2023 Budget Request for the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Programs

Transcript

by so do so so um i ask unanimous consent that the chair be authorized to declare a recess at any time during today's hearing without objection so ordered i also ask unanimous consent that members not on the subcommittee be permitted to sit with the subcommittee at today's hearing and ask questions without objection so ordered as a reminder please keep your microphones muted unless speaking should i hear any inadvertent background noise i will request that the members please meet their microphone and to insert a document into the record please have your staff email it to documents ti mail.house.gov good morning and welcome to today's hearing on the review of fiscal year 2023 budget request for the coast guard and maritime transportation programs today we will hear directly from the commandant and master chief petty officer of the coast guard the chair of the federal maritime commission and acting administrator of the maritime administration on the president's budget request and agency priorities we begin with testimony from the coast guard which has nearly forty thousand five hundred active duty military members eight thousand reservists and nine thousand civilian employees who carry out the services missions including port and waterway security marine environmental protection boater safety and search and rescue among others despite the agency's importance as one of the six branches of our military the coast guard is chronically underfunded and overextended even during its largest recapitalization effort since world war ii to ensure our service members have the equipment personnel and support systems they need to complete their missions and return home safe the service must be supported with every available resource following the coast guard i look forward to hearing from the fmc on how it plans to address supply chain issues and ensure fairness in ocean shipping the agriculture industry which includes many farmers and growers in my home state of california continue to be negatively impacted by these supply chain issues as the federal agency tasked with enforcing international shipping regulations fmc has key authorities which allowed to secure an even playing field for participants of maritime commerce and continue to promote american jobs last but not least i look forward to merit discussing its plans to revitalize the american maritime industry from porch and infrastructure to our shrinking us flagship flight fleet and the availability of merchant mariners acting administrator leslie has done a phenomenal job facilitating efforts to append the toxic culture that's allowing that's allowed sexual assault and harassment to fester within the maritime industry her leadership on embark and her work to bring industry along is remarkable and does not go unnoticed we have a long way to go but i believe her leadership in the passage of the safer seas act at which i am an original co-sponsor will help protect future mariners and bring justice to victims miss leslie chair defazio and i stand ready to help you merit oversees vital grant programs including the maritime security program the new tanker security program mera and the port infrastructure development program which give maritime users the opportunity to improve the safety efficiency and reliability of their operations short side and at sea this benefits mariners the u.s economy in our irreplaceable natural environment to give one example mera the maritime environmental and technical assistance program supports the research development installation and use of new carbon technologies that are safe affordable and sustainable investing in such innovations is crucial to positioning the united states as a leader in the global marketplace and help reduce our carbon pollution with the within the transportation sector for marin i'm particularly interested in how the port infrastructure development program will support the morro bay wind energy project offshore of my district building out the port infrastructure to receive and transmit this energy as well as creating lay down space for short side wind turbine staging is of critical importance and will take a significant investment this project is especially timely for areas in my home district such as san luis obispo county who may need federal assistance to take full advantage of this budding energy industry i will end my remarks here by thanking our witnesses and attendees for their participation i want to especially thank commandant admiral schultz as he will be retiring from his position in june admiral schultz has given his entire career in service to this country and has been knowledgeable and a genial leader for the coast guard and has worked with us in congress also for the past four years i wish you a fulfilling next chapter of your life i hope today's testimonies and the discussions that follow will call congress's attention to priorities within america's vital maritime domain now i'd like to call on ranking member uh subcommittee ranking member mr gibbs uh thank you mr chairman and thank you to our witnesses for being here today first i want to congratulate the commandant admiral schultz as he completes his long service the nation this next month he has done much to repair the damage done to the services budget by the budget control act and has begun what will be a long road upgrading the coast guard's digital capabilities to those needed by the 21st century law enforcement marine safety and environmental stewardship service i'm sure i speak for all my subcommittee colleagues and wishing you well as you leave the coast guard in which you have served more than 40 years congratulations wish you all the best while we do celebrate your service the coast guard i have to mention the issues the guard must address in your absence since you appeared before the subcommittee last july nothing seems to have happened with respect to completing the regulations implementing the recommendations of the atlantic coast port route study i look forward to hearing whether we are in any danger of seeing those regulations be made final in the near future or will the coast guard continue to defer those to the interior department i continue to believe the coast guard should take its role as the primary federal agency responsible for maritime navigation and safety seriously rather than act as a permit reviewer for the department of interior i was heartened to see in the fy 23 increase in the request for the coast guard's operating and support account but as always i am extremely disappointed in the perennial reduction in the procurement construction and improvement account the account falls from an appropriate level of more than two billion dollars in fy 22 and a house passed authorized level of 3.4 billion in fy 23 to a requested appropriation level of 1.6 billion for fy23 that level of funding will not even allow the coast guard to hold steady on the billions of dollars of shore site construction and maintenance needs prevent the service from falling further behind in this it infrastructure and allow progress on the services far behind schedule cutter acquisition program i urge the commandant to assure his legacy by telling us that he supports the acquisition of the 12th national security cutter before that production line grows cold and the opportunity is lost i will work to see that congress steps in yet again to reverse the budget's request's harmful impact on the coast guard's acquisition budget and in turn protect the services future mission capabilities like last year i noticed no funds are requested for the new great lakes icebreaker i will work with my great lakes colleagues to correct this oversight i'm also interested in whether a common hall design could be used for great lakes ice breaker and the national arctic security cutter if the coast guard remains committed to a two-size polar icebreaker program i think that could make sense a provision included in hr 6865 sets minimum standards for alternative oil spill response planning criteria in western alaska the section provides new authority that only applies if the coast guard determines that the national planning criteria don't apply to in western alaska the coast guard has refused to set such criteria thus leaving it to congress to do the job i regret that the coast guard has the difficulty understanding that the plain language of this section and look forward to continuing to work with the service on this issue an unprecedented surge of imported cargo is uh pressure testing the u.s supply chain both the house and senate have passed ocean shipping reform measures at the behest of the bill auger below reliable importers and exporters who are finding their products late and reaching their destinations thus far as i have understand it the federal federal maritime commission has found no collusion or illegal anti-competitive manipulation of vessels and equipment however i look forward to hearing from our former colleague and new and now federal maritime commission chairman dan mafi to describe what resources the commission needs to assure that a robust effective ongoing ocean shipping regulatory program is maintained i'm pleased again to see a former coast guard and maritime transportation subcommittee staffer linda leslie back today as the acting maritime administrator i look forward to hearing today what actions the maritime administration is taking to tighten down cargo preference regulations to ensure that all federal agencies abide by this important mandatory set of sides of cargo for care carriage and u.s flag vessels i'm also interested to hear from marorade has received availability of determination requests in regard to the increased rate of discharge from the strategic petroleum reserve thank you mr chairman i yield back thank you mr gibbs i now would like to call on uh chairman of the transportation and infrastructure committee uh mr defazio um thank you chairman carbajal thanks for this important hearing today um and um you know all of the witnesses here before us today play a vital role uh the coast guard um the federal maritime commission the maritime administration uh in the uh in our marine transportation system and you know obviously as a you know an ocean going nation uh we have tremendous needs in this area um and um you know i want to try and start the same way as as you did in the ranking member by congratulating the admiral um thanking him for his strong leadership chief thank you uh and uh you know these were pretty uh tough and turbulent times for the coast guard and uh you've gotten through it and uh in good shape uh so uh you know for whatever you're gonna do next uh you know best wishes uh and then uh you know i'd also like to congratulate although she's not yet uh confirmed uh i expect will be confirmed uh admiral linda fagan uh who's not here today but as the next commandant and a i think a tremendous successor to uh to admiral schultz and i look forward to working with her during my remaining time in congress for um for the fiscal year 23 coast guard has requested 13.82 billion it's a 1.3 percent increase over last year um now that's better than what you proposed last year which was a 0.3 percent increase but given the current rate of inflation and you are obviously going to be subjected to that in many ways sure side costs you know fuel for the ships and all that i really don't think that that's going to be an adequate amount of funding and you know i have ongoing concerns or expressed by others about the problems on your shore side infrastructure you know particularly the inadequate housing we have an adequate uh you know child care those are complaints they hear a lot and in areas where there's inadequate housing they have to go into the private market rents are skyrocketing it's very difficult and if we want to do what we need to do uh to recruit um and retain our coasties we've got to do better um for their uh for their working conditions and i just that's that's really a tremendous concern i when i was in coos bay when commandant was there i think it was a year ago last summer to get the award we saw what they were doing to renovate some housing it was a start but but we need to do a heck of a lot more of that and you know you know you're proposing to recruit 4 200 people uh this year that's a pretty high number uh and uh you know i hope you can achieve it and but then once we achieve it we want to keep them we want them to solve us you know do full careers so um as you know during the shutdown i was very upset about the lack of pay uh for the coast guard attempted to move legislation to uh prohibit that from happening in the future um but uh was unsuccessful at that point in time um you know the uh the decrease in funding for shore facilities and aids navigation uh is is puzzling to me uh with the backlog we have and uh you know i want to learn more how you came at 180 i assumed it was the trolls over at omb putting pressure on you uh but anyway i'd be interested in plumbing uh the depths of that you know i'm constantly trying to deal with office of management budget would be much better off without them but that's for another day with regards to the maritime administration marid's vital you know for the successful management of our maritime shipbuilding industries uh you know we i'm constantly trying to see that we do more of us you know build more u.s ships and also that we have a more competitive shipping industry i note that the cartel of three major shippers made more money last year than they made over the last decade and yet we don't think there's some con you know collusion or you know price gouging