[House Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED
AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2015
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARINGS
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES
KEN CALVERT, California, Chairman
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho JAMES P. MORAN, Virginia
TOM COLE, Oklahoma BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio JOSEE E. SERRANO, New York
DAVID G. VALADAO, California
CHRIS STEWART, Utah
NOTE: Under Committee Rules, Mr. Rogers, as Chairman of the Full
Committee, and Mrs. Lowey, as Ranking Minority Member of the Full
Committee, are authorized to sit as Members of all Subcommittees.
David LesStrang, Darren Benjamin, Jason Gray,
Rachelle Schroeder, and Colin Vickery,
Staff Assistants
________
PART 8
Page
Native American and Alaska Native Testimony, April 7, 2014....... 1
Native American and Alaska Native Testimony, April 8, 2014....... 291
Public Witnesses, April 10, 2014................................. 539
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations on Behalf
of Native Americans and Alaska Native............................. 895
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations............. 999
________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED
AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2015
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARINGS
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES
KEN CALVERT, California, Chairman
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho JAMES P. MORAN, Virginia
TOM COLE, Oklahoma BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio JOSEE E. SERRANO, New York
DAVID G. VALADAO, California
CHRIS STEWART, Utah
NOTE: Under Committee Rules, Mr. Rogers, as Chairman of the Full
Committee, and Mrs. Lowey, as Ranking Minority Member of the Full
Committee, are authorized to sit as Members of all Subcommittees.
David LesStrang, Darren Benjamin, Jason Gray,
Rachelle Schroeder, and Colin Vickery,
Staff Assistants
________
PART 8
Page
Native American and Alaska Native Testimony, April 7, 2014....... 1
Native American and Alaska Native Testimony, April 8, 2014....... 291
Public Witnesses, April 10, 2014................................. 539
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations on Behalf
of Native Americans and Alaska Native............................. 895
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations............. 999
________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
87-891 WASHINGTON : 2014
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky, Chairman
FRANK R. WOLF, Virginia NITA M. LOWEY, New York
JACK KINGSTON, Georgia MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
RODNEY P. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey PETER J. VISCLOSKY, Indiana
TOM LATHAM, Iowa JOSEE E. SERRANO, New York
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
KAY GRANGER, Texas JAMES P. MORAN, Virginia
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho ED PASTOR, Arizona
JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina
ANDER CRENSHAW, Florida LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California
JOHN R. CARTER, Texas SAM FARR, California
KEN CALVERT, California CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania
TOM COLE, Oklahoma SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida BARBARA LEE, California
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania ADAM B. SCHIFF, California
TOM GRAVES, Georgia MICHAEL M. HONDA, California
KEVIN YODER, Kansas BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas TIM RYAN, Ohio
ALAN NUNNELEE, Mississippi DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
THOMAS J. ROONEY, Florida CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
CHARLES J. FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington WILLIAM L. OWENS, New York
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
DAVID G. VALADAO, California
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
MARTHA ROBY, Alabama
MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
CHRIS STEWART, Utah
William E. Smith, Clerk and Staff Director
(ii)
DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES
APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2015
----------
TESTIMONY OF INTERESTED INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONS
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
PUBLIC WITNESSES--NATIVE AMERICANS AND ALASKA NATIVES
Opening Remarks of Chairman Calvert
Mr. Calvert. Good morning, the hearing will come to order.
Welcome to our first of four public witness hearings over
the next two days, specifically for American Indian and Alaska
Native Programs under the jurisdiction of the Interior and
Environment Appropriations Subcommittee. I especially want to
welcome the distinguished tribal elders and leaders testifying
today in the audience.
Despite a somewhat abbreviated hearing schedule this year,
I am proud that this Subcommittee is able to hold hearings on
these very important programs. They have been and will continue
to be a bipartisan funding priority for this Subcommittee.
The chair will call each panel of witnesses to the table,
one panel at a time. Each witness will be provided with 5
minutes to present their testimony. We will be using the timer
to track the progress of each witness. When the button turns
yellow, the witness will have 1 minute remaining to conclude
his or her remarks. Members will be provided an opportunity to
ask questions of our witnesses, but in the interest of time,
the chair requests that we keep things moving in order to stay
on schedule.
We have a large numbers of tribes that have come all over
from the United States, and so we want to make sure everybody
has an opportunity to be heard.
The chair also wants to remind those in the hearing room
that the Committee Rules prohibit the use of outside video
cameras and audio equipment during these hearings. So Mr. Moran
will be here shortly, but if Ms. McCollum, if you have any
opening remarks, we would be happy to hear.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I look forward to
today's hearing, and I want to thank all of the people
testifying for their travel to Washington, D.C. Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Okay, first up is Mr. Vernon
Miller, council member of the Omaha Tribe of Nebraska. Mr.
Miller, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
[Prayer.]
Mr. Miller, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
OMAHA TRIBE OF NEBRASKA
WITNESS
VERNON MILLER
Mr. Miller. Well, good morning, esteemed members of the
House that are able to be here today. My name is Vernon Miller,
and I'm a member of the Tribal Council for the Omaha Tribe of
Nebraska. I was elected to this position in November, just a
few months ago, so I am pretty green to this position. I am
here on behalf of our chairman, Clifford Wolfe Jr. who couldn't
be here today.
Prior to my election, I was the high school business
teacher at Omaha Nation, which is a public school, for the past
8 years. And so, like I said, this is a new experience for me,
and this is something that I am acclimating to slowly but
surely.
So because of that and because I lived on the reservation,
and my past experience on a tribal council, I have some
knowledge of how the budgets of BIA and IHS impact our tribe
and by also the utilization of those services that I do as
well.
We are a federally-recognized tribe living on the Omaha
reservation in northeast Nebraska and western Iowa. We have a
population of 6,699 tribal members. Our land area is
approximately a little over 307 square miles, and unfortunately
we have an unemployment rate of 69 percent in our community.
As a result of a lot of the treaties and things that have
happened, we have inadequate funding, high poverty rates, and
the loss of much of our land due to the federal policy such as
federal allotment. Because of our rural location combined with
the fact that it was only about four decades ago that we were
able to run our own governmental programs, it has made it very
challenging for our tribe to develop viable economic ventures
to fund critical government and social programs.
Our tribal community more recently has been devastated
through two natural disasters due to climate change. In, 2011,
a manmade flood. We lost deer and buffalo, which are crucial
because of the diseases, to our livelihood through the debris
that came down through the Missouri River and that flood that
happened in that area. And thus we watch our nutrients just
float away down the river.
And so then we have been praying for and struggling for our
tribal farm and our crops for this upcoming season. We can't
purchase nutrients that have been lost and need to be replaced.
Even though we are in a natural agriculture or farm belt, we
don't have--we don't receive agricultural dollars in our TPA
funding. Although we sit on the banks of the Missouri River, we
weren't able to use this natural resource, the water itself,
for any purpose unless we find a way to circumvent the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers for its use.
We also just suffered a tornado that came through our
community a few months ago, and that devastated our primary
headquarter area. And so that is another natural disaster we
are overcoming as well. We don't receive federal dollars to
help pay for our water system, nor repair it. We have constant
water breaks, we just had another one last week. We rely on
what limited collections we do receive from the users of that
water. But it is pretty hard with an unemployment rate as high
as it is to receive any dollars from our users or tribal
members. So you can kind of see the limitations that we have
there.
Our contract support dollars have been received at 100
percent this year finally, but with the decision that we take
out of funds that we have already provided. Our tribe has faced
challenge after challenge with a flood and a tornado. It has
taken out 11 homes of people that live in those communities,
and it hasn't been replaced. Slowly we are trying to replace
them. Our people are faced with the same drug and alcohol abuse
that you find in overcrowded, overpopulated cities of America,
yet we do not have a youth detention facility.
And I bring these challenges to you and pray that you hear
the reality of the lives that the Omaha who live back in
Nebraska are living with. We don't receive HIP, Home
Improvement Programming, to improve our homes. And so those
vacant housings, some of our homes, are still vacant because
they can't--we can't afford to, you know, revitalize those
homes to make them livable.
With regard to law enforcement for at least the last
decade, we have lacked a dedicated criminal investigator
through inadequate funding. And as a result, we lack the
resources to investigate and ultimately prosecute in the areas
such as white collar crime and so forth. Any resources we must
have must be dedicated to the crimes of violence.
We continue to wrestle with the issue of juvenile
detention, and in this regard, the closest juvenile detention
facility to us in Nebraska is located 1,000 miles away on the
Ute Mountain Reservation in Colorado. Thus we are burdened not
only with the cost of transportation, but also the loss and
expense for police officers to travel to transport.
With this in mind, I urge you to allocate additional
funding to the BIA to increase the base funding for tribal
courts and to finally fund the Indian Tribal Justice Act at $50
million over the FY2010 funding level of $328 million including
the funds for officer recruitment and training for tribal
detention facilities, operations, and maintenance.
I know I am getting close to the end of time, and I just
want to reference my testimony I submitted. I didn't touch on a
lot of it, but I just wanted to bring you what I had to heart.
[The statement of Vernon Miller follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Everyone's complete testimony will be entered
into the record. Thank you very much, Mr. Miller. Next, Mr.
Scott with the Rosebud Sioux Tribe.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ROSEBUD SIOUX TRIBE
WITNESS
CYRIL SCOTT
Mr. Scott. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I am
Cyril Scott, the president of Rosebud Sioux Tribe. It is a
great honor to be here to speak on behalf of our tribe, which
is part of the great Sioux Nation.
Mr. Chairman, we will cut right to the chase here. I want
to talk a little bit this morning about health care. Service
units are inadequately funded so people are being provided
inadequate health care in our unit. We need these dollars,
contract dollars, here in our units. Our people are suffering
some major atrocities in IHS down there with the healthcare.
Diabetes and all these things are running rampant.
The United States government is putting more money into the
health care of people incarcerated in federal institutions than
they do Native Americans, which is a treaty-entrusted
responsibility under 1868 Treaty Section 6. And we always thank
you, thank everybody for that Treaty, but still, you know, some
of the people, the upper-class, some of their pets are treated
better than Indian country itself, Mr. Chairman and community.
So the dollars need to be there for contract support. We
cannot--it is life or limb in Indian country in IHS. And we
can't send our people out for adequate service on contract
dollars. In Rosebud, we send them to Sioux Falls Rapids, a city
which right, right now it is almost impossible. We are ruining
our children's credit to be able to go to universities because
we send them out, and IHS is not paying their bills today. So
then we have the bill collectors chasing our children.
So we ask humbly that we actually go in and look for these
dollars for IHS, and that is really needed and will surely be
appreciated. IHS needs a complete overhaul in its expenditures
as far as their procurement processes and their hiring and
employment processes where they give contracts to doctors and
nurses that come to Indian country for two weeks, then leave
for two weeks and are still paid under IHS dollars.
That is burdening. It is not the government's fault. IHS
needs to watch their spending and put more spending back into
healthcare. You know, if we bill for any insurance monies, that
goes back into the administrative part of it, not into
healthcare.
So again when it comes to IHS, the monies are really needed
for the American Indian and also the Alaskan natives, you know.
4.1 years less life expectancy. We have all these things. We
have 182 percent diabetes, so IHS needs these dollars. And we
come to BIA, the flat budget here, across the board there is no
money in there for economic development. In Indian country, we
scream sovereignty, and to be sovereign, we need to be self-
sufficient. And how we do that is by the government, you folks
going over there and asking for some economic development
dollars so we can do this in Indian country. It is a must.
Everyone in this room, as Native American leaders, we want to
progress forward economically in agriculture or whatever we
choose to do. But without the dollars being there in the flat
budget, it is tough in Indian country.
So then, we really ask for that, for some monies to be
allocated just for economic development in Indian country and
the vehicle to receive the dollars should be a short ride to
the bank as we should say, I guess. And, if you look at what we
are asking for, again is treaty and trust responsibility to
Indian country.
Wrapping up, I want to thank each one of you for hearing
us, hearing me today to speak on behalf of the Rosebud Sioux
Tribe and our funding issues. I have submitted testimony to
you, and again I can't say it enough. Thank you for your time
here this morning on behalf of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, and
thank you once again.
[The statement of Cyril Scott follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman for his statement. Next
Mr. Roman Nose from the Executive Director, Tribal Education
Departments National Assembly. Sir, you are recognized for 5
minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
TRIBAL EDUCATION DEPARTMENTS NATIONAL ASSEMBLY (TEDNA)
WITNESS
QUINTON ROMAN NOSE
Mr. Roman Nose. Chairman Calvert, and other members of the
committee, especially recognizing Representative Cole and also
Representative McCollum who are strong supporters of the Indian
Education. My name is Quinton. Roman Nose is my last name, two
words. I am Cheyenne, and I am the executive director of the
Tribal Education Departments National Assembly.
It is a national nonprofit organization for tribal
education agencies and departments also known as TEAs or TEDs.
They are an important part of the executive agencies of
American Indian and Alaska native tribal governments
responsible for tribal education matters. TEDNA respectfully
requests $2 million for a BIA grant program supporting TEAs
which was authorized in the original No Child Left Behind Act
of 2002, and even before then, 1988.
Furthermore, TEDNA supports the president's request for $3
million in order to implement the research-based reforms that
the BIA grant kills. Federal education policy is failing Native
American students. This subcommittee is well-versed in the
shameful statistics that are more thoroughly discussed in my
written testimony. It is suffice to say Native Americans score
lower than any other student group on achievement tests and are
falling behind in every educational level.
While achievement results for every other major ethnic
group has improved in recent years, those for Native American
students have remained nearly flat, and in some cases, the gaps
have actually widened. At the same time, tribal government
involvement in education of Native American students is
severely restricted.
Although Congress authorized the funding to build tribal
capacity to directly survey the students of BIA schools, funds
have never been appropriated to fulfill this crucial need. A
similar authorization aimed at public schools on Indian
reservations has been funded since FY2012 resulting in the
Department of Education's pioneering State Tribal Education
Partnership program, also known as STEP.
Though very important, STEP only addresses one aspect of
the existing need. TEAs, TEDs are in the unique position to
halt and reverse the negative outcomes for native students. The
Chickasaw, a STEP grantee, is an excellent example. Many of
their Native American students were falling behind through the
cracks or were being expelled. Chickasaw Nation now moves
expelled students into alternative high schools, addressing an
acute problem for native students that federal, state, and
local agencies were unable to remedy.
Similarly, Idaho acknowledged its inability to provide
training or technical assistance to meet the unique needs of
Native Americans. The Nez Perce Tribe, using its STEP grant,
began providing technical assistance in teacher training on the
integration of cultural pedagogy, tribal education standards,
and Common Core standards.
Successful models of tribal involvement in education should
be expanded to BIA schools. In order to meet this worthy
objective, this appropriation would focus on three areas
already identified and authorized in the ECSA.
First, TEAs would support early education initiatives and
develop culturally relevant curriculum and assessments.
Second, TEAs would provide coordination in administrative
support services, technical assistance to schools, and
education programs on Indian reservations.
Third, it would fund a development in enforcement of tribal
education codes and policies. As Congress has already
recognized, these three areas, our core educational functions,
are most appropriately left to tribes.
We applaud President Obama's request that Congress invest
in incentivizing schools funded through the Bureau of Education
to introduce reforms that improve student outcomes. We believe
that TEDNA's request today for appropriation of capacity
building dollars complements the President's initiative well.
Additionally, we emphasize that TEAs should have an
essential role in the reform of BIA's school system, fulfilling
its essential administrative and governance functions. This
type of reform TEDNA has encroached for many years. Investments
in TEAs is sound policy and begins to implement the policy of
tribal self-determination in education and further the United
States trusting responsibility to Native American students.
I want to thank the Subcommittee for this opportunity to
testify, and I am happy to answer any questions you may have.
[The statement of Quinton Roman Nose follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman, and we will now have
questions. So, Mr. Moran, do you have any questions or
statement you want to make or----
Mr. Moran. Betty, Ms. McCollum, do you have anything?
Ms. McCollum. I have been in a couple of eldercare
facilities. I am just wondering if--the Rosebud Nation
mentioned their eldercare facility was really inadequate. That
might be more of a problem than many of us on the committee
realize for some of our elders. Mr. Miller, are you having
issues with elders being able to age--not just with the
healthcare dollars, but adequate facilities for them.
Mr. Miller. I will respond--we have a nursing facility and
a clinic in our town.
Ms. McCollum. You need to push the button too, sir.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. We have a nursing home on our
reservation, and, you know, because of the limited amount of
beds, we do have one capacity for our elders to even utilize
that facility and two, yes, the infrastructure itself does need
some pretty deep renovations, and it does--it is highly
inadequate, you know, even for--even to be culturally to our
elders and their needs.
I know it is oftentimes difficult for the route to other
people that are residing in the nursing home facility for our
elders to visit them. And oftentimes the quality of care is
inadequate as well.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
Mr. Scott. When it comes to elderly in Indian country
especially on the Rosebud, we have what we call the 20 flex
service units. It is based apartments for our elderly. We need
dollars for better medical care, in-house medical care. We are
spending a lot of money on transportation to transport to an
IHS service unit. We could do that and not cause so much stress
on our elders, by providing some services in-house, in the
facility itself. As Mr. Miller said, we also have an elderly
care facility that is suffering right now.
We were the first one in Indian country to do this, the
Rosebud Sioux Tribe, to buy a nursing home in the city of White
River. And we struggle every day to take care of our elderly.
You know, we, as Native Americans, the elders are everything to
us, and when we suffer in these fashions financially, we let
our people suffer with healthcare and just their basic
necessity needs in life at these facilities.
So, yes, the elderly concerns, we need dollars to better
provide services for our elders, whether it is in healthcare or
just day-to-day activities. So thank you.
Mr. Moran. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Yes.
Mr. Moran. If I might, the improvement in our contract
support though, you figure, is going to have a direct benefit.
I know the Chairman, Ms. McCollum, myself, and Mr. Simpson have
all wanted stronger contract support services, and this is
going to have a direct benefit to your healthcare, I assume. So
you might just say a word about that.
The other thing is we have been holding out hope that the
Affordable Care Act with its provisions for the Indian Health
Service within it would improve healthcare on reservations. We
don't know. We have to hear from you, of course, on what impact
is made. But over time, there was an assumption that it would
make a substantial, I mean a substantial improvement, in
funding for healthcare and in the quality of healthcare. Have
you seen any of that as a result of the Affordable Care Act
implementation?
Mr. Scott. Mr. Moran, thank you for the question. Though we
have the Affordable Care Act, until there is an overhaul of IHS
and the dollars in IHS, the Affordable Care Act will not be
effective, cost-effective for Indian country. When we are
misusing so many of our health dollars, how could we justify
the Affordable Care Act being implemented in Indian country
when the norm of the day is to put more money into
administration. And we will see it--with Obama Care, we will
see the same thing. It will all go into administration from
here in Rockville, Maryland and through our agencies at home.
More money goes to administration than it does our healthcare
needs of our people, and it can't be.
So the Affordable Care Act, I believe, it is my own
personal belief that that is going to cause Indian country to
even suffer more because those dollars will not come as
healthcare dollars. They will come at administrative dollars in
Indian country, and thank you for your question, Mr. Moran.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Well, thank you. I don't really have a
question, but I do want to thank you all for being here today.
And, Quinton, education is obviously one of the things we have
to improve on. We have been focusing kind of on healthcare, but
many of us are looking at the education system that is woefully
inadequate. You all have to be a part of any reform. In fact,
you have to be the center of any reform that we do. So we look
forward to working with you.
I was very disappointed in the President's budget, not just
this president, previous presidents also, that there was
actually no request for any new schools construction in Indian
country. And I will tell you what, some of the schools out
there are dangerous. They are just--they are old. They are run-
down. They are unhealthy, and we have to make some changes to
that. I saw that on the Rosebud and other places where we
really need to invest in upgrading the schools in Indian
country. And I would like to see you help us with our
colleagues on the other side of the rotunda as we work through
this budget so that hopefully we can get some reforms done in
the school system and also in the buildings that are necessary.
So thank you all for being here today. Go ahead.
