456 



to assist State and local governments in tlie technical aspects of coastal 

 problems since it houses such entities as the National Ocean Survey, 

 Enviromnental Data Service, Environmental Research Laboratories 

 and Office of Sea Grant, among others. When the House bill was con- 

 sidered on the floor, however, an amendment was proposed and 

 adopted which would place the responsibility for administration from 

 the Secretary of Commerce with the Secretary of the Interior. The 

 argument in support of this change addressed itself to the fact that 

 the Coastal Zone Management Act involved land use decisions and 

 since pending land use legislation in both Houses gave the adminis- 

 trative responsibility to the Secretary of the Interior, that official 

 should also administer the Coastal Zone Management Act so that the 

 land use aspects of the coastal zone legislation and the national land 

 use legislation could be readily coordinated and not result in conflict 

 between the two programs. 



The conferees adopted a final approach which acknowledges the 

 validity of many of the arguments advanced to justify the placement 

 of responsibility in the Department of Interior rather than the De- 

 partment of Commerce. First, the definition of what land areas shall 

 be included in the "coastal zone" has been limited to those lands 

 which have a direct and significant impact upon coastal water. Sec- 

 ond, those lands traditionally managed by the Department of In- 

 terior or the Department of Defense, such as parks, wildlife refuges, 

 military reservations, and other such areas covered by existing legis- 

 lation, were specifically excluded from the coverage of the bill. Third, 

 it is provided that upon enactment and implementation of national 

 land use legislation, the Secretary of Commerce shall coordinate with 

 and obtain the concurrence of the Federal official charged with man- 

 aging the national land use program. 



Until such time as a State begins its participation in any national 

 land use program, the question of this required concurrence will not 

 of course arise. The conferees expect that the concurrence procedure 

 will take place after Federally supported land use programs become 

 effective, and would take place when the coastal zone program is sub- 

 mitted for original approval under title 306 or where a modification 

 is proposed. It is also expected that whei^ a coastal zone program 

 already exists in a state when the state federally supported land use 

 program is proposed, that necessary changes in the coastal zone pro- 

 gram consistent with the concept of land use responsibility, as out- 

 lined in section 307(g) would be accomplished. The conferees also 

 agreed to include definitions for "management program", for "water 

 use", keyed to the requirements of section 307(f) and "land use", 

 keyed to the requirements of section 307(g). 



Therefore, what the conferees agreed upon was basically a water- 

 related coastal zone program administered by the Secretary of Com- 

 merce with required full coordination with and concurrence of the 

 Secretary of Interior. This compromise recognizes the need for making 

 coastal zone management fully compatible with national land use 

 policy, while making use of the special technical competence of the 

 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the Department 

 of Commerce in managing the nation's coastal areas. 



Sec. 305. The conferees adopted the Senate approach of providing 

 for a maximum for any one State of ten percentum of the total amount 



