understood the importance of the nation's wastewater infrastructure in achieving the goals of fishable and swimmable waters under the clean water act over the years this subcommittee has hill numerous hearings on the condition of our waste water infrastructure and on the adverse impacts of deteriorating infrastructure to the nation's economy and vironment in addition the subcommittee has documented the growing gap between the need for water infrastructure improvements and expenditures for this purpose for example current estimates show and annual investment shortfall of between three point two billion and eleven point one billion for water related infrastructure this subcommittee also understands the importance of increased infrastructure investment on job creation while this is not the primary for focus of the clean water act we must recognize the added benefit of the infrastructure investment on job creation and the secondary beneficial impact on the nation's economy with a national jobless rate of nine point five percent the highest it's been for twenty six years including roughly one point six million unemployed construction workers it clear that an increase in infrastructure investment will have multiple benefits to the nation at large earlier this year this committee approved a charge twelve sixty two the water quality investment act of two thousand and nine to  reauthorize the clean water state revolving fund at increased amount over the next five years this bill which is awaiting action in the full senate would reach store the federal commitment to meeting our wastewater needs in the future however assuming that actual federal appropriations are made to match levels authorized in that bill there would still be an annual gap between federal expenditures and the need for clean water infrastructure that is why we're here today take the first step in a large debate about how best to fund our nation's water related infrastructure needs in the future today's conversation focuses on one potential option other than general revenues that may be necessary to address the growing water related infrastructure gaps the potential creation of a clean water trust fund the creation of a national trust fund would provide a deficit neutral long term federal contribution to protecting nation kane water trust fund should also provide greater certainty to state and local governments on the availability of sufficient revenues to meet existing and future water needs both through capital expenditures for which water infrastructure repairs and replacement as well as potential addressing other clean water act authorities such as not point source control programs and grants the state water pollution control programs this long term predictability on the wastewater restructure funding will allow state and local governments to develop long range planning for waste water infrastructure projects similar to the planning effort for the nation's infrastructure transportation projects funded through the highway trust fund unfortunately before the debate even started in the benefits of a clean water trust fund we heard from interest groups that do not believe they should contribute to the creation of a trust fund this finger pointing is reminiscent of the quote attributed to the late senator russell long who said don't tax you don't tax me tax that fellow behind the tree i recognize that any debate on identifying potential revenue sources for infrastructure investment will be challenging this committee is already engaged in a similar debate to address the current shortfall in the highway trust fund however in opinion of the chair we must recognize that the end goal of this debate is and increase in infrastructure spending that will benefit the entire nation it is clear that the need for what structure investment is well documented it is clear that clean water benefit both the human and ecological health as well as this health of the united states economy it's clear that we're all beneficiaries of are going to be successful in creating a long term sustainable and dedicated source of revenue to address our which water infrastructure needs all of the potential revenue sources for a trust fund must be put before congress and debate it that means all of the potential revenue sources identified by may two thousand i report of the government accountability office need to be put on the table and debate it it seems unlikely that interest groups will come to con me however at the same time we must be able to articulate a logical connection between the source of revenue and the benefit that comes from clean water i applaud john for more of that mr brueggemann are for taking the first step in this larger debate b introducing the wastewater protection or the water protection and reassessment investment act i would hope my colleagues agree that if they want to trust fund would be useful addition to address the nation's wastewater infrastructure needs look forward to hearing the witnesses this morning can this afternoon and continue this debate continuing the debate on the opportunities and challenges to the creation of the clean water trust fund and with that i'd like to ask the yes before do that i just want to say that we're going to waive any member minutes to to move forward with a hearing mr bozeman thank you madam chair we need to ensure that sound federal policies  placed to promote responsible management of our nation's infrastructure careful uses of our valuable water resources and protection of the environment today's hearing will be about the first of these priorities making sure that our nation has adequate water infrastructure this is long been a court an issue to the subcommittee today's hearing is the latest in a series of hearings are subcommittee has held on the important issue over the past several congresses it's also our understanding this hearing will be the first of multiple hearings that subjugated subcommittee intends to hold on how to finance waste water infrastructure our nation's health quality of life and economic well being rely on adequate wastewater treatment industries that rely on clean water like farmers fishermen and manufacturers contribute over three hundred billion billion dollars a year to our gross domestic product to provide clean water and national already has invested over two hundred fifty billion dollars in waste infrastructure but this infrastructure is now aging and our population is continuing to grow increasing the burden on our existing infrastructure if communities do not repair replace not drive their infrastructure we could lose environmental health and economic benefits of this investment various organizations have quantified waste water infrastructure needs the congressional budget office c p i and the water infrastructure network of estimated that could take between three hundred and four hundred billion dollars to address or nation's clean water infrastructure needs over the next twenty years to keep our drinking water and wise water's clean inside if this is twice the current level of investment by all levels of government these needs have been well documented in our subcommittees prior hearings we can reduce the overall cost of why is flawed or infrastructure with good asset management management innovative technologies water comforts conservation and re use and regional approaches to water pollution problems but these things alone will not close the large funding gap that now exists between whilst water infrastructure needs and current levels of spending increased investment must still take place that leads to the question where is the money going to come from there is no single answer to that question municipal waste water services are state and local responsibility but there is clearly a strong federal interest in clipping in keeping our water clean so what we need is an effective partnership between all levels federal state and local that means all partners need to contribute if we do not and start investing in our waste water infrastructure now it is going to cost or nation  the future recently the house of representatives passed legislation will authorize increased funding for waste water infrastructure through reauthorization of the clean water state revolving loan fund program administered by a this bill is designed to help communities nationwide meet their growing demand for waste water infrastructure needs and improve water quality when we do invest federal funds in infrastructure we need to do it in ways that would give us the best plain water value for the dollar there are a number of potential ways for the federal government to invest for example we might provide more loan money to the s r m program or might provide assistance grants additional you might increase our investment  research and development of new technologies to improve the efficiency of white water treatment facilities or perhaps are innovative financing options that would make more funds available in any event the federal government is not going to be able to solve this problem alone the local level communities need to evaluate their assets make capital improvement plans identify sources of capital to implement the plans and asked for the writing traces over probably the capital over a period of time that last part is very difficult no one likes to spend more but if citizens understand the relationship between clean water weiss water infrastructure they should be willing to make the investment recent surveys show most americans want sustainable dedicated source of funding for water infrastructure projects and would support the creation of a sustainable trust fund for waste water infrastructure one of the most complex acts aspects of moving from the trust fund concept to reality however is determining the funding sources for such a fund the water and wastewater community has not supported a user fee for a trust fund and so far no other water user has stepped forward in support of the failure tax in their activities either as a result it remains unclear how trust fun and used what type of financial assistance should be provided and what activities should be eligible to receive funding from a trust fund while a majority of stakeholders have said that a trust fund should be administered through an e p a partnership with the states they differed in their views on how a trust fund should be used stakeholders vigorously stated the trust fund should be used only to fund the existing clain what waste water evolving sun that it should support only a new and separate wastewater program or that it should support both the state revolving fine and a separate program some did not support the establishment of a trust fund at all estimated that the revenue that could potentially be raised by various taxes on a range of previously proposed products activities and found that it may be difficult to generate ten billion dollars annually from any one option by itself rather probably require a combination of taxes on more than  one evaluate options to reach the ten billion target level we've requested that g a o can ducting additional study to analyze funding investment mechanisms and revenue sources from potential turn of public or private sources that could be used to fund investments in mice water infrastructure and other water pollution control activities under the federal water pollution control act we look forward to those results in a few months harper witnesses will bring forward ideas on how we can increase funding for waste water infrastructure identify potential willing revenue sources and ensure excellent means for generating revenues while the trust fund may have the advantage or providing a dedicated source of funds for wastewater treatment how really the truth i'm going to bypass all of the opening statements and ask that you just fathom for the record and go right to our colleague mr bloom annapolis testimony thank you very much madam chair member bozeman it is members of the subcommittee it is a pleasure for me to return to the hearing room that i spent so many pleasurable  challenging hours and i'm reminded madam chairwoman that for ten years i was a member of your subcommittee and it was fascinating to scroll back thinking about all the groundwork that has been laid over the course of a decade with you and former chairman duncan trying to put the spotlight on a an urgent national priority i am pleased to be testifying today and behind me are some of the people with whom i have been working on issues dealing with waste water and how we're going and drinking water how we're going to finance it ike i can't think of a better panel to help you frame the issue going forward and people who will be vital partners answering the questions that the ranking member just outlined i'm thinking back to one of our hearings in march between wastewater needs and current spending in april of two thousand for our aging water supply infrastructure looked at the needs of drinking water a similar picture the american water works discussed a reported released the don of the replacement era in two thousand and five i think there were truly landmark hearings here in this room by the subcomm examining the questions that have been previously raised and talking about where we go from here and it was fascinating one of the featured speakers at that hearing a witness was the famous republican pollster frank lun z and his findings i think were telling indicating that the vast majority of americans believe clean and safe drinking water is a key national priority and that they would support a sustainable dedicated source of funding for water infrastructure projects i commend your staff for excellent summary as usual this really drills down and captures it and one element that they have placed before you and it's one that i think all of us need to raise the banner and try and drive the point home is that because of the why and increasing gap between new urgent local needs and available funding source we are at risk of losing all our progress for the last forty years it's not a case of helping keep pace it's not a case of trying to keep rates down the fact is the progress that has that this committee helped engineer with the clean water act for instance is at risk because we falling behind growth and aging systems these hearings your report the work that you've done build a case for a significant increase in federal funding the clean water act as we're moving forward and back in the carter administration the federal government provided seventy eight percent of the resources necessary to comply with the act it's now three percent it's not a sustainable picture now we had a number of witnesses in the past and one element of testimony that i thought was very important came from the  association and the ranking member again and get this is not exactly going to be the simplest task before us because no one wants to be singled out and they made the point right there and that has guided the legislation that i want to talk to you about in commend to you and that is her industry was willing to do its part and pay higher rates that reflected infrastructure needs but didn't think it was fair to make beverages be the sole source of funds i agree and that has guided the legislation that is before you i won't i guess be increasingly redundant talking about the gap you've got some people here that will give you a more immediate urgent and local perspective on it but the fact remains we've got to do something about dealing with the funding in two thousand and eight when mr oberstar gave me permission to leave the transportation and infrastructure committee was with the understanding that i would go to the ways and means committee to try and find the resources necessary for you to be able to do your important work we have been in deeply involved for the last thirty months with efforts about how we finance rebuilding and renewing america there is no more critical issue in my judgment in order to restart the economy to protect the environment and revitalize our communities you reference the g a o study that the chair mr oberstar and i requested you'll hear about it but yes there is no silver bullet but it didn't deal with elements that we can we have together to provide a funding comprehensive approach to funding the point is that the local communities are doing their job now you're going to hear it and some of you represent communities where the local fees utility rates are crushing and the prospects for the future are of them doubling tripling quadrupling in a way that is going to pose a huge problem on people with then comes it's it's crippling business development  what is missing is that the federal government needs to do a better job like it did thirty years ago in helping local communities meet the altogether appropriate requirements of the clean air act i've introduced legislation the water protection and reinvestment act h r thirty two zero two that would stablish such a trust fund we have spent countless hours over the last year and a half trying to refine the elements i know it's complex i think we've given you a very good start for how it would work it is firewalled like we do with the highway trust fund it would be distributed mainly through the clean water and drinking water state revolving funds but there would be additional resources available for critical grant programs focusing on addressing current and future needs things like combined sewer overflows climate change most of the authorizing language will look very familiar to members of this committee and your staff because we built on your outstanding work and breaking the log jam over the last two years we have taken the advice that there not be a single source to finance this and nobody's going to step forward and voluntarily do it they have a legitimate point that they don't want to be singled out and given the burden of closing the federal gap so what we have done is to look at the four primary areas where they rely heavily on fresh fuel or water and they burden the system and they profit from it there is a four cent per container fee on water based  the whole burden on them but it's hard to think of an industry that is more dependent on an inexhaustible supply of safe pure water the second item as a three percent fee on items that are designed to be disposed of in waste water there are products tooth but toothpaste cosmetics toilet paper that actually if it weren't for the ability to dispose of them through our sewer systems the products would have little or no value or they would be very expensive if they were required cooking oil for instance you required it to recapture and recycl this is girl rectally tied to benefit we are in a situation and some of you have real problems at home where we are slowly medicating the american population because of all the pharmaceuticals that are getting into the drinking water system with real serious potential health implications extraordinarily expensive for minnis apologies whether they are large or small to be able to extract that this would have a small fee on the industry to support programs in legislation to prevent the drugs from entering the drinking water systems and to support research on remediation one fifteenth of one percent would be a fee on corporate profits over four million dollars american industry relies on safe drinking water and safe disposal of sewage and storm water this is again a minuscule fee but it has broad application and in total these four sources that have been reviewed who'd in your g a o report are sufficient to generate over ten billion dollars a year on an ongoing basis doesn't put the primary burden on anyone and they're all connected to beneficial use it is a user fee president eisenhower and president reagan understood the importance of user fees when in the case of president eisenhower they implemented a highway trust fund user fee and both president eisenhower and president reagan increased those user fees because people benefited we're going to hear from of wide variety of stakeholders and i won't go through the list ranging from the american general contractors the environmental community american rivers there have been a wider range of people who really are on top of this and they will work with you to refine the legislation and to support some of the tough decisions that need to be made i am particularly pleased with co sponsorship the original co sponsor of this of this legislation including three  alumni of our committee congressman la tourette congressman simpson actually i guess a congressman he tries not yet an alumni i don't i don't think he's on the subcommittee now  conclude with the final point i referenced the research by frank luntz who talked about how important this was to the american public and how there was broad bipartisan support mr lunch came out with a new poll in january of this year he found that a near unanimous ninety four percent of the american public are concerned about the state of our infrastructure he found these concerns cut across all regions urban suburban and rural he found that eighty four percent of the american public wanted the federal government to spend more money to improve infrastructure and he found eighty one percent a majority of democrats independents and republicans are personally prepared to pay one percent more in taxes for this cause i would point far far more than or a larger percentage that are included in this legislation i deeply appreciate your courtesy and allowing me to testify on support of this bipartisan legislation and i look forward  madam chair and members to working with you and the other three committees that have been assigned the legislation to be able to help you meet the amazing task that you have been given as a challenge to make our communities more livable dealing with the critical water infrastructure thank you thank you very much we what we want to have questions for you right now ok now we will not we will not that that's even better and they will come later yes man we will massy the second panel can i just i just want to thank mr bloom an hour though he's worked very very hard on this and is very passionate and this is not something that he's done in the last month or so i know you've been working on this for a couple years so we do appreciate you i'd like to ask each of you to try real hard to keep your mark at