Mr. Roman Nose. Thank you for those comments. I just want
to quickly say about the BIA school construction program, under
the Bush Administration, there was adequate money funded for a
lot of the buildings, and the money has decreased since then.
Unfortunately until we improve the system of how the BIA
goes about building those buildings, you know, it is always
going to be a money pit. I mean it is just not going to meet
the needs that Indian schools need for their buildings.
We are woefully behind now as it is. I also serve on the
school board for Riverside Indian School, a BIA-funded school
in Oklahoma. So I know that for a fact.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Mr. Miller. If I could just make a brief comment too in
regard to the schools. Most people think of BIA schools as just
being K-12, but there are also tribal colleges as well. And my
sister, she is a freshman at Haskell Indian Nations University.
When we took her down there, I mean it is a testament of how
there is more funding that is needed there. I mean there are
stains that were there that couldn't be taken care of because
of funding levels, and so I agree. It is also not just K-12 but
also higher ed.
Mr. Simpson. And I, if I could, Mr. Chairman, and I should
say also as much as I run down the schools and the inadequate
job we have witnessed a number of years ago, same situation
existed with military schools. And we started off on a program
and said we are going to fix them, and they did some stuff. And
they are in the process of doing that, but I don't mean to
imply every Indian school is run down. There are some that are
in very good shape that are doing a great job. Just depends on
where they are, but every child deserves an education and in
conditions that are safe. So we look forward to working with
you on this subject.
Mr. Scott. If I may, you know, you are exactly right, and I
want to thank you for addressing the schools. You know, in
Rosebud, we have an agreement, a lease agreement with the BIA,
and we have three schools that are really inadequate. We spend
more money in bringing in modular homes for classrooms than we
do in maintenance and repair. What they have spent in our
county alone, in our districts alone, in these modular homes,
we could have built a new facility out in the low-lying
communities.
We believe what is going on here today is that they want us
to start using the state school, the Todd County High School,
which is going to be very hard on our children, especially the
younger children. Some of them are going to have to be bused in
the excess of 15 to 17 miles a day, and that is one day. So
thank you for your question on education.
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman. And obviously healthcare
and education will be a common theme here today. And so we need
to address it. One quick question for Mr. Miller. 307 square
miles in Nebraska. You primarily grow, what, wheat?
Mr. Miller. No, it is corn.
Mr. Calvert. Corn?
Mr. Miller. We also have soybeans.
Mr. Calvert. And do you contract farm all that, or do you
farm it yourself?
Mr. Miller. We just started our own farming business
corporation, LLC. And so we take care of it might be like a
quarter of our land, but the rest of it is leased out through
the BIA.
Mr. Calvert. So I see the 69 percent unemployment rate.
Mr. Miller. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. Boy, that is very----
Mr. Miller. And we are trying to employ higher numbers to
get them into the industry again, and so that is kind of a goal
of ours.
Mr. Calvert. Well good. I thank the three of you for coming
out here today. We appreciate it, and we will be seeing you
soon. Have a great day.
Mr. Roman Nose. Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, next we have our second panel coming up,
Mr. Brian Brewer, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, and Mr.
Ervin Carlson, president of the Inter Tribal Buffalo Council.
Good morning. You probably heard my opening statement about the
5-minute rule we are operating under today because we have a
large number of folks coming in. So we appreciate if we can
stay on track here. So green light stays on for four minutes,
and the yellow light comes on for the last minute. That kind of
gives you an indication of how much time you have. We
appreciate your courtesy on that.
First we will recognize Mr. Bryan Brewer, president of the
Oglala Sioux Tribe.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
OGLALA SIOUX TRIBE
WITNESS
BRYAN BREWER
Mr. Brewer. Thank you very much. My name is Red Buffalo
Boy. My English name is Bryan Brewer. I am the president of the
Oglala Sioux Tribe, and first, Mr. Calvert, I would like to
congratulate you on your new position here, and----
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Brewer [continuing]. The Committee, I would like to
thank you for everything that you do to help us and your
efforts. We realize that it is a tough one that you have to do
to represent us.
But our reservation is one the largest in the United
States. Our land is--we have 3.1 million acres of land. We have
about 40,000 to 50,000 people on our reservation, people come
on and off the reservation as the year goes, looking for jobs
and things like that.
We have 13 schools on our reservation, state BIA and
contract schools. Our reservation schools, we are running at an
over 50 percent dropout rate, close to 60 percent. One of the
things I am concerned about is our off-reservation students in
Rapid City. They are running at an over 85 percent dropout
rate. So as the president, I am also concerned about our
students that live off the reservation and the amount of impact
aid that the schools receive and how that money being used. And
this is something that we are hoping to meet with them on.
You know, the last time I was here, I said we need 4,000
homes. And I got back, and I got the updated data. And we don't
need 4,000 homes. We need 12,000 homes. It is very difficult to
get an accurate census because people are afraid to tell how
many people are actually living in the home because it may
affect their rent, things like that. But some, we have two to
three families living in the home. We have one home that had 27
people living in it. Very difficult.
When you have poverty, this is real sad, but it brings on a
lot of things that we don't want. We have abuse with our
children, physical, mental, sexual abuse. Our children are
being abused just because of the poverty, the drugs, the
alcohol. It's very difficult for our children. And you can
understand why maybe our dropout rate is so high when our
children go to school hungry and they don't have their needs
met with clothing and things like that. So very, very
difficult.
Our Indian health service, you know, it is very difficult
for them to meet the needs of our people. It is just not
happening. We don't have the doctors. They are not there.
Everyone has to be flown out, you know, for any injuries,
health issues. We don't have the doctors. Uses up all of our
money. A lot of our people have to pay their own bills.
IHS does not provide a way home. A couple weeks ago, I had
a woman that IHS sent to Rapid City, South Dakota to see the
doctors. When she was finished, she was left there, and a
Laundromat called me the next morning. She slept at a
Laundromat because they would not provide a way for her to get
back to the reservation, which is over 100 miles away. So we
had to send someone up to get her.
The tribe--everybody that has an appointment with the
doctors, we pay their way. We get them up there. So it is
nothing that IHS is doing right now. They owe our tribe about
$10 million in contract health. So we are really hoping that we
can get this settled this year. Yvette Rubado said that all the
tribes would be made an offer this year, so we are hoping. Only
10 were.
Our schools, you know, we are only funded at about 60
percent of what is allocated to us. Right now, our schools that
are--should be used to educate our children, it is being used
for heat, vehicles, you know. It is very sad that the money
that should be used to educate our children have to be used
just to keep things going in the school. You know, when it
comes down to it, they have to--they can't hire teachers
because they need money for fuel or food or something like
that. So our schools are really struggling.
One of the things is that we are going to lose our language
in about 25 years, the Lakota language. So it is something that
we are very concerned about. Ryan Wilson, I hope he will be
testifying. We are asking for $3 million for language
initiatives and things like that. We are really hoping that you
will support that because we really feel that once we lose our
language, it will be the death of our culture.
We are 3.1 million acres of land. We are the same size as
the state of Connecticut, and we have 51 officers, you know.
There are probably more than 51 officers in this building here
alone right now. So we have a very difficult time. We brought
in--the Bureau of Indian Affairs brought in 10 additional
police officers a month ago, and they kept them on our
reservation for about 60 days. And they gave our officers the
opportunity to take a little time off. They have so much comp
time built up that they gave them a break, but we really need
more officers. We need more money.
Our court systems, you know, we have so many cases that we
just can't handle it. Our detention centers, we need
everything. I just--it is hard to be specific on our needs, but
I just want to say that federal government, you know, they are
not meeting our needs.
And with our treaties, we are a Chigi treaty tribe, and the
tribe cannot meet the need of our people. You know, we had a
lady that froze to death because she couldn't get propane up
north. Right now, we have people without propane, without
electricity. So it is very difficult to go back home and meet
our people's needs.
[The statement of Bryan Brewer follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Appreciate your testimony, sir.
Mr. Brewer. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, Mr. Ervin Carlson, you are recognized
for five minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
INTER TRIBAL BUFFALO COUNCIL
WITNESS
ERVIN CARLSON
Mr. Carlson. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and committee
members. I would like to thank you for allowing me here to
testify before you gentlemen this morning on behalf of the
Inter Tribal Buffalo Council. I don't know if you all are aware
of the Inter Tribal Buffalo Council, but it is an organization
that consists of--I think we are right at 60 tribes now, and
every year, we do have a lot of other tribes joining the
organization. Most of the tribes, I think, that you have
listened to this morning, they are a part of the organization.
We are requesting this year, I guess, an increase on our
funding to $4.5 million which we have been at before. We have
had a history of, since 1992, receiving funding from--we have
earlier been in the President's budget. Now we are on to
congressional earmark, and then on into the President's within
the Interior. So we are requesting this from the Interior, the
$4.5 million.
And without ITBC, you know, all efforts to restore and
protect buffalo wouldn't exist. As I said, we have consistently
grown our organization, and consistent funding shows
congressional commitment to buffalo restoration and management,
as I said, since 1992 in its various--we kind of fluctuated, I
guess, on our funding. And we had--I guess we are presently
kind of in a shortfall. We have fallen down from where we were
earlier, and at one time, I said $4.5 we would like to be
restored to that if possible.
ITBC is structured as a member cooperative, and 100 percent
of the appropriated funds are expended on the development and
support of tribal buffalo herds and buffalo product business
ventures. A significant portion of ITBC funding is distributed
directly to ITBC member tribes through herd development grant
program, developed and administered by our ITBC members.
The reduction in funding from '06 to level critically
curtailed ITBC's successful marketing program at a point when
tribes were close to accessing secure markets which would
facilitate self-sustaining herds. Further, the funding cut
seriously reduced efforts to solidify the ITBC health
initiatives that has a potential to positively impact the
incidental diet-related health programs among American Indian
tribes.
And a lot of the tribes here this morning talk about the
health needs, and one of the things that we do as a health
initiative is to help with, and we think it is in future, with
tribes as for their funding that they need for diabetes, which
is rampant in Indian country, heart disease. Those are rampant.
So we want to--with a health initiative, curtail those problems
that we have in Indian country, and I guess that would even
help with the big need of the dollars that we also have within
those health areas.
As I said, our funding has been stagnant for many years,
and our membership has grown each year. Every year, we do a
one-page consult letter, and that is where the tribes will
write down their needs and how much money they need to maintain
their programs. And the funding there is used for staffing
needs to their infrastructure, fencing, water development,
harvesting, and processing the meat for the tribal members to
consume.
We are really working towards having our tribal members go
back to eat buffalo, which is a really healthy diet for our
people.
One of the other areas that we are really working with you
is with the Yellowstone National Park. Our biggest thing there
is we want to bring out the animals alive to tribal herds.
This year, we are helping with transporting those animals
out and processing them and getting them to our tribes, you
know, to eat. But our main goal is to get those animals out
alive and get them out to our tribes. And, you know, as we put
money out there probably it costs about $100,000 a year for
trucking the animals, the process and getting paid for the
process.
Before that, there was a lot of the meat before we were
helping was just ruined. It didn't get to our people in the
proper manner. So we are providing that now where it is a lot
easier and it is healthier. And we are using all of the meat.
We are looking for funding for our current initiatives,
and, like I said, our primary objective though is to restore
buffalo back to Indian country. As I said, we provide
assistance to all of the tribes in all of the infrastructure
areas. We do help with surplus buffalo with the Park Service
and U.S. Fish and Wildlife, and distribute these out to the
tribes that request them, like the surplus animals. We pay for
all of the shipping and all of the cost there to our tribes
also. This enhances and grows their herds for further
consumption.
We are working on market initiatives. Some tribes are at
marketing where it will help with their lack of funding just as
many tribes talk about here today. We are trying to build
revenue for them in that way also.
Like I said, we do have a healthcare initiative. We have 6
member tribes that are serving tribal-raised buffalo into their
school lunch program to address all of the health concerns
again there. And we anticipate expanding that program to 20
tribes within the next 3 years.
The organization, as I said, has existed for over 20 years,
and there is no other program here within Indian country that
assists tribes with buffalo restoration and protection.
[The statement of Ervin Carlson follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much, Mr. Carlson.
Mr. Carlson. Okay, so with that, I guess I would just
respectfully request that if you could help in returning our
funding level to $4.5 million just to serve the tribes a lot
better for their objectives and their needs. And also I thank
you for listening to me today, and I sure would appreciate it
if we would be able to do that. I say a lot of the issues today
with the tribes that they brought up, it also helps with that,
you know, alleviate those problems there.
And we are building an economy, I guess, for the tribes
also with the marketing.
Mr. Calvert. All right, I thank the gentleman for his
statement. Any questions for this panel? Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Brewer, I mean absolutely no disrespect
in asking this question. Has the council considered putting
forth some organizational planning so that there are cluster of
villages around the reservation? Because it is so large, as we
saw when we were traveling out there. There are places where
there isn't Internet service. There is improper water. The
propane shortage this year up north was just terrible. So when
you told the story of the elders, my heart just broke because I
have elders in Minnesota, off reservation that are having huge,
huge problems.
My thought was if that was something you were looking at
doing, that would require extra money, extra planning and
things like that. Your tribe and the council has the right to
have people live where they choose to live within the tribal
rules and regulations. But if there was a plan put forth, maybe
with some help from us to organize in maybe a more efficient
manner, is that something that has ever been discussed?
Mr. Brewer. It is something that we are discussing,
especially sustainable housing communities, because it is
something that is so badly needed. One of the things with the
buy-back program that is really going to help us out is getting
land. We do have a lot of land, but we are running out. We ran
out of land for our people to build homes. So we are really
hoping with the land buy-back program we will be able to ride
around to the different villages where there is no land.
So we will be able to have land where we can build these
communities. So it is something that we are looking at. We have
Thunder Valley. They are really looking at building sustainable
communities. They're going to start one, but our need is so
great. It is going to take a lot of communities and many of the
homes that we do have, they were built back in the '60s. So it
is, you know, it is really dire conditions for the people that
do have homes.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady.
Mr. Moran. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Mr. Carlson for
managing the Inter Tribal Buffalo Council. We put language in
the bill last year to ensure that the National Park Service and
the Fish and Wildlife Service must work with the tribes to
address those surplus buffalo leaving national parks such as
Yellowstone, and you have made that work. And so it is a good
program. Not a lot of money, but it is the right thing to do.
So we appreciate that. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah, one question on the buffalo meat itself,
is it exclusively for Indian tribes, or do you sell that
outside of the--to general population also?
Mr. Carlson. Well, a lot of the tribes are at different
stages, and the main purpose though is to get the meat to our
people to eat for the healthy, like I said, for the diet and
get back to eating that. And on the marketing part, there are
some tribes are at that, selling it to outside. Their animals--
some of them might have two different type of herds that they
use.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah, I was in a store, and I saw the original
Indian buffalo jerky. I was wondering if that was part of your
program or whether it is just somebody, you know, promoting it
from that perspective.
Mr. Carlson. Well, we do, and I apologize today, we were
going to bring some jerky for you guys. And I will get after my
director for not bringing any, but that is one of the areas
that we are looking at getting started to market that out
there. And as I said, we are marketing some of the meat out
there. There are a lot of tribes marketing it out there to try
to make their herds self-sustainable.
Mr. Calvert. Sure.
Mr. Carlson. We have a long ways to go yet for that.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, well thank you very much. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Mr. Brewer, talk to me a little bit if you
could about the Department of Justice's detention construction
program. How is it going, and is it working well? Or should it
be back with the BIA?
Mr. Brewer. We requested that everything go back to the
BIA. Nothing against the Department of Justice, but they are
not into construction at all. When you have two entities that
we have to answer to, it takes double the manpower just for
reporting and everything else. But, you know, Department of
Justice, we have to compete with everybody, and it is not just
the needs. For the ones that really have the needs, we really
feel that we get left out on the tribes. So we would really
like to see everything go back to the Bureau, and we feel it is
a must for us to survive.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you for that. I have one other question
on the buffalo and really the diet. As you know, I don't have
to tell you anything you don't already know, but diabetes is a
problem particularly among the Indian population.
Mr. Carlson. Right.
Mr. Simpson. And part of the effort is to try to get them
back on traditional diets that they had always eaten before.
Mr. Carlson. Right.
Mr. Simpson. And the thought is that is going to reduce the
diabetes rate and other things. Do we have any evidence of that
yet, that that is----
Mr. Carlson. We do. Actually we do have some of the tribes
that have just gone completely back to eating just the buffalo
and that has curtailed the diabetes that they had. There was
one family in Fort Belknap that just had a lot of that within
their family, and they went to just eating that. And it just
curtailed the diabetes.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah, that is very interesting.
Mr. Carlson. And we are trying to get that back into the
schools----
Mr. Simpson. Right.
Mr. Carlson [continuing]. So our young can start from
there. You know as our diet and, I guess, a lot of other things
in Indian country and our tribes has drastically changed for
us. And so we are trying to get back to those, the traditional
things that are pretty healthy.
Mr. Simpson. And the one other thing that you mentioned
that is very important to me is maintaining the languages. They
just started Fort Hall.
Mr. Carlson. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. The Shoshone-Bannock Tribe started a school to
teach the Shoshone language, I went out and spent a morning
with them. Didn't understand a word because it was all spoken
in Shoshone. It is very vitally important to maintain their
culture.
Mr. Carlson. You know, as a BIA, they have had the language
in their school since early '70s, but yet the BIA has not
produced one fluent speaker. So I think we have to look at
that, and it is time for us, the tribes, to decide how these
language programs will operate. Let us do that instead of the
BIA. And, you know, BIA hasn't been very successful in
educating our people, and the tribes, we would like to have a
bigger part in that of how our children will be educated. And I
think it is time for that we decide what our children need to
know and how they will learn it, and I think we will have a
better success rate.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you for being here today.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you both.
Mr. Carlson. Thank you for listening.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, the next panel is going to be Mr. Tex
Hall Sherman of the Mandan Hidatsa, hope I am pronouncing these
correctly, Arikara Nation; Mr. Dana ``Sam'' Buckles, Fort Peck
Tribal Executive Board; Mr. David Gipp, Chancellor, United
States Technical College; Mr. Ryan Wilson, President, National
Alliance to Save Indian Languages.
Good morning. You probably heard we have a lot of folks
from around the country today, and we want to hear from
everybody. We are operating under a five-minute rule so we
would appreciate when the green light is on, that means you are
still in your four minutes, and when the yellow light goes on,
please try to wrap up your remarks. And then we will have some
time for questions, and we would appreciate that very much.
So with that, Mr. Hall----
Mr. Hall. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. You are granted five minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
MANDAN, HIDATSA AND ARIKARA NATION
WITNESS
TEX HALL
Mr. Hall. Thank you, Chairman Calvert and members of the
Committee for the House Appropriations, Subcommittee on
Interior, Environmental-Related Agencies. I am Tex Hall, the
travel chairman of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Tribal
Nation on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota.
I want to just start with about five points, but I want to
start with the first one on energy, and as you may or may not
know, our tribe is in Western North Dakota. And we are located
in the Bakken Oil Formation, which is the largest oil formation
in the lower 48, and we currently at over 1,000 wells, 180,000
barrels of oil is being produced daily, which is more than most
states. We have 30 drilling rigs and 20,000 plus semi truck
traffic, who is all on the--it is a boom is what it is.
And so as you know, North Dakota as a whole is now number
two. It is nearing a million barrels of oil production now, and
in 2020, they predict we are going to be--in the state we are
going to be at 1.7. So we are moving in on Texas. I don't know
if anybody is here from Texas, but we are getting close to you.
And now secondly I want to talk about the red tape, and
former Senator Dorgan talked about 49 steps, you know, it took
to get a lease through the BIA. Well, my testimony today I want
to talk about, there are seven boxes, seven bureaus, not only
just BIA but BLN, Fish and Wildlife, EPA, Army Corps, Honor,
OST. And so 49 steps is in the BIA. If you add those, it is all
over 100 if you put seven of those bureaus together.
So that is entirely too much red tape, and there are many
other tribal nations who are trying to get through those boxes.
We were the guinea pig in 2007, so to speak, and so we have--we
are experts on those, all those steps and how to fight through
them because it is your economy you are trying to develop. And
so we have firsthand experience. An oil company will contract a
drilling rig about approximately $30,000 a day. If they don't
have any permits that are ready to drill, APDs that have been
approved by BIA and DLM, they will go off the reservation, and
it will make a doughnut. And it will develop around you. So we
are fully aware of that whole thing.
