Establishing the Task Force on Ocean Policy.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Mr. Hastings for helping bring this legislation to the floor, and I want to thank him for yielding the time. I will speak now for a few minutes explaining the legislation, and I would hope, Mr. Speaker, that we can have a bipartisan vote to move this task force along so that the myriad of issues that cover a broad range of committee assignments, both on the House and the Senate side, and a broad array of Federal departments and agencies can be viewed with a single entity, this task force, between now and June to understand the comprehensive magnificent work of the people under Admiral Watkins that put together this commission report.

The members on the commission are people who have represented and continue to represent the oceans, aquariums around the country, the port authorities, coastal studies, offshore oil drilling, the U.S. Navy, shipping and marine transportation, ocean ecology and fisheries, environmental interests and the banking industry, a broad array of individuals that were appointed by the President, the House and the Senate.

The scientists that represent the Ocean Commission Report that worked to develop the recommended policies are scientists from universities all across the country. Their expertise and diverse fields are in marine economics, coastal and estuarine issues, atmospheric issues, Gulf of Mexico issues and the whole array of problems with hurricanes, fishery science, coastal development, physics of ocean currents, oceanography. The list goes on and on and on.

They presented this report to the U.S. Congress in September of 2004. In this report, there are 31 chapters. Seven of the 31 chapters come under the jurisdiction of the Fisheries and Oceans Subcommittee on Resources. Seven of the 31 chapters come under my jurisdiction in this Ocean Subcommittee. We have held hearings on our part of the Ocean Commission Report. But 24 chapters lie outside the jurisdiction of that Fisheries Subcommittee. And it is important to get this task force so that all those other committees in this House can view this commission task force from the specific recommendations that the task force will assume from the ocean commission report.

What I would like to do is explain to my colleagues, the ocean commission task force makes recommendations in the following areas, which are outside the jurisdiction of the Ocean Subcommittee. Those are: The Congress should establish for better leadership and coordination a national ocean council and a non-Federal ocean council of advisors to view the full range of issues in the departments, the agencies and the executive branch and what goes on in the States and the tribes and the international arena regarding oceans.

They make recommendations to improve NOAA, EPA, the Corps of Engineers, the Department of Interior, USDA and the States in their regional coordination. Right now it is severely fragmented. They make recommendations to clarify offshore responsibilities as far as leasing oil and gas, aquaculture, bioprospecting, wind energy, fisheries, just to name a few. They recommend structural changes in NASA, the Corps of Engineers, the Coast Guard, the U.S. Navy, the National Science Foundation, Aquaculture, Health and Human Services, Department of Justice, Department of State, Department of Labor, Department of Transportation and the United States Agency for International Development. Can all of this be done with one subcommittee or fragmented throughout the course of this Congress? Promote lifelong ocean education, ocean stewardship, science literacy, future ocean leaders, helping to bridge the gap between scientists and educators, a need for qualified ocean science in the classroom, bringing the ocean to the vast array of students across this country. This is the Committee on Education.

Better financial technical institutional support for watershed management initiatives through existing Federal and State laws linking coastal and offshore ecosystems. Better financial technical institutional support for all these issues. Something that is dear to our hearts right now as a result of this past hurricane season, several chapters dealing with guarding people and property against national hazards such as hurricanes and floods. And a year ago, a year and a half ago, in the commission report they predicted, right down to the letter, what could and eventually did happen to New Orleans, to coastal Louisiana, to Mississippi. A vast array of information.

Managing sediment flows: 30 States contribute sediment in the Mississippi River that eventually goes through Louisiana, Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico.

How do we manage those sediment flows?

Techniques for cost benefit analysis is in this report. Marine commerce and transportation across the oceans, the estuaries, and the rivers in this country. Addressing coastal and water pollution, three major laws, statutes. The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, Total Maximum Daily Load Program, Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund, those are outside the jurisdiction of resources entirely. Their recommendations are for dealing with wastewater treatment plants, septic tanks, industrial facilities, agriculture, urban and suburban runoff.

