U.S. water usage plan exposed

Approximately 160 members of the South Central Industrial Association were told last Tuesday of White House plans that if fully implemented could seriously hamper commercial and recreational use of the Gulf of Mexico and waterways feeding into it.

Jack Belcher, managing director for the National Ocean Policy Coalition, offered a power point presentation that outlined and documented efforts by the Obama administration to place restrictions and zoning ordinances on all offshore activity. A measure that Belcher claimed would basically be a moratorium on usage of natural resources.

Belcher introduced those in attendance to Executive Order 13547, through which President Barack Obama has established a national ocean policy and adopted an ocean zoning scheme referred to as Coastal Marine Special Planning.

Under a task force ordered by the White House, a 27-member National Ocean Council is being put in place to oversee policy implementation and become ultimate arbiters when dealing with disputes between federal interests and regional concerns.

The NOC is also being developed to enforce national policies and priorities compliance with federally mandated plans.

“It sounds like zoning,” Belcher said. He explained that such a measure would also justify the use of moratoriums. “We’re concerned about the lack of uncertainty and need to have local officials to be brought into this,” he said.

Belcher claimed that the Obama administration plans push an extreme environmental agenda that works on ecosystem-based management, regional ecosystem protection and makes adaptations to climate change.

The primary issues involved include not only the matter of zoning and restrictive use, but also compromising state’s rights, and confusion on ocean usage that could conflict with the Clean Water and Air Act and other established pieces of legislation. The NOC also blocks involvement by industrial and recreational interests and Administrative Procedural Act concerns regarding public input.

Belcher said that energy and fishing industries would especially feel a negative impact if the NOC is allowed a foothold. “Congress has been very quiet [about this],” he said.

Belcher said on the surface many of the environmental and smart usage proposals of the NOC seem reasonable, but the “devil is in the details.”

“A lot has not been revealed as to what they are planning to do. They are trying to do this without statutory changes, but there are 20-plus statutes that are at play here and various activities that take place in the oceans,” Belcher said away from the meeting.

State Rep. Gordon Dove (R-Houma) said the National Ocean Policy Coalition could prove to be very important for residents of southern Louisiana.

“[The federal government through the NOC] is looking to a five-year environmental impact study and it is likely to impact energy and everything we do,” Dove said. “The Obama administration is looking not only at the oceans but at all the waterways. The lakes and the streams, everything under their control to slow it down and make it very, very tough to get permits. It’s just another bureaucratic step that the Obama administration is putting in and it is obvious that it is something that is going to slow down the energy industry more and more.”