WETLANDS: LEGISLATORS REACT TO NEW GUIDELINES

Although they have not yet had the opportunity to review the changes in detail, the co-chairmen of a joint legislative committee on wetlands believe changes announced this week in federal wetlands policy will help ease some of the confusion and frustration that have troubled many landowners.

"Overall, it looks pretty good," said Rep. Larry Thomason, D-Kennett, the House chairman. "From looking over what I've seen so far it is a real positive step forward.

"I am concerned that we don't have a new definition of wetlands yet, but I understand that will take time because it is such a technical and difficult thing to define."

Besides the definition, Thomason stressed the importance of having one particular federal agency responsible for dealing with wetlands.

Sen. Jerry Howard, D-Dexter, the Senate chairman, agreed with Thomason that the report is encouraging. "It appears to me that there is going to be some significant change, especially when they go to a single agency for administering policy," said Howard.

"I think working with one agency will be a lot better. Certainly there should be less confusion working with one agency."

The White House announced the new policy earlier this week. It was developed by representatives of nine federal agencies that attempted to address landowners' complaints about cumbersome, restrictive and conflicting government regulation of wetlands. Forty changes to the wetlands policies were announced.

One part of the new policy exempts from federal protection 53 million acres of wetlands that were drained and converted to farm use before 1985. Some are in the Missouri Bootheel, some of the nation's richest agricultural land.

Howard said he was pleased to hear that and noted that some extremists were suggesting much of the Bootheel should be returned to wetlands.

"If we allow this land that was drained in Southeast Missouri to be taken back as wetlands it would have a serious impact on our state's economy," said Howard.

The plan also gives farmers and other landowners greater administrative avenues short of going to court when they want to appeal a government denial of their permit requests to develop wetlands. The same appeal process is not granted to environmentalists or others who want to challenge the granting of a permit.

"There is some real positive stuff in here; apparently they have exempted a lot of the prior converted wetlands, which is the entire Bootheel," said Thomason.

He is hoping the end result of the policy change will be that farmers in the Bootheel will not need the kind of permits now required.

Said Thomason: "Another thing is they give a greater appeal process, and this is really necessary. Until we get down to a single agency handling wetlands, we will have problems.

"When we held our hearings around the state about wetlands two years ago, we heard many horror stories where agencies were not communicating with each other and there was really no appeals process.

He said the EPA was making decisions arbitrarily. "It didn't matter what you said. The only recourse was to take them to court, and that is an extremely expensive process for a property owner."

With four different agencies involved in wetlands policy each with different definitions landowners are faced with a nightmare that has to end, Thomason said.

He explained: "Can you imagine if you paid your taxes to four different agencies? That's what this is like. The IRS has enough rules and regulations for everybody, but can you imagine having to deal with three other agencies also."

Howard said he understands that ultimately the Soil Conservation Services will be designated to administer the wetlands.

The senator said he is concerned that the definition of wetlands to be used by the federal government is being drafted by the National Academy of Sciences. Howard said agriculture groups fear that not enough lay people are on the commission and that the definition could be too scientific and impractical.

Though the new policy still maintains a position of "no net loss" of wetlands, Thomason and Howard point out that lack of a clear definition of wetlands makes it difficult to determine what "net" is based on.

Said Howard: "To have no net loss, we have to know what we have now. But we don't have a complete inventory of what we have in the state. There has been an effort to inventory for several years, but it has never been completed."

Some of the proposed changes can be done administratively, but others will require Congress to change the Clean Water Act. Thomason and Howard agreed that clarifying language in the act is necessary to end some of the current confusion over wetlands.

They are pleased that the policy still allows mitigation banking, where an acre taken out of wetlands can be replaced with a new acre of land converted to wetlands.

"I think there has been an effort made to address problems that agriculture has had with the wetlands policy, but I'm not sure they have solved all the problems," said Howard. "Farmers and other agriculture interests are still going to have to be involved in a considerable amount of red tape and regulation in order to be in compliance with all the regulations.

"We are regulating away people's private property rights; this is being done in the name of saving the environment, but people who want to save the environment are opposed to more taxes to purchase that land from farmers."

Thomason said the goal of the joint legislative committee is to work toward a common sense approach to wetlands policy. He hopes the new federal changes will be a step in that direction.

"Overall, I think it is a real positive step," summed up Thomason. "It still helps preserve wetlands, which we vitally need. But we need to create more, but at the same time respect the rights of private property owners.

"All we've ever been asking for on wetlands is common sense. I've never met a person who doesn't understand the need to preserve and create wetlands, but this is probably the worst example of government I can think of."

There are an estimated 100 million acres of wetlands in the U.S., not counting 170 million acres in Alaska.

The swamps, marshes and other wetlands support crucial wildlife and biological systems, and are key to flood control, filtration of ground water and maintenance of water quality, as well as ecosystem protection.