Pallone: Bush's Army Corps Cuts Will Result in Less Surveillance of NY/NJ Harbor

Washington, D.C. --- After learning from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that budget cuts proposed by President Bush would eliminate all skimmer boat coverage of the Jersey coastline on summer weekends and holidays, U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) today called the president's proposal ill-advised and urged him to reconsider this budget cut. The New Jersey congressman expressed his displeasure with the cut in a letter to the president today.

The president's Fiscal Year (FY) 2006 budget provides the Army Corps $4.4 million for the agency's Drift Removal program for the New York/New Jersey Harbor, a more than $1 million cut from the $5.414 million Congress provided in FY 2005, and $1.6 million short of the Army Corps' need for the coming fiscal year.

"The drift removal program is critical not only to ensuring safe navigation into and out of one of the world's busiest ports, but it also helps ensure clean beaches and healthy tourism along the New Jersey shore," Pallone wrote in his letter to President Bush.

"It is my understanding that your woefully inadequate budget request, if enacted by Congress, would result in two of the five skimmer boats used by the Army Corps to be tied up at dock all summer," Pallone continued. "It would also result in the reduction of 10 full-time employees working under the program and would eliminate weekend and holiday coverage by skimmer boats. This last point is the most disturbing -- in the summer of 2004, a seven-mile garbage slick appeared off the Jersey shore on July 4th weekend, and coverage was not in place due to a damaged helicopter. New Jersey's citizens, businesses, and visitors would not like to see such an event occur this summer."

After garbage spilled on the beaches in Monmouth County last year, Pallone asked both the Army Corps and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to investigate why, in that instance, a federal "Floatables Action Plan" did not work. The two agencies came back with several improvements, including the approval of additional vessel coverage to ensure that coverage was taking place daily. At the time, Pallone believed the primary reason garbage washed up on some beaches was that neither the proper air coverage nor skimmer vessel coverage occurred over the Independence Day holiday.

Under the Water Resources Development Act of 1990, the Army Corps is responsible, along with the Environmental Protection Agency's Region 2 Office, for developing a "Floatables Action Plan" to collect floating debris in the ocean that could wind up on our beaches. Floatables collection began in response to the summer of 1987 and 1988, when beaches were often closed because of fugitive debris washing up on our shores. The "Floatables Action Plan" has dramatically reduced the number of beach closures due to floating debris.

"Garbage slicks are ugly mats of street filth, sewage refuse, and litter that form large slurries and threaten public health and marine life," said Cindy Zipf, Executive Director, Clean Ocean Action. "This program is proof positive that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Rolling back environmental protection is shortsighted and reckless."

Pallone also expressed concern that the president's budget does not include funding for the Army Corps' program for prevention of obstructive deposits. This program allows the Army Corps to help identify damaged piers and other structures that could potentially end up as floating debris and require further expenditures to remove.

The New Jersey congressman said he would also work to restore funding for the Drift Removal Program as the appropriations process begins later this month.