Addressing the atmospheric deposition problem: the single biggest issue

with many estuaries including San Francisco and the Chesapeake Bay is air deposition. Thirty percent of the problem with degrading the Chesapeake Bay is air deposition.

Watershed monitoring: in 1974 we had 500 stations across the country that monitored the quality of water. Today there are 32, from 500 down to 32. The lack of coordination between the State, the Federal Government, and the institutions is appalling.

Limiting vessel pollution and improving vessel safety: that is the EPA, the Coast Guard, and the International Maritime Association. How to deal with invasive species with ballas water, marine organisms, major problems in the Great Lakes, the Mississippi River, and many estuaries around the country.

Connecting the oceans and human health: biomedical research, marine bacteria, contaminated seafood, harmful alga blooms, recommendations that can be gleaned from a single perspective with a single entity such as this task force and then legislative recommendations to the myriad committees that deal with these issues.

Creating a national strategy for increasing scientific knowledge in ocean science, technology, and understanding the oceans' ecosystem.

Collaborating with the international community and funding recommendations for how long this is going to work.

The Ocean Subcommittee under the Resources Committee does not have the time or the resources or the people or the jurisdiction to do this. We have dealt in that ocean subcommittee with our jurisdiction regarding the Ocean Commission Report, which is marine debris, fisheries management, marine mammals, coral reefs, agriculture, ocean observing system, coastal habitats, and so on.

This report by Admiral Watkins and many scientists around this country deserve to have the United States Congress, this institution, take a comprehensive view of this report, study it for several months, and then make legislative recommendations to this body.

I urge my colleagues to vote for the task force.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I would just like to respond to my colleague on the other side of the aisle. This issue did not pop up out of thin air. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle know full well that we have been working on this. We have had numerous, numerous conversations since last May on this particular task force. Leon Panetta, who headed the Pew Ocean Policy Commission's report, is in favor of this task force. Admiral Watkins, who worked on the Oceans Commission's report, is in favor of this task force. As a matter of fact, both of those men, Leon Panetta and Admiral Watkins, are urging my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to vote in favor of this.

Now, as far as my subcommittee that Mr. Pallone serves on dealing with these issues, this is a commission report that did cost a few million dollars, and it is worthy of our close scrutiny, not having staff make up a bill that we do not know the substance of that bill. This commission report is worthy of our attention, of our observation, of our analysis, of our critical understanding of it.

My subcommittee has been dealing with the issues that have come under our jurisdiction. We are working on the marine mammal recommendations, marine debris recommendations, coral reef recommendations, Magnuson Act recommendations. We are doing that and passing that through the subcommittee. But 24 chapters are outside those issues. They deal with the Science Committee, the Transportation Committee, the Agriculture Committee, the International Relations Committee, the Education Committee, the Financial Services Committee. We think, instead of fragmenting this all over again because 30 and 40 years ago we went through this with the Stratton report and there was not any single entity in the House of Representatives that took a critical and analytical view of the Stratton report, we want to do that now. Now is the time to do that.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton).

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

I will tell you this, Mr. Farr: The aspects of Oceans- 21 in your bill that is subject to the jurisdiction----

The parts of your bill that comes under my jurisdiction--

We have held hearings on those issues. We have. And we have developed from your bill legislation that is moving through the subcommittee, that many of them have already passed the subcommittee and the full committee and are awaiting floor action.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to read the first paragraph, because there has been a lot of mention around here about delay and the cost of the ocean commission report. I want to read the first paragraph of the ocean commission report: America's oceans and coasts are priceless assets, indispensable to life itself. They also contribute significantly to our prosperity and overall quality of life. Too often, however, we take these gifts for granted, underestimating their value and ignoring our impact on them. Then our use of the oceans becomes abuse and the productive capacity of our marine resources is diminished.

In 6 months, June 30, this bipartisan task force, made up as a reflection of the ratio of Democrats and Republicans in the House, which is standard practice for all committees, will issue its comprehensive report, legislative recommendations, so that each one of the fragmented committees will not have to deal with these issues that they have very little expertise with in any way.