So we would like to proposed, based on our experience now
and there is going to be other tribes that are going to be
asking for this and they should because we have all met, the
Navajo Nation, the Northern Utes, all of the other--the
Jicarillas, the Fort Peck, the Crows. All the other tribes are
going to be asking for the same type of thing is to create a
Denver office, and this Denver office then, you still have your
agency office, your Bureau of Indian Affairs, at the local
level, which you need to have to help process the leases. And
then it goes to the BLM, and that, in our instance, it goes to
the Dickenson Mile City in Billings and then back through
Denver. Now, if EPA has some concerns or Fish and Wildlife, it
will juggle back to Denver. To make a long story short, you are
going through 100 steps to get back to you and say yes, it is
okay to drill.
So what we are proposing, there are 12 regions in the BIA
that has an Indian country across the United States. So we in
the Dakotas are an Aberdeen Region. All the Montana/Wyoming
tribes are in the Billings and et cetera, et cetera. Everybody
is in different boxes. This would consolidate it all into the
Denver. So you do the local level. If you have questions about
your leases or your permits for final approval, you would not
go to Denver, Billings, Phoenix, or Albuquerque. Instead you
would go to this Denver office which should have the--all of
the experts instead of experts, you know, spread 12 different
regions, you would have them in one office.
And you would have to have somebody from Interior that has
authority over those seven boxes, the BIA, the BLM, the EPA,
the Fish and Wildlife. All of those seven boxes then would have
to have somebody under the Secretary of Interior authority to
say that instead of shuffling to Billings to Phoenix to
whatever, you know, to get the permit done. If there are
questions about endangered species under Fish and Wildlife,
then work it out because you are all in Denver now. You don't
have to go through 100 boxes.
So, Mr. Chairman, we are really proposing that. That would
really be a key for us. And then finally, I notice the yellow
light, so the map. And we are at zero funding again as you can
see on this map with the BIA. And the BLM has, excuse me, $40.7
million increase, and we are at zero.
I mean I just don't understand why they don't, you know,
and then 180,000 barrels a day is more than most states. We are
trying to--we are only 33 percent through this development, and
this is a great quality fuel, and we have a refinery that we
are building, the first refinery since 1976 to produce propane,
diesel, jet fuel, gasoline, at a very good price to help, you
know, less dependence on foreign oil. It is like somebody at
BIA doesn't get it, you know. We have to have this assistance
in this capacity building to help us. We should at least get
the same increase. We are not asking for more than BLM or Fish
and Wildlife. Give the Bureau of Indian Affairs oil and gas
energy budget, the same kind of authority.
And then I will close with law enforcement. This 20,000
semis has increased crime and all of the activity. In Justice,
DOJ, transfer those funds back to BIA. It is about $80 million
of law enforcement monies that are at DOJ and that we have to
compete for. Put that back into our BIA budget, and that would
put more cops on, you know, on the ground for us. And it
wouldn't be any increase in Appropriations. It would just be
simply a transfer. Thank you very much, Chairman Calvert.
[The statement of Tex Hall follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Hall. Mr. Dana ``Sam'' Buckles,
Fort Peck Tribal Executive Director.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
THE ASSINIBOINE AND SIOUX TRIBES OF THE FORT PECK RESERVATION
WITNESS
DANA ``SAM'' BUCKLES
Mr. Buckles. Good morning, Chairman Calvert, Ranking Member
Moran, Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for inviting me
to testify today regarding the President's 2015 budget. My name
is Dana Buckles. I am a member of the Executive Board of the
Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes, Fort Peck Indian Reservation. As
a former tribal police officer and environmental health
technician for the tribes, I am familiar with health and safety
issues facing our tribes. That is my focus today. I will cover
issues of combating substance abuse and diabetes, addressing
increased crime, and adequate funding for our rural water
system. Fort Peck is located in the Northeastern part of
Montana. The reservation consists of 2.1 million acres, and is
a five hour drive from Billings, and about an hour and a half
to Williston, North Dakota. Our reservation borders the Bakken
and Three Forks Formations.
The President's proposed increase of 1.2 for BIA programs
and four percent increase for IHS is inadequate to meet these
challenges, especially on a large rural reservation like Fort
Peck. In addition, the President's 2015 budget for BIA
endangers the health of our tribal members and residents for
our surrounding communities by shorting our water system of
nearly a million dollars in operations and maintenance costs.
With oil and gas developments neighboring our reservation, we
have seen both economic development, and the downsides of rapid
growth. One downside is increased use of drugs,
methamphetamine, and prescription drugs, which become
increasingly available. Last month we had two babies born on
the reservation who were addicted to meth.
There are no tribal foster families trained to care for
children born with meth addictions, so we had no choice to
place them in foster families off our reservation who are
qualified to care for these special needs babies. We ask the
subcommittee to provide funds for 2015 to strengthen our tribal
foster care programs. The IHS budget for substance abuse,
alcohol, and family counseling is insufficient for needs.
Also, more of our members have been diagnosed with
diabetes. Our one dialysis center is too small to handle the
growing numbers of members who require dialysis. IHS services
and IHS construction funds must be increased to address this
crisis. Drug related crime is also rising. Our chief of police
estimates that 70 to 80 percent of criminal activity on our
reservation is drug related. We have 16 police officers that
patrol the entire reservation, and two officers who are full
time drug enforcement agents. As you can imagine, it is tough
for the tribal police to timely respond to emergency calls.
With the help of the DOJ, we are completing construction of
a new 88 detention facility in 2014, but the BIA has estimated
it can only provide half the level required staff for
corrections, and operations maintenance funding is also a
concern to us. Will this new facility fall into disrepair due
to lack of staffing, operations, and maintenance and repair
funds?
Finally, the President's budget request for BIA endangers
both the tribe's rural water system and the availability for
safe drinking water for our reservation residents, and for
surrounding communities. Since 2001 we built a raw water intake
pump station, a 30,000 square feet water treatment plant, then
laid hundreds of miles of pipes to bring water to different
communities on our reservation. Now we treat raw water from the
Missouri River and distribute it to different communities on
our reservation.
Our system will soon connect to the Dry Prairie Rural Water
System, which serves rural communities off the reservation.
Once we are connected, Dry Prairie will eliminate these interim
water resources and rely on the tribes' water system. At full
build-out, we will serve over 30,000 Northeaster Montanans. The
tribes have estimated operations and maintenance and repair
costs for its water system in 2015 at 1.8 million. Without
consulting us, the BIA operations funding for our rural water
system next year is 750,000.
Taking into account that 192,000 contribution from the Dry
Prairie, the BIA funding is 900,000 less than we need to
maintain our water system. A breakdown in the treatment would
be felt on and off our reservation, and endanger ranches,
farms, health clinics, schools, our dialysis center,
businesses, and homes. We ask that you adequately fund BIA and
IHS for the services and infrastructure so necessary to our
community's health and safety. And thank you.
[The statement of Dana ``Sam'' Buckles follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Next, Mr. David Gipp, Chancellor, United Tribes Technical
College.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
UNITED TRIBES TECHNICAL COLLEGE
WITNESS
DAVID GIPP
Mr. Gipp. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have some additional
handouts, which just basically brochures that I was not able to
deliver earlier. I can provide further copies for the other
members of the subcommittee. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much
for the honor to testify. I would ask that our prepared
testimony is accepted for the record.
Mr. Calvert. Your full testimony will be accepted for the
record. Everyone's testimony today will.
Mr. Gipp. Thank you so much. I will summarize our three
basic requests, and then I would like to elaborate a little bit
within the time given about the school, and some other plans
that we are working on.
We have been in business for 45 years at United Tribes
Technical College, originally United Tribes of North Dakota,
and it was created by the tribes of North Dakota, as well as
some of our tribes from South Dakota. We serve anywhere from 77
to 85 different tribes in our student body, about 1,300 to
1,500 students annually on a semester and summer basis, and we
serve also roughly 400 to 450 children in our three early
childhood centers on campus, as well as another 180 to 200
students in our K through 8 elementary school. Our belief is to
invest in the family, the whole family, if at all possible, and
so the adults are attending school, the children are attending
school. We have single adults as well.
We occupy an old military fort that was built between 1900
and 1910, originally called Fort Abraham Lincoln, not to be
confused with the Fort Abraham Lincoln that Colonel Custer rode
out and went west for, told the BIA to wait until he got back,
and not do anything until then. Well, they are still waiting
for his return. But, not to get into history here, Mr.
Chairman, there are, I know, a few Custer buffs that are my
friends in both Mandan and Bismarck, by the way.
Our request covers $6.8 million in BIE funding under the
Self Determination Act for both United Tribes and the Navajo
Technical University. It is a line item in the BIA budget, and
it is 2.5 million over the Administration's request. We are
asking for a one time BIA forward funding for United Tribes and
Navajo Tech, as well as the three Federally operated colleges.
We were left out of the forward funding strategy about five,
six years ago, when the rest of the tribal colleges were
allowed to participate in forward funding. The details are in
my testimony.
Third, we are asking for Congressional support for a
tribally administered law enforcement training center to be
based at United Tribes. We have the support of our region of
tribes, and many other tribes around the country. We have been
working on this for well over 10 to 12 years, and that is based
on the lack of law enforcement personnel within the whole
Bureau of Indian Affairs, Law Enforcement Division. You heard
Chairman Hall talk about the growth issues, and you heard him
talk about the shortages of public safety. I will not go into
all of those details. We have an existing program, but it is
not yet adequate to be funded at the level that we need to to
address some of the concerns of lack of public safety
throughout Indian Country.
We occupy, as I mentioned, buildings that are over 100
years old. We have some new buildings. Our housing on campus is
over 50 years old, and in some cases students occupy some of
the old 100, 110 year old buildings, so we have a great need to
expand. There is a big demand for us to train more and more
Native students. I think I had mentioned that 51 percent of our
population throughout Indian Country is now under the age of
24. And if you go to Turtle Mountain, or other tribes, you will
find that that 51 percent applies to those that are 18 and
under. So you look at that, we have growth throughout Indian
Country, and we need to address it. We need to upgrade our
technology and our facilities throughout United Tribes.
So I mentioned these things. The Administration has asked
for about a 200,700 increase for United Tribes, and an increase
for Navajo Tech University in their request. We receive funds
from the Department of Ed, but it is not adequate to meet the
total needs of training that I had mentioned.
I mentioned the forward funding. We are trying to address
some of the issues of Bakkan oil, and what is happening there.
We have added back things like welding, electrical,
construction technology, GIS training, small business
management, and the list goes on. There is a great need for
more and more training to address just the region that I am
talking about, much less Western North Dakota. So I mentioned
these things, and I have talked a little bit about the forward
funding. We have been late in funding for FY '13 and '14. For
this year, in the first six months, we received only 25 percent
of our funds.
Our successes, well, we have anywhere from an 85 percent
retention rate, 77 to 100 percent placement rates, depending on
which vocation you are talking about, and we offer about 25
different programs, the one and two year programs, and three
four-year degree programs as well. So we have an unduplicated
count as we speak right now of about 1,391, not counting the
children that I had mentioned. This Northern Plains Law
Enforcement Academy is something that is very, very crucial to
the well-being of Indian Country.
So we ask that you take a look at our testimony, and look
at the needs of these, as well as the other institutions.
[The statement of David Gipp follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Next, Mr. Ryan Wilson, President of the National Alliance
to Save Native Languages.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NATIONAL ALLIANCE TO SAVE NATIVE LANGUAGES
WITNESS
RYAN WILSON
Mr. Wilson. Chairman Calvert, I thank you for this
opportunity. Ranking Member Moran, thank you as well.
Congresswoman McCollum, you know, appreciate all your support.
And, again, Congressman Simpson, we thank you for coming to
Pine Ridge, and for coming to Lakota Country several summers
ago, and we would like you to talk him into coming over there
as well. Yeah, we wanted to make sure the record was known also
that Tex as named Tex before oil was found over there, you
know.
But, that being said, you have heard already a couple
references to Native languages. That is what I am here to talk
about, and I am going to be very brief, and fast, and get to
the point as well. I am going to show you some research. I am
also going to talk about what our request is, which is for a
new demonstration project in the BIE to support immersion
schools. And I am also going to kind of talk a little bit about
that budget that they had rolled out recently. And, finally,
the support, the broad based support that exists for it, you
have already had a taste of it. As the days go on here, and as
you receive other testimony, you are going to get a good sense
that this is an idea that its time has come, and it could not
come at a more important time, as a matter of fact.
So, with that being said, if you read my testimony, you see
we are requesting $3 million for demonstration projects for
that. And this is not a request for new money, it is a request,
actually, to repurpose existing resources there. They, as
President Brewer indicated, had been teaching Native languages
in schools for quite a long time, mostly using bilingual money
from Department of Ed, mostly for an hour a day at various age
levels.
There are only three existing BIE schools that are engaged
in this right now, in full immersion. That is Rock Point in
Arizona, and Rough Rock in Arizona, and Niigaani School, Bug O
Nay Ge Shig, that your colleague is very familiar with, in
Minnesota. What we are asking is, those schools have received
budget cuts from these budgets as well. There have been
rollbacks on what they have been doing, and we are trying to
protect that, but also expand. And we have got two schools in
Pine Ridge, Wounded Knee School, and also Little Wound, that
are interested in doing this. And there are a lot of other
schools that are interested, but they have been prohibited by
these rules. The promulgation of these regulations have really
stunted that growth. And so this is basically what we are
asking for here.
So in my packet that I wanted to submit of support, this is
being supported by the National Congress of American Indians,
also the Great Plains Tribal Chairman's Association, who he is
chairman of here, also the National Indian Education
Association, and NCAI have released joint recommendations for
the ESCA which call for immersion schools. We have also the
United Tribes of North Dakota, and we have a joint policy paper
that is presented by the National Indian School Board
Association on Tribal Education Department's National Assembly
and American Indian Higher Education Consortium to support this
culturally based education approach too. So, with your
permission, Chairman, I wanted to submit these for your record
as well.
And then, I am not going to go through this, but I am going
to just briefly highlight this. I wanted to provide for you
guys too, this is some of the most comprehensive literature
review on the research supporting immersion schools. And I want
to be very clear to the committee, I am not talking about
teaching a language for a couple classes in a day. We are
talking about using your heritage language as the medium of
instruction for academic content as well. This is done by all
of our best researchers in Indian Country. The educators that
are presenting in the next couple days will corroborate, you
know, a lot of this as well. So, with your permission,
Chairman, I would like to submit this into your record as well.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, all testimony will be----
Mr. Wilson. Thank you. I appreciate that. I am going to
give this to you. This is a copy of our treaty, the Fort
Laramie Treaty, and in Article 7, Article 13, you will see some
of the education provisions in there. All of us talk about
treaty rights, but I wanted you to have a copy of that too.
So you know two things, these two streams of research.
Everything we are doing now is not working. Not only isn't it
working, it has been an abysmal failure. I think my colleagues
would also attest to the restructuring of the Bureau of Indian
Education from the BIA has been a complete failure as well. It
is time to go ahead and say that. We should not be fearful in
saying that. This, on scale, is not going to turn that failure
around, but it will address a real critical need, and a
critical mass of students that need that as well.
With that being said, I am going to conclude. I want to
give the committee this book also. This is an eyewitness
account of Wounded Knee, so these are pictures. And so we have
that old saying, a picture is worth 1,000 words, there are
almost a million words in this book. But I wanted this to go to
the committee. And I am going to just share real quick that my
great-grandmother was 10 years old when this happened. She
helped take care of me and my younger sister when my mom was
teaching at our tribal college, not a bitter person at all. Her
name was Julia Genese. Our old--back here are familiar with
her, but her sons, she sent four of them to World War II. They
all were decorated. They all came back alive and well, very
patriotic people. They are part of that similar generation that
you guys just recognized, our code talkers. My grandpa and his
brothers were not code talkers, but they served with other
Native American code talkers.
These are people that did everything for this country. And
it is really an important thing, I think for us to kind of
recognize that. This happened because we were simply talking
our language, and practicing our religion, our spiritual
beliefs. And this did not happen very long ago, so I wanted to
just give this to you guys as well. So, with that, I am happy
to close, and answer any questions that the committee may have.
[The statement of Ryan Wilson follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Certainly. I thank the gentleman for his
statement, and I am sure there will be a number of questions. I
think I will start on this one.
Mr. Hall, a fantastic success, and I know you are
frustrated. I think I talked to you a number of years ago on
the permitting frustrations that you are having up there. But
you have made enormous progress--180,000 barrels a day. Are you
working with one primary, or are you working with a whole
number of independent petroleum producers, just a mix of folks?
And I am just curious about the royalties that you are able to
provide for your nation. How has that been working out?
Mr. Hall. Chairman, that is a great question, and it really
is a management issue, and it is boots on the ground. Oil does
not sleep. You have to manage it seven days a week, and we have
regular scheduled monthly meetings with all of our oil and gas
partners. So we look at it as a partnership, and it is a
triangle. You have the tribe, and its regulatory authority, and
its landowners, because we have allotments too. So we are 70
percent allotted, 30 percent tribal minerals, and then you have
the oil companies, and you have the Feds. So that triangle
really needs to be, you know, always looked at, discussed.
And so when we meet with the oil companies, we ask them,
you know, do you have any concerns in the permitting, in the
leasing on the rights of ways? And they will let us know,
because that is their job. That is their business, and they
will be very straightforward about--we have a backlog, they
will say, for example, in permits or right of ways. Then we ask
the Feds, and they may say, no, we do not have any backlog. So
then you have to get right down to, let us do a spreadsheet.
Every oil company, you let us know, is it a right of way,
and what is the land description? You know, is it for a well
pad, is it for a road, is it for a pipeline? What is it? And
then we put that on a spreadsheet, then we give it to the Feds,
the BIA, the BLM, all the Feds. And then we say, you said there
was no backlog, well, we say there is, here is the spreadsheet.
So we have to get right down to the science in order to cut
through all of the red tape, and then try to get success that
way. So it has been pretty successful for us to get through.
And I do have a copy of that Denver office, there are
copies of the resolution----
Mr. Calvert. Submit that for the record also, and----
Mr. Hall. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. We will look at it. Thank you.
Let's see. Other questions?
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Ms. McCollum. I have some.
Mr. Calvert. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have got a couple of
questions, and I am going to ask you gentlemen to help me get
through my questions by being brief.
So, Mr. Hall, you mentioned about doing propane.
Mr. Hall. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. So does that mean you will not be flaring
off? With all the flares, the Bakkan is lighting up larger than
the Twin Cities. We are a little unhappy about you showing up
bigger on a map than we do.
Mr. Hall. I saw that.
Ms. McCollum. So your intention is not to waste anything,
is that correct?
Mr. Hall. Right, absolutely, Congresswoman McCollum. We are
very concerned, and we are at 70 percent flaring, and it is
because there was no infrastructure in place. There was no
natural gas pipelines. And so we are at a feasibility stage to
do a study to see how much, you know, what location, and where
could a possible gathering system and a natural gas plant be
developed. And once we get to that stage, we are going to build
a natural gas plant and a power plant, and we are going to
start developing our own electricity using natural gas, and
maybe it is going to be co-gen with solar or wind----
Ms. McCollum. Um-hum.
Mr. Hall [continuing]. As well. And so that way it is
continuous power. There is no reason that Native homes, or any
home, should have to be at a shortage for propane or fuel, or
pay high electricity costs.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you. And propane prices were at record
high this year, as was pointed out in earlier testimony.
It is a shame that we would lose Native languages not only
just for the First Americans, but to lose the languages that
saved lives during World War II, and really, many would argue,
affected the outcome of World War II. What a shame for our
history, for our culture, to let that go.
The immersion schools that you are talking about, Mr.
Wilson, you have to have tribal input on the immersion schools.
The tribes would petition to do that, because you need
significant numbers of elders who can talk and speak the
language. We do immersion schools in public schools for French.
