[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 169 (Monday, November 28, 2016)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6517-S6518]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SA 5112. Mr. McCONNELL (for Ms. Baldwin) proposed an amendment to the
bill S. 2325, to require the Secretary of Commerce, acting through the
Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,
to establish a constituent-driven program to provide a digital
information platform capable of efficiently integrating coastal data
with decision-support tools, training, and best practices and to
support collection of priority coastal geospatial data to inform and
improve local, State, regional, and Federal capacities to manage the
coastal region, and for other purposes; as follows:
Strike all after the enacting clause and insert the
following:
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Digital Coast Act''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress makes the following findings:
(1) The Digital Coast is a model approach for effective
Federal partnerships with State and local government,
nongovernmental organizations, and the private sector.
(2) Access to current, accurate, uniform, and standards-
based geospatial information, tools, and training to
characterize the United States coastal region is critical for
public safety and for the environment, infrastructure, and
economy of the United States.
(3) More than half of all people of the United States
(153,000,000) currently live on or near a coast and an
additional 12,000,000 are expected in the next decade.
(4) Coastal counties in the United States average 300
persons per square mile, compared with the national average
of 98.
(5) On a typical day, more than 1,540 permits for
construction of single-family homes are issued in coastal
counties, combined with other commercial, retail, and
institutional construction to support this population.
(6) Over half of the economic productivity of the United
States is located within coastal regions.
(7) Highly accurate, high-resolution remote sensing and
other geospatial data play an increasingly important role in
decision making and management of the coastal zone and
economy, including for--
(A) flood and coastal storm surge prediction;
(B) hazard risk and vulnerability assessment;
(C) emergency response and recovery planning;
(D) community resilience to longer range coastal change;
(E) local planning and permitting;
(F) habitat and ecosystem health assessments; and
(G) landscape change detection.
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) Coastal region.--The term ``coastal region'' means the
area of United States waters extending inland from the
shoreline to include coastal watersheds and seaward to the
territorial sea.
(2) Coastal state.--The term ``coastal State'' has the
meaning given the term ``coastal state'' in section 304 of
the Coastal Zone Management Act of 1972 (16 U.S.C. 1453).
(3) Federal geographic data committee.--The term ``Federal
Geographic Data Committee'' means the interagency committee
that promotes the coordinated development, use, sharing, and
dissemination of geospatial data on a national basis.
(4) Remote sensing and other geospatial.--The term ``remote
sensing and other geospatial'' means collecting, storing,
retrieving, or disseminating graphical or digital data
depicting natural or manmade physical features, phenomena, or
boundaries of the Earth and any information related thereto,
including surveys, maps, charts, satellite and airborne
remote sensing data, images, LiDAR, and services performed by
professionals such as surveyors, photogrammetrists,
hydrographers, geodesists, cartographers, and other such
services.
(5) Secretary.--The term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary
of Commerce, acting
[[Page S6518]]
through the Administrator of the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration.
SEC. 4. ESTABLISHMENT OF THE DIGITAL COAST.
(a) Establishment.--
(1) In general.--The Secretary shall establish a program
for the provision of an enabling platform that integrates
geospatial data, decision-support tools, training, and best
practices to address coastal management issues and needs.
Under the program, the Secretary shall strive to enhance
resilient communities, ecosystem values, and coastal economic
growth and development by helping communities address their
issues, needs, and challenges through cost-effective and
participatory solutions.
(2) Designation.--The program established under paragraph
(1) shall be known as the ``Digital Coast'' (in this section
referred to as the ``program'').
(b) Program Requirements.--In carrying out the program, the
Secretary shall ensure that the program provides data
integration, tool development, training, documentation,
dissemination, and archive by--
(1) making data and resulting integrated products developed
under this section readily accessible via the Digital Coast
Internet website of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, the GeoPlatform.gov and data.gov Internet
websites, and such other information distribution
technologies as the Secretary considers appropriate;
(2) developing decision-support tools that use and display
resulting integrated data and provide training on use of such
tools;
(3) documenting such data to Federal Geographic Data
Committee standards; and
(4) archiving all raw data acquired under this Act at the
appropriate National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
data center or such other Federal data center as the
Secretary considers appropriate.
(c) Coordination.--The Secretary shall coordinate the
activities carried out under the program to optimize data
collection, sharing and integration, and to minimize
duplication by--
(1) consulting with coastal managers and decision makers
concerning coastal issues, and sharing information and best
practices, as the Secretary considers appropriate, with--
(A) coastal States;
(B) local governments; and
(C) representatives of academia, the private sector, and
nongovernmental organizations;
(2) consulting with other Federal agencies, including
interagency committees, on relevant Federal activities,
including activities carried out under the Ocean and Coastal
Mapping Integration Act (33 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.), the Coastal
Zone Management Act of 1972 (16 U.S.C. 1451 et seq.), the
Integrated Coastal and Ocean Observation System Act of 2009
(33 U.S.C. 3601 et seq.), and the Hydrographic Services
Improvement Act of 1998 (33 U.S.C. 892 et seq.);
(3) participating, pursuant to section 216 of the E-
Government Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-347; 44 U.S.C. 3501
note), in the establishment of such standards and common
protocols as the Secretary considers necessary to assure the
interoperability of remote sensing and other geospatial data
with all users of such information within--
(A) the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration;
(B) other Federal agencies;
(C) State and local government; and
(D) the private sector;
(4) coordinating with, seeking assistance and cooperation
of, and providing liaison to the Federal Geographic Data
Committee pursuant to Office of Management and Budget
Circular A-16 and Executive Order 12906 of April 14, 1994 (59
Fed. Reg. 17671), as amended by Executive Order 13286 of
March 5, 2003 (68 Fed. Reg. 10619); and
(5) developing and maintaining a best practices document
that sets out the best practices used by the Secretary in
carrying out the program and providing such document to the
United States Geological Survey, the Corps of Engineers, and
other relevant Federal agencies.
(d) Filling Needs and Gaps.--In carrying out the program,
the Secretary shall--
(1) maximize the use of remote sensing and other geospatial
data collection activities conducted for other purposes and
under other authorities;
(2) focus on filling data needs and gaps for coastal
management issues, including with respect to areas that, as
of the date of the enactment of this Act, were underserved by
coastal data and the areas of the Arctic that are under the
jurisdiction of the United States;
(3) pursuant to the Ocean and Coastal Mapping Integration
Act (33 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.), support continue improvement in
existing efforts to coordinate the acquisition and
integration of key data sets needed for coastal management
and other purposes, including--
(A) coastal elevation data;
(B) land use and land cover data;
(C) socioeconomic and human use data;
(D) critical infrastructure data;
(E) structures data;
(F) living resources and habitat data;
(G) cadastral data; and
(H) aerial imagery; and
(4) integrate the priority supporting data set forth under
paragraph (3) with other available data for the benefit of
the broadest measure of coastal resource management
constituents and applications.
(e) Financial Agreements and Contracts.--
(1) In general.--In carrying out the program, the
Secretary--
(A) may enter into financial agreements to carry out the
program, including--
(i) support to non-Federal entities that participate in
implementing the program; and
(ii) grants, cooperative agreements, interagency
agreements, contracts, or any other agreement on a
reimbursable or non-reimbursable basis, with other Federal,
tribal, State, and local governmental and nongovernmental
entities; and
(B) may, to the maximum extent practicable, enter into such
contracts with private sector entities for such products and
services as the Secretary determines may be necessary to
collect, process, and provide remote sensing and other
geospatial data and products for purposes of the program.
(2) Fees.--
(A) Assessment and collection.--The Secretary may assess
and collect fees for the conduct of any training, workshop,
or conference that advances the purposes of the program.
(B) Amounts.--The amount of a fee under this paragraph may
not exceed the sum of costs incurred, or expected to be
incurred, by the Secretary as a direct result of the conduct
of the training, workshop, or conference, including for
subsistence expenses incidental to the training, workshop, or
conference, as applicable.
(C) Use of fees.--Amounts collected by the Secretary in the
form of fees under this paragraph may be used to pay for--
(i) the costs incurred for conducting an activity described
in subparagraph (A); or
(ii) the expenses described in subparagraph (B).
(3) Survey and mapping.--Contracts entered into under
paragraph (1)(B) shall be considered ``surveying and
mapping'' services as such term is used in and as such
contracts are awarded by the Secretary in accordance with the
selection procedures in chapter 11 of title 40, United States
Code.
(f) Ocean Economy.--The Secretary may establish publicly
available tools that track ocean and Great Lakes economy data
for each coastal State.
(g) Authorization of Appropriations.--There is authorized
to be appropriated to the Secretary $4,000,000 for each
fiscal year 2017 through 2021 to carry out the program.
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