tency certification. With regard to jurisdiction, BCDC uses its 
consistency authority to work with the appropriate local, state, 
and Federal agencies conducting activities that could effect the 
Bay. 
For example, with regard to water quality matters, BCDC has 
used this consistency provision as a comment authority on the 
regional water quality award. Through their permitting process, 
BCDC can actually enforce state water quality regulations. It 
has been critical that BCDC and other effected agencies 
recognize the legal limitation of the consistency provision. 
Consistency should not be misconstrued as a state or local veto 
over Federal matters, but rather as a mechanism designed to 
promote state/Federal consultation and resolutions wherever 
practicable on matters of mutual or conflicting issues. 
In Congressional activities relating to estuary management 
in general, both the House and the Senate have passed legisla¬ 
tion to reauthorize the Clean Water Act. Included in both of 
these bills are proposals for a National Estuary Program. These 
proposals allow for a state governor to nominate estuaries which 
are deemed to be of national significance to be included in this 
program. If the EPA administrator concurs with that nomination, 
a Congressional Committee is convened comprised of Federal, 
state, and local officials to develop a water quality regulatory 
program for those estuaries which have national significance. 
Certain members of the Merchant Marine and Fisheries Com¬ 
mittee leadership, including Chairman Jones, are interested in 
broadening the scope of these programs and shifting their focus 
to develop an overall management program as opposed to programs 
specifically limited to water quality. These broad regulatory 
programs will then be forwarded to the state CZMA plan. 
I believe there is some merit in this Merchant Marine and 
Fisheries Committee approach. Certainly, the more comprehensive 
the management framework and more of the state and local role in 
estuarine programming is increased, the more appropriate and 
effective, I believe, the management will be. 
However, as we have seen in the case of the San Francisco 
Bay, the Federal mechanism in the form of CZMA is already in 
place. I believe it promotes a comprehensive estuary management 
regime. 
We are seeking ways to cut Federal spending. Reduction 
mechanisms are being seriously considered by Congress. I think 
it is going to be hard to justify a new program for management 
of estuaries, even those that have national significance. I 
believe that maybe a more appropriate method of encouraging 
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