitted by december thirty first two thousand and nine and these studies were never submitted section seven zero zero six the three required six feasibility studies to be submitted by december thirty first of two thousand and eight the studies were never completed even though based on my understanding the district personnel are moving forward and the report was supposed to be is supposed to be due by december thirty first of two thousand and ten miss to go restoration plan section seventy thirteen requires a restoration plan from is to go by mid two thousand and eight planned and all reports were scheduled have a number of major projects in my district and the deadlines are either missed or some of the projects were or at least some of the requirements were never submitted i am also concerned about the corps the corps excessive delays in deepening and mean and maintaining a portion of the mississippi channel ha sent to the napoleon avenue container terminal at the port of new orleans a small enough  project to deepen and maintain the burthen area near that terminal was specifically authorized by word of two thousand and seven that was two years ago and the corps has not even begun a routine study to examine the significant transportation and we laded economic benefits that the navigation project will produce that are vital to the competitiveness of the port of new orleans mr chairman the waterways r and trickle part of louisiana's way of life as well as and indispensable components of our economy and if we don't keep the army corps up to task with a number of these spot checks it will affect our ability to recover as well as it will affect our ability to provide our people with  jobs i thank you for holding this hearing and i hope that we can both continue to work together to address the needs of the people along the gulf coast especially for the people of new orleans in which in fact over the course of years and glad you raised those issues mr bishop is german i don't have a formal opening statement i just want to thank you for holding this hearing given the nature of my district the  we all understand here in this committee that nearly a third of our energy comes through that port of new orleans and we want to make sure that not only they recover but that our nation recovers as well in this economic downturn i look forward to your comments reason the second system is being built is that the first one was done according to the recommendation of the corps of engineers when president teddy  engineers who spent a year traveling the document writing his port forty pages which i've seen and it's fascinating report went up through the chief of engineers report recommended locks of one hundred fifty foot and fifteen hundred foot length had that original plan been built that wouldn't be doing a second one now  members of the committee i'm honored to testify before you today on the implementation of the water resources development act of two thousand and seven as you know i have a deep personal interest and a keen appreciation of the importance of the water resources development act for the program i focused my oral statement on the implementation of the national policy provisions contained entitled to and would ask that my full statement be included in the record a lot of church and sword and especially like to focus on the four specific provisions in that title two section twenty thirty one which is the principles and guidelines sections twenty thirty four independent peer review section twenty thirty five safety assurance review and section two thousand thirty six which is mitigation for fish and wildlife and wetlands losses section twenty thirty one of the water resources development actor ect of the secretary of the army to revise the economic and environmental principles and guidelines for water and related land resources implementation studies which are referred to as the p and g the council owned by a metal quality took the lead in this effort to apply the revised p m g to all federal agencies involved in water resources project development a process that is expected to last at least another year on december third of two thousand and nine the council on environmental quality submitted to the national academy of sciences for peer review new proposed revisions to the principles as well as the chapter one of the guidelines of the one thousand nine hundred three p m g which are called the proposed national objectives principles and standards for water and related resources implementation studies and water science technology board review will take about eleven months to complete this draft was concurrently made available for public review for ninety days the administration plans to issue the principles and standards and final form in the spring of two thousand and eleven after consideration and resolution of comments received from the general public and from the national academy the corps implemented a comprehensive peer review process in may of two thousand and five with the publication of an engineering circular for peer review of decision documents which established a rigorous peer review process adopting most of the recommendations of the national resource council study under section two sixteen  awarded two thousand and implementing the two thousand and four office of management and budget information quality bulletin peer review provisions in the water resource development act of two thousand and seven reinforce and further to define for the core of this review process we recently published an engineering circular which provides a more comprehensive and a more robust review policy for civil works planning design and construction the guidance contained in this  engineering lays out a standard seamless process for review of all civil works projects from initial planning through design construction operation and maintenance repair replacement and rehabilitation mitigation planning is an integral part of the corps overall planning process the core issues supplemental guidance for mitigation plans as well as for monitoring adaptive management in may of two thousand and five with the passage of word two thousand and seven and section twenty thirty six we have strengthened the requirement for developing and reporting monitoring and adaptive management activities monitoring of project mitigation features will continue until the board demonstrates that identified the logical success criteria have been met or division commanders are establishing an annual consultation process with states and agencies and we will include these consultation reports in the annual status report on mitigation required by section twenty thirty six  b in addition the core of the stablish in a database to track the mitigation performance i would be remiss if i did not mention the work we have accomplished under title nine of word two thousand and seven the national levy safety program title nine civically section nine thousand three stablished the committee on levee safety and directed the committee to develop recommendations for a national safety program the national committee on left we did a draft report in january of two thousand and nine and put forward twenty recommendations for creating a national level safety program although the corps of engineers chairs the committee the committee's recommendations do not and were not intended to represent those of the administration the final draft report was provided to two thousand levee system which comprise about fourteen thousand miles of levees within current authorities and funds during fiscal year two thousand and ten activities planned in fiscal year two thousand and eleven include the expansion of the national levy database to other federal agencies and to incorporate nonfederal levee data on a nationwide basis we're going to work with stakeholders to facilitate their use of the database for local safety program and we're going to develop a levy screening in classification process to rank and prioritize levees based on risk with the allocation of ninety million dollars from the american recovery and reinvestment act for periodic inspections the corps will complete inspections for those levees which the corps operates and maintain and those levees for which the corps performed the initial design and construction and for those levees which have been incorporated by law into the corps program as a federally often authorized levee system mr chairman implementation of this very important legislation has been and remains a priority for the corps and the army this concludes my testimony and i would be happy to answer any questions that you have to understand by prior agreement you  n when the initial draft of the revision of the principles and guidelines was done by the corps of engineers it was put out for public comment then the council on environmental quality decided that the principles and guidelines because they originally applied to other agencies that they should be developed with other agencies as well so after that the internet agency including the corps of engineers and other agencies worked on a draft of the principles and guidelines the principles and standards part of the guidelines we wanted to have this independently peer reviewed so we submitted it to the national academy of sciences on december third i believe it was their review of this they estimated to take about eleven months  we're going to have our first meeting with the academy i believe in march and our public comment period on the principles and guidelines has been extended till mid april seventh i believe the extension date once we hear from and within that timeframe process is to get somebody that is totally independent of which the national academy of sciences and then they have means of touching other groups are other elements that we use for these are five hundred one c three non profit elements because we want this to be totally my experience with the national academy of sciences is that they start as we do and lay down the milestones schedule for whatever project or review they're going to do this is a very complex i think that that's exactly right one of the one of the guidelines behind external review is that it should be scalable and it is scalable on the complexity of it and also the importance of it and both of those you've got to get those right and so this one is of both of those it's very complex plus the importance of it is significant here because as many senses eighty three is what we're academic approach to issues and have a stake in the outcome that is a financial stake in the outcome but seeking good public policy but then it appears that this has become very different role that that's a more substantive role that is one that looks at the environmental consequences of what you're proposing to do so tell me about your interaction with these two agencies and how long turnaround time do you get with them we have been working with you on a number of issues in addition to the development of the principles and guidelines and other ecosystem restoration efforts that are being within the budget including ecosystem restoration i think it's been my experience so far and been in the seven months we've been collaborating with the e q i think more than this agency ever has in the  past not only because of the priorities of this administration but because i think the recognition of what the role of the corps of engineers plays in every water resource development decision that's made in this country projects that may have some elements of controversy surrounding them we are also considering want of those reviews but we are also concerned about timing we didn't want that outside review to delay or make an already deliberative process cumbersome but it seems that the reviews undertaken so far coming at the end of the process raise issues that should have been addressed earlier and thereby creating a delay that we didn't want to happen boston harbor deepening an example  external peer review is mississippi coast project that we have just sent you support to the congress we had an external independent peer review on this project that lasted about three and a half for months it did not delay the project it did not delay the study and it came in at about two hundred twelve thousand dollars for the accidental independent peer review and i think we have a better project because of it i think the local sponsor would agree to sever all right we'll  leave it there for the moment bozeman thank you mr chairman it's good to have you secretary darcy and i think we get to have you again tomorrow so we're looking forward  and i say that you know in the right spirit very much we appreciate your also hard work one of the national objectives proposed by c q not congress is avoiding adverse impacts to ecosystems whenever possible since no action alternative is always possible this could preclude the corps of engineers or any other federal water resources agency from ever constructing a project with economic benefits how does the corps intend to carry out this proposal i think that what we are going to consider with those new peonies is a range of alternatives i know that we will be looking at the other provisions in a in a more careful way  also in a more deliberative way i think that i don't think that the principles and guidelines as drafted and as there are for public comment we welcome anyone's input on those but i don't think they are going to preclude us from going forward with what the best project alternative would be hundred eighty three principles and guidelines had a special emphasis that all effective alternatives for cell alternatives for solving a set of water resources problems ought to get unbiased consideration a valuation in making a decision on what is recommended to come for authorization again can you explain the administration's position on this fundamental idea of considering all the alternatives without bias and making recommendations i guess kind of the impasse we have  is we appreciate the counsel of environmental quality and maybe we should get them to come over and testify since are having so much influence but i guess you know they're a body that's there to give you know to give guidance give advice but the ultimate the ultimate advice giver and the ultimate whatever is congress and what we're saying is a difference by the intent of the law and  again can you comment on water resources problems getting unbiased consideration valuation make decision what is recommended to congress for authorization so yeah tell us tell us what you see the role is and  and i think that the principles and guidelines that have been been drafted and that are out for public comment will be able to provide for those alternatives to be considered what what d m g revisions are intended to do is to be able to look at not only the net economic benefits but also the environmental benefits and to be able to look at both of those in all alternatives and at the end in making a final decision for the project alternative selection that both of those would be weighed so i don't think any alternative is going to be able to is going to be off the table i think that looking at them through both the eyes of the national economic the total national economic benefit as well as the environmental benefit is the way that that they'll be looked at in the future no i understand i guess our concern is that it doesn't have that effect that you know the language is different with the intent of what congress was trying to do so with  share i'm very concerned about cost share particularly in this economic environment we have state and local governments with really no capacity or very limited capacity to contribute their share of  army corps projects and my understanding of the intent of language in word of seven was that local government would should be able to use other federal dollars for their cause share and my further understanding is that that's not happening that's not being allowed and so my question is what tools or authority does the corps possess to assist communities with the local cos for example is there not language existing language dating back pre war to zero seven that gives the secretary the right to waive local question yes yes there is and so i guess more specifically than my question is what are the set of circumstances that would need to be present for such a judgment to be made and further question is aren't they already present congressman i would have to say that i don't know the specifics of what the particular criteria would be in order to get that waiver under which at the ready but i would be happy to get back to you i would appreciate that because it is a particularly difficult issue right now and i know in my own state there are a lot of army corps projects that are ready to go that are not going for lack of a local cost share and not not only are the projects important to do but these are projects that would put people to work so i would i would be very grateful if you would give this your serious attention and let us know what we can do to move this forward i will next question i want to go to was the issue of independent peer review and linking that if i may to the centers of expertise that the corps maintains that my understanding is the corps maintains some number of centers of expertise and that one of their roles was to provide some type of independent peer review of major army corps projects so i have a couple of questions that flow from that one do you feel that this process is working are the centers of expertise providing this kind of peer review that's my first question congressman we do have we have six centers of expertise and i'll say today that four of six are functioning very well and have done a lot of what they were designed to do a couple of them and one is the navigation small boat harbor is still trying to get up and running but these six centers are to do exactly as you say one of their functions is to help in the in the review we have two types to review we have internal review and so they can organize that and put together the group of experts in fact a lot of times they're resident at the center of expertise because they deal in that particular issue a lot and they also can help to organize external review when that would go to go to that non profit organization or whatever so that's part of their charter the other part is to really help our districts where they have insufficient expertise to really bring the best technology and innovation to the project is to bring that to these projects how are these centers currently funded there are really joint funded they funded partially by what we call general funds and then partially by the project funds of those projects that they are lending their expertise on would would the core benefit and certainly with the american people benefit process easier or whatever their particular expertise might be that would be route related to or be relevant to core projects i think several questions that i think one i think we have the number about right  where they're located generally is where there have been proud that are in a district that is already got that expertise we do use universities and we do have the money that we provide universities to help us both in review and in study which i think is an excellent idea that it gets it gets the innovation and it also puts us with academia in a little different light and i think that's that's good so by and large i think we're located well we have  as you can tell from hurricane katrina all of these projects that i just mentioned not only does not only do they mean economic development but these projects basically  entails the survival of the people of the region and katrina devastated eighty percent of an oil and this place over a million people nationwide to to their to their areas of the country and for a half years after katrina we are only hopefully sixty percent sixty five percent back this past weekend i met with director spike lee who is doing a follow up documentary to his first piece when the levees broke and he asked me a very direct question he said you are the representative of this district task is to make sure that they keep up with their with their duties to make sure that they complete their project on time and my question to you here is what are you doing to ensure that the projects in my district are being completed on time and to ensure