----- Original Message -----

From:

To:

Sent: Monday, June 15, 2009 11:31 PM

Subject: Congress To Seize Control Of All
U.S. Waters

Congress To
Seize Control Of All U.S. Waters

You must take urgent
action to help stop the CWRA (Clean Water Restoration Act).  This bill
will have a huge impact on business, agriculture, small communities, rural
America, farming, ranching and all private lands in cities and towns as well.

It will overturn the Rapanos and SWANCC

Supreme Court Decisions of
2006 and 2001.

No one who owns private
land in a city,

town or countryside is safe.

Congress To Seize Control Of All U.S. Waters

Land Rights Network

American Land Rights Association

PO Box 400 – Battle Ground, WA
98604

Phone: 360-687-3087 – Fax:
360-687-2973

E-mail: [email-masked]

Web Address:
http://www.landrights.org

Legislative Office: 507 Seward
Square SE – Washington, DC 20003

Your Senator Votes On Huge Water Land
Grab Bill Thurs., June 18

Senate Committee S 787 Wetlands Vote
Thursday, June 18

Urgent!
Please forward this message as widely as possible

-----The Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee (EPW) is scheduled to hold a vote (mark-up) on the Clean
Water Restoration Act (Wetlands) (S 787) Thursday, June 18th.

-----You are receiving this e-mail
because you live in a state of a Member of the Senate Environment and Public
Works Committee.

The vote is on the official schedule
for June 18th. Urge a NO vote.

See Inside
EPA news article below.

See Action Items below.

See e-mail by RJ Smith from the
Center for Private Conservation below.

See entire Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee below.

-----We can only get the message out
fast enough if you forward this e-mail.   Send it to your entire
list.  You are doing a great job but you must keep it up.

-----This is an urgent, all out call
to action on the Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787) (Wetlands).

-----Call your friends, call your
neighbors.  You are doing a great job so far.  Now is the time for a
grassroots uprising.

-----Deluge your senators with
calls, faxes and e-mails at (202) 224-3121.  You can call any Senator at
that number.  Their faxes are listed below.  Ask for the e-mail of
the staffer in charge of this issue.  You need to make sure they know they
will be held responsible for their votes on this issue.

-----Do you want the Corps and EPA
in your backyard?

-----Do you want the EPA and Corps
to control your water?

-----Do you want the Corps and EPA
to control all your watersheds that means all your land too?

------That’s what will happen
if the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S787) passes Congress.

-----Besides private property, the
Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S 787) threatens businesses, agriculture,
small communities, grazing, forestry, mining and many other uses on private and
Federal land.  It will affect many kinds of manufacturing companies and
businesses.

-----The Real Goal of the Clean
Water Restoration Act (S787) is to give Corps and EPA Control over your water
and all your watersheds.  That means National Land Use Controls as well as
control over all your water and land.  That’s because all land is in
a watershed. The proposed Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S787), which has
no House bill number yet, will give the Corps and EPA jurisdiction and control
over your property and water.

-----It will redefine what the term
“wetlands” means in the law.  It will eliminate the
requirement that the Corps and EPA limit their jurisdiction to
“Navigable” waters and give those agencies control over all waters
of the US or “activities” affecting those waters.

-----Congress is considering
expanding the jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act of 1972 to include “all
waters of the United States” and not limit it to “navigable
waters” as is currently the law under two Supreme Court Decisions, the Rapanos and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and
2001.

-----Congress is also considering
expanding Clean Water Act jurisdiction to include “all activities
affecting these waters.”  In other words, the bill is a double
whammy:  It expands the definition of waters and gives the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA), Corps of Engineers (Corps) and other Federal agencies
control over activities that affect waters—any land use activities.

-----There has been no hearing on S
787 in this Congress.

-----Chairman Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
tried to ram through a vote on  S 787 Thursday,
May 7th, but there were objections.   The Committee wanted
to vote May 20th and June 10th but were unable to.

-----That’s because of your
phone calls, e-mails and other contacts.  You are doing a great job but
you must keep it up.

-----Please accept our apology for
the length of this message.  We believed it was important for you to see
the Inside EPA article as well as the RJ Smith e-mail included below.

-----Also call the National Rifle Association at (703) 267-1000 to stop
their back room deal selling out farmers, ranchers and landowners.
As a life member of the NRA, I want the NRA to protect our guns, not help take
our land.  You can read about what the NRA is doing in the news story
below– Chuck Cushman

If you live in Montana, you should know that Senator Max Baucus is working on a
backroom deal to get S 787 voted out of Committee.  The people in Montana
must rise up and tell him no to the Clean Water Restoration Act, S 787.
See inside EPA article below about Baucus slight of
hand efforts.

If you live in Tennessee, Senator
Lamar Alexander (R-TN) is also working on the backroom deal to pass S
787.  You need to call him and give him a piece of your mind.

If you live in Ohio, you need to ask
Senator Voinovich to stop trying to pass S 787.

If you live in Minnesota, understand that Senator Amy Klobuchar
(D-MN) is working with Senators Baucus (D-MT), Alexander (R-TN) and Voinovich
(R-OH) in the dark of night to pass S 787.

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Action Items:  Here’s what you can do
to fight back..

-----1. Forward this message to your
entire list if possible.  This is a huge issue for rural
America.

-----2.  Call your Senator or
Senators who are on the Environment and Public Works Committee list below to
insist that the Committee hold new hearings on S 787 in this Congress before
any vote.  When you call, ask them to vote no on S 787.   Ask
for the staff person who handles S 787 and ask for his or her e-mail or
fax.

-----3.  You must deluge the Committee with calls
requesting hearings and a no vote. Call any Senator at (202) 224-3121.

-----4.  Send a fax to your
Senator.  A faxable formatted pdf Testimony
Questionnaire can be printed out from American Land Rights at www.landrights.org.   You can
make changes.

-----5.  You can get both a
formatted Testimony Questionnaire that you can fax and an unformatted text
version that you can put in e-mail.  It is too late to use the mail.
We have included the fax number for your Senator who is on the EPW Committee
listed below.

-----6.  You must also request a recorded vote on S 787
when they do vote.  We must be able to give the Senators that vote for
this huge land and water grab all the credit they deserve for their
votes.

-----7.  Call the National Rifle Association at (703)
267-1000.  Insist that they overturn their backroom deal and come out
against S 787.

-----8.  You want to call both your Senators even
if they are not on the EPW Committee to ask that they request the EPW Committee
to hold new hearings and that any Senators on the Committee they talk to vote
no on S 787.

(202)
224-3121

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There must be an all out call of outrage to the
Senators on the Committee opposing a vote until they hold a hearing this year
on the new bill S 787.

You can call any Senator at (202) 224-3121.
Make sure they know you oppose S 787 and urge them to vote against it.

-----

Here is a list of the
Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) Members:

Their phones must ring off
the hook.

You want new hearings held
in 2009.

Call your Senators, and then call the
other Senators.  You can call all Senators at (202) 224-3121 or their
individual offices listed below.

EPW Comm:
Democrats…PH:  202-224-8832…Fax:
224-1273

Barbara Boxer, CA (Chair)…Ph:
202-224-3553…Fax 224-1454

Max Baucus, MT…Ph:
202-224-2651…Fax
224-9412

Thomas Carper, DE…Ph:
202-224-2441…Fax 228-2190

Frank Lautenberg NJ…Ph:
202-224-3224…Fax 228-4054

Benjamin Cardin, MD…Ph:
202-224-4524…Fax 224-1651

Bernard Sanders, VT (Ind)…Ph:  202-224-5141…Fax 228-0776

Amy Klobuchar,
MN…Ph:  202-224-3244…Fax 228-2186

Sheldon Whitehouse,
RI…Ph:  202-224-2921    Fax 228-6362

Tom Udall, NM…Ph:
202-224-6621…Fax 228-3261

Jeff Merkley
OR…Ph:  202-224-3753…Fax 228-3997

Kirsten Gillibrand,
NY…Ph:  202-224-4451…Fax 228-0282

Arlen Specter, PA…Ph:
202-222-4254…Fax 228-4254

EPW Republicans…PH:
202-224-6176…Fax: 224-5167

James Inhofe, OK (Rnk. Mem.)…Ph:
202-224-4721…Fax 228-0380

George Voinovich, OH…Ph:
202-224-3353…Fax 228-1382

David Vitter, LA…Ph:
202-224-4623…Fax 228-5061

John Barrasso,
WY…Ph:  202-224-6441…Fax 224-1724

Mike Crapo, ID…Ph:
202-224-6142…Fax 228-1375

Christopher Bond, MO…Ph:
202-224-5721…Fax 224-8149

Lamar Alexander, TN…Ph:
202-224-4944…Fax 228-3398

Background:

Congress Moves To Seize
Control Of All U.S. Waters

Key Wetlands Bill Coming In
Congress. It is called the Clean Water Restoration Act.  The new Senate
number is S 787.

