Thirty-Five Years of Water Policy: The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Congressional research reportMay 11, 2009
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Thirty-Five Years of Water Policy: The 1973
National Water Commission and Present
Challenges
(name redacted), Coordinator
Specialist in Natural Resources Policy
(name redacted), Coordinator
Specialist in Natural Resources Policy
May 11, 2009
Congressional Research Service
7-....
www.crs.gov
R40573
CRS Report for Congress
Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress
The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Summary
Concern about the availability and use of water to support the nation’s people, economy, and
environment has bolstered interest in establishing a national water commission. The commission
structure proposed in recent legislation (e.g., H.R. 135) is similar to that of the 1968-1973
National Water Commission (NWC or Commission). As proposed in H.R. 135, the commission
would assess future water demands, study current management programs, and develop
recommendations for a comprehensive water strategy. Questions about a commission as an
effective model and which topics a commission might consider have raised interest in assessing
what the NWC recommended in its 1973 report, Water Policies for the Future, and how the issues
that it identified have evolved.
The NWC recommended addressing the interconnection between water development and the
natural environment, implementing a “users pay” or “beneficiary pays” approach, accomplishing
water quality improvements, and adapting governance and organizations to meet water
challenges. Since 1973, progress has been made in some of these areas; however, few actions can
be traced directly to the NWC’s recommendations. Nonetheless, the influence of the NWC on the
evolution of water policy cannot be dismissed. Many of the problems that the Commission
identified remain today, and some actions since 1973 have moved water policy toward alignment
with NWC recommendations; others have moved it in the opposite direction of NWC
recommendations. Shifts in institutional arrangements in general have reduced coordination of
federal water agency activities and in many ways have moved away from NWC-recommended
multi-objective or river basin planning. State-federal tensions over proper and respective roles
continue to cloud resolution of difficult water resource issues and complicate coordination efforts.
While many support better coordination of federal water activities and a clearer national “vision”
for water management, Congress has not enacted overarching water policy legislation since the
1965 Water Resources Planning Act. Instead, water policy has largely evolved through executive
and judicial actions, in many cases in response to piecemeal legislation. Congress continually
modifies federal water projects through amendments to existing projects and programs through
Water Resources Development Acts (WRDAs), Reclamation acts, water quality legislation, and
appropriations decisions. Incremental and ad hoc evolution of water policy, however, is not
surprising. Water management is complicated by past decisions and investments affecting a wide
range of stakeholders pursuing different goals. Specifically, federal and state laws and
regulations, local ordinances, tribal treaties, contractual obligations, and economies dependent on
existing water use patterns and infrastructure all affect water management. Attempts to untangle
such complexities involve many constituencies with differing interests, and success is difficult to
achieve. Expectations for a commission to achieve change in a complex system resistant to
transformation may be unreasonable; instead, the influence of a commission may lie in how its
recommendations combine with other drivers to support policy evolution.
This CRS report presents the NWC’s recommendations and analyzes how issues targeted by the
recommendations have evolved during the intervening years. The report focuses on key federallevel recommendations, thereby targeting what has been accomplished since 1973, what issues
remain unresolved, and what additional concerns have developed.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Contents
U.S. Water Policy and the 1968-1973 National Water Commission: An Introduction....................1
Water Management Roles in a Federalist System...................................................................1
Water Policy Challenges in a Federalist System.....................................................................2
Genesis of the National Water Commission ...........................................................................4
Response to the National Water Commission.........................................................................5
Summary of the Commission’s 1973 Report and Its Recommendations .......................................6
General Themes of Recommendations...................................................................................6
Governance and Institutional Issues.......................................................................................7
Water and the Natural Environment.......................................................................................9
“Users Pay” or “Beneficiary Pays” Approach ........................................................................9
Improvements to Water Quality........................................................................................... 10
Water Rights ....................................................................................................................... 10
Analysis of the 1973 NWC Recommendations .......................................................................... 11
Governance and Institutional Issues........................................................................................... 11
Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation ............................................................... 11
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 11
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 12
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 13
Accounting for the Environment in Project Development .................................................... 18
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 18
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 18
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 18
Public Participation in Water Resources Planning................................................................ 20
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 20
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 20
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 21
Federal Water Resources Coordination ................................................................................ 22
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 22
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 22
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 23
Water Resources Authorizations, Budget, and Appropriations.............................................. 26
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 26
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 26
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 26
Water and the Natural Environment........................................................................................... 30
Reservoir Development....................................................................................................... 30
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 30
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 31
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 31
Flood Policy ....................................................................................................................... 34
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 35
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 35
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 36
Estuaries and the Coastal Zone............................................................................................ 38
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 39
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 39
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Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 39
Channelization ................................................................................................................... 41
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 41
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 41
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 42
Fish and Wildlife Protection ................................................................................................ 42
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 42
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 42
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 43
“Users Pay” or “Beneficiary Pays” Approach ............................................................................ 44
General Water Resource User Fee and Cost-Share Policies .................................................. 44
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 44
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 45
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 46
Inland Waterway User Charges............................................................................................ 47
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 47
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 48
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 48
Federal Irrigation Policy—Reclamation Reform.................................................................. 50
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 50
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 50
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 51
Pricing of Municipal and Industrial Water and Wastewater Services .................................... 53
Issue and NWC Recommendations................................................................................ 53
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 53
Improvements to Water Quality................................................................................................. 54
Water Pollution Control....................................................................................................... 54
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 54
NWC Recommendations, and Current Status and Implementation ................................. 54
Water Rights ............................................................................................................................. 58
Non-Indian Water Rights..................................................................................................... 58
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 59
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 59
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 61
Indian Water Rights............................................................................................................. 62
Issue ............................................................................................................................. 62
NWC Recommendations............................................................................................... 63
Current Status and Implementation................................................................................ 63
Other Recommendations ............................................................................................... 65
Conclusion................................................................................................................................ 65
Figures
Figure 1. Federal Water Resources and Water Quality Spending ..................................................8
Figure 2. Federal Water Resources Spending as a Percentage of GDP (1956 -2007)................... 28
Figure 3. Federal and State (and Local) Spending on Water Resources, 1956-1990 .................... 29
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Figure 4. Federal Water Resources Construction and Maintenance Spending ............................. 29
Appendixes
Appendix. Fundamentals of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) ............................. 67
Contacts
Author Contact Information ...................................................................................................... 68
Acknowledgments .................................................................................................................... 68
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
R
ecent Congresses have considered legislation to establish a national water commission
modeled after the 1968-1973 National Water Commission (NWC).1 Interest in a
commission stems from basic concerns about how water is being used to support the
nation’s people, economy, and environment, as well as the appropriate role of the federal
government in water resources management. Questions about whether a commission would be
effective at addressing the nation’s water resources challenges and what topics it would be
charged with have raised interest in assessing the status of recommendations in the NWC’s 1973
final report, Water Policies for the Future.2 In its report, the Commission made more than 200
recommendations for improving federal and state water resources actions.
As Congress considers whether to establish a new “Twenty-first Century Water Policy
Commission,” questions arise about the scope and effect of the 1973 NWC report. After a brief
introduction to U.S. water policy and the NWC, this report presents a general summary of the
NWC report, its recommendations, and how these issues have evolved since 1973. The issues are
organized into five categories: (1) “Governance and Institutional Issues”; (2) “Water and the
Natural Environment”; (3) ““Users Pay” or “Beneficiary Pays” Approach”; (4) “Improvements to
Water Quality”; and (5) “Water Rights.” The remainder of this CRS report provides greater detail
on issues that fall under each of the five broad categories. The report provides an overview of key
issues and recommendations identified by the NWC; it neither covers the entire NWC report nor
provides an exhaustive assessment of progress made on Commission recommendations.3
U.S. Water Policy and the 1968-1973 National Water
Commission: An Introduction
Water Management Roles in a Federalist System
The responsibility for development, management, and allocation of the nation’s water resources is
spread among federal, state, local, tribal, and private interests. The federal government has been
involved in water resources development since the earliest days of the nation. From
improvements first to facilitate navigation, and later to reduce flood damages and expand
irrigation in the West, the federal government has been called upon to assist with and pay for a
multitude of water resource development projects. In recent decades, it also has regulated water
quality, protected fish and wildlife, and facilitated water supply augmentation. However, the
federal role also has limits. For example, Congress has generally deferred to the states’ primacy in
1
For example, the 110th Congress considered establishing a “Twenty-first Century Water Policy Commission” (H.R.
135 and S. 2728; see also Title VII of H.R. 2701). H.R. 135 has been reintroduced in the 111th Congress. Other
legislation may also address water resource or wastewater management issues addressed by the 1973 NWC (e.g., the
Secure Water Act (Title IX, Subtitle F, of P.L. 111-11) and water infrastructure legislation), but do not establish a
commission similar to the NWC.
2
NWC, Water Policies for the Future: Final Report to the President and to the Congress of the United States
(Washington: GPO, 1973), 579 pp., hereafter referred to as the 1973 NWC Report.
3
Due to this focus, little attention is given to the energy/water nexus, water resources research, supply augmentation, or
technological and methodological changes in water resources management. Similarly, this CRS report focuses on
federal or national policy and does not, except in limited circumstances, discuss recommendations aimed at state and
local governments. This focus allows for greater attention to what has been accomplished, what problems remain
unresolved, and what additional concerns have developed at the federal level.
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intrastate water allocation. 4 While local municipalities have largely been responsible for
developing and distributing water supplies, the federal government in limited cases also has been
authorized to assist communities with water supply development. Land use planning and zoning
are almost always within the purview of local governments; however, federal and state actions
and interests may run counter to local interests and actions, and vice versa.
Water Policy Challenges in a Federalist System
Nearly two centuries of water resource project development, environmental and resource
management activities, and population shifts have resulted in a complex web of federal and state
laws and regulations, local ordinances, tribal treaties, contractual obligations, and economies
based on existing water use patterns and infrastructure. These laws have been enacted for diverse
purposes, including to allocate, manage, and regulate water use, protect its quality, develop its
energy potential, contain its destructive powers, and restore or maintain its biological integrity.
Development of these laws has required the action of numerous congressional committees and
federal agencies. At the congressional level, this interest has resulted in a set of diverse and
sometimes overlapping committee jurisdictions dealing with various aspects of water policy.5 At
the executive branch level, this interest and congressional direction has resulted in many agencies
and organizations being involved in different but related aspects of federal water policy. This
dispersed arrangement complicates management of large river systems (e.g. Missouri,
Mississippi, Columbia, and Colorado River basins) and estuaries (e.g. Chesapeake Bay and the
San Francisco Bay and Sacramento-San Joaquin Rivers Delta (California Bay-Delta)), especially
where anadromous fisheries or threatened or endangered species are involved. For example,
fishes navigating some of these large river systems must pass through waters and facilities
managed by multiple state and federal agencies and are affected by state, federal, local, and tribal
water and land management decisions.
Multiple laws and responsibilities also confuse entities looking for assistance with local water
projects or other related activities, as well as those seeking to increase recreational opportunities,
fish and wildlife protection, and scenic enjoyment. For example, multiple federal programs exist
to help communities with rural water supply, wastewater treatment, drinking water quality, and
other water-related needs.
4
This is not generally a question of what powers the federal government has and could exercise under the Constitution.
Rather, it is a recognition that Congress has often required that the United States defer to or comply with state law in
the construction and operation of federal facilities pertaining to allocation, control, or distribution of water (see, for
example, §8 of the Reclamation Act of 1902, 32 Stat. 390; 43 U.S.C. 372, 383). Other laws recognizing state primacy
and their effects have been the subject of much judicial interpretation. At the same time, as owner of hundreds of
thousands of acres of public domain land, the federal government is the “owner of the right to use the waters pertaining
to the public domain lands, the right to use of which has not passed into private ownership under authority of the U.S.
or an earlier sovereign.” (Letter from Kent Frizzell, Assistant Attorney General, Land and Natural Resources Division,
Department of Justice, to the National Water Commission, January 11, 1973.) The federal government also holds
reserved water rights—although in many cases unquantified—for reservations of federal lands withdrawn from the
public domain (e.g., national forests, national park lands, and wilderness areas). For example, see CRS Report
RL30809, The Wild and Scenic Rivers Act and Federal Water Rights, by Cynthia Brougher.
5
See, for example, Water in the West: Challenge for the Next Century, June 1998, Appendix C, Western Water Policy
Review Advisory Commission. A minimum of 12 standing committees in the House and Senate have jurisdiction over
various components of federal water policy; moreover, this figure excludes the extensive responsibilities of the
appropriations committees in both chambers, and the direct and indirect activities of the budget, finance, and oversight
committees in both houses.
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At the state level, concern arises any time the federal government is perceived to be infringing on
the concept of state primacy in water allocation or controlling water management decisions. This
federal-state tension is mirrored in executive-legislative tensions over water resources
development and management. Thus, in responding to the former concern, many experts have
called for a “national” (i.e., not federal) commission or other mechanism that would involve
states and localities in development of a national water policy “vision.”6
Complicating matters further is the dynamic nature of water itself. The basic hydrologic cycle,
climate variability—including floods and droughts—and the chemical, physical, and biological
nature of surface and ground waters are in a constant state of flux.
Criticism of the fractured nature of federal water policy has been a recurrent theme for decades.
Historically, countless commissions, councils, and studies have called for new directions in water
policy and better planning, evaluation, and coordination of federal actions.7 Options used in the
past have included formal and informal coordination entities within the executive branch, nongovernmental commissions tasked with reviewing past policies and laws, and a legislative branch
committee made up of key committee leaders.
Congress has not enacted any comprehensive—or overarching—change in federal water
resources management or national water policy since enactment of the 1965 Water Resources
Planning Act (P.L. 89-80; 42 U.S.C. §1962). The Water Resources Planning Act was the direct
result of recommendations of the Senate Select Committee on National Water Resources, a
congressional committee established to review national water resources policy.8 Although an
assessment of the nation’s water resource conditions was last conducted in 1975 and several
entities have studied selected aspects of water policy and management, the last systematic and
comprehensive review of nationwide federal water policy was the 1973 NWC report. Congress,
which represents local interests, often has reacted to proposals to change or reorganize water
6
See, for example, the January 6, 2003, and February 20, 2007, letters from the American Water Resources
Association (AWRA) to President George W. Bush et al., calling upon the Administration and Congress to develop a
“national water vision” and policy to translate that vision into action. Available at http://awra.org/pdf/fnwpd.pdf;
accessed February 12, 2009.
7
These efforts included the Commission on Reorganization of the Executive Branch of the Government (First Hoover
Commission, 1949); the President’s Water Resources Policy Commission (Truman Administration, 1950); the
Subcommittee to Study Civil Works, House Committee on Public Works (Jones Subcommittee, 1952); the Commission
on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government (Second Hoover Commission, 1955); the Commission on
Intergovernmental Relations (1955); the Presidential Advisory Committee on Water Resources Policy (Eisenhower
Administration, 1955); the Senate Select Committee on National Water Resources (1961); the Water Resources
Council (1965-1983); the National Water Commission (1973); the National Commission on Water Quality (1976); the
National Council on Public Works Improvement (1988); and the Western Water Policy Advisory Review Commission
(1998). For more information on these efforts, see Reorganization Efforts Affecting the Corps of Engineers Civil Works
Mission, by Martin Reuss, former historian for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, undated white paper; and U.S.
House of Representatives, House Resources Committee, Water & Power Subcommittee, Hearings on the Twenty-first
Century National Water Commission, testimony of (name redacted), May 22, 2002.
8
According to Theodore M. Schad, former executive director of the NWC, “[results of the] Kerr Committee [Senate
Select Committee on National Water Resources] had a much better reception and was essentially implemented within a
few years which is unusual for a study commission report. The key reason was that the study was made by people who
were in a position to influence the implementation of the recommendations, which is a lot different from a presidential
commission where the appointees are appointed and do their work and then are gone.” Martin Reuss, Office of History
and Institute for Water Resources, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Water Resources People and Issues, Interview with
Theodore M. Schad (Alexandria, VA: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Jan. 1999), p. 166. Hereafter Reuss Interview
with Schad.
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organizations and institutions as attempts to exert federal control over state and local matters or as
attempts to concentrate power and decision-making in the executive branch.
Congress arguably has been comprehensive (in the aggregate) in its approach to legislating on
many different aspects of water law and policy, but it has not done so in a coordinated or
overarching way. Any attempt to untangle the complexities of current water policy involves many
constituencies with differing interests, and becomes politically difficult to sustain. Instead of
comprehensive or overarching legislation, Congress has enacted numerous incremental changes,
agency by agency, statute by statute. Both the executive and judicial branches have responded to
these changes and, over time, have developed policy and planning mechanisms largely on an ad
hoc basis. When coordination of federal activity has occurred, it has been driven largely by
pending crises, such as potential threatened or endangered species listings, droughts, floods, and
hurricanes; and by local or regional initiatives. Concern about water supply and its development,
however, has bolstered recent interest in legislation to establish a national water commission to
assess future water demands, study current management programs, and develop recommendations
for a comprehensive strategy.
Genesis of the National Water Commission
The National Water Commission was created by Congress in 1968 to “provide for a
comprehensive review of national water resource problems and programs ... ”9 Congress
specifically tasked the Commission to (1) review present and anticipated national water resource
problems, including making projections of water “requirements” and alternative ways of meeting
such requirements, giving consideration to a host of interests and technological approaches; (2)
consider economic and social consequences of water resource development; and (3) advise on
such specific water resource matters as might be referred to it by the President and the thenexisting Water Resources Council (WRC).10 (See box, “Brief History of the Water Resources
Council.”)
Creation of the Commission stemmed largely from congressional debate over development of
dams and related irrigation infrastructure in the Lower Colorado River Basin, which in total
“would use more water than the river could supply.”11 Members of Congress from the Pacific
Northwest, including the chairman of the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee, objected
to proposals to transfer water from the Columbia River Basin to supply the needs of states in the
Southwest, and a political compromise was reached to create a commission to study water
resource problems—a suggestion originally proposed by the Bureau of the Budget. 12 Passage of
legislation authorizing the National Water Commission was a direct result. The Commission was
made up of seven members appointed by the President. 13 Although none was allowed to be a
9
P.L. 90-515; 82 Stat. 868.
Ibid.
11
Theodore M. Schad, The National Water Commission Revisited, Water Resources Bulletin, American Water
Resources Association, vol. 14, no.2, April 1978, p. 303. Hereafter National Water Commission Revisited.
12
Reuss Interview with Schad, EP870-1-61, p. 166.
13
The National Water Commission Act passed in September 1968, and the “nucleus” of the Commission staff of 19
was assembled by June 30, 1969. The maximum number of staff employed was 44 in June of 1971. The Commission
met monthly from November 1968. President Nixon made changes to the Commission in 1969 and 1970. U.S.
Congress, Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee, Subcommittee on Water and Power Resources, National
Water Commission Report, hearings, June 28 and July 17, 1973, 93rd Cong., 1st sess. (Washington: GPO, 1973), p. 8.
10
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federal employee, some, including chairman Charles F. Luce, had formerly held senior positions
in the federal government. Members were chosen largely for their expertise in a variety of fields
related to water resource management. Together, they represented a range of geographic regions
and backgrounds in government, industry, and law. 14 Unlike the common practice of today, no
special interests were required to be represented.
Response to the National Water Commission
While progress has been made on addressing many of the problems identified by the
Commission, particularly through successive enactment of many Water Resource Development
Acts, Reclamation laws, and amendments to water quality legislation, few actions can be directly
traced to the Commission’s 1973 recommendations. Aside from immediate oversight hearings by
the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee and Senate Public Works Committee, and
references in appropriations hearings, the report received no direct follow-up action. In 1978, the
Commission’s executive director, Theodore Schad, noted that the report had remained in “limbo,”
awaiting mandated action from the WRC and final transmission from the President to the
Congress.15 Schad went on to note:
It appears these actions [WRC comments and recommendations from the President to Congress]
will never be taken. President Nixon became preoccupied with his defense against the Watergate
scandals which ultimately led to his resignation. The Ford administration occupied itself with the
Section 80 study of water policy. And the Carter administration appears to have accepted
Santayana’s comment as its precept [that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to
repeat it”].16
Instead of direct action to implement the Commission’s recommendations, it appears that water
policy has continued to evolve—in some areas, much as the Commission predicted—and that this
evolution has had many drivers, including but not limited to the Commission findings. For
example, a shift from federal grants to loans for local water quality activities is consistent with
the Commission’s recommendation for an end to such grants; however, the change was not a
direct response to the Commission’s recommendations. Changes in Reclamation law in 1982 and
federal cost-share policies in 1986 also reflected Commission recommendations. Again, however,
it is doubtful that these changes were a direct response to Commission recommendations; rather,
they reflect the culmination of many forces to bring about change.
Despite the evolution in water policy, many of the problems identified by the Commission remain
today. Often, what makes these problems so intractable is the difficulty in reaching agreement
among varied stakeholders as to the proper and respective roles and responsibilities of federal,
state, local, tribal, and nongovernmental entities in water management and the distinct dichotomy
between agencies, institutions, and constituencies dealing with various aspects of water resource
issues on the one hand and water quality issues on the other. Whether a new commission could
succeed in promoting direct responses where others have found difficulty is uncertain.
Expectations for a commission to directly achieve changes in a complex system resistant to
transformation may be unreasonable; instead, the influence of a commission may lie in how its
recommendations combine with other drivers to create support for an evolution in policy.
14
According to Theodore M. Schad, “The membership was very well balanced politically, geographically, and
environmentally.” Reuss Interview with Schad, pp. 168-169.
15
National Water Commission Revisited, p. 305.
16
Ibid.
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Summary of the Commission’s 1973 Report and Its
Recommendations
In June 1973, the National Water Commission completed its five-year term and published its final
report, Water Policies for the Future. The Commission found that many of the country’s water
policies were based on outdated goals and objectives (e.g., settlement of the West, territorial
expansion of navigation) and on flawed assumptions about future water needs. The Commission
viewed itself as being at the cusp of a shift in water resources management, as the era of large
dam construction and other large-scale development investments tapered off; this put the
Commission in a unique position to take stock of past policies, assess implementation of thencurrent programs, and make recommendations for future federal, state, and local policies in water
resource and water quality management. The report was based on hundreds of documents, special
studies contracted by the Commission, eight public hearings, and other meetings conducted since
its inception in 1968. Early chapters of the report describe the long history of water resource
development and federal activities related to water supply and water quality, as well as water
demand projections.
General Themes of Recommendations
The final Commission report included 17 chapters and supporting appendixes and 232
recommendations. It articulated seven basic themes, which together provided the foundation for
the Commission’s conclusions and recommendations:17
•
The demand for water in the future is not predetermined and does not follow an
inexorable growth pattern, but depends on policy decisions that society controls.
•
A change in emphasis from water development to preservation and enhancement
of water quality and environmental preservation is underway and will continue
into the future.
•
Water development planning must be tied more closely to water quality planning,
and all water planning to land use planning.
•
Meeting future demands necessitates conservation, increased efficiency, and
better use of water for agriculture, industry, and domestic and municipal
purposes.
•
Sound economic principles, such as consumers’ willingness to pay, should be
used to encourage better use of water resources, but tempered by governmental
attention to protection of environmental values.
•
Updated laws and legal institutions are needed to implement future water
policies.
17
National Water Commission Revisited, p. 306. These seven themes also are articulated in Chairman Luce’s testimony
before the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee (U.S. Congress, Senate Interior and Insular Affairs
Committee, Subcommittee on Water and Power Resources, National Water Commission Report, hearings, June 28 and
July 17, 1973, 93rd Cong., 1st sess. (Washington: GPO, 1973).)
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•
The level of government (federal, regional, state, or local) nearest the water
resource problem and capable of adequately representing all interests should
control water resource development, management, and protection.
In analyzing the above themes, the text of the report, historical analysis of the Commission’s
work, and congressional statements and hearings following the release of the 1973 report, CRS
has identified several broad issues areas: a need for reevaluation of federal project planning and
evaluation, as well as relationships among federal, state, local and tribal entities with respect to
water management and water rights; concern about the effects of water resources management on
the natural environment; a movement toward recovering from direct beneficiaries the costs of
federal investments in water projects; and concern over degraded water quality. These issues are
summarized in the following five sections: (1) “Governance and Institutional Issues”; (2) “Water
and the Natural Environment”; (3) ““Users Pay” or “Beneficiary Pays” Approach”; (4)
“Improvements to Water Quality”; and (5) “Water Rights.”
Governance and Institutional Issues
A fundamental and overarching issue area addressed by the NWC was governance and related
institutional mechanisms to address water management and planning. In particular, the
Commission recommended numerous changes to the institutional structure through which water
resources actions were planned, evaluated, and managed. Specific governance and institutional
topics covered by the Commission included (1) water resources project planning and evaluation;
(2) accounting for the environment in project development; (3) public participation in water
resources planning; (4) federal water resources coordination; and (5) water resources
authorizations, budgets, and appropriations. Although the basic functioning of the authorization,
budgeting, and appropriations processes for water resources has not changed significantly since
1973, a few major changes in organizations and focus have altered the institutional landscape
affecting water resources management. These include disbandment of the executive-level Water
Resources Council (WRC) and most of the federal river basin commissions, and increased
emphasis on state responsibility for water management and development. These changes largely
moved water resources planning and evaluation in the opposite direction from Commission
recommendations. (See box, “Brief History of the Water Resources Council.”)
The Commission also predicted (accurately) that large-scale federal development would play a
less significant role than in the past,18 and instead identified joint or coordinated management of
multipurpose water facilities, water quality, and local and nonfederal uses as more pressing. The
predictions of less large-scale development and the increasing challenges of managing rivers for
multiple uses have largely come to fruition. While the federal government has constructed many
multipurpose projects, multi-objective federal planning—that is, planning for multiple objectives
such as national and regional economic development, environmental quality, and other social and
safety concerns—has not been implemented widely or consistently since the mid-1980s. The
1983 federal water resources planning guidance moved away from the 1970s planning guidance
of multi-objective planning, and reverted to a focus on national economic development. This
1983 guidance remains in effect,19 although Congress recently enacted legislation requiring its
18
For several decades leading up to the 1960s, the federal government had played a large role in development of the
nation’s resources—largely through the construction of large dams and extensive projects, with little integrated
planning.
19
“Economic and Environmental Principles and Guidelines for Water and Related Land Resources Implementation
Studies” (Principles and Guidelines), available at http://www.usace.army.mil/cw/hot_topics/ht_2008/pandg_rev.htm.
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update. 20 Notwithstanding the current planning guidance’s focus on economic criteria, the
environment has received greater attention in federal water resources project planning and
operations, due in large part to implementation of environmental laws, in particular the National
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA; P.L. 91-190, 42 U.S.C. §4321 et seq.) and the Endangered
Species Act (ESA; P.L. 93-205, as amended; 16 U.S.C. §§ 1531-1543).
The Commission found that budgeting procedures neither reflected nor promoted regional or
long-term water resources development, and projects were often presented to Congress and
considered individually. Considering project authorizations and appropriations as part of
comprehensive river basin and regional development plans, as recommended by the Commission,
has not been an option since the early 1980s, when most larger-scale federal water resources
planning efforts were halted. Budgeting for the two largest federal water resource agencies (the
Corps and the Bureau of Reclamation) also has remained largely project-specific, while federal
funding for water quality infrastructure is largely done via formula-based funding to state
revolving fund programs.