that the projects that are under the direction of are being completed on time first of all thanks for the question and i counted as constructive criticism and i appreciate it we have our eye on our target in new orleans and it is june twentieth eleven it is the beginning of hurricane season two thousand and eleven and the congress has been gracious the administration grazes and that this is about fifteen billion dollars worth of work and we have that laid out and i would love to bring it to you in the detail that we have it when the study must be completed when the feasibility when the detailed design has to be done in order to start the project at the right time to finish and meet those deadlines so we are very much conscious of the necessity of getting these projects done to meet that deadline of two thousand and eleven i'm pretty sure you're familiar with  the issue we have in connection with option one and option two nuts and two a connection with the i guess the project and it's just been raised and  the issue questions the i guess the the forthrightness the honesty of the army corps with respect to the feasibility study of option one versus option two into a they seemed to think one and two and two are two into a are a lot different in that it really is a pump to the river option that eliminates a lot of the local pumps but it's a much more elegant solution but a pricey you've got all kinds of utilities and stabilization when you start to really lower increase the depth of those canals so here's what we've decided first of all thus far short of having any of that that we a were studied and was feasible and funded that that would all be thrown away but there is a part here that has been talked about and that is suspending any action now unless it's consistent with two  first of all it's very hard to know what is and what isn't until you've done a feasibility study so that's the first start feasibility study give you the risk give you enough of the engineering to say it could be done the other part is we have pumps right now that are temporary pumps that are on those canals and by two thousand and thirteen they're going to hit their design life they are not they were never intended to go the long distance i'm very concerned right now hard to hard about not doing something now that in twenty we're going to make a decision today that we're going to have pumps on those walls that we're going to count on if you have a major event that won't be able to deliver without an incredible amount of maintenance we're checking the maintenance curves right now on every single point and they're increasing as we speak as they age towards twenty thirteen so we've got to do something the others are more a longer term solution to study it well we think it'd be fifty about fifteen million and thirty six months to do an adequate feasibility study that would be actionable by the congress and the administration to say if we wanted to do to it to into  would be for a feasibility study to look at options to into a way which is really the pump to the river option via option one which is currently funded and authorized to replace those temporary pumps with a permanent solution the one nuance there and maybe i wasn't clear but when if we would do option one we would make that there would be some adaptability features that in case you came back replacement cost would be for those pumps and i ask the question just you know i just need a ballpark figure but i think the gentleman would want to know i would want to know other members of one of those we can start laying the foundation for those pumps have to be replaced or the city is simply going to be inundated and should be planning now for some rather substantial investment we actually are planning for that investment right now that's under option one and we are funded for that so we have a plan to do that are one the one thing we don't have yet for that part of the project is a project agreement with a local sponsor for that because we had a debate over one two into the course position is that we need to get that project agreement done and get to work and put those permanent pumps in and then if the congress tells us let's do a feasibility study for two and two and it's funded we would do that to the best of our ability and give the comparison but those pumps are going to need to be replaced in two thousand and thirteen in the range are hundreds of millions of dollars i'm sure it's in the hundreds of millions but the funding is staff was denied access probably has a right to see these reports our staff have a right they're not available on the internet so we can get them in person we have to come and knock on the door bag and hand what we have to do to get this you have every right to have total access to those there's a way to google them but when we went and made a lot of improvements to our website we centrally took the easy internet access down we have a challenge we're trying to improve the system and give more access and visibility and what actually happened was it shut the internet access down unless you were really really savvy at how to get there and i'm not newly become a internet user after years of resisting i'm a paper and typewriter person and i kept telling my staff don't put this in the record but i kept telling thought well let me try to get that we can get access to the so i tried and i can get in there and use google whatever you know all these things so you tell us how to make it open and transparent whether you have a headquarters web page or something somehow we have to we have to we're going to link it put a big spot in the headquarters web page come on the corps of engineers and it'll tell you how to get the consider alternatives like do they have a high benefit the cost ratio is coming from and it turns out that there is a there was a document  council the water resource how do you determine that a project has a particular benefit the cost ratio if you don't do the study first abraham lincoln build impose a toll on a waterway unless you build the project first so that you have product in the waterway for a while so that can generate the money for the toll this is the same things one hundred sixty years later or recommend only those projects that have a benefit cost ratio two point five to one that's huge it's a standard c high requirement number floats depended on the list in priority but as you take the benefit cost ratio in iraq and stack the projects and then you look at what you're what the affordability is that's how it's prioritize it could be a year that it could be three or it could go to two or whatever it just in the two thousand and eleven budget for those construction projects construction projects been all the way through the study we know how much they cost we know what the benefit cost ratio is when we drew the line it came to that now there's there's a couple other categories there safety projects in those construction projects that it's not the cut the benefit cost ratio that governs it's the life health and safety and an example that would be one of our dams that needs rehabbing and is critical so but the projects that that were not life health and safety or ecosystem kind of two at the beginning turned out to be one of the best projects we have ever done of the mississippi river and we need five more of them and i wonder i just wonder what  study then we go through if we think we have a one one to one or better then we could go to field ability make a horseback estimate right you make you take that as doesn't look like it and then you go to feasibility and then you refine it then it comes out one to two one to four one to two point five whatever and then that's where you now have a tool i guess that says i can prioritize these but a project that is a one to one has a cost benefit ratio that it could be worth doing now you get into the next question can we afford to do all those that were one to one and the answer that is not  different question that's a question congress needs to address whether we can or as in the case of the panama canal president roosevelt said i don't think congress will ever prove that kind of money but he's not the first one president franklin roosevelt when presented with the cost of building the atomic bomb said can we make a little that's a lot of money we have a war going on so they made little boy yeah it was big  what is it in in the planning process where in this in the order of significance to the b c ratio come i think it comes in in several places the first one is where you do the the initial cursory study hundred percent federal to see do we think we have a project it's answering that question and the benefit cost ratio and les to health or safety or other things that says ok this makes sense to go to the next level the next level the feasibility has some caution erring aspects so now you're also engaging the stakeholders partners local  folks and saying is this worth it for you to do we think that there's a benefit cost ratio that applies here and then you come through that process eventually ending up with a chief report and it'll have the benefit cost ratio nailed down with all the documentation of what are the benefits what are the costs one of the things of course the new principles and guidelines will do it it will now incorporate non monetary things it will incorporate the environment and some of those things that are a little harder to get at cost but they're going to have to be figured into whether this makes a valid project or not one of the makes it a co equal partner and that's very illuminating that's and that's that's important let me ask the question also about mitigated downgraded by the other lot said part of that efficiency if you're looking at a system that don't you have to look at all the elements of the system together they achieve this greater goal and it will have this greater benefit to cost ratio great moves in international markets on as little as an eighth of a cent a bushel if it takes six weeks roundtrip for barge tows to make that trip to  new orleans and back to the upper mississippi we're not being efficient we're not being competitive in the international marketplace the port of santos in brazil