Safety Zone; Laguna Madre, South Padre Island, TX

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY <SUBAGY>Coast Guard</SUBAGY> <CFR>33 CFR Part 165</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket Number USCG-2025-0462]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1625-AA00</RIN> <SUBJECT>Safety Zone; Laguna Madre, South Padre Island, TX</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Coast Guard, DHS. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Temporary final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Coast Guard is establishing a temporary safety zone for certain navigable waters in the Laguna Madre. The safety zone is needed to protect personnel, vessels, and the marine environment from potential hazards created by a series of fireworks displays launched from a barge in the Laguna Madre, South Padre Island, Texas. Entry of vessels or persons into this zone is prohibited unless specifically authorized by the Captain of the Port, Sector Corpus Christi or a designated representative. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This rule is effective without actual notice from July 2, 2025 through July 30, 2025. For the purposes of enforcement, actual notice will be used from June 26, 2025, until July 2, 2025. It will be subject to enforcement from the hours of 9 p.m. through 11:59 p.m. each of the following dates: June 27; July 1, 8, 11, 15, 18, 22, 25, and 29. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> To view documents mentioned in this preamble as being available in the docket, go to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> type USCG-2025-0462 in the search box and click “Search.” Next, in the Document Type column, select “Supporting & Related Material.” <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> If you have questions about this rule, call or email Lieutenant Timothy Cardenas, Sector Corpus Christi Waterways Management Division, U.S. Coast Guard; telephone 361-244-4784, email <E T="03">Timothy.J.Cardenas@uscg.mil.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Table of Abbreviations</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">CFR Code of Federal Regulations</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">DHS Department of Homeland Security</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">FR Federal Register</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">NPRM Notice of proposed rulemaking</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">§ Section </FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">U.S.C. United States Code</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Background Information and Regulatory History</HD> The Coast Guard is issuing this temporary rule under the authority in 5 U.S.C. 553(b)(B). This statutory provision authorizes an agency to issue a rule without prior notice and opportunity to comment when the agency for good cause finds that those procedures are “impracticable, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest.” The Coast Guard finds that good cause exists for not publishing a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) with respect to this rule because it is impracticable. We must establish this safety zone as soon as possible to protect personnel, vessels, and the marine environment from potential hazards created by the fireworks displays beginning June 26, 2025. Therefore, publication of an NPRM is impracticable as the Coast Guard does not have sufficient time to receive, consider, and respond to comments before the series of fireworks displays begins. Under 5 U.S.C. 553(d)(3), the Coast Guard finds that good cause exists for making this rule effective less than 30 days after publication in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . Delaying the effective date of this rule would be contrary to the public interest because immediate action is needed to respond to the potential safety hazards associated with fireworks launched from a barge in the waters of the Laguna Madre. <HD SOURCE="HD1">III. Legal Authority and Need for Rule</HD> The Coast Guard is issuing this rule under authority in 46 U.S.C. 70034. The Captain of the Port Sector Corpus Christi (COTP) has determined that potential hazards associated with a fireworks display will be a safety concern for anyone within an 800-foot radius from a stationary barge from which the fireworks will be launched. The purpose of this rule is to ensure safety of vessels and persons on these navigable waters in the safety zone while the display of the fireworks takes place in the Laguna Madre. <HD SOURCE="HD1">IV. Discussion of the Rule</HD> This rule establishes a temporary safety zone from June 26, 2025, through July 30, 2025. The safety zone will be subject to enforcement from the hours of 9 p.m. through 11:59 p.m. each day it is in effect. It is anticipated that fireworks will only take place on each of the following nights: June 27; July 1, 8, 11, 15, 18, 22, 25, and 29. The COTP or a designated representative will inform the public of the enforcement times and dates for this safety zone through Broadcast Notices to Mariners and Safety Marine Information Broadcasts, as appropriate. The safety zone will encompass certain navigable waters of the Laguna Madre and is defined by an 800-foot radius around the launching platform. The regulated area encompasses an 800-foot radius around the following point: 26°6′02.1″ N, 97°10′17.7″ W. No vessel or person is permitted to enter the temporary safety zone during the effective period without obtaining permission from the COTP or a designated representative, who may be contacted on Channel 16 VHF-FM (156.8 MHz) or by telephone at 361-939-0450. <HD SOURCE="HD1">V. Regulatory Analyses</HD> We developed this rule after considering numerous statutes and Executive orders related to rulemaking. Below we summarize our analyses based on a number of these statutes and Executive orders. <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Regulatory Planning and Review</HD> Executive Orders 12866 (Regulatory Planning and Review) and 13563 (Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review) direct agencies to assess the costs and benefits of available regulatory alternatives and, if regulation is necessary, to select regulatory approaches that maximize net benefits. Executive Order 13563 emphasizes the importance of quantifying both costs and benefits, of reducing costs, of harmonizing rules, and of promoting flexibility. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has not designated this rule a “significant regulatory action,” under section 3(f) of Executive Order 12866. Accordingly, OMB has not reviewed it. The regulatory action determination is based on the size, location, and duration of the safety zone. It is anticipated that the temporary safety zone will only be subject to enforcement for a short period (3 hours) each of several nights in June and July 2025. The zone is limited to an 800-foot radius of the launching position in the navigable waters of the Laguna Madre. Vessels will be able to transit around the safety zone unobstructed, and mariners may also be permitted to enter or transit through the zone when the COTP or their representative determines it is safe to do so. <HD SOURCE="HD2">B. Impact on Small Entities</HD> The Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980, 5 U.S.C. 601-612, as amended, requires Federal agencies to consider the potential impact of regulations on small entities during rulemaking. The term “small entities” comprises small businesses, not-for-profit organizations that are independently owned and operated and are not dominant in their fields, and governmental jurisdictions with populations of less than 50,000. The Coast Guard certifies under 5 U.S.C. 605(b) that this rule will not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities. While some owners or operators of vessels intending to transit the safety zone may be small entities, for the reasons stated in section V.A above, this rule will not have a significant economic impact on any vessel owner or operator. Under section 213(a) of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996 (Pub. L. 104-121), we want to assist small entities in understanding this rule. If the rule will affect your small business, organization, or governmental jurisdiction and you have questions concerning its provisions or options for compliance, please call or email the person listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. Small businesses may send comments on the actions of Federal employees who enforce, or otherwise determine compliance with, Federal regulations to the Small Business and Agriculture Regulatory Enforcement Ombudsman and the Regional Small Business Regulatory Fairness Boards. The Ombudsman evaluates these actions annually and rates each agency's responsiveness to small business. If you wish to comment on actions by employees of the Coast Guard, call 1-888-REG-FAIR (1-888-734-3247). The Coast Guard will not retaliate against small entities that question or complain about this rule or any policy or action of the Coast Guard. <HD SOURCE="HD2">C. Collection of Information</HD> This rule will not call for a new collection of information under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520). <HD SOURCE="HD2">D. Federalism and Indian Tribal Governments</HD> A rule has implications for federalism under Executive Order 13132, Federalism, if it has a substantial direct effect on the States, on the relationship between the National Government and the States, or on the distribution of power and responsibilities among the various levels of government. We have analyzed this rule under that Order and have determined that it is consistent with the fundamental federalism principles and preemption requirements described in Executive Order 13132. Also, this rule does not have tribal implications under Executive Order 13175, Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments, because it does not have a substantial direct effect on one or more Indian tribes, on the relationship between the Federal Government and Indian tribes, or on the distribution of power and responsibilities between the Federal Governm ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 15k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━