In terms of federal appropriations for water programs, a shift from development to preservation
indeed occurred; where once water resource development was predominant in water program
spending, federal water quality spending significantly increased in the 1970s and has remained
well above pre-1970s levels, while water resources development spending has experienced a
modest decline (see Figure 1). With regard to water resources program focus, development has
slowed and federal water resource agencies now must take into account the environment in
planning, constructing, and operating projects. Still, the degree to which development and
environmental protection are evaluated and weighted remains central to many current water
resources conflicts.
Figure 1. Federal Water Resources and Water Quality Spending
(1956-2007 in millions of 2006 dollars)
16,000
14,000
12,000
10,000
8,000
6,000
Water Resources
Drinking Water and Wastew ater
Treatment
4,000
2,000
0
1956 1961 1966 1971 1976 1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2006
Source: CRS, with data from the Congressional Budget Office, CBO Infrastructure Spending Supplemental
Tables, 2008 Update, available at http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=9135.
20
§2031, Water Resources Development Act of 2007, P.L. 110-114 (42 U.S.C. §1962-3).
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Water and the Natural Environment
The Commission found that by 1973, the best sites for dams and other water resource
development projects had been used, that many projects had heavily affected the environment,
and that the public had turned its support from development to environmental and water quality
preservation. The Commission recommended a similar shift from development (construction of
dams, irrigation ditches, channels, etc.) toward preservation and improvement of water quality. Its
recommendations ranged across numerous fields, including (1) reservoir development; (2) flood
policy; (3) estuaries and the coastal zone; (4) channelization; and (5) fish and wildlife protection.
Many of the water and natural environment concerns raised by the NWC have been addressed via
implementation of environmental laws at their infancy in 1973—for example NEPA, ESA, and
the Clean Water Act (P.L. 92-500; 33 U.S.C. §1251 et seq.). Further, many of the largest current
federal water actions are attempting to address environmental or species concerns through
ecosystem restoration and stream rehabilitation (e.g., Everglades restoration, San Joaquin River
restoration, and San Francisco Bay/San Joaquin River and Sacramento Delta (Bay-Delta)
restoration); whether these recent efforts will perform as planned and whether the federalnonfederal collaboration central to many of them will function effectively and efficiently remains
in question. As a consequence, whether these changes and efforts adequately address the
Commission’s concerns is a matter of disagreement.
“Users Pay” or “Beneficiary Pays” Approach
The Commission also supported greater application of “users pay” and “beneficiary pays”
approaches, which are founded on the concept that those directly benefitting from federal
investment ought to pay the for investment. The twin goals of this approach were to improve
equity and efficiency. These goals were the focus of several chapters in the final report, and the
users pay and beneficiary pays policies were woven throughout the report. The Commission
focused on (1) increasing (or establishing) general nonfederal cost shares of projects by federal
water resource agencies (e.g., the Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation); (2)
establishing inland waterway user charges; (3) changing federal irrigation policy and
implementing reforms to the Reclamation program (i.e., reducing federal irrigation subsidies and
complexities); and (4) addressing appropriate pricing of water and wastewater services.
At congressional hearings, the Commission stated that heavy federal investment in water
resources development made sense in the early part of the nation’s history and through the first
half of the 20th century, but changing federal priorities necessitated changes in water policies. The
needed changes included improving cost recovery and eliminating program duplication and crosspurpose policies.
Cost recovery remains part of the ongoing discussions of the proper federal role in water policy.
For example, ongoing tensions between successive administrations and recent congresses over
funding for federally supported water reuse and rural water projects have revolved mostly around
what the proper federal role is in financing local municipal and industrial water supply projects.
Federal program duplication also generates federal investment concerns; on the other hand,
congressional supporters often justify new projects and programs as fulfilling an unmet social
purpose. Regarding costly cross-purpose programs, numerous studies since 1973 have questioned
the incentives created by federal assistance for flood damage reduction infrastructure (like levees
and floodwalls). Specifically, if this infrastructure encourages commercial, residential, and
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
industrial development in floodplains, the social and economic costs are generally greater when
flooding occurs.
Increasing or changing nonfederal cost shares or establishing special fees for beneficiaries of
water projects consistently proves politically difficult.21 Nonetheless, some progress has been
made in addressing the Commission’s recommendations related to containing costs—most
notably through increased cost shares for certain port development, flood projects, and
establishment of a barge fuel tax. Some economists, however, argue that these steps have been
insufficient to address the full range of inefficient cost share and water pricing policies.
Improvements to Water Quality
The elements of the final report that addressed water pollution control were some of the most
controversial, 22 chiefly because the Commission rejected some key concepts that Congress had
recently adopted in the Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972 (P.L. 92-500;
33 U.S.C. §1251 et seq., commonly referred to as the Clean Water Act (CWA)). The draft final
report was released one month after enactment of that major law, and the final report barely eight
months after enactment. The Commission rejected the zero discharge goal and the core regulatory
approach central to the CWA.
The CWA is viewed today as one of the most successful environmental laws in terms of achieving
its statutory goals, and the CWA programs have been widely supported by the public. The
Commission made observations that remain valid about the extent of water pollution problems,
despite water quality improvements that have occurred since then. Issues on which the
Commission focused some recommendations, such as planning, federal and state roles, and
enforcement through discharge permits, have been and remain basic elements of implementing
water quality programs. The need to adequately fund pollution control activities, highlighted in
several recommendations, also remains a challenge for policymakers.
Water Rights
The Commission also focused on the scarcity of water as a resource and adapting to more
efficient use and allocation. It suggested that procedural mechanisms and legal regulations,
including adjustments to water rights, be implemented to ensure that water was used efficiently
and effectively. Congress has enacted legislation protecting social and noneconomic values while
respecting the state-based water rights frameworks; many states also have modified their water
rights systems to protect social values. The Commission described water supply in the West as
limited and near full appropriation, and it framed the Indian water rights issue as a conflict in the
West between Indian rights to water and water development, on the one hand, and the potential
harm to extensive non-Indian water development and use, on the other. As is the case today,
Indian water rights claims were largely unquantified. The Commission found that resultant
uncertainties created an urgent need to resolve Indian water rights claims; many perceive this as
still being the case.
21
For an introduction to this ongoing struggle, see T. R. Reid, Congressional Odyssey, the Saga of a Senate Bill (New
York: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1980).
22
“Water Commission: No More Free Rides for Water Users,” Science, April 13, 1973, p. 167.
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Analysis of the 1973 NWC Recommendations
The following sections provide an overview and analysis of the Commission’s recommendations.
Each section includes a brief discussion of issues identified by the Commission, a listing of key
recommendations, and a discussion of whether certain recommendations have been implemented.
In many cases, a discussion of how issues identified may have evolved is also included.
Governance and Institutional Issues
The Commission found that future water requirements could not be fully assessed without taking
into account how water resources are governed and what institutional structures guide their
management, use, and allocation. The Commission emphasized that policy choices would greatly
influence future water use and water “needs” or “requirements”—that future water “demands”
would depend on multiple factors and future polices.
A persistent tendency of water resources planning has been the issuance of single valued
projections of water use into the future under a continuation of present policies, leading to
astronomical estimates of future water requirements.... The amount of water that is actually used
in the future will depend in large measure on public policies that are adopted. The National Water
Commission is convinced that there are few water “requirements.”... But there are “demands” for
water and water-related services that are affected by a whole host of other factors and policy
decisions, some in fields far removed from what is generally considered to be water policy.23
With regard to government programs and institutions affecting water policy, the Commission
made many recommendations related to (1) water resources project planning and evaluation; (2)
accounting for the environment in project development; (3) public participation in water
resources planning; (4) federal water resources coordination; and (5) water resources
authorization, budget and appropriations.
Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation24
Issue
The NWC predicted a less significant role for large-scale federal project development (e.g.
construction of locks, dams, levees, and diversion facilities) than in the past. The Commission
instead identified joint or coordinated management of multipurpose water facilities, water quality,
and local and nonfederal uses as more pressing. It concluded that comparisons of alternative
water uses would become increasingly important as demands increased on limited supplies. The
Commission believed that estimating the values of various uses and pricing policies would be
important to achieve efficient water allocation. It concluded that federal investment in water
resources projects was inefficient for achieving regional economic development, and cautioned
that careful development and assessment of project proposals were necessary to enhance their
effectiveness and offset losses in other regions.
23
24
1973 NWC Report, p. 2.
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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The Commission found water resource project planning insufficient in its integration with landuse planning, water quality and environmental concerns, and the interests of the general public.
The Commission criticized large river basin and watershed plans as avoiding needed
prioritization, being unrealistically ambitious, and failing to capture the issues significant to
metropolitan areas. It noted that important non-quantitative issues and judgments were buried in
the analysis of some plans, and that federal planning requirements for states were costly while
producing unclear state benefits.
The Commission supported broadening traditional objectives of water resources plans, but was
uncertain how to properly evaluate multi-objective plans and their alternatives. The Commission
determined that society was not only concerned with national economic consequences, but also
with water projects’ nonmarket and regional effects. It found that a bias toward construction
projects and projects within agency mission areas resulted in inappropriately narrow alternative
formulation during the early phases of planning. In particular, the Commission found that there
was a bias against alternatives for no action, delayed investments, and nonstructural measures
(e.g., pricing, metering, conservation, evacuation, floodproofing). It found that the evaluation of
alternatives seldom adequately treated adverse, indirect, social, and non-monetized effects. The
Commission commented on the bias caused by the dominance of benefit-cost analyses in
evaluation and selection, in particular the often overriding weight given the benefit-cost ratio in
identifying the preferred alternative.
The Commission also identified municipal water supply and wastewater treatment; recreation
use; water quality and pollution control; and power plant siting and licensing as significant
planning challenges. The Commission’s planning recommendations focused on these issues as
they relate to water resources planning. The discussion below similarly focuses on water
resources planning, rather than water quality and other planning issues.
NWC Recommendations
To improve planning, the Commission recommended:
•
integrating land-use and water planning at the state, federal, and local levels, and
in coordinating institutions such as river basin commissions;
•
increasing federal funds for state water planning, and access to these funds by
local and interstate planning entities;
•
authorizing federal-state-local planning organizations if there is a federal interest,
and giving more intensive and continued attention to water management needs of
smaller basins and metropolitan areas;
•
estimating values for alternative water uses as part of basin plans, as appropriate;
•
analyzing water resources as hydrologic systems (i.e., accounting for quantity,
quality, timing, resource location, and subsequent uses); and
•
judging fish, wildlife, and aesthetic values indirectly (i.e., not by economic
evaluation), and basing decisions on the value of uses preserved exceeding the
value of the uses foregone.
For evaluating alternatives, the Commission recommended:
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•
approving the multi-objective planning approach in the WRC’s (then-proposed)
Principles and Standards for water resources planning;
•
not relying solely on benefit-cost analysis for decision-making;
•
determining nonfederal sponsors’ willingness to pay for a project, and to consider
that a measure of its attractiveness as an investment; and
•
basing the discount rate for projects on average yield rates for long-term Treasury
obligations.
Current Status and Implementation
Significant shifts have occurred in water resources planning since 1973. In the early 1970s, water
resource agency planning Principles and Standards incorporated environmental, regional, and
social effects, as well as national economic development factors.25 Consistent with the
Commission’s recommendations, the WRC revised the Principles and Standards. New, extensive
Principles and Standards were published under the Carter Administration in 1979. Soon
thereafter, the Reagan Administration replaced this guidance with the “Principles and Guidelines”
just as the WRC disbanded in 1983, which revised the Principles to focus decision-making on
economic criteria but left out the analytic provisions. 26
The Principles and Guidelines moved away from the 1970s Principal and Standards’ use of a
multi-objective planning and evaluation framework, thus reverting back to a focus on national
economic development. As the Commission envisioned, regional development and resource
development projects continued their decline after 1973. Much of the post-Commission federal
planning has been concentrated at the Corps and at a smaller scale in USDA watershed programs.
In the early 1980s, President Reagan also dissolved the majority of the large-scale river basin
commissions.
As with other areas addressed by the Commission, the advent of new environmental laws (e.g.,
NEPA and ESA) has also significantly shaped federal water resources planning since 1973. (See
“Accounting for the Environment in Project Development” and “Public Participation in Water
Resources Planning” for more information.)
25
Prior to development of planning “Principles and Standards” by the WRC in the late 1960s and early 1970s, project
planning focused on project costs, benefits, and engineering feasibility.
26
“Economic and Environmental Principles and Guidelines for Water and Related Land Resources Implementation
Studies” (Principles and Guidelines), available at http://www.usace.army.mil/cw/hot_topics/ht_2008/pandg_rev.htm.
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Brief History of the Water Resources Council
U.S. water resource agencies largely acted autonomously in proposing project plans until an interagency Water
Resources Council was established in 1965 to coordinate federal water programs and policy. The Council was
created by the Water Resources Planning Act of 1965 (P.L. 89-80); it challenged more established institutional
decision mechanisms of both executive and legislative branches and was subsequently disbanded in 1983. The 1965
act declares that “the policy of the Congress is to encourage the conservation, development, and utilization of water
and related land resources of the United States on a comprehensive and coordinated basis by the Federal
Government, States, localities, and private enterprise ..." Specific duties given the Council were to:
•
conduct continuing "assessments" of water supplies;
•
coordinate basin plans with larger regional and federal programs, including making policy
recommendations;
•
establish "principles and standards" for evaluating projects, i.e., integrating environmental and social
objectives with cost-benefit analysis;
•
review and make recommendations on basin commission plans; and
•
allot financial grants to states for planning assistance.
Council Activities, 1968-1978
With 50 professional staff, the Council issued unprecedented and highly detailed national water assessments in 1968
and in 1975. Dozens of river basin studies and major planning studies were completed, as was issuance of new
principles and standards for project evaluation.
The Council operated in an environment dominated by a few large water project construction agencies and the
legislative committees of jurisdiction. Although the Council operated as a sub-Cabinet (staff-level) committee, it was
nominally made up of the Secretaries of Agriculture, Army, Health, Interior, and Transportation and the (then)
Federal Power Commission chairman; later the Housing Secretary and Administrator of the Environmental Protection
Agency were named as associate members, while "observers" included the Office of Management and Budget, Council
on Environmental Quality, Tennessee Valley Authority, and river basin commission chairpersons.
