[Senate Hearing 110-266]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 110-266
MISCELLANEOUS NATIONAL PARKS LEGISLATION
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL PARKS
of the
COMMITTEE ON
ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
ON
S. 128 S. 1476
S. 148 S. 1709
S. 189 S. 1808
S. 697 S. 1969
S. 867 H.R. 299
S. 1039 H.R. 1239
S. 1341
__________
SEPTEMBER 27, 2007
Printed for the use of the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
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COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico, Chairman
DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico
BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho
RON WYDEN, Oregon LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota RICHARD BURR, North Carolina
MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana JIM DeMINT, South Carolina
MARIA CANTWELL, Washington BOB CORKER, Tennessee
KEN SALAZAR, Colorado JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama
BLANCHE L. LINCOLN, Arkansas GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont JIM BUNNING, Kentucky
JON TESTER, Montana MEL MARTINEZ, Florida
Robert M. Simon, Staff Director
Sam E. Fowler, Chief Counsel
Frank Macchiarola, Republican Staff Director
Judith K. Pensabene, Republican Chief Counsel
------
Subcommittee on National Parks
DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii, Chairman
BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota RICHARD BURR, North Carolina
MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
KEN SALAZAR, Colorado BOB CORKER, Tennessee
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
BLANCHE L. LINCOLN, Arkansas JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon
JON TESTER, Montana MEL MARTINEZ, Florida
Jeff Bingaman and Pete V. Domenici are Ex Officio Members of the
Subcommittee
C O N T E N T S
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STATEMENTS
Page
Akaka, Hon. Daniel K., U.S. Senator From Hawaii.................. 1
Allard, Hon. Wayne, U.S. Senator From Colorado................... 9
Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., U.S. Senator From Delaware........... 4
Brooks, Tom, Assistant Vice President and Chief Engineer, Alaska
Railroad, Anchorage, AK........................................ 41
Burr, Hon. Richard, U.S. Senator From North Carolina............. 9
Carlino, August R., CEO and President, Steel Industry Heritage
Corporation, Homestead, PA..................................... 42
Casey, Hon. Robert P., Jr., U.S. Senator From Pennsylvania....... 3
Kennedy, Hon. Edward M., U.S. Senator From Massachusetts......... 3
Kyl, Hon. Jon, U.S. Senator From Arizona......................... 4
Lautenberg, Hon. Frank R., U.S. Senator From New Jersey.......... 5
Levin, Hon. Carl, U.S. Senator From Michigan..................... 11
Menendez, Hon. Robert, U.S. Senator From New Jersey.............. 7
Murkowski, Hon. Lisa, U.S. Senator From Alaska................... 6
Pascrell, Hon. Bill, Jr., U.S. Representive From New Jersey...... 16
Salazar, Hon. Ken, U.S. Senator From Colorado.................... 14
Specter, Hon. Arlen, U.S. Senator From Pennsylvania.............. 2
Wenk, Daniel N., Deputy Director, National Park Service,
Department of the Interior..................................... 19
Zax, Leonard A., Partner, Latham & Watkins, LLP, on Behalf of the
New Jersey Community Development Corporation................... 46
APPENDIXES
Appendix I
Responses to additional questions................................ 61
Appendix II
Additional material submitted for the record..................... 73
MISCELLANEOUS NATIONAL PARKS LEGISLATION
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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2007
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on National Parks,
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:28 p.m. in
room SD-366, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Daniel K.
Akaka presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DANIEL K. AKAKA, U.S. SENATOR FROM
HAWAII
Senator Akaka. Good morning, everyone. The Subcommittee on
National Parks will come to order.
In an effort to address the many requests we have received
for hearings on Park-related bills in as timely a manner as
possible, we're going to continue our recent practice of
considering as many bills as possible at each hearing.
This afternoon we will receive testimony on 11 different
bills, including S. 128, to amend the Cache La Poudre River
Corridor Act to designate a new management entity and make
other amendments; S. 148, to establish the Paterson Great Falls
National Park in the State of New Jersey; S. 189, to decrease
the matching funds requirement and authorize additional
appropriations for Keweenaw National Historical Park in the
State of Michigan; S. 697, to establish the Steel Industry
National Historic Site in the State of Pennsylvania; S. 867 and
H.R. 299, to adjust the boundary of Lowell National Historical
Park in the State of Massachusetts; S. 1039 to extend the
authorization for the Coastal Heritage Trail in the State of
New Jersey; S. 1341, to provide for the exchange of certain
Bureau of Land Management in Pima County, Arizona; S. 1476, to
authorize the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a special
resources study of the Tule Lake Segregation Center in
California, to determine the suitability and feasibility of
including the site in the National Park System; S. 1709 and
H.R. 1239, to amend the National Underground Railroad Network
to Freedom Act of 1998 to provide additional staff and funding
to carry out the Act; S. 1808, to authorize the exchange of
land between the National Park Service and the Alaska Railroad
in Denali National Park in the State of Alaska; and S. 1969, to
authorize the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a special
resource study to determine the suitability and feasibility of
designating Estate Grange and other sites related to Alexander
Hamilton's life on the island of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin
Islands as a unit of the National Park System.
After reviewing the Administration's testimony, I believe
most of these bills will be non-controversial. However, there
are two bills that propose new National Park areas despite a
contrary recommendation from the Park Service Study. I'm
concerned with any proposal that ignores the requirements and
criteria for new park areas, that this committee helped put
into place. I wanted to give the proponents of those areas a
chance to present their views. So, we have included both bills
on this agenda and we can review these in greater detail later
in the hearing.
[The prepared statements of Senators Specter, Casey,
Kennedy, Kyl, Biden, and Lautenberg follow:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Arlen Specter, U.S. Senator From
Pennsylvania, on S. 697
Mr Chairman, thank you for including this legislation in your
hearing today that will honor the importance of the steel industry in
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the nation by creating the ``Steel
Industry National Historic Site'' to be operated by the National Park
Service. I have introduced this bill dating back to the 107th Congress
and it is my hope it will at last become law. We came very close to
passing this bill in the 108th Congress with its passage in various
forms in the House and the Senate. However, Congress adjourned prior to
final passage of the same bill in both chambers during the 108th and
109th Congresses.
The importance of the steel industry to the development of the
United States cannot be overstated. A national historic site devoted to
the history of the steel industry will afford all Americans the
opportunity to celebrate this rich heritage, which is symbolic of the
work ethic endemic to this great nation. There is no better place for
such a site than in southwestern Pennsylvania, which played a
significant role in early industrial America and continues today.
It is important to note why Pennsylvania should be the home of the
national site my legislation authorizes. The combination of a strong
workforce, valuable natural resources, and Pennsylvania's strategic
location in the heavily populated northeastern United States allowed
the steel industry to thrive. Today, the remaining buildings and sites
devoted to steel production are threatened with further deterioration.
Many of these sites are nationally significant and perfectly suited for
the study and interpretation of this crucial period in our nation's
development. The historic site would include three properties: the
Carrie Furnace Complex, the Hot Metal Bridge, and the United States
Steel Homestead Works. As testimony of the area's historic
significance, on September 20, 2006, the Carrie Furnaces were
designated as a National Historic Landmark by the Secretary of the
Interior.
Highlights of such a national historic site would commemorate a
wide range of accomplishments and topics for historical preservation
and interpretation from industrial process advancements to labor-
management relations. It is important to note that the site I seek to
become a national site under this bill includes the location of the
Battle of Homestead, waged in 1892 between steelworkers and Pinkerton
guards. The Battle of Homestead marked a crucial period in our nation's
workers' rights movement. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,
individuals, and public and private entities have attempted to protect
and preserve resources such as the Homestead battleground and the Hot
Metal Bridge. For the benefit and inspiration of present and future
generations, it is time for the federal government to join this effort
to recognize their importance with the additional protection I provide
in this bill.
I would like to commend my colleagues who have joined me in
supporting the Steel Industry National Historic Site. Senator Casey
joined as a cosponsor this Congress and Representative Doyle has been a
longstanding leader in this preservation effort and has consistently
sponsored identical legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives. I
commend the southwestern Pennsylvania officials and Mr. August Carlino,
President and Chief Executive Officer of the Steel Industry Heritage
Corporation, who have worked tirelessly to bring this national historic
site to fruition.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Robert P. Casey, Jr., U.S. Senator From
Pennsylvania, on S. 697
Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding today's hearing and for giving
me the opportunity to testify on S. 697, the Steel Industry National
Historic Site Act. I am proud to join my colleagues from Pennsylvania,
Senator Specter and Congressman Doyle, in sponsoring this legislation.
The introduction of S. 697 and the House companion bill H.R. 285 is the
culmination of our effort to establish a unit of the National Parks
System that honors the contributions of Southwestern Pennsylvania to
our nation's steel industry. The story of the steel industry is linked
to the history and the identity of Pennsylvania, and we are very proud
of this heritage.
With only 391 National Park sites across the country, additions to
the National Park System must be reserved for locations with special
historical or environmental significance. In my view, the assets of
this particular site, including the Carrie Furnace Complex, the United
States Steel Homestead Works, and the Hot Metal Bridge meet this high
standard because of their central importance in the history of the
steel industry to the development of both our country's unsurpassed
economic vitality as well as the vigorous workforce that fueled such
achievements.
The wide availability of domestically-produced steel has
represented the backbone of the United States economy since the mid-
19th century. It was at sites like the Carrie Furnace, which first
opened in 1907, that fuel and ore would combine to produce pig iron,
the main ingredient of steel. At its peak, Carrie produced 900 to 1000
tons of this every day, which, when combined with the massive steel
production capabilities across the river at the Homestead Works, helped
to establish the Pittsburgh region as the world's leading producer of
iron and steel during the late 19th and 20th centuries. As a nation
that relied upon these structures to produce the materials to build our
national highways and railroads, fight two world wars, and erect the
skylines of our most vibrant cities, we cannot afford to let them fall
victim to the strains of age or the perils of redevelopment.
But the lessons that these sites have to impart to this and future
generations extend far beyond the mechanics of pre-World War II iron
and steel making technology. The rise of Pittsburgh's steel industry
was naturally accompanied by the development of a large and organized
workforce. Specifically, the experiences of the Amalgamated Association
of Iron and Steelworkers at the end of the 19th century at Homestead
provide a troubling yet critical reminder of the sacrifices that
organized labor has made in the pursuit of fair and equitable working
standards for the millions who have and continue to toil in this
industry every day. We owe these brave men and women a proper stage to
tell their story, and this Congress has the opportunity to make this
possible through the powerful and prominent dais afforded by a National
Historic Site.
Thank you once again, Mr. Chairman, for including S. 697 in today's
hearing. I would also like to extend my gratitude to Mr. August Carlino
for offering his expert testimony and for responding to any concerns
the committee may have. His tireless efforts over the last seventeen
years are the primary reason that this effort has gained such
widespread appeal.
I hope that the Subcommittee and the full Committee will act
swiftly to report this measure to the full Senate so that we might move
one step further towards its final passage in the 110th Congress.
Thank you.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Edward M. Kennedy, U.S. Senator From
Massachusetts, on S. 867 and H.R. 299
I commend Chairman Akaka and Senator Burr for holding this hearing.
Senator Kerry and I introduced the Lowell Park Boundary Adjustment Bill
last March, shortly after the House passed Congressman Meehan's
identical legislation, and I appreciate this opportunity to emphasize
my strong support for it, which will add an historically important
recreational resource in Massachusetts.
The bill would authorize the National Park Service to acquire five
tracts of land expanding the current boundary of the Park. The land
totals less than one acre, but its inclusion in the Park will complete
a 5 mile scenic walkway along Lowell's historic canal system. The
finished walkway will improve public access to the Park and its vast
collection of cultural relics and information about its famous canal-
powered factories during the Industrial Revolution.
I had the privilege nearly thirty years ago, with Congressman Paul
Tsongas and Senator Ed Brooke, to sponsor the original legislation
creating the National Historical Park. Each year, it holds festivals,
art exhibitions, community service events and concerts for three-
quarters of a million visitors. In recent years, the National Park
Service has continued to work with the City of Lowell to maintain and
develop the city's famous canal walkways and river-walk.
Passage of this legislation will enable the historic canal walkway
project to be completed, so that visitors will have a fuller experience
of the nation's industrial heritage.
I look forward to the enactment of this legislation and I commend
the Subcommittee for holding this hearing.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Jon Kyl, U.S. Senator From Arizona, on S.
1341
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for holding
this hearing on S. 1341, the Las Cienegas Enhancement and Saguaro
National Park Boundary Adjustment Act of 2007. I introduced this bill
on behalf of myself and Senator McCain on May 9, 2007. An identical
companion bill, H.R. 3617, was introduced in the House of
Representatives by Congresswoman Giffords.
This legislation directs the exchange of land in southeastern
Arizona between the Secretary of the Interior and Las Cienegas
Conservation, LLC. Through the exchange, the Secretary of the Interior
would acquire two highly sought after private parcels of land. First,
the Secretary would acquire the ``Empirita-Simonson Property,''
approximately 2,392 acres of land adjacent to the Las Cienegas National
Conservation Area (NCA). The Empirita-Simonson property lies within the
``Sonoita Valley Acquisition Planning District'' established by Public
Law 106-538, which designated the Las Cienegas National Conservation
Area. The Act directed the Department of the Interior to acquire lands
from willing sellers within the planning district for inclusion within
the conservation area. Acquisition of the Empirita-Simonson property
for inclusion in the NCA will conserve and protect important wildlife
corridors between the Sky Island mountains surrounding and adjacent to
the Cienega Basin.
The Secretary would also acquire the Bloom Property, approximately
160 acres of land that was identified for inclusion in the Saguaro
National Park during a boundary study conducted by the National Park
Service in 1993. In 1994, using the data from the study, Congress
enacted legislation expanding the park and changed Saguaro's
designation from monument to park. At that time, the Bloom Property did
not have a willing seller and, therefore, was not added to the Park. I
am pleased to say circumstances have changed, and we are able to
include it in this exchange. The Bloom Property lies just south of the
Sweetwater Trail in Saguaro Park West. Acquisition of the Bloom
Property will connect Saguaro National Park with the Sweetwater
Preserve, an important wildlife corridor that offers hiking and
wildlife viewing for nearby residents and visitors.
In exchange for these two properties, the Secretary of the Interior
would transfer out of federal ownership the ``Sahuarita property,''
approximately 1,280 acres of land south of Tucson near Corona de
Tucson. The Sahuarita property is low-lying Sonoran desert and has been
identified for disposal by the Bureau of Land Management through its
land use planning process.
In addition to these important land acquisitions, the legislation
also accomplishes two other important objectives. First, the bill
limits water withdrawals at Cienega Creek. The land exchange is
conditioned on Las Cienegas Conservation, LLC conveying a 98-acre well
site to Pima County and relinquishing the water rights it controls. The
net result is a water savings of 1,050 acre-feet per year. This will
help preserve the Cienega Creek riparian area that provides habitat for
many bird species including, the endangered Southwestern Willow
Flycatcher, and important lowland populations of amphibians and
reptiles. Second, the bill provides the Forest Service with badly-
needed road access through the Empirita-Simonson property to the
Whetstone Mountains, a popular recreation and hunting destination.
This legislation is the product of consensus-building between the
Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, local officials,
and community groups. It is a balanced exchange that is fair and in the
public interest. I urge my colleagues to work with me to approve this
legislation at the earliest possible date.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Joseph R. Biden, Jr., U.S. Senator From
Delaware, on S. 1709
Mr. Chairman, distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, I thank
you for giving me the opportunity to speak in support of S. 1709, the
National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Reauthorization Act of
2007. I have introduced this legislation with my good friend and
colleague from Pennsylvania, Senator Specter, and I am pleased that we
are joined in this effort by Senators Alexander, Bayh, Cardin, Carper,
Clinton, Cochran, Kennedy, Kerry, Levin, Nelson and Obama.
The original Act, signed into law in 1998, has increased public
awareness of the Underground Railroad--a cornerstone in African
American heritage and history--with sites and programs in 29 states and
the District of Columbia. This is the only national program dedicated
to the preservation, interpretation and dissemination of Underground
Railroad history. Reauthorization of this bill will allow this
important work to continue.
Throughout this nation there are sites in the Underground Railroad
Network that, while still standing, have suffered structural damage.
There are also many sites that no longer house a physical structure,
but still are important to recognize. A good example is the Thomas
Garrett House, located in Wilmington in my home state of Delaware. The
Garrett House was the last station on the Underground Railroad before
the slaves reached freedom in Pennsylvania. It has been estimated that
Garrett, a well known Quaker, helped more than 2,000 runaway slaves
escape from the Southern states. The legislation being introduced today
will not only help pay to repair damaged structures, but also to
educate the general public about those sites that are no longer in
existence, like the Thomas Garrett House.
The Underground Railroad Network is a special part of American
history that we cannot afford to let slip away. Our legislation will
preserve these invaluable memorials and educational resources by
raising the authorization level from $500,000 to $2.5 million. We must
move now to ensure that the brave acts of these individuals, and the
struggles of those who sought freedom, are preserved for future
generations to observe and honor.
A companion bill was introduced in the House of Representatives,
H.R. 1239, by Representative Alcee L. Hastings and my friend and
colleague from Delaware, Representative Mike Castle. The House has
passed the measure and I hope that my colleagues in the Senate will
move quickly and act on this bill.
It is my honor, Mr. Chairman, to be here today, supporting this
bill so that this part of our nation's past will not be forgotten.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Frank R. Lautenberg, U.S. Senator From
New Jersey, on S. 148
The Great Falls in Paterson is the place that Alexander Hamilton
selected to launch what we have come to call the American Dream. In the
1790s, Hamilton announced to the world that Paterson would welcome
workers and entrepreneurs and expand opportunities for people of all
backgrounds, races, religions, and nationalities.
Unlike so many of Hamilton's contemporaries who called for a rural
agrarian society based on slave labor, Hamilton's economy would be
built through the work of free men and women. Hamilton's fight for
immigrants, and his battle against slavery, was part of an inclusive
view of how all Americans would benefit from a growing modern economy
based on freedom. Much of this was rooted in the fact that Alexander
Hamilton was himself a poor immigrant to America who believed that our
nation's future was dependent on others who would work hard to take
advantage of the boundless opportunities that America offered.
Hamilton sought to create an economic model in Paterson not
dependent primarily on one industry, but rather focused on diverse
manufacturers. In particular, his 1791 Report to the Congress called
for a wide variety of industries in America--including cotton,
sailcloth, flax, paper, nails, steel and ironwork for carriages, and
silk. As a result, Paterson became a leading manufacturer in every one
of these industries.
Paterson's water-powered mills were manufacturing cotton in the
1790s. These mills produced all of the sailcloth for every ship in the
American Navy at one point in the first half of the nineteenth century.
Paterson industrialists began silk production in 1827 and beginning in
the late 1800's, Paterson became the largest silk manufacturing and
dyeing center in the world.
One of America's leading economic historians, Professor Richard
Sylla of the NYU Stern School of Business, said in his Senate testimony
that Hamilton sought to make Paterson an ``incubator'' of
entrepreneurial startup businesses. Paterson entrepreneurs succeeded in
realizing Hamilton's vision.
I particularly appreciate Hamilton's efforts in Paterson because I
was raised in Paterson as the son of poor, hard-working immigrant
parents. My father worked in the silk mills of Paterson when Paterson
was known as the Silk City. After serving in the Army during World War
II, I joined with two friends who were brothers and whose parents also
were immigrants to Paterson and together, we created in Paterson
America's first major payroll services company. We worked very hard to
build this small entrepreneurial startup company into one of the
largest computing services companies in the world.
Notwithstanding the objections of the National Park Service,
Congress in 2001 directed the Secretary of the Interior to study making
the Paterson Great Falls National Historic District a part of the
National Park System. Now, six years later and after spending over
$250,000 on the study, the National Park Service claims Hamilton's
efforts and vision do not merit the designation of a national park.
More than 25 of the leading historians and other experts in America
have documented why the draft National Park Service Study is wrong. It
is shocking to read the way these distinguished scholars characterize
the key Park Service findings: ``a serious misreading of the historical
record'' . . . ``seriously deficient'' . . . ``demonstrably wrong'' . .
. ``analytically flawed and violates fundamental principals the
professionals use in studying historic resources.''
The fact is the Great Falls represent not only natural beauty, but
also the beginnings of American industry. Alexander Hamilton saw the
possibilities in 1778. He established the Society for Useful
Manufacturers in 1791 and the Industrial Revolution was launched. Great
Falls National Historic District still stands as a testament to the
American Dream of economic independence and should become America's
next national historical park.
At this time, I'd like to recognize a member, Senator
Murkowski for any statement she may have to make.
STATEMENT OF HON. LISA MURKOWSKI, U.S. SENATOR
FROM ALASKA
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate
the opportunity to very briefly present my statement on S.
1808. I will not be able to stay with the subcommittee this
afternoon, as I have a scheduling conflict with a hearing in
Foreign Relations, as we speak.
S. 1808, the Denali National Park in Alaska Railroad Land
Exchange Act of 2007 reflects a joint effort by the National
Park Service and the Alaska Railroad. Mr. Wenk of the National
Park Service and Mr. Brooks of the Alaska Railroad will, you'll
hear from them. I want to welcome Mr. Brooks to the committee.
He's come a long way to be with us and greatly appreciate the
work that he does for the Alaska Railroad.
They will both explain S. 1808, which would allow both
entities, both the Park Service and the Alaska Railroad, to
exchange lands, so that the Alaska Railroad can build a much-
needed train turnaround track in Denali National Park. This
wide track would allow more frequent trains and more flexible
rail schedules, thus accommodating the ever increasing number
of rail passengers that visit our park.
In the words of Mr. Brooks, ``This is a win-win for the
Alaska Railroad, for the National Park Service, and the
hundreds of thousands of visitors that would benefit from
access to our Nation's treasured Denali National Park.'' I am
also pleased to report that only did the National Park Service
and the Alaska Railroad support the legislation, but the
National Park Conservation Association also has submitted a
statement in support of S. 1808.
Mr. Chairman, I would ask that this statement be included
as part of the hearing record.
I do appreciate, again, the opportunity to kind of go out
of turn and appreciate the consideration of the Chairman and
this consideration of this important legislation.
Senator Akaka. Your statement will be included in the
record.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much.
Senator Menendez.
STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT MENENDEZ, U.S. SENATOR FROM NEW JERSEY
Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me start
off, Mr. Chairman, by thanking you and the Ranking Member for
holding this hearing on various of these parks applications,
but particularly on the Paterson Great Falls National Park Act
of 2007. I look forward to working with both of you to try to
enact this important legislation.
I know that we will be having witnesses today. I believe
Congressman Pascrell is going to, hopefully, appear before the
committee, Mr. Leonard Zax, who have been tireless advocates on
behalf of the Park. My senior Senator, Senator Lautenberg has
asked me to express his regrets for not being able to attend
today's hearing, but he remains deeply and personally committed
to seeing this legislation pass.
To understand Paterson and the Great Falls Park, one has to
understand the man most responsible for the city's founding,
Alexander Hamilton. He lived the American dream. When he came
to this country as a teenager, he did not have wealth, he did
not have land, and he did not have a respected family name.
Hamilton came here with nothing other than his talent, his
intellect, and his willingness to work hard to better himself.
From these meager beginnings, Hamilton became a Revolutionary
War Army officer, a lawyer, a founder of our Nation, a
politician, a leading statesman, a financier, and perhaps
America's most important political theorist.
Today, the concept of the American dream is so widely
accepted, it is almost a cliche, but what people forget, is
that at the time of our Nation's birth, there was no agreement
on what achieving the American dream truly was. Some thought
our future was largely an agrarian one, based on land ownership
handed down from generation to generation. Others thought our
society would be based on exploiting slave labor. Still others
believed we needed to copy the model for success Europe by
installing a class of elites to lead the country.
Alexander Hamilton's vision of the American dream was
different. He, more clearly than any other American at the time
of the founding, understood our future would be based on giving
immigrants the opportunity to come to this country in freedom,
use their natural talents to make a life for themselves and
their families. In return for this opportunity, immigrants
would help transform this country into the world's leading
industrial power.
In order to make this idea a reality, Hamilton formed the
Society for Establishing Useful Manufacturers. This company
helped make Hamilton's vision a reality by making Paterson, New
Jersey into an industrial giant. By 1816, Paterson became a
national leader in textiles, paper, steel, and iron work. In
the 1850s, Paterson was the Nation's leader in locomotive
manufacturing, and later in the century, Paterson became the
world's leader in the production of silk.
Over the years, these industries created jobs and
opportunities for waves of immigrants, including the Irish,
English, German, Polish, Jewish, Syrian, and Italian
communities. Here they worked hard, raised families, and
achieved the same American dream that Hamilton himself enjoyed,
and the same American dream he envisioned for the Nation.
Today, the American dream is alive and well in Paterson, as
growing communities of Latino and Middle Eastern families make
their homes here. This unique national historical treasure
deserves to be a National Historical Park, but the National
Park Service apparently disagrees.
The Park Service, when looking to see if a site can be
added to the National Park system, evaluates the site on four
criteria. The site must be nationally significant, the site
must be a suitable addition to the National Parks system, must
be a feasible addition to the system, and must be in need of
direct National Park Service funding and management.
Any objective evaluation of the Great Falls, would find
that the Park easily meets these criteria. Even the Park
Service admits that the Great Falls is a nationally significant
cultural resource. But the Park Service draft study of the park
somehow finds that the Great Falls does not meet the other
three criteria.
The Park Service seems to think that the Paterson Great
Falls are not a suitable addition to the Park Service, because
its characteristics are found elsewhere in the National Park
system. I could not disagree more strongly.
As I described earlier, the Great Falls Park represents
Alexander Hamilton's unique vision of America come true. No
other site in the Nation more richly represents the remarkable
transformation of a rural agrarian society based in slavery
into a modern global economy based in freedom. I'm sure Mr.
Zax, a witness here today, will go into much greater detail on
this point.
Finally, in arguing that the Park does not meet the
remaining two criteria, the Park Service seems to make two
seemingly contradictory arguments. On the one hand, the Park
Service argues that they can not afford the added expense
beyond the committed State funds. But on the other hand, it
says that the State will fully protect this site of national
importance and properly present it to the public.
The truth is, is that the State has pledged to fund roughly
half of the resources needed to make this site into a wonderful
National Park. This makes the Park both affordable and
feasible, but it also points out that without designating the
Park a unit of the National Park Service, the Great Falls will
not be presented or protected in the manner it deserves.
I therefore urge the committee to join me in supporting
passage of the Great Falls National Park Act of 2007. This
truly unique Park deserves Federal recognition and protection.
Last, Mr. Chairman, I want to briefly say that I support S.
1039 to extend authorization of the New Jersey Coastal Heritage
Route by 4 years, from 2007 to 2011. In 1988, Congress
authorized the Secretary of the Interior to designate this
route along coastal New Jersey to provide for public
appreciation and enjoyment of important fish and wildlife
habitats, geologic and geographical land forms, cultural
resources, and migration routes in coastal New Jersey.
I ask my colleagues to support this bill, to extend funding
for the important trail through September 30, 2011.
Once again, Mr. Chairman, thank you for putting this on,
and the Ranking Member on your hearing list. I see my colleague
from New Jersey, from the House of Representatives, who I have
the privilege of serving with. I know the appropriate time,
after Senator Levin and Senator Allard, you'll have the
opportunity to recognize him.
Thank you.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Menendez.
Let me call on our Ranking Member, Senator Burr, for your
statement.
STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD BURR, U.S. SENATOR FROM NORTH
CAROLINA
Senator Burr. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be extremely
brief. My apologies for my tardiness, because we do have a full
agenda today, covering a wide range of topics, each important
in its own way and we'll thoroughly cover those.
I wanted to take the opportunity to assure my colleagues
that are here, that just because of the Burr historical
relationship to Alexander Hamilton, I'm not going to recuse
myself, but I will try not to let that influence how I judge
this legislation.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for putting this panel together. I
look forward to the testimonies.
Senator Menendez. Mr. Chairman, very briefly, we can, I can
tell the Ranking Member, we're happy to weave that history into
the process.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Burr.
Now I would like to call on Senator Allard for your
testimony. Thank you so much for being here.
STATEMENT OF HON. WAYNE ALLARD, U.S. SENATOR
FROM COLORADO
Senator Allard. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank
you, Chairman Akaka, as well as our ranking member Burr for the
committee's consideration of Senate Bill 128. Its title is, the
Cache La Poudre River and National Heritage Area Technical
Amendments Act. That's what it is, it is a, basically its
primary is that it is a technical amendment to the Cache La
Poudre River National Heritage Area. I'd like to thank you for
allowing me the opportunity to comment on this legislation and
for your leadership on issues affecting our Nation's parks.
The area around the Cache La Poudre has a unique and rich
history that, like much of the West, is tied to water. The
Cache La Poudre River played an important role in the
development of Water Law in the West, including the idea of
prior appropriation of water. The Prior Appropriation of Water
Law is unique, is universal throughout the Western part of the
United States. Those of you who come from States where they
have plenty of water use a different system of water tied to
riparian rights.
Understanding the significance and history of prior
appropriations is vital, as much of the Water Law in the
Western United States is based on it. The objective of the
Cache La Poudre Heritage Area is to interpret the area's
cultural, historic, and natural resources within the theme of
Western water development.
Under the original legislation established in the Heritage
Area, the Secretary of Interior was to appoint a Commission to
work with the National Park Service and manage the area. But
because of a technicality, the Secretary was unable to appoint
the Commission. In response, local citizens stepped forward and
formed the Poudre Heritage Alliance. It's a volunteer
organization that helps support the Heritage Area until an
official Commission can be named and it can't be named until
after we take care of those technical things that are in this
bill.
The legislation being reviewed today would rectify this
technical problem, would provide for the establishment of an
official Commission to help manage the area. This bipartisan
bill enjoys the support of numerous local citizens, elected
officials, as evidenced by the letters of support that I will
submit to the committee.
Senator Allard. I'm hopeful the committee will agree with
these individuals and view this legislation favorably.
Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Burr, thank you and the
committee for your time and consideration.
[The prepared statement of Senator Allard follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Wayne Allard, U.S. Senator From Colorado,
on S. 128
Thank you, Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Burr, for the
committee's consideration of S.128, the Cache la Poudre River National
Heritage Area Technical Amendments Act.
I would also like to thank you for allowing me the opportunity to
comment on this legislation and for your leadership on issues affecting
our nation's parks.
The area around the Cache La Poudre River has a unique and rich
history that, like much in the West, is tied to water.
The Cache la Poudre River played an important role in the
development of water law in the west, including the idea of prior
appropriation of water.
Understanding the significance and history of prior appropriation
is vital, as much of the water law in the Western United States is
based on it.
The objective of the Cache la Poudre Heritage Area is to interpret
the area's cultural, historic and natural resources within the theme of
western water development.
Under the original legislation establishing the Heritage Area, the
Secretary of Interior was to appoint a commission to work with the
National Parks Service and manage the Area, but because of a
technicality the Secretary was unable to appoint the commission.
In response local citizens stepped up and formed the Poudre
Heritage Alliance, a voluntary organization to help support the
Heritage Area until an official commission could be named.
The legislation being reviewed today would rectify this technical
problem and would provide for the establishment of an official
commission to help manage the area.
This bipartisan bill enjoys the support of numerous local citizens
and elected officials, as evidenced by the letters of support that I
will submit to the Committee.
I am hopeful the committee will agree with these individuals and
view this legislation favorably.
Chairman Akaka, Ranking member Burr, thank you and the Committee
for your time and consideration.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Allard.
Now we would like to hear from Senator Levin.
STATEMENT OF HON. CARL LEVIN, U.S. SENATOR
FROM MICHIGAN
Senator Levin. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Burr, and
Senator Menendez, thank you for holding this hearing.
One of the items on your agenda today is a very important
bill, not just to the State of Michigan, but to the Nation,
because it regards an existing National Historical Park called
the Keweenaw National Historical Park.
It's in that part of Michigan, which some of you are
familiar with, which kind of looks like a little bit like a
shark's fin, at the top of the upper peninsula. It's an
extraordinary site. It's the site of the world's purest copper.
It's the only place in the world where large scale economically
recoverable, 97 percent pure native copper is found.
It was the site where, when Horace Greeley told young men
in those days, to go west. ``Go west, go west young man.'' That
was the west he was referring to. It was the Keweenaw Peninsula
up in Michigan. It had a major role in copper production and
all the technologies which go into copper production. It
produced, I think, about half of the world's copper during the
1880s, and had a major role in the Civil War. It has a major
role in our social and labor history and in the history of
mining, and a park was created there 15 years ago called the
Keweenaw National Historical Park.
There has been some great progress made in that park. It's
in a part of Michigan which doesn't have a lot of people, and
has a lot of unemployment. But now, more and more visitors are
coming to the area. It's a very strong visitors attraction
because of the way the National Park Service has really done a
wonderful job with local people, of growing a National
Historical Park.
There are three parts to this amendment--or to this bill,
excuse me--which are important to us. One has to do with the
fact that one part of the area--and this is an Historical Park
which covers a large area and has a lot of private in-holdings
in it--one part of this is a former smelter, which is on a site
that is polluted and will need to be cleaned up. The question
is, should the Park Service be able to use their regular
criteria on that, as to that site? As to whether to acquire it,
and if so, under what conditions should they acquire it? They
have criteria to protect the Treasury and the taxpayers from
acquiring a site which should not be acquired until it's
properly cleaned-up.
But we put something in the law 15 years ago which
prohibits it. This criteria is unique, I believe, to this Park,
and needs to be removed from the law so the National Park
Service can apply the regular criteria, whatever they are.
We're not trying to change the National Park Service criteria,
in terms of acquisition of a contaminated site. We want them to
have the discretion to apply their normal criteria to the
acquisition of a contaminated site. So we want to remove a
legal impediment to their normal criteria being applied.
In addition, this bill would also apply the usual match to
this Park, in terms of public and nonpublic funding. Right now
it's, I think, probably unique in the country, that the match
requirement is four to one, $4 local for each Federal dollar.
Most other national parks do not have this kind of a
requirement. We're asking that a one to one match be applied.
Some parks have no local match at all. Others have a one to one
or a two to one. This Park requires a four to one match.
The park is located in an area that can not possibly afford
that kind of a local match and it should not be singled out, in
effect, for that kind of a local match, when other units in the
Park Service do not generally have that kind of a requirement.
Finally, there would be an increase in the authorization of
appropriations. It's different amounts in different areas, so I
won't go into the details of that, but there is an increase in
authorization, which is requested in this bill. We would very
much hope that the committee could be supportive of this
legislation. Senator Stabenow, of course, is a co-sponsor of
it.
One final thing. I just want to thank the Park Service for
two things. No. 1, the way in which they have really taken to
this park. They are an incredibly talented agency. They are a
beloved agency of the people of the United States. I don't know
what the public opinion polls would show in terms of the
favorable, unfavorable position of the National Park Service,
but I'm not sure there's any agency of the Government, perhaps,
that's higher than them. They are truly respected.
We are grateful to them for all of the inputs and the
efforts that they have made, and for all the restoration of
buildings that has gone on already, making this into a true
attraction. I believe that they support the bill. They'll be
speaking for themselves later, but I think that they do support
this legislation. I'll let, again, them speak for themselves.
But in any event, I thank them for that. I thank them for
all they've done for all the parks in this country, including
the ones in my home State of Michigan.
Thank you for holding this hearing, Mr. Chairman and
Ranking Member Burr. Senator Salazar, nice to see you here.
[The prepared statement of Senator Levin follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Carl Levin, U.S. Senator From Michigan,
on S. 189
I want to thank Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Burr for holding
this hearing on important legislation relating to the Keweenaw National
Historical Park.
This legislation would improve the park's ability to carry out its
statutory mission to preserve the nationally significant historical and
cultural sites, structures, and districts in Michigan's Keweenaw
Peninsula for the education, benefit, and inspiration of present and
future generations. The Keweenaw National Historical Park is home to an
incredible treasure of historic resources. This area is the only site
in the country where prehistoric, aboriginal mining of copper occurred.
In the 1800s, reports of the vast copper resources prompted a mining
rush, attracting entrepreneurs and tens of thousands of immigrants to
the region. By 1849, the Keweenaw Peninsula provided 85 percent of the
nation's copper production, powering America's industrial revolution.
The legislation that your subcommittee is considering today would
do three things. The bill would: (1) change the matching requirement
for federal funds from a 4:1 ratio to a 1:1 ratio; (2) increase the
authorized level of funds to be appropriated for the park; and (3)
eliminate the prohibition on the Department of the Interior from
acquiring any lands that have become contaminated with hazardous
substances.
change in match requirements
Unlike most National Parks, private individuals and groups own and
operate most of the historic properties in the park. There are 19 of
these partnership sites, which are known as ``Keweenaw Heritage
Sites,'' that significantly contribute to the preservation and
celebration of the cultural and natural resources of the area. The
Keweenaw Heritage Sites include an underground mine with one of the
world's deepest shafts, the oldest municipally-built opera house in the
country (which continues to host a variety of theatrical and musical
events), a Civil War fort, and a museum with one of the world's most
extensive mineral collections. These cooperating heritage sites enhance
the visitor's experience at the park. However, these sites are simply
not in the position to raise the match of $4 for every $1 in federal
funds, which is the current requirement in Keweenaw's enabling
legislation. The heritage sites rely entirely on donations and/or
nominal entrance fees. Also, the Keweenaw Peninsula is one of the most
economically depressed areas in Michigan, having an unemployment rate
last year of 9.9%, which was nearly double that of the national
unemployment rate, and Keweenaw had a per-capita income in 2005 of
$25,740, which was about 75 percent of the national average.
According to the National Park Service, most of the 391 NPS units
do not require any non-federal match of federal funds. And, for those
National Park System units that do require a match, it is typically in
the ratio of 1:1 or 2:1. In contrast, the Keweenaw National Historical
Park requires $4 in non-federal funds for every $1 of federal funds
that are used to provide financial and technical assistance to mark,
interpret, and restore non-federal properties within the park. This is
an incredibly burdensome requirement for the private partners that help
to carry out the mission of the park. This legislation would reduce the
burden on the local community, while still requiring a match.
acquisition of property
The bill before you addresses another issue of fairness for the
park. Unlike most other NPS units, the Keweenaw National Historical
Park is prohibited from acquiring any land that has become contaminated
with hazardous substances. S. 189 would restore parity to the National
Park System by removing this restriction.
Importantly, this bill does not in any way force the National Park
Service to acquire any such land, it simply removes the land
acquisition restriction. Removing this restriction would increase
flexibility for the Keweenaw National Historical Park, and would be
especially helpful for properties that may have minimal contamination.
Given the industrial history of the area, many of the historical
properties may be contaminated. And even if the park were never to
acquire a single additional property, removing this restriction would
at the very least allow the park to consider acquiring certain parcels
of land for preservation. As a partnership park, the majority of the
historical buildings are not owned by the National Park Service; the
NPS owns only five buildings within the park boundaries. However, at
some point in the future, the park may be in the position to acquire
property of historical significance that may be contaminated.
Importantly, one of the most valuable historic properties within
the park's boundary is the Quincy Smelter site, which is one of the
last 19th century copper smelter sites remaining in the world. The
buildings on this site are quickly deteriorating, and the current
owners are contemplating demolition of these historical treasures due
to the complications surrounding stabilization and lack of funding.
Even though it is the National Park Service's position that it will not
acquire this property due to contamination and associated cost
concerns, removing this restriction would allow the park service to at
least consider acquiring the property after cleanup plans and funding
are in place.
increase in authorization levels
Finally, this bill increases the appropriation ceilings for three
categories of park activity: (1) the authorization of appropriations
for the development and acquisition of land would be increased from $25
million to $50 million; (2) the authorization for financial and
technical assistance would be increased from $3 million to $25 million;
and (3) the annual authorization for the Keweenaw Historic Preservation
Advisory Commission would be increased from $100,000 to $250,000. These
increases are necessary because as the park moves forward in assisting
with the preservation and interpretation of the numerous historical
properties within the park boundaries, the park will eventually hit
these authorization ceilings. According to the National Park Service,
the park has already spent $13.5 million on development activities.
Although this is only about one-half of the current ceiling of $25
million, because the park is rather new, and does not even have a
visitor center, from a long-term perspective it is important to
increase this ceiling so that the park has freedom in moving forward
into the future with acquisition and development activities.
The increase for the Keweenaw Historic Preservation Advisory
Commission is especially important. As a partnership park, it is
essential that the Advisory Commission has the funds necessary to carry
out its statutory charge, which includes assisting the park with local
and state government coordination, carrying out programs to enhance
appreciation of park historic resources, and selecting sites for
interpretation and preservation through cooperative agreements with
non-Federal parties. At a $100,000 level, the Advisory Commission is
limited in the assistance it can provide. At a level of $250,000, the
Advisory Commission would be able to more fully meet its legislated
responsibilities to advise and assist the park. With the increased
level of appropriations authorized, the Advisory Commission could hire
professional staff members and leverage corporate, foundation, and
individual gifts for projects and programs in collaboration with the
park and area partners. Of importance, the 19 heritage sites need the
assistance of the Advisory Commission, and this increase would help
improve these sites, and keep them in operation.
In summary, this legislation would help the park to fulfill its
mission to preserve and bring to life the vibrant history of Michigan's
``copper country''--an essential part of the nation's history of
industrial and technological development, immigration, labor relations,
and natural resources. Thank you for holding this hearing, and I look
forward to working with the Committee to pass this important
legislation.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Levin, for you.
It sounds really personal, the way you provide your statement,
and we thank you very much for that.
Senator Levin. It is indeed that. We put a lot of effort
into this. One other quick comment.
This is way up in the most northern part of the State of
Michigan, but it was such a booming mining area in the mid-19th
century when Michigan became a State, that it's town called
Kalumet, which was the middle of this mining bonanza, which
brought all of the people from, a lot of people from the east,
people from all over the world. So there's a huge ethnic
diversity that came to that town, came to that area.
But it almost became the capitol of Michigan, although it's
the most remote part of the State, a town called Kalumet, a
very small town now. But the boom was so huge that it was a
final contest between Lansing, our current capitol in the
middle of the State, geographically central, but which had
competition for the upper peninsula, Keweenaw Peninsula. That's
how major an economic part of this State and country.
Again, was a major part of the Civil War and the reason the
North prevailed, because of the copper that was available to
the military in the Union, that was not available in the South.
So there's huge history here, and thank you for considering
this bill.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Levin.
Senator Salazar. Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Senator Salazar.
Senator Salazar. If I may just say, as a surrogate son of
Michigan, since I went to law school in Ann Arbor at the
University of Michigan. I know this place and I think it is a
great piece of legislation that Senator Levin has brought
before the committee, and I hope that we favorably consider it.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much. Senator Salazar, let me
call you for your remarks or testimony at this time.
STATEMENT OF HON. KEN SALAZAR, U.S. SENATOR
FROM COLORADO
Senator Salazar. Thank you very much, Senator Akaka. You
know that my colleague, Senator Allard, was here earlier on and
testified concerning the Cache La Poudre legislation that is
before us.
I want to just spend a few minutes making a quick comment
about that legislation. The bill itself is very
straightforward. It fixes a problem in the law that was, for
the Heritage Area that was established back in 1996. Because of
the glitch in the statute, the Secretary of Interior has been
unable to appoint a Commission to manage the Heritage area. The
bill designates a local non-profit organization, the Poudre
Heritage Alliance.
I'm familiar with the organization. It's a good
organization. The organization is designated as the management
entity for the Heritage area and extends the authorization for
the area for an additional 10 years at a very modest funding
level.
The bill has very strong support from communities and
stakeholders in my State of Colorado, including the cities of
Fort Collins, Greeley, Windsor, and the Northern Colorado Water
Conservancy District. We're proud of the Poudre River and its
history. I will add, I will make the rest of my statement, I
will just make it a part of the record. I would hope that the
committee----
Senator Akaka. We'll include it in the record.
Senator Salazar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would hope that
the committee helps us in moving this legislation forward.
[The prepared statement of Senator Salazar follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Ken Salazar, U.S. Senator From Colorado,
on S. 128
Thank you, Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Burr, for holding this
hearing today.
I want to talk for a couple minutes about S.128, a bill that
Senator Allard and I introduced to amend the Cache La Poudre River
Corridor National Heritage Area Act.
The bill itself is very straightforward. It fixes a problem in the
law that established the heritage area in 1996. Because of the glitch
in the statute, the Secretary of the Interior has been unable to
appoint a commission to manage the heritage area. This bill designates
a local non-profit organization, the Poudre Heritage Alliance, as the
management entity for the heritage area, and extends the authorization
for the area for an additional 10 years, at a very modest funding
level.
The bill has the strong support of the local communities and
stakeholders, including Fort Collins, Greeley, Windsor, and the
Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District.
We in Colorado are very proud of the Poudre River and the history
that grew up along its banks. The river's name goes back to 1836, when
a party of French fur trappers got stuck in heavy snow as they traveled
along the Front Range. They had to lighten their loads before heading
to the mountains, so they buried their excess supplies, mainly gun
powder and lead shot, before moving on. One of the members of the
expedition came back to the area later as settler, and remembered that
it was the place where they ``hid the powder,'' so the river took on
the French name ``Cache''--for hiding place--and ``Poudre''--for
powder.
As more settlers came to Larimer County and the banks of the Poudre
River in the late 19th century, they built an expensive and expansive
system of ditches to irrigate their fields. Farmers banded together on
cooperative projects to reduce the labor required to move water from
the Poudre River to their crops. Eventually, they established private
irrigation companies--mutual ditch companies--to finance larger storage
projects.
As their irrigation infrastructure became more sophisticated, the
settlers of the area established a system for determining who had
priority on the water in the river. The doctrine of prior appropriation
which they helped develop has become the foundation of Colorado water
law and of water law throughout much of the American West.
The Cache La Poudre National Heritage Area helps preserve and share
these vital stories of the Poudre River and of the origins of our water
law. It is a heritage of which are proud.
Mr. Chairman, thank you again for holding this hearing. I hope we
can pass S.128 promptly out of this committee.
Thank you.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator.
Now, our next witness is Congressman Bill Pascrell, who is
the--who is here to testify on S. 148, the Paterson Great Falls
National Park proposal, and you sponsor a companion measure in
the House of Representatives.
Congressman Pascrell, I want to welcome you to this
subcommittee and look forward to your statement to the
committee.
STATEMENT OF HON. BILL PASCRELL, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE FROM NEW
JERSEY
Mr. Pascrell. Thank you, Senator. I wanted to be here and I
want to thank the, yourself and the members of the committee
for allowing me to discuss the Paterson Great Falls. I was the
Mayor of Paterson before running for the Congress of the United
States. I've lived there all my life, so I have visceral
relationship here and I think you'll understand that.
I'm confident that you will find that the Great Falls
Historic District is uniquely deserving of a National Park
Service unit designation. Fifteen miles west of New York City,
the Great Falls was the second largest waterfall in colonial
America.
At the Great Falls, Alexander Hamilton conceived the plan
to harness the force of water to power the new industries that
would secure our economic independence. Hamilton told Congress
and the American people that at the Great Falls, he'd begin to
implement his ambitious strategy to transform an agricultural
society dependent upon slavery, into a modern economy based on
freedom.
True to Hamilton's vision, Paterson became a great
manufacturing city, producing the Colt revolver, the first
submarine, the aircraft engine for the first transatlantic
flight, more locomotives than any city in this Nation, Mr.
Chairman, and more silk than any city in the world.
Scholars have concluded that Pierre L'Enfant's innovative
water power system in Paterson and many factories built later,
constitute the finest remaining collection of engineering and
architectural structures, representing each stage of America's
progress, from a weak agrarian society to the leader in global
economy.
In a special Bicentennial speech in Paterson, the late
President Gerald R. Ford in 1976--I know this quite well, Mr.
Chairman, because I introduced him on that day, a Democrat was
introducing a Republican President--it was greatest, one of the
great thrills of my life. ``We can see the Great Falls as a
symbol of the industrial might, which helps to make America the
most powerful Nation in the world.''
As a lifelong resident of Paterson and the city's former
Mayor, I continue to live there, work there, in the shadow of
the Great Falls of Passaic. I fought for many years to bring
much-deserved recognition to this natural wonder and this
historic landmark.
So many years later, we're at that much, we're much closer
to making the dream of a National Park in Paterson a reality.
The legislation we are here to discuss today, that Paterson
Great Falls National Park Act, would achieve this long sought
after goal. The legislation enjoys bipartisan, widespread
support. Every member of the Jersey delegation, Democrat and
Republican, supports this piece of legislation and have put
their name on in support, not afraid to do that.
National conservation and historic preservation
organizations, our Nation's most renowned Hamilton scholars,
distinguished professors at prestigious universities, have
documented that this historic district is worthy of a national
historic designation. Editorial boards, Federal, State, local
officials and community groups have also endorsed the campaign
to create a National Park Service.
Some have argued that because the State of New Jersey, the
city of Paterson, and other entities are working to protect and
preserve the Great Falls Historic District, that we do not need
a National Historic Park there as well. This is completely
false, Mr. Chairman.
Governor Corzine himself, has maintained that the State of
New Jersey cannot preserve, protect the Falls Historic District
of the public without Federal Government assistance. The
National Park Service has a long history of Federal-State
cooperation, from Lowell, Massachusetts to the redwood in
California. It is Park Service policy to foster State and
Federal partnerships to fund and manage parks. The Great Falls
should be no different.
In conclusion, let me say this, Mr. Chairman. If the Great
Falls district were added to the Park System, Federal resources
could be leveraged to revitalize the Great Falls area. Not only
is Paterson depending on this, but the entire area is depending
on this, refurbishing this beautiful, the historic mill
buildings, maintaining and protecting the waterfall.
Through this Federal partnership, the Great Falls would be
transformed into an attraction for visitors and Patersonians
alike, that could lead to the economic revitalization of my old
city, my own city, being a living reminder of our Nation's rich
industrial history.
Congress must act now to pass this vital piece of
legislation. I really want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and
members of the committee. I stand ready to answer any questions
that you might ask. This is not important to me, it's important
to the entire area and I trust that you will do the right
thing.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Pascrell follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Bill Pascrell, U.S. Representative From
New Jersey, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, I very
much appreciate your having me here today to discuss the Paterson Great
Falls National Park Act of 2007, which I introduced in the House of
Representatives.
I am grateful for the opportunity to talk about an issue that is
very close to my heart--the possible creation of a National Historical
Park at the Great Falls Historic District in Paterson, New Jersey. I am
confident that you will find that the Great Falls Historic District is
uniquely deserving of being designated a National Park Service unit.
Fifteen miles west of New York City, the Great Falls was the second
largest waterfall in colonial America. No other natural wonder in
America has played such an important role in our nation's historic
quest for freedom and prosperity. At the Great Falls, Alexander
Hamilton conceived and a plan to harness the force of water to power
the new industries that would secure our economic independence.
Hamilton told Congress and the American people that at the Great
Falls he would begin to implement his ambitious strategy to transform a
rural agricultural society, dependent upon slavery, into a modern
economy based on freedom. True to Hamilton's vision, Paterson became a
great manufacturing city, producing the Colt revolver, the first
submarine, the aircraft engine for the first trans-Atlantic flight,
more locomotives than any city in the nation, and more silk than any
city in the world.
Scholars have concluded that Pierre L'Enfant's innovative water
power system in Paterson, and many factories built later, constitute
the finest remaining collection of engineering and architectural
structures representing each stage of America's progress from a weak
agrarian society to a leader in the global economy.
Notably, the Great Falls Historic District is the only National
Historic District that includes both a National Natural Resource and a
National Historic Landmark. In a special Bicentennial speech in
Paterson with the spectacular natural beauty of the Great Falls in the
background, the late President Gerald R. Ford said, ``We can see the
Great Falls as a symbol of the industrial might which helps to make
America the most powerful nation in the world.''
As a lifelong resident of Paterson and the city's former mayor, I
continue to live and work in the shadow of the Great Falls of the
Passaic. I have fought for many years to bring much deserved
recognition to this natural wonder and historic landmark.
In the 1970s, I worked closely with Mary Ellen Kramer, who was the
driving force in gaining Federal recognition of the Great Falls
Historic District. I was there on that great day in June 1976 when
President Ford came to Paterson and designated the Great Falls a
National Historic Landmark. As Mayor of Paterson, I worked closely with
fellow Patersonian Senator Frank Lautenberg, who was a warrior for this
worthy cause.
Now, so many years later, we are that much closer to making the
dream of a National Park in Paterson a reality. The legislation we are
here to discuss today, the Paterson Great Falls National Park Act of
2007, would achieve this long sought-after goal. The House bill is
cosponsored by every Member of New Jersey's Congressional delegation,
both Democrats and Republicans.
National conservation and historic preservation organizations, our
nation's most renowned Hamilton scholars, an esteemed former
Smithsonian Institution curator, and distinguished professors at Yale,
Princeton, Harvard, NYU, Brown and other universities have documented
that this historic district meets all of the standards to become a
National Historical Park.
Editorial boards, federal, state, and local officials and community
groups, including New Jersey's Governor Corzine, have also endorsed the
campaign to award a National Park Service designation to the Falls.
Some have argued that because the State of New Jersey, the City of
Paterson, and other entities are working to protect and preserve the
Great Falls Historic District, that we do not need a National Park
there as well. This is completely false.
Governor Corzine himself has maintained that the State of New
Jersey cannot preserve, protect, and present the Great Falls Historic
District to the public without Federal Government assistance.
Additionally, in order to attract private investment, it is imperative
that the site be designated a National Park. In the long-term, major
private donors will require the integrity, professionalism, continuity,
and permanence of the National Park System.
The National Park Service has a long history of federal-state
cooperation, from Lowell in Massachusetts to Redwood in California. It
is Park Service policy to foster state and federal partnerships to fund
and manage parks, and Great Falls should be no different.
Mr. Chairman, if the Great Falls District were added to the Park
System, federal resources could be leveraged to revitalize the Great
Falls area, refurbishing the beautiful, historic mill buildings and
maintaining and protecting the waterfall.
Through this federal partnership, the Great Falls would be
transformed into an attraction for visitors and Patersonians alike that
could lead to the economic revitalization of Paterson, and be a living
reminder of our nation's rich industrial history.
Congress must act now to pass this vital piece of legislation, so
that we may fully recognize these cultural and historic landmarks that
have played such a seminal role in America's history.
Thank you for your time.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Congressman. We
appreciate your statement here and know also that this is very
close to you as former Mayor of that area. We'll certainly
consider this when we consider all of these bills. Thank you
very much.
Mr. Pascrell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Yes.
Our next witness is Dan Wenk, the Deputy Director of the
National Park Service, who will testify on behalf of the
Administration on all 11 bills.
Dan, welcome back again, to the subcommittee. We will
include all of your statements in the record and would
appreciate it if you could briefly summarize the Department's
position on each bill. Once you've completed you comments,
we'll begin a round of questions. So thank you again, and you
may begin with your statement.
STATEMENT OF DANIEL N. WENK, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, NATIONAL PARK
SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Mr. Wenk. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to
appear before the subcommittee to present the Administration's
view of 11 subjects on today's agenda. I would like to submit
our full statements on each of these subjects to the record and
summarize the Administration's positions on these bills.
The Department supports the following bills: S. 189, which
would amend the legislation that established the Keweenaw
National Historical Park; S. 867 and H.R. 299, which would
adjust the boundary for Lowell National Historical Park; S.
1039, which would extend the authorization for the New Jersey
Coastal Heritage Trail Route for an additional 4 years; S.
1341, which would provide for a land exchange involving the
Bureau of Land Management and a private developer that involves
a boundary adjustment for the La Cienegas National Conservation
Area and for Saguaro National Park; S. 1476, which would
authorize a special resource study for the Tule Lake
Segregation Center; S. 1709 and H.R. 1239, which would amend
the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Act of
1998; S. 1808, which would authorize the exchange of exclusive
use easements between the National Park Service and the Alaska
Railroad within Denali National Park; and S. 1960, which would
authorize a special resource study of Estate Grange and other
sites related to Alexander Hamilton's life on St. Croix in the
Virgin Islands.
In addition, the Department does not object to S. 128,
which would amend the legislation that established the Cache La
Poudre River Corridor.
The reasons for our positions on these bills are explained
in detail in our full statements. For several of the bills I
just mentioned, we are requesting the committee make minor
adjustments or amendments to the bill language. Explanations of
these requested amendments are also contained in the full
statements.
The Department opposes the remaining two bills and I will
briefly explain our position. S. 148 would establish the
Paterson Great Falls National Park. The Special Resource Study
conducted on this area, which is still under departmental
review, has preliminarily concluded that the resources of this
area do not meet the congressionally required criteria for
designation as a unit of the National Park System.
Since a majority of the proposed unit is already being
managed by the State of New Jersey as a State Park, there is no
need for the National Park Service management of the area. In
addition, the bill includes within the boundary of the proposed
unit, a resource with no relationship to the documented period
of significance, the Hinchliffe Stadium. The bill contains
provisions that raise important concerns about how the proposed
unit would be effectively and efficiently managed by the
National Park Service.
The draft study for the Great Falls Historic District does
suggest a pathway to effective partnership with the State of
New Jersey, to protect and interpret the nationally significant
resources of the district. That would be through a designation
of the district as an affiliated area of the National Park
System. That route would involve assistance from the National
Park Service, but not direct management by the National Park
Service.
S. 697 would establish the Steel Industry National Historic
Site. The National Park Service completed a special resource
study of the sites included in the proposed new unit in 2002.
The study concluded that the sites were not feasible to
administer as a unit of the National Park System, that the site
of the Homestead Lockout, a Seminole event in American labor
history, lacked integrity and there was no need for NPS
management.
The study also concluded that local management framework
could adequately protect and manage these historic resources,
since they are all located within the Rivers of Steel Heritage
area. Rather than establishing a new unit of the National Park
System, the study recommended that the sites proposed for this
unit and some other sites, be designated as an affiliated area
of the National Park System, which would permit a viable
Federal-local partnership for resource protection and public
education.
Mr. Chairman, that concludes my statement. I would be
pleased to answer your questions.
[The prepared statements of Mr. Wenk follow:]
Prepared Statement of Daniel N. Wenk, Deputy Director, National Park
Service, Department of the Interior
s. 148
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to appear before your
committee to present the views of the Department of the Interior on S.
148, a bill to establish the Paterson Great Falls National Park in the
State of New Jersey. The Department opposes S. 148.
The Department has three main objections to the bill. First, the
Special Resource Study authorized by P.L. 107-59 and still under final
Departmental review, has preliminarily concluded that the resources of
the Great Falls Historic District do not meet congressionally required
criteria for designation as a unit of the National Park System. Second,
the bill includes within the boundary of the proposed unit, a resource
with no relationship to the documented period of historic significance
of the Great Falls Historic District or of any determined national
significance under established National Historic Landmark criteria. And
third, the bill also contains a number of sections that raise crucially
important concerns as to how the proposed unit would be effectively and
efficiently managed by the National Park Service.
The history of the Great Falls Historic District is rich in the
nation's late 18th and early 19th century movement into the industrial
revolution. Conceived by Alexander Hamilton as the demonstration of his
Report on Manufactures to Congress, the venture was of clear historic
significance. While the Hamilton-inspired Society for the Establishment
of Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.) did not achieve the early success
envisioned by its architect, largely due to diversion of funds by its
initial governor, William Duer, it became a very successful real estate
leasing and water power purveyor into the mid 20th century. The S.U.M.
water power system at the Great Falls, designed by Pierre C. L'Enfant,
and constructed between 1794 and 1827, was an engineering achievement
of major importance.
Over time, industries at the Great Falls produced cotton and wool
textiles, spun flax, hemp, jute, paper, and other products. The site
was the location of Samuel Colt's unsuccessful first arms factory, and
a major center for locomotive manufacturing and the production of silk
fabrics. The latter activity of silk weaving and dyeing, which during
its heyday produced half of the nation's silk products, earned Paterson
the label of ``Silk City.'' The District was also an important place in
labor history, with the unsuccessful Silk Strike of 1913 involving an
estimated 24,000 workers spurred on by the labor organization, the
Industrial Workers of the World, often referred to as the ``Wobblies.''
John Holland's first submarine, ``The Fenian Ram,'' built in New York,
was fitted with its engine at the Great Falls and made its maiden
voyage on the Passaic River. While the District was plagued by arson
impacting or destroying many of its earliest and most important mills,
the remaining structures have integrity and have been and continue to
be rehabilitated for housing and other public and private adaptive
reuses.
During the course of the Special Resource Study and the public
comment period for the report which ended on January 30, 2007, a number
of Alexander Hamilton biographers, knowledgeable historians, and
interested individuals have urged the designation of the District as a
unit of the National Park System because of its seminal role in the
industrial revolution and its association with Alexander Hamilton. The
Department concurs that the history of the Great Falls Historic
District and its remaining resources are of national significance. Its
designations as a National Historic Landmark and National Natural
Landmark attest to that significance.
National significance, although the first criterion analyzed in any
Special Resource Study, does not alone result in a recommendation to
Congress for unit designation. The resource being studied must also be
judged suitable and feasible for designation, and a determination must
be made that there is a need for National Park Service (NPS) management
of the resource. The National Park Service does not believe that the
Great Falls Historic District meets these critical criteria nor is
there a need for NPS management of, or presence at, the site.
Suitability is the determination of whether comparable resources to
those being studied are already adequately represented in the National
Park System or protected by other public agencies including state and
local governments or private organizations. The extant resources of the
District primarily comprise the S.U.M. water power system and the
remaining elements of a collection of 19th century mills used for the
manufactures noted above. We believe that within the National Park
System and among numerous other protected sites, there are similar
resources adequate to interpret the major theme categories also
associated with the Great Falls Historic District, whether they
represent comparable manufacturing enterprises, early water power,
labor unrest of the same period, or sites associated with Alexander
Hamilton's contributions to our nation. In the National Park System,
itself, Lowell National Historical Park contains comparable mill
resources and tells the stories associated with our nation's industrial
revolution, including those of immigrant workers and labor unrest. The
John H. Chafee Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Area contains
Slater's Mill, the first successful textile manufacturing enterprise in
the nation. The Special Resource Study documents many examples of
similar resources and themes within and outside of the National Park
System. NPS sites associated with Alexander Hamilton include his home,
Hamilton Grange, in New York City and, of course, Independence National
Historical Park in Philadelphia.
The feasibility analysis conducted by the National Park Service
estimates the costs for planning, developing and operating a unit at
the Great Falls to range from $20 to $34 million dollars over a ten-
year period. This estimate assumes a small staffing contingent and no
major NPS ownership of resources at the site. In the difficult budget
climate facing federal agencies, we believe these costs would
negatively impact finite resources available to other units of the
National Park System in the Northeast Region and that lesser and
equally effective cost alternatives are available through a partnership
between the NPS and the State of New Jersey. We believe the costs to
implement the provisions of S. 148 would far exceed this estimate.
In late 2004 the State of New Jersey established the Great Falls
State Park in the Historic District. The boundaries of the park contain
the primary resources related to the S.U.M. water power system and the
earliest mill sites. The State has recently completed a design
competition for phase 1 of the park and has pledged $10,000,000 for
park improvements. The Department believes that the Division of Parks
and Forestry of the New Jersey State Department of Environmental
Protection, which manages both natural and cultural resources of
national significance throughout the State, is fully capable of
providing the stewardship necessary to protect the critical resources
associated with Alexander Hamilton and the S.U.M. Therefore, we believe
there is no need for NPS management of these resources. We understand
that many state park systems are encountering necessary budgetary
constraints similar to those of the National Park Service. We do not
believe this constitutes a reason to supplant any state's management of
resources.
The Department also has strong concerns with a number of provisions
of S. 148 that go beyond the fact that the Great Falls Historic
District fails to meet congressionally required criteria for
designation. The bill includes Hinchliffe Stadium within the proposed
boundary of the unit. Hinchliffe Stadium, built during the 1930s, has
important associations with the Negro Baseball Leagues, serving during
periods as the home field for the New York Black Yankees. It is also
the site where Larry Doby, the second African American to play in the
previously all white major leagues, played high school baseball. The
site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, but
currently is listed as ``locally,'' rather than ``nationally''
significant. To be considered as a unit of the National Park System,
resources must be determined to meet the criteria for National Historic
Landmark (NHL) designation. This resource is far from being considered
for NHL status and no nomination for such a designation has been
presented to the Department. Hinchliffe Stadium also has no connection
to the NHL determined period of historical significance of the Great
Falls Historic District, and we believe it should not be considered for
unit designation. Costs associated with maintaining and improving the
site would also be significant due to its present deteriorated
condition.
S. 148 contains other provisions that cause the Department concern.
In section 6(d), for example, the bill provides a process for approval
of the park's management plan more common to Affiliated Areas of the
National Park System or national heritage areas. In section 7, the bill
creates a federal commission to coordinate management of the park. In
section 8, an advisory council is provided, also appointed by the
Secretary, to advise the group created in section 7. In section 10(c),
the bill appears to provide for authority to the Secretary to condemn
property for Federal ownership under certain circumstances. Congress
has been reluctant to extend this authority in recent park legislation.
Section 11(b) provides a matching requirement that for every one
federal dollar the value in cash or in-kind of three non-federal
dollars must be available. In effect, annual funding to operate the
national park unit would be contingent upon the availability of non-
federal donations. The Department has concerns with taking on this
permanent funding obligation under the assumption that some of the
costs would be covered through private fundraising since appropriations
would be required if private funds proved to be insufficient. While
philanthropic donations can and do help to enhance park activities,
facilities and resources, they should not be relied upon to support
core operations, including the salaries for permanent staff.
We have specific concerns about the viability of raising funds for
this purpose based on our past experience working in Paterson. While
during the study period, advocates for unit designation have stated (as
does section 2 (a)(10) of the bill) that significant funding for the
park will be available from private donors if the unit is established,
attempts to verify any tangible evidence of private funding interests
were met with the simple explanation that ``They will not identify
themselves unless and until the park is created.'' In 1996, Congress
authorized $3.3 million through the Omnibus Parks and Public Lands
Management Act (section 510) in technical assistance, grants, and
infrastructure improvements. All funding required a 50 percent local
match, yet over the past 11 years, no local matching funds have been
made available under this authority.
S. 148 contains other technical and substantive provisions of
concern that are incompatible with current unit designation and park
management practices.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, the Special Resource Study of the
Great Falls Historic District does suggest a pathway to an effective
partnership with the State of New Jersey to protect and interpret the
nationally significant resources of the District. It provides for
possible congressional consideration of a Great Falls National Historic
Site, as an Affiliated Area of the National Park System, with technical
and financial assistance provided by the Secretary of the Interior to
the State of New Jersey. We believe that time spent exploring this
alternative could enhance the protection of the District's resources by
establishing a strong partnership between the NPS and the New Jersey
Department of Environmental Protection, one not dissimilar to the very
productive partnership we have enjoyed with the State of New Jersey in
its 25 years of management of the congressionally designated 1.1
million acre New Jersey Pinelands National Reserve.
Thank you for the opportunity to present the Department's position
on this bill. This concludes my prepared remarks and I would be glad to
answer any questions that you or the members of the committee may have.
s. 189
Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you today to present the Department of the
Interior's views on S. 189, a bill to remove the restriction on land
acquisition, to decrease the matching funds requirement and to
authorize additional appropriations for Keweenaw National Historical
Park in the State of Michigan.
The Department supports enactment of this legislation with one
amendment described later in this statement.
S. 189 would amend P.L. 102-543 to remove the restriction on
acquiring contaminated property and decrease the ratio for matching
fund requirements. It also would increase the appropriation ceilings
for development and for financial and technical assistance to owners of
non-Federal property, and increase the ceiling for the operations of
the Keweenaw National Historical Park Advisory Commission. These
changes would enable Keweenaw National Historical Park to acquire land
in a manner consistent with other national park units, to better
preserve nationally significant resources inside as well as related
resources outside of park boundaries, and to better implement the
operation of the park's Advisory Commission as envisioned for this
ground-breaking partnership park.
The Keweenaw National Historical Park was authorized by Congress in
1992 through Public Law 102-543 to preserve a portion of the Keweenaw
Peninsula in the State of Michigan where the prehistoric, aboriginal
mining of copper occurred. Artifacts made from this copper were traded
as far south as Alabama.
The ensuing copper mining industry ``pioneered deep shaft, hard
rock mining, milling, and smelting techniques and advancements in
related mining technologies later used throughout the world.'' The
picture of copper mining is best represented in the Village of Calumet,
the former Calumet and Hecla Mining Company properties, and the former
Quincy Mining Company properties. The Calumet National Historic
Landmark District and the Quincy Mining Company National Historic
Landmark District comprise the vast majority of the land within park
boundaries. However, other resources outside the park boundary
significantly contribute to ``interpret[ing] the historic synergism
between the geological, aboriginal, sociological, cultural,
technological, and corporate forces that relate the story of copper on
the Keweenaw Peninsula.''
The park has been unable to acquire key historic sites within the
park boundaries because of the park-specific restriction in Section
4(d) of Public Law 102-543 on acquiring contaminated property. For
example, the park was unable to pursue acquisition of the
``Coppertown'' site, which includes the historic Calument & Hecla (C&H)
Pattern Shop, the C&H Pattern Storage Warehouse, and the associated
lands contributing to the cultural landscape of Calumet's core
industrial area, due to contamination revealed in environmental site
assessments. This acquisition restriction stopped the National Park
Service (NPS) from further action on these important sites despite the
limited extent of contaminants at this property and the desire of the
park's Advisory Commission and the local community to consider their
acquisition.
Existing Department of the Interior policies and procedures require
a thorough environmental assessment and review prior to acquisition of
real property, with an additional review and professional assessment of
those areas found to possess contamination issues. Those areas are then
subjected to a graduated approval process, beginning at the Regional
Director level, going through the NPS Director, and on up to the
Secretary of the Interior, depending on the projected costs of
remediation.
The park-specific ban from NPS ownership of contaminated property
applies even when mitigation has been undertaken to meet U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency and Michigan Department of
Environmental Quality requirements. This ban also prevents the park
from considering alternatives such as acquiring preservation easements.
The current restriction would prohibit acquisition even after a common
remediation action such as capping contaminated soils is completed
since the site would still contain contaminants. S. 189 would strike
Section 4(d) of Public Law 102-543, allowing the NPS to acquire or to
enter into partnerships for the acquisition of at-risk sites and other
historic properties within the park boundaries while still requiring
the areas to be subject to existing Servicewide safeguards. Those
safeguards include a requirement in the National Park Service
acquisition regulations that a contaminants study be prepared before
the acquisition of park lands. In addition, the NPS will consider
requiring indemnification agreements from current owners before
acquisition of previously contaminated lands for this unit.
The Keweenaw region was built by and subsisted entirely on the
wealth generated by the copper industry for more than 100 years. When
the industry collapsed, the companies departed, leaving the Copper
Country economically depressed. Community expectations of the
establishment of a national park on the Keweenaw Peninsula included the
development of heritage tourism to assist in economic recovery. In the
fifteen years since the inception of the park, even though the park was
given authority to provide financial assistance to owners of property
containing nationally significant resources to foster historic
preservation and visitor services development, there has rarely been an
opportunity for the park to provide assistance due to the uncommonly
high 4 to 1 match requirement. Depressed communities are hard pressed
to provide four-fifths of the cost of preservation projects. The park's
ability to foster a preservation ethic of nationally significant
resources through partnerships rather than ownership and improve
visitor services goals would be significantly enhanced by a decrease in
the match requirement for financial and technical assistance to the
more common 1 to 1 ratio. The increased ability to effect bricks-and-
mortar preservation projects will, in turn, benefit the economic health
of these communities. S. 189 would change the ratio from 4-to-1 to 1-
to-1, providing a greater opportunity for the park to work with
partners and to support the preservation and interpretation of the
rapidly deteriorating resources of the park.
S. 189 also would raise the appropriations authorization ceiling
for development from $25 million to $50 million. Since 2000,
approximately $6 million has been spent on park-owned facilities for
administrative use, and it is anticipated that another $7.5 million
will be spent for both administrative and visitor use over the next
three years. The park's General Management Plan (GMP) called for the
early development of partnerships and assistance programs, followed by
park-owned visitor facilities. The park is now poised to enter into
this facility development phase as prescribed. While the park does not
know the total amount that would be spent on implementing this phase of
the GMP, having an increased ceiling would allow the park to proceed
with the plan and not be hindered by reaching a specific ceiling in the
midst of planned activities.
Additionally, S. 189 would authorize Congress to appropriate up to
$250,000 annually to meet the needs of the Keweenaw National Historical
Park Advisory Commission and would eliminate a required match of funds
by the Commission. The Commission was authorized in 1992 to interface
with the park's external partners and owners of historic properties and
raise funds for park purposes. It has also been charged in part, to
``carry out historical, educational, or cultural programs which
encourage or enhance appreciation of the historic resources in the
park, surrounding areas, and on the Keweenaw Peninsula.'' Although the
Commission has put forth valiant efforts to meet its charge, it will be
unable to effectively fulfill its mandates without recurring base
funding. The present limit of $100,000 on appropriations for the
Commission would fund only the most minimal staff, or allow the
Commission to only minimally reimburse the NPS for NPS-supplied-staff
as required in the enabling legislation. This increase in the
authorization ceiling and the elimination of matching requirements
would allow for the sustained and viable operation of the Commission.
With sustained operations, the Commission would be able to raise funds
for park purposes, including financial and technical assistance to
partner sites, and to fulfill its charge to carry out historical,
educational, or cultural programs.
Finally, we recommend striking a provision in S. 189 concerning the
ceiling on technical and financial assistance. The park has provided
financial and technical assistance to owners of historic properties
nearly entirely out of park operating funds. It is a primary function
of this partnership park. It is expected that such assistance will
continue through the use of discretionary park funds rather than
specific appropriations for such purposes. Therefore, we recommend
striking the language from the bill that seeks to increase the ceiling
on financial and technical assistance from $3 million to $25 million
and inserting language that eliminates this ceiling. This will result
in the law not identifying a specific amount for the park to provide
for such purposes and in having the park continue to fund this
assistance through the park's base budget rather than providing a
separate authorization for it. We have attached the proposed amendment
to the testimony.
If enacted, the amendments in S. 189 would significantly enhance
park development and operations by eliminating overly restrictive
property acquisition criteria, by reducing unrealistic matching fund
requirements, by increasing appropriation ceilings to levels that would
support the mandates and purposes of the park, and by fulfilling the
partnership provisions that are unique to this park unit.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony. I would be glad to
answer any questions that you or other members of the subcommittee may
have.
Suggested amendment to S. 189
On page 2, line 10 strike subparagraph (B) in its entirety and
insert a new subparagraph (B):
(B) by striking ``, and $3,000,000 for financial and
technical assistance to owners of non-Federal property as
provided in section 8''.
s. 867 and h.r. 299
Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to present the views of the Department of the Interior on
S. 867 and H.R. 299, bills to adjust the boundary of Lowell National
Historical Park, and for other purposes.
The Department supports enactment of these bills.
These bills would authorize the Secretary of the Interior to
acquire five small tracts of land, totaling less than one acre, and to
include these tracts in the boundary of the Lowell National Historical
Park. These five small parcels are important to the park's operation.
Lowell National Historical Park preserves and interprets the
nationally significant historic and cultural sites, structures and
districts in Lowell, Massachusetts, that represent the most significant
planned industrial city in the United States and symbolize, in physical
form, the Industrial Revolution. The park tells the human story of the
Industrial Revolution and the changing role of technology in a 19th and
20th century setting. The cultural heritage of many of the ethnic
groups that immigrated to the United States during the 19th and early
20th century, and which continues today, is still preserved in Lowell's
neighborhoods. The park provides a vehicle for economic progress in the
community, encouraging creative and cooperative preservation and
interpretive programs.
The tracts included in this bill are needed to complete development
of the Canalway, a linear park and walkway along Lowell's 5.6-mile
historic power canal system. The acquisition of these tracts will
provide the access points necessary for development, maintenance, and
visitor protection in order to complete the Canalway. Approximately two
miles of the walkway along Lowell's 5.6-mile canal system remain
incomplete. Acquisition rights and associated boundary changes are
needed to ensure that park visitors will have access to the entire
system and to give the park the right to develop and maintain these
canal walkways.
S. 867 and H.R. 299 would authorize the Secretary to acquire the
tracts in fee, or by easement, purchase or donation, and if necessary,
by means of condemnation. The original 1978 legislation establishing
Lowell National Historical Park contains condemnation authority for the
Secretary and the now defunct Lowell Historic Preservation Commission.
The National Park Service (NPS) inherited the assets of the Commission
when it ceased operations in 1995. Although condemnation authority has
not been used in 20 years, it is needed now because NPS has been unable
to obtain clear title to one of these small tracts through the usual
means of title and record searches.
Dating back to the 1800s, tract ownership is uncertain and NPS has
not been able to locate or determine the owners. The NPS would use
condemnation authority to gain clear title only if owners of the
parcels cannot be identified after further attempts through notice in
local newspapers is unsuccessful. The Lowell City Council will be
consulted and condemnation authority will be used only with its
concurrence, as required in the park's enabling legislation. If the
Lowell City Council would oppose our intention to use condemnation
authority, the park would not proceed.
As has been the practice of the Lowell National Historical Park
throughout its Canalway acquisition program, donated easements and fee
acquisition will be sought as a first course of action. In the event
that property owners are unwilling to donate fee or easement rights,
funding for these acquisitions will be sought through public and
private funding sources.
The proposed legislation is supported by the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts, the City of Lowell, the Lowell Historic Board, and the
Lowell Plan/Lowell Development and Financial Corporation.
Mr. Chairman that concludes my testimony and I will be happy to
answer any questions from you or members of the subcommittee.
s. 1341
Thank you for the opportunity to testify on S. 1341, the Las
Cienegas Enhancement and Saguaro National Park Boundary Adjustment Act.
S. 1341 provides for the conveyance of Federal land managed by the
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in southern Arizona to a private
developer in exchange for environmentally significant lands to be
included within the Saguaro National Park and the Las Cienegas National
Conservation Area (NCA). During the 109th Congress, the BLM testified
before the House Resources Committee on legislation that provided for
the exchange of the Las Cienegas NCA parcel but that did not include
the Saguaro National Park parcel, and, at that time, suggested a number
of modifications to that legislation.
The Department appreciates that S. 1341 incorporates the vast
majority of our recommendations. We support S. 1341 and would like to
provide a few additional amendments to ensure that the bill is in
keeping with our land exchange practices.
S. 1341 authorizes an exchange of land between the Department of
the Interior and Las Cienegas LLC. The federal land to be conveyed
totals approximately 1,200 acres and is referred to in the bill as the
``Sahuarita parcel of land.'' This property is BLM-managed land south
of Tucson near Corona de Tucson. The land is low-lying Sonoran desert
and has been preliminarily identified for disposal by the BLM through
its land use planning process.
The bill would bring two parcels of land into Federal ownership.
The first is approximately 2,392 acres of land referred to in the bill
as the ``Empirita-Simonson parcel of land.'' This property lies north
of the Las Cienegas NCA managed by the BLM in southern Arizona. The
lands are currently private property but mostly lie within the
``Sonoita Valley Acquisition Planning District'' established by Public
Law 106-538, which designated the Las Cienegas NCA. The Act directed
the Department of the Interior to acquire lands from willing sellers
within the planning district for inclusion within the NCA to further
protect the important resource values for which the NCA was designated.
