[House Hearing, 107 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
H.R. 701, THE CONSERVATION AND REINVESTMENT ACT; AND H.R. 1592, THE
CONSTITUTIONAL LAND ACQUISITION ACT
=======================================================================
LEGISLATIVE HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
June 20, 2001
__________
Serial No. 107-43
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Resources
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COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
JAMES V. HANSEN, Utah, Chairman
NICK J. RAHALL II, West Virginia, Ranking Democrat Member
Don Young, Alaska, George Miller, California
Vice Chairman Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
W.J. ``Billy'' Tauzin, Louisiana Dale E. Kildee, Michigan
Jim Saxton, New Jersey Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
Elton Gallegly, California Eni F.H. Faleomavaega, American
John J. Duncan, Jr., Tennessee Samoa
Joel Hefley, Colorado Neil Abercrombie, Hawaii
Wayne T. Gilchrest, Maryland Solomon P. Ortiz, Texas
Ken Calvert, California Frank Pallone, Jr., New Jersey
Scott McInnis, Colorado Calvin M. Dooley, California
Richard W. Pombo, California Robert A. Underwood, Guam
Barbara Cubin, Wyoming Adam Smith, Washington
George Radanovich, California Donna M. Christensen, Virgin
Walter B. Jones, Jr., North Islands
Carolina Ron Kind, Wisconsin
Mac Thornberry, Texas Jay Inslee, Washington
Chris Cannon, Utah Grace F. Napolitano, California
John E. Peterson, Pennsylvania Tom Udall, New Mexico
Bob Schaffer, Colorado Mark Udall, Colorado
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Rush D. Holt, New Jersey
Mark E. Souder, Indiana James P. McGovern, Massachusetts
Greg Walden, Oregon Anibal Acevedo-Vila, Puerto Rico
Michael K. Simpson, Idaho Hilda L. Solis, California
Thomas G. Tancredo, Colorado Brad Carson, Oklahoma
J.D. Hayworth, Arizona Betty McCollum, Minnesota
C.L. ``Butch'' Otter, Idaho
Tom Osborne, Nebraska
Jeff Flake, Arizona
Dennis R. Rehberg, Montana
Allen D. Freemyer, Chief of Staff
Lisa Pittman, Chief Counsel
Michael S. Twinchek, Chief Clerk
James H. Zoia, Democrat Staff Director
Jeff Petrich, Democrat Chief Counsel
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C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing held on June 20, 2001.................................... 1
Statement of Members:
Cubin, Hon. Barbara, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Wyoming, Prepared statement of.................... 93
Hansen, Hon. James V., a Representative in Congress from the
State of Utah.............................................. 1
Prepared statement of.................................... 3
McCollum, Hon. Betty, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Minnesota, Prepared statement of.................. 95
Miller, Hon. George, a Representative in Congress from the
State of California........................................ 7
Otter, Hon. C.L. ``Butch'', a Representative in Congress from
the State of Idaho, Prepared statement of.................. 93
Rahall, Hon. Nick, a Representative in Congress from the
State of West Virginia..................................... 4
Prepared statement of.................................... 5
Tauzin, Hon. W.J. ``Billy'', a Representative in Congress
from the State of Louisiana................................ 5
Thornberry, Hon. Mac, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas............................................. 8
Prepared statement of.................................... 8
Udall, Hon. Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State
of New Mexico, Prepared statement of....................... 94
Young, Hon. Don, a Representative in Congress from the State
of Alaska, Prepared statement of........................... 92
Statement of Witnesses:
Ashe, Hon. Victor, Mayor, City of Knoxville, Tennessee....... 12
Prepared statement of.................................... 14
Caldwell, Jack C., Secretary, Louisiana Department of Natural
Resources, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.......................... 19
Prepared statement of.................................... 20
Callahan, F. Patricia, President and Founder, American
Association of Small Property Owners, Washington, DC....... 78
Prepared statement of.................................... 81
Daniels-Mantle, Renee, The Mantle Ranch, Dinosaur, Colorado.. 30
Prepared statement of.................................... 32
Johnson, Randy G., Commissioner, Emery County, Castledale,
Utah....................................................... 15
Prepared statement of.................................... 17
McKnelly, Dr. Philip K., Director, North Carolina Division of
Parks and Recreation, Raleigh, North Carolina, on behalf of
the National Association of State Outdoor Recreation
Liaison Officers, and National Association of State Parks
Directors.................................................. 57
Prepared statement of.................................... 59
Mullen, Tom, Supervisor, Riverside County, California,
Riverside, California...................................... 51
Prepared statement of.................................... 52
Sanderson, Edward F., President, National Conference of State
Historic Preservation Officers, Washington, DC............. 73
Prepared statement of.................................... 75
Waller, David, Director, Georgia Division of Wildlife,
Department of Natural Resources, Social Circle, Georgia.... 68
Prepared statement of.................................... 70
Whitefeather, Hon. Bobby, Chairman, Red Lake Band of Chippewa
Indians, Red Lake, Minnesota............................... 62
Prepared statement of.................................... 63
Additional materials supplied:
Arnett, G. Ray, Letter submitted for the record on H.R. 701.. 96
Babauta, Juan N., Resident Representative, Commonwealth of
the Northern Mariana Islands, Statement submitted for the
record on H.R. 701......................................... 99
Colegrove, Nolan, Sr., Forest Manager, Hoopa Valley Tribe,
Hoopa, California, Letter submitted for the record on H.R.
701........................................................ 100
Garber, Allen, Commissioner, Minnesota Department of Natural
Resources, St. Paul, Minnesota, Letter submitted for the
record on H.R. 701......................................... 102
National Governors Association, Statement submitted for the
record on H.R. 701......................................... 104
Norton, Hon. Gale A., Secretary, U.S. Department of the
Interior, Letter submitted for the record on H.R. 701...... 91
Patt, Olney, Jr., Chairman, Tribal Council of the
Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon,
Letter submitted for the record on H.R. 701................ 111
Regan, Ronald J., Commissioner, Department of Fish and
Wildlife, State of Vermont, Letter submitted for the record
on H.R. 701................................................ 114
Taylor-Rogers, Sarah, Ph.D., Secretary, Maryland Department
of Natural Resources, Annapolis, Maryland, Letter submitted
for the record on H.R. 701................................. 117
Walters, Thomas P., Washington Representative, Letters
submitted for the record on behalf of the Counties of
Riverside, San Diego, and Ventura, California, on H.R. 701. 122
H.R. 701, THE CONSERVATION AND REINVESTMENT ACT; AND H.R. 1592, THE
CONSTITUTIONAL LAND ACQUISITION ACT
----------
Wednesday, June 20, 2001
U.S. House of Representatives
Committee on Resources
Washington, DC
----------
The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10 a.m., in Room
1324, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. James V. Hansen
(Chairman of the Committee) presiding.
The Chairman. The Committee will come to order.
We are grateful to have you all here today. This is a very
important hearing, and we will get started.
We have some very important guests and witnesses here. We
are grateful that you could be here.
We recognize the presence of Chairman Billy Tauzin of the
Commerce Committee, in whom we stand in awe.
Today's hearing is on H.R. 701, the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act, CARA, and H.R. 1592, the Constitutional Land
Acquisition Act.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. JAMES V. HANSEN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF UTAH
The Chairman. CARA passed the House of Representatives in
the 106th Congress by a bipartisan vote of 315-102. Although
the bill passed the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural
Resources by a vote of 13-7, it was not enacted into law.
We worry about our friends over on the other side and their
dilatory manner of getting things done.
And that is something I wish people would quote me on.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. The Committee heard testimony from 88
witnesses at four hearings on CARA during the 106th Congress,
one in each of the following locations: Washington, DC;
Anchorage, Alaska; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Salt Lake City,
Utah. We compiled over 1,000 pages of written testimony.
CARA was reintroduced in the 107th Congress on February 14,
2001, by Congressmen Don Young, Dingell, Tauzin, George Miller,
John, Rahall, Kildee, Cooksey, Saxton, myself, and, as of
today, has 218 cosponsors.
H.R. 1592 was introduced by Congressman Mac Thornberry on
April 25, 2001. This is the Committee's first hearing on that
bill.
CARA takes revenue from Federal offshore oil and gas
production and utilizes those funds for production impact
assistance and coastal conservation while funding conservation
and recreation programs in all 50 States and territories.
For example, not only does CARA provide a comprehensive
approach to wildlife conservation funding by broadening funding
support to a permanent, definite appropriation from a general
revenue source, but it also helps provide inner-city children
with places to play basketball or to study after school.
CARA also funds the Payment In-Lieu of Taxes program. As
most of you know, I would not have cosponsored CARA had it not
been for the bill's full funding of PILT.
As originally drafted, CARA undertook to fund PILT and the
refuge revenue sharing programs by a complicated method of
allocating interest proceeds from the CARA fund based upon
appropriation levels of a given year.
Unlike the CARA of the 106th Congress, the 107th CARA fully
funds PILT and RRS at their authorized levels by simply
providing all of the funding for the two programs directly from
the CARA fund. And that, to me, is a very important change.
CARA also fully funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund
(LWCF) and provides several property rights protections and
land management guidelines.
For decades, the LWCF has made $900 million available for
Federal and State land acquisition. However, State acquisition
funding is often overshadowed by that provided to the Federal
Government, which may currently spend up to $900 million on
land acquisitions with virtually no restrictions.
CARA requires the Federal Government to share half of the
Land and Water Conservation Fund's money--or $450 million--with
the States to be spent on locally selected projects.
CARA provides several other protections from Federal land
acquisition.
First, the bill mandates that Congress approve the
expenditure of LWCF money for land acquisition.
Second, the Federal portion of the CARA fund may not be
used for Federal acquisition unless the owner of the property
concurs or Congress specifically approves the acquisition.
Third, each year the Administration must transmit a list to
Congress requesting specific approval for each tract of land to
be acquired. In preparing the list, the Administration must
attempt to consolidate checkerboard Federal landholdings and
use exchanges and conservation easements as an alternative to
acquisition.
Finally, the Federal portion of the LWCF may not be used to
acquire any interest in land unless the Administration notifies
the parties affected by the proposed acquisition.
Despite its property rights protections, CARA has not been
without its critics. Property rights advocates have denounced
the bill for its alleged failure to adequately protect private
property rights. H.R. 1592 attempts to address that criticism
by adding several property rights protections to those created
by CARA.
To be sure, we would all agree that no legislation is
perfect, but I feel that CARA is a sound conservation package
that not only provides valuable protection for landowners, but
would create a lasting heritage for American conservation.
The Committee looks forward to hearing from our witnesses
today. Due to the number of witnesses with us, I will restrict
opening remarks to Mr. Rahall, Mr. Miller, Mr. Tauzin, and Mr.
Thornberry, which is about everybody here anyway.
Lastly, we expected that Secretary Norton would have had a
deputy or assistant secretary confirmed in time to testify
before the Committee today. Unfortunately, this has not taken
place, and Secretary Norton is traveling in Alaska.
Therefore, the Department of the Interior will submit
written testimony for the record. We will make that testimony
available to all members of the Committee when we receive it.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hansen follows:]
Statement of The Honorable James V. Hansen, Chairman, Committee on
Resources
Today's hearing is on H.R. 701, the Conservation and Reinvestment
Act (CARA); and H.R. 1592, the Constitutional Land Acquisition Act.
CARA passed the House of Representatives in the 106th Congress by a
bipartisan vote of 315 - 102. Although the Bill passed the Senate
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources by a vote of 13-7, it was not
enacted into law.
The Committee heard testimony from 88 witnesses at four hearings on
CARA during the 106th Congress--one in each of the following locations:
Washington, D.C.; Anchorage, Alaska; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Salt
Lake City, Utah. We compiled over 1000 pages of written testimony.
CARA was reintroduced in the 107th Congress on February 14, 2001 by
Congressmen Young, Dingell, Tauzin, George Miller, John, Rahall,
Kildee, Cooksey, Saxton, and myself, and has, as of today, garnered
over 218 cosponsors.
H.R. 1592 was introduced by Congressman Mac Thornberry on April 25,
2001. This is the Committee's first hearing on that Bill.
CARA takes revenue from Federal offshore oil and gas production and
utilizes those funds for production impact assistance and coastal
conservation while funding conservation and recreation programs in all
50 States and territories. For example, not only does CARA provide a
comprehensive approach to wildlife conservation funding by broadening
funding support to a permanent, definite appropriation from a general
revenue source, but it also helps provide inner-city children with
places to play basketball or study after school.
CARA also fully funds the Payment In-Lieu of Taxes (PILT) program.
As most of you know, I would not have cosponsored CARA had it not been
for the Bill's full funding of PILT. As originally drafted, CARA
undertook to fund PILT and the Refuge Revenue Sharing (RRS) programs by
a complicated method of allocating interest proceeds from the CARA fund
based upon appropriation levels of a given year. Unlike the CARA of the
106th Congress, the 107th CARA fully funds both PILT and RRS at their
authorized levels by simply providing all of the funding for the two
programs directly from the CARA fund.
CARA also fully funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF)
and provides several property rights protections and land management
guidelines. For decades, the Land and Water Conservation Fund has made
$900 million available for Federal and State land acquisition. However,
State acquisition funding is often overshadowed by that provided to the
Federal government, which may currently spend up to $900 million on
land acquisitions with virtually no restrictions. CARA requires the
Federal government to share half of the LWCF money, i.e., $450 million,
with the States to be spent on locally selected projects.
CARA provides several other protections from Federal land
acquisition. First, the Bill mandates that Congress approve the
expenditure of LWCF money for land acquisition. Second, the Federal
portion of the CARA fund may not be used for federal acquisition unless
the owner of the property concurs, or Congress specifically approves
the acquisition. Third, each year the Administration must transmit a
list to Congress requesting specific approval for each tract of land to
be acquired. In preparing the list, the Administration must attempt to
consolidate ``checkerboard'' Federal land holdings and use exchanges
and conservation easements as an alternative to acquisition. Finally,
the Federal portion of the LWCF may not be used to acquire any interest
in land unless the Administration notifies the parties affected by the
proposed acquisition.
Despite its property rights protections, CARA has not been without
its critics. Property rights advocates have denounced the Bill for its
alleged failure to adequately protect private property rights. H.R.
1592 attempts to address that criticism by adding several property
rights protections to those created by CARA.
To be sure, we all would agree that no legislation is perfect, but
I feel that CARA is a sound conservation package that not only provides
valuable protection for landowners, but would create a lasting heritage
for American conservation. The Committee looks forward to hearing from
our witnesses today. Due to the number of witnesses with us, I would
restrict opening remarks to myself, Mr. Rahall, and Mr. Miller, as well
as the original sponsors of the bills, Chairman Young and Mr.
Thornberry.
Lastly, we expected that Secretary Norton would have had a Deputy
or Assistant Secretary confirmed in time to testify before the
Committee today. Unfortunately, that has not taken place, and Secretary
Norton is traveling in Alaska. Therefore, the Department of the
Interior will submit written testimony for the record. We will make
that testimony available to the Members of the Committee when we
receive it.
______
The Chairman. Mr. Rahall?
STATEMENT OF THE HON. NICK J. RAHALL II, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA
Mr. Rahall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, the effort to gain enactment of the
Conservation and Reinvestment Act is truly a historic one. And
the making of history is normally something that does not occur
at first blush.
In many ways, the effort behind CARA reminds me of one that
I was intimately involved with during the 105th Congress. That
was the struggle to restore the word ``trust'' in the highway
trust fund, which resulted in TEA-21.
This legislation erected firewalls around highway spending,
providing a guaranteed stream of revenue to finance our surface
transportation needs, just as we are trying to do with CARA for
important fish, wildlife, land conservation, and historic
preservation programs.
I well recall on several occasions, when faced with the
united opposition of the appropriators and the budgeteers, we
patted then-Chairman Bud Shuster on the back and said, ``Nice
try. Good going, Bud. Give it the old college effort, but we're
probably not going to win this fight.''
To his credit, Bud never backed down. He did not flag nor
fail in his dedication. And against overwhelming odds, he
gained enactment of this landmark legislation.
It is true that he was not the first architect of that
effort. It dated back many years to other chairmen, who all
fell short by a few votes. But he was the final architect.
So I would note that the first architects of CARA--Don
Young, George Miller, and others--truly deserve the credit for
this effort.
But as Melville put it in the novel ``Moby Dick,'' and I
quote, ``But I now leave'' my system of classifying whales
``standing thus unfinished, even as the great Cathedral of
Cologne was left, with the crane still standing upon the top of
the uncompleted tower. For small erections may be finished by
their first architects; grand ones, true ones, ever leave the
copestone to posterity.''
I am here today to say that if we build upon the success of
this measure in the House of Representatives last year, we are
dedicated on a bipartisan basis to laying the copestone of CARA
this Congress by gaining its enactment into law.
We are dedicated to keeping faith with the unfulfilled
promise made to the American people in such laws as the Land
and Water Conservation Fund of 1965, that the investment in
their land, in their resources, in our heritage, is as
important to our society as any other public endeavor.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Louisiana, Mr. Tauzin, and one of the
architects of this legislation.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rahall follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Nick Rahall, Ranking Democrat, Committee on
Resources
Mr. Chairman, the effort to gain the enactment of the Conservation
and Reinvestment Act is truly an historic one. And the making of
history is normally something that does not occur at first blush.
In many ways the effort behind CARA reminds me of one that I was
intimately involved with during the 105th Congress. That was the
struggle to restore the word ``trust'' in the Highway Trust Fund which
resulted in TEA 21. This legislation erected fire walls around highway
spending, providing a guaranteed stream of revenue to finance our
surface transportation needs. Just as we are trying to do with CARA,
for important fish, wildlife, land conservation and historic
preservation programs.
I well recall on several occasions, when faced with the united
opposition of the appropriators and the budgeteers, we patted then
chairman Bud Shuster on the back and said, nice try, good going, but we
probably are not going to win this fight. To his credit, Bud never
backed down. He did not flag nor fail in his dedication and against
overwhelming odds gained the enactment of that landmark legislation. It
is true that he was not the first architect of that effort. It dated
back many years, to other chairmen, who all fell short by a few votes.
But he was the final architect.
So I would note that the first architects of CARA, Don Young,
George Miller and others, deserve the credit. But as Melville put it in
the novel Moby Dick: ``But I now leave my system [of classifying
whales] standing thus unfinished, even as the great Cathedral of
Cologne was left, with the crane still standing upon the top of the
uncompleted tower. For small erections may be finished by their first
architects; grand ones, true ones, ever leave the copestone to
posterity.''
I am here today to say that as we build upon the success on this
measure in the House of Representatives last year, we are dedicated, on
a bipartisan basis, to laying the copestone of CARA this Congress by
gaining its enactment into law.
We are dedicated to keeping faith with the unfulfilled promise made
to the American people in such laws as the Land and Water Conservation
Fund Act of 1965 that the investment in their land, in their resources,
in our heritage, is as important to our society as any other public
endeavor.
______
STATEMENT OF THE HON. W.J. (BILLY) TAUZIN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF LOUISIANA
Mr. Tauzin. Mr. Chairman, thank you for that.
Let me first recognize the cosponsorship and extraordinary
help and assistance of my good friend Chris John. The reason
you didn't recognize his name, Mr. Chairman, is that Chris
comes from a family that was so poor that they couldn't afford
a real last name.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Tauzin. His dad was named John John, by the way, and
served on the Natural Resources Committee with me in the
Louisiana legislature.
Two weekends ago, Louisiana experienced 38 inches of water
in my home town--38 inches of water in the rain gauges in
Thibodaux, Louisiana.
You know, I used to joke about Louisiana being half
underwater, half under indictment. It was almost true a couple
of weekends ago. [Laughter.]
The governor, 3 weeks ago, facing a drought in my state,
went on television and asked Louisianians to pray for rain. The
next weekend, we got 38 inches, which is a message, George.
When Cajuns start praying, we better get out of the way,
partner. [Laughter.]
The bottom line is that the old song by Randy Newman,
``Louisiana,'' ``They're tryin' to wash us away; They're tryin'
to wash us away,'' almost came true again a couple weekends
ago.
I tell you that because I want to remind you of the genesis
of this extraordinary action of this Committee and the Congress
last year. The genesis was a Marine Minerals Management report
that indicated that the money derived from the great offshore
activities of our country that are permitted ought to be in
some way shared with the coastal states to deal with problems
that coastal states have with ravages of nature.
In my state, in my district almost, we lose 35 square miles
a year to erosion. You know, that is just one little sentence,
but think about it, how profound that is.
If you were losing 35 square miles of your district, any
one of you, you know, you get a sense of what we go through
year after year after year in Louisiana. We lost the size of
the State of the Rhode Island since the 1950's in my district
alone.
George, they tease me, and say I'll be representing fish
pretty soon. [Laughter.]
We're trying to teach them how to vote, by the way.
[Laughter.]
But we are literally losing some of the most valuable and
most sensitive and most productive estuaries of the country in
coastal Louisiana. And with the loss of all that immeasurably
valuable coastal wetlands comes the threat of hurricanes and
floods like we experienced this weekend, this last weekend, and
devastation and damage, because all of that coastal wetlands
served as a buffer at one time to the ravages of nature in the
gulf.
So while we drain 40-some-odd states through the
Mississippi and the Red River valley and down by Lafourche in
my home town, we also face enormous rainfall and erosion on the
coastline.
And so this started as an effort to try to do something
about it. If Louisiana coastline were as close to Washington as
the Chesapeake, we probably would have done something a long
time ago. Or if it got as much attention as the Everglades, we
probably would have done something a long time ago.
But this is the first effort to do something about it, to
literally make a dedication, not just to Louisiana, but to all
coastal states who are similarly threatened, a real dedication
of funds on a permanent basis to do something about it, to try
to protect and preserve those incredibly valuable lands.
And we came to this table and met with the
environmentalists and the conservationists of this House and
put together an enormously important and delicately balanced
package that funds land and water conservation efforts and
acquisition efforts across America, coastal preservation
efforts, the PILT program, Federal lands, historic
preservation, urban parks.
You look at this bill, it is an extraordinary contribution
to a whole host of incredibly important aspects of American
life that this bill literally funds and makes possible.
And we finally met with all the conservatives in this body,
who were deeply concerned about property rights, and built in
17 specific property rights provisions that actually makes the
law of America more protective of property rights than it would
be without this bill.
That is an extraordinary balance. There is a lot of give
and take.
And the meetings that we sat through last year were arduous
and tough negotiating sessions. But we ended up with a package
that three-quarters of the Members of this House could support.
That is a remarkable achievement in a partisan decade when
we tend to throw bombs at each other rather than compliments.
That is an extraordinary achievement for the good of our
country.
We need to replicate that again this year, Mr. Chairman.
And I know, under your leadership, we are going to do that. And
we will present to the Senate one more chance to get it right.
And hopefully this time, they will get it right, and we will
get a bill signed by the President.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
The gentleman from California, Mr. Miller.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. GEORGE MILLER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I want to join you and Mr. Rahall and Mr. Tauzin and
Mr. Thornberry and others on this matter and to say that I join
in this effort.
CARA is in fact a package. It was not designed to be
cherry-picked in one fashion or another by the Appropriations
Committee. And I, like all of us, appreciate the pressure that
they are under.
But this was about a commitment, about a commitment that we
called that was really about redeeming the promise that was
made to the people in this country about the use of those oil
revenues and about the needs of the coastal states.
And we did part of the job last year, but we didn't do the
entire job. And I think it is important that we come back and
that we make every effort to fulfill the entire package, that
we get a sustained program of spending on what are clearly
national priorities that have overwhelming bipartisan support
in rural areas, in suburban areas, in urban areas, in the
heartland of this country, and along the coast of this country,
and that we recognize that this is a matter of national need
and of purpose, and that we follow through on this.
Members of this Committee spent many, many hours meeting
with people across the board. And one of the components was
something that took a lot of work, and that was on the points
that Mr. Tauzin raised about property rights and the provisions
and the protections.
Well, if just do the appropriations, you don't get the
other half of that package. And that was a major concern to
many people who sponsored this legislation, that that in fact
would happen.
And that is why we need the passage of this bill. I hope we
will be able to do it early. It got to the Senate late, and we
know the Senate needs a lot of time to move.
But hopefully, we can get this over to them early on and
this will be a matter of priority there, too. I know I have
talked to a number of Senators who now recognize what we are
trying to do, and now they want to champion this bill where
last year they were reluctant.
So I am very encouraged by those efforts. We have had a
couple of meetings with the White House. And I think that
people understand the importance of this legislation and the
priority that it should have.
And I want to thank you for this hearing, Mr. Chairman, and
to all of my colleagues for the reintroduction of this bill,
and to everybody who worked so hard to get the 218, 219
cosponsors I think we are at today.
Finally, I just want to say to Mr. Tauzin, there was a
wonderful program on the Mississippi and on New Orleans and on
the pumps that my wife watched. And of course, when it started
raining, she kept going to the Weather Channel to see how the
pumps were doing in New Orleans.
But it is an amazing amount of rain that you absorbed in 2
days' time down there. It is just absolutely remarkable.
But I think it makes the case for the kind of work that has
to be done if we are in fact going to protect those wetlands
and the coastline of this state in that very tenuous position.
So I look forward to the hearing and thank you again, Mr.
Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Mac Thornberry, the author of
H.R. 1592.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. MAC THORNBERRY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I would ask unanimous consent that my complete
statement be made part of the record.
The Chairman. Without objection.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Thornberry follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Mac Thornberry, a Representative in Congress
from the State of Texas
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate the opportunity to have this hearing today to discuss
government land ownership and a bill that I have introduced to help
safeguard one of the most precious rights a free people can have.
The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution clearly states that the
federal government cannot lay claim to private property without
compensating the owner or owners of the land.
Yet over the years, this right has been eroded away. New laws have
been passed and regulations enforced that have pushed property rights
far down the list of things about which Washington is concerned. The
Land and Water Conservation Fund is a good example of that.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund is the main fund that the
government uses to buy private lands. Over the past 35 years, around
4.5 million acres of land--an area around the size of New Jersey--have
been acquired with tax dollars collected through this fund. Yet as it's
currently written, the law includes no provision recognizing the rights
of private property owners.
I introduced H.R. 1592, The Constitutional Land Acquisition Act, to
recognize and protect those rights in the law. My bill basically says
that if the government wants to buy a piece of land, it's got to take
into consideration the rights of property owners before moving ahead
with the sale.
Among other things, H.R. 1592 would:
LRequire that a land seller concur with the purchase, and
that the transaction be approved by an Act of Congress.
LProtect inholders so that federal standards on
surrounding LWCF purchased lands cannot conflict with neither use nor
enjoyment of the owners'' lands.
LRequire relevant agencies to certify that equal value
land exchanges, conservation easements, and other factors have been
considered before an acquisition can be made.
LRequire affected areas to be notified of a purchase.
LProhibit using LWCF money for condemnation actions as a
means of acquisition.
LMake it easier for states to convert lands they purchased
with LWCF funds to a new purpose.
One of the issues we'll likely discuss today is how the private
property protections included in my bill compare with the private
property protections included in the Conservation and Reinvestment Act.
I would make the case that while CARA does take a step in the right
direction toward strengthening private property rights, it does not go
far enough. Perhaps most critically, it does not specifically prohibit
federal or state governments from condemning private land.
Mr. Chairman, in his recent book, The Mystery of Capital, acclaimed
author Hernando de Soto has this to say about the importance of private
property to Western Civilization:
``With legal property, the advanced nations of the West had the
key to modern development; their citizens now had the means to
discover...the most potentially productive qualities of their
resources.''
H.R. 1592 is not only about mechanics and fairness when a federal
or state acquisition is made, it is also about preserving the basic
foundation which enables Americans to continue our liberty and pursuit
of happiness.
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate once again the opportunity to discuss my
bill and this issue this morning.
______
Mr. Thornberry. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the opportunity
to have a chance to discuss today the proposal that I put
forward.
It is certainly related to CARA, but I believe that we need
some additional property protections whether or not CARA
passes, because I believe one of the most precious things that
a free people can have is the right to own property and to use
that property.
There has been a fascinating book that has come out in the
past year or so called ``The Mystery of Capital'' by a Peruvian
author, Hernando De Soto, which tries to look at why the Third
World has not developed the way other parts of the world have.
And his conclusion is it comes down to property ownership and
protections of those rights.
And if CARA passes, and we have the tremendously greater
sums of money available for land acquisition, which you have
all talked about, I think we need to be more vigilant in the
protections of property rights as well.
CARA certainly takes a step forward from existing law.
There are no protections in the Land and Water Conservation
Fund now. CARA is a step ahead. I think we can make another
step ahead.
But, again, whether or not CARA passes, I believe we need
to have additional protections.
Mr. Chairman, the power of the Federal Government is an
awesome thing, particularly when it zeros in on a particular
piece of land owned by a particular landowner or a family. I
think we have to be very vigilant in thinking about what it
looks like from that landowner's standpoint, and the importance
of those property rights as we talk about tremendously greater
sums of money which could be used for land acquisition by the
Federal and state governments.
So I appreciate the chance to talk about those issues and
the chance to have a hearing on this proposal.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman from Texas.
We are grateful for our first panel, and we have some very
great people on all three of our panels, if they would come
forward.
I see Mayor Ashe is there. Mr. Randy Johnson, Commissioner
from Emery County, if he would come forward. Mr. Jack C.
Caldwell, Secretary, Louisiana Department of Natural Resources.
And Mrs. Renee Daniels-Mantle.
Now, we have them from different States here, and I would
appreciate it if the respective ladies and gentlemen on the
Committee would introduce the distinguished members of this
panel.
I will start with Mayor Ashe and turn to our friend from
Tennessee.
Mr. Duncan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I simply want to welcome to the Committee a longtime friend
of mine, Mayor Victor Ashe, who is Knoxville's longest serving
mayor. He is now in his fourth 4-year term.
Mayor Ashe has made a tremendous record as mayor of
Knoxville, and that has been recognized nationally. He was
honored as being named the national Chairman of the U.S.
Conference of Mayors a few years ago.
Mayor Ashe has been a very popular mayor. He has been
reelected by large margins.
And we have worked together over the years on many
different projects. And I can tell the Committee that he has
been a really outstanding mayor for the city of Knoxville.
I am proud to call him my friend and proud to welcome here
to the Committee this morning. He was the executive director of
the President's Commission on Americans Outdoors a few years
ago. And he has great, great interest in the work that this
Committee does, and particularly in this legislation on which
he will testify this morning.
So thank you very much for allowing me to introduce and
welcome Mayor Victor Ashe.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman for those comments.
Our next witness is Mr. Randy Johnson, a Commissioner from
Emery County. I personally know Mr. Johnson, and I don't know
if I have ever known a Commissioner that works as hard or is as
dedicated in my many years in this business.
But I will turn to Mr. Cannon, who represents that area, to
introduce Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Cannon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
It is my pleasure to introduce Randy Johnson, who has been
a commissioner at least as long as I have been here, longer,
and done a great job.
We work closely together. Mr. Johnson represents that area
of Utah which Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid occupied and
which is where the movie was made, by the way.
[Laughter.]
So if you enjoyed some of the stark scenery in that movie,
you will understand that that is the San Rafael Swell that has
been subject to a significant amount of legislative work on
this Committee.
So we would like to welcome you.
And also point out that I think Mrs. Daniels-Mantle also
runs cattle in Utah, don't you?
Mrs. Daniels-Mantle. Partly.
Mr. Cannon. Partly. The part that you do is in my district,
so we appreciate your being here and welcome you here today,
also.
Thank you.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman from Utah.
The gentleman from Louisiana.
Mr. Tauzin. I will be brief, Mr. Chairman.
That movie, ``Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,'' was
remarkable for that great line. Every time Butch Cassidy and
the Sundance Kid would look behind them, they would say, ``Who
are those guys?'' Remember? They kept following them; they
couldn't lose them.
[Laughter.]
Well, among the guys and the gal of who are presenting
today is a very special person from Louisiana. Governor Foster
named Jack Caldwell the secretary of our natural resources
department because of his extraordinary depth of knowledge, not
only about our natural resource base and its environment, but
about the oil and gas industry and the important interplay
between the two. And Jack Caldwell has been an extraordinary
force in the last Congress's efforts to put together the CARA
bill.
Recently, he was an adviser to the Vice President and sent
the Vice President extraordinarily good advice on the energy
package that the Vice President delivered to Congress just
recently.
Jack, I want to thank you for that. You served our state
extraordinarily well, I think, in the great advice you gave him
as a consumer state and the messages you gave him about
conservation and the need for us to balance our program out
properly. And I want thank you for that, Jack.
Jack is an extraordinary public servant. And if I were
governor of Louisiana, I would have picked him as secretary of
natural resources as well.
Thank you for being here, Jack.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
Our next witness claims many areas, I understand, but it
says Wyoming, so I will turn to the gentlelady from Wyoming.
Mrs. Cubin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I would like to welcome Renee Daniels-Mantle, who
resides in Pavillion, Wyoming, I understand. But the ranch that
you run is in Representative McInnis's district for the most
part, so he wanted to introduce you as well.
But he is busy so--
[Laughter.]
Yes, I am done.
Welcome. Glad to have you here.
Mr. McInnis. Well, I welcome the witness as well.
I think that the Mantle Ranch is a clear demonstration of
overreaching by the Federal Government. It is clear at the
Mantle Ranch there is a Federal agency that wants the land and
is bound and determined, despite the property owner's rights
and privileges, is bound and determined to take that ranch by
whatever acquisition method is necessary or justified,
including regulatory overburden, including threats of
condemnation, including lack of cooperation.
I mean, I am glad that we have an owner of the ranch, a
representative of the ranch, here today to testify, but, I'll
tell you, if any of my colleagues want an example of grievous
overreaching by the government to push private property owners
off the property and put it into the Federal bag of
landholdings, this is the example.
So I appreciate the witness making the trip and coming out
here.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentlelady from Wyoming and the
gentleman from Colorado.
With that said, let me point out to you folks that when you
were asked to testify, you were told that we would appreciate
it if you could keep it within 5 minutes. We know how important
this legislation is, both to Congress and to America.
And you will see there in front of you a little thing that
looks like this, and it is just like a traffic light. When you
see the yellow, don't try and run it--but you know some people
in America do.
And if you feel there is just something that you just can't
stand, that has to be said, well, I probably won't gavel you
down for at least 30 or 40 seconds.
So with that in mind, Mayor Ashe, we are very grateful to
have you here. And the floor is yours, sir.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. VICTOR ASHE, MAYOR OF THE CITY OF
KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE
Mr. Ashe. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. It is
certainly a privilege to be here representing the U.S.
Conference of Mayors.
And I thank my Congressman, Jim Duncan, for that very
generous introduction. He didn't tell you, for those of you who
might not know, that his father served as mayor of the city of
Knoxville and also, up until my time, had the record of being
elected the most times as mayor of the city of Knoxville, and
was very instrumental in bringing minor league baseball to our
city during his tenure back in the 1960's.
Let me express appreciation to both Democrats and
Republicans on this Committee for your bipartisan sponsorship
in the last Congress of CARA and the fact that it achieved a
bipartisan majority in both parties in the enactment of this
legislation.
And I speak to this today from the standpoint of local
government. I am not qualified to speak for what has or has not
occurred at the Federal level in terms of land acquisition or
non-acquisition.
And I realize that from Yosemite to the Everglades, the
national parks serve as a shining star in terms of the scenic
beauty of our nation, and they make for memorable once-in-a-
lifetime opportunity for visits.
But I can tell you, as mayor of the city of Knoxville, that
the most important park in American is the one down the street,
where your children play ball or soccer or whatever the sports
activity may be.
In fact, this sunburn that is peeling off my face here
today is the result being there from 12:15 Saturday until 5:30,
watching my 11-year-old play ball at a park in our city.
It is the park where you spend recreational time, where you
may be there, walking with a friend to develop a healthier
lifestyle. It may be where you had your first picnic with that
other person who became the most important person in your life.
It may be where you developed athletic ability.
But the fact is, I can tell you that developing new local
parks and maintaining existing local parks is increasingly more
difficult. They are not making any new land, and the pressure
to develop greenfields for new industrial and commercial uses
often makes park use sometimes a secondary consideration.
I am proud to say that in Knoxville, we have just acquired
and are developing a new 100-acre park, which will be probably
be the last park of that size within the current corporate
limits of our city, simply because we don't have any other
undeveloped land available. And the expense of converting
developed property into park land is oftentimes far beyond the
reach and the financial ability of local government to do.
And while it is difficult to develop new facilities, I
think the citizens not only of Knoxville but cities and
counties across our nation want improved and expanded
recreational opportunities.
Two years ago, I testified before the comparable Committee
but on the other side of this Hill in the Senate. And I sat in
the shadow of NFL star Denver Broncos running back Terrell
Davis, who certainly took the limelight that day, and
appropriately so.
But it was to urge the Senators and the Congress to keep
the promise to support local parks, because when the Land and
Water Conservation Fund was enacted some 36 years ago, it
pledged to use the funds collected from offshore oil and gas
drilling to support the development not only of national and
state parks but also local parks.
And that is the point I want to make, that this should not
be lost in terms of the debate at the national level, realizing
the local level is a major, major component. And in terms of
the actual use that will occur in this country, there will be
more use occurring at the ballpark down the street from where
you live than will be at Yosemite or Yellowstone or the
Everglades, as great as those parks are. None of my comments
are in diminution of that.
But the fact is, we have already used to a great degree
this funding over the last 36 years, whether it is Morningside
Park, which has the largest statue of an African-American in
our nation in Knoxville for Alex Haley, who has Knoxville as
his adopted home town, or whether it is other parks, Westview
or Harriet Tubman.
The fact is, they are providing good opportunities for
people to develop healthier lifestyles.
And I would point out I think it helps provide for a safer
community because, particularly if kids and teenagers have
things to do, it makes sure that they are not getting into
trouble or doing things they shouldn't be doing.
It enhances property values, parks do, in those immediate
neighborhoods.
And when you improve recreational opportunities for
children or for young people, I think there is a clear
correlation that crime goes down. I can tell you as mayor that
when anyone has ever suggested that the park budget or
recreation budget be reduced, I respond that police department
budget ought to be increased because you will need that much
additional help to offset the problems that will be created by
reduced recreational opportunities.
Park improvements are an investment in our future, they are
an investment in our youth. And I hope that this Committee and
the Congress is able to enact this with the same type of
bipartisan support that you have in the past.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ashe follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Victor Ashe, Mayor, Knoxville, Tennessee
Americans are justifiably proud of their national park system. From
Yosemite to the Everglades, the national parks serve an important
purpose in preserving our natural history for future generations and
make for memorable once-in-a-lifetime visits.
However, as mayor of Knoxville, Tennessee, I have learned that the
most important park to most Americans is the park down the street from
where they live. The park down the street from your house is the place
you take your children to play baseball, football or soccer. It is the
park where you walk with a friend to develop healthier lifestyles. It
is probably the park where you had your first picnic with that most
important other person in your life.
Developing new local parks is becoming increasingly more difficult.
The pressure to develop greenfields for new industrial or commercial
uses often makes park use a secondary consideration. In Knoxville, we
have just begun to develop a major new park of about 100 acres, which I
think will be the last of its size in our city. It will be the last
because the city doesn't have the undeveloped land to build another
park of this grandeur. And the expense of converting developed property
into parkland is many times beyond the reach of local governments.
While is it difficult to develop new facilities, the citizens of
Knoxville and most every other American city for that matter, want
improved and expanded recreational opportunities.
Two years ago, I joined with NFL star Denver Broncos running back
Terrell Davis in addressing your colleagues in the Senate.
Mr. Davis and I urged the senators to keep their promise to support
local parks.
When the Congress created the Land and Water Conservation Fund in
1965, it pledged to use the funds collected from off-shore oil and gas
drilling to support the development of national, state and local parks.
However, since the 1980s, Congress has used most of this money for
budget deficit reduction leaving very little funding for state and
local parks programs.
I urge this committee to approve H.R. 701, the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund and the Urban Park and
Recreation Recovery Program have helped to develop some of the most
popular parks in Knoxville, both in the inner city and in other
sections of the city.
An example of the success of the federal funding is our Morningside
Park, which is the home of the outstanding Alex Haley Statute, the
largest statue of an African American in the nation.
Other parks so developed include the Harriet Tubman Park and
Westview Park.
And we have an Urban Park and Recreation Recovery Program grant
application to develop Caswell Park, which will be a multi-use facility
located in the city's HUD designated Empowerment Zone area.
Using these models, Knoxville has been very successful in
developing new parks and greenways.
While many people like park development is nice and good for the
quality of life, there are many other important factors to consider in
park funding.
These park improvements strengthen the fabric of our community by
providing young people with a safe place to gather and play.
Across the nation and right here in Knoxville, communities have
learned that when you improve recreational opportunities for children,
the crime rate goes down.
Many mayors have found that if you reduce your Parks budget, you
need to increase the Police budget by a like amount to handle the
problems of teenagers on the streets with no where to go.
Park improvements are an investment in our future''. They are an
investment in our youth.
Thank you for this opportunity to address the members of this
committee.
______
The Chairman. I thank you, Mayor. I appreciate you being
here.
Commissioner Johnson?
STATEMENT OF RANDY G. JOHNSON, COMMISSIONER, EMERY COUNTY, UTAH
Mr. Johnson. I was hoping Mr. Tauzin would be here because
I was going to ask him if he would have the people of Louisiana
pray for rain in Utah. [Laughter.]
But at any rate, Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to be here
today and am grateful for the opportunity to testify about the
Payment In-Lieu of Taxes provisions of Title VIII of this bill.
Section 802 of this legislation earmarks up to $320 million
for annual PILT payments to counties, essentially fulfilling
the longtime promise to public lands counties that the Federal
Government would help pay for the services it imposes upon
counties in the form of mandates.
A full PILT payment is, in essence, Congress keeping its
word, providing a portion of the funds necessary to comply with
that mandate. I will discuss this in more detail in a moment.
May I say that there is some irony to the fact that I am
here to testify in regard to fully funding PILT payments in
connection with legislation which may well create an increase
in the loss of tax revenues to counties from private lands, and
a corresponding increase in cost to those counties for
infrastructure requirements on Federal lands.
In fact, in order for rural counties to support H.R. 701 in
any significant way, they must believe that the Federal
Government recognizes the fiscal impacts to counties as a
result of Federal lands, and that it recognizes its
responsibility to make the counties as whole as possible for
the burden they carry.
Truly full and ongoing funding of PILT becomes integral to
the success of H.R. 701.
To go back, Congress did enact the Payment In-Lieu of Taxes
in 1976 and began funding it at about 35 percent of its
authorized level in 1977.
Counties have worked hard to increase that level over the
past 7 years after Congress increased the PILT authorization in
1994. Despite its miserly 1977 to 1995 funding of the PILT Act,
Congress made a solemn commitment to counties that the Federal
Government would begin to pay--if only a fraction--for services
it demanded from county governments, including basic health and
safety actions such as police, search and rescue, fire control,
road maintenance, jail operation, and garbage collection and so
forth.
I chair the Rural Public Lands County Council and am also
on the executive board of the Utah Association of Counties.
These two organizations from the State of Utah have been by far
the two most active voices in working to get PILT fully funded.
Often, we were the only two voices being heard.
We were often coolly received even by some who would
normally be our allies. Their reasoning was usually that we
should be happy with what we were already receiving, and that
we should not forget that PILT is really a form of government
welfare.
I would like to speak to that by giving you an example from
my own county, which illustrates what counties face in dealing
with large areas of public lands.
In Emery County, we have approximately 3 million acres,
roughly the size of the State of Connecticut, with just under
11,000 residents. Over 80 percent of our lands are owned by the
Federal Government. Another 10 percent is state-owned.
Obviously, very little land is privately owned.
We receive approximately $370,000 in annual PILT payments
based on the formula and at the current funding level. As you
know, the formula is based on many factors but in no way does
the formula account for impacts to the county as a result of
Federal land use.
For instance, I-70 bisects Emery County from east to west
across the San Rafael Swell. Hundreds of thousands of people
cross our public lands yearly and have free access to those
lands without passing through our towns. We only know visitors
are there if we arrest them, rescue them, retrieve them, or
find their trash.
Yearly, we average between 50 and 100 rescues on the San
Rafael alone, most lasting at least 1 day and some as long as 7
to 10 days. In 1997, we had 180 rescues in the San Rafael area.
For example, in 2000, we had two drownings in the Black
Box. This is a very high and narrow canyon with the San Rafael
River at the bottom. These people attempted to tube the river
through this winding canyon based on advice in a travel book.
The first body took us 3 days to locate and retrieve, and
it all took place inside a Wilderness Study Area. Total cost to
the county was over $50,000, and this is just one of many
examples.
Furthermore, these search and rescue operations are not
seasonal, nor are they limited to the San Rafael Swell. We have
hikers, fishermen, hunters, snowmobilers, public-land users of
every kind, all through the year on all areas of our public
lands.
In a recent survey done of use of national forest lands in
a 3- to 4-mile section of the Huntington Canyon, 28,000 people
visited that 3-mile stretch of road and 47 percent of the
visitors came from Utah's Wasatch front, 41 percent from other
from out-of-state areas, and only 12 percent were from Emery
County.
So the point is that we are severely impacted by the use of
these lands. And, ironically, people in these urban areas are
the ones who support programs that tend to limit our
availability to these public lands and yet they are the first
to leave their urban areas and scurry out to these rural areas
to have some fun and refresh and recreate.
Summarily, sir, I would just like to say there are 2.2
million acres of Federal land in Emery County, for which we
receive $370,000. If that were in greenbelt status, the lowest
tax rate that the county has in private ownership, the amount
that we would receive is around $900,000.
So, truly, the Federal Government is not paying its own way
in terms of the impacts that we face in Emery County. And we
fully support fully funding PILT as part of this legislation.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson follows:]
Statement of Randy Johnson, Commissioner, Emery County, Utah, on behalf
of Rural Public Lands County Council and Utah Association of Counties
Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to be here today and am grateful for the
opportunity to testify about the Payments in Lieu of Taxes (PILT)
provisions of Title VIII of this bill. Section 802 of this legislation
earmarks up to $320,000,000 for annual PILT payments to counties,
essentially fulfilling the longtime promise to public lands counties
that the federal government would help pay for the services it imposes
upon counties in the form of mandates. A full PILT payment is in
essence Congress keeping its word, providing a portion of the funds
necessary to comply with that mandate. I'll discuss this in more detail
in a moment.
May I say that there is some irony to the fact that I am here to
testify in regards to fully funding PILT payments in connection with
legislation which may well create an increase in the loss of tax
revenues to counties from private lands, and a corresponding increase
in cost to those counties for infrastructure requirements on federal
lands. In fact, in order for counties to support H.R. 701 in any
significant way they must believe that the Federal Government
recognizes the fiscal impacts to counties as a result of Federal Lands,
and that it recognizes it's responsibility to make the counties as
whole as possible for the burden they carry. Truly, full and ongoing
funding of PILT becomes integral to the success of H.R. 701.
To begin, let me put this issue of Payments in Lieu of Taxes in
perspective. Since the late 1940s, most public lands counties concluded
that they would prefer that the lands owned by the federal government
within their borders be returned to them as the legal subdivision of
their respective states. In other words, counties would prefer that
they be removed from federal ownership. There are legitimate arguments
to be made about maintaining federal ownership of National Parks and
Monuments and perhaps some areas within our National Forests and
Wildlife Preserves. Congress can debate this and decide. But, those
lands which were not included in these designations, the remaining
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands should by all rights be placed on
the local tax roles and removed from federal ownership and control.
This is not radical thinking, but rather common sense in the 21st
Century. Until now, Congress has ignored this concept even though it
solves numerous problems for the people who are left to eke out a
subsistence in the public lands states and the people of the United
States as a whole. Just imagine what the American taxpayers could do
with the $1.8 billion earmarked for BLM in the fiscal year 2002 budget.
The fact that PILT payments to counties are only $320 million as
proposed in this bill (and $200 million in the fiscal year 2002
Interior Appropriations bill) illustrates why counties believe they are
shortchanged even with full PILT funding.
As a stopgap measure, Congress did enact the Payment in Lieu of
Taxes (PILT) Act in 1976 and began funding it at about 35% of its
authorized level in 1977. Counties have worked hard to increase that
level over the past seven years after Congress increased the PILT
authorization in 1994. Despite its miserly 1977-1995 funding of the
PILT Act, Congress made a solemn commitment to counties that the
federal government would begin to pay-if only a fraction-for services
it demanded from county governments. These services include basic
health and safety actions such as police, search & rescue, fire
control, road maintenance, jail operation, and garbage collection and
disposal.
I chair the Rural Public Lands County Council (RPLCC), and am also
on the Executive Board of the Utah Association of Counties (UAC). These
two organizations from the state of Utah have been by far the two most
active voices in working to get PILT fully funded. Often, we were the
only two voices being heard. We were often coolly received even by some
who would normally be our allies. Their reasoning was usually that we
should be happy with what we were already receiving, and that we should
not forget that PILT is really a form of Government welfare. I would
like to speak to that, by giving you an example from my own county
which illustrates what counties face in dealing with large areas of
public lands.
In Emery County, we have approximately 3,000,000 acres, roughly the
size of the state of Connecticut, with just under 11,000 residents.
Over 80% of our lands are owned by the Federal Government. Another 10%
is state owned. Obviously, very little land is privately owned.
We receive approximately $370,000.00 in annual PILT payments based
on the formula and at the current funding level. As you know, the
formula is based on population, land mass, and other factors, but in no
way does the formula account for impacts to the county as a result of
federal land use.
For instance, Interstate-70 bisects Emery County from east to west
across the San Rafael. Hundreds of thousands of people cross our public
lands yearly and have free access to those lands without passing
through our towns. We only know visitors are there if we arrest them,
rescue them, retrieve them, or find their trash. Yearly, we average
between 50 and 100 rescues on the San Rafael alone, most lasting at
least one day, and some as long as 7- 10 days. For example, in 2000, we
had two drownings in the Black Box. This is a very high and narrow
canyon with the San Rafael River at the bottom. These people attempted
to tube the river through this winding canyon based on advice in a
travel book. The first body took us 3 days to locate and retrieve, and
it all took place inside a Wilderness Study Area (WSA). Total cost to
the county was over $50,000, and this is just one of many examples.
Furthermore, these search and rescue operations are not seasonal, nor
are they limited to the San Rafael Swell. We have hikers, fishermen,
hunters, snowmobilers-public land users of every kind--- all through
the year on all areas of our public lands.
As an example, in 1998, the Forest Service did an impact study on a
3-4 mile stretch of road in the Manti LaSalle National Forest. During
the 3 month summer high-use period, over 28,000 people visited this
small area of our county. 47% of the visitors came from Utah's Wasatch
front, where over 80% of the population of the state reside, and
another 41 % came from other Utah areas or from out of state. Only 12%
of the visitors to this area were from Emery county. Ironically, many
of the residents of the urban areas support programs which threaten the
economic heath of our rural communities, but when they get tired of the
city life, they are the first to seek our little towns and rural areas
to refresh and recreate.
As another example, in 2000 we wrote off more than $380,000.00 in
uncollectible ambulance bills--- most of which originated with people
who were enjoying our public lands most from out of state and some from
out of the country.
Often, there are more people visiting our public lands than
actually reside in the county. On Easter weekend, our population
triples as over 30,000 people make their way to the San Rafael Swell to
go ``Easterin.'' But regardless of how many people visit, the
responsibility for their welfare remains entirely on the shoulders of
the county. This includes search and rescue, medical emergencies,
public access, and so forth. And, we have not even spoken of costs of
road maintenance & law enforcement, which are substantial. Some would
speak of PILT as government welfare, but all other landowners in our
county pay their own way. Only the Federal Government does not. With
all due respect, who is the true welfare recipient here?
Summarily, there are approximately 2,299,825 acres of Federal land
in Emery County, for which we receive $369,000 If those same lands were
in private ownership under greenbelt status, the lowest tax rate in the
county, the revenue to the County would be approximately $897,069.
So, Mr. Chairman, if we had our way, most representatives of public
lands counties believe we could better manage the lands ourselves, much
in the same way that over 2500 counties currently do in the United
States. Most public lands are in the western states. However there are
large pockets of public lands in Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire,
Vermont, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Florida. Forty-nine states have
some federally owned land inside their borders. Yet, until Congress
places these 1739 public lands counties on the same level as the rest
of the country, PILT is the only way many of us can financially afford
to continue providing these crucial services on behalf of all Americans
who use our public lands. The reality is that absent full PILT funding
going forward, many counties will simply have to stop providing these
services because they lack the means to do so.
Moreover, we believe the record is clear that local governments,
with few exceptions are far more efficient users of tax dollars than
are federal agencies. We accomplish more for less because our
constituents demand that we protect their lands in a frugal, efficient
way, not in a gold-plated way. As local elected public officials, we
have to stand before the voters and are accountable, whereas unelected
federal bureaucrats are not--they come and they go while we are left to
live in their wake. And all too often, their management practices are
insensitive to the local residents and the challenges they face.
Rural communities face many difficult problems in maintaining
economic viability. A big part of the problem, if I may say so, is the
all-or-nothing approach to public land management issues used by many
in the debate. This has become very harmful. All-or-nothing
philosophies are intolerant. They refuse compromise. They are
prejudicial and contentious, and it is the way we have been forced to
do business on our public lands for the last 20 years. It is deeply
concerning that in our zeal to protect land and wildlife, we are not
only ignoring one of our most important national treasures, we are
actually working to eliminate it. I refer, of course, to the small
communities of the rural west. I hope that in the final language of
H.R. 701, as well as in your decisions regarding PILT payments now and
in the future, you will work to assure that this important part of our
American culture is not only protected and preserved, but is given the
opportunity to thrive.
Mr. Chairman, I applaud your efforts to move toward full PILT
funding and will leave it to you and your colleagues to determine the
best way to accomplish that objective. I would point out that the PILT
Act is authorized in a way which ties it to the CPI for annual
inflationary adjustments. For fiscal year 2002, the PILT authorization
is $327 million dollars. That level will increase over time. As a
recommendation to keep counties whole, I suggest you consider amending
your bill so that rather than having a fixed amount of $320 million
(already behind the authorized level), you attach it to the indexing
provisions of the PILT Act to always ensure that full funding goes
forward.
Thank you again for this opportunity to place PILT in perspective
and to focus on the huge financial demands which public lands counties
must endure. I also want to personally thank you, Mr. Hansen,
Congressman Cannon, and the Committee for what you are doing in behalf
of the rural counties of Utah and across the country. The fact that you
have addressed the PILT issue demonstrates that Congress intends to
find ways to keep its commitments to us. For your assistance on this
and many, many other issues, I thank you.
______
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Caldwell?
STATEMENT OF JACK C. CALDWELL, SECRETARY, LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT
OF NATURAL RESOURCES, BATON ROUGE, LOUISIANA
Mr. Caldwell. Mr. Chairman, honorable members of the
Committee, last year I had the pleasure of testifying before
this Committee in support of H.R. 701, the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act, which passed this House by a three-fourths
vote but unfortunately failed to reach the floor in the Senate.
This morning, my focus is going to be on Title I of the
act, pertaining to coastal states. Today, half of the country's
population lives within 100 miles of the coast. And the coast
is subject to increasing stresses of all kinds, from pollution,
overdevelopment, coastal erosion, and other stresses that are
severely impacting this fragile ecology.
In addition to that, the oil and gas producing states bear
a disproportionate burden of the additional adverse
environmental impacts from offshore oil and gas operations.
I can speak particularly about Louisiana, where we have
20,000 miles of pipeline in the offshore area and crossing the
Louisiana coastline and 12,000 producing oil and gas wells in
the offshore area.
Today, 25 percent of all of America's oil and gas crosses
the Louisiana coast either by pipeline, barge, or tanker.
Now, this vast infrastructure is protected by the Louisiana
coastal marshes. America's wetlands, 3 million acres
disappearing at the rate of 35 square miles a year.
Two weeks ago, tropical storm Allison hit the Texas-
Louisiana coast and the price of crude oil jumped $1 a barrel.
Just imagine what would happen if a Category 3 hurricane hits
this coast and the coastal marshes have all eroded away.
Now, we believe that CARA can be the answer, not only for
Louisiana, but for the entire country. The principle of CARA
that a portion of the revenues should be shared with the host
states has already been recognized with reference to onshore
Federal properties, where half of the revenues go to the host
state.
But at the present time, the coastal producing states get
no assistance at all from the Federal Government to offset
these adverse impacts.
Now, Louisiana has a plan to save its coast. And we are
implementing that plan with encouraging success. But the
funding is woefully inadequate, and the timing is urgent.
So we need CARA and we need it now.
Now, CARA is overwhelmingly popular. The polls show that 80
percent of the American people support CARA. All of the major
newspapers have editorialized in favor of CARA. Almost all of
the governors support the CARA bill. Over 7,000 organizations
have endorsed CARA.
The reason for this popularity is apparent. The American
public firmly believes in the basic principle of reinvesting a
portion of the revenues from nonrenewable resources, such as
oil and gas, into renewable and sustainable conservation
assets. And that is the basic principle for CARA across the
board.
So on behalf of the State of Louisiana, we urge favorable
consideration of H.R. 701.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Caldwell follows:]
Statement of Jack C. Caldwell, Secretary, Louisiana Department of
Natural Resources
Louisiana is in a dynamic position. We find ourselves at the center
of the nation's energy debate as a key player in the future of the
country's oil and gas supplies. Eighty percent of the nation's Outer
Continental Shelf (OCS) oil and gas is extracted off Louisiana's coast
or comes across our shores through pipelines to supply the rest of the
nation.
At the same time, we are the focus of what many scientists consider
to be the largest on-going environmental crisis in America today. Each
year, Louisiana is losing almost 35 square miles of our nation's most
productive coastal wetland. This three-million acre wetland supports a
third of the total volume of U.S. fisheries and provides wildlife
habitat for two-thirds of the Mississippi Flyway waterfowl and many
endangered and threatened species.
Louisiana's coastal wetland provides protection from storms and
hurricanes, not just for the two-million people who live in the coastal
zone, but for the number one port system in America and for the
nation's offshore oil and gas industry, an industry that puts $2
billion to $3 billion a year into the Federal Treasury.
Louisiana is the nation's coastal wetland basket, providing
invaluable benefits to the rest of the country, while sustaining
tremendous environmental impacts. Although the situation along our
coast is clearly a Federal responsibility, the Federal government is
not paying its way to do business off our shore. States like Louisiana
that provide so much to the nation but that do not have a large
population base or economic base, can no longer bear the cost of
ecological and infrastructure damage occurring from an activity that
benefits every man, woman and child in our country.
Louisiana gets little direct benefit from Federal offshore OCS oil
and gas activity in the Gulf. Jobs that were once almost exclusively
held by Louisianians have dwindled through the years. The onshore
infrastructure that supports Federal offshore activities is
deteriorating and in immediate need of attention. For example, the
single thread of highway that connects Louisiana's shore to the
nation's offshore oil and gas supply is close to being washed into the
Gulf. Still, more than 1,000 tanker trucks a day traverse it as they
carry oil and gas to the rest of the nation.
About a fourth of the nation's entire oil and gas supply comes to
rest on Louisiana's shores by pipeline, tanker or barge. In light of
today's energy crisis, this is a staggering thought. A more disturbing
thought, however, is that the coastal wetlands that protect that
industry's infrastructure are disappearing. Without their protection,
the ecological consequences of a Category Four hurricane making a
direct hit on more than 20,000 miles of oil and gas pipelines coming on
shore is unthinkable.
Ten years ago, the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and
Restoration Act (CWPPRA) provided a unique partnership as five Federal
agencies and the State of Louisiana began the daunting task of
restoring Louisiana's coast. We have made great strides in learning
what does and does not work as we try to save this fragile ecosystem,
and although CWPPRA provides $50 million a year for the effort, it is
only a fraction of what is needed to do the job.
During the past 50 years, Louisiana has lost more than 1,000 square
miles of its coast. Even with current efforts, we expect to lose
another 1,000 square miles over the next 50 years. This loss represents
80 % of all coastal wetland loss in the entire continental U.S.
To address this loss, CWPPRA has developed Coast 2050, a
technically sound strategic plan to sustain Louisiana's coastal
resources and to provide an integrated multiple-use approach to
ecosystem management. The main strategies of the plan are watershed
structural repair, such as restoration of ridges and barrier islands,
and watershed management, such as river diversions and improved
drainage.
In developing Coast 2050, the number of coastal wetland acres saved
was not the only priority. The plan also considered other resources,
such as roads, levees, fish and wildlife, and public safety and
navigation. We know that a comprehensive restoration program, using
Coast 2050 as a guide, could restore and maintain more than 90% of our
coastal land loss. At the present rate of funding, we can only hope to
save about 20% at best.
The price tag to do the job is estimated at $16 billion to $20
billion, but the cost of doing nothing is far greater. The cost to the
nation of lost infrastructure alone would be close to $150 billion.
CARA would go a long way toward providing the funds to restore this
invaluable part of the nation's coast by sharing Federal OCS revenues
with the states, just as Federal land-based revenues are shared through
the Minerals Lands Leasing Act.
For example, in 1997, the state of Wyoming hosted development of
Federal mineral resources that generated more than $569 million in
revenues. Wyoming received $239 million for its share of revenues
produced on Federal lands. In the same year, Louisiana hosted
development of Federal mineral resources offshore that generated more
than $3.8 BILLION, and received only $18.2 million for its share of the
revenues produced in Federal offshore waters.
According to a 1993 report, Moving Beyond Conflict to Consensus,
the OCS Policy Committee of MMS recommends ``a portion of the revenues
from OCS program activities should be shared with coastal states, Great
Lakes states and U.S. territories.'' The report goes on to say that
``although coastal states that host Federal OCS oil and gas exploration
and development suffer the environmental and infrastructure impacts
caused by that development, just as Wyoming and other states that host
extensive land-based Federal oil and gas development suffer impacts,
these coastal states are not compensated in the same way and cannot
mitigate the consequences of those impacts in the same measure.''
The report emphasizes two fundamental justifications for a revenue
sharing or impact assistance program: to mitigate the impacts of OCS
activities and to support sustainable development of nonrenewable
resources.
The report states that ``addressing these needs would strengthen
Federal-State-Local partnerships that must underlie a reasoned approach
to national energy and coastal resource issues, and the breakdown in
this partnership is evident in the fact that new OCS development is now
occurring only off the coasts of Alabama, Alaska, Louisiana,
Mississippi and Texas.''
The report further states that `` a modest portion of the revenues
derived from development of nonrenewable resources, such as oil and
natural gas, should be used to conserve, restore, enhance and protect
renewable natural resources, such as fisheries, wetland and water
resources. This concept also underlies the Land and Water Conservation
Fund which uses OCS revenues to acquire and develop park and
recreational lands nationwide.''
In 1997, the OCS Policy Committee reiterated its support. The
committee's Coastal Impact Assistance Working Group was formed to look
at alternatives and to make recommendations to the Secretary of the
Interior on how to implement such a program. Their recommendations
include the basis for the formula used in CARA to distribute the
revenues to the coastal states.
Louisiana has been very aggressive in the fight for CARA. Our
state, along with the rest of the nation, has much at stake as our
coastal wetlands continue to disappear. Last year, led by this
committee, the U.S. House of Representatives championed CARA.
Ultimately, CARA did not prevail. Instead, certain aspects of the bill
were authorized or appropriated. Many called this CARA Lite.
Those of us who fought hard for CARA know that what happened in the
end was not CARA at all. The true essence of CARA is a steady,
predictable stream of funding that would come directly to the states.
