good afternoon everyone the legislative hearing by the subcommittee on in store affairs oceans and wildlife will come to order today we will hear testimony concerning h r sixteen seventy two the northwest straits marine conservation initiative reauthorization act of two thousand and nine and h r twenty five forty eight that keep america's waterfronts working active two thousand and nine nearly half of the population of the united states lives along our nation's ocean and great lakes coastline it is projected that by two thousand and fifteen our coastal population will reach a hundred and sixty five million people rising population pressure presents new threats of environmental degradation and heightens the competition for valuable and finite coastal resources the bills we will consider today would provide new tools for coastal managers to meet this challenge the first bill h r sixteen seventy two introduced by my colleague from washington state congressman rick larsen would extend the authorization of the northwest str marine conservation initiative in the north sound region of washington state the initiative originally authorized in one nine hundred ninety eight to support organized citizen involve and in the protection and the restoration of marine coastal and island resources of the northwest straits is now recognized as an innovative bottoms up management approach that produces real results i will be interested to learn more about the northwest straits commission and its ongoing activities and importantly whether the commission should continue to receive federal funds without a statuary nexus to any federal marine conservation program the second bill we will hear is h r twenty five forty eight introduced by my colleague from maine congressman chellie pingree would address the escalating competition over limited space within our coastal communities who are hard pressed to preserve access to beaches shorelines and waterways for water dependent industries such as boat yards and commercial fishing terminals h r twenty five forty eight would amend the coastal zone management act to establish a new competitive matching grant program intended to preserve protect and expand coastal access commish all water dependent uses this bill would not only further advance the existing policy under the seas e m e a preserving water dependent uses but it would more importantly preserve the historic character and economic vitality of many working waterfront communities from made to the island of guam i would like to commend my colleagues congressman larson and congresswoman pingree for their leadership in perth sowing these new innovations in coastal management and i do look forward to hearing from our witnesses this afternoon i would like to now recognize my friend and colleague from the first district of maine missed pingree to testify regarding her legislation on h r twenty five forty eight before we begin with that i would like to introduce congressman kildee and mrs shaffer porter for being with us this afternoon thank you very much and now mr pingree if you would like to begin your testimony thank you very much madam chair and members of the committee thank you for convening this hearing and for having me here today your continued work on behalf of our nation's coastal resources has made a significant difference in so many communities across our country i would like to testify about this bill and i request permission to submit additional testimony and information for the thank you the economic and cultural heart of many coastal communities is the working waterfront working waterfronts contain water dependent coastal related businesses businesses that depend on being able to have access to the water  working waterfronts helps to define a town and provides jobs to local residents working waterfront also brings visitors to the community who are drawn to the authentic experience of a working waterfront i'm sure this is an issue that many of you can relate to i know that all of you are from coastal regions including the great lakes and have water dependent businesses in your state and communities we have all seen the waterfront and harbors dominated by condominiums and residential development what we don't see sometimes are the fishermen the boat builders and the marinas and the others who need access to the water we don't see them often because they're quickly disappearing these businesses have been squeezed into an ever decreasing amount of space many of these businesses once the backbone of our coastal communities have moved or gone out of business entirely the conversion of working water fronts to the mistakenly named higher and better residential uses displaces fishermen and others who depend on working  economic and cultural devastation to the coastal community when this conversion occurs not only do we all lose access to our coastal resources our constituents lose their jobs my bill will help to protect these jobs and will help to protect our coastal communities in maine our coastal communities rely on working waterfronts in fact working waterfronts support our coastal economy and the economy of the entire state we have about one point two million residents in the state of maine and our total g d p in two thousand and seven was estimated to be forty eight billion dollars our coastal economy contributed estimated twenty nine billion dollars to the state's g d p that's over nearly sixty percent of our state's economy our largest single site employer bath ironworks employs about four thousand people on the shores of the canopic river and has been and continues to be an important part of maine shipbuilding history our coastal khana me and our national defen mains coastline is over thirty five hundred miles long yes less than twenty miles support working waterfronts and those last twenty miles support more than thirty five