HR 5577 Status Update – 5-29-08

During my daily check of Thomas.Loc.Gov, the Library of Congress site for checking up on legislative related matters, I found out two interesting things today, first the LOC has a time machine and second the Chemical Facility Anti-terrorism Act of 2008 is laying on its death bed, waiting for friends and family to make their last visit.

The Time Machine

On the status page for HR 5577 it gives the following information:

 

"5/30/2008 1:02pm:

"House Committee on Energy and Commerce Granted an extension for further consideration ending not later than July 11, 2008. "

Given the fact that I am writing this at 1:16pm EDT, they either have a time machine that lets them see one day in the future or I am stuck in some sort of time warp. Either that or they were told by the House leadership that since the current extension given to the Energy and Commerce Committee expired on 5-30-08 that that should be the official date that they were given their third extension of time to review this bill.

HR 5577 on Its Deathbed

This is the third extension given to this committee to allow them time to review this bill. Seeing as the committee has not held a single hearing, it does not take any great political prowess to see that the Democratic leadership in the House has no real interest in bringing this bill to the floor for a vote this session. With the political conventions taking up the member’s time this summer and campaigning starting in the fall, this bill is essentially dead. This is especially true since there is no companion bill wending its way through the Senate.

That is a shame. While this bill is not perfect, it is a politically crafted bill that expands and extends the current CFATS regulations past their current expiration date of October 2009. The Homeland Security Committee did a lot of hard work putting this bill together. Hopefully Chairman Thompson will re-introduce this bill in its current form next January so that it has some small chance of passage before current regulations expire like the pumpkin carriage in the fairy tale.

Tags: Chemical Facility Security, HR 5577 Status