In 1978, the Carter Administration initiated an effort to reform federal water policy—initially employing a "hit list" of
about 20 large water projects for which de-authorization was sought. The Council was called upon to assist in the
effort, and Council staff were used to independently review the water agencies’ project justifications. Eventually,
congressional funding provisions maintained many projects and prohibited the Council’s independent reviews.
Early 1980s
In early 1981, Interior Secretary James Watt, serving as Council chairman, requested reduced Council funding. The
action was consistent with the Reagan Administration's outlook that states should play a more active role in water
policy activities. All the organizational and staff planning functions of the Council and basin commissions were
disbanded, and a revised set of "Principles and Guidelines" were issued in 1983 as one of the last formal actions of the
Council. Although the Water Resources Planning Act has not been repealed and thus authorization of the Council
remains statutorily, no funding for the Council has been appropriated since FY1983.
Prepared by (name redacted) and H. Stephen Hughes
Planning and Evaluation Guidance
The 1983 Principles and Guidelines remain in effect. How they focus planning, evaluation, and
selection of the preferred federal project alternative on national economic benefits (NED) has
been widely criticized, particularly as interest and support for aquatic ecosystem restoration and
environmental protection has grown. Furthermore, Hurricane Katrina drew national attention to
concerns about the incorporation of public safety in planning. In a Water Resources Development
Act of 2007 (WRDA 2007, P.L. 110-114) provision, Congress called for the Secretary of the
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Army to update the Principles and Guidelines by the end of 2009. The same provision also stated
a national water resources planning policy.27
It is the policy of the United States that all water resources projects should reflect national
priorities, encourage economic development, and protect the environment by—(1) seeking to
maximize sustainable economic development; (2) seeking to avoid the unwise use of floodplains
and flood-prone areas and minimizing adverse impacts and vulnerabilities in any case in which a
floodplain or flood-prone area must be used; and (3) protecting and restoring the functions of
natural systems and mitigating any unavoidable damage to natural systems.
How this provision is implemented (i.e., how the Corps, Reclamation, NRCS, and the TVA will
conduct their planning) and the oversight it receives remain to be seen. For instance, it is
unknown how a revised planning framework will address tradeoffs across national economic
effects, environmental benefits, and public safety, as well how regional economic and social
effects might be weighed. Whether the WRDA 2007 provision results in greater consideration of
nonstructural measures and broadening of planning to include alternatives outside of an agency’s
mission, as recommended by the Commission, also remains unknown. Numerous already enacted
provisions supporting nonstructural measures have produced little shift toward their full
consideration and selection in water resources planning, thus indicating that authorizing
provisions and statements of planning policy, without oversight and funding, may not be
sufficient to produce significant change.
With some exceptions, water resource and water quality planning and implementation efforts
continue to be performed separately. Although the NWC discussed preservation, it did not predict
the evolution of ecosystem restoration as a significant water resources planning challenge. The
growth of ecosystem restoration has precipitated a deviation from the economic basis of the 1983
Principles and Guidelines; the basic justification for restoration is not economic but
environmental. For example, the Corps has developed its own guidance, which often broadly
assumes that the environmental benefits exceed their economic costs, thereby negating the need
for a benefit-cost analysis to justify undertaking a project based on national economic benefits. In
order to evaluate and select a restoration alternative, the analysis is based on cost-effectiveness,
which instead identifies which alternative provides a unit of environmental benefit at least cost.
Cost-effectiveness, therefore, helps determine the efficient project design given unlimited fiscal
resources, but provides little insight into whether, given constrained fiscal resources, the nation
should invest in a particular restoration effort compared to other restoration opportunities.
Whether implementation of WRDA 2007 provisions may assist in integrating water resources and
water quality planning, and in structuring the planning and evaluation of restoration projects, is
unknown.
Consistent with the recommendation by the Commission, Congress in the Water Resources
Development Act of 1974 (P.L. 93-251) made the discount rate for federal water projects the oneyear average yield of long-term government securities. This discount rate remains controversial.
Some economists argue that the rate should reflect displacement of private investment, which is
usually higher than long-term government securities. Recently, the Treasury-based rate has been
lower than the rate of return on private investments or the Office of Management and Budget’s
27
§2031, Water Resources Development Act of 2007, P.L. 110-114 (42 U.S.C. §1962-3).
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base rate of 7%.28 The benefits of moving to a different rate, which may affect the evaluation and
selection of a project, and federal participation in it, continue to be debated.
Federal Water Resource Planning Activities
Following the 1965 Water Resources Planning Act (P.L. 89-80; 42 U.S.C. §1962), the federal
government supported federal, state, and river basin planning in numerous ways. By the late
1970s, federal watershed and river basin commission planning was both positively received and
criticized for its costs and usefulness. Federal funding for state planning efforts began to decline.
The early-1980s abandonment of the WRC and river basin commissions, as well as detailed
planning standards, shifted federal project planning away from coordinated watershed-based
decision making. Since then, most federal agency planning has been project-specific with some
exceptions. The exceptions in the last decade include large-scale ecosystem restoration efforts at
Reclamation and the Corps, and long-standing planning assistance programs like the Corps’
Planning Assistance to States. Other exceptions include the NRCS small watershed program, EPA
watershed activities (see “Federal Water Quality Planning Activities,” below), and congressional
funding of five Corps pilot watershed studies; these pilot studies are two-year, 100% federally
funded, multi-jurisdictional regional and watershed efforts. WRDA 1986 authorized the Corps to
assess water resource needs of river basins and watersheds; this authority, however, has gone
largely unused and unfunded.
In the late 1990s, the Western Water Policy Review Advisory Commission (WWPRAC) reviewed
existing planning for and coordination of federal water resource projects by recommending a pilot
program using a tiered or “nested” approach to water resources governance based on watersheds
and river basins.29 The WWPRAC recognized the many watershed initiatives, watershed councils,
and other partnerships that had developed over the years and believed they held “much
promise.”30 Along with a new governance structure based on hydrologic systems and linking
basin and watershed activities, the WWPRAC recommended new coordination of basin-level
federal activities, in part via appointment of a key official at the presidential or secretarial level to
coordinate agency activities. 31 These suggestions were not well received by committee leaders in
Congress. In a letter expressing “strong opposition to [the final WWPRAC] report,” the chairmen
of the Senate Appropriations Committee and House Resources Committee postulated that such
recommendations would result in more bureaucracy and less state and local control.32 Thus, the
WWPRAC recommendations were not implemented; however, state and local action watershed
activities and some partnerships with the federal government continue to occur.
In recent years, there has been a trend toward congressional support for technical assistance, in
particular using federal agencies’ engineering and design expertise to support water supply and
28
The 2008 Treasury-based rate for long-term yields was 4.875%; however, recent volatility in the U.S. financial
system may result in very different projections of long-term yields.
29
Western Water Policy Review Advisory Commission, Water in the West: Challenge for the Next Century, June,
1998, p. xvi.
30
Ibid.
31
Ibid., p. xxviii.
32
April 3, 1998 letter from Representative Don Young and Senator Ted Stevens to Denise Fort, Chair of the Western
Water Policy Review Advisory Commission, reprinted in Appendix B of the Commission’s report, Water in the West:
Challenge for the Next Century, June 1998.
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treatment. For example, since 1992, Congress has authorized and funded the Corps to provide
technical assistance for municipal water and wastewater projects in selected locations. Also in
1992, Congress created a Reclamation program to investigate opportunities for water reuse in the
West, including the design and construction of demonstration and permanent facilities. These
planning and related construction activities have raised questions regarding the use of federal
staff and funds for design of projects that are managed separately from the agencies’ typical
planning framework and that support municipal and industrial water supply, which typically has
been treated as a local responsibility. (See “General Water Resource User Fee and Cost-Share
Policies” for a discussion of questions raised by these authorizations related to uniformity across
federal agencies and project purposes.)
Some states and basins have found themselves in conflict particularly during droughts, as
demands on water resources have increased. Some states, such as California, Texas, and Florida,
have undertaken their own planning efforts. In recent years, these efforts have often been geared
toward water supply augmentation, restoration of significant ecosystems, and drought
management. Federal agency participation in state and local planning efforts, much less creating
federal-state-local planning organizations as recommended by the Commission, has been
constrained by the focus of the budget and appropriations process on specific projects, rather than
broader planning efforts. Provisions in WRDA 2007 (e.g., Corps assistance for update of the
Oklahoma state water plan) and other legislation (e.g., DOI water supply needs assessment for
Alaska in P.L. 110-229, the Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008) illustrate ongoing
examples of occasional congressional support for federal assistance with state and local planning,
albeit on an ad hoc basis.
In summary, in 1973, regional and watershed planning was embedded within the executive
branch water resource mission agencies, the WRC, and the federal river basin commissions and
supported by a program of federal grants to develop state planning capacity. Now federal
planning is primarily project-specific, with the most notable exception being large-scale
ecosystem restoration efforts. Federal support for watershed and state planning is now largely ad
hoc and congressionally directed.
Federal Water Quality Planning Activities
While Principles and Guidelines apply to the four federal water resource agencies (Corps,
Reclamation, NRCS, and TVA), other laws address water quality and pollution control planning.
(See, for example, the planning subsection under “Improvements to Water Quality.”) However,
because the federal government does not construct water quality projects receiving funding from
EPA, there is no comparable planning and evaluation guidance to the water resource project
Principles and Guidelines.
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Accounting for the Environment in Project Development33
Issue
The Commission, in Chapter 6 of its final report, discusses issues associated with the need to
balance water resources project development and environmental values. 34 The Commission found
that project development needs tended to dominate over concerns about the potential
environmental impacts of a project (see also “Water and the Natural Environment,” below). A
mechanism identified to help achieve a balance was the integration of the environmental review
requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA; 42 U.S.C. §§ 4321-4347) with
the project development process. Although the Commission recognized NEPA as a potential tool
to include environmental concerns in the decision-making process, it also identified how certain
elements of the NEPA process could contribute delays, uncertainty, and challenges to project
development. For example, it identified challenges associated with appropriately determining all
“reasonable” project alternatives. To understand the Commission’s recommendations on this issue
it is important to understand some of NEPA’s requirements, particularly as they were understood
and being implemented in 1973. A brief explanation of these requirements is found in the
Appendix of this report. (See also, CRS Report RL33152, The National Environmental Policy
Act (NEPA): Background and Implementation, by (name redacted) and CRS Report RL33267,
The
National Environmental Policy Act: Streamlining NEPA, by (name redacted).)
NWC Recommendations
The Commission recommendations reflect the NEPA compliance difficulties that many agencies
were facing in the early 1970s. The NWC identified processes intended to clarify NEPA
requirements and expedite the environmental review process for water projects. Generally, the
recommendations specify:35
•
how elements of the NEPA process should be integrated into the licensing
process;
•
certain measures regarding public and congressional participation; and
•
the need for hearings on challenges associated with determining the appropriate
range of reasonable projects.
Current Status and Implementation
Many of these recommendations were subsequently addressed, particularly through NEPA-related
case law and promulgation of regulations to implement NEPA’s EIS requirements in 1978.
Specifically, since the Commission report was issued, a host of court decisions, the promulgation
33
Prepared by (name redacted), Analyst in Environmental Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
34
In this context, environmental values appears to mean an interest or concern about the environmental impacts of a
project.
35
Commission recommendations addressed in this section include those associated with water resources projects likely
to require a permit or some other authorization from the federal government and hence to be subject to NEPA. The
Commission also included recommendations aimed at streamlining federal licensing procedures, particularly the
licensing of hydroelectric facilities, including resolution of respective federal and state roles. Response to licensing
recommendations is beyond the scope of this section and therefore not included in this discussion.
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of Council of Environmental Quality’s (CEQ’s) NEPA regulations, and the implementation of
NEPA regulations by individual agencies have contributed to the development of a now-mature
NEPA process for water resources projects. Elements of that process address many of the
recommendations made by the Commission. For example, CEQ’s regulations were intended to
foster better decision-making and reduce the paperwork and delays associated with NEPA
compliance. 36 Also, among other requirements, NEPA regulations:
•
defined and specified the roles of “lead agencies” (those responsible for
preparing the NEPA documentation) and “cooperating agencies” (agencies that
participate in or contribute to the preparation of the NEPA documentation);
•
allowed lead agencies to set time limits on milestones in the NEPA process and
page limits on documentation;
•
specified environmental review procedures and documents applicable to projects
that had uncertain or insignificant environmental impacts;
•
specified how an agency was to involve the public in the NEPA process (e.g.,
specified at what points public input should be solicited and accepted); and
•
specified criteria that must be addressed when providing an analysis of project
alternatives.
Also, the CEQ regulations specified the required elements of an EIS, which include:
•
a brief statement, developed by the lead agency, specifying the underlying
purpose of a project and the need to which the agency is responding;
•
a discussion of the range of alternatives, including the proposed action, that will
meet the project’s purpose and need—a discussion that should explore and
objectively evaluate all “reasonable” alternatives;
•
a succinct description of the environment of the area(s) to be affected by the
alternatives under consideration; and
•
an analysis of impacts of each alternative on the affected environment, including
a discussion of the probable beneficial and adverse social, economic, and
environmental effects of each alternative.
The degree to which the CEQ regulations have expedited the NEPA process is still debated. Since
1973, NEPA’s procedural requirements may have become clearer, but the overall process is more
complicated for reasons that have little to do with NEPA itself. For example, water resources
projects are likely to be large, complex projects that may involve compliance with a host of other
environmental requirements (many promulgated after June 1973). To integrate the compliance
process and avoid duplication of effort, NEPA regulations specify that, to the fullest extent
possible, agencies must prepare the EIS concurrently with any environmental requirements.37 The
EIS must list any federal permits, licenses, and other government certification required to
implement the proposed project. In this capacity NEPA functions as an “umbrella” statute,
36
Council on Environmental Quality, Ninth Annual Report of the Council on Environmental Quality, December 1978,
pp. 396-399; and at 40 C.F.R. §§ 1500.4 and 1500.5.
