SB 5058-S - DIGEST
(DIGEST OF PROPOSED 1ST SUBSTITUTE)

Finds that the derelict vessel removal program has proven highly successful. A vessel generally becomes abandoned or derelict after a long chain of legal ownership transactions in which successive owners either lack the inclination or financial resources to properly maintain the vessel and pass it along in progressive stages of decline. The result is a decrepit vessel selling for nominal cost to someone who cannot bring it back to a safe working condition, or properly dispose of it. The vessel often becomes abandoned or derelict, resulting in cost to the state for removal and disposal.

Authorizes the department of natural resources to create a pilot vessel amnesty disposal program to prevent vessels from becoming abandoned or derelict and to address this issue when it is less expensive and poses fewer threats.

Allows the department of natural resources to expend two hundred thousand dollars, or as much thereof as may be necessary, from any money appropriated to the department from the derelict vessel removal account in the omnibus appropriations act for the biennium ending June 30, 2011, for the purposes of the act.

Expires June 30, 2011.