thousand jobs bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in maine the lobster industry requires access to the water a place to unload their traps a place to try a place to land lobsters without access to the working waterfront many of maine's lobsterman would not have a viable business model and the lobster industry has two hundred fifty million dollars worth of landings in our state and indirectly contributes nearly one billion dollars to the maine economy we are just not doing enough for the for the pressures that are facing the working waterfronts they are real and i have seen those pressures per stand we truly need a federal grants program to help our states many states have already recognized the need to protect working waterfronts and now it is time for the federal government to recognize them to three quick examples i want to share that i think will help highlight the diversity of what working waterfront is as well as the common threats that are facing all of our working waterfronts and one of our small coastal towns there are a growing number of shellfish farmers who grow easters and mussels many of them are the sons and daughters of former fisherman and aquaculture is the only way for them to work on the water and to continue the family tradition of working at sea each of their operations employs five to ten people they have demonstrated a beneficial effect of impact on the local water quality a few of them need to use a private pier the cruise almost an hour each day in transit time but the pier is on prime coastal real estate the owner wants to continue allowing lobsterman arkell culturist to use the pier access but with local property values rising the owner has already received inquiries about potentially selling the land without that pier and access for the aquaculture beds the local businesses will struggle lose valuable time and money and is feared without some sort of protection these budding our culture businesses will go out of business not for lack of a good product but for the inability to get to and from the water we also have in our waterfront many marinas and boat yards marinas provide good well paying jobs and skilled trades for their employees well providing access for fishing charter boats party boats without a place to dock their boat their clients fuel bill bait these businesses would not be able to serve the fisherman they also provide good access at these marinas for recreational boaters allowing families to enjoy the great pastime of boating we have a strong tradition of boat building and numerous boat yards can be found tucked away in the codes and harbors along the coast for residents and visitors alike if you end up hitting log or running into a piece a ledge of the main coast and up with a broken propeller it doesn't matter whether you're on a commercial lobster boat a fishing charter boat or a cruising sail boat your propeller is still broken somebody needs to fix it we need boat yards all up and down along our coast and it's another reason why we need working waterfront boat yards in business  for all of us on the water well thirty example i want to use is about our coastal boat yards and marinas many of them are struggling to make ends meet and the rising property values threaten the viability of their business model one of our oldest and most historic yards in my state is for sale the artist still there with deep water front edge and commercial buildings and there are several people who are interested in buying the yard and starting it to use it for manufacturing high tech composite components for the marine industry a growing industry in our state but of course there are developers eyeing the property as well if they buy it instead of creating new manufacturing jobs we will see vacation condominiums popping up and we will lose even more access to the water will also lose good high paying jobs that are main boat yards provide in maine as you'll hear later from gen literal who has done a tremendous amount of work on this area and we're happy to have with us today the state has raised millions of dollars in bond issues to protect our working waterfronts dedicated to commercial fishing it isn't enough and maine has a rich waterfront tradition with strong economic cultural and historic ties to the fishing industry i'm particularly interested in this issue because i live in a coastal community i live on one of maine's fourteen offshore islands to get to my home i take an hour ferry ride before i end up in my community of three hundred fifty year round residents about two thousand summer residence and it's a community that was built around commune commercial fishing community with a very strong can into a working waterfront when i was a teenager on the island of north even there were a tremendous number of more of fisherman and the island supported a variety of different fisheries over the years we've had native americans who went fishing in canoes big boats that went with herring singers gill netters ground fisherman today most of our fishing is  for lobster but most of my friends and neighbors like all fishermen down the coast still need a place to land their lobsters store their base load unload their traps buy diesel fuel and repair their boats having a working waterfront is critical to their businesses to my community like many other communities and for people to be able to feed their families and heat their homes this bill h r twenty five forty eight builds on the work done by my by this committee in the past and my predecessor the former congressman tom allen it will help to protect these and other working waterfronts across the country by establishing a grants program within the coastal zone management act the bill will help protect working waterfronts the jobs they provide and the ability for all of us to access coasts the flexible definition of what a working