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House committee approves
Orcutt's flood and forest products bills
Measures
would help flood prevention, extend forest products work group
The House Agriculture and
Natural Resources Committee has given unanimous approval to two
bills prime-sponsored by
Rep. Ed Orcutt.
House Bill 2628 would help landowners protect their properties from
floods, and
House Bill 2909 would extend a study of the state's specialized
forest product resources.
Orcutt noted the first
bill would save landowners thousands of dollars in engineering costs
when they are seeking to stabilize riverbanks from flood erosion.
"The law says you have to get a permit from the Department of Fish and
Wildlife before any work begins to stabilize a stream bank. To get that
permit, you need to have plans that will show what you will be doing to
stabilize the banks. It could be cost-prohibitive to have those plans
engineered, which often means people simply give up," said Orcutt.
The Kalama Republican's original bill would have required the Department
of Fish and Wildlife to identify three engineered bank stabilization
methods to help landowners. However, he soon found what he was seeking
already exists.
"Upon introducing legislation to help landowners, I discovered that Fish
and Wildlife already had created a thick notebook of bank stabilization
methods that could be used. They just haven't made it available to the
public," noted Orcutt. "I have amended the bill to require the
department to make this information available to citizens, and to
provide the technical assistance necessary that would help them protect
their homes and properties from bank erosion."
The second measure, House Bill 2909, would extend until Dec. 1, 2008 the
reporting deadline of the Specialized Forest Products Work Group that
Orcutt created through legislation last year.
"We had a situation where an individual was transporting wood he already
owned. He got into legal trouble because he didn't have a permit to
transport that kind of wood. It was an unintended consequence of
previous legislation that was designed to prevent theft of certain types
of wood from the forest. This resulted in the person having to pay more
than $21,000 in legal fees and court costs, not to mention two years of
his time," said Orcutt. "Last year, I offered a bill which the
Legislature approved that created a work group to study how to clean up
the statutes so that law-abiding citizens are not prosecuted."
The group comprises county sheriffs, prosecutors, forest landowners,
tribes, wood carvers, cedar processors, representatives from the
Department of Natural Resources, and other participants invited by the
Commissioner of Public Lands. Orcutt had hoped to make recommendations
to the Legislature by Dec. 1, 2007. However, he noted the issue is far
too complex to do in just the few months the work group had prior to the
due date.
"This is an extremely complicated issue, and while we have identified
the different components of the issue, the group was not able to develop
recommendations before the first of December," said Orcutt. "The bill
I'm sponsoring simply extends the reporting time to the end of this
year, which should give the group sufficient time to provide
recommendations we will use for the basis of legislation in 2009."
House Bill 2628 has been referred to the House Appropriations Committee.
House Bill 2909 has been sent to the Rules Committee for further action.
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For more information, contact:
John
Sattgast, Senior Information Officer: (360) 786-7257
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