STATEMENT OF HON. CURT WELDON, A U.S. REPRESENTATIVE 

 FROM PENNSYLVANIA, AND RANKING MINORITY MEMBER, 

 SUBCOMMITTEE ON OCEANOGRAPHY, GULF OF MEXICO, AND 

 THE OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF 



Mr. Weldon. Thank you. I will submit my statement for the 

 record. But I will make a couple of comments. This is one of the 

 most vexing problems we will face in this session of Congress. It is 

 for that reason we must understand what is being faced by both 

 landowners, developers and local officials. 



Having been a county commissioner for five years before coming 

 here, I am well aware of the frustrations in my home State of 

 Pennsylvania and our Delaware Valley Region with local officials 

 trying to understand the compliance process for permitting and ad- 

 hering to the Clean Water Act. 



We have come to terms with a definition, scientifically based 

 that we can all agree on. We have discussed this for four or five 

 years, we have to have the definition first. 



The second, the permitting process is an absolute abomination. 

 Anyone trying to deal with permitting with the number of Federal 

 and State agencies involved and the overhanging jurisdictions and 

 lack of coherent process is just impossible for anyone to deal with 

 in a comprehensive and cohesive way. 



Third, instead of always pushing from the top down, we have to 

 find ways to encourage proper land use from the bottom up. 



One of the things I am going to be doing, and I have done it al- 

 ready in some hearings, is focusing on what I think is a unique ex- 

 ample in one of the three counties I represent; suburban Chester 

 County, Pennsylvania, where the county actually floated a $60 mil- 

 lion bond issue on their own, established a land use plan taking 

 into consideration both wetlands and endangered species, using 

 some of the strategies we are talking about here but doing it local- 

 ly with no prodding from the Federal Government. That is where 

 we have to be moving. 



The notion that we can sit here in Washington and determine 

 what is best for local jurisdictions, I think, is wrong-headed and 

 something that we have to be very careful about as we move in 

 this debate. 



I look forward to working with the administration. We have to 

 move quickly because time is not on our side. 



[The statement of Mr. Weldon follows:] 



Statement of Hon. Curt Weldon, a U.S. Representative from Pennsylvania 



I would like to take this opportunity to thank Chairman Studds and Congressman 

 Saxton, the Subcommittee's ranking Republican member, for holding this important 

 hearing. This hearing promises to provide the Subcommittee with a better under- 

 standing of the Clinton Administration's new wetlands policy. 



I have long been an outspoken advocate of protecting our nation's wetlands. As a 

 member of the Migratory Bird Conservation Commission, I have worked closely 

 with the Clinton Administration to protect some of the country's finest wetland 

 habitat. 



I believe that Federal regulations for the protection of wetlands must be fair and 

 scientifically based, if we are to achieve the goal of "no net loss". All too often in 

 the past, politics have been substituted for science. Likewise, the Clean Water Act 

 permitting process has often been a bureaucratic nightmare from which many land- 

 owners can never wake. 