has a has a  two week sailing advantage over new orleans because we're further out in the south a think you're absolutely on to what we would call watershed planning and you can't do a project in isolation you have to look at effects is whether if one lock could take x amount of traffic but all the other ones on either side that actually govern then that figures into the benefit cost ratio of building that and other examples the great lakes they're so intertwined all the ports and harbors in the great lakes really make up a system and you have to work them all together if you because if you can't get into one port then you can't take materials to another so to dredge those are those are the tough decisions but i think the principles and guidelines also includes  this larger look that you're speaking of just made the argument maybe somewhat better than i've done for the second longest st marie thank you mr chairman i guess i'd like to follow up since the chairman brought it up the cashier ratios and things and hopefully will we'll be able to talk about this morning more as we talk about the budget but where would a situation fall where if you had a project that you spent eighty million dollars on it lacked thirty million dollars of completion the cost benefit is a dollar fifty so if you go ahead how would you do that i mean in the sense why would you not complete a project like that why would you change the rules of the game in the mid stream and that's essentially what we have being proposed today i guess when we see things like that it really is as as the chairman mentioned you know there has to be some common sense with these things and it really does it makes us lose confidence  it makes us really look harder at the rest of it to wonder if you know if those kind of projects can go on what you know kind of what the rationale is behind it so we're that fall general question regarding now i just want to either one i just really would like an answer a question that how would you not continue that project what's the rationale behind that one because if you figure the cost ratio now if you've got all this  stuff invested in it there's way up there it's over the two fifty mark at this point to go forward is this compared you know to discontinue it does that make sense because you've got so much invested in i mean is are rational is are rational is a rational actual general i mean do you agree with that what you have to do is take the cost to complete obviously the cost invested the factors you know the benefit cost ratio but as it came out in the administration came out with the president's budget where it fell  the priorities was to not continue and that's kind of like and so cost to complete is twenty million dollars you spent eighty million dollars on it i'm sorry the cost to complete is rational why i understand you've got to do it but again that makes no sense at all and like i said we can talk about it tomorrow but but those are the kind of things chairman that we're running in to  you know we really need to get some answers to and it's a problem so i yield back john makes a very important point to the layman's mind it's very hard to justify germination cost that's almost as much as it takes place when you've got a hydroelectric and less wear down on hydroelectricity now and we don't know about the president in his state of the union dress was very much  fully transparent to the public they will say that the interested parties don't even know that it is in the works so what suggestions do you have for making the peer review process more publicly available access problems on the internet but i think we need be open to try to work more openly with the independent review process because i think that was the intent of having the process in the first place to be able to have a very very important point in the discussions between our committee in the senate committee not just in the summer or seven conference that we had which by the it was about forty five minutes on a seven year bill but it was the subject of frequent discussions over that period of seven years and one of the issues that continually held up further action on were to water resources development so it takes action to let interested par the peer review process is underway or it's coming and inform the panels that they have the responsibility to seek public input general i think the independent peer reviews do seek public input but there's another piece at the end after they make their recommendations that that is also public and what we do with those recommendations yes will be public so we'll say  yes we took that it was important we put that in we're considering this we've done the cost benefit of doing this but i think that's the whole lifecycle of this the one in particular about even the principles and guidelines when they went to the national academy of sciences the principles and standards they also went out for public review what happens after the review of the academy of sciences and after the public review all that stuff should be made public that's our opinion regardless of what the what the judgment is from the public about the substance of the review making it public is the critical point we get more flak for process than you do for the substance  so we have among the federal agencies a lot of different inputs that if there wasn't significant impact on it i think that we would know it and if there is i think they would let us know too so  the further question is when do those other agencies come into this process i raise the because in the two thousand and five surface transportation bill mr young's and chairman asked me to convene a group of working group of all the various interests environmental groups contractors builders unions and all the rest and the federal highway administration find a way to expedite projects and what i found in this process is that we have council environmental quality and then you have the forest service of the fish and wildlife service and then you have the park service and one project comes and so you forgot about us and then trail end of the there's a national trust preservation and they also and how long do you need and how long does this agency need for your permit and let's squeeze that time frame down and do it in more expeditious manner not override it not ignore these things but concurrently rather than  real early and for us that usually begins when we make a decision it's going to take an environmental impact statement or whatever that process has to begin really early because in a lot of the planning processes that is the time drive so if you can get that time down for that you have decreased the time for the planning start you have all you have legislative authority or administrative authority to do this to command all the various agencies to come together at the beginning of the process we have all everything we need to do that to bring them all together and a lot of it is collaboration with them but it is also what their mandate and what they are to do and all of us are now working together to to get a good jump off and actually it goes right into the initial scoping that we're all getting together to determine what needs to be done do from time to time have an experience as i  covered in the course of this process on on the safety legislation an agency for example fish and wildlife service we'd love to do this but we don't have the budget for it we can't afford to send one of our staffers off for three months or six months to do this work so what i did was right into the surface transportation will pay out of the highway trust fund that person to do this where you can't get off the hook this is got to be done and we can't have things dragged on for years it's not to rule out or or or skirt the environmental issue but deal with it in a reasonable timeframe plan designed to reduce the impacts of future flood events in the project area shall be implemented by the nonfederal interest not later than one year after completion of construction project going back t and fema have just reestablished the floodplain management task force that was originally instituted i think in the early ninety's but we sort of reenergize that because we think it's really important for us to be looking at a number of fr not only for floodplain management but also for some of the other executive orders that have been issued in this area as well as some other how our programs overlap and can be better managed we're doing that in addition to what comment on i would just make one quick additional comment that under the principles in guidelines one of the aspects really the nonstructural floodplains which is also very wise so it's also in the principles and guidelines  one of the big factors how do we use those planes and where possible could you have a nonstructural solution as part of the flight control measures nonstructural becoming kind of the watch word been around public in this procedure the draft for the principles and guidelines was released on december ninth it was released and transmitted to the national academy of science for review concurrently it was put out for public review and comment for i believe it was sixty or ninety days but it's been extended through april of this next month for public review and comment and that public comment will be considered not only by the academy but then  finally by the inner agency group headed by you that will review it before it goes final figure out how to access just one thing real quick i know that there are witnesses have to go and again we appreciate you being here section five or one direction the court specified navigation channels upon upon a determination that the assumption would be in the best federal interest however the course interpreted this is requiring a full feasibility study of the existing project and i know there's some wording in there that  that this thing was built in such a manner that it is economically in the best interest of our country the language is in the bill but not to make sure that the study cost tremendously more than if we just  circle and other circles within the circle they have underfunded the corps for the in their proposed budget for two thousand and eleven again supposed to be the administration of change e stimulus bill and by the way my report card now we have a million ninety one thousand total employment direct indirect jobs that's half of all the jobs part of their one point four trillion dollar infrastructure investment program they're halfway through with that we need to do that at least on the mississippi ohio river and the law i've already talked about five locks on the mississippi they need to be locking them twenty six one on the ohio and illinois and europe is going to have this project done before we ever get these five blocks off the ground have here today is the chairman of the board of the american association of port authorities which represents the interests of the leading us public port authorities as well as public port authorities throughout the western hemisphere from canada argentina or including the caribbean will direct my comments today to several policy provisions included in the two thousand and seven act specifically that set of provisions in title to the general provisions which deal with the corps project development and review and the two thousand and seven act congress directed a number of management measures aimed at improving the efficiency reliability and response of nys of the corps project development and implementation processes to like to share our observations on the impact of the changes and pursue the question of meeting the intended goals as a project development review there were two areas of concern sections twenty thirty four dealing with independent peer review and section twenty forty five projects streamlining that should be given additional consideration by the committee both sections feel with review of project reports at different times in the project development process and with varying scope the issue that is not addressed is one of timing when the reviews occur we do not believe that the course current process is consistent with the intention intent of sections twenty thirty four and twenty forty five to assure both thorough and streamlined review of project reports we believe that the review as quality control needs to start at the beginning of the study involve the local sponsor district and higher headquarters and or independent entity be continuous throughout the phases of study this should be no surprises at the end of a cost shared four to six year multi million dollar study effort and my own case massport has invested ten years in several million dollars towards a feasibility study to deep in boston harbor which so far has been rejected twice by the corps headquarters staff after a late stage review service differences of opinion within the course on the economic study parameters there is no end in sight in pursuit of an approved report in the meantime we're losing jobs in business there are currently many channel deepening studies underway throughout the country that are required to handle increasingly large of vessels and for the nation to remain competitive in global markets some have been stalled for many years and are not advancing because of technical or policy conflicts among reviewers the study teams and the project sponsor we are hopeful that when fully implemented the revised project development in review sections of word of two thousand and seven will result in improvements in the overall project delivery process and we asked the committee to monitor their progress with us related area of concern in section twenty thirty three is that of centers of expertise we have yet to see a viable and fully operational center of expertise draft navigation will leave believe that as a critical missing link in fully implementing section twenty forty five and streamlining the project delivery process and improving the quality of the planning and review process attrition and downsizing about a noticeable effect on the ability of the corps just work to perform all of the technical and economic studies necessary to formulate a project work is often spread among districts with mixed results we believe a deep draft center of expertise with a dedicated full time qadri of subject matter experts can pay many dividends in providing the most technically competent of fission and cost effective project delivery system in a central location the course in the navigation center of expertise has been fully operational since one thousand nine hundred eighty one and provides world class products the core districts in the navigation industry so we know what success looks like would like to see that replicated for the deep draft navigation to the benefit of all four coasts we are working with the core in the center of expertise concept the work quality partnership initiative and ask for the committee's continued support as well additionally section two thousand twenty zero five in two thousand and twenty nine awarded two thousand and seven speak to the need for adequate dredge material management beneficial use of recovered settlements and use of multiple factors in judging the benefits of the investing investing in maintenance dredging however we believe it is time to revisit the twenty four year old harbor maintenance tax and trust fund authorized in one thousand nine hundred six that is a sole source for reimbursement of federal maintenance dredging funding port and harbor uses or paying for the full maintenance and getting half in return the tax revenue about one point five million dollars billion dollars annually would be adequate to maintain federal channels if fully applied congressional intent notwithstanding there was no provision in the original authorization to dedicate tax revenue for its intended purpose we asked the committee to it consider legislative provisions to ensure full use of the tax writing and the subsequent w hopefully this year and finally mr chairman i'd like to commend your leadership for section thirty nine one of the two thousand and seven act which finally provided the resolution and direction necessary to get the construction started at the sioux st marie for the second lo this is a project of national significance that directly impacts the great lakes in st lawrence seaway portions of our national freight system our great lakes members look forward to the jobs of fish and seas in transportation cost savings the new project will bring again thank you the local district determine that forty eight was probably the optimum optimum for us we feel that forty five would be adequate but we're arguing on the economic parameters as to whether or not it's forty eight forty seven or what is the numerous courts that will need it and that's why we would been preparing for many many years as other ports have done so so it's important to get the authorization necessary because we're in the process of also dredging our own berths and our own cos we have particularly focused on what we believe to be among the most critical word reform areas the peer review mitigation of fish and wildlife and wet losses and revision of the principles and guidelines but first i want to speak to the reform issues in their context these roofs were to reform provisions were enacted in the wake of the terrible consequences of hurricane katrina and a series of damaging hurricanes and storms in two thousand and four and five in addition the nation was growing increasingly aware of the threats of climate change and sea level rise continued to reraise critical fish and wildlife habitat and health of natural ecosystems and increasingly severe instances of flooding and drought conditions after the findings emerged about the background and conditions of the new orleans levees in new orleans this was in essence as much a manmade disaster as a natural disaster many felt that the word reforms were all the more necessary these were also adopted against the backdrop of the general accounting office the government accountability office having reported that recent course studies did not provide a reasonable basis for decision making that they were fraught with errors mistakes and miscalculations and used invalid assumptions and outdated data those were all in quotes g a o also testified failings were systemic in nature and therefore prevalent and therefore prevalent throughout the course civil works portfolio that confirmed a pattern of egregious planning flaws that have been revealed by more than a decade of analyses of the end and i asked g a o army inspector general independent reports and such as the coastal louisiana levees in the upper mississippi loch expansions these reforms are not just about technical planning matters and minute details of the law we have received major wakeup calls that the impacts of the activities of the corps of engineers h profound impacts and implications for our citizens the environment and the nation's future development we cannot simply do things the same way mr chairman we have reviewed the guidance an extensive amount of material provided by the system secretary darcy in the core on the whole we found that to date the implementation of these reform provisions in many cases is barely underway guidance made in many prepared in many ways fall short in some cases far short of what we believe congress and the law intended and the objectives sought in the word of reforms are still mostly on implemented an independent peer review we would first applaud the corps for at least broadly embracing the concept of peer review even beyond that required by word but on the ground word is independent review process and where does independent review process we find the process has been weakly implemented is highly obscure and h failed to involve the public and almost completely and is almost completely out of public sight the corps reported that in thirteen of fourteen ongoing completed external peer reviews and four of the five ones that were completed among those reviewers had not taken any public testimony or otherwise obtained public and put conversations with conservation activists and state officials across the country have shown a near universal lack of awareness of and lack of public involvement in these prophecies locating review plans and completed p r reports on district websites is in many cases difficult or impossible reviewers names can generally be located can generally not be located and tell after reports are completed we believe core guidance and the lack of public lack of public input will like we discourage review panels from reviewing issues outside whatever is included in the charge set by the corps contractor this would defeat some of the main purposes of in external review on mitigation of fish and wildlife and wetlands we looked extensively at implementation of the new section two zero three six provisions we are extremely concerned that the compliance with these provisions appears to be lagging were to added great specificity to the definition of mitigation plans standards for in kind mitigation requirements for ongoing monitoring and consultation with federal agencies and states and reporting annually to congress on progress for ecological success and contingency plans for speeding progress for progress was not being made regrettably  review found implementing guidance and mitigation plans developed by the corps demonstrating that the corps had made little progress in complying with even the most basic of medication reforms in one example we a waterway channel improvement project the galveston district of the corps concluded that resources were which were not nationally or otherwise significant need not be mitigated such a standard which is directly contrary to section two zero three six would likely result in far less mitigation than were to requires of view documentation of thirty two projects the corps said fell within the parameters the of the senators request for information and his seventeen projects for which we could locate adequate information for a judgment beyond those with negligible impacts we found all seventeen essentially out of compliance with word as requirements and in some and usually multiple major wa process for monitoring ecological success is essentially unimplemented in our opinion finally on principles and guidelines mr chairman were to two thousand and seven enacted a new water policy that requires fundamentally different approach to water resources project planning and directs the secretary to develop new planning principles guidelines and procedures to modernize water planning we are very pleased that the white house council on environmental quality has taken on a key role in facilitating the revision and updating the principles and standards we also applaud congress for directing attention to the need to update water resources planning and applaud the administration for recognizing its importance across the federal government a new p s revision proposal is now set to receive public and n a s comments and we recognize the process will appropriately take considerable time to unfold but the potential long term benefits to the nation make this a highly important exercise and a written statement we raise critical concerns that planning should be driven by federal law and policy not simply by benefit cost only framework environmental protection and restoration need to be fundamental objectives for water planning in the twenty first century we are also concerned that economic requirements not undermine the new policy requirements to protect and restore our natural ecosystem functions and a base of science including recognition of climate change and sea level rise and great emphasis greater emphasis on nonstructural approaches integrated water resources manage planning is essential to a modernized planning process structure mn once again and congressman bozeman once again on behalf of the federation we greatly appreciate the efforts being made by the committee to hundred members mostly large urban agencies and about seventy six million citizens are members on the front line reducing loss of life and property damage from floods improving the quality of the nation's water's surface waters and repair and habitats and helping guide the design and construction of low flood risk and affordable communities national not only supported passage of order two thousand and seven but our members have experience complying with it and previous word of bills as partners with the corps of engineers we recognize the corps has had a challenge developing guidance for such a large bill but they've done a good job setting priorities from a local perspective most active studies and projects are not being held up waiting for new implementation guidance my testimony today will focus on four of the general provisions in word two thousand and seven first independent peer review it takes multi disciplinary teams to address the many interp interdependent and interrelated factors that influence analysis evaluation and decisions our members welcome any assistance provided provided is helpful in advancing the study results in a better project and does not hinder progress in practice some feasibility studies that were near completion have been delayed to comply with new peer review requirements with no substantial improvement in the recommended course of action we believe peer review will be beneficial when it's actually utilized as stated in the bill in all cases the peer review shall be accomplished concurrent with conducting the project study the second provision the principles and guidelines update as you'd expect we've been active in this effort well nasmyth supports and agrees with most of the draft principles and standards issued by c e q in december we feel there are some air clarifications and if assists is needed first while some believe that historically there's been a bias toward economic benefits it's imperative that future water resources planning emphasize the balance and recognize interdependency of economic environmental public safety and social factors easier said than done next the nonfederal sponsor is an active partner with the federal government in terms of contributing funding local knowledge and expertise active participation by the nonfederal sponsor during all phases of the planning process is critical to the success of the study and subsequent project and finally nasa members are concerned that the new principles and guidelines will make the planning process even longer more expensive and more complex than it is now resources funding and patience are limited to fully appreciate how the proposed principles and standards will change the planning process nasa recommends at the core and work through an example flood risk reduction study from initiation to completion while the national academy of sciences is preparing its comments the third provision i want to address is actually  planning and streamlining the current process as i've mentioned has evolved into such a long and costly exercise that doesn't necessarily yield better decisions or projects so what are we doing about it well the inclusion of these two provisions in order two thousand and seven was a good first step and national work group has it in a fire for basic problem areas and is developing alternatives to address them we understand the core senior leadership and secretary  have made this a priority as well it will take a sincere considerable and collaborative effort from local sponsors the corps and congress to make significant improvements and finally the national levee safety program the national committee on levee safety carried out the necessary work prepared an excellent report and continues to function effectively and productively nasscom believes that significant progress has been made on several of the committee's twenty recommendations since your hearing on this topic last may for example the corn fema have made substantial progress completing the national levee inventory in database however additional thirty is needed to include data for those l owned and operated by non federal into d c much work is still needed to improve levee safety in this nation in closing more two thousand and seven was a much needed piece of legislation that helped our nation move forward it's now time to take the next step forward by pursuing the passes of war to two thousand and ten to continue our critical water resource needs and protect the nation's population environment and critical infrastructure thank you for inviting the local coalition thank you for being here thank you mr chairman members of the committee i appreciate being here my name is brian polish and i am the co chair of the water resources coalition and managing director of government relations and infrastructure initiatives at the american society of civil engineers i'm pleased to hear from you before you today as we talk about the implementation of word two thousand and seven title to avoid a two thousand and seven contain many key policy requirements for the corps to complete an independent  w dredge material disposal technical assistance access to water data planning protection projects and other program requirements title nine called on the establishment of the national committee on levee safety first i want to talk a little bit about principles and guidelines in december of two thousand and nine as many of my colleagues have noted the white house council on environmental quality released for public comment its version of the principles and guidelines the water resources coalition believes the current proposal fails to meet the congressional intent and still needs to be reworked first the proposal speaks to the need to incorporate public safety into the planning process but it does not contain a discussion of the obvious ways to achieve the goal specifically nothing in the proposal identifies the unequivocal need for resiliency in the design and construction of federal civil engineering projects in engineering terms resiliency is the ability of an infrastructure system to recover its function after it is damaged by a natural disaster or a manmade attack sustainability and resiliency must be an integral part of improving the nation's infrastructure today's infrastructure especially flood control systems must be able to respond to and change with dynamic conditions incorporating resiliency by incorporating resiliency disasters will pose less of a threat to public health and will minimize disruptions to our economy second the proposals discussion of the use of cost benefit analysis and the