Outdoor industry representatives and sportsmen, including the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, have written to the Congressional Boating Caucus requesting a legislative solution to a 2006 ruling by a federal judge against recreational boating exemptions to the Clean Water Act which was designed for cargo container ships, cruise ships and supertankers. For 34 years, the Environmental Protection Agency exempted recreational boaters and anglers from the rules and regulations protecting aquatic resources from invasive plants and animals transported in ballast water of commercial vessels. If not corrected by legislation, the ruling would require an unprecedented permitting requirement system for normal discharges such as bilge water, deck runoff and engine cooling water for which there is no current enforcement mechanism in place.
”