47 



teed minimum flows to preserve and protect the fishery of the Trin- 

 ity River. 



And the question was how much water is that? And the Fish and 

 Wildlife Service gave their best guess as to how much water that 

 was. Well, it turned out the answer was wrong. It wasn't enough 

 water, and the Congress recognized that in 1992. And now, you are 

 dealing with it here again. So that is the first reason that I think 

 it is important. 



The second reason I think that legislation is not the ideal way 

 to approach many of these problems is that there is a tendency 

 when legislating to skip over the most difficult problems and say, 

 "Well, that is something somebody else — the agency — can figure 

 out in regulations or whatever." 



Time after time we have struggled administratively with trying 

 to resolve problems where the general guidance provided by the 

 Congress was not specific. And so it is difficult in legislation to be 

 as specific as you need to be to protect everybody's interests. So 

 those would be the two primary reasons why I think some other 

 form may be the right way. 



There may be issues where we can all agree that legislation is 

 the right way to go, and that is fine. But as a general matter, to 

 answer your question, that is how I would approach it. 



Mr. Nelson. May I have the opportunity to comment on that if 

 it is appropriate? 



Mr. DooLlTTLE. His time is expired. Let us catch it in some other 

 fashion. Mr. Farr is recognized. 



Mr. Farr. Well, thank you very much, Mr, Chairman. I want to 

 follow up on Mr. Radanovich and Mr. Dooley's observation; essen- 

 tially, the issues of administrative solutions versus legislative solu- 

 tions. It seems to me just from the testimony we have had here 

 today, and I think we are getting down to the nitty-gritty, that if 

 vou don't have essentially a system that allows all users and all 

 benefactors of it to come to some kind of consensus, the remedy is 

 lawsuit. 



That ties up the solution whether it be a legislative or adminis- 

 trative solution. So it is in our best interest — all of our best interest 

 to try to figure out how to deal with this complex situation without 

 losing players to the Courts, essentially seeking remedy in the 

 Courts to jam it rather than to solve it. 



And I guess what I am very interested in following up on on 

 their questioning, Commissioner Beard, is, I mean, you are leaving, 

 and you have certainly made a big commitment to this. I notice 

 that in Senator Boxer's comment that she believes that the way to 

 improve the CVPIA must be to exhaust all possible administrative 

 solutions before legislative solutions. How much of the issues 

 raised in the bill, in 1906, can be solved administratively, and are 

 there any provisions that we really need some legislative correction 

 on? 



Mr. Beard. Well, I think most of them can be dealt with; but 

 there are some that are just difficult and can't be removed; where 

 there are specific things in the base statute you can't get around. 

 One example that comes to mind is tiered pricing. Ttered pricing 

 is required under the statute in all future long-term contracts. 

 Now, there are instances where I think we all agree that maybe 



