Senate Bill S.786 could kill NWS internet weather products

Follow up:

Here, is the bill,
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:s786:

and below is the Commercial Weather Services Association's press
release advocating passage of the bill. I'll just point out one of
the many duplicities in the press release. Note the particular
paragraph that reads, "This will mandate that the public, including
users like pilots, boaters and farmers, and the private sector, will
all have unrestricted real-time access to government information."
What the press release doesn't disclose is that, under the bill, this
"unrestricted real-time access" will be through a set of data portals
designed for volume access by commercial providers of products or
services. In other words, the data would be in a form that would be
essentially useless to the lay public, including pilots. The
non-competition clause of the bill would likely kill any user-friendly
Internet weather presentations by the NWS if similar presentations
were available commercially on the Internet.

--------------------------
Commercial Weather Services Association Says S.B. 786 Assures Both
Public and Industry Access

April 29, 2005 - The Commercial Weather Services Association (CWSA)
announced today its support for Senate Bill 786, "The National Weather
Services Duties Act of 2005." S.B. 786, one of three related bills
now before Congress, will benefit both the public and the private
sector.

The new legislation would require the National Weather Service (NWS)
to distribute government generated weather information "in real-time,
and without delay . . . in a manner that ensures that all members of
the public have the opportunity for simultaneous and equal access." No
such requirement currently exists.

This will mandate that the public, including users like pilots,
boaters and farmers, and the private sector, will
all have unrestricted real-time access to government information.

The bill will also update the 115-year-old mission of the NWS to fit
within the American weather framework of today, in which both the
agency and the Commercial Weather Industry now play important parts in
providing weather products, services, systems, networks and
communications to the nation.

"Through more than 55 years of innovation by the Commercial Weather
Industry and a policy of free and open exchange of government
information, the American public has become the beneficiary of the
best
weather information available anywhere in the world," said Steven
Root, President of the Commercial Weather Services Association (CWSA).
"Unfortunately, the performance of the National Weather Service in
fulfilling its key tasks of collecting and disseminating government
information has not always kept pace with public and private needs and
critical information the agency possesses is not always reaching the
public in time."

CWSA has noticed an increasing number of occurrences where the NWS has
not provided timely, key information during hurricanes, floods, and
severe snowstorms, exposing the public to heightened and serious
danger. Just as alarming, this key information was not made available
to the public or the Commercial Weather Industry including the media.
Such delayed or missing information has included real-time cooperative
observer and snow intensity reports delayed up to twelve hours during
a blizzard, hurricane
reconnaissance reports delayed during an intensifying storm, and
missed flood warnings.

S.B. 786 will provide for better information and warnings to the
public by requiring NWS to focus on a defined core mission and adhere
to its own non-competition/non-duplication policy, which NWS has had
in effect, in one form or another, for over 55 years. The National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA), the parent organization of the NWS, unilaterally repealed this
policy in December 2004. This NOAA action is not in accord with
long-standing government policies and programs designed to encourage
private-sector investment and development of products, services,
systems, networks, and communications facilities beneficial to the
nation. Root added, "Government duplication of existing products and
services readily available from the private sector is unnecessary and
detracts from the NWS mission of saving lives and property."

The result of the December repeal has been a growing uncertainty and
risk for private sector firms engaged in the weather enterprise and
threats to jobs throughout the industry. Accordingly, this NOAA
action also endangers the very existence of free weather information
to the public, an estimated 95% of which comes from the Commercial
Weather Industry including the media.

The bill requires the Secretary of Commerce, which directs and
controls the operations of NOAA and NWS, to determine what those
competitive and duplicative activities are and requires oversight
reports to Congress. The bill does not target any particular
government activity for elimination.

S.B. 786 endorses the concept of encouraging private-sector activities
and investment, rather than government expenditures, in the American
weather sector, a principle that was jointly adopted with bipartisan
support in both the House and Senate in November 2004 as part of the
appropriations legislation funding the National Weather Service
(Conference Report to H.R. 481 . The non-duplication provision of S.B.
786 is also in line with NWS's prior policy and the philosophy of
national policies on space transportation and other government
activities.