In addition, these lands would provide important access to the
Whetstone Mountains which are managed by the Forest Service. Upon
acquisition, the bill provides that the parcel would be administered as
part of the La Cienegas NCA.
The second parcel of land consists of 160 acres and is referred to
as the Bloom property. This tract is undeveloped and is immediately
adjacent to the boundary of the West District of Saguaro National Park.
Park planning documents dating back to 1993 have identified this
property for acquisition, if available. This tract contains important
wildlife corridors and high resource values that would complement the
resources already present in the park. The area surrounding the park
has seen significant population increases during the last decade and
protecting remaining undeveloped areas is a priority for both the park
and local communities. Upon acquisition, the bill provides that the
parcel would be administered as part of Saguaro National Park.
We recommend three modifications to the bill. First, we would
recommend striking section 3(b)(3)(B), which allows a waiver of section
206(b) of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (43 U.S.C.
1716(b)) with regard to limiting equalization payments to 25 percent of
the value of the Federal land. The inclusion in the bill of section
3(b)(3)(A)(iii), which allows for the reduction of acreages to bring
the exchange within the 25 percent ceiling, eliminates the need for
section 3(b)(3)(B) and is consistent with BLM policy on equalization of
payments. Second, we urge that the timeframes for completing the land
exchanges in section 4(e) be extended from one year to 18 months to
allow adequate time to complete all of the actions necessary for a land
exchange. Third, we would suggest a technical correction to the acreage
total for the Empirita-Simonson parcel of land.
We support section 4(b) of the bill to remove the Elgin Landfill
from the boundaries of the Las Cienegas NCA; its inclusion within the
boundaries of the NCA was an error in need of correction and this
provision will address that problem.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify on S. 1341, I will be
happy to answer any questions.
s. 1709 and h.r. 1239
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to appear before your
committee to present the views of the Department of the Interior on S.
1709 and H.R. 1239, bills to amend the National Underground Railroad
Network to Freedom Act of 1998. Both bills would adjust the authorized
funding levels for the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom
program and for the associated grant program. S. 1709 would also
require a minimum number of staff for the program.
The Department supports enactment of H.R. 1239 as passed by the
House. We support increasing the authorization ceiling for operation of
the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom program and
decreasing the authorization for the associated grant program, as both
H.R. 1239 and S. 1709 would do. However, we object to requiring a
minimum number of staff for the program, as S. 1709 would do. That
provision was also included H.R. 1239 as introduced, but H.R. 1239 was
amended to remove that provision before it was passed by the House.
The Network to Freedom program was authorized by Congress in 1998
through Public Law 105-203 to coordinate and facilitate Federal and
non-Federal activities to commemorate, honor, and interpret the history
of the Underground Railroad--the story of extraordinary actions of
ordinary men and women working in common purpose to free a people. The
law calls for producing and disseminating educational materials,
entering into agreements to provide technical assistance to a variety
of public and private entities in the United States, Mexico, Canada,
and the Caribbean, and creating a symbol for the network. The network
was to include both units and programs within the National Park Service
and other entities outside the Service that had a verifiable connection
to the Underground Railroad story.
Since the program was established, 328 sites, programs, and
facilities in 30 States and the District of Columbia have been included
in the Network to Freedom. Through this program, which is national in
scope but managed from the Midwest Regional Office, the National Park
Service coordinates preservation and education efforts nationwide,
integrating local historical sites, museums, and interpretive programs
into a mosaic of community, regional, and national stories of the
Underground Railroad.
In 2000, Congress authorized the Underground Railroad matching
grants program through Public Law 106-291 to provide support for
preservation of buildings and other structures and related research to
members of the network. Funds for these matching grants have been
appropriated three times--$250,000 in Fiscal 2002; $295,800 in Fiscal
2005, and $375,000 in Fiscal 2006. In total, 52 grants have been
awarded for projects. Several projects involved stabilizing and
preserving historic buildings, such as Eleutherian College in Indiana,
Constitution Hall in Topeka, Kansas, Mayhew Cabin in Nebraska, and the
Oswego School District Public Library in New York. Other projects
focused on expanding research in support of site interpretation, such
as the archeological survey at John Rankin House in Ohio, or education,
such as the ``Discovering New Bedford's Underground Railroad History''
program in Massachusetts, a cooperative project among three local
partners.
Through its establishment, the Network to Freedom has brought
traditional National Park Service strengths in preservation,
interpretation, and planning to new communities. The program carries
the message about the cultural and historic aspect of national parks
directly to communities of color and opens the door for public
participation in the expansion and design of the program at a
grassroots level. The program has become an essential part of our
ongoing effort to enhance diversity in our parks and programs.
The Network to Freedom's work with outside partners led to the
establishment of Friends of the Network to Freedom in 2006. The Friends
group will work to raise funds to support cooperative projects, but the
funding will not substitute for regular operations funding.
H.R. 1239 and S. 1709 would increase the authorization ceiling for
operating the Network to Freedom program from $500,000 annually, the
amount that was set in the 1998 law, to $2 million. Along with
increasing the funding level, S. 1709 would require the Secretary to
appoint at least eight full-time equivalent staff to carry out the
program. In addition, both bills would reduce the authorization ceiling
for the Underground Railroad grant program from $2.5 million annually,
the amount set in the 2000 law, to $500,000.
When the Network to Freedom program was first authorized, it
appeared that $500,000 annually would be sufficient to operate the
program. However, with the addition of the grant program, the growth of
the network to more than 300 members, and nine years worth of increases
in pay and other fixed costs, the program could justify more than
$500,000 a year in subsequent budget requests. NPS is spending $487,000
in FY 2007. An authorization ceiling of $2 million would enable the
Administration to request, and Congress to appropriate, additional
funding for this program, subject to overall NPS priorities and the
availability of funds.
For the grant program, we believe it is appropriate to reduce the
authorization ceiling from $2.5 million annually to $500,000. In the
seven years of its existence, Congress has not appropriated any amount
larger than $375,000 for grants. With the amounts provided, program
staff has been able to provide grants to nearly all network members who
have sought them and who have also been able to raise the necessary
matching funds.
S. 1709 would require NPS to increase the staff of Network to
Freedom program from six to eight. We do not believe it is appropriate
to establish a minimum staffing requirement in law. The National Park
Service needs to have the flexibility to determine appropriate staffing
based on program needs and available funds. Establishing a minimum
number of staff in law could hinder efforts to achieve management
efficiencies. If the committee acts on S. 1709, we recommend striking
Section 2, as was done in the House-passed version of H.R. 1239.
In addition, we do not support providing for funds appropriated
pursuant to this authorization to remain available until expended for
operations funding, as S. 1709 would do. Allowing such funding to be
available until expended would establish budgetary treatment for this
program that is different from all other operations funding in the
National Park Service. We do support allowing funding for grants to be
available until expended, as S. 1709 would also do. If the committee
acts on S. 1709, we recommend amending Section 3 to make this
distinction. H.R. 1239, as passed by the House, does not provide for
funding to be available until expended for either type of spending.
Mr. Chairman, that concludes my testimony and I am prepared to
answer any questions that you or other members of the committee might
have at this time.
s. 1969
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to provide the
Department of the Interior's views on S. 1969, a bill to authorize the
Secretary of the Interior to conduct a special resource study to
determine the suitability and feasibility of designating Estate Grange
and other sites related to Alexander Hamilton's life on the island of
St. Croix in the United States Virgin Islands as a unit of the National
Park System, and for other purposes.
The Department supports S. 1969. However, the Department feels that
priority should be given to the 37 previously authorized studies for
potential units of the National Park System, potential new National
Heritage Areas, and potential additions to the National Trails System
and National Wild and Scenic River System that have not yet been
transmitted to the Congress.
Studies of this type typically take approximately three years to
complete after funds are made available. We estimate the cost for this
study to be approximately $250,000.
S. 1969 would authorize the Secretary of the Interior, in
consultation with the Governor of the Virgin Islands, to conduct a
special resource study of Estate Grange and other sites and resources
associated with the life of Alexander Hamilton on St. Croix, in the
U.S. Virgin Islands. The study would evaluate the sites according to
established criteria to determine whether it is appropriate for
addition to the National Park System, or whether it is better suited to
protection by another entity.
Hamilton was born out of wedlock in Charlestown, Nevis, the capital
of the island of Nevis, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Leeward Islands, West
Indies to James A. Hamilton, the fourth son of a Scottish laird, and
Rachel Faucett Lavien, of part French Huguenot descent. There is,
however, some evidence that Hamilton's biological father may have been
a Nevis merchant named Thomas Stevens.
In 1765, a business assignment led James Hamilton to move the
family to Christiansted, St. Croix. James then abandoned Rachel and
their two sons. After James left, Rachel supported the family by
keeping a small store in Christiansted. She contracted a ``severe
fever'' and died on February 19, 1768, leaving Hamilton effectively
orphaned.
After his mother's death, Hamilton was twice adopted and worked as
a clerk with a local import-export firm with ties to the New York area.
Impressed with his writings, the local community created a fund to send
him to New Jersey for a formal education. He was attending King's
College in New York when the Revolutionary War began.
During the Revolutionary War, Hamilton served as an artillery
captain, was an aide-de-camp to General George Washington, and led
three battalions at the Battle of Yorktown.
One of America's first constitutional lawyers, he was a leader in
calling the U.S. Constitutional Convention in 1787 and was one of the
two chief authors of the Federalist Papers, the most cited contemporary
interpretation of intent for the United States Constitution. Under
President Washington, Hamilton became the first Secretary of the
Treasury.
The Estate Grange, a former rum factory and sugar plantation, was
once the home of Hamilton's mother and she is buried on the premises.
The 115-acre estate is situated approximately 1.5 to 2 miles southwest
of Christiansted National Historic Site and is owned by the Armstrong
Trust.
In 1886, the Great House, which has five bedrooms and four baths,
was used as a convalescent home for Danish gendarmes stricken by yellow
fever at the Christiansted barracks. In later years the Great house was
modified, by subsequent owners, by adding a grand staircase on the
southwest corner of the building and converting the gallery to a dining
room. The basement, with arched window openings and passageways,
includes stone and coral-walled bedrooms, as-well-as storage areas.
Mr. Chairman, that concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to
answer any questions you or the other members of the subcommittee may
have.
s. 128
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you today to present the Department of the
Interior's views on S. 128, a bill to amend the Cache la Poudre River
Corridor Act to designate a new management entity, make certain
technical and conforming amendments, enhance private property
protections, and for other purposes.
The Department has no objection to S. 128 if amended as described
in this testimony to make the bill similar to other recent national
heritage area bills. The Administration usually does not support
extending the time period for financial assistance to national heritage
areas, but is willing to accept an extension in this case, given the
statutory problems in establishing a management entity.
The Cache la Poudre River Corridor was established on October 19,
1996 by P.L. 104-323. The National Park Service (NPS), working with
former Senator Hank Brown and members of the community, completed a
resource study that focused on the area's history of water and water
rights. Water rights continue to be an important issue in the west, and
the Cache la Poudre River Corridor provides a unique opportunity to
tell the story of the natural history of 19th century settlement,
irrigation, and establishment of water rights in an arid environment.
S. 128 would correct a number of technical errors, provide a more
accurate definition of the national heritage area's boundary, change
the management of the heritage area to a private not-for-profit
organization from a federal commission, include the proper spelling of
the Cache la Poudre River, and change the name of the area to more
accurately reflect the purpose for which the area was established.
Congress established the Cache la Poudre River heritage area in
1996, however, it has never been fully operational due to concerns from
the Department of Justice over language used in the law to appoint
members to the operating commission that potentially conflict with the
appointments clause of the Constitution. The NPS and members of the
Colorado delegation have been working for several years to reach an
agreement on legislative language that meets the concerns laid out by
the Department of Justice, preserves the regional administration of the
area, and protects private property rights. S. 128 meets these goals.
The most significant change in S. 128 is the management entity. It
replaces a federally appointed advisory commission with a local
501(c)(3) organization, the Poudre Heritage Alliance. Established in
2002, this group has continued to lead the program, meeting regularly
with the public, conducting research and developing the elements of the
required management plan. The Alliance represents a broad spectrum of
the area's residents, organizations, and agencies that were involved in
the planning for the National Heritage Area.
The NPS exercises limited oversight of national heritage areas. The
current management of those areas is the responsibility of qualified
management entities, with NPS providing financial and technical
assistance to help with visitor education and planning if needed. Cache
la Poudre, however, has received limited financial assistance, because
of the problems in establishing a qualified management entity. NPS has
provided some planning and research assistance over the past 10 years.
S. 128 would extend the authority to receive financial assistance
until 10 years after enactment of this bill. In most cases, that would
raise concerns about postponing the time when the heritage area becomes
self-sufficient. In this case, however, the previous delays in
designating a qualified management entity have significantly limited
both the progress in establishing the heritage area and the financial
assistance provided. Over 10 years, NPS has provided approximately
$340,000 in financial assistance to the Cache la Poudre River heritage
area, which is less than one-tenth of what was provided to other
heritage areas established at the same time.
The bill also authorizes the development of a management plan
within three years of enactment and authorizes the use of federal funds
to develop and implement that plan. If the plan is not submitted within
three years of enactment of this Act, the Heritage Area becomes
ineligible for federal funding until a plan is submitted to the
Secretary. Additionally, the Secretary may, at the request of the
management entity, provide technical assistance and enter into
cooperative agreements with other public and private entities.
S. 128 contains safeguards to protect private property, including a
prohibition on the use of federal funds to acquire property. The bill
proposes no new restrictions with regard to private property rights and
does not convey any water right or water restrictions to the federal
government.
S. 128 would also correct a number of errors in the original
legislation. The first correction would be the proper spelling of the
river, with a lower case ``l'' for Cache la Poudre. It replaces the
original name of the heritage area from Cache La Poudre River Corridor
to Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area. It also replaces a
listing of flood plain map references with a map developed specifically
for the area.
It appears that the amendments that the bill suggests to P. L. 104-
323 result in contradictory language regarding land acquisition within
the heritage area. We would like to work with the Subcommittee to
clarify this language and make it similar to other heritage areas.
We also suggest including an additional requirement for an
evaluation to be conducted by the Secretary, three years prior to the
cessation of federal funding under this act. The evaluation would
examine the accomplishments of the heritage area in meeting the goals
of the management plan, analyze the leveraging and impact of
investments to the heritage area, identify the critical components of
the management structure and sustainability of the heritage area, and
recommend what future role, if any, the NPS should have with respect to
the heritage area.
Lastly, legislative language regarding National Heritage Areas has
evolved since 1996 when the Cache la Poudre Heritage Corridor was
enacted. We recommend amending the bill further to make the amended act
similar to other, more recent heritage area legislation. We would be
happy to work with the Subcommittee to develop these amendments.
Mr. Chairman that concludes my prepared remarks. I would be pleased
to answer any questions you or other members of the Subcommittee may
have.
s. 697
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to present the
Department of the Interior's views on S. 697 to establish the Steel
Industry National Historic Site in the State of Pennsylvania.
The Department opposes enactment of this legislation.
S. 697 would establish a unit of the National Park System
comprising resources related to the former United States Steel
Homestead Works in the boroughs of Munhall, Rankin, and Swissvale,
Pennsylvania. The resources include the site of the Battle of
Homestead, which is important to labor history in the United States,
the remnants of the Carrie Furnace, and the Hot Metal Bridge connecting
mill sites in Rankin and Munhall.
The resources cited in the bill are representative of what was once
a larger and historically important steel industry complex in the
Pittsburgh region and the rise of the labor movement by steelworkers.
The ``Homestead Lockout,'' is one of the seminal events in American
Labor history. We believe the resources are worthy of preservation and
have significant interpretive value to the people of the United States
and to those who may visit the site from other nations. They enable
visitors to understand the role of steel manufacturing in our nation's
history and the manner in which labor and management interacted before
and during a most important time in the development of organized labor
in the United States. This is the place that enriched men such as
Andrew Carnegie and J.P. Morgan, and in which immigrant workers and
their descendents produced quality steel for U.S. and world markets.
The National Park Service (NPS) completed a Special Resource Study
involving these sites in 2002. The study concluded that the sites were
not feasible to administer as a unit of the National Park System; that
the site of the ``Homestead Lockout'' lacked integrity; and, that there
was no need for NPS management. The configuration and condition of the
resources--scattered sites in varying states of repair, uncertainty
regarding the protection of the resource setting over time (e.g. the
area adjacent to the Homestead Landing Site is now a shopping center),
and significant improvement and operational costs exposure--led to the
conclusion that the site did not meet criteria for designation as a
unit of the National Park System. The costs associated with
stabilization and rehabilitation of the Carrie Furnace and the
Homestead Site, alone, were estimated in the study to be in excess of
$14 million. With the addition of costs for exhibits and visitor
services facilities, the total capital costs would rise to over
$36,600,000.
The study also concluded that a local management framework could
adequately protect and manage these historic resources since they are
all located within the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area. Rather
than establishing a unit of the National Park System, the study
recommended that these and additional historically important resources,
including properties in the Homestead National Register Historic
District and the Bost Building (a National Historic Landmark and the
site of union headquarters during the strike), be designated as an
affiliated area of the National Park System. An affiliated area
designation would suggest a significantly reduced federal contribution
for capital and associated operational costs, while increasing the
opportunities for a wider scale of resource protection measures and
visitor experiences at nearby critically related resources. Local
partners would contribute the larger share of costs for rehabilitation
and interpretive facilities and services. The Bost Building, now owned
and operated by the Steel Industry Heritage Corporation, the management
entity for the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area, would be the
initial focal point of the affiliated area. We believe that an
affiliated area status would permit a viable federal/local partnership
for resource protection and enjoyment.
Establishment of a national historic site, as an affiliated area,
would include a wider array of relevant resources than proposed in S.
697, without NPS ownership and management, but with technical and
financial assistance, appears to be a better approach to protecting
these resources for public education and enjoyment. This level of
federal recognition and involvement could be a catalyst for greater
local commitments and initiatives, and would serve to enhance public
understanding, interest and appreciation of the roles of labor and
management in the ``Big Steel'' era. We believe, based on the financial
leveraging history of the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area, that
there is sufficient local capacity to contribute substantially to the
preservation and interpretation of these resources.
Mr. Chairman that concludes my statement and I am prepared to
answer any questions that members of the subcommittee may wish to ask.
s. 1039
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to appear before your
committee to present the Department of the Interior's views on S. 1039
a bill to extend the authorization for the New Jersey Coastal Heritage
Trail Route for an additional four years.
The Department supports enactment of this bill with two amendments.
The Act of October 20, 1988 authorized the Secretary to designate a
vehicular tour route in coastal New Jersey and to prepare an inventory
of sites along the route. An interpretive program was also mandated to
provide for public appreciation, education, understanding and enjoyment
of important fish and wildlife habitats, geologic and geographical
landforms, cultural resources, and migration routes in coastal New
Jersey. The Secretary was authorized to provide technical assistance,
prepare and distribute information, and erect signs along the route.
The trail links national wildlife refuges, national parklands, National
Historic Landmarks, and National Register sites with important historic
communities, state parks, natural areas, and other resources to tell
the story of New Jersey's role in shaping U.S. history and in providing
internationally important habitats for bird and other migrations.
The trail, an affiliated area of the National Park System, is a
partnership among the National Park Service, the State of New Jersey,
and many local government and private non-profit partners. Through
interpretation of five themes (Maritime History, Coastal Habitats,
Wildlife Migration, Relaxation & Inspiration, and Historic
Settlements), the trail brings attention to important natural and
cultural resources along coastal New Jersey. The trail demonstrates the
potential of new public/private partnerships that allow the National
Park Service to meet its core mission of natural and cultural resource
preservation along with interpretation and public education in a cost-
efficient manner through technical assistance while reducing
operational responsibilities. No federal funds are used for operations,
maintenance, or repair of any road or related structure.
Extending the authorization of the trail would enable the National
Park Service to complete implementation of the trail plan, as supported
by the public and our partners. Without additional time and funding,
the New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail Route will be left incomplete.
Implementation of the plan is also critical in building a base of
sustainable partners and developing a strategy for the long-term
management of the trail. Additionally, commitments to trail partners
would go unfulfilled, and many additional natural and cultural
resources would not receive the partnership assistance leveraged by the
trail.
Public Law 109-338, the National Heritage Areas Act of 2006,
reauthorized federal funding for the New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail
Route until September 30, 2007, while also requiring a strategic plan
to be prepared by the Secretary three years after funds are made
available. The current sunset date of September 30, 2007 does not
provide adequate time to complete the preparation of the strategic
plan. The strategic plan is an important tool to help the trail develop
a long-term management strategy that includes a variety of options for
sustainability of the trail. In order to carry out this provision, the
authorization for federal funding for the trail should be extended to
September 30, 2011, to match the time period for the completion and
transmittal of the strategic plan.
The Department recommends two amendments to the bill. First, we
recommend that the long title of the bill be amended to use the
generally accepted name of the trail, which is the New Jersey Coastal
Heritage Trail Route. Second, the current authorization of
appropriations for the New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail Route is
limited to the Secretary providing technical assistance and funds for
the design and fabrication of interpretive materials, devices and
signs. All federals funds under the enabling legislation require a non-
federal, one-to-one match. We recommend that S. 1039 be amended to
authorize the Secretary to use federal funding to complete the
strategic plan since the current authorization does not allow for funds
to be used for this purpose.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to
answer any questions you or other members of the committee may have.
s. 1476
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to appear before your
committee to present the views of the Department of the Interior on S.
1476, a bill to conduct a special resources study of the Tule Lake
Segregation Center in Modoc County, California, to determine the
suitability and feasibility of establishing a unit of the National Park
System.
The Department supports this legislation with amendments described
later in this statement. The study authorized by S. 1476 would provide
the opportunity to evaluate options for preserving and interpreting the
largest and most heavily guarded of the ten internment camps where
Japanese American citizens from west coast states were forced to live
during World War II under Executive Order 9066. However, the Department
feels that priority should be given to the 37 previously authorized
studies for potential units of the National Park System, potential new
National Heritage Areas, and potential additions to the National Trails
System and National Wild and Scenic River System that have not yet been
transmitted to the Congress.
Tule Lake, which housed more than 18,000 internees at its peak, was
the only internment camp that was converted to a maximum-security
segregation center for evacuees from all the relocation centers who
resisted internment. It was the only camp that had its own jail. It had
the most guard towers and the largest number of military police of any
of the camps. During its operation, the center was the site of several
acts of resistance and declarations of martial law and military
control.
The Tule Lake site features more surviving historic features and
resources in original locations than all of the other former internment
camps combined. The original jail structure is, for the former
internees, the most significant symbol of internment anywhere in the
United States. In 2006, the Secretary of the Interior designated 42
acres of the Tule Lake Segregation Center as a National Historic
Landmark. The designation confirmed the national significance of the
site, one of the key criteria a resource must meet to be considered an
appropriate candidate for establishment as a unit of the National Park
System. The work done on the nomination for National Historic Landmark
designation would provide a foundation for the study that would be
authorized by S. 1476.
The National Park Service administers two sites that were used as
internment camps for Japanese Americans during World War II: Manzanar
National Historic Site, in central California, which was authorized by
Congress in 1992, and Minidoka Internment National Monument, in
southern Idaho, which was established by presidential proclamation in
2001. However, neither site has the unique historic resources or story
that Tule Lake has as the only designated segregation center among the
ten internment camps.
The study would evaluate the site according to criteria provided by
law to determine whether it is appropriate for addition to the National
Park System, or whether it is better suited to protection by another
entity. In carrying out the study, the National Park Service would work
closely with the Bureau of Reclamation, the Bureau of Land Management,
and the California Department of Transportation, which are the primary
land managers, as well as private land owners in the area, local
agencies, and groups interested in the preservation of Japanese
American internment sites, including the Tule Lake Committee. The study
would cost an estimated $150,000 to $200,000.
S. 1476 provides for the study to be completed within one year
after funds are made available for it. We recommend that the bill be
amended to provide for the study to be completed within three years
after funds are made available, which is the standard time frame for
conducting special resource studies. We would also like to work with
the committee to simplify the language of S. 1476 in several places.
Mr. Chairman, that concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to
answer any questions that you or other members of the committee might
have.
s. 1808
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to present the views of
the Department of the Interior on S. 1808, a bill to authorize the
exchange of exclusive use easements between the National Park Service
and the Alaska Railroad within Denali National Park.
The Department supports S. 1808.
S. 1808 would authorize the Secretary of the Interior to convey to
the Alaska Railroad (Railroad) an exclusive use easement to not more
than 25 acres of land in exchange for the Railroad's relinquishment of
an exclusive use easement of equal size to the federal government. The
bill would limit the use of the easement conveyed to the Railroad to
activities necessary for the operation of the railway. The bill would
also require the Railroad to pay the costs associated with the
exchange, including the costs for surveys and compliance with the
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). To complete the exchange, the
Alaska Legislature would have to approve any release of Railroad land
interests as the Alaska Railroad is a state-owned corporation. The
exchange would have to be carried out within five years after
enactment.
Both easements in question are located within Denali National Park
on land owned by the federal government. The exchange of easements
would not affect federal ownership of underlying lands. The easement
conveyed to the Railroad would be used to build a train turn-around at
Denali National Park. The easement relinquished by the Railroad would
be managed in its natural state as part of Denali National Park. If it
is adjacent to the Denali Wilderness, this bill would add the land to
the wilderness.
The Alaska Railroad provides passenger rail service from Whittier,
Anchorage, and Fairbanks to Denali National Park. In 2005, the Alaska
Railroad carried more than 260,000 passengers to Denali National Park.
In 2006, that number rose to over 300,000. The Railroad's ability to
manage this increasing traffic is limited by the lack of a turn-around
at Denali. Under current conditions, trains carrying visitors from
Anchorage to Denali must continue to Fairbanks. Trains traveling south
from Fairbanks to Denali must likewise continue to Anchorage. To
accommodate existing traffic, the Railroad concentrates passenger
service into two trains to Denali per day, one in the morning and one
in the afternoon. These trains average 20 coach cars in length and
carry up to 1,500 passengers each. The arrival of so many visitors to
the park at one time often causes congestion, crowding, and traffic.
For example, visitors who travel by train to Denali Park Station must
travel by bus to enter the park. The concentration of rail traffic
results in two major ``pulses'' of buses that leave the park entrance
and travel into the park each day.
A turnaround would allow trains to run round trips from either
Fairbanks or Anchorage to the park. It would offer the Railroad the
ability to economically use smaller trains and to offer more trips to
the park each day. This expanded schedule would, in turn, allow the
park to smooth out the bus schedule and provide a less crowded
experience for visitors.
The lands that would be affected by this bill are within the
boundary of Denali National Park and owned by the federal government.
The Alaska Railroad Transfer Act of 1982 (45 U.S.C. Sections 1201-1214)
conveyed to the state an exclusive use easement to the Railroad for the
approximately 35 miles of track through park. This Act limited the use
of the easement to activities necessary for the operation of the
railway and mandated that the state operate the Railroad subject to
laws and regulations for the protection of park values. S. 1808 would
apply these same conditions to the easement it conveys to the Railroad.
Although not specified in the bill, the proposed location of the
turn-around is approximately four miles south of Denali Park Station on
land that has been determined to be unsuitable for wilderness
designation. The Railroad has identified four parcels of land that are
of interest to the National Park Service.
The National Park Service believes that full public involvement in
the planning process should occur prior to deciding if a land exchange
should occur. This would occur through the NEPA compliance that is
provided for in the proposed legislation.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to
answer any questions you or the other members of the subcommittee may
have.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Mr. Wenk.
As I noted in my opening statement, most of these appear to
be non-controversial. So I'd like to take a minute and focus on
the bills that you raise concerns about.
S. 148, Paterson Great Falls National Park, the proponents
of S. 148, the Paterson Great Falls National Park Bill contend
that the Park Service study is flawed. That many noted
historians and scholars have criticized the Park Service's
findings. Are you aware of these criticisms and do you have any
comment to make on them?
Mr. Wenk. Yes, we are. We're currently in the process where
we're evaluating or looking at our responses to the public
comments. We are aware of the opinions that have been generated
by individuals from throughout the country. We are, that will
be part of our response when we send the package up to Congress
early in 2008.
Senator Akaka. Your testimony notes that one of the Park
Service concerns with S. 148 is that there are other sites in
the National Park System that interpret similar themes, as the
proposed Paterson Great Falls Park would. But isn't it common
to have several parks that interpret related themes? If the
resources at Paterson are nationally significant, as your
testimony suggests, why is it a problem to add one more site to
help tell these stories?
Mr. Wenk. The question, certainly there are other sites.
There's sites such as the Lowell National Historical Park,
there's Slater's Mill within the John H. Chafee Blackstone
River Valley National Heritage Corridor, that are protected as
similar resources.
I believe that we are looking at the cost that's associated
with the site, the fact that there are limited resources for
the protection of these areas. We think that the story of that
era is adequately told in the other areas, and so that it is
not necessary.
It also has already been afforded protection by the State
and local governments, for protection of the area.
Senator Akaka. My next question concerns S. 697, the
proposed Steel Industry National Historic Site. Is your primary
concern that the site would be too expensive to administer or
is it that the resources are not nationally significant and
appropriate for National Park designation?
Mr. Wenk. The Carrie Furnace area has been determined to
have national significance, however the cost--one of the sites
that was identified, the Bost Warehouse, that site is actually
outside of the proposed boundary.
The Homestead area, that area lacks integrity for
consideration as part of the site.
Having said that, the cost is a major component. Between
the cost of rehabilitation and the interpretive work that would
need to be done, we believe the cost would approach $40 million
if this was determined to be a Historical Park.
Senator Akaka. My next question is on S. 1341, the land
exchange in southern Arizona.
I understand that this bill primarily affects the Bureau of
Land Management. But I wonder if you can clarify one issue. The
bill requires the lands to be exchanged, to be of equal value
as of the date of enactment. My understanding is that the
standard valuation practice is to require the values to be
equal at the time the lands are appraised. Does the Department
have any concern with this provision?
Mr. Wenk. I think you're correct, that is our position,
that it is at the time of the appraisal. I think that is a
correction that would need to be made to make it consistent
with other exchanges that we have throughout the country. Thank
you.
Senator Akaka. My final question to you concerns S. 1808,
the authorization for the land exchange between the National
Park Service and the Alaska Railroad at Denali National Park.
This bill requires the lands exchange to be on an equal
acre basis, not equal value. Why is it appropriate to focus on
acreage instead of value as is more typical for land exchanges?
Mr. Wenk. This is all currently Federal land and these are
easements that we're exchanging. So the exchange of the
easement would, we believe is an appropriate equal--acreage
would be an appropriate way to look at the exchange. We believe
there's sufficient acreage and believe it's an appropriate
thing to do to improve, both our ability to manage and the
delivery of visitors to the Park.
Senator Akaka. The bill doesn't specify which particular
lands or easements are to be exchanged. Would it be appropriate
to specifically identify in the bill the parcels to be
exchanged?
Mr. Wenk. We've not yet done the environmental analysis to
look at all the various options that would be available for
exchange. Until that is done, we do not know which parcels may
be the best interest of the exchange for the public.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Mr. Wenk.
Senator.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Senator Burr.
Senator Burr. Welcome. I'll try to run through these as
quick as I can.
Paterson Great Falls Park--how many acres of the proposed
area are in private ownership and how much will remain in
private ownership, were it designated?
Mr. Wenk. It's my understanding that there, that the only
thing that would be looked at for Federal ownership would be
those areas necessary for the administration. I can't give you
a specific number. I know that we do not intend to acquire, we
would only acquire land through willing sellers.
Senator Burr. I get the impression that we've already got a
Historic District Congressionally created. We're trying to
rectify elsewhere in the country, in holdings that might exist.
Wouldn't this go against the grain of what we're trying to
rectify out there, were we to?
Mr. Wenk. I believe that we're looking at this, the overall
management of the site is one of the issues that we have in
terms of the criteria, in terms of the feasibility of managing
the site. So certainly, we are concerned about all aspects that
would relate to difficulty with that management.
Certainly we do try to eliminate in-holdings when we
believe they're in parks across the country, when they're
important to the overall management of the park area. I
believe, as this is proposed, that I think about a third of the
proposed National Historic Site would include a State park
within the boundary of the park area, as it's proposed.
Senator Burr. OK. The Keweenaw National Historic Park
matching funds. Do you know how many parks we have that in
their enacting legislation, provided for matching funds, based
upon some leverage of private funds?
Mr. Wenk. It's not uncommon, but I cannot give you the
number. We can provide the number for you, I'm sure.
Senator Burr. Let me ask you, and if you don't know the
answer, would you get it back for us?
Mr. Wenk. Sure.
[The information follows:]
The National Park Service does not know the exact number of parks
whose enabling legislation requires matching federal funds with non-
federal funds. A few examples of parks that do have this requirement
include Boston Harbor Islands National Recreation Area, in
Massachusetts, that requires a 3:1 match of non-federal dollars to
federal dollars, and New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park, also
in Massachusetts, that requires a 3:1 match for cooperative agreements
and a 1:1 match for visitor and interpretive facilities. The majority
of park units do not require a non-federal match for operations.
Senator Burr. Under the Centennial Fund, would that create
an opportunity for this park, or any park that currently has
matching funds, to then double dip?
Mr. Wenk. Currently, we are not including land acquisition.
The projects that were presented to Congress, in terms of the
centennial challenge, I believe, about 200 different projects
that we had certified eligible, none of those were land
acquisition projects. We are looking at those separately to try
and to determine the criteria that should be used. So I believe
the answer is, we do not yet know on the land acquisition side,
how we're going to look at the Centennial Challenge funds.
That's something we're still developing.
Senator Burr. Can I just throw that out as a cautionary
note?
Mr. Wenk. Yes.
Senator Burr. It's one of the things, as we try to come to
some finality on that legislation, that the intent here is not
to create additional pots--it is to have a program leveraging
private support with matching Federal support, which I embrace,
wholeheartedly.
The Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation.
Clearly, I understand the cost that would be incurred of
repairs to the structures. How many other National Heritage
Areas or portions of such areas have been designated within the
National Park System?
Mr. Wenk. National Historic Heritage Areas, we have 37 that
have been designated, to date. If you're asking me how many
different park areas have been designated within those
National----
Senator Burr. As units?
Mr. Wenk. Once again, I will have to get you that number,
sir.
Senator Burr. Thank you.
Mr. Wenk. To give you, specifically.
[The information follows:]
Of the 37 National Heritage Areas, none are units of the National
Park System. However, 28 contain within their boundaries, one or more
units of the National Park System.
Senator Burr. How many structures are there on this
proposed site?
Mr. Wenk. I'm sorry, I do not know the answer.
Senator Burr. OK. Has a study been conducted to determine
the suitability and feasibility of designating the site as a
unit of the National Park System and if it was, what were those
findings?
Mr. Wenk. The Carrie Furnace site has been designated a
National Historic Landmark, I believe, and that in itself gives
it national significance.
Excuse me for 1 minute.
Yes, I'm sorry. There was study done. It was done in 2002
and it determined that it did not meet the criteria for
inclusion as a National Park Area.
Senator Burr. Thank you. I'd be remiss if I didn't ask this
last one, relative to the Alexander Hamilton Site Study at
Virgin Islands. How many existing National Park Units currently
interpret the life and contributions of Alexander Hamilton?
Mr. Wenk. Certainly, the Hamilton Grange, his home,
Independence in Philadelphia, Federal Hall in New York all have
a significant interpretation, I believe, of Alexander Hamilton.
Senator Burr. Do we know what it would cost to conduct the
proposed study?
Mr. Wenk. The study itself would probably cost around
$200,000. We would look at about a 1-year period of time to
complete it.
Senator Burr. Great. Thank you.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Burr.
I want to thank you very much. I'm sorry.
Senator Menendez, your questions?
Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very
much.
Mr. Wenk, even though the hearing today is before the
Senate bill, you're familiar that there is a House bill that
has passed the committee, are you not?
Mr. Wenk. Yes, I am familiar.
Senator Menendez. In that House bill, it has been amended
in various ways, rather significant ways. They eliminated a
section allowing the NPS to exercise eminent domain. They
streamlined the management and advisory committee. They changed
the designation to a National Historical Park. They eliminated
Hinchliffe Field, which you mentioned as one of your objections
from the park because it was not studied. If those amendments
were made to the pending Senate bill, would you still be in
opposition to it?
Mr. Wenk. Yes, we would. The questions of suitability and
feasibility still remain on the criteria.
Senator Menendez. All right. So you oppose the House bill
that has passed the committee?
Mr. Wenk. Yes.
Senator Menendez. OK. That will likely pass the House of
Representatives in full, shortly. All right.
Let me ask you this. At an early stage of the Paterson's
Great Falls study, the National Park Service launched a special
web page devoted to the Paterson study. For all the years the
study continued, the web page noted that the Administration,
``Does not support addition of new units to the National Parks
system.'' What effect did the Administration policy have on the
Paterson study?
Mr. Wenk. I guess I'm not able to quantify.
Senator Menendez. But it had some effect, did it not?
Mr. Wenk. I would--I'm not aware of any effect that it had
on it.
Senator Menendez. Why would you have put, during all of the
period of time of the Paterson study, right on that web page
where you were soliciting, supposedly, commentary and
invitation during the comment period, that the Administration
does not support addition of new units to the National Parks
system. Doesn't that undermine the very essence of why we seek
public comment? I tell people we, ``Well, the Administration
doesn't want any more parks so----''
Mr. Wenk. I believe the statement is made so that we are,
we have not taken a position while we're in the study period.
Senator Menendez. That's a very unique reason. Did you do
that with every website that you put out?
Mr. Wenk. I would have to check and see, sir.
Senator Menendez. Would you answer that for the committee,
please?
Mr. Wenk. Yes, I will.
[The information follows:]
The message on the website was inadvertently placed there and once
discovered, was immediately removed since it did not reflect current
Departmental policies regarding new areas. I am unaware if this
occurred on ony other Nationl Park Service websites during the study
period. The National Park Service follows standard guidelines and
requirements for conducting special resource studies as directed by
Congress. Given the high number of public comments submitted in support
of designation during the study period, it would seem that the message
did not have an impact on public input.
Senator Menendez. The Park Service published a draft of the
Paterson Great Falls study for public comment in November 2005
and invited the public to provide comments by January 30, 2006.
It's astonishing to read the letters of some of the most
distinguished scholars in America, characterize what the Park
Service did in the Paterson study.
Let me just use a few of their words. The use words like
``misreads the historical record,'' ``seriously deficient,''
``demonstrably wrong,'' ``false,'' ``a serious misreading of
the historical record.'' As a result of getting all these
letters from leading scholars, what changes did the Park
Service make in the draft study? Any?
Mr. Wenk. I'm not aware of the specific changes. I do know
that we're, at the present time, looking at all the public
comments and that will be part of our transmittal to you early
in 2008.
Senator Menendez. But you haven't made any changes in the
draft study, as a result of all those comments.
Mr. Wenk. Those, the changes will be made in the subsequent
document, sir.
Senator Menendez. Now, the Park Service says that the
Paterson, what Paterson represents is already covered elsewhere
in the National Park System, in part because water, power, and
industry are covered in Lowell National Historical Park.
Let me read to you testimony that I think is before the
committee, Mr. Chairman, from Eric DeLony, the former chief of
the Historic American Engineering Record of the National Park
Service, the U.S. Department of Interior. He says, ``The range
of these works is unique in the nation.'' He goes on to say,
``Paterson's varied and evolving nature of manufacturing also
differentiates the area from other National Park System sites
that deal with the discrete aspects of industry.