or taking advantage of the excuses of the pandemic or whatever in that i you know it's it's a real problem and i want to learn more about the decrease in your port infrastructure development program request compared to uh the 22 enacted you know it all starts with port capacity in fact uh you know i'm i'm advocating at this point for a megaproject so that we can have a new container poor to be the first direct ship to rail container port on the west coast obviously very efficient very environmentally responsible and that would be in coos bay oregon and can add 10 percent to west coast capacity there's not a lot more land area in l.a long beach and it's a heck of a long steam up the columbia river to portland coos bay has a lot of advantages if the administration has the vision uh to move forward with with that and i'm hopeful they will the president did mention it when he was in portland last week um but i am uh pleased to see an increase in the operations training budget you know and some but some of this goes to the merchant marine academy and we need again we need a lot of repairs for aged buildings and facilities and dorms and things there and and i'm also you know pleased to support the embark measures which have been designed to protect cadets against sexual assault and sexual harassment last year the academy has faced a lot of scrutiny regarding its culture safety for good reason unfortunately witnessed steadfast leadership of merits acting administrator miss lucinda leslie during this time and she has worked diligently to motivate a major cultural shift at the academy despite resistance and i have every confidence that she'll continue to lead capably competence integrity and a whole steadfast on the changes we need the federal maritime commission i'm pleased to see a 5.5 increase requested for overall funding so we can begin hopefully as a ranking member mentioned that we haven't found a collusion but we know there is a conclusion that we're dealing with shipping cartels and you need you need those resources to enhance your oversight and enforcement capabilities and you know that's that's critically needed to lower the shot you know the cost of shipping which is going to help with inflation and uh you know that i look forward to hearing from all of our witnesses today thank you mr chair thank you mr defazio i would now like to welcome the witnesses admiral carl schultz a commandant of the united states coast guard master chief jason van der heyden master chief petty officer of the united states coast guard the honorable daniel mcfay chairman of the federal maritime commission ms lucinda leslie acting administrator of the maritime administration thank you for being here today and i look forward to your testimony without objection our witnesses full test full statements will be included in the record since your written testimony has been made part of the record the subcommittee request that you limit your oral testimony to five minutes with that admiral schultz you may proceed well good morning chairman defazio chairman carbajal ranking member gibbs distinguished members of the subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to testify today on behalf of the entire service i thank you for your enduring support of the coast guard in our efforts to restore service readiness our 2022 fiscal year appropriation reflects congress's continued commitment to addressing the coast guard's readiness challenges and maintaining progress on surface aviation infrastructure recapitalization while also highlighting the services increasing role in shaping global maritime affairs and national security because of your support we're acquiring the nation's first new heavy polar icebreakers in almost a half century to enable a u.s presence in the geostrategically important high-latitude regions the operations and support increase of more than 20 percent between the 2019 and 2022 budgets in the administration's 2023 budget requests better positions the coast guard by investing in our mission-ready total workforce mission-enabling technologies and modern assets and capabilities to meet the challenges today and in the future but critically important work remains to advance our national economic and environmental security interests in an increasingly complex geopolitical and technologically sophisticated environment we must maintain this growth through our operational funding and a keen focus on the resilience of our capital infrastructure as a multi-mission service we are exceptionally agile and adaptive executing our 11 statutory missions simultaneously and we must apply these same skills to build a stable and predictable pcni funding of 2.0 billion plus op annually to optimize our ability to plan the recapitalization of both our facilities and our assets while we have been very successful in replacing frontline operational units devastated by recent years hurricanes my crews on the great lakes praying for hurricanes to reach their region is a poor way in the unacceptable way to do business the administration's 2023 budget request supports continued progress on the offshore patrol program cutter program absolutely vital to replacing the capability provided by our legacy fleet of 210 foot and 270 foot medium endurance cutters which largely operate in the atlantic these legacy assets have served the nation with distinction some for 55 years but are increasingly more difficult and expensive to maintain the budget request also enables us to grow our fleet of mh-60 jayhawk helicopters which operate with national and offshore patrol cutters as force multipliers new jayhawk hulls are converted former navy airframes for our sundowner program will enable us to optimize coast guard aviation operations both in near coast and distant waters beyond 2023 we must continue to restore the coast guard the nation needs to ably conduct domestic operations facilitating the economic engine that is the marine transportation system as 95 percent of overseas trade enters or leaves the u.s by ship as well as resourcing expanded operations abroad abroad in support of our national interests including those detailed in the white house's recent indo-pacific strategy the coast guard contributes significantly to domestic as well as global maritime safety and security by employing our service's unique blend of authorities and capabilities collaboratively alongside our interagency and international partners to achieve national objectives across a broad spectrum of strategic challenges we are currently executing about 1.4 billion dollars dedicated to improving shore facilities across our service including 350 million dollars provided in the 2022 appropriation that supports 11 critical short facility investments as well as a supplemental inject of 430 million provided by congress as part of the infrastructure and jobs act which in itself funds 18 distinct projects we are grateful for this general funding which enables us to address some of our aging infrastructure including inventory that dates back to the late 18th century as well as provide new infrastructure for new assets we are fielding but our legacy assets remain vital operational contributors and we cannot shortchange their maintenance and sustainment funding our forces are disaggregated across america's coastal communities at roughly 1 000 individual units hence we maintain a significant inventory and backlog for both recapitalization of infrastructure and asset maintenance we're appreciative in the 22 funding that supports 26 new engineering positions civil engineers specifically to help action those funds this additional support to manage and execute this critically important infrastructure work will help us tackle new projects at the speed of need like the other dod and for armed forces and dhs operation components the reality of high inflation as well as the needs of a modern workforce warrant immediate review and retooling of our policies to recruit train and retain the finest talent in order to sustain service readiness while diligently address policies to eliminate barriers to success we must inject additional creativity in our thinking about how we organize and employ people to continue to meet operational demands the key to our success has always been and will remain our people the backbone of our service and previously stated they stand the watch 24 hours a day seven days a week 365 days a year always ready for the call thank you and i look forward to your questions thank you admiral schultz uh next we will go to master chief vanderhayden you may proceed thank you sir good morning chairman defazio uh sir it's been an honor to serve with you thank you for being uh for inviting me and allowing me to be your guest at the state of the union address that was one of the highlights of my life and i'm grateful for that thank you it was a wonderful wonderful time chairman carbajal ranking member gibbs and distinguished members of the subcommittee i want to join admiral schultz in extending my utmost gratitude on behalf of the men and women of the coast guard for your enduring support of our efforts to restore service readiness this is likely the final time i'll appear before the committee as mashie bears the coast guard because i also am retiring uh later next month as i reflect on the last 34 years i'm proud to observe how much the coast guard has grown to better serve our american people i want to thank the members of this subcommittee and the congress for helping the service continually evolve to meet the complex challenges facing our nation your advocacy has been and continues to be essential to ensure that we provide the best mission execution and that we remain always ready the coast guard's relatively small force executes a broad array of missions and we're successful because we foster an empowering environment where all our members understand the importance of their service to their nation as with all services the coast guard faces numerous challenges the current challenge i'm most concerned with is our ability to recruit and retain the workforce needed to operate our cutters boats and aircraft and a second close a close second concern is the exponential increase in the cost of housing facing our coast guard families as we replace our aging assets the new cutters helicopters and planes being built require us to grow our workforce and that we're prepared to so that we're prepared to operate these new amazing assets the coast guard enjoys the highest retention rate of all the military services however like the rest of the country we are challenged to find the next generation of dedicated men and women who can and will serve in the military it's an all hands on deck effort to attract the best and brightest and that's why we're expanding our everyone as a recruiter program finding new ways to attract talent to the coast guard uh is is tricky if any of you know anybody that wants to serve in the coast guard i'll get some coast guard swag for you and we can hand that out so we are we are really uh working hard to recruit but it's a it's a tough recruiting environment right now a close second to recruiting is retention if we want to grow we have to keep the people we have but housing costs are making it almost impossible for our people to find a place to live with the dispersed nature of the fifth largest branch of the u.s military your coast guard our members are forced to live on the economy in most places our people are having to live very far from their units giving them untenable commute times it is having a detrimental effect on the on the service members and their families i know you can't bring housing costs down but we need some legislative help in addressing the speed and flexibility to assess housing costs the basic allowance for housing costs assessment system lags far behind the actual cost especially for the coast guard this lag means that the rates never reflect the actual cost that our people are paying for housing policy changes are helpful for retention but we are always looking to do more to retain our best and brightest having a mentor is proving to be very helpful to improving retention we have seen outstanding participation in our new mobile-enabled mentoring program that connects mentors and mentees through traditional one-on-one mentoring on a global basis we have thousands of coast guard members using this new program and that number is growing every day 28 of those users are women and we're finding the program is very popular with our affinity groups and other representative members in fact the air force the army the navy dhs and many of our other federal government partners are using the coast guard as a model for their mentoring programs the coast guard is diligently developing innovative strategies to build the workforce of the future we recognize the imperative to be an employer of choice that reflects the public we serve we are incorporating recommendations and best practices from several workforce studies along with human resource management software improvements into a ready workforce 2030 strategy we are currently developing currently developing implementation plan for that strategy which will help us leverage data and technology uh to improve the quality of life for our people as i depart the coast guard i want to thank you on behalf of the entire coast guard you all have demonstrated not just by word but by action how much you care about the coast guard your staffs have enabled a small force to complete an incredible amount of service to our country you have improved our morale by making each coastie more effective and efficient in their duties and with your continued support we'll be able to provide more and better service to