This is a bipartisan task force that is funded with its own staff separate from any other committee or influences from any other committee to deal with the issue of oceans, which determine the climate, determine the weather, determine the air we breathe, the food source for billions of people. This is an issue that we can get together on, have a bipartisan working relationship and put aside our partisan bickering, because the oceans are priceless. We have some work to do, and we can accomplish that by June 30.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, this task force creates an opportunity to bypass, eliminate the bureaucracy and fragmentation of the myriad of jurisdictions of this body. This task force creates a new dynamic. It brings people in, Democrats, Republicans. It brings the public into the process. It brings scientists into the process. It brings people who work in all the various marine industries into the process to evaluate, to analyze in a very clinical manner the ocean commission recommendations.

This is about specific recommendations coming out of a bipartisan task force with the idea that we eliminate bureaucracy; we eliminate the committee jurisdiction problems and hand to these various committees the specific recommendations that we have evaluated over this 6-month period of time.

The subcommittee is moving legislation with the recommendations from the ocean commission report and the Pew Commission report on oceans. We are dealing with what to do about sanctuaries, marine protected areas, coral reefs, marine debris, Magnuson issues, ecosystem management of the fisheries. All of these things subject to our jurisdiction and the rules of the House are being moved through that subcommittee. I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the task force.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California for yielding me this time, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, in 2003 the Pew Ocean Policy Commission put out a comprehensive report telling us that our oceans were in serious trouble. The Republican leadership quickly ignored the report, saying they wanted to wait for the results of the congressionally appointed U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy. And lo and behold, last September that commission came to the same basic conclusion: that our oceans are in peril from degraded waters, compromised resources, and conflicts between man and nature, and that immediate action is needed. They laid out some pretty pointed recommendations for Congress, and I would like to show this book, which is their recommendations. Over 500 pages at a cost of $10 million. It took them 3 years. They did a comprehensive report at a cost of $10 million.

Well over a year has gone by and still the House Republican leadership has sat on its hands and done virtually nothing for our oceans. At the end of 2004, the Fisheries and Oceans Subcommittee, on which I am the ranking member, held exactly one hearing on the U.S. Ocean Commission's recommendation. This year our subcommittee and the full Resources Committee have done nothing to comprehensively consider or address the commission's recommendations despite my repeated requests.

What we have done instead is to hold a random assortment of hearings on a few areas that are mentioned in the commission's report, but without getting into any of the commission's recommendations. We seem to be highlighting the status quo rather than using the commission's recommendations to move forward.

Now, today in the face of the Republicans' consistent refusal to comprehensively address ocean issues, we are now handed the emptiest of promises that this oceans task force would mean real progress in dealing with the commission's recommendations. We are not going to fall for that, Mr. Speaker. Democrats are going to oppose this task force because it does nothing. Its task will literally be to write a report on a report that itself is already quite prescriptive in its instructions to Congress.

We don't need to study what is wrong with the oceans. We don't need more reports. What we need now is action, real action, not this task force.

I would point out that the resolution says we are going to spend $400,000, that is on top of the $10 million that the U.S. Oceans Commission has already spent. That is taxpayer dollars. That does not count the Pew Commission. That, I think, was mostly private funds. And this is at a time when I keep hearing from the House Republican leadership about how we do not have any money and we have to cut expenses and we do not want to waste our money. Well, why are we wasting another $400,000 in taxpayers' money on a task force that does not even have any legislative responsibility?

I listened to Mr. Hastings, who sponsored this resolution. He said that there is no legislative jurisdiction in this task force. And I have heard my colleague, whom I respect greatly, the gentleman from Maryland. He is my chairman and I respect him greatly, but he goes on to say that there are so many committees that have jurisdiction over this that we don't have the time to deal with it.

Let me tell you, the House Republican leadership has no problem even ignoring committees and writing a lot of legislation in the Rules Committee when they want to get something done. I respect my colleague, but don't tell me that this Republican leadership needs another task force to write a bill, because I have seen bills written in the Rules Committee and come to the floor directly without even going to committee. I just don't buy it.