Although Lowell serves a valuable role in the National
Parks system as an example of the 19th century cotton industry,
Paterson represents so much more. Paterson ventured into silk
textiles as early as the 1830s, eventually becoming the largest
silk producer in the world,'' not America, in the world, ``and
making America a major force in international commerce.''
It goes on to talk about it being a hub for non-textile
manufacturing, the first revolving pistol assembled in
Paterson, of the Colt gun mill. During the 19th and 20th
century, Paterson playing a major role in producing forms of
nearly every type of transportation, locomotives, submarines,
bridges, the engine for the Spirit of Saint Louis, the B-17
Flying Fortress of World War II. ``No other site,'' this is his
testimony, ``in the National Park Service, not even those that
illustrate the cultural theme of industry, comes close to the
breadth of Paterson's story.''
Now, how does that reconcile, you gave an answer to Senator
Akaka about, this is taken care of by Lowell. That's seems to
be a far different cry.
Mr. Wenk. These are all, I understand the question. I
understand the presentation of the differences between the two
site areas. That is part of the things that we will be
resolving as we're looking at the comments and as we transmit
this to the Senate.
Senator Menendez. Mr. Chairman, I have your indulgence for
another 2 minutes?
Senator Akaka. Yes.
Senator Menendez. Thank you.
Mr. Wenk, to suggest, when the Park Service says that what
Paterson represents is already covered elsewhere, lies in
Lowell. Would that mean that the Air and Space Museum would not
have been built because of the Wright Brothers National
Memorial at Kittyhawk?
Mr. Wenk. I don't----
Senator Menendez. Would that mean that the World War II
Memorial would not have been built because the U.S.S. Arizona
Memorial, where the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor would have
been ineligible?
Mr. Wenk. I don't believe so.
Senator Menendez. Finally, did not Governor Corzine write a
letter to Secretary Kempthorne on September 11th of last year,
that said, ``The State of New Jersey alone, can not, can not
protect the resources of the Great Falls and properly present
them to the public without an NPS unit in Paterson.''
How is it that when you have a State that can't meet the
wherewithal on its own to protect what you, yourself, as an
agency says, has national historical significance--how can you
conclude that the, how the study concluded the State would be
doing, or including the fact that the State of New Jersey is
willing to put down $10 million toward this? But that, in fact,
it is unfeasible when the State is willing to put $10 million
down? It doesn't have the money to achieve what your estimate
is, but when the State puts $10 million down, I don't know how
often you get those type of offers.
Mr. Wenk. I would suggest we are--the offer is, while it's
not unique, it's not common. I think that we're looking at it
as a----
Senator Menendez. It's a very significant park.
Mr. Wenk. It is. We're looking at it as, the study
recommends that we have a pathway to a future through an
affiliated area, and that kind of an offer would coincide very
directly with an affiliated area that we would work with the
State to manage.
Senator Menendez. Finally, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Zax who, I
think, may offer testimony at some point today--but I want to,
while I'm here, draw our attention to page 19 of, well this was
a submission to Secretary Kempthorne.
It says, ``The draft study clearly errs in concluding that
Hamilton's economic vision as realized not by the SUM in
Paterson, but by the Boston Associates in Lowell, and other New
England mill towns.
Hamilton worked to create an economy that would allow
immigrants to share directly in America's boundless
opportunities. Contrary to the draft study's strained argument,
the Boston Associates--a group of wealthy Boston Brahmian
families, connected through interlocking corporate directorates
and marriage--never sought to achieve Hamilton's vision of
opportunity for all. Unlike Hamilton, one of the most ardent
opponents of slavery at the time, the Boston Associates played
a role in attempting to quell the Northern anti-slavery
crusade.''
Now, these historians seem to me to have a far better grasp
of why the Paterson Great Falls should be a National Park. It
seems like the Park Service is way off base with this
historical aspects of this.
So, Mr. Chairman, I have a lot more which I will include
for the record, with the Chair's permission, and also a series
of questions for the Service. So, not to delay the committee
any longer, but there is a very compelling side, and even the
descendants of Aaron Burr, I know, believe in truth and
justice, and will give us an opportunity for a fair hearing in
the process.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Thank you, Senator Menendez.
Ranking Member Burr, do you have any further questions?
Senator Burr. I don't think so.
Senator Akaka. I want to thank you for your responses and
we will see you again.
So, at this point, I want to call the next panel, and ask
them to take a seat at the witness table.
The panel includes Mr. Tom Brooks, the Chief Engineer for
the Alaska Railroad from Anchorage, Alaska and Mr. Augie
Carlino, the President and CEO of the Steel Industry Heritage
Corporation, from Homestead, Pennsylvania, and Mr. Leonard Zax,
a partner with the Latham & Watkins law firm here in
Washington, who is representing the New Jersey Community
Development Corporation.
I want you to know that we'll include your complete
statements in the hearing record, and I'd ask each of you to
please summarize your testimony, and limit your remarks to no
more than 5 minutes.
Mr. Brooks, will you please proceed?
STATEMENT OF TOM BROOKS, ASSISTANT VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF
ENGINEER, ALASKA RAILROAD, ANCHORAGE, AK
Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the
subcommittee for the opportunity to speak to you today, on
behalf of the Alaska Railroads.
My name is Tom Brooks, and I'm the Assistant Vice
President, and Chief Engineer with the Alaska Railroad. The
Alaska Railroad is a State-owned railroad, carrying both
passengers and freight. It was originally built, and operated,
by the U.S. Government in the early 1900s through the enabling
statute adopted by Congress in 1914.
It was sold to the State of Alaska in January 1985. The
500-mile long mainline runs from the South-Central city of
Seward, to the interior city of Fairbanks, as the enabling act
required. The Alaska Railroad carried over a half a million
passengers in 2006.
The Alaska Railroad provides passenger service to Denali
National Park through S. 1808. The bill being considered at
this hearing, the Alaska Railroad with the help of Senator
Murkowski, seeks to exchange up to 25 acres of Denali National
Park land for an equal amount of Alaska Railroad land, in order
to build a turnaround for our trains. The formerly Alaska
Railroad land given to the National Park Service would be
designated as wilderness lands.
The Alaska Railroad has been carrying passengers to this
National Park since the early 1920s, long before rail access to
our National Parks came into vogue. The number of rail
passengers to Denali National Park has been increasing each
year, and in 2001 about 200,000 passengers used the Denali rail
station, and in 2006, the number grew to over 300,000.
The Alaska Railroad has accommodated this growth by adding
additional direct trains, however, the options to improve
service further are limited because our trains can not be
turned around.
The existence of a turnaround track, known as a wide track,
in Denali would allow more frequent trains and more flexible
rail schedules, thus accommodating the continued growth and
development of rail access to the Park.
There was originally a turnaround track at the Denali rail
station, which was too short for modern train lengths, and thus
with Railroad concurrence, converted to Park Service use in the
1980s.
Besides enhancing visitor access options, there are other
public benefits of a turnaround track at the Park. The rail
mode of transportation offers less highway congestions,
improved public safety, and less environmental impact than the
highway alternative. Improved access to Park land through
public transportation is a national policy goal, as evidenced
by the Department of Transportation's Transit in the Parks
Program, created by Congress in 2005.
The National Park Service and the Alaska region of the
National Parks Conservation Association both support the land
exchanges described in the bill. The Association has written a
letter of support, which I will submit for the record, and we
are pleased that there is a companion bill in the other body.
Thus, S. 1808 is a win-win for the Alaska Railroad, the
National Park Service and the hundreds of thousands of visitors
who would benefit from access to our Nation's treasured Denali
National Park.
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the
committee today, and I'll be happy to answer any questions the
committee might have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Brooks follows:]
Prepared Statement of Tom Brooks, Assistant Vice President and Chief
Engineer, Alaska Railroad, Anchorage, AK, on S. 1808
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, for your
invitation to speak with you today on behalf of the Alaska Railroad. My
name is Tom Brooks, and I am Assistant Vice President and Chief
Engineer at the Alaska Railroad.
The Alaska Railroad is a State-owned railroad carrying both
passengers and freight. The Alaska Railroad was originally built and
operated by the U.S. Government in the early 1900's through the
enabling statute adopted by the U.S. Congress in 1914. It was sold to
the State of Alaska in January 1985. The 500-mile-long mainline runs
from the south central city of Seward to the interior city of Fairbanks
as the enabling act required. The Alaska Railroad carried over a half-
million passengers in 2006.
The Alaska Railroad provides passenger service to Denali National
Park. Through S. 1808, the bill being considered at this hearing, the
Alaska Railroad, with the help of Senator Murkowski, seeks to exchange
up to 25 acres of Denali National Park land for an equal amount of
Alaska Railroad land, in order to build a turnaround for our trains.
The formerly Alaska Railroad land given to the National Park Service
would be designated as wilderness lands.
The Alaska Railroad has been carrying passengers to this national
park since the early 1920s, long before rail access into our national
parks came into vogue. The number of rail passengers to Denali National
Park has been increasing each year. In 2001, 198,737 passengers used
the Denali Park Rail Station, and in 2006 that number grew to 303,741
passengers. The Alaska Railroad has accommodated this growth by adding
additional direct trains; however, the options to improve service are
limited because trains cannot be turned around. The existence of a
turnaround track, known as a ``wye track,'' at Denali would allow more
frequent trains and more flexible rail schedules, thus accommodating
the continued growth and development of rail access to Denali Park.
There was originally a turnaround track at the Denali Rail Station,
which was too short for modern train lengths and thus, with Railroad
concurrence, converted to Park Service use in the 1980s.
Besides enhancing visitor access options, there are other public
benefits of a turnaround track at Denali National Park. The rail mode
of transportation offers less highway traffic congestion, improved
public safety, and less environmental impact than the highway
alternative. Improved access to parkland through public transportation
is a national policy goal, as evidenced by the Department of
Transportation's Transit in the Parks program created by Congress in
2005.
The National Park Service and the Alaska Region of the National
Parks Conservation Association both support the land exchange as
described in the bill. The Association has written a letter of support,
which I will submit for the record. We are also pleased that there is a
companion bill in the other body.
S. 1808 is thus a win-win for the Alaska Railroad, the National
Park Service and the hundreds of thousands of visitors that would
benefit from access to our nation's treasured Denali National Park.
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee today.
I will be happy to answer any questions the Committee might have.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much.
Now we'll hear from August Carlino.
STATEMENT OF AUGUST R. CARLINO, CEO AND PRESIDENT, STEEL
INDUSTRY HERITAGE CORPORATION, HOMESTEAD, PA
Mr. Carlino. Mr. Chairman, good afternoon. Thank you for
inviting me here to testify on S. 697, the Steel Industry
National Historic Site Act.
I've submitted my testimony for the record, and I won't go
into the detailed history of the significance of Homestead
Works Steel Mill, that's outlined in my testimony, has been
written about by scholars, worldwide.
I will tell you that this bill is strongly supported by the
Pennsylvania delegation, and I'm grateful to our two Senators,
Senator Specter, for his long support, and Senator Bob Casey
for his support, as well.
This effort dates back to try and designate portions of the
Homestead Works as a National Park Service, actually, to
Senator John Heinz when he was a member of this esteemed body.
This effort has taken almost 20 years to get to this point, and
I'm grateful for the committee for having a hearing here today
on the bill.
I would just go off-track a little bit from my written
testimony and summary, and say to you that I think Senator
Menendez from New Jersey has uncovered some serious problems
with the way feasibility studies and suitability studies are
conducted, particularly with relationship to industrial sites,
that can create contradictory findings.
I won't profess to know everything that my colleague
sitting next to me knows about Paterson, but as a person who
has worked in Homestead for almost 20 years, and has studied
it, I will tell you that the suitability and feasibility and
the Special Resource Study is flawed when the process starts--
as the Senator pointed out--with the statement that, ``We will
not create any new National Parks.''
When that is the determined outcome at the beginning of a
Special Resource Study, the results are basically predictable
as to what you would get, and that is a recommendation that
comes out--for which Homestead's did--of not recommending it as
a National Historic Site, a unit of the National Park Service.
In fact, as we went through the National Historic Landmark
process to nominate the Carrie blast furnaces in the Battle of
Homestead Site, two very interesting scenarios came up. We were
planning to submit the whole National Historic Landmark Study
as one basic application, but we were advised by the Park
Service to split the properties up into three, one of which
included the blast furnace, one of which included the battle
site, and the other which included the Boast Building, which
was the headquarter for the Union in 1892, during the strike.
The Boast Building was designated, the Carrie Furnace
National Historic Landmark, was basically stonewalled, and the
battle site was rejected. Rejected not because it lacked
integrity--because it's all there--the landing site is there,
the war facility is there, the building that existed at the
time of 1892 that was the command battle site was there.
What caused the integrity problem was that a building
identical to the pump house was added onto it in 1896. As steel
mills would do--they were in expansion mode at that point--to
build the United States.
So, the new building, which didn't date to 1892, but was
identical in specifications, was added to it. I offered that
there was a simple solution to it--not that I would propose
doing it--but we could have torn down that 1896 building, and
met, then, the historic standards. None of the Park Service
historians in the room supported that.
They also asked us to do a Special Resource Study of
national view, in order to support the Carrie Furnace
contentions we were making in the landmark study. Our
Congressman, Mike Doyle, had a meeting with Park Service
administration, and suggested that wasn't our responsibility,
it was the Park Service's responsibility to do so.
So they set out on a National Historic Context Study, to
determine if the application that we submitted for a National
Historic Landmark was actually true. If came in stronger in
recommendation for Homestead and Carrie Furnaces than our own
application was submitted, and it is what allowed, I believe,
Carrie Furnaces to be designated in 2005 as a National Historic
Landmark.
Senator, and members of the committee I will say this--
there are other places where you can interpret steel history,
just as there are other places in the system of the National
Parks that you can interpret, for example, Civil War history.
But, if you interpret those sites of steel history without
Homestead, it would be like interpreting the history of steel
without--or the history of the Civil War without Gettysburg.
That's how significant this site is.
If it is not designated, these resources will be lost.
There is no capacity, locally, for long-term management. The
other contradictory part of the Park Service testimony is, they
suggest that we have the opportunity for long-term management,
and yet just two or 3 months ago, they were here before this
committee testifying against our reauthorization.
This is truly a rare industrial resource that, if it is
lost, it will be gone forever, and the story of that element of
America's rise of industrial might as it's related to steel
will not be able to be told anywhere else in this country. I
implore you to consider this bill for your approval.
Thank you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Carlino follows:]
Prepared Statement of August R. Carlino, CEO and President, Steel
Industry Heritage Corporation, Homestead, PA, on S. 697
Mr. Chairman and other distinguished members of the subcommittee,
my name is August R. Carlino and I am President and Chief Executive
Officer of the Steel Industry Heritage Corporation. The Steel Industry
Heritage Corporation (SIHC) is a non-profit heritage tourism and
economic development organization based in Homestead, Pennsylvania.
SIHC is the management entity for the Rivers of Steel National Heritage
Area, one of 37 National Heritage Areas designated by Congress.
Thank you for inviting me to testify today before the Subcommittee
on National Parks on S. 697, the Steel Industry National Historic Site
Act. I am grateful to Senator Arlen Specter and Senator Robert Casey
for their willingness to sponsor, and support, this legislation you are
considering today.
The Steel Industry National Historic Site Act has had a very long
life, and has been introduced and re-introduced many times over the
past several Congresses. In fact, the consideration of a National
Historic Site for the properties included in S. 697 dates back to the
late 1980s, as the permanent closure and dismantling of many of the
steel mills in the Pittsburgh Industrial District began to occur. At
that time in Pittsburgh, civic, corporate, labor and community groups
realized the demolition of mills would cause a lasting change to the
region's socio-economic landscape and have national implications. It
was their vision to preserve a part of a steel mill to tell the story
of Pittsburgh's steel-making history to the nation.
During the late 19th and 20th centuries, the Pittsburgh region was
the world's leading producer of iron and steel. The region's proximity
to raw materials, ease of shipping and abundant capital wealth and
labor encouraged the construction of huge integrated production
facilities, bordered by supporting manufacturing facilities, coal
mines, coking ovens, machine shop and foundries, all of which were
linked by an expanse of railroads. This and the Allegheny, Monongahela
and Ohio rivers made it the center of the nation's iron and steel
industry. The centerpiece of this industrial complex was the U.S. Steel
Homestead Works, located on the shores of the Monongahela River just
upstream from the City of Pittsburgh. It was the closing of this mill
in 1984 which sparked a regional effort to save its most significant
features and to pursue its designation as a unit of the National Park
System.
The Homestead Works, which date back to Andrew Carnegie, has a
storied and turbulent history. Built in 1906-1907, the Carrie Blast
Furnaces enabled the Homestead Works to become the largest producer of
iron and steel in the world. The Furnace's output of iron often set
production records with each shift, and helped set the daily commodity
price for steel. By the end of World War II, Carrie Blast Furnaces 6
and 7, located on the northern shore of the Monongahela River in the
Boroughs of Swissvale and Rankin, were each producing between 900 and
1,000 tons of iron daily, or between 300,000 and 350,000 tons of iron
each year per furnace. Iron from the furnaces was made into steel on
the southern side of the mill, transported from the furnace complex to
the steel mill side across the Rankin Hot Metal Bridge. On the southern
shore in the Boroughs of Homestead, West Homestead, Munhall and
Whitaker, the massive mill complex of the Homestead Works made the
steel that went into many of America's and the world's most prominent
structures including the Panama Canal lock gates, the George Washington
Bridge, the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, Rockefeller
Tower, the Sears Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge and the United Nations
Building. Additionally, Homestead was the center of armament production
for the United States during both world wars, turning out armor plate,
munitions, weapons and steel for America's war needs.
Of all the remaining blast furnaces nationwide, Carrie 6 and 7 have
the greatest concentration of pre-World War II equipment. The facility
was the cornerstone of the Pittsburgh Industrial District, a sprawling
interconnected mosaic of mills, mines, aluminum and glass factories,
machine shops, foundries, railroad, and river barge facilities that
stretched more than 150 linear miles along the shores of the region's
rivers.
The proposed National Historic Site in S. 697 also includes the
Pump House and Water Tower, a five-acre site situated within the
Homestead Works in Munhall Borough, directly across the river from the
Carrie Furnaces. It was at this site, a river landing within the
Homestead Works for off-loading of materials, that the infamous Battle
of Homestead occurred between Pinkerton Guards and striking steel
workers who had been locked out of the mill. This battle, which took
place on July 6, 1892, was a pivotal moment in United States labor-
management history. As much as it is studied today, the consequences of
that day still has ramifications in labor relations in the U.S., and is
viewed as hallowed ground by organized labor and the community for the
lives that were lost there. The dramatic events of that lockout and
battle, are ``among the most famous of American history'' and a
``savage and significant'' story, according to labor historian Paul
Krause. At the root of the battle in 1892 was Carnegie, with his
determination at any cost to drive down wages through modernization and
technology advancements in iron and steel production, matched against
the might and strength of the most powerful union remaining in the
steel industry, the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steelworkers,
who desired to protect wages and jobs as the mill's and the steel
industry's production processes advanced.
Individually, these sites would warrant some form of protection and
preservation as they represent significant elements of America's
industrial legacy. Collectively and when linked by the Rankin Hot Metal
Bridge, the Battle of Homestead site and the Carrie Furnaces are
monuments of national significance which tell a story of America's rise
as the world's greatest industrial and economic power. This is a story
that cannot be told or interpreted anywhere else in the United States,
and the reason why S. 697 proposes the creation of a National Historic
Site for the properties.
In the early 1990s, this fact was recognized by the late Senator
John Heinz. Through his efforts, feasibility plans and studies were
conducted by the National Park Service and the Pennsylvania Historical
and Museum Commission to determine what properties of the closed
Homestead mill needed to be saved from demolition, and how those saved
sites might be preserved and interpreted. While his death was
unfortunate, the project moved forward with strong leadership and
legislative sponsorship from Senator Specter and Congressman Mike
Doyle. The support for S. 697 is widespread, including past funding for
planning and development, and the potential for substantial capital
funding from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the many Pittsburgh-
based foundations, and a planned capital campaign to be conducted by
the Steel Industry Heritage Corporation, chaired by top executives of
the U.S. Steel Corporation and the United Steel Workers of America.
Local governments have also committed to the long-term preservation
of these resources, as Allegheny County has purchased the Blast Furnace
complex and its surrounding 130-plus acres with plans of revitalizing
the brownfield into a modern mixed-use industrial and commercial
complex with the proposed National Historic Site as the anchor for the
redevelopment project. The Rankin Hot Metal Bridge will serve as an
interpretive link between the iron and steel sides of the mill, and as
transportation link between the two sides, as both a roadway and a
connector in the soon-to-be-completed rail-trail, the Great Allegheny
Passage, which will connect Pittsburgh with Washington, DC by 2010.
The properties included within S. 697, the Steel Industry National
Historic Site Act, represent a rare, if not the only, opportunity to
preserve one of the nation's most significant industrial complexes.
Homestead's association with steel making, labor organizing, great
American capitalists like Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick, and its
extant working-class communities with ancestries rooted in Eastern,
Southern European and African American traditions, present the
opportunity to develop a National Historic Site that tells a part of
the story of America that is unrepresented in the National Park System
today. All of the partners, both public and private, have diligently,
at times doggedly, worked to get to the point we are at here today--
this esteemed body's consideration of the legislation that would
preserve Homestead's legacy for future generations in the world's most
premiere historical conservation institution, the National Park System.
I urge your favorable consideration of S. 697, and I am happy to answer
any questions you might have.
Thank you for your consideration of this important legislation.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Mr. Carlino.
Now we'll hear from Mr. Zax.
STATEMENT OF LEONARD A. ZAX, PARTNER, LATHAM & WATKINS, LLP, ON
BEHALF OF THE NEW JERSEY COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
Mr. Zax. Thank you, Chairman Akaka, and Ranking Member
Burr.
On behalf of the New Jersey Community Development
Corporation, I am honored to testify in support of the Paterson
National Park legislation. My colleagues in my New Jersey and
Washington offices and I take special pride in our pro bono
work for New Jersey Community Development Corporation, a
private non-profit corporation, whose mission is to improve the
quality of life for low and moderate-income citizens.
NJCDC joins many national organizations, including the
National Trust for Historic Preservation, the National Parks
Conservation Association, the NAACP, and the Sierra Club, that
urge the creation of the Paterson National Park.
Also supporting the Paterson National Park are former
Cabinet member who served in the Administrations of Presidents
Gerald R. Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton,
and George W. Bush.
Local and National newspapers have published many
editorials that support making the Paterson Great Falls
National Historic District a part of the National Park System.
The New York Times just published its third editorial, this one
referencing the hearing today, in urging Congress to create
this National Park.
The Paterson Great Falls is the place that Alexander
Hamilton selected to begin to attain two quintessential
American goals. First, to achieve economic independence and
second, to launch the American dream. At the Great Falls,
Hamilton began to create an economy requiring not slavery, but
freedom, rewarding not social status, but hard work, and
promoting not discrimination against some, but opportunities
for all.
He outlined these goals in his great State paper delivered
to the Congress, the Report on Manufacturers, explaining that
the United States must produce its own goods to avoid
dependence on foreign products, particularly for military
supplies.
His report specifically refers to his plan to create the
city of Paterson to begin implementing his strategy. He was not
content to have, simply, a theoretical treaty to deliver to the
Congress, he wanted to show how it could be done. How, through
the spirit of imitation, other cities, some 25 and 30 years
late, like Lowell, could begin to implement similar plans
involving different individual manufacturing enterprises.
Following Hamilton's plan for Paterson, the city became a
great manufacturing city. Paterson factories produced the first
sail cloth, a new form of cotton cloth that would not mildew,
for every ship in the American Navy. The first Colt revolvers
and the first motorized submarine. Famed products of the plants
of Paterson, eluded to briefly, include the aircraft engines
for the Spirit of Saint Louis, for many World War II bombers,
and for the Enola Gay that dropped the bomb that ended the war.
Hamilton created opportunities for all in Paterson, and
that was a radical thing to suggest and try to achieve in his
day. Hamilton worked to create an economy in Paterson, driven
by the labor of free men and women, rather than slaves, in a
society that rewarded hard work, rather than inherited
privilege.
The testimony of scholars submitted to this committee
sharply criticized the Park Service study. I'll say only in my
limited time, and expand for the record, that this Park Service
draft study distorts and ignores crucial evidence of Paterson's
role in American history, violates the Park Service's own
policies, and makes unsubstantiated conclusions in the face of
direct and compelling evidence presented by distinguished
scholars to the contrary.
More that 30 million citizens live within a 3-hour drive of
the Paterson Great Falls. Many citizens who feel little or no
connection with our National Parks and the Founding Fathers
will find much greater meaning within Paterson's authenticity
and diversity. That is just one reason why support for the
Paterson National Park continues to grow.
Hispanic and African-American, Muslim and Jewish, Catholic,
and Baptist citizens support a National Historical Park in
Paterson. Corporate executives and laborers, environmentalists
and property right advocates, bankers and community activist,
scholars and school children, historic preservationists and
developers, and I will add, Republicans and Democrats support
this cause. Only the Administration now opposes it.
I have never in my 30-some years working in housing and
community development efforts around the country, seen a
project that enjoys this breadth and depth of public support.
So we urge you to support this legislation, to create the
Paterson Great Falls National Park.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Zax follows:]
Prepared Statement of Leonard A. Zax, Partner, Latham & Watkins, LLP,
on Behalf of the New Jersey Community Development Corporation
Chairman Akaka and Senator Burr: On behalf of the New Jersey
Community Development Corporation (NJCDC), I am honored to testify in
support of the Paterson National Historical Park legislation. My
colleagues in our firm's New Jersey and Washington offices and I take
special pride in our pro bono work for NJCDC, a private nonprofit
organization whose mission is to improve the quality of life for
Paterson's citizens.
NJCDC joins many national organizations--including the National
Trust for Historic Preservation, National Parks Conservation
Association, NAACP, and the Sierra Club--that support the Paterson
National Historical Park. Also supporting a Paterson National
Historical Park are former Cabinet members who served in the
Administrations of Presidents Gerald R. Ford, Ronald Reagan, George
H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. (Exhibit 1 lists
supporters.)*
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* Exhibits 1-3 have been retained in subcommittee files.
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Leading newspapers have published many editorials that support
making the Paterson Great Falls National Historic District a part of
the National Park System. The New York Times just published its third
editorial endorsing the park.
The list of individual supporters includes the preeminent Hamilton
biographers of our time, renowned former Smithsonian curators, the
former chief of the National Park Service Historic American Engineering
Record, professors at every university in the Ivy League, N.Y.U., Duke,
Williams--and at state universities from Massachusetts to Michigan and
Arizona.
Three generations of my family came of age in Paterson during the
twentieth century. My grandparents settled in Paterson in the early
1900s, coming to America from Eastern Europe to seek freedom and
opportunities. One of my grandfathers worked in a silk mill at a time
that Paterson was known throughout the world as the Silk City. My other
grandfather built modest housing for immigrant families, including his
own--and also including Senator Lautenberg's family. My father, a
lawyer who chaired the local bar association committee on immigration,
for many years presented a copy of the Bill of Rights to new citizens
who left other countries and came to Paterson seeking a better life for
their families.
alexander hamilton and the paterson great falls
At the Great Falls in Paterson, Alexander Hamilton began
implementation of his far-reaching plan to achieve the economic
independence that secured America's future and launched the American
dream.
At the Great Falls Hamilton began to create an economy requiring
not slavery but freedom, rewarding not social status but hard work, and
promoting not discrimination against some but opportunities for all.
On a special Bicentennial visit to Paterson, President Gerald R.
Ford proclaimed the unique place of the Paterson Great Falls in
American history:
The industrial history of the Great Falls goes back to the
very first years of our United States, and this engineering
achievement embodied our most basic political and economic
goals--independence and prosperity.
In 1792 Hamilton announced to Congress and the American people that
at the Great Falls in New Jersey he would found the City of Paterson as
the first major step in his ambitious plan to secure the new nation's
economic independence and begin transforming a rural agrarian society
based in slavery into a modern economy based in freedom.
Though today we often take America's economic power and liberties
as given, in Hamilton's time neither was guaranteed. Political
independence proclaimed by the Declaration of Independence and won in
the Revolutionary War did not secure economic independence. Long after
the British surrendered, America remained heavily dependent on England
for virtually everything from clothing to military supplies.
Hamilton believed that political independence was only the first
step toward achieving economic independence. He wrote that America
would never be free from Britain, nor from any other foreign oppressor,
so long as our nation remained dependent on foreign manufacturers.
Hamilton alone among America's Founders championed the spirit of
enterprise and opportunity that would transform a Third World nation
into the greatest economic power ever known.
paterson great falls national historic district
Although Hamilton's economic and political legacy is now secure,
the fate of the Paterson Great Falls Historic District--so central to
that legacy--is much less certain.
More than 25 distinguished historians, city planners, and historic
preservation experts have analyzed the unique resources and narratives
that a national historical park in Paterson would add to the National
Park System.
These scholars conclude:
(1) Hamilton's vision of economic independence and economic
opportunity is a critical theme of American history not
adequately represented in the National Park System or anywhere
in the United States.
(2) The Paterson Great Falls National Historic District is
the best place to present and interpret Hamilton's vision of
economic independence and of economic opportunity for all
Americans.
unique combination of natural and cultural resources
The Great Falls provides not only stunning natural beauty for a
National Park Service unit in Paterson. All of the members of the New
Jersey Congressional Delegation point out in a letter to the Secretary
of the Interior that ``New Jersey's Great Falls is the only National
Historic District that includes both a National Natural Landmark and a
National Historic Landmark.'' (Exhibit 2)
And the National Parks Conservation Association points out, ``No
other natural wonder in America has played a more important role in our
nation's historic quest for freedom and prosperity.'' (Exhibit 3)
During the Revolutionary War, Hamilton met with the Marquis de
Lafayette and George Washington at the Great Falls, where General
Washington established his headquarters for a time. After the war,
Hamilton chose to begin implementing his industrial plan at the Great
Falls to use the awesome force of the Great Falls to provide power for
future factories. Hamilton commissioned Pierre L'Enfant--who had just
completed the plan for Washington, D.C.--to design an unprecedented
water power system in Paterson.
As the President of the National Trust for Historic Preservation,
Richard Moe, writes in a letter to the Director of the National Park
Service, ``Scholars have concluded that Pierre L'Enfant's innovative
waterpower system at the Great Falls--and many factories built later--
constitute the finest remaining collection of engineering and
architectural works representing each stage of America's progress from
Hamilton's time to the twentieth century.''
L'Enfant's water power system in Paterson is the only one in
America that is directly linked to the Founding Father who set America
on the path of its industrial development. The Great Falls was central
to Hamilton's plan for a nation whose security would be bolstered by
its economic independence, and whose modern economy would provide
opportunities for immigrants.
The distinguished former Smithsonian curator Robert Vogel writes:
Paterson is the one place in America where it is possible
directly to connect the 18th century vision of a great
manufacturing nation, articulated by one of our Founding
Fathers, with the actual fruits of that vision in the following
centuries.
Paterson's Great Falls Historic District includes a
combination of natural resources and buildings not represented
anywhere else in America. In Paterson there is a Pantheon of
important historical events in American industry: the Great
Falls that inspired Hamilton, the L'Enfant plan of hydraulic
raceways harnessing the power of a major river, the initial
Colt Revolver plant, the Holland submarine, the greatest
grouping of locomotive builders in America, and the largest
silk-producing center in the world.
hamilton's success in paterson
Hamilton's vision of an economically independent America with
opportunities for all succeeded in Paterson before any other place in
America.
Ron Chernow, author of the acclaimed biography of Alexander
Hamilton, explains that Paterson ``became the home for this industrial
laboratory, this futuristic city, this model of what America could
be.''
Hamilton wrote the charter for the Society for the Establishment of
Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.), the first corporation in New Jersey.
Because Hamilton recognized that the S.U.M. likely would suffer losses
in its first manufacturing experiments, Hamilton's charter endowed the
S.U.M. with broad powers to continue encouraging industries in Paterson
through successive generations and economic cycles.
Harvard University Professor Joseph Stancliffe Davis wrote in the
definitive history of the S.U.M. that ``the Society's stock became a
highly profitable investment.'' Professor Davis wrote in 1917 that the
S.U.M. ``is one of the very few companies of the time to survive the
vicissitudes of a century and maintain an unbroken existence down to
the present day.''
Over one hundred and fifty years after Hamilton founded the City,
the WPA Federal Writers Project concluded that Paterson ``is one of the
few American cities that have turned out almost exactly as they were
planned.''
hamilton achieved economic independence with paterson manufactures
Hamilton wrote the Report on Manufactures, his great report to the
Congress in 1791 explaining that the United States must produce its own
goods to avoid dependence on foreign products, particularly for
military supplies.
In the first decades of the nineteenth century, John Colt, Deputy
Director of the S.U.M. in Paterson, invented a form of cotton cloth
that did not mildew and contributed to America's military self-
sufficiency by manufacturing the sailcloth for every ship in the United
States Navy. Samuel Colt invented and first manufactured the Colt
revolver in Paterson.
Paterson was the birthplace of the world's first motorized
submarine, and the City's role in the forefront of manufacturing for
war and peace would continue well into the twentieth century.
Paterson's factories produced nearly 140,000 aircraft engines,
surpassing all other American cities. During World War II, Jimmy
Doolittle raided Tokyo in daylight in planes powered by engines made in
Paterson, and the Enola Gay bomber ended the war on a flight with
Paterson engines.
Paterson produced a wide variety of goods securing America's
economic independence and helping make the nation a leader in
international commerce. Paterson represents Hamilton's vision of
diverse manufactures and economic independence in a way that no other
place in America does or can.
hamilton created opportunities for all in paterson
Hamilton worked to create an economy in Paterson driven by the
labor of free men and women rather than slaves, and a society that
rewarded hard work rather than inherited privilege. As Ron Chernow
observes in his bestselling biography of Hamilton:
His America would be a meritocracy of infinite variety, with
a diversified marketplace absorbing people from all nations and
backgrounds . . . Hamilton's ideal economy is devoid of the
futile barbarities of the Southern plantations. Hamilton's list
of the advantages of manufacturing has a quintessentially
American ring: ``Additional employment to classes of the
community not ordinarily engaged in the business. The promoting
of emigration from foreign countries. The furnishing of greater
scope for the diversity of talents and dispositions which
discriminate men from each other.''
Paterson is the best place to interpret Hamilton's industrial
vision because--in sharp contrast to the New England mill towns built
by the wealthy elite called the Boston Associates--Paterson actually
provided the very opportunities that Hamilton sought.
True to Hamilton's fervent desire to end slavery, some Paterson
manufacturers were among the local visionaries of the larger national
movement that became known as the Underground Railroad. Frederick
Douglass wrote in his autobiography of escaping through Paterson
following the John Brown uprising in Harpers Ferry.
The Paterson industries not only provided entry-level jobs but also
gave poor immigrants a genuine opportunity to rise to the top of
society. The noted social historian Herbert Gutman systematically
studied the leading mill owners in Paterson and concluded that ``the
rags-to-riches promise was not a mere myth in Paterson.''
Building upon the research from a series of articles in Scientific
American in the nineteenth century, Professor Gutman wrote:
Scientific American, groping for a simple sociological
generalization about these men, praised Paterson's early
enterprisers in these words: ``In the eastern states,
flourishing cities have been built up by corporations of
wealthy capitalists . . . . In Paterson, it was different. With
few exceptions, almost every manufacturer started, financially,
at zero, enlarging his establishment as the quicksilver
expanded in his purse.'' Scientific American was not guilty of
mouthing abstract rhetoric or just putting forth a paean of
traditional tribute to an invisible hero, the ``self-made
man.'' Instead, it accurately described the successful
locomotive, iron, and machinery manufacturers of the era, and
what it wrote applied as well to a group in 1840 and 1880 as in
1859.
hamilton achieved diverse manufactures in paterson
By 1816, Paterson was already a national leader in the production
of many of the goods Hamilton listed in the great state paper he
submitted to Congress, the Report on Manufactures. Just as Hamilton
urged, Paterson avoided excessive dependence on any one industry and
became an extraordinary center of invention and a major producer of a
wide variety of goods.
The author Christopher Norwood writes:
In Paterson people did not just invent; they tried
everything--a repeating revolver, a submarine, an airplane that
could fly across the Atlantic. And Paterson did not just
manufacture; it produced articles that redefined the limits of
life. It is impossible to think of any other city whose
products cut so deeply into the texture of the United States
and not only transformed its national character, but
revolutionized American relations with the world.
changing role of the united states in the world community
In addition to interpreting Hamilton's economic vision of
independence and opportunity, a Paterson National Park would be a place
to feature other important supporting stories. The allotted time
permits me to mention only one such supporting story that speaks
directly to the times in which we live: the Silk City and the Silk Road
today.
National Park Service policies require that studies of potential
new national parks analyze the ``multiple layers of history
encapsulated within each resource.'' The NPS policies emphasize the
importance of potential new national parks that represent ``the
interaction between the United States and the world community.''
Hamilton recognized the opportunity that silk production presented
to American economy. His Report on Manufactures encouraged silk
production, a recommendation that would increase America's involvement
in international commerce.
As early as 1794, the S.U.M. authorized the culture of mulberry
trees in Paterson to promote the cultivation of silk. In the nineteenth
century, industrialists would make Paterson the Silk City--the largest
manufacturer of silk goods in the world. Silk holds a very special
place in history. Paterson's central role in silk manufacturing formed
a connection between America and the Asian, Middle Eastern, and
European cultures that also cherished silk.
As Richard Kurin of the Smithsonian Institution explains, ``Silk
both epitomized and played a major role in the early development of
what we now characterize as a global economic and cultural system.''
In the late nineteenth century, historians began to describe the
old routes of the global trade of silk as the ``Silk Road.'' In recent
years, historians at the Smithsonian and universities around the world
have expanded the traditional view of the Silk Road and have recognized
that the historical connection between East and West exists to this
day.
In 1998 the cellist Yo-Yo Ma created the Silk Road Project,
celebrating how people shared art and music along the modern Silk Road
and promoting continuing cultural collaboration between Asia, Europe,
and the Americas. The Aga Khan, Imam of the Shia Imami Ismaili Muslims
and direct descendant of Muhammad, has contributed generously to the
Silk Road Project, particularly in the Muslim nations.
The Smithsonian organized--and the Park Service cosponsored--the
2002 Folklife Festival to celebrate the modern Silk Road. The Aga Khan
and Yo-Yo Ma joined Secretary of State Colin Powell in opening the
festival.
During the Folklife Festival, Richard Kennedy of the Smithsonian
Institution observed:
The Silk Road has extended to the United States and, since
the tragic events of September 11, understanding that
connection clearly has become more important. There is no
better time, then, to learn more about the roots of this vital
connection and to celebrate the long-standing relationships
that have existed between east and west and north and south.
A Paterson National Historical Park would preserve and present a
station on this contemporary Silk Road, providing a unique opportunity
to connect with other cultures and build trust between cultures of the
global Silk Road. Mohamed El-Filali, a leader of the Islamic community
in Paterson, writes that a national park in Paterson would help
Americans ``reach out and attempt to understand how other cultures can
affect and enrich America's culture.''
The National Parks Conservation Association points out that
``Paterson can become the first NPS unit with strong Muslim American
support in a city that has the second largest number of Muslims in any
American city.''
Dr. Alvin Felzenberg, a political scientist and an expert on New
Jersey history, explains that Paterson is a station on the Silk Road
not just because of its history as the Silk City but also because
``large numbers of Islamic citizens continue to work in Paterson
textile businesses, coming from places like Damascus to Paterson
because of textile manufacturing in both cities.'' Dr. Felzenberg, who
also served as the Principal Spokesman for the 9/11 Commission, writes
that a Paterson National Park would create a connection between Muslims
and the Park Service, while promoting valuable cultural interchanges
between Muslims and other Americans.
