The Oceans Act of 2000 established the United States Commission on Ocean Policy, a working group tasked with the development of what would be known as the National Oceans Report. The objective of the report is to promote the following: Responses from the executive branch to the commission's report are listed in a National Ocean Policy, sent to the legislative branch. The act was passed by the United States Congress on July 25, 2000 and signed by the President a fortnight later.

The Commission

Chair: supervises commission staff and regulates funding. Members must be "balanced by area of expertise and balanced geographically". To be eligible, members must be "Representatives, knowledgeable in ocean and coastal activities, from state and local governments, ocean-related industries, academic and technical institutions, and public interest organizations involved with scientific, regulatory, economic, and environmental ocean and coastal activities." (https://web.archive.org/web/20060207190735/http://www.oceancommission.gov/documents/oceanact.html) The Commission's report is required to include the following, as relevant to U.S. ocean and coastal activities: The Commission is to give equal consideration to environmental, technical feasibility, economic, and scientific factors. In addition, the recommendations may not be specific to the lands or waters within a single state.

Other Roles

Meetings

The Commission is required to hold public meetings. The Commission must hold at least one meeting in each of 6 specified areas around the country. Meetings must be advertised in the U.S. Federal Register.

Committees

The bill has been referred to the following committees:

Timeline

Amendments

S.Amdt. 3620 by [U.S. Sen. Hollings D-SC]

Funding

The Act provides for $8.5 million for the Commission. In 1999, $3.5 million was appropriated for the same effort, but never used. Therefore, only $2.5 million would need to be accumulated to completely cover the cost of this act.

Representational Members

Biennial Report

A biennial report must be submitted by the U.S. President to Congress of all federal programs incorporated with coastal and ocean activities. This was set to begin in September 2001. The report must include: