Clean Water Advocacy - Newsroom - AMSA in the News
No. 217
Tuesday, November 13, 2001 Page A-4
ISSN 1521-9402
News
Drinking Water
Senate Panel Approves Security Bills; House Committee Hearings Set For This Week
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee approved two bills Nov.
8that would provide EPA with immediate and long-term funding for measures to
protect U.S. water systems from terrorist attacks.
The first bill (S. 1608), introduced by Sen. Robert Smith (R -N.H.), would
provide the agency with $25 million "for meeting short-term physical security
needs at water utilities."
The money would be administered in the form of annual grants and used for
immediate security needs such as personnel, fencing and lighting, monitoring
systems, and training materials.
Another bill (S. 1593) sponsored by Sen. James Jeffords (I-Vt.), the committee
chairman, authorizes $72 million over six years for both physical and cyber
security needs, such as the protection of computerized systems that regulate
water treatment and flow.
Both measures, approved by unanimous voice vote, allow EPA to allocate the
funding among drinking water and wastewater projects.
House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-N.Y.) has filed a
companion version of the Jeffords bill (H.R. 3178), which is also known as the
Water Infrastructure Security and Research Development Act of 2001. It will be
the subject of a Nov. 14 Science Committee hearing and is tentatively scheduled
for a Nov. 15 mark-up by the full committee.
The Jeffords-Boehlert legislation is backed by several water organizations that
have been lobbying Congress for increased anti-terrorist funding since the Sept.
11 attacks.
Proponents of the legislation include the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage
Agencies (AMSA) and the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA).
In 1998, EPA appointed AMWA to create an industrywide network to share water
security information. Expected to be operational in 2002, the Water Information
Sharing and Analysis Center will collect incident data, threats, alerts, and
warnings, and provide manuals and other emergency training materials to
participating utilities.