partment of Fish and Game, who we understand might be accompanied by John Katz, who is special counsel to the State of Alaska; Dale Snow, assistant marine regional supervisor, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Gentlemen, we welcome you and your associates, and are pleased to receive your testimony.

I would suggest, if you can, that you summarize it, so that we can proceed to any questions.

STATEMENTS OF A PANEL CONSISTING OF WES HAYDEN, LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL, INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FISH AND WILDLIFE AGENCIES; RONALD SKOOG, COMMISSIONER, ALASKA DEPARTMENT OF FISH AND GAME, ACCOMPANIED BY JOHN BURNS, STATEWIDE MARINE MAMMAL COORDINATOR, AND DALE SNOW, ASSISTANT MARINE REGIONAL SUPERVISOR, OREGON DEPARTMENT OF FISH AND WILDLIFE Mr. HAYDEN. Mr. Chairman, I consider it a particular privilege to present my first testimony as legislative counsel for the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies before this particular subcommittee, and on this particular subject, to which I may say the association does attach a considerable degree of impor

tance.

Before I go into my own remarks, however, I want to express appreciation to the panel of experts who are sitting with me. I would also like to introduce, for the record, a statement by the Wildlife Management Institute on the issue now before you.

Mr. BREAUX. Without objection, it will be made a part of the record.

[The following was received for the record:]

STATEMENT OF LONNIE L. WILLIAMSON, Secretary, Wildlife Management

INSTITUTE

Mr. Chairman, I am Lonnie L. Williamson, secretary of the Wildlife Management Institute.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act is a classic example of how not to go about managing the nation's invaluable wildlife. Its history exemplifies what usually happens when emotion and expediency direct the formation of resource management programs. Recalling the clamor and sacks of mail from grammar school children that affected the legislation, there may be solace in the fact that the Act could be worse than it is.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act, as feared and stated by resource professionals in 1972, ushered in a period of benign neglect for most of the species involved. With the possible execption of helping to ease the porpoise/tuna problem, the Act has been a liability, in our view.

The Act usurped the states' authority to manage marine mammals and scattered that responsibility among the Departments of Commerce and the Interior and the Marine Mammal Commission. That acquisitive act drove another wedge between the federal and state wildlife agencies and exacerbated that age-old problem. Instead of providing authority for both levels of government to undertake needed cooperative management activities, the result was that the State of Alaska (which harbors most of our marine mammals) dismantled its management program, the federal government did not initiate a replacement program, and the marine mammals are left essentially unmanaged.

The federal government's takeover and subsequent failure to perform is but one problem with the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Another is the apparent vagueness of some of the statute's provisions which make them impossible to administer. Administrators are faced with the very pressures that discouraged Congress from doing a better job and they have even less leeway to cope with them. The result seems to have been the forfeiture of responsibilities to solicitors who are ill-equipped to produce anything except the safest legal position.

Another problem with the Act is the definition of "Optimum Sustainable Populations." The Act's requirements under the current definition of OSP are impossible to carry out. To conform would require a quantity of information that is not available and will not be available within the foreseeable future. But marine mammals, as is other wildlife, can be managed successfully without the ultimate knowledge. Another problem with the OSP definition is that it places the Marine Mammal Protection Act in conflict with the Fishery Conservation and Management Act. The MMPA prohibits reductions in marine mammals to help fisheries, yet the FCMA definition of "Optimum Sustained Yield" requires that marine mammals and fishery populations be balanced at some acceptable level. The MMPA should be amended to remove that inconsistency.

Native exemptions in the MMPA also create an untenable situation. Court decisions indicate that neither the federal nor state governments may regulate native taking of marine mammals. That is totally unacceptable.

Considering the numerous problems experienced with the MMPA and the obvious need for extensive amendment, we recommend that the Committee reauthorize the Act for one year and immediately begin developing appropriate amendments which may be aired at hearings later this year and refined for a longer-term reauthorization bill in 1982 or earlier if possible.

To fail to reauthorize the Marine Mammal Protection Act would be unwise, in our opinion. But simply to reauthorize it for a long term without needed amendment would be equally undesirable. We ask that the Congress, based on nearly nine years of experience, give the marine mammal managers the legal tools they require to conduct a successful program.

Mr. HAYDEN. You are thoroughly familiar with the makeup of the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, its objectives and its purposes. So I will not presume on the subcommittee's time for a review of that.

I propose, instead, to proceed directly with a discussion of our position on the subject in question. I would explain at the outset that this is intended only as a general statement, because the people who are with me, Mr. Snow, Mr. Skoog, and Mr. Burns, represent a wide range of knowledge, experience, and technical background on the subject which will be of great value to the subcommittee. I will therefore not attempt any indepth analysis or detailed discussion of the technical aspects of the problem which we confront.

Instead, I will confine my remarks to discussion, in summary fashion, of the issue at hand. Basically, our position is based upon the premise, as the chairman has already stated so well, that the Marine Mammal Protection Act, while well intentioned, simply has not worked out effectively in practice for a number of reasons. It was originally designed as a means of protecting marine mammal species, but because of the way it has been promulgated, it is not accomplishing that objective, nor the objective of the conservation and sound management of mammal resources.

In our view, the problem stems primarily from the Federal preemption of State authority for control of marine mammal species, and from the vague and imprecise regulations established for implementation of the program. The result has been, in too many instances, ineffectual administration, inadequate or incomplete enforcement and a disservice to the cause of resource conservation. We are glad that the subcommittee has decided to address this problem and to devote the time and attention necessary for a timely solution. We hope we will be able to make some contribution to that objective.

Our position is in complete accord with that enunciated by the subcommittee; namely, that there should be only a 1-year extension of the act and that during that period, major amendments to the

program should be conceived and acted upon to insure its redirection and effective operation for marine mammal conservation and management.

One of the changes we would suggest is the return of responsibility to the coastal States for control of marine mammals in the territorial waters, restricting Federal control to the pelagic forms, This position, as outlined, was formally adopted by the executive committee and the legislative committee of the association on March 22, and was endorsed by the membership in a business meeting which took place on that date.

There has been further endorsement, of this position by the States of Nevada, New Mexico, Mississippi, Washington, Arizona, Kentucky, New York, Missouri, and Nebraska in communications which the association has received, and which can be made available to the subcommittee for its record, if you desire.

That, basically, is our position.

I thank you for the opportunity of discussing it with you, Mr. Chairman, and with the subcommittee. I will offer my full statement for the record at this point and surrender any remaining time to members of the panel.

[The following was received for the record:]

STATEMENT OF WESLEY F. Hayden, LegislaTIVE COUNSEL, INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FISH AND WILDLIFE AGENCIES

Mr. Chairman, as your committee is aware, the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies is a voluntary organization made up of fish and wildlife management agencies in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

Its paramount purpose and objective is the fostering and encouragement of legislation, policies, practices and programs contributing to effective conservation and sound management of the resources with which its members are involved and to which their activities are directed.

In that context, the Accociation and its agency members have a direct and particular interest in the issue now before you.

It is our perception that the form and substance of the action you take in the matter of extending autorization of the Marine Mammal Protyection Act can have important and long-range jurisdictional implications for all of our member states and even more direct specific connotations for those in coastal areas.

These are the considerations to which this statement will be addressd.

In that approach to the issue, we will undertake no in-depth analysis or detailed discussion of the technical aspects of the marine mammal problem. There is abundant data on such matters in the testimony being provided for this hearing by witnesses for Alaska and other coastal area states. That evidence, reflecting a high degree of knowledge and professional expertise, speaks eloquently and persuasively on those points.

The thrust of our presentation is designed instead to spotlight and underscore the broader facets of the problem and to suggest some possible approaches to their resolution.

And in our view, such a discussion, if it is to be productive and realistic, has to start with the premise that the marine mammal program as now constituted, while noble in intent, has serious defects and that major changes are essential as a condition for full reauthorization.

That conclusion, we submit, is supported by examination of the performance record of the past eight years under the original 1972 authorization as well as by the weight of evidence submitted by the diverse interest groups in the course of this committee proceeding.

In combination, Mr. Chairman, those assessments serve to put into focus what can perhaps be best described as another classic example of a well-meaning theory that did not work out as planned in reality.

At least that seems to be the case up to this point.

Conceived primarily as a way of insuring protection for marine mammals, the program as it now operates is so structured as to militate against full attainment of that objective.

At the same time, it has served to thwart and frustrate to a significant degree meaningful and effective efforts toward management of certain of those resources in a balanced manner and in recognition of the needs of other involved interests. A variety of factors have contributed to this less-than-desirable result.

But perhaps the most significant has been the cumulative effect and spinoff impact of federal pre-emption and disruption of state marine mammal regulation and management procedures, and division of that government control between the Departments of Interior and Commerce.

That action coupled with the vague and imprecise nature of some of the implementing regulations for the program, has compounded administrative problems and contributed to the weakness of performance and enforcement at the federal level. Clear conflicts between the provisions and objectives of the marine mammal program and those operating under the Fisheries Conservation and management Act have served to create even more administrative difficulties.

