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regime, and the flexibility to establish priorities on how to use 

 available funds. 



We believe that this is the fundamental difference between our 

 compromise proposal and your bill as technically drafted. Your 

 bill appears to create mandates where discretion and creativity are 

 necessary. Your bill must have sources of new funding, other than 

 the current level of Federal appropriations, in order to work. Our 

 proposal assumes baseline funding, but is capable of absorbing 

 other sources of funding when available. Vte attempt to take the 

 resources at hand and deal with the most critical of the stocks not 

 already receiving heightened protection under the ESA. While well 

 intentioned, your bill as drafted simply would try to do too much, 

 too soon. It overlaps existing State and Federal fishing 

 participation registries, and would duplicate the conservation 

 protections being afforded under the ESA. We had hoped that the 

 MMPA incidental take regime would be used as a tool to prevent 

 listing under the ESA, to the extent direct human interactions are 

 a cause of the decline. 



It is my understanding that the Committee is considering a 

 quick markup on the Chairman's bill tomorrow. Again, we do not 

 support the bill as drafted. Should you move forward with the 

 markup tommorrow, we hope that you will be open to further 

 discussions prior to the time action is taken on the Floor of the 

 Full House. 



The following are my specific comments on the provisions of 

 your bill. Where appropriate, I also try to draw a comparison to 

 the Negotiated Proposal, where appropriate. We do recognize that 

 our Negotiated Proposal is not clear in many instances. We hope 

 that this testimony will serve to clarify the intent behind the 

 Proposal. 



1. Section 3(a). Small Take Provisions 



The Secretary of Commerce has existing authority to regulate 

 small takes of threatened and endangered species under the ESA by 

 requiring the development of "reasonable and prudent measures" 

 which avoid jeopardy to the listed stock. This authority includes 

 the ability to limit incidental lethal takes when necessary. A 

 separate small take permitting process for endangered species under 

 the MMPA, as set forth in your bill, is not necessary. 



Our Proposal would call for incidental takes of threatened and 

 endangered species to be deemed a Federally-authorized action for 

 purpose of Section 7 of the ESA for both Federal and State 

 fisheries for threatened and endangered species. This assures that 

 all listed species are covered by the ESA. Our intent was to cover 

 all remaining marine mammal stocks not under an ESA listing, 

 particularly pre-threatened stocks, under the proposed conservation 