This steady stream of funding makes it possible for states like
Louisiana, with major environmental needs, to plan for and implement
restoration efforts costing hundreds of millions of dollars.
Some good things did come of last year's CARA efforts. The one-time
appropriation of funds for the Coastal Impact Assistance Program (CIAP)
was the first time Congress has ever acknowledged the need for such
funding and the contribution being made by the oil and gas producing
states. The one-time amount of $150 million shared by the seven
producing states is a start, but pales in comparison to the enormous
need for future funding.
Louisiana has put its CIAP plan together and will put its share of
the money ($26.4 million) to good use. To demonstrate Louisiana's need
for the funds, in only three months, we identified 100 projects worth
more than $64 million. It is evident that the one-time CIAP funds would
barely scratch the surface of our state's enormous coastal impact
needs.
However, Louisiana is not standing still. With the Coast 2050 plan
in hand, we have joined as full partners with the Corps of Engineers.
For the first time in history, the Corps has taken a state agency into
a 50-50 partnership. Together, we are engaged in a feasibility study to
implement the Coast 2050 plan.
Even without a source of funding to build projects on a scale that
will truly save our coastal wetlands, Louisiana is moving forward. We
must be ready if and when the money comes. We have no choice.
I urge you to consider passage of CARA this year with the same
vigor and enthusiasm you did last year. Only legislation like CARA will
give Louisiana the fighting chance it needs to save a coastline that
is, indeed, in the national interest.
Attachments:
Additional Facts on Louisiana's Coastal Land Loss and Contributions
to the Nation's Offshore Energy Supply
``MMS Gulf of Mexico Pipeline Data.'' Image Data: 1993 LanSat TM
Imagery.
``Principal Interstate Natural Gas Flow Summary, 1999.'' Energy
Information Administration/Natural Gas Annual 1999.
``Coastal Louisiana Existing and Predicted Land Loss Trends 1956-
2050.'' Map produced by the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources,
Coastal Restoration Division, and the USGS National Wetlands Research
Center, Coastal Restoration Field Station. Data Sources: USGS National
Wetlands Research Center: 1956-1990 land loss data. Base map derived
from 1993 GAP land cover data; 1993-2050 with action predicted loss
compiled for Coast 2050 by Louisiana State University, Natural Systems
Engineering Lab, and the US Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans
District. Map-id 2000-4-317. Map Date: 4/28/2000.
June 20, 2001
Additional Facts on Louisiana's Coastal Land Loss and Contributions to
the Nation's Offshore Energy Supply
Louisiana's coastal wetlands represent 40% of all the salt marshes
in the contiguous United States. During the past 50 years, more than
one thousand square miles have disappeared. During this decade, our
coastal wetlands are being lost at the rate of 25 to 35 square miles a
year, or the equivalent of a football field every 15 minutes. Even with
current restoration efforts, we expect to lose almost one thousand more
square miles by the year 2050. This dramatic loss represents 80% of all
coastal wetland loss in the entire continental United States.
The effects of natural processes like subsidence and storms,
combined with human actions, including impacts from offshore oil and
gas exploration and development, have led to an ecosystem on the verge
of collapse.
America is losing much more than acreage. Louisiana's coastal
wetlands contribute 28% to the total volume of U.S. fisheries, provide
winter habitat for one-half to two-thirds of the Mississippi Flyway
waterfowl population and for many threatened and endangered species,
the nursery ground for fish and shellfish for much of the nation's
seafood consumption, and 40% of the nation's fur harvest. They provide
for 400 million tons each year of waterborne commerce, and support and
protect the multi-billion dollar a year oil and gas industry. Our
coastal wetlands are home to more than two million people and serve as
their buffer from hurricanes and storms.
Louisiana Offshore Oil and Gas Activity
Eighteen percent of U.S. oil production originates in, is
transported through, or is processed in Louisiana coastal wetlands,
with a value of $6.3 billion a year. Almost 24% of U.S. natural gas
production originates in or is processed in Louisiana's coastal
wetlands, with a value of $10.3 billion a year.
Louisiana's OCS (outer continental shelf) territory is the most
extensively developed and matured OCS territory in the United States.
It has produced 88.8% of the crude oil and condensate and 83.2% of the
natural gas extracted from all federal OCS territories from the
beginning of oil and gas exploration and development in the U.S.
through the end of 1996.
As of December, 1998, Louisiana offshore leases totaled 5,363, with
more than 27 million acres under lease, 130 active drilling rigs, 4,489
producing oil wells and 3,813 producing gas wells.
Our latest annual production data for 1997 shows that 353,846,995
barrels of oil and 3,881,352,353 MCF (thousand cubic feet) of natural
gas was produced. Between January and July, 1998, oil production was at
227,282,332 barrels, with gas at 2,281,832,468 MCF.
As of October, 1998, there were 3,439 platforms in the Gulf off
Louisiana's coast.
In 1997, oil and gas production was valued at a combined total of
$18.6 billion, with federal royalties totaling $2.9 billion.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3218.034
The oil and gas industry has rebounded from a downturn in the
1980s. The main reasons are the discovery of oil and gas in deepwater
fields of the central Gulf of Mexico, deepwater royalty tax relief, and
new and improved technology used to extract oil from the deepwater
Gulf.
Industry leaders are expressing a new optimism and the frantic pace
of drilling is breaking old records. The deepwater Gulf of Mexico has
emerged as the country's most significant oil and gas province and some
estimates say within the next four to five years, as much as 30% of the
country's total domestic output will originate from the Gulf of Mexico.
Market analysts predict this intense level of exploration could
last 10 years. The success of Louisiana's oil and gas industry
contributes billions to the state and national economies every year.
Offshore companies paid about $2.4 billion to vendors and contractors
in 165 Louisiana communities in 1992 alone. Nearly 4,000 vendors serve
offshore operations and employ 55,000 people and more than 30,000 are
employed offshore.
Port Fourchon is the geographic and economic center of offshore
drilling efforts along the Louisiana Gulf Coast. More than $700 million
in public and private investments have been made in the complex and the
port will provide support to 75% of the deep water drilling prospects
in the Gulf. Its tonnage has increased 275% in the last five years and
it is anticipated to double again within two years. It handled more
than 30 million tons of cargo in 1996.
More than 6,000 people currently depend on the port as an avenue to
and from offshore facilities and more than 13,000 people depend on it
for jobs, supplies, facilities and as a hurricane evacuation hub to
safer locations north of the coast. Most of the major and independent
oil and gas companies operating in the Gulf have a presence at Port
Fourchon. On any given day, more than 1,000 trucks are unloaded and
loaded there and pipe yards, shipyards, platform construction
facilities, service bases and barge terminals within the immediate
service area of the port are working at or near capacity.
Less than 20 miles southeast of Port Fourchon is the Louisiana
Offshore Oil Port (LOOP), built by a group of major oil and pipeline
companies. It serves as the central unloading and distribution port for
all incoming supertankers to the Gulf region. The supertankers offload
crude oil into LOOP's offshore pipeline continuously. The oil is then
piped north to Lafourche Parish where it is stored and piped to markets
all over the country.
The Oil and Gas Industry - Impacts Come Full Circle
The United States depends on the oil and gas shipped through and
produced in Louisiana's coastal zone. Wetlands and barrier islands
protect the billions of dollars worth of infrastructure that supports
the industry from wave and storm damage and are an integral part of the
nation's energy system. The industrial uses associated with offshore
exploration and production, pipelines, and canal developments have
directly and indirectly contributed to marsh destruction, putting the
industry, itself, at risk.
Navigation channels and canals dredged for oil and gas extraction
have dramatically altered the hydrology of the coastal area. North-
south channels and canals have brought salt water into fresh marshes,
killing vegetation and habitat. East-west canals have impeded
sheetflow, ponding the water on the marsh and leading to stress and
eventual loss. Canals have also increased tidal processes that impact
the marsh by increasing erosion. Channel deepening has caused saltwater
intrusion, endangering the potable water supply of much of the coastal
region.
As of 1997, there were more than 20,000 miles of pipelines in
federal offshore lands and thousands more inland. They all make
landfall on Louisiana's barrier islands and wetland shorelines. The
barriers are the first line of defense against combined wind and water
forces of a hurricane and they serve as anchor points for pipelines
originating offshore. These islands protect the wetland habitants from
an offshore oil spill and are critical in protecting the state's
wetland-oriented oil and gas facilities and thousands of jobs directly
and indirectly tied to the industry.
If the barrier islands erode entirely, as expected in the next 50
years, platforms, pipelines and wells will be damaged in increasing
numbers. More than 58% of the region's wells are located in coastal
parishes. Most of them are more than 50 years old and were not designed
to withstand the conditions of open water they could face in the next
50 years. More than 30,000 wells are at risk within the 20-parish
coastal area. Wells that were on land only a few years ago are now
surrounded by water, a situation hazardous to boat traffic and an
environmental liability to habitat and fisheries.
Workers, equipment, supplies, and transportation facilities that
accompany the rapid growth of the offshore oil and gas industry depend
on land based facilities. Roads, housing, water, acreage for new
business locations and expansions of existing businesses, waste
disposal facilities and other infrastructure facilities will be needed
in localized areas along the Louisiana coast. Existing land based
infrastructure is already heavily overburdened and needs expansion and
improvement, requiring extensive financial infusions from state and
local governments. For example, Louisiana's only highway leading to
Port Fourchon is on the verge of crumbling under the strain of the
thousands of trucks that travel it each week. It will cost about $266
million to make the highway safe and fully useable.
LOOP also depends on onshore infrastructure protected by wetlands.
Without this protection, America will lose an essential trade and
navigation center that would affect commerce throughout the world.
Other Impacts From Coastal Wetland Loss
Louisiana ranks first in the nation in total shipping tonnage,
handling more than 450 million tons of cargo a year through its deep-
draft ports of New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lake Charles, South Louisiana,
Plaquemines Parish and St. Bernard. The ports between Baton Rouge and
New Orleans are the largest by tonnage carried in the world and serve
the entire eastern part of the country.
The state's wetlands and barrier islands protect this
internationally important port system, as well as navigation channels,
waterways and anchorages from winds and waves. At present land loss
rates, more than 155 miles of waterways will be exposed to open water
in 50 years, leaving this key port system at risk and businesses
throughout the nation losing preferred links to European and Pacific
Rim markets.
Because of our coastal marshes and barrier islands, Louisiana's
commercial and recreational fisheries are among the most abundant in
America, providing 25% to 35% of the nation's total catch. Louisiana is
first in the annual harvest of oysters and crabs and menhaden, and is a
top producer of shrimp. Some of the best recreational salt water
fishing in North America exists off Louisiana's coast. The reason for
this abundance is that our coastal marshes provide the nursery for
young fish and shellfish.
The long-term impacts of wetland loss relates to many species of
fish and shellfish that depend on these habitats, translating into
economic losses that affect the entire region and the nation. Nearly
all Louisiana commercial species use the marsh at some stage of their
life cycle, and fisheries loss will be proportional to marsh loss. By
the year 2050, the annual loss of commercial fisheries will be nearly
$550 million. For recreational fisheries, the total loss will be close
to $200 million a year.
Louisiana's coastal wetlands provide a diverse habitat for many
wildlife communities. The wetlands provide life cycle needs for
resident species and wintering habitat for migratory waterfowl and
other birds. Land loss and habitat change by the year 2050 will affect
the nation's wildlife population. Sea birds, wading birds and shore
birds are expected to decrease, along with raptors and woodland birds.
Alligators and furbearers will decrease in certain areas of the coast,
as will the abundance of ducks and geese.
Louisiana's cities and coastal communities are at great risk as the
wetlands and barrier islands disappear, leaving people with no buffer
from storm surges and the force of high winds. Miles of hurricane
protection levees will be exposed to open water conditions, forcing
widespread relocation and abandonment of coastal communities.
Wetlands create friction and reduce high winds when hurricanes hit.
They also absorb hurricane storm surges. Scientists estimate that every
2.7 miles of wetlands absorb one foot of storm surge. The 3.5 million
acres of wetlands that line Louisiana's coast today have storm
protection values of $728 million to $3.1 billion.
The recent strike of Hurricane Georges, just a few miles east,
brought home just how devastating a direct hit to New Orleans would be.
The potential loss of life and property is incomprehensible and the
threat of disaster was not lost on the city's residents. Bumper-to-
bumper traffic snaked out of the city north and west for hours as more
than one million people evacuated the crescent city. Hotel space was
scarce as far north as Memphis.
With the loss of barrier islands and wetlands over the next 50
years, New Orleans will be a Gulf coast city and will lose its wetland
buffer that now protects it from many effects of flooding. Hurricanes
will pose the greatest threat, since New Orleans sits on a sloping
continental shelf, which makes it extremely vulnerable to storm surges.
More than two million people in inland south Louisiana will be
subject to more severe and frequent flooding than ever before. Coastal
communities will become shorefront towns and the economic and cultural
costs of relocation is estimated in the billions of dollars.
We expect an increase in homeowner and commercial insurance rates
by 20% in some cases. Insurance coverage for wind damage may be
discontinued, deductibles will increase by 20% by next year, and large
insurance companies will stop issuing new policies in the coastal zone.
South Louisiana's unique culture is a national treasure and the
very fabric of its distinct way of life is being eroded with the coast
at great intangible cost to the nation and the world.
Coast 2050: A Vision of the Future
Louisiana began work in earnest to restore its coast in 1989 with
the passage of Act 6 and continued its work in 1990 with passage of the
Breaux Act or CWPPRA (Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and
Restoration Act). Since then, more than 80 restoration projects are
presently underway or already completed. We have gained the technical
know-how, and, by working with our federal partners, we are cementing
long-term partnerships as we build projects together.
During the past 18 months, the Coast 2050 Plan was developed in
partnership with the public. It is a technically sound strategic plan
to sustain Louisiana's coastal resources and to provide an integrated
multiple-use approach to ecosystem management.
Coast 2050 has received unanimous approval from all 20 Louisiana
coastal parishes, the federal Breaux Act Task Force, the State Wetlands
Authority, and various environmental organizations, including the
Coalition to Save Coastal Louisiana. This approval is unprecedented.
The main strategies of the plan are watershed structural repair,
such as restoration of ridges and barrier islands, and watershed
management, such as river diversions and improved drainage. In making
recommendations, the process did not view the number of coastal
wetlands acres saved as the only priority, but considered other
resources as well, such as roads, levees, fish and wildlife resources,
and public safety and navigation, in making recommendations.
The Breaux Act (CWPPRA) Task Force, the State Wetlands Authority
and the Department of Natural Resources Coastal Zone Management
Authority will establish it as a unifying strategic plan of action. It
will become the CWPPRA restoration plan and Louisiana's overall
strategic coastal plan. Proposed projects will be measured against the
strategies in the Coast 2050 Plan before being approved.
In one way or another, everyone in the nation will feel the
enormous loss of land along Louisiana's coast and current restoration
efforts will only prevent 22% of the land loss projected to occur
within the next 50 years. However, we know that a comprehensive
restoration program using the Coast 2050 Plan as a guide, could restore
and maintain more than 90% of our coastal land existing today.
The price tag is between $16 billion and $20 billion to construct
more than 500 projects that would be needed, but the price of
infrastructure alone that would be lost is more than $150 billion.
For more than 50 years, Louisiana has shouldered the environmental
and infrastructure impacts of supporting the OCS oil and gas industry.
In 1997, royalties paid to the federal government from OCS revenues off
the coast of Louisiana totaled $2.9 billion. Louisiana realized only a
fraction in direct financial benefit, while losing another 35 square
miles of its coast. If Louisiana receives its fair share of OCS
revenues, we will be well on the way to restoring our coastline,
justifying the $14 billion investment.
CARA makes good sense. Investing income from a non-renewable
capital asset into renewable resources that will provide economic
stability and health to an entire region and the nation for decades to
come, is good business. Louisiana and America cannot afford to wait.
Some of the information in this testimony was taken from: the
preliminary final draft of Coast 2050: Toward A Sustainable Coastal
Louisiana, the final draft of No Time to Lose, a report by the
Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, and reports written by Dr.
Donald W. Davis, Administrator, Louisiana Applied Oil Spill Research
and Development Program.
______
[Attachments to Mr. Caldwell's statement follow:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3218.002
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3218.003
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3218.004
The Chairman. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Mrs. Renee Daniels-Mantle is our next witness.
STATEMENT OF RENEE DANIELS-MANTLE, THE MANTLE RANCH, PAVILLION,
WYOMING
Mrs. Daniels-Mantle. Thank you, Chairman Hansen, for the
opportunity to testify.
My name is Renee Daniels-Mantle. I am not a policy expert
on the different land acquisition proposals today, but I can
tell you the implications that they have for my family and
others like us based on the dealings we have had with the
Federal Government and the land acquisition in our area.
My family has raised cattle for over a century. In 1919, my
husband's grandfather, Charley Mantle, homesteaded the Mantle
Ranch in Hell's Canyon, along the Yampa River in northwestern
Colorado. The Mantles are as much a part of the cultural
identity of the area as the humans who have lived there for
over 8,000 years.
Miles away, Dinosaur National Monument was declared by
President Wilson near the town of Jensen, Utah. The original
monument was only 80 acres.
In 1938, President Roosevelt expanded Dinosaur by over
200,000 acres, and it encompassed the Mantle homestead. Twenty-
two years later, it was expanded again, a small expansion, to
include the rest of the Mantle Ranch. The red dots on that map
are private property.
Today, the Mantle Ranch is the only occupied private ranch
remaining inside the monument. It consists of about 1,800 acres
in four parcels, two of which are completely surrounded by
Federal property and two of which border it.
In addition to these base lands, we also maintain a large
grazing allotment in and around the monument. The ranch is
located in one of the most remote areas of the country. There
is still no electricity, no running water, no phone, and no
mail.
I want to stress that the Mantle Ranch is still a working
cattle operation within the borders of a national monument. And
though the natural challenges of this county and the ranching
industry in general are difficult, they are minor in comparison
to those coming from the Park Service.
The land acquisition objective for Dinosaur National
Monument is to acquire private and state in-holdings. First
priority for purchase will be those lands where incompatible
uses are taking place. Incompatible uses are described as
grazing, development of roads and structures, et cetera.
Based in part on these guidelines, there has been an
aggressive and relentless effort by the Park Service over the
years to make the Mantle property available for acquisition.
The Park Service has attempted this in two ways. The first was
once described by a Federal Judge as regulatory whittling. And
the second, a far worse fate, is condemnation.
Evidence of this is overwhelming, beginning with the 1964
letter in which we first see that the Park Service intended to
use our property for major road and construction projects with
recommendations to acquire the property by condemnation.
I also wish to note the phrase in recommendation two of
this document, which says, when land acquisition funds become
available. It is my understanding that in land acquisition, it
is the availability of Federal dollars for a condemnation
proceeding that determines how deliberately a Federal agency
acts.
I have provided several more examples of condemnation
threats in Park Service policy toward grazing, but the park's
current management plan sums it best by stating: If any
nonfederal property is subjected to incompatible use, necessary
actions would be taken to protect park resources. This could
include the use of condemnation. Incompatible uses still
include grazing, irrigation of a meadow or pasture, building
stock ponds, barns, and storage buildings.
Remember, we are a ranch and these regulations apply to our
private property.
As recently as this February, we received a letter
outlining our options to sell the ranch, should we ever want
to, including condemnation.
This says nothing of the blatant harassment by the Park
Service, all to acquire our land by creating a situation that
prohibits grazing and renders our property worthless to us.
In a nutshell, ranching or any use as far as I can tell is
not a compatible use, and as soon as the park is able or has
the funds, they will use their regulations to put us out of
business or condemn our property.
Congress is currently considering many proposals that deal
with land acquisition. It is my understanding that the House
Appropriations Subcommittee has allocated $390 million dollars
toward Federal land purchases out of the Land and Water
Conservation Fund, or LWCF, for 2002.
Last year, the LWCF was funded at a record $544 million.
Without adequate private property protections on the LWCF, my
family and others like us across the country fear it will
become the instrument by which the government forcibly removes
us from our homes.
Two proposals in Congress attempt to add property rights.
The Conservation and Reinvestment Act makes a good start at
addressing the potential abuses that can occur. However, CARA
does not prohibit condemnation. And because it transforms the
LWCF into a mandatory trust fund, what little protections it
does have are just decorative.
By contrast, Congressman Thornberry's proposal, H.R. 1592,
would add meaningful private property protections to the LWCF.
His bill requires the consideration of land exchanges,
easements, and other options before acquisition is made. His
bill reasserts the provision in CARA that requires an area be
notified when an acquisition is under consideration. His bill
takes an aggressive step in blocking the application of Federal
regulations to private property if that property is inside or
adjoining land purchased with money from the LWCF. The right of
the landowner to use and enjoy his or her property would not be
diminished.
I guarantee, had this provision been placed upon the funds
that created Dinosaur, the problems the Mantles have
encountered would have never existed.
Most importantly, however, H.R. 1592 prohibits acquisition
by condemnation. It offers the protection that families like
mine need. It would take away the incentive for harassment by
the Park Service seeking to make us willing sellers, and it
would finally eliminate the threat of condemnation that has
hung over our ranch for 40 years.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Daniels-Mantle follows:]
Statement of Renee Daniels-Mantle, Rancher, Dinosaur, Colorado
Thank you, Chairman Hansen, Ranking Member Rahall, distinguished
members of the House Resource Committee, for the opportunity to tell
you a little bit about what life is like today in rural Western America
and to provide testimony on some land acquisition proposals currently
being considered by Congress.
My name is Renee Daniels-Mantle. My family has raised cattle for
over a century. In 1919, my husband's grandfather, Charley Mantle,
homesteaded the Mantle Ranch in Hell's Canyon, along the Yampa River in
northwestern Colorado.
Miles away, and four years earlier, Dinosaur National Monument was
declared by President Wilson near the town of Jensen, Utah. The
original monument was only 80 acres. In 1938, President Roosevelt
expanded Dinosaur by over 200,000 acres, encompassing the Mantle
homestead. Twenty-two years later, legislation authorized another small
expansion and gave it its present-day borders, including the rest of
the Mantle Ranch. (Attachment 1)
Today, the Mantle Ranch is the only occupied private ranch
remaining inside the monument. It consists of 1800 acres in four
parcels, two of which are completely surrounded by federal property and
two of which border it (Exhibit). In addition to these base lands, the
law of 1960 grand fathered a large grazing allotment that the Mantle
family had already maintained when the land was under the control of
the BLM. This allotment is committed to the Mantles in perpetuity, and
it is transferable with the private base property.
The ranch is located in one of the most remote areas of the
country. Today, it is still a perfectly preserved pristine snapshot of
the early pioneer days. There is still no electricity, no running
water, no phone, and no mail.
I want to stress that the Mantle Ranch is still a working cattle
operation within the borders of Dinosaur National Monument. Four
generations have raised cattle on this ranch. The men and women of this
ranch were born on it and buried on it. In addition to our cattle
operation, we have recently obtained an Incidental Business Permit to
begin showcasing it to guests. We conduct weeklong horseback excursions
through the ranch, working cattle and riding some of the roughest
terrain in Colorado.
Not only does the ranch possess incredible beauty, it boasts one of
the largest collects of privately owned petroglyphs in the United
States. Some of these are at least 4,000 years old. The Mantles have
fiercely protected these artifacts, yet we enthusiastically display
them to our guests. We are fond of saying in our family that if we do
not share our ranch with people, then we probably don't deserve our
ranch.
Though the natural challenges of this country and the ranching
industry are difficult, they are minor in comparison to those coming
from the Park Service.
As stated in their Land Acquisition Plan, the acquisition objective
for Dinosaur National Monument is to ``acquire private and state
inholdings as they become available. First priority for purchase will
be those lands where incompatible uses are taking place.'' Incompatible
uses are described as ``...grazing, development of roads and
structures, etc.''
Based in part on these guidelines, there has been an aggressive and
relentless effort by the Park Service over the years to make the Mantle
property available for acquisition. The Park Service has attempted this
in two ways; the first was once described by a federal Judge as
``regulatory whittling'' (Attachment 2). The second, a far worse fate,
is condemnation.
Evidence of this is overwhelming, but I will provide only a few
examples.
First, a letter dated November 25, 1964 hung the cloud of
condemnation over the Mantle Ranch (Attachment 3). In this document, we
see that the Park Service intended to use the property for ``major road
and construction projects'' with recommendations to ``acquire [the
property] by condemnation.'' I also wish to note the phrase in
recommendation two of this document: ``when land acquisition funds
become available.'' It is my understanding that in land acquisition, it
is the availability of federal dollars for a condemnation proceeding
that determines how deliberately a federal agency acts.
In 1979, the Mantle Ranch's fully lawful grazing allotment is next
targeted in the same Land Acquisition Plan mentioned earlier
(Attachment 4). Although considerable text is spent describing how
condemnation will only be used as a ``last resort'' in the event there
is an incompatible use, a sentence near the end of the document says
this is about easement acquisition, ``scenic easement acquisition is
not practical for this area because it will not eliminate grazing use,
which is one of Dinosaur National Monuments objectives.'' A letter
fifteen years later from the Park Service (Attachment 5) clarifies
their position on grazing by stating ``In general, grazing is regarded
as an incompatible use of National Park System areas.''
The current Management Plan (Attachment 6) states--if any
nonfederal property is subjected to incompatible use, necessary actions
would be taken to protect park resources. This could include the use of
condemnation.'' Incompatible uses include; ``new agricultural uses,
including grazing or the cultivation or irrigation of a meadow or
pasture, new major agricultural support structures...including stock
ponds, barns, and storage buildings.'' Remember...we are a ranch and
this applies to our private property.
Finally, the current Superintendent, Dennis Ditmanson, wrote the
most recent threat in a 40-year series, on February 5, 2001. I might
mention that Mr. Ditmanson has actually been a remarkable
Superintendent. Mr. Ditmanson wrote an objective, sensible letter
outlining the options for sale of our ranch, should the day ever come
when the Mantles sell their land.
Yet, as this letter shows, Option 1 for a Mantle land purchase by
the agency is a condemnation proceeding. Although this letter is not
nearly as alarming as the one from 1964, my family is alarmed that
condemnation proceedings are described here as presenting an
``advantage'' to the family on the point of agreeing to a price.
Furthermore, the letter clearly informs us that ``If the NPS elects to
condemn the property, either with or without [our] concurrence, the
Mantle family does not have the option of withdrawing'' (Attachment 7).
It seems to me that if the Mantles are willing sellers, a fair
price will be arrived at. The federal government does not need the
power to acquire land for conservation purposes until the owner is
ready.
I have many more examples that display intentions to acquire the
property by making us ``willing sellers''. This says nothing of the
blatant harassment, constant surveillance, private property
destruction, and trespassing on the part of the NPS. All to acquire our
land by creating a situation that prohibits our grazing and renders our
property worthless to us. In a nutshell, ranching is not a compatible
use and as soon as the Park is able or has the funds, they will use
their regulations to put us out of business or condemn our property.
Congress is currently considering many proposals that deal with
land acquisition. It is my understanding that the House Appropriations
Subcommittee has allocated $390 million dollars toward federal land
purchases out of the Land and Water Conservation Fund, or LWCF, for
2002. Last year, this entire account was funded at a record $544
million. Without adequate private property protections on the LWCF, my
family and others like us across the country, fear it will become the
instrument by which the government forcibly removes us from our homes.
Two proposals in Congress attempt to add property rights
protections to the LWCF. The Conservation and Reinvestment Act, or
CARA, does make a good start at addressing the potential abuses that
can occur when federal land acquisitions are made. However, CARA does
not prohibit condemnation, and because it transforms the LWCF into a
mandatory trust fund, what little protections it does have are just
decorative.
By contrast, Congressman Thornberry's proposal, H.R. 1592, would
add much more meaningful private property protections to the LWCF. His
bill requires the consideration of land exchanges, easements and other
options before acquisition is made. His bill reasserts the provision in
CARA that requires an area be notified when an acquisition is under
consideration. His bill takes an aggressive step in blocking the
application of federal regulations to private property if that property
is inside or adjoining land purchased with money from the LWCF--the
right of the landowner to use and enjoy his or her property would not
be diminished. I guarantee, had this provision been placed upon the
funds that created Dinosaur, the problems the Mantles have encountered
would have never existed. Most importantly, however, H.R. 1592
prohibits acquisition by condemnation. The federal government and its
employees would be kept honest in dealing with a willing seller, and
even a state would not be able to use federal money for a condemnation
proceeding.
H.R. 1592 offers the protection that families like mine need. It
would help us in many ways. It would take away the incentive for
harassment by the Park Service seeking to make us willing sellers. It
would finally eliminate the cloud of condemnation that has hung over
our ranch for 40 years.
Thank you again Mr. Chairman, for allowing me to testify. I would
be happy to answer any questions you or any other members of the
committee may have.
______
[An attachment to the statement of Ms. Daniels-Mantle
follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3218.001
The Chairman. I thank you for that testimony.
We are pleased to be joined by Chairman Don Young, past
Chairman of this Committee and Chairman of the Transportation
Committee and also the chief sponsor of this interesting piece
of legislation.
I turn to Mr. Young for any statement he may have at this
point.
Mr. Young. I apologize to the Chairman and of course to the
panel itself.
Mr. Chairman, I thank you for holding this hearing. We have
had 88 witnesses before. We have had numerous hearings all
across the country. I have said all along that this is good
legislation.
We have 218 cosponsors today. I'll have 300 before it gets
to the floor.
I will tell you what concerns me the most, Mr. Chairman,
and I would like to revise and extend my remarks, is a lot of
people were caught into the CARA Lite.
And for those that oppose my legislation, there was more
money spent last year in the purchasing of land without any
safeguards. Under my legislation, there are safeguards, to the
persons, the private property owners.
And if you do not read the legislation, again, to those on
this Committee that oppose it, I suggest you read the
legislation, tell me where it is worse and, in fact, if it is
not better than existing law.
And as you know, the appropriators last year did
appropriate a considerable amount of money, and we had what we
call CARA Lite.
This bill goes into setting the legacy and allowing the
states and allowing individuals to have some say in the
purchasing of land. It also and in fact fully funds the Payment
In-Lieu of Taxes. It takes care of the historic preservation.
It does fund the Land and Water Conservation fully. And as I
mentioned last year, Mr. Chairman, it passed 315-102.
As it got into the Senate, there was a great deal, again,
of effort to take and try to demonize this legislation. And I
worked with everybody, I believe, on both sides of the aisle,
trying to arrive at a position that keeps, I believe, private
property protected, but more than that, recognizes the
importance of open spaces for people to have hunting and
fishing, wildlife rehabilitation, which is crucially important.
If somebody can come up with a better concept, then I am
willing to listen to that. But until they do, I am going to be
pushing this legislation, H.R. 701, as hard as I possibly can.
I do thank you, Mr. Chairman, for doing this. It is
extremely important to me that this legislation comes to the
floor of the House. I believe it will come to the floor of the
House. And I believe when it does, we will have as many votes
as we did last year and maybe more.
And so, again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your stalwart
work on this. And, again, I thank you because I am the primary
sponsor of this legislation. And I yield back the balance of my
time.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
I think the Chairman just hit it on the head. People have
to say, is this legislation better than what we currently have?
And I think you will come down on the side that this is better
legislation.
I was going to turn to Mr. Duncan, but he just walked out.
But I would just like to ask a question, very briefly, of
our last witness.
It concerns me, your comment regarding the possibility that
your ranch may be taken by eminent domain. This legislation
basically requires willing sellers or an Act of Congress.
The latter would seem very improbable to me. And I would
seriously doubt if that would happen.
But you may want to review this legislation and check that
out yourself, because I really think you are pretty well
covered under this legislation. But if you have any problems,
would you get with us and tell us what you are upset about,
because I think this answers that question?
Mr. Cannon?
I will recognize my colleagues for 5 minutes.
Mr. Cannon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would just like to ask a couple of questions of Mr.
Johnson, and then that is all I will have.
First of all, you mentioned in your testimony that rural
communities face many difficult problems in maintaining
economic viability. Can you tell us some the specific problems
you have had in Emery County? And also, elaborate perhaps a
little bit on the recreational opportunities on the Federal
lands within your county.
The Chairman. Grab the mike, would you, Mr. Johnson? Thank
you.
Mr. Johnson. I keep forgetting I need a microphone here.
In terms of economic viability, there are many public land
policies that impact rural counties. And I will go into some of
those.
But I think that, largely, there are many out there who
believe that small communities, such as those in Emery County--
we have no large towns but eight small communities. And small
communities are essentially expendable for the sake of the
environment. And I believe that that is improper thinking.
I believe one of the greatest treasures of this nation are
the small communities of the rural West. And it is a heritage
that we ought to actually be working very hard to preserve.
And in fact, some of the policies on environment of past
administrations and some of the interest groups that work on
the environment and their ever-expanding efforts to have
wilderness, for example, wherever they can get it, to not have
any extraction of minerals on any public lands, and those kinds
of policies make it very difficult for some of the rural
communities to make a living.
Emery County is an energy-producing county. We have power
plants in Emery County that produce almost all of the
electricity for the State of Utah and allow other producers in
the State of Utah to sell power outside on that grid.
We produce most of our own coal in Emery County.
And so, as you can see, current proposals for half of the
county to be put into wilderness would make it very difficult
for us to continue to do business as we have done historically.
And this is even more true of some of the other smaller
counties, such as Kane and Garfield, who are impacted by the
monument that was created that closed off the Kaiparowits
Plateau to any kind of future coal mining, where 6 billion tons
of very clean-burning coal was simply locked away.
So there are many, many ways that we are impacted
economically. And ironically, in a recent poll, 75 percent of
the people of Utah said that they did not believe that we
needed to sacrifice the economy for the environment or the
environment for the economy, but that we could achieve balance.
And I believe that that is the approach that we ought to be
taking on these issues and that we should shy away from all-or-
nothing approaches to public lands management.
And I forgot the second half of your question, sir.
Mr. Cannon. Recreational opportunities.
Mr. Johnson. Just about anything you can name, in Emery
County. We currently have legislation that we are hoping to
push this year for the San Rafael Swell national conservation
area western legacy district that sets aside a million acres of
the San Rafael Swell in special protection.
But as part of that plan would be a travel plan that
designates where people can use roads with mechanized, such as
bicycles, where they can use off-road vehicles, where can they
hike, where they walk, where they can ride horses.
Emery County has everything from fishing to boating to
Alpine meadows to hunting to red rock opportunities. Whatever
there is on public lands, we have that kind of recreation in
Emery County.
Mr. Cannon. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I yield
back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Did I hear you correctly, Commissioner, you said that 80
percent of your county is owned by the Federal Government?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, sir. A little over 80 percent. I believe
it is 81 percent.
The Chairman. And how much is owned by the State?
Mr. Johnson. Somewhere around 10 percent.
The Chairman. Don't have a much of a tax base, do you?
Mr. Johnson. We do not.
And we have another interesting problem, if I may just say
so, and that is that 75 percent of our tax base is from
centrally assessed properties, such as PacificCorp, Scottish
Power that owns the power plants. And over the last 5 or 6
years, they have appealed their tax base and have been having
their tax base go down an average of 5 to 7 percent a year,
which means that with them as a 75 percent taxpayer, and their
tax base going down significantly every year, our local
homeowners our increasingly having to bear the burden of taxes
in Emery County.
The Chairman. You alluded to the San Rafael Swell bill. Are
you going to push that this year?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, sir.
The Chairman. Well, I won't get into the strategic
maneuvers here--
[Laughter.]
--but I would kind of be curious to hear from you.
The gentlelady from Wyoming.
Mrs. Cubin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I just want to make a brief statement. I have worked with
Chairman Young and Chairman Hansen ever since I have been in
Congress and agree with them about 99 percent of the time.
There are a few little--there are few things in the CARA
bill that I don't disagree with--or, actually, there are a lot
of things I don't disagree with, but there are a few that I do.
And I think one reason the CARA bill is so popular by so
many groups is that it does a little bit of something for
everybody. It protects property rights, which is better than
the status quo; not as good as Thornberry's bill, but better
than the status quo.
It takes care of the problems that Alaska and Louisiana
have with their coasts. That should absolutely be done.
Somebody needs to remind me why states that don't allow
drilling off the coast, like California, would get hundreds of
millions of dollars from this. I don't exactly understand that,
when Louisiana and Alaska have specific things that they could
put the money to, that could be funded.
And we wouldn't be talking about spending a billion dollars
a year. It isn't new money.
So in Wyoming, we get about $10 million a year out of this.
We will be getting that.
So since it is not new money, I need to write to my
governor and I need to say, ``Okay, Governor, where do you want
me to cut $11 million out of Federal funds?'' And that is not
going to be a pleasant thing.
And I think that is one aspect that people both in Congress
and out in the public haven't come to realize, that it isn't
free. There is a cost. Now where do you want me to cut?
I have worked every year since I have been here to get PILT
fully funded. And then I fight with the appropriators to get as
much as possible. Fortunately, every year since I have been
here and Mr. Young was the Chairman, we have been able to get
more for PILT, which we all know the counties need desperately.
And the last point I want to make is what it says in the
bill. And, you know, I see the light on the train coming down
the track; this is going to happen. And I have never, ever seen
a bill where the sponsors worked harder to address the concerns
of everyone and where a bill was brought together with all the
best motives in the world to try to get the best bill we could.
I still stand by the other criticisms I have.
But willing seller, willing buyer, that is in the bill and
that is great, because it is better than what we have.
But I know in my district sometimes how the Federal
Government makes the seller willing, and that is, they don't
let them use one square inch beyond their own private property
rights for grazing. They make it impossible for them to use
their own private property because it is surrounded by Federal
lands. Through different regulation requirements, they make it
financially impossible.
And that is how people become willing sellers, because
their land is valueless when they aren't allowed to use the
surrounding land as well.
But I do appreciate the Chairman's good intentions and hope
that we will be able to get more of the Thornberry bill in
this.
Thank you.
The Chairman. I thank the gentlelady.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Thornberry.
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I appreciate the testimony of all the witnesses. I
think we are continuing to get a feel for the allure that
having billions of new dollars to spend for many worthwhile
purposes has for folks at all different levels of government. I
just think that we have to be very careful not to let our
passionate enthusiasm for spending all this money overwhelm
fundamental property rights, which are so important.
Ms. Mantle, from your testimony and the documents you
provided, the Park Service, it sounds like, has held the threat
of condemnation over your family since at least 1964. And you
have this letter from just a few months ago, from 2001, where
the Park Service again reiterates the possibility that they
could condemn the property with or without your approval.
One of the answers to the Chairman's question is that CARA,
as is currently written, does not prohibit that kind of what
they call friendly condemnation.
But getting back to the point that Mrs. Cubin was making,
how does that become friendly? How do you have a willing
seller? I think that is something that we have to be concerned
about. And I think it would be helpful if you would describe
for the Committee some of the things that have happened in the
relationship between you and the Park Service, where they have
done something to affect the value of the land, for example,
with the springs, and the kinds of tactics they have used with
your family to try to encourage you to become a willing seller
or to participate in friendly condemnation.
Mrs. Daniels-Mantle. I think the focus of the Park Service
is to find an incompatible use that they can paste for us. So
there have been many instance, I think, in their search for
incompatible uses where they have used tactics that wouldn't
necessarily be good.
For instance, in the mid-1980's, they brought in, after
grazing season, after our cattle were pulled off, they brought
in a couple horse trailers full of antelope and put them out on
the range where they watered on Mantle property. And then they
did their range study.
They, in essence, weighted our grazing land with wildlife
and then did a research study to show that our property was
over-grazed, including our private property, to show over-
grazing as an incompatible use.
We are also subjected constantly to surveillance by
helicopters, by foot traffic, by vehicles. In fact, I have
another document called the Mantle log; they actually keep a
Mantle log, where they chronicle what we do on a daily basis,
trying to find an incompatible use.
One of the quotes is, as they are looking out over--they
have the round-top observatory up on top of the mountain--and
as they are looking out over our private property, the note
says: No new bulldozers. No new gas stations. No new brothels
on Mantle property. We will see tomorrow.
Things like that, which show that they are constantly
looking for an incompatible use. And grazing is not a
compatible use for them; I don't think any part of ranching is.
Mr. Thornberry. Well, let me ask this, and I guess this is
kind of a common-sense question, but do these tactics that have
been used against your family play a role in whether your
family decides to continue to operate the ranch? Aren't you
tempted to throw up your hands and say, ``Let them have it.
Let's go do something else.''
Mrs. Daniels-Mantle. Yes, sir. Well, I don't know that we
know how to do anything else, but when it becomes financially
burdensome to us just to maintain--ranching doesn't make a lot
of money anyway. We know that. But when it becomes financially
burdensome just to maintain those regulations that are
inflicted upon us by the Park Service, it makes ranching even
less economically stable.
So, it is hard to run cattle in that kind of country
anyway. But when you are coming up against those regulations
that go beyond what you would come up against in normal private
property situations, it is certainly--it is not a money-making
proposition for a rancher.
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, I would just add one final point, and that
is, my understanding under CARA as is drafted currently that
the willing seller provision does not apply to those funds
which the Federal Government supplies to the states; therefore,
there are not those kinds of protections against condemnation
with those funds.
Something else, I think there are some improvements we can
make here, and hopefully we can do so.
Thank you.
Mr. Young. Mr. Chairman?
The Chairman. The gentleman from Alaska.
Mr. Young. I would just like to ask Mr. Caldwell if he
would like to comment on the property rights provision, because
I want the gentleman from Texas to understand what he is
dealing with right now. What the young lady has been saying is
under present law. And it is the action of the Park Service,
which I happen to agree with you 100 percent.
If anybody should be chastised in the last 8 years, and
even before then, the conduct which they--launched a campaign
against getting land is--you are absolutely correct.
What I try to do in this bill is to make sure that does not
happen.
And I will tell you, on the Federal level, it cannot
happen. And it is a whole, long--and that is, by the way, many
of the environmental groups did not support this legislation
because it does make them be responsible.
And I have great sympathy of what they have done to the
young lady down here. And it has happened all around this
country. And it is the government attitude.
But, Mr. Caldwell, I started to ask you, can you comment on
that, please?
Mr. Caldwell. Yes, sir, Mr. Young. I would be delighted to.
You and Mr. Tauzin are known throughout the United States
as being some of the strongest property rights advocates in the
Congress, without any question. And we know that you and Mr.
Tauzin particularly negotiated at length with the other members
of this Committee to get a balanced property right that they
could vote for but that provided strong protections that are
not in the present law and could probably never get into
present law in any other way except being combined in the CARA
bill. That is the meat of the coconut.
We can all sit here and blow in the wind about what we
would like to do, but you have been in the trenches on this
issue as a property rights advocate, a very effective one, an
expert on the subject matter.
And it is my understanding--I am not an expert on property
rights. But from reading the act, it would be my assessment
that as a practical matter, it is going to be extremely
difficult for the Federal Government to acquire land in a state
over that state's objections.
There are enough roadblocks thrown up to acquisitions that
it will tremendously reduce the amount of Federal lands
acquired in states that don't want it.
See, some states are fine with having acquisitions under
the Federal part of Land and Water. But when you combine that
with the PILT provision, which is part of this property rights
tradeoff, is the PILT provisions, I think that particularly the
westerners who oppose Federal land acquisitions should find the
CARA bill a tremendous advance and far beyond what they can get
through any other legislation than the CARA bill, which has a
lot of people under the tent, as Mr. Thornberry pointed out.
Everybody gets not just a little bit, but quite a bit of what
they want.
Mr. Young. Thank you.
The Chairman. The gentleman from Nevada, Mr. Gibbons.
Mr. Gibbons. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
And as I have read this bill and looked through it, there
indeed are some provisions in here which are far better than
existing rights and preservation of rights in the current
existing law.
My concern is that we may be just a day late and a dollar
late with some of these things. And we go back to what my good
friend and colleague from Wyoming said, and as well my friend
from Texas, about willing sellers.
The concept of a willing seller of course assumes that the
current value of the property is one which the historic and
current economic uses are taken into consideration.
Over the last several years, I would say that Ms. Mantle
has had the economic uses of her ranch restricted. And,
therefore, the current appraised value, which would be included
in the assessment of what she would be a willing seller for and
the government's valuation of that property would be much less
than historic value of that ranch with its grazing rights on
public land, which happens around the West.
And this has happened in Nevada, it happens continually,
where willing sellers are extorted into selling their land.
I come from the State of Nevada, which we don't talk about
public land in terms of millions of acres. We talk about public
lands in the tens of thousands of square miles. The state I
represent has 89 percent public land.
PILT, which if I may address that issue, Mr. Chairman, was
a promise by this government to fully fund the difference
between what the property taxes would be if they were in
private hands versus what they would be if they were paid for
at the lowest base, as we heard Mr. Johnson talk about, the
lowest appraised value.
Well, that promise, that law, has never been complied with
by our Federal Government. What makes us all believe that
saying fully funding PILT today will be the answer to those
woes?
The State of Nevada, if you take 90 percent of 112,000
square miles as public land receives a fraction of a percentage
point for the valuation of that land in terms of taxes. It is
an easy state to walk into and say, ``We want to acquire the
remaining private property in that state and turn it over to
the public,'' because it is surrounded by other public lands.
It is an in-holding.
The State of Nevada is literally an in-holding on all
private lands.
My idea here is that if there is a willing seller concept,
then historic and normal uses, and historic economic uses, have
to be considered, not current, existing valuations based on
removal of the grazing rights, removal of the access rights,
removal of personal uses of private property, as is the current
concept today. There ought to be some provision by which the
Federal Government is held accountable for extortionary
practices in driving property owners into the maze of saying
that their land has to be sold if they are going to survive.
It is vastly different to graze cattle in the West than it
is in the South or as it is in the East. In the East, you could
probably graze 17 to 20 cows on one acre of ground, based on
the rainfall and the grass conditions. In the West, it probably
takes 25 to 30 acres to graze one cow, which is vastly
different. And that is the reason why we have grazing rights on
large areas.
Secondly, let me address the idea that grazing is
incompatible. Today we are burning 20,000 acres of forest
outside of Reno, Nevada. Over 3 days, it has gone over 20,000
acres, because it has not been allowed to manage that forest
either through reduction of the fuel loads, which has been
normal, with grazing or mechanical means, to reduce the fuel
load underneath the forest on the floor. And that, again, is a
compatible--or, now, an incompatible use of our forest and now
we are just seeing it burn up.
I am frustrated like the rest of us with this issue. Yes,
indeed, this bill has some wonderful protections. But I think
there are some historical issues that need to be addressed as
well.
I have one final issue here in the remaining time, it is
the water law. Seventeen western states have prior
appropriation. Any time you give the Federal Government the
ability to acquire water rights, they have the ability to have
Federal law supersede state law. That would destroy many of our
states' prior appropriation water law.
And even though this says it shall not interfere with state
laws, I am concerned, Mr. Chairman, that our prior
appropriation water law will be destroyed if we allow the
Federal Government to own such laws in our states. And,
therefore, I still have several reservations and concerns about
this law.
I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and sorry I didn't ask a
question but got on my soapbox. Thank you.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman from Nevada.
The gentleman from Idaho, Mr. Otter.
Mr. Otter. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to begin by associating myself with the
remarks from my colleague from Nevada. Being from Idaho where
65 percent of the land mass of the state, roughly 21.5 million
acres of U.S. Forests and 14.5 million acres BLM, we are also
surrounded, inundated.
And between the Endangered Species Act, the roadless area,
various and sundry national monuments now, we have counties in
the north of Idaho that even the courthouse is off-limits
because it is infringing upon the territory for the grizzly
bear, the caribou, the sturgeon, the bull trout, the salmon.
The list goes on and on.
And yet, I know how well-intended H.R. 701 is. And I
applaud the efforts, and especially the safeguards that at
least are sensitive to the private property issue. In fact, I
am so sensitive to that that I am cosponsor of the gentleman
from Texas's Constitutional Land Acquisition Act.
But I, along with many westerners, are extremely suspicious
of any time you give the government or an agency of the
government--now, everyone one of us sitting in this body would
not go onto private property and would not infiltrate the life
and the style and the value system of you, Ms. Mantle, or any
of your family.
Yet, when you have an unelected bureaucrat that is
answerable to nobody, they are suddenly the vigilante that
speaks for everybody. I have seen it as lieutenant governor the
State of Idaho.
And I apologize to my colleagues on this Committee because
they have heard this speech so many times.
But for 14 years I have watched as some Federal agent, who
is answerable to nobody, march into the state with all manner
of intent on harassing and, quite frankly, eating out the
substance of Idahoans. And anything I can do to safeguard that,
I am going to.
I am extremely suspicious even of the most well-intended
effort. If we truly want to protect private property, we don't
need to improve on the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. It
is very, very simple: Nobody is to be denied without just
compensation.
And taking all those other things into consideration, I say
again, I appreciate my colleagues for their well-intended
effort here, but I cannot support it.
If indeed we have enough money to do all these wonderful
things and acquire yet more land--I have sat in this very
Committee room, Mr. Chairman, members of this Committee, for 2
days this week and listened to over $9 billion of backlog on
national parks, on noxious and invasive weed programs that we
are not taking care of on public lands we have today.
I am sorry, but as businessman, as a landowner in Idaho
that has been denied the use his land, because I wanted to take
a couple of old car bodies out of a swamp at my house and was
descended on by the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers and I
can't remember all the rest of the agencies that showed up. I
was fined $137,500 for less than a half acre of swamp.
I went, spent many years in court, spent well over $100,000
trying to defend my rights under the Fifth Amendment. Never
once saw a court. I saw the EPA hearing officer. I saw the EPA
judges. Everybody that I talked to was bought and paid for by
the EPA.
Ladies and gentlemen, that is not the system that I believe
the Founding Fathers intended. And it is not the system that is
going to work and make the well-intended ideas that we have
here work.
And so, along with my colleague from Nevada, I apologize
for not asking questions, but, unfortunately, I have heard
those stories so many times. And my heart goes out to you
because it doesn't make any different what it is worth. It is
your value system, Ms. Mantle.
And your value system, everybody in this Congress is
prepared to jump up any time a value system is threatened. We
talk about all manor of constituencies in the United States and
say, ``Look what we have done to this group of people, and look
what we have done to that group of people.''
And whether it is the Native Americans, God bless them, or
whether it is some other group in this nation, what generation
is going to come back and repay the private property owner for
the damage that we are doing to them today? And what is it
going to cost them? And what is the reparation going to be?
If we can't learn from our mistakes, then I think we are in
more trouble than we think we are.
I say again, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank
you, members of the Committee, for enduring my tirade. Thank
you.
The Chairman. Thank you. I found it very enjoyable.
The gentleman from Washington, Mr. Inslee.
Mr. Inslee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have a question and I may be the only person in the room
who doesn't know the answer already, but I will ask anyway.
I was looking at Mr. Thornberry's bill, and as I read it,
essentially the intent is to require a no-net increase in
Federal lands or public lands. That is sort of my reading of
the bill in general.
Could anyone here help me with that? Is that a basic
accurate reading of the intention of the bill?
The Chairman. Mr. Thornberry?
Mr. Thornberry. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Inslee. You bet.
Mr. Thornberry. That is not the case. There are those who
want to have no net increase of Federal lands. What we do is
prohibit condemnation. We require some certifications that you
have checked out land exchange and other things. But it does
not put a limit on the total amount of land that Federal
Government can own.
Mr. Inslee. Let me ask about that. I am just looking at a
paragraph on the second page that says: There will be no
property acquisition unless the secretary of the department
that administers the acquisition certifies that any acquisition
of the interest through an equal value exchange of property
interest is not feasible and suitable.
Now, I would understand that to mean that before you could
have a purchase, you would have to show that you couldn't
acquire the land by giving away some Federal land in an
acquisition. And to me, that would be heading toward a no-net
increase. You essentially would require the Federal Government
to divest itself of some land to acquire some land.
If my reading is inaccurate--if you could tell me your
thoughts on that.
Mr. Thornberry. Sure. If the gentleman will yield,
basically, the existing CARA bill says that you have to have
considered a land exchange. What I try to do is take that one
step beyond, and that is, have a certification that you
actually considered a land exchange.
It just needs to be one of the options that you explore
before the Federal Government goes to acquire the land without
some sort of land in exchange.
But there is no requirement in the bill that says: For
every acre that you acquire, you have to divest yourself of
another acre.
Mr. Inslee. Thank you, Mr. Thornberry. I appreciate that.
I would just say that I have some considerable concerns
about the intent of this, and we will leave it to a later date
to express those.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Jones.
Mr. Jones. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. And I want to
thank the panel for being here also.
I guess I really don't have a question of the panel, but I
do want to make a couple statements.
I support Mr. Thornberry in his effort. I am from the
South. I am very proud to say I am from North Carolina. And
quite frankly, I do support the CARA bill.
However, the property rights section is so critical, in my
opinion, to guaranteeing the constitutional rights of the
American people that I hope that Mr. Young, who I have great
respect for, will work with Mr. Thornberry and others from
around this nation to ensure that there is not any--any--lapse
so that the Federal Government can continue to extend its heavy
hand.
I had the opportunity of going to California a couple of
weeks ago to Mr. Herger's district. And I can honestly tell you
that I felt for those people.
And I understand, Ms. Mantle and Mr. Johnson, I can
understand your frustration, because I saw the northern part of
California where towns at one time had 3,000 people now have
500, 600 people left, people who have lost their jobs.
There was an issue up in Oregon, I think the Klamath water
issue, dealing with farmers, where 500 who were promised land
by the Federal Government after their family members returned
from World War I, that they could farm that land. Now they
cannot get water, half of them because of the suckerfish.
And I looked at the forest. And we spent about 9 hours. It
was well-organized. It was a real education for me, being from
the eastern part of North Carolina, to go to the northern part
of California.
But to see that between 1991 and 1997, we have had over
331,000 acres of forest destroyed by fire, and yet we can do
nothing to protect those forests because of the Endangered
Species Act.
And I realize that CARA doesn't speak to the Endangered
Species Act, but I will say to you, Mr. Chairman, and to my
friends on the other side of the aisle, if something is not
done to bring some sanity to the Endangered Species Act, I
don't know what is going to happen, not only to our national
forests, but when I had the opportunity to see the experts and
I warned these people about a concern--which I am concerned
about the species also.
But how concerned are they when the forest fire kills them?
Is there not some concern about the forest fires, because they
kill animals, they kill birds, they kill insects also?
So I hope, Mr. Chairman, with your leadership and other
members', that when we move this CARA bill forward, that we
have done everything that we can do to protect the
constitutional rights of the private citizen, because I feel
for my friends from the West. I sincerely do.
It was God's will that I should take that trip, quite
frankly, because I have a new perspective for the people in the
western part of this United States.
And, Mr. Chairman, I remember something you said a year ago
in a hearing, that too many times we in the Federal Government,
whether we be elected officials or bureaucrats, we forget the
first three words of Constitution: It is we the people are the
government. And we the people too many times do not have a say.
So I just want to do my part as a foot soldier up here in
this Congress to work with my colleagues as this CARA bill goes
forward to make sure that property rights of the American
people are protected, and there is no question about it.
Thank you, sir.
The Chairman. Thank you. I couldn't agree more.
The gentleman from Indiana, Mr. Souder.
Mr. Souder. I thank the Chairman.
I am actually an enthusiastic supporter of the bill and
have been. And it is interesting to listen to the westerners
debate because, for example, in my district, which is
approximately 100 miles north and south, and probably 40 miles
east and west, the only Federal land we have is the Veterans
hospital and the courthouse. You would have to go 100 miles
west, 150 miles south, and probably about 400 miles east to
find Federal land.
The bulk of the support of the CARA bill has been from
people who aren't in the situations like Utah where you have 80
percent public land or in Idaho where it is 65 percent. When we
hear about the backlog in the national parks possibly being $9
billion, we look at this as another cash transfer from the
Midwest and the East to make the West more attractive so our
young people move west.
We don't have the same recreational opportunities to access
BLM forest land, park land that I see in every magazine, every
ad that comes from the western states to try to recruit people
because we don't have those open spaces.
First, thank you, Louisiana. We wouldn't have our trucks,
pickups, SUVs, and cars if you weren't willing to drill. And
part of this is to say, look, if we are going to in fact, in
places like Louisiana and Alaska, drill, there should be some
compensation in developing the wetlands and preserving the
heritage.
And it is a balance. I don't fully understand the
California question, but I know we have pressures on California
as well.
So I don't view it as a disadvantage that we are putting
dollars into Alaska and Louisiana because we are directly
benefiting from that.
But the only way those of us in the Midwest and the East,
who do not have this kind of open land access, are going to see
when the money comes down to the parks in Knoxville, is when it
goes into historic preservation, and things like that.
I discussed at one point, earlier on, with both Chairman
Hansen and Chairman Young, of saying, okay, let's agree that
three-quarters of the money is going to go east of the
Mississippi, and we will exclude Congressman Jones's district
because he already has a huge national park in his district.
Another way to do it would be to say that if you have 50
percent Federal land in your district that you don't get any of
the CARA funds. In other words, put some caps on this so that
the dollars flow to the areas that actually need public space.
I am sorry I missed the testimony, but I have read through,
in addition to listening to everybody complain, your testimony.
And in Mayor Ashe's case--and I actually have a question--
you said that in the city of Knoxville, basically you are not
going to have, after this one park, additional green space to
add a park. You have a national park--
Mr. Ashe. The Smoky Mountains.
Mr. Souder. --just east of Knoxville. But in Knoxville, as
in other areas of the country, and you have been a mayor and a
leader in the national mayors' association, we are seeing a
suburban sprawl where there was not planning for city parks,
like you have in Knoxville or like we have in Fort Wayne.
Could you further expand, having listened to a lot of this
discussion, on what this means for cities and also the suburban
areas as we try to address the problems in other parts of the
country?
Mr. Ashe. Well, thanks very much, Congressman.
First of all, it is a education to me as a southerner and I
guess easterner, being east of the Mississippi, to listen to
the horror stories in the West and to learn what is going on.
But it seems to me, and if we can separate the two, those
seem to be Federal issues, stories and situations that involve
the Federal Government. At the local level, let's not forget a
major portion of CARA is money for cities and counties across
America.
Again, even though the Great Smoky Mountains National Park,
which is 20 miles from Knoxville, is the most visited park in
America, the fact is, more people in Knoxville go to the
ballpark down the street than go 20 miles away to the Smokies,
as much as I love them.
We are 100 square miles within the corporate limit, the
city of Knoxville. We have 10-acre tracts left. But in terms of
a 100-acre tract, which is what you would need, if you want
eight ball fields, three soccer fields, a greenway, you know,
those sort of large activities, we don't have them anymore,
short of annexation, which is another issue that I don't think
you want to get into.
We can't expand. I mean, we are what we are. So if you are
going to have space available--and the area which I describe is
the most rapidly growing area of our city, that is the one part
of town--which is predominantly middle to lower income,
predominantly Caucasian--that does not have a large
recreational facility. They are going to now.
But I think that is important in terms of urban sprawl as
well, in terms of dealing with it. And it seems to me CARA
represents a balance, a compromise. Not everyone gets
everything they want.
But surely, I hope the local portion doesn't go down the
tubes because of situations either in the West or wherever,
where the Park Service may have done something that they should
not have done. I can't comment on all of that.
But clearly a situation in Nevada or Idaho, where a
majority of the land is owned by the Federal Government, is a
very different situation than Indiana or Tennessee. I mean, it
is just totally different.
I would say, in terms of land acquisition at the local
level, not saying we don't have the power of eminent domain,
but if the city of Knoxville wants to condemn, first of all, I
can't do it. No bureaucrat can to it in the city. The city
council must vote on it, on each piece. So everybody in
Knoxville can show up and say whatever it is they want to say
about it.
Secondly, if the landowner doesn't like the acquisition, he
or she has a right to jury trial under Tennessee law. Now, we
do have the right to acquire but it must be done, one, by
public vote of the legislative body.
Remember, we are at Kroger's, Food City, Walgreens. I mean,
I have a listed phone number. There is no shortage of citizens
to come tell me what a great job or what a lousy job I'm doing.
Secondly, a jury trial is there, and it may very well come
back with an amount that far exceeds what the appraised value
was, because, I mean, juries have a way of acting on their own.
Mr. Souder. Thank you.
The Chairman. The gentlelady from California.
Ms. Solis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members. I
apologize for coming in late, but I also want to associate my
support for H.R. 701, which I am a cosponsor of.
I am particularly pleased to see that there may be an
opportunity to help provide funding for inner-city and urban,
suburban America, particularly in my district, where you have
very scarce resource or open space available to an increasing,
changing demography in southern California.
In my short term in the state senate, I worked to provide
funding and create a conservancy along the San Gabriel and
foothills in Los Angeles County.
We are in need now of Federal support. And this is an
avenue for many of the cities along that corridor that
stretches almost 30 miles possibly that could apply for this
particular fund.
We have it so bad in some of district where we actually
have to overuse our high school properties, in terms of their
football fields, to use as multiple recreational facilities.
Soccer is played there, softball. You don't have parks in some
of the areas that are adjacent to highly industrial commercial
areas.
Our students, our kids, need some relief. They need to have
a place to go.
And certainly, I could see this, CARA, as an avenue to help
provide that much needed support in a district like mine, where
you see the largest percentage of people that are living there
are under 15 years of age. We want to keep them out of crime.
We want to keep them in activities that are sports-like and
that will provide them educational enhancement and
opportunities to grow and understand better open space and the
environment and how meaningful that can be.
So I just want to add my words of support.
The Chairman. I thank the gentlelady.
The gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Kildee.
Mr. Kildee. Again, I apologize for being late. I had
another hearing, Mr. Chairman.
But, as you know, I am cosponsor of CARA. And we passed
this last year by a very good margin. I appreciate the
testimony of all of you here, and my staff has read that. I
hope we can do likewise this year.
I notice that H.R. 1592 contains many of the additional,
redundant property rights that were attempted to be added to
CARA last year, which were opposed, turned down, by this House.
But I certainly appreciate the witnesses and their
testimony.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
And I thank the panel. It has been extremely interesting,
and some very heartfelt discussion has gone between the members
and the panel. It has been very enlightening for a lot of us.
Let me just say that we will continue to move this bill. I
take very seriously the comments made by everyone concerning
the property rights of America. That is sacrosanct to all of
us.
But I agree with Mr. Young. What we have here is much
better than what we have now. We will go from that point.
I thank the witnesses. You have been an excellent panel.
And we will excuse you and turn to the second panel: Mr.
Tom Mullen, Supervisor, Riverside County, California; Dr.
Philip K. McKnelly, Director, North Carolina Division of Parks;
and Mr. Bobby Whitefeather, Chairman of the Red Lake Band of
Chippewa Indians, Red Lake, Minnesota.
I thank this panel for being here.
The gentlelady from Minnesota, Ms. McCollum, wanted to
introduce Mr. Whitefeather. She isn't here, but I would like to
mention that. We appreciate her interest.
And you folks know the rules. Members will be in and out
all day.
But I would like to briefly turn to the gentleman from
Michigan, Mr. Kildee.
Mr. Kildee. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I, too, would like to welcome Mr. Bobby Whitefeather, the
Chairman of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians in Minnesota.
Ms. McCollum right now, Chairman Whitefeather, is over on
the House floor defending an Indian resolution over there, and
doing a very good job of it. I just spoke on that myself.
But I have visited your sovereign nation. And you have some
of your citizens actually living as far east as Michigan, and
they are very good citizens of that area, too.
But I appreciate your being here.
Mr. Thornberry. [Presiding.] I thank the gentleman.
And now we would turn to Mr. Mullen.
STATEMENT OF TOM MULLEN, SUPERVISOR, RIVERSIDE COUNTY,
CALIFORNIA
Mr. Mullen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the
Committee.
My name is Tom Mullen. I am a county supervisor in the
Riverside, California, which is located in the southern portion
of the state.
Let me tell you just a little bit about Riverside County
and how we are attempting to make the ESA work. And I certainly
need not remind the Committee that the ESA is a Federal mandate
and an onerous one on local government.
You have my prepared remarks, and to expand on those, I
would let the Committee know that Riverside County would be
equal to the 13th largest state in the union. We are slightly
smaller in population and area than the State of Massachusetts
and New Jersey. We stretch 200 miles from the Los Angeles
basin, bounded by the county of Los Angeles, Orange to the
west, San Bernadino to the north, and San Diego to the south.
In the basin area, in the western quarter of this county,
we have about 1.2 million people. The county itself is 1.6
million. In the next 15 years, we will add another million
people to the western quarter of that county.
During the late 1980's, with the advent of more stringent
enforcement action by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the
listing of several species, including the Stephen's Kangaroo
Rat in Riverside County, we acquired over about 40,000 acres at
a price of about $42 million. And we have not closed out that
habitat conservation plan.
Recognizing the infrastructure stresses that we in the
basin and the L.A. area, the greater metropolitan area, have in
providing for this dynamic growth, which I should say will,
over the next 20 years, exceed the population growth of
Washington, North Carolina, and Arizona just in Riverside
County, that we found that dealing with one species at a time
just doesn't work. And when you attempt to put in major pieces
of infrastructure, such as highways, we have found in southern
California, particularly, that it is not a question of years,
but it is a question of decades.
And for the Committee, I would point out three examples.
The 710 freeway, which runs from the Port of Los Angeles in
Long Beach to Pasadena. The first public hearing was in 1949,
and that freeway is not completed yet.
Interstate 15 through Riverside County, western Riverside
County, was held up near the Santa Anna River at an increased
cost of $1 billion in 10 years and nothing changed.
Highway 30 from the area of Redlands, Mr. Lewis's district,
over to the 210 above Azusa, the first public hearing was in
1946, and they just started construction of the last 20 miles
of that last year.
Because of the rapid increase in population in western
Riverside County, the need for this type of infrastructure is
critical. It seemed to us that one of things that was really
missing was treating the environment as you would any other
piece of infrastructure.
And with that, we then put together a stakeholders' driven
group. And that encompasses, presently, over 100 individuals,
organizations. It includes the Farm Bureau, environmental
groups, as well as both the Federal and state regulatory
agencies. And we meet weekly.
It is a $32 million project with a 36-month time line. We
are in the 25th month of that. And we are on schedule, with the
exception of the EPA.
We intend to put in, over the next 20 years, approximately
$13 billion in infrastructure. And without CARA, that will be
impossible.
We have approximately somewhere between and $800 and $1.5
billion worth a land acquisition that in fact must take place
in order to meet the needs of the Endangered Species Act and to
prepare, if you will, for the influx of people in the future.
With that, I would be pleased to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Mullen follows:]
Statement of Tom Mullen, Supervisor, 5th District, County of Riverside,
California
INTRODUCTION
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Tom Mullen. I am a County
Supervisor in the County of Riverside, located in Southern California.
I appreciate the opportunity to appear before your committee today
to urge your support for H.R. 701. This bill is unquestionably the most
significant legislative initiative for conservation in the last several
decades.
As you know, President Theodore Roosevelt is credited with shifting
public attention to the importance of conservation. In his efforts to
instill a conservation ethic into the American consciousness, it was
Roosevelt who noted, ``The nation behaves well if it treats the natural
resources as assets which it must turn over to the next generation
increased, and not impaired, in value.''
Beginning with Roosevelt and the establishment of the National
Forest Service at the turn of the century and continuing through the
enactment of the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered
Species Act, the federal government has played an important role in
conservation efforts. As a result, Americans today share a proud
conservation legacy.
You have a unique opportunity to continue that legacy by supporting
the Conservation and Reinvestment Act (CARA).
Whether you hunt, fish, hike, or just enjoy the peace and
tranquility of being outdoors, CARA will ensure that future generations
can enjoy our nation's precious natural resources for many years to
come.
TITLE VII FUNDING
Mr. Chairman, I have been asked to testify on Title VII of CARA.
The provisions under this Title offer the kind of innovation and
flexibility that would be embraced by Riverside County. We believe:
LTitle VII gives private landowners the ability to work in
a non-regulatory, incentive-based manner to achieve land management
objectives that are mutually beneficial.
LTitle VII builds on our citizens'' strong sense of
stewardship about their land by involving them in problem solving and
the implementation of solutions.
That being said, Mr. Chairman, we offer recommendations that we
believe are essential to ensure greater flexibility in the application
of Title VII funding, especially as it applies to our county. We
strongly believe Title VIII should be expanded to include provisions
which direct the Secretary to provide funding to local jurisdictions:
LEither directly or through the states to implement
actions, including land acquisitions, to benefit recovery species or
actions to prevent a species from becoming listed.
LTo develop conservation plans and recovery agreements
consistent with the ESA.
With the inclusion of these recommendations, Mr. Chairman, we
believe Title VII would be complete, improving the overall utility of
CARA for communities like ours.
We not only support CARA for its conservation benefits, we believe
it has the potential to dramatically improve quality of life for
millions of Americans in numerous other ways.
A GROWTH MANAGEMENT SOLUTION
This legislation will make much-needed federal funding available to
help state and local governments address critical infrastructure needs
so they can effectively manage numerous challenges in the face of
extensive population growth.
Allow me to explain by providing background on our experiences in
Riverside County.
For several years, Riverside County has been pursuing locally-
initiated conservation efforts to protect endangered species. But until
just recently, our efforts were centered on single-species
preservation. This proved to be a costly and highly inefficient
approach.
The most significant and controversial Habitat Conservation Plan
effort undertaken in Riverside County occurred 1988 when the federal
government listed the Stephen's Kangaroo Rat (SKR) as an endangered
species.
During the late 1980's, residential and commercial development
accounted for a significant portion of the total activity in the
western part of the county. Since that area also provided a majority of
remaining habitat for the SKR, the listing precipitated an economic
crisis as the Endangered Species Act--specifically Section 9 take
prohibitions--effectively stopped public and private development in the
region. The situation was exacerbated by the fact that at the time of
the listing very little was known about the SKR, its geographic
distribution, or its habitat needs.
Following the listing of the SKR, the Riverside County Habitat
Conservation Agency (RCHCA) was formed to develop and implement a
Habitat Conservation Plan for the SKR. The RCHCA is a public agency
comprised of 9 members, 8 cities and the County of Riverside.
In August of 1990, the RCHCA received approval from the Unites
States Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the California Department of
Fish and Game (CDFG) for a short-term Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP)
that covered 565,000 acres. Nine ``study areas'' encompassing
approximately 78,000 acres were designated throughout Riverside County
and development was restricted to ensure that land-use activities would
not preclude future preserve establishment. Over 47 percent of the land
contained in the study areas were privately owned. There were a number
of key elements included in the short-term plan; one of which involved
the establishment of an SKR mitigation fee of $1,950 per acre that was
assessed in conjunction with the issuance of building, grading, surface
mining, and other land disturbance permits in the HCP area. The habitat
mitigation fee has generated over $34 million to date. The RCHCA
expended over $30 million in local funds to implement the short-term
plan. Approximately 85 percent of this sum was devoted to the
acquisition of nearly 9,000 acres that were permanently dedicated to
SKR conservation.
It is fair to say that the short-term plan was among the most
controversial and widely monitored HCP's ever implemented. That plan
has been the subject of extensive media coverage, ranging from the Wall
Street Journal to National Geographic to television news programs like
20/20 and Eye to Eye. Additionally, the plan was a frequent subject of
litigation; the RCHCA has expended over $400,000 to defend seven
lawsuits and has budgeted another $500,000 in litigation defense costs
for the remaining three lawsuits during the 2001/2002 fiscal year.
Three factors are primarily responsible for the extensive
controversy surrounding this HCP: 1) regulations imposed on thousands
of property owners located in the study areas; 2) lack of federal
funding for HCP implementation and; 3) difficulties experienced in
achieving consensus with the USFWS concerning an appropriate amount of
conservation in the absence of a Recovery Plan for the SKR.
As a result of the incidental take prohibitions and other
conditions included in the short-term HCP Implementation Agreement,
over 3,000 privately held property owners in the study areas suffered
significant hardships as a result of this conservation effort. Many
property owners claimed that the marketability of their parcels was
adversely affected because the regulations in the study areas adversely
restricted the use of their land. The study area property owners became
highly vocal opponents of the short-term HCP.
Both the total cost and sources of financing for the short-term HCP
were highly problematical as well. The implementation budget was built
upon the assumption that state and federal funds would cover
approximately 50% of its cost. Unfortunately, that assumption proved to
be erroneous. Of all expenditures related to the short-term HCP to
date, approximately $2 million has been provided by the State of
California and $30 million has been paid by local residents through
collection of the SKR mitigation fee. Despite active funding
solicitation efforts by the RCHCA, the federal government has provided
no financial assistance to the short-term HCP.
The burden placed upon the residents of Riverside County to finance
the SKR short-term HCP produced extreme frustration among the populace.
This was based upon the belief that if federal law deems protection of
the SKR to be in the national interest, then the federal government has
an obligation to share in the cost of its conservation.
Amid these sentiments, the RCHCA developed a long-term HCP to
replace the short-term HCP. This was approved in March of 1996. The
preserve system consists of 7 core preserves encompassing over 41,000
acres including over 12,500 acres of occupied SKR habitat.
Implementation of the long-term HCP is expected to cost approximately
$15.3 million, including $11.7 million from the RCHCA and $3.6 million
from federal sources. Combined with the $30 million already expended on
the short-term HCP, more than $46 million will be spent on the SKR
conservation effort. Of that amount, approximately $42.7 million--or 91
percent - comes from the local level.
In areas such as Riverside County, single species HCP's only
address a fraction of the total habitat conservation issue. The
development and implementation of large scale single species HCP's is
extremely expensive and time consuming as well as controversial.
After nine long years, and millions of dollars, we learned our
lesson: with multiple species listed on the threatened and endangered
rolls, we finally realized that habitat conservation must take place on
a broad-scale and it must take place within the context of an
infrastructure plan that addresses long-range transportation and land-
use needs.
A comprehensive approach provides the highest level of certainty to
property owners, builders, farmers, environmentalists, and local
governments concerning their future obligations and benefits under the
ESA.
Riverside County is one of the largest counties in the nation. It
covers 7,300 square miles. By way off comparison, the states of New
Jersey and Massachusetts cover approximately 7,400 square miles and
8,200 square miles, respectively.
Riverside County is also one of the fastest growing large counties
in California and the United States. Its population will double from
1.5 million to 3 million in the next 15 to 20 years.
According to Southern California economist John Husing, more people
will move to Riverside County over the next 20 years than to seven
other states, including Arizona, Washington and North Carolina.
Inevitably, the impact of such a population boom and the challenge
of balancing the related housing, transportation and economic needs
with our limited natural resources becomes critical to our very
survival.
The challenge of planning for growth is not unique to Riverside
County. But we have devised an innovative model to address this
pressing concern.
In 1999, we launched the Riverside County Integrated Project
(RCIP). The RCIP is a stakeholder driven process that unites builders,
property owners, farmers and government behind a long-range planning
effort that incorporates three distinctive elements--conservation,
transportation and land-use.
What makes the RCIP approach unique is the premise that the
environment must be addressed the same as any other piece of critical
infrastructure. Just as you must have utilities, roads and schools to
support a growing population, you must address environmental
constraints or you cannot grow.
The normal approach to development in California has been to plan
the project first then attempt to mitigate. The RCIP begins with the
development of a multi-species habitat conservation plan (MSHCP) and,
we hope, a watershed special area management plan (SAMP), and then
integrates land use and transportation elements that minimize the
environmental impacts while still addressing housing demands, job
creation, and congestion relief. The RCIP includes:
LA Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan (MSHCP) which
forms the nucleus of an open space plan for the western part of the
County. The goal of the plan is to address up to 164 species. County
staff, a consultant team, resource agencies, and stakeholders are
working closely together to create a conservation and implementation
strategy which allows the maximum coverage of species while respecting
individual property rights.
LAn updated General Plan for the unincorporated portion of
the County, which includes land use, circulation, housing, open space,
conservation and other mandatory elements of the general plan in
conformance with state statute. Close coordination between public and
private sector stakeholders, including all the cities in the County, is
viewed as essential for the development of a plan that can be
successfully implemented.
LThe Community and Environmental Transportation
Acceptability Process (CETAP), which identifies future transportation
corridors in the western part of the county and provides the
appropriate environmental documentation to allow early reservation of
the necessary rights to develop the corridors. These corridors will be
designed to meet future needs not only for the mobility of autos,
buses, and trucks but also to provide the ability to move goods,
information and products, as well as to provide room for implementation
of transit well into the next century. The CETAP forms an essential
component of the County's circulation element and its arterial highway
plan, associated with the General Plan. The goal of the program is to
improve mobility both within Riverside County and the Southern
California region.
LA Special Area Management Plan (SAMP) to address
watershed management and obtain clearance 404 and 1600 requirements is
the desired fourth element of the plan. We are currently seeking
funding that will allow the Army Corp of Engineers to work with the
County to develop the SAMP.
The essence of RCIP is in the integration of land use,
transportation and conservation planning, and implementation, to
develop a consensus for the future development of Riverside County. As
a first-of-its-kind endeavor, the RCIP is intended to be model for
making the ESA work while providing for the long-term development and
economic growth of the County. Recognizing the need for this new and
different approach, the project is guided by five overarching
principles.
LThe process must be a bottom-up process. The public,
along with stakeholder groups, must drive it. Development of the RCIP
requires close guidance from stakeholders and citizens throughout the
County. In order to facilitate this guidance, three Advisory Committees
were established; one for each of the plan elements. Membership in
these committees is comprised of citizen appointees and representatives
of a variety of stakeholders and public agencies. The advisory
committees number over 100 individuals that represent diverse
interests. Cities within the County participate both through the
Advisory Committees and through the two sub-regional Councils of
Government (COGs), the Western Riverside Council of Governments (WRCOG)
and the Coachella Valley Association of Governments (CVAG). Advisory
committees meet monthly to review progress of the RCIP elements and
provide input on data presented. Various subcommittees to the three
advisory committees are often meeting weekly to address specific issues
and report their recommendations back to the full advisory committees.
In addition to the advisory groups, a management committee that
includes senior officials from all the participating state and federal
regulatory agencies confer on a weekly conference call.
LThe recognition of the interdependence between the
region's future transportation, habitat, open space, recreation, land
use, and housing needs is essential.
Without solving the conservation issues, as mandated by the
Endangered Species Act, the successful identification and
implementation of new transportation corridors and continued expansion
of our job bases simply is not possible.
LEveryone, from the private landowners and development
interests to our state and federal partners, has a financial
responsibility to ensure the completion of the plan and its
implementation.
The equity of the funding plan is at the heart of RCIP. The funding
plan must recognize the obligation of the local land owners and
developers to mitigate the impacts of their projects. However, this
must be in the context of the state and national policy decision that
conservation of endangered species is a state and national priority and
should be supported with state and federal funding. Further, there is
long-term value to the County and the Southern California region as a
whole to address housing and transportation needs in the region. The
recognition of joint responsibility and agreement on fair and equitable
sharing of the implementation costs is essential.
LMake use of the best available scientific information.
Working with the University of California at Riverside (UCR), the
USFWS and the CDFG, we have attempted to collect all available data on
species occurrences and habitat and consolidate it in our Geographic
Information System (GIS). The consultant team has augmented this with
an extensive review of the literature available on each of the species
anticipated to be covered under the MSHCP. More than 10 thousand data
points collected from museum records; local, state and federal data
bases; literature sources; and field notes were compiled. The resulting
data base of information, managed by UCR, will continue to be updated
as additional information becomes available.
UCR also coordinates a Scientific Review Panel (SRP), which
provides formal academic review at key points in the MSHCP planning
process. To our knowledge, the incorporation of an SRP is a unique
element of the RCIP. The SRP will help ensure independent critical
review of the data used to support policy decisions. Furthermore, the
SRP review will address concerns expressed by critics both in the
scientific and environmental communities and in the general public who
contend the conservation has generally lacked scientific credibility
(Sullivan and Scott, March/April 2000).
LUse incentives and market based approaches where
feasible.
To avoid many of the criticisms of earlier plans, one of the goals
of the RCIP has been to look for opportunities to create incentives for
property owners to participate in the MSHCP. The MSHCP Advisory
Committee is currently meeting with the General Plan Advisory Committee
to develop incentives and policies that will help implement the MSHCP
and concurrently support programs in the General Plan. Incentives
include density credits or transfers, conservation credits that reflect
conservation values and can be sold in an open market, or conservation
easements that might be mutually beneficial to the property owner and
to the implementation of the MSHCP.
The RCIP offers an innovative model for a comprehensive regional
approach to addressing the ESA as part of an integrated program. The
RCIP is a superior alternative to the traditional project-by-project
approach. While not without significant challenges and risks, it offers
advantages to local, state, and federal agencies in implementing their
land use, infrastructure, development and regulatory responsibilities.
Moreover, it offers the advantages of a regional approach to local
property owners and developers while addressing many of the objections
they have had to previous habitat conservation plans. Through the RCIP,
a broad array of stakeholders and individual citizens are afforded
opportunities to participate and communicate what is most important to
them in order to improve their quality of life now and into the future.
ADDITIONAL NEED
Although the ESA is a federal mandate, the cost of compliance falls
on a limited few. It is only reasonable that implementation of national
policies should be accompanied by an equitable amount of federal
funding.
Funding for conservation incentives for small landowners as
proposed under Title VII will be helpful to RCIP. Riverside County has
many areas that are characterized by parcel sizes of 2.5 to 10 acres.
The ability to offer incentives to conserve a portion of these
properties is the only feasible method of achieving conservation in
some instances.
However, these parcels only represent a small percentage of the
total privately owned land (153,000 acres) that must be conserved under
our project. Therefore, we wish to register our support for Title II
and Title III. Full funding under these Titles would be of paramount
importance in helping us reach this enormous conservation goal.
In addition, we support a modification of Title III to clearly
acknowledge that one of its primary objectives is to enable state
wildlife agencies to secure lands, in pursuit of helping cities and
counties as they implement habitat conservation plans. This would
greatly help local jurisdictions meet the unfunded mandates associated
with the ESA.
Incentives for small property owners is an essential element but
must be coupled with sufficient funding to purchase lands when
necessary. This is especially true in areas of western Riverside County
where land development pressure is high and land is held for its future
development value. Property owners here most often want to develop
their land or sell their land. Conservation incentives will not be a
sufficient enticement for these property owners.
We believe that by providing both conservation incentives and
direct funding for land acquisition, the ESA can be made to work in
areas such as Riverside County.
CONCLUSION
You have a unique and profoundly important opportunity to help give
folks in Riverside County, and other growing cities and towns, the
promise of a future filled with hope--access to affordable housing for
families, good schools for their children, new roads and freeways for
safe passage, progressive and dynamic economic development and the
protection of priceless natural resources.
These are the sweeping benefits this landmark legislation can help
provide.
Without this legislation, our county will become a textbook example
of fragmented urbanization marked by extreme social and economic
disruption.
We will have inflated housing prices that few families can afford,
prohibitive traffic congestion that restricts the flow of commerce and
people, and uncoordinated natural resource protection. Moreover,
without comprehensive habitat conservation, all future development
projects will likely wind up in court, at enormous cost to taxpayers.
This is why your support for CARA is critical for the future of
Riverside County and for thousands of other communities across the
nation.
Thank you.
______
Mr. Thornberry. I thank you, sir.
Dr. McKnelly?
STATEMENT OF PHILIP K. MCKNELLY, DIRECTOR, NORTH CAROLINA
DIVISION OF PARKS AND RECREATION, RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA, ON
BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF STATE OUTDOOR RECREATION
LIAISON OFFICERS AND THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF STATE PARKS
DIRECTORS
Mr. McKnelly. Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, my
name is Phil McKnelly, and I am the director of the North
Carolina Division of Parks and Recreation.
I am here today representing the National Association of
State Outdoor Recreation Liaison Officers, which is a long term
to say that we represent the states, with the National Park
Service, in dealing with Land and Water Conservation Fund and
other park-related issues.
I am also representing the National Association of State
Parks Directors.
We appreciate you holding these hearings on H.R. 701, and
want to thank the sponsors for their strong and persistent
leadership on this issue.
While the state liaison officers and the state park
directors are deeply committed to CARA, I am going to focus my
comments today on the state side of the Land and Water
Conservation Fund in Title II.
And, I am going to use North Carolina examples because
those are the examples that I am the most familiar with. But I
have talked to colleagues across the country, and I am aware
that there are similar issues in every state in the union.
Issues for state and local governments, the issues they are
facing, in many cases are caused in part by the shifting
population. Particularly in the Southwest and the Southeast, we
are seeing tremendous growth patterns, and we are also seeing a
shift from rural to urban and suburban areas.
When I moved to North Carolina in 1973, 54 percent of the
state population was rural. In 2000, 65 percent of the
population lived in 15 percent of the counties. We are seeing a
tremendous shift and this shift is creating growing conflicts
for the limited resources.
The playgrounds and the athletic fields in our local
communities are crowded and worn out. The competition between
motorized and nonmotorized vehicles, both on trails and on
waterways, is stiff; the conflict is real. And we are losing
open space to sprawl.
As you can see in my written testimony, in North Carolina
we are losing 156,000 acres a year of open space. We are losing
it to urban sprawl. And that is a 67 percent increase in a 10-
year period, in the previous decade.
We are losing 34 percent of our wetlands. They have been
altered to a point that they no longer function as buffers to
our streams and watercourses. And we, along with those
wetlands, are losing opportunities to preserve some threatened
habitats and species that have been discussed earlier.
But while the needs are great, the opportunities are also
great.
In revitalizing urban cores, there is an opportunity to
reacquire or reestablish some greenways, some open spaces, that
have been lost previously.
In the rural areas, particularly, at least in North
Carolina, Champion Paper, International Paper, and Duke Energy
are all selling off large tracts of land on an unprecedented
scale. Once these large tracts are broken up, they will be
gone. It will be difficult if not impossible to ever have a
chance to acquire and preserve those again.
While the states are looking for help and need help badly
through CARA, we are also trying to help ourselves. In 1993 in
North Carolina, for example, the state passed its first ever
bond referendum. It was for $35 million, which is small
compared to the scale of bond referendums passed in Indiana,
California, and other states. But it was the first time in 80
years the General Assembly had seen that need.
But based on the support for that bond referendum, in 1994,
the state created a Park and Recreation Trust Fund, which is a
dedicated stream of revenue for state and local governments. It
is a program patterned after the Land and Water Conservation
Fund.
At least 17 other states have similar programs to our Park
and Recreation Trust Fund. Their revenue is generated by the
transfer tax; in some cases, by the lottery; in other cases, by
personalized license tags sold by the department of motor
vehicles.
Like the state programs, it is terribly important for CARA
to be consistent to be effective. That is the only way states
can effectively plan for long-range issues. It is the only way
we can deal with the large tracts of land that the industries
are selling right now.
North Carolina is looking at an $18 million tract of
waterfront property. We are going to have to do that over a 3-
to 5-year period. And without consistent sources of funds,
there is no way we can do that. There would be no way we could
count on the Federal Government.
While some folks don't like this commitment, I would
suggest that that is actually an investment. The states will at
least match that. In many cases, they overmatch that sometimes
twice by the state and the local governments.
It also is effective in attracting business and industry. I
have given some examples in the written testimony. There are
others where folks have moved into North Carolina because of
the quality of life, the open space and the recreational
opportunities for those communities.
The broad support has been pointed out before, both by
Mayor Ashe and the National Governors Association. The National
Association of Counties has also supported this bill.
The organizations, (I liked Mr. Caldwell's number; he
mentioned 7,000. The number I had was a little bit older, but
it was also a little bit smaller, so I will go with his number
on the organizations and the communities that have supported
this) range from the Chamber of Commerce to the Nature
Conservancy, a couple of groups that do not always see eye-to-
eye.
I would urge you to move forward with a favorable
recommendation. It is a highest priority in this Congress for
the two organizations that I am representing. And we are ready
and willing to help in any way we can to start this step to
create a truly national system of parks.
I do appreciate the opportunity to appear here today. Thank
you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. McKnelly follows:]
Statement of Dr. Philip K. McKnelly, Director, North Carolina Division
of Parks and Recreation
Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, thank you for this
opportunity to testify on this very important piece of legislation. My
name is Phil McKnelly and I am here on behalf of the National
Association of State Outdoor Recreation Liaison Officers (NASORLO) and
the National Association of State Parks Directors (NASPD) and I want to
tell you that both of these organizations are deeply committed to the
passage of H.R. 701, The Conservation and Reinvestment Act. I would
like to thank the sponsors of CARA for their strong and persistent
leadership in trying to make this dream of millions of Americans a
reality.
While my state and the organizations I represent here today
heartily endorse CARA, I will focus my testimony on Title II, the Land
and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). Almost thirty-five years ago I
started my professional career with the Arkansas Planning Commission
trying to get a fledgling program off of the ground. That program, the
original LWCF, was the result of a national study called the Outdoor
Recreation Resources Review Commission. That study took several years
to complete and was hailed as the most significant piece of
conservation legislation to be passed in the history of our country.
While the LWCF program has accomplished a great deal, it has never
quite lived up to the to the hopes and dreams it generated when it was
created. I have seen the program grow and flourish during the late
1960's and 1970's, and I saw it fade during the1980's and then die in
the early 1990's. Finally, in the late 1990's our country saw an ember
of hope among the ashes of LWCF and now, with strong leadership from
the House and a renewed hope in the cities and states across America,
we have a chance to turn a history of unfulfilled hope into a true
legacy of stewardship and opportunity for the generations that follow
us.
But my purpose here today is not to dwell on what might have been
or to place blame for what went wrong with the dreams of 1965. My
purpose is to endorse the legislation before you and convince you of
the promise it holds. I will focus on North Carolina because it has
been my adopted state for more than 20 years and I am most familiar
with the problems and opportunities that exist there. I have visited
with other State Liaison Officers and State Parks directors from other
states and I am convinced that, while our issues may be different in
the east than they are in the west, while the specific concerns in
Texas may be different than those in Minnesota, there is a real need
for CARA and LWCF in every state. I am absolutely convinced - and want
to convince you - of the need for a national program to encourage and
assist states and local governments to preserve their significant
natural resources, to provide open spaces that will act as buffers that
protect the water quality of our rivers and streams, to minimize the
damage caused by natural disasters such as the floods and hurricanes my
state has experienced during the past few years, and to provide
opportunities for our children to grow and learn in a safe, healthy
environment.
In North Carolina the average conversion rate of forests, farms,
and rural lands between 1992 and 1997 was 156,300 acres per year - a
sixty-seven percent increase over the previous ten years. The
Charlotte/Mecklenburg County area will lose forty-one acres of open
space a day for the next twenty years if the current development
practices are allowed to continue. In the Research Triangle (Raleigh,
Durham, and Chapel Hill), urban land area has grown more then three and
a half times faster than the population between 1959 and 1990. Thirty-
four percent of North Carolina's coastal wetlands have been altered to
the point they no longer fulfill their function of protecting water
quality in our streams, rivers, and sounds. These trends are taking
place at a time when the North Carolina State Parks System has
documented over $120 million dollars worth of land acquisition needed
to complete existing master plans and almost $300 million dollars worth
of capital improvements necessary to complete and repair existing
parks. The backlog of needs for parks and recreation land acquisition
and development by local governments in North Carolina is approaching
one billion dollars.
While the needs are great, the opportunities to preserve
significant open space are also great. Large corporations such as
Champion Paper, International Paper, and Duke Energy are divesting
themselves of large tracts of undeveloped lands at an unprecedented
rate. Lands that could be used, for parks, greenways, or public open
spaces. With improved funding state and local governments could take
advantage of these once in a lifetime opportunities and take a
significant step toward making sure that future generations have
forests, waterfalls, and clean, free flowing streams to appreciate and
enjoy.
Because of the concentrated population growth in urban areas,
pressure is growing on the public lands in close proximity to
population centers and conflicts are growing among the recreation user
groups because of crowded conditions on limited resources. Prime
examples of these conflicts include the competition for open water on
Corps of Engineers reservoirs swimmers and sailors face from
personalized water craft, water skiers, and other power boaters.
Another example of a growing conflict is the competition between
mountain bikers, horseback riders, and hikers. The explosion of
mountain biking has had a tremendous impact on the demand for
additional miles of trail and the need to separate conflicting uses
such as horses and mountain bikes. Also, the demand for off-highway
vehicle trails and areas is growing at a tremendous rate - and North
Carolina does not even have the population of snowmobile riders many
other states experience.
While the states and local governments are looking to the federal
government for assistance, it is important to note that they are also
taking steps on their own to relieve the situation. In 1993 the North
Carolina General Assembly authorized, and the citizens passed, a
thirty-five million dollar bond issue for state parks improvements -
the first bond referendum in the eighty-seven year history of the State
Parks System. In 1994, based largely on the public support for the 1993
bond referendum, the General Assembly passed the Parks and Recreation
Trust Fund. A dedicated revenue source committed to land acquisition
and capital improvements for state and local parks and recreation. In
recent years the General assembly has also created the Natural Heritage
Trust Fund (a dedicated stream for revenue committed to preserving
lands with outstanding natural heritage values) and the Clean Water
Management Trust Fund (a program directed towards the acquisition of
properties that provide significant protection to rivers, streams,
lakes, sounds, and the ocean and other preventive measures and
solutions to water pollution.) Combined, these programs provide
approximately fifty million dollars per year for parks, recreation, and
open space projects. While this is a significant step forward, in the
State Parks System alone, with over four hundred million dollars in
identified needs and approximately fifteen to twenty million dollars
per year from the dedicated funds, it will still take over twenty years
to complete current master plans - and that scenario does not provide
for the acquisition and development of any new parks. The needs in our
local communities are equally great. In Fiscal Year 2001, North
Carolina received two million four thousand dollars in LWCF assistance
and has received applications from thirty-eight local governments
requesting over ten million dollars in assistance.
There are other proposals to rekindle LWCF in addition to CARA, but
they often omit a very important factor. To be effective, funding
designed to address acquisition and development needs must be
consistent. For example, opportunities mentioned earlier in this
testimony such as the potential acquisition of land from major
corporations involve large sums of money. North Carolina is currently
exploring the possibility of acquiring a tract containing over two
thousand acres of lake front property valued at approximately eighteen
million dollars. To complete such an acquisition, the State will need
to spread the transaction over three to five years and will need a
stable source of funding for the duration on the project. If the recent
history of LWCF funding continues, North Carolina would simply not be
able to enter into a contract that relied on matching funds from the
federal government.
I have used specific examples from North Carolina because I am the
most familiar with that situation, but other states around the country,
such as Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, and Missouri are taking similar
steps to help themselves and their local governments. My point is that
states and local governments are committed to being good stewards of
the environment, but they need some help to accomplish what has become
a formidable task. The passage of CARA and Title III would make a
significant impact on the backlog of state and local government parks
and recreation needs, and it would also be a solid investment for the
federal government. Every dollar the federal government provides to the
states requires a local match of at least equal value. In many cases
the grants are over-matched and the environment and our citizens
benefit even more.
Another economic benefit our citizens would receive from this
investment is the proven attraction parks and open space have for
business and industry. As Will Rogers, Jr. has pointed out, ``Too many
community leaders feel they must choose between economic growth and
open space protection. But such a choice is not necessary.'' This
statement has been reinforced in North Carolina by the fact that two
companies recently relocated to our state because of the quality of
life available to their employees. Reichold Chemical Company recently
brought five hundred jobs to the Raleigh-Durham area and Catepillar,
Inc. moved to Morganton after a twenty city search. In both cases
greenways, open space, and the quality of life were cited as decisive
factors in the relocation decisions. LWCF and CARA are good investments
from at least two different perspectives.
The last point I would share with you is that this issue has a
broad range of support. Nationwide, approximately thirty-five hundred
communities and organizations have endorsed the legislation. The
National Governors'' Association, National Association of Counties, and
U.S. Conference of Mayors are among the leaders of those supporters and
organizations as diverse as The Nature Conservancy and the United
States Chamber of Commerce have joined forces to get this bill passed.
Also, major newspapers from New York to Los Angeles and Seattle to
Miami have endorsed CARA, and just last year the U.S. Congress passed a
very similar bill with 315 votes in the affirmative.
In summary, H.R. 701 is the highest priority in this Session of
Congress for NASORLO and NASPD and we are ready to do what ever is
necessary to help you complete the effort initiated and passed in the
House last year. Last Session eleven of our twelve North Carolina
Congressmen co-sponsored the bill and we intend to do at least that
well again this year. The one member who did not co-sponsor CARA last
year did vote for the measure every time he had the opportunity. I urge
you to give this important piece of legislation a favorable
recommendation and move it forward in the process as soon as possible.
On behalf of NASORLO, NASPD, and North Carolina I appreciate this
opportunity to testify before the House Resources Committee and look
forward to working with you to make this tremendous opportunity a
reality.
______
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you.
Before yielding to Chairman Whitefeather, I will yield to
Ms. McCollum for any comments that she would like to make.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I am deeply honored to be able to introduce Bobby
Whitefeather, Chairman of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa.
Chairman Whitefeather was raised in a small, tradition
Indian community on the Red Lake Reservation in northern
Minnesota. After serving the United States honorably in the
Vietnam war, Chairman Whitefeather has worked on behalf of his
people on the reservation for the past 15 years.
First elected to treasurer, Chairman Whitefeather has
served as secretary before becoming Chairman of the Red Lake
Band of Chippewa.
While economic development is a priority for Chairman
Whitefeather, conservation has also played an important role in
his professional career. He has testified before Congress in
the past on matters such as improving tribal conservation
enforcement capability, strengthening educational opportunities
in fish and wildlife management for tribal members, and has
worked for equitable access for Federal aid that helps to
restore fish and other wildlife.
Closer to home, Chairman Whitefeather initiated a series of
meetings between state and Federal Government in 1997 after
walleye stocks in Red Lake in northern Minnesota had been
devastated by overfishing.
The partnership has led to one of the largest freshwater
fish recovery programs in America today, and one of the most
successful so early in the process.
Two years ago, Chairman Whitefeather was honored by the
Great Lakes region of Native American Fish and Wildlife Society
with a special honor for his long-standing commitment to
conservation.
Chairman Whitefeather has been active in the area of Indian
issues throughout his career. He is a past officer of the
National Congress of American Indians, and he currently is
president of the Midwest Alliance of Sovereign Tribes and
serves on a number of Bureau of Indian Affairs self-governance
Committees at the regional and national level.
Obijwe is the Chairman's first language. And while Obijwe
is a language unknown to many, the Chairman has become an
effective voice for the Chippewa, for the Minnesota people,
native people, and for many of us here in the United States.
It is my honor today, Mr. Chairman, and I thank you for
yielding to me, to introduce Chairman Bobby Whitefeather.
Mr. Thornberry. Mr. Whitefeather, a double introduction.
You may proceed.
STATEMENT OF BOBBY WHITEFEATHER, CHAIRMAN, RED LAKE BAND OF
CHIPPEWA INDIANS, RED LAKE, MINNESOTA
Mr. Whitefeather. [Speaking in Obijwe.]
Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee--
Mr. Kildee. May I respond with: [Speaking in Obijwe.]
[Laughter.]
Mr. Whitefeather. Members of the Committee, my name is
Bobby Whitefeather. I am the tribal Chairman of the Red Lake
Band of Chippewa Indians. And as is my custom and tradition in
my culture, I introduce myself in our language.
And it is my pleasure to testify before you here this
morning and express our support for the measure called CARA.
And as a brief introduction to my homeland, we reside in
northern Minnesota, comprising approximately 850,000 acres of
land and water. And I must say, 80 percent is comprised of
wetlands, wildlife, and water, so we are very aware of the
responsibilities that we have for the protection of natural
resources.
And as well, certainly tribal nations across this country
being the original stewards of the land now called America, we
are grateful that CARA is going to include tribal
participation, which is critical because of the land base that
tribes currently hold, presently, which amounts to about 2.25
percent of the entire land base of the United States.
Last session, CARA Lite was introduced, and we were
certainly grateful for the inclusion of tribal nations within
CARA Lite during the last session. However, we were greatly
disappointed that even though we were included as being
eligible for funding under certain provisions of CARA Lite,
tribes weren't allocated to any funding that was available. So
that was a great disappointment.
This morning, my testimony will focus on Titles II, III,
and VI of CARA, as being proposed. And, again, while we are
tankful for tribal inclusion, we, again, find it very
disturbing if not unusual that there is a prohibition for
tribes to participate in the land acquisition section of Title
II.
We as tribes are cognizant of our responsibilities as
stewards of natural resources, and to disqualify us from this
particular section we feel is not right and not just.
Also, I would like to address the funding formula under
Title II. And in order for us as tribes to demonstrate fairness
and equity to tribes amongst us, we ask that the allocation
formula and the maximum amount of availability to a single
tribe be adjusted from 10 percent to 5 percent.
That adjustment will allow that more tribes will have
access to the funding. As you know, there are approximately
560-plus tribes across this country.
Under Title III, as I said before, 2.25 percent of the
allocation for tribes is being appropriated, and we thank the
Committee for recognizing what we see as a past oversight or
inequity in not making the funds available to the tribes.
This new funding opportunity will certainly allow us to
greatly enhance our efforts at protecting our natural
resources, and land and water conservation efforts.
Under Title III, however, we do suggest that statutory
language be included so that the 2.25% distribution methodology
reflects the formula of two-thirds land and one-third
population. This will enable tribes that are eligible, to
properly allocate their resources based on that methodology.
We also ask that tribes that are eligible to access the
funding have existing conservation programs, or a plan or
strategy in place so that there would be adequate funding to
begin their programs.
Finally, under Title III, statutory language needs to be
added so that any undistributed funds be redirected back to
funded tribes on a proportional basis.
Under Title VI, we strongly urge the Committee to keep
Title VI intact because we as tribes have very limited funding
to protect our natural resources due to budget reductions that
we experienced over the last few years, amounting to in excess
of 20 percent, and thereby greatly straining our existing
resources and putting additional burden on our limited staff of
biologists, technicians, and so forth.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee,
we as the first Americans realize that protection of Mother
Earth is of the greatest importance. And CARA, as a national
conservation measure, represents the greatest opportunity for
all of us to leave a lasting legacy.
We hope and pray that the Committee will find the necessary
way to include tribes in CARA so that we also, as stewards of
our homeland, can offer its protection in order for us to
remain connected to our culture and a way of life that has been
handed down to us through generations.
I thank the Committee for your time and the opportunity to
testify. And as always, before I go home, I must invite you.
And grandma requires that I invite you to come visit our
homeland any time I meet new friends and make new
acquaintances.
So with that, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, I
would be pleased to answer any questions. And again, thank you
for the opportunity to testify.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Whitefeather follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Bobby Whitefeather, Chairman, Red Lake Band
of Chippewa Indians Tribal Council
Mr. Chairman, I thank you and the other distinguished members of
the Committee for this opportunity to provide testimony on behalf of
the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians, concerning H.R. 701, the
Conservation and Reinvestment Act (CARA) legislation. The Red Lake Band
is a Native American Indian tribal government recognized by the United
States government.
Red Lake and, I believe it is safe to say, most of the 561
federally-recognized Indian tribes across the country, strongly support
CARA and the lasting benefits it will provide for conservation and
future generations of Americans. I thank this Committee and the
Congress for recent improvements made to CARA with respect to tribal
government participation, most notably the 2.25 % proportional funding
share provision included within Title III. I also thank the House
Appropriations Committee for retaining $5 million of President Bush's
proposed $10 million fiscal year 2002 tribal allocation under the Land
and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) state grant program. These actions
signal a recognition by the Administration and the Congress of the
great need tribes have for conservation funding, and I am very pleased
to see these improvements.
The enactment of CARA, and the direct participation by tribes in
CARA-supported programs, is absolutely critical to Indian tribes. Like
states, tribes have governmental responsibilities for the conservation
of fish, wildlife, and other resources on their lands. Like states,
tribes regulate hunting and fishing and gathering on their lands. Like
states, tribes would receive critically needed conservation funding
under CARA. But unfortunately, when CARA died late last year and CARA
``Lite'' was enacted, tribes were completely shut out from the CARA
Lite conservation funding, unlike states and local governments.
CARA Lite, as you know, was enacted as a new Title VIII, Land
Conservation, Preservation and Infrastructure Improvement to the Fiscal
Year 2001 Interior Appropriations Bill, H.R. 4578. To our dismay,
virtually none of the tribal allocations from either the House or
Senate versions of CARA last year were included in CARA Lite, leaving
tribes with nothing for their conservation responsibilities. After an
additional $50 million was added for wildlife conservation to Sections
901 and 902 of Title IX, Wildlife, Ocean and Coastal Conservation in
the Fiscal Year 2001 Commerce, Justice, State, and Judiciary
Appropriations (CJS) bill, tribes were further shocked to discover
that, at the last minute during the final House-Senate conference, the
tribal allocation percentage was dropped, leaving tribes as technically
eligible to receive funds but with no allocation. These actions
represented significant blows to tribal conservation efforts after
years of cooperative effort in support of the campaign for CARA.
My testimony today will focus on CARA Titles II, III, and VI, as
they contain provisions of critical concern to tribes. I will suggest
minor modifications which would make major improvements to these
titles. But first I want to provide some background information about
the Red Lake Nation and our Reservation, information which I believe
will assist you in judging the merits of our requests.
Red Lake People and Resources
Red Lake is a relatively large Tribe with 9,300 members. Our
841,000 acre Reservation, located in northwestern Minnesota, is held in
trust for the Tribe by the United States. While it has been diminished
in overall size, our Reservation has never been broken apart or
allotted to individuals. Nor has our Reservation ever been subjected to
the criminal or civil jurisdiction of the State of Minnesota.
Consequently, we have a relatively large land and water area over which
the Tribe exercises exclusive governmental authority and control in
conjunction with the United States.
Red Lake Band members'' lives center around a seasonal cycle of
reliance on natural resources. Fishing, hunting, and gathering
activities are as vital to our survival today as they were 200 years
ago. Time has certainly changed some aspects of this cycle. The desires
of Band members to purchase modern-day products and goods has led to a
resource-based cash economy of fishing and logging that began early in
the 20th century and continues today. However, concerns about resource
depletion in recent years have led us to seek out economic
diversification.
Due in part to our Reservation's location far from centers of
population and commerce, we have few jobs available in the private
sector economy. While unemployment rates throughout America have
dropped to historically low levels, our unemployment rate remains at an
outrageously high level of 60%. The lack of good roads, communications,
and other necessary infrastructure continues to hold back economic
development and job opportunities. We have had limited success with
gaming, but our remote location prevents the type of often-cited,
large-scale gaming operations run by a small handful of tribes
throughout America. The limited gaming revenues we do receive are
devoted to human-services programs like meals for the elderly, our
nursing home, and community-based activities devoted to meeting the
pressing needs of people who live on the edge of survival on our
impoverished Reservation.
Relatively speaking, our resources are vast and important to many
people who are our neighbors beyond our Reservation borders. The
resources for which the Red Lake Band, not the State of Minnesota, is
responsible, include 350,000 acres of forests, 471,000 acres of
wetlands (including forested wetlands), 237,000 acres of lakes, and 55
miles of rivers and streams. Title to all of these resources is held in
trust status for the benefit of the Red Lake Band by the United States.
Many of our resources are truly unique.
Our Reservation includes much of northern Minnesota's patterned
peatlands, which have received worldwide scientific recognition because
ours is the largest peatland resource outside of Alaska and because
many rare and endangered species reside in these areas.
Our Tribe's natural namesake, the Red Lake, is the sixth largest
natural, freshwater lake in the United States. While it has never been
included as a sixth Great Lake, Red Lake is ``greater'' in size than
Lake Champlain which, with some controversy, was temporarily bestowed
that status several funding cycles ago.
Until just recently, Red Lake was home to the largest and longest
continuously operated freshwater commercial fishery in America and
provided important employment for some 500 reservation families.
Unfortunately, similar to the fate of commercial fisheries the world
over, stocks of walleye, which were the principal commercial Red Lake
species, collapsed in the mid-1990s forcing the Tribe to close our
fishery for the first time since the beginning of World War I. The
Tribe has since implemented an aggressive recovery plan in conjunction
with the federal government and the State of Minnesota. Ours is the
largest freshwater fish species recovery program in America today.
I have provided the above information to help you understand that
we have been blessed with abundant natural resources, and the
conservation and perpetuation of these resources is extremely important
to my people and their direct survival needs.
Resource Management Funding Inequities
Our tribal resources are managed by a small but dedicated group of
biologists, technicians, and wardens. Our relatively meager natural
resources funding comes primarily from Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA)
programs. Unfortunately, recent federal budget cuts in BIA natural
resource funding have diminished our resource management capacity by
20% in just the last five years. We have attempted to make up the
difference by seeking outside grant funds, but the opportunities are
very limited, especially for fish and wildlife conservation. Still, we
do the best we can with the limited funds we have.
For the most part, tribes have been left out of authorizing
language for federal conservation programs, even though these programs
were enacted to conserve all of America's resources, and even though
tribes are responsible for managing more than 2.25% of the land
resource base within the United States. For example, tribes cannot
access substantial funding sources like the Federal Aid in Fish and
Wildlife Restoration Acts of 1950 and 1937. These acts levy excise
taxes on hunting and fishing equipment, and allocate the proceeds
(about $450 million annually) to the fifty states, territories, and the
District of Columbia for fish and wildlife programs. Tribal members who
hunt and fish pay these excise taxes just like all Americans, but none
of these revenues come back to tribes to fund programs which benefit
fish and wildlife on that portion of America under tribal jurisdiction.
Tribal Request to Remove Prohibition on Land Acquisition in CARA Title
II
I thank the Committee for including tribes as an eligible entity to
receive funds under the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), which
has, as its major focus, the purchase of land for conservation. But a
prohibition in Title II of H.R. 701 that applies only to Indian tribes
would prevent tribes from acquiring land for conservation purposes.
This prohibition makes no sense, because any land acquired with LWCF
funds must be used only for public outdoor recreation uses. I ask that
the prohibition on tribal land acquisition be removed, and that tribes
be subject to the same benefits and responsibilities as the states and
the territories.
I also request that language be included requiring the Secretary of
Interior to consult with tribes in the development of the competitive
grant program for allocation of funds to tribes under this title,
consistent with the government-to-government relationship.
Finally, I ask that the maximum amount available to a single tribe
in any year be limited to 5% rather than the 10% currently used in the
bill, in order to ensure that more of these funds reach more tribal
programs. In Attachment A, we have provided proposed amendment language
for Title II which addresses the concerns I have raised.
Tribal Access to CARA Title III
I thank the Committee for including the 2.25% allocation in Title
III of H.R. 701. Tribes have long proposed that on the basis of
fairness and equity, we should receive 2.25% of new conservation
funding, including the new subaccount to be created by Title III in the
federal aid to wildlife restoration fund. This 2.25 percentage is based
on the ratio of Indian trust land to the rest of the land area of the
United States. No Federal Aid funds now go towards fish and wildlife
conservation efforts on these lands for which tribes are responsible. I
am grateful that this Committee has recognized the inequities and
included a 2.25% allocation in Title III.
I appreciate the Committee's effort to find statutory language by
which the 2.25% share can be fairly allocated among the various tribes.
We believe statutory distribution language is necessary to ensure a
reliable base of core funding that Indian tribes can count upon from
year to year. The present language would divide the funds among tribal
conservation programs on the basis of 1/3 land and 2/3 population. As
the Committee further deliberates on the CARA provisions, we ask that
you give some consideration to amending this provision so as to
allocate funds on the basis of 2/3 land and 1/3 population. Obviously,
wildlife conservation funding needs rise incrementally in relation to
the amount of trust land acreage a tribe is responsible for managing.
Therefore it makes sense to have greater weight apply to the trust land
acreage of a tribe, while still including a factor to reflect that
tribe's population of users. We also ask that language be added to
clarify that funds allocated under this section, upon application by a
tribe, shall be used by a tribe only to support an established wildlife
conservation and restoration program or to develop a wildlife
conservation plan or strategy. Finally, since some tribes may not apply
or develop conservation programs, I ask that language be added which
specifies that any of the 2.25% allocation which remains undistributed
to tribes near the end of the fiscal year should be redistributed on a
proportional basis to those tribes who received distributions that
year. In Attachment B, we have provided proposed amendment language for
Title III to address these issues.
Keep CARA Title VI Intact
Title VI of H.R. 701, Federal and Indian Lands Restoration,
provides up to $200 million annually for a coordinated program on
federal and Indian lands to restore degraded lands, protect resources
that are threatened with degradation, and protect public health and
safety. Of this amount, 60% would be allocated for Department of
Interior lands, 30% would be allocated for Department of Agriculture
lands, and 10% would be allocated for Indian lands. This allocation
formula is based on acreage.
Like the federal government and the states, tribes have an immense
wealth of natural resources under their management and care. However,
tribes lag far behind the federal government and the states in our
capacity to protect these resources. The development of this capacity
takes time and dedicated financial resources, and tribes have long been
disadvantaged in this area.
The $20 million allocated to tribes under this title is modest when
you consider that it must be spread among more than 550 tribal
governments and 56 million acres of Indian trust land. However, it does
represent a critically important source of funds, and I strongly urge
you to ensure that Title VI is kept intact in the final CARA
legislation.
We do ask that the maximum amount available to a single tribe in
any year be limited to 5% rather than the 10% cap used in the current
version of CARA. We also ask that language be included in Title VI
requiring the Secretary of Interior to consult with tribes in the
development of the competitive grant program for allocation of funds to
tribes, again, to reflect the government-to-government relationship. In
Attachment C, we have provided a proposed amendment that would do this.
Conclusions
The protection of America's natural resources is of immense
importance. CARA represents perhaps the greatest opportunity ever to
provide a lasting legacy of resource preservation for future
generations of Americans. CARA is consistent with the First Americans''
view of protecting Mother Earth.
Because tribes were left out of Title VIII, Land Conservation,
Preservation and Infrastructure Improvement to the Fiscal Year 2001
Interior Appropriations Bill, H.R. 4578, our hope lies in the enactment
of CARA this year. If tribes are to preserve our resources and our way
of life, we need access to funds in a manner similar to other agencies
charged with the protection of America's land and water. I sincerely
hope that you, and this Committee's colleagues in the Congress, will
take my words to heart, and do the right thing on behalf of America's
Indian tribes.
I have attached to this testimony proposed amendment language for
CARA Titles II, III and VI, which addresses the issues I have raised
today. Also attached is further background information which justifies
our request. I would be pleased to provide any additional information
you need. I thank you for the opportunity to present testimony today on
behalf of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians.Attachment A
______
ATTACHMENT A
Tribal Amendments Proposed to CARA Title II--H.R. 701
H.R. 701 (As introduced in the House of Representatives on February
14, 2001) (GPO's PDF version)
On page 36, line 7, just after ``...rule.'' insert:
``The Secretary shall develop the competitive grant program in
consultation with Indian tribes and with the active
participation of a joint, federal and tribal workgroup,
composed of a BIA and a tribal representative from each BIA
region.''
On page 36, line 12, strike ``10'' and replace with ``5''
On page 36, line 14, strike ``Funds''
On page 36, strike lines 15 through 18
______
ATTACHMENT B
Tribal Amendments Proposed to CARA Title III--H.R. 701
H.R. 701 (As introduced in the House of Representatives on February
14, 2001) (GPO's PDF version)
On page 45, line 12, strike ``not more''
On page 45, line 13, strike ``than''
On page 45, line 14, strike ``1/3'' and replace with ``2/3''
On page 45, line 18, strike ``2/3'' and replace with ``1/3''
On page 45, Insert at the end of line 24, the following two new
sentences:
``Such amounts may be used by a tribe only to support or
develop a wildlife conservation or restoration program or plan,
and, upon application, shall be distributed to tribes before
July 1st of each fiscal year. Should any of the 2 1/4 percent
apportionment remain undistributed on July 1st of each fiscal
year, such remainder shall be distributed on a proportional
basis to those tribes previously receiving distributions that
year under this subsection.''
______
ATTACHMENT C
Tribal Amendments Proposed to CARA Title VI--H.R. 701
H.R. 701 (As introduced in the House of Representatives on February
14, 2001) (GPO's PDF version)
On page 59, at the end of line 2, insert:
``The Secretary shall develop the competitive grant program in
consultation with Indian tribes and with the active
participation of a joint, federal and tribal workgroup,
composed of a BIA and a tribal representative from each BIA
region.''
On page 59, line 5, strike ``10'' and replace with ``5''
______
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you, sir. I appreciate your
testimony.
I would inform the other members that the House in recess
until about 1:30, at which time we will have further votes.
Mr. Kildee?
Mr. Kildee. I thank you. I want to thank the entire panel
for their testimony. This bill is very near and dear to me. I
am one of the original cosponsors.
And, Chairman Whitefeather, I certainly recognize the fact
that you and I need to work together with Ms. McCollum to try
to recognize that, as a sovereign government, you should be
treated like the other sovereign governments in the United
States.
So hopefully, during the process of enacting this bill, we
can recognize that our own Constitution states that the
Congress shall have the power to regulate commerce with foreign
nations and among the several states and with the Indian
tribes. And that does narrate, gives a list, of the three
sovereignties that the Constitution recognizes, doesn't grant.
Your sovereignty is a retained sovereignty under the decisions
of the U.S. Supreme Court.
So I would like to work with you to see how we can be more
sensitive to the needs of your sovereign nation.
Thank you very much for your testimony.
Mr. Whitefeather. [Speaking in Obijwe.]
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you.
Ms. McCollum, do you have any questions?
Ms. McCollum. No, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Thornberry. Let me thank the panel for your testimony.
I appreciate you being here and hearing your perspectives.
And we will go ahead and call up the third panel at this
time: Mr. David Waller, director, Georgia Division of Wildlife,
Department of Natural Resources, Social Circle, Georgia; Mr.
Edward F. Sanderson, president, National Conference of State
Historic Preservation Officers, Washington, DC; Ms. F. Patricia
Callahan, president, American Association of Small Property
Owners, Washington, DC.
Let me welcome each of you to the hearing today, and I
appreciate your willingness to testify.
Mr. Waller, we will begin with you.
STATEMENT OF DAVID WALLER, DIRECTOR, GEORGIA DIVISION OF
WILDLIFE, DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES, SOCIAL CIRCLE,
GEORGIA
Mr. Waller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is David
Waller, and I am director of the Georgia Wildlife Resources
Division and a past president of the International Association
of Fish and Wildlife Agencies.
As you are aware, all 50 states are members of the
association and strongly support H.R. 701. The wildlife
agencies and the international have been working on this for
several years. We worked in building a coalition across the
country, and it has been mentioned many times about how broad
that coalition is. But it represents a truly grassroots
support, including business and industry, conservation
organizations, elected officials, governors, mayors, city
council members, support this. The recreational community
supports it, soccer moms.
So it has tremendous support across America.
This bill is a bipartisan, consensus-built, common-sense
approach to conservation that makes good economic sense, good
common sense, and good political sense.
I would like to thank you for your efforts last year in
basically passing the same bill out of the House of
Representatives. We came so close last year, and that created
the momentum that brings us back here today to consider a bill
that is currently cosponsored by over half the House. And what
we want to do is finish the job this year.
The support of the American people for CARA, which
dedicates assured funding for conservation, sends a clear
message that certainty for conservation program funding has
finally achieved the standing in the national budget that it
truly deserves.
As you know and appreciate, natural resource, conservation,
recreation programs contribute significantly to our quality of
life, our socioeconomic stability, and our nation's health and
well-being. Stewardship of our fish and wildlife, land,
coastal, and cultural resources is important to every one of
our citizens. It is particularly important to future
generations who will benefit from our care for these resources.
Good stewardship cannot be imposed from Washington, DC, or
defined by regulation. It needs to be supported at the state
and the community level where we live.
It is clear that our nation's long-term resource
conservation challenges can't be solved by one-time fixes or
cookie-cutter answers or simply passing more regulations. The
history of fluctuations and constantly shifting priorities of
year-to-year appropriations has proven that annual funding
simply is not adequate to meet current needs or address future
problems.
There needs to be a comprehensive and sustained Federal,
state, and local stewardship commitment. For these reasons,
assured funding and state-based decisionmaking are the most
important provisions of CARA.
As you know, Mr. Chairman, conserving fish and wildlife
species is not a quick fix. Restoring declining species to a
sustainable level is a complex, multiyear endeavor that
requires a certainty of available funding for success.
We have learned this from our experience with game and
sport fish species where assured funding was made available for
these efforts. And that is why our wildlife populations across
the country are in such good shape.
But there is no such funding currently available with any
certainty to address the many imperiled nongame species. With
assured and dedicated funding, we can implement proactive
conservation programs to address the early warning signs of
declining species. And it is a ``pay a little now,'' or ``pay a
lot more later'' situation after species are added to the
endangered species list.
And that has been brought up many times, about the problems
with endangered species. And this is a preventative maintenance
program that will keeps species off that list.
Assured long-term funding is also necessary to create
incentives, providing technical and financial assistance for
private landowners, which include such things as cooperative
agreements with resource agencies to accomplish conservation
objectives.
These efforts would be designed to reduce the need to list
endangered species by funding preventative conservation
programs that restore declining species before they reach a
point where listing is necessary. This helps the landowner
become part of the solution.
Also, as you know, Mr. Chairman, outdoor recreation is the
fastest growing industry in this country. And CARA will
position the state fish and wildlife agencies to help local
communities identify and take advantage of wildlife-related
tourism opportunities. Programs to capture these opportunities
can significantly enhance the economy of these rural
communities.
And last but not least, there is a huge need for
conservation and education programs in these counties. I go
into schools every year across Georgia, and you can do the same
thing in your state, and you will be shocked at the lack of
information children have. Most of them don't even know that
milk comes from a cow or a cow bites the dust when they get a
hamburger at McDonald's.
So there is a huge need for that. And CARA provides funding
for conservation education.
And I see my time has run out, but I would encourage you to
please move forward with this bill and move it through the
House as soon as you can to get it over to the Senate where we
will have more time to work on it for next year.
Mr. Chairman, I have one more request that some of our
coalition asked, and I don't know the protocol, but they asked
if you could keep the record open for another week or two so
they could get in some--they would like to write in and make
comments on it, too.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Waller follows:]
Statement of David Waller, past President, International Association of
Fish and Wildlife Agencies
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is David Waller, Director of the
Georgia Wildlife Resources Division, and a past President of the
International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies. As you are
aware, all 50 states are members of the Association.
The Association sincerely appreciates the opportunity to appear
before your Committee today to share with you the collective and
continued strong support of the 50 State Fish and Wildlife Agencies for
H.R. 701, the Conservation and Reinvestment Act, a bill that will
ensure a conservation legacy for all Americans. This bill is
unquestionably the most significant legislative initiative for fish and
wildlife (and other natural resources) conservation in the last several
decades. Whether you hunt, fish, bird watch, hike, play soccer or just
enjoy the peace and tranquility of being outdoors appreciating the vast
natural bounty of our Nation, this bill will ensure that our children
and future generations will enjoy this bountiful natural wealth.
The International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies was
founded in 1902 as a quasi-governmental organization of public agencies
charged with the protection and management of North America's fish and
wildlife resources. The Association's governmental members include the
fish and wildlife agencies of the states, provinces, and federal
governments of the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. The Association has been a
key organization in promoting sound resource management and
strengthening federal, state, and private cooperation in protecting and
managing fish and wildlife and their habitats in the public interest.
Let me also thank you, Chairman Hansen, and Chairman Young,
Congressman Dingell, Congressman Miller, Congressman Tauzin,
Congressman John and many others for your efforts in passing
essentially this same bill out of the House in the last Congress.
Although the bill was never acted on by the full Senate in the last
Congress, your efforts to dedicate assured funding to state-based
conservation and recreation programs captured the overwhelming support
of the American public and your House colleagues as well as support
from most Senators. It has created the momentum that brings us back
here today to consider a bill that is currently cosponsored by over
one-half of the House. Mr. Chairman, we remain as committed to working
with you this Congress as in the last, and in this Congress, we fully
expect to join you in the Rose Garden for the ceremony signing CARA
into law.
The overwhelmingly bipartisan House vote in the last Congress, and
robust sponsorship in this Congress for H.R. 701 clearly shows that
conservation programs are an extremely high priority for the American
people. The support for CARA, which dedicates assured funding for
conservation, sends an unmistakable message that certainty for
conservation program funding has finally achieved the standing in the
national budget that it truly deserves. As you know and appreciate, Mr.
Chairman, natural resource conservation and recreation programs
contribute significantly to our quality of life, our socio-economic
stability, and our Nation's health and well-being. Just as Social
Security is a financial safety net, conservation of our natural
resources is resource safety net for both this and future generations.
Unless Congress makes a multi-year commitment to conservation, history
indicates that we postpone conservation efforts which then cost more
and result in substantial impact on private and public land because
species become threatened and endangered.
Stewardship of our fish and wildlife, land, coastal, and cultural
resources is important to every one of our citizens. It is particularly
important to future generations who will benefit from our prudent care
for these resources or be burdened by our failure to do so. Good
stewardship cannot be imposed from Washington, DC, or defined by
regulation; it needs to be nurtured and supported at the state and
community level where we live. It is clear that our nation's long-term
resource conservation challenges cannot be solved by one-time fixes,
cookie-cutter answers, or simply passing more regulations. The history
of fluctuations and constantly shifting priorities of year-to-year
appropriations underscores the fact that annual funding simply is not
adequate to meet current needs or address future problems. There needs
to be a comprehensive and sustained federal, state and local
stewardship commitment. For these reasons, assured funding and state-
based decision making are the most important fundamental provisions of
CARA.
As you know, Mr. Chairman, conserving fish and wildlife species is
not a one-time fix. Restoring declining species to a sustainable level
is a complex, multi-year endeavor that requires the certainty of
available funding for success. As an example, restoring the nation's
symbol--the bald eagle--to its current status has taken four decades.
It took a lot more than banning the use of certain pesticides to
achieve this goal. In this case, funds were available under the
Endangered Species Act, but no such funding is currently available with
any certainty to address the many imperiled nongame species from which
ranks will come the next listed species. With assured and dedicated
funding, we can implement proactive conservation to address the early
warning signs of decline. It is less expensive to restore species, and
our opportunities to use voluntary incentive based, non-regulatory
programs are much greater than when a species comes under the authority
of the ESA. Also history indicates it is not only expensive to restore
an endangered species but it may be too late.
Our experience with game and sportfish species also demonstrates
the success of wildlife conservation efforts when dedicated and assured
funding is available. As you know, Mr. Chairman, at the beginning of
the last century, America's fish and wildlife populations were in dire
circumstances from several factors. Through the dedicated efforts of
the sportsmen and sportswomen of this country, working with the hunting
and fishing equipment industry and state and federal fish and wildlife
agencies, Congress statutorily established the Federal Aid in Wildlife
Restoration Act (Pittman-Robertson) in 1937 and Federal Aid in
Sportfish Restoration Act (Dingell-Johnson/Wallop-Breaux) in 1950 to
provide dedicated and assured funding to the State fish and wildlife
agencies for game and sportfish species. Those funds, along with
license fees paid by hunters and anglers, have provided the foundation
for America's successful fish and wildlife conservation programs over
many years in bringing back species like the white-tailed deer,
pronghorn antelope, wood duck, wild turkey and striped bass. Now is the
time to duplicate that success with funding provided under CARA that
include those fish and wildlife species (nongame species) that are
neither game nor sportfish, but constitute the majority of fish and
wildlife in this country. We have the expertise, we have the will, and
with assured funding from CARA, we will have the resources to duplicate
our successes which make our system of fish and wildlife conservation
the model which other countries seek to emulate.
Also, as you are aware, assured, long-term funding is necessary to
create incentives for private landowners to provide technical and
financial assistance which include such things as cooperative
agreements with resource agencies to accomplish conservation
objectives. These efforts would be designed to reduce the need to list
endangered species by funding preventative conservation programs that
restore declining species before they reach a point where listing is
necessary. This helps landowners to become part of the solution through
non-regulatory, incentive-based programs that can integrate their land
management intentions with fish and wildlife conservation efforts.
We look forward to working with you to expeditiously report H.R.
701 out of your Committee, and pass it out of the House before the
August recess. Let's take advantage of the tremendous opportunity
afforded us in this bill to do something for all Americans!
The Association has testified several times before this Committee
(and others) in the last Congress on H.R. 701 and other proposals that
would dedicate Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) revenues to State-based
enhanced programs for fish and wildlife conservation, conservation
education, and wildlife associated recreation; land and water
conservation; outdoor recreation; and coastal conservation and impact
assistance. The Association strongly supports the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act because it is a bipartisan, consensus-built, and
common sense approach to conservation that makes good economic sense,
good common sense, and good political sense.
We also sincerely appreciate the work of you and the other CARA
champions, on and off this Committee, in amending the Wildlife
Conservation and Restoration Program (Title III) authorizing language
into the Pittman-Robertson statute last year through the enactment of
the fiscal year 2001 Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary and
Related Agencies Appropriations act. That law, again through your and
many other members'' supportive efforts, also made available to the
State fish and wildlife agencies a one-time appropriation of $50
million to be apportioned to and expended by the States under the terms
and conditions of the Wildlife Conservation and Restoration Program. I
wanted to share with you that, through a truly cooperative effort
between the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the State Fish and
Wildlife agencies, all states and territories have been expeditiously
qualified for their apportionment and are currently submitting their
projects for expenditure approval so that they can do good things on
the ground for fish and wildlife and our citizens. This was a good
start, but as you know, more funding with greater assurances is
necessary to meet the needs.
The coalition of over 4500 organizations that has come together in
support of CARA, and worked so tirelessly for House passage in the last
Congress and is doing so again now, truly represents both broad and
diverse grass-root support of the business community, conservation
organizations, elected officials at all levels of governments,
industry, the recreation community and other interests. Citizens from
``soccer moms'' to hunters and wildlife photographers strongly support
CARA. Our common goal is to bring dedicated, consistent funding to
state-based fish and wildlife conservation programs; land and water
conservation; coastal conservation and environmental programs; state
and local outdoor recreation; historic preservation; and incentives for
our landowners to continue good stewardship of their land in open space
uses as farmland, ranchland and forest land. CARA places decisions on
identifying needs and spending priorities at the State and local level
which we believe can best reflect the interest of our citizens, and, it
does that while giving greater protection than exists in current law to
private property owners with respect to federal land acquisition. This
coalition truly represents America's interest in our natural and
cultural heritage, and our need to conserve that heritage for future
generations.
As we have testified many times before, the most significant
benefit of CARA to fish and wildlife conservation is that the State
fish and wildlife agencies will finally be in a position to take
preventative conservation measures to address the life needs and
habitat requirements of declining species before they reach a status
where they must be listed as endangered or threatened species. This
will save money and prevent the social and economic disruption
associated with species being threatened or endangered. By acting
proactively when more conservation options are available to us, the
State fish and wildlife agencies can work cooperatively with private
landowners through voluntary, non-regulatory means such as incentives,
technical assistance, easements, and other such measures. Prevention
makes good biological sense, good economic sense, and good common
sense. Preventative conservation now is an investment that will
continue to pay dividends far into the future. It simply costs much
less to conserve fish and wildlife species by responding to early
warning signs of decline, than it does to recover these species once
they have to be listed.
Also, as you know, Mr. Chairman, outdoor recreation is the fastest
growing industry in this country, and CARA will position the State fish
and wildlife agencies to help local communities identify and take
advantage of wildlife related tourism opportunities. Programs to
capture these opportunities can significantly enhance the economy of
these rural communities.
Let me briefly share with you today two perfecting amendments the
Association would urge be made to the Wildlife Title (Title III) of the
Conservation and Reinvestment Act. The Association staff will continue
to work closely with your Committee staff on the details of some other
technical or clarifying language suggestions.
First, we would ask for your serious consideration of eliminating
the 10% spending cap restriction on wildlife related recreation
expenses. In 1996, over 62 million Americans participated in wildlife
viewing with an economic impact of nearly $30 billion. Wildlife related
recreation is critical in the fostering of the public's commitment to
wildlife conservation--in short, responsible nature-based tourism
development, the promotion of nature and birding festivals, active
wildlife-watching skill-building, and other creative activities build
and sustain a growing wildlife conservation constituency. Although we
recognize the concern that infrastructure needs might divert needed
funding away from on the ground conservation, states need to be able to
provide quality, safe opportunities for wildlife viewing and
photography which are not only highly popular but provide significant
economic benefits to communities. Such wildlife recreation
opportunities would be provided consistent with other needs for
wildlife management. Also, one-time capital investments to provide
wildlife related recreation facilities while maintaining ongoing
programs could require more funding than the 10% annual cap would
allow. State fish and wildlife agencies are in the best position to
decide what mix of Title III funds should be applied to conservation,
wildlife associated recreation, and conservation education, and we
encourage your support for eliminating the 10% cap on expenditures for
wildlife associated recreation.
Second, we strongly encourage you to allow, at the discretion of
the State fish and wildlife agency, the expenditure of up to 10% of the
Title III funds for conservation law enforcement activities. As you
know, state fish and wildlife conservation officers have many
opportunities to work with landowners and the public to implement
voluntary, proactive fish and wildlife protection and public education
and outreach programs. They also prevent poaching, or over-utilization
of fish and wildlife resources, thereby reducing the likelihood that a
species may become threatened or endangered in the future. Further,
they provide for public safety, security, search and rescue functions,
and resolution of outdoor user conflicts. In short, conservation law
enforcement is an integral component of a comprehensive state fish and
wildlife program and should, at the discretion of the State Director,
be eligible for up to 10% funding under CARA.
Mr. Chairman, in closing, the Association stands ready to assist
you in whatever way we can to make programs which would be funded under
CARA a reality for all of our citizens. Let's work together to pass
this landmark legislation now, and provide a future for our citizens
that we can all be proud of passing on.
We would be pleased to answer any questions the Committee may have.
Thank you for the opportunity to share the Association's
perspectives with you.
______
The Chairman. [Presiding.] I appreciate that, and we will
honor that request.
Mr. Sanderson?
STATEMENT OF EDWARD F. SANDERSON, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL
CONFERENCE OF STATE HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICERS, WASHINGTON,
DC
Mr. Sanderson. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity
to speak to the Committee. My name is Ted Sanderson. I am the
director of Rhode Island's Historical Preservation and Heritage
Commission, and I am here today representing the National
Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers as their
president.
We strongly support the concept of H.R. 701 to provide
predictable, automatic withdrawals from the Historic
Preservation Fund to states and tribes. And we thank the
Committee for including the Historic Preservation Fund as Title
V at its authorized level of $150 million per year.
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation
Officers is the association of state officials appointed by
their governor to carry out the national Historic Preservation
Act on behalf of the secretaries of interior and the Advisory
Council on Historic Preservation.
Today we are part of a broad coalition that strongly
supports H.R. 701, and includes other state-based
organizations, like the National Governors Association and the
National Conference of State Legislators.
When Congress created the Historic Preservation Fund in
1976, it made a promise to preserve America's heritage. Part of
the proceeds from the sale of nonrenewable oil and gas
resources would be used to fund the long-term conservation of
historic places. But appropriations have fallen short of that
promise and the nation's heritage is at risk.
Only a third of the total authorized revenue in the
Historic Preservation Fund has ever been appropriated. For
fiscal year 2002, funding for states and tribes would be cut by
20 percent. And the total appropriation for historic
preservation would only be about half the authorized level.
The consequence of this underfunding is a mounting backlog
of unmet needs, historic buildings lost, and communities with
few resources, struggling to save their heritage. Ironically,
unappropriated revenue continues to accumulate in the Historic
Preservation Fund.
The funding provided by H.R. 701 is essential to fulfill
Congress's promise to preserve America's heritage. Instead of
creating a large bureaucracy, the Historic Preservation Fund
enables each state to carry out historic preservation
activities on behalf of the Federal Government.
Our program is an excellent example of federalism. The
Secretary of the Interior sets standards while state historic
preservation officers do the actual work, and governors oversee
the effective operation of the program in their state.
The Historic Preservation Fund pays only half the cost of
this national program, and states match the Federal dollars.
This is cost-effective government that is responsive to local
citizens.
The National Historic Preservation Act created a rational
approach to historic preservation. States identify the historic
places within their boundaries, and with the involvement of the
public, produce a historic preservation plan to set priorities.
The Historic Preservation Fund matches nonfederal funds to
carry out the program, and H.R. 701 will guarantee an adequate
and predictable funding level.
Congress understood that states are in the best position to
have knowledge about the full range of historic properties and
to make decisions in accordance with local needs and local
conditions. For this reason, the act limited direct grants by
the Secretary of Interior to 10 percent of the annual
appropriation.
But over the last few years, special category grants
awarded from Washington have exceeded 40 percent of the annual
appropriation. Coupled with low appropriations, this situation
has choked the flow of funding originally envisioned by the
Historic Preservation Fund.
As a result, all across America, critical preservation
projects are locked out from a large share of what funding is
available. Language in Title V directing Historic Preservation
Fund allocations to states and tribes will correct this
situation.
My written testimony recommends several specific changes to
the bill. In the interest of time I won't discuss the details
of those changes but ask that they be considered by the
Committee. And I would be happy to answer any questions that
you might have about it.
In conclusion, our nation's heritage rests in the historic
buildings, sites, and neighborhoods of towns and rural areas in
each of the states. Historic places close to home are part of
the heritage of the nation as a whole, and preserving them is
the promise the Congress made in the National Historic
Preservation Act and in the Historic Preservation Fund.
States are fulfilling their part of the promise, working
with citizens and local government. Now we ask that Congress
fulfill its part of the promise by enacting H.R. 701 to
guarantee full funding of $150 million per year.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Sanderson follows:]
Statement of Edward F. Sanderson, President, National Conference of
State Historic Preservation Officers, Executive Director, Rhode Island
Historical Preservation and Heritage Commission
I. INTRODUCTION: EXPRESSION OF THANKS
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the opportunity to speak to the
committee. My name is Ted Sanderson. I'm the director of Rhode Island's
Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission and President of the
National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers.
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
extends its thanks to House Resources Committee Chairman James Hanson
for including the Historic Preservation Fund as Title V of H. R. 701,
the Conservation and Reinvestment Act at its historically authorized
level of $150,000,000. The National Conference further thanks Chairman
Hansen, Ranking Member Rahall, and the Resources Committee for an
invitation to testify on behalf of H. R. 701, particularly Title V.
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
strongly endorses the concept of H. R. 701 to provide predictable,
automatic withdrawals from the Historic Preservation Fund to States and
tribes.'
II. CONSERVATION AND REINVESTMENT ACT: A PROMISE KEPT FOR AMERICA'S
HERITAGE
When Congress created the Historic Preservation Fund in 1976 it
made a promise to America's heritage. A part of the proceeds from sale
of non-renewable oil and gas
'The National Conference, while fully supporting tribal historic
preservation officers as a major part of the national historic
preservation program, does not presume to represent or speak for Tribal
Historic Preservation Offices or tribal interests. resources would be
used to fund the long-term conservation of historic places. Less than a
year ago, thanks to the leadership of the Honorable Joel Hefley,
Representative from Colorado, Congress again renewed its promise of an
annual deposit of $150,000,000 into the Historic Preservation Fund (P.
L. 106-208). But appropriations from the Historic Preservation Fund
have fallen short of the promise, and the nation's heritage is at risk.
Over the past 25 years, only a third of the total authorized revenue in
the Historic Preservation Fund has ever been appropriated. For Fiscal
Year 2002, funding for states and tribes would be cut by twenty
percent, and the total appropriation for historic preservation would be
only about half the authorized amount. The consequence of this under
funding is a mounting backlog of unmet needs, historic buildings lost,
and communities with few resources struggling to save their heritage.
Ironically, unappropriated revenue continues to accumulate in the
Historic Preservation Fund.
The funding provided by H.R.701 is essential to fulfill Congress'
promise to preserve America's heritage. The National Historic
Preservation Act (16 U.S.C. 470) created a partnership between the
Department of the Interior and all of the states. Instead of creating a
large federal bureaucracy in historic preservation, the Historic
Preservation Fund enables each state to carry out historic preservation
activities on behalf of the federal government.
The historic preservation program is an excellent example of
federalism. Our national heritage rests in the historic buildings,
sites, and neighborhoods of cities, towns, and rural areas located in
each of the states. States work with the federal government and with
local government to preserve historic resources. The Historic
Preservation Fund pays only half the cost of the national historic
preservation program. States match the federal dollars, and State
Historic Preservation Offices do the actual work. The Secretary of the
Interior sets standards, while governors oversee the effective
operation of the program in their state. This is cost-effective
government responsive to local citizens.
III. NATIONAL HISTORIC PRESERVATION ACT AND THE HISTORIC PRESERVATION
FUND: A RATIONAL APPROACH TO HISTORIC PRESERVATION
The National Historic Preservation Act created a rational approach
to historic preservation based on historic values and public input.
States identify the historic places within their boundaries, and with
the involvement of the public, produce a historic preservation plan to
set priorities. Adequate, dependable, predictable funding as provided
in H. R. 701 will allow State Historic Preservation Offices to raise
matching funds and meet historic preservation needs in cooperation with
local governments, nonprofit organizations, and property owners.
Congress understood that states are in the best position to have
knowledge about the full range of historic properties and to make
decisions in accordance with local needs and conditions. For this
reason, the Act limits direct grants by the Secretary of the Interior
to ten percent of the annual appropriation.
The National Historic Preservation Act specifies recipients of
Historic Preservation Fund grants. Section 101(e) specifies the
recipients: States, National Trust for Historic Preservation, Indian
tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations, and Micronesian States.
Subparagraph 101(e)(3) authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to make
direct grants with the following conditions: a) the amount of
Secretarial grants may not exceed 10% of the annual appropriation from
the Historic Preservation Fund, b) the Secretary must consult with the
appropriate State Historic Preservation Officer, and c) projects may be
for National Historic Landmarks, World Heritage sites, demonstration
projects, training and development of skilled labor trades, and to
assist small businesses in National Register Historic Districts.
In recent years, special category grants awarded from Washington
have exceeded forty percent of the annual appropriation. Coupled with
low appropriations, this situation has choked the flow of funding
originally envisioned by the Historic Preservation Fund. As a result,
all across America in town centers and rural areas critical
preservation projects are ``locked out'' from more than a third of the
available funding. Language in Title V of the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act directing Historic Preservation Fund allocations to
States and tribes will correct this situation.
IV. CHANGES NEEDED IN H.R. 701
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
makes the following suggestions for changes to the text of H. R. 701.
A. Section 6. Limitation on Use of Available Amounts for Administration
The National Conference agrees that the purpose of H. R. 701 is to
conserve resources benefitting the Nation's heritage. Making available
the full $150,000,000 annually to States and tribes will allow
sufficient funding to administer federal funds following OMB and
Department of the Interior and National Park Service requirements.
Administrative costs as a percentage of the total funds available
declines as the size of the grant increases.
At the lesser amounts States have received historically through the
budget and appropriations process, the actual cost of administration to
meet federal requirements is 10%. Should allocations to States be less
than the authorized amount this section would create an unfunded
mandate on State government.
B. Section 7. Record Keeping Requirements
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
questions the Committee's inclusion of additional Record Keeping
requirements on State governments. At least in the case of Historic
Preservation Fund expenditures, substantial record-keeping and
reporting requirements are already in place in accordance with
regulations previously issued by the Secretary of the Interior and the
Office of Management and Budget. Recognizing the desire of Congress to
minimize the use of CARA funds for administration, additional or
duplicative Record Keeping should be avoided.
C. Section 8. Maintenance of Effort and Matching Funding
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
believes the 30-year record of the States in supporting the Historic
Preservation Fund makes this section unnecessary. Further, under the
National Historic Preservation Act, the State Historic Preservation
Officers are carrying out a federal government program for
identification, evaluation and protection of historic properties. The
Historic Preservation Fund reimburses States for roughly half the cost
of making subgrants for heritage enhancement as well as for half the
cost of running this federal program. Existing law and regulations
require that all federal funds must be matched by non-federal funds.
Therefore a reduction of state or local resources may automatically
reduce federal assistance as the result of matching fund requirements
already in place.
D. Section 501. Treatment of Amounts Transferred from the Conservation
and Reinvestment Act Fund
1. Section 501 (3), new Section 108(b) of the National Historic
Preservation Act-The National Conference of State Historic Preservation
Officers recommends the addition of the word ``and'' after the word
``States'' on line 18 and the insertion of a period after the word
``tribes'' on that same line. Note: grants to the States, by law,
include funding for local governments-not less than 10% of the States'
allocation up to $60,000,000 and, in amounts above $60,000,00, half of
the excess.
2. Section 501(3), new Section108(c) of the National Historic
Preservation Act-The National Conference of State Historic Preservation
Officers has testified for thirty years about the need to increase the
Historic Preservation Fund appropriations to allow for subgrants for
restoration projects, and we continue to support that position.
However, the Conference requests that this section be stricken as it
limits State flexibility to respond to State needs for the following
reasons.
a. LBecause the Historic Preservation Fund supports a program
for identification, evaluation, and protection of historic
properties generally as well as enhancement and restoration of
particular properties, a substantial share of HPF funding will
continue to be allocated to program-wide needs.
b. LIn some States such as Florida and Colorado that have major
annual State funding for restoration projects, the State may
need to use its Historic Preservation Fund allocation to assist
in redevelopment projects, to help local governments undertake
historic site survey or National Register work.
c. LTitle V includes specific authorization for States to use
Historic Preservation Fund allocations to assist heritage
areas. Heritage areas may need redevelopment assistance, or
help with survey and education activities. Section 501(3) will
hamper the State Historic Preservation Officer's ability to
address the genuine needs of heritage areas.
d. LOutside of heritage areas important unmet needs also exist
for historic preservation -related redevelopment assistance and
implementation of survey and education programs to increase
public recognition and understanding for historic resources.
e. LThe needs of the historic resources and sound management
practices may require a short-term major investment that is not
project related. A significant example is the need to make up
for the past 30 years of under funding of historic site survey
work to identify and record significant historic properties. In
many states the current backlog in historic site survey pushes
the financial burden for identification of historic places on
to other federal agencies and sometimes on to private sector
applicants for federal assistance.
f. LSound preservation planning may dictate a major capital
investment in digitizing information on historic properties
through computer-based geographic information systems to
modernize the accessibility of information and expedite project
reviews.
One response to these concerns would be to define ``projects''
broadly enough to include the types of activities described above.
E. Section 503. Funding for Maritime Heritage Programs
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers
fully supports funding for maritime heritage. This sector of the
historic preservation community has been active for decades working
with Congress to secure dedicated funding.
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers has
consistently advocated for the Historic Preservation Fund to support a
historic preservation program that is truly national in scope and
inclusive of all types of significant historic properties. With limited
funding through the appropriations process, the National Conference of
State Historic Preservation Officers has warned about the danger of
``Balkanization'' of the historic preservation program. When individual
properties or groups of properties, no matter how worthy, obtain
special, dedicated funding for their own narrow resource type, a
disproportionate benefit is created that excludes the majority of
resource types and fails to address truly national needs. Special
category grants, awarded from Washington, have helped many threatened
resources. However, sending the same amount of money through the States
leads to more equal access, better pre-project evaluation, funding for
more projects, assurances of matching-fund capability, and quality
control over the final product.
The Conservation and Reinvestment Act will allow all Americans
access to funding for historic preservation. The dependability of
funding from CARA also will encourage applicants that if their project
is not funded in the current year, funding will be available in the
next application cycle.
V. EXPLANATION OF NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF STATE HISTORIC PRESERVATION
OFFICERS
The National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers is
the association of state officials-appointed by their governors-who
carry out the National Historic Preservation Act for the Secretary of
the Interior and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation pursuant
to the National Historic Preservation Act (16 U.S.C. 470). For over
thirty years State Historic Preservation Officers have actively
supported historic preservation authorization legislation and advocated
for adequate appropriations to achieve the Congressional mandate for
preserving America's heritage ``as a living part of our community
life.'' Today we are part of a broad coalition that strongly supports
H.R. 701, and includes other state-based organizations such as the
National Governors Association, the Southern Governors Association, the
Coastal States Organization, and the National Conference of State
Legislators.
VI. CONCLUSION
Everywhere in the United States historic buildings and sites are
valued for various reasons: saving key historic landmarks, preserving
the character of a special neighborhood or small town, helping to teach
rising generations about their nation's past, economic development on
traditional Main Streets, rehabilitation of housing, and revitalizing
older communities. In every state, citizens recognize that the historic
places close to home are also part of the heritage of the nation as a
whole. That is the promise Congress originally offered in the National
Historic Preservation Act and the Historic Preservation Fund. State
Historic Preservation Offices in each state are fulfilling their part
of the promise by carrying out the national historic preservation
program and by working with citizens and local government to raise the
money to match federal funding. We ask that the Congress fulfill its
part of the promise by enacting H.R. 701 to guarantee states and tribes
the full authorized funding of the Historic Preservation Fund:
$150,000,000.
______
The Chairman. I thank you, Mr. Sanderson.
Ms. Callahan, I appreciate seeing you again, appreciate you
being here.
STATEMENT OF F. PATRICIA CALLAHAN, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN
ASSOCIATION OF SMALL PROPERTY OWNERS, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Ms. Callahan. Thank you so much.
Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, thank you for
your invitation to appear today and express the perspective of
small property owners. I am Pat Callahan, president and founder
of the American Association of Small Property Owners, the voice
of small landlords and real estate investors.
Since 1993, AASPO has been working for the right of small
property owners to prosper freely and fairly, to make possible
the American dream of building wealth through real estate.
There are 10 million small owners of investment properties
nationwide, accounting for $40 billion per year in direct
economic activity. We are served by 2,000 state and local
associations. Our print newsletter, The Small Property Owner,
was voted the best independent real estate newsletter for 1996
by the National Association of Real Estate Editors. And we work
very closely with the National Association of Real Estate
Editors.
AASPO believes that entrepreneurship flourishes in a free-
market economy. This means that taxes and regulations should be
kept to a minimum, and that government must clearly define its
role to provide for the general welfare of all its citizens.
Government programs should encourage small property owners, not
stifle them, and certainly not compete with them.
Too often we see that policies and programs which started
with good intentions have the opposite effect.
We oppose CARA as the next step in an already flawed
Federal land policy. About 100 years ago, the Federal
Government stopped privatizing its massive landholdings and
started to act as the perpetual owner, instead of temporary
steward, of its lands.
As a consequence, the Federal Government became the
nation's number one landowner, in several states owning more
than half of the land. The landholdings eventually came to be
organized into various tracts, from wilderness areas to
national parks to national forests.
Yet even in the latter tracts, where multiple use prevails,
the possibility of ownership in fee simple was taken off the
table. Thus, a hallmark of our constitutional order, the
ancient privilege and immunity of free people to own land in
fee simple, no longer motivates public policy.
CARA moves this land policy in the wrong direction, by
authorizing the acquisition of some $45 billion in land over 15
years.
To be sure, our Constitution allows the acquisition of
private property for public purposes provided there is just
compensation, and there can be no objection to select
acquisition of land by the Federal Government when there is a
proper and necessary relationship to the enumerated powers of
the Federal Government.
But select acquisition of private property is altogether
different from the concerted effort embodied in CARA.
Private ownership of real property is a fundamental
principle on which our country was founded. Ownership of land
is connected with freedom itself and has been at the core of
our governmental process. If you take the resources and
ownership out of land use, then you destroy the fundamental
meaning of private property ownership.
Private property ownership underlies the opening of the
West. Responsible stewardship is best exercised not by
government but by private owners.
Private landowners are natural conservationists, inclined
to multiple use, preserving what is most valuable to be
preserved, and developing what is most valuable to be
developed.
The highest and best use, which is a concept in real
estate, of one's property is best determined by the owner, not
by the Federal Government.
Property ownership is a local issue and is best dealt with
by local governments. This is another founding principle of
federalism, that the power of decisionmaking rests with state
and local consensus.
In the absence of a compelling need and a compelling
Federal interest, the Federal Government should not intrude
into land use decisions and certainly not become the owner of
private property.
Nowhere in the Constitution is there granted the right of
the Federal Government to enter into the real estate business.
Private property ownership is not a Western issue. It is an
urban issue, a women's issue, a minority issue, and an
immigrant issue. The ownership of real estate is what draws
newcomers to our shores.
Urban landlords are sensitive to the present debate because
of our experiences with encroachment on the management of our
properties, as you would find, for example, with rent control
in New York City and California.
Sixty years ago, in response to a national wartime
emergency, rent control was imposed in many communities. But
New York City has never ended its housing emergency. The result
has been a shortage in housing options, lost tax revenues, and
missed opportunities for women, minorities, and immigrants to
become successful landlords in New York.
Unfortunately, the situation has not been allowed to be
self-correcting. The shortfall in local property tax revenues,
for example, is conveniently made up for by an infusion of
Federal funds through various grant programs, thus removing an
important element for municipal fiscal discipline.
Land use, to be sure, involves many tough issues fought out
at the local level. The exercise of democracy can at times
become very contentious. The intervention of the Federal
Government in land use matters, whether directly or through a
funding mechanism, will allow idealogues to exercise undue
influence in the process, and thereby disenfranchise local
private property owners.
Finally, there is the economic impact of CARA. We question
the effects on transportation and the flow of energy resources
to our cities and suburbs.
For example, how would a pipeline reach our cities if parts
of the route were to be placed off-limits by designating land
as wilderness?
I think a current example of the calamity in Klamath basin
is precisely the sort of situation the environmentalists and
the government land acquisition agents create and will create
to destroy the use and market value of private lands so that
contented second and third generation families will have no
other choice but to become willing sellers. And the feds,
states, and the environmentalists will be there with their
billions of dollars of CARA money to buy up these private lands
and transfer it into government hands. This is an outrage.
The Klamath basin catastrophe is the absolute perfect
textbook example of exactly what CARA is all about.
And why people who are working tirelessly to pass it and
spending millions of dollars hiring expensive lobbyists--the
Trust for Public Lands, the American Farm Trust. You know, you
name it, you know who the players are.
The extreme environmentalists and the government create a
calamity using the ESA to halt private property, private use on
private lands. When the land can't be used, the landowner sees
the market value of their land plummet and the collateral value
of their land drop to zero. They can't get loans, they can't
buy, they can't sell, they can't really do anything of economic
worth with the land.
In desperation, families that had been the backbone of the
rural community are suddenly facing total disaster and have no
choice but to become willing sellers. Then the government and
the Nature Conservancy and others such as they come into save
the day and rescue all of these willing sellers, picking up
their land and homes and dreams for $.05 on the dollar, if they
are lucky, and further eroding American freedom by transferring
still more private land into the hands of the government.
In sum, we feel that the Federal Government should be a
minimal interventionist. If citizens want a particular benefit,
they should discuss it, debate it, vote on it, and pay for it
directly. The closer the taxpayer is to the collection point,
the wiser the decision is likely to be.
A recent article in USA Today illustrates this point, and
what it says--and I have examples in my testimony--is that
local people are not voting bonds and taxes on themselves in
order to create additional green space.
In conclusion, we hope that the policies and programs that
compel consideration of constitutional protections for private
property, as found in H.R. 1592, would be changed so that this
bill will be unnecessary. But absent such a move, we support
the enactment this legislation. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Callahan follows:]
Statement of F. Patricia Callahan, President and Founder, American
Association of Small Property Owners
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee:
Thank you for your invitation to appear today and express the
perspective of small property owners on H.R. 701, the Conservation and
Reinvestment Act, or CARA, and H.R. 1592, the Constitutional Land
Acquisition Act. I am Pat Callahan, president and founder of the
American Association of Small Property Owners, the voice of small
landlords and real estate investors.
Since 1993, AASPO has been working for the right of small property
owners to prosper freely and fairly--to make possible the American
dream of building wealth through real estate. Based in Washington, DC,
and with experts and advisors strategically located throughout the
nation from California to New England, AASPO is the only national
organization for small landlords, property owners and real estate
investors to share information and strategies on important issues of
the day.
There are 10 million small owners of residential and commercial
investment properties, accounting for more than $40 billion per year in
direct economic activity. We are served by 2,000 state and local
associations around the country. AASPO's print newsletter, The Small
Property Owner, was voted the ``Best Independent Real Estate Newsletter
for 1996'' by the National Association of Real Estate Editors. Our web
site is at www.aaspo.org. We use the internet as the main
communications vehicle for our growing constituency.
AASPO believes that entrepreneurship flourishes in a free-market
economy. This means that taxes and regulations should be kept to a
minimum, and that government must clearly define its role to provide
for the general welfare of all its citizens. Government programs should
encourage small property owners, not stifle them, and certainly not
compete with them. Too often we see that policies and programs which
started with good intentions have the opposite effect.
We oppose CARA as it is the next step in an already flawed federal
land policy.
About one hundred years ago, the federal government stopped
privatizing its massive land holdings, and started to act as the
perpetual owner, instead of temporary steward, of its lands. As a
consequence, the federal government became the nation's 1 land owner,
in several states owning more than half of the land.
The land holdings eventually came to be organized into various
tracts, from wilderness areas to national parks to national forests.
Yet, even in the latter tracts, where ``multiple use'' prevails, the
possibility of ownership in fee simple was taken off the table. Thus, a
hallmark of our Constitutional order, the ancient ``privilege and
immunity'' of free people to own land in fee simple no longer motivated
public policy.
CARA moves this land policy in the wrong direction, by authorizing
the acquisition of some $45 billion in land over fifteen years.
To be sure, our Constitution allows the acquisition of private
property for public purposes provided there is just compensation, and
there can be no objection to select acquisition of land by the federal
government when this has a ``proper and necessary'' relationship to the
enumerated powers of the federal government. But select acquisition of
private property is altogether different from the concerted effort
embodied in CARA.
Private ownership of real property is a fundamental principle on
which our country was founded. Ownership of land is connected with
freedom itself. The history of our political parties shows that private
property ownership has been at the core of our governmental process. If
you take the resources and ownership out of land use, then you destroy
the fundamental meaning of private property ownership. As Thomas
Jefferson observed in 1816: ``The true foundation of republican
government is the equal right of every citizen in his person and
property and in their management.''
Private property ownership underlies the opening of the West to
settlement in the last century. Responsible stewardship is best
exercised not by government but by private owners. Private landowners
are natural conservationists, inclined to ``multiple use,'' preserving
what is most valuable to be preserved, and developing what is most
valuable to be developed. The highest and best use of one's property is
best determined by the owner, not the federal government.
Property ownership is a local issue and is best dealt with by local
government. This is another founding principle of federalism, that the
power of decision-making rests with state/local consensus. In the
absence of a compelling need and a compelling federal interest, the
federal government should not intrude into land use decisions and
certainly not become an owner of private property. No where in the
Constitutional is there granted the right of the federal government to
enter into the real estate business.
Private property ownership is not a ``Western'' issue. It is an
urban issue, a woman's issue, a minority issue, and an immigrant issue.
Our Massachusetts chapter president is an immigrant from Switzerland
and regularly reminds me that America is the only country were ordinary
people can hope to own real estate. It is a magnet that draws newcomers
to our shores.
Urban landlords are sensitive to the present debate because of our
experiences with encroachment on the management of our properties, as
you would find with rent control in New York City and California. Sixty
years ago, in response to a national wartime emergency, rent control
was imposed in many communities. But New York City has never ended its
housing ``emergency.'' The result has been a shortage in housing
options, lost tax revenue and missed opportunities for women,
minorities and immigrants to become successful landlords in New York.
Unfortunately, the situation has not been allowed to be self-
correcting. The shortfall in local property tax revenues, for example,
is conveniently made up for by an infusion of federal funds through
various grant programs, thus removing an important element for
municipal fiscal discipline.
Land use involves tough issues, fought out on the local level. It
is an exercise in democracy which can at times become very contentious.
The intervention of the federal government in land use matters, whether
directly or through a funding mechanism, will allow ideologues to
exercise undue influence in the process, and thereby disenfranchise
local private property owners.
Finally, there is the economic impact of CARA. We question the
effects on transportation and the flow of energy resources to our
cities and suburbs. For example, how would a pipeline reach our cities
if parts of the route were to be placed off-limits by designating land
as wilderness?
In sum, we feel that the federal government should be a minimal
interventionist. If citizens want a particular benefit, they should
discuss, debate, vote on and pay directly for it. The closer the
taxpayer is to the collection point, the wiser the decision is likely
to be.
A recent article in USA Today illustrates this point, and reports
that voters in states and municipalities around the nation are
approving new taxes to purchase open spaces. Last year, California
approved $5 billion in acquisition funds. Open-space advocates say
approving tax hikes for recreational and environmental purposes is an
easier sell at the county and municipal level--because voters are more
willing to pay to keep land green when it is in their own neighborhood.
The movement is swiftly building momentum. In November 2000, voters
approved 172 local measures, raising $2.4 billion for land
acquisition--a considerable jump from the $540 million raised in voting
two years earlier. Residents of Boise, ID voted last month to hike
property taxes for two years and devote the $10 million to purchases of
land outside the city. In April, voters in McHenry County, IL, and in
DeKalb County, in the Atlanta area, passed bond referendums to buy open
space. Since March 31, Massachusetts towns have voted to raise property
taxes as much as 3 percent to finance open-space acquisitions and other
land issues. Source: Martha J. Moore, ``Cities Tax to Keep Land
Green,'' USA Today, May 31, 2001.
In conclusion, we would hope that the policies and programs that
compel consideration of constitutional protections for private
property, as found in H.R. 1592, would be changed so that this bill
would be unnecessary. But absent such a move, we support the enactment
of H.R. 1592.
Thank you.
______
The Chairman. I thank the lady, thank you, Ms. Callahan.
The gentleman from Louisiana, questions for our panel?
Mr. Tauzin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, Ms. Callahan, are you aware of the average
Federal appropriations for land acquisition since 1998 in this
country?
Ms. Callahan. Well, I didn't want to get into the specifics
and start talking about dollars and cents on--
Mr. Tauzin. I am just asking you a question. Could you
answer it for me? Are you aware of the dollars we spend each
year to acquire private lands in America?
Ms. Callahan. Well, in what regard? I am trying to address
your question. What exactly--
Mr. Tauzin. I am asking you if you know the average
expenditure each year by the Federal Government to acquire
private lands in America right now, without CARA.
Ms. Callahan. Oh, without CARA.
Mr. Tauzin. Yes.
Ms. Callahan. I don't believe I have the figures in--
Mr. Tauzin. That average is $544 million a year.
In fact, the last President and this current President are
each recommending at least $450 million a year in Federal land
acquisition. But we are averaging $544.
If CARA had been in place in 1992, we would have only
bought $373 million of property. In 1995, for example, we would
have only bought $387.
CARA puts a ceiling of $450 million when we are spending an
average of $544 million a year right now without CARA.
Are you aware of that?
Ms. Callahan. Well, you are buying. You are not divesting.
The whole essence of my testimony is that the Federal
Government should not be in the real estate business.
Mr. Tauzin. But what I am saying is--
Ms. Callahan. And the--
Mr. Tauzin. --that without CARA, Ms. Callahan, government
is now acquiring more property, spending more dollars to
acquire private property, than CARA would permit. It limits it
to $450 a year.
Are you aware of that?
Ms. Callahan. Well, it isn't a matter of being aware. It is
a matter of whether I support the trend that I feel is very
disturbing.
We should be--
Mr. Tauzin. Well, what I am suggesting--
Ms. Callahan. --encouraging private property ownership, not
ownership by institution--
Mr. Tauzin. Well, then let's talk about the way the
government acquires property today and the way CARA would allow
or prohibit the government from acting.
Are you aware of any law today that requires the Federal
Government to consolidate the Federal landholdings in states
that have checkerboard patterns of landholdings?
Ms. Callahan. Well, what I am looking at is the practical
results of what has been happening by case examples, and I
think the trend is very disturbing. We should be encouraging--
Mr. Tauzin. I understand--listen.
Ms. Callahan. --private property ownership.
Mr. Tauzin. I listened to your testimony very carefully,
and I am asking you now to respond to my questions, not to give
your testimony again.
I simply want to know, are you aware of any law that
requires the Federal Government today to consolidate the
checkerboard pattern of Federal landholdings out west?
Ms. Callahan. Well, the effects are occurring, as we heard
from the witness earlier--
Mr. Tauzin. No, you don't want answer my question.
The answer is no, there is no such Federal law. CARA
creates such a requirement.
Are you aware of any Federal law that requires the Federal
Government to consider exchanging land rather than acquiring
new land when it needs new property?
Ms. Callahan. Well, again, you--
Mr. Tauzin. There is no such law. The answer is no; CARA
provides such a law.
Are you aware of any law that requires the Federal
Government to consider permanent easements rather than full
acquisition in place of land acquisition? Are you aware of any
such law today?
Ms. Callahan. Well, that trend, again, toward easements and
that is really preventing, I think, the full use of one's
private property. So usually what you will end up doing is
owning, having the title to the land, and the privilege of
paying the taxes.
I think it is very--
Mr. Tauzin. Well, today there is no such law that--
Ms. Callahan. Conservation easements are very disturbing.
Mr. Tauzin. --would favor land acquisition in the form of
easements instead of full title. CARA would permit that, in
fact, encourage that, as opposed to full landownership by the
Federal Government.
Are you aware of any law that requires that the Federal
Government today prepare a list of surplus land eligible for
sale to private landowners again?
The answer is no, there is no such law. CARA creates such a
provision.
Are you aware of any law that requires the Federal
Government to state the statutory authority and the reason why
land is be acquired when it acquires it?
The answer is no. CARA now requires that, in its language.
Here is the most important part: Are you aware of any law
that requires Congress to approve a land acquisition rather
than allowing an agency to do it on its own, from an unwilling
seller?
Ms. Callahan. Well, you know, the theories that you are
showing, whether we accept them or not, as a practical matter,
Congress, when they were not able to, with the regulatory
reform issue, oversee simple regulations before they went into
effect, how are they going to be able to review every piece of
land acquisition?
Mr. Tauzin. Well, CARA requires them to. CARA says
something brand new in the law that I think property rights
advocates have missed and ought to pay attention to.
And as a lead sponsor of the first private property rights
bill in this Congress, I can tell you, I pay a lot of attention
to it, because we help craft these provisions.
Today, when the President has asked for $544 million to buy
land and the appropriators give it to him, the agencies make
the decision about what land they are going to buy, and they do
it under forced acquisition. They have that power and they go
about doing it.
And Congress never approves the specific act. They don't
even have to advertise it in the local papers and tell us, send
Members of Congress a list of what they are going to acquire.
They can just go ahead with the money that has been
appropriated to them under the appropriation authority, and
they can go ahead and condemn property and take it.
CARA says no to that. CARA says, from now on, before you
take any property, you have to say what you want, you have to
send letters to the Members of Congress and publish it in the
local newspapers. And if it is an unwilling seller, you can't
take it unless Congress specifically passes a new act saying
you can take that property from an unwilling seller. They have
to pass a whole new act.
Otherwise, the only way you can acquire that property is if
the person wants to sell it to you. Now, that is a huge
improvement over current law that I think private property
advocates ought to take account of.
This CARA bill protects private property in ways that the
current law does not, and everybody, unfortunately, is missing
that.
If we let the current law stand, and we let the Presidents
and the appropriators continue to ask for and spend a half
billion dollars a year in acquiring property, current law
allows the agencies to take what they want, when they want,
from whom they want, without Congress ever specifically saying,
``Yes, we want it so badly we're going to let you
expropriate,'' or we're going to let you take it in a way that
doesn't require willing seller.
This law says, you have to have a willing seller or else
you have to come back to Congress, specifically identify the
site after notice to all the parties, and then make a decision
here in Congress to buy it.
That is a huge improvement over current law. That is a huge
improvement.
And I know you come here to protect private property
rights, and I applaud you for that. I am standing with you.
What I am saying is that current law is so much weaker in these
areas than is CARA. And that makes a great deal of difference
to me.
And one final point, because I know we have time limits,
Mr. Chairman, but in Louisiana--I know Jack Caldwell knows
this. In Louisiana, we have something called the civil law. It
is a little different from common law. But when you study them
both, you see that they end up arriving at the same place, in
time, when it comes to private property.
In Louisiana, we divide property ownership in three parts:
the use of the property, which is the rentals on the property;
the fruits of the property, that is, the crops you might grow
or whatever you might take from the property; and the naked
ownership, the right to sell it and to make profit from it in a
sale.
The right to sell it is an integral right to the property
owner.
Now, what I don't understand from some of my friends in the
private property protection community is that I think sometimes
we fail to respect that right.
If I want to sell my property, and I want to sell it to a
conservation organization or to the Federal Government for a
park or a refuge, if I want to sell it to them to build an
airport, if I want to sell to them because they are the best
buyer and they can make the most profit for me, you ought to be
fighting and I ought to be fighting for the right of that
private property owner to sell it whomever he wants, including
the public purpose, if that is what he wants.
CARA protects that. It says we will protect the right of
willing sellers to sell. And if you are not a willing seller,
unless Congress says specifically the government can take your
property, it can't take it.
And it restates the incredibly important provision you cite
in the Constitution, which I have cited a thousand times at
this Committee, that the government does not have a right to
take your property through regulations or through any other
means without fully compensating you under the Fifth Amendment
of the Constitution.
I guess what I am trying to say, Ms. Callahan, is CARA is
so much of an improvement over current law, and CARA recognizes
the reality of the fact that government is going to buying
property. It is buying a ton of it every year.
And if we are going to be buying a ton of it every year,
maybe we ought to put a cap on the acquisitions and maybe we
ought to encourage the government to swap property instead and
dispose of property it doesn't need instead.
And maybe we ought to tell the government, you can't go
around taking property from people without paying them. And you
ought to always work with willing sellers whenever you can. And
if you can't, you better doggone well come back to Congress and
make a good case for it.
That is a heck of nice improvement over current law.
And, Mr. Chairman, I know I have gone on long, but I just
wish all of our friends in the property rights movement would
at least recognize what CARA improves in private property
rights over the current state of the law.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Thornberry.
Mr. Thornberry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I certainly recognize that the private property rights
provisions in CARA are an improvement over current law. I don't
see how anybody can look at the black letter of the law and
question that they are better than what we have now.
Now, there are other parts of CARA that give people some
concerns. But if you just compare what we have versus what is
in CARA, they are certainly an improvement.
I am concerned, however, that they don't improve enough and
that there may be a little bit less there than meets the eye.
And I am sorry, I know the Chairman from Louisiana has a lot of
other commitments. We had a discussion earlier with some of the
witnesses about what a willing seller really means, and whether
it is possible to have friendly condemnation when you have an
agency which continues to harass you. And the Chairman knows
the kinds of things I am talking about.
That is why I think there are improvements that can be made
and should be made to CARA. But, Mr. Chairman, it is why I also
think that with or without CARA, we have to put something into
the law under the Land and Water Conservation Fund to put some
private property rights there.
Again, with or without CARA--
Mr. Tauzin. Would my friend yield a second?
Mr. Thornberry. Of course.
Mr. Tauzin. And I will be glad to ask additional time. I
don't want to take his time.
Let me concur with that. And let me assure my friend that
in our negotiations on CARA, we tried to get in even better
protections.
One of the things we did get in there that I think is very
important for the point the gentleman was making is that we
have in here a provision that says the Federal Government gains
no regulatory authority over property that has been identified
for acquisition within the boundaries of an existing proposed
land management unit.
That was one of the areas that Mr. Pombo and I know you and
others, particularly members out West, were so interested in,
because the Federal Government has used the maps of proposed
acquisitions to go in and regulate the dickens out of property
until you want to become a willing seller by force. That is
hardly a willing seller.
So let me concur with the gentleman. I think his crusade to
stop the Federal Government from harassing people into becoming
willing sellers is a good crusade. And I will join him in it.
I just want to point out that we did include in here at
least one good feature that stops the Federal Government from
imposing regulatory authority that it doesn't have over areas
just because they drew a map of proposed acquisitions. And that
was an incredibly important provision in here.
Thank you, sir.
Mr. Thornberry. I appreciate the gentleman's comments. And
I agree with them, except they will not solve all of the
harassment that goes on. And we heard some of that earlier in
the testimony today.
And so my bottom line is that with or without CARA we have
to find some way to get these protections.
I certainly appreciate the testimony and perspective of all
the witnesses today.
Certainly, we have heard, Mr. Chairman, there are a number
of good ways to spread this royalty money around all over the
country.
I do have to note, following up on a comment from my
colleague from Wyoming earlier today, we have had testimony in
the last two panels from state and local officials from
California, North Carolina, and Georgia, none of which help
produce these moneys that they are eager to spend.
But nonetheless, there are a lot of good purposes out
there. I just think we have to be very careful about having--
and I appreciate the negotiating ability of the gentleman from
Louisiana, the gentleman from Alaska, and others. But I do
believe that there is still a shortfall that could be made up
to put the protections in there that will help prevent some of
the harassment and some of the kinds of things we have heard
earlier today, where a landowner is pushed toward becoming a
willing seller perhaps against his will.
So I appreciate the time today, Mr. Chairman, and your
patience.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman from Texas and the
gentleman from Louisiana for their excellent remarks.
You know, the frustration of this Committee, if I may say
so, is what you do with public ground. We have held 11 hearings
in my 20-some years here on how you handle public ground.
If you want to see a fudge factory, see the BLM, the Forest
Service, and the Park Service. Try to figure out, to sell,
swap, buy, trade. It is almost impossible.
I have used the following illustration: When I was city
councilman 40 years ago, we tried to swap some ground in the
little town of Farmington. We worked on it for 12 years. We
couldn't get it done.
I then went to the State legislature, where I was speaker
of the House. I had the Forest Service come in, and we couldn't
get it done.
We finally had to come to Congress and pass an omnibus bill
for 12 different states on little things for little communities
who couldn't get it done with either the BLM, the Park Service
or the Forest Service.
The most frustrating experience you can go through is what
we are talking about.
Both of these gentlemen have brought up some very
interesting ideas. I hope that this is a step forward in
getting things done. And in no way, shape or form do we want to
hurt--I don't think there is a person on the Committee who
wants to in any way, shape or form have the heavy hand of
government, the Federal Government, take away their rights and
think--
Mr. Tauzin. Would the gentleman yield a second?
The Chairman. I would be happy to yield.
Mr. Tauzin. I think it is important to make a point here.
The gentleman makes some extraordinarily good points. I mean, I
am ready to stand shoulder to shoulder with him and tackle
Federal regulators who do this to people, because they do it in
my state and they do it to my people as well, and I get as
angry as you do about. And I know it occurs probably more often
out West than it does in some of our states.
But remember, I live in a wet state. I have to deal wetland
laws and all sorts of things, where people twist and bend the
regulatory of the Federal Government in ways that are shocking
to me sometimes.
I had a priest trying to build a boys' club, a boys' home,
to help wayward young men in our state. And I had all kinds of
surveys and engineers view that property, and they approved it
for the building of that facility--and all people who were
approved of by the Corps of Engineers for that purpose.
And yet the corps followed right behind them and condemned
it all as wetland property and denied the building.
And you see those kinds of things happening. This is high
and dry property. Even in 38 inches of rainfall, it didn't
flood. It is high and dry property.
So I know what the gentleman talks about. And so that
person is left--if you can't sell it someone who can use it,
what does he do with it. The government literally is taking the
value of that property away when it could have been put to an
extraordinarily useful purpose.
And it is not serving any wetlands purposes in my state, I
promise you. We have a lot of real wetlands in the state; not
that one.
So let me first say my sympathies are with the gentleman.
But my concern is that when we can come to agreements that
advance the cause of property rights, owners, in America as
significantly as this list I sort of read off, and we say,
``Well, it doesn't go all the way so we are not going to do it.
We can't accomplish everything, so we won't accomplish what we
can accomplish,'' I also get frustrated.
My concern is that, in this legislative process, we are
often at that juncture where we say, well, we can't get
everything so we will settle for nothing. I am at the point
where, after many years of fighting property rights battles,
when I can win significant improvements over current law, I try
to win them.
And that is my only point to the gentleman. I hope we don't
miss the opportunity with CARA, because there is an awful lot
people who want other things in CARA, who are willing to give
us these improvements in property rights in exchange.
We may never have this opportunity again. When it is
strictly a fight between us and them on private property
rights, we lose. Now we have them with us because they want
some other things in CARA that are equally good, parks and, you
know, all the other, preservation, conservation efforts.
This is the kind of thing where I just think we ought not
miss the opportunity to win what we can when we are making
significant improvements. And that is my only point.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman for his comments.
And I couldn't agree more. What a problem.
I look at Section 404 of the Clean Water Act. Holy cow,
have you ever seen a problem as big as that? It just is one of
the things that just blows my mind.
And the thing the lady from the Dinosaur area up in Utah
and Colorado talked about, extortion by the Federal Government,
really bothers me. And I have seen that, and the pressure, it
is kind of subtle in some ways, sometimes heavy handed. A
terrible thing for people to do.
But it runs the other way sometimes. I had gentleman call
me because I was Chairman of the Parks Subcommittee for a
number of years and he had an in-holding in one of our parks.
I said, ``How much you got?''
And he said, ``I've got 3 acres.''
And I said, ``Well, we're interested in getting those. Are
you willing to sell?''
And he said, ``Absolutely.''
And here it is, stuck in a huge park. And I said, ``How
much do you want for it?''
And he says, ``$6 million.''
I mean, it is totally ridiculous. I said, ``Would you go to
binding arbitration?'' I said, ``Maybe we can arrange that.''
He said, ``No, I don't want to do that. I want $6
million.''
I said, ``How old are you?''
He said, ``I'm 89.''
I said, ``Well, just wait a little while.''
[Laughter.]
Anyway, with that in mind, let me thank all of you for a
very interesting hearing. I appreciate everybody who is here.
All of your points were well-taken, and we will look forward to
things that you have written. And we also hope that you will
respond to questions if they come up.
The Chairman. And with that, we stand adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:43 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
[A letter submitted for the record by Secretary Gale Norton
follows:]
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[The prepared statement of Mr. Young follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Don Young, a Representative in Congress from
the State of Alaska
Thank you, Chairman Hansen, for holding this hearing on H.R. 701,
the Conservation and Reinvestment Act and Mr. Thornberry's H.R. 1592,
the Constitutional Land Acquisition Act. I will focus my comments on
the Conservation and Reinvestment Act, the bill known as CARA.
I would like to add my enthusiasm for the fact that CARA has
surpassed 218 cosponsors today. This is an important milestone and I am
impressed with how quickly our colleagues have returned to this
comprehensive, bipartisan conservation legislation.
At the end of last Congress, many were left wondering if a single-
year of high appropriations would remove the need for annual and
dedicated funding for conservation and recreation. I think that we will
hear today that CARA is still needed to provide federal dollars for
state-based conservation and recreation.
The promise of substantial and annual appropriations for wildlife,
the Land and Water Conservation Fund, Historic Preservation and Payment
In-Lieu of Taxes has always been an empty promise. For the states to
have the assurance of consistent funding, we must pass CARA this
Congress.
Last year, CARA passed the House with a supermajority and
bipartisan vote of 315 to 102. It was especially rewarding that a
majority of both Republicans and Democrats joined together to pass this
large conservation legislation. Unfortunately, the other body was only
able to pass CARA out of Committee and did not have enough time to put
a bill before the President. This year, we have a new opportunity to
pass this historic legislation in the House early and allow the other
body more time in its consideration.
Today's hearing is a great first step to that goal and one that
allows all interested groups and individuals the opportunity to testify
and submit testimony. Since this bill is so similar, I don't expect
that we will receive many new comments or suggestions. Rather, I expect
that we will build upon the five days of legislative hearings held
during the last Congress.
I understand that the Resources Committee received testimony from
nearly 90 individuals in the 106th Congress. This hearing provides a
forum for individuals to comment on the few changes that were made to
the bill and allows others another opportunity to share their opinions
on the bill.
An ongoing issue for the Conservation and Reinvestment Act is the
notion that property rights are not protected within the bill. As a
champion of protecting the rights of landowners I have found this claim
troubling--mainly because it is, quite frankly, false.
Current law does not provide protections for property owners, CARA
provides substantial property rights protections. Current law does not
prohibit the Administration from unilaterally taking someone's property
into federal ownership--CARA does. Current law does not require
notification when the government seeks to buy private lands--CARA does.
These are only two of the many property protections found within
the Conservation and Reinvestment Act. In addition, CARA continues to
provide Congressional oversight of new federal Land and Water
Conservation Fund acquisitions through the Congressional appropriations
process. In fact, we strengthen that process to further protect
landowners.
By adding protections that do not exist today for federal land
acquisition and providing stable funding for conservation and
recreation, CARA is a win-win. It provides the funding necessary for
comprehensive, state-based conservation and recreation programs, while
providing property protections that would not be viable on their own.
It is time to report CARA from the Resources Committee and send it
to the House floor for consideration. CARA is sound policy that holds
the support of more than 5,000 organizations that are joined by our
Nation's governors, county leaders and mayors. We must not hesitate in
acting on the will of the House and work to pass CARA as early as
possible.
Thank you Chairman Hansen for holding this hearing today. I look
forward to listening to the witnesses assembled.
______
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Cubin follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Barbara Cubin, a Representative in Congress
from the State of Wyoming, on H.R. 701 and H.R. 1592
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this important hearing on H.R.
701 and H.R. 1592.
In the 106th Congress I heard from group after group in Wyoming,
and across the nation, who had extreme difficulties with CARA. The
107th Congress has been no different.
I will be the first to recognize that coastal states, such as
Louisiana, are not receiving a fair amount of royalty revenues to
address their conservation concerns and I am more than willing to work
with these states to fix this problem.
Having said that, I continue to have several basic philosophical
differences with provisions within CARA. First, my primary concern is
that this legislation establishes a trust fund for the purpose of land
acquisition. I maintain that the federal government cannot manage the
lands it has now, including the addition of several million acres of
new National Monuments. The last thing I will advocate for is more
federal land in the West.
Second, I continue to be concerned with where the money will come
from specifically. It obviously can't just fall from the heavens. I am
convinced CARA will prosper at the expense of other yet unnamed
programs that many in this room will later fight for in order to
maintain that program's funding level. I fear that in the rush for
short term fixes to many funding needs, we will pay far greater
sacrifices from equally important long term initiatives.
Finally, I am still highly concerned about private property rights
being infringed upon through new government land acquisitions. While
CARA does create a good starting point, I look to Mr. Thornberry's H.R.
1592, the Constitutional Land Acquisition Act, to further protect
private property owners and their lands from current law.
I look forward to the testimony today on these bills as we move
forward to finding a solution more palatable to all parties involved.
______
[The prepared statement of Mr. Otter follows:]
Statement of The Honorable C.L. ``Butch'' Otter, a Representative in
Congress from the State of Idaho
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate your holding this hearing this morning
on H.R. 701--the Conservation and Reinvestment Act (CARA), and H.R.
1592--the Constitutional Land Acquisition Act.
While H.R. 701, is certainly well-intentioned, as are my colleagues
who support it, I, like many of my western colleagues, must oppose it.
Federal ownership of Idaho lands now equals nearly 64 percent--a total
of 20 million acres. Apparently if H.R. 701 passes, that number would
increase substantially, because the bill establishes an off-budget
dedicated trust fund for substantially more federal and state
acquisition and ownership of lands across the United States.
I am concerned that the bill would authorize Congress to deposit
more than $42 billion of Outer Continental Shelf oil royalties into the
trust fund over the next fifteen years to enable the federal and state
governments, and other special interest groups to purchase land for
``conservation.'' Mr. Chairman, that's an extraordinary amount of money
that could be used for so many other important priorities.
H.R. 701 would require states to match federal monies provided to
them for land acquisition. Requiring so much local and state matching
acquisition funds could impact other important state and local
priorities such as education, crime prevention, and other vital
services. Inevitably, acquisition of new land would also require
millions of dollars in increased funding for maintenance of lands on
top of the substantial maintenance backlogs that the federal government
has already amassed.
In addition, it could imperil private property rights by
strengthening the hand of government and special interests at taxpayer
expense. The Founding Fathers defended private property rights as a
fundamental tenant of the United States Constitution. I cannot support
legislation that could weaken that important principle.
While I do not support H.R. 701, I am an original co-sponsor of my
friend and colleague, Representative Thornberry's bill--H.R. 1592--the
Constitutional Land Acquisition Act. This measure will provide
protection to real property owners whose property is within or adjacent
to a federal unit. It provides stronger notice requirements for
acquisitions. It prohibits the use of funds for acquisition by
condemnation. And it restricts the the use of acquired property for
other than public outdoor recreation purposes. Mr. Chairman, Idaho's
citizens deserve the protection that H.R. 1592 would give them, and I
urge its passage.
This hearing is important to the lives and prosperity of thousands
of people who live far away from Washington, D.C. Unfortunately, most
will not be afforded the time and cannot afford to be here today. That
is why I and a number of other members of Congress are requesting today
that the House Resources Committee do not mark-up H.R. 701 until the
Committee holds additional field hearings. While many are for or
against CARA, I believe we should all support additional hearings
closer to the people most affected, so that they have a say in
legislation of such magnitude.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your leadership and commitment to the
values and constitutional property rights of every citizen.
______
[The prepared statement of Mr. Tom Udall follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Tom Udall, a Representative in Congress from
the State of New Mexico
Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, of the two measures before the
committee today, I would like to make a brief comment on H.R. 701, the
Conservation and Reinvestment Act. I strongly support this bill because
of the role it has in improving the quality of American life and
conserving important natural resources. CARA addresses this national
need because it provides lasting protection for our nation's special
public lands and wildlife. Across our country there is tremendous
pressure to develop farmland and open space yet at the same time,
coastlines and marine resources are highly stressed and we need more
wildlife habitat and recreation areas.
My father, former Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall, has
rightly called the Land and Water Conservation Fund Act landmark
legislation that will be remembered for years to come. My father's
words still ring true because CARA is as important today as when he
served as Secretary of the Interior, over 30 years ago.
My father and others working on this bill in the 1960's were
successful because these initiatives were the result of bipartisan
input that looked ahead to generations of Americans yet unborn. In
fact, the idea for creating a Land and Water Conservation Fund came
from a bi-partisan commission sitting on Lawrence Rockefeller's Outdoor
Recreation Resources Review Commission were: four Senators, 2 Democrats
and 2 Republicans, four Representatives also split 2 and 2, and 7
presidential appointees including groups as diverse as the Wilderness
Society and the American Cattlemen's Association. This bi-partisan
commission translated its work into sound proposals, and Congress then
passed the Land and Water Conservation Fund Act with virtually
unanimous support.
H.R. 701 has had and should continue to have broad bi-partisan
support in the House. The 107th Congress should take the example of the
88th Congress' success and demonstrate that we also can also work
together to pass landmark legislation, such as H.R. 701.
By joining with each other in a meaningful, bi-partisan dialogue,
individuals like my father and his colleagues were able to leave as
their legacy the invaluable gift of protected wildlands and wildlife.
It's now our turn as their heirs to do the same thing for our children.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund helps all of us in our
respective states by protecting invaluable lands and resources. For
example, my district in New Mexico has been awarded over $25 million in
federal and $10 million in state funds for projects such as:
LThe Chaco Culture National Historic Park;
LBandelier National Monument;
LThe Chama Playground;
LThe Rodriguez Baseball Park in Las Vegas, New Mexico;
LA High School Recreation Park in Raton;
LA Recreation Park Development in Zuni; and
LA Red Rock Campground in Gallup, New Mexico.
As you can see, these are projects that support much needed state
and local programs and speak to the fact that CARA supports not only
federal projects but also local ones. As I conclude, I am reminded of
John Chafee who loved to quote Teddy Roosevelt's observation that ``of
all the great questions which can come before this nation, short of the
actual preservation of its existence in a great war, there is none
which compares in importance with the central task of leaving this land
even a better land for our descendants than it is for us.''
Mr. Chairman and Mr. Ranking Member, I support CARA and urge all of
my colleagues--regardless of the side of the aisle on which they sit--
to support H.R. 701.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to today's hearing.
______
[The prepared statement of Ms. McCollum follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Betty McCollum, a Representative in Congress
from the State of Minnesota
Thank you Mr. Chair. I am deeply honored to be able to introduce
Bobby Whitefeather, Chairman of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa.
Chairman Whitefeather was raised in a small, traditional Indian
community on the Red Lake Reservation in Northern Minnesota. After
serving the United States honorably in the Vietnam War, Chairman
Whitefeather has worked on behalf of his people on the reservation for
the past 15 years. First elected to Treasurer, Chairman Whitefeather
served as Secretary before becoming Chairman of the Red Lake Band of
Chippewa.
While economic development is a priority for Chairman Whitefeather,
conservation has also played an important role in his professional
career. He has testified before Congress in the past on matters such as
improving tribal conservation enforcement capability, strengthening
educational opportunities in fish and wildlife management for tribal
members and has worked for equitable access to federal aid that helps
restore fish and other wildlife.
Closer to home, Chairman Whitefeather initiated a series of
meetings between the state and federal government in 1997 after walleye
stocks in the Red Lakes in Northern Minnesota had been devastated by
over fishing. This partnership led to one of the largest freshwater
fish recovery programs in America today, and one of the most successful
so early in the process. Two years ago Chairman Whitefeather was
honored by the Great Lakes Region of the Native American Fish and
Wildlife Society with a special award honoring his longstanding
commitment to conservation.
Chairman Whitefeather has been active in the area of Indian issues
throughout his career. He is a past officer of the National Congress of
American Indians. He is currently President of the Midwest Alliance of
Sovereign Tribes and he serves on a number of Bureau of Indian Affairs
and self-governance committees at the regional and national level.
Ojibwe is the Chairman's first language. And while ojibwe is a
language unknown to many, the Chairman has become an effective voice
for the Chippewa and all Native People. It is my honor today to
introduce Chairman Bobby Whitefeather.
______
The following additional information was submitted for the
record:
LLetter from G. Ray Arnett, Stockton, California
LStatement of Juan N. Babauta, Resident
Representative, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
LLetter from Nolan Colegrove, Sr., Forest Manager,
Hoopa Valley Tribe, Hoopa, California
LLetter from Allen Garber, Commissioner, Minnesota
Department of Natural Resources, St. Paul, Minnesota
LStatement of the National Governors Association
LLetter from Olney Patt, Jr., Chairman, Tribal
Council of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Reservation
of Oregon
LLetter from Ronald J. Regan, Commissioner,
Department of Fish and Wildlife, State of Vermont
LLetter from Sarah Taylor-Rogers, Ph.D., Secretary,
Maryland Department of Natural Resources, Annapolis, Maryland
LLetters from Thomas P. Walters, Washington
Representative, on behalf of the Counties of Riverside, San
Diego, and Ventura, California
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