With Texas floods and Northwest fire season in mind, Cantwell questions Trump’s NOAA nominee on weather research cuts

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the agency that oversees weather told senators at his confirmation hearing on Wednesday that a proposal to cut more than a quarter of the agency’s budget wouldn’t jeopardize its ability to predict severe events like wildfires in the Northwest or the recent deadly flooding in Texas.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration includes the National Weather Service, which has been scrutinized in recent days over the impact of layoffs on its ability to warn the public before the floods that hit Texas on Friday. Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington, the top Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee, pressed nominee Neil Jacobs over the president’s proposed 27% cut to NOAA’s budget, including the elimination of an office charged with improving forecasts and conducting other research on climate and ocean conditions.

“You said you supported the 27% budget cut to NOAA,” Cantwell said. “So how do you keep your science mission, and particularly in atmospheric and oceanic areas? How do you keep that science mission if we’re cutting that budget?”

Jacobs replied that other parts of the agency would take over the responsibilities of the Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research once it is eliminated, and said he believes that NOAA can fulfill its “mission requirements” despite the cuts. That prompted Cantwell to say, “I think we’re in a disagreement on this.”

Cantwell raised concerns about roughly 2,000 job cuts at NOAA, part of the Commerce Department, since the beginning of the year and pointed out that the National Weather Service has lost some of its most experienced forecasters.

“For example, Pendleton, Oregon, the forecast office serving central Washington, no longer has 24/7 local coverage because of their 44% vacancy rate,” she said. “And in my opinion, that is unacceptable in the height of fire season.”

The committee’s chairman, Texas Republican Ted Cruz, focused on the floods that devastated his state on Independence Day, when heavy rains made the Guadalupe River surge beyond its banks, inundating a girls summer camp. As of Wednesday, local authorities said the flood had killed at least 119 people and 173 others remained missing.

“One question we will certainly be asking in Texas, and we ought to be asking across the country,” Cruz said, “is how can we improve the speed and rate of response?”

The National Weather Service did provide warnings of the severe flooding in Texas, but residents in the area north of San Antonio have raised questions about how those warnings could better reach communities. Jacobs committed to fully staffing the service if the Senate confirms him, as the GOP majority is likely to do even if every Democrat opposes his nomination.

“If confirmed, I want to ensure that staffing weather service offices is a top priority,” he told the committee. “It’s really important for the people to be there, because they have relationships with people in the local community.”

NOAA also plays a major role in fisheries management, including salmon and steelhead recovery efforts in Northwest rivers, monitoring climate change, among other responsibilities. Once the committee votes in an upcoming meeting to advance Jacobs’ nomination to the Senate floor, he will need the support of a majority of the 100 senators to be confirmed.