A House Natural Resources subcommittee will take up bipartisan legislation during a hearing this week to expand the authority of certain states over the Gulf of Mexico.
The Subcommittee on Water, Wildlife and Fisheries will scrutinize Mississippi Republican Rep. Mike Ezell’s H.R. 8542, the “Offshore Parity Act,” which would expand state control of waters off Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.
Coastal states have jurisdiction of waters immediately past their shores, with federal control of the outer continental shelf generally beginning past 3 nautical miles.
But in the Gulf of Mexico — renamed the Gulf of America by President Donald Trump — Texas and Florida have control within 9 nautical miles. Ezell’s bill would grant all states in the region the same authority.