waterfront is protects working waterfronts in all coastal states both u s the national marine manufacturers association the conservation law foundation have all written letters expressing their support for working waterfronts and for this bill the need for this legislation is shown in two recent reports one by the notion national ocean economics program on the value and importance of our ocean and coastal economy and the other the access to waterfront by know and see grant i ask that these reports and letters of support be entered into the record supporting working waterfronts is just a small piece of improving the management of our coasts developing a working waterfront grants program is just a part but an important part of ensuring that our coastal economy remains strong i am looking forward to working with you on this important issue and i thank you again for holding this hearing today i thank the general lady from maine mr pingree for her statement and i do look forward to working with you on this very important piece of legislation i would now like to ask for unanimous consent to enter into the record thirty two letters in support of h r sixteen seventy two including letters from congressman rick larsen washington state governor christine gregoire and other industry conservation tribal and local representatives and hearing no objection so order and i wish to think the gentle lady for her testimony and like to invite the second panel to testify and you're more than welcome to join us congresswoman if if you would like to i would now like to recognize our first panel of witnesses to testify our witnesses include mr david kennedy acting deputy assistant administrator for ocean services and coastal zone management national oceanic and atmospher administration ms jenny broadhurst director northwest straits commission and ms jennifer littoral director of marine programs island institute i thank you all for being here today and as we begin i would note for all the witnesses that the red timing light on the table will indicate when your five minutes have passed and your time has concluded we would appreciate your cooperation complying with these limits however register that your full written statement will be entered into the congressional record before i recognize mr kennedy to begin his testimony it is come to my attention that just last week mr kennedy was promoted to his new position and i offer him a hearty congratulations for this and all of these outstanding work and i look forward to working with you mr kennedy in this new capacity and invite you now to begin your testimony well thank you very much appreciate that i've gotten some congratulations that i'm not sure maybe condolences that i need but nonetheless a challenge thank you thank you for the opportunity to  testify this morning an honor and pleasure coast to resources in the pacific northwest are environmentally economically an ascetic lead vital to the region through various programs and partnerships know devotes considerable resources to managing a restoring these coastal assets in addition to supporting regional and state partnerships provides community based stewardship organizations such as the northwest straits initiative with resources and technical expertise to help address local  grants and other funding opportunities to address coastal issues this relationship has successfully combined noah's technical expertise and fiscal resources with northwest straits local capacity to implement project noah supports the goals and objectives of the initiative and applaud their significant efforts to protect and restore local marine resources now i support the intent of this legislation and appreciate the opportunity to comment on the bill h r six hundred seventy two direct no employees to be designated as liaison to the northwest rights commission now expects to provide significant meaningful input to the commission but this legislation would be strengthened by including the language to clarify this that non voting participants are not bound to the same goals and assigned to the members of the commission we also look forward to working with the committee with respect to the proposed expansion of possibilities for the director of the padilla bay reserve hopes to continue to support the northwest straits initiative we encourage the initiative to continue pursuing competitively awarded federal grants to help support its various activities now moving to working waterfronts our nation's waterfronts are experiencing increased pressure from competing demands as you heard before accelerating the need to it provides assistance to coastal states and territories in order to revitalize waterfront preserve public access enhanced maritime commerce and restore coastal features for example the main coastal program partnership between now and the state of maine in an active is an active member of maine's working waterfront coalition that helps manage a working waterfronts grants program that provides funds to help purchase preserve and protect coastal property for commercial commercial fishing activities the marine coastal program matches federal funds with state dollars to support program implementation no recognizes the importance of providing water front access for diversity of coastal dependent commercial residential and recreational uses h r twenty five forty eight access for the full suite of public and private uses the cesium includes waterfront as a piece of the larger coastal picture and a holistic approach is needed to maintain healthy resilient and sustainable ocean coastal and great lakes resources know recognizes the and i'd like to recognize ms broadhurst thank you for travelling all the way from the pacific northwest to be with us today and you are now recognized to testify for five minutes thank you very much  highlight the degree to which working