These are matters of parmount concern to this Association and its members and are issues which we feel strongly should and must be dealt with in the reauthorization process which you contemplate.

And that applies particularly to those questions relating to state jurisdiction and authority.

We would urge in that context that any modification of the Act include among its features a provision restoring to coastal states the responsibility for management of marine mammal stocks within their respective territorial waters and restricting federal control to pelagic forms.

They already have the demonstrated capacity and desire for such an assignment. It is our judgment that the arrangement, under appropriate terms, would significantly improve program administration and operation and, in the process, significantly enhance the objective or resource conservation.

Proper attention to the reauthorization issue as a whole will be a time-consuming process for your committee and for Congress as a body.

Hastily considered, changes in the legislation could well create new problems equally as serious as those which they were designed to resolve.

By the same token, prolonged inaction would serve only to compound and exacerbate the existing dilemmas.

Either course would be undesirable. The Association therefore favors extension of the authorization of the act for a period of no more than one year and the development, consideration, and action on appropriate and needed amendments wihtin that time frame.

That is consistent with the official position taken on the issue by the Association's Legislative and Executive Committees in session here March 21, 1981, and with the desires expressed by a number of member states in communications to members of your committee in recent days.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, we appreciate the opportunity you have afforded this organization to present its views. We hope you and your colleagues will find them useful for your consideration.

Mr. BREAUX. Thank you, Mr. Hayden.

Mr. Ron Skoog?

Mr. SKOOG. My name if Ronald Skoog, head of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and a member of Governor Hammond's cabinet. I am responsible for the conservation and management of Alaska's fish and wildlife resources.

I have with me today, instead of John Katz, John Burns, who is the Statewide marine mammal coordinator, and reknowned marine mammal researcher.

The subject of this hearing is of great importance to Alaska because of the significance of the marine mammals in the daily lives of our citizens. Today, in spite of illusions to the contrary, the Marine Mammal Protection Act has reduced or eliminated

Mr. BREAUX. Mr. Skoog, could you bring that mike up a little closer so that we can hear you better?

Mr. SKOOG. The MMPA has reduced or eliminated, rather than promoted, sound conservation and management programs. The rigidities of the act are proving harmful to the very resource it was intended to protect, because the act does not permit the develop

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ment and implementation of the balanced management regime so necessary to protect this valuable resource.

The State of Alaska is seeking significant corrective amendment to the Marine Mammal Protection Act. However, because there is so little time available this year to adequately address all the substantive issues, we are recommending a reauthorization of the act for only 1 year, with congressional mandated hearings, and other mechanisms designed to guarantee input for future deliberations and action by the Congress within the year.

We believe that a broad consensus can be obtained on most of the controversial issues, and at the same time develop constructive alternatives to the other issues.

Be assured that serious biological problems created by the act do exist today, and will intensify over time. These problems are discussed in more detail in my written testimony, from which I am varying, and other supporting information we would like to submit, and therefore, I will not repeat them here.

In passing the act, Congress preempted the ongoing highly effective, broadly based marine mammal management program being carried out by the State of Alaska, a program recognized nationally and internationally by most knowledgeable experts, as one of the most finest marine mammal management and research programs in the world. In its place was established a management regime, under the Departments of Commerce and Interior, which in Alaska has proven to be incapable of implementing adequate conservation and management programs.

Today, with the exception of the successful, long-established fur seal program, every other effective marine mammal management program in Alaska has been dismantled, and no effective Federal program has been substituted.

Needless to say, Alaska has become rather frustrated over the last 8 years in attempting to resume its former role in what we believe to be a State responsibility of considerable magnitude, the conservation of a wildlife resource of such importance to its residents and to the marine ecosystems adjoining its long, complex coastline of some 30,000 miles.

Significant amendments to the Marine Mammal Protection Act are necessary in connection with the following subjects:

First, the clarification of the act concepts, such as optimum sustainable population and optimum carrying capacity;

Second, resolution of conflict between the Marine Mammal Act, the Federal Conservation and Management Act and the Endangered Species Act;

Third, return of management to States which can mount adequate and effective programs for management of marine mammals of direct importance to its citizens; along this line, language might be considered that might remove certain coastal species from the jurisdiction of the act itself, and have these species managed by the States, with Federal emphasis perhaps being placed on the pelagic species, whales and porpoises, which the National Marine Fisheries Service might appropriately take care of;

Fourth, amendment to section 101(b) relating to the native exemption. Now some protectionist groups are expecting to push for elimination of Native taking of marine mammals. Managing agen