Senate Government Operations Committee advances H.397, removes section on governor drawdown authority

The Senate Government Operations Committee on Friday voted to advance House Bill H.397 (draft 2.5) after deleting a provision (section 10) that would have required a new report on gubernatorial authority to order dam drawdowns.

The change came after testimony from the Department of Environmental Conservation and a discussion among senators and staff about overlapping jurisdiction for federal and state-regulated dams and about work already underway by a state dam-safety study group.

Committee chair opened the meeting and asked Tucker Anderson, committee counsel, to walk members through draft 2.4 and the subsequent changes that led to draft 2.5. The committee accepted staff edits including a substitution of the term "flood prone" for "flood vulnerable" in the bill's voluntary buyout language, the removal of a retroactive abatement…