The House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) held a hearing on Wednesday, April 16, to receive testimony on H.R. 2421, the Clean Water Restoration Act. The bill is sponsored by T&I Chairman James Oberstar (D-Minn.), who is seeking to overturn two recent decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court regarding jurisdiction over wetlands. The bill seeks to broaden the scope of federal jurisdiction over waters by removing the term "navigable" and replacing it with the term "waters of the United States," a term that opponents of the legislation would dramatically increase federal jurisdiction. NAR strongly opposes this legislation and is working wit ...
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 President Bush this week called for a halt in the growth of greenhouse gases by 2025 and said there was a need to curb climate change. In a Rose Garden address, the president for the first time called for a specific target date to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but offered no details on how the reduction would be achieved. However, he rejected a Senate proposal that would impose mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions beginning in 2013, followed by increasing annual reductions. The remaining presidential candidates - Republican Sen. John McCain and Democratic Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton - all favor a mandatory, cap-and-trade system, much like that used in Europ ...
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On March 14th, HUD published the long-awaited proposed regulations on the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA).  The rules include a mandatory four-page Good Faith Estimate (GFE) and a modified HUD-1/1A; a required "closing script" to be read orally at settlement; enhanced disclosures; as well as new rules concerning volume discounts, average cost pricing, and "required use."  The rules have a 60-day public comment period that expires on May 13th. NAR will be filing comments. To ...
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Colorado River Agreement, from the Arizona Department of Water Resources On December 13, 2007, the Secretary of the Interior signed the Record of Decision for the Colorado River Interim Guidelines for Lower Basin Shortages and Coordinated Operations for Lakes Powell and Mead.  It is the first agreement that allocates Colorado River water during shortage and it begins a new era that emphasizes conservation and augmentation of the river to meet water demands.  An important part of the seven States' proposal for the Secretary's guidelines involves the concept of "Intentionally Created Surplus" (ICS). ICS means that a water contractor may add water to the system throu ...
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Tom Farley, AAR’s Vice President Government Affairs, wrote a letter on behalf of membership to protest the application for a permit to transfer water from Beaver Dam Wash in northern Arizona to the State of Nevada.  Following is the text of that letter.   Hon. Thomas SheddenHearing OfficerArizona Office of Administrative HearingsOAH No. 07-TR001-DWRFiled electronically at:  TR001@azoah.comDear Hearing Officer Shedden:Thank you for this opportunity to formally submit comments to the above-cited application review. My name is Tom Farley; I am the Vice President of Government Affairs for the Arizona Association of REALTORS, a statewide b ...
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