"That new airport should be sited and operated in such a manner as to comply with the performance standards at all times." Ibid.

(ii) Operation of the CNEL

The CNEL regulations do not directly regulate the aircraft or its noise. Instead based both upon the state's power and upon the state's licensing of the proprietor, the regulations are in their own words "designed to cause the airport proprietor, aircraft operator, local governments, pilots, and the department to work cooperatively to diminish noise." Title 4, Calif. Admin. Code $ 5000.

Elsewhere the purpose of the regulations is stated:

"5010. Purpose. The purpose of these regulations is to provide a positive basis to accomplish resolution of existing noise problems in communities surrounding airports and to prevent the development of new noise problems. To accomplish this purpose, these regulations establish a quantitative framework within which the various interested parties (i.e., airport proprietors, aircraft operators, legal communities, counties and the State) can work together effectively to reduce and prevent airport noise problems."

The regulations do not directly regulate aircraft noise. Instead they provide a framework within which the airport proprietor and other interested parties are to work together to achieve overall noise reduction in the surrounding residential areas. Limitations on airport noise in such residential communities are established. (Title 4, Calif. Admin. Code § 5012.) A noise impact boundary is established (Title 4, Calif. Admin. Code § 5006 (h), 5013) as is a noise impact area which is the area within the noise impact boundary less that area deemed to have compatible land use (Title 4, Calif. Admin. Code § 5006 (i), 5014). The proprietor may not operate his airport with a noise impact area of other than zero unless he has a variance. (Title 4, Calif. Admin. Code § 5062; see § 5075.)

The various interested parties are given a wide variety of means within which to cooperate so as to reduce the noise impact area to zero. None is mandated. The pertinent section is quoted:

"5011. Methodology for Controlling and Reducing Noise Problems. The methods whereby the impact of airport noise shall be controlled and reduced include but are not limited to the following:

"(a) Encouraging use of the airport by aircraft classes with lower noise level characteristics and discouraging use by higher noise level aircraft classes;

"(b) Encouraging approach and departure flight paths and procedures to minimize the noise in residential areas;

"(c) Planning runway utilization schedules to take into account adjacent residential areas, noise characteristics of aircraft and noise sensitive time periods:

"(d) Reduction of the flight frequency, particularly in the most noise sensitive time periods and by the noisier aircraft;

"(e) Employing shielding for advantage, using natural terrain, buildings, et cetera; and

"(f) Development of a compatible land use within the noise impact boundary.

"Preference shall be given to actions which reduce the impact of airport noise on existing communities. Land use conversion involving existing residential communities shall normally be considered the least desirable action for achieving compliance with these regulations.'

In brief, the CNEL cumulative noise exposure or noise footprint regulations do not directly control aircraft noise. Instead they provide a framework within which the airport proprietor may cooperate with other interested parties to reduce the impact of aircraft noise on people.

CONCLUSION

State and local governments do now and have traditionally exercised a concurrent jurisdiction with the federal government in the regulation of aircraft and airport noise. The United States has itself recognized this. In the case of Burbank v. Lockheed, at the request of the Department of Transportation, the Department of Justice filed a brief amicus curiae in the Supreme Court upholding the right of the City of Burbank to impose a curfew on jet takeoffs

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under its police power. This change of position by the United States represents in every way a commendable thing. With the narrow exceptions of certification of aircraft types directed at the manufacturer and certain aspects of flight regulation connected with safety, the authority for the regulation of airport and aircraft noise has been a shared one, with the National government perhaps more responsive to national needs while states and localities have been more responsive to the needs of local citizens, which include quiet as well as commerce. In our federal system that is the way things work, and it is a healthy thing.

Thank you again for the invitation to appear before your committee, and if our office can be of assistance to you, we would be pleased to help.

Senator CANNON. The next witness is Dr. Alvin F. Meyer, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Noise Control Programs, EPA.

Doctor, you have with you Mr. John Schettino as well?

STATEMENT OF DR. ALVIN F. MEYER, DEPUTY ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR FOR NOISE CONTROL PROGRAMS, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

Dr. MEYER. Regretably, Mr. Schettino late yesterday afternoon, Mr. Chairman, indicated to me that because of the very heavy pressure of managing his task group, which I will describe in this testimony, and its meeting that is taking place next week, he would like to be excused. So I, on my authority, excused him.

Senator CANNON. Very well.

Dr. MEYER. Senator Cannon, Senator Tunney, members of your staff, it is a real pleasure to be here today to report on what EPA has done about implementation of the Noise Control Act and to discuss with you any questions you may have on this subject.

At this point I would also like to express my appreciation and that of the Administration for the various actions taken within the Congress, leading to the enactment of this very important measure with which the committee is familiar, and the Members involved.

Mr. Chairman, I do have a prepared statement, but I would like to, if I might, in the interest of perhaps concentrating on some of the issues, paraphrase it as I go along; but I will read parts of it. Senator CANNON. Fine.

The statement will be made a part of the record.

Dr. MEYER. As the chairman and Senator Tunney know, we had undertaken a very extensive effort to plan for the implementation of this act prior to its passage.

Almost immediately thereafter, we did indeed begin to take the necessary actions thereon.

As both of the Senators know, EPA had a very limited resource level regarding noise, most of it being related to the title IV effort. We have undertaken our planning so as to use those resource to phase into this Act very quickly.

Now, we have devoted a major portion of our efforts since the act was passed to the mandatory requirements called for by July of this year. Principal among these, of course, is the Airport and Aircraft noise study.

We have chosen to follow the pattern that we followed successfully in preparing the Noise Control Report for Congress last year by

setting up a series of task groups and setting a limited level of contract effort.

Our task force activities have been very carefully planned. They were launched in February of 1973. Now, what we are doing, sir, is using representatives of the various Federal agencies, State, and local governments, people that we have hired as consultants and people under contract to try and undertake a major effort to bring the best expertise we can find in the country to deal with this problem. We have utilized, and I want to express our appreciation to the mayor of Inglewood, the Intergovernmental Personnel Act to actually bring in people employed by cities and States, such as Randy Hurlbut of his staff who is now working with us on this task.

We have utilized the services of Mr. Yost and others of his capabilities to assist us so that we will indeed have the best talent known to us.

I think that the Intergovernmental Personnel Act procedure, which the Congress enacted in 1970, is a mechanism of great value to us in this regard. We have approximately 120 people involved in this effort at the present time. In this task in which Mr. Schettino is involved, all six of these task group units are meeting next week for the fourth time and I would like it is shown in the prepared testimony-to discuss very briefly what these task groups are. It is on page 2 of the prepared text.

Task group No. 1 is preparing a legal and institutional analysis of aircraft and airport noise concerning the apportionment of the authority between Federal, State, and local government. I mentioned Mr. Yost. Also on that task group there is Mr. Shelton Plager, of the State of Illinois who is in the University of Illinois Law School, and a number of other distinguished individuals. Mr. Lou Mayo of George Washington University is heading this group.

The principal figures in this effort were out here to meet with the mayor and Mr. Moore this past week for field investigations and to discuss some of the very subjects that we are discussing in this hearing.

Task group No. 2 is involved in operations analysis-not operations analysis in the classic operations research sense-but an analysis of aircraft operations, although it may include some monitoring, enforcement, safety, and cost.

Here, again, we want to express our appreciation to Mr. Moore. He is helping us a great deal; in fact, we are in the process of letting a contract so that we can utilize some of the services and facilities here, and we are depending on help from Los Angeles to make some very detailed studies which will appear in our report.

Task group No. 3 is involved an impact characterization of noise to deal with the question of identifying and achieving levels of cumulative noise exposure and what the significance is.

Task group No. 4 relates to noise source abatement technology and cost analysis, including retrofit. Here we are using information developed by the Department of Transportation, by the Aviation Advisory Commission, plus some of our own efforts.

Task group No. 5 is charged with the review and analysis of the present and planned FAA noise regulatory actions and their consequence as they related to aircraft and airport operations.

This, of course, is one of the major thrusts of this effort.

Although not called for in the act, we felt that the impact of military aircraft and military aviation could not be ignored; and since the act did call for our taking a look at what all agencies of the Government are doing to conform to the intent of the act, we have included Task group 6 on military aviation noise with, I might say, maximum participation by the Department of Defense. They have provided a large number of people and specialists to work in this.

Now, as of today, each of the task groups has had three full-scale meetings. As I have already mentioned, there will be a meeting of all six of these task groups lasting all next week.

In addition, the various subpanels and individual members have had a series of meetings and consultations. They are working with our staff in such efforts as the one I just mentioned, not only making just roundtable discussions, but field visits.

As a result of this, we have developed a very extensive data base from which the material for the various chapters of the report will be drawn. I will be happy to submit for the record an example of one of the task group meetings which will give you some idea of the subject matter, participation, the types of people who are involved from government, industry, and citizens' groups.

As I have mentioned, this is producing a wealth of data, and in anticipation of this, we have already structured into our Environmental Protection Agency's automated data retrieval system procedures to correlate, document, and acquire this information for use in the report so that it will not be just a massive accumulation of uncorrelated data and information.

We have prepared a report outline; we have prepared a detailed chapter synopsis; and we are currently in the process of beginning to get the report well underway.

Now, a major byproduct of this effort, which we think may be of major significance to those concerned with this problem, will be the production out of the automated data system of a comprehensive bibliography on the subject of airport and airport noise problems.

It is probably the most comprehensive to date. The present schedule calls for the completion of the basic chapter drafts in May and the development of the final draft of the report during the latter part of the month.

At this point, sir, I would like to say that, as shown in the prepared testimony, we are undertaking a major effort to insure participation in this effort by representatives of other agencies of the government, of affected industry, and of specific environmental interests, as well as of professions concerned with noise, noise effects, and aviation or related areas of interests.

As an aside, sir, one of the things that I think I ought to point out is that as the chairman and Senator Tunney and the staff knows, I held eight public hearings around the Nation as part of the work on the title IV report for the last Congress.

I became intensely aware of the frustration of many citizens with government. It is not just frustration with the Federal Government, Mr. Chairman, it is frustration with government at every level, particularly in regard to this problem. We felt that it was absolutely

necessary to bring in as many differing views as possible, recognizing that there are two, three, and possibly four or five sides to these very serious questions relating to this problem. That is the effort that we are now trying to undertake, so that this report will not represent a particular bias.

We feel that that is being done. All participants in this effort are being furnished information and exchanging copies of the various reports. They will all be furnished a draft copy in the last week in May.

We are going to have an open meeting regarding the draft of the report in June. I might point out that we have established a docket procedure for this report similar to that used for regulations so that all the material being accumulated, including the various participants' specific comments, become a part of the public record.

In many ways we recognize that it is a formidable task with a limited staff, but we feel confident, based on the progress we have made to date, that this report will be submitted to the Congress on schedule.

Now, I hope I shouldn't say I hope I should say that EPA hopes that this report will fill a major part of the need expressed by Mr. Clifton Moore of the Los Angeles International Airport regarding, at least, some uniform, agreed upon basis of identification of the parameters of the problem and some of the things that can be done about it.

I think that it is very important to point out that the one basic requirement for EPA in this whole area is to identify the actions necessary to minimize the adverse consequences of health and welfare resulting from aircraft and airport operational noise as well as other noise.

Concurrent with the requirement of section 7 of the aircraft study, we have also undertaken the action to develop and publish the Health and Welfare Effects Criteria Document, and the information on levels of environmental noise, which are deemed necessary to protect public health and welfare, as called for by section 5 of the act.

In order to avoid any possibility of confusion among those requirements, and those related to the study on implications of identifying and achieving levels of cumulative noise exposure, we have established a formalized internal coordination and review mechanism.

The principal coordinator of this effort is Henning Von Gierke of the U.S. Air Force Aerospace Medical Research Laboratory whose eminence in this field is recognized worldwide.

The Committee on Hearing Bioacoustics & Biodynamics of the National Research Council is providing special working groups to assist us in this effort, and the chairman of that committee, Dr. W. Dixon Ward of the University of Minnesota, is serving on a leave of absence from the university as our principal consultant and project director for the criteria document.

Dr. David Lipscomb of the University of Tennessee and Dr. Clifford Bragdon of the Georgia Institute of Technology will be working with our staff audiologists, who have recently joined us.

Supplementing all of that effort regarding the criteria of health effects is the international conference on health effects of noise,