The truth is the real obstructionists are the Republican leaders and the Republicans on the Resources Committee, not all, but most, who have refused to allow a comprehensive consideration of major ocean issues this entire year.

And I mean not just haphazard hearings, but actually doing something that is meaningful.

The majority proposes to ignore this issue for another 6 months by creating a task force that has no legislative authority and comes with no guarantee that we will be any closer to serious action than before we started.

I want to say that my Democratic colleagues have specific recommendations that they have put in legislative form, and some of them are here on the floor. The gentleman from California (Mr. Farr) has put together the Oceans 21 bill that has most of the government's issues that come out of the U.S. Commission report.

He is a cochair of the Oceans Caucus. The gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) has put forward the Fishing Quota Standards Acts, again adopting a lot of these recommendations. We also have the reauthorization of the Coastal Zone Management Act.

Democrats have been out there with legislation that we would like to move through committee that adopt the recommendations of the U.S. Oceans Commission's report. We have alternatives. We do not need another task force.

And I would point out over and over again I am getting very frustrated, and it may be obvious, with the fact that there is no action on the Republican side. The oceans are a tremendous resource for this Nation. The fishermen, the beach-goers, the coastal business owners in my district, they know this. They expect us to be working on problems facing our oceans. They would be quite disappointed to hear that the House leadership continues to ignore these problems and instead is choosing to avoid real action by studying this problem for another year.

Again, the Pew Commission, U.S. Oceans Commission, they have sounded an alarm; and it is time to do something to save our oceans and what is in our oceans. Let us reject this unnecessary task force and get down to some real work.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller).

(Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, as one point of clarification regarding the claim made by the gentleman, our chairman, that no select committee was formed to consider the Stratton Commission recommendations, I believe that the gentleman from Maryland was in fact wrong on that. The Senate specifically established a National Ocean Policy Study in the Commerce Committee for that purpose.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, again, I think it is very important that we vote no on this resolution. Essentially, it is going to accomplish nothing. I said before that, when Mr. Hastings, who is the sponsor, first spoke earlier today, he said that the task force will have no legislative jurisdiction. If you read section 3, Jurisdiction, under the resolution, it specifically says: The task force may develop recommendations and report to the House on the final report of the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy making recommendations for a national oceans policy entitled, An Ocean Blueprint For the 21st Century.

So, again, it says in the resolution, this is nothing but a report on another report which is already 500 pages, and $10 million of taxpayers' money has been spent on it. Why should we spend another $400,000 to come up with another report on the report with no legislative action? My democratic colleague Mr. Farr says he has a bill, Oceans-21. He is the co-chair of the Oceans Caucus, bipartisan legislation. He asked the gentleman from Maryland, when is there going to be a hearing on that? No answer. When is it going to be reported out? No answer. Why? Because this Republican Congress does not want to take any action on the ocean commission's recommendations. They just want to do another study, another report, another 6-month delay, another $400,000, $500,000 spent. It is ridiculous. We had the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) she said, why isn't her bill being reported?

Now, I know my colleague from Maryland said, Well, we can't do this because this goes across so many committees' jurisdictions. That is really not a legitimate argument.

The bottom line is that this House Republican leadership has taken bills, as I said many times, written them in the Rules Committee. The notion that they cannot get their act together and report out some of these bills, it just does not make any sense. I think that what we are seeing here is a delaying tactic. If you think about it, once this gets started, another 6 months, we will be halfway into the last year of this Congress, and we will basically see absolutely nothing happen. The only way that we are going to see action on the Ocean Commission's recommendations, the only way that we are going to see anything happen here is if we eliminate this task force and we demand and build pressure on the Republican leadership to report out legislation that has already been introduced that would enact the U.S. ocean commission's report. That is the main reason I believe why we must vote no on this legislation. It will accomplish nothing. It is simply another delay.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the resolution to create a House Ocean Task Force.

