[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 85 (Friday, June 18, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1172]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




INTRODUCTION OF THE NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION ACT

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                        HON. WAYNE T. GILCHREST

                              of maryland

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, June 17, 2004

  Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join my colleague, 
Representative Ehlers, in introducing the National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration Act at the request of this Administration. 
Our Subcommittees in the Science and House Resources Committees share 
jurisdiction over authorization of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
Administration, or NOAA, programs and I'm proud to say we work well 
together. Our joint introduction of a NOAA organic act is just one step 
in our commitment to work together to solidify and better support NOAH 
agency functions.
  NOAA performs a number of vital services to the nation, including the 
monitoring and management or our oceans, monitoring meteorological 
trends, and making life-saving storm predictions. Its job is to bring 
together many pieces of complex oceanic and atmospheric systems so that 
we can best understand and utilize them as good stewards. Our very 
lives, particularly along the coasts, depend upon many of NOAA's 
functions and our future, especially as we observe the impacts of 
atmospheric, surface and ocean warming trends, rests on how well we 
support this work. NOAA's work emphasizes an ecosystem approach and 
enables the U.S. to best manage our place in the global environment as 
well as the impacts of global changes on us. This effort, given its 
many and diverse pieces and constituents, needs strong and central 
leadership and coordination, just as steering a ship requires a captain 
and a plan.
  Because NOAA does not have a single organic act that requires the 
agency budget, as a whole, to be authorized on an annual basis and 
because many NOAA programs are authorized under different public laws 
and committees of jurisdiction, NOAA programs may be authorized at 
different times. NOAA's functions, in the contexts of many laws with 
varying purposes, are difficult to oversee and for the agency to fulfil 
under these circumstances. In light of these challenges, NOAA has done 
well, and by crafting an organic act for the agency, the Administration 
has taken the first important step toward the leadership we need to 
strengthen NOAA's role.
  As one of the key recommendations of the U.S. Commission on Ocean 
Policy, this effort is a necessary component to improving our ocean 
management. I look forward to working with Representative Ehlers and my 
colleagues on both the Resources and Science Committees and the 
Administration with this important legislation and on continuing to 
pursue and create greater central coordination of ocean policy issues.

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