"CWSA believes that the public safety and well-being of the nation
would best be served by NWS concentrating on its long-standing and
critical core missions including disseminating government-generated
weather information and issuing severe weather warnings for the
protection of life and property of the public.

The NWS is the only source of official government weather warnings,
government data and computer models, all relied upon by numerous users
in government, industry and the public," said Root. "Activities that
shift the NWS focus away from this mission by duplicating products,
services, systems, networks and communications that are already widely
available from the private sector, many free to the public, do not
represent appropriate stewardship of public funds."

S.B. 786 was introduced April 14, 2005 by Senator Rick Santorum
(R-PA). It is one of three bills currently before Congress that would
reexamine and redefine the structure and mission of the National
Weather Service and its parent NOAA.

About the Commercial Weather Services Association

The Commercial Weather Services Association is the trade association
for professionals who make weather their business. Its members
collect, interpret and disseminate weather information to
weather-sensitive
businesses as well as the general public. In addition, CWSA members
engineer a variety of hardware and software systems, including weather
sensors and meteorological workstations and operate weather
information networks.

For more information about the Commercial Weather Services
Association, please visit:
www.weatherindustry.org

In article ,
Matt Whiting wrote:

Even if I used GPS for my bugsmasher, the cost to provide
regular ol' SPS GPS for my use is still zero.

How do you see that? Somebody has to pay for the satellites. Sure the
military needs them anyway,

Exactly. we already paid for the satellites. And nothing on the GPS SV's
is there for me. Everything is there to meet military requirements. This
isn't like the Shuttle where NASA paid big bucks to add military-specific
capabilities which meant lotsa extra weight so that every single launch
costs extra money to haul the the extra weight into orbit.


but if this was all private enterprise, then
you'd pay for your fair share of the use.

Well, the GPS SV's aren't private enterprise.

--
Bob Noel
no one likes an educated mule

George Patterson wrote:
Matt Whiting wrote:


I think if most "public" services were provided by a free enterprise
system, then we'd get a lot more in aggregate for our money.


I disagree. I remember when the Weather Station first came out, they had
very frequent local reports and paging of text weather of various cities
every 20 minutes or so. Also had some aviation weather, as I recall.

Then they started attracting advertisers. The pilot weather was gone the
next time I saw a report. By 1995, the local cable companies had
replaced the local weather reports with their own ads. TWS corrected
that a few years later by announcing that the local weather would be
displayed every 10 minutes (on the 8s). That forced the cable companies
to play it.

Basically, if you need something special and are perceived to be a
minority, private enterprise will cut you right out of the picture. If
weather info is provided only by private enterprise, we won't have pilot
weather unless something like AOPA provides it for us.

Yes, that is why I said in aggregate. We overall have much better
weather services today than we had 30 years ago when it was nearly all
government provided. I didn't say that aviation would be better off.
Actually, my point is that aviation is very heavily subsidized and would
likely take it on the chin without such subsidies.

Government is very wasteful, but it does provide for the special
interests in a manner that wouldn't exist were everything based on a
"pay as you use" basis. In the end it might work out OK, but it
certainly would look a lot different. I wouldn't pay school taxes if I
didn't have kids in school, but I'd probably pay $10/gallon for avgas,
if it was even available, and I'd pay for weather briefings, use of ATC,
use of GPS, etc.

Matt

Jose wrote:

Costs [of public infrastructure] are only half the story. Benefits
are the other half. There are invisible benefits to the system (any
system) which also need to be figured in.



Such as?


I'm not going to answer specifically, because I can't prove them. They
are hidden - that's what hidden means. But consider the following.

Where I live we recently discussed (with great heat) attracting
corporations to move into our town so that we would get a bigger tax
base. The more taxes paid by corporations, the less we'd have to pay in
property tax. The arithmetic is quite simple and very compelling. It's
also wrong. However, while we can all speculate as to why, it is
virtually impossible to prove. The only verifiable numbers are the tax
rolls, and they clearly show that corporations would pay tax that would
otherwise have to be paid by homeowners.

Nonetheless, looking at neighboring towns and graphing the mil rate
(homeowner tax rate) against the corporate percentage, those towns with
the highest corprorate presence have the highest mil rate. They have
the highest traffic density, the worst schools (schools are supported by
corporate and property tax), the highest prices in the stores... stuff
like that. The reason (I speculate) has to do with the impact of the
corporations on daily life - more cars parking, more roads to be built,
slower speeds, everything takes longer, wealthier people move out...
things like this that don't show up on the balance sheet.


Those costs aren't hidden at all. It is fairly easy, admittedly very
tedious though, to figure them out. And, as you said, it is easy to
simply look at a town that looks like your town would look after you
attract large corporations. I don't see much hidden here. Large
companies need lots of workers, better fire fighting equipment,
hazardous waste response teams, etc. The cost of these is pretty easy
to figure out and, as you say, tends to offset the taxes that the
corporation pays.


I have no children, but it benefits me to have a good school system.
I'll leave you to figure out why (and it has nothing to do with my
screen name). Therefore, there is a benefit to non-users of the school
system.

If you are benefiting, then then you are a user of the system and should
help pay for it. :-)


The benefits to reliable mail service, reliable transportation (air and
otherwise), reliable telecommunications, extend to people who walk to
the store, don't have a phone, and burn all their mail. It means that
when I walk to the store, they will have what I want. OK, that makes me
an indirect user, but there are lots of indirect users of infrastructure
that are not tracked, but benefit from it.

Yep, same thing. You are still using the system, albeit it somewhat
indirectly.


We all benefit from our water system (unusual in the world in that even
our wash water is potable) because it reduces disease, even if I don't
use water from the system. It is not just the people with the tap that
benefit.

Street lighting could be seen as benefitting the drivers, and so should
be paid by the drivers. However in reducing accidents it also reduces
my health insurance premiums, and it reduces robberies to boot. These
are "invisible" benefits which accrue to non-drivers.

They aren't invisible. It isn't that hard to compare crime rates in
areas with street lights and those without.


It's little things like this that add up all over the place, just like
little costs also add up all over the place, that make a strict "user
pay" accounting problematic.

Yes, I agree it would be an accounting nightmare.


Matt

Bob Noel wrote:

In article ,
Matt Whiting wrote:


Even if I used GPS for my bugsmasher, the cost to provide
regular ol' SPS GPS for my use is still zero.

How do you see that? Somebody has to pay for the satellites. Sure the
military needs them anyway,


Exactly. we already paid for the satellites. And nothing on the GPS SV's
is there for me. Everything is there to meet military requirements. This
isn't like the Shuttle where NASA paid big bucks to add military-specific
capabilities which meant lotsa extra weight so that every single launch
costs extra money to haul the the extra weight into orbit.

They have to be replaced periodically and monitored by folks on the
ground. There are onging operational costs. If the military isn't the
sole user, it shouldn't be the sole payer. All users should be
supporting the system. If this was the case, then folks that don't use
GPS wouldn't be taxed as heavily to support the military and thus
subsidizing those of us who do use the system. That is the essential
point. Aviation is very heavily subsidized and folks who argue it isn't
are deluding themselves.



but if this was all private enterprise, then
you'd pay for your fair share of the use.


Well, the GPS SV's aren't private enterprise.

Right, and that is why our use of it is subsidized by general revenue to
the defense department.


Matt

"Matt Whiting" swaggered in message news:P1ofe.2026 I
wouldn't pay school taxes if I
didn't have kids in school,

Oh, yes you would or suffer the consequences.

[crossposting trimmed]

I wouldn't pay school taxes if I didn't have kids in school

It is in your best interests that other people's children are well educated.

Jose
--
Get high on gasoline: fly an airplane.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Those costs aren't hidden at all. It is fairly easy, admittedly very tedious though, to figure them out.

No, it is not easy at all to figure them out. How much of the price of
ham is due to the fact that it takes two minutes longer to get through
town? How much of my income is leaking away in little costs like this
because a developer put a corporate park next to the river? And even if
you could figure it out to your own satisfaction, could you do so well
enough to convince the voters?