waterfront access is the cornerstone of maine's coastal economy and heritage imagine if you will following a winding route one thirty one in midcoast maine it will eventually lead you to the end of the st george and to the village of port clyde port clyde is home of the famous marshall point lighthouse mont ferry him on he can island and is also not worthy for its rich history and art as its home to three generations of wyatt however the tradition of port clyde is steeped in the fishing industry going back some two hundred years today and to a fine to significant fisheries the lobster fishery and the ground fish fishery the poor cod fishermen are working together to preserve their heritage their community and resources for future generations the first goal of their alliance was to preserve access to the ocean for their fishing fleet of for quite four hundred year round residents half of them are directly dependent upon commercial fishing from the town's historic fisherman's co operative wharf built more than two hundred years ago this property is one of only eighty one prime working waterfront access points remaining along maine's five thousand miles of coastline identified in the island institute's two thousand and seven report the last twenty miles which i've submitted for the hearing today although just a tiny coastal village port clyde has the distinction of being home to the second largest ground fishing fleet between portland maine and the canadian border without protection this this historic property and the seafaring heritage it represents might have just become one more casual in the development trend threatens working waterfront properties along maine's coastline this trend however is not unique to the state of maine rising property values and development are putting the squeeze on traditional water dependent uses in coastal towns throughout our nation w there are many trends you can count on one that you will never see is a developed waterfront property being trance or a place by a fishing wharf one of maine's twenty miles of working waterfront sixty percent are actually privately owned  vulnerable to conversion more than seven hundred fifty million dollars in maine state revenue and thirty five thousand jobs are dependent on working waterfronts maine has been a real leader in the nation in the saddle shing tools to protect our working waterfront in two thousand and six the state of maine created the working waterfront access pilot program with five million dollars in state bonds three years later through working waterfront covenants we've secured nineteen properties and more than one mile of coastline out of those twenty miles were trying to preserve the port clyde fisherman's wharf was one of the nineteen properties secured through the program the fishermen use funds from the sale of the development rights to build an additional wharf on the property at a celebration last september the  dedicated gerry cushman a third generation lobstermen a ground fisherman led the effort to apply to the working waterfront program jerry's father was one of the fishermen who originally formed the co op in port clyde at the event he said i wish my dad could be here today i feel like i'm completing a legacy that he started by keeping this work warf working forever another fisherman said that day it may seem like just a dock but it is the keystone to our lives while policies and state and federal funding can bring about many successes there are few that result in something as tangible and concrete as standing on a wharf i think that you can identify with the next example as i also live on an island the second example takes us three hours north of po clyde on route three here you come to the town of stream on the quiet side of mount desert island home of acadia national park and visited by more than three million people yearly much of the working waterfront access on the island has been squeezed out to accommodate other uses the davis family owners of a multigenerational fishing business also applied to the working waterfront access program the davis war is a last full service non dealer own fishing war on mount dedication of the davis work this past august robert davis said fishing is a battle every day but when i go to my grave i'm going to look back and i'm going to say i got something accomplished today's the day i'll remember today is the day the state of maine has seen many successes using this tool to securing we're working waterfront access such as the two i've highlighted here today there is more need than there is state funding to secure the miles of coastline that are required to support our working waterfront dependent stakeholders around the nation we feel that creating this model for the from the stool at a federal level will have similar impacts across the nation h r two five four eight protecting america's working waterfront act will go a long way to sustaining coastal resilience in the future of our nation's i conic centuries old tradition of working and living by the sea thank you thank you miss littoral for your dedication to preserving the working waterfronts and before we begin with our questions i understand there are a number of graduate students from the globe's program at notre dame in the audience and they are here learning about how science gets incorporated into policy would you students please stand to be recognized i know that notre dame and st mary's are now integrated i went to st mary's before that happened so you're the lucky girls o welcome the students from notre dame i went to the university of michigan and i always cheer for notre dame the jeopardy play university of michigan but  get on there also it lasted well forty four years we were married but welcome here today i want to thank the witnesses also you're involved in something extremely important our  waterways and our waterfronts are already part of our national well than our national heritage environmentally economically for commercial fishing and and  and recreational fishing as a matter of fact my district in michigan is on the coastline of michigan michigan has three thousand two hundred eighty eight miles of coastline and i happen beyond that it's a beautiful area and we do a lot of balancing which is very important of the use and value o being on the water all the economic uses the fishing the recreational and of course the cheapest form of transportation by water and that's a very important part of michigan's economy ships from around the world are and the saginaw river is constantly being grad's so more and more ships can get up what they used to get up  gentleman from michigan for his statement and now i invite the members of the committee to ask questions for the witnesses and i'll begin with myself and i have a couple of questions for mr kennedy mr kennedy in the senate companion legislation to h r six hundred seventy two two amendments were adopted to clarify the responsibilities of the no well listen to the commission and to add kennedy has been very successful in securing noid grants for the citizen driven project can you describe the type of oversight that know what provides the northwest commission through its annual grant award process and does know commission initiated in a kitty that conflicted with no way or the mission of any other rebel in federal agency operated to the best of my knowledge no now we are not engaged and involved to the point that we would know all of the activities that the commission of the foundation are involved with but i think the real answer the question is to the best of our knowledge and how do the activities of the commission complement noise existing restoration projects in the northwest  as you heard i think in our testimony and from the commission they're involved in a number of activities that directly support the same sorts of missions that no is involved with so at the grassroots the absence of existing programs to support working waterfronts was not adequate force the state of maine to initiate its own program yet you stated that the objective twenty five forty eight could be funded by existing programs in the department of commerce how do you explain this discrepancy what specific programs in the department are you referring to i really think that probably some more discussion is needed on this front but  think that there may be some possibility within the department of commerce through economic development administration outside our jurisdiction in discussions we've had of other places that we think we may explore collectively resilient coastal communities identified under office of coastal resource management strategic plan i think they do certainly the economic side of that resilience we try and have a balance when we talk every day because i deeply appreciate what you do and i don't want to take up much of the time of course i think twenty five forty eight is a brilliant piece of legislation that could do great work for all of our coastal communities but let me just follow up with one aspect with  literal thank you so much for coming to talk about some specific examples from maine and and the chair talked a little bit about the level of need in our state and other places and we represent a minor piece of the need that happens on a broader scale but specifically i know that the state was able to fund some of these projects you know off the top you had i know you mentioned briefly in your testimony exactly how much has been funded around purchasing working waterfront and you have a sense of what the demand is just in our state if the funding were available yes that's a good question we've done through extensive study and we've actually identified roughly one hundred properties that are crucial to our state that need to be funded and that would cost a roughly twenty five million dollars to fund secure just one hundred properties it's probably not enough to go all the way that what we need to secure we have secured five million dollars in state funding so far that cured nineteen properties and about a mile of coastline so we're nineteen of the hundred of the way there so we're in the states we're we've been funded at multi year roughly one to two million dollars waiting for the next  that i will just emphasize this issue and i and i do appreciate suggesting that there are sources of funding and we would be very interested in following up on that yet without a specific mandate and increase funding as you can i think the general you know i've been listening to all the discussion around the state centered around the state so i sure hope the territories are included in all this legislation i worry about that and we do have a lot of waterfront  mr kennedy i really enjoyed questioning you so i'm back with you in your testimony you suggest that further clarifying changes should be made to the responsibilities for the director of  a reserve now what is the nature of the suggested changes and have the changes been adopted in the senate companion bill i'm going to have to get back to you for the record on that because  i don't well i don't know the answer however i do know that in general the issue there is just making sure that the amount of effort without any other resources to  the director and his office are considered in the discussion but specifically i'm not aware there are details on the other bill and i don't have any details would you get that information i will local planning for working waterfronts they provide some limited funds for infrastructure and by infrastructure we're talking about docks walkways that sort of thing and then the third component with commission's bottom up approach allows local constituents to prioritize restoration goals through the marine resources