PROGRAM OBJECTIVES:
Section 320(a) of the 1987 Water Quality Act (WQA) authorizes the Agency to convene management conferences with participants from State legislatures, interstate or regional environmental agencies, State agencies, local governments or other public or nonprofit private agencies, research institutions and individuals to develop programs to protect and restore coastal resources in estuaries of National significance. The program objective is to develop, and as amended in Public Law 106-457, implement a Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan (CCMP) for each estuary designated by the EPA Administrator. The program characterizes the problems in the estuary, determines relationships between pollutant loading and impacts on living resources, develops a comprehensive plan recommending solutions to priority problems, and implements actions addressing priority problems. Potential implementation includes basin-wide reduction of point and nonpoint sources of pollution and basin-wide resource management programs. Public Law 106-457 also amended Section 320 by calling for the addition of Lake Pontchartrain of Louisiana and Mississippi to the list of estuaries for priority consideration by EPA.

 ELIGIBLE FUNCTIONAL CATEGORIES:
1. ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY;
- Water Pollution Control;

 WHO CAN BENEFIT FROM THIS PROGRAM:
- Interstate;
- Intrastate;
- State;
- Local;
- Public nonprofit institution/organization;
- Individual/Family;
- Private non-profit institution/organization;

 WHO CAN APPLY:
- Interstate;
- Intrastate;
- State (includes District of Columbia, public institutions of higher education and hospitals);
- Local (includes State-designated Indian Tribes, excludes institutions of higher education and hospitals);
- Public non-profit institution/organization (includes institutions of higher education and hospitals);
- Individual/Family;
- Private non-profit institution/organization (includes institutions of higher education and hospitals);