This committee will decide the
future of the Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787) that threatens you.  So
you have more power to influence the Senators on the Committee.

You then need to call, fax or e-mail
them letting your Senators know of your opposition to the Clean Water
Restoration Act.  The EPW Committee is trying to avoid holding
hearings.  You need to insist that they hold new hearings and request to
be notified about the hearings and if possible, ask to testify.

No number has been designated yet in
the House.  It should be introduced in the House soon.  You must
contact both your Senators immediately even if they are not on the
Committee.

The Clean Water Restoration Act
(CWRA) is bouncing around the

House Committee.  It should be introduced
shortly.

Here are the two Committees that
have jurisdiction.  You can see a complete list of committee members at www.landrights.org.

-----House Transportation and
Infrastructure Committee

-----Senate Environment and Public
Works Committee

------We again apologize in advance
for the length of this e-mail.  But we are trying to give you the tools to
be effective with your Congressman and both Senators.  We are trying to
shorten the e-mails by placing material on the website with links.

-----The Clean Water Restoration Act
is a massive land and water grab.  You need to read the following
information and then contact both your Senators and your
Congressman.

-----Early action by you gives us a
good chance to defeat the CWRA (S787) and prevents your Congressman from
signing on as a co-sponsor.

-----Additional Action Items:

-----1.  Go to www.landrights.org to see the Members of
the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Senate
Environment and Public Works Committee.

-----2. Go to www.landrights.org to check which of your
Senators or Congressman is on the Committees listed above.  You have a lot
more power if you find your Congressman or Senator is
on the list of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the House or
the Environment and Public Works Committee in the Senate.

-----3.  Write, call, fax and e-mail both your Senators
even if they are not listed on the Environment and Public Works
Committee.   You may call any Senator at (202) 224-3121.  Ask
for the staff person who handles the Wetlands, Corps of Engineers or the
Environment and Public Works Committee.   Request his or her e-mail
address or fax number.  You can write any Senator at:  Honorable
_________ U. S. Senate, Washington, DC 20510.   It is better to fax
your letter because time may be short.

Be sure to ask when the hearings are
scheduled, request to be notified about those hearings, and request to testify
if you can.

To send testimony you can use the
revised and updated New Clean Water Restoration Act Corps of Engineers, EPA and
Wetlands Testimony Questionnaire available in both formatted and text versions
at www.landrights.org

-----4.  Write, call, fax and
e-mail your Congressman in opposition to the Clean Water Restoration Act no
matter if he or she is on either of the two Committees listed
above.   What you need to know is written below.  You may call
any Congressman at (202) 225-3121.  We’ve made it easy to write
testimony by setting up two versions of the Testimony Questionnaire on the
website www.landrights.org.

-----The first version is a
formatted version you can print out, add your comments to, and fax or mail it
to your Senators or your Congressman.

-----The second version is an
unformatted text version you can put in your word processor, edit to meet your
needs and concerns, and then e-mail to your Senators and Congressman.
Just go to www.landrights.org and the
two versions for the Senate and the two versions for the House will be right on
the home page.

When you call your Congressman, ask
for the staff person who handles Wetlands, the Corps of Engineers or the House
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and request his or
her    e-mail address.  You can write any Congressman at:
Honorable _________, US House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515.

Ask to be notified about coming
hearings and if possible, ask that you be allowed to testify.

-----5 Be sure
to tape a printed copy of this e-mail to your refrigerator door so you can
refer to it in the future.  This is going to be a huge battle and will
take time and action by you to save your water and land.

Finding the Testimony Questionnaires
is easy.  They are right on the home page at www.landrights.org.   The
formatted version can be printed out and mailed or faxed to your Senators and
Congressman with any added comments you wish to make.  The text version
you can put in your word processor and edit any way you like.  Then e-mail
it to your Senators and Congressman.

You can also use the Testimony
Questionnaires to give you ideas to write a personal letter. Keep it to one
page.  Because of time limitations, be sure to fax it to your Congressman
and both Senators.