There is an immersion school for German not that far from my
house, ones for Spanish and many others. So this is not an
unusual concept to teach a language this way. But if you could
comment, one of the things that we found out at Leech Lake was,
that, without the immersion school, just doing the hour or two
isn't enough. At home, many of these children's parents were
not given the opportunity to learn their language, so there is
no reinforcement outside. That is why the immersion school is
more important, and it draws the parents in to learn the
language as well. Would you comment on that for a second?
Mr. Wilson. Well, that is a good model. And so what we are
saying is, because there is a moratorium on building and
creating new BIE schools is, we create these demonstration and
immersion magnet schools within existing schools. And so I laid
out the three schools that are already doing this that are
successful. It works. They have high parental involvement, high
professionals that are involved as well.
I think it is very important for this committee to
understand too that Secretary Jewell has asked for hundreds of
millions of dollars in new resources under the auspices of
saving national treasures, saving these historical sites, these
things. These are still living, and not only can they be saved,
and should they be saved, it is the best academic approach that
we have right now, and culturally based education, it is really
shown to work.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, if you will indulge me, I think
this will be a quick answer.
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Gipp, one of the things that I heard,
because we are close to the Bakkan too, is that Minnesota's
trade schools are having a hard time keeping teachers in
carpentry, in pipe fitting, and some of the other things that
they are asking for. These instructors can make so much more
money out on the field, but yet we still need young students.
So my two questions are, one, are you working with any of the
building trade councils around in your area to help with this,
and then two, will your law enforcement also include law
enforcement for natural resources?
Mr. Gipp. Right now, quick answer, excuse me, quick answer
on the impact on jobs, yes, we are having to be much more
competitive for teachers and instructors. We are looking for a
lot of retirees who would want to come out and teach. But, the
point being is we have to work with the associations. We have
to work with the unions. We work with employers as well to try
to set up more congruent partnerships. It is very critical, but
the competition is on for people, because they can go and make
much, much bigger money. That is the issue. As to the law
enforcement issue, that would be an element of the overall
curriculum that we hope to provide, if we had adequate support
for that effort.
I should add one more thing, Mr. Chairman, and members of
the committee. Chairman Hall is also a chairman of our Board of
Directors for the North Dakota and South Dakota tribes, so we
appreciate the help that they give us as well.
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman. I imagine there is almost
no unemployment up in North Dakota right now. Booming along.
Mr. Wilson. We do need the skills, though.
Mr. Gipp. Need the skills, right.
Mr. Simpson. And housing costs are a little expensive in
North Dakota now also.
Mr. Wilson. 2,700 a month.
Mr. Simpson. Ryan, thank you for being here today, and this
focus on education is very important, and these immersion
skills are, I think, vitally important to preserving a culture,
one that we cannot let die. And have you seen any improvement
to the Federal Government's support for Native languages and
preservation since the 2012 MIU between the BIE, the Department
of Education, and HHS?
Mr. Wilson. No, not at all. We have been on this slide, and
you can see it, one, just reading through the budgets, but also
through their application of No Child Left Behind, where they
are letting everybody else have waivers. That has not been the
case. And they are moving towards this unified AYP system. It
is very oppressive. And it is confusing in Indian Country,
because, one, they are managing the schools, and they are also
evaluating the schools, so it is like one finger talking to the
other and scolding each other.
Mr. Simpson. That is what I like to do with my wife.
Mr. Wilson. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I do not want to be one-
upped by Dr. Gipp, so I will also acknowledge Chairman Hall is
on our Board for National Alliance to Save Native Languages
also. But you guys could fix this in your report language. You
could fix this, and get us going in the right direction, and
let us close the deal that was started, you know, in the '60s
by Rough Rock.
Mr. Simpson. As I said, I went out to Fort Hall reservation
when they started this immersion school out there, which is
fascinating. I am going to go back either this spring, or
sometime--and see how they are getting along with it.
But, David, you mentioned that you want to start an officer
training program?
Mr. Gipp. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. Most of the tribal officers that I know now
on--I do not know if it is true across the country, but in
Idaho, anyway, they go to the State Academy----
Mr. Gipp. State Academies probably, yeah.
Mr. Simpson [continuing]. That helps, if they have gone to
the State Academy, to get cross-jurisdictional agreements in
place with counties. Are you worried that, if you start this
program, that they will not have gone through the State
approved program? What would you do to make sure that they
still have that ability to be recognized by the State? Because
part of this problem is allowing tribes to be able to manage
their own affairs on their own lands, and that means cross-
jurisdictional stuff between counties, and so forth.
Mr. Gipp. Right. Good question, Mr. Chairman. We are post-
Board approved by the State of North Dakota by the Attorney
General's Office, so in most cases, whether they are going to
another State or not, they will be accepted. The second thing
is we have conformed our curriculum to match up that of
Artesia's. What we need, though, is greater cooperation from
the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and that really is not happening
as it should be.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. Great. Just one other question, quickly,
if I could, and you can answer these probably pretty quickly,
Tex. Who owns the land of the reservations?
Mr. Hall. In the Southwest it is primarily tribal land. Up
in the Northern Plains, we are a combination of allotments, so
it is individual Indian trust allotments, which is 70 percent,
and then 30 percent tribals, so that is----
Mr. Simpson. But those allotments, you control the
reservation, and the laws on the laws on the reservation.
Mr. Hall. That is correct. The tribe has the regulatory
authority to, you know, to pass regulations for anything for
the oil and gas for water usage, flaring----
Mr. Simpson. Are you competent to make decisions of what is
in the best interest of your tribe on your own lands?
Mr. Hall. Absolutely, and we have a vested interest because
we live there. We drink the water, we breathe the air, and we
are going to pass it down to the next generation.
Mr. Simpson. That is what frustrates me, is we have so many
Federal agencies telling you what to do on your land, and I
think we have got to change that.
Mr. Hall. And they do not even live there. They are trying
to tell us from Washington, or from Denver, or wherever else.
Mr. Calvert. I thank this panel for your testimony. I
appreciate your coming out here today. Mr. Simpson is going to
take over for a couple of minutes while I have a little
meeting.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for being
here today. We appreciate it very much.
Next we have Mr. Ben Shelly, President of the Navajo
Nation, and Mr. Walter Phelps, Chairman of the Navajo Hopi Land
Commission.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Simpson, while the panel is coming up,
the Esther Martinez Language Revitalization Act needs to be
reauthorized. You know how sometimes we have problems in the
full committee when we go to give the resources out to the
right line item, and that has not been reauthorized yet. So we
should talk to the policy committee. I will on my side, if you
could on your side, please.
Mr. Simpson. Sure.
Thank you both for being here today. Ben, you are up first.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NAVAJO NATION
WITNESS
BEN SHELLY
Mr. Shelly. Wow. I should have been up before Tex Hall.
Just because he has oil does not mean he gets first crack. I
have more oil than he has. All right.
I would like to go ahead and continue testifying here to
you, Mr. Chairman, and also the committee, and Madam
Congresswoman, and all of you. Thank you for allowing us to
state our concerns, and bring a budget to you. My testimony
this morning will focus on five major budget topics, reflecting
the Navajo Nation Federal budget priority to strengthen
sovereignty.
The Navajo Nation, like the majority of the tribe, relies
heavily on Federal. Two thirds of our budget comes from the
Federal budget, through the 638 grants program. One thing I
would like to say is the Navajo Nation thanks this body for
recommending the full funding of contract support costs, and
that really helps quite a bit.
The first priority is natural resources. We talked about
natural resources here a while ago. The Navajo Nation advocates
for an increase in the natural resource management line item.
This is where the large land-based tribe can see real progress,
and we can progress. We have abundant natural resources, you
would not believe. Regulatory approval and permit requirements
have always been a burden. It is the red tape of the Federal
Government, and we cannot do it ourselves, always have to go to
the Federal Government for this. And this is something that is
really plaguing us at this point in time. Funding this line
item will allow us to use our resources the right ways, to
create jobs and revenue.
The second one is public safety and justice. We need to
safeguard our tribal laws and order. Assistant Tribe agreed
that this is a top priority. As you know, the ratio of police
on the reservation is one police officer for 10,000. In our
land, this is the size of West Virginia. Three states in the
Union were bigger than that. With other areas, there are 22
officers per 10,000, compared to ours, one officer per 10,000.
There are currently 280 commissioned officers on this
great, wonderful land of ours, 27,000 square mile Navajo
Nation. Our Tribal Court on the Navajo Nation are considered
the benchmark of Tribal Court system. We have the best courts,
judicial system, and it has been tested here. It has been
amended through the Congress here, and we had the best, we
believe that.
Despite being a 93-638 contract, the Navajo Nation funds
over 91 percent of the court costs, and the Federal Government
funds only eight percent. We cannot continue to operate--
critical piece of Federal law, such as the Tribal Law and Order
Act and Violence Against Women Act, without full support and
funding. The bipartisan Law and Order Commission released a
recent report to Congress recommending sufficient funds to be
directed to Indian Country law enforcement to address immediate
public safety needs. The Navajo Nation fully support the
finding of the commission, the administration public safety
recommendation to increase the overall public safety in just
this line item. Most of these increase goes to fire safety.
Third, health, for most of the Navajo Nation, IHS is the
only healthcare facility option. We ask that funding for IHS be
allocated, with the priority being facility and direct service.
One of the funding facility within the President's request is
the Kayenta Arizona Healthcare Center. We, with the completion
of this facility, will provide quality healthcare to over
19,000 people. The Navajo Nation support the proposed
opportunity growth and security initiative, which includes an
additional 200 million for construction of Indian Health.
Regarding education, more than a third of our tribal
citizens are younger than 18 years old. The Navajo Nation
awarded scholarship over 3,500 students, but received more than
17,000 applicants a year. We had to turn away 60 percent of
these seeking financial assistance. Some of the funding comes
from BIA higher education and grant program. Also, the money is
often delayed due to continued resolution. Whose fault is that
here? So when this happens, we get into a lot of mess. To fix
this problem, Congress should forward fund this line item.
Other educational programs operate this way. The Navajo
National fully supports the Administration proposal for the
ongoing evaluation of the Bureau of Indian Education System.
The Navajo Nation has the largest numbers of Federal funded
school, 66 out of 183, over a third. And we also support the
funding of the Johnson-O'Malley Program. The JOM Program serves
more than 49,000 eligible students, age through 12th grade, on
or near the Navajo Nation reservation.
Lastly, the Navajo Nation have critical environmental
needs. The Navajo Nation have faced many hurdle with burdens
and Federal regulation. Again, thanks--here. We ask that
resources be put forth to assist tribal coal basis. We have 200
years of coal, natural gas, and we have oil--to invest in both
cleaner coal technology, we are happy for that, and renewable
projects. We have a power plant. We own a coal mine now. We
would like to go to cleaner technology of coal.
Also, the Navajo Nation continues to live with the Cold War
legacy of uranium mining, as you have heard, that we endorsed
$1 billion that is going to clean up 49 uranium mines. Of the
up to nearly 500 abandoned uranium mine sites located
throughout the Navajo Nation, only one has been fully assessed.
The Navajo Nation requests the Federal Government fully fund
the ongoing five year plan conducted by the EPA in cleanup.
This is what is so bad about having papers. Where is my iPad?
Okay. We also ask for funding for long term comprehensive
health assessment, and research on the impact of uranium mining
on the Navajo Nation. There are over 100 left. 49 is just a
part of it.
In conclusion, the Navajo Nation subsidizes a majority of
the Federal trust responsibility. All of our general fund is to
subsidize Federal responsibilities, these Federal programs. It
is hurting us quite a bit. The priority outlines the Navajo
Nation seeks to strengthen the sacred trust relationship and
assist the Navajo Nation in promoting self-sufficient tribal
sovereignty.
The Navajo Nation has a lot of educated kids who are coming
back. Our young grandkids are coming back with Bachelor
Degrees, Master's Degrees. We have an abundance of young people
that can rebuild this nation. And they are talking. When I
listen to them talk, in 30 years to 40 years from now, the
Navajo Nation could declare independence as a state. And I
think this is what they are asking for, and right now is the
best time to start promoting self-sufficient true sovereignty
of a nation. Let us regulate ourselves. Let us be the landlord
of our reservation. Let us do what we need to do with our
natural resources to create jobs and revenue for our nation.
This is where we are at. We are growing. We will be a million
people that are all in the nation. So, again, this is the
vision of the young people, and I wanted to be here to endorse
their ideas, and I hope you do too.
And, again, thank you very much for listening to our
testimony here.
[The statement of Ben Shelly follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Next, Mr. Walter Phelps, Chairman of the Navajo Hopi Land
Commission.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NAVAJO HOPI LAND COMMISSION
WITNESS
WALTER PHELPS
Mr. Phelps. Chairman Calvert, honorable members of the
subcommittee, thank you this morning for giving us this
opportunity to provide testimony. On behalf of the Navajo Hopi
Land Commission of the Navajo Nation Council, my name is Walter
Phelps. I am Chair of the Navajo Hope Land Commission, and the
commission is entrusted with addressing ongoing effects of two
Federal actions, first, the relocation of Federal Government of
nearly 15,000 Navajos off their ancestral lands. Second, the
well-being of 12,000 Navajos living in the former Bennett
Freeze area, where a strict 40 year construction freeze left a
desperate need for rehabilitation and reconstruction. This past
year this subcommittee investigated the relocation program. We
thank you for your interest, and encourage your continued
oversight of the Office of the Navajo Hopi Indian Relocation.
The Office of Navajo Hopi Indian Relocation is relocating
approximately 10 to 12 families per year. There are
approximately 100 certified applicants awaiting relocation.
Perhaps 10 or so of these are in the contract stage, and can
expect a home in the next year. The rest will have to wait for
another decade. Meanwhile, we project at least another 100
families will be deemed eligible, perhaps more.
To address these long delays, in addition to the
President's request of approximately $8.5 million, we ask the
subcommittee to seriously consider an additional allocation of
$13 million to the Office of Navajo Hopi Indian Relocation for
the sole purpose of addressing and clearing up the backlog, so
that the additional money would explicitly be restricted for
building homes and related infrastructure. We also request a
GAO study of ways that ONHIR could be made more efficient, and
how it could be reoriented to focus on home construction,
rather than denying eligibility through a costly appeals
process.
As to the former Bennett Freeze area, we believe there is a
need for a sustained rehabilitation and reconstruction program
be implemented for a decade or more. Key needs including
housing, related infrastructure, solid waste facilities, fire
department facilities, telecommunication facilities, assisted
living centers for senior citizens, and improved community
facilities, such as cemeteries and recreation parks.
Finding resources for proper maintenance of roads within
each of these communities is a huge challenge. Similar to the
Promise Zone initiated under HUD, which benefits impoverished
communities in the U.S., the Land Commission continues to
advocate for a Navajo sovereignty empowerment designation. The
Navajo Nation asks the subcommittee to support an increase in
funding housing related improvements in the former Bennett
Freeze of $20 million in FY 2015.
We request that the subcommittee require the Department of
Interior to conduct a study and furnish a report regarding
lease payments due the Navajo Nation to the Hopi Tribe. The BIA
delayed for years making these determinations, resulting in
huge interest payment obligations on the part of Navajo Nation.
We would also ask that the subcommittee include report
language that would establish a DOI task force to undertake a
review of Interior programs, inclusive of the BIA Bureau of
Reclamation, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Services, Office of Surface Mining, that could assist the
Navajo Nation in creating jobs, support workforce development,
with the goal to strengthen the impact of Navajo chapters.
Additionally, the focus of rural water authority under
their reclamation was somewhat changed, effectively frustrating
ongoing collaborations working with the Navajo Nation's
initiatives involving rural water delivery. The Bureau of
Reclamation must continue work with the Navajo Nation to
complete studies on how it can bring resources of scale to the
Navajo Nation.
Although the Navajo Hopi land dispute and Bennett Freeze
are painful issues, I thank this subcommittee for this
opportunity to provide testimony on a path forward to ensure
that the many Navajo families who have suffered as a result of
these Federal actions can hope for a better life. Thank you.
[The statement of Walter Phelps follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his statement. I
apologize, I was out for a few minutes, so I missed most of
your statement, Mr. Shelly. I apologize for that. But I am just
curious, how many tribal members do you have now?
Mr. Shelly. We have a total of, off reservation, on
reservation, about 300,000. And we are foreseeing projecting
about 15,000--close to a million. So that is how fast we are
growing. And you cannot afford us when we get to a million, so
you better start doing something here right now.
Mr. Calvert. How many square miles is in the Navajo
reservation?
Mr. Shelly. 27,000 square miles.
Mr. Calvert. 27,000 square----
Mr. Shelly. Um-hum.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Miles. I have been on it a long
time ago now, but I want--get back over there. Okay. Some
questions? Ms. McCollum?
Ms. McCollum. Thank you. Mr. Shelly, there was recently,
and I think you alluded to it in your testimony, a settlement
of some of the cleanup for some of the uranium mining. Could
you gentlemen comment on that a little farther? I was at some
early meetings almost five years ago. Mr. Udall was leading
them, and we had to get Housing, and EPA, and everybody in a
room all around the table, because everybody was pointing
fingers with each other.
I know this does not address everything, but do you think
the process that we have in place is a good way forward? Any
suggestions or comments you might want to give the committee?
Mr. Shelly. Yeah. The $1 billion that came through, we have
been fighting for cleanup for years and years. This is an issue
that the Navajo Nations have been pursuing, and I am glad to
hear that some part of that settlement for the lawsuit, the
people that caused the contamination and the open pit mine,
have come through with a settlement from the judgment of $1
billion for 49 mines only. We have over 100 still out there
yet, and we are still faced with that. We have the EML, which
is subsidized by mined coal, and that is something that we
still need to have that coming through so that we can use that
money to clean up the rest of the 100.
One thing I would like to mention here is that this $1
billion for cleanup of 49 mines, we had a Superfund. We have
been training our Navajos to be qualified to work with uranium.
It is supposed to create jobs for the Navajo people, but we
have a Superfund that comes through that does training. We have
19 using Superfund, and we are trained by the people to handle
uranium. This is pertaining to Church Rock cleanup. That is the
general--going to do a cleanup. We are just waiting for a
permit to have to go-ahead to do it. So, again, through all
this program, Superfund training our Navajos to understand
uranium.
Believe it or not, we have a large deposit of uranium on
the Navajo reservation too. I do not put that in there, because
it is mandated that we do not talk about uranium. We outlawed
that. So maybe by educating our young people what uranium is
all about, and how to handle it, you might open the door for
paths. We have a rich ore. I will tell you, we are sitting on
one of those. So, again, it is a creation of jobs, and
educating our Navajo people about uranium, what they are. See,
right now it is unknown to them, so what they read in the paper
is what it is. So, again, thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Maybe the most honest statement that has ever
been made in Congress, you cannot afford us.
Mr. Shelly. We are all growing. Remember that, we
reproduce. The Lord says----
Mr. Simpson. I was going to make it out to the Navajo
reservation, I think it was the summer before last now, and it
got interrupted, and we did not get there. But it is a place I
still want to go, and I am sure members of the committee would
still like to go, and see it, and talk to you about it on site,
because you actually learn quite a bit when you are actually
out there, rather than talking about it right here.
Mr. Shelly. Call me.
Mr. Simpson. So if the committee does not go--and I have
talked with Chairman Calvert, and he is interested also. But
this is my question. I am still trying to wrap my head around
this Navajo Hopi land settlement and the commission. 8.5
million dollars is requested this year, plus you would like 13
million to address the backlog in one time funds. 8.5 million,
and we are relocating 10 to 12 families.
Mr. Phelps. Right.
Mr. Simpson. Either that is some really expensive homes, or
there is an awful lot of this money that is not being used to
build homes, but is being used in court.
Mr. Phelps. That is correct, sir.
Mr. Simpson. How do we change that? I have no problem
meeting our obligations, and building homes, and doing the
necessary things. I really hate spending money in court. How do
we address that so we can use the resources to actually do some
good?
Mr. Phelps. Am I allowed to answer?
Mr. Simpson. Yes. Please answer.
Mr. Calvert. The gentleman is recognized.
Mr. Phelps. Thank you, Honorable Simpson, for your
question. Yes, that is a big concern to us, because we see it
as, the focus of a government agency that was established to
relocate is now spending most of its time processing appeals,
and handling, you know, the applications that are being
submitted are all being challenged internally by the agency
itself. They have their own attorneys, they have their own
Judges, all internally, and that is a big concern to us. And
that is why we do support oversight, and maybe even the
appointment of a commissioner. There has not been a
commissioner for over 10 years or 15 years now. There needs to
be a commissioner appointed over the Hopi Indian Relocation
Office.