our wonderful nation thank you for inviting me to testify today and i look forward to answering your questions thank you master chief van let me just say that i neglected to also recognize and thank you for your service uh thank you sir for some reason it just escaped my mind that you two were retiring so congratulations thank you for your service and leadership uh over your career but as well as these these past four years working with the commandant to make sure that you guys provide extraordinary leadership for the coast guard in our nation thank you so much thank you sir it's an honor next we'll go to mr mafay you may proceed thank you good morning chairman carbajal ranking member gibbs full committee chairman defazio and members of the subcommittee i'm grateful to have this opportunity to testify in support of the federal maritime commission fiscal year 2023 budget request and answer your questions the commission seeks just under 34.7 million dollars to support its operations in the coming fiscal year this would be a substantial increase a bit over 5 percent from our fy 22 enacted budget the increase would go mainly to enforcement and consumer assistance since we continue to receive large numbers of complaints to measure it with the high freight rates diminished reliability increased delays and shortages of equipment such as containers and chassis that currently plague our ports and ocean transportation we strive our best to review every potential case thoroughly for violations of the law and do all we can to assist importers and especially exporters managing a system where the capacity is simply unable to meet the continuing surge of demand that started early in the covet 19 pandemic that said we are a small agency of fewer than 120 people regulated regulating an estimated one and a third trillion dollars of commerce as i have indicated to the subcommittee before there are potential enforcement cases that we cannot examine or at least not as thoroughly and expeditiously as they might merit because we simply do not have enough capacity your and your colleagues response to this situation is why i am bold enough to ask you for this increase while understanding there you are contending with intense pressures on the federal budget i also want to make it clear that while i advocate for an increase in resources and i support bipartisan bills to enhance our authority the fmc is not waiting for these things we're already taking action on multiple fronts we have increased monitoring and enforcement activity paying particular attention to ocean cargo carriers and their alliances and i have directed our enforcement bureau to prioritize export cases we have initiated a new focus on addressing fees and surcharges with the goal of bringing greater transparency to what shippers actually have to pay we have provided guidance to shippers on bringing complaints to the fmc and we are seeing a marked increase in cases being filed with the support and advice of my commission colleagues i directed the fmc to audit the major container carrier companies to encourage and facilitate compliance on the commission's detention and emerge rules and their legal obligation not to discriminate against exports the commission is acting on all of the non-legislative recommendations of the fact-finding investigation on pandemic-related effects led by commissioner rebecca dye these include launching a new rulemakings to set forth standards governing detention and demerged billing practices issuing policy statements that address barriers to filing action at the fmc and placing an export advocate in our consumer affairs bureau through multiple initiatives such as commissioner dye supply chain innovation teams and commissioner carl bensel's data initiative we have started tackling the complex issue of shortages of usable equipment such as export containers and chassis and the difficulties that shippers face in getting reliable useful information such as when ships will actually take on export cargos these efforts are contributing to increased incentives on the container ship lines and terminal operators to work together with america's shippers to solve problems rather than cause them i am gratified that some long time critics of ours are saying that they have not seen so much positive activity at the fmc in years and perhaps ever all of this said the supply chain challenges are complex and interconnected cargo transportation and foreign nations as well as the united states as we have seen with the the shanghai issues uh in this past week and at sea at ports and inland has all come up short when it comes to satisfying the vast demand for ocean shipping no single government agency is capable of addressing all these issues so the fmc works across government as well as with industry stakeholders to find solutions to improve our nation's cargo transportation networks in ocean shipping however the fmc is at the vanguard and if legislation pending before congress is enacted into law as i hope it will be our workload will further increase this is the right time to invest in the ability of the commission to hold accountable the industry we regulate and meet the needs of american shippers thank you thank you mr muffet and next miss leslie you may proceed good morning thank you chairman carvajal ranking member gibbs and of course chairman defazio and members of the subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to appear i also want to thank you for your support and leadership as we have worked to address the many challenges at the merchant marine academy and to support culture change throughout the maritime industry your leadership support and that of your staffs has been absolutely essential to all of our efforts and i i just can't thank you enough i am honored to appear with my colleagues admiral carl schultz coming down to the coast guard master chief petty officer of the coast guard van der hayden and of course chairman mcfay to testify on the president's fiscal year 2023 budget priorities for the maritime administration i'd like to begin by providing an update on senior as has been discussed last year we made a difficult decision to briefly pause the merchant marine academy's seer training aboard commercial vessels so that we could institute new safety policies to help prevent sexual assault and harassment to support survivors and to strengthen a culture of accountability we developed a program called the every mariner builds a respectful culture or embark which which enumerates new safety requirements for vessels that carry our cadets marad will not place cadets on commercial vessels that have not enrolled in embark we have critically also instituted new policies at the merchant marine academy to improve the support we provide to our cadets at sea and to try to remove barriers to reporting when assault or harassment do occur cadet embarkations resumed in december initially on training vessels and vessels operated by the navy the military sealift command and the us coast guard we thank them for their support of our midshipmen and i particularly want to thank admiral schultz for his leadership for the unwavering support of the coast guard at all stages of this effort with their assistance uh the members of the class of 2023 are accumulating the sea time they need to graduate on time if however due to any unforeseen circumstances a midshipman is not able to accrue all required sea time the coast guard has indicated that midshipmen can still take their license exam at the expected time and then complete all required seed time no one will leave the academy without all of the seed time they need to obtain their licenses as of today we have i'm pleased to announce seven commercial carriers enrolled in embark we just enrolled one more this morning through continuous review we will work to identify areas where our policies fall short and improve them and we will work to support urgently needed culture change across the maritime industry we know we did not get everything right we have put embark in the federal register and encourage everyone who has comments to submit them turning to the budget request to address critical infrastructure gaps while fostering and sustaining job opportunities in the maritime industry the president's fiscal year 2023 budget requests 906 million dollars for merid the bipartisan infrastructure law also provides 450 million dollars in advance appropriations for our port infrastructure development program which i know is a priority for the subcommittee this funding when coupled with the budget request represents a nearly 1.4 billion dollar investment in the merchant marine in the maritime industry looking first at sea lift the but the budget requests 318 million dollars in full funding for the maritime security program which will continue to assure the department of defense's access to the 60 ships enrolled in the program the budget request also continues funding for the funds would continue funding for the tanker security program and we look forward to the enrollment of 10 u.s flag tankers marat of course maintains 41 ready reserve vessels that provide sea lift surge capacity in support of our military funding from dod in 2023 would enable merit to continue to maintain the c-lift support and to advance essential recapitalization of the fleet merit has awarded our vessel acquisition manager contract and two used vessels have been procured construction is also well underway on the first of the are the first two of the five national security multi-mission vessels with the first expected to be delivered in early 2023 looking at mariner training programs the budget requests 77 million dollars to provide federal assistance to the six state maritime academies for our grant programs as i mentioned the budget requests 230 million dollars for the port infrastructure development program to fund grants that improve port infrastructure and facilities this funding which when combined with the 450 million dollars provided in the bipartisan infrastructure law would create a total proposed investment of 680 million dollars the budget requests 20 million dollars for our small shipyard grant program and 10 million dollars for the america's marine highway program to support the increased movement of freight by water to advance our essential decarbonization goals the budget requests 10 million dollars for the maritime environmental and technical assistance program and finally the budget requests 99 million dollars for the merchant marine academy thank you for the opportunity to discuss the budget's request i'm happy to answer any questions thank you miss leslie we will now move on to member questions each member will be recognized for five minutes and i will start by recognizing chairman defazio oh thank you thank you chairman carballo um and this would either be uh to the commandant or as chief um what what percent of your budget is fuel costs do you have a not an anticipated question it's just sort of i'm just sitting here thinking about it and what impact that's going to have on your operational capabilities yeah chairman i'll be honest with you unless the massachusetts knows the answer i don't know the percent of our budget i do know under the dla defense logistics agency contract we got about a 20 percent increase due to inflation that has recently been uh announced to us so that's a fairly significant lift inside our budget okay um all right that's good but we can i don't want to belabor it but back to the short side infrastructure that again i'm puzzled by uh the president's budget uh you know and i've shall we say raised with you and former commandants uh you know your your role in terms of uh you always the coast guard is always going to do with what they got uh but sometimes it's just not enough in my opinion um we hear perhaps other services and other agencies squawk a little bit more about the inadequacies of their budget and i just can't reconcile the reduction to 180 this year and don't see how are you going to begin to catch up with your backlog with those numbers either of you want to address that or you just want to let that drop chairman i would say this i think i think when you look into our coast guard budget across the top line and you do a year by year comparison i think i think there's different pieces you know from the 2011 budget control act 2013 sequestration the subsequent eight years we lost 10 percent of operations and support purchasing power that was very deleterious to the readiness of the coast guard in recent budget cycles 1920 21 22 we've actually seen a 20 increase in ons and that's been very helpful and we're very appreciative of that you know the the 1.65 1.6 that ranking member gibbs mentioned and the pc and i budget you know pc and i budget i overtly stated you know we'd like to see 2.0 plus on an annual basis for predictable stable pci funding that would put us on the most healthy trajectory course there's large variations if you have a large lift of a capitalized let's say polar security cutter in one year that can move that you know a half billion dollars quit it pretty easily but i would tell you sir from a from a budgetary standpoint we have started to turn a corner and we're very appreciative of the congress both both chambers both sides of the aisle embracing you know that the nation needs a more ready coast guard on infrastructure sir i would tell you right now we're executing about 1.4 billion we have never done that before 22 i mentioned 26 extra civil engineers to help us get after that work if we can sustain the momentum that we're starting to build in recent years i think we put this on a good trajectory but i'm leaving you know operational cutter days on the table