11th-Hour Attempt Launched to Salvage Pipeline Safety Bill
As the 106th Congress neared an end, bipartisan discussions were going on to see if a pipeline-safety bill could be passed before lawmakers left town. But the effort faces an uphill road. On Oct, 10, House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bud Shuster (R-Pa.) pronounced pipeline legislation dead after the House failed to approve a safety bill that the Senate had passed on Sept. 7.
Nevertheless, shortly after the House vote, White House, Senate and House aides began to meet in a last-ditch try to get a pipeline bill passed, maybe as part of an end-of-session spending bill, Capitol Hill sources say. Its gotten a lot harder but its not dead yet, says a spokesman for Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who has pushed for a bill for months. Spurring Murray is a 1999 pipeline accident in her state that killed three people. In August, a second pipeline accident, this one in New Mexico, claimed 12 lives.