During the more than 20 years I have been here in the Congress, I have made it a priority to promote protection of our oceans and effective conservation and management of the living marine resources. From protecting coastal wetlands to cleaning up our estuaries to promoting sustainable fisheries to preventing ocean pollution, each has been a priority.

We have accomplished a great deal. But as highlighted in the more than 200 recommendations contained in the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy report released last year, much remains to be done. And as Mr. Gilchrest just pointed out, a bipartisan group to coordinate this activity is necessary, given the fragmentation that has existed in the committee system as it relates to ocean issues for more than 50 years.

As a chief sponsor in the House of the legislation to establish the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, I feel it is important to follow through and ensure the recommendations are effectively implemented.

We need to build on the momentum generated last year by the release of both the U.S. and the Pew Ocean Policy Commission reports and accomplish a true sea change in the way we utilize and manage our ocean resources. Given the scope and sheer number of recommendations from both commissions, it is also clear that we need to prioritize our efforts.

The U.S. commission recommendations to Congress include a range of issues that cannot be addressed by any single committee. This task force will develop a number of recommendations that will be forwarded to the relevant standing committees and work with those committees to see that the recommendations are implemented.

I feel it is time that we recognize that in order to make progress, we need a coordinated Congressional focus incorporating policy justifications of each of the standing committees to draft a comprehensive national oceans policy. This task force will enable us to do that, and I might say that the Republican leadership and I hope the Democrat leadership is committed to help in this effort in a very direct way.

It took more than 10 years to implement the recommendations of the Stratton Commission. We cannot wait 10 years. The first U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy was an important one, but 10 years is just too long to wait. We need to work together to ensure implementation does not take that long this time.

We need to capitalize on the enthusiasm and momentum generated by the commission reports and their recommendations. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this House Ocean Task Force resolution so that we will better be able to deal with ocean issues.

Mr. Speaker, I would just like to point out to my friends on the other side of the aisle that Mr. Gilchrest has spent a great deal of time in working with leadership on this issue, recognizing that there is a process problem here in that the Oceans-21 bill that we all want to see passed is in the jurisdiction of quite some number of committees.

For example, the Agriculture Committee has jurisdiction with regard to issues involving runoff. The Armed Services Committee has obvious jurisdiction over issues involving the Navy. The Transportation Committee is where the Coast Guard subcommittee is housed. The Resources Committee, obviously made up of Interior members I might add, has great jurisdiction here, as does the Financial Services Committee and the Education Committee.

What Mr. Gilchrest is attempting to do here, and I support his effort very much, is to have a bipartisan commission made up that can work with leadership to work it through this morass, this maze of standing committees. If we do not do that, the sure bet is that this bill in this term is going nowhere.

Mr. Speaker, I want to put this debate in some perspective. It was a year ago this week that the commission that the United States Congress created gave their report to us, after spending approximately $10 million of the taxpayers' money to put the report together, a year ago. This debate is about how we spend another year before we do anything, and that is wrong.

What is lacking here is leadership. The ocean issue goes back generations. It goes back to the last administration. President Clinton had the first White House Conference on the Oceans out in California in 1997. That was where all the ideas were created that we needed to upgrade all the oceans. President Bush signed into law and appointed members of the committee which gave us this report.

What is happening is that this task force that is before the House today is just a way of delaying, stalling and not getting anything done. Everybody that is speaking here today loves the oceans. Everybody is a supporter of it, and there is not a greater supporter than Mr. Gilchrest. But, unfortunately, there is a lack of leadership behind Mr. Gilchrest.

Where, Mr. Speaker, is the leadership? There is a bill in his committee, it has been there for almost a year, and

they say, We need more time. That bill was put together with a coalition of Democrats and Republicans and Sea Grant Fellows, the staff, the Ph.D.'s and MAs to come here and work together. They are on it a year with Members and other staff.