development of water resource projects is flawed the c e q needs to explain in some detail how it will require cost benefit analysis to be employed and this especially how it will be possible to monetize the social or environmental benefits of projects and how these benefits can be compared to economic benefits and public safety nearly five years after the devastation of hurricane katrina and one year after the release of the national committee on levee safety's recommendations congress has still not acted to create a national levees safety program while the corps of engineers has begun work and made significant progress there is no comprehensive and dependable catalog of the locate ownership condition hazard potential of all of the levees in the united states as a february fifteenth the cord inventory been contracted or contracted for inspection approximately two thirds of the more than fourteen thousand miles of federal levees another twenty one percent of the levee mileage is under contract for inventory and inspection however by some estimates there are more than one hundred thousand miles of levee in the united levees in the united states we still have a long way to go to complete a national inventory of l title nine of ward a created the national levee safety program committee and the goal of a robust nationwide levee safety program though remains an aspiration rather than a reality today the committee safety submitted its interim report with the office of management and budget in january of two thousand and nine we feel very strongly that congress should adopt many of the recommendations of that committee and enact legislation to establish a national levee safety program we also feel strongly that this program could be modeled on the successful national dam safety program and possibly merge with that program additionally congress should also examine fema certification rule for levies congress should direct fema to amend the rule to change the requirement from a certification to an n f i p evaluation the term and f i p evaluation is preferable over the present quote unquote certification requirement to make it clear that an evaluation is merely a judgment that a levee system is in conformity with the requirements of the n f i p regulations the national shoreline erosion control development program was established by section two twenty seven of word a back in one thousand nine hundred two it is designed to test new technologies that will improve or reduce the cost of federal beach restoration projects there are currently seven testing sites being used by the coal section twenty thirty eight of word two t  and seven contains important modifications to that program for example the original section two thousand and seven program did not permit the corps to ca share these projects with local governments in addition technology was demonstrated to work section two twenty seven did not permit the technology to be seamlessly integrated into existing federal beach restoration projects these weaknesses have been corrected in section two hundred thirty eight currently the core is issued no guidance on this program this is an important program coastal areas of the nation are risk from serious storms that endanger lives and property we cannot afford a lack of implementation guidance for section twenty thirty eight this critical program without mr chairman iowa in my remarks and be ready for your questions today will be focused on the principles and guidelines and likable to the planning and development of water resources projects and the proposal issued by the council on on environmental quality related to this effort tach to my written statement is a copy of the comments the conference submitted to seek you in response to its proposal and i respectfully request that they be included in the record here as this committee well knows reliable well maintained water resources infrastructure is fundamental to america's economic and environmental wellbeing and is essential to maintaining our competitive position within the global economy our water resources infrastructure provides lifesaving flood control navigation critical to national security and commerce abundant water supplies shore protection water recreation and vironment restoration and hydro power production as a consequence the planning and development of water resources projects are vitally important with that in mind we are very concerned that see each use proposal fall short of an acting a policy model envisioned by congress and enacting the water resources development act of two thousand and seven at the outset water resources planning ought to be governed by a well defined set of overarching principles which set forth the national interest in water resources development management and protection the principle should establish a clear concise and workable planning framework to guide the development of project recommendations through an unbiased scientifically sound analysis and they must recognize the critical role nonfederal sponsors and project formulation and development fundamentally these revised principles should strengthen strengthen the executive branch's ability to recommend to the congress economically and environmentally sound projects and they must be clear enough to drive understandable processes and replicable outcomes thus enabling unable in the nonfederal interests to make complimentary plans unfortunately the proposal issued by the council on environmental quality fundamentally fails to establish a path to balance solution clear and consistent guide to planners or replicable results that are understandable to all stakeholders at the outset the proposal doesn't really a stablish or workable set of principles at all but instead uses the concepts of principles guidelines procedures and standards interchangeably so that the proposal itself is confusing an unworkable word  two thousand and seven contemplates planning founded upon multiple national objectives economic environmental and social wellbeing including a public safety objective and additionally word two thousand and seven emphasizes a watershed approach to planning recognizing the importance of collaborative planning and implementation we are concerned that the proposal in apparent contradiction of the directive in word two thousand and seven does not promote coequal objectives and water resources planning but instead elevates environmentalists consideration at the expense of economic benefit this approach would be especially detrimental to flood control navigation and water supply project the proposal also sets forth fusing approach to watershed planning although it appears to recognise the importance of watershed planning as called for and word of two thousand and seven watershed plans are then explicitly excluded from the process it's unclear why a comprehensive planning framework would exclude watershed plans and this is particularly troubling at a time when our nation both at the federal and state level is working toward the development of collaborative watershed planning rather than planning on a project basis we're also concerned that the proposal establishes an unworkable policy with regard to the use of floodplain while directing avoidance of the un why do you unwise use the floodplain the proposal does not provide criteria for determining what that would be it appears are a lot of projects that are listed in one of the tables that the corps of engineers provided to congress in terms of ongoing independent peer review project's peer peer reviews in the last few weeks i spoke with conservation leaders state and state officials particularly and even some new news media people who regularly are involved in those protection were rather shocked to hear that even though they had been to many many meetings of the corps of engineers in planning those projects they had not heard about the independent peer reviews that the that the corps listed were underway  and they were well again rather shocked because they thought they were following things very very closely that shocked me when i heard that i began to realize this process is really just an internal process at the changing the process making it open to the public transparent and accessible and you were at the exchange i had with the system secretary and the general that i went on the web i couldn't find their information well i'm no expert on the on the web but i used the procedures most everyone else would use and you shouldn't have to be an expert on this they should think what the general general antwerp was sufficient that they're going to fix the web they're going to make the success is that enough i think it needs they need to have an active outreach i think it's going to need a lot more than that the way the corps the newest corps guidance which by the way i couldn't find on the web either the two zero zero nine guidance which came out on january thirty first the way that guidance contemplates the process the review plan is supposed to be up front and it would lay out when and where the review would take place but what the public is going to need is to know who are the reviewers that they're going to need opportunities i think to be able to communicate with reviewers reviewers are mostly dealing with technical issues but  public in many cases has technical information that is that is necessary and valuable to a room to reviewers so i think they're going to need to create a more robust process than than what we see so far your testimony  many many years and we tried to give them the means by which to overcome those objections and so now is there an assessment of the cumulative effect on mitigated harm should there be one how should it be done well as we looked at at the fairly high degree of specificity that you all included in  it's rather hard to understand how how that could could be any less clear that these are required with each project that that if it is non negligible impact anything other than a negligible impact should be part of a plan part of plan they should be monitored and reported back to congress with consultations with state and federal fish and wildlife agencies all these different processes unfortunately they just haven't been