Mr. Simpson. Well, I look forward to working with you as we
try to resolve this, because I do not think anybody on this
committee has any problem with doing what we are obligated to
do.
Mr. Phelps. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson. But we would like the resources at a time of
decreasing budgets, and I am trying to find money to build new
schools among other things in Indian Country, so it is
disappointing to see so few homes being built with the amount
of money that we are putting into it, which gives us a
resistance to try to put more money into it.
Mr. Calvert. You should look into----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Some language----
Mr. Simpson. I look forward to working with you to solve
the problem.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah. Let us hope we streamline this process.
Okay. Mr. Moran.
Mr. Moran. No, I am good, just----
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Mr. Moran. I want to thank Mr. Simpson for raising the
issue. I mean, it just boggles the mind.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah. Hopefully we can come up with some
language, maybe, that will help that process be less crazy. I
appreciate the two of you being here today, and we look forward
to our next panel. Thank you very much.
Mr. Phelps. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Next is Mr. Michael Chavarria, Governor of the
Santa Clara Pueblo, and Mr. Fred Vallo, Senior, Governor of the
Acoma Pueblo.
Mr. Vallo. Acoma.
Mr. Calvert. Acoma Pueblo. Good morning.
Mr. Chavarria. Good morning.
Mr. Vallo. Good morning.
Mr. Calvert. We are operating under the five minute rule,
which we have been trying to stick to. So when the green light
is on, you are fine, and when the yellow light is on, you have
got one minute left. Kind of gives you the go, and slow down,
and stop, or hurry up, whatever way you want to look at it.
With that, Michael, you are recognized. Michael Chavarria,
Governor of the Santa Clara Pueblo.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
SANTA CLARA PUEBLO
WITNESS
MICHAEL CHAVARRIA
Mr. Chavarria. All right. Good morning, Chairman, members
of the committee. I appreciate the opportunity to testify
before you today. What I said in my native language, which is
Tewa, is thank you for the opportunity for being here, and
that, as we move forward, we work together on these various
issues, come together from the local agency here to Washington,
D.C.
My name is J. Michael Chavarria. I am the Governor of Santa
Clara Pueblo, but also serve as Chairman for the eight Northern
Indian Pueblos Council there in New Mexico. I will testify on
four areas this morning. First is the emergency disaster
funding, appropriations for the IHS joint venture construction
program. Talk a little bit on the Tribal Forest Protection Act,
stewardship contracting, and then IHS and BIA.
In the summer of 2011, Santa Clara Pueblo was impacted by
the Las Conchas Fire. At the time, in 2011, it was the largest
fire in New Mexico history. Although no lives were lost, many
of our traditional cultural properties, watershed, our
commercial timber, was impacted by the fire. Roughly 16,000
acres were impacted by this fire in 2011. The Santa Clara
Canyon is our spiritual sanctuary, a place that we hold dear to
our hearts.
Santa Clara Pueblo has been impacted by four fires over the
last decade. These fires stem from coming off the reservation,
and that is why we are looking into how do we get
appropriations for the stewardship contracting and Tribal
Forest Protection Act. This Act was enacted in 2004. Public Law
108-278 authorizes the Secretaries of Agriculture and Interior
to give special consideration to tribally proposed stewardship
contracting on Forest Service or BLM lands which border, or are
adjacent to, Indian trust land to protect the Indian trust
resource from fire, disease, and other threats coming from
forests and BLM lands.
The stewardship contracting is very important to empower
the tribes as a caretaker to protect the tribal lands, but also
the traditional cultural properties from future impacts, such
as fire, so we urge the committee to support the expansion and
appropriations of this program, both at the Department of
Agriculture and the Interior.
Santa Clara Pueblo is also engaged in discussions with the
Indian Health Service, or Santa Fe Service Unit, in Santa Fe,
New Mexico, talking about refunding the joint venture
construction program for the Indian Health Service. From 2007
to 2009, our annual patient visits at the Health Center in
Santa Clara, from 2007 was 14,878, and in 2009, jumped up to
27,000, roughly 87 percent. Our little facility is not in a
position to handle those extra patients coming to the Santa
Clara Health Center. Santa Clara is looking at constructing a
new health facility, however, we need some funding in the joint
venture program which will provide the IHS to provide staffing
for this facility.
Right now our staffing needs is very important. We do have
an adult day care regional facility there in Santa Clara
Pueblo, but in order to help grandma and grandpa, and our
constituents, we do need an additional health care facility to
cover those 87 percent of additional patients we are seeing.
Right now Santa Clara Pueblo has retained consultants to give
us advice and to design a new facility.
And then, also, looking at the least payments, I know right
now there is a joint venture program. If the tribe builds it,
there are staffing needs, but yet the tribe cannot recoup any
costs through any type of lease payments through this joint
venture program.
The Tribal Forest Protection Act, as I mentioned, is very
important. This is going to protect our future remaining green
stands of timber, the impact of our commercial forest. So right
now we still face the imminent threat of flooding. We have four
Presidential disaster declarations there Santa Clara Pueblo,
totaling $200 million. Our match is almost $10 million to cover
those four disasters. Right now, working with FEMA, we are part
of the National Disaster Recovery Framework, NDRF. This
framework helps to then bring in all the agencies, utilizing
their existing authorities within to help support these
mitigation efforts on behalf of the Pueblo.
My biggest need today is a temporary dam to be constructed
through the advance measures program from the Corps of
Engineers as a temporary type of structure, which is $40
million. Through this advance measures program, within the
existing authority of the Corps, hopefully allow, then, the
Pueblo to build this facility at 100 percent Federally funded.
As I mentioned, if we add on another 40 million, that
brings us now to $240 million in damages. My tribe is in a
financial hardship at this time. We have also partnered with
the Corps to the 205 authority, to the 203 authority. We looked
at various existing authorities within. One of the things we
are looking at, though, is through WRDA, Water Resources
Development Act, is to see if there are any languages to then
limit that cost match, or find out how the tribe can be in a
position to cover these type of costs.
We are in a life and death situation. I do not know what to
expect, knock on wood, this upcoming what we call monsoon
season, from July through September. But with the Corps, what
they say a 100 year flood event, 20,000 cubic feet per second
coming down a little creek, while on a given day, it is only
five to seven cubic feet per second. So where is that other
additional 12,000 CFS going to go? Well, that is going to
impact our adult day care center, our tribal government, our
Head Start, our day school, community members, where they do
not have any type of flood insurance.
So it is very important that we look at these different
authorities that we do have as a trustee from the Federal
agencies to support our needs there in Santa Clara Pueblo. We
appreciate the 100 percent of the contract support cost to
support the BIA and IHS, however, I feel that we need new
monies to be appropriated, because right now it was given back
to both IHS and BIA to look at the 100 percent coming from the
direct funding we got in the current FY '14 budget. So I think
we need to find new ways of how do we get new monies in there,
because we have got to take within our direct budgets, we are
not in a position to adequately provide the program services--
--
Mr. Calvert. We will take a look at that.
Mr. Chavarria. And I thank you.
[The statement of Michael Chavarria follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I appreciate your opening statement.
Next, Mr. Fred Vallo, Senior. You are recognized.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ACOMA PUEBLO
WITNESS
FRED VALLO, SR.
Mr. Vallo. Thank you, Chairman. I just have a small
presentation this morning. You have received my written
statements, and there is more detail in that written statement.
However, I do want to express that I represent a small tribe of
Pueblo in Southwest New Mexico, the Pueblo of Acoma, and,
contrary to the Navajo Nation, you can still afford us. I
represent about 4,800 of my tribal members, and my governorship
is appointed. I am not a politician. I do not run for the
office. It is just, you are it this year, so I am it.
Thank you again, Chairman Calvert, and members of the
committee, for this opportunity to testify before your
subcommittee. As this subcommittee understands, the
relationship between the United States and the tribes is
unique. Because of the course of history, there has arisen a
trust responsibility on behalf of the United States to
supporting Native tribes in our efforts to develop and maintain
thriving, healthy communities, as you have heard my brothers
from other tribal nations. Regrettably, that responsibility has
not been fully met.
Although I would like to thank this subcommittee for
frequently proposing increased funding levels for Federal
Indian programs, I ask again the subcommittee to consider what
it would take to fully meet that responsibility and to stand
strong in defense of America's first commitment, which is to
its native peoples.
Tribes are not like any other groups within American
society. We are sovereign governments, and have a government to
government relationship with the United States. I do not know
if you know this, every Pueblo governor carries a cane from
Abraham Lincoln which was specifically presented to the
governors 150 years ago to acknowledge our sovereign authority
over our lands and our people. This was carried over as a
symbol and affirmation from the Spanish government, and the
Mexican government, and then the United States. The cane is a
symbol of our status and the commitment of the United States to
protect and respect our sovereign rights, as well as to support
the well-being of our communities. That commitment is also
embodied in the Federal budget.
I would like to emphasize several points, and there are
more specifics in my written testimony as well. First, BIA
funding has declined as a percentage of overall Federal budget
since 1995, at 35 percent. In years of plenty, we received
smaller increases. Now we must bear the full burden of
sequestration.
Second, we need support to address crumbling infrastructure
and build critical new infrastructure. Acoma is bisected by a
major transcontinental rail line, with over 80 freight trains
and various passenger trains passing through the reservation
every day, but no bridge over the tracks. Acoma has experienced
significant safety issues, as the hospital and the other
emergency response folks are on the other side of the tracks,
while the school, the Head Start, and main communities are
located on the southern part of the railroad tracks.
Third, the smaller IHS hospitals are the front line of
healthcare in Indian Country, and need your support. Acoma's
health facility provides critical care services to the Pueblos
of Laguna and Acoma, as well as some of the Navajo Nation's
small communities. However, the quality and quantity of
services offered at this facility has declined markedly in
recent years, resulting in an adverse effect on the health
status of the Pueblos, which already suffer from high rates of
diabetes, and other serious medical conditions. The sequester
only make this much worse.
Fourth, there is a need to increase funding for cultural
preservation before irreversible development errors are made.
For example, Acoma remains deeply concerned about the potential
impact of renewed uranium mining on Mount Taylor, a mountain
sacred to the Acoma people, and some of the neighbor tribes.
Acoma believes that the mining companies in the United States
have an ongoing obligation to clean up the environmental damage
created by past uranium mining. Also, it is very important to
increase funding to the tribal historic preservation office
program within the National Park Service to assure cultural
preservation issues are fully addressed, especially when
massive development is proposed.
Fifth, the Johnson-O'Malley Program provides supplementary
educational programs for Indian children attending public
schools by promoting student achievement, and incorporating
Native American languages, and culturally based educational
activities into the learning process. This is a worthy program,
and should be fully funded. Finally, the Acoma supports the
Carcieri fix, even though we are not directly affected by this
issue.
In conclusion, I would like to thank you for this
opportunity to provide testimony before this Subcommittee. Your
work is of great importance to America's Native peoples, and is
greatly appreciated. Thank you very much.
[The statement of Fred Vallo, Sr. follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. Mr.--
am I pronouncing your name correctly--Chavarria?
Mr. Chavarria. That is correct.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Temporary dam, I have worked with the
Corps of Engineers, and Mr. Simpson over the years, he chairs
the Energy and Water Committee, but----
Mr. Chavarria. Um-hum.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. I cannot imagine the Corps of
Engineers doing anything less than a permanent dam as a
temporary dam. That is probably one of the problems you are
enduring, because they have to build it for the worst case
scenario, supposedly.
Mr. Chavarria. That is correct.
Mr. Calvert. So a temporary dam, in effect, would be a----
Mr. Chavarria. Permanent.
Mr. Calvert. Permanent facility, wouldn't it?
Mr. Chavarria. Yeah. That is where we are kind of going,
because of the life expectancy, 20 years. So 20 years or less,
it will be a temporary. 20 years or more, it will be a
permanent, just depending on the stabilization of the
environment.
Mr. Calvert. So why are you referring to it as a temporary
dam?
Mr. Chavarria. Because right now that is the terminology we
are using to get the advance measures program to fund 100
percent of the funding.
Mr. Calvert. Does the Corps refer to it as a temporary
facility also?
Mr. Chavarria. They referred to it as a temporary, but now
they are switching to a permanent type of structure because of
the life expectancy of that dam.
Mr. Calvert. I see. Any other questions for this panel? Ms.
McCollum?
Ms. McCollum. Along that line, if I understood correctly,
if the dam is temporary, there is one funding stream; if it is
permanent, it is another funding stream; and you would be best
served out of the temporary funding stream because your cost
share would be different?
Mr. Chavarria. That is correct. 100 percent if it is
temporary, 25 percent if it is full, or permanent.
Ms. McCollum. Wow.
Mr. Chavarria. In addition to the 200 million that we have
already sustained in damages. That is why we want it temporary.
Mr. Calvert. If the gentlelady would yield, is there money
coming out of FEMA for this?
Mr. Chavarria. This is 100 percent under the advance
measures program under the Corps. The other program, 200
million, is coming under FEMA, to them do our match at the 25
percent.
Mr. Calvert. I see. Interesting.
Mr. Chavarria. And right now, because there is no type of
structure between 25 miles in our community, that is why we are
looking at a temporary type of facility, 24/7 type of
operation, to have this in place before the next monsoon
season, to protect our community.
Ms. McCollum. On the property, when the forest fire went
through, sometimes forest fires burn everything clear,
sometimes things are left that can become tinder again. Do you
need help with cleaning anything up in case another fire came
through, or is there funding available for you for that?
Mr. Chavarria. Yes, we do, and that is why that stewardship
contracting, the Tribal Forest Protection Act, would be very
important, because those are adjacent to our land. Right now we
did get some emergency funding through BIA for emergency
stabilization, but because we have not seen any stabilization,
we are in a position to request additional funds. Right now,
with such a high burn intensity fire, it is just all down to
bedrock. There is not even no sediment.
Ms. McCollum. Okay. Thank you. And to the governor of
Acoma, Mr. Vallo, we were out there, so we saw the division
with the railroad tracks. I was on the city council of a city
that, when it was first built, was divided literally in half by
railroad tracks, same thing that you are talking about. Now it
is a freeway. It took us 46 years, but we finally got a bridge
across for our emergency vehicles. Has there been any movement,
any discussion at all, in the transportation departments that
you work with about providing a bridge?
Mr. Vallo. We are planning a bridge across one part of our
lands, and we have the New Mexico Department of Transportation
that--highways, as well as the railway assisting in our plans
to build a bridge. So we are inviting folks from all over,
hopefully funders, that will make this come true. We invite you
as well to a forum we are having in August to talk about the
bridge. And it is going to be costly. So far it is running
around 28 million, but it will really provide for access to our
hospital, and other emergency vehicles. So it is something that
is greatly needed.
Ms. McCollum. So, sir, we are seeing a vast increase in
rail transportation in my part of the country. Are you seeing
the frequency of the trains coming closer and closer together,
or trains being longer than in the past?
Mr. Vallo. We have. There is all kinds of activity on the
railway. There are cars of oil, more oil coming through there.
There is more coal coming mainly through the west, looks like,
and there is a lot of activity. The study of 80 trains per day
was done two years ago.
Ms. McCollum. So it is going to be higher than that now?
Mr. Vallo. It is probably much higher----
Ms. McCollum. And maybe the trains themselves even longer,
as well as more of them?
Mr. Vallo. Yes. I believe they are limited to, like, a two
mile----
Ms. McCollum. Right.
Mr. Vallo [continuing]. Stretch.
Ms. McCollum. Right. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Schuster is working on a freight movement
section in his bill that hopefully he is going to have up next
year. I doubt if we get it done this year. Mr. Simpson?
Mr. Simpson. I would just say what we need is restoration
dollars for those fire ravaged areas across the country. And,
unfortunately, with the way we currently fund wildfires, we use
all the funds to do restoration and hazardous fuels, reduction,
and everything else fighting the wildfires. So there is
actually a bill in Congress to try to address that. Anyway----
Mr. Calvert. CBO apparently sent it to----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Fiscal----
Mr. Simpson. CBO said it is a neutral score. All we are
trying to do is manage the account differently.
Mr. Chavarria. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. But that is neither here nor there.
Stewardship contracting, I had not thought about that before,
but it is a program that we tried to get authorized again, and
again, and again, but, because of the way we score things
around here, it was almost impossible to do. But in the Farm
Bill they made that permanent, didn't they? I thought it was
permanent for stewardship contracting in the future. I thought
it went beyond one year. Yeah.
And the main reason is, if you are going to go out and do
stewardship contracting, it is a multiple year, that is
correct, sort of thing. But I would think that would be a very
valuable thing, for tribes to be able to enter into MOUs with
the Forest Service, or BLM, or whoever are the adjacent
property owners to actually do some management, and you might
find other partners that want to participate also, whether they
are environmental groups, whether it is a local county, or
something like that. I think this has some opportunity to be
very, very beneficial to how we manage these public lands,
particularly around the reservations, but also in general.
So that is an interesting concept that you brought up. I
had not thought about it with the concept of a tribe doing a
stewardship contracting provision.
Mr. Chavarria. Yes, Chairman of the Committee. Right now we
do have some management within the Valles Caldera, same type of
situation for a beaver habitat restoration. And so our thing is
just go to ahead on the forest lands and BLM just to do the
hazardous fuel reduction, but looking at the protection of the
traditional cultural properties on the watershed that we still
have the----
Mr. Calvert. Do you have any beavers down there?
Mr. Chavarria. We have beavers.
Mr. Calvert. Do you really?
Mr. Chavarria. Yes. Valles Caldera is 10,000 elevation----
Mr. Calvert. Yeah.
Mr. Chavarria [continuing]. And so, because of this fire,
it wiped out both our projects on the reservation and in the
Valles Caldera, so it is a matter of going back and doing the
restoration efforts. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you both for being here today. I
appreciate it very much.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you both for being here, and we
appreciate all our panelists today, and we will come back to
order two o'clock. Thank you.
Mr. Chavarria. All right. Thank you.
Monday, April 7, 2014.
AFTERNOON SESSION
Mr. Calvert. The hearing will please come to order.
Good afternoon, and welcome to the second of four public
witness hearings over the next two days, specifically for
American Indian and Alaskan Native programs under the
jurisdiction of the Interior and Environment Appropriations
Subcommittee. I especially want to welcome the distinguished
tribal elders and leaders testifying today, and in the
audience. I can assure you that your voices are heard and that
this Subcommittee will continue to be as responsive to your
concerns as possible. Even though the wheels of change turn
much slower around here than we would like, I would ask that
you continue to communicate with the Subcommittee throughout
the budget process, not just for the 5 minutes we have here
today. And you probably know that because of the large number
of Native Americans that have come to the Nation's capital, we
are operating under a 5-minute rule so we can hear from all the
witnesses and then have hopefully some time for some questions
after your testimony. So when the green light is on, that means
that you have gone through 4 minutes. When the yellow light is
on, that means you have a minute left to finish your testimony.
So we would appreciate if everybody tries to stay within that
timeline. And with that, the first person I am going to
recognize is Mr. Moran, the Ranking Member.
Mr. Moran. I think we should move on. We are here to listen
to the people we are elected to serve on this Committee, so
let's just move ahead with the witness testimony. It has been
very good and compelling, and I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for
having--enabling all of these tribes to have a hearing. There
was a time when they didn't all get an opportunity to speak
before the Subcommittee. I appreciate your accommodating all of
them. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. I appreciate that. Thank you. Ms. Angela
Barney Nez, Executive Director of the, and if I pronounce this
correctly, Dine Bi Olta School Board Association. Close?
Ms. Nez. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, good. Thank you. You are recognized for
5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
DINE BI OLTA SCHOOL BOARD ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
ANGELA BARNEY NEZ
Ms. Nez. Thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Angela Barney
Nez----
Mr. Calvert. Is the red light on? Push that button.
Ms. Nez. Okay. My name is Angela Barney Nez. I am the
Director for the Dine Bi Olta School Board Association. We are
an organization that represents the local community school
boards on the Navajo Nation. There are currently 66 federally
funded schools, and 34 of them are operated by a grant.
