enjoy a lobster dinner not knowing if it came from those polluted areas where shellfish contain concentrated polio virus 60 times that of the fish in surrounding waters? Pollution has already closed 20 percent of our commercial shellfish beds and of the large clam industry areas, particularly in my area.

Oil in the water is a real killer of our marine life, but it may come to the time where it has a second strike capacity-it may kill human beings. Direct contact with the breathing apparatus of undersea life kills many and weakens others. Cancer in fishes is a likely result of oil pollution with cancers, growths, and concentrated cancer producing agents being found in a variety of marine life exposed to those parts of the ocean polluted by oil refineries. Oysters and mussels from polluted areas have been found to contain concentrations of hydrocarbons known to cause cancer in man. And don't think because your oysters are fried you're safe. These potentially lethal hydrocarbons, odorless and invisible, are still locked into seafood tissues even after frying.

Food and Drug Administration scientists say it is possible that these cancerous fish could cause cancer in humans, although they have not had medical evidence of this yet. I, for one, do not want to take that chance and I don't think the American people want to take that chance, either.

For those of you who are clam lovers, I would remind you that clams harvested from the New York Bight contained coliform bacteria 50 to 80 times above acceptable levels set by the Food and Drug Administration. And when you consider the poor little shrimp, I call attention to the ironic case in Florida where uncontaminated shrimp were contaminated by being cleaned on land with polluted water taken from the harbor at Key West.

Of course, the recent mercury pollution flap is receding from our minds, but let us not forget that mercury contamination is still with us; it will be with us for a long time, and its dangers are still very real. You may remember my statement last July when I described the greatest cesspool of our seas, the New York Bight. I carefully outlined the "plight of the bight" in my remarks then. Nothing has changed, but the fact is that pollution in our harbor is getting worse. The importance of all this is that it is not only happening in the New York area but in all coastal areas of the United States. There are 121 other ocean-dumping sites on the Atlantic coast, 56 on the gulf coast, and 68 on the Pacific coast, where we are dumping upward of 50 million tons of trash from tin cans to cannons and poisonous isotopes to poisoned gas.

New York and its own "dead sea" is being emulated by a string of fledging dead seas from Maine to Washington State, and we must not forget our polluted inland waterways and lakes that are fast turning into a massive national disgrace.

I have an explanation of my bill that I have submitted in two Congresses now, H.R. 285. H.R. 285 offers a total program for the solution of the water pollution problem not only in New York Harbor but throughout America wherever wastes are disposed of in our waters. In a nation where 85 percent of the population lives in the coastal environment, and in which 100 percent of the people depend on that

environment, the problem is nationwide in scope and needs a comprehesive national solution.

The bill amends the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act to provide additional protection to marine and wildlife ecology by requiring the designation and regulation of certain water and submerged-land areas where the depositing of any waste material will be permitted. The bill established a mechanism for developing effective disposal standards within these areas and provides that all other marine areas will be maintained in a "no dumping" status and preserved and protected as marine sanctuaries.

The guiding principle is to require the Secretary of Interior or the new Environmental Protection Agency to identify and designate those areas in which certain dumping can be safely accomplished. For example, some quantities of cellar dirt may be safely dumped on the Continental Shelf without damaging the ecology of the marine environment if carefully controlled and regulated. Elsewhere the bottom configuration and other factors may permit disposal of certain chemicals or other wastes that are absorbed into the water without causing imbalance.

There has never been a comprehensive program to determine what kinds can be safely disposed of in which waters. Previously, factors such as effects on navigation and distance from population centers were considered but specific ecological effects were generally ignored. My bill tasks the Secretary of Interior or EPA-with studying the national marine environment with a view to identifying each river, harbor, and coastal area and designating which of these areas can accept certain types of waste disposal. Standards for the types and amount of dumping would follow in cooperation with the States and the vast majority of our marine environment would be maintained as disposal-free marine sanctuaries where wildlife and fish could exist without the threat of foreign introduction of harmful materials.

The bill includes stiff penalties which I am convinced are justified for dumping in nondesignated areas and for illegal dumping in designated areas: $10,000 per day, per violation, with each day of violation constituting a separate offense. Two years are permitted for completion of the study and identification and designation of disposal areas, and the Secretary of Interior-or EPA-is required to cooperate with the Secretary of the Army in the execution of the study of potential water and submerged-land areas.

Following formal designation by Interior-or EPA-all existing licenses will be revoked and suspended and the Army Corps of Engineers will receive new applications for controlled disposal in designated areas. Enforcement of dumping standards-standards based on the capacity of a specific marine area to absorb wastes harmlessly— shall be undertaken by the Coast Guard.

The foreging represents an innovative approach to the problem of waste disposal in our harbor, river, and coastal waters, and has application to every type of waste disposal throughout the Nation. I strongly urge your prompt approval of this approach and hope that we may see House action on this proposal before the close of the current session.

So I implore the committee, let us take the first step. I have a great deal of pride of authorship in this legislation but I am perfectly will

ing to cooperate with the committee in reporting out an administration bill which contains the provisions needed to get the job done. But I do urge cautious speed.

I urge this committee to act quickly to report out a bill that contains those provisions needed to halt the destruction of our marine and wildlife ecology. My only qualification is that the committee consider these sections of the administration bill that fall short of the standards contained in my bill, H.R. 285.

In that respect I point out that the administration bill is lacking a major provision of my original legislation, the establishment of "no dumping" sanctuaries for marine life. I insist that proposals which simply move dumping grounds from one area to another are myopic and only increase the danger of prolonged pollution and international complications growing out of contaminating the world's oceans.

I ask the members of this committee to carefully consider the incorporation of the concept of no-dumping sanctuaries for marine life into any bill they report.

I ask that a physical description of the New York Bight and a map showing the location of ocean disposal sites in the area be printed at the conclusion of my remarks today.

Mr. Chairman, there were proposals made last year that ocean dumping be mandated at 100 miles off the coast and other people said 25 miles off the coast. In effect they were trying to move the dumping areas off the Continental Shelf. What they would do is make it impossible to dispose of wastes that have to be disposed of.

In the New York area I think there were three or four oceangoing barges that would be permitted by the Coast Guard to go those distances at sea. In effect what that type of legislation or approach would do would be simply to cut off dumping that could not be cut off. Those wastes were formerly dumped in New York Harbor and now they are dumped in a controlled area. H.R. 285 goes into the problem of controlled dumping areas without affecting marine sanctuaries and protecting the ecology.

I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this committee and particularly its chairmen, Chairman Dingell and Chairman Lennon, who worked so long in the ecology field and are so identified with the progress we have made.

Mr. LENNON. Without objection, at the gentleman's request, following his remarks a description of the New York Bight and a map showing disposal sites in the area should be printed in the record. (The description and map follow :)

THE NEW YORK BIGHT

The New York Bight is a slight indentation of the Atlantic coast, extending northeasterly from Cape May inlet, New Jersey, for some 200 miles to the eastern end of Long Island, New York, at Montauk Point. Its coastline is generally a moderately sloping sand beach shore, broken by indentations of the sea into the land. Among these are a number of small inlets along the New Jersey coast, Lower Bay of New York Harbor, East Rockaway Inlet, Jones Inlet, Fire Island Inlet, Moriches Inlet, and Shinnecock Inlet.

Depths in the Bight generally exceed 100 feet about 50 miles off shore but are substantially less than that in most inshore areas. The bottom is mostly sandy and is subject to shifts due to tidal actions or storm surges. Consequently, channels have been dredged and maintained by the U.S. Engineers to accom

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modate the large volume of sea commerce into the industrial and commercial complex of Greater New York. Sandy Hook Channel leads into Sandy Hook Bay and Raritan Channel branches off into Raritan Bay. Ambrose Channel is the principal entrance into New York Harbor leading to Upper Bay and New City. The inlets to the east (East Rockaway, Jones, and Fire Island) are also subject to shifting sands from time to time.

The New York Bight is a contract in extremes. It contains the only remaining strip of virgin barrier beach between Cape Cod and Cape Hatteras (Island Beach State Park, New Jersey) and supports the most heavily populated and industrialized complex in the country-between Sandy Hook, New Jersey, and Jamaica Bay, New York. The Bight supports some of the most heavily utilized and valuable recreation areas in the country. For example, New Jersey's fourcounty coastal waterway supports a two-billion-dollar recreation industry

annually and New York's Coney Island beach recorded 22 million visitors in 1968. The Bight area also supports excellent sport and commercial fishing resources. Some of the finest oyster grounds are found in this area; approved shellfish harvesting operations for inshore and offshore clams continue within sight of the New York skyline. Both New York and New Jersey contemplate removal of inadequately treated sewage effluent from condemned inshore shellfish waters that will assure even greater shellfish production in this area.

Mr. LENNON. I would like to ask you also, please, Congressman, if you can furnish us for the record, following the introduction in the record of what we have just agreed to, the 121 ocean-dumping sites on the Atlantic coast, and the 56 on the gulf coast and the 68 on the Pacific coast that you have referred to in the third paragraph of your statement on page 3. Do you have those sites by identification? Mr. MURPHY. Yes, Mr. Chairman, I have those sites and I would be happy to furnish them.

Mr. LENNON. Without objection, then, they shall be inserted in the record at this point.

(The information referred to was included in chapter I of the Report of the Council of Environmental Quality on Ocean Dumping and is as follows:)