Bill Description: House Bill 183 would resurrect and restructure the Big Payette Lake Water Quality Council.

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Does it create, expand, or enlarge any agency, board, program, function, or activity of government? Conversely, does it eliminate or curtail the size or scope of government?

President Ronald Reagan once quipped that "a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!" House Bill 183 seems determined to prove him correct by resurrecting the Big Payette Lake Water Quality Council, which was created in 1992 and disbanded in 2005. 

The original purpose of Chapter 66, Title 39, Idaho Code, was "to embark upon a program of water quality protection for the lake so that future generations of Idahoans may use and enjoy it."

House Bill 183 leaves this old language in place but adds that the Legislature "declares that it is necessary to reestablish the council to provide for subsequent studies in order to review and update as necessary the now-existing plan and program and to review the same on a continuing basis."

The bill also replaces two of the at-large members on the council, saying one must represent "an environmental organization." 

The solution to our state's challenges (including "eutrophication, sediment and shoreline erosion, pollution, defense and control of non-native and invasive species, and algal growth," as called out in the bill's statement of purpose) is not more government. 

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