committees or the m r c can you explain how the commission provide comprehensive vision and scientifically base frame the work done so we review all of the project ideas that are submitted by the m r c to ensure that they fit within that framework and we also have a strategic plan for the overall initiative  help provide vision the five year plan is the commission framework able to respond to emerging coastal issues such as climate change with shovel ready projects policy guidance or both we certainly try to stay abreast of these emerging issues and i think that's one of the roles of them are there within their local communities to learn about those issues and share them with the community members we also have in the annual training conference m r c members and we do focus on projects the sister prioritized for implementation within the m r c as well makes the final approval for projects funding the m r c the commission or nola the side on which projects they want to do given the money that's available and they submit that in a proposal to the commission commission and a technical committee review them for technical merit science based approach successful pilot program indicate that a national working waterfronts program such as h r twenty five forty eight would be successful in other states and territories yes that's a good question in two thousand and seven there was a national working waterfronts conference in norfolk virginia many of our tools a suite of tools that we've come up with in maine to help preserve our working waterfronts the grants program with the covenants i talked about was one tool we found that we need multiple tools including planning for zoning and all of these other things and we presented that at the national conference the proceedings of that i believe her have been submitted to you as well and in that we've seen similar work emerge from florida creating similar programs of that and north carolina as well and i think that a national level this is what's really needed that the needs of different working waterfronts from the states and the territories are very different and they need to create and determine what their working waterfront interests are and they're not matched up exactly with what main bar every state has an individual interest and that really became apparent at that national conference we're planning another conference next year another national working waterfront conference will be hosted in maine and that's being planned with the island institute was to grant was the state planning office in maine so we're hosting that next year that's good at what federal assistance is currently available for preserving and expanding working waterfronts in maine we weren't able to find any for the specific tool that we've been using there are really very successful programs for helping to plan helping harbor city planning for the schip program which is small harbors improvement grants which our state uses infrastructure but we couldn't find anything that was directly that would directly impact preserving the property in perpetuity there's constantly this shift of properties and humor and working with owning zoning changes over time and that was this program was the only tool that we could find to work with that would in your in your work import tree mont and other coastal areas in maine how has the preservation of working waterfronts aligned with local zoning processes  designing within the the program that we've established one of the criteria actually to apply for the program they have to show it has the town done zoning is the community behind the project and the score is actually higher on the program the more involvement there is of the town level and of the levels it doesn't require it doesn't impede or circumnavigate the process but it works in tandem and you need both and like i said this is one of many tools that we've identified  but it's a very important tool and one of the most crucial ones that we have right now you touched it earlier on grants you know under twenty five forty eight grants can only be used to purchase property interest from willing sellers is that correct yes yes they have to be willing nothing such as eminent domain can take place or anything of that nature it has to be a property owner that is willing to sell their development rights to place a covenant in perpetuity on their property and how would a twenty five improve public access to coastal waters this particular bill has a very strong public piece to it with the exception of fishing properties and industrial properties where the state or  project without a fire that it could be a hazard to public health obviously wharves with slippery bait and things like that obviously don't work well with the public on it but there are many other public properties that would work well combining the two together one of our first properties in maine it was secure before we had this program was actually a land trust in the town of york harbor working together and they combined the dock in half and half of it for public and half of it for the fishermen and it works really well together where the fishermen actually enjoy talking to tourists about what's going on and  i think that's a very true statement that it does all begin here and we learned so much from these hearings and the author of the bill is pingree do you have any for the question i don't but thank you again for hearing the  some additional questions for you and we will ask you to respond to these in writing in addition the hearing record will be held open for ten days for anyone who would like to submit additional information for the record and if there is no further business before the subcommittee the chairwoman again thanks the members of the subcommittee and our witnesses for their participation here this afternoon and the subcommittee now stands adjour