If you are benefiting [from a good school system], then then you are a user of the system and should help pay for it. :-)

I am not a consumer of the school system in any shape or form.
Nonetheless, I benefit because my fellow citizens know how to add and
subtract, can reason properly, understand logarithmic progressions, and
are familiar with literature. This means for example that plays and
concerts are popular (which allows me to be a consumer of these events),
and that when a referendum comes by, I can count on people to think more
than react.

If the schools were funded simply by tuition, I'd be getting a free
ride. But if the schools are funded publicly, I might argue (like we
are doing in aviation) that I'm not a user of the system and shouldn't
pay for it - the money should come strictly out of the pockets of the
students.

I use the aviation system just by eating a ham sandwich (and not just
when I'm navigating . Why shouldn't I pay for it (in taxes) instead
of having pilots getting a weather briefing fork over their credit cards?

It isn't that hard to compare crime rates in areas with street lights and those without.

True, but as an indirect measure of an indirect benefit, it's subject to
much interpretation.

Jose
--
Get high on gasoline: fly an airplane.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

On Sat, 07 May 2005 19:24:38 GMT, Matt Whiting
wrote in ::

Larry Dighera wrote:

On Sat, 07 May 2005 14:54:02 GMT, Matt Whiting
wrote in ::


If the private
enterprise is efficient enough that it can make a profit and still cost
less than a government agency, then it is a good deal overall.


It's difficult to envision a less costly and more equitable way of
collecting the revenue for ATC operation, than a tax on fuel.

I was talking more about the delivery of services costs than the
collection costs. I agree a fuel tax is pretty simple, however, do you
know how high that tax would have to be to support the entire aviation
infrastructure? I don't, but I'll bet it would be several dollars a
gallon at least. I don't know where to get an accurate assessment of
the real cost of our aviation system (airports, ATC, navaids - we'd need
to pay our share of the cost of GPS for example) or I'd make an estimate
of the cost per gallon. I suspect the fuel consumption figures are
available with some research, but I doubt all of the costs of the rest
of the system area readily available.


The aggregate cost of all government services provided aviation is
probably a staggering figure, but so is the amount of aviation fuel
consumed annually. AOPA's 2005 Fact Card figure is 18,857 million
gallons. Fortunately, Congress is only contemplating ATC
privatization at this time.

At our city-owned/operated airport we have available a commercial
weather product (I can't recall the name but it is one that is commonly
found at FBOs) that I find useful when I am there to use it. But I
also use the NWS-generated ADDS Aviation Weather and IMHO it is First
Class and a damn fine example of the government "getting it right" (a
refreshing anomoly).
Of the possibility that AccuWeather's Michael Steinberg could be
(speaking) in a self-serving manner should be a given and the weight of
his "arguments" assigned a big fat zero.

Sid Knox

FlyBoy wrote:
As a private pilot, I make frequent use of the NWS's Aviation Digital
Data Service (see 1). I especially like their "Java Tools" graphic
presentations of METAR, TAF, and AIR/SIGMET data. Senate Bill S. 786
(see 2) could well kill such NWS weather presentations in favor of
private sector subscription or advertisement supported Internet
weather services. AccuWeather.com has been a vocal proponent of this
bill. The Senator sponsoring this bill is from AccuWeather's home
state.

I have been arguing the case against this bill with AccuWeather's
Michael Steinberg in an online forum on ipetitions.com (see 3). If
any of my fellow pilots wish to add their voice to the discussion, I
would appreciate it. I must admit that I have reached the limit of
my
patience with Michael Steinberg, who characterizes my views as "a
bunch of distortions at best". I believe that I have presented an
accurate interpretation of the likely effects of this bill and I also
believe that any "distortions" in the forum largely originate with
AccuWeather's Michael Steinberg. I urge those who care about this
issue to sign the online petition, join the online forum, and write
their own senators with their opinions of this bill.

1: NWS ADDS: http://adds.aviationweather.noaa.gov/
2: S. 786: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:s786:
3: http://www.ipetitions.com/campaigns/SaveTheNWS/

FlyBoy