First, my thanks to the Maritime Association of New York and New Jersey for the opportunity to have further dialogue on the topic of Harbor Safety Committees. The conference last year, and the conclusions drawn in the MTS Report, gave marine transportation good visibility and a road map for future action. This meeting gives us yet another chance to follow up on the MTS Report recommendations made to Congress last September.
    Among the suggestions made in the report was formation of the MTS National Advisory Council which will be made up of representatives from private sector organizations that have a role in the MTS.
    As AAPA Chairman of the Board, I'm pleased to say that AAPA plans to submit the name of Bernie Groseclose, President & CEO of the South Carolina State Ports Authority, as our representative to the MTS Council. We look forward to Bernie's participation on the Council and to providing input which will shape our future.

    As all of you know, port authorities are stewards of the public assets that facilitate the movement of goods between land and sea transport systems. So, we're not only concerned with landside infrastructure and operational issues, we're naturally concerned with the development, operation, security and emergency response capabilities of the waterside component.
    Ports represent a complex web of shared responsibility between local, state and federal public and private stakeholders. The uniqueness of each port warrants allowing each to operate independently, with maximum flexibility to adapt to the local market environment.

    The title of this panel, "Harbor Safety Committee's Role in Individual Port Competition," implies that safety issues may be used to gain competitive advantage in one region or another.
    The first thing to put on table is that harbor safety is a universal issue. Ports may be fiercely competitive, but they are in complete agreement on the importance of harbor safety. Local port groups have been cooperating on issues of mutual importance for many years, long before the MTS Report was developed.
    These local groups have been doing a good job planning for and addressing the issues that can, and have, come up in harbors. Many of them are strong advocates for managing harbors in ways that maximize protecting the environment. They collectively address regulatory issues and review new legislation that impacts their regions. At the local level, they are most familiar with the unique characteristics of their own harbor. In my view, they should be allowed to continue to address harbor safety needs at the local level, while encouraging and cooperating with the new Federal Interagency Committee for the MTS and the MTS National Advisory Council in Washington.
    Ports are encouraged by the fact that the MTS called attention to the need for coordination. Similarly, in the mid-1990s, the creation of a National Dredging Policy by the Clinton Administration held out to policy makers the challenge of improving interagency coordination so that ports could get their channels dredged in a more timely and efficient manner. The National Dredging Team has helped forge better relationships between regulatory agencies and their clients - the local sponsors for projects. The NDT now meets monthly and the Regional Dredging Teams less often, but they serve as a model for Harbor Safety Committees and the MTS effort.

    While there may only be a handful of what the Coast Guard officially calls "Harbor Safety Committees," there are many groups that perform similar functions. In my own region, for example, the Hampton Roads Maritime Association fills the role of an HSC. As a Board member of HRMA, I can tell you that this group helps to determine what's in the best interest of the Hampton Roads/Norfolk harbors.
    The Hampton Roads Maritime Association Board includes steamship lines, agents, towing and barge folks, Virginia pilots, port personnel, and local, state and federal agency representatives. We discuss issues through an extensive committee structure. For example, as an organization we have a hurricane contingency plan that maps out what should happen in the harbor 24 hours in advance, 12 hours in advance, and so on, up until the hurricane hits. All our members are involved in developing the plan. Each year, we try to fine tune it. Then we sit down after the hurricane season to talk about any changes we need to make next year.
    We also advocate local and national issues that are important to harbor users. The HRMA has actively participated in the debate about replacement of the Harbor Maintenance Tax. Representatives attend meetings in Washington, write letters to members of Congress and help inform people about the challenges that our harbors face.

    One issue which the HRMA is deeply concerned about is the lack of adequate funding for navigation safety programs such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) mapping and charting and real-time tides and information systems. As a port community, we're very disappointed that the charting situation is as bad as it is. The backlog of mapping and charting of our waters is a national disgrace.
    In Hampton Roads, our harbor is a busy place -- not just to commercial traffic -- but we're homeport to many Navy vessels. We expect cargo activity to increase substantially in the next 10 years. We have already seen 6,000+ TEU vessels like the Regina Maersk in our harbor, which, fully loaded, require depths of 46 feet or more. Ships like the Regina are sailing alongside a host of other commercial vessels such as barges and tugs. At the same time the numbers of recreational and commercial users of the harbor are increasing, with yachts, jet skis, sailboats, motor cruisers, and kayaks coexisting. With all this vessel activity, well coordinated, safe, efficient and secure management of vessel operations is critical.