This supporting story of the modern Silk Road in a Paterson
National Park would help prepare new generations of Americans for
global citizenship.
civic engagement
Many citizens who today feel little or no connection with our
national parks and the Founding Fathers will find much greater meaning
within Paterson's authenticity and diversity. The proposed Paterson
National Park legislation has captured the imagination and spirit of a
diverse group of citizens.
Latino citizens.--who make up more than half of Paterson's
population--support the Paterson National Park because Hamilton
was the most forceful advocate among the Founding Fathers for
the view that immigration strengthens the nation. They also
seek to celebrate Hamilton's role in helping to spread the
cause of freedom to the Spanish colonies in the Americas.
African-Americans.--who make up over one quarter of
Paterson's population--recognize Hamilton's vigorous fight
against slavery was an essential part of his inclusive view of
how all Americans would benefit from the growing modern economy
that he began in Paterson. African-American leaders also note
that Hinchliffe Stadium--the landmark home of the N.Y. Black
Yankees and the N.Y. Cubans in baseball's Negro Leagues--was
sited and planned by the renowned Olmsted Brothers firm right
next to the Great Falls.
Arab Americans.--who make up more than one-tenth of
Paterson's population--support the Paterson National Park as a
continuation of the Silk Road that united their homelands in
Central Asia with China and the West.
need for national park service in paterson
The record clearly supports the need for a National Park Service
unit in Paterson. The Park Service's own cost estimates demonstrate
that the $10 million assistance from the State of New Jersey is not
sufficient funding to preserve the Great Falls Historic District and
present its resources to the American people.
As Governor Jon Corzine writes to the Secretary of the Interior:
``The State of New Jersey alone cannot preserve and protect the Great
Falls National Historic District and properly present it to the public
without a National Park Service unit in Paterson.''
the park service study
Despite opposition from the Administration for budgetary reasons,
both the House and the Senate passed legislation by unanimous votes
directing the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a study of whether
the Paterson Great Falls National Historic District should become a
part of the National Park System.
Five years after President Bush signed the legislation into law, in
November 2006 the National Park Service finally published its Paterson
Study and invited comments from the public. As the House Resources
Committee emphasized in its Report on this legislation, distinguished
scholars sharply criticized the Study in detailed letters drawing from
seminal texts and recent research.
Here are typical phrases that some of America's most distinguished
scholars use to describe the Park Service Study's conclusions:
``misreads the historical record'' . . . ``seriously deficient'' . . .
``truly absurd'' . . . ``demonstrably wrong'' . . . ``false'' . . . ``a
serious misreading of the historical record'' . . . ``again, judging by
the results of recent scholarship, the Study is wrong'' . . .
``analytically flawed and violates fundamental principles that
professionals use in studying historic resources.''
A former senior Massachusetts official who worked on the creation
of the Lowell National Historical Park and the Blackstone Valley
National Heritage Corridor writes that the Study ``creates a false
account that destroys the integrity of our nation's history.''
The scholars dispute every supposed fact that the Park Service
Study uses to conclude there should not be a Paterson National Park,
including the Park Service claim that Hamilton's economic vision was
first realized not in Paterson but by the Boston Associates at what is
now the Lowell National Park.
Historians find the Park Service's claim about Lowell reflects a
fundamental misunderstanding of history because Hamilton's economic
vision included two fundamental principles:
(1) no tolerance for slavery; and
(2) opportunities for poor immigrants lacking any social
pedigree to rise to the top of American society.
Historians point out that in many respects Lowell represented the
precise opposite of Hamilton's vision. The Boston Associates were
members of what Professor Robert Dalzell of Williams College called the
``Enterprising Elite''--wealthy families of Boston's high society whose
primary mission was to achieve ``for both themselves and their
descendants, what had always mattered most: a secure and remarkably
durable position at the top of the social order.''
Contrary to the Park Service Study's argument, the Boston
Associates--a group of wealthy Boston families connected through
interlocking corporate directorates and marriage--never sought nor
achieved Hamilton's vision of opportunities for all.
Unlike Hamilton, the most ardent opponent of slavery among the
Founding Fathers, the New England mill owners played a role in
attempting to quell the Northern anti-slavery crusade. United States
Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts spoke of the ``unholy union . .
. between cotton planters and flesh mongers of Louisiana and
Mississippi and the cotton spinners and traffickers of New England--
between the lords of the lash and the lords of the loom.''
Even the NPS Handbook for the Lowell National Historical Park
recognizes:
When an anti-slavery speaker came to Lowell in 1834, he drew
an angry stone-throwing mob. Mill owners and workers depended
on Southern cotton, and anyone who threatened the system was
unwelcome.
The testimony from scholars provides more details on the numerous
serious errors and flaws in the Park Service Study. The Study distorts
and disregards crucial evidence of Paterson's role in American history,
violates Park Service policies, and makes unsubstantiated conclusions
in the face of direct and compelling evidence presented by
distinguished scholars to the contrary.
conclusion
S. 148 is the Senate version of H.R. 189. The House Report on H.R.
189 responds to concerns the Administration raised in the House
National Park Subcommittee hearing and repeats in the Administration's
prepared testimony for today's Senate hearing. The Senate could support
an amendment of S. 148 to reflect the amendment of H.R. 189 as reported
by the House Resources Committee.
National and local support for the Paterson National Historical
Park continues to grow. Latino and African-American, Muslim and Jewish,
Catholic and Baptist citizens support a national historical park in
Paterson. Corporate executives and laborers, environmentalists and
property rights advocates, bankers and community activists, scholars
and schoolchildren, historic preservationists and developers support
this cause.
We live today in the economic world Hamilton envisioned and--
starting at the Great Falls in Paterson--played a major role in
creating. We urge members of this Subcommittee to support the
legislation to create the Paterson Great Falls National Historical
Park.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much for your testimony.
My first question is to Augie Carlino. Mr. Carlino,
according to the Park Service, their study concluded that since
the proposed National Historic Site was within the Rivers of
Steel National Heritage Area, which you oversee, there is no
need for National Park Service management. What is your
response to this?
Mr. Carlino. Mr. Chairman, as I said in summarizing and
adding to my testimony, we are one of 37 National Heritage
Areas, as you know, but we operate with very finite resources.
That money goes into grants that go into Heritage Development
Programs in seven counties in Southwestern Pennsylvania.
As part of that work, and actually it was this project, the
Homestead Works, which gave rise to the National Heritage Area,
not the opposite. The Heritage Area didn't discover the
Homestead Works site to propose it as a National Park. It was
just the opposite.
Because of that work, our capacity to own and manage a
steel mill that remains of a 550-acre site, would be beyond our
capacity. Over the time of our planning that we did in order to
designate the National Heritage Area, with the Park Service
involved in that planning, it became very clear during that
planning effort that the National Park Project was going to be
one of the projects proposed by the management plan of the
Steel Industry Heritage Task Force at that time, which was the
predecessor to the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area
Corporation. Park Service supported that as a recommended
project of the management plan.
So at this point in time, for them to say, ``We can operate
it.'' As I said, with them coming to testify against our
reauthorization, is contradictory. It also doesn't meet with
what meets our management plan, in which the management plan
called for the creation of a National Historic site at
Homestead, which was approved and forwarded to this body by the
National Park Service in 1996.
Senator Akaka. The National Park Service is recommending
that the proposed National Historic Site be administered as an
affiliated area of the National Park System, which, in their
words, ``Would suggest a sufficiently reduced Federal
contribution, while having local partners contribute the
largest share of costs.'' Do you have any comments on the
affiliated area proposal?
Mr. Carlino. I do, yes, sir. That was one of the questions
that was vetted during the management planning process. It
became clear, and it still is evident today, that while there
is--and we enjoy substantial support of potential funding
partners, including the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, which has
authorized line items in its capital budget for the creation of
this site. From our many Pittsburgh-based foundations,
including the Heinz Foundation, which is part of the Senator's
legacy.
The conclusion of all of those parties are that they would
like to see a role for the Federal Government in this, but that
role for them would need to be a way that the Federal
Government comes in and owns and operates with their support
coming in financially. So, if we lose the opportunity for the
Park Service to be a management entity for this site, we will
lose all the State and local support that is committed for the
preservation of the site's long-term benefit.
Senator Akaka. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Carlino.
Mr. Zax, your testimony takes issue with the Park Service's
study. As I understand the Park Service's opposition, though
it's not questioning the significance of the historic events
that occurred in Paterson, but rather, they're saying that the
site isn't suitable or feasible for Park Service management.
What are your comments about these concerns?
Mr. Zax. Surely. My comments are essentially the same as
the scholars. The scholars addressed the issue of suitability.
They addressed the claim and found it false, that what Paterson
represents is already adequately represented within the
National Park system at such places as Lowell. With all due
respect to my friends from Massachusetts, Lowell is a wonderful
National Historical Park.
Interestingly enough, the National Park Service testified
against creating the Lowell National Park during the Carter
Administration. But the Congress created the National Park
anyway and now the Park Service holds it up as a great example
and a reason to deny funding to Paterson.
But the business plan that Francis Lowell and his
colleagues had in Lowell, was diametrically opposed to
Hamilton's vision for Paterson. Their vision was--and they
began implementing it generations later than Paterson's
founding--their vision was that daughters of farmers in Western
Massachusetts and Canada could come to Lowell, live in
dormitories, work for three or four or 5 years, get enough
money so they've earned their dowry, so they could go back to
Western Massachusetts or back to Canada and get married to
their farmer boyfriends there. It's beautiful to see this
description of how that system works in Lowell.
But frankly, that is not what Paterson is about. It's not
what Hamilton envisioned. The Senator from New Jersey, Senator
Menendez alluded earlier to the fact that, because Lowell was a
cotton producing town. The power structure in Lowell looked the
other way, with respect to slavery. One member of this body,
the United States Senator from Massachusetts, Charles Sumner,
referred to the relationship between the mill owners in Lowell
and the slave holders of the South as an unholy alliance
between the lords of the loom in Massachusetts and the lords of
the lash on the plantations.
Hamilton was, among our Founding Fathers, the most
vigorously anti-slavery advocate. He was, himself, one of the
first organizers of the New York Abolition Society, to fight
slavery.
Many of our founders had slaves. I'm not saying Francis
Lowell and his colleagues, the Cabbots and the Lodges and the
Appletons, who sat at the top of Boston society--I'm not saying
they were pro-slavery, I'm sure they were not. But they were
prepared to make a deal because they needed the cotton produce
from the South. They needed the support of the Southern
Senators and Congressman for tariff protections.
That's just because in Lowell they had a very, very
different business plan. Hamilton's business plan really bears
much more of a relationship to what sustained this country
between 1790 and between the War of 1812 and 1820 and 1825,
before Lowell began.
We were not economically independent. We were dependent
upon Britain and Europe for every manufactured item, from
clothing to military supplies. The Congress asked Alexander
Hamilton, then the first Secretary of the Treasury, to produce
a report on how we could make America less dependent on foreign
production for essential supplies. A report that really
resonates in the times in which we live, because of our
excessive dependence on imported oil.
Hamilton took a year, produced this extraordinary report,
wrote most of it himself. Part of what he recommended was that
this town of Paterson be created. He wrote the corporate
documents for the first corporation. He hired Pierre L'Enfant
to produce the complex water power system. He attended meetings
of boards of directors. He secured an extraordinary charter,
one of the first corporations in America, to provide for the
assembly of land and the hiring of L'Enfant to create this
power system, to show in a very visible and successful and
effective way how to implement his dream for America. In
Paterson, gentlemen, he succeeded.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much.
Let me ask a question now to Tom--Tom Brooks.
Mr. Brooks, is land within Denali National Park the only
option for construction of a turnaround or is there a State
land that could be used?
Mr. Brooks. The railroad has lands that could be used for
turnaround, but they're very inferior and wouldn't be able, we
would not be able to provide the level of service that we would
be able to do if we had a turnaround right at the Park.
The most likely place is about 10 minutes or, excuse me, 10
miles north of the Park. It goes, the track goes through a
dangerous--dangerous may not be the right word--a narrow canyon
with tight curves and it would take us about 2 hours from the
time we arrived at the Park to until we got turned around and
back to the Park. With the site that we're considering with the
Park Service, we estimate we can get turned around in less than
half an hour.
Senator Akaka. Let me end with a similar to one I asked Mr.
Wenk earlier. Have you identified specific parcels to be
exchanged? If so, is there is a problem with specifying that in
the bill?
Mr. Brooks. We have talked, generally, with the Park about
where the location of a turnaround track could be and where the
lands for exchange would be. But we have not identified them
specifically and we have agreed with the Park Service that we
need to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act,
which, in that process, we can't pin things down until we've
done a thorough environmental analysis.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much.
Senator Burr.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Brooks, can I assume from your answer to Senator Akaka,
that all the land that's exchanged is for the purposes of a
turnaround?
Mr. Brooks. The land we are obtaining is, and the land
we're giving up isn't.
Senator Burr. Correct. The land you're accessing from the
Park----
Mr. Brooks. Yes.
Senator Burr [continuing]. Is for the sole purpose of a
turnaround?
Mr. Brooks. That is correct.
Senator Burr. OK. Thank you.
Mr. Carlino, are there any businesses located within the
Historic Site designation?
Mr. Carlino. There are no businesses located within the
properties, as proposed in the bill. There are, adjacent to the
Battle of Homestead site, there is a remnant of the steel mill
of Homestead that is now being operated by an Italian steel
company. Across the road, as a part of the old mill----
Senator Burr. But that is not, that's not----
Mr. Carlino. That's not in the--no, sir.
Senator Burr. Thank you. How many structures are on the
proposed site and what's the estimated cost of repair, and do
you have an estimate of the annual maintenance cost?
Mr. Carlino. We don't have an estimate of the annual
maintenance cost. I believe CBO did a study on that a few years
ago, when the Special Resource Study was done. I don't know
what the numbers on that were, sir. But I could get those for
you, I'm sure, or they might be available through Congressional
Budget Office.
At the Battle of Homestead site there are two buildings,
the pump house and the water tower. That's about five acres of
that surround those two buildings. There is a hot metal bridge,
which is basically a railroad structure that was a connector
between the iron producing side of the site, which is where the
Carrie Furnaces are, and the steel mill side of the site, which
is where the battle site is.
Then at the Carrie Furnaces, there is two blast furnace
complexes which make up a series of buildings, including ovens
and stoves, a cast house, a blowing engine house, and another
large building. I forget the name of that building right now,
sir. But there's about five or six buildings there.
Senator Burr. You are in year 10 of, if I remember
correctly, the National Heritage Area expires in 2012 for you?
Mr. Carlino. It would expire in 2012 or cap on the funding
at $10 million.
Senator Burr. You're close to having hit the cap, aren't
you?
Mr. Carlino. Yes, sir.
Senator Burr. What is the annual budget for that Heritage
Area?
Mr. Carlino. On average we have a budget of about $2.5
million a year that includes----
Senator Burr. Does that include the $1 million that the
Federal Government has kicked in?
Mr. Carlino. When it has been $1 million, yes sir. That's
why I say, it's on average about $2.5 million. Last year's
appropriation was $780,000.
Senator Burr. But you're at year 10.
Mr. Carlino. Yes, sir.
Senator Burr. You've almost hit your $10 million cap?
Mr. Carlino. Yes, sir.
Senator Burr. We have a $1 million annual cap. So you've
been pretty close to a million dollars a year.
Mr. Carlino. Yes, sir.
Senator Burr. What percentage of that annual budget goes to
personnel?
Mr. Carlino. About 35 to 40 percent of that in various
costs.
Senator Burr. Over this 10-year life so far, how much money
has been spent on repair and maintenance of the structures
proposed for designation as the National Historic Site?
Mr. Carlino. We were donated the pump house and water tower
by the developer, which bought the property in 2000. We've
spent roughly $200,000 to $300,000 on that. It's part of a
trailhead site, the connection of the Great Allegheny Passage
Trail that connecting Pittsburgh to Washington, D.C. We've made
some other safety improvements on the site because people
wanted to visit it.
At the Carrie blast furnaces, we don't own it right now,
Allegheny County owns it. They have asked us, as they just
acquired it, to raise capital in order to begin the necessary
stabilization of that property. We've raised approximately $1
million for stabilization of that site, but we've not spent any
yet on that site.
For the railroad bridge, that was donated to us by Union
Railroad back in 1999. That is such a huge engineering
structure that we've had to do very little maintenance to that
facility, except for changing navigational lights, in order to
keep the channels on the Monongahela River signaled properly.
So that maintenance and operation, I would say, including
insurance, is about $100,000 a year.
Senator Burr. OK. So roughly a million dollars over the 10
years that you've put into restoration, reconstruction of
buildings?
Mr. Carlino. For the properties that we have access to, yes
sir. Like I said, the Carrie Furnaces, that's still a rather
crude abandoned site that has limited access.
Senator Burr. Thank you.
Mr. Zax, do you have any idea how many acres the proposed
area covers?
Mr. Zax. It covers about 108 acres.
Senator Burr. How many people live within the boundaries
that are proposed?
Mr. Zax. I'd like to verify that with certainty, rather
than estimating.
Senator Burr. I'll take a guesstimate and we'll look for
the certainty in a follow-up.
Mr. Zax. I'd feel better just submitting for the record.
I've been pressing Park Service to be so accurate. I don't want
to----
Senator Burr. I appreciate----
Mr. Zax [continuing]. Be guilty myself.
Senator Burr. I appreciate that. Can you give me an idea of
how many businesses operate within the proposed boundaries? How
many, if any of those, would become National Park Service
concessions operations after the designation?
Mr. Zax. Let me get to, if I may, what I think is the heart
of your question. Everyone who lives, works, own property, or
rents property in this area, supports this National Park. No
privately owned property is necessary for this National Park.
There will be private properties within the boundaries of the
part, just are there are in Lowell.
Senator Burr. What I'm trying to ascertain here, just for
the purposes of the Chairman and myself and the members, is
that where we have concessionaires on National Parks, we have
the ability to charge franchise fees. We have the ability to
compete those concessionaires. If in fact, incorporated in the
boundaries are private businesses that then become
concessionaires. We don't have the ability for franchise fees,
we don't have the abilities to compete the businesses. My only
point is to try to lay out for all the members what the
precedent is we might set, whether it's Paterson or anything
else.
Because I have learned in the 13 years that I've been here,
as soon as we deviate from what might be a historic pathway, we
have a number of people beating at the door ready to go down
that new pathway, which might send me to the, sort of the last
question that I had, which was who would control the land use
within the boundaries of this unit that's designated? Is it the
Park Service?
Mr. Zax. There is now local zoning that applies and local
Historic Preservation Protection that applies, within the
boundaries of the area. We would seek to have that continued.
As I'm sure you and your staff know, upon passage of this
legislation, there would be a period of time to produce a
general management plan that would address all of the issues
that you raise.
I will say only that, in the case of Paterson, it's much
easier than in the case of Lowell. Though the Park Service
today tells us they're worried about the management problems in
Paterson, it's going to be much easier to manage in Paterson
than in Lowell. In fact----
Senator Burr. Please----
Mr. Zax [continuing]. Lowell has not been a problem in this
regard.
Senator Burr. Please understand, this is one member of the
Senate that's not comparing this with something else. I'm
purely focused on the precedent that we would set--if there is
one--that differs from the precedent in place. I will assure
you prior to the consideration by the committee of the bill,
I'll do the remainder of my homework to find out. Do we have
other facilities in the country, where we have a concentration
of private business operating within the boundaries of a park?
Do we have dual control agreements, where the Park Service is
in control of some things, but private entities, companies,
individuals, or--I guess, to have zoning you have to have some
type of corporated or unincorporated city within the boundaries
or town, however we want to call it.
If in fact we don't find other properties that have that,
then an additional consideration of the committee has to be, is
that a precedent that we want to set for the future? It was not
a series of questions that I asked the Park Service. I can
follow-up with them in some written questions.
Mr. Zax. I would like to respond for the record, as well.
Senator Burr. Sure.
Mr. Zax. Because one of the things that really made me and
representatives of private foundations very interested in
supporting other efforts around the park, to go to Lowell
during the earlier part of this month, was to look at exactly
this question. So let me, we have a little more work to do, but
I certainly could respond to those inquiries during the 2-week
period that this committee allows.
Senator Burr. I would be grateful to you----
Mr. Zax. Perfect.
Senator Burr [continuing]. If you would provide that. Thank
you.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Senator Burr.
I want to thank our witnesses for testifying this
afternoon. Some of you, Mr. Brooks in particular, have traveled
a long way to appear here today, and I want to let you know
that we appreciate your willingness to come to Washington to
help us better understand these issues.
Some members of the committee were not able to attend this
hearing, and they may submit additional questions in writing.
If we receive any, we'll forward them to you and ask that you
respond to those, and we may include both the questions and
answers in the official hearing.
We have also to include in the record the testimonies for
the record of Senator Biden and Senator Lautenberg, and we'll
have a spot on the record.
So again, thank you very much and thank you again for your
testimony. The subcommittee is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:08 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
APPENDIXES
----------
Appendix I
Responses to Additional Questions
----------
Responses of August R. Carlino to Questions From Senator Burr
Question 1. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): How was it determined that a National Historic Site was the most
appropriate designation?
Answer. The Steel Industry National Historic Site was first
proposed as the Steel Industry National Historic Park Act (H.R. 5030)
in the 106th Congress by Congressman Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania. In the
107th Congress the bill was reintroduced, and considered by the House
Resources Committee, chaired then by Congressman Richard Pombo. It was
the decision of the Chairman to re-title the bill to be a ``National
Historic Site'' when the legislation was marked-up in Committee.
Question 2. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): How many structures are on the proposed site and what is the
estimated cost of repairs and annual maintenance?
Answer. The property and structures to be designated in the bill
include the Battle of Homestead site, Carrie Furnaces No. 6 and No. 7,
and the Rankin Hot Metal Bridge. The Battle site includes two (2)
structures, the pumphouse and water tower. The blast furnaces site
includes the twelve (12) structures which make up the National Historic
Landmark, including Carrie Furnaces No. 6 and No. 7, stationary car
dumper, ore yard, ore bridge, stocking trestle, stock house, hoist
house, cast house, blast plant, blowing engine house and AC power
house. Also included in the NHL and a part of the site, is the Rankin
Hot Metal bridge. In total, the S. 697 proposes fifteen structures (15)
as a part of the proposed Steel Industry National Historic Site.
In 2002, the Congressional Budget Office prepared an estimate for
the cost of the legislation. CBO reported the cost to be slightly more
than $53 million over a five-year period, including capital costs,
operations and maintenance, and cooperative agreements.
Question 3. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): How much has been spent on repair and maintenance of the
structures proposed for designation as a National Historic Site each
year in the past 10 years?
Answer. Since SIHC acquired the Battle of Homestead site (pumphouse
and water tower) in 2003, $83,939 has been expended on the site
including insurance, utilities and restoration and repairs. As for the
Carrie Furnaces, this site is owned by Allegheny County, and except for
the costs incurred by SIHC to open the site for tours--insurance and
site preparation totally $29,261 since 2006--there has not been any
work performed in association with the maintenance or restoration of
this facility. Since 2001, when SIHC acquired the Rankin Hot Metal
Bridge by donation from Union Rail Road, $56,315 has been spent on
maintenance, security and insurance.
Question 4. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): Have you received any opposition to this designation? If so, who
has opposed the designation and why?
Answer. The only opponent to the legislation was the previous owner
of the site, The Park Corporation. Their opposition is no longer a
factor since they willingly sold all of their holdings in the entire
brownfield site that includes the Carrie Furnaces to the County of
Allegheny in 2005. The legislation is supported by Allegheny County,
owners of the Carrie Furnaces, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the
surrounding boroughs, numerous civic and community organizations, along
with local philanthropic foundations.
Question 5. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): Will the Federal government be expected to purchase any of the
land, buildings, or other property within the National Historic Site?
If so, who is the current owner, how long have they owned the property,
and what is the estimated cost?
Answer. The legislation specifies that all land and structures
within the proposed Steel Industry National Historic Site are to be
transferred to the National Park Service by donation. This provision of
the legislation is supported by both Allegheny County, which owns the
Carrie Furnaces (since 2005) and the Steel Industry Heritage
Corporation which owns the Battle of Homestead site (since 2003) and
the Rankin Hot Metal Bridge (since 2001).
______
Responses of Tom Brooks to Questions From Senator Burr
Question 1. Denali National Park/Alaska Railroad Land Exchange (S.
1808): What is the historical use of the non-Federal land being
transferred to the National Park Service as a result of S. 1808?
Answer. Basically, there has been little use of the land. The non-
Federal land was Federal until the Alaska Railroad was sold to the
State of Alaska in 1985. While in the Federal domain, the railroad used
minor portions of this area to ditch for drainage. In 1985, the land
was reserved to the railroad for maintenance of the track and future
rail realignment. This area is called the ``Moody Slide'', and is an
area of naturally unstable ground. The lands proposed for exchange in
S. 1808 are along the top of the slide.
Question 2. Denali National Park/Alaska Railroad Land Exchange (S.
1808): Does the non-Federal land involved in this exchange contain any
form of development or history of hazardous waste contamination?
Answer. As noted above, the land was used for minor drainage
ditching when under Federal control. In addition, in about 1980 the
Federal government permitted construction of an electrical pole line in
this area. This pole line remains in service today and is the source of
electrical power for the NPS Denali Park entrance area. The Alaska
Railroad is not aware of any contamination in this area.
Question 3. Denali National Park/Alaska Railroad Land Exchange (S.
1808): How does the Alaska Railroad intend to use the land it obtains
as a result of this exchange?
Answer. The Alaska Railroad intends to use the land to construct
track to turn trains around at Denali Park. Alternatives to a
turnaround track are not viable. If a turnaround track is not created,
options to expand and improve rail service to Denali Park will be
limited.
______
Responses of Leonard A. Zax to Questions From Senator Burr
Question 1. Many structures within the area of the proposed
National Park Unit were originally constructed for manufacturing
purposes. How many of the original manufacturing buildings remain, what
was the original use of each structure, and what is the current use?
Answer. Some 40 structures and complexes originally constructed for
manufacturing purposes are within the area. Tables A through D on
attached Schedule 1 set forth the number, original use and current use.
Although many of the structures within the boundaries of the
proposed National Park Unit were originally constructed for
manufacturing purposes, Alexander Hamilton and Pierre L'Enfant planned
for Paterson to include housing as well. Some manufacturing continues
there, but other industrial buildings have been restored for adaptive
reuses, including housing, consistent with the best practices in
historic preservation.
Question 2. How many acres does the proposed area cover and
approximately how many people live within the proposed boundary? What
type of residences currently exist (e.g., single family homes, town
homes, apartments, condominiums)?
Answer. The proposed area covers approximately 115 acres, including
the Hinchliffe Stadium property that is not in the bill the House
enacted last night. The population is about 1,000 persons, with the
majority residing in apartments. There are no single-family homes or
townhouses. There are rental apartments and condominium units located
in several rehabilitated mill structures. There are also other rental
apartments in structures never used for manufacturing.
Question 3. Will any of the historic structures within the proposed
boundary of the national park be adaptively reused for residential
buildings such as apartments or condominiums after designation? If so,
what was the original use of the future residential building and how
has the use changed since first built?
Answer. There are seven historic mill renovation projects planned
with private financing. Six of the historic buildings are planned as
condominium or rental apartments. The seventh historic structure is
proposed as commercial offices. Table C of Schedule 1 provides
additional details.
Question 4. How many businesses operate within the proposed
boundary and how many of those would become National Park Service
concessions operations after designation? Will the merchants pay any
fee to the National Park Service or the U.S. Treasury for operating
within the boundaries of a national park unit?
Answer. Approximately 125 businesses operate within the proposed
boundaries. More than half of those are manufacturing or offices.
At the Subcommittee Hearing, Senator Burr expressed a concern that
the passage of this legislation might create an unusual new precedent,
perhaps with unintended consequences, for Park Service concessions in
an urban national park. We believe that the Paterson National Park
would not create a new or untested precedent.
Even though the Paterson Great Falls National Historical Park would
be located in the heart of a city, the regular National Park Service
concessions guidelines would apply to any concession operation on park
lands. After the passage of this legislation, the National Park Service
will prepare a General Management Plan for the new park that will
address the number and location of NPS concessions.
In urban national historical park settings like Boston,
Philadelphia and Lowell, NPS units have been operating successfully in
cooperation with established businesses on private property within park
boundaries. The National Park Service concessions laws and policies
would apply to the same extent in Paterson with respect to the payment
of any fees to the National Park Service or the U.S. Treasury for
commercial service operations that take place on national park lands.
Question 5. How many acres of land within the proposed boundary are
in private ownership? How much of the land is Federal? How much of the
land is state? How will land ownership change if S. 148 is enacted?
Answer. About 35 acres are privately owned. None of the land within
the boundaries is currently owned by the United States. The State of
New Jersey owns about 5 acres. The City of Paterson owns about 57
acres. Streets account for about 15 acres.
Ownership would not change if Congress enacts this legislation.
We understand that the National Park Service is also responding to
this question and some of the other questions herein. Park Service
officials may be in a better position to provide more precise
responses.
Question 6. Who currently controls land use within the proposed
boundary of the Paterson Great Falls National Park and who will control
land use after designation?
Answer. The City of Paterson now controls land uses through zoning
and historic preservation guidelines, but historic preservation laws
currently provide a limited role for the State and Federal governments
in certain circumstances. After designation, and pursuant to the NPS
General Management Plan, land use will also be controlled pursuant to
cooperative agreements between the City of Paterson, the State of New
Jersey, and the National Park Service.
Question 7. What is the estimated cost to repair and rehabilitate
the structures included in the area proposed for designation as a unit
of the National Park System and who will be responsible for such
efforts?
Answer. The National Park Service estimates that the costs for
repair and rehabilitation of structures would be: (i) $3 million to $5
million to refurbish a facility for visitor services and administration
needs; and (ii) $10 million to $15 million for historic preservation
grants.
As explained in further detail on Tables B and C on Schedule 1,
several buildings have already been rehabilitated and the private
sector will bear responsibility for almost all future renovation costs.
Question 8. How will the American public benefit from this
designation?
Answer. The Paterson Great Falls National Historical Park will
provide benefits to everyone in America. Many citizens who today feel
little or no connection with our national parks and our national
heritage will find much greater meaning in the interpretation of
American history within Paterson's gritty city setting of cultural
diversity.
Thirty million Americans-more than one in ten Americans-live less
than a three hour drive from the Great Falls in Paterson. For many of
them, the great national parks of the west are something they have seen
only in photographs. Paterson offers a unique opportunity to provide a
new Park Service unit in a setting that Hispanic, African-American,
Arab-American, Islamic, Jewish, and Christian organizations have
recognized as a place to connect with American history and the National
Park System.
These diverse groups come together for many reasons. They have seen
the spectacular beauty of the Great Falls-the second largest waterfall
in the eastern part of the United States. They increasingly recognize
that no other natural wonder in America has played a more important
role in our nation's historic quest for freedom and prosperity.
The history of the Paterson Great Falls has captured the
imagination and spirit of a broad and diverse group of citizens
throughout America. Hispanic citizens, who constitute a majority of
Paterson's 180,000 residents, support the this new national historical
park in part because Hamilton played such an important role in
expanding opportunities for immigrants and helping to spread the cause
of freedom to the Spanish colonies in the Americas. African-American
leaders recognize Hamilton's vision of an American economy beginning at
the Great Falls and built through the work of men and women dedicated
to freedom.
Paterson would become the first NPS unit with strong Arab-American
support in a city that has the second largest concentration of Arab-
Americans in any American city. Islamic leaders support the Paterson
National Park as a continuation of the Silk Road that united their
homelands in Central Asia with China and the West. They note that
Paterson became the largest silk manufacturing center of the world at
the end of the 19th Century and was long known as the Silk City. As
Richard Kennedy of the Smithsonian Institution has pointed out:
The Silk Road has extended to the United States and, since
the tragic events of September 11, understanding that
connection clearly has become more important. There is no
better time, then, to learn more about the roots of this vital
connection and to celebrate the long-standing relationships
that have existed between east and west and north and south.
National and local support for the Paterson National Historical
Park continues to grow. The National Trust for Historic Preservation,
the National Parks Conservation Association, the NAACP, and the Sierra
Club have written letters and submitted testimony to support this new
national historical park. Also supporting a Paterson National Park are
former Cabinet members who served in the Administrations of Gerald R.
Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W.
Bush.
Corporate executives and laborers, environmentalists and property
rights advocates, bankers and community activists, scholars and
schoolchildren, historic preservationists and developers support this
new park. All Americans will benefit from making this very special
place a part of the National Park System.
Question 9. Can the proposal be modified so that the boundary of
the park unit includes only land and structures that will convey to the
Federal government and excludes all private property? By doing so, it
will be clear from the start that there are no private in-holdings
within the boundary of the National Park unit.
Answer. Although it is theoretically possible for the Congress to
exclude lots that are privately owned from the national historical
park, neither precedent nor policy would support such an unnecessarily
complicated patchwork of boundaries for a national historical park in
an urban setting. Eliminating private lots from the proposed park
boundaries of Paterson would increase NPS management difficulties,
increase Federal costs, frustrate historic preservation best practices,
and create a problematic precedent for our National Park System.
The boundaries in the bill are based on resource significance and
opportunities for high quality visitor experiences. The private owners
support having their properties within the proposed park boundaries.
Keeping these private lands within the boundaries will help encourage
private funding for restoration and maintenance. These properties would
remain in private ownership in accordance with a General Management
Plan and cooperative agreements between the NPS, State and local
governments. Excluding some or all of the private lands would not
enhance management efficiency nor would it reduce costs to NPS for
operations.
Many private properties are included within the boundaries of urban
national historical parks such as Independence National Historical
Park, Boston National Historical Park, Lowell National Historical Park,
and Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park
in California. Even though the Park Service had opposed creation of
Lowell National Historical Park in the Carter Administration, since
Congressional passage of the legislation the Park Service professionals
have done a highly-effective and very impressive job of administering
this historical park in the heart of the city.
The proposed boundaries are important for maintaining the integrity
of the Paterson Great Falls National Historic District. As the
President of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Richard Moe,
observed: ``Scholars have concluded that Pierre L'Enfant's innovative
water power system at Great Falls-and many factories built later-
constitute the finest remaining collection of engineering and
architectural works representing each stage of America's progress from
Hamilton's time to the twentieth century.''
Despite changes in private owners and uses, the historic built
environment of the district endures. The Pulitzer Prize winning
architecture critic of the New Yorker, Paul Goldberger, has written of
this Paterson historic district: ``The visitor comes back, again, to
the remarkable mill and factory architecture, for it is the real gem of
this city. Streets and buildings form a surprisingly cohesive urban
composition. Here, the rich brick facades of the mills and the crisp
forms of the smokestacks play off against one another, with the cliffs
of the Great Falls providing a serene background.''
To secure the benefits of the entire national historic district for
the American people, we believe the Paterson Great Falls National
Historical Park should include the private properties.
SCHEDULE 1.--MAJOR HISTORIC STRUCTURES & COMPLEXES
Table A.--Public Historic Properties in Need of Rehabilitation
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Location Historic Name Historic Use Year Built Comments
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
upper, middle & lower channels S.U.M. Raceway Industrial: Power 1794-1839 Conceived by S.U.M., first designed by Pierre L'Fant, implemented by Peter Colt.
Canal Unique 3-tier canal system to provide water power to mills. Fully intact, with
running water and partially rehabilitated
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Passaic River S.U.M. Dam Industrial: Power 1838 Built across Passaic river to impound water for use in the raceway system. Still in
Canal functional use today as part of the hydroelectric generating station
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
former ATP site Colt Gun Mill Industrial: Textile 1836 Constructed by the Colt family where Samuel Colt produced the first Colt firearms,
Mfg. and later where the first skein of silk was produced in Paterson. Currently a
stabilized ruin but will be incorporated into park design
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
lip of the Great Falls Passaic Water Co. Dam Industrial: 1860-1870s Masonry dam constructed to impound water before it flowed over the waterfall for the
Utilities purpose of pumping into nearby reservoirs. Part of Paterson's first fire and
domestic water supply system. Severely threatened
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
south bank of Passaic River River Wall Industrial: Textile 1850-1860s Stone masonry river wall running 1,000 ft. along river bank functioned to separate
Mfg. the river from a heavily industrialized campus. Severely threatened
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
former ATP site various mill remnants Industrial: 1870s-1930 Various mill remnants that are worthy of stabilization that resulted from several
Textile Mfg. 20th century fires that consumed the former ATP campus. Includes one smoke stack,
steam power plant, and mill components. Threatened
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 Market St Rogers Loco. Shop Bld. Industrial: 1850s-1870s Site of the Paterson Museum, this impressive iconic structure was rehabilitated in
Locomotive 1980 and has since been in use. Suffers from deferred maintenance. Needs some
capital improvements
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 McBride Ave S.U.M. Hydro electric Industrial: 1912-14 Operated from 1914-1967. Producing power since reactivation in 1986. Suffers from
Sta. Utilities deferred maintenance
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 McBride Ave S.U.M. Steam Plant Industrial: 1912-14 Constructed by the S.U.M. to replace water power to mills with electrical power
Utilities generated by coal. Demolished in the 1960s leaving massive foundation that is in
need of rehabilitation and reuse as park infrastructure
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source: City of Paterson
Table B.--Completed Rehabilitations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current Use
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Address Historic Name Historic Use Year Built Educational/
Industrial Residential Public Commercial
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
24 Mill St. Essex Mill Industrial: 1807-1870s Artist housing
(complex) Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
33-35 VanHouten St. Phoenix Mill Industrial: 1813-1870s Artist housing
(complex) Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
9 Mill St. Ryle & Residential 1815 Offices, rental
Thomson
houses
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16-26 Mill St. Hamil & Industrial: 1857,1877 Rental Housing Retail rental spaces
Hamilton Textile Mfg.
Mills
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
18 Market St. Cooke Mills Industrial: 1870s Industrial
(complex) Locomotive incubator
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
19 Market St. Cooke Loco. Industrial: 1881 Condominium
Admin. Bld. Locomotive
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
20-24 Mill St. Pub. School Educational: 1871-1930s Public
#2 School school
(Elementary)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Market St. Rosen Mill Industrial: 1891 Day care/
Textile Mfg. elem. school
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
31-35 McBride Ave. Hayes Mfg. Co Industrial: 1910 1950s bld:
(Demolished Textile Mfg. Day Care
)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16 Spruce St. Rogers Loco. Industrial: 1880 CDC/social
Admin Bld. Locomotive services
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
10 Spruce St. Ivanhoe Mill Industrial: 1840 Artist
Wheelhouse Paper Mfg. public
gallery
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
49 Spruce St. Pub. Industrial: 1930s Day Care
Utilities Pub.
Offices Bld. Utilities
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
32 Spruce St. Rogers Loco. Industrial: 1870s CDC Day Care
Shop Bld. Locomotive & high
school
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 Market St. Rogers Loco. Industrial: 1850s-1870s Paterson Offices, rental
Shop Bld. Locomotive Museum
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
7 Mill St. Argus Mill Industrial: 1900 Day Care &
Textile Mfg. services
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16 McBride Ave Franklin Mill Industrial: 1870-1915 Offices, rental
Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 McBride Ave S.U.M. Hydro Industrial: 1912-14 Generates electricity
electric utilities
Sta.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source: City of Paterson
Table C.--Rehabilitations in Progress or Planned
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current Proposed Uses
Address Historic Historic Year Built Occupancy ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name Use Status Industrial Residential Educational/Public Commercial
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
101 W. Broadway Old Commerci 1845 Vacant Offices
Hotel al:
Hotel
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
24VanHouten St. Harmony Industri 1850-1870s Vacant Rental
Mills al: Housing
(comple Textile
x) Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
50 Spruce St. Rogers Industri 1870s Vacant Condominium
Loco. al:
Shop Locomot
bld. ive
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
68 Ryle Ave. Addy Industri 1850s Vacant Condominium
Mill al:
Textile
Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
50 Ryle Ave. Venerabl Industri 1870s Vacant Condominium
e Mill al:
Machine
Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
13VanHouten St. Congdon Industri 1907 Vacant Condominium
Mill al:
Textile
Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
28-42 Ryle Ave. National Industri 1915 Vacant Condominium
Silk al:
Dyeing Textile
Co. Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source: City of Paterson
Table D.--Private Historic Properties, Not Rehabilitated
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Educational/
Address Historic Name Historic Use Year Built Industrial Residential Public Commercial
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
70 Spruce St. Barbour Flax Industrial: 1860s Manufacturing
Spinning Textile Mfg. and
Mills industrial
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
70 Spruce St. Dolphin Jute Industrial: 1874-1880 Manufacturing
& Twine Co. Textile Mfg. and
industrial
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
183-229 Grand St. Granite Mill Industrial: 1881-1908 Warehouse
Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2-50 Jersey St. Cooke Loco. Industrial: 1870s NJ Transit:
Shop Bld. Locomotive Bus depot
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
17 River St. Society Commercial: 1915 Furniture
Island Market
(S.U.M.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
44-48 Ryle Ave. National Silk Industrial: 1915 Manufacturing
Dyeing Co. Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
38 VanHouten St. Edison Industrial: 1894-1910 Salvation Army
Illuminating Utilities
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Upper Raceway Park Rogers Loco. Industrial: 1870s
Storage Bld. Locomotive
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
37-53 McBride Ave. Oppenheimer Industrial: 1915 Manufacturing
Mill Textile Mfg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
23-29 McBride Ave. Fine Colors Industrial: 1910
Co. Textile Mfg.
(complex)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source: City of Paterson
[Responses to the following questions were not received
from the National Park Service, Department of the Interior, at
the time the hearing went to press:]
Questions for Daniel N. Wenk From Senator Menendez, on S. 148
Question 1. How many National Historic Districts include both a
National Natural Landmark and a National Historical Landmark?
Question 2. What other places in America now interpret Hamilton's
vision of economic independence, particularly for military supplies?
Question 3. Hamilton biographers emphasize that Hamilton's economic
vision had two critical aspects: (i) zero tolerance for slavery; and
(ii) opportunities for poor immigrants with no social pedigree to rise
to the top of American society. What other places in America connected
with Hamilton interpret this extraordinary vision of a Founding Father?
Question 4. What National Park Service units have a relationship to
Muslim Americans?
Question 5. What National Park Service units interpret the modern
Silk Road that was the theme of the Smithsonian Folk Life Festival on
the National Mall in 2002?
Question 6. On the same day that the Administration testified
against the Paterson National Park, the Administration testimony on S.
187 stated that Lowell, Massachusetts is ``the most significant planned
industrial city in the United States.'' Why is Lowell more significant
than Paterson, which was planned as an industrial city a generation
earlier than Lowell by one of our Founding Fathers and Pierre L'Enfant?
Question 7. The Park Service testified that Hamilton is represented
three places in the National Park System. But scholars point out that
he lived in Hamilton Grange only the last two years of his life--many
years after his service in government--and the Grange has nothing to do
with his industrial vision and its primary importance is as a remaining
18th century house. Independence Hall does not interpret Hamilton's
vision of the American economy or economic independence. And Federal
Hall is a welcome center for the entire New York region that has only a
very limited display on Hamilton's contributions. How can these three
sites be used as a justification for rejecting the Paterson National
Historical Park legislation?
In addition, while I did ask these questions at the hearing I would
like a more complete answer from the National Park Service on these
questions in writing if possible.
Question 8. At an early stage of the Paterson Great Falls Study,
the National Park Service launched a special webpage devoted to the
Paterson Study. For all the years the Study continued, the webpage
noted that the Administration ``does not support addition of new units
to the National Park System.'' What effect did the Administration
policy have on the Paterson Study?
Question 9. The Park Service published a Draft of the Paterson
Great Falls Study for public comment in November 2006 and invited the
public to provide comments by January 30, 2007. It is astonishing to
read the letters of some of the most distinguished scholars in America
characterize what the Park Service did in the Paterson Study. They used
words like: ``misreads the historical record'' . . . ``seriously
deficient'' . . . ``truly absurd'' . . . ``demonstrably wrong'' . . .
``false'' . . . ``a serious misreading of the historical record.'' As a
result of getting all these letters from leading scholars, what changes
did the Park Service make in the Draft Study?
Question 10. Governor Corzine wrote a letter to Secretary
Kempthorne on September 11, 2006 that said: ``The State of New Jersey
alone cannot protect the resources of the Great Falls and properly
present them to the public without an NPS unit in Paterson.'' How can
the Park Service Draft Study conclude that the State will be doing all
that is necessary at the Great Falls when the New Jersey contribution
to the Park is $10 million and the Park Service numbers make it clear
that $20 million is necessary?
______
Questions for Daniel N. Wenk From Senator Burr
Question 11. Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area Amendment
(S. 128):
a. Why has this National Heritage Area been inactive since it
was first established in 1996?
b.Have any other National Heritage Areas or Corridors
encountered similar management challenges to those found at
Cache la Poudre River? If so, how were the problems resolved?
Question 12. Paterson Great Falls Park Act (S. 148):
a. What is the status of the suitability and feasibility
study conducted by the National Park Service for the Paterson
site?
b. How many acres of the proposed area are in private
ownership and how much will remain in private ownership after
designation?
c. The House companion bill, H.R. 189, has been reported out
of the Natural Resources Committee with an amendment. The
National Park Service opposed the House bill as introduced.
Does the National Park Service support the amended version of
H.R. 189? If not, why?
d. Who will control land use within the boundaries of the
unit after designation?
e. How many private businesses exist within the proposed
boundaries of the Paterson National Park? What other units of
the National Park System contain a concentration of private
businesses similar to Paterson? Does the National Park Service
collect a franchise fee or business use authorization fee in
such cases?
f. It is my understanding that the proposed Paterson National
Park site currently contains apartments, affordable housing,
and proposed condominiums as adaptive reuse of historic
structures. Do any other units of the National Park System
contain private residential structures of this type? If so,
where and to what extent? Would the National Park Service
support adaptive reuse of historic structures for condominiums
in a national park unit?
Question 13. Keweenaw National Historical Park Matching Funds
Reduction (S. 189):
a. The amendment removes a provision that prohibits the
Secretary from acquiring lands that have become contaminated
with hazardous substances. Under what circumstances would the
National Park Service feel compelled to purchase lands that are
contaminated with hazardous substances?
b. Why is it necessary to delete a provision that prohibits
the acquisition of lands contaminated with hazardous
substances?
c. How will this amendment improve the visitor experience to
Keweenaw National Historical Park?
d. How many units of the National Park System have matching
funds requirements as part of their enabling legislation or
subsequent amendments? What is the range of matching fund
requirements (e.g., 1 federal to 1 non-federal or something
less being the smallest to 1:4 or something greater being the
largest)?
e. Would Keweenaw or other units having a matching fund
requirement be able to apply the non-federal match toward the
enabling legislation requirement and the Centennial Challenge
program, if enacted, and essentially ``double dip''?
Question 14. Steel Industry National Historic Site Designation (S.
697): The site is part of the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area,
which was designated a National Heritage Area in 1996. It preserves and
interprets the role of the steel industry in the development of a
nation. The site contains several structures that are in need of over
$30 million in repairs. If designated a National Historic Site, it
would become a unit of the National Park System and the Federal
government would be responsible for the repairs.
a. How many other National Heritage Areas or portions of such
areas have been designated as units of the National Park
System?
b. How many structures are on the proposed site and what is
the estimated cost of repairs and annual maintenance?
c. Has a study been conducted to determine the suitability
and feasibility of designating the site as a unit of the
National Park System and what were the findings?
Question 15. Lowell National Historical Park Boundary Adjustment
(S. 867):
a. How many acres affected by this amendment are currently in
private ownership and how many owners are involved?
b. Do any of the owners object to this amendment?
c. What is the estimated cost of the land included in this
amendment?
d. How will this amendment support the purpose for which the
Lowell National Historical Park was established?
Question 16. New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail Reauthorization (S.
1039): The Trail was reauthorized last Congress, but the final version
signed into law inadvertently extended the authorization for one year
instead of five. S. 1039 corrects the error by extending the
authorization to 2011. The law passed in the 109th Congress also
directed the National Park Service to prepare a strategic plan for the
trail.
a. S. 1039 extends the authorization from 2007 to 2011. Does
the National Park Service know of any other corrections we
should take care of regarding the New Jersey Coastal Heritage
Trail?
b. What is the status of the strategic plan being prepared
for the New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail?
Question 17. Saguaro National Park Boundary Expansion Act (S.
1341):
a. What is the estimated cost of the property proposed for
addition to the Park and the Conservation Area?
b. Are any of the lands included in the expansion area in
private ownership?
Question 18. Tule Lake Segregation Study (S. 1476):
a. S. 1476 requires the National Park Service to complete a
study within one year. The National Park Service is usually
given three years to complete a study. Can the study authorized
by S. 1476 be completed in one year or will you require more
time?
b. How many acres does the Tule Segregation Center occupy and
what original structures remain on the site?
Question 19. Underground Railroad Amendment (S. 1709/H.R. 1239):
a. Section 2 of S. 1709 specifies that ``the Secretary shall
appoint at least 8 full-time equivalent staff to assist the
Secretary in carrying out duties under this act.'' What other
park units or park programs have legislation that specifies the
number of full-time equivalent staff that the Secretary shall
appoint?
b. How many full-time equivalent staff has the Secretary
appointed to the National Underground Network to Freedom
program in 2007?
Question 20. Denali National Park/Alaska Railroad Land Exchange (S.
1808):
a. How will the proposed land exchange between Denali
National Park and the Alaska Railroad improve the visitor
experience?
b. Does the non-Federal land involved in this exchange
contain any form of development or history of hazardous waste
contamination?
c. What is the historical use of the non-Federal land being
acquired by the National Park Service as a result of S. 1808?
d. How will Denali National Park benefit from this land
exchange?
e. Will the Alaska Railroad use the land it receives as a
result of this exchange in a manner consistent with the purpose
for which Denali National Park was established?
Question 21. Alexander Hamilton Site Study at Virgin Islands (S.
1969):
a. How many existing National Park Units currently interpret
the life and contributions of Alexander Hamilton?
b. How much will it cost to conduct the proposed study?
Appendix II
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
----------
Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District,
Berthoud, CO, September 24, 2007.
Hon. Wayne Allard,
U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
Dear Senator: I am writing you to encourage your support for the
Cache la Poudre Heritage Area bill (SB128) pending in the United States
Senate. Senate Bill 128 is a technical corrections bill that will
rectify some errors in the boundary description in the original bill,
and designate the Poudre Heritage Alliance, a non-profit 501(c)(3)
organization, as the management entity for the Heritage Area.
The Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District is a member of the
Alliance, and has long supported the efforts to pass this bill. This
bill is needed to assure proper administration of the National Water
Heritage Area designation given the Poudre in 1996. It has been more
than a decade since that designation, and we believe it to be
imperative that we take this final step necessary to implement the
intent of the designation.
Your support of Senate Bill 128 which will allow implementation of
the original Cache la Poudre Heritage Area bill will be most
appreciated when this bill comes before of the National Parks Committee
on September 27, 2007.
The Heritage Area has widespread support throughout Northern
Colorado and this federal legislation will strengthen an already
successful heritage area.
Sincerely,
Eric W. Wilkinson,
General Manager.
______
Town of Windsor,
Windsor, CO, September 25, 2007.
Hon. Wayne Allard,
U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
Dear Senator: I am writing you to encourage your support for the
Cache la Poudre Heritage Area bill pending in the US Senate. Senate
Bill 128 is a technical corrections bill that will rectify some errors
in the boundary description in the original bill and designate the
Poudre Heritage Alliance, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, as the
management entity for the Heritage Area.
Since its inception the Heritage Alliance has provided support with
the help of the National Park Service at Rocky Mountain National Park
in educating the public and promoting the Heritage Area. The Poudre
Heritage Alliance has hosted two (2) national conferences and given
numerous tours of the Heritage Area. The Heritage Alliance has
negotiated with the Colorado Department of Transportation to locate two
(2) large infonnational signs along I-25 where the Heritage Area and
Poudre River cross the interstate. Twenty wayside signs have been
installed along the trail that borders much of the Heritage Area's
forty-four (44) mile corridor.
Additionally, a Heritage poster, passport stamp program, brochures,
an ethno history and website have all been created.
A historical and cultural handbook has also been drafted and thanks
to some non-profit grants will be printed and distributed in the near
future.
Your support to finalize the intent of the original Cache la Poudre
Heritage Area bill is most appreciated when this bill comes up in front
of the National Parks committee on September 27, 2007.
The Heritage Area has widespread support throughout Northern
Colorado and this federal legislation will strengthen an already
successful heritage area. The Town of Windsor is an active member of
this Alliance.
Cordially,
Ed Starck,
Mayor.
______
Sky Island Alliance,
Tucson, AZ, September 25, 2007.
Hon. Jon Kyl,
730 Hart Senate Building, Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Kyl, We appreciate the opportunity to support the Las
Cienegas Enhancement and Saguaro National Park Boundary Adjustment Act
(S. 1341) which will be heard in the Subcommittee on National Parks on
Thursday September 27th.
Sky Island Alliance has been party to negotiations concerning this
bill since its original inception in February 2003. The legislation
provides for the important acquisition of lands adjacent to the Las
Cienegas National Conservation Area, lands adjacent to Saguaro National
Park. and the net retirement of almost 1000 acre-feet of water rights
on Cienega Creek. These actions combined will increase the integrity of
the NCA and help ensure its core value--Cienega Creek--retains critical
above-surface flows. S. 1341 also improves landownership patterns
within the Sky Island region, and reduces the threat of ex-urban
development largely outside of the Tucson metropolitan area, in turn
keeping the Whetstone-Rincon wildlife linkage largely intact.
Another beneficial aspect of S--1341 is Section 3(b)3(C)ii where
cash equalization payments made to the Secretary must be used for the
acquisition of lands or interests in southern Arizona. With more than
70,000 acres of non-federal land within the Sonoita Valley Acquisition
District alone, we appreciate your support of ensuring that
equalization payments stay within southern Arizona.
In relation to Section 4(c) which directs the Secretary to provide
a road easement to the Forest Service boundary. we ask that the
committee report further clarifies that new road construction into the
Forest is not expressly authorized by this legislation and because of
the existing access route, is not warranted.
The expansion of the National Conservation Area and National Park
arc worthy conservation measures that will have lasting beneficial
impacts on our region's natural heritage. We look forward to the bill's
passage.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Matt Skroch,
Executive Director.
______
County Administrator's Office,
Pima County Governmental, Center,
Tucson, AZ, September 26, 2007.
Hon. Jon Kyl,
U.S. Senate, 730 Hart Senate Building, Washington, DC.
Re: Pima County Support for S.1341, the Las Cienegas Enhancement and
Saguaro National Park Boundary Adjustment Act
Dear Senator Kyl: Pima County has long supported the conservation
of lands in the Cienega Corridor, as well as expansions of the Saguaro
National Park, East and West. We continue to support the most recent
iteration of this bill, S. 1341, The Las Cienegas Enhancement and
Saguaro National Park Boundary Adjustment Act.
The Act would conserve the 2,700-acre Empirita Simonson property in
the Cienega Corridor east of Tucson. This property was identified for
conservation as part of the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan and
subsequent voter-approved bond election. Conservation of the property
would expand significant conservation investments made by the National
Forest Service, National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, and
Pima County, in this important biological and cultural landscape. In
addition, this Act will expand the boundaries of Saguaro National Park
along the important Rincon Creek and along the eastern slopes of the
Tucson Mountains. This legislation will also conserve the Bloom
property, a large 160-acre property adjacent to Saguaro National Park
East and within the boundary expansion area.
Thank you for your continued efforts to make this land exchange a
reality.
Sincerely,
C.H. Huckelberry,
County Administrator.
______
Statement of Jim Stratton, National Parks Conservation Association,
on S. 1808
The National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) works to
protect, preserve, and enhance America's national parks for present and
future generations. On behalf of NPCA's 325,000 members, and especially
its members in Alaska, we appreciate the opportunity to submit these
comments for the record.
Several months ago we received a briefing on the proposal land
exchange by representatives of the Alaska Railroad. Subsequent to that
briefing, the National Parks Conservation Association reviewed the
specific language of S. 1808, the Denali National Park and Alaska
Railroad Land Exchange Act of 2007, to evaluate its potential impact on
park resources. That review found the proposal to have minimal impact
on the park and, therefore, we have no objection to the bill.
We recognize the Alaska Railroad's need to build a turnaround for
its trains and we understand the benefit that it will bring to both the
economic viability of passenger service and the advantage for those
seeking to travel to Denali by rail rather than the highway.
We support the acre for acre provision with its upward limit of 25
acres. This clearly establishes the minimal scope of the exchange. We
endorse the section establishing newly acquired parkland under the
exchange as designated Wilderness. And we further endorse the 5-year
timeline to ensure this project is completed in a timely fashion.
______
Statement of Richard Brookhiser, Historian, on S. 1969
To understand the United States we have to understand Alexander
Hamilton, and to understand Alexander Hamilton we have to understand
his time on St. Croix. Hamilton, more than any of the founding fathers,
worked to make America a prosperous modern nation; St. Croix, where he
passed his early youth, taught him several key life lessons.
Hamilton came to St. Croix with his parents in 1765. He left it for
North America, alone in world, in 1772. Those seven years exposed him
to capitalism, slavery, journalism and shame.
In 1768 Hamilton, age 11, was apprenticed as a clerk to the
merchant firm of Beckman & Kruger. This was a trading company,
headquartered in New York, with branches throughout the Atlantic world.
Hamilton worked in its Christiansted office. From errands and scut-work
he rose to a position of real responsibility, minding the store when
his boss was off island. He learned how trade and credit spanned
international borders, and how your own backyard could be plugged into
the global economy. He learned the importance of opportunity in his own
life, and potentially in the lives of others. Years later, when as
first Treasury Secretary of the United States, he wrote that a
country's ``spirit of enterprise'' depended on the ``variety
of...occupations'' it could offer its people, he was reflecting on the
occupation he had been lucky enough to find at Beckman & Kruger.
Most people on St. Croix were involved in growing sugar and cotton,
and Hamilton learned about that too. He had seen plantations in his
birthplace, Nevis, and he would see more in his years in America. But
his time at the Grange on St. Croix, the plantation owned by his
mother's in-laws, first thrust him into that world. It had
opportunities of its own--for polish and civility. But it was based on
the brute exploitation of slave labor. We do not know exactly when
Hamilton adopted the abolitionist views of his adulthood. But when he
wrote, as early as 1779 (84 years before the Emancipation Proclamation)
that the ``natural faculties'' of blacks ``are probably as good as
ours,'' he was drawing on observations he had first made in Caribbean
slave society.
St. Croix also had a newspaper--the Royal Danish American Gazette
(ancestor of the Avis, still in business). Hamilton's first work of
reporting and opinion was an account of the hurricane of 1772, with his
judgments of the conduct of local officials. (He thought the governor
did a good job--21st century officials take note). This was the start
of a lifelong romance with printer's ink. Hamilton's contributions to
the newspapers run to hundreds of thousands of words. The Federalist
Papers, the 1787-8 newspaper campaign to ratify the Constitution, was
his idea, and he wrote almost two thirds of the essays. The New-York
Evening Post, the paper he founded in 1801, is also still in business.
``My arguments,'' Hamilton wrote in Federalist #1, ``will be open to
all and may be judged of by all.'' It was his credo, and he adopted it
on St. Croix.
His curse also began on St. Croix--the searing brand of shame, and
a lifelong preoccupation with honor. Hamilton was taken to the island
by his parents, James Hamilton, Sr. and Rachel Faucett. They were not
married. In 1765, the year of their arrival, James took off. In 1768,
Rachel died (she was buried at the Grange). Hamilton knew illegitimacy,
abandonment and loneliness. Like troubled young men today, he was
touchy about such matters all his life. His life ended, in 1804,
because of a duel with Vice President Aaron Burr, fueled by his
obsession with honor.
``The child is father of the man,'' wrote the poet William
Wordsworth, a contemporary of Hamilton's. And the child raised on St.
Croix became a founding father of the United States. We understand him,
and ourselves, by understanding his St. Croix experience.
______
Statement of Hon. John P. de Jongh, Jr., Governor, U.S. Virgin Islands,
on S. 1969
Chairman Akaka, Ranking Member Burr, and Members of the National
Parks Subcommittee, on behalf of the people of the Virgin Islands,
thank you for the opportunity to present testimony in support of S.
1969, ``The Alexander Hamilton Boyhood Home Study Act of 2007'' Virgin
Islanders are grateful to Senator Orrin Hatch for his friendship, and
his leadership on behalf of all Americans, including those residing in
the territory of the Virgin Islands. Senator Hatch has a special
understanding of American history and an appreciation of St. Croix'
important role in early history of the Republic. He is an invaluable
asset to the Senate and to the nation. I would also like to thank the
original cosponsors of this Bill, namely Senator Jay Rockefeller,
Senator Sam Brownback, Senator Evan Bayh, Senator Bill Nelson, Senator
Mike Crapo, and Senator Tom Harkin, for their support of S. 1969.
S. 1969 calls upon the National Park Service to conduct a special
resource study to determine the suitability of designating Estate
Grange and other sites related to Alexander Hamilton's life on St.
Croix as a unit of the National Park Service. This study is to be
conducted in collaboration with the Government of the Virgin Islands.
We know that Alexander Hamilton was 10 years old when he moved to
St. Croix from St. Kitts, with his mother, Rachael Faucette Lavien, his
brother, James Junior, and his father, James Hamilton. His mother
Rachael had strong family ties on St. Croix. Her mother lived on St.
Croix. She was married and divorced on St. Croix to Johann Michael
Lavien. We know that she was charged with abandoning her husband, and
was briefly imprisoned in Christiansted before departing for Nevis. Her
mother owned land on the island and her older sister, Anne and her
husband James Lytton owned a small sugar plantation named The Grange.
When Rachael, and her family returned to St. Croix, they took up
residence at The Grange.
In 1764, the island of St. Croix was one of the leading centers of
commerce in the Caribbean. Tens of thousands of imported African were
worked to death in major sugar plantations throughout the island. The
harbors of Christiansted and Fredericksted were busy loading sugar and
rum to commercial centers in New York and Europe, and off-loading
slaves from Africa. Rachael operated a ship provisions business in
downtown Christiansted from 1765 until she died in 1768. She was buried
at The Grange.
After his mother's death, Alexander Hamilton went to work as a
clerk for Beekman and Cruger, a New York based shipping agent with
offices in key sugar producing Caribbean islands. He departed St. Croix
in 1773 to attend college in New York, and participate in the American
Revolution. He wrote most of the Federalist Papers, served as our first
Secretary of the Treasury, created the Bank of the United States, and
founded our Coast Guard. He is rightfully viewed as one of our greatest
Founding Fathers.
St. Croix had a profound effect Alexander Hamilton's fundamental
ideas. Leading scholars have credited Alexander Hamilton's experiences
on St. Croix for his financial acumen and his vision of America as a
world industrial and commercial power. Leading scholars agree that his
mother's literary interests, including her extensive collection of
books, inspired Hamilton's intellectual curiosity and writings.
Scholars also agree that his first hand observations about the horror
of slavery on St. Croix inspired his abolitionism, the creation of the
Manumission Society, which inspired the end of slavery in the state of
New York. Hamilton purchased a vacation property in Harlem, which he
named The Grange, in honor of his childhood home on St. Croix.
I hope to see Estate Grange and other associated sites on St. Croix
transformed into a site of national significance, a center for the
study of Alexander Hamilton's life, and the study of the influential
role of the triangle trade in sugar, rum and slaves on colonial
America.
Estate Grange comprises 115 acres. The plantation is privately
owned, and is largely intact from the days of Alexander Hamilton. It
includes the Great House where Hamilton lived, a tombstone dedicated to
his mother Rachael, and other buildings, including slave quarters,
throughout the property. We envision a place where tourists and
residents on St. Croix can experience pre-Revolutionary War plantation
life, and where leading scholars and researchers can study and
participate in discussions about Alexander Hamilton and the political
climate that influenced his world-view. We hope that this study will
lead to the restoration of other important locations on St. Croix, such
as the Beekman and Cruger warehouse where he worked.
My administration will collaborate closely with the Committee and
with the National Park Service in implementing this important resources
study. We believe that once completed, this project will be an
important addition to the National Park Service system, and a model of
cooperation on projects of significance, both locally and nationally.
I appreciate this opportunity to present testimony on this
important legislation. I once again, thank Senator Hatch and the other
cosponsors of their leadership on behalf of the memory of Alexander
Hamilton, and I urge passage of this legislation.
______
State of New Jersey,
Office of the Governor,
Trenton, NJ, September 27, 2007.
Hon. Daniel Akaka,
Chairman, Senate Energy and Natural Resources, Subcommittee on National
Parks, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
Hon. Richard Burr,
Ranking Member, Senate Energy and Natural Resources, Subcommittee on
National Parks, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
Dear Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Burr: As the Senate Energy
and Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks considers S. 148,
the Paterson Great Falls National Park Act of 2007, introduced by
Senator Frank Lautenberg and cosponsored by Senator Robert Menendez, I
would like to take this opportunity to register my strong support for
this important legislation. The Great Falls in Paterson is a site of
tremendous historical, natural, and economic significance and would be
a worthy addition to the National Park System.
Alexander Hamilton, a founder of our nation and its first Secretary
of the Treasury, chose Paterson as the nation's first planned
industrial city just after the end of the Revolutionary War in an
effort to establish our economic independence from England. Hamilton
saw that the waters of the Great Falls--the second largest waterfall
east of the Mississippi--could be the engine to power our growth into
an industrial, self-sufficient nation.
Though Hamilton's life ended far too soon afterwards in the nearby
palisades of Weehawken, New Jersey, the success of his integration of
the water power system with his urban and industrial planning forever
attached the label ``Cradle of American Industry'' to Paterson, New
Jersey. Beginning with the establishment of the first water-powered
cotton spinning mill, the city became a great manufacturing center at a
time when most of our society was still agrarian. A candlewick-spinning
mill in 1800 and a paper mill in 1804 followed the establishment of the
cotton mill. By 1837, the city was the nation's largest silk producer
and eventually became the largest producer of the material in the
world. The ``Silk City,'' as Paterson came to be known, went on to
produce and test the nation's first modern submarine, the engine for
the first trans-Atlantic flight, and more locomotives than any city in
the nation. Paterson was also home to one of the world's first
hydroelectric plants, which was constructed to harness the power of the
mighty Passaic River with the assistance of Thomas Edison, who helped
usher in the modern age from his laboratory in nearby West Orange.
Clearly, the Paterson Great Falls Historic District's
qualifications for National Historic Park status are numerous, diverse,
and beyond question. The federal government has long acknowledged the
historical, natural, and economic significance of Paterson and the
Great Falls, beginning with the Washington Administration's efforts to
industrialize our nation. More recently, over the past two decades, the
federal government repeatedly has partnered with New Jersey and the
City of Paterson through the National Historic Preservation Act to
assist in preserving the Great Falls Historic District and its
structures.
New Jersey, too, has continually recognized the historic and
natural importance of the Great Falls area, most recently by
designating the district as a State Park. However, the planned State
Park is not a substitute for a National Park in Paterson. The State of
New Jersey alone cannot preserve and protect the Great Falls National
Historic District and properly present it to the public without a
National Park Service unit in Paterson. This is a site of national
historical importance that clearly deserves and needs the federal
government in a lead role.
Recognizing that National Park Service officials may have fiscal
concerns about partnerships with states, we have worked very hard to
create a real partnership with a strong financial commitment from the
State, as well as the City of Paterson, which owns many of the historic
structures. There are numerous successful precedents for such a
Federal-State partnership, including the Pinelands National Reserve in
southern New Jersey. Within the National Park System, there are
numerous examples of co-located state and National Parks, from Lowell
in Massachusetts to Redwood in California.
Nor would this be a purely public venture. Because a central theme
in the history of Paterson and the Great Falls involves Alexander
Hamilton and American industry, we have the opportunity to attract
substantial private donations from individuals and foundations outside
of New Jersey.
As the United States continues to prosper and grow, we must not
neglect the history that has made our nation into the great superpower
of economic and political freedom it is today. Hamilton's vision of
combining the power of nature, business, and government--realized,
nurtured, and preserved in the Great Falls Historic District of
Paterson--is the foundation of our nation's current economic
prominence. The House Natural Resources Committee has approved a
companion bill, H.R. 189, authored by Congressman James Pascrell, Jr.
and cosponsored by the other twelve Members of the House of
Representatives from New Jersey. I urge you to honor Hamilton, his
vision, and our nation by offering your support to the Paterson Great
Falls National Park Act of 2007.
Sincerely,
Jon S. Corzine,
Governor.
______
Statement of Francis J. Blesso, Consultant, Paterson, NJ, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony here today.
Please consider the following comments I sent to the National Park
Service, responding to their Special Resource Study.
I've been intimately involved with the Great Falls area for almost
forty years since I arrived in Paterson in 1968 to begin working on the
city's redevelopment program in the first term of Mayor Lawrence
``Pat'' Kramer, Jr.
While the National Register Nomination Form which resulted in the
Great Falls/S.U.M. Historic District being entered on the National
Register on April 17, 1970 was researched and documented almost
exclusively by John Young, a Columbia University graduate student, I
was also one of the preparers. The dedication of the Great Falls Power
and Receway System as a National Civil and Mechanical Engineering
Landmark, on May 19, 1979, the 50th anniversary of Lindbergh's crossing
the Atlantic (powered by a Wright Aeronautics engine made in Paterson)
was a result of my documentation and nomination to the American Society
of Civil Engineers. The fact that it is also a Mechanical Engineering
Landmark was omitted in your report.
In November 1993, I testified before the Subcommittee on National
Parks, Forests and Public Lands at a hearing on a bill which initially
failed, but ultimately survived, as P.L. 104-333, which is still an act
without appropriation. The NPS was also at the hearing to testify
against funding for Paterson.
Since 1992, I have served as Paterson's contact person working
under the mayor and with the Core Advisory Group in the administration
of the $4.147 million New Jersey Urban History Initiative.
In the early `70s, after the Great Falls/S.U.M. District was
entered on the National Register, Mary Ellen Kramer, the mayor's wife,
called upon the National Park Service and the Smithsonian Institution
to evaluate the area in terms of national significance. Field visits
were made by both agencies in 1972. Robert M. Vogel, an industrial
expert from the Smithsonian Institution wrote:
No other American city has the prospect for the imaginative
development of a historically important industrial area than is
now Paterson's.
While you consulted Mr. Vogel as part of this report, I deeply
regret that you did not give us the benefit of his current views. The
early field visits and reports, including two summers of study by teams
from the Historic American Engineering Record, provided additional
national credibility to the area.
I was not surprised to read your conclusion that the Great Falls
Historic District does not meet all of the criteria to become a unit of
the national system. Little has changed since the early `70s when I
accompanied Mary Ellen Kramer and several other citizens on a trip to
Washington, D.C. in an effort to meet with NPS officials to discuss the
possibility of a national park. We received the cold shoulder then and
were basically told that the NPS was not interested in taking on any
new parks.
Your report, by using selective quotes from selected biographers
and your own writers, claims that Hamilton's S.U.M. proposal was a
failure because it `` . . . did not fulfill the vision of its founders
. . .'' and later that ``The S.U.M. did not become the manufacturing
colossus Hamilton envisioned: rather it became a real estate venture .
. . '' This most egregious distortion is used to fulfill your pre-
ordained conclusion. In modern financial parlance the S.U.M.'s early
problems would have probably been handled as a Chapter 13 Bankruptcy--
Reorganization not, as you imply, a Chapter 7--Liquidation. The reality
is that the S.U.M. was America's first industrial park and continued
and sustained itself for more 150 years. What is a new planned
manufacturing city if not a real estate venture? You treat the phrase
real estate venture as a pejorative--as if Hamilton had created a used-
car lot.
The NPS is forced to concede the national significance criterion by
virtue of the NHL designation. In the suitability analysis of cultural
resources, the NPS selected three of the eight evaluation concepts. A
strong argument can be made that each of the concepts is applicable and
should have been evaluated.
In an effort to support its conclusions, your report lists many
protected resources which contain elements similar to those in
Paterson. There is some redundancy of resources, many of which are
units of the national park system, such as Lowell National Historical
Park and the Steamtown National Historic Site. I wonder how many of
those cited NPS resources received a favorable recommendation from the
NPS, yet were established by Congress anyway. While there are many
similar individual elements in other places, it is only in Paterson
where they all come together.
The three main factors that justify inclusion of the GFHD as a unit
of the NPS are: planning, Hamilton and manufacturing creativity.
Paterson was ``planned.'' It didn't just happen. Sure the plan--
created by the greatest financial and engineering minds at the time--
required modification, as all plans do. But it worked. Its
implementation attracted people with creative minds and innovative
ideas that led to the many inventions and products that were produced
here, products that changed our country. The list is long, varied and
well-known.
I couldn't agree more with your assertion that Hamilton is not as
well represented in the national park system as his contribution
deserves. There is simply no more effective or appropriate way to pay
deserved tribute to Hamilton than through the GFHD. Recognizing
Hamilton's contributions in this way is long overdue. The report states
`` . . . there are no other resources at Great Falls save the falls and
the S.U.M. constructed water raceways that reflect the period of his
association.'' What about his greatest remaining resource--the city
itself? Hamilton could have easily called his new city ``Hamilton'' had
he not been so politically astute as to name it after the state's
Governor.
The most significant and obvious similar resource already
represented by the NPS is Lowell National Historical Park. The NPS has
done a fantastic job in preserving and interpreting the Lowell
resources, thanks to substantial and continuous federal funding since
1978. The web site photo shows a staff of over 70! There have been
numerous economic and cultural spin-offs from the NPS involvement. The
park is promoted with NPS signs along Interstate 495, including one
encouraging motorists to dial an AM station at the end of the dial for
information. It irritates me, to no end, to tune in and hear a welcome
to Lowell `` . . . home of the first successfully planned American
industrial city.'' The claimed ``first,'' is an outright lie. It
rightly belongs to Paterson and it is time that the NPS correct this.
Paterson singularly reflects the contributions of Alexander
Hamilton to the United States. Despite the negative twist given in your
report, it did come to embody Hamilton's dream of America as a
mercantile powerhouse. This was his vision, this is what America
became, and it all started when he looked out at the Great Falls.
I follow University of Connecticut basketball, having attended the
University and grown up in Hartford, where Sam Colt returned to the
easier part of his very successful enterprise, mass producing, with a
booming war-fueled demand, the revolver he created in Paterson. Gino
Auriema, the Hall of Fame women's coach, in talking about his team
versus arch rival University of Tennessee in reference to All-American
and 2003 National Player of the Year, Diana Turasi, told the press:
``We've got Diana, and they don't.'' Well, we have Hamilton, and they
don't! It's just that simple.
Paterson has received a great deal of federal and state assistance
and has invested its own resources in the Great Falls area and has
accomplished much. The staffs of the NPS and many state agencies have
been very helpful. The resources, however, are still threatened. The
raceway system, although partially restored, is still in need of major
costly repairs. The 19th century masonry dam at the top of the falls
continues to lose stone each year affecting not only the flow and view
of the falls, but the ability to interpret Paterson's first water-
supply system. The remaining resources in the seven-acre former ATP
site, except for the now stabilized Colt Gun Mill ruins, continue to
erode and deteriorate. The City of Paterson constantly struggles to
maintain the district's public spaces and facilities, the cost of which
must compete with essential public services such as police, fire and
schools.
Your report, to buttress its negative conclusion, cites the 2004
designation of the Great Falls State Park, the recent completion of the
design competition and the commitment of $10 million for public
improvements. Actually, no improvement funds have been appropriated to
date and the prospects for a single appropriation do not look good
despite Governor Corzine's strong support. In your magnanimous gesture
to steer the GFHD to the affiliated area category, you gloss over the
fact that state and national parks do successfully partner and co-
exist. They enhance each other. Even if the state comes through with
the $10 million, it must still find operating and maintenance funds on
an annual basis. The state funds, as challenging as they are to secure,
are like a barrel of water over the falls in comparison to the NPS's
own estimates to create and manage the park. Incidentally, your
estimate of 5 to 10 full-time equivalent staff positions pales in
comparison to the staff currently being utilized in Lowell. Federal
financial resources are warranted and direct NPS management and
protection is desperately needed.
The NPS in this report and in previous testimony before Congress
has consistently opposed funding for the GFHD including its testimony
against P.L. 104-33 and P.L. 107-59. Paterson shouldn't continue to be
penalized because it didn't possess the political muscle that Lowell
had when both cities were competing in the `70s for national park
designation. Our efforts were hindered by having a mayor and
congressman of different political parties, fear of losing local
control, as well as the prospect of a major federal flood control
project proposed for the Passaic River which would have greatly
affected the intensity and scenic elements of the Falls.
Now, 30 years later, the situation has changed. The mayor,
congressman, the entire New Jersey congressional delegation, the
governor, as well as local citizen organizations (as exemplified by the
New Jersey Community Development Corporation) all stand unified in
their support for park status. What hasn't changed, however, is the
attitude and bias of the leadership of the NPS. They continue to oppose
the addition of any new parks in general, and Paterson in particular.
The time has come for a change and to finally grant Paterson the
recognition and support it deserves.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Richard Sylla, Professor, Stern School of Business, New
York University, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
I am grateful for being invited to submit testimony about the proposal
for a National Historical Park at the Great Falls of the Passaic River
in Paterson, New Jersey. In the course of a four-decade career of
research and teaching on the economic, business, and financial history
of the United States, I have developed a great appreciation of the
significance of the Paterson site for our understanding of how the
United States, within a century after the Constitution created our
current form of government became, became the world's largest economy,
its leading manufacturing nation, and a magnet of opportunity for both
free American labor and the immigrant workers of other nations, among
them my own German and Irish ancestors, who were drawn here to
contribute to and participate in the American dream. A National Park
Service facility at Paterson would do much to remind us as a people of
who we were and how we came to be what we are, namely, the largest,
wealthiest, and freest economy and society in the world's long history.
what paterson uniquely represents
The Paterson site is unique in U.S. history in a number of ways. It
was there that one of our greatest of our founders, Alexander Hamilton,
himself a talented immigrant who took advantage of the opportunities
America afforded to help shape them for others who came later, launched
the Society for establishing Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.). Hamilton
wrote the S.U.M. charter, which was enacted as New Jersey's first
business corporation in 1791. This was the same year that Hamilton
presented to Congress his classic Report on Manufactures, a visionary
document of America's diversified industrial future. In the Report on
Manufactures, Hamilton specifically mentioned a number of industries
that the United States should pursue: Iron (including steel, nails and
spikes, and firearms), Copper, Coal, Flax and Hemp, Cotton, Wool, Silk,
Glass, Gunpowder, Paper, Printed Books, and Refined Sugar and
Chocolate. Paterson became a center of a number of these industries.
The S.U.M. at Paterson, our first planned industrial community, was
to be a concrete embodiment of Hamilton's vision. It was to be, in
today's terms, an ``incubator'' of entrepreneurial manufacturing start-
ups, and it became exactly that. The original plans for the city and
its manufactories were the product of the famous immigrant architect
L'Enfant, who also left a large imprint on Washington, D.C. The
raceways L'Enfant designed to channel waterpower to manufactories are
still there. Paterson grew up as an important, diversified
manufacturing center around the site. Many evidences of that
development as it played over the course of the 19th century remain,
for example, silk mills, locomotive works, and the site where Colt
first began to manufacture firearms. Much of Hamilton's 1791 vision is
thus preserved at Paterson. Also at Paterson one can access S.U.M.
records and other corporate documents, and study original letters that
Hamilton and L'Enfant wrote to advance the industrial incubator. As a
scholar, I assure you that these resources can be used to illustrate
the connections between ideas, actions, and results.
As a professional economic and business historian, I have visited
related sites such as the Old Slater Mill at Pawtucket, RI; the
wonderful National Park Service restoration at Lowell, MA; and the
Hamilton Grange site in New York City. Slater's mill is just a small
factory; it was never intended to be an incubator of diversified
manufacturing. Lowell, on a grander scale, represents just one
industry, cotton textile manufacturing. Hamilton Grange honors the
memory of a great founder, but it is just a house which Alexander
Hamilton built and lived in during the last three years of his
foreshortened life, and it will remain just a house, albeit a much more
attractive house, once the contemplated move of it is realized.
What is unique about Paterson is that it embodies in a concrete and
developing way that can be traced in the waterworks, the buildings, and
so on, the vision of diversified manufacturing and industrial power
under corporate auspices that, along with our public and private
financial system, is one of Hamilton's great legacies to his country.
In my estimation, the National Park Service is the only
organization capable of presenting and interpreting the national
significance of the Paterson site. Equally important, National Park
Service adoption of the site as one of national significance would do
wonders in attracting corporate and other private donations to preserve
the site and bring it to life. To have such a Park Service site in the
densely populated tri-state region centering on New York City would be
a boon to school children and indeed children of all ages who are
curious about the origins of U.S. economic might based on free and open
opportunity for all who were here and came here.
flaws in the nps special resource study of paterson
Given the professional and personal opinions I have just stated, I
was disappointed by the National Park Service's Special Resource Study:
Great Falls Historic District, Paterson, New Jersey, dated November,
2006. That study used strained reasoning and faulty interpretations to
reach a conclusion that the Paterson site failed to meet the criteria
for suitability, feasibility, and need for NPS management.
I believe the Special Resource Study misreads the historical record
when it asserts in two places that the Society for Establishing Useful
Manufactures (S.U.M.) at Paterson was intended to become ``a
manufacturing colossus'' (pp. 22 and 55), and that its failure to
become a manufacturing colossus is one reason why it is unwarranted to
have a national park at Paterson. That is incorrect. Alexander
Hamilton's plan for the S.U.M., as I noted earlier, intended the new
company to be what today we would call an ``incubator'' of
entrepreneurial start-ups. My point was not new or original. An early
historian of the S.U.M., Joseph Stancliffe Davis of Harvard, made the
point in his 1917 study of the company's history, noting that the stock
of the company ``became a highly profitable investment and the
corporation proved itself no insignificant factor in promoting the
development of a `considerable manufacturing town,''' and concluding
that, ``The event has thoroughly justified the farsightedness, if not
the sense for immediate profit, which was shown by the original
entrepreneurs'' (Davis, Essays on the Earlier History of American
Corporations (1917), vol. 1, p. 518).
In short, by providing factory sites and waterpower to
entrepreneurs in the years and decades after its founding, the S.U.M.
at Paterson achieved the primary objective of Hamilton and its
founders. It became an incubator of manufacturing start-ups,
demonstrating the value of manufactures to secure America's
independence and providing growing opportunities for immigrants to
begin to realize the American dream. It was not an enterprise failure.
Another serious misinterpretation of the National Park Service
Study is to read a provision of the S.U.M. charter saying, `` . . . the
said corporation shall not deal, nor trade, except in such articles as
it itself shall manufacture, and the materials thereof, and in such
articles as shall be really and truly received in payment and exchange
therefore''--in an expansive way, as implying: ``This was envisioned as
no mere business or holding company enterprise, but one that
manufactured the products and gathered the resulting profits at a scale
previously unknown in the new nation'' (NPS Special Resource Study:
Great Falls Historic District, Paterson, New Jersey (November, 2006),
p.17. Historian Davis, in a contrast with which I agree, concluded that
its main intent was to limit rather than expand the scope of the
enterprise: `` . . . the Society was prohibited from becoming a general
trading or banking company . . . ''(Davis, Essays, I, p. 380). Such
limiting provisions were common in early U.S. corporate charters.
Alexander Hamilton, the author of the S.U.M. charter, had included
similar limiting provisions in the charters he wrote for the Bank of
New York and the Bank of the United States.
I would also question the Study's conclusion (on page 55) that `` .
. . the fact of the matter is that the Paterson venture, as envisioned,
failed early-on due to the major weaknesses of its governor/director
participants. The S.U.M. did not become the manufacturing colossus
Hamilton envisioned.'' This is a misinterpretation because Hamilton did
not envision the company becoming a manufacturing colossus. He
envisioned it as a pilot and learning project that would serve as an
incubator of manufacturing start-ups and a stimulus to industrial
entrepreneurship in Paterson and elsewhere in America. In the long run,
the S.U.M. succeeded in realizing that vision, and it was the long run
that mattered most to Hamilton.
Yes, in the short run the S.U.M. did have managerial problems. But
those problems were not the sole reason for suspension of its factory
operations in the mid 1790s. After the S.U.M. received its New Jersey
charter in 1791, war broke out in Europe between Britain and France,
creating new international commercial opportunities for the neutral
United States. That shifted profit opportunities as well as labor and
capital away from domestic manufacturing and toward international
commerce. When French armies conquered the Dutch Republic in 1795,
America's access to the Amsterdam capital market was cut off, raising
the cost of capital for U.S. manufacturing and the United States in
general. There were a number of reasons why the S.U.M. put its plans on
hold in the mid 1790s, and managerial problems were most likely not the
most important of them. As the international and domestic situations of
the United States changed in the late 1790s and early 1800s, it did not
take long for many new factories to be built at Paterson, using sites
and power provided by the S.U.M.
Again, judging by the results of recent scholarship, the NPS Study
is wrong in contending that ``Hamilton's vision of an industrial
society was achieved in the United States, and in Paterson, but after
the early decline of the S.U.M., more quickly and wide-spread in places
like Lowell and Waltham, Massachusetts and other New England cities
that were built on the firm stepping stones of less grandly conceived
endeavors'' (p. 55). The Waltham textile factory of the Boston
Associates did not open until 1815, and Lowell was not founded and did
not become a major center of textile production until the 1820s. That
might not matter if economic historians still believed, as they once
did, that industrialization and factory manufacturing production did
not take hold in the United States until 1815 or after. Recent economic
historical research findings--considered to be so important that they
were published in a leading economics journal--indicate, however, that
industrialization took hold during the 1790s, not a quarter century
later. A new index of U.S. industrial production, 1790-1915, shows that
industrial output grew at a rate of about 5% per year for the entire
125-year period, with no tendency for it to accelerate after any
particular date such as 1815 (J. H. Davis, ``A Quantity-Based Annual
Index of U.S. Industrial Production, 1790-1915,'' Quarterly Journal of
Economics 119 (Nov. 2004), 1177-1215.). Waltham and Lowell sustained a
rate of industrial growth that already had been established during the
previous quarter century. The S.U.M. and Paterson played a critical
role in the industrial upsurge that began during that quarter century,
many years before Lowell and Waltham opened their factories.
Let me note just one more area in which the NPS Study, by ignoring
the findings of more recent scholarship, seems to me to be seriously
deficient. The Study says on p. 15 that Hamilton's Report on
Manufactures of December 1791 `` . . . was not received favorably by
Congress . . . ,'' and supports that by quoting Hamilton biographer
Richard Brookhiser on p. 22 to the effect that `` . . . the `Report on
Manufactures' was a dead letter.'' But recent research demonstrates
that virtually every tariff recommendation contained in Hamilton's
Report on Manufactures--and these policy recommendations were key parts
of the Report--was adopted by Congress by May 1792, that is, within
five to six months after Congress received the Report from Hamilton.
The tariff increases recommended by Hamilton and adopted by Congress
were modest--contrary to many depictions, Alexander Hamilton was not a
protectionist--but in keeping with Hamilton's intent, they did provide
added stimulus to the rapid growth of U.S. industrial production that
began during the 1790s.
In summary, a proper interpretation of the goals envisioned by
Hamilton and others for the S.U.M. at Paterson, when combined with the
recent findings of scholars on the industrial expansion of the U.S.
economy starting in the 1790s and on the favorable reception by
Congress of key recommendations of Hamilton's Report on Manufactures,
greatly strengthens the case for a national park at the Great Falls
Historic District in Paterson, New Jersey. The NPS Study notes,
``Alexander Hamilton, the person, is not as well represented in the
national park system as his significant contributions to American
history deserve, but it is largely through a failure of the Service to
fully interpret his recognized achievements . . . '' (p. 56). At
Paterson, the National Park Service has a unique opportunity to
interpret both Hamilton's achievements and the earliest and most
important foundations of U.S. industrialization. I suggest that
Congress encourage NPS to seize this opportunity.
Lowell National Historical Park and the other parks listed in the
Study provide no basis for concluding that what Paterson represents is
already adequately represented elsewhere in America. Lowell, for
example, was a cotton textile and textile machinery center established
in the 1820s, in the midst of an industrial upsurge that began at least
a quarter century earlier. Paterson in contrast became a leading
national center for a wide range of industries. In that sense Paterson,
much more than Lowell and much earlier than Lowell and other New
England textile mill towns, came to embody the diversified industrial
base for the United States that Alexander Hamilton envisioned and
promoted. Hamilton detested slavery more than any of the great founders
(a number of whom owned slaves), and he wanted America to have a broad
industrial base so that our manufacturing sector would do much more
than process cotton grown in the South by slaves. He envisioned
Paterson becoming a center of opportunity for free laborers, including
hard-working immigrants, who would do far more than spin and weave a
raw material produced by slave labor. Paterson fulfilled that vision in
a way that Lowell and the other New England mill towns did not.
conclusion
Indeed, Paterson is the only place in America where it is possible
to connect Alexander Hamilton's prescient vision of a great
manufacturing nation in the 18th century with the actual fruits of that
vision realized in the 19th and 20th centuries. Even if the Bush
Administration cannot support funding now for a Paterson National
Historical Park, the National Park Service has an obligation to
American history to draw the proper conclusion that what Paterson
represents is not adequately represented anywhere else in America. What
is unique about Paterson is that it embodies--in a vivid, concrete, and
developing way that can be traced around the Great Falls in the
waterworks and mills--the vision of diversified manufacturing and
industrial power under corporate auspices, with all the opportunities
that represented for entrepreneurs and free labor, that is one of
Hamilton's greatest legacies to our nation. I very much hope that
Congress in this, the 21st, century will see fit to support a Paterson
National Historical Park that will portray and interpret how our
diversified economy developed from its roots in the 18th century into
and through the 19th and 20th centuries.
I thank the subcommittee for allowing me to present these views and
interpretations of Paterson's unique significance in the development of
the American economy in many crucial areas not now adequately
represented in the National Park System or anywhere else in the United
States.
______
Statement of Ronald J. Tipton, Senior Vice President of Programs,
National Parks Conservation Association, on S. 148
Chairman Akaka, Ranking Member Burr, and other distinguished
Members of this Subcommittee, thank you for allowing me the opportunity
to submit testimony on this very important issue.
The National Parks Conservation Association strongly supports the
proposed new National Park unit in Paterson, New Jersey. We believe
that a National Park Service unit in Paterson is especially important
now because the National Park Service must do more to establish
connections with the millions of Americans who feel little or no
connections to our National Parks. Paterson offers a unique opportunity
to provide a new Park Service unit in a setting that Hispanic, Latino,
African American, Muslim, Islamic, Jewish and Christian organizations
have recognized as a place to connect with American History and the
National Park System.
These diverse groups come together for many reasons. They have seen
the spectacular beauty of the Great Falls--the second largest waterfall
in the eastern part of the United States. They increasingly recognize
that no other natural wonder in America has played a more important
role in our nation's historic quest for freedom and prosperity.
Paterson is the only National Historical District that includes both a
National Natural Landmark and a National Historic Landmark.
America's First Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton,
conceived and implemented a plan with the help of Pierre L'Enfant to
harness the force of the Great Falls to power the new industries that
would secure America's economic independence. Leading scholars have
determined that the Great Falls National Historic District contains the
finest remaining collection of structures representing each stage in
the transformation of America from a rural agrarian society based on
slavery into a modern economy based on freedom.
The history of Paterson has captured the imagination and spirit of
a broad, diverse group of citizens throughout America. Hispanic and
Latino citizens, who constitute most of Paterson's 150,000 residents,
support the Paterson National Park in part because Hamilton played such
an important role in expanding opportunities for immigrants and helping
to spread the cause of freedom to the Spanish colonies in the Americas.
African Americans recognize Hamilton's vision of an American
economy beginning at Paterson's Great Falls and built through the work
of men and women dedicated to freedom. Alexander Hamilton was an
organizer of New York's first anti-slavery organization and Hamilton's
fight against slavery was part of his inclusive view of how all
Americans would participate in and benefit from a growing modern
economy that would begin in Paterson.
Continuing in the spirit of Hamilton's strident anti-slavery
beliefs, Paterson became an important stop on the Underground Railroad
in the 19th Century. Paterson also contains a 20th century landmark in
African American history, Hinchliffe Stadium, the home to the New York
Black Yankees and the site of the Colored Championship of the Nation in
the 1930s. Baseball legends such as Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, and
Hall-of-Farmer and Paterson-native Larry Doby--the first African
American to play in the American League--regularly played baseball at
Hinchliffe. A Paterson National Historical Park will help preserve and
protect this historic stadium that Preservation New Jersey, another
supporter of a Park Service unit in Paterson, has listed as one New
Jersey's Ten Most Endangered Historic Sites.
Paterson can become the first NPS unit with strong Muslim-American
support in a city that the second largest number of Muslims in any
American city. Islamic citizens support the Paterson National Park as a
continuation of the Silk Road that united their homelands in Central
Asia with China and the West. They note that Paterson became the
largest silk manufacturer of the world at the end of the 19th Century
and was long known as the Silk City. As Richard Kennedy of the
Smithsonian Institution observes, ``The Silk Road has extended to the
United States and, since the tragic events of September 11,
understanding that connection clearly has become more important. There
is no better way, then, to learn more about the roots of this vital
connection and to celebrate the long-standing relationships that have
existed between east and west and north and south.''
The National Parks Conservation Association proudly joins with an
extraordinarily diverse group of Americans and scholars in calling for
the creation of the Paterson National Historical Park. We urge the
Department of Interior to endorse establishing this worthy addition to
the park system.
Thank you for your consideration.
______
Statement of Benjamin H. Irvin, Assistant Professor of History,
University of Arizona, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for permitting me to submit testimony regarding the proposed
National Historical Park at the Great Falls of the Passaic River in
Paterson, New Jersey.
paterson's historical significance
The Paterson Great Falls National Historic District is situated
upon the Passaic River at the enormous Passaic Great Falls, whose
awesome power inspired the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury,
Alexander Hamilton, to choose that location as the site for his Society
for the Establishment of Useful Manufactures. From this auspicious
beginning, Paterson emerged as one of the world's foremost producers of
silk. It also became home to the Colt gun manufactory as well as
numerous locomotive works. For these reasons, the Paterson Great Falls
National Historic District must be understood as one of the most
important birthplaces of American industry. Additionally, as the scene
of the notorious Silk Strike of 1913, Paterson is a vital landmark in
the history of American labor and immigration. More recently, Paterson
was the venue for Hinchliffe Stadium, which was not only a marvelous
example of art deco architecture but more importantly was also the home
to the New York Black Yankees and the New York Cubans baseball teams.
Paterson is thus a place of great consequence to African American
history.
the need for a national park service unit at the great falls national
historic district
The Paterson Great Falls National Historic District contains
cultural resources not adequately represented in any other National
Historical Park. It uniquely combines a National Natural Landmark and a
National Historic Landmark. But the State of New Jersey cannot protect
this precious historical and cultural resource without assistance from
the National Park Service.
conclusion
For the reasons stated above, I implore you to disregard the
National Park Service's shortsighted Draft Special Resource Study,
which misguidedly underestimated the historical value of the proposed
park while simultaneously overestimating the State of New Jersey's
capacity to maintain the site. Rather, please fight for the creation of
a National Park Service unit at the Paterson Great Falls National
Historic District. Do not consign Paterson or its magnificent and
historical Great Falls to the dustbin of unpreserved national
treasures.
Thank you.
______
Statement of Daniel J. Walkowitz, Professor, New York University,
on S. 148
Mr. Chairman and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee:
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
very important issue.
I urge you to make the Great Falls Historic District in Paterson,
New Jersey, a unit of the National Park Service.
As a labor and social historian, I was consulted for the National
Park Service's November 2006 report, Special Resource Study: Great
Falls Historic District, Paterson, New Jersey and supported the
designation of the Great Falls site as a national historic park. I was
surprised, therefore, to read the report's conclusion that Paterson did
not warrant such designation because Alexander Hamilton's plan for the
city and the establishment of early industrialization was realized
elsewhere, most especially in the role of the Boston Associates in
Lowell. I respectfully submit this is a serious misreading of the
historical record.
Lowell is a wonderful site for exploring the development of the
cotton industry and the early role of native American farm girls.
However, the Lowell experience of the 1820s and 1830s so well recounted
in the romanticized story of Lucy Larcom and the mill girls' magazine,
The Lowell Offering, is precisely not typical of the American
industrial experience. Lowell is a wonderful story but an out-of-date
paradigm. Work now twenty years old by Raphael Samuel on the
persistence of hand craft and Sean Wilentz on metropolitan
industrialization in New York has pointed out that industrialization
was neither defined by textile machines or large factories and was a
more gritty tale of immigrant dependent labor across a multitude of
industries.
Paterson only becomes the ``silk city'' in the late nineteenth and
early twentieth century; it is early home to the full range of early
industrial industries and, of course, notably both iron and textile
manufacture. The city also reflects the early and dominant role of both
native and immigrant entrepreneurs and labor in industrialization. For
instance, the late Herbert G. Gutman, who was the doyen of the new
social history and remains unquestionably the leading historian of
Paterson's industrialization, long ago complicated the rags-to-riches
story which notes how top manufacturers (in textile centers in places
like Lowell) came from privileged backgrounds. Paterson again tells a
different tale. In Paterson most middle-level manufacturers came from
immigrant backgrounds and lacked an inheritance of money or established
social pedigree.
But before concluding, let me return to the Special Resource
Study's effort to connect Hamilton to the Boston Associates. Two
positions held respectively by Hamilton and the Associates are
critically divisive issues that characterized the early Republic: the
role of slavery and immigrants. In his seminal work on the Boston
Associates, Enterprising Elite: the Boston Associates and the World
They Made (Harvard University Press, 1987), retired Williams College
Professor Robert F. Dalzell Jr. makes it clear that the Associates
played a troublesome role in attempting to quell the northern anti-
slavery crusade. Dalzell also demonstrated that their highest priority
was continuing their secure position at the top of the social order to
the exclusion of poor immigrants. On both scores, Paterson better
reflects Hamilton's values then: the role of immigrants in industry is
noted above; and since Paterson's primary textile industry was silk
rather than cotton, Paterson's industries were not economically tied to
the continuation of slavery. Indeed, at least one Paterson cotton
manufacturer opened his home to runaway slaves on the Underground
Railroad.
In sum, I realize that several American cities lay claim to being
the ``birthplace of the American industrial revolution.'' Lowell and
Troy, a city about which I have written, are important parts of that
story. But Hamilton in proposing the development of American
manufacture chose Paterson as the site, both for its water power--the
magnificent falls--and its centrality to urban markets and natural
resources. Hamilton's vision and values, in truth, are most accurately
reflected in the Paterson experience and its people. Early
industrialization is now understood and taught as more than machines
and large factories--it is changing rhythms of work, increased scale of
production and the division of labor, the rise of wage labor--changes
well in place well before the 1830s and not well represented by mill
girls who imagined themselves becoming teachers! This modern
scholarship on social and economic history points to the importance of
Hamilton's vision for America. The National Park system, however, has
not adequately accounted for these developments and the central role
Hamilton played in them. It is time the Park System to fill this gap,
and Paterson's Great Falls is an excellent place to do so.
______
Statement of Ron Chernow, Author, Biographer of Alexander Hamilton,
on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony today.
As author of the bestselling biography of Alexander Hamilton
published in 2004, I am writing to endorse, in the warmest terms, the
Paterson Great Falls National Park Act of 2007, S. 148. This is not
only a spot of spectacular natural beauty that deserves to be far
better known, but one that occupies a place of supreme importance in
the annals of American economic history. For it was at this very spot
hat Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and the Marquis de Lafayette
paused to picnic on a day during the American Revolution and it was
here that Hamilton first envisioned the enormous economic potential of
the great waters thundering over the falls.
As our first Treasury Secretary, Hamilton personally composed four
great state papers. Easily the most sweeping and prophetic among them
was his ``Report on Manufactures.'' At a time when America was an
agrarian society and the other Founders pictured the country remaining
a rural paradise of yeomen farmers, the audacious Hamilton dared to
conjure up quite a different America--one that bears a startling
resemblance to the advanced industrial society that we inhabit today.
This America would honor traditional agriculture, but it would also be
a bustling, diversified place with manufacturing, trading, banks, and
stock exchanges. Only in retrospect, after two centuries, can we
appreciate the uncanny prescience of Hamilton's vision and its abiding
relevance.
To demonstrate the practicality of his far-sighted vision,
Hamilton, as Treasury Secretary, spearheaded the creation of the
Society for Establishing Useful Manufactures. The Great Falls of the
Passaic became the home for this industrial laboratory, this futuristic
city, this model of what America could be. Although the project
faltered after the initial creation of a cotton spinning mill, the
spirit of Hamilton's vision was ultimately to thrive in Paterson. As I
write in my book: ``Hamilton's faith in textile manufacturing in
Paterson was eventually vindicated in the early 1800s as a `raceway'
system of canals powered textile mills and other forms of
manufacturing, still visible today in the Great Falls Historic
District. The city that Hamilton helped to found did achieve fame for
extensive manufacturing operations, including foundries, textile mills,
silk mills, locomotive factories, and the Colt Gun Works.''
It has always saddened me that we do so much better a job in our
schools in instructing students in the rich political history of our
country than in the no less stirring saga of our economic development.
A National Park Service site in Paterson would prove an especially
vivid and dramatic way of educating our citizenry in America's economic
history. At the same time, it could serve to revitalize one of the
major cities in New Jersey and help to restore the luster that it once
enjoyed and could enjoy again. All in all, this would be a timely and
imaginative project for the Interior Department to undertake and one
that would certainly redound to the future glory of any Interior
Secretary. I urge the Committee to mark up the Paterson Great Falls
National Park Act of 2007 as soon as possible.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Mohamed El Filali, Outreach Director, Islamic Center of
Passaic County, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
very important issue.
I have reviewed a copy of the National Park Service draft Special
Resource Study on the proposed Great Falls National Park. The Study
incorrectly concludes that Paterson does not have unique resources or
stories when compared to those already represented in the National Park
System or interpreted by other public bodies. The NPS lists about a
dozen different places ranging from Angel Hill State Park in California
(where Chinese immigrants were detained) to the Danish Immigrant Museum
in Elkhorn, Iowa and the Museum of Work and Culture in Woonsocket,
Rhode Island (that ``interprets the compelling stories of French
Canadian immigrants seeking economic improvement''). But none of the
examples the National Park Service lists has anything to do with the
Muslim immigration to Paterson, or anywhere else for that matter.
In my August 15, 2006 letter to the National Park Service, I
explained that many citizens support a Paterson National Park, and I
want you and the National Park Service to understand why it is
especially important to the Islamic community. Paterson has the second
largest number of Muslims in any city in America, and New Jersey is the
home of almost half a million Muslim-Americans. In that letter, I
suggested a Paterson National Historical Park could achieve two
important goals.
First, I explained that a National Park in Paterson would provide
Muslim-Americans with a meaningful opportunity to establish some
connection with American history. There are special relationships
between Paterson's history and the hopes and aspirations of the Islamic
community in America today. Paterson's founder, Alexander Hamilton,
invited immigrants from many different cultures to Paterson in order to
build a new economy of opportunities. Hamilton welcomed immigrants at a
time that other American leaders favored rewarding those who had been
here longer or had come from families with more money or higher social
status. Hamilton opposed slavery and created a new economy in Paterson
that provided freedom and opportunities to immigrants from different
cultures.
Second, a Paterson National Park could increase America's
understanding of Muslim-Americans. Such understanding is critical
today. Since the tragic events of 9/11, many journalists and government
investigators have come to Paterson and claimed that some of the
hijackers stayed here. The novelist John Updike came to Paterson and
wrote a novel called Terrorist, which was intended to be a work of
fiction but which nonetheless has contributed to the negative views
about Muslim-Americans. The Islamic community, however, sees Paterson's
heritage as a way of showing how it connects with the American
experience.
Yo-Yo Ma's ``Silk Road Project,'' which is supported by His
Highness The Aga Khan, highlights these points. It celebrates the
connections between the West, Asia, and the Middle East formed by the
global silk trade--connections of not just commercial, but also
cultural, artistic, and religious interactions. Paterson, whose silk
mills drew many Muslim immigrants from afar, is our stop on the great
Silk Road, and it provides an example for Muslim and non-Muslim
Americans of how we can affect and enrich each other's culture even as
we share a common home.
The draft study addressed none of these points. It is clear to me
from reading the study that the National Park Service is under a lot of
financial pressure not to create new national parks and the study's
conclusions appear driven by a desire to reject a Paterson National
Park.
I sincerely hope, however, that this Committee recognizes the
importance that a National Park in Paterson will have for the Muslim-
American community. Please support the Paterson Great Falls National
Park Act.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Alison K. Hoagland, Professor of History and Historic
Preservation, Michigan Technological University, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
very important issue.
I urge you to make the Great Falls Historic District in Paterson,
New Jersey, a unit of the National Park Service. Paterson's
significance to the history of our nation is undoubtedly well known to
you. As the site of one of the first deliberate industrial enterprises
of the young republic, as the location of an innovative water power
system, and as a tangible representation of the influence of such
important personalities as Alexander Hamilton and Pierre Charles
L'Enfant, this historic district is one of the pre-eminent sites in the
history of the establishment of the new nation.
During my long career in historic preservation I have studied and
advocated for many historic sites. In the fifteen years that I worked
for the National Park Service, I undertook projects with a number of
parks, including Illinois & Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor
and America's Industrial Heritage Project in southwestern Pennsylvania.
I was an active volunteer preservationist as well, serving as an
officer of the D.C. Preservation League in Washington, DC, and on the
Board of Advisers of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. I am
currently a professor of history and historic preservation at Michigan
Technological University (and am proud to note that one of the
graduates from our M.S. Program in Industrial Archaeology now works for
the City of Paterson).
I would like to offer the combined perspective of an educator and a
public historian. I teach a course called History of American
Technology to engineering students. In that course, I discuss the
Society of Useful Manufactures' establishment at Paterson as an example
of Hamilton's commitment to the nation's industrial self-sufficiency.
His debate with Thomas Jefferson over the role that industry should
play in the new republic, as articulated by his Report on Manufactures,
is one of the most significant turning points in the economic
development of our country. Hamilton expressed his ideas in words and
he built them in brick and stone in Paterson.
As a public historian, I chair the Advisory Commission of the
Keweenaw National Historical Park, which commemorates copper mining,
the industrial history of this part of Michigan. From this perspective,
I see the impact that a national park can have in drawing attention to
our industrial resources and in explaining that history to the public.
Industrial sites, so vital to the development of our nation, are more
subtle in the way they present their significance. For years, people
may walk on bridges over raceways, oblivious to their significance
until it is explained to them. The promotion of industrial heritage can
help residents take pride in their past, which in turn engenders
confidence in the future. Industrial heritage is also an attraction for
tourists, an important factor in a now-deindustrialized area.
I understand that there is some concern that the industrial
heritage found in Paterson is already adequately represented in the
National Park Service. I assure you that that is not the case. Paterson
pre-dates Lowell by thirty years, or a generation of thinking about
industrial enterprise and development of water-power technology.
Similarly, the Blackstone River Valley NHC interprets a later period.
Other industrial history parks include Steamtown NHS and Dayton
Aviation Heritage NHP, but they are obviously ordered around very
different industries. The Erie Canalway NHC and Delaware and Lehigh NHC
might be as interested in water systems, but it is water for
transportation, not industry. No other National Park Service site comes
close to embodying the role that Paterson played in developing the
nation's industry.
It is also important that this be a national park, not just a state
park. Paterson has the ability to draw support nationwide--including
some very well-connected people who come from Paterson but no longer
live there--but that support would probably not be forthcoming for a
state park. The connection with Alexander Hamilton in particular offers
an attraction to out-of-state donors. The prestige and visibility of a
national park are essential for serious private-sector support.
Keweenaw NHP is established along a private-public model, one that is
engineered to bring in private monies. In a deindustrialized region,
that sort of support is not available locally. National donors must be
tapped, and only a national park will be attractive to them.
I particularly want to address the National Park Service's Special
Resource Study on the Great Falls Historic District, in which I am
deeply disappointed. The Draft Study, which seems to be a thinly veiled
attempt to justify a predetermined conclusion, is analytically flawed
and violates fundamental principles that professionals use in studying
historic resources. Most significantly, the authors utilize a
disturbingly narrow interpretation when it suits them, or an
excessively broad one when that seems to fit the case they are making.
It is hard to believe that this study was undertaken with a truly open
mind.
One example of this problem involves the boundaries. The authors
narrowly interpret their charge to never take even a single step
outside of the National Register-listed Great Falls Historic District.
It is unfortunate that responsible professionals would lock themselves
into the boundaries set decades ago and not go a few feet further to
the adjacent National Register-listed site, Hinchliffe Stadium.
Inclusion of the Stadium, the home of the New York Black Yankees, would
provide a highly relevant dimension to a potential park, while being
consistent with the larger themes of the Historic District through its
origins as a municipal amenity for, and with funding from, workers in
Paterson's mills.
Similarly, the Study adopts an indefensibly narrow period of
significance. The first National Register nomination was written in
1970 and examined resources that were more than fifty years old.
Subsequent nominations (the National Historic Landmark in 1976 and
expansions of the National Register district in 1975 and 1986) did not
re-examine this assumption. Thirty-six years have elapsed since the
original nomination, yet the authors of this Study did not think to re-
examine the period of significance. If they had looked at the 1920-1956
period, surely Hinchliffe Stadium would have been included.
The boundaries and period of significance in National Historic
Landmark documents prepared decades earlier is only a starting point;
they must not limit proper study today.
Another example of this narrowness is when the Study notes that
Pierre L'Enfant's drawings for Paterson do not survive, yet the authors
apparently declined to read L'Enfant's letters in Paterson at the
Passaic County Historical Society, which detail his plans. More
importantly, the Study chooses to examine the Society for Establishing
Useful Manufactures (SUM) with a single narrow purpose, concluding that
it was a failure, yet overlooking its 153-year existence; arguing that
it was a private enterprise, yet overlooking its origins as a publicly
chartered organization; and highlighting its first cotton mill, yet
overlooking Alexander Hamilton's goal of fostering a number of
different kinds of industries, which it did: sailcloth, locomotives,
revolvers, silk and submarines being among those mentioned in this
Study.
This implicit branding of Paterson as a ``failure'' is disturbing
for another reason, as if failure alone would disqualify it from being
a national park. In fact, important events in history are often
failures; we can learn from them as much as from successes. But
Paterson was a ``failure'' only in the narrowest terms; instead,
Hamilton successfully fostered a thriving industrial community. It may
not have happened in his life time, but he is responsible for beginning
a complex water-powered industrial park.
When this Study looks for comparisons, though, it casts the
broadest net and chooses to define Paterson as an unexceptional, common
undertaking. The comparison of the Great Falls of the Passaic with
waterfalls at Yellowstone and Yosemite is truly absurd. The idea that
immigrant labor is a theme well-covered in national parks does not take
into account which immigrant groups are best identified with which
park; it is as if all immigrants and their experiences are the same,
regardless of their country of origin, location in the U.S., or
industry in which they work. Similarly, there might be several parks
addressing industry, engineering, and technology, but the kinds of
industry, engineering, and technology that could be interpreted at
Paterson are distinctly different.
Paterson's Great Falls deserve to be considered for national park
status in a way that honestly assesses their merits. If Paterson were
judged in appropriate contexts, we would see that it represents a
unique chapter U.S. history; that it constitutes tangible evidence of
an idea of industrial development articulated by one of our leading
founders and developed by one of our significant early architect-
engineers; and that it does not replicate anything else in our national
park system. I urge you to recommend that Congress create the Paterson
National Historical Park.
The Great Falls Historic District in Paterson is eminently worthy
of inclusion in the National Park Service system, and I hope that you
will do all in your power to make that possible. Thank you for your
consideration.
______
Statement of Steven Lubar, Director, The John Nicholas Brown Center for
the Study of American Civilization, Professor, Department of American
Civilization, Brown University, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony for this important
hearing. The following is my response to the National Park Service's
Great Falls Historic District Special Resource Study.
I write in reference to the ongoing Great Falls Historic District
Special Resource Study. Great Falls occupies a distinctive place in
American history, and I urge you to carefully regard its long history
and unique resources as you consider the possibility of making it a
unit of the National Park Service. I write both because I believe that
America's industrial history is important, and because I believe it is
important for the public to understand our industrial past, and because
I believe that Paterson is an important part of that history. In my
books Engines of Change: The American Industrial Revolution and
Philosophy of Manufactures I highlighted the important role of
Hamilton's Society for Encouraging Useful Manufactures. When I was a
curator of industrial history at the Smithsonian's National Museum of
American History, I was pleased to be able to include its history in
the Smithsonian's industrial history exhibition, ``Engines of Change.''
I am sure that your team of historians knows well the long and
important technological, industrial and labor history of Great Falls
and Paterson, with its eighteenth-and nineteenth-century waterpower
systems, its key role in locomotive and armament manufacture throughout
the nineteenth century, and the union activity that made Paterson
famous into the early twentieth century. These activities, and the
cultural resources, which are well described in the district's National
Register nomination, represent important areas of American history that
are under-represented in the National Park System, and which deserve
greater representation as key elements in our nation's history. True,
there are elements of the earlier industrial story told at Slater Mill
(Blackstone Heritage Corridor), Lowell, and elsewhere. But those are
local stories. Paterson represents the origin of American industrial
policy; it is where national politics, economics, and industry were
first joined. It is the first chapter in a story that came to define
the American industrial system.
Beyond the industrial story, there are also two other areas
represented by the Great Falls Historic District that might not be as
obvious, are not as well described in the nomination, and which I also
believe are underrepresented among the National Park Service's
holdings. While politics, in general, is very well represented,
economics and economic and industrial policy--a key element in U.S.
history throughout the life of the nation--is not. Alexander Hamilton's
Society for Encouraging Useful Manufactures, which founded Paterson,
was a key part of Hamilton's attempt to define the United States as an
industrial nation. The Park Service preserves Hamilton's house, but his
work, his philosophy, and his economic and political theories are
better represented by the industrial structures at Paterson. With a few
exceptions, they may not date from his time; but they are the result,
in many ways, of Hamilton's ideas about America as an economic and
industrial power.
These cultural resources are enhanced by the Great Falls as a
natural resource--and one that tells us about the changing history of
the appreciation of natural resources in the United States. To an
America used to the wonders of the West, the Great Falls of the Passaic
River at what is now Paterson may not seem an extraordinary site, or
sight. But they were one of the great natural wonders of the
eighteenth-century America. Along with the Great Falls of the Potomac
and Niagara Falls, the Great Falls of the Passaic were one of the sites
that evoked feelings of awe and wonder. They captured the emotion the
era called ``the sublime.'' Jedidiah Morse's American Gazetteer of 1798
called the Great Falls ``one of the greatest natural curiosities in the
State.'' It continues:
The river is about 40 yards wide, and moves in a slow, gentle
current, until coming within a short distance of a deep cleft
in the rock, which crosses the channel, in descends, and falls
about 70 feet perpendicular, in one entire sheet, presenting a
most beautiful and tremendous scene.
There are not many of these sites important to the cultural
landscape history of the country remaining, and including the Great
Falls as a National Park will ensure that this one survives.
I hope that the Park Service will give the Great Falls Historic
District the careful and thoughtful consideration it deserves as you
consider its possible inclusion in the National Park system. Even
should it become a state Park, its designation as a National Park
remains important, both to insure that national story be told, and to
connect the story of Paterson to the rest of our national history.
Paterson tells a key part of our nation's story. It is a unique and
important site, and could allow the nation's parks the chance to tell
important stories not currently told.
______
Statement of Richard Moe, President, The National Trust for Historic
Preservation, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, my name is Richard
Moe and I am the President of the National Trust for Historic
Preservation. I would like you to know that the National Trust strongly
supports S. 148--The Paterson Great Falls National Park Act of 2007
introduced by Senator Lautenberg. The historic and natural resources at
Great Falls in Paterson, New Jersey, are extraordinary and meet the
National Park Service's criteria for suitability, feasibility, and
management.
Founded in 1792 by Alexander Hamilton, Paterson is the place he
chose to implement his economic vision for new industry necessary to
secure America's economic independence as an emerging nation. At the
heart of the Great Falls Historic District lies the Passaic River and
the second-highest waterfall on the East Coast. Hamilton hired Major
Pierre-Charles L'Enfant, the famed planner of the Federal City, to
harness the tremendous power of the Passaic and create the industrial
opportunities he imagined. L'Enfant designed a series of raceways to
divert river water and channel it to operate mills along its route. As
a result, Paterson has the distinction of being the county's first
planned manufacturing city and one of the pre-eminent textile producing
centers in the United States.
Silk manufacturing first began in Paterson in 1840 replacing
earlier cotton mills that had mainly relocated to New England. Within
ten years, it became known as ``Silk City.'' Except for the cultivation
of silkworms, all other stages of silk production took place there and
by 1870 it processed fully two-thirds of imported raw silk.
Located just 12 miles west of New York City, this part of the
metropolitan area is now under tremendous development pressure and its
overall historic integrity is increasingly threatened. Though the Great
Falls district has been designated a National Historic Landmark and a
New Jersey state park, safeguards ensuring its long-term protection and
public benefits are limited. L'Enfant's innovative water power system
and many of the adjacent factories comprise the finest remaining
comprehensive collection of engineering and architectural industrial
works. These showcase almost every stage of America's manufacturing
progress from the Hamilton era to the twentieth century. The best way
to protect and interpret this extraordinary natural, historic, and
cultural resource is through the creation of a national park in a
partnership with the State of New Jersey. This is what Senator
Lautenberg's measure would do and we urge you to support it.
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, Great Falls is the
only Congressionally-created historic district that includes both a
National Historic Landmark and a National Natural Resource. In this one
place the American public can behold the panorama of this nation's
industrial revolution and development, and its story should be fully
interpreted and protected for future generations. Designating a
national park is the first step in this process. Thank you for holding
this hearing and providing the National Trust to present its views.
______
Statement of Gianfranco Archimede, Executive Director, City of Paterson
Historic Preservation Commission, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony today.
I am providing the following comments on the National Park
Service's Special Resource Study of the Great Falls Historic District.
What follows is my professional response to the study. It is not the
official response of the City of Paterson Historic Preservation
Commission, nor of the City of Paterson. As staff to the Commission and
to the City of Paterson, it is my responsibility to provide this
assessment. These points were distributed locally for comment and I can
say that many of them were strongly supported by colleagues and
Commissioners here in Paterson.
1. The study goes into detail where necessary in support of
its negative conclusions, and becomes apparently thin in areas
where scholars, both local and of national stature, have
supported opposite conclusions. I am referring to the body of
documents sent to the NPS during the study process that are
referred to in the Consultation & Coordination section on page
72. None of these documents are apparently referred to in the
study and the extent of their influence on the NPS research
does not come across.
Furthermore, there is little explanation why these letters are not
reproduced for direct reference in Appendix Two, while others between
the NPS and NFWS and Native-American Tribes were. I can infer that
these are the groups the NPS is required to formally consult with under
NEPA and NHPA, while ``public consultation'' is more one-sided; the NPS
requests input in general, gets it, makes their conclusions either way
and then opens a comment period. This process may amount to little more
than a pro forma exercise if the correspondence, especially from the
body of scholars that responded, are not referred to nor reproduced for
inspection. I imagine that Congressmen would also like to know more
specifically the results of the local consultation without having to go
to Chestnut Street in Philadelphia to view the documents.
2. The study pays too much attention to revisiting well-known
history to establish criteria 1, that the GFHD possesses
nationally significant natural and/or cultural resources. Page
44 of the study states that areas already listed as NHLs or
NNLs are pre-qualified under criteria 1. There is no need,
then, for the study team to revisit national historic
significance other than to misrepresent it in a way that
supports the study's negative recommendations. There is an
obvious push by the narrative to lay out ``historical
realities'' in a way that refutes several key arguments
traditionally made by scholars in support of Paterson's
national significance. Of particular concern is the nit-picking
of the S.U.M. as a conceptual failure in context of a)
Hamilton's other great contemporary successes, b) later
developments, both locally and nationally, and c) relationship
to other extant resources in the district. There seems little
reason to pursue this thread other than to debunk or at least
to obfuscate the association between the resources and the
unique significance that Hamilton provides Paterson and the
Great Falls.
This is, in my opinion, suggestive of doing ``What If''
(counterfactual) history. If, as the study states, the S.U.M. ``was
ultimately to prosper as a real estate venture, rather than a
manufacturing colossus'' (pg 22.) then ``what if'' Hamilton intended it
to be a real estate venture? Would the S.U.M be more significant, given
the same subsequent development of Paterson? Hamilton's preoccupation
with dishonor to his reputation over the bankruptcy of the S.U.M.
further proves what exactly? That he did not lead the S.U.M. to
subsequently develop and expand its existing crude raceway system
beginning in 1794? The same raceway that the study says, ``remains the
most significant resource of the GFHD'' was built by Hamilton's S.U.M.,
an experimental industrial venture. Another example is the statement
that ``the real first step in America's industrial revolution, however,
took place in another former colony--Rhode Island,'' referring to the
NPS' Slater's Mill NHL, that took off in 1792. This line of commentary
appears clearly leveled at undermining the long-held propriety of
Paterson as the experimental seat of the American industrial economy as
envisioned and carried out by A. Hamilton.
3. The GFHD resource inventory begins on pg. 39 and provides
an overview of extant cultural resources by listing the large,
early to mid nineteenth-century mills with obvious purpose of
showing the resources are ``typical of many northeastern cities
that experienced industrialization in the nineteenth century.''
Perhaps all of these typical cities should also be National
Historic Landmarks, like the GFHD, which enjoys the highest
level of historic status that can be bestowed on an historic
district by the NPS.
If, as the study alludes, a primary reason for NHL designation is
the early water power system, then the system should be designated
alone, and the period of significance limited to about 1830, for there
were few improvements made thereafter. This, however, would be a
serious oversight of interpretation, taking the artifact without regard
to its context. This thread is obvious throughout the report and in its
conclusions: that on most of the evaluated criteria--significance,
representative resources, integrity, feasibility, etc. Paterson is
typical, ordinary and already represented in other parks--and
especially in Lowell National Historic Park. Lowell is referred to in
each and every evaluated category in Chapter Three except for
association with Alexander Hamilton. It is apparent that the study has
gone out of its way to make this point emphatically known.
4. When accounting for the resources within the district, I
am surprised that the content of the NRHP nomination forms was
not mentioned. Such germane documentation should be brought to
light so that an understanding and evaluation of the district's
resources would have a broader base for understanding
``representative comparisons'' than those given. This is
especially the case if there exists oversights, discrepancies
or incompleteness in the NRHP documentation. In my opinion, the
study overlooks an essential opportunity to revisit the
district's boundaries and constituent resources in this way.
For example, to posit in the study that other NPS sites have
mills with intact and working machinery while the GFHD does not
seems simple enough, but is essentially the beginning of a
comparative inventory that is not fully informed. Such an
inventory, though, could and should be used effectively for
evaluating important comparative and thematic significance
criteria.
The GFHD National Register nomination forms as they are, however,
have but a sketchy inventory of GFHD resources and a primarily
narrative evaluation of their contributing or non-contributing status.
Defining such status is an essential step to delineating boundaries in
a historic district nomination endeavor. To those who know the
district, there are many cases where the forms and amendments do not
help determine the status of particular resources, or flat out contain
no information. Areas of archaeological potential and evaluation of the
district under criterion D, for example, may not have been adequately
addressed initially. Perhaps the Passaic Water Company pump houses
extant at Mary Ellen Kramer Park, or the masonry dam constructed along
the lip of the Great Falls, or the archaeological deposits of the
Cottage on the Cliff dump site along the river across from ATP, or
perhaps Hinchliffe Stadium should be included as contributing resources
in such an inventory. There is a hydroelectric plant, a stadium,
raceways, a waterworks, one extant reservoir and the remains of another
(adjacent to the stadium and within the boundary) archaeological
deposits, and a NNL waterfall--all practically touching each other, but
not all included or adequately inventoried in the NRHP documentation.
For this study to now sweep the resources of the GFHD into a typical
collection of mid to late nineteenth-century mill buildings, save for
the raceway (pg. 41) and to give negative comparative examples to the
inventories of other parks, is particularly out of hand. Given the
paucity of a comprehensive resource inventory and conditions assessment
at the time of the study, I imagined the study team would have the
opposite reaction, such as an explanation that the district's resources
had not been thoroughly documented, followed by a recommendation to do
so. Rather, lumping them into two representative architectural/
engineering periods followed by specific comparisons with inventories
of other parks is to set up a predictable conclusion.
5. Of the eight points of the Thematic Framework used for
evaluating Suitability, only three themes were determined as
relevant for review in the GFHD. What follows is a brief
discussion of how each of the three relates to the GFHD, and
comparisons with other existing NPS entities interpreting that
theme: immigration, waterpower, engineering, and industry/
labor. The significance of Hamilton's involvement in Paterson
falls under ``industry'' and his involvement in Paterson is
significant insofar as it gave rise to the same ``phenomenon
that occurred in other locations all over the Northeast and the
nation at the same time.'' This can only mean then that
Hamilton's involvement in Paterson is trite considering the
national context--Paterson may as well be Newark. In my
opinion, the GFHD easily qualifies for evaluation under all the
themes, or at very least six of the eight. The three covered
oversimplify the interpretation of the district's cultural
significance in the same way as describing the district as a
collection of typical nineteenth-century mills did earlier.
There is little explanation of why the other five themes did
not apply.
6. As for Feasibility, the GFHD is sufficient in terms of
access for visitation, but on pg. 65, ``Traffic congestion,
noise and exhaust odor impact the visitor experience
negatively.'' Perhaps those who visit are expecting Vermont?
There is a unique opportunity provided by the synergy of both
the Great Falls and a National Park at the center of a
stressed, dense urban area that the study team simply did not
grasp. It is the crux of the argument for the State Park, on
the other hand. This comment about exhaust odor exemplifies
that oversight perfectly.
7. On-going state, county and city efforts are referenced but
not genuinely addressed in this study, and in the feasibility
section, are beguiled with deep negativity and doubt. I will
focus my brief comments only on city efforts. In 1986-87, the
City of Paterson adopted a historic preservation ordinance that
created a Historic Preservation Commission. Paterson remains
today as one of about forty Certified Local Governments in New
Jersey, serving the largest population of all other CLGs in the
state. The State's historic preservation plan and Smart Growth
master plan are supported by preservation planning efforts in
Paterson. The Commission adopted the National standards and
criteria for the preservation and evaluation of significance of
historic resources--those published in the Federal Register by
the Secretary of the Interior and applied by the NPS. Since
then, the City and the Commission have worked on a myriad of
projects on public and private land, often times in partnership
with the State and county entities. Project values managed
through this process over the years are conservatively
estimated to be over $150 million. There is no reason, then,
other than for a lack of public funding perhaps, to believe
that the City and State have not ``made a commitment to manage
the resources they own within the parameters of the NPS
management policies'' as stated in the study.
For many years there has been firm agreement that the GFHD meets
criteria for national significance especially by association with the
S.U.M. and A.Hamilton. Congress has, over these years, authorized and
appropriated funding used for planning and protection of some key
resources, such as the Colt Gun Mill and the raceway. It is not the
case that more federal funds have been invested than the local share,
however, while local planning for these public resources in the GFHD
has been largely consistent with federal standards. There has not been
enough Federal investment made on behalf of these irreplaceable
nationally-significant resources, however, in terms of consistent
preventative maintenance, stabilization and restoration. This kind of
federal assistance is required to get the resources to the stable
condition that the study suggests they are in. While I agree with the
statement regarding the competence of the New Jersey Parks Commission
as stewards, there needs to be a larger role played by the NPS in both
financial and technical assistance on a continuing basis for its NHLs
if national park status and outright federal ownership is not possible.
The ability of local government to bring to bear the sizable
investments required on behalf of nationally-significant, district-
level resources for their stewardship (to national standards no less)
in perpetuity is not realistic in most cases. The study's claim that
adequate local stewardship exists without additional federal
involvement is false.
8. The overall feasibility conclusion for the NPS is that for
between $35 and $55 million (pg. 66), they could establish,
staff and maintain a park at the Great Falls, but given other
factors, they do not have that kind of funding to do so. If the
NPS does not have the ability or responsibility to offer as
much as $55 million to manage nationally-significant, qualified
resources that are rapidly deteriorating, can it argue that
others must demonstrate that they can provide this level of
sustenance prior to affiliating with them? Why then would the
city or state need any assistance from or affiliation with the
park service, as it already has national-level historic status
and recognition? The arguments made regarding pledges, lack of
local commitment and third-party investment seem backwards.
There is no comparison to managing a Park with the NPS'
recommended $55 million to leveraging $3 million from P.L. 104-
333 (1996), even with the $10 million promised for the State
park development as suggested by the study.
Please realize the far-reaching impact this study, published by the
NPS and funded by Congress, will have locally. It is in the spirit of
our shared commitments to preserving our national heritage that the
charge of stewardship and legacy of these resources has been passed by
those before us. By both small and large endeavors, we here in Paterson
and New Jersey are doing our part.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Eric DeLony, Former Chief, Historic American Engineering
Record (HAER), National Park Service, Department of the Interior, on S.
148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
very important issue.
I write to express my strong support for designation of the Great
Falls National Historic District in Paterson, New Jersey, as a unit of
the National Park Service.
My support for the site is based on my intimate familiarity with
the unique historic and cultural resources available in Paterson and
the goals of the National Park Service. Until my retirement in October
2003, I worked with the National Park Service through the Historic
American Engineering Record (HAER), a Federal program established in
1969, to create a national record of America's engineering, industrial
and technological heritage. My tenure at HAER extended for 32 years,
half that time as senior program manager. I administered the program in
such a manner that the act of documentation not only created a
permanent record of drawings, photographs and histories for the Library
of Congress, but also promoted the physical preservation of that
technological heritage. As chief of the Historic American Engineering
Record, I served as the Department of the Interior and National Park
Service senior authority on engineering and industrial heritage.
In 1973 and 1974, I was the project leader for two HAER recording
teams that documented the power canals, silk mills, rail locomotive
shops, and the related industries and neighborhoods of Paterson and the
Great Falls area. The records created by this project led to the
original designation of Paterson's Great Falls as a National Historic
Landmark.
The Paterson Great Falls site is the first planned industrial
development in the United States--the place Alexander Hamilton selected
to implement his vision of the United States as an urban, industrial
nation. Hamilton created the concept of planned industrial development
and America's first public/private partnership for economic
development, the Society for Useful Manufactures (SUM). Hamilton
selected the skilled city planner and engineer Pierre Charles L'Enfant
to bring the plan to life with a raceway system that harnessed the
power of the Great Falls for use in manufacturing. L'Enfant began the
raceway system in 1793. Paterson's raceway system, the nearby dam
across the Passaic River, and the buildings accommodating many
industries represent the finest remaining ensemble of engineering,
architectural structures and city planning from the 120-year period
when America was becoming the great industrial nation Hamilton
envisioned. The growth and changes in industrial planning, engineering,
alternative energy sources, and architecture that took place in America
are clearly shown in the works of the Paterson Great Falls Historic
District that remain to this day. The range of these works is unique in
the Nation.
Based on my experience with the National Park Service and in
Paterson, I firmly believe that the resources and historic and cultural
themes present in Paterson are in no way adequately represented in any
of the 388 units of the National Park System--not in Lowell, Hamilton's
Grange, Steamtown, or any other NPS unit that touches on various
aspects of the evolution of American industrialization and technology
from the late-18th and early-19th century. I am familiar with the
engineering and industrial heritage units of the National Park System
having helped get some of them established. HAER has documented sites
in most of these units over the years.
One critical difference I see comparing Paterson with other
industrial units of the National Park System such as Lowell, Saugus,
Hopewell and Steamtown, is Paterson's industrial diversity. Paterson
was not just a textile, iron site, locomotive shop, power canal or
single industry community. Paterson is the finest illustration of
Hamilton's vision to create an America based on diversified industries,
thus enabling America to compete more successfully in the international
marketplace. Hamilton's dream was realized through the creation of the
planned industrial center in Paterson and through the evolution of
industries throughout the past 200 years. As he explained in his Report
to the Congress on Manufactures, Hamilton believed that America could
compete economically with Europe only if America embraced new and
varied types of manufacturing. Paterson represents this vision
demonstrating the results of Hamilton's economic dream through the
creation and evolution of the raceways, mills, locomotive plants and
other diverse industrial factories. Paterson and the Great Falls
Historic District represent the fruits of Hamilton's vision better than
any other location.
Concerning 21st century relevancy, Paterson, because of its
economic and racial diversity, is relevant to contemporary America
because the City engages all citizens--black and white, Italian,
Hispanic, African American, Muslim and Jewish--especially those of the
laboring, working class and the lower end of the economic scale. No
other National Park unit has the potential of embracing and
interpreting such a vast cross section of the United States--the
culture, history and mores of the common laborer--better than Paterson.
A National Park Service unit in Paterson will provide the opportunity
to interpret these values with special relevance to labor and working
class America through the physical workplace and surrounding
neighborhoods. America's working class and minority citizens today have
little stake in our great National Park System. The industrial fabric,
power canals and associated neighborhoods of the Great Falls/SUM
Historic District in Paterson have the potential to interpret those
values for the edification and enjoyment of future generations better
than any other place in America.
Paterson's varied and evolving nature of manufacturing also
differentiates the area from other National Park System sites that deal
with the discrete aspects of industry. Although Lowell serves a
valuable role in the National Park System as an example of the
nineteenth century cotton industry, Paterson represents so much more.
Paterson ventured into silk textiles as early as the 1830s, eventually
becoming the largest silk producer in the world and making America a
major force in international commerce. Paterson also became a hub for
non-textile manufacturing, as the first revolving pistol was assembled
in Paterson at the Colt Gun Mill. During the nineteenth and twentieth
century, plants in Paterson played a major role in producing forms of
nearly every type of transportation, including locomotives, submarines,
bridges and the engine for the ``The Spirit of St. Louis'' and the B-17
``Flying Fortresses'' of World War II. No other site in the National
Park Service, not even those that illustrate the cultural theme of
industry, comes close to the breadth of Paterson's story.
Paterson is particularly suitable for inclusion in the National
Park System because resources abound to illustrate the unique stories
told in Paterson. The story of Hamilton, L'Enfant and the SUM is
present in the Great Falls and raceways. Paterson is also the site of
an instructive collection of Hamilton and L'Enfant's writing on
industry, city planning and engineering. These letters, which help make
history come alive, provide a dimension of insight into history and
will be eminently useful in interpreting and understanding the area.
The evolving nature of industry in the United States is also present in
the three-tiered power canal system, the associated rail and silk mill
buildings such as: the Rogers, Grant, Danforth-Cooke locomotive works;
Dolphin, Barbour, and Phoenix, Congdon and Harmony mills; the Ivanhoe
Mill wheelhouse; and the former site of the Colt firearms manufactory.
Paterson retains examples of nearly all the varied types of industry
present in the town for the past 200 years.
In 1976, following my work with HAER in Paterson, the National Park
Service named Paterson's Great Falls a National Historic Landmark. To
celebrate the spirit of economic independence, President Gerald Ford
paid a visit to Paterson during a special Bicentennial tour of the
country. During his visit, President Ford recognized that, though there
are many important national parks and landmarks, ``this site has a very
particular significance within that very select group.'' The President
pointed out that Hamilton founded Paterson ``as a place to encourage
America's economic independence and demonstrate the value of American
industry'' and observed that ``we can see the Great Falls as a symbol
of the industrial might which helps make America the most powerful
nation in the world . . . We can see it as a symbol of industrial
democracy, which makes a vast array of material goods available to our
people.''
Indeed, the fact that Paterson is a symbol of industrial democracy
of the nation necessitates a national presence at the site. Although I
understand the State of New Jersey is taking steps that may result in a
State Park in Paterson, the possibility of a State Park must not be
used to deny the eligibility of the Great Falls Historic District as a
unit of the National Park System. Because Paterson's Great Falls
Historic District is deeply rooted in the vision of one of the Founding
Fathers of creating a great industrial nation able to compete
successfully in the international marketplace, this site should be made
a part of the National Park System. If the State does implement its
announced plan to create a State Park in Paterson, then there would be
the opportunity to have--as there is in Lowell--State financial
assistance that helps fund activities related to a National Park.
Because a central part of the Great Falls story involves Alexander
Hamilton and American industry, there is in Paterson the genuine
opportunity to attract substantial private donations. This realistic
opportunity would be rendered virtually impossible if the National Park
Service were to determine that the Great Falls Historic District is not
eligible to be part of the National Park System. The kind of major
private donors who would make substantial donations to present the
history of Hamilton and American industry will demand the integrity,
high professionalism, continuity and permanence of the National Park
System.
The story of Hamilton and American industry is not a story of the
State of New Jersey; it is the story of our nation. The Great Falls
Historic District should be a unit of our National Park System. Once
part of the National Park System, it will be possible to link the
presentation in Paterson with other elements of our National Park
System involving Hamilton in Philadelphia and New York, and industry in
Lowell and Steamtown. A National Park Service unit in Paterson will
enhance NPS sites in Philadelphia, New York, Washington and other units
of the National Park System.
Paterson's Great Falls Historic District is clearly eligible to be
a unit of the National Park Service. Because of the great interest that
private donors have expressed in the story of Hamilton and American
industry, in recent years, the timing is perfect for the site to become
a unit of the National Park Service. I urge you to support the Paterson
Great Falls National Park Act of 2007.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Ron Emrich, Executive Director, Preservation New Jersey,
on S. 148
I am writing on behalf of the Board of Directors and more than
1,000 individual and organizational members of Preservation New Jersey
to urge you to actively assist in the creation of a Great Falls
National Historical Park--the site Alexander Hamilton selected to
implement his vision of America's economic independence--in Paterson,
New Jersey.
As you know, after the Revolutionary War, America was dependent on
Europe for most manufactured products, from clothing to military
supplies. Alexander Hamilton, America's first Secretary of the
Treasury, recognized this economic dependence as dangerous for the new
nation, and he conceived and implemented a plan to harness the force of
New Jersey's Great Falls to power the new industries that would secure
our economic independence. His ambitious vision was based on an intent
to transform a rural agrarian society dependent upon slavery into a
modern economy. True to Hamilton's vision, Paterson became a great
manufacturing city, producing the Colt revolver, the first submarine,
the aircraft engine for the first transatlantic flight, more
locomotives than any city in the nation, and more silk than any city in
the world.
New Jersey's Great Falls is the only National Historic District
that includes both a National Natural Resource and a National Historic
Landmark. We understand that numerous scholars have weighed in with
their support for a National Historical Park for the Great Falls
Historic District. Many of these educators have concluded that Pierre
L'Enfant's innovative waterpower system and the factories powered by it
constitute the finest remaining collection of engineering and
architectural structures representing each stage of America's progress
from a weak agrarian society to a leader in the global economy.
Because the City of Paterson owns the key properties, buildings,
and valuable historical documents and the State of New Jersey will
provide at least $10 million in financial assistance, a National Park
unit at the Great Falls will not be costly for the Federal government.
We are confident that private donors will also make significant
contributions to a Paterson National Park interpreting Alexander
Hamilton's vision of economic independence and freedom.
Therefore, Preservation New Jersey is pleased to ask for your
active support in recognizing that our nation's economic independence
began in Paterson. We urge you to support the Paterson Great Falls
National Park Act, and to work to create a national historical park at
the Great Falls to interpret America's rich economic history
Thank you.
______
Statement of Flavia Alaya, Professor Emerita, Ramapo College of New
Jersey, and Co-founder, Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium Paterson, on S.
148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
important legislation.
As an educator as well as author, co-author and editor of a number
of studies in Paterson hisotry and culture, and as co-founder of the
501(c)(3) non-profit Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium, I write in vigorous
support of S. 148 proposing to create a Great Falls/SUM National Park
in Paterson, New Jersey, and especially to endorse the inclusion of
Hinchliffe Stadium among the landmarks integrated into this richly
interpretable site.
The collaboration that established the Friends in 2002 had as its
first goal inscribing the Stadium into the history of the Great Falls
area by establishing its importance as a site of Negro League baseball.
It is our conviction that the work that won it a place on the National
Register in 2004, together with our ongoing research and interpretation
(available via the Friends' recently-launched website:
www.hinchliffestadium.org), enhances its national significance and
convincingly affirms its potential as a National Landmark. We believe
that if it is repositioned within the Great Falls and S.U.M. District
boundaries from which it was originally excluded, it has the power to
give this extraordinary area true narrative fullness and closure.
That the Park Service has chosen to disparage such potential is
puzzling in light of their own effort to bring the Stadium to national
and even global attention in 2005, when their American Memory website
made it the African-American site of the year. Indeed we allowed
ourselves to think of this Park Service accolade as a kind of reverse
rebuke for the bureaucratic error that sent the Stadium application to
the Register as merely ``locally significant,'' an error the we and the
New Jersey Preservation Office have been working to correct ever since.
But the Park Service evidently speaks with many voices. Their
recent statements on the proposed legislation before Congress are
literally a different story: not only do they disparage the Stadium's
story-power, but they deny the dynamic character of public culture
generally. If this denial is a true reflection of policy, it would, I
think, also reflect a monumental failure of imagination in their role
as guardians of our national narrative.
The central claim of both Study Report and testimony appears to be
that the National Park at Lowell, which placed America's complex
industrial past on the American cultural landscape for the first time
almost a half-century ago, can still tell us (if it ever could!) all we
know or need to know about our industrial origins and development;
that, even leaving aside Alexander Hamilton's crucial contribution to
this story, the Lowell catechism can answer all our questions about the
checkered making and re-making of American industrial might.
Such assumptions carry these documents into almost preposterously
reductive absurdities: e.g., characterizing the Paterson locomotive
``first'' at the intercontinental spike as an accident, nothing more
than a contingency plan; comparing the culture-imbued Great Falls of
the Passaic with the unspoilt natural wonders of Yosemite;
counterweighing the major water-power innovations of the Society for
Usefull Manufactures with Mr. Slater's mill-wheel. Employing another
disingenuous rhetorical device, the testimony applies the drumlike
repetition of the word ``unsuccessful'' to virtually every Paterson
claim to innovation, hoping to persuade Congress via hypnotic
suggestion, perhaps, that a Paterson National Park would be a permanent
American shrine to failure.
And yet what a gallery of extraordinary Paterson photographs
accompanies this Study Report--page after page exhibiting not just the
grandeur but the staying power of the venture capitalism of the S.U.M!
Not only do these images visually repudiate everything the report
actually says, they repeat what dozens of historians have already told
us: Go ahead, circumnavigate the U.S., stop at every one of the places
named in the NPS study; you will still not have the grasp of this
nation's industrial history, or plumb its meaning to an incredibly
varied workforce, or catch its entrepreneurial elan, or connect it to
the competitive national spirit, or come to the level of insight into
the essential, intricate integration of all these disparate, scattered
parts of industrial development, including--yes--failure as well as
success--success beyond failure, that would be made possible, visible,
intelligible, in a single visit to a Great Falls National Park.
Of course I include Hinchliffe Stadium in this missed interpretive
potential. It offered the Park Service an obvious opportunity to join
the authors of the proposed legislation outside the box. There is no
news in pointing out that the Stadium falls technically beyond both the
physical boundaries and ``period of significance'' of the existing
landmarks, or that it has not yet been given the full landmark stamp of
approval. But to say this and no more is to remove everything dynamic
from the process that adapts interpretation to new scholarship and
insight.
One such missed opportunity would have served a critical
contemporary project of public culture as well, indeed one of the
legislated imperatives of the Park Service itself: to tell more
African-American history on our cultural land-and cityscapes. S.148 is
forthrightly consistent with this mission. It cites Hamilton's
abhorrence of slavery and Paterson's repudiation, from its founding
moment, of an economy dependent on it, a story no other National Park
related to American industrial history, least of all Lowell, will ever
be able to tell. Nevertheless, the Study Report's only mention of
Hinchliffe Stadium's stellar connections to Black sports sidesteps
entirely its potential to narrate such an important piece of under-
written African American history.
Nonetheless, the Stadium does have this power. It is the power to
tell a thrillingly positive story, evoking the ongoing dynamic of
sports as a key means by which African Americans have challenged
racism. As a major site of Negro League baseball, Hinchliffe is likely
to prove one of only a handful of stadiums left in the U.S., certainly
of any size, stature, or integrity, to tell this story, let alone tell
it so brilliantly. We know that over the course of twelve full seasons
here many of the Negro Leagues' greatest Hall of Fame superstars gave
some of the best performances of their lives. As for Larry Doby, to see
Hinchliffe as nothing more than the site of his early life as a high
school athlete is to flout the obvious: its inspirational influence as
scene of such great Negro League play, brilliant role-modeling for a
talented poor kid dreaming of a career in professional baseball. For
those of us who know this story from Doby himself, it is merely the
crowning touch that he was ultimately scouted by the Newark Eagles at
Hinchliffe, a touch that if it weren't absolutely true would sound like
Hollywood fiction. This was a defining moment not just for him but for
the rest of us, the break that led to his 1947 American League break-
through and gave the final death-blow to Jim Crow baseball in the
American major leagues.
There is still, of course, a more complex interpretive task:
bringing this recreational structure into the narratives of industrial
development so deeply scored on the surrounding cultural landscape. Yet
it is--or ought to be--an exciting and rewarding one. Since the years
in which the Great Falls/S.U.M Landmarks were defined, scholarship has
helped us reclaim the meaning of the Stadium's proximity to both.
Steven A. Reiss's work, including City Games: The Evolution of American
Society and the Rise of Sports (1989) and Sport in Industrial America
1850-1920 (1995), are just two recent studies in social history that
link the evolution of American sports directly to technological
innovation, work, and social movements, bridging the gap between
industrial work and play. The Friends' own research, both in preparing
the National Register application and the Stadium website
(www.hinchliffestadium.org), has shown how the social and historical
context of the Stadium's creation offers critical insight not only into
millowner/leading-citizen attitudes toward the purifying power of
athletics but into working-class consciousness of the meaning of sport
and play.
This was the same worker culture, after all, whose slogan for the
eight-hour-day movement (a movement the Park Service testimony so
glibly characterizes as ``unsuccessful''!.) was: ``Eight hours for
work, eight hours for sleep, and eight hours for what we will!'' It was
a demand that laid fresh claim to the part of life that work was not,
and Hinchliffe ``City'' Stadium planted it large on the landscape.
Justly called ``The House that Silk Built,'' it was paid for by the
donations and self-sacrifice of the workers of this dominant industry
and was constructed largely by and for working people. Completing it
gave saving temporary livelihoods to men just thrown out of factory
jobs. The dyers union local celebrated the successful end of an early-
Depression strike here.
Even in its design and construction the stadium is rooted in the
worker community, having been planned with instinctive respect for a
scene long associated with popular recreation that includes the unique
surround of the Great Falls and the Valley of the Rocks. Olmsted
Brothers of Brookline, Massachusetts, direct descendants of the
designers of New York's Central Park and originators of some of
America's most visionary and people-centered environmental planning,
engaged in a consultative process that interacted directly with the
community. They succeeded in resolving, in an amazingly successful way,
site considerations that included proximity to what they knew to be one
of the nation's great natural wonders. They thus managed to preserve
the awesome dignity of the Falls without sacrificing either the
Stadium's visual grandeur or the 10,000-person seating capacity that
represented its lifeline to economic survival.
Folded together--as they should be--as they can be--such people-
centered narratives of race and industry, environment and sport, can
invigorate and inspire. Here is a people's park, making no invidious
distinctions of national origin or class or color or religion or
gender, a place that made Eleanor Egg, one of America's earliest great
female runners, its first honored athlete in 1932. Hinchliffe stories
like these--and they are legion--add depth to a Paterson narrative that
already underscores the equalizing force of talent and ``industry.''
Stories of Black industrial entrepreneurship in this city, of its
counter-intuitive support for abolition and of Underground Railroad
activity among its mid-19th-century manufacturers, all gain force by
having Hinchliffe's empathy with underprivilege and the community's
vigorous welcome of Black baseball as their sequel.
It is sad to find the NPS unwilling to take on such an interpretive
challenge, or even to define it as a challenge worth taking on.
Although even the Study Report admits that a proper reading of American
industry should include its ``path of decline'' and take us into the
Great Depression, its own ``period of significance'' analysis instead
makes 1914 a chokehold, not only denying the full curve of industrial
change into the Great Depression, but cutting us off from every advance
in social history since the 1970s. Most egregiously, it shows a refusal
to address the insight we now have into Paterson's long adventure, and
investment, in the egalitarian thrust of American capitalism, our
awareness that it is a story about both entrepreneurs and workers, not
one to which workers' contributions can be summed up, as the Park
Service document does, in the phrase, ``labor unrest,'' as if labor
contributed nothing more to our industrial economy than an
``unsuccessful'' effort to undermine it. As Herbert Gutman's Paterson
historiography has unequivocally proved, the true story about American
industry is really two stories held in wonderful tension: one of
individualist entrepreneurial workers making it ``from rags to riches''
and another of collective workers claiming their rights to work and
wages and reasonable conditions of both.
And also, yes, their right to play. Hinchliffe Stadium, as part of
a larger national stadium movement that climaxed the growth phase of
American industrialization, objectifies these ideas and brings them
into focus. It was product of decades of local planning and dreaming,
designed to be a statement of working people's investment, financial no
less than moral and social, in the physical education of their aspiring
young, in the fuller humanity represented by their own leisure time.
When it was finally constructed, in the midst of economic calamity, it
was explicitly meant to shout back the triumph of industrial America
over adversity. Its very construction was made possible because the all
parts of government and community worked together, exemplifying the
best of the New Deal. To recount the litany of great athletes at
Hinchliffe is to represent the full spectrum of our rainbow of national
origins. It is to describe how work, decency, and sport are intertwined
uniquely on the American scene. It is to show how the culture of
striving, and the essentially hopeful, egalitarian, aspirational
character of both our industrial culture and our cultural diversity are
represented, literally and symbolically, by the ``level playing
field.''
Ultimately what the National Park Service has failed to
acknowledge, even in the face of some of its own evidence, is the
single thing that Paterson owns, missing from all the separate theme-
representing places they allege can tell the tale. That missing thing
is synergy. It is a synergy both structural and human. Fully
interpreted, allowed to do the work it can do, it can tell the story of
industrial capitalism in all its sometimes beautiful, sometimes
irritating, sometimes fractious and unsettling and difficult complexity
and interrelatedness, all in one astonishing little educational
universe. It is a synergy not just enriched but secured by the
inclusion of Hinchliffe Stadium, a synergy that will guarantee a
Paterson Great Falls National Park greater than the sum of its
miraculously serendipitous, if far from accidental, assemblage of
proximate parts.
With S. 148, the legislative process stands poised to create this
interpretive synergy. It is my deepest hope that your committee will
thoroughly endorse this effort, in spirit and letter.
I thank you again, especially on behalf of my colleagues among the
Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium, for the opportunity to offer this
testimony.
______
Statement of Maria Magda O'Keefe, Executive Director, Hispanic Multi-
Purpose Service Center of Paterson, NJ, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on this
very important issue.
As one of the leaders of the proud Hispanic and Latino community in
New Jersey, I am testifying today because we urgently need your help in
creating a Paterson National Park at the site that Alexander Hamilton
chose to invite immigrants to America to participate in the new and
growing economy Hamilton sought to begin in Paterson. Paterson is the
home to over 150,000 residents, with more than half coming from
Hispanic or Latino origins, and New Jersey is the home of almost 1.5
million persons of Hispanic or Latino origin.
In proposing a modern American economy that would begin at the
Great Falls in Paterson, Hamilton rejected the prevailing cultural
standard of the time that rewarded the rich solely for the accident of
birth and social status. Hamilton welcomed immigrants and believed
deeply in a meritocracy that embraced hard work and accomplishments.
At the end of the Eighteenth Century, Alexander Hamilton announced
to a new nation and the world that Paterson welcomed entrepreneurship
that would expand opportunities for people of all incomes, races,
religions, and nationalities. It was a radical notion then and we still
have a way to go to realize every element of Hamilton's dream. Today,
Paterson's first Hispanic mayor continues to welcome immigrants and
low-income families to Paterson's many ethnic neighborhoods and
cultures.
The National Park Service has finally come to recognize that many
Americans--including many Hispanics--feel little or no connection to
the National Park System and our Founding Fathers. We want you to know
that the Hispanic community does feel a deep connection to Paterson's
Great Falls National Historic District. We see it as the symbol of one
Founding Father's efforts to shape our nation's economy to provide
increased opportunities for immigrants.
Alexander Hamilton is one of America's greatest immigration success
stories. His personal triumph over elitism and classism in early
American society and his belief that America's economy can help people
from all walks of life will resonate with everyone visiting a Paterson
National Park. Paterson's Great Falls National Historic District
provides a unique representation of immigrant and American economy
history that presents an inclusive story of the diverse American
experiences going back to the vision of one of America's Founding
Fathers.
We believe a Paterson National Park will help Hispanic citizens
from across New Jersey, across the New York Metropolitan area, and
across the nation to take special pride in America's past, which
engenders confidence and a stake in America's future. Paterson's story
of a diverse group of hard-working immigrants will touch many members
of America's Hispanic community who have felt little or no connection
with our National Park System. We also see the Paterson National Park
as an opportunity to recognize Hamilton's efforts to liberate Spain's
American colonies.
The Hispanic and Latino community needs you to support a Paterson
National Park now. Please do not let us down.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
______
Statement of Christopher MacGowan, Professor, Department of English,
The College of William and Mary, on S. 148
Mr. Chairman, and other distinguished Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to submit testimony on the
proposed Great Falls National Historic Park.
I write to draw your attention to an important feature of the Great
Falls Historic District--the unique place of the Great Falls, its
history, and that of the industry and city that grew up around it, in
American literature. Poetry, and literature generally, are cultural
elements not adequately represented in American parks.
Much of my scholarship has centered upon the Pulitzer prize-winning
poet who wrote the best known literary work associated with the Great
Falls, William Carlos Williams (1887-1963). Williams' 240 page Paterson
is directly related to the National Natural Landmark and to the
National Historical Landmark, both of which are within the Paterson
Great Falls Historic District. Paterson initially appeared separately
in five books in 1946, 1948, 1949, 1951 and 1958. I edited the current
edition of the poem for Williams' estate and publishers (New
Directions) in 1992. Book III won the first National Book Award for
Poetry in 1950, and two of the other books of Paterson were nominated
for the award when they first appeared. Robert Lowell, writing on the
poem's use of the city and the Falls in a 1947 review of Book I,
observed, ``Taken together, Paterson is Williams' life, and Williams is
what makes Paterson alive.'' Reviewing Book II in 1948 Lowell wrote,
``Paterson is Whitman's America'' grown tragic in the 20th Century,
``No poet has written of it with such a combination of brilliance,
sympathy, and experience, with such alertness and energy.'' John
Berryman, reviewing Book V in 1959, declared, ``I wish everyone would
read it.''
The poem has never been out of print. Its first printings of 1,000
copies are now rare books, but New Directions issued cheap pocket
editions of the poem as its first editions quickly sold out, and paper
and hardcover editions are now readily available. Williams is standard
reading on campuses in literature and creative writing courses; the
poem is anthologized in all the standard undergraduate college text
books, and the complete poem is taught in American literature graduate
courses across the nation and internationally. I know of German,
French, Italian and Spanish translations currently in print. Recently,
to give another example of this poem's international fame, I was asked
by a leading Norwegian Art Museum to write an introduction to the poem
and to the history of Paterson and the Falls to accompany an exhibition
of paintings inspired by the poem.
Williams' poem is about a nation not a state, and recognizes the
national importance of Paterson and the Great Falls. His intention, in
writing a long poem about America and the city that marked its
industrial beginnings, was to answer the long poems of his
contemporaries T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. Both The Waste Land and the
Cantos foreground European history, myth and culture. Williams' poem
begins with the landscape itself and the early myths associated with
Garret Mountain and the river. In the course of its five books it
includes the history of Native American settlement, the violence of the
Dutch era, Hamilton's interest in the area and the founding of SUM, the
city's industrial expansion and decline, major catastrophes, recreation
activities (daredevil stunts across the Falls, the circus, Sundays in
Garret Mountain Park), the 1913 strike, and the contemporary city.
Williams' sources include a number of 19th and early 20th Century
histories, newspaper accounts, assorted documents (e.g. a will, a
drilling chart), and letters. Some of this material is reprinted as
prose documents within the poem, for Williams recognized, as recent
literary scholarship has come to acknowledge, that history and
literature are not absolutely separate categories but enrich and inform
each other in important ways (as Williams' poem would demonstrate as
part of the exhibits of a National Park).
The major themes of the poem include the tension between the
natural beauty of the falls and its exploitation by industry; money and
economics; the sometimes misleading language of historical record; the
role of religion; and the impact of class, gender and industry on the
cultural life of the city and beyond. At the center of the poem is the
Falls itself to which the poem returns again and again. The Falls serve
as the focal point of the histories that the poem uncovers, and as a
sound and force which--in the poem--represents an unheard call to
recognize the beauty of the landscape and rediscover a neglected
heritage, a heritage that could, if uncovered, help to bring direction
and renewal to an American culture threatened, as Williams saw it, by a
language and imagination rootless and unfulfilled.
In the exhibits of a National Park extracts from Williams' poem
would surely help tell the story of the people who made and lived the
history of the Great Falls, and would itself be part of that story. It
offers an interpretation of the role of Hamilton, and covers the
history of the area both before and after his important actions. The
poem would contribute a good deal to the broader educational mission of
a Great Falls National Park, a mission that would conceive of the
cultural heritage of a site as including more than just an important
historical record.
This cultural heritage includes, along with Williams' famous epic
poem, Washington Irving's ``On Passaic Falls'' (1806), the 150 page
poem on the Passaic by Thomas Ward (1842), the 18th Century engravings
by Paul Sandby, the many later paintings of the Falls across two
centuries, and more recently the poetry of Allen Ginsberg. It also
includes the many eighteenth and nineteenth century tourist accounts of
the Falls, themselves an important part of the national and
international story this unique site has to tell.
Thank you for your time and consideration.