-----Oberstar,
Feingold, Baucus, Voinovich and Klobuchar will try to
gut the meaning of the word “Navigable.”  They are doing this
to make it possible for Democrats on their Committees to vote for the Clean
Water Restoration Act (CWRA) without getting hammered by you..

Your Congressman and both
Senators must hear from you that you are not falling for this trick.  They
must learn from you that they will be held responsible if they vote for the
Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA).

----- Maps showing existing Clean
Water Act affected areas compared to the areas affected if the CWRA (Clean
Water Restoration Act) if the CWRA were to pass Congress are right on our
homepage at www.landrights.org

If you see the number HR 2421, that
is last year’s number.  That’s the old House number Oberstar
used last year.  You should call your Congressman to request that he or
she inform you when the new House version of the Clean Water Restoration Act is
introduced in the House and what the new number is.  This is very
important because it lets him or her know you are interested and following the
issue.

Until the House assigns a new
number, use CWRA or better yet, the full “Clean Water Restoration
Act” name to describe the bill.  Of course, in the Senate use S
787.

-----The Clean Water Restoration Act
is worse than a mere return to the jurisdiction the Corps of
Engineers and EPA had before the U.S. Supreme Court limited their
jurisdiction.

It gives the jurisdiction to the federal government that the
environmental bureaucrats only dreamed of before the Supreme Court's rulings.

-----An example is that the Federal bureaucracies will gain control
over all the watersheds in the United States.  That includes dry land
inside or adjacent to watersheds.  That means everything.  Because all land is in a watershed.

-----And in fact the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S787) even
goes far beyond that by adding the language, “the activities affecting
these waters,” which is essentially a limitless national land use control
provision.

-----Chairman Rep. Oberstar and
Senators Feingold, Baucus and Alexander Klobuchar,
Voinovich and other Members of Congress are trying to overturn the U.S. Supreme
Court decisions using the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) to define those
decisions away.   The Supreme Court said the Corps and EPA only have
jurisdiction over “Navigable Waters.”

-----Oberstar, Feingold, Baucus and
Alexander want to give the Corps and EPA jurisdiction over “all
water” and “all activities affecting those waters.”

-----The
Clean Water Restoration Act restores the jurisdiction of the Corps and EPA over
all the lands they had taken jurisdiction over before the two critical Rapanos and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001

-----The Clean Water
Restoration Act is the biggest threat to private property since CARA and actually
affects far more land and people.  It seeks to overturn the critical Rapanos and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001
that said the Corps of Engineers was going outside their jurisdiction..

Alert ….. Alert ….. Alert

Democrats
and Oberstar staff lay out their plan to use Clean Water Act and Corps
Jurisdiction to create national land use controls.

Read
it in their own words.

Oberstar staff White Paper published
on our Website, www.landrights.org.

ALRA has published an Executive
Summary and Analysis of the Oberstar Staff White Paper written by our associate
Don Parmeter of the National Water Conservation
Alliance.  You’ll see in their own words
what the Democrats plan is to control your land.  Go to www.landrights.org.

------In the White Paper on the
Clean Water Act you’ll see how Rep. James Oberstar, Chairman of the
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee want to give the power and
jurisdiction to the Corps of Engineers and EPA to control all the watersheds in
the United States.  All land is in a watershed.

-----It is critical that you forward
this message as widely as possible and hand out copies.   Send it to
your friends, neighbors and business associates no matter where they
live.  The Clean Water Restoration Act affects all waters across the whole
U.S.

-----It became clear
what Oberstar is really up to at the House Transportation and Infrastructure
Committee Hearing
on Oberstar’s Clean Water Act Wetlands Land Grab Bill, the Clean Water
Restoration Act at a hearing last year.

-----Committee Chairman James
Oberstar (D-MN) made it clear at the hearing that he plans to overturn the Rapanos and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

-----That would give the Corps of
Engineers and EPA jurisdiction over nearly all private and Federal land.
The Supreme Court limited that jurisdiction in the two Supreme Court
decisions.  Look at the two maps for comparison of how the Clean Water
Restoration Act affects the country at www.landrights.org.

Even if you sent in testimony last
year, you should do it again.  This is a new Congress and a new bill.
You should also call, fax and e-mail both your
Senators, your Congressman and any other Congressman from your state plus all
the Members of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.   You
should also call Members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

-----Call,
Call, Call.  Fax, fax, fax.  The Senate and
House must be overwhelmed with testimony and phone calls.  You can call
any Senator at (202) 224-3121.  You can call any Congressman at (202)
225-3121

Some Democrats have real concerns
about the affect of the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) on their
constituents.   They are worried about whether you will realize that
the CWRA really hurts you in a big way and that their vote will be held against
them in the election next year.

