Recent threats to the moratorium include provisions in the House-passed Energy bill and legislative proposals to repeal all existing offshore moratoria, such as Senator Lamar Alexander's Natural Gas Price Reduction Act and draft legislation called State Enhanced Authority for Coastal and Offshore Resources Act (SEACOR).  In addition, oil and gas interests continue to mount a campaign to roll back the moratoria on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

For example, the National Ocean Industries Association, a lobbying group for drilling interests, recently submitted written testimony to Congress claiming that the moratoria currently in place offshore are unreasonable. Other trade groups have taken similar positions.

“Congress needs to continue this vital protection of our coasts,” Congresswoman Capps said. “Despite efforts by big energy companies, the natural gas and oil industry and some members of Congress to open up the Outer Continental Shelf to drilling, we remain firm in our support for the moratorium.

“Our coasts are not for sale,” Capps said.

Congress has voted repeatedly in recent years to reject proposals for new development in coastal waters, including two years ago when the House of Representatives supported a Capps amendment to strip the energy bill of an attempt to open the moratoria areas to exploratory drilling under the guise of conducting an unnecessary inventory on the entire OCS.

Since 1982, bipartisan legislative and administrative actions have affirmed protection of moratoria areas from offshore oil and gas development. Every annual Interior Appropriations bill since that year has included the moratorium. In addition, in 1990 President George H. W. Bush signed an executive memorandum placing a ten-year moratorium on new leasing on the OCS. In 1998, this moratorium was renewed by President Bill Clinton and extended until 2012. President Bush also included the moratorium in his FY06 budget.

 “Coastal communities have spoken in broad bipartisan voices to protect their sensitive resources and productive economies from new drilling,” Capps said.  “New offshore oil and gas drilling directly threatens this economic powerhouse. Serious accidents and environmental damage can and do occur at offshore drilling rigs.”

Text of the letter to the Subcommittee on Interior and Environment follows:

Dear Chairman Taylor and Ranking Member Dicks:

We are writing to express our strong support for the longstanding bipartisan legislative moratorium on new mineral leasing activity on submerged lands of the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS).  We are deeply appreciative of the leadership your Subcommittee has shown on this issue over the years and hope to work with you this year to continue this vital protection.

The legislative moratorium language prohibits the use of federal funds for offshore leasing, pre-leasing and other oil and gas drilling-related activities in moratoria areas, enhancing protection of these areas from offshore oil and gas development.  As you know, in 1990 President George H. W. Bush signed an executive memorandum placing a ten-year moratorium on new leasing on the OCS.  In 1998, this moratorium was renewed by President Bill Clinton and extended until 2012.  As you know, President George W. Bush endorsed the moratorium in his 2006 budget.  These actions have all been met with public acclaim and as necessary steps to preserve the economic and environmental value of our nation’s coasts.

With a renewed interest in developing natural gas and oil on the OCS, we believe it is again imperative for Congress to reaffirm its authority on this issue.  Therefore, we respectfully urge you to include the OCS moratorium language in the fiscal year 2006 Interior and Environment Appropriations legislation.  Specifically, we ask you to use the language in Sections 107, 108 and 109, Division E, Department of the Interior and Related Agencies of the fiscal year 2005 Consolidated Appropriations Act (P.L. 108-447).  These sections restrict oil and gas activities within the OCS in the Georges Bank-North Atlantic planning area, Mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic planning area, Eastern Gulf of Mexico planning area, Northern, Southern and Central California planning areas, and Washington and Oregon planning area.

Once again, we encourage the Subcommittee to support these important provisions, which represent over 20 years of bipartisan agreement on the importance of protecting the environmentally and economically valuable coastal areas of the United States.  Thank you for your consideration of this request.

Lois Capps

Jeff Miller

Randy Cunningham

Jim Davis

Peter DeFazio

Rahm Emanuel

Richard Neal

Sam Farr

Walter Jones

Henry Waxman

Lynn Woolsey

Frank Pallone

Tom Lantos

Dennis Moore

Mike Thompson

Chris Van Hollen

Mark Foley

Barney Frank

Anthony Weiner

Jim McDermott

Janice Schakowsky

Christopher Shays

Nick Rahall

Jay Inslee

Jerrold Nadler

Ed Case

Zoe Lofgren

Bart Stupak

Diane Watson

Ellen Tauscher

Loretta Sanchez

Barbara Lee

James McGovern

Donald Payne

Jim Saxton

Mark Kennedy

Dale Kildee

Mike Honda

Rosa DeLauro

Robert Wexler

Howard Berman

Rush Holt

Sherrod Brown

Madeleine Bordallo

Jane Harman

Ginny Brown-Waite

Katherine Harris

Wayne Gilchrist

Michael McNulty

George Miller

Fortney Stark

Michael Michaud

Edward Markey

Brian Baird

Hilda Solis

Maxine Waters

Bob Etheridge

Clay Shaw

Nancy Pelosi

Robert Simmons

Anna Eshoo

Alcee Hastings

Frank LoBiondo

James Langevin

Susan Davis

Earl Blumenuer

G.K. Butterfield

Michael Bilirakis

Raul Grijalva

Betty McCollum

Thomas Allen

Chris Smith

Tom Feeney

Connie Mack

Dennis Kucinich

Luis Gutierrez

Ilena Ros-Lehtinen

Grace Napolitano

Robert Menendez

Brad Sherman

Dennis Cardoza

William Delahunt

Linda Sanchez

Juanita Millender-McDonald

Doris Matsui

David Wu

Debbie Wasserman-Schultz

Ric Keller

Bob Filner

Carolyn Maloney

Robert Andrews

Jim Costa

Mario Diaz-Balart

Lincoln Diaz-Balart

Kendrick Meek

Xavier Becerra

Corrine Brown

Adam Schiff

Eliott Engel

Bill Pascrell