January 6, 1965
PAGE 186
INTRODUCTION OF S.4, THE WATER QUALITY ACT OF 1965
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I introduce, for appropriate reference, a bill (S. 4) amending the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, as amended.
This legislation is, with two exceptions, identical to that which passed the Senate on October 16, 1963, and in which 21 Members of this body joined me as cosponsors. I would add that the legislation was approved by the Senate by a vote of 69 yeas and 11 nays, and of the 20 Members not voting, 15 announced themselves as favoring its passage. The House Public Works Committee reported an amended version during the closing days of the 88th Congress. However, no further action was taken by the other body.
The bill which I am introducing is cosponsored by 25 of my colleagues, including all members of our Subcommittee on Air and Water Pollution. It is a bipartisan measure directed toward improving the quality of our water resources and making more effective our programs for the control and abatement of water pollution.
This proposal is consistent with and supports the objectives outlined by President Johnson in his state of the Union message, in which he called for an expanded conservation program as part of our effort to achieve the Great Society:
For over 3 centuries the beauty of America has sustained our spirit and has enlarged our vision. We must act now to protect this heritage. In a fruitful new partnership with the States and cities the next decade should be a conservation milestone.
We will seek legal power to prevent pollution of our air and water before it happens. We will step up our effort to control harmful wastes, giving just priority to the cleanup of our most contaminated rivers. We will increase research to learn much more about the control of pollution.
These objectives and approaches are reflected in S. 4.
As I mentioned previously, this legislation is, with two exceptions, identical to S. 649, as approved by this body October 16, 1963. The sections deleted were those relating to the control and abatement of pollution from Federal installations and the problem of nondegradable detergents.
The Federal installations section was eliminated from this bill because similar problems with respect to Federal installations are present in the field of air pollution, as well as water pollution. In addition, there were other matters relating to Federal activities in both fields which require separate and more complete consideration. Because of these factors it was decided to cover these matters in separate legislation which will be introduced within a week.
The detergents section was deleted because the members of the coal and detergent industry have reported changes in their schedules for supplying the market with detergents which will degrade more readily than those presently on the market. In view of this change in schedule, it is considered advisable to conduct additional hearings on the detergent problem to determine the type or need of corrective legislation.
S. 4 includes the following proposals Which were contained in S. 649 as it passed the Senate in October 1963:
First. To establish an additional position of Assistant Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare to help the Secretary to administer the Federal Water Pollution Control Act.
Second. To create a Federal Water Pollution Control Administration to administer sections 3, comprehensive programs; 4, interstate cooperation and uniform form laws; 10, enforcement measures; and 11, to control pollution from Federal installations.
Third. To authorize appropriations for fiscal year ending June 30, 1965, and for 3 succeeding fiscal years in the amount of $20 million annually for grants for research and development to demonstrate a new or improved method of controlling discharge of sewage from combined sewers.
Fourth. To increase grants to individual sewage treatment projects from $600,000 to $1 million and to allow multimunicipal combinations to be allowed grant increases from $2,400,000 to $4 million. There is also a provision which allows for an increase of 10 percent in construction grants for treatment plants where comprehensive metropolitan planning has been carried out and where the treatment plants are part of such comprehensive plans.
Fifth. To provide procedures for the establishment of standards of quality applicable to interstate waters.
Sixth. To authorize the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare to initiate abatement where he finds that substantial economic injury results from the inability to market shellfish or shellfish products in interstate commerce because of pollution of interstate or navigable waters and action of Federal, State, or local authorities.
Seventh. To provide for audits where Federal funds are utilized and the normal requirements for technical amendments.
The need for the acceleration of sewage treatment plant construction and for the correction of the problem of combined sewers is no less urgent than when I introduced S. 649 in January of 1963, or when it passed the Senate in October of that year. As a matter of fact, the delay in enactment of legislation has created a greater backlog of needs in correcting the Nation's water pollution problems.
Today our older cities are faced with the necessity of separating their combined storm and sanitary sewers or devising means whereby the discharge of runoff from city streets are gradually fed through treatment plants to prevent overloading of treatment systems and the discharge of untreated sewage into public waterways. The 'correction of the problem of combined sewers requires huge expenditures on the part of the communities. In order to encourage and assist these hard-pressed cities it is essential that Federal encouragement be provided. The $20 million authorization could not correct the problem, but would furnish an incentive to attack it.
The importance of establishing water quality standards in our interstate water system is gaining more recognition and support. While this would be a new provision in Federal legislation, it is by no means a new or novel approach to aiding in the improvement of water quality and in the proper management of our water resources. We all recognize that the availability of water of good quality is a necessity for our economic and industrial growth. It is essential to the achievement of the Great Society.
The development and application of water quality standards would enable us to establish objectives and guidelines on the use of our waters and to prevent the misuse and abuse of this vital resource.
Water quality standards would provide techniques which could, in many instances, help us to avoid the necessity for enforcement action. Under present law and procedures nothing is done until pollution has reached the point where it endangers the health or welfare of many people. Then abatement action is taken and efforts are made to correct a situation which could have been prevented if standards of water quality had been established; municipalities and industries could develop realistic plans for new plants or expanded facilities, without uncertainties about waste disposal limitations which may be imposed.
In my own State, as in others, our previously abundant shellfish-producing waters have been immeasurably harmed through disposal of deleterious wastes. The economic losses to shell fishermen have been catastrophic. S. 4 could provide them with effective protection for the first time.
For the program of sewage treatment facilities to be of greater benefit to our larger communities the limitation on individual and multi municipal grants needs to be raised. The present ceilings are unrealistic when applied to the considerably greater expenditures which a larger city must bear in installing necessary treatment works. In application, the grants approximate as little or less than 10 percent of the costs involved, and thus they fail to achieve what is at once a primary and necessary objective of the grant program-the incentive to develop local projects for the control and abatement of water pollution.
S. 4 would authorize the establishment of an additional Assistant Secretary to help in the responsibility of the Department to oversee this important sphere of activities. There would also be authorized a Federal Water Pollution Control Administration to carry out certain functions of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, thus accomplishing two purposes.
First, the new administration would elevate the status of our water pollution control and abatement programs to a more appropriate and effective level in the Department. Second, it would free the Public Health Service to concentrate in its primary concern with health in the water pollution field as it is in other areas.
I ask unanimous consent that the complete text of the bill, and a section-by-section analysis of the bill, be printed in the RECORD at this point: