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Show ,.,, 11 "" "" ' 1 """"" NIIIMIIIM I , , Western Resources WRAP-UP 11lllHlllll,,i:inM'H"MlN..nillll,IIMIin,ll.,,,,i,,n,,,l,llllllnillll(n Deepening ports final K press VashinS,on l',l'r,';iP,"'l'tit hinptoa - Tto Administration is ,xV(t to st'iul to Congress In-fore the ,ie month a new initiative to im- mnV Jeep " ,!tT lvlls l"ulT a Cllsl-Ojrin.i Cllsl-Ojrin.i .irr.i"j:einent. saiin is primarily to step up the ex-,( ex-,( 0( American coal to foreign i-kt'ts. also. 10 lesser extent, other n."vr.ils. I'honue.ils and fertilizers, !.-j::i. ttnitx-r and paper products tVr the West that means primarily ex-,;j ex-,;j I0 the Asian Kim countries, so a .,vvr of Western Members of Congress Con-gress are particularly interested in the e :,rt. m.ii:Ji"S Senator Mark O. Il.it--VJ K-Ore . chairman of the Senate Ap-r..,jria:ions Ap-r..,jria:ions Committee, and Hep. R.vVrt T. Matsiii. D-C'ahf. They are in .v,. jrivess of preparing new legislation o introduce to upgrade port facilities i-iora cost-sharing arrangement. Ir.'.erest in such a proposal is not -v.c'd to the depressed coal and ship-industries ship-industries When Western Resources Wrap-up itt'KWi recently Bill Oleary, the new president of -.v, aNxit subjects he planned to ex-:;.re ex-:;.re in h.s new post, he replied. "Trade i -.h Japan." Club 20 is an organization 3' the A' Western Colorado counties : .quartered in Grand Junction, Colo, rresf counties are largely the mineral :::er.ouse of Colorado. Rep Dick Cheney, R-Wvo . recently ;rserved at a coal slurry pipeline hear-:r. hear-:r. the House Interior Committee that , 'iV.;:r.g is interested in selling its coal Japan. Era A. McKeever. president of jsWR. Grace i Co. Mining Division :;uar.ered in Denver, made a highly :;:uci;ec! :np to the Orient last year to r- :o line up long-term contracts to sell v.ur.tair. States coal, via the Aquatrain ::::sal. particularly to Japan and .12. He didn't, but he recently told ?.',V. "We are still talking to the .'ira.'.ese " ADMINISTRATION' PROPOSAL IN' FLL'X ) T-o years ago the Reagan Ad-r.ii".ra::on Ad-r.ii".ra::on proposed legislation to l: local port authorities to charge ::'ees to recover full federal costs of rjcratiocs and maintenance for ports . zi w construction of port facilities. I 7:e legislation cleared the Senate En- , ":-est and Public Works Committee cie House Merchant Marine Com-ee Com-ee ie sorr.euhat watered-down form rur.eto user fees, but then it stalled. Dr. G. Edward Dickey, economic ad-to ad-to William R. Gianelli. .Assistant seL-Kary of the .Army for civil works, on 1 summed up response to the Ad- ".ration's 1961 proposal. There w as. 3c.d. "little response from Congress -i affected industries. ..beyond the "".:r. that the amounts to be collected 'St'.oo much too soon." Ickev told a seminar on coal policies aaorec by the National Coal Associa-'aasdthe Associa-'aasdthe Edison Electric Institute in --t-ston on March 1 that the new Ad--ts'J"at!on proposal provides for the Ejection of "about S225 million or 60 Pttwt of Corps of Engineers expenses expen-ses on operation and maintenance of -p-araft navigation projects in fiscal .'-if 1934." So it will not be as far-crj-g as the initial proposal. D.ckey warned the Army still feels -j "cost of operation and maintenance -of future capital improvements for M'uon's harbors should be recovered -re part from commercial users," not from the average taxpayer. He said "Recovery of future capital costs should be port-specific. The test of a project's feasibility should be the willingness of the direct beneficiaries to pay for at least a good part of it." Thud, he said, the "recovery of the operation and maintenance lO&M I casts should be largely on a systemwide basis." If maintenance costs are recovered thru a nationwide standard fee it would not disturb the existing competitive com-petitive positions of major American pin ts, he observed. This gets around the concern of small ports that thev might not be able to generate enough revenues to pay for O&M. which is not a concern of mast large ports, Dickey told WRW on March 4. At the same time, he said, there should be some local financing of O&M to serve as an incentive to high-cost ports to reduce their CAM costs. Twelve ports in the nation including four in California had O&M costs per cargo ton of from $175 to more than $1,000. according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers study in 19S2. This study indicated in-dicated it cost more than $1,000 per cargo ton to maintain Santa Barbara Harbor and $5-18 11 per cargo ton to maintain three Napa River ports in California, including in-cluding that on Napa River, San Pablo Bay and San Francisco Harbor. The average cost annually of maintaining maintain-ing deep-draft harbors and channels that can accommodate a deep-draft com- mrri:l v'l wifh 51 Hr:if nf l.i f.n. . . . . . , . , , u ... ut . vl VT. I UI more when fully loaded is about 23 cents a ton of cargo, this study indicated, based bas-ed on 1978 data. Finally. Dickey pointed out, any proposal pro-posal would have to have a "fast-track" provision, so that "inordinate delays" can be avoided. .Asked about the size of a port improvement improve-ment program the Administration is considering. con-sidering. Dickey told WRW on March 9. "I would say not more than $3 billion between bet-ween now and 1990." The first ports scheduled to be improved and deepened include Baltimore harbor in Maryland and Freeport harbor in Texas; both received Congressional approval for deepening their channels in 1970 but the projects are still on hold. Other ports seeking authorization for deeper channels include N'orfork. Va., Mobile. Ala., and New Orleans, La. Work on Long Beach and Los Angeles harbors is in the process of being completed, according ac-cording to the Corps. Other West Coast harbor improvements not yet unveiled by the Corps are understood to be in the works. INDUSTRY REACTION & NEW PROPOSALS Gianelli and Dickey appear to have made some progress in their efforts to get industry to agree to some cost-sharing cost-sharing on harbor projects. "Even tho water projects represent less than one percent of the total federal budget, it has become increasingly difficult for them to compete for funds," Gianelli told the House Public Works Committee on Feb. 23. Failure to move ahead often is at high cost to the national well-being economically, he pointed out. "Several proposed harbor deepening projects for the East and Gulf Coasts" would, if built, "enable coal and other commodities to be exported at significant savings over the cost of using vessels which are operating at existing depths," he underscored. Gianelli has already been able to get local interests to agree to higher cost-sharing on a jetty construction construc-tion project at Freeport. |