990 



HISTORY OF THE COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 



coming all too typical in the Federal Government, and that is a prob- 

 lem which cuts across several jurisdictions, generally including several 

 committees in the Congress." Brown told the House: 



What we have attempted to do here is to say to all the different agencies that are 

 involved with the problem of ocean pollution: "We want you to get your act together. 

 We want you to develop a common plan, a common set of priorities, and we want 

 you to attack this general problem with your respective resources in accordance with 

 a common set of parameters which will solve the problem with a minimum cost to 

 the taxpayer and in a fashion that will be the most effective." 



The House adopted the bill by voice vote, and after the Senate acted 

 in April, the President signed the legislation on May 8, 1978. 



JURISDICTIONAL CONFLICT WITH MILFORD SUBCOMMITTEE 



As noted in chapter X, the Antarctic Conservation Act of 1978 

 was also passed as a result of action by the Brown subcommittee in 

 cooperation with the Merchant Marine and Fisheries Committee. In 

 1977, the subcommittee held a two-day briefing, at which various 

 NOAA officials testified, including the Director of the National 

 Weather Service. It seemed inevitable that a conflict would arise be- 

 tween Milford's Subcommittee on Transportation, Aviation and 

 Weather and the Brown Subcommittee on Environment and the Atmos- 

 phere. This conflict came to a head over how to divide up the functions 

 of the National Weather Service. As noted in chapter XVI, the Milford 

 subcommittee reported legislation, which eventually passed the House, 

 providing a new statutory charter for the National Weather Service. 

 Although he would have preferred to wait until broader legislation 

 was ready, with a new organic act for NOAA (including the National 

 Weather Service), Brown did not oppose the Milford bill. 



On April 14, 1978, Milford and Brown negotiated a signed agree- 

 ment delineating their respective subcommittee jurisdictions. Gen- 

 erally, it authorized the Milford subcommittee to hold hearings for 

 an organic act for NWS, including how NWS should be integrated 

 most effectively with the remainder of NOAA. The Brown subcom- 

 mittee was then authorized to hold hearings on an organic act for the 

 remainder of NOAA, including how the remainder of NOAA should 

 be integrated most effectively with the NWS. 



NOAA ORGANIC ACT 



In April and June, the subcommittee started hearings on the 

 NOAA Organic Act, based on legislation which had been introduced 

 by Representative John M. Murphy (Democrat of New York). The 

 Murphy bill was heavily slanted toward a national oceans policy, so 

 the first job of the subcommittee was to broaden the bill to include 



