House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Passes Two Water Resource Related Bills; Reschedules Consideration of Three Others

This morning the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee took up and passed two of the five water-related bills it had originally scheduled for consideration today, and rescheduled consideration of the three remaining bills.

The two bills passed out of Committee were (with links to the bills in blue):

• H.R. 3158, sponsored by Rep. Rick Crawford (R-AR), which would specify how EPA should enforce spill-prevention rules for large containers on farms. 
• H.R. 5797, sponsored by Rep. Chip Cravaack (R-MN), which would exempt Mille Lacs Lake, Minnesota, from federal jurisdiction, in order to stop the U.S. Coast Guard from requiring fishing guides there from having to pay approximately $2,000 for boating licenses. 

Three of the five bills will be rescheduled for Committee consideration next week:

• H.R. 4278, cosponsored by Reps. Robert Hurt (R-VA) and Jason Altmire (D-PA), which would eliminate limits on the regulatory exemptions provided in the Clean Water Act for agricultural activities. 
• H.R. 2541, sponsored by Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA), which would prohibit the EPA from requiring a water pollution permit for silviculture.
• H.R. 5961, sponsored by Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), which would amend the Clean Water Act to prohibit the EPA from conducting aerial surveillance of farmland without voluntary written consent, public notice and a certification of reasonable suspicion that a violation has occurred.