bath minutes but you can file your entire statement and we will have it  and we will start in the same order that we call the names and them i told director of natural resources and environment u s government accountability office follow thank you madam chairwoman ranking member boozman and members of the subcommittee thank you for inviting us to participate in your hearing on the opportunities and challenges and establishing a clean water trust fund at the request of this committee g a o just released a report that you have just heard about the details of variety of issues that will need to be addressed when establishing a clean water trust fund my statement today is based on the information contained in this report our report identified three main issues that will need to be addressed when establishing a clean water trust fund first it is important to decide how the trust fund will be administered this will involve deciding which agency will manage it and whether the funds will support the existing clean water state revolving find or a separate program second it is essential to determine what kinds of financial assistance the trust fund will provide this involves deciding whether the trust fund will make grants or loans or a combination of the two finally it is necessary to decide which activities will be eligible for trust fund support these activities could include planning and designing waste water projects and implementing capital improvement projects as well as other kinds of activities such as providing ratepayer assistance to low income households the next question you asked us to address was how can we raise ten billion dollars annually to support a clean water trust fund we identified various options that could generate this desired level of revenues but each option poses implementation challenges and it may be difficult to raise ten billion dollars from any single option instead congress may have to consider a combination of several options that could collectively generate the level of funding needed i will briefly describe each of the funding options that we identified and the related challenge first congress could consider excise taxes on products that may contribute to the wastewater stream these products include beverages fertilizers and pesticides flushable products pharmaceuticals and water appliances and plumbing fixtures the amount of revenue generated by these taxes depends on the number of products tax and then amount of tax that you apply for example raising ten billion dollars just from pharmaceuticals would require a tax of six point four percent but raising this amount from water appliances and fixtures would require a tax of thirty nine point two percent congress could also consider a per unit tax for example a five cent tax on each bottle and can a beverage sold could yield about ten billion dollars the second option that we identified is a levy an additional tax on corporate income tax would be similar to the corporate environmental income tax that helped fund the superfund program until  five increasing the current corporate income tax by an additional point seven percent could raise ten billion dollars however this level of taxation would significantly exceed the point one two percent tax that was used to support the superfund program the third option we identified is to levy a tax on water use a tax on water the use could be a volume based charge or a flat charge added to the utility bills of all households a volume based charge of point one cent per gallon could raise about thirteen billion dollars or a flat charge similar to maryland's thirty dollar flesh tax apply to all households nationwide could raise about two point six billion to raise ten billion you would need to charge each household one hundred sixteen dollars a final option that we identified is an industrial discharge tax a tax on industrial discharges could be levied in two ways the first would be to levy a fee on n p t s permits and the second would be to levy a tax on toxic chemical release as by industrial facilities however it is unclear what level of taxation would be needed to generate ten billion dollars speak from either these options because there are no good data on which to base these calculations regardless of which revenue options are chosen for a trust fund we found that each poses implementation challenges for example each of these options involve establishing clear and precise definitions of the products or entities to be taxed in addition both of these options require establishing a collection and enforcement framework and finally obtaining stakeholder and industry support for these options poses additional challenges this is because many stakeholders do not perceive a strong connection between some of these options and their impact on the wastewater in for structure and most industry groups are opposed to the idea of congress taxing their products in conclusion madam chairwoman while the establishment of a clean water trust science is a viable option for addressing the water infrastructure funding gap establishing such a fun comes with a host of challenges and greatest of which may be obtaining stakeholder support this concludes my prepared statement i'd be happy to respond to any questions thank you very much thank you madam chair members of the committee for the opportunity to testify today like to marilyn congresswoman edwards for her support of the efforts that we in maryland government are making to restore chesapeake bay in my testimony today i'm going to provide information regarding maryland's bay restoration fund and i want to start out by saying though that really would have not been possible to do this without very broad support from maryland citizens very concerned about the health of our waters particularly chesapeake bay very interested in the restoration effort and so there's a long history that this builds on more recently our governor o'malley has really championed this through the development of his base that web page which is actually a very user friendly source of information regarding the bay restoration effort it's very consumer friendly and it  provides everybody likes a call transparent information that we can use to track our progress in restoring the chesapeake bay in the bay restoration fund is a very porton although  relatively small part of this maryland has a very significant water and wastewater need our most recent need survey indicates over fourteen billion for both point and nonpoint source pollution control and drinking water infrastructure maryland's bay restoration fund covers about one billion of this need it's focused on our largest sewage treatment plants and upgrading them to a enhanced new tree removal it's part of our solution but it's not the whole solution maryland very much depends upon the state revolving loan fund financed by the federal government and we strongly support your efforts to strengthen these funds your staff asked a little bit about how this bill was passed i've already mentioned that maryland citizens are very concerned about the bay and   by two thousand and four about twenty years later we had achieved significant progress but everyone acknowledged that it really was not enough to achieve our goals for cleaning the bay and in maryland's two thousand and four session former government governor robert l ehrlich jr introduced legislation creating the bay restoration fund financed by a two dollars fifty cent monthly surcharge on wastewater bills and subsequently on fees paid by owners of septic systems or on site sewage disposal systems was immediately dubbed the flesh tax and i just like to make one correction we don't call it the flesh taxes the flush fee and that was a very important aspect of the success of this legislation  and when governor ehrlich introduced it there was quite a lot of interest and support for it the legislature actually jumped on board and an added to the bill and added  dollars a year phoebe on on site sewage disposal systems and there's been broad public support for this effort in maryland the fee structure the fee is very critical  to its success i believe it's paid by all users of municipal waste water treatment facilities all owners of private on site sewage treatment systems and by all commercial and industrial facilities that discharge nutrients to the water it's again directed towards the bay restoration it's a nutrient reduction fund the fee as we've heard is flat rate two dollars fifty cents a month or thirty dollars a year for residential users but for and it's paid is a surcharge on sewage bills for people who get sewage bills for folks who live in the rural areas that are on septic systems that's paid directly to the county government for commercial and industrial users the fee is based on a sliding scale depending on how much wastewater they actually produce and it's a  multiple of the amount that's charged to the individual residential owners the fees being used into dedicated funds and those funds and it's absolutely critical that those funds be dedicated funds the citizens watch it very closely the governor of the legislature there's a requirement for an experience for this important effort that we're talking about today we have broad public understanding good public education effort to make sure people understand the connection the source of the fee is understood to be related to that and that it's broadly and equitably distributed amongst the various users and the fee and just to emphasize policing the dedicated fund absolutely critical i think massachusetts i'm honored to testify here today on behalf of the national association of clean water agencies regarding the stablish myth of the clean one trust fund to help finance wastewater infrastructure projects natural represents the interests of publicly owned wastewater treatment utilities and many of our members also provide drinking water services projects financed through the trust fund will help ensure the protection of our vital water resources improve public health provide recreational enjoyment for all americans and promote economic prosperity this hearing in the recent release year report on potential ways to finance and structure a clean water trust fund are important steps toward a long term sustainable revenue source to address the serious water and wastewater infrastructure funding we believe a clean water introducing a water protection and reinvestment act h r thirty two zero two and for appreciating the water tax does not bring new supplemental money to the table for recognizing the need to fund waste water drinking water and storm water projects a and global competition driving costs of labor and materials in order to meet these challenges all levels of government federal state and local must commit to a partnership that recognizes the role of science  criteria and utilizes pragmatic planning to prioritize projects understands the need for more for more investment in our nation's clean water infrastructure as the cost of compliance continues to go up we see infrastructure start funding gap of three to five hundred billion dollars over the next twenty years meanwhile u p a estimates that more than four the percent of the nation's water bodies remain impaired a figure that is not changed in twenty years in other words the years federal investment in clean water as declined sharply in this apologies currently pay about ninety five percent of the cost of wastewater infrastructure and ninety nine percent of the cost of drinking water infrastructure that was on triennial service charge index projects a steady rise in the average residential service charges over the next five years and this is the face that in your average cost a single family residences will increase nearly thirty four percent between two thousand and eight and two thousand and thirteen since two thousand rates of my utility which provides only treatment services to our members have increased four hundred fifty percent in order to pay debt service for ongoing plant upgrades required to meet more stringent discharge standards this is resulted in a one hundred  ten percent increase in sewer rates to our largest member community wister which has a median household income of thirty six thousand dollars per year it goes without saying the small rural and low income communities would be hit hardest by these increased costs brings us back to the subject of today's hearing how to finance the enormous clean water funding need momentum is building to address the infrastructure funding gap in a meaningful way we appreciate this committee we appreciate this committee's work to move legislation increasing federal funding for clean water infrastructure including bills to reauthorize us are open to provide six billion in stimulus funding to address our needs while the represents all the steps forward we must remove water infrastructure investment from the realm of uncertain annual appropriations and focus on a dedicated funding system use apology to want to pay their share and will continue to do so however not to believe that the federal government must do more to it just a short while facing our nation's publicly owned wastewater treatment agency's if highways were to trust fund a thirty billion a year in airports why should we not have a water trust fund for a national resource each of us uses every single day during deliberations for the clean water act congress decided that water infrastructure was a national good that demanded federal investment represented but sure of this committee at the time so the test cleaning up the nation's waters was even more monumental than establishing the interstate highway program congress created a trust fund to ensure the long term viability of the nation's highways system we asked the congress to the same a nation's waterways we look forward to working with you the water infrastructure network and associations representing drinking water utilities that support the blue in our bill thank you for your time and for a long nap but to share its views on clean water funding the twenty first century thank you chairman johnson ranking member bozeman and distinguished members of the committee it is my great pleasure to testify before you today on the need to establish a dedicated fun for clean water for all americans my name is there ethical and some executive program director citizens campaign for the environment where an environmental and public health advocacy organization supported by over eighty thousand members throughout new york and connecticut i also serve as a the treasurer and a board member on the national clean water network and i also serve on governor paterson's clean water collaborative i believe stablish ng a dedicated fund to ensure that americans have access to safe drinking water and that american waters are no longer followed by sewage and polluted runoff is long overdue the need is overwhelming urgent and new york state alone were estimated over the next twenty years to need seventy four billion dollars to meter clean water and drinking water needs nationally the e p a put that estimate at seven hundred twenty two billion dollars to bring that back home in syracuse we need one billion dollars to deal with our aging water pipes alone and i could speak at length about the overwhelming quantities of raw sewage that poor and for waters as it happens almost every day just on the fourth of july weekend at lake george on their million dollar beach over six thousand gallons of raw sewage spewed onto the beaches closing the beaches ruining summer vacations and the businesses that depend on those tourists the same is true for a water mains mother's day in syracuse over one billion or one million gallons of water flooded downtown churches businesses closing daycares permanently we've removed lead from gasoline from paint and from toys now is the time to ensure that our children and members of congress and your staff can drink tap water that's not delivered through lead leaching pipes water is a powerful compound in sewage is caustic with so many other problems in plain sight investing in clean water is often too is often ignored for too long in till it is too late and it's even more expensive we must make rebuilding and reinvesting in the fundamental sanitary service a national priority we need federal resources to protect americans and our right to basic sanitation sewage treatment plants are some of the most energy intensive and expensive taxpayer expenses by investing in energy and energy and water efficiency we have many benefits to gain as well as controlling our costs we can look at example dallas they've been able to avoid controversial water projects by providing incentives for both the commercial and residential consumers to practice water efficiency practices now a dedicated and robust clean water trust fund will assist states and local municipalities and closing that gap for water infrastructure and it's going to the economic benefits will be felt far and wide we're going to be improving water quality creating jobs and protecting public health and i applaud congress for and especially the leadership in this committee for including a much needed funding and the american recovery and reinvestment act in particular there was key language that was included that encourage green infrastructure innovative solutions that promote outside the pipe thinking and also provide funding for water and energy efficiency improvements at our treatment plants and i'm also encouraged by the much needed funding that's moving forward through the  referee authorizations for both clean water and drinking water is an effective important funding source for american water projects but need consistently exceeds funding in the solution is the american water protection and reinvestment act that outlines a twenty first century approach to deal with our twenty first century water needs and i want to highlight a few of those key provisions for successful clean water trust funds first we need to fix it first approach we need to make sure this fund is not  funding pipes to nowhere we need sensible growth we need to make sure that we have funding research and development our twenty first century water infrastructure needs need to be grounded in twenty first science  engineering we need to have national research centers and programs at our universities to develop those bright minds to bring about our sustainable water future we need to encourage our innovative clean water solutions the e p a tells us to manage water efficiently we need to slow it down spread it out and soak it in we need to make sure that we're keeping pharmaceuticals out of the water our treatment plants are not equipped to deal with removing undercurrent disrupting and a to mimicking medications grants are necessary for our local municipalities that are cash strapped we need to deal with climate change and mitigation these are challenges that water infrastructure has not seen and they can be part of the solution by generating clean renewable energy on site we need to supplement not supplant the s r s and we need dedicated funding from a variety of sources the small fees on pesticides beverages and users create a sensible and  diffuse way to fund this program and of all things and water is a public trust it's necessary for us to drink or we perish and of all things to hold in public trust what could be more important to americans and access to safe and clean water thank you thank you very much we have a vote and we have a vote that's going to take at least thirty to forty minutes but we'll have to take return and the questions will come after we complete the testimony water resources and environment subcommittee hearing on opportunities and challenges in the creation of a clean water trust fund is now reconvened we will move on to our next witness this christine young president and chief executive officer miller the driller the moines iowa welcome i as you said i am christiane from des moines iowa i like to thank you for having me here  excited to be a part of this process i am part of a family owned business we've been in construction for for sixty two years now and we have helped municipalities and communities recover when systems have gone down so we're very much aware what goes on at the local level the state level and with the corps of engineers i am a certified d v e and many of the states that we work in and i'm very proud to be here to represent the thirty three thousand members of a g c of america on the opportunities and challenges in the creation of the clean water plus fun even before the current economic downturn many of our cities and towns have experienced substantial challenges repairing and replacing water infrastructure that is quickly reaching the end of its useful life many communities do not currently have the resources to make the investments necessary to replace aging infrastructure and meet federal water quality standards as a contractor i see firsthand what neglecting our infrastructure can do to our communities as a resident of des moines iowa i also know what it's like to go without water for thirty days when your water system goes down and a flood in one thousand nine hundred three until recently with the passage of the recovery act which is providing over seven point four billion for e p a and u s d a water programs congressional appropriations for water infrastructure projects has been diminishing steadily over the years while our needs are ever increasing our industry is facing a crisis much like the infrastructure in june alone construction employment declined by seventy nine thousand jobs while over the past twelve months almost one million construction workers have lost their jobs overall unemployment is at nine point seven percent but seventeen point four percent of construction workers are now the g a o report which is the subject of the hearing today acknowledges that our nation faces tremendous challenges in replacing and rehabilitating our water infrastructure we're all aware of the various studies projecting needs approaching six hundred billion over the next twenty years as a g a o as report to this committee states the trust fund for water infrastructure would stablished a multi year commitment to address the nation's pressing water needs if congress can develop a fair and defensible system for raising the revenue a water infrastructure