By Sarah Chang, USCM Intern
August 13, 2007

The House passed the Water Resource Development Act of 2007 (WRDA) August 1 by a vote of 381-40. This comes despite a veto threat from the White House that objected to the $21 billion authorization amount.

The WRDA authorizes more than 900 Army Corps of Engineers’ projects for flood control and environmental restoration. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman James Oberstar (MN) reminded lawmakers, however, that the cost of the WRDA conference report represents the backlog of the past seven years of project requests. “Divide the cost by the number of years that have passed since we last passed this critical legislation, and the cost is understandable,” Oberstar said.

The ranking member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee John Mica (FL), guaranteed a two-thirds House vote to override any veto.

Senate Environmental Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (CA) and the Committee’s ranking member James Inhofe (OK) also vowed to fight President Bush to get the two-thirds majority needed to override a veto.

The Senate did not vote on their version of the WRDA by the August 3 recess due to the debate over other Senate priorities such as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and other legislation. The Senate version, however, lost the support of Russ Feingold (WI), who stated that the final report severely weakened his Army Corps reform language. The final congressional vote in the Senate on this year’s WRDA has been delayed until September when Congress reconvenes.