    Mariners transiting U.S. waters all too often are forced to rely on out-dated navigational charts and tidal predictions produced by NOAA. A large percentage of the depths shown on NOAA charts are based on surveys that were conducted over 50 years ago. A number of deep draft ships that travel through U.S. waters are relying on charts with depths that were determined by lead lines. Likewise, NOAA has recently been forced to withdraw tide and current predictions for several major ports due to insufficient and outdated information.
    The Hydrographic Service Improvement Act of 1998 (Public Law 105-384) was designed to address concerns about the state of the U.S. nautical charting and navigational services programs. The Act authorized $121.5 million for Navigation Services in Fiscal Year 2000. In FY 2000, Congress funded these programs at a level of only $100 million--jeopardizing efforts to improve navigation safety throughout the United States.

    With accurate, real-time information and modern forecasts, newer deeper-draft ships can safely adjust loads to use the available draft margins. The Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS) allows ships--berthed or under way-to access real-time data from a variety of instruments that measure currents, winds, and waves, along with water levels (tides), depths temperatures, and salinity. This data enables much more accurate tide and current predictions, reducing travel delays and increasing traffic-handling capabilities. They are also instrumental in preventing and responding to spills of hazardous materials and oil, predicting coastal floods, and conducting scientific research.
    The success of PORTS in Tampa Bay, Florida, New York-New Jersey, San Francisco, and Houston is fueling support for the establishment of these systems at other ports around the country. (Insert thoughts about VPA's position on PORTS)

The grounding of the Exxon Valdez resulted in the most costly environmental disaster in U.S. history. Billions of dollars in environmental and economic damage was inflicted on Prince William Sound and the surrounding Alaskan communities. Studies show that if the Valdez had been equipped with a modern electronic chart, alarms would have sounded at four different times before the ship ran aground, and the accident might never have happened.
    Most maritime nations have built, or are in the process of building, electronic vector chart databases called ENCs. NOAA is responsible for providing mariners with the official electronic vector charting data.
    Commercial software vendors then develop applications to display and manipulate the NOAA-produced data. The U.S. attempt to build vector charts has lagged because of a lack of funding. NOAA is attempting to maintain its suite of 1000 paper and raster charts and, at the same time, has taken on the significant task of building 200 new vector charts to cover the 40 major U.S. ports.

    The 1992 grounding of the QE2 in Martha's Vineyard highlighted the dangerous condition of U.S. nautical charts. The QE2, with a draft of 32 feet, traveled over an area where the nautical chart produced by NOAA showed a depth of 39 feet. Uncharted rocks ripped a hole through the ship's hull, causing over $60 million in damage and lost revenues. Fortunately, there was no major oil spill or loss of life. The 39-foot charted depth was based on the latest hydrographic survey conducted in that area. The survey was conducted in 1939 with sextants and a device that was new at the time, called an echo sounder.
    Today, ships carrying hazardous cargo and drawing upwards of 50 feet, routinely pass within a few feet of the bottom when entering and transiting our nation's coastal and inland waterways. A single feature such as an uncharted boulder, an old concrete buoy block, or the fluke of an abandoned anchor, has the potential to puncture the hull of a ship. The risk of such an accident can be measured in billions of dollars.
    Currently, some 34,000 square nautical miles of U.S. waters are considered critical to commercial navigation and need to be resurveyed using modern full bottom coverage technology. At FY 01 funding levels, NOAA estimates that it would require more than 30 years to complete surveys of these critical areas.

    The Coast Guard's Vessel Tracking System also works to prevent accidents, primarily groundings. Admiral North has called VTS the best investment for highly congested ports one can make in incident prevention. Ports agree. While the Vessel Tracking System is operated by the Coast Guard and requires continual staff oversight, the service requires high technology infrastructure to provide real-time, accurate and reliable information. With increased activity, enhanced computers and satellites will be needed to relay more information faster and to provide useful, accurate and current data.

   With that summary you can see that there is a great need for Congressional attention to and funding for navigation safety needs. Safety is a national issue, particularly when we are talking about these federal programs that have been so terribly underfunded. Harbor Safety Committees can be some of the best advocates for solving these critical issues.
   This is the month the Appropriations Committees will hold hearings in Washington to review the Administration's budget requests. I encourage you to take some time to contact your member of Congress regarding funding for NOAA and Coast Guard programs.
   Ports across the country have weighed in on the issues; there is a Washington, D.C. coalition called the Marine Navigation Safety Coalition that is focused on promoting navigation safety a U.S. ports and increasing funding for NOAA's programs.
   AAPA has more information on its Web site regarding the need for NOAA funding, the Harbor Services Fund, and other issues. Please take a look and let us know if you need more information. Let your member of Congress know that a workable Marine Transportation System requires using existing technology and updating maps and charts for our mariners.

Thank you for the opportunity to talk about harbor safety.