trust fund is achievable and the benefits for the american people business and environment would be enormous for structure investment enhances our quality alive provides good paying jobs for americans in fact a study conducted by a g c completed in the spring of two thousand and eight estimated that every one billion and nonresidential construction spending would add about three point four billion to the gross domestic product about one point one billion to personal earnings and create and sustain over twenty eight thousand jobs the federal level we have used dedicated trust funds to tackle problems too big for states to handle alone financing water infrastructure through a trust fund would have advantages over general fund financing it would it would be deficit neutral the funding stream would not be said jack to the annual appropriations process providing the certainty that state and local officials need to commit to long term infrastructure financing and it would get the job done providing the revenues were service and to meet the needs we as an association have been dedicated to educating our members and the public about the current needs that exist in c clear terms that every american can understand with our support of the penn state publishing public broadcasting documented very liquid assets the state of our water infrastructure has been broadcast over seven hundred times in ninety four percent of the p b s stations we thank the efforts of chairwoman johnson and ranking member boozman and all five hundred thirty five members of congress who have received and hopefully looked at the liquid assets documentary the number of americans who understand the need to improve our water infrastructure is growing and their patience is this manish ing as those who have failed to make investment in water infrastructure a priority agency acknowledges that in these tech tough economic times raising taxes may be a difficult pill for the american public and corporate america to swallow however we think every structures different it is an investment program and we have an obligation to provide the american people with the assurance that the water they drink is clean and safe and that our infrastructure is delivering environmental benefits i thank you for the opportunity to speak to this committee today thank you just to mony in light the mr barry has a plane to catch we will jump over gentlemen to be don't mind thank you madam chairman appreciate your letting me testify today and then changing the order a little bit at the very gracious  you i am yes and i thank the gentleman to my right who have to suffer through my testimony first i will keep this very brief i am testifying on behalf of the american waterworks association which is a association of utilities throughout the united states more than fifty thousand members there are probably their utilities in every state and certainly all the large utilities in the country belong to that is who i'm representing although my job is as general manager of the denver water department i just have a couple of things to say about this bill i'm not here to oppose it i'm not here to support it i want to make some obs survey sions and give you some perspective about it number one the primer responsibility for finding water and wastewater infrastructure in this country has always been local we think it should remain so americans are best served by water systems that they pay for themselves it's more responsive it's direct government it's direct democracy we don't want to see that change aging water infrastructure in this country is an issue but i don't think it's a crisis and all the infrastructure is not crumbling there are many reports and a lot of numbers out there but the thing i want the committee to remember is that the water industrial self now invest eighty billion dollars a year in water and waste water infrastructure that's eighty billion a year now this funding gap of three hundred some odd billion supposedly after twenty years is in fact only a twenty percent funding gap and e t a itself says that if utilities will increase their water rates at three percent above the rate of inflation that gap is largely closed so it's not a crisis and it's not all crumbling it's an issue that we have to pay attention to on a local issue by issue state by state kind of basis now there is definitely a role for the federal government and lowering the cost of capital and for particularly in special circumstances low income communities combined sewer overflow problem small systems there is a disparity in the ability of different communities to fund their infrastructure and the federal government can help i think that's very important to note that they can help but i've not one of our concerns is i don't want to see the federal government take over this responsibility it's a local responsibility and it needs to remain so one of our concerns about the bill well as we think that a trust fund is in fact not a very good mechanism i think most of the committee knows this but the words trust fund in the federal government parlance don't mean what they mean to the rest of the world  funds don't have trustees they don't have beneficiaries and they don't have segregated assets they are simply accounting entries that congress can change or a limited at any time there are four hundred federal trust funds i think almost none of them actually spend all the money that comes supposedly to them for the purposes for which they were created what i worry about is we create a trust fund created an expectation that the federal government's going to solve this problem through a trust fund and in fact that's not the case the history of trust funds tells you that it's a false promise it won't work that way that's one of our concerns it's not that we oppose the taxes or that we oppose any federal government involvement it's that the promise will be far greater than the performance and the history of trust funds it's very clear about that we think there are more effective tools to get federal help to those communities that need it one of them is something called a water infrastructure bank we have a w a day at the v a has written a report about that that bank could build on and leverage as r f money  another thing we think is important and it's in the bill it's broadening and enhancing the purposes and the mechanisms by which as a raft of money is administered as a raft money right now can't be used to fix aging infrastructure that needs to be fixed and that's in the bill when we certainly appreciate that the last thing i want to say or almost the last thing and there was a reference to it in the g a o testimony is about a water tax it water tax is something that makes many of us knew till a nursery extremely nervous we're not in favor of a national water tax partly because it's inefficient way to collect and spend money partly because it in fact punishes those cities and there are many of them in minutes apparently who have maintained their systems to a higher degree who would now be taxed to have that money sent somewhere else if this is a local responsibility let's keep it generally local we think that's an important concept there are many things that a w w a is for in this arrangement and that's listed in the testimony won't go into detail about that i will conclude with one thought and that is that this bill to me implies doesn't that say it explicitly but it implies that clean water and wastewater infrastructure is no longer a local responsibility and the federal government's going to take care of it well first of all that doesn't give me chairman i am wrapped up i appreciate your letting me give this testimony we like some parts of the bill we don't like others and you've heard our concerns and reservations thank you thank you very much for your testimony and your  concerns are noted some agree some we disagree but very much appreciate the fact that you have been very constructive in criticism thank you thank you sir you are dismissed thank you thank you sir we will now hear from that mr bill hellman chief executive officer national utility contractors association from arlington virginia welcome sir and you're on q madam chair and thank you so much for including us in this important proceeding today and i want to thank the ranking member and the full committee as well as mr bloom an hour and g a o for just getting us where we are today in this discussion we supported this idea of a trust fund for many years and it's it was lonely for a while now it's not and stood all of all of your efforts at the outset i want to share that we do support in concept the creation of a trust fund and i took a few moments to explain the key reasons why we do in time allowing some out ideas on how it might be structured to be most effective but first at the request of a couple of sub committee members i'd like to discuss for a moment why the investment gap that's been mentioned really matters because for example some speakers including the previous witness i don't think it's really a crisis and then they can they make a case for that and we've got some members of think it's not a crisis but just because people aren't dying right and left doesn't mean it's not a crisis  it's ramifications are not just inconvenient they're very serious and some of the previous testifiers and as well as mr bloom in our outline quite succinctly and well some of the environmental protection ramifications and public health ramifications or failure to address this growing gap however i want to add one more factor to the mix that we think is very important the failure to narrow this gap effectively puts an economic straitjacket o economy for a number of reasons which all explain we recently for example put out a study through our coalition the clean water council i think everyone's got a copy called called sudden impact and it's about through it's been out for months we released it with these consideration of the  recovery package but it extends far beyond that this shows in the short term only that is during that period of construction only a billion dollar investment similar to the eight the study results  substantial real changes in economic output increases to personal income which are spent in the economy increased state and local tax coffers and last but certainly not least extensive employment ramifications we can create almost twenty seven thousand jobs per billion at an average income of more than fifty thousand dollars per year and for those of you who may be rolling your eyes out for some of the numbers thrown out during the stimulus package hearings you can stand by these numbers are based on actual data from one hundred sixteen jobs completed in the last year and the run through to economic models so we thought we could we can look in the mirror and this is in the morning and it cite these figures that run away and we want to point those out to the to the committee that explains why it's a crisis there's another aspect to it the problem we believe the structural despite all the efforts by state and local government and the s bond referendums and everything else the gap is not being diminished and let me illustrate very quickly