Volume 150, No. 103 covering the 2nd Session of the 108th Congress (2003 - 2004) was published by the Congressional Record.
The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“WASTEWATER TREATMENT WORKS SECURITY ACT OF 2003” mentioning the Environmental Protection Agency was published in the Senate section on pages S8662-S8663 on July 22, 2004.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
WASTEWATER TREATMENT WORKS SECURITY ACT OF 2003
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise today in opposition to the Wastewater Treatment Works Security Act of 2003.
In the wake of September 11, 2001, I believe that it is imperative that the Nation takes every reasonable action we can to prevent terrorism, create effective response and recovery mechanisms, and find ways to minimize any impacts should an event occur.
The Congress has a key role in facilitating these actions by establishing authorities for Government agencies, establishing the legal framework in which homeland security improvements will occur, and appropriating adequate funding for the homeland security mission. Protecting our Nation's critical infrastructure is a major piece of our homeland security strategy.
The water sector has been identified as an element in our Nation's critical infrastructure since the issuance of Presidential Decision Directive 63 (PDD-63), issued in by President Clinton in May 1998, which was the first major governmental action focused on reducing the vulnerability of our Nation's critical infrastructure.
At that time, and in each document outlining homeland security responsibilities since that time, the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, was designated as the lead for water infrastructure protection.
The security needs are significant in the water and wastewater sectors. There are over 16,000 publicly owned treatment works in the United States, serving almost 190 million people. These industrial facilities use large quantities of toxic chemicals in their treatment and disinfection processes. They are located near population centers and other critical infrastructure. A chemical accident would pose a serious threat. In addition, collection systems run beneath every city and town in America, creating potential corridors for travel or opportunities for access.
There are also serious public health risks associated with a disruption or service failure at a wastewater treatment plant. Treatment works clean wastewater that comes from our toilets, showers, and sewers and send it back into our rivers, streams, lakes, and oceans. Those same bodies of water are our drinking water sources. Without proper treatment, we would see the public health effects of the same type of water-borne disease outbreaks such as cholera that we saw in Iraq earlier this year due to the failure of wastewater treatment plants.
I believe that the Congress should take the risk to wastewater treatment plants seriously. Unfortunately, S. 1039, the Wastewater Treatment Works Security and Safety Act, provides security for our Nation's wastewater infrastructure in name, only.
First, this bill is a rollback of current law requiring vulnerability assessments and emergency response plans at drinking water utilities. In 2002, the Congress passed H.R. 3448, the Public Health and Bioterrorism Preparedness Response Act of 2002, P.L. 107-188. This act requires community water systems to conduct vulnerability assessments and develop an emergency response plan that incorporates the results of the vulnerability assessment. Vulnerability assessments are to be submitted to EPA. The threats posed by drinking water and wastewater facilities are similar. These plants are often colocated. It makes no sense to adopt weaker standards for one sector of the industry than the other. The Bioterrorism Act ensures that water systems take basic action to first identify and then address security needs.
Second, S. 1039 increases wastewater security in name only. It does not require the most basic security precautions--completion of a vulnerability assessment and the incorporation of the results into a treatment works' emergency response plan. Under the provisions of S. 1039, we do not know if individual publicly owned treatment works will choose to complete a vulnerability assessment because there is no requirement to do so. We do not know if they will incorporate their findings into emergency response plans that are designed to protect communities surrounding those plants because there is no requirement to do so. These most basic actions are not too heavy a burden for the wastewater treatment industry to bear.
S. 1039 also does not require, and may actually preclude, the submission of vulnerability assessments that are completed to the Federal Government--a serious obstacle in the Department of Homeland Security's ability to perform its mission. Providing the results of a facility's vulnerability assessment and its emergency response plan to the Federal Government is a vital step both to ensure that vulnerability assessments are completed in critical infrastructure sectors and to ensure that the Federal Government has all of the information it requires to secure the Nation against a potential terrorist attack.
The President's National Strategy for Homeland Security, issued in 2002, states, ``A complete and thorough assessment of America's vulnerabilities will not only enable decisive near-term action, but guide the rational long-term investment of effort and resources.'' Not only does DHS plan to use vulnerability assessments to evaluate threat information and provide warnings, but also to allocate resources. I agree that one of the most efficient ways to spend limited resources is to dentify where we are vulnerable and where we are threatened, then target resources to the cross-section of those two areas.
Under S. 1039 as reported, it is unclear where DHS will get the information they require to complete a national vulnerability assessment and make resource allocation decisions that will increase the level of security in our Nation. What is clear is that DHS is likely to receive only partial information, if any, from a subset of wastewater plants that voluntarily choose to complete a vulnerability assessment and that voluntarily choose to share the information they collect. Without the best, most up to date, accurate information available, DHS will be unable to fully perform its mission.
In addition, elected officials in Congress have a constitutional oversight role over Federal agencies and the laws they implement. Under S. 1039, Congress will not be accountable to the public for the purpose or implementation of this law--Congress will not be able to request or access information from the Federal agencies because the agencies will not have such information.
At the beginning of this Congress, I introduced the Wastewater Treatment Works Security and Safety Act, S. 779. This legislation mirrors existing law for drinking water systems. It requires all wastewater utilities to conduct vulnerability assessments and to develop or modify emergency response plans to incorporate the results of the vulnerability assessments. It requires that these documents be presented to the EPA for review, and it includes significant security measures designed to protect this information from unauthorized disclosure. It authorizes $185 million for assistance in completing vulnerability assessments, for immediate security improvements, and for assistance to small treatment works. It authorizes $15 million for research to identify threats, detection methods, and response actions. This bill will clearly enhance the security of our Nation by taking real actions to improve the security of wastewater treatment works.
The Federal Government has a responsibility to protect the American people. If S. 1039 becomes law, the Federal Government will not know if publicly owned treatment works will voluntarily conduct a vulnerability assessment, if they will voluntarily implement the security needs identified, or if they will incorporate the results into their emergency response plans, and there will be no way of finding out. The Department of Homeland Security's mission to increase the security of the country will be hindered. I believe that S. 1039 fails to take responsible, basic steps to protect our wastewater infrastructure security from terrorist attack, putting Americans at risk.
I urge my colleagues to oppose this legislation and support my alternative bill, S. 779.
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