[Congressional Bills 103th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 824 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

103d CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                 S. 824

To amend the Food, Agriculture, Conservation, and Trade Act of 1990 to 
 provide that a single Federal agency shall be responsible for making 
 technical determinations with respect to wetland or converted wetland 
             on agricultural lands, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

               April 27 (legislative day, April 19), 1993

   Mr. Bond (for himself, Mr. McConnell, Mr. Heflin, Mr. Conrad, Mr. 
Coats, Mr. Danforth, Mr. Dole, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Nickles, Mr. Boren, Mr. 
  Dorgan, Mr. Pressler, Mr. Coverdell, Mr. Kempthorne, Mr. Helms, Mr. 
  Grassley, Mr. Thurmond, Mr. Cochran, Mrs. Kassebaum, Mr. Craig, Mr. 
    Hatch, Mr. Lugar, Mr. Packwood, and Mr. Shelby) introduced the 
 following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on 
                  Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To amend the Food, Agriculture, Conservation, and Trade Act of 1990 to 
 provide that a single Federal agency shall be responsible for making 
 technical determinations with respect to wetland or converted wetland 
             on agricultural lands, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Wetlands Simplification Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSES.

    (a) Findings.--Congress finds that--
            (1) technical determinations with respect to wetland or 
        converted wetland on agricultural lands (including the 
        identification of wetland and the development of wetland 
        restoration and mitigation plans) are currently made by--
                    (A) the Soil Conservation Service, in consultation 
                with the Fish and Wildlife Service, to carry out 
                subtitle C of title XII of the Food Security Act of 
                1985 (16 U.S.C. 3821 et seq.); and
                    (B) the Secretary of the Army, acting through the 
                Chief of Engineers, to carry out section 404 of the 
                Federal Water Pollution Control Act (33 U.S.C. 1344);
            (2) the system of separate determinations made under such 
        Acts has led to unnecessarily cumbersome and slow 
        decisionmaking and to a lack of consistency and unpredictable 
        results in determinations;
            (3) the lack of consistency places substantial burdens on 
        private property owners that could be alleviated if 
        responsibility for making the determinations was carried out by 
        one agency; and
            (4) the Soil Conservation Service has a long history of 
        working with agricultural producers to protect soil and water 
        resources, has considerable soils expertise, and has field 
        personnel in almost every county of the United States.
    (b) Purposes.--It is the purpose of this Act to--
            (1) provide that a single Federal agency shall be 
        responsible for making technical determinations on agricultural 
        lands with respect to wetland or converted wetland (including 
        the identification of wetland and the development of wetland 
        restoration and mitigation plans) in order to reduce confusion 
        among agricultural producers; and
            (2) provide that the Soil Conservation Service, in 
        consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service, shall be the 
        Federal agency responsible for all such technical 
        determinations concerning wetland and converted wetland on 
        agricultural lands.

SEC. 3. COMPLIANCE WITH WETLAND CONSERVATION REQUIREMENTS.

    Section 1222(j) of the Food Security Act of 1985 (16 U.S.C. 
3822(j)) is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
            ``(4) Effect of determinations.--
                    ``(A) In general.--Notwithstanding any other 
                provision of law, a technical determination with 
                respect to wetland or converted wetland on agricultural 
                lands (including the identification of wetland under 
                paragraph (1) and the development of a wetland 
                restoration or mitigation plan developed under 
                paragraph (1)) shall be used in the administration of 
                section 404 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act 
                (33 U.S.C. 1344).
                    ``(B) Consistency.--Any area of agricultural land 
                or any activities related to the land determined to be 
                exempt from the requirements of this subtitle shall 
                also be exempt from the requirements of section 404 of 
                the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (33 U.S.C. 
                1344) for such period of time as those lands are used 
                as agricultural lands.
                    ``(C) Definition.--As used in this paragraph, the 
                term `agricultural lands' means cropland, pastureland, 
                native pasture, rangeland, orchards, vineyards, 
                nonindustrial forest land, and any other land used to 
                produce or support the production of an annual or 
                perennial crop of a commodity, aquaculture product, 
                nursery product, or livestock.''.

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