37
40 C.F.R. § 1502.25.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
meaning that any study, review, or consultation required by any other environmental law should
be conducted within the framework of the NEPA process.
NEPA’s overarching nature often leads to confusion as to how it relates to other laws. As an
umbrella statute, NEPA forms the framework to coordinate or demonstrate compliance with other
environmental requirements. NEPA itself does not require compliance with them. If, theoretically,
the requirement to comply with NEPA were removed, compliance with each applicable law
would remain. For example, a required element of the EIS is to determine whether biological
consultation is required under ESA. The requirement to comply with ESA would simply be
identified by the NEPA process; the obligation to comply with the law remains under the ESA.
Some environmental review issues identified by the Commission remain at issue. For example,
for individual projects, agencies may still have challenges in sufficiently identifying all
“reasonable” project alternatives. Although there are more specific criteria to make that
determination, it is something that must be determined on a project-by-project basis. It may form
the basis of litigation if project stakeholders feel that an alternative they would prefer is not
considered but, to them, is reasonable. Also, the threat of litigation is sometimes an issue in EIS
preparation. Agencies may prepare NEPA documentation that is overly inclusive and lengthy in
an attempt to avoid litigation challenging the sufficiency of the analyses or review of alternatives.
Public Participation in Water Resources Planning38
Issue
The Commission, in a section of Chapter 10, addressed concerns regarding public participation in
water resources planning. It discussed deficiencies in public participation and acknowledged
certain limits and requirements to avoid delays in project implementation.
NWC Recommendations
The NWC sought to clarify public participation requirements as well as set parameters to avoid
excessive delay. The Commission made a number of recommendations:
38
•
Federal water resources agencies should adopt procedures and issue appropriate
directives to field entities to provide opportunities for broad public participation
in water planning activities “from the inception of the planning process on.”
•
As a prerequisite to project authorization, Congress should require agencies to
report on public participation with respect to particular projects, showing
compliance with agency public participation procedures, describing the questions
considered and the viewpoints expressed, and providing supporting information
for the decisions reached on controversial points.
•
Water resources planning agencies should structure their planning procedures to
promptly resolve and conclude issues by timing the public participation and
defining issues to be addressed.
Prepared by (name redacted), Analyst in Environmental Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
•
Water resources planning agencies should help compensate for the lack of
financial, technical, and manpower resources of participants by providing timely,
well-publicized information, scheduling at least one public hearing near the
proposed project, and making basic data readily available.
•
Federal and state governments should require advance public disclosure on the
pre-license planning of major nonfederal projects expected to have an impact on
water resources.
•
Licensing agencies should seek to develop the interests of all participants
affected by agencies’ decisions.
Current Status and Implementation
Many of the public participation concerns raised by the Commission have been addressed through
the current NEPA process. For example, as the law has been interpreted, one of NEPA’s primary
goals is to allow the public a meaningful opportunity to learn about and comment on the proposed
federal actions before decisions are made and actions taken (e.g., during the project planning and
evaluation process). To meet this goal, CEQ’s regulations require agencies to encourage and
facilitate public involvement in decisions that significantly affect the quality of the human
environment (i.e., projects that require an EIS).39 Specifically, agencies are required to provide
public notice of NEPA-related hearings, public meetings, and the availability of environmental
documents.40 Documentation of public participation must be included in the final EIS. Although
the Corps and other agencies had some processes requiring public review prior to NEPA, NEPA
greatly expanded the public review and input process. CEQ has guidance educating the public on
its rights with regard to participation.41
Generally, public participation opportunities are available during the initial project scoping
process and after a draft EIS has been produced (not throughout the entire project planning and
development process). If stakeholders have concerns about a proposed plan’s impacts, their
comments may be directed at virtually any element of that plan, the NEPA process, or related
documentation. If stakeholders believe their concerns have been inadequately addressed, they
may sue. To avoid conflict after a project has reached an advanced stage of planning, CEQ
recommends that continuous contact with non-agency stakeholders be maintained from the
earliest planning stages up to the decision to select a particular alternative.
CEQ regulations specify public involvement requirements only for federal actions requiring an
EIS. Agencies may devise their own public involvement policies for environmental assessments
(which are an allowable alternative to an EIS under certain circumstances) or in making a
categorical exclusion determination. If a project does not require an EIS but still has garnered
public attention, agencies generally involve the public in ways similar to its EIS methods.
39
40
40 C.F.R. § 1500.2(d).
40 C.F.R. § 1506.6.
41
In December 2007, CEQ released a citizen guide to help the public navigate the NEPA process, A Citizen’s Guide to
the NEPA: Having Your Voice Heard, available at http://ceq.hss.doe.gov/nepa/Citizens_Guide_Dec07.pdf.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Federal Water Resources Coordination42
Issue
The Commission recommended federal organizational changes to improve efficiency and to meet
future challenges for the planning, development, and management of the nation’s water and
related land resources. The Commission found the then-active WRC an important and useful
mechanism; however, it recommended changes to help the WRC better fulfill its roles of
coordinating and appraising water policies and programs and of planning the conservation and
development of the nation’s water resources. The Commission cited and agreed with numerous
previous studies in supporting the independent review of federal water development proposals.
The Commission found three areas in which the functions of federal agencies needed modifying.
NWC Recommendations
The Commission recommended for the WRC’s structure:
•
creation of an independent, full-time chairman on the staff of the White House
reporting directly to the President;
•
placement in the Executive Office of the President; and
•
expansion of statutory membership to add the Secretaries and Administrators of
Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, EPA, and Atomic Energy
Commission, and eliminate the membership of the Secretary of Health.
The Commission recommended the following actions to facilitate the WRC’s task:
•
authority to distribute planning funds;
•
extension of the authorization and removal of the appropriations cap on its grant
program to support state water planning;
•
submission of a consolidated grant application for each state seeking funds from
federal agencies for water planning and programs;
•
authority for the WRC chairman to coordinate federal participation in the river
basin and water management compacts; and
•
authority for the WRC chairman to chair an independent review board examining
federal water development proposals, river basin plans, and grant programs and
make recommendations on their need, feasibility, and utility to the President and
Congress.
The Commission recommended eliminating duplication in the collection and distribution of basic
water data; better managing the similar engineering functions in federal water resources agencies,
and concentrating dispersed water technology efforts. Specifically, it recommended:
42
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Environmental and Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and
Industry Division.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
•
combining NOAA and USGS into a new DOI agency responsible for water
resources data, moving NOAA’s fisheries functions to the FWS, and having
NOAA’s coastal zone management functions be part of the land planning
functions of the federal government;
•
shifting USDA water engineering functions (e.g., reservoir design,
channelization) to nonfederal entities;
•
shifting Reclamation from a construction agency toward an agency operating
federal facilities efficiently in water-short regions;
•
limiting the Corps to only design and construction that cannot be efficiently
performed by nonfederal entities and increase its nonstructural and nonfederal
assistance actions; and
•
creating an Office of Water Technology by combining existing water research
offices and activities placed in the DOI with a charter broad enough to meet other
federal research needs.
Current Status and Implementation
Since 1973, significant shifts have occurred in the federal water resources institutional
arrangements and organizations; however, the federalist division of responsibilities has remained
largely intact. As recommended by the Commission, the WRC was located in the Executive
Office of the President and membership was expanded in 1975 to include the Secretaries of
Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, and Transportation, and the EPA Administrator.
The WRC has not been funded or active since 1983; however, the authorization for the WRC still
exists.
By 1973, implementation of the Water Resources Planning Act of 1965 (P.L. 89-80; 42 U.S.C.
§1962) had increased the coordination and planning of federal actions, particularly through the
creation of the WRC. The 1965 act created the WRC and numerous river basin commissions
charged with watershed planning. There has been no legislation comprehensively changing
federal water resources since that act. Instead, the shifts in organizations and institutional
arrangements came about from executive branch actions and incremental changes through
legislation. Their cumulative effect has been a decrease since the 1970s of coordination of federal
water agency activities and planning.
Following years of decreasing support for river basin commission efforts, President Reagan in
Executive Order 12319 ordered the termination in 1981 of six of the commissions created by the
1965 act and the transition of their activities to the member states. This effectively eliminated the
federal river basin and broad-based watershed planning efforts.43 During this time, federal grants
for state planning activities also largely disappeared. Since these changes, federal agency
participation in planning and negotiation efforts within watersheds and between states has been
constrained by the focus on specific projects. What remains of the federal planning assistance
generally is a few programs scattered among several agencies. (See “Water Resources Project
Planning and Evaluation,” above, for additional analysis.)
43
Some smaller programs remain (e.g., USDA’s NRCS small watershed program); however, none are on the scale of
what was anticipated under the WRC and river basin commissions.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Review of federal water projects also has experienced many shifts since 1973. There is no entity
that independently reviews water projects by all federal agencies. The Corps has maintained its
construction program, although not at its 1960s level, and may continue to have significant
construction responsibilities as it improves aging infrastructure, retools earlier projects to balance
environmental needs, and is called on to provide flood and hurricane storm risk reduction
projects. However, changes in the late 1980s and early 1990s reduced the level of review of
Corps projects. For example, Congress eliminated the Corps-staffed Board of Engineers for
Rivers and Harbors, which had reviewed the civil works plans from 1902 until WRDA 1992.
Review continued to occur under the 1981 E.O. 12322, which requires that a Corps feasibility
report be reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for consistency with the
policies and programs of the President, planning guidelines, laws, and regulations. Following
criticisms of a number of Corps planning studies for faulty analysis and New Orleans floodwall
failures in 2005, Congress created in WRDA 2007 a process for external independent review of
many Corps planning studies and for ongoing safety reviews during construction of significant
flood and storm damage projects. How these provisions are implemented is still being
determined. The WRDA 2007 reviews are limited to technical analysis and do not include a
policy review.
As the Commission predicted, Reclamation too has moved more toward management and has a
less substantial construction function than it did in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1987, Reclamation
formally adopted a new mission statement recognizing its increased role in water resources
management vis-à-vis construction. Recent Reclamation efforts have included working with other
DOI, federal agencies, and nonfederal parties, including Tribes, to resolve water conflicts through
settlement agreements and assisting with water supply augmentation technologies (e.g.,
Reclamation’s water reuse program and its desalination research program).
The NWC recommendations that NOAA’s responsibilities be divided among other agencies were
not implemented. The challenge of accomplishing organizational changes like the Commission’s
NOAA recommendations was seen when the Secretary of the Interior in the mid-1990s attempted
to consolidate the biological research being conducted by DOI’s various agencies into a single
agency. The effort was met with much resistance and skepticism, eventually being scaled back to
creating a new biological division within the U.S. Geological Survey. While the channelization
program at the USDA largely disappeared, USDA watershed efforts have continued. Specifically,
USDA’s NRCS cooperates with states and local agencies to carry out engineering works to
improve flood control and water use, including dam rehabilitation. Dam repair and safety remain
areas of growing engineering and construction not only for NRCS but also for Reclamation and
the Corps.
The Commission’s recommendation to limit Corps design and construction activities to those that
cannot be efficiently performed by nonfederal entities generally has not been a criterion used
during authorization and appropriations. For example, Congress has authorized and appropriated
funds for Corps participation in design and construction of municipal drinking water and
wastewater projects. In the United States, drinking water and wastewater systems generally are
the responsibility of municipalities; their design and construction are performed by the
municipalities or their private engineering consultants (albeit sometimes with federal financial
support). In an effort to define the scope of the Corps’ involvement in the growing area of
ecosystem restoration, the G. W. Bush Administration in recent budgets used as one of its criteria
for restoration projects that the Corps be uniquely well suited to perform the work.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
The Commission’s recommendation to increase the Corps’ nonfederal assistance actions has not
been implemented. The Corps has retained its Planning Assistance to States program and its
Flood Plain Management Service, which in recent years have averaged roughly $6 million each in
annual appropriations. However, this funding level represents a decline in federal support for
these activities. In the mid-1970s, the Corps received roughly $30 million (in 2007 dollars) for
regional planning and planning assistance to states, with another $30 million (in 2007 dollars) for
its Flood Plain Management Service.
In 1974, the Office of Water Research and Technology was formed in DOI through consolidation
of some of the offices identified by the Commission. The Office of Water Research and
Technology was abolished in 1982 and the desalination research program transferred to
Reclamation. Since the 1960s and 1970s, the topical balance of the federal water research has
shifted from social science topics (e.g., water demand, water institutions) and water supply
augmentation and conservation (e.g., desalination), to water quality.44 Also since the early 1970s,
the amount of the federal budget dedicated to all types of water research has been halved.45
Aspects of water resources have remained scattered across congressional committees, in a pattern
generally similar to the fragmented arrangement in 1973, which the Commission did not find
particularly problematic.46 Since 1973, other institutional and organization changes that are not
specific to water resources, yet affect water resources, have occurred. For example, executive
branch oversight and management direction in the water resources field has evolved. In particular,
the Office of Management and Budget in 1973 functioned as an agency with dual management
and budget missions. A reorganization in the 1990s reduced the distinction between management
staff and budgetary staff; this resulted in less management oversight and in the administrations’
budget policy influencing both the short and long-term guidance provided to water resources
agencies.
Without the WRC, CEQ at times and other ad hoc mechanisms have been used to arbitrate and
coordinate among federal agencies on water issues; however, there is no institutionally
recognized system for conducting such coordination. The organizational landscape of water
management also has shifted as a result of increased consideration of environmental issues; the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), created in 1970, has the lead federal role in protecting
the quality of the nation’s environment. In selected cases, EPA has influenced the implementation
of federal water resources projects. EPA has also become a significant force in shaping a wide
range of state, local, and private project planning and design through the agency’s implementation
of its water quality and wetlands permitting responsibilities.
44
National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences, Confronting the Nation’s Water Problems: The Role of
Research (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2004).
45
Ibid.
46
1973 NWC Report, p. 389.
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
Water Resources Authorizations, Budget, and Appropriations47
Issue
The Commission found that the steps by which separate branches of government conceived and
executed water resources projects needed to be closely linked, or coordinated, to efficiently use
the nation’s water and fiscal resources. According to the Commission, the budgeting procedures
neither reflected nor promoted regional or long-term water resources development. The
Commission instead found that projects often were presented and considered individually. The
Commission concluded that an annual appropriations process unnecessarily subjected
construction completion to uncertainty as well as to both cost and lengthening of schedules
(“schedule growth”). It found that a backlog of projects planned and evaluated under obsolete
guidance and criteria overburdened the appropriations process and allowed initiation of projects
that no longer merited the required investment. The Commission concluded that congressional
politics and behavior tended toward particularized and fragmented decision-making.
NWC Recommendations
The Commission recommended:
•
using comprehensive river basin and regional development plans as the basis for
authorization and appropriations for both individual projects and broader
programs;
•
incorporating into budgeting the 20 major regions used by the WRC for planning;
•
moving from an annual construction appropriations process to full-cost
budgeting;
•
giving federal program administrators authority to contract in advance of
appropriations for programs meeting national objectives;
•
requiring five-year agency programs for existing and new construction projects;
•
requiring a five-year national budget for the multi-agency federal water program;
•
deauthorizing construction not begun within 10 years of authorization; and
•
reevaluating plans authorized more than five years before construction.
Current Status and Implementation
Although some of the Commission’s recommendations have been attempted, the basic
functioning of the authorization, budgeting, and appropriations processes for water resources has
not changed significantly since 1973. The consideration of project authorizations and
appropriations as part of comprehensive river basin and regional development plans has not been
practiced since the early 1980s, when most of those larger-scale federal water resources planning
efforts were halted. (See “Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation” for more
information.) Project authorizations and appropriations generally still are considered on a project47
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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specific basis. For example, although there is regular congressional consideration of an omnibus
WRDA, the legislation consists mostly of authorizations of individual Corps study and
construction projects. While there have been provisions in WRDAs that address policy issues, the
authorizations generally are not considered as part of a comprehensive plan or review of Corps or
federal water resources activities. The same is true for occasional omnibus Reclamation
legislation.
Budgeting for water resource projects also has remained project-specific, with some exceptions
for large-scale restoration efforts such as some Everglades restoration funding. For example,
Reclamation budgets consist of projects grouped by regions, but budgeting is not founded on
regional resource plans. In recent years, the G. W. Bush Administration proposed funding the
Corps operations and maintenance account based on hydrologic regions; however, this approach
has not been adopted in enacted appropriations, due largely to concerns about a lack of
transparency in how the regional requests were developed and about transparency in how regional
appropriations would be implemented.
Full-cost budgets and appropriations for water resources projects generally have not been used. A
significant exception is the full funding via supplemental appropriations of the repair and
strengthening of coastal storm protection facilities in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
Congress has used general contract authority to varying degrees for different programs. For many
water programs since 1973, Congress has tightened its controls of contract authority in an attempt
to preserve the congressional role in guiding appropriations. For instance, Congress recently has
enacted more stringent rules for Corps multi-year contracts.
Water resource agencies, along with many other agencies, have produced five-year strategic plans
in response to the Government Performance and Results Act of 1994 (P.L. 103-62). These plans
are not capital budgeting plans, instead they focus on agency mission, goals, and performance.
There have been few efforts at capital budgeting by water resource agencies, and no sustained
effort for coordinated budgeting for the entire federal water program.
Congress has passed legislation requiring deauthorization of Corps construction projects that have
not received appropriations for six years. Without other changes being enacted and with the
continuation of authorization of individual projects, this deauthorization process has neither
quelled the construction backlog nor ensured that construction activities satisfy current planning
requirements. Reclamation has no general deauthorization process for unfunded projects;
however, in limited cases, Reclamation authorizations contain a “sunset” provision.
Because the G. W. Bush Administration had a “no new start” policy in recent Corps budgets, the
vast majority of new construction projects have been initiated by congressional appropriations.
There has been no requirement that new construction starts that were authorized many years prior
be re-evaluated.
The backlog of construction authorizations created tension between the G. W. Bush
Administration, whose Corps budget concentrated funding on a smaller set of projects, and
Congress, which applied a more distributed approach by appropriating to a larger set of projects
and activities. An argument for concentrated appropriations is that the lower funding levels that
individual projects receive under the distributed approach delay construction progress, resulting
in increased cost and schedule growth, which represent lost economic efficiency. Those
supporting a more distributed appropriations process, however, assert that a geographical and
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The 1973 National Water Commission and Present Challenges
jurisdictional dispersal of projects maintains the currency and relevance of the Corps’ mission.
Furthermore, tradeoffs in economic efficiency, equity, and political feasibility have implicitly
occurred to some degree during the development of the Corps’ annual construction
appropriations. Data on cost and schedule growth of Corps civil works projects may help clarify
the tradeoffs between the two approaches and identify improved opportunities for project
management; however, little aggregated or systematic data about cost or schedule growth is
available.
Annual federal appropriations (not including supplemental appropriations) for water resources
projects followed a declining trend after the mid-1960s, as a percentage of both gross domestic
product (GDP) (Figure 2) and discretionary spending. During the 1970s and 1980s, nonfederal
spending increased (Figure 3) in response to numerous forces including new federal standards for
water quality and related municipal water and wastewater infrastructure investments.
Environmental litigation and resource constraints have focused much of the new authorization
and appropriation for water resources efforts on resolving multi-use resource conflicts and
addressing new and instream demands. Safety and rehabilitation of aging federal infrastructure is
a growing part of the agencies’ budgets and appropriations. Aging local infrastructure and interest
in nonfederal dam removal are currently addressed, often on an ad hoc basis, by Congress
through individual authorizations and annual appropriations for water resources agencies. The
shift in federal water resources spending from construction to maintenance is evident in Figure 4.
Figure 2. Federal Water Resources Spending as a Percentage of GDP (1956 -2007)
0.3
0.25
0.2
0.15
Operation and Maintenance
Capital
0.1
0.05
0
1956 1961 1966 1971 1976 1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2006
Source: CRS, with data from the Congressional Budget Office, CBO Infrastructure Spending Supplemental
Tables, 2008 Update, available at http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=9135.
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Figure 3. Federal and State (and Local) Spending on Water Resources, 1956-1990
(in millions of 2006 dollars)
12,000
10,000
8,000
Federal
6,000
State
4,000
2,000
0
1956
1961
1966
1971
1976
1981
1986
Source: CRS, with data from the Congressional Budget Office, CBO Infrastructure Spending Supplemental
Tables, 2008 Update, available at http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=9135.
Figure 4. Federal Water Resources Construction and Maintenance Spending
(1956-2007, in millions of 2006 dollars)
12,000
10,000
8,000
Operation and Maintenance
6,000
Capital
4,000
2,000
0
1956 1961 1966 1971 1976 1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2006
Source: CRS, with data from the Congressional Budget Office, CBO Infrastructure Spending Supplemental
Tables, 2008 Update, available at http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=9135.
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Water and the Natural Environment
The Commission’s report (primarily in Chapter 2) addressed the environmental impacts of water
projects and water resource agency activities. The Commission noted negative impacts (e.g.,
alteration of stream habitat) as well as positive ones (e.g., recreational benefits of a reservoir). It
found that the federal government insufficiently addressed ecological processes and
environmental values in its water project and permitting decisions. Yet the Commission also
noted that economic values and public safety often were at stake when choosing among water
resource alternatives. The Commission identified three areas for improvement:
•
understanding and predicting the primary environmental impacts of water
programs, uses, projects, and their alternatives;
•
assessing the secondary and broader environmental effects of these actions; and
•
incorporating environmental values and processes into decision-making.
The report specifically discussed the environmental effects of reservoir development, flood
policy, water development in estuarine and coastal ecosystems, water project effects on fish and
wildlife, and channelization. 48 A related topic is the Commission’s recommendations for
addressing fish and wildlife values in project planning. The Commission’s overarching concern
that environmental impacts be analyzed in the decision-making process also is addressed in
“Accounting for the Environment in Project Development,” above, which discusses
implementation of NEPA.
Since 1973, water resources development has slowed, and federal appropriations shifted from
development to environmental preservation and operation and maintenance of infrastructure.
Many of the concerns raised by the NWC have been addressed via implementation of
environmental laws. Many large federal water actions are for ecosystem restoration and stream
rehabilitation. Whether these changes and efforts have adequately addressed the Commission’s
concerns is a matter of disagreement. The degree to which development and environmental
protection tradeoffs are evaluated and weighed remains central to many current water resources
conflicts.
Reservoir Development49
Issue
Chapter 2 of the Commission report includes a section on reservoir development. Creating a
reservoir, by impounding water behind a dam or diverting it to an off-stream storage site,
generally alters a river’s aquatic and riparian ecosystems, sometimes benefitting some species and
ecosystems while harming others. Reservoirs inundate habitat and alter ecosystem properties by
changing flow regimes, water temperature, and water quality. Changes in ecosystems due to
reservoir construction can result in biodiversity loss and changes in species composition.
48
Chapter 2 also discussed development and impacts of water projects in the Great Lakes; however, this topic is not
reviewed in this report.
49
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Environmental and Natural Resources Policy, and (name redacted),
Specialist in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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Downstream of reservoirs, altered flows can change native fisheries and habitat. Dams creating
reservoirs also can prevent the migration of fish species up- or downstream. The Commission
also noted the social effects of reservoir development; reservoirs change the types of recreation
opportunities available and the aesthetics of the landscape. The Commission believed that these
alterations or effects should be considered when contemplating water resource decisions.
NWC Recommendations
The Commission’s recommendations for reservoir development were to:
•
develop a comprehensive database of the condition of the nation’s waters that
encompasses water quality and quantity, ecological processes, and environmental
attributes;
•
further research environmental impacts of water resource development;
•
adopt planning techniques that account for ecological processes and
environmental values;
•
analyze environmental impacts of proposed projects and their alternatives;
•
promote decision-making in the face of uncertainty; and
•
monitor environmental consequences of projects post-construction.
Current Status and Implementation
Neither a national-level data set documenting the extent to which waterways have been
channelized and impounded (and the effects of these measures) nor a national database of
ecological and environmental conditions of waterways has been implemented. 50 Although there is
not a national database, understanding of how reservoirs and their operations affect fisheries and
habitat is much improved, and significantly more information on the state of the nation’s waters is
available today than in 1973.
The Commission’s recommendations regarding accounting for ecological values and analyzing
environmental impacts today are considered largely through implementation of NEPA and ESA
during project planning and evaluations necessary for major changes in project operations. Both
NEPA and the ESA require extensive assessment of project impacts on the environment and
consideration of alternative actions; however, there is no requirement to protect the overall
function of such ecosystems and some argue that full accounting of ecosystem effects in project
planning could still be improved. Few new large-scale U.S. reservoirs are currently under
construction, although some are being considered, particularly in the West. Consequently,
reservoir planning in recent decades has largely focused on balancing competing objectives in
operation and management of existing reservoirs (as opposed to planning new projects), and in
some cases managing for new objectives. For example, actions required to protect threatened or
endangered species listed under the ESA have been significant drivers for many changes in
operating plans. Conflicting objectives of operating Missouri River locks and dams—namely,
maintaining flows for navigation and restricting or otherwise changing flows to protect seasonal
50
The H. John Heinz Center for Science, Economics, and the Environment, The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems
(Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, England, 2002).
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needs of some bird species—required controversial updates to the Missouri River reservoir
control manual to provide for barge traffic and other purposes. Similar operational changes are
occurring with salmon runs in the Sacramento and Columbia River basins and fishes in the
California Bay-Delta, sometimes pitting one species against another.
Data
The Commission called for collecting and organizing a broad range of data on the condition of
the nation’s water. The Commission report suggested including not only water quantity and
quality factors but also geological attributes, soil properties, riparian vegetation, fisheries and
climate factors, aesthetics, related land uses, and recreation use. Although a national database was
never developed, broad data sets have been developed in some regions with high data demands
due to resource conflicts. For example, some federal restoration initiatives, such as in the Florida
Everglades and the Bay-Delta in California, have resulted in the documentation and monitoring of
a wide range of ecosystem and environmental conditions. Nonetheless, according to many
experts, improvements in understanding, modeling, and predicting the interaction of water project
operations and ecosystem health continue to be needed and pursued.51
Some basic water flow data are being collected on a national level. As in 1973, water flows in
streams and rivers continue to be measured by a network of roughly 7,500 stream gages and are
reported through the National Streamflow Information Program administered by the U.S.
Geological Survey (USGS). Many of the gages use collection and communication technologies
that have significantly improved since 1973. For example, most report real-time stream flows,
thus improving their usefulness for forecasting river conditions, issuing flood warnings, and
planning reservoir releases or water withdrawals. However, the streamflow program is based on
partnerships with local sponsors and is not comprehensive. Additionally, the program is often a
target of budget-cutting efforts. While Congress typically restores funding in annual
appropriations, overall levels of federal funding and the number of stream gages have declined in
recent years.
The USGS also works with states to estimate water withdrawals and assess water quality52 in
various water bodies. Data on trends in freshwater fisheries are available, but generally are
reported on a species-specific basis rather than by watershed or ecosystem, unless they are part of
a specific plan. Data are also collected on wetland losses due to human activities such as
agriculture, urban development, and water resources projects.53
Attempts have been made to better coordinate data collection and improve the quality of
information collected. For example, OMB Circular No. 92-01 established a national “Advisory
Committee on Water Information” to coordinate and improve data collection. The committee is
made up of federal agency representatives, state interests, academics, and industry professional
51
U.S. Office of Science and Technology Policy, National Science and Technology Council, Subcommittee on Water
Availability and Quality, the Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, A Strategy for Federal Science and
Technology to Support Water Availability and Quality in the United States (Washington, DC: National Science and
Technology Council, Sept. 2007).
52
For more information on water quality activities, see the National Water Quality Assessment Program, available at
http://water.usgs.gov/nawqa/.
53
National Wetland Inventory, at http://www.nwi.fws.gov.
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organizations. The committee meets regularly to advise federal government officials on federal
water information programs. 54
Environmental Values in Planning and Decision-Making
The Commission recommended analyzing the environmental impacts of water resources
proposals and their alternatives as part of its 1973 final report. This recommendation was not new.
NEPA, which became law in early 1970, required documentation of the environmental impacts of
federal actions, but its implementation remained in its infancy at the time of the NWC report.
Since then, NEPA implementation has resulted in a more comprehensive environmental analysis
of project plans, similar to what the NWC and others had recommended. Implementation of the
ESA has also been a significant driver in incorporating species and some habitat issues into the
analysis of reservoir plans and operations. Taken together, these laws have fundamentally
changed the way in which project impacts are evaluated. Non-federal interests play a much larger
role than previously, and in some cases have become active “partners” in the decision-making
process.
Even so, water resource planning continues to be criticized for a narrow focus on national
economic development benefits or specific development objectives and insufficient evaluation
and weighing of environmental and social concerns (such as public safety and social equity). The
110th Congress, in the Water Resources Development Act of 2007 (WRDA 2007, P.L. 110-114),
called for the Secretary of the Army to update water resources planning principles and guidelines
to better account for the environment and for projects to be justified based only on public
benefits. The updated planning principles and guidelines would apply only to those planning
studies begun after issuance and only to Corps projects. There remains no review process for
previously authorized projects or projects undertaken by other federal water resource agencies.
(See also “Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation” and “Accounting for the
Environment in Project Development.”)
In general, reservoir planning efforts and other water resources planning have responded to
environmental concerns by trying to minimize and mitigate harm, rather than avoiding harm and
improving existing environmental conditions. A major exception has been the planning of
ecosystem restoration projects. Even so, many of the largest ecosystem restoration projects are at
least in part aimed at restoring habitat and other conditions degraded by past water resource
development projects. How to evaluate the costs and benefits of ecosystem projects remains a
challenge; a current debate is whether and how to value losses and gains in ecosystem services55
during water resource project evaluation and decision-making.
The Commission contended that research will not always result in a definitive understanding of
the environmental impacts of water projects. It recommended that planners reach a decision on a
project based on the best available science, even if uncertainties exist. Tension remains over when
there is sufficient research, monitoring, and modeling to make decisions on whether and how to
proceed with a project or operational change.
54
Advisory Committee on Water Information, at http://acwi.gov/index.html.
55
Ecosystem services include provisioning services such as food, water, timber, and fiber; regulating services which
affect climate, floods, disease, wastes, and water quality; cultural services which provide recreational, aesthetic, and
spiritual benefits; and supporting services such as soil formation, photosynthesis, and nutrient cycling.
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Some recent planning efforts have used adaptive management as a tool to address decisionmaking in the face of environmental uncertainty. Adaptive management is the process of
incorporating new scientific and programmatic information into the implementation of a plan. It
is a management approach that allows flexibility to adjust strategies during implementation if
goals are not being met or if new circumstances arise. The flexibility inherent in adaptive
management, however, remains controversial. Concerns with using adaptive management include
the potential for cost growth of restoration efforts, the delegation of decisions to agency staff or
even nonfederal parties, the water supply or water flow uncertainty for other water users, and the
level of investment risk if the restoration effort fails. The use of adaptive management in water
resources to date has largely been limited to select restoration efforts and has yet to be used across
all types of projects and their operations.
Monitoring
The Commission stated that a project’s environmental effects should be monitored postconstruction. In general, federal agencies typically do not analyze the cumulative effects of a
project’s impacts or multiple dams on a river system until directed to do so or possibly when a
significant operational change is being considered. There are some examples of trying to address
ecosystem and species health through monitoring and actions prior to such a review and any
required mitigation—actions to reduce or reverse damage—that might result. However,
monitoring river systems and tracking effects on species raise challenging issues for rivers in
which reservoirs and other development were begun prior to the enactment of most
environmental laws. Such monitoring is also costly. Adaptive management techniques have been
used in some cases where operational changes are necessary. In such cases, monitoring and
ongoing assessment are key components used to inform decision makers. Yet, because it is often
difficult to predict how much projects will cost and when they might be completed under adaptive
management approaches, the use of adaptive management is particularly difficult for legislative
decision makers who are accountable to the public and must justify agency expenditures and
actions.
While a national program specifically targeted at monitoring the environmental impacts of water
projects does not exist, WRDA 2007 includes numerous provisions that augment monitoring for
newly authorized Corps of Engineers (Corps) projects. For example, WRDA 2007 required that
each project have a plan for monitoring implementation and ecological success of mitigation. It
also required that Corps ecosystem restoration project plans include a plan for monitoring the
success of restoration efforts for 10 years after project completion, with the costs shared by the
federal government and the nonfederal project sponsor. WRDA 2007 also added monitoring as an
authorized activity for many specific Corps projects, including some dredged material disposal
projects and coastal sediment management efforts. The impact of these provisions remains
unknown, due to the early stage of their implementation.
Flood Policy56
The Corps and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) are the principal federal
agencies involved in programs to reduce riverine and coastal flood damages and risk. Other
federal agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation
56
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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Service (NRCS), the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation), and the
Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), also are involved with flood damage reduction projects.
In the United States, flood-related roles and responsibilities are shared; local governments are
responsible for land use and zoning decisions that shape floodplain and coastal development, but
state and federal governments also influence community and individual decisions on managing
flood risk. For example, the federal government constructs some of the nation’s flood control
infrastructure, supports hazard mitigation, offers flood insurance, and provides emergency
response and disaster aid for significant floods. However, state and local governments largely are
responsible for making land use decisions (e.g., zoning decisions) that allow or prohibit
development in flood prone areas. In addition to constructing flood damage reduction
infrastructure, state and local entities operate and maintain most of the flood control infrastructure
and have initial flood-fighting responsibilities.
Issue
The Commission found that despite significant investments to reduce flood damages, annual
flood losses grew and people continued living in harm’s way. The Commission called for a
fundamental reorientation in national flood policy, and for Congress, relevant agencies, and the
public to commit to the broad goal of putting floodplain lands to their best use rather than
allowing unfettered flood-prone development.
NWC Recommendations
The Commission recommended federal efforts that:
•
encourage floodplain management that maximizes national economic, social, and
environmental welfare;
•
reform federal programs for flood damage reduction; 57
•
improve state floodplain management capabilities;
•
encourage public, typically nonfederal, acquisition of floodplain lands for which
the best use is recreation or open space;
•
restrict federal construction assistance in floodplains or for flood-damaged
structures until steps have been taken to avoid future damages;
•
require federal programs and actions comply with floodplain plans;
•
improve flood forecasting and community emergency response action plans;
•
require the (then-active) WRC to develop a unified national program for basic
flood data and flood damages;
•
encourage coordinated land-use and floodplain planning; and
57
For example, the Commission recommended ensuring full and equitable consideration of all practicable alternatives,
higher beneficiary cost-sharing, and stronger local floodplain regulation, as well as eliminating windfall gains to private
landowners.
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•
independently appraise the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP, P.L. 90448, 42 U.S.C §4001 et seq.).
Current Status and Implementation
Federal efforts since 1973 have not been guided by a clearly defined flood policy or floodplain
vision, as recommended by the Commission. However, many incremental changes to improve
flood policy consistent with the Commission’s recommendations have been enacted or adopted at
all levels of government. Nonetheless, the nation’s riverine and coastal flood vulnerability has
increased. Incremental policy and program improvements were overwhelmed by incentives to
develop floodplains and coastal areas and population and other demographic trends, or were
never fully implemented or enforced. Other federal actions produced some indirect flood risk
reduction benefits; for example, Congress has supported conservation efforts on agricultural lands
and wetlands protection that may reduce flood damages by slowing down or temporarily storing
flood waters. Whether these benefits are overwhelmed by changes in flood-prone land use (e.g.,
conversion of agricultural land behind levees to residential or commercial development) remains
largely unknown because regional-scale and multi-agency plans and evaluations have been rare.
The fundamental reorientation for floodplain management called for by the Commission has not
occurred. The institutional arrangements that in 1973 provided avenues for more coordinated
federal efforts have diminished (see box, “Brief History of the Water Resources Council”). The
WRC was disbanded in 1983; the Federal Interagency Task Force on Floodplain Management,
which had continued some of the WRC’s flood-related functions after 1983, stopped convening in
the late 1990s. Federal support and opportunities for local capacity building decreased with the
loss of these institutions.
However, WRDA 2007 may be an early step in a reorientation of flood policy if its provisions are
implemented. The legislation calls for a report describing flood risk and comparing regional risks.
The report also is to assess the effectiveness of flood efforts and programs, analyze whether
programs encourage development in flood-prone areas, and provide recommendations. The
challenge may be less to develop the report’s content and more to achieve action on its findings
and recommendations. Numerous reports have recommended reducing flood vulnerability,
especially following the devastating 1993 Midwest floods and significant hurricanes.58 Generally,
these reports’ narrower recommendations, rather than their broader calls for change, are the only
ones implemented.
Since 1973, numerous legislative provisions and administrative actions have addressed flood risk.
These actions include supporting nonstructural flood damage reduction, augmenting hazard
mitigation activities, fostering floodplain regulation, and guiding federal actions in floodplains
(e.g., E.O. 11988). Many of these, however, have seen only marginal implementation,
enforcement, and funding. This marginal action to reduce risk has been overwhelmed by the
growth of the number of lives, property, and infrastructure in flood-prone areas; significant
outlays for disaster relief; and increased potential for social and economic disruption from
hurricanes and floods. (For more information, see CRS Report RL33129, Flood Risk
Management and Levees: A Federal Primer, by (name redacted) and (name redacted).)
58
For example, see Interagency Floodplain Management Review Committee, Sharing the Challenge: Floodplain
Management into the 21st Century (Washington, DC: Administration Floodplain Management Task Force, June 1994).
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Generally, congressional oversight, administrative implementation, and federal appropriations
have reflected a reactive and fragmented approach to flooding. Flood policy continues to be
dominated by structural flood damage reduction investments (e.g., levee building), the NFIP, and
federal disaster aid, rather than a comprehensive flood risk and floodplain management approach
(e.g., restricting unnecessary development in floodplains). Current arrangements of aid,
insurance, and water resources projects are criticized for providing disincentives to “wise use” of
flood-prone areas.59 This is in contrast to the Commission’s support for a focused and coordinated
effort to reduce the cost of flooding on the economy, improve public safety, and promote state and
local capacity and responsibility for flood management.
In WRDA 1986, consistent with the Commission’s recommendations, Congress increased the
nonfederal cost-share requirements for local Corps flood control and coastal storm projects from
none at all to 35%. Bureau of Reclamation construction actions with flood control benefits,
however, continue to be 100% non-reimbursable. How to fairly address and account for private
gains from federal projects continues to be debated, with the private benefits and development
incentives in flood- and erosion-prone coastal areas created by Corps beach replenishment
receiving particular scrutiny. The 110th Congress, in WRDA 2007, called for the Secretary of the
Army to update water resources planning guidance. The update is to be consistent with actions
being justified solely on the basis of public benefits. How this provision, as well as other WRDA
2007 provisions related to a national policy for wise use of flood-prone areas, will be
implemented remains unknown (See “Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation” for
more information).
Some of the more significant enacted changes in flood-related policy have consisted of efforts to
improve the NFIP (e.g., improvements to increase participation in the program and better manage
repetitive loss properties)60 and reorganization of federal emergency response and recovery
following the 9/11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina’s impact on New Orleans. Considerable
concerns continue to be raised about the degree of subsidization under the NFIP and the financial
foundation of the program. Numerous Government Accountability Office (GAO) studies have
reviewed various aspects of the NFIP; some of the recommendations have been implemented. In
2006, an independent review working group released its evaluation of the NFIP;61 the
recommendations are among other changes that have been considered, but not enacted, as part of
recent NFIP legislation. Reorganization of emergency response, in particular the placement of
FEMA within the Department of Homeland Security, remains a topic of much debate.
Hurricane Katrina, levee breaks in California and Nevada, and the 2008 Midwest floods have
increased the recent debate about how to manage flood, coastal, and aging infrastructure risks,
what is an acceptable level of risk—especially for low-probability, high-consequence events—
and who should bear the costs to reduce these risks (particularly in the case of levees and coastal
development). The policy issue is how to use limited fiscal resources to address a wide range of
concerns, including protecting concentrated urban populations, reducing risk to the nation’s
public and private economic infrastructure, reducing vulnerability by investing in natural buffers,
59
A contribution of flood policy reports initiated by WRDA 2007 may be to clarify what is meant by “wise use” of
floodplains and what kinds of restrictions wise use might entail.
60
For more information on the NFIP and repetitive loss issues, see CRS Report RL32972, Federal Flood Insurance:
The Repetitive Loss Problem, by (name redacted).
61
American Institutes for Research, The Evaluation of the National Flood Insurance Program Final Report
(Washington, DC: American Institutes for Research, Oct. 2006).
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and equity in protection for low-income and minority populations. The challenge is how to
structure actions and programs so they provide incentives to limit flood-prone lands to their best
use; to tackle this challenge would require significant adjustments in the flood insurance program,
disaster aid policies and practices, and programs for structural and nonstructural measures and
actions, without infringing on private property rights or usurping local decision making.
Hurricane Katrina also raised the sensitive question of whether and how federal agencies can
raise concerns, particularly as they relate to public safety, about actions directed by Congress. In
the early 1990s, Congress overrode the Corps’ analysis of how to reduce flooding from hurricanes
in New Orleans in favor of a locally preferred floodwall option;62 these floodwalls were the site
of significant failures during Hurricane Katrina.
Damage caused by Hurricane Katrina and other coastal storms illustrate the growing flood and
erosion risks of the nation’s coastal developments. Hurricane-prone states have increasingly
dominated NFIP outlays. Since the mid-1960s, the federal role in hurricane storm protection also
has become more prominent; the Corps, with nonfederal sponsors, builds structures and places
sand periodically for beach renourishment to reduce flooding.
Hurricane Katrina also brought national attention to the issue of levee and floodwall reliability
and different levels of protection provided by flood damage reduction structures—some of which
were built by the federal government, but most of which have been constructed by local entities.
Levee overtopping and failure contribute to approximately one-third of all flood disasters, and a
large percentage of locally built levees are poorly designed and maintained. How to address levee
reliability and various levels of protection is a current issue that did not receive much attention in
the Commission’s report. WRDA 2007 builds on some post-Katrina actions that supported
developing a levee inventory; it requires the Corps to establish and maintain a database with an
inventory of the nation’s levees by 2009 and to inspect federally constructed and other levees.
WRDA 2007 also created a National Committee on Levee Safety to make recommendations to
Congress for a national levee safety program. It also requires Corps planning to consider the risk
that remains behind levees and floodwalls, upstream and downstream impacts, and equitable
analysis of structural and nonstructural alternatives. How these provisions and the
recommendations by the National Committee on Levee Safety are implemented over the next few
years may affect the nature of the federal and local investment in flood and storm damage
infrastructure and mitigation measures.
Drought in many parts of the country also is drawing attention to options for capturing and
treating urban stormwater as a potential water supply. Stormwater is increasingly being seen as a
resource (e.g., for reuse), rather than only for its negative effects on water quality and urban
flooding.
Estuaries and the Coastal Zone63
Estuaries—formed at the confluence of freshwater flows (e.g., rivers and streams) and the
ocean—are considered some of the most biologically rich areas on earth. Many animal species
rely on estuaries for habitat, especially for places to spawn or nest and for nurseries to support
early life stages and juveniles. Human communities rely on estuaries and nearshore areas for
62
For more information, see CRS Report RL33188, Protecting New Orleans: From Hurricane Barriers to Floodwalls,
by (name redacted).
63
Prepared by Harold Upton, Analyst in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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direct benefits such as food and recreation and indirect benefits such as filters of pollutants and as
buffers from floods and intense storms. Over half of the U.S. population now lives in coastal
watershed counties.
Issue
The Commission found that the nation’s estuaries and shorelands had been “subjected to massive
physical modification, threatening the ecological balance and the maintenance of high biological
productivity.”64 The Commission further noted that the federal government had played a large
role in the physical modification of estuaries and shorelands, primarily through water resource
projects undertaken by the Corps, as well as many federal agency activities in major river basins
that empty into the nation’s estuaries. For example, modifications on the Mississippi River, in
part, have caused reduction of sediment load that is necessary for maintaining coastal wetlands in
Louisiana; and agricultural pollution has reduced water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and along
the Gulf Coast. The Commission found that decisions about where, whether, and how to dredge
and fill waterways and harbors, develop real estate, preserve natural systems, locate industries,
and dispose of wastes determine to a large extent the uses and health of the waters and shorelands
of the coastal zone, including wetlands.
NWC Recommendations
An overarching NWC recommendation on estuaries and the coastal zone called for coastal zone
planning to be handled in coordination with general land use and water resources planning at all
levels of government. In addition, the Commission specifically recommended that:
•
water resources and development plans should include measures to protect
estuaries and coastal zones; and
•
costs of protection should be included in project costs and borne by project
beneficiaries, except when benefits are widespread, national in scope, or cannot
be tied to beneficiaries.
Current Status and Implementation
Several pieces of legislation have been enacted and programs implemented to protect the coasts
and estuaries since 1973. Coastal programs and legislation established since 1973 generally
represent targeted treatment of estuaries and coastal zones; however, they do not represent an
integration of coastal zone planning with general land use plans and broad water resource plans.
The type of integration envisioned by the Commission was constrained by the contraction of
large-scale water resource planning efforts in the 1980s.65 Without these larger planning efforts,
federal water resource projects are planned and evaluated largely as individual projects.
Consequently, the cumulative impacts of multiple and existing projects in a basin or ecosystem on
coastal and estuarine resources often are not fully examined. In contrast, the impacts of individual
projects on estuarine and coastal resources generally are examined and environmental mitigation
64
1973 NWC Report, p. 31.
For more analysis of planning, see this report’s sections on “Water Resources Project Planning and Evaluation” and
“Federal Water Resources Coordination.”
65
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measures are developed during individual project planning. Mitigation costs are generally shared
between the federal and nonfederal sponsor based on the primary purposes of the project.
Coastal Zone Management Program
Implementation of the Coastal Zone Management Program, established by the Coastal Zone
Management Act of 197266 and the National Estuary Program (NEP), which was created in
amendments to the CWA in 1987,67 arguably have caused the most significant movement toward
the Commission’s recommendation that water resources and development plans protect coasts
and estuaries, and be integrated with land use planning. The Coastal Zone Management Program
supports the creation of state plans that encourage coastal development while protecting
resources. The NEP focuses conservation, management, and restoration efforts on estuaries of
national significance, many of them in proximity to coastal development (e.g., Puget Sound,
which borders Seattle and Tacoma, WA). It currently covers 28 estuaries located throughout most
of the coastal continental United States and Puerto Rico. The Chesapeake Bay Program, although
not a part of the NEP, is managed by a similar approach with federal-state partnerships; the
program develops and participating agencies implement plans to improve water quality. NEP
programs have financed projects targeted at protecting and restoring habitat, conducting outreach,
upgrading municipal stormwater infrastructure, and implementing other priority actions in their
management plans.
Other Coastal Programs and Laws
Several other programs and laws are closely related to coastal zone management. For example,
the Coastal Nonpoint Pollution Control Program, established by the Coastal Zone Act
Reauthorization Amendments of 1990 ( Section 6217 of P.L. 101-508; 16 U.S.C. 1455b), is
intended to strengthen links between state coastal zone management and water quality programs
by requiring coastal states to develop a nonpoint pollution control program to restore and protect
coastal waters. Further, the Coastal and Estuarine Land Conservation Program (Title II of P.L.
107-77; 16 U.S.C. 1456d) provides matching grants to eligible states and local governments to
acquire property or easements on coastal property. Projects have protected coastal habitats,
reduced coastal water pollution, and improved access for coastal recreation. The Coastal Barrier
Resources Act, enacted in 1982 (16 U.S.C. 3501, et seq., P.L. 97-348), prohibits federal financing
of development in areas designated as part of the coastal barrier system. The system includes 585
units and nearly 1.3 million acres of land and associated aquatic areas.
Trends Affecting the Coasts and Coastal Planning
Although coastal zone planning has expanded since 1973, the stress on coastal and estuarine
ecosystems has not lessened as more intense development and population growth and increased
water use have occurred in these sensitive environments. Some of the environmental
consequences have worsened (e.g., expansion of the size and number of dead zones in coastal
waters, especially the Gulf of Mexico). In 2004, the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy noted
that, as more people come to coastal areas to live, work, and visit, the nation has lost millions of
66
67
CZMA, P.L. 92-532; 16 U.S.C. 1451, et seq.
P.L. 100-4; 16 U.S.C. 1330.
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acres of wetlands, seen the destruction of seagrass and kelp beds, and faced a significant loss of
mangrove forests.68
The Commission focused largely on protection of estuaries and coasts. In some locations, water
resources planning has moved beyond protecting these areas from incidental impacts associated
with water resources projects. Restoration of estuaries, in particular, has become the core of a
number of large-scale restoration planning efforts, such as the Chesapeake Bay, coastal Louisiana
wetlands, and the California Bay-Delta. Aquatic ecosystem restoration has been added as a
primary mission area for the Corps. The cost-share arrangements for these larger-scale efforts
often are decided on a case-by-case basis, reflecting the uniqueness of each effort and of the
federal responsibility in each effort.
One aspect of estuarine and coastal health that has received much policy attention since the
Commission’s report is coastal wetlands. Wetlands are critical to a clean, properly functioning
environment and to ecosystem and species health. Federal data indicate that historic trends of
inland wetland acreage loss due especially to urban and rural development have been
substantially slowed and even slightly reversed nationally in recent years. A number of federal,
state, and local programs involving regulation, protection, and conservation contribute to the
recent national trend of net gain. However, the same trends are not occurring in coastal areas,
where data indicate that coastal watersheds have been losing a substantial amount of wetlands and
will continue to do so because of continuing development in those areas.69
Channelization 70
Issue
The Commission identified the negative environmental effects of channelization—the
straightening of streams—as an issue. It found that evaluations of channelization investments had
given insufficient weight to environmental harm from channelization relative to channelization’s
drainage, flood control, navigation, and erosion control benefits. The Commission found that
evaluation tools often ignored or underestimated negative effects on groundwater infiltration, fish
and wildlife habitat, downstream sedimentation and flooding, and aesthetic value.
NWC Recommendations
The Commission recommended:
•
improvements to the evaluation procedures in channelization plans;
•
a user pay approach for costs that increase the value of private lands; and
•
review of probable effects of already authorized channelization plans, and
provision of funds only to those with national benefits exceeding all costs.
68
U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, “An Ocean Blueprint for the 21st Century,” Final Report, September 2004, p. ES16.
69
Office of the President, Council on Environmental Quality, Conserving America’s Wetlands 2008: Four Years of
Progress Implementing the President’s Goal, April 2008.
70
Prepared by (name redacted), Specialist in Natural Resources Policy, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
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Current Status and Implementation
Since the Commission’s report, most federal channelization efforts, such as those at USDA and
the Corps, have been abolished or gone unfunded. Some plans using channelization are still
developed as components of flood damage reduction, navigation, and other federal projects. For
these efforts, the detrimental effects of channelization are evaluated and addressed pursuant to
federal and state environmental laws, fish and wildlife mitigation requirements, and species
protection measures. The dredged material produced during construction and maintenance of
channels previously was disposed as waste; now, it is often put to beneficial environmental use,
such as island building and wetland restoration. (See also “Water Resources Project Planning and
Evaluation.”)
Fish and Wildlife Protection71
Issue
The Commission found that water projects often had been planned and developed with little
regard for fish and wildlife impacts, resulting in harm to these resources. Specifically, it noted:
[t]housands of miles of natural stream channels were relocated or altered; some streams were
dried up; estuaries and marshes suffered from drainage and landfill operations; and estuarine
habitat essential for shellfish and other species was destroyed by dredging and channel deepening.
Water quality deterioration and water temperature alteration have also adversely affected fish and
wildlife resources in both marine and fresh waters.72
The Commission expressed concern that state and federal legislation at the time might not fully
address these impacts. However, the NWC found that federal protections under the Fish and
Wildlife Coordination Act (FWCA; Act of March 10, 1934, as amended (16 U.S.C. §§661666(e)) and NEPA “seem to be adequate to prevent unreasonable or unnecessary damage to [fish
and wildlife] resources under future projects constructed or licensed by the Federal
Government.”73
NWC Recommendations
To better address fish and wildlife impacts, the Commission recommended that fish and wildlife
agencies jointly participate in initial water project planning, as opposed to reacting at later stages.
The NWC argued that the FWCA requires this collaboration, and that this collaboration should be
continued and strengthened. The Commission also was concerned that the FWCA did not cover
nonfederal entities. It recommended that all states enact legislation to protect fish and wildlife
resources from impacts of nonfederal water projects. The Commission recommended having the
WRC supervise and coordinate the resolution of stakeholder disagreements.
NEPA also was a concern for the NWC because, in 1973, implementation of NEPA was just
beginning. The Commission also called for more research and data on the effects of water
71
Prepared by Pervaze Sheikh and Harold Upton, Resources, Science, and Industry Division.
1973 NWC Report, p. 200.
73
Ibid., p. 202.
72
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projects on fish and wildlife, and for steps to reduce water-related conflicts by reducing
uncertainty and producing scientifically defensible results.
Current Status and Implementation
Water resources planning and project development practices now give significantly more
attention to fish and wildlife than in 1973. Many of the fish and wildlife accomplishments have
been achieved through wetlands conservation under the CWA, fish and wildlife agency
consultation pursuant to ESA,74 assessment requirements of NEPA, and site specific legislation.75
Federal fish and wildlife agencies still appear largely to operate in a reactive mode, responding to
plans already formulated and when species have already declined to low levels. In sum,
improvements have been made, but the sufficiency of these improvements is debated. The NWC
may have contributed to improvements, but indirectly.
Today, there are many more threats to fish and wildlife resources than impacts from federal water
project development. These threats include destruction of habitat due to other development,
invasive non-native species, climate variability and change, and pollution. Despite past
achievements, fish and wildlife resources continue to decline. Specifically, the FWS notes that
“aquatic resources in the United States are in decline, and habitat destruction and modification are
the principal culprits.”76
Application of the FWCA
Consistent with the NWC recommendation, attempts were made to establish regulations to
implement the FWCA in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but they were abandoned during the
Reagan Administration.77 FWCA currently is applied to water activities through each agency’s
planning process. For example, the Corps and Reclamation consider FWCA requirements when
preparing NEPA documentation. However, FWCA, like NEPA, imposes procedural requirements,
not substantive obligations on the “action agency” to avoid adverse affects on fish and wildlife.
According to one source, the FWCA has “largely [been] overshadowed by NEPA, and undercut
by a series of disabling judicial interpretations. Its promise, once viewed with considerable
optimism, remains largely unfulfilled.”78 The role of WRC as arbitrator became moot when this
coordination mechanism was disbanded in 1983.
Research on Water Resource Project Impacts o
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