operational aviation days there's a lot of money in the budgets in the last couple years for spare parts i think we've sort of got this the issue on the table you know when we roll in iija infrastructure investment jobs act we roll in the monies in the 22 budget it's almost 800 million dollars to get after infrastructure we're building the first child care centers that we have in 10 years the iaj has five new child care centers plus um upgrades to the unit in cape cod we also have new massey what major acquisition short infrastructure that's going to build child care in seattle and charleston we've got our first new aviation unit out in uh in california point magu that's under construction sir so i think the story is bettering there's a long history and things we drag with us but if we can maintain the momentum we've started to build sir i think we can get after this okay thank you um um acting administrator leslie i just want to again uh congratulate you on your work on the embark program everybody does every mariner does deserve respect but i noticed that you know some shipping companies have acted pretty quickly others haven't um you know i'm looking at the my safer seas act um as a necessary adjunct do you what other steps would you recommend so we can get more full compliance thank you for the question and thank you also for your leadership um we continue to have dialogue with the carriers appreciate chairman carbajal also congressman swazil's helped convene the carriers i believe that they're making the changes they need to make to enroll and appreciate those who have enrolled um obviously we want every carrier to enroll uh appreciate also all of the resources that you're bringing to bear i work on the legislation the safer seas i this is a long-term process and i think what's essential is that we not only implement the initiatives we have underway but that we look to to make sure that everyone is part of this process that everyone understands the expectation that the merit every maritime workplace must be a place that where every person is safe where they have the opportunity to advance on the basis of their competency and skills that's what we're aiming for within marad we will also be continuing to to strengthen our work we have a lot to do at the merchant marine academy in terms of continuing to review our policies and procedures to make improvements we're also standing up a new office of cadet training and safety that will help us at marad strengthen our oversight and support of the academy in you know in line with the recommendations the national academy of public administration reports so okay i'm pleased to hear that quickly uh chair mafi um you've recently released a ruling against hapag lloyd which found them to be acting in violation of the shipping act um these additional resources that we're proposing for this year will they help you pursue more investigations and handle more complaints absolutely but that's the the point of the asking form as i mentioned we're going to devote most of those to investigations and enforcement um you know that i can't speak uh in particular that ruling because i might be sitting in a pellet state but but i will say that there are many investigations going on there are a couple of additional cases uh that the fmc has brought uh against carriers that are still in the that are in process there are some in the pipeline but clearly we'd be able to do more um i think the ranking member mentioned that i uh had said at one point that we have not yet found uh you know collusion among the carriers and while that is is is technically true i do want to make it absolutely clear that that's that's not because the industry is holier than the pope that's because freight rates remain um incredibly high anyway even with expansions of capacity and also there are certainly many many reports of uh issues with the individual carriers that are members of these alliances so the this is not an end this is an industry that in my view needs more assessment in the enforcement section and that's what these resources will allow us to do and i appreciate again mr chairman you allowing me to make that point i'm pleased to hear that and it's a breath of fresh air compared to under the last administration where the problem was substantially ignored so thank you for your work uh thank you matt mr chair thank you mr defazio next i uh will recognize mr gibbs thank you mr chair uh admiral i just had a couple comments here on bill what the uh chairman defazio was talking about on the biden's administration's budget for procurement construction improvement 1.654 billion uh we approved uh what was it two 2 billion i guess for fiscal year 2022 and the don young coast guard bill we just authorized 3.5 billion for fiscal year 23 which is uh twice uh the request um you know my concern i think we share up in the dioceres uh you know how much would they sure shy in shore site infrastructure construction backlog grow from 23 to 25 fiscal years of maintenance backlog and um and then i also want to tag on that about the 12th national security cutter um i mean maybe i'm missing something here but my understanding is on the 12th uh national security cutter the the the construction uh you know that that pipeline's hot and if we don't do it it'll go cold and my understanding is we can probably build that for 700 million if we go cold it's going to be over a billion and then you tack on inflation you know you have more additional comments you want to make about this president's request on the budget because it seems like to me you said two billion a year would be enough to sustain making progress but when i look at the maintenance backlog and with inflation and all that i i think the coast guard needs to be more aggressive in in trying to get the funds that we're trying to authorize and appropriate thank you ranking member gibbs i would say sir you know from from a predictable stable fund level 2 billion is it would be a good number for the coast guard i would tell you we obviously as an operating agency inside a department have to work within a top line and there's there's puts and takes i think when you look at the unfunded priority list which congress enabled us to start submitting years back we have lifted quite a bit consistently increasingly so each of the the previous budget years and are picking up a lot of those projects so we identify those predominantly pcni infrastructure type projects capital projects and the congress has been putting that on top of the president's request so i think we're we're making some progress there you asked about national security cutter 12 national security council i have i think consistently for four years said that national security cutters are remarkably capable of global deployers the program of record was eight ships the congress has supported the procurement of three additional ships the tenth and eleven ships are under construction we'll take acceptance of number 10 in 2023. we've got about a 208 million dollar shortfall budgetarily to bring 10 and 11 into service the 23 budget bites down about um about a little little less than a third of that so there's still going to be about 150 million outstanding bill we're the congress to to lift uh 12th national security on top of the president's budget sir the coast guard would not push back on that there's still costs but i think i think coast guard needs to be a little bit more aggressive in requesting it from the appropriators well sir it's hard for me to request that when i when my top priorities from an acquisition standpoint are the offshore patrol cutter and the polar security cutter so this gets into the you know into the top line maneuver space sir but but i would tell you our security cutters as you've defined them are incredibly capable um we're three beyond the programmer record it would displace something within our current plans right all right i got to move on here sir i went quickly i got a text here uh from the uh capitol police on 6 30 3 p.m at april 20th about aircraft intrusion to evacuate this complex uh i guess the army rangers were doing a uh at the national army golden knights uh doing a thing for the national baseball game um my question is who what happened here did we have a communications breakdown why didn't the capitol police know about it because anything in this you know zone in this area is is under the coast guard because i've written in the coast guard uh choppers you know and that what can you just briefly tell me what what happened because i'm looking for congressman what i know of that it was we do have a mission here the national capital regional air defense mission we have mh65 dolphin helicopters that stand this 724 365 ready watch on very short alert my understanding was the golden knights did not notify the faa the operation occurred it created some excitement once they figured out what was going on so why the notification did not occur sir i do not know on that but we do have that presence here a little bit different than what we generally trained for i i just i'm just raising i just raised here because communications is as you know is the wheel start certainly yeah and uh obviously there was a communication breakdown there unfortunately it wasn't there wasn't a national security issue but i think the notification if i understand it should have probably went to faa because it involved capital region airspace services runs out too much here i want to help me understand you know we had the coast guard atlantic coast port access route study congress required in 2016. uh we've been waiting on the coast guard to do their final complete the rule making process um recommended to set a size navigation that the atlantic coast the study and that and i would tackle that ty uh touch on on top of that we have the co the tottenham interiors intensive leasing areas in the gulf of mexico wind energy project in the near future we also have the arctic and the west coast route access studies it doesn't seem maybe i'm wrong but doesn't seem to me that this has been a top priority for the coast guard to develop these lanes for shipping lanes for with the wind projects uh you know kind of deferring or or by defuncting to uh department of interior can you explain what's going on here i would tell you we take our our waterways safety management security roles very seriously sir the uh the acpars atlantic coastal waterways support access route study that you're talking about we will issue the final rule this calendar year that we will issue at this counter it has been longer than than anyone desires that's fair criticism i i own that um but we we are working with boehm the bureau of ocean energy management we're working with other federal stakeholders we have worked on the on the spacing of wind you know we currently have i think eight towers off of uh off of rhode island there's two off virginia beach there's permitting for up to seventeen hundred there are multiple captain of the port zones and regions here um but the frustration is fair the criticism but we will have a final rule the scout gulf of mexico it stands on that one gulf of mexico sir it's it's it's it's work in progress again but we understand the urgency but i assure you that we are not seeding ground on our safety responsibilities established by by law i'm just i'm just encouraging you to make sure the coast guard service is an exceeding ground because i think that's where that is not our attention at this time thank you thank you mr gibbs uh i will now recognize myself miss leslie two weeks ago i was made aware of a report conducted by suny maritime which was completed in january among other things the report discussed deficiencies associated with diversity sexual assault and sexual harassment while every institution should be looking inward on this issue the circumstance circumstances surrounding this report are troubling in its publicly released versions sunny maritime redacted seemingly important portions of the report associated with sexual harassment sexual assault and racial harassment that certainly went beyond shielding names for privacy the academy even refuses to share the unredacted version with me as well the report states that the committee has found that across the board there are issues regarding how racial and sexual harassment or claims of sexual assault are handled i can only imagine what's in the redacted portions the smas received 1.6 billion from 2018 to 2022 and it is my understanding that they are asking for significant help in re-capitalizing some of their short-sight infrastructure ms leslie is it appropriate that they operate outside the reach of any meaningful federal government oversight while still continuing to receive federal funds thank you for the question um so i will give you a multi-part answer obviously there are um for example title ix and other federal requirements that apply and we are also looking at our policies and procedures including opportunities to strengthen title vi oversight that said i think that there are many novel issues that are being raised particularly of concern to me is for example custodial arrangements for the nsmv which are meant to be dual purposed there are novel questions that are not necessarily anticipated in statute our regs are to the to the extent that we have them are outdated and and there are also limits to our resources and as i mentioned uh you know we as you know we have a tremendous amount of work to do at the merchant marine academy that said our north star is safety creating safety for everyone at sea you know as we look at our policies and procedures as we look at these opportunities [Music] i would like to continue the dialogue