what i mean in one thousand nine hundred eighty we were told the need for one hundred twenty five billion for wastewater we spent seventy five billion in the next ten years to reduce it twelve years later the need to gone up to one hundred and thirty two billion that patterns been continued every two to four years to the point where the gap is over two hundred billion dollars with that says to us business as usual it hasn't been working furthermore we believe and we don't the study for this but even if you implement full class pricing like many want to do and even if you have proper asset management and even after as this this committee's done and the house is done you pass a good as a referee authorization bill and even with the recovery package you're still going to have a gap so something new fresh and innovative has to be done i think it's very difficult to argue against that the big issue is what do you do that's that's that's the big question and we believe the trust fund is it for a couple reasons is the best mechanism one is it can raise enough money to actually do something about the problem number two and  touched upon this in your opening statement the trust fund besides adequate funding provides consistent funding it's very important for not only private sector contractors and engineers and labor but also for state and local government if you can't predict what funding it was going to be if you did base your planning off of what the subcommittee is going to vote on what the president's going to introduce and what what some voters are going to do you're going to be a lot less likely to ramp up your employment and go out and buy that three hundred thousand dollar track hoe and a jobs shovel ready when the opportunity arises and i think that's another important point in favor of a trust fund the third point and i disagree at least one other witness on this is i think there is a federal role to be play the reason is actually quite simple water pollution is and it's an interstate need and the federal government going to have to be involved in partnership with state and local but as long as we've got the pacific ocean the atlantic seaboard and the city river in the great lakes and the chesapeake bay and a hundred others there's going to be a federal role to play in financing that concludes my my my five minutes if i get a chance later on i'd be happy to share some of the ideas for how we structure this  thank you for your patience but all of you thank you good afternoon madam chairwoman representative bozeman and members of the subcommittee my name is dale jacobson i am licensed professional engineer in nebraska and iowa and the president of jacobson satchel consultants a consulting firm with offices in omaha and denver i have about forty years of experience in engineering waste water and drinking water projects today i'm pleased to appear on behalf of the one hundred forty six thousand members of the american society of civil engineers to testify on opportunities and challenges in the creation of a trust fund to provide funding for clean and safe water and to discuss the water protection and re investment act introduced by mr bloom in our america's drinking water and wastewater infrastructure systems our aging many systems are well beyond their design lies new methods of financing improvements to these critical structures are vitally needed a s e believes that funding for water infrastructure improvements and the associated operations requires a comprehensive program to provide financial support to that in a s c supports the creation of a trust fund to finance the national shortfall in funding of infrastructure systems under the clean water act and the safe drinking water act the movement our ability create a trust fund for drinking water and wastewater infrastructure needs and raise approximately eleven billion annually from and new sources of revenue each designed to provide a constant source of funds the bill would provide a budgetary firewall to ensure that all monies received into the trust fund would be appropriate into the two state revolving loan funds there are some important points to be made about the bill before you this legislation is vitally needed if in acted the water protection and reinvestment act would begin the process of restoring our nation's threatened surface water and drinking water resources in march as c e released its two thousand and nine report card for america's infrastructure we had in a fight a two point two million trillion dollar need for infrastructure find funding over the next five years with about half of that money assured under current funding arrangements this leaves a gap of one point one trillion to be met for new sources of revenue in our report card drinking water urn to demonise and waste water also learned to demonise our annual shortfall of eleven billion is needed to replace aging facilities that are near the end of the useful life and to comply with new and future federal regulations this does not account for growth in demand for drinking water and wastewater services over the next twenty years americans still enjoy some of the best tap water in the world and as as the gentleman from the american waterworks association pointed out it's delivered locally but there are costs for treating and delivering that water that continue to out pace the funds available at the local level a situation similar situation for funding exists with our waste water system the bill would establish a trust fund that would receive money from the new taxes unlike other trust funds with a single source of revenue the water infrastructure fund would have multiple sources of revenue thus ensuring a more stable and dependable source of support for essential water systems in january this committee led the fight to pass the american recovery and reinvestment act that act signed into law in february provided an estimated one hundred billion dollars for all u s infrastructure needs as an emergency job creation measure for fiscal year two thousand and nine the boom in our bill will also create badly needed jobs the recovery act and this legislation are more than about jobs they represent a partial downpayment on the one point one trillion five year infrastructure investment gap identified  our report card that is why as he strongly supports the creation of a trust fund to finance the national shortfall in funding of infrastructure systems under the clean water act and the safe drinking water act such a trust fund would provide source of funding for many decades to come let me cause with a few brief points the nation's infrastructure faces some very real problems that threaten our way of life not address we determined in march that these problems are solvable but we need to have the needed vision and leadership raising the grades on our infrastructure will require us to seek and adopt a wide range of structural and nonstructural solutions in every category including technological advances funding and regulatory changes and changes in public behavior and support a s c develop several strategic solutions to begin raising the grades one of these is to increase federal leadership  infrastructure to address the need for additional funding this proposal would create a trust fund for water is the first step in that leadership madam chairman thank chairwoman thank you for my your time and i conclude as sees testimony it would be pleased to respond to any questions you may have thank you sir for your testimony and that wraps up the testimony and we begin the questions to the panel there are lots of them i mean i don't know where existing appropriations are insufficient to meet clean water needs the current clean water needs but what the rest of you what do you think and i'd like to start i know that it's not necessarily within your realm is mattel but i would appreciate if you be able to give some comment on this because i think i agree there's just not enough in the no not enough in the a r e to be able to do than the needs of the infrastructure and i disagree with mr barry in terms of being a what to say that they don't want government to set up a trust fund because well we need to do something we need to be able to help small communities that do not have the ability to do it on their own and be able to see whether it's a ladder a thing coming out of the the infrastructure how do we deal with it and be able to not tax the people or tax all the businesses or everybody calls that a text but certainly if there's a lot of because lot of soul searching about what we need to do so would you please sure as you said this is not the main focus of our report but during the course of our work there are a couple of things that came to light one is even though it's very difficult to figure out exactly what the funding gap is there's a pretty strong consensus that there is a funding gap and the s r s is a very important tool but over a year over the years the funding for the s r s has been declining and  provided four billion dollars but that was you know a one time deal so a couple of things that we did here and you just mentioned is that with the s r s there are certain limitations and small communities in particular as well as very large communities that have mega projects are not able to get the money that they need from the existing ass r f so having a clean water trust fund that provides a little bit more flexibility to meet those needs would be in my written testimony dress the gap specifically maryland has fourteen billion need based on our latest need survey we currently combination of state federal and local maryland i would also know with the era funding maryland received about one hundred twenty million dollars for which we're extremely grateful we received three point four i can talk a little bit about what goes on in massachusetts give you an example of one community in massachusetts new bedford which just finished upgrading its wastewater treatment plant and it's making major investments in its combined sewer overflow facilities the debt service on those projects alone has brought new bedford to the point where it's exceeded the two percent of median household income level that the e p a uses as an indication of affordability so there's new bedford which is already well above the affordability level and i suspect there are a number of other communities across the country are in that situation without the help of the federal government it would be very difficult for those communities i think to afford further improvements to their infrastructure and interestingly also in the case of new bedford the reason that the the the e p a has decided to impose new stringent standards on the pertwee trenton is going to require them to go to nitrogen removal  nitrogen rip the nitrogen removal is there because of issues in downstream areas such as buzzards bay and there again today which are national water resources not just massachusetts water resources so i think what we're doing is we're trying to protect resources that are in scope that also applies to my utility most of the reason that i have more stringent affluence standards is to meet water quality requirements in the state of