August 25, 1966
Page 20542
CREATION OF A SELECT COMMITTEE ON TECHNOLOGY AND THE HUMAN ENVIRONMENT
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I submit, for appropriate reference, a Senate resolution for the creation of a Select Committee on Technology and the Human Environment. I ask unanimous consent that it remain at the table for 1 week to allow those Senators who wish to join in sponsoring the resolution.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, the genesis of this resolution is a problem confronting all of us. Each day we are asked to make decisions on legislation which may have profound implications in the years ahead. But we are conscious of our inadequate knowledge of tomorrow and of the rapid changes changing technology is making in our environment. We are also conscious that too often we do not have the time or the resources to make use of the information which is available.
Too often we have heard criticism of our reliance on non-congressional sources for the basic data and evaluations which lead us to the decisions we make. It has been suggested that with our limited staffs and time demands, we are at the mercy of the vast resources of the executive branch, which can develop and mold information to lead us to their conclusions.
The suggestion is an over exaggeration, but has a semblance of truth, and I fear that it will be a growing truth. I fear this because of the way we must deal with legislation. Our environment cannot be neatly divided into simple components. There is an interrelationship between our urban growth and our natural resources program as there is between transportation and housing, health and pollution. Yet the Senate must, in order to conduct its business, divide itself into committees to consider separate aspects of legislation affecting human environment.
Mr. President, these committees have, in the past few years, become inundated with legislative proposals. Little or no time is available to collect or evaluate information on the future nature of our environment.
We are forced to succumb to the demand to do the immediate. More and more we find that we do not have the answers we need or that we have to rely on our confidence in work done outside of Congress because the time is not available to do the job.
Complicating this matter is the fact that more and more legislative committees are finding that part of their answers lie in the work of other legislative committees.
What I am proposing is a means to alleviate the time pressures on the standing committees and to assure that needed information is not overlooked. This can be done with a select study committee composed of members f rom legislative committees with interrelating interests.
I do not propose this as a permanent committee, a legislative committee or an all-encompassing one. There is one area for which we have a vital need to begin accumulating knowledge now. That is the effect on human environment of technological change during the next 50 years.
In no way will this interfere with the responsibilities of the standing committees. The select committee would be able to supply to the standing committees assistance not now available and which the standing committees do not have the time to do for themselves.
Specifically, the select committee would be a study committee and will not have authority to consider legislation. It will attempt to assemble and evaluate information relative to technological change and what this change will mean to the human environment.
We need to know not just what the Federal Government may have to do in the future because of technological change, but what all levels of government should be doing. Indeed, we need to know just as well what to expect from the private sector of our economy as well as government.
The select committee could examine, for example, the relationship of technological change on transportation, water supply and use, education, general construction and the distribution of the population in the next 50 years.
A few of the questions which could be probed are:
What factors will affect population distribution and profile and how should public investment in public works be related?
What will be the character of urban areas in the year 2000 and how will public and private planning and investment in public facilities affect this character?
What technological advances will be necessary to maintain the character of the urban area consistent with a high standard of environment?
How will predictable technological change affect the cost and availability of public works and facilities?
What will be the relative values and impact on urban development of varying modes of transportation affected by technological change?
How will technological change affect housing and what will be the relationship of such effect on water resources and parks and open spaces?
More specifically, these questions would be translated into examinations of the following problems, which are of concern in part to several standing committees. These problems are:
Planning and programing of community development, including education, Communications and housing.
Transportation.
Water supply and waste treatment.
Air pollution control.
Parks, recreation, and open spaces.
Power supplies, technological advances, and automation.
Public facilities.
A study of this nature will not change legislative jurisdiction, but since individual committees are not in a position to cover the whole range of related subjects, the select committee will perform a useful service for each and all of the standing committees.
Mr. President, this select committee should be able to do its job in 3 years, and the job it does should make it easier for the standing Committees to decide the character of the legislation they will have to consider in the next 10 years.
I believe the proposed select committee would improve the quantity and quality of information available to the standing committees, increase the capacity of the Senate to deal with the increasingly complex problems of our world, and enable us to do a more effective and coordinated job of conserving and improving the quality of our environment. I hope early approval can be given to this resolution.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of Senate Resolution 298, be printed at this point in the RECORD.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The resolution will be received and appropriately referred; and without objection, the resolution will be printed in the RECORD.
The resolution (S. Res. 298) was referred to the Committee on Government Operations, as follows: