the bills are inadequate with regard to the 
functions we feel must be carried out by 
DENR to implement marine affairs pol- 
icy ... Third, their deficiency is the failure 
to specify which functions will and which 
functions will not be the responsibility of 
a marine affairs administrator . . . Fourth, 
the function of marine multiple-use co- 
ordination and regulation was not recog- 
nized at all.” 
The Moore Proposal (1976) 
Professor John Norton Moore, Director, Center 
for Oceans Law and Policy at the University of 
Virginia, recently advanced a three-pronged reor- 
ganization proposal which would (1) create a Cabi- 
net-level Marine Affairs Council, (2) centralize non- 
military ocean programs under a strengthened and 
independent NOAA, and (3) strengthen and recog- 
nize the existing State Department Bureau of Oceans 
and Environment."” 
Under the Moore proposal, the following func- 
tions would be transferred to the new ocean adminis- 
tration: 
The Coast Guard; 
The Maritime Administration (MARAD); 
The Outer Continental Shelf programs of the 
Bureau of Land Management and the Geological 
Survey; 
e The Ocean Mining Administration of the De- 
partment of the Interior; 
@ Marine and coastal zone activities of the Army 
Corps of Engineers; 
© Most ocean research programs of the National 
Science Foundation (including the International 
Decade of Ocean Exploration); 
e Most ocean research and monitoring programs 
of the Environmental Protection Agency; 
© Ocean and atmosphere activities of the Bureau of 
Reclamation; and 
e Some ocean-related activities of the Fish and 
Wildlife Service, particularly programs for 
andromous species and marine mammals. 
The proposal is significantly different from its 
predecessors. By including the Maritime Administra- 
tion (MarAd), which is now in the Department of 
Commerce, in an up-graded independent NOAA, 
the Moore proposal recognizes the importance of 
maritime transportation to our national ocean pos- 
ture. The proposal also would transfer the ocean 
pollution functions of EPA to the expanded agency 
and bring the entire program of ocean pollution 
control into a single entity, thereby avoiding the pit- 
falls of split jurisdiction. 
Reorganization of the Bureau of Oceans, Environ- 
ment, and Science within the Department of State is 
aimed at giving the oceans more prominence and 
attention in international affairs. The Bureau was 
created at the initiative of Congress, and, in the 
process of implementation at the department level, 
was merged with other disparate programs including 
science and environment. This, according to some 
observers, has diminished the effectiveness of the 
Bureau in dealing with international ocean affairs, 
particularly the Law of the Sea negotiations. 
The Hollings Proposal: Department of Environment and Oceans (1976) 
The Department of the Environment and Oceans 
Act, S. 3889, was introduced September 30, 1976, 
too late in the 94th Congress for further action, but 
its introduction served as a means for developing 
discussion and debate for the 95th Congress. It is the 
first congressional attempt to create an independent 
ocean agency since the flurry of proposals that 
emanated immediately after the release of the Strat- 
ton Commission report in the 91st Congress.*® 
In the statement of introduction for S. 3889, the 
bill’s sponsor, Senator Ernest F. Hollings, chairman 
of the Senate National Ocean Policy Study, cited five 
major goals of the proposal: +9 
* John Norton Moore, op. cit. note 21. 
See, generally, H.R. 3848, 4838, 15147, 15233, et al., S. 
2054 and 2204, 91st Cong., Ist sess. (1969); approximately 15 
Teorganization bills for creating an independent ocean agency 
were introduced in the 91st Congress. 
*°U.S. Congress, Senate. Senator Ernest F. Hollings in state- 
ment of introduction for S. 3889. 94th Cong., 2d sess., 1 October 
1976, Congressional Record 122: § 17854. 
e@ Minimize the unnecessary duplication and over- 
lap which now exists; 
e Provide the type of organizational setting where 
coherent national policies for managing and pro- 
tecting the environment, the oceans, and their 
resources can and will be carried out, and where 
a new sense of direction can develop in the 
executive branch; 
® Increase the accountability by fixing responsi- 
bility squarely, and remedying the present situa- 
tion where no one is in charge and thus no one 
is held accountable; 
@ Unify the now myriad permit processes which 
confuse the Federal Government and burden in- 
dustry and State and local governments with enor- 
mouse amounts of unnecessary redtape; and 
e Bring ocean and environmental affairs into the 
Cabinet, where they can get the high-level atten- 
tion they deserve in this era of increasing de- 
mands on these resources. 
IX-31 