implemented implemented yet cumulative effect should definitely be part of that i would think i think we may have to look very closely little bit beyond what you thought would be the case for a congressman i think one area we have great concern especially after our experience with hurricane katrina and working with the corps of engineers is this concept of public safety i think the principles and guidelines started with a single approach of looking at the economic benefits of a project obviously the environmental benefits and environmental issues came into play and that's an acceptable that's an acceptable second leg of the stool if we want to if we want to think of it as that i would see and that coalition the water resources coalition feels very strongly that public safety needs really to be the third leg of that stool as as we look at when you're looking at a project certainly when you talk about flood control projects levees and things like that public safety is paramount when we're when we're looking at those types of activities we also have some concerns as you try to monetize the environmental benefits that th no agreed upon monetization of that if you will i'm not an economist but certainly there's a lot of skepticism as to how we approach that issue and i think the same is probably true to be said for public safety and  so we have those concerns certainly we're going to be filing our comments we've got an extra thirty days i guess yesterday so we're pleased to have a little bit more time to comb through the document can you can you comment on that mr larsen  and i guess i'd like to know what you feel like see cues doing to ensure public involvement you know making sure that organizations like yours are eyeball to petition the federal government i think at the beginning of the process we were the water resources coalition was rather frustrated by the by the switching of the process shall we say the corps of engineers was in charge you all gave them the charge of rewriting the principles and guidelines and certainly a s c supported that we had some of our members who are calling for that over there over their lifetime of using that document and in the middle of the game shall we say we will little changed the rules and he was put in charge and we expanded it from being a rewrite simply for the core to going to all of the groups that were involved and i think it's actually a little bit broader than just before agencies and so it's not that that maybe wasn't the right thing to do to expand it a little bit  i think there were some time issues involved in that where there was only a thirty day comment at the beginning and i think there probably we would have been better served with a little bit more of an open process  we have substantive as well as procedural concerns with it in at the outset is the question of whether the agency with the most expertise and water resources planning is at the helm here and we have serious concerns about that i don't think it should be navigation and flood control project it promotes a nonstructural approach to floodplain use sort of a biased approach there without that balance as well those are the substantive concerns in a nutshell on the process side i have two concerns about that as well first the second phase of this process has already started that is the development of the guidelines and i'm saying guidelines they have interchange the words here but that seems a bit premature how can one develop guidelines when the principles are not established principles should be the foundation can't build a house without the foundation properly so they seem to be getting ahead of themselves the other part of this is a procedural due process concern and it falls back on the administrative procedure act now i recognize this is not construed at the moment as a notice and comment type of rule but in a notice and comment type of rule making an agency is required to at least respond to and address the common failure to do so would be considered arbitrary and capricious and grounds for reversing that decision in the court of appeal at this point is not explained what the process is how any comments will be addressed how they will be how they will be heard and that could be an agency rulemaking something as simple as saying we've heard your comments we're not persuaded because of these reasons but at least setting forth that we don't even have that at this point so really there's no transparency and if we're talking about long term viable planning this document does not affect that that foundation very good thank you very much mr fitzgerald very quickly because we do have i think the perhaps to follow but let me say you know the my some of my communities were you know got involved in that very early on and got in the process of dusting when you look at the timeline the timeline really becomes pretty unworkable by the time you do things back and forth i guess what i'd like to look for is you know with your all shelters a little softer landing you know that i think our communities are the timeline on identifying a project or make a decision is taken a long time i'm not sure what the ad time is but some in our community are taken to in years plus to go through the planning process and some of it you know is local sponsored we have a responsibility to to help and do our part we recognize this is not all the corps we have responsibilities to and we're willing to step up to the plate where we can  but i think this is evolving over the years you know when something would go wrong we have a team in tennessee to add another step put another you know try to make it not happen again and i think over the last fifty years this process has evolved into something that's gotten process itself it's a bit unwieldy the second was people it takes people to to do a to do a study to look at the problems and come up with good solutions so the people side is one of the areas we need to work on  another one is the written guidance itself it's evolved over time and it's very difficult to kind of work your way through it and that needs to be somewhat cleaned up and the third one is of course the funding and budget budgeting if you  unair uninterrupted funding cycle you can get through the process more quickly but i don't sometimes the federal sponsor can't come up with their funding that kind of slows it down sometimes to not it's not only a federal thing but i think with the principles and guidelines of dates this gives us a great opportunity to look at all these areas and build into these guidelines and procedures that each agency is going to come up with to try to make sure this doesn't get more complicated but that we can streamline and get the planning at is a more streamlined procedure we want to be sure the public is engaged in the process transparency in what is happening but also that we move the whole procedure along and that's why i spent a great deal of time on that issue with  five x but i project x but i think language put it into the corps of engineers were to build it now we take it and refine that language further and put it into our next surface transportation authorization bills that reported subcommittee that we need to continue working on delivering to the public a product that agencies are supposed to deliver it takes three years to do a simple mill and overlay on a highway project the public sector is not being efficient  fourteen years to do a transit project from idea to ridership the public sector is not being efficient and in the meantime bond issues expire public loses interest projects die and same thing for the water program  think our structure of comments went broad based policy rather than go section by section because it is the and these defects i think are throughout the document but i think overall the navigation mission and the flood control mission in particular are relegated to second class in this document and i think we need to find the appropriate balance between economic and human uses of our water resources and environmental and eagle logical considerations and that includes ensuring that the navigation flood control and water supply projects are addressed and it includes an unbiased look at alternatives structural and nonstructural i think if we can strike that balance between as we have proceeded on the oversight of the implementation of the requirement on the court to undertake responsible flood plain management prepare a flood plain management plan designed to reduce the impacts future flooding events in the project area cetera et cetera do you have experience with implementation so far section four hundred two what are your views and what the corps is doing in pursuance of that language in harris county harris county flexeril district we are very aware of this requirement and other local sponsors and united states agree with that once we invest with the corps any project a lot of time and effort and money into a project to reduce flood risk we want to make sure that that level of protection does not deteriorate over the years and that's what the important part of the flood plain with us the reason for the flood plain management plan is that actions aren't taken over the years to where that level of flood protection deteriorates and we take that very seriously and we are  actively preparing those on a couple of projects during the study face i know the law says are the guidelines say we don't have to do it till after the construction is finished that can take a long time to do and while we're in this in the analysis and study phase that's the time when we need to be developing our floodplain management plans and we're doing that now we look forward to completing a flood control project a new one so that we can actually implement those new flood control plans f in developing the revisions to the principles and guidelines early on when the corps of engineers started drafting their revisions there was a couple of days worth of listening sessions that they held in the become a little bit more of a closed process closed process and that's not what we want want to be i want to thank you for their contribution to testimony for your written documents which are very on the subject of this hearing