There has been all the work done, and it has been put in a bill. It is a bipartisan bill. It has all the cosponsors of the Oceans Caucus, three Democrats and three Republicans. That bill is H.R. 2139 and the leader of that bill is Mr. Weldon from the Republican Party. We have not even been able to have a hearing, not even scheduled a hearing. That bill could pass, and it is the ocean policy. It is the sum total of the parts of those two commissions. We do not need to spend more taxpayer money and more time in our House trying to decide what to do; we just need to do it.

Now, we created a commission after 9/11, and after the recommendations came back, yes, there was debate on it, but in the same year we adopted it, and we took the recommendations. This is not being done.

Mr. Gilchrest is not getting the support. What they are giving him is a bone and saying, Here, go out and use the bureaucracy of the House to have another task force. I ask, what date are we going to have a hearing for our bill? If we want to have some leadership on this, can you give us a date when the Oceans-21 bill will be heard in your committee?

I yield to the gentleman from Maryland.

I just want to know the date. What month? January?

Can we have a hearing on it?

I have not seen any of that, and I am one of the cosponsors of that bill.

The Oceans Blueprint for the 21st Century is the report that we spent $10 million on. The bill to implement that is called Oceans-21. This task force, the caucus, have all been bipartisan, have been equally split. But if you want to look at it, this task force is not only a delay tactic, it is also a very partisan tactic. The task force, for no apparent reason, will have seven Republican members and only five Democratic members. This is the first time in any of the debates we have not been an equal number in leadership and work.

This is a cynical attempt to just delay, to stall. Although you have quoted Mr. Panetta and Admiral Watkins, I know they want more than anything legislation to pass, not creation of another task force.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this resolution for many of the reasons that my colleagues have cited.

The fact of the matter is, we have the blueprint for what needs to be done on the oceans. $10 million was spent developing it. We have another one from the private sector, from the Pew Foundation, led by our former colleague Leon Panetta. I think they spent over $4 million. The Resources Committee has a budget of $14 million. If there are five other committees, most of their budgets are larger than ours, so you are approaching almost $100 million in public moneys that are available to deal with this issue. And yet we are going to create a task force to study a study and spend another $400,000. Either the place is so terribly bureaucratized that it cannot respond or it does not want to respond.

The fact of the matter is, we can do this through a select committee and end up with a legislative product, or we can do this through a task force and end up with a study of a study recommending to the committees, that have not shown any interest to date, that they should do something about the oceans.

You are right, the oceans are far too important to be left to that mechanism. But the fact of the matter is, this task force does not take this any further down the road.

This is about action. As Mr. Farr said, it is about leadership. We have the expertise in the committees. When we did the energy bill, the Speaker told us that the energy bill would be on the floor by a certain date. The Commerce Committee did their part, the Ways and Means Committee did their part. Transportation did their part. Resources did their part. We saw the bill on Monday. We talked about it on Wednesday, voted on it on Friday. It was on the floor the following week. Not a great process, but they obviously wanted to do something to have an energy bill on the floor.

We have done that in other cases. Here they simply do not want to do it. They really just do not want to do this to protect the oceans, because it requires a commitment of resources. It requires a national commitment to protect the oceans, and the Republican Congress is not interested in doing that. If they wanted to do it, they would do it. They simply do not want to do it.

But what they want to do now is just throw some additional money at it to kind of kick the can down the road. The emotions are too important to be kicked down the road. This should be addressed by this Congress. We have had a year, and nothing has happened. So now we are going to spend another 6 months and the ball is not going to get advanced very far, other than politically, and then we are going to be back telling the committees they should do something about the oceans. We just spent $15 million telling the committees they should do something about the oceans.

So this is about whether you have the will to do something about the oceans, whether you have the political ability to do something about the oceans and the leadership to do something about the oceans, or you do not. It just does not make any sense.

This system, I guess, should become more flexible to deal with, because almost all of the tasks now that the Congress deals with cut across committee jurisdiction lines. So we ought to become more flexible to deal with it. We should not just be throwing more money at it to pretend like we are doing something to advance this incredibly important, incredibly urgent oceans agenda. This task force does not deal with that. I urge my colleagues to vote against this.