with you with with your staff with obviously with congress to ensure that we're meeting congress's expectations uh and certainly you know as we discuss these issues that are not necessarily anticipated in statute thank you and i would be interested in knowing what legislative solutions might exist as well so admiral schultz in march's field hearing on small passenger vessel safety we discussed this severe shortage of maritime safety inspectors this coast guard itself estimates it has only two-thirds of the inspectors it needs to conduct timely vessel inspections can you please explain what impact the president's requested increase of 38 ftes and 11.2 million or 3.8 percent would uh have on the current staffing shortfall chairman thanks for the question sir so the budget proposed budget has 11 plus million 73 ftps my count those are marine inspectors investigators environmental specialists they build on previous budget cycles numbers i think that rolls up to be a couple hundred additional marine inspectors we have uh we've rolling out and implementing now the marine inspectors support performance support architecture in the modern recognized learning environments we have very much focused on the increasing technological sophistication of the maritime domain i put out a strategy the maritime commerce strategy back in the early part of my tenure in 2018 that fall and we are action that we need to build the workforce with the expertise to deal with the increasingly complex technologically sophisticated landscape and so this is another investment towards that ends thank you miss leslie in 2021 the united nations issued a declaration on zero emissions shipping by 2050. the international maritime organization of which the united states is a member similarly issued an ambitious greenhouse gas reduction strategy what role do you foresee merit programs such as metaplane in making the united states a global leader in maritime decarbonization thank you for the question obviously it's a very important program the president's budget for 2023 requests 10 million dollars for the program which would be an increase over the 2022 enacted level and that would be consistent with the administration's priorities to support decarbonization the development of alternative fuels and future energy technologies to improve energy efficiency improvements we think we have unique opportunity with our domestic fleet to pioneer these new technologies and emission reduction efforts which can serve as a proof of concept for the ocean going fleet so very excited about this program and about the president's support in his request thank you now i will recognize uh representative garrett graves thank you mr chairman um and i want to thank both of you if you're for your service and uh hope you'll get some great fishing in uh during during retirement um coming on i wanted to ask you as part of the the don young coast guard authorization act uh congressman gear mindy and i offered an amendment on on manning and we added section 518 to the bill that um effectively treats uh foreign vessels operating in the offshore working on energy type projects the same way as domestic vessels would be would be treated things like ensuring improving ownership things like making sure that your crew matches the flag of the vessel making sure that we actually enforce the terms of the work visas that are that are granted to these foreign workers working in uh our near shore environments um i know that you've been a big advocate of our national security marine security maritime security um do you think it's fair to require foreign vessels to operate under rules similar to to those of domestic vessels congressman um i think i think there's an ongoing dialogue with you in terms of you know the the u.s crew there's some waiver authority for us on that i think we look forward to continuing to to work and and have those conversations are on on on that amendment here in terms of how we implement in terms of consistency across you know other other foreign crewing type conversations uh coming on uh this amendment if i remember right i think it passed 58 or 59 to 2 in this committee strong bipartisan support for for the amendment i just i'd urge you to to think for just a minute about having a level playing field and not actually prioritizing foreign vessels and foreign crews over those of of the united states and i i don't think i have to remind anybody here what happens when we compromise our energy security in the united states uh yes sir based on of course what's going on in the in the uk so i think i've been a pretty consistent voice on jones act and support and support for u.s you know merchant fleet and merchant american mariners so i think like i said i just i think that conversation is it's we're working your point of taking sir i'm not disagreeing with that i think it's uh just just still a little bit back and forth here with uh drafting assistance those kind of conversations and and happy to happy to get technical assistance or drafting assistance from the coast guard on this i just i do want to reiterate that i think from just from a marine domain awareness perspective it's important that we we're actually enforcing the conditions of these work visas and that we know who's in our waters making sure that they're planned by fair rules and we're not giving foreign vessels and workers a competitive advantage over american vessels yes an american workforce and as you mentioned uh commandant admiral i i know that you are a big jones act supporter and i think that this is consistent with the objectives of of the jones act that's right so look forward to working with you on that um second thing i wanted to ask you and i know you you covered this in your in your opening on ice on an icebreaker and you and i have had numerous discussions over the need for the united states to increase its capability uh to operate in polar environments um we've we've both looked at the chart and the number of vessels that other countries operate in the arctic have in terms of heavy capabilities as compared to the united states i know that you all have been cannibalizing the sea and star to try to use duct tape and bubble gum to do what you can um and and i appreciate that the budget request includes i believe 125 million dollars to give you uh capabilities in the in the short term for a commercially available vessel um in in the the i think it requires a purchase um [Music] to give you operational capabilities but i wanted to ask you if you thought that uh that a leasing capability or a leasing uh option would make sense for the coast guard in in terms of more quickly trying to achieve that um that capability operating in in polar environments yeah congressman we've had some interesting conversations over the previous administration the current administration you know the conversation with my predecessors was leasing in lieu of procuring the polar security cutters heavy breakers we need once we sort of got the car down and the program or record we had a chance to revisit that um the i believe after pretty pretty diligent homework and study on this that a procurement option because we're going to need you know i've talked about 631 a minimum of six breakers three are heavy you know three beyond that i think that conversation's really evolved with some additional based on the high latitude study we probably need four to six heavy breakers and three to five medium breakers what we're gonna call arctic security cutters this commercial available option could feed that for the good part of you know the next 25 years so the ability to go out with 125 million another 25 million made available in 23 budget for crewing and operating that i think we could bring that ship you know once we work through we need a little help on how we you know some legislative help on how we actually go execute that but so i think that brings in a ship so it's a bridging strategy polar security cutter contract date is may 25. obviously we haven't started cutting steel on that this allows us to build the fleet of icebreaker sailors allows us the gap between that ship that new power security about 27 before it's operational and it helps us to find the requirements for those medium breakers out of the roadside and coming i'm out of time i just want to make sure including a leasing strategy so i think the leasing just as we did the cost analysis it would cost us more to lease that vessel for some specified period time than to procure that and have it in the inventory as one of these arctic security cutters henceforth i'd i'd love to be able to continue that conversation with you thank you mr chairman thank you thank you mr graves next we'll go to representative larson thank you mr um administrator leslie on the tankers tanker security program that's a program that's under jurisdiction armed services but but you but mariad implements it is that correct that is correct yeah could you discuss how the tsp takes for your program how you're thinking about it with regards to the announced closure of the red hill um facility in hawaii where the the defense department has said that we're going to distribute fuel distribution throughout the indo-pacific have you guys thought through that what that vision looks like um so a few weeks ago i had the opportunity to testify in front of armed services with general vanovos the transcom commander and um would emphasize that uh general van ovos made clear that you know the the dod is looking at options and things like long-term charters for tankers and i i would not opine on that it's really a dod but we are excited about the tsp and and to your point it would obviously provide additional provide access to much needed tankers for our dod we are in the process as i testified there of developing a rule and hope to have that in place quickly as possible so that we could ideally have enrollments begin by the end of the calendar year and we recognize the urgency of of this program getting it up and getting it going correctly okay that's that's fine can i just shift to small shipyards grant where are you in the fy22 process on small shipyards thank you so much for that question so um we issued our notice of funding opportunity earlier this year grants applications are due on may 16th and we have approximately 20 million dollars to award and as we talked last time um in the last round for 2021 we issued 31 small shipyard grants in 15 states so the nofo is out it's open we encourage all small shipyards to apply that's great thanks now we're used very it's used a lot and very well um in washington state uh mr mcfay um this morning i met with some folks from ilw the long shore on the west coast and the way that they described the potential reopening of shanghai ports because of the shutdown is a tsunami of containers and goods coming back in the united states so we have a little bit of relief a little bit of relief on the west coast right now because the unfortunate circumstance of covet in china but are you do you anticipate that same picture that we're going to have backups again and use of anchorages and and how do you then what would fmc's response be to that i i do anticipate that um i mean the fmc will continue to be vigilant in terms of making sure that nobody is violating the shipping act there's not a whole lot of levers we have to reduce congestion in itself other than you know make sure that um you know continuing to do the audits that we're doing to make sure that best practices are followed amongst all the carriers and certain mtos we have been meeting with the wikimantoa the the organization of mtos that manages peer pass to help facilitate coming up with additional ideas to help with congestion but congestion is the biggest challenge particularly that exporters face so the irony is we're going to get this wave of imports and it's going to end up hurting exports and that is of extreme concern i will only say that the respites that we have had are are not due to any lessening of the overall problems or situation but simply the market cyclical forces and the same thing will happen with this we will get unfortunately a fair amount of of a wave from shanghai and that will eventually dissipate in the same way but not because any problem has been you know fundamentally solved yeah thank you admiral schultz i have a lot of other questions i was had a great uh tour of coast guard seattle and last week and with admiral mcallister was up from pacific command so i'll save you the questions about uh seattle and and uh and protecting our marine mammals act and all these we're getting those answered back home so appreciate that but having said that um the the polar security program as we've discussed a little bit there was a 800 million in funds in the budget reconciliation package which hasn't passed so how has the lack of reconciliation funding forced you all to change plans on the on the polar security cutter program well congressman the polar security fund program i think is is on a good trajectory um the 23 budget has about 167 million dollars that gets after program management long lead time materials 22 by some of the long lead time materials on the caterpillar key engines the other pieces we were able to roll into 23.

we should be maintaining positive momentum on the psc program of record of three ships i think there's a conversation beyond that as i indicated to mr gray possibly a hot production line more ships but we're still getting ready to cut steel hopefully before this calendar year on the first polar security cutter okay thank you that's great thank you and yield back thank you mr larson next we'll go to representative meliotakis thank you mr chairman and thank you to the witnesses for being here today my district on staten island we have coast guard sector new york which represents the largest operational field command on the east coast um in october of last year the opportunity to visit with the leadership of our u.s coast guard sector in new york and one of the main issues that we spoke about was the need for housing upgrades for the men and women a station there certainly housing is a big part of being able to attract and retain coasties and as you know adequate housing it and it is also important that we give our coasties and their families the quality of life that they deserve and that the homes they come back to at the end of the day are ones that they are proud of um housing upgrades at fort wadsworth base have been long overdue as you know there was a fire a couple of years ago um there was a 40 million 40 million dollars put aside for phase one to rehab um those homes and um was also pleased to work to push for another five million from the infrastructure investment jobs act for phase 2 to upgrade 154 legacy housing units i'm also encouraged to see that there's 10 million dollars in funding for phase 3 that's included in the u.s coast guard unfunded priority list for fiscal year 23. admiral i know that you also visited our station in september and saw the housing for yourself i would love a comment from you on the status of the upgrades and what is the timeline for the project's overall completion well congresswoman thank you for your advocacy of the coast guard at large and our men and women in new york and fort wadsworth housing as you mentioned 40 million in the 21 budget that get after the fire destroyed units there uh some additional monies and 22.5 million to continue efforts you know we're able to uh to touch the upgrades of the 154 legacy units we're able to do safety assessments of their condition and make upgrades to all those units i think that's critically important um the environmental due diligence contract excuse me on that one the the uh the staten island units i think it's the phase two just gets after the continued body of work there ma'am so in terms of the actual timeline i i don't have the the dates in front of me about when you would see you know the actual timeline for for the work there but the good news is we've secured the funding allows us to do the detail planning and uh with the with the multi-year commitment i think it sends a very strong signal to our men and women that that live in a very high cost area but have a high pace and high demand of coast guard services there this is all part of the equation that master t spoke to about recruiting and retaining the men and women with the right skills to do the work of the nation well thank you and as you said for all those reasons uh it is time is of the essence to make sure that we get this construction going and um i i look forward if you if you can look offline and get back to me on some type of a more concrete timeline i very much look forward to being with you at the ground breakings and the ribbon cuttings because uh this is as you said a really important part of retaining coasties this is something that the commander made very clear that new york city is a very expensive place to live and so uh providing this housing at the base is um very very important is there any other issue that i should be looking at as relates to new york coast guard station any any way that i can help advocate to help my coasties do their job better congresswoman we will get back to you on on more specificity on the timeline let me just defer to the master if he has anything on your question about the people up at sector new york anything like that jason so the way we uh you know just supporting with with the cost of living allowances and and paying attention to the increased costs of of uh living basically just doing your your job there uh we need to to pay attention to that and be able to assess that and and accurately compensate our people on a timely basis so that um you know as rents go up as as groceries as things become uh more challenging more expensive that we we definitely need to to be able to make sure that people have the same quality of life year after year uh without you know so help with that and i can get back with you on on what that would look like okay i look forward to that thank you very much yield back thank you representative melinda uh i now uh recognize uh rep the distinguished gentleman from california representative lowenthal thank you chairman um i i found this to be in a very interesting hearing and i've learned a lot and i want to start with uh chairman mafay thank you for being here with us today uh thank you for your testimony especially like if i was correct uh you're here you're presenting to us that the uh improvements that have been you have kind of led on the fmc have been noticed by people who interact with the fmc and that uh people are sitting are getting back to you in a very positive way that's always nice to hear uh and obviously when we talk about supply chain issues uh they're under stress at every level and no single agency if you point it out can and the impact of the pandemic alone but i want to underscore something and i want to ask you if what i'm going to share with you is what you're hearing also there's a small importer in my district he imports basically olives from europe and he told me and he brings him into the ports of l.a long beach and he said that his container fees 40-foot containers had increased from less than four thousand dollars i think it was thirty nine hundred and forty dollars uh from uh january of 2020 uh to over twelve thousand dollars in march of this year and in april it was going and had gone up to fourteen thousand dollars i don't need to tell you how that increase can hurt businesses and lead to tremendous increases in inflation and consumers all over the country i'm wondering are those the same numbers you're hearing about importing and and how uh here that's one question the second question is uh you've provided uh an important update on the fmc's activities to make sure that people are playing by the rules and i appreciate all your work but i want to make sure you have the resources uh to make sure that these companies are playing by the rules and that they aren't profiting uh from unfair fees can you speak to the importance of more resources and to what and to the impact of your february mou with the department of justice uh thank you for the questions um mr lowenthal i will try to answer them as expeditiously as i can um there is not one price for ocean transportation or spot rates uh contract rates tariff rates that said though um what you're saying does ring true and and the unfortunate thing is is that different uh size of a shipper does make a huge difference because of their market power if you are a big box importer one of those big stores or or online companies that we all know so well um you can guarantee hundreds of thousands of containers sometimes to get a much lower rate so those their rates have gone up those big cargo importers but nowhere near as much as the medium size and small shipper because of the differing degrees of market power so unfortunately your small importer is probably paying that much more it's not it's not an aberration at all what we've tried to do at the fmc is even though we we're not allowed to regulate the rate itself we're trying to make sure that there's no additional fees that are hidden someplace like a congestion surcharge we're trying to make sure that your your constituent is not being charged unfair detention demurrage which they cannot control um and that's what we focused our our efforts at under under our current authority in terms of um other things that we're doing first of all i appreciate what you you know that we are getting some compliments but that doesn't mean we're anywhere near doing as much as we need to do we are clearly ramping up as quickly as we can given the situation um the memorandum of understanding with the justice department is helpful we mostly exchange expertise um we both do independent investigations the justice department is currently investigating uh carrier alliances as well as we do and we do exchange information but we keep those investigations separate um it has those sort of cooperations have uh been beneficial in the past um and will continue them um and in terms of our overall uh request i mean obviously you know i don't take lightly the fact that in in this current budget environment um we're asking for uh you know about five percent more but it is essential uh given the number of cases uh with this kind of the this demand surcharge this demand uh surge there have been very high rates affecting all sorts of shippers um and then the congestion uh makes everything much worse so i think i've addressed all of your questions but but um if i haven't sufficiently please please let me know thank you uh mr chairman how much time do i have left you're out of time mr london well that's too bad i had great questions we're gonna have a second round so hold your questions we'll come back to you shortly uh thank you mr london with that we'll move on to representative andrew and thank you for holding today's hearings on the coast guard's 2023 budget um as we know we have our great commandant carl schultz here and our master chief petty officer vanderheyden who equally does a great job admiral schultz thank you for the decades of dedicated service to the united states of america your extraordinary tenure as a commandant has built a stronger united states coast guard the contributions you have made will endure long after your retirement i want to thank you for attending my community's coast guard ball last week it was an honor hosting you with such a momentous occasion for the cape may counties coast guard community our friendships will only become stronger as the coast guard invests in the training center cape may in the don young coast guard authorization act of 2022 this committee authorized 120 million for phases one and two of the u.s coast guard's training center kate may barracks recapitalization congress then appropriated 55 million towards phase one in a bipartisan and in a bicameral manner yesterday the coast guard provided an unfunded priority list to congress the list includes a request for 60 million to fund phase 2 of the barracks project funding phase 2 in this year's appropriations legislation is a national security imperative global threats such as chinese aggression in the south china sea and russia's expansion into the arctic have greatly increased the importance of the coast guard to america's national security only the coast guard has the tools to encounter china and russia's gray zone strategy to address this global challenge the coast guard needs more and better prepared personnel eighty percent of all coast guard personnel comes through the training center in my district in cape may the expansion of the training center cape may is the expansion of the coast guard itself and we must expand the coast guard to meet the national security challenges of our 21st century the training center project will also provide more opportunities for women to serve just as admiral linda fagan has been nominated to be the new commandant we should provide women the opportunity to serve their country in this our coast guard the training center current infrastructure can only accommodate 30 percent female recruits the proposed recapitalization will accommodate 50 percent female recruits the barracks recapitalization must move forward to expand opportunities for women in the coast guard and i look forward to working with admiral fagan to fully deliver on the training center kate may project and give more women the chance to serve their country the training center kate made barracks recapitalization project is crucial to the future of the coast guard and the united states we've got to get this project done when the training center was last being renovated a funding lapse resulted in an incomplete project this cannot happen again we must ensure this project is fully funded and fully delivered i have proposed with you a framework to deliver this critical project the first step is for congress to fund the coast guard's year 2023 request of 60 million for the already on already authorized phase two of the barracks projects the next phase is to authorize phase three and four in the 2024 coast guard authorization legislation congress should then fund phase three and four in fiscal years 2024 and 2025. this framework ensures that the barracks project is fully funded by the start of phase one and delivers the full project by 2032. this proposal this proposed approach was evaluated by the coast guard engineering and budgetary officials as you know as operationally financially and legally feasible this plan will ensure that this product is fully delivered and i submit to the record a framework timeline for this proposal my framework to implement a prioritized timeline for the u.s code guard training center kate may barracks project is feasible responsible and imperative to the national security of the united states of america in the 21st century admiral schultz thank you again for your leadership and your integral role in delivering phase one of the training center barracks project could you please speak on what the training center barracks means to the coast guard and to the united states of america and secondly i yield the remainder of my time for you to speak freely on your time of your great service as commandant of the united states coast guard use me just once by saying i'm sorry mr andrew you're out of time i'll let the witness answer your question briefly and then we'll move on i would just say thank you for the support of the training center the unfunded priority list for 23 that just reached the hill here inclu includes 60 million for phase two as we sequence the conversations earlier about you know working within the top lines federal agency it maintains my commitment i speak for my successor that we are committed to building out all phases of cape may there's 10 million that came in the iaj to kind of keep moving the ball forward into your last question i'll speak for myself the mass chief it's been the privilege of our lifetimes to uh to serve in these leadership positions and we appreciate the support of this committee as we uh try to make the coast guard a little bit better each and every day thank you thank you for your service thank you mr andrew we'll now move on to the former chairman of this subcommittee representative maloney the highlight of my career uh mr chairman and it's great to see the tradition of excellent leadership of this subcommittee maintained and expanded upon by your own distinguished leadership i'm tempted to yield more time to expand on your great leadership uh admiral schultz but i actually do have a question for you it's great to see you again sir it's great to see you master chief it's been um terrific working with y'all thank you for treating me so well and um uh and and the work you do when when i chaired the subcommittee but i am curious about a couple of things um and i'll just note in passing um my ongoing belief that that for the 13 billion bucks you guys were requesting we get a hell of a lot for the taxpayers dollars the 11 statutory missions you perform doesn't mean we don't have challenges don't doesn't mean we don't have things to work on but bang for the buck i've always been incredibly impressed uh by by by all of you and of course the coasties uh who do those missions so thank you for that the uh it's great to see my former colleague dan maffe here it's nice to know this life after congress sir you give us all hope uh say hi to your beautiful family for me um and thank you for your service to new york and since so look um i just had a couple of questions as you know a real priority of mine was the ban on oil barge anchorages in the hudson river between kingston and yonkers obviously that's federal law now that's not my question but but there was a required assessment that went along with that study about the effects of that and i hope we can look forward to that and in addition to that i'm curious about the progress on uh a second study that was required as well under the 2021 authorization which was a plan to analyze the effectiveness of what are called wing and ground craft which i think you're familiar with which are the um really remarkable uh crafts that that attempt to use new technology to sort of operate above the surface of the water on dynamic air suspension and can attain speeds in excess of 100 miles an hour i know for your missions in the east pacific for example uh getting at those uh distances would be very helpful but i'm sure for other missions as well could could could you comment for me if you could on the progress of those two studies the hudson river anchorages and and the um winging ground craft congressman to be frank sir i need to circle back we have both those the wing over water that you talk about i have not seen received a recent update i'll tell you the increasingly complex nature of the waterway recreational boating up 15 i mentioned earlier before you came in about 1700 permitted wind towers off the eastern coast there's a question about the acpar's route study there's a lot of moving things in waterways so we need to autonomous vessels are right around the corner so we're defining sort of the criteria by which we judge you know the ability for these craft to operate safely but in terms of that type of specific crafts are on the river i would take those both for uh for homework to get back to you here lately this week just to be clear separate studies reflecting the anchorages on the river but the the craft in general so happy to take your commitment to get back to us on the completion of those appreciate that and thanks for your committee leadership and your support of the men and women of the coast guard sir well and thank you for your forbearance with the current leadership we're doing what we can and uh and i'd like to yield my remaining time to uh mr larson who i believe had an additional question but thank you all thanks sir good to see you yeah ed uh admiral schultz um the other question i had was i have two but quickly on opc opc cutters and the timing is a delivery still on schedule for those or not congressman yes sir we are on schedule earlier this week we uh awarded contract for the construction of opc number four um this quarter and i say fiscal year quarter so that is april may june we will uh we should award phase two for the opc program that'll be halls five through fifteen the next eleven hulls and i think we are on track so the 23 budget includes a a large chunk of money for um opc number five and long lead materials 650 million dollars long materials for number six so that program is progressing as plants sir all right and then uh a second question to wrap up for me the cruise industry is a pretty big deal in washington state and other places around the country we've been through covid uh and i think this year alone seattle's expecting 300 port calls which is more than i think the 2019 number the pre-covered number so people are coming back cruises are up and going just want to get a flavor from you about your preparation in order to serve uh safety at sea um with the increased number of folks who are rushing back to the end of the cruise industry congressman um we are absolutely ready you know we've seen various levels of return to uh to normal activities pre-covet activities in different parts of the country i was in south florida here this past friday and talked to different lines coming back at different paces sir but we are ready to work in terms of any um inspection type work that needs to go on and uh you know we're ready should we have some other challenges you know each and every one of those almost 250 300 000 people that removed from cruise lines was challenging but we really worked with local cdc local officials um different safety entities and i'm proud of the working men of the coast guard but we stand ready sir for full resumption of normal operations appreciate that thank you yieldback thank you mr larson uh i will now recognize each member for an additional five minutes a second round of questions and i will start by recognizing myself mr mafay i am aware there are multiple efforts underway to increase information transparency in the u.s supply chain would you please talk about the importance of information transparency in improving the cost and efficiency efficiency of transportation goods how does the fy 2023 president's budget take into account this data initiative um i'll answer the second part of the question first which is that we are definitely proceeding with a number of uh efforts not the least of which is my colleague commissioner bensall's data start in terms of the specific resources we give to it some of it will come out of recommendations that he makes this is a huge area as you know and we want to make sure that you know we're putting we're putting the resources in the right places but there's no question that both in terms of our ability to analyze trends in the industry and even potential violations of the shipping act information is essential and in terms of serving the shipping public information transparency is incredibly important for two reasons one is is that uh given that this is a market-based system and has been since the 1984 shipping act how can uh consumer how can consumers in this case shippers make the right decisions if they don't know so for instance if a rate if they're comparing rates but one of the rates isn't really the full rate there's also a surcharge or even in one case we had a value-added charge a congestion surcharge everything is congested so putting a congestion surcharge in my view isn't isn't a legitimate thing it's simply part of the rate you need to be able to compare rate versus rate so that's one reason the second thing is is that particularly for exporters the logistical challenges involved right now are extreme a good portion of the reason why exports are not getting on ships is not so much because the carriers won't take the exports but because it is so unpredictable when that ship will be exactly in the right place in the birth accepting exports and so commissioner rebecca dye in particular is focusing on working with the industry to try to uncover that there's also a lot of private sector work here particularly by uh the port of los angeles and many others but in any event this kind of information is absolutely crucial to expanding the capacity of our ports keep in mind our ports have not reduced their overall throughput quite the opposite they've all set productivity records but the demand is so intense that even setting those productivity records we're still jamming up with long lines of ships and high high uh uh containers that are not getting out fast enough transparency initiative yeah the transparency i mean i'm sort of answering both of because to me looking you know transparency means being able to see the information the accurate information so all of the i think that's this it's the same answer thank you very much uh miss leslie according to the gao the size of the u.s flag commercial fleet decreased by about 60 between 1990 and 2017 this mariner shortage drives up the cost for shipping and poses a serious threat to our national defense capabilities what action if any has merit proposed to remedy this persistent challenge thank you so much for this question and um a critical issue and i will say that um back in 2009 when uh congressman cummings for whom i worked was chair we had a series of hearings on that very issue which was the decline in the us flag fleet and the fact that we were not carrying a substantial portion of our water-borne import export commerce on our u.s flag vessels i think part of the there are obviously significant consequences from having a a small u.s flag fleet um but i think part of the challenge is that at the merchant here at maritime administration where our priority is obviously supporting our u.s flag fleet we're implementing the authorities that we have which yield the fleet that we have i think it's a policy question of whether whether there should be changes um but i do recognize again that there are significant consequences from having the small fleet one of them as you mentioned is having a a small mariner pool and you know we do believe that there would be a shortage if we had to ever activate uh all of our ready reserve and and keep our commercial vessels going to provide essential sea lift um i i think that there are the variables here are known and it really comes down to the policy question like i said we we implement the authorities they have that we have fully um and differ in terms of whether or not there should be changes to congress thank you miss leslie well i look forward to working with you to identify what incentives what policy suggestions solutions might exist for us to uh remedy that challenge that i think is uh so important for us to address in the near future so thank you very much thank you and i i know time is out but i just want to say again recognizing that the maritime industry has never been more critical to our nation and having u.s flag fleet having mariners who can both meet our economic and national security needs is a critical concern thank you move on and recognize mr gibbs acting administrator leslie the maritime administration issues permits for deep water ports and this the agency's only permit granting program is my understanding that one such project is now being required to do a second draft supplemental environmental impact statement ironically this statement is due to proposed addition of vapor uptake systems which result in significant emission reductions is unfortunate that this project is being slowed down because it is attempting to meet more stringent emission standards this is particularly true during a time which our allies are looking at oil import reductions from russia and threatens to reduce their oil supplies when do you expect marad to issue a final environmental impact statement for the golf link project uh thank you for that question so yes as you indicated they were the project sponsors were advised in april that um they would be required to do a supplemental draft environmental impact statement um given the addition of a vapor recovery system we're working with our coast guard partners on the details of that and developing a detailed timeline for the remainder of the application review process through the final environmental impact statement and the record of decision which uh we're estimating uh that we're estimating the record of decision to be completed in early in 2023 and hope to have um the s the sei uh is process well underway in mid-summer well i hope it gets done as exponentially as if we can because i hope you're not slow walking the process because it's important uh that i think this gets done i think the additional regulations is causing uh you know is damaging what we can do especially for helping our allies in this oil situation uh mr mahaffey i just got a quick question china came up earlier about the uh very uh increases in in containment containers cost and then my question is dealing with container costs versus contracts and i guess the kind of two-part thing um obviously when looking at those escalating costs for the containers that's really uh in the spot market correct and the contracts i assume are specifically less i don't know how long the contracts go for um and then also second part of that the small shippers um do they have they have opportunities uh to contract to are or were they pushed out of the marketplace by the big by the big shippers you know a large retailer we all know who the large retailers are are they uh they're at some advantage i know anyways it's economics of scale but is your uh uh agency kind of monitoring that and what's your thoughts uh you know are we uh is it is it it's just pushing it out the small shippers and making it the bigger retailer shippers are from such an advantage that we're just seeing more of that um going on can you comment quickly that's an excellent question ranking member gibbs and i think you're really on to something because it is one of those unfortunate things that's going on that yes prices are going up for everybody of course the demand's high um but much much less for the big the bigger you are kind of the more market power you have and when there is such scarcity it really you know flattens out and lengthens so that a small shipper may not be able to get contracts now even when they were before we at the committee commission tried to work with them um we have made it clear that um you know uh shipper uh various shipper alliances can can help with making contracts and that uh and we have made it clear that shipper alliances can also bring cases to the fmc so some of these small are you seeing a growth in the alliance system in these sort of shippers alliances anecdotally yes but i don't have any data on that okay because it seems like me that would be a way to compete with that uh my second part my third part i guess something question comes up i assume that this is not hopefully it's not an issue uh the the shippers that have contracts for the containers and stuff with the shipping company the shipping you know that the ship ships the merisk or whatever they're not getting an advantage to get unloaded quicker move up in front of the line where he had the congestion or not uh are you asking if the ships are are prioritized or if the car goes unloaded quicker yeah i mean do they get do they get the movement i'll look into that uh i'm just raising the question you know just to see yeah you know no no it's a good question i'll look into it i don't i don't believe that because of the how complex it is to unload these container ships i don't think there's anything kind of productive but that said though you're onto something again because these these contracts people the shippers sign these contracts and are led to believe one way or another that they're they're very binding often what we find when we look into it is they're actually not binding on the carrier as much as the shipper thought and so there is a lot of issues with these contracts notwithstanding the fact that that the shipper thinks they got a better a rate and particularly a guaranteed number of spaces and then it turns out that they don't and that's been a big problem and that's probably why we need the maritime transportation data initiative that your agency is working on uh what do you think we can receive that report um i i will have to get back to you on that i mean obviously as expeditiously as possible mr trump just indulged me here i got a question for okay anyways uh admiral um like i have to bring this up of course we have uh uh you know the great lakes carriers continue to believe additional coast guard ice breaking capacities leading the great lakes what percentage increased the coast guard ice spring effort and now that the 140 foot ice-breaking tug rehabilitation program is is complete and uh also i guess it's more important to me to understand this better uh could the great lakes icebreakers share a common hall in powertrain with it's now being called the arctic security cutter when my understanding is the rx security cutter is a smaller um vessel compared to the what up in the arctic and and the coast guard wants that to do activities around uh uh in the north would be the northwest atlantic i guess up there in greenland area um is it possible to to for it seems like it may be a cost efficiency thing if they shared the same hall in powertrain with the arctic security cutter and a great lakes icebreaker would that make sense congressman thanks for the question um i'll say it this way i think it's possible i think we had some earlier conversations i think as we think about what we've sort of notionally called an arctic security cutter a medium breaker i think that's probably bigger than the capability to the great lakes let me watch conversation back in the great lakes there's 640-foot icebreaking tugs usb5 we added the six congress has signaled clearly over the last five budget cycles to the tune almost 20 million dollars that you're looking for more capacity there we are looking at you know we call it the glib program i don't think we want to build another mackinaw off the existing designs that's a 20 year old design now but something that's mackinaw like two of the 140s up there operate with 100 foot barge you know maybe there's a platform that is mackinaw-like that also would be replacement for the 140 and barges so we are we understand the clear intent that congress the lake carriers has has made a business case for more capacity we are pressing in on that we have a program office based on previous year's budgets with 11 bodies there's additional bodies going in so we are getting after pre-acquisition activities to come forward with a clear plan on what we're gonna do in the great lakes terms capacity the linkage outside for the arctic so i think that's gonna be a vessel with too much draft to be of utility on the great lakes haven't sailed up there for three years so i actually started that conversation as i've sort of had a chance to cognitate on that look at this commercially available icebreaker there's one i won't mention by name we got to go through acquisition processes but when you look at the draft and that's probably closer to what we need for the arctic work outside the lakes i'm not so sure that would get after the mission on the great lakes so i appreciate i appreciate the response and you're looking into it and concerned sir thank you and as i just closed out here i want to thank you again for your service and master chief uh thank you again i didn't realize you're retiring too i've heard great things about you and i wish you all the well and uh i was thinking about this uh you you me and foreign and sharon defazio are all retiring so good luck thank you very much i yield back and congressman congratulations to you thanks for your support i just want to say both the committee staff has been a pleasure to work with over my 39 years i've got to know the cgnt committee and i've worked with john rayfield for most of my entire coast guard career so i want to thank john and matt's come in and fill big shoes and done a great job so thank you and it's a privilege to be here with lucinda leslie who is a key partner working together on some heart issues in the maritime today about safety at sea for uh for all sailors and particularly women these days thank thank you there's always the next generation mr gibbs um with that we'll move on to close out our hearing representative lowenthal i think you're muted can't hear you my thank you thank you and uh it's nice to be clean up and my questions i want to follow up on questions that i was going to ask in the first round and that's to ms leslie and my first one is more of a statement than a question uh and i want to thank you for being here and i want to lend my support to the strongest possible funding for programs like the port infrastructure development program and i think you talked about that in your statement and how the bipartisan infrastructure will greatly enhance the funding for that program but i do want to note that in the fiscal year 21 uh there were applications for over 1.3 billion dollars in federal funds while we only uh gave out a total of 239 million i know that did go up this will go up this year uh the program is at that point in 2021 was over subscribe by a factor of 5.4 to 1 and there's a huge demand for these resources they're even more important as the program expands to fund electrification and decarbonization projects so i just want to kind of reiterate what you have said and and and say the importance of the port infrastructure development program but i do want to turn briefly to the importance a funding america merchant marine academy and i thank you for your efforts and provided more light on the new standards to ensure that students are protected at our merchant at our academy and i'd just like to know uh if you can give us a little more insight on what it's like bringing the carriers into compliance with the embark standards and and in protecting students it was my understanding that usually that a student had a c year before they graduated will every student have a c year before they graduate now are we able to provide that to them thank you so much for your questions um i want to address the merchant marine academy but also i want to just associate myself with your comments on the critical importance of the port infrastructure development program and the historic investments that uh the president president biden's bipartisan infrastructure law are providing our port infrastructure development program uh will provide 2.25 billion dollars in investments over five years all made possible by the bipartisan infrastructure law looking at the merchant marine academy so our process for bringing carriers into the program they complete a self-assessment and provide policies which are then reviewed by our staff and they are then enrolled and we're also in the process of as i mentioned standing up our office of cadet training and safety which will take over responsibility for us doing the assessment visits to the carriers uh which is required by statute we're also as i mentioned we instituted new policies and procedures at the academy uh and are in the process of now reviewing embark reviewing the policies and procedures so that we can continue to identify opportunities for improvement we can remove barriers to reporting the essential thing here is trust and we have a lot of work to do to build that in terms of senior so yes our the most affected group our class of 2022 will graduate on time they had their c year the class of 2023 is the most affected by this and all of our eligible students are gathering their sea days we're cl tracking very closely and uh anticipate that everyone will have the time they need to graduate obviously sears is is a requirement they need the c days so that they can sit for the licensing exam we are tracking closely there you know we did come into the temporary pause with deficits because of covid um if there are any students who do not any midshipmen who do not gather the time they need by the time of the licensing exam they will be able to take the exam thank you to the coast guard on time and then accumulate the sea days that they still require after the licensing exam no one as i said in my opening statement will leave the academy without the sea time that they need i want to again thank military sealift command the navy the coast guard for providing billets uh in any given year the military sealift command vessels have provided about 25 percent of our sea days we have without their support we would not have been able to get our students underway our midshipmen underway um but with their support um we are looking good in terms of having the class of 2023 gather their accrue their seat time so that they can take their licensing exams and graduate on time thank you uh and with that i yield back thank you mr lonthal it seems that mr gibbs uh in light of his pending retirement has a lot more questions we're gonna let him have uh uh another crack at it uh mr gibbs i just wanna kind of request the admiral because i wanna have something to do here in this last month but uh we're talking about the western alaska national planning criteria i just want the coast guard to submit to the record the committee for record a list of equipment necessary to be located in alaska in order to meet the time deadlines included in the national planning criteria and the capital costs of such equipment just we just send it into the committee congressman western alaska is obviously a unique place with unique challenges in terms of vessels complying with national compliance we have an altered compliance program we are watching you know what is going on and encouraging private sector investment other things and we look forward to continuing work to the congress on that challenge up in that area so we we understand that and we have to come up with a workable solution because it's not reasonable for compliance with other you know national standards elsewhere i agree with that and we just want to see you pursue your plan thank you thank you with that that concludes our hearing for today i would like to thank the witnesses for your testimony today i ask unanimous consent that the record of today's hearing remain open until such time as our witnesses have provided answers to any questions that may be submitted to them in writing i also ask unanimous consent that the record remain open for 15 days for any additional comments and information submitted by members or witnesses to be included in the record of today's hearing without objection so ordered the subcommittee stands adjourned so you