Your actions can help get both Democrats and
Republicans

to oppose the Clean Water
Restoration Act (S 787)..

-----You must make it clear to them that
you know the Clean Water Restoration Act will overturn the Rapanos
and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

That means the CWRA (S787) will vastly expand the
jurisdiction of the Corps of Engineers and the EPA.

It is critical that you take action
with both your Senators and your Congressman and any other Congressman from
your state.   Please fill out and e-mail or fax or e-mail your
Testimony Questionnaire to both your Senators and your Congressman.  You
can find specially written versions for both the Senate and the House at www.landrights.org. You are free to
change them any way you want.

Also call both your Senators and
your Congressman to make sure they know you oppose the Clean Water Restoration
Act and any attempt to overturn the Rapanos and
SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

If you sent testimony to your
Senators or Congressman last year, it does not count now.  You must do it
again because it is a new Congress and the Testimony Questionnaire at www.landrights.org is different than what
you sent before.

-----Call at least five friends,
forward this message to them, and get them to submit testimony.

-----The Clean Water Restoration Act
has very little to do with clean water or restoration.  It is mostly about
land use control and expanding the power, reach and jurisdiction of the Corps
of Engineers and EPA over their definition of “wetlands” under the
Clean Water Act of 1972.

-----What the bill supporters are
doing is using the term “Clean Water,” which everybody wants, as a
tool to pass legislation (CWRA) that is really about land use control and has
little or nothing to do with clean water.  It is a huge rural land grab
but it affects urban areas too.  Their target is land use control over all
lands, both urban and rural.

-----What the Clean Water
Restoration Act does is give the Corps of Engineers and EPA control over all
private property in the US by changing the definition of “wetlands”
under the Clean Water Act of 1972 expanding the regulatory reach of the Corps
and EPA over private property.

-----You must prevail on both your
Senators and your Congressman not to let that happen.

Go to www.landrights.org to print out a
formatted Testimony Questionnaire to mail or fax to both your Senators and your
Congressman.  Or download a text version you can edit in your word
processing program and then e-mail to your Congressman and both Senators.

Send a copy of your testimony to
American Land Rights and we will hand deliver it to your Senators and
Congressman.  Fax it to (360) 687-2973 to e-mail it to [email-masked]

You can borrow information from the
Testimony Questionnaire to simply write a letter.  Try to keep your letter
to one page.  Fax the letter if you can.   Mail is too slow for
this vote.

Follow up with a phone
call.

-----Urgent Action Required

You must take urgent
action to help stop the CWRA (Clean Water Restoration Act).  This bill
will have a huge impact on business, agriculture, small communities,

rural
America, farming, ranching and all private lands.

It will overturn the Rapanos and SWANCC

Supreme
Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

No one who owns private
land in a

city,
town or countryside is safe.

Your help is greatly
appreciated.

Chuck Cushman

Executive Director

American Land Rights Association

(360) 687-3087

[email-masked]

See the Land Rights Network reprint
below of Inside EPA article that talks about the NRA
inside backroom deal.  See who is selling you out.   Senators
Baucus, Alexander, Voinovich and Klobuchar are also
involved in a backroom deals in order to pass S 787 out of Committee.

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Daily News from InsideEPA.com -
Wednesday, June 03, 2009

To Win Farm Support For CWA Bill, Baucus Exempts Chemical Spraying

In an apparent bid to win support
from agriculture groups for legislation clarifying the scope of the Clean Water
Act (CWA), Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) is offering to exempt pesticide spraying
activities from water act permit requirements imposed by a controversial recent
appellate ruling.

Baucus has also proposed to exempt
hunting and shooting activities from the water law to address National Rifle
Association (NRA) concerns that recent court rulings have defined bullets as a
“point source” if they are discharged into waters.

But the pesticide exemption is
facing opposition from environmentalists and has not yet won support from other
Democrats on the Senate environment committee. “Serious discussions are
ongoing, but no final resolution has been made,” a source close to the
situation says.

It is also not clear whether the
Obama administration will back Baucus’ proposal. The Department of
Justice (DOJ), on behalf of EPA, in a May 27 brief reiterated its call for the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit to stay for two years its January
ruling in National Cotton Council v. EPA requiring permits for spraying
activities, a move intended to give the agency time to craft a permit program.

And in a June 3 brief DOJ urged the
6th Circuit to deny an industry request for an en banc rehearing, saying
“EPA believes it can conform its conduct to comply with
the panel’s decision.”

Baucus’ proposal, an amendment
to a Democratic bill seeking to clarify the scope of the Clean Water Act, S.
787, would add pesticide application to a list of activities exempt from the
discharge standards in section 402 of the water law, if applied in accordance
with federal pesticide regulations.

Baucus’ office is floating the
amendment in hopes of winning support to include it in the bill, introduced by
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI). It is the latest proposal Baucus has floated to
amend the Feingold bill.

Last month he floated a substitute
to the Feingold bill that hewed closely to a proposal from states that codified
EPA’s regulatory definition of jurisdictional waters, making most waters
subject to federal oversight, not just “navigable waters” as is the
case under current law.

Environmentalists insist on dropping
jurisdiction based on navigability as a way to overcome current and possible
future Supreme Court limitations on jurisdiction, but industry officials insist
on maintaining it.

The Baucus plan also codified
regulatory exemptions for prior converted croplands and waste treatment systems
that environmentalists have long opposed codifying.

His latest proposal retains those
two exemptions while also adding new exemptions for shooting activities and
pesticide spraying. If the chemicals are applied “in accordance with the
instructions on the label” under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide &
Rodenticide Act, the spraying “shall be
considered to have met all requirements for a permit under this section,”
the new amendment says.

The new exemption is a response to
the Cotton Council ruling, which says pesticide spraying on or near waters
constitutes a “point source,” requiring a water act permit. Industry
officials say that the ruling has far reaching implications for pesticide
applications and other activities previously considered as nonpoint source
activities that until now have been exempted from permit requirements under the
CWA.

EPA in its recent briefs says that
the agency may have to issue as many as 365,000 new permits because of the
ruling.

The case played a key role in the
agriculture industry’s opposition to Feingold’s bill, which they
say could expand the reach of the CWA to more waters than were originally
regulated under the water act before two Supreme Court rulings.

Feingold’s bill seeks to
clarify the CWA in the wake of two cases --  Solid
Waste Agency of Northern Cook County (SWANCC) v. Army Corps of Engineers and Rapanos, et ux., et al. v. United States --  which
critics say have narrowed the law’s jurisdiction over isolated wetlands,
intermittent streams and other marginal waters. In SWANCC, the court limited
the basis for asserting jurisdiction over solely intrastate waters, while in Rapanos,
the court provided two competing tests for determining jurisdiction.

Baucus and other moderates have been
seeking to pick up support from some in the agriculture community for
Feingold’s bill, according to industry sources. The latest offer could
boost prospects for the bill’s passage. For instance, one source says the
wheat sector may endorse the Baucus amendment.

But despite Baucus’ latest
effort, most industry groups, including many agricultural organizations,
continue to take a hard line against the legislation because it would remove
“navigable” from its definition of “waters,” which
industry critics say would broaden the reach of the CWA far beyond the
law’s original reach.

Sources following the negotiations
say the changes Baucus made to the bill are also in part intended to appease
concerns from the NRA stemming from several federal court decisions defining
bullets as a “point source” if they are discharged into waters. An
NRA source says the organization has voiced its concerns to Senate environment
committee members that the bill could drastically expand permitting
requirements.

“The [EPA] administrator shall
neither require a permit under this section, nor directly or indirectly require
any state to require a permit, for any discharge from a firearm during hunting
or competitive or recreational shooting,” the amendment says, adding the
language to section 402(l) of the CWA, which includes other exemptions for
agriculture, oil and gas related stormwater runoff.
The amendment also includes exemptions for hunting and recreational shooting
under sections 404 and 502 of the CWA.

Baucus’ bid may also
underscore a desire by moderates on the environment committee to obtain
additional political cover in order to support Feingold’s bill, even
after the Obama Administration recently issued statement of principles calling
on Congress to “broadly protect” waters under the CWA.

Environmentalists and others said
the Obama administration’s recent release of principles calling for
legislation to expand the reach of the water act could provide cover for
moderates like Baucus and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN).

While the principles stop short of
endorsing a particular bill, they go some way towards heeding
environmentalists’ calls for the incoming Obama administration to endorse
S. 787. The principles also echo recent statements from Jackson who called for
a legislative fix to expand the law’s scope.

The statement does, however, endorse
calls by states and industry groups to preserve existing regulatory exemptions,
such as those for prior converted croplands.

Republicans and industry groups
continue to call for further hearings on legislation to define the scope of the
CWA, arguing that new members of the environment committee deserve more
information on the bill. Both industry groups and EPA held briefings for Senate
staff on the issue this week. -- Jonathan Strong

End of InsideEPA
article

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Please forward this message as
widely as possible.  This is a historic issue.

It is incredibly important for you
to forward this message.   By forwarding the message, you can help
get millions of copies of this   critically important e-mail
distributed.  Thank you in advance for your help.

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This is a forward of an e-mail sent
by RJ Smith of the Center For Private Conservation on
Friday, June 12th.   Even though it makes this message
even longer, it is very much worth your time to read.  You can reach RJ at
[email-masked].

I received an email at 11:05
p.m. last night from E&PW staff that Sen. Barbara Boxer and
company are going to bring the Clean Water Restoration Act up for full
committee mark-up and vote in their Thursday 18 June business session scheduled
for 9:30 a.m. in the EPW Hearing Room, 406 Dirksen.

This is Sen Russ Feingold's S.787 which was
introduced on April 2.

With the Democrats having nationalized the financial, banking and automobile
industries -- bringing a strong layer of socialism to the key portions of
the US economy, they are now moving to nationalize the American land and water.

Under the Clean Water Act the Federal government only had the authority to
regulate "navigable waters" and control the discharge of pollutants
and dredge and fill activities within those navigable waters.

The so-called Clean Water RESTORATION Act restores nothing. That is a
hoax.  Instead it removes the restrictive and limiting terms
"navigable" waters and unconstitutionally extends the Federal
regulatory authority over ALL waters of the United States.  This includes
the driest desert areas that may only hold water for a few weeks a year during
summer monsoon rains.  And it includes completely isolated prairie
potholes (small ponds and marshes) with no connection whatsoever to any other
waters.

Furthermore, the bill will now prohibit ALL activities affecting all waters of
the United States.  This means that anything a landowner, a business, a
county roads department, a waterfowl conservation program undertakes that could
conceivably affect anything that is wet -- will be subject to
the discretionary jurisdiction of Army Corps or EPA
bureaucrats.  They will then be able to make the lives of family farmers,
ranchers, tree farmers, homebuilders -- almost anyone and everyone -- literally
impossible.  They will have the total power to force every farmer or
rancher or ordinary business owner to run a gauntlet of permits, red tape,
delays -- that will delay projects long enough and cost so much as to
essentially shut down or bankrupt even the most necessary and innocuous
projects.

There are copious examples of wetlands horror stories over the last 20 years
where people have been imprisoned and fined staggering amounts for simply
building their own home, cleaning up dumps, or creating habitat for
waterfowl.  And that occurred under the CWA
restrictions of "navigable waters" and prohibitions only on
discharging pollutants and dredge and fill activities.

Once those constraints are removed by the CWRA, life will quickly become
a bureaucratic nightmare with no exit -- particularly so throughout
all of rural America.  This bill would be much more honestly named The
Rural Cleansing Act of 2009.

This will be a tough
battle given that the E&PW Committee make up is 12 Ds and 7 Rs (which
includes Senators George Voinovich and Lamar Alexander.)

It is especially important to enlist the help of the
agricultural community, especially county and state farm bureaus.  Request
that they notify not only the members of the Senate E&PW but also the
Senate Agriculture Committee.

It is also vital to contact Rep. Collin Peterson Chairman of the House
Agriculture Committee and request that he ask for oversight hearings on the
impact of the CWRA on America's farmers and the nation's food production.

You should also request that the farmers and ranchers you know and your county
and state farm bureaus and cattlemen's associations contact the American Farm
Bureau Federation and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association asking them to
strongly oppose the CWRA.

You must take urgent
action to help stop the CWRA (Clean Water Restoration Act).  This bill
will have a huge impact on business, agriculture, small communities, rural
America, farming, ranching and all private lands.

It will overturn the Rapanos and SWANCC

Supreme
Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

No one who owns private
land in a city,

town
or countryside is safe.