My testimony will focus on four areas and not specifically
a comprehensive look at the fiscal year 2015 budget. However,
we would like to report that we expect the Interior is
requesting a mere 1.3 percent increase in BIA in a year when we
are trying to rebuild from the damaging effects of
sequestration.
But first I would like to talk about, Mr. Chair, is
administrative cost grants, and Dine Bi Olta School Board
Association respectfully requests that $73.3 million is
appreciated. However, it is not enough to meet the needs of the
schools in this budget category.
BIE realignment, Mr. Chair and Committee Members, Dine Bi
Olta respectfully requests the Committee provide oversight to
ensure the Department of Interior plans for restructuring the
management and support services of the BIA and the BIE are
consistent with the authorizing statute. And under Education
Program Enhancement, the BIE has received $12 million for year
for several years to provide technical assistance to the
schools. The Dine Bi Olta School Board Association requests
that the committee specify no less than $5 million for the
funding for education programming enhancements to be set aside
for contracting with tribes and tribal organizations for the
establishment of federal tribal partnerships. More detail can
be found in the written testimony.
The next area is Education Program Evaluation. The Bureau
is requesting $1 million in fiscal year 2015 for an evaluation
of the care or education programs. We have no information at
this time regarding the focus of that evaluation. However, the
Dine Bi Olta School Board Association requests that two areas
be a focus in the evaluation. One is to look at successes in
Indian education, successes over failure. The next one is to
review of compliance with the Bureau's implementation of the
applicable statutes. We are of the belief that the Bureau is in
many ways, in many respects, in violation of both the letter
and the spirit of the law. We further believe that going by
with such violations in the past has created an environment
where the Bureau is emboldened to expend the violations in the
future.
I would like to add in my testimony, Mr. Chair and members
of the committee, a congressional record of the fiscal year
2014 budget that was approved, and in the Interior budget is
the BIA and the BIE funding lumped together.
Mr. Calvert. All your comments and additional information
will be entered into the record with unanimous consents.
Ms. Nez. Okay, but there is a prohibition of--funded
programs, funding to be used for their turnaround project which
is in effect, the Bureau is implementing the turnaround project
in our federally operated schools on the Navajo Nation. And we
have serious concerns regarding the violation of what the
Bureau is exercising and implementing with this fund. We want
that to be on the record, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
[The statement of Angela Barney Nez follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. The gentlelady is finished with her
testimony, and so our next witness is Earl Apachito.
Mr. Apachito. Apachito.
Mr. Calvert. Apachito. Thank you. Board President,
Association of Navajo Community Controlled School Boards. I
will get the names down. Thank you.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ASSOCIATION OF NAVAJO COMMUNITY CONTROLLED SCHOOL BOARDS
WITNESS
EARL APACHITO
Mr. Apachito. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, and members of the
Subcommittee. My name is Earl Apachito. I am from Alamo, New
Mexico, and also the president of the Association of Navajo
Community Controlled School.
The Association of the Community Controlled School Boards
is incorporated, is an organization of 11 school boards who
operate federally funded schools on their Navajo Reservation in
Arizona and New Mexico under contracts and grants from the
Bureau of Indian Education.
Today I would like to go over a topic on Indian School
Equalization Formula. ISEF is the core budget account for
Indian and education and residential program of the BIE
elementary and secondary schools and dormitories. These funds
are used for instructional programs at BIE-funded schools and
residential programs and dormitories and include salaries of
teachers, educational technicians, principals and other school-
level program administration, kitchen and dormitory staff. The
ISEF amount due to each school is determined by the statutory
mandates formula established by regulation 24 C.F.R.
During the 8-year period of fiscal year 2003 to fiscal year
2010, the ISEF account increases by the amount of $45 million,
but only 2 years of those, fiscal years 2009 and 2010. The
increase was actually an increase in programs funding. For the
other years the requested increase were limited to accounts
needed for fixed costs and related changes as opposed to actual
program increases. For most Bureau-funded schools, the chronic
shortfall in their key school amounts has a negative impact on
ISEF fundings because ISEF fundings are most often reverted to
make up the shortfalls in the other accounts, school
transportation facilities, tribal support costs, from the
administrative costs, et cetera. When the tribe or tribal
school has no other source of revenue to satisfy those
shortfalls, this means fewer dollars are available for
education and residential program.
Association of Community Controlled School Board members,
schools respectfully requesting a full funding of ISEF at $431
million or above the fiscal year 2010 in the Act level of
$391.7 million.
I thank you, Mr. Chair.
[The statement of Earl Apachito follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. Next,
Mr. Jeffrey Mike, President of the Board, the Pinion Community
School District of the Navajo Indian Reservation. Sir, you are
recognized.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
PINION COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT, NAVAJO INDIAN RESERVATION
WITNESS
JEFFREY MIKE
Mr. Mike. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, and
Members of the Subcommittee. My name is Jeffrey Mike, and as
you pointed out I am on the Board of the Pinion Community
School, and I will be presenting our testimony.
I wish to note the following specific critical areas of
funding need for Pinion Community Schools and other schools
within the BIA school system which are not included in the
Bureau of Indian Education's fiscal year 2015 funding. Denoted
from the requests are essential for our students to achieve
academic success to address the real educational issues facing
our and other Native American communities and for us to operate
our school safely and responsibly.
There are seven items I would like to--that are here, but I
will focus on three.
One is fully fund our actual transportation needs. Almost
all of the roads serving PCS and most of the schools within the
Navajo Nation are poorly maintained, dirt roads that are
frequently impassable, especially during the winter and spring
months. Our buses must be 4-wheel drive, and even so equipped,
regularly get stuck in the mud and mire. This creates an
extremely arduous and dangerous scenario for our Kindergarten
and other students. Some of our students are picked up at 5:30
in the morning and dropped off again at their homes at 5:00 in
the evening. No other group of students in the United States is
subjected to this kind of shameful treatment.
Due to the underfunding of our actual needs, we cannot
procure sufficient buses, towing vehicles or safety vehicles as
needed for these conditions. Operating an educational home
living program under these conditions is sometimes harrowing
and always frustrating. Of course, there is a larger problem of
the pathetic infrastructure resulting from years of BIA roads
department neglect and under-construction.
While greater funding for BIA road development cannot be
part of my present request, it is essential to a full
resolution of this problem. We immediately need an additional
$250,000 to address our transportation shortfall.
Two, funding for pilot alternative school. There are a
large number of high-school age young adults in the forgotten
population on the streets of the Pinion Community School and
across the Navajo Nation because they have either dropped out,
been expelled, suspended or otherwise rejected by other high
schools in the geographic area, and there are no alternatives
for this sector of our population. This forgotten population
appear to have a connection with increasing problems in the
community with gangs, drugs, drug trading, shooting, domestic
violence, break-ins and other criminal and social disorder.
This forgotten population appears related to a growing
community dysfunction which is causing increased general
concern and fear. We know that both problems arise from the
community's failure to meet the needs of this forgotten
population. There are no coordinated efforts of agencies or
entities serving Pinion to effectually respond to this group.
Our principal has examined this issue and feels a holistic
intervention program for this group of forgotten youth is
needed.
The concept to develop an alternative school that would
include online courses, teachers on site, counseling
technicians available and the possibility of residential
opportunities. The program would be focused on the needs of
this group, the forgotten population, and it would be based on
Navajo language, culture, counseling, traditional boundaries
and principles.
Pinion Community School may have facilities available that
could be segregated for this alternative school and provide the
basic infrastructure for alternative school. Funding is needed
to initiate this pilot program. We are requesting a special
funding of $15 million to initiate this pilot program with the
strong belief that we can develop a response to this nationwide
program. Development of a model could be an answer for a great
many Native American communities facing this problem.
Number three, conversion of uninhabitable housing. There is
crumbling housing surrounding the PCS campus. It cannot be
inhabited, and it cannot reasonably be repaired or remodeled.
However, conversations with agency personnel, the agency
personnel have noted that the foundations could be salvaged and
the buildings converted into useful school buildings which
could house, among other things, the alternative school program
noted above. It is estimated that renovation of this former
housing would require approximately $10 million, and it would
not only remove a safety hazard and an eyesore but also provide
the needed infrastructure for the above-described alternative
school and other PCS programs.
In conclusion, the Native American Educational Improvement
Act of 2001, this Congress stated that PCS and other BIE
schools were the sole responsibility of the Federal Government,
and the Federal Government would provide schools of the highest
quality. These high-sounding phrases are shamefully hollow and
not supported by action. We request the above action and bring
an end to hollow promises.
[The statement of Jeffrey Mike follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. Next,
Mr. Ron Gishey, a member of the Board, the Rough Rock Community
Schools.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ROUGH ROCK COMMUNITY SCHOOLS
WITNESS
RONALD GISHEY
Mr. Gishey. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and good afternoon, and
Subcommittee. My name is Ronald Gishey. I am the school board
members on behalf of the Navajo Rough Rock Community School.
The Rough Rock Community School is the oldest tribal
operating school in the United States, and our school has been
in continuous service since the founding after 1966. We operate
a K to 12 education program and dormitory program for the
students in the grades 1 to 12.
Rough Rock is primarily funded through the appropriation
from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, has provided Tribal
Controlled School Act under Public Law 100-297. We operate
under the authority of our local school board, and accordingly
for Navajo--we set a high standard and challenge our students.
Our education program integrates unique horsemanship program
and study with the modern-day technology. The learning has
inspired and motivate our student. The horsemanship is very
important and very helpful for our student that develop the
discipline for success.
To the Rough Rock Community School to increasing the
funding to meet the student transportation challenges. Our
location, school is very remote area. Almost all of our
students needs to travel a long distance by the bus to attend
the school. Our transportation programs are vital to success
for students is a top priority in our community.
For this reason, I am here with the Transportation
Director, Lucius Sells. He is sitting in the room. For each
day, Mr. Sells oversees the school bus service to cover 878
miles in six directions to transporting the students in the
evening and the morning. Extra-curricular activities extend
this responsibility even more, such as the sports program over
three seasons and the basketball and the football and many
other sports, and even students' school trip. And in the
typical school year, we travel enough miles on our bus to
circle maybe seven times on the Earth. Our student travels
unimproved roads which means there are not even great roads,
just the bare dirt.
During rain or snow it makes it nearly impossible to travel
on these roads. It has been like that for the 7 years, and talk
about road improvement. That is not such or any have been done
yet to the road improvement such as a gravel road or installing
the culvert. When it rains, a quarter of our students can't
make it to the school.
Our school is judged on the academic yearly progress which
takes into account daily attendance. Our school has been left
behind due to the weather. This is a problem that can be solved
with the gravel and a road grader.
No other students in America must miss the school when it
rains because their buses can pick them up. Our remote location
and a poor road condition add to the cost only for the fuel and
wear and tear in our vehicle. The fact that the closest repair
shop for our buses is more than 2 hours away from Rough Rock,
Arizona, to Gallup, New Mexico, and one way is 170 miles and
two ways is 240 miles just for the bus service.
The shortfall for the student transportation service
virtually impact this classroom program. We need funding
increase. As you know the tribal received in the Construction
Fund from the Highway Trust Fund Account with proceedings from
the gas tax. Road maintenance funding, however, is the
responsibility for the Secretary of the Interior, and the
only--the Bureau of Indian Affairs--testified the BIA has a--
deferred the needs of the tribal roads at $240 million. This
year the BIA requested only $240.4 million for the road
maintenance, only $158,000 more than last year and the level.
This is even 10 percent of the Agency own estimate which means
it is discontinued and--the student on a dangerous road just to
get to the classroom.
We need increased funding for the road maintenance and the
student transportation safe and passable route to the school to
vital for our students' education achievement. We urge Congress
to adopt a major--direct transportation funds toward their own
school bus route on the Navajo Reservation to have our children
to get to the school safely.
We need funding to the best way to be ensure that our
students excel in all subjects by providing them with the early
and continue emerging and native language. For this reason,
Rough Rock Community School support the Congress' calling
Native Language Emersion Student Achievement Act, H.R. 4214.
Rough Rock has offered a Navajo land emersion program in the
elementary school for many years. The student in program
performs better and all their course, non-language class,
science, math and the reading. The language programs not only
provide the student with the vital link to their heritage and
culture but learning the Navajo enabled them to success in
their education overhaul.
We call the Subcommittee to increase the funding to
language programs. These programs are provided to be a
fundamental part of the improving Navajo education overhaul.
The program has proved to be a great stepping stone to help the
student success in the core subjects such as science and math,
et cetera, and related area, even to the language instruction
has ended.
School facility. School facility is meant to be a welcome,
safe and healthy place to learn. Any school at the Rough Rock
School should be no different. But reality, our school are
older, more worn down, less safe than the other school in the
Nation. According to the GAO report in 2001, 65 percent of BIA
school and 76 percent of BIA dormitories suffered from less-
than-adequate conditions. Unfortunately, this 13-year-old GAO
report paint an accurate picture of the Rough Rock and other
BIA school today. Our administration built back in the early
1900s, and it is not currently safe for the staff and they have
no other place to work. Yet the administration purports to
reduce the school facility construction funding by $3 million
this year.
As you consider the administration's request, please
remember the other federally funded school system. Department
of Defense school system was awarded to special--building
school to repair and replace appropriately. As a matter of
fundamental fairness, would the BIA school system deserve a
similar consideration? We asked the student and the staff to
live, work and learn at the school in the condition with the
appearance of administration and--with nothing--to. This cannot
be allowed to continue. The tribal grant costs in ISEF, the BIA
budget requests a tribal grant supported costs would not only
45 percent--tribal grant support costs fund have been reduced
by 20 percent in the 4 years. This decrease is taking place at
the same time of the course program funding from ISEF. This has
been declined by other BIA schools, and we have to sacrifice
this essential materials, staff or student service in order to
operate within this reduced budget.
A fully funded tribal grant support costs would increase
ISEF which is essential to all affected and deliver a quality
education served to our Navajo student. Thank you,
consideration to----
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. I
appreciate it.
Mr. Gishey. Thank you.
[The statement of Ronald Gishey follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I have a few minutes for questions. I have a
comment first. We told the BIE not to do that turnaround
projection fiscal year 2014 because the feedback we receive in
these hearings, and your testimony last year and now again this
year. We will take this allegation seriously. We will look into
this matter immediately and see if we can't get a change on
that as quickly as possible.
Any questions, Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. No.
Mr. Calvert. Other questions? Betty.
Ms. McCollum. More of a comment. I was on a school bus with
Mr. Simpson in parts of the Dakotas. We have heard again today
about funding for the roads and the schools, as well as the
roads and healthcare. You can't take them apart and the
transportation costs for maintaining these buses. So maybe we
can figure out something in language directing the Bureau to
account for what is going on between the roads and the schools
and how much is being spent on transportation so you get a
better handle on it. And then maybe we can do a push for roads.
Mr. Simpson. If I could, Mr. Chairman? Do you get any
funding from the state to maintain roads on the reservation?
Mr. Apachito. None.
Mr. Simpson. None?
Mr. Apachito. None.
Mr. Simpson. Okay.
Mr. Gishey. The county provides the funds, but that is not
covered the mileage. It just covered just a few miles.
Mr. Gishey. Yeah.
Mr. Calvert. And these are mostly gravel roads?
Mr. Gishey. Yeah, it is a dirt road.
Mr. Simpson. If they have gravel.
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Mr. Simpson. The challenge is--I know you mentioned you
need $250,000, and the challenge for this committee as we hear
this testimony all the time is we can't appropriate $250,000
for you to do that because that would be kind of an earmark. We
have been banned from doing those kind of things. And the
question, what would the need be to appropriate money for a
roads program that was general within the BIA that would
actually get down to you to actually do those projects? When we
appropriate it to the BIA, does it ever get down to you to
actually do that work?
Mr. Calvert. That is the problem.
Mr. Mike. In our area, we have been told BIA can only
maintain or grade roads 15 miles, each road that they are
responsible for each March. And we have over 100-some miles of
roads in our area. One tractor, it is only 15 miles that we can
do so they can improve grade or whatever.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Certainly--we will look into that. We
are going to try to do some traveling this year and get out to
some of these areas.
Mr. Mike. You are more than welcome to come to the Pinion
area here.
Ms. McCollum. Yes.
Mr. Gishey. I don't know if I've been near Pinion.
Mr. Calvert. We certainly thank all of you for your
testimony and appreciate your coming out here to Washington to
talk to us. You are relieved, and we will have our next panel
come on up.
Mr. Nez. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Apachito. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, the next panel is Mr. Arthur Ben,
Principal of the----
Mr. Ben. Lukachukai.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah. There are some good ones here. I will
take your word for it. Ms. Faye BlueEyes, Principal of the--
Mr. Simpson. Go ahead. Say that one.
Mr. Calvert. Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle Community Grant School.
Mr. Darnell Maria, member of the Board, the Ramah Navajo School
Board. Ms. Pam Agoyo, President of the National Indian
Education Association.
Before we start out again, out of fairness to other
witnesses, we ask that witnesses please be mindful of their 5-
minute time limit and the blinking red light when the time is
up. That way we have more time for questions. We would like to
do that if we can.
The first person we will recognize is Mr. Arthur Ben who is
Principal of what?
Mr. Ben. Lukachukai Community School.
Mr. Calvert. There you go.
Mr. Ben. Lukachukai, Arizona.
Mr. Calvert. That is----
Mr. Ben. Navajo Nation.
Mr. Calvert. That is a tough one.
Mr. Ben. That is a tough one, yeah.
Mr. Calvert. You are recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
Mr. Ben. And that is in English.
Mr. Calvert. Oh, that is in----
Ms. BlueEyes. You could say Luke Skywalker and it would
almost sound the same.
Mr. Calvert. Luke Skywalker.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
LUKACHUKAI COMMUNITY SCHOOL NAVAJO NATION
WITNESS
ARTHUR BEN
Mr. Ben. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice-President,
Members of the Committee. I thank you for the opportunity to be
here and be the voice of our children who are enrolled in the
BIE schools, the school systems, and are funded by the BIE
school systems. On behalf of the Lukachukai Community Board of
Education and the Bureau of Indian Education funded schools and
more importantly, the students enrolled in the Bureau of Indian
Education schools, I thank the committee for the opportunity
for testimony, and my testimony is on school facility
replacement and construction. Vice Chairman Simpson made a
comment about that this morning, and I appreciate his support
to bring that out on the table.
I am here to testify for new school construction, and in my
testimony, on the fourth page, under the Office of Facilities
Management and Construction, the index, the Facility Condition
Index, there is a list of 37 schools, and each one of these 37
schools listed are in poor condition, and these schools are
throughout the country. They are in Arizona, New Mexico, South
Dakota, Minnesota. So throughout the country, and so we are
here to testify on that.
Back in the past there was some money appropriated for
school facility construction, and not all the schools made it.
So I am here to provide testimony so we can finish up on new
school construction on the schools that remain, and those are
on this list.
Our school, Lukachukai Community School, is ranked number
one on this list in addition to all the other 36. So we are all
aware of that, there is a need there. The schools, which are
generic, were commonly--a lot of them were founded back in the
early '30s, and Lukachukai is like that, okay? We have got some
historic buildings. We don't get the funds to renovate them and
all that because they are historic, and we work on that area.
However, there was a shortfall of school facility construction,
and I am here to ask for that funding to be restored for new
school construction.
A lot of it has to do with life safety concerns and also
this being the 21st Century, we are inadequately preparing our
students for college and career readiness in these facilities.
You know, the internet. I have got technicians that have to
crawl under the building, where in most places they are in the
ceiling. So that makes it difficult.
I have a dirt parking lot. You know, we get Title 1 funds,
and we are asked to have family engagement activities, bring
the families in, get that parent involvement, and we do that.
They got to park in the dirt road. Somebody has got to park
across the street and walk across the street. No street
crossing. And in the wintertime, we are dealing with mud, which
is pretty common. We don't have snow days. We come to school on
snow because our school buses can travel in snow. We cancel
school on mud days. We call them mud days. And we also have
parking issues. ADA compliance, I have got one parking spot for
handicapped at our school. And that is the only one I can mark.
We try to look for others, and if we do others, there is just
no parking. We have got to park in a dirt area. And that dirt
area is not lit at night. There are no lights. And we put
lights up, and they go out. The ballast goes out, we put them
in. And when we ask for service, we are told it is not part of
the BIA property, it is not on the--listing. So we can't fix
it. So you know, we go about the best we can to get light.
A lot of our ADA compliance issues are in our rest rooms,
wheelchairs, accessibility. Some of the doors are narrow. We
are working on that. We have a lot of asbestos in the
classrooms. We got four or five classrooms that are smaller
than half of the size of this room. And I have got 25 students
in those classrooms.
Our student is 388, Kindergarten through eighth grade. And
we have--our Kindergarten tops out at 30 students. It is very
congested. So our parents are asking, you know, open up a third
classroom. I am like, where? We got a modular, and that is what
we are using.
Our support services for our special ed students, ESS
student services, physical therapy, occupational therapy, I got
no place for their equipment. They are in a small room. So you
know, if we expanded, got a bigger place, we can provide those
services, speech services, those types of things. So there is a
lot of stuff that we can put in a new school. And furthermore,
the community of Lukachukai is working on withdrawing 44-acre
tract for new school construction. So we are being proactive.
Got an elder by the name of Edward Bia Harvey [phonetic].
He had a vision of putting up a new school, and he set his
sights on proper and some land from his grazing rights. And his
grandchildren are honoring his work. He is deceased. He is
passed on but his vision is still alive.
So with that testimony, I hope you take it to heart and
assist us with new school construction for our children. You
know, actually we prepare our children for the military, for
the workforce and for post-secondary education, and we can't
prepare them adequately in these types of facilities. So I
appreciate your time.
[The statement of Arthur Ben follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. His
chart will be entered into the record.
Next, Ms. Faye BlueEyes, and you are with the--how do you
pronounce----
Ms. BlueEyes. You said it very well the first time.
Mr. Calvert. Just take my word for it.
Ms. BlueEyes. Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle Community Grant School.
Mr. Simpson. Say that again?
Ms. BlueEyes. Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle Community Grant School.
You got to make your tongue roll.
Mr. Calvert. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
DZILTH-NA-O-DITH-HLE COMMUNITY GRANT SCHOOL
WITNESS
FAYE BLUEEYES
Ms. BlueEyes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
Subcommittee. Again, my name is Faye BlueEyes, and no, I don't
have blue eyes but it is Navajo blue. I am the Assistant
Executive Director of the Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle School. My
testimony is being made on behalf of the school board. We have
four focus areas of the Bureau of Indian Education fiscal year
2015 funding, and one is directed the BIE and GSA to do
something about the GSA's aging fleet, fully funded Indian
School Equalization program at $431 million, provide $109
million in facilities operation and $76 million in facilities
maintenance and fully fund the Tribal Grant Support Costs at
$70 million.
I will only focus on two areas of our concerns because the
other school representatives have given their input. Regarding
the GSA buses, we learned that the guidelines in GSA allows for
us to replace the buses every 80,000 miles or 7 years,
whichever comes first. However, we have our buses that have
over 100,000 miles, and we had them more than 7 years. And the
concern with the buses, the way it works is if Rough Rock
decides that they don't need this bus anymore and we request
for a bus across the reservation at Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle, we
get assigned that bus. And when we get it, it is already pretty
much beaten up, worn out. So when we are driving it down the
dirt, unpaved roads--they don't have gravel--and that is when
like the windows will just start sliding down on its own. Maybe
the side mirrors fall off. The bumpers will even fall off. And
driving on this dirt road and all that dirt will just be inside
the bus. Then you have the students coughing and whatever,
including the bus driver. So those are some of the concerns
that we have. So when these buses that we get used from Rough
Rock, they end up in the shop. So then we end up paying for the
maintenance and additional costs to keep these buses operating.
And therefore it is sapping the school's funds that could be
used elsewhere.
So that is one of our biggest concerns, and maybe what they
need to do is relook at the guidelines, especially for the
reservation buses. Instead of the guidelines are probably for
the cities and where all the roads are paved but not out on the
reservation. So that is one of the biggest issues that we see.
The second area is that we request funding for facilities
maintenance in the amount of $76 million and facilities
operation for $109 million. The facility maintenance are for
the preventative, routine and unscheduled maintenance for all
school buildings. As we have testified numerous times before,
our school also is on this list the gentleman has, and we are
also one of the poorest-rated facilities. We have had all sorts
of problems at our schools. Last year we have had a huge amount
of sewers leaking because our pipes were breaking, and while we
had to bring in people to fix it, you hear this jackhammer
going and the kids are right next door trying to learn. And the
smell was horrible. And when they barely banged into a water
line which was also corroded, then that busted. So we had water
again. I mean, it was horrible. And the kids are expected to be
learning in these types of conditions. So what we had to do was
move them to where they told them this rest room is closed. Go
to the other side of the building. It was very frustrating for
the students and the staff, and that is what they had to
endure.
The other thing that happened this year is our boilers are
so outdated that we closed our kitchen a few times. The
dishwasher didn't have hot water, so the staff had to boil
water on the school kitchen stove in order to pour it into the
dishwasher so at least they could wash the dishes. And then we
also discovered some leaks under the building. There was a huge
puddle under the kitchen again, and we were trying to figure
out how to get rid of that because then we didn't want mold to
form.
Our school faces all types of facility issues along with
the other schools are the same way. And then the electrical is
another area where like these fluorescent lights are flickering
when the students are trying to read, and the letters are
jumping around. I mean, that is like really frustrating for us,
too.
So there is a lot of issues with facilities, and like he
stated, our school, the replacement cost would be $19.1 million
to replace. The backlog is $7.7 million. So those are our
issues. Thank you very much for your attention.
[The statement of Faye BlueEyes follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady. Next, Mr. Darnell
Maria, member of the Board, the Ramah Navajo School Board. You
are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
RAMAH NAVAJO SCHOOL BOARD
WITNESS
DARNELL MARIA
Mr. Maria. Thank you, Chairman, and members that are here.
I stopped by your office, Ms. McCollum, this morning.
My name is Darnell Maria, and I have with me my colleague,
Carolyn Coho, sitting by me, and also here on this travel is
with our local tribal government, The Ramah Navajo Chapter
seated to my right here.
Basically, I have three main requests. I know that you all
don't do earmarks anymore. Nevertheless, we are requesting for
a total amount of $4.4 million, and one of the areas is the
public water system upgrade and maintenance for the Pine Hill
School campus for $1.85 million and also improvement to our
school security for $385,000 and economic development
initiative for over $2 million. And these are really our needs
here.
Perhaps you know a little bit about the Ramah Navajo
community, but it is found more or less at Public Law 96-638,
Indian Self-Determination Act, and it has been known throughout
the country as such. And so we have come this far for over 40
years.
One of the areas that I just mentioned this, the renovation
and upgrade of the Pine Hill campus water system. We are
located above 7,000 feet near the Continental Divide, and I
love this rain out here. It is what we need back in the
Southwest. We have no water. We have no, I mean, like rivers or
ponds or streams like that. So we are in dire need, especially
in the area of health. We do have 3,500 community people, and
then there are other non-natives that live in the area, too. So
we really rely on the aquifers that are there that pumps the
water out. And so we are in dire need of anther well and also
the water line. The water lines that are there have been there
for over 40 years. They are corroded. They are rusted. There
are always water breaks that are coming up which hinders the
education of the students as well as the health center that we
have a Pine Hill School. So the copies that you have summarizes
the needs that we have at Pine Hill.
The second area is a security system. This is very, very
important. Just a little over a month ago we had to have a
lockdown because there was an individual that came on campus
with a gun. Fortunately, the two individuals that were
threatened came to help with the security, but we could never
find that individual. So we really are in dire need security
system and funding. Our current fencing area around the school
are so torn down that it needs to be replaced and it needs to
have a better security system, including the alarm and also the
bell system to ensure that the students receive the required
education that they need right now. We don't have anything in
place, and we are constantly have to remind the students to get
to class on time and all of that.
So those are the very important matters that I bring before
you. And just as--see, we have all heard in the week or two
about the gunman that came on the military base. We don't want
to experience the same tragedy back home. So I would like to
avoid that as much as possible by securing funding for the
security system at our school.
The third area is economic development. We are
geographically isolated from the main Navajo Nation, and we are
an hour away from the nearest town. So economic development is
pretty hard to establish, especially on trust land when we
don't have the very much tax base. And one of the things that
occurred is that we were able to scrape some funds and able to
purchase a building for $350,000 out in Ramah. We would like to
renovate that and then convert it into an economic development
initiative. And one of the things that we are thinking of doing
is doing housing paneling that consists of Styrofoam, metal and
then you have the plywood on the outside and then the sheetrock
on the inside. And we thinking that this would be a really good
opportunity for housing, not for only our community members but
outside our community. And it would be a very good economic
development project for us to do.
So in a nutshell, that is what I am requesting today, and I
hope that you will be able to fund the projects that we have
identified, not only myself but other tribes that are here with
me today.
I thank you very much and thank you [indiscernible].
[The statement of Darnell Maria follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman. Next, Pam Agoyo.
Ms. Agoyo. Yes, sir.
Mr. Calvert. National Indian Education Association. You are
recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NATIONAL INDIAN EDUCATION ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
PAM AGOYO
Ms. Agoyo. Thank you. Chairman Calvert and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for convening this hearing. As you have
heard, my name is Pamela Agoyo. I am the President of the
National Indian Education Association, otherwise known as NIEA,
and I am from Cochiti, Kewa, Ohkay Owingeh Pueblos in New
Mexico.
NIEA is the most representative and inclusive Native
education organization in the United States whose principal
goal is to advance comprehensive and equal educational
opportunities for American Indian, Alaska Natives and Native
Hawaiian students.
Last year NIEA was privileged to testify before this
Subcommittee and provide insights on the state of Native
education. We look forward to continuing to build upon those
suggestions and provide new recommendations to ensure this
year's work creates results.
For instance, bureaucratic issues between the Bureau of
Indian Affairs and the Bureau of Indian Education have
decreased the ability of the BIA to meet the educational needs
of our youth. As an individual bureau, the BIE should have the
ability to dictate funding for its programs and ensure
education is maintained as a priority within the Department of
the Interior.
Transferring budget authority from the BIA to the BIE will
not only increase efficiency but also ensure effectiveness as
BIE officials better understand needed funding within their
programs.
In addition to budget authority, the BIE should be seen as
a capacity builder for tribes. Since the late 20th Century,
Congress has worked to strengthen tribal capacity to directly
serve their citizens. In this spirit, we request additional
funding of $5 million for tribal education agencies to ensure
more tribes can participate in providing education services to
their students.
Because tribes and their education agencies understand
their students' cultural and academic needs best, this local
authority would provide tribes the responsibility in providing
the necessary services to raise student achievement and protect
native cultures.
Furthermore, as the BIE becomes increasingly suitable for
supporting tribes and their education agencies, Congress should
appropriate funds to create a competitive grant pilot that
incentivizes capacity building and tribally controlled grants
and contract schools. For $5 million, the BIE would administer
a pilot to help spur systemic reform that would include tribal
prerogatives and local knowledge in order to improve its
student success, close achievement gaps, raise high school
graduation rates and prepare students for success in college
and careers.
Three-year competitive incentive-based grants similar to
existing Department of Education initiatives for which the BIE
continues to be excluded would provide resources to tribes for
accelerating local reforms and aligning education services to
tribal education priorities that include language and culture.
Further, performance metrics for the grant would track student
attendance rates, graduation rates, college enrollment rates,
and measures on educator accountability.
In order to catalyze reform efforts and create a set of
high-performing, tribally controlled grant and contract
schools. The BIE would also provide ongoing technical
assistance to build the capacity of those schools that applied
for but did not receive a grant.
We also continue to request increased funding for Interior
programs such as BIE school construction and replacement with
an allocation to be set at $263.4 million. NIEA was grateful to
see funding appropriated by Congress to begin work on the first
phase of the Beatrice Rafferty School. However, I was
disappointed to see Interior Secretary Sally Jewell recently
state before this Subcommittee that, ``DOI is focusing more on
the classrooms than the buildings.''
This limited concentration is unacceptable. While focusing
on the classroom is to be applauded, no child can be expected
to successfully learn while the structure around them is
falling apart and potentially dangerous. All vested interests
must work together and support efforts to drastically increase
replacement funds and address the long outdated list of more
than 60 BIE school buildings in disrepair.
Finally, NIEA was happy to see Indian Health Service and
Bureau of Indian Affairs contract support costs fully funded
this year. However, Public Law 297 and 638, schools contracted
under the BIE, were exempt from full funding. The BIA currently
funds only 65 percent of the support costs needed in the 126
tribally managed schools and residential facilities under the
BIE purview. This forces the schools to divert critical
education funding in order to cover unpaid operational costs,
making it unrealistic to support those classroom services
needed to improve educational outcomes for Native students.
NIEA appreciates the continued leadership of this
Subcommittee. I look forward to working with you to increase
the success of the BIE and tribes as they increasingly work
together to educate Native students. I also request that our
fiscal year 2015 budget document be included into the record as
a supplement. It provides appropriation levels for additional
Native education programs within this Subcommittee's
jurisdiction. Thank you again, and I look forward to addressing
any questions you may have.
[The statement of Pamela Agoyo follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony. It seems it is a
common theme here that the schools in Indian Country throughout
the United States are in horrible condition and that we are not
doing enough to fix that. That is certainly a challenge ahead
of us.
Ms. Agoyo, as you know, the BIA funding isn't currently
controlled by the BIA. Instead, the funds are split between the
Assistant Secretary of the BIA and the BIE. Will you clarify?
Should the Subcommittee move all the BIE funds under the BIE?
Is that what you're asking us to do?
Ms. Agoyo. Yes. In fact, we feel that, you know, the Bureau
of Indian Education really, because they are working directly
with tribes and ultimately the goal is to allow tribes to have
more control right over many of the facets regarding education
in their communities. But this would just be a much more
efficient and effective operation and plan.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you. To follow up and to ask your
thoughts on this, a lot of Indian Education funding is tied up
with the Department of Education in and of itself. One of the
things that you are asking for is to be able to compete for
Race to the Top and some of the other competitive grant
programs.
I am going to give you my opinion.
Ms. Agoyo. Okay.
Ms. McCollum. My opinion is I am not a fan of Race to the
Top, and I was not excited to hear that the President was
taking this program and putting it in pre-K and I will tell you
why. I watched repeatedly, just in Minnesota and surrounding
States as thousands and thousands of dollars were put together
for grant writers and everything else needed to compete for
these funds. It didn't go to education; it went towards these
grants. Some of the ideas that you have for Indian Country are
very innovative, and I think you know some of the best
practices that are out there. You know whether what your
students need is more original language teachers, more science,
more whatever. Have you ever thought of coming up with a best
practices packet yourself and then kind of grading schools on
it and then helping them implement? In other words train the
trainer, train the teacher. Have a team that would go in and do
something because you have identified your needs. I am sure you
have identified the successes. Race to the Top makes you come
up with a whole other program.
Ms. Agoyo. So you know, I certainly share your perspective
regarding Race to the Top, and I think it is also important to
point out that, you know, BIE continues to be excluded as an
eligible entity from that process to begin with. So that is an
important point to make. But to your second point about best or
promising practices, certainly at NIEA we recognize that there
are immense amounts of great work going on and tremendous
successes, even in these schools in spite of the challenges
right with structure that our students are still progressing
and they are brilliant.
So as an organization, we are working very hard with all of
our constituents to really identify those best practices and
those promising practices, and certainly your idea about sort
of cataloging and putting something together in sort of a
storehouse or a think tank if you will, to have all those
together I think is an important one that we will certainly
take back.
You know, I personally feel as well, too, that you know,
the statistics that describe our students, our students are not
responsible for those statistics. We know, right, that they are
not responsible for those statistics. We know that when they
have equal access and opportunity, they perform and they exceed
overwhelmingly, and I think that that is the basis also of our
perspective.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you for being here and for your
testimony. You have rightly focused on education which is one
of the biggest challenges facing us.
It is clear to me that if we are really going to have a
change in how we construct school buildings and so forth on the
reservation, it is going to have to come from this committee.
It seems like, and I hate to say this, but it seems like we are
the only ones that care about it, besides you. And it is
something that we continue to struggle with, but we have got to
have an initiative that takes this on.
And I am curious. Let me ask you about your list that you
give us there. It is 37--where did this list come from?
Mr. Ben. It came out of the FMA system, Maximo. I had my
facility manager access this, and he printed it.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. It is not the list of schools that the
BIA has for construction, is it?
Ms. Agoyo. No.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. That is different? Because I was
wondering----
Mr. Ben. Yeah. This is like the backlog list----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Ben [continuing]. Where you keep putting in what you
need repaired.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Ben. And then you will see the----
Mr. Simpson. But this isn't for the whole country, is it?
Because this is just the region. I was looking here and----
Mr. Ben. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson [continuing]. All of a sudden----
Mr. Ben. It is a--
Mr. Simpson [continuing]. Out of 37, 19 of them are in
Arizona and 9 in New Mexico. So this has got to be regional.
Mr. Ben. It's regional, yeah.
Ms. McCollum. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson. So there is a much greater demand than just
this list shows here?
Mr. Ben. Yeah. This is a fraction of it.
Mr. Simpson. I will guarantee you we are going to work on
this.
Mr. Ben. I appreciate it.
Mr. Simpson. Because while I appreciate the fact that the
Secretary wants to focus on what is in the classroom, what is
in the classroom is very important. But you cannot put children
in unsafe, unsanitary, dangerous buildings and expect them to
learn. Besides that, it says a lot about what we think of our
children when we send them to those places. So we have got to
do something about them, and I will guarantee you this
committee will work on it. I know Chairman Calvert in the last
negotiations was able to keep at least some money in school
construction working on this when the Administration didn't
request any and has not requested any this year. And sometimes
we have a fight with our colleagues that we love dearly across
the rotunda. But Ken was able to do that in this bill, and I
thank him for that.
Mr. Calvert. As a matter of fact, the school that was
funded is in Mrs. Pingree's district. So Mrs. Pingree, do you
have any questions?
Ms. Pingree. Thank you. First, thank you for your
testimony. Thank you to the Chair for having the hearing. I am
fortunate enough to have the Bernice Rafferty School in my
district, and Chief Socobasin is actually testifying in the
next panel. So I was holding back. But I do want to echo the
remarks of my colleagues. I am relatively new on this
committee, but everything I have learned since I joined the
committee and everything that all of you have reinforced today
about the horrendous conditions that we expect you to teach
your children in. I thank my colleagues for their remarks. It
is unreasonable to think that we could ask young people to
learn in an environment where it is hard to maneuver, it is
hard to operate, and the stories of transportation, getting
back and forth to the school, I truly hope we can make some
changes here and happy to support them.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Certainly we have some challenges
ahead of us, but this is certainly high on the list of
possibilities. And we heard you. So thank you for your
testimony, and thank you for attending today.
Mr. Ben. Thank you.
Ms. BlueEyes. Thank you.
Mr. Maria. Thank you very much.
Mr. Calvert. The next panel, and then Chairman Simpson is
going to take over for a little while while I have to make some
phone calls. But I will just announce who the panel is, and
then I will----
Mr. Simpson. Because I can't pronounce them.
Mr. Calvert. I can't either. Ms. Nancy Martine-Alonzo,
Secretary/Treasurer of the Ramah Navajo Chapter. Mr. Joe
Socobasin, Chief of the Passamaquoddy Tribal Government.
Ms. Pingree. Passamaquoddy.
Mr. Calvert. I came close, came close.
Ms. Pingree. We can do our own states.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Mr. William Harris, Chief of the Catawba
Indian Tribe, and Mr. Colley Billie, Chairman--this is a big
one.
VOICE: Miccosukee.
Mr. Calvert. Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida. If you
would please come forward?
VOICE: If not, I will want all of their time.
Mr. Calvert. There you go. Sounds like my attorney.
Mr. Simpson. That is right.
Mr. Calvert. And with that, I am going to--let's see. We
have one other gentleman who is going to join us, and I am
going to delegate this over to Mr. Simpson----
Mr. Simpson. Who is not up here, yet? If you are not up
here, raise your right hand.
Ms. Pingree. Chief Socobasin.
Mr. Simpson. Okay.
Mr. Calvert. Chief Socobasin.
Ms. Pingree. There is your place. It is not easy getting
in.
Mr. Calvert. So we are waiting for Chief Socobasin.
Mr. Simpson [presiding]. Okay. Sounds good. Nancy, you are
first.
Ms. Martine-Alonzo. Okay.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
RAMAH NAVAJO CHAPTER
WITNESS
NANCY MARTINE-ALONZO
Ms. Martine-Alonzo. Good afternoon Honorable Chairman and
committee members. I am Nancy Martine-Alonzo. I'm the elected
Secretary/Treasurer of the Ramah Navajo Band, and I am also the
former President of the Ramah Navajo School Board. Our
testimony focuses on four areas, on the contract support cost
issues and concerns on retention of the Ramah agency and also
the annual budget formulation and the appropriation versus the
actual funds, and four, operations and maintenance funds.
The contract support cost issues and concerns, from the
very beginning, in 1970, there have been two amendments, in
1988 and 1994, and the first one allows contractor programs to
be operated at the same level that the secretary would operate
those programs and services. And the second amendment was that
there was a category established called the contract support
costs, and so all of those amendments have been made so that
there is parity of opportunity to operate the programs. But
what has happened over the years is that there has been a
failure to pay the adequate contract support costs, and that
has really impact the services to Indian people.
And so one of the immediate problems that we have in our
community of Ramah Chapter is that we have not been paid the
direct support contract cost for 2012 and 2013, and that amount
is about $700,000 and also for 2014 when we have now been
allowed to receive the 100 percent, we have barely received the
first installment of the payments. And so we would like to
ask--we are wanting to ask Congress to compel BIA to pay all
the appropriate funds to us immediately. And so that is one of
our requests.
The second portion of the contract support cost is the
settlement of the Ramah class action lawsuit. That has been
settled in June of 2012, in the case Salazar v. Ramah Navajo.
And the negotiations to settle those funds have been ongoing
now for a long time, over a year, and we have just not been
able to make very much progress on it. And in fact, some of the
criteria and requests have been to look at a number of the
tribal funds that were received and to subject them to a
forensic audit. And we feel that that is not appropriate. Maybe
if it was a big company like Enron or Bernie Madoff, that is
big corporations and big money. Maybe in that you would allow
something like that. But as tribes, we don't receive, you know,
a whole lot of money and it has been determined that we should
be paid all of the contract support costs. And so we are asking
this committee to compel the BIA, the IHS to conduct an
accounting of the true cost and to be able to provide all of
the operating services that we need at this time.
In addition to that, even though it has been established
that we should be providing the same quantity and the same
quality of services, the process and the way that it has been
implemented has sometimes put us in a situation where it treats
differently those that contract and those that are not choosing
to contract. And it shouldn't be. The choices are up to the
tribes, whichever way that they choose. They should be given
the full benefit of what they are entitled to and how they
implement that.
And so instead of putting in those kinds of barriers, we
are asking that--our request is that you should look at what is
the burden for the shortfalls that happen to come up with ways
that that can be paid across the board. And so instead of just
looking within the program to see where you can find those
funds and using the already appropriated programs from where to
get those funds, we would like to ask that you look at other
sources of revenue instead of borrowing from Peter to pay Paul
concept, that you look for other sources where there are funds
available to make up for the shortfall and to pay the full 100
percent cost. And we feel that that is the right thing to do,
and that doesn't further penalize the tribes.
And then another concern that we have is we have a BIA
Ramah agency that was established, and that was the result of
about over 100 years of neglect, back when the Treaty was
signed with the Navajo Nation in 1868 to 1968 when our fore
leaders came here and they asked for some way to remedy all
those hundred years of neglect, of not having the services the
agency was established there so that we can speed up the
infrastructures that were needed for water, housing, road and
all of schools and all of that, et cetera. And now we find in
the 2015 budget, that the funds to give the Ramah agency was
taken out. And so we have worked with congressional offices so
far, and they have said that they will put that back. And so we
just want this committee to ensure that those funds will be
there for not only 2015 but in the future to the extent that we
need--because of two really compelling reasons. One is the
Trust responsibility cannot be contracted out, and Ramah has
the most mature contracts, over 20 of them, out of all the
Southwest region as far as the tribes and all of that concern--
--
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Ms. Martine-Alonzo. Between the school board and the
chapter, and we need that partnership and that oversight in
order to carry out those programs. And then because our land is
very checker boarded, we have eight different ownership types
of land. We have BLM. We have Indian Allotment. We have Navajo
Tribe. We have Ramah Band land. We have Ramah Navajo School
Board. We have state land. We have federal land. So we have all
of these jurisdictions that we have to look, and we have over
300 in--and based on the recent Cobell lawsuit that are higher
standards now in making sure that all of those assets are taken
care of.
And so because of those reasons, we feel that it is not
right that they should close the agency. And then----
Mr. Simpson. I appreciate that and out of respect for all
the witnesses that we have to get in today, I appreciate your
testimony. Your full statement will be in the record.
Ms. Martine-Alonzo. Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. But I appreciate it. Thank you very much.
Ms. Martine-Alonzo. Thank you very much.
[The statement of Nancy Martine-Alonzo follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. William.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
CATAWBA INDIAN NATION
WITNESS
WILLIAM HARRIS
Mr. Harris. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Committee
Members. On behalf of the Catawba Nation, thank you for this
opportunity to testify before this subcommittee. My name is
William Harris. I am the Chief of the Catawba Nation.
Since time immemorial, the Catawbas have lived in the
Piedmont generally along and upon the Catawba River. Our
aboriginal lands cover most of South Carolina, a third of North
Carolina and into the borders of Southern Virginia.
In ancient times, Catawbas lived off the land and the
river, hunting, fishing and farming. We grew the Three Sisters:
corn, squash and beans. However, these pursuits of the past are
not sufficient to enable the tribe to survive economically
today.
I am here to urge the Subcommittee to support our tribe and
our plans to achieve economic self-sufficiency. Our Settlement
Act specifically refers to the policy of the United States to
promise tribal self-determination in economic development
sufficiency, and it is about fulfilling this promise of support
for economic self-sufficiency that I appear before you today.
In the 2000 census, the Catawba Indian Nation had a per-
capita income of just $11,096. The estimated current employment
among the Catawba today has more than doubled out of the State
of South Carolina, which has a very high unemployment itself.
The Catawba Nation is one of a handful of federally
recognized tribes that do not enjoy the range of sovereign
powers possessed by most federally recognized Indian tribes.
Under the terms of our Settlement Agreement, we possess what I
would term second-class tribal sovereignty.
In our case, the state government has enormous civil and
criminal jurisdiction on our lands, far in excess of that
commonly accorded to states over other tribes. This state
jurisdiction has ended up greatly limiting our ability to
develop our economy. For example, we are not authorized to
establish gaming operations pursuant to the Indian Gaming
Regulatory Act. Instead, we are limited to two bingo halls,
neither of which has been in operation since the state adopted
a lottery. Although we plan to reopen one of the facilities
within a month, it will employ about 30 people, and this is a
huge accomplishment for us.
We are also not allowed to entertain electronic play
devices on our reservation, if the state authorizes. Since the
state authorizes casino cruise ships, we believe that we can
have similar games on our reservation. However, the State
Supreme Court just ruled against us. I guess it is okay for the
state to tax gaming and okay for state citizens to participate
in gaming and okay for South Carolina communities to profit
from gaming, but that does not mean that the state has
authorized gaming. And our settlement in which we gave up
treaty-based right works only one way. It is the same old
story.
We are trying to rewrite that history by taking land into
trust within our federal reserve service area in North Carolina
pursuant to our Settlement Agreement. We ask this committee
urge the Department of Interior to expedite that application to
a mandatory basis. This is perhaps the most significant and
major single action you could take to help the Catawba people.
Besides bingo, we are moving ahead with our projects.
Specifically the Catawba tribe is seeking to examine whether we
can offer any tax benefits that would attract outside investors
to our land. It would be helpful if this committee could
support funding such a legal research. We also need to make
some additional land purchases where we can and cannot afford
them. In this regard, it would be helpful if the committee
supported funding for land acquisitions for smaller tribes.
It is through initiatives like these that smaller and less
well-off tribes like the Catawbas who have limited or no
economic development can take control of their future and have
the hope that the next generation of Catawba will know a more
prosperous life than this generation. I thank you for this
time.
[The statement of William Harris follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Mr. Colley.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
MICCOSUKEE TRIBE OF INDIANS OF FLORIDA
WITNESS
COLLEY BILLIE
Mr. Billie. Thank you, Chairman Calvert, Ranking Member
Moran and the other Members of the Subcommittee for the
opportunity to testify. My name is Colley Billie. I am the
Chairman of the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida. With me
today are tribal members, Wayne Billie, and Houston Cypress.
The Everglades have been the home of Miccosukee people for
hundreds of years, and our commitment to its restoration is
unwavering. Protecting our home and our traditional ways of
life depends on it. To give you an idea of the everglades, here
is a satellite map. Gordon.
[Slide]
Mr. Billie. Here are our tribal lands, in red, in the heart
of The Everglades. Here is Everglades National Park. Here is
the Tamiami Trail where the National Park Service is trying to
construct a series of skyway bridges. To the north are sugar,
orange and cattle farms that generate high levels of phosphorus
and other pollutants damaging The Everglades. Water flows from
north to south in The Everglades.
Here is the L-28 Canal System that ends on our reservation
dumping untreated water from the north and west.
Given the enormous cost of Everglades restoration, limited
resources must be used wisely and effectively. However, we see
a disjointed approach on projects resulting in decisions that
harm the Miccosukee people.
One of these projects is the massive skyway bridging of the
Tamiami Trail. The tribe strongly opposes this. With one mile
of bridging completed at a federal taxpayer cost of over $80
million, National Park Service has begun efforts to build a new
2.6 mile bridge that will cost at least $193 million. The
fiscal year 2014 omnibus provided only $7.5 million for this
new bridge but also had an important provision requiring
National Park Service to secure all fundings before entering
into any contracts. This year, National Park Service seeks to
fund a bridge through a new transportation program in the
highway bill. However, this program is not authorized or
funded. National Park Service will defer up to $30 million from
other projects to fund the bridge. This would be a violation of
the Subcommittee's provision requiring full funding. The tribe
requests that the requirement to secure all funding before
construction be strictly applied.
The skyway bridges are a waste of taxpayer dollars.
National Park Service has yet to resolve fundamental questions
regarding the effectiveness of the bridging. National Park
Service claims that bridging is needed to provide ecological
connectivity from water conservation areas in the north to the
park. This is a fancy term that basically means that National
Park Service wants to connect water from a canal to the park.
For the bridges to deliver increased water volume to the part
that it seeks, the water in this canal just north of the bridge
needs to be raised. However, the State will not permit the
water to be raised in the canal because there is no operational
plans due to significant downstream flooding concerns and the
potential for water quality violations. The park still hast not
resolved the need for close easement on non-federal property in
the park.
Further, significant flooding concerns remain for nearby
communities due to water seepage from the park into these
communities. Under the best case, up to 50 percent of water is
lost on the eastern side of the park, then pumped back into the
canal from which it came from and ultimately into the park
again in the circular pattern. This is not restoration. It is
wasted effort and money.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection will not
authorize an operational plan due to water quality violation
concerns. Already water flows into the park have exceeded the
phosphorous limits established by the 1991 Everglades
Settlement Agreement and are routinely barely meeting the
limits. Given the water quality in water conservation area 3A
including the tribe's land, the Florida Department of
Environmental Protection cannot be assured that increased water
flows will not result in water quality violations Without the
ability to move more water, water stacks up on the tribe's
land, damaging our tree islands and flooding our traditional
homes. How would you like your home flooded every year due to
actions by the Federal Government?
With its focus on bridging, the park has neglected existing
culverts under the Tamiami Trail that would deliver a
significant amount of water into the park if they were simply
cleared of downstream vegetation.
The tribe asks the Subcommittee to direct the park to clear
the culverts out to increase water flow and alleviate high
water levels on the tribe's land. The tribe's second priority
is the need to improve water quality. The L-28 Canal System
dead-ends on our reservation dumping water that often has
phosphorous level over 10 times the EPA approved standards. Our
land is a de facto storm water treatment area.
Addressing contaminations in the L-28 Canal System must be
a top priority for true restoration. I thank you for
recognizing this problem last year and urging the Department of
Interior to work with the tribe. This year the tribe asks the
Subcommittee continue to support cleanup efforts by directing
Department of Interior and EPA to work with the tribe to
develop solutions to improve water quality.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
[The statement of Colley Billie follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Colley. Joseph.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
PASSAMAQUODDY TRIBAL GOVERNMENT
WITNESS
JOSEPH SOCOBASIN
Mr. Socobasin. Thank you. Honorable Chairman and Members of
the Subcommittee, my name is Joseph Socobasin. I serve as the
Tribal Chief of the Passamaquoddy Tribe in Maine. Thank you for
inviting me here today to provide testimony regarding American
Indian and Alaskan Native programs. My comments today will
reference Indian Health Services and the Bureau of Indian
Affairs. In my written testimony, I have historic preservation
and climate change, but because I am limited to 5 minutes, I
have cut those out of my testimony.
Mr. Simpson. Your full statement will be in the record.
Mr. Socobasin. Thank you. The Passamaquoddy Tribe of Indian
Township is located in Washington County, Maine, the
northeastern part of the State, bordering Canada. Our county
covers 2,568 square miles with fewer than 34,000 residents.
Approximately 2,000 residents are Passamaquoddy. We are known
as the People of the Dawn.
As a smaller tribe, our needs are often overlooked. Limited
economic development and restrictions of our main Indian land
claim settlement have resulted in inadequate employment
opportunities for the Passamaquoddy people with unemployment
rates reaching 65 percent compared to 10.7 percent for
Washington County and 29 percent of adults making less than
$10,000 per year.
The Indian Township community is one of the most
impoverished communities in Maine. Economic deprivation and
lack of access of programs and resources have taken their toll
on our population. American Indian and Alaska Natives have life
expectancies of 4.1 years less than the United States, all
races, population. The majority of Passamaquoddy people do not
live that long. Only 11 percent of Passamaquoddy tribal members
are 60 years or older, and 65 percent is under the age of 35
reflecting the mortality rates in my community. The average
death of the Passamaquoddy tribal member is 50 years of age. It
is unacceptable for the Passamaquoddy Tribe to have the health
status similar to a third-world country.
I am surrounded daily by those in my community who are
dying way too young and who feel hopeless and tired from the
struggle of trying to meet their basic needs. I am here today
to advocate on behalf of the Passamaquoddy Tribe and other
American Indians and Alaska Native people that have similar
challenges.
In order to address these disparities, the Indian Health
Services is a key partner in providing access to healthcare.
The President's fiscal year 2015 budget request reflects an
increase of $228 million, but it does not adequately address
how severely underfunded the IHS has been historically. The IHS
remains funded at 56 percent level of need. I would be remiss
not to request additional funding for the IHS to support
direct-patient care.
The national IHS tribal budget formulation team has
requested $5.3 billion for fiscal year 2015 in an attempt to
bring Indian Country slightly closer to the actual cost of
delivering adequate healthcare to tribal citizens.
In addition to increased funding, there is a need to manage
appropriations more efficiently for Indian healthcare delivery
systems. Advanced appropriations for the Indian Health Services
would allow Indian health programs to effectively and
efficiently coordinate healthcare for American Indians and
Alaska Natives.
Any delay in acting on the final budget makes it difficult
to adequately address these health needs. Advanced
appropriations will allow IHS and tribal health programs time
improving access to care through continuity, staff recruitment
and retention while decreasing administrative costs.
An additional cost-savings measure that would extend the
limited funding that IHS and tribal programs receive would be
to establish Medicare-like rate cap for all purchased and
referred care, formerly known as Contract Health Services.
Medicare participating hospitals are reimbursed by Indian
Health Services' tribal and urban health programs using a
Medicare-like rated. That corresponds generally to the
applicable Medicare payment methodology.
Tribal advocates are working on draft legislation that
would amend Section 1866 of the Social Security Act to expand
the application of Medicare-like rate to all Medicare
participating providers and suppliers. The Government
Accountability Office recently examined the Purchase/Referred
Care, a program, and found payments for care two-and-a-half
times higher than the Medicare rate. And they have been capped
at the Medicare rate. This would have resulted in a savings of
$62.8 million for services provided by tribal health programs.
I ask that you support this expansion of the Medicare-like rate
to all Medicare providers and suppliers.
The President's fiscal year 2015 budget request for Indian
Affairs is $2.6 million, a $33.6 million increase over fiscal
year 2014 enacted levels. The request includes support for
increases to the TPA of $19.3 million over the 2014 enacted
level. This provision is critical in the importance to the
Passamaquoddy Tribe. Over the last several years, the Bureau of
Indian Affairs has absorbed reductions in funding and resulted
in a decrease or loss of vital services to our communities. In
2000, the Passamaquoddy Indian Township TPA funding was
$714,000. This year fiscal year 2014 funding was $742,000,
reflecting a $28,000 increase in 14 years, which actually
reflects a reduction in funding.
TPA funds are critical to the operations including
administration of crucial programs such as Social Services,
adult education and natural resources. And I am trying to read
fast. I know I am over my time.
Mr. Simpson. Yes. Very quickly.
Mr. Socobasin. So I will skip right to my closing remarks.
I ask that you give careful consideration to the issues I have
highlighted. The Passamaquoddy Tribe respectfully asks that the
committee support funding increases for federal Indian programs
that consistently exceed the relevant rate of inflation in
order to achieve real progress in closing the service gaps for
American Indians and Alaska Natives. This support translates
into the changes and to the quality of life and the health of
Passamaquoddies in our community. It is crucial and essential.
I hope that you will recognize the importance and act
accordingly to allow fair access to the Passamaquoddy Tribe to
resources it desperately needs. Thank you for this.
[The statement of Joseph Socobasin follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. I notice that Chairman Calvert was
keeping this hearing right on schedule, and as soon as he turns
it over to me I blow it and I am off schedule. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. One of the shots up
there showed the culverts. You can say it different in
different parts of the country. So would you point those out?
And then if you would, Chairman Billie, that is what you would
like to see cleaned out, is that not correct?
Mr. Billie. Right. What you are looking at is the culverts
under the Tamiami Trail. These culverts are already in place.
What we are asking is that the National Park clean out the
dense, unnatural growth that you see in the picture that is
caused by the phosphorus and pollutants that is in the water.
That is all unnatural. And the whole 'Glades is starting to
look like that because of the contamination that is in the
water.
Right now, our homeland is being flooded, and with these
culverts, they can be cleaned out the water can be allowed to
flow through the culverts and into the part that the park says
that they need. So what I----
Ms. McCollum. To your knowledge, when was the last time
when they were cleaned out?
Mr. Billie. They have never been cleaned out since
construction as far as I know.
Ms. McCollum. So if they would have been properly
maintained, this probably wouldn't have happened.
Mr. Billie. Exactly.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Mrs. Pingree.
Ms. Pingree. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to all of you
for your very articulate presentations, and I just want to make
sure I recognize the great work of Chief Socobasin. I have been
privileged to work with the tribes in my state since I served
in the state legislature. Maine is one of the few states that
has tribal representation that sits in the legislature and
serves on committees with us. That has been very beneficial,
and you have been extremely helpful to me since I came here in
educating me along with other tribal members about some of the
challenges. We have already talked a little bit about the
Beatrice Rafferty School and how fortunate we are to have
already received some design money and to have it continuing in
this President's budget. But I just want to reiterate, we have
heard from so many people today and otherwise at the
significant need of the many schools that really need to be
upgraded and funded. And I thank you for your earlier words,
Mr. Chair, about how it just doesn't give the right message to
eager young people who want to live and learn. We are not
valuing them enough if we can't put them in the right kinds of
places. I also just want to quickly thank you for making the
point to this committee about Indian health. Washington County
is one of the poorest counties in the country, and many tribal
members live at a lower level of poverty, at a higher level of
unemployment. To imagine people trying to exist on $10,000, it
is