rhode jackson governor paterson congressman hinchey and congressman tonto to announce e p a s largest wastewater infrastructure grant history around earth day four hundred thirty two million dollars from the stimulus funds thank you very much for that  those projects that funding was we were able to leverage that we almost doubled it over seven hundred million dollars in new york we still have hundreds of review ranks and ready to go projects that still await funding so we can get these projects out tag is tied up to the ng with c s o s and found that eighty billion dollars in economic benefits we would gain from that twenty six billion dollar upfront investment we think that's a pretty good rate of return  and we do we need additional funding new york state provides some funding in our state budget for waste water infrastructure we leverage arrestor up as much as possible funding from the local municipalities but there's a clear role for the federal government we have many shared waterways thank you miss you know i can particularly on the contractors level and in the midwest where i work we regularly have communities under boil orders because their water systems have become contaminated we regularly have problems where old water mains break streets open up sin es you hold the thought but how do they get the ability to have those entities to address those contamination without funding well i think many of them don't address it until they have a catastrophe and then they call construction companies to come out on the weekends and make emergency repairs and and i it seems as though with the municipalities that we're involved in it's like they don't have the money until they're just forced to fix it and they need to fix it the money the contractors are ready and waiting to help with this and what's really frustrating is to see municipalities put projects out and literally lot let us bid them and then they don't have the funding just for those who are gap numbers already i didn't i didn't talk talk about why the gap exists and you beg the question your last question and i don't mean to be flip i'm saying it but the biggest part of the reason for the gap is because the american public seemingly unwilling to pay for what they want we need an attitude adjustment we need to change the definition of need to have lower water quality or step up to the plate than some away to a trust fund or other combinations and build a home if you place the right way they will agree part of the problem is that it's unlike for example transportation infrastructure ours is more out of sight out of mind it just is now we try to fight that we put out a blog every day we started last year and i bring this up because i asked for some the stuff we're going to do a daily blog and all the tasks to appease with with sinkholes and collapse infrastructure do it once every two weeks two days later we do it once every we're going to make it once a week we've got enough stories i'll address your question from both the macro and micro perspective as i know that i've been in this business since of about the time the clean water act was passed originally in one thousand nine hundred seventy two and through the years the p a has generated their needs survey on both water and wastewater infrastructure they don't do this by dividing it from washington they work with the state regulatory agencies and those regulatory agencies in turn work with the the cities and the counties and agencies in their state to determine the needs so i believe that the needs survey that have been has been generated periodically by the e p a are quite accurate and very reflective of the needs in the water and wastewater infrastructure to answer of him a micro perspective my hometown and that doesn't address any of the other needs of the waste water system within the community whether it's within the collection system or the treatment system so the need for a trust fund to help assist in such a funding mechanism is definitely something that we a little bit jael found that stakeholders identified three main issues that would need to be addressed in designing establishing the clean water trust fund namely how the trust fund should be administered and used what type of financial assistance should be provided and what activity should be eligible to receive funding from the trust fund how would you recommend that each of these issues be addressed so mr walsh i don't i don't know that i could tell you how i think the trust fund should be administrator administered say from the top but i think that there is a tremendous mechanism that's already in place that work has worked very well  in distributing funds for wastewater treatment systems and that's the state revolving on fund operation that's basically the same operation that was distributing funds during the construction grants  t that program worked tremendously towards bringing our wastewater infrastructure up to the level that it is today so i think that there's quite a bit of the the administrative capability is there to to run that sort of a fund and the type of financial assistance the type of financial assistance you're saying should it be a grant should be alone is that the question  well we are we've got mr summers is talking about having a fine that is really designed to reduce nutrients in the sense we have other problems with aging pipes and  infrastructure i guess what i want to know is what you know if we have this trust on mr lim in our in this testimony talked about the fact that we're getting small very minute quality quantities of drugs and that's very very expensive to take out so again i guess if we had this infrastructure find what are we what are we talking about using it for i think that there are sufficient needs in terms of more stringent standards that are coming along such as nutrition removal such as more better management combined sewers such as local communities are capable of managing the maintenance of their systems have been managing the maintenance of their systems frankly i think they would manage the maintenance of their systems a lot better if these federal mandates were funded  i think many of us do tend to reduce the money that we spend on maintenance in order to spend money meeting the more stringent standards that are coming at us so i think if we got relief on the newer mandates that would help us tremendously in being able to keep our systems in much better condition thank you mr walsh kicked it off the rest of you mean you have else would like to come in  think using the existing mechanisms through the s r s managers is a very good system it's already set up i do think that with a family a trust fund that transparency in the public understand exactly where that money's going is going to be incredibly important to maintain public support and i think that the fuse funding source the more funding sources that we can tap to help build the solid trust fund i think the more solid it's going to be and i think pollution prevention activities are so much more cost effective if we can prevent that pollution before we have to deal with it it's going to be a lot cheaper in the long run so we do need to have a holistic look at managing water where it falls and before it goes to the treatment plant so that we can stay on top of this and reduce our overall costs and one of the things i do really like about this legislation is that deals with both drinking water and waste water you know these are these are this is our water infrastructure and we need to look at them holistically together so you know i would agree that you have three basic elements with water you've got the treatment you've got the rehab of existing systems and then replacement or adding new systems to to accommodate growing populations in certain areas  education is really important for not only like she said how the water is handled before it gets to the treatment a g c did that with liquid assets we had people say we didn't know that stuff and i think the finding the formulas are in place in most states to handle this they just don't i have enough  money and if they had money it's like any business or any homeowner or or individual it's those capital improvements they don't have the money to do it let me let me since you bring that up sense one thing that is can alike it's kind of like bus mass transit everybody loves it but they want their neighbor to rot versus themselves mr summers i would say that it's definitely true that there is a big resistance to raising rates but in the case of maryland where we have invested a lot of time and effort in educating the public regarding the need for bay restoration i mentioned governor o'malley's base that web page  gives a transparent easily understandable accountability mechanism there really is very broad support i'm not going to say there are people who object certainly but there is broad support and i live in baltimore city baltimore city is subject to a judicial federal consent decree we're spending over a billion dollars on s s o problems in the city my rates have been going up steadily and the mayor just raised rates again this year and really there was not the kind of outcry you might expect people when they really understand what's going on their support that but evidently because they had resisted increasing rights they got themselves in trouble and then you have this crisis and then everybody understands that if you don't get this done and then the feds through the justice department funds through the state the different programs that i've mentioned the states putting hundreds of millions of dollars into this problem already the federal s r s been mentioned is has been going down but it has been a major part of our effort but there definitely needs to be also an increase in rates and we're seeing that across the state rates are going up we're doing more and more comparison in education of rates and so i really do think that it is multi phase solution here we're not going to do it based on the trust fund alone it's definitely going to have a major ra component to it but i think there are federal mandates in the feds have a role in helping deal with the problem so it's got to be a joint effort because i need to go back so  your your inquiry my question is first to dr summers and always good to greet someone from the great state of maryland but i think that what maryland has done is really instructive for us about how you can really engage the public with a broad public commitment to clean water to a clean and healthy chesapeake bay and then people are willing to invest in it i live in the metropolitan area here just outside of washington and you know you would think you wouldn't be able to make a connection between the people who live in the immediate d c suburbs to the bay and yet people have an incredible connection to the bay they understand that what we do in the potomac river has an impact on the chesapeake bay we've embraced that and we're willing to pay for it and so i don't actually buy the argument that people are not willing to pay for clean water for healthy rivers and i just because i was sitting here playing with my blackberry pulled up based at because i go to it often and i look and i notice that you know many of the rivers that are tributaries into the into the bay have a d d plus f rating these are rivers that i've fished and for twenty some years and and so it does highlight i think the tool like this for consumers  for average citizens that's easily accessible and usable highlights for us what our responsibility is to our water and our water supply and engages us in the debate about the need to pay for it and so  i want to ask you dr summers that there's a tension i think between the opposition in some sectors to water use and funding a national water infrastructure initiative and i wonder if you have recommend specifically recommendations of how you engage the public and create a sense of support national support for instance structure investment in the way that you've experienced in maryland  i think that's where the partnership that we've been talking about comes from each region of the state scuse me each region of the country has a water problem of some sort of the other and i think by having the federal government actively involved providing the technical and financial support to the state organizations which in turn work with our local governments it's got to be a joint educational effort has wonderful information on their web page which we use for educational opportunities the internal linking these days with the world wide web and you were just looking at base that one of the things we've tried to do with base that is tie that into other sources of information to help educate the public so i think the interconnection amongst the various organizations and should also mention our non governmental organizations chesapeake bay foundation and the river keepers and others  have have really helped with the educational effort as well so it's really got to be multi pronged the legislation no child left inside  has been something that i think congressman sarbanes has been working on and the education of the youth is something that's absolutely critical critical to yes i think that what you highlighted is that it really takes a full scale engagement and this is then leadership that has cut across republican and democratic administrations in the state of maryland and i think that's instructive to i want to go on to a question to m mittal and it has to do with your written testimony i looked through it and i pulled out a you know a quote and i want you to clear up what i thought was a little bit of confusion on page four of your testimony you mention that while past proposals for funding a clean water trust fund of identified these products referring to certain beverages fertilizers pesticides that cetera as contributing to the wastewater stream limited research has been done on their specific impact on wastewater infrastructure cording to e p a and then on page seven of i think it's seven of your testimony you say that in addition industry groups were consistently opposed to a tax on their specific product groups to support a clean water trust fund in their view their products did not contribute significantly to the deterioration of wastewater infrastructure and therefore should not be taxed and i just want to make sure that you are not suggesting that the only  the only reason that one should be identified or an industry or sector should be identified to contribute to clean water has to do with the deterioration of the infrastructure and that that has to be the only logical linkage in terms of identifying funding because that would be very problematic i think we heard earlier testimony from mr bloom in our that in fact we need to sort of spread the  responsibility across multiple arenas and sectors to come up with the amount of money the billions and billions that we need and so i just want to make sure that's not what you were saying and you're not at all what we were saying was that there is no empirical data currently avail that directly link some of these products to the waste water infrastructure system so although there's a general recognition that they do contribute to the waste water infrastructure issues that we're dealing with there is no good solid empirical evidence that says this is the exact impact that a particular product or pesticide or whatever has on the wastewater system so that's one thing the other thing that i wanted to emphasize is we asked the stakeholders that we question what about the linkages between some of these options that we identified and where there was a stronger linkage between the waste water system and these products we found a much greater level of support for the tax so nobody's going to step up to the plate and say yes tax my products but where they see that linkage between the wastewater system and their product they are much more willing to support the idea of a tax but i just want conclude here but i think it's certainly the the opinion of this member that if we were only looking at sectors that had an identifiable impact on deterioration one it would be very limited and two there are consumers like me who would say well heck i don't fish so why should i contribute to cleaning up the bay or river or i don't produce as much waste as my neighbor does and so why should i have to contribute more i think if we go down that route we run the risk that will never be able to fund the nation's water infrastructure needs and i think that it's important for us to i mean we have significant gaps and so at the very least the federal government i think ought to be a partner in closing that gap so that then local responsibility and state responsibility can take over in the way that it needs to and fun things annually so that we don't run the risk twenty years from now that we have an even greater gap and i will challenges to it in negative any other measure whether it's c s r as for increasing the funding levels for wastewater infrastructure for example would there be a challenge to the concept of lifting the cap on private activity bonds on creation of a national infrastructure bank i mean all of them would have challenges so because of that what all increases in water infrastructure would face later legislative scrutiny and challenges as you well know but the challenge is in creating a trust and and the trust fund surplus to those who are there increases how how would that be able to be the best plan what what would be in y more challenges less challenges we haven't actually done the comparison those all of those things that you identified were options that we identified during the course of our review and we currently have any review going on for congressman mi where we're looking at the challenges that some of those other funding mechanisms could pose so in about four or five months we'll have a much better sense of what some of the positives and some of the negatives are with applying some of those other alternatives to raising funding at that point in time we would definitely be able to look across all of the for ending options and give you a better sense of which one would pose greater challenges i respectfully request this committee this subcommittee be given that update it's and when it comes to shoot it because that would be enlightening in so far as the different options and their challenges we'd be happy to thank you ma'am  infrared way does the lack of available financial resources to construct clean water the structure hurt the nation economically what economic benefits can be realized from the investment in water infrastructure and how with the creation of a clean water trust fund increased those benefits to follow up on the earlier comments i think th represent a huge lost opportunity for to allow the economy to florists comparing it to for example the creation of the highway trust fund fifty six once you created that you not only brought the country together but the economy grew massively for for half a century because of that i think you can unleash the same type of of results here for example in many in many communities where there's dilapidated infrastructure in office because it's just old it's nobody's fault it's just old and everyone is ever going to have some skin in the game and they say they should because often upgrading an infrastructure replacing it is literally a precondition for a growing economy i'll give you what i think is a good example but i'm winging it a little bit here driving to work yesterday on arlington boulevard in arlington tar office and i would notice something like this there's a utility contractor starting a job i'd like to know who it is are they paying dues and i couldn't see but blueprints unrolled on their on their s u v they're starting the job and during that jobs are going to create all these results and here are the numerate i won't repeat them but the minute the minute that jobs over the sudden impacts over but what happens is i have to do this by illustration because quantifying it is very difficult to do for most of the life expectancy of that new infrastructure you're constantly adding on new things and in fact i can pretty much guarantee that job is designed for redevelopment for the next five ten fifteen years they're going to be knocking down these vacant buildings or putting the putting unmixed they're probably going to be putting in housing units entertainment recreation medical care who knows what and every time you do that it takes place because of the investment you're making now if you don't make the investment now if you don't close the gap you don't get any of that thank you sir and that says very well put but i'd go a little further in saying th contractor is creating those jobs i would call it to be blunt great flick service transportation i mean it the list goes on it creates it's a domino effect it is and i'm really glad you corrected me because i forgot something on if you got this one well on page ten of this there's a graphic that illustrates the in this is the short term only and it summarizes some some of the induced the just not the direct and indirect jobs but the jobs that are conducive by the creation of the infrastructure and i'm very proud of this first of all because it's my duty to put it in but more importantly what it does is it really illustrates this induced multiplier effect and what this chart does  out of those twenty thousand jobs created this shows you the breath of of the employment actually a billion dollars creates jobs in three hundred twenty five different employment categories it's virtually everything in the economy still in most your job classification is permit you're going to get some impact from this and we have a storyline like we learned in here everything from tires to tortillas we're not being smart it's actually true and i don't have it today but if you go out three hundred twenty five industries it makes sense to put a billion dollars in something you're going to buy a lot of stuff that a plant is going to put somebody else on the tire line thank you mr hillman and yes  that's very very true anybody else have any so we're just you know well thank you for being so patient to the panel for sticking with us while we had to go vote if you have submit please do so we thank you very much and this hearing is a