Friday, October 9, 1998 6:30 PM FROM THE CLEAN WATER NETWORK: CONGRESS IS ATTEMPTING TO ADD THE JONES WETLANDS MITIGATION BANKING BILL TO THE OMNIBUS APPROPRIATIONS BILL! CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES AND THE WHITE HOUSE TO TELL THEM TO OPPOSE EFFORTS TO ATTACH IT TO THE APPROPRIATIONS BILL THEY WILL BE THERE ALL WEEKEND President Clinton --message line is (202) 456-1111 Call and ask the Administration to veto any bills with anti-environmental riders, and specify the Jones Mitigation Banking bill. Congressman Jim Leach -- 202-225-6576 Congressman Leonard Boswell -- 202-225-3806 Congressman Greg Ganske -- 202-225-4426 Congressman Tom Latham -- 202-225-5476 Congressman Jim Nussle -- 202-225-2911 OR TRY: Dial toll-free, using 888-898-7717 or 800-335-4949 or call the Capital switchboard 202-224-3121 and ask for your Senators' and Representative's offices. == In a synical, 11th hour move, the forces of evil have attached the Jones Wetlands Mitigation banking bill as a rider to the Omnibus appropriations bill. Right now, Congress is working into the wee hours of the morning and all weekend to combine all of the remaining unpassed appropriations bills into what is being called the Omnibus Appropriations bill. Appropriations bills must be passed so that the Government won't shut down. These types of bills are targets for a lot of anti-environmental initiatives that wouldn't pass under the scrutiny of public debate. Remember the 1995 government shutdown? In part, it was over 17 anti-environmental riders (that had nothing to do with appropriations) being attached to a "must-pass" appropriations legislation. That year, Rep. Boehlert and 60 other moderate Republicans as well as most Democrats opposed these riders. Let's ask them to do it this year too. The Jones (R-NC) Wetlands bill was debated this summer in the House Water Resources Subcommittee and the debate was so heated and divisive, that the full committee decided not to consider it or vote on it, so it was stalled. Now the mitigation bankers are trying to pull a fast one by attaching it as a rider to a bill that they know Congress must pass in the next few days. Call your members of Congress immediately and tell them to oppose this effort. They will be working all weekend, so you can call them through the Congressional Switchboard at 202-224-3121. (They may not even know that this rider got attached yet, so tell them about it, why wetlands are important to you.). Ask them their position and urge them to oppose a bill with any anti-environmental riders, including the Jones wetlands mitigation banking bill. Also call the White House Hotline and leave a message that you want the Administration to veto any bill that has the Jones Mitigation Banking bill on it as a rider. Here is an analysis of the Jones bill and our reasons for opposing it. You all did a great job of killing this bill this summer. Please find the time to put in a call and bring it to your Representatives' attention this time around. --------------- Principal Objections to H.R. 1290 (Jones Wetlands Mitigation Banking Bill), as Reported by the Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment on June 4, 1998 1. Sequencing: Under the concept of "sequencing," wetlands are allowed to be destroyed only as a last resort. The bill fails to provide that sequencing (the requirement that developers first avoid and then minimize wetland impacts before mitigating for those impacts that cannot be avoided or further minimized) be followed where mitigation banks are used. Without a clear sequencing requirement, mitigation banks can easily be used as an excuse for permitting unnecessary and damaging wetland destruction. 2. Lack of Adequate Requirements for Bank Success: H.R. 1290 lacks adequate provisions to ensure that mitigation banks are successful ecologically. For example, there is no requirement for the Army Corps of Engineers to evaluate and make findings on the success or failure of a bank, and there is no opportunity for public input in determining and ensuring the success of a bank. 3. Credit for Preservation: The bill would allow a mitigation bank to sell credits for preserving wetlands (or even uplands). Preservation cannot compensate for wetland destruction in the nation's continuing effort to achieve and move beyond no net loss of wetlands. The bill's restrictions on preservation credits do not apply if a mitigation bank includes wetlands restoration, creation or enhancement. 4. Moving Wetlands: H.R. 1290 establishes "service areas," the geographic areas within which mitigation credits can be traded, that are far too large. As a result, the bill would allow developers effectively to "move" wetlands by restoring or creating a wetland far away from the wetland being destroyed. 11. Squeezing the Federal Resource Agencies Out of the Process: Presently, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Marine Fisheries Service contribute vital expertise to the process of reviewing banks and setting their ecological success standards. H.R. 1290 significantly reduces the role of these agencies, giving them little to do but comment on bank proposals, and even then limiting their comments to a short comment period. 12. Failure to Address Real Wetlands Threats: H.R. 1290 fails to confirm the Corps' jurisdiction over excavation activities by failing to codify the "Tulloch Rule," a bipartisan wetland-protection provision that was struck down by a federal appeals court in June 1998. With the loss of the Tulloch Rule, excavation activities are entirely unregulated under the Clean Water Act and developers can drain wetlands without a Clean Water Act permit and without any mitigation obligations whatsoever. Codifying authority for mitigation banking without confirming the Corps' jurisdiction over excavation would constitute a major failure to address the real reasons why America is still losing more than 100,000 acres of wetlands every year. Prepared by American Oceans Campaign Center for Marine Conservation National Audubon Society National Wildlife Federation Natural Resources Defense Council Sierra Club ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To get off the IOWA-TOPICS list, send email to [log in to unmask] Make the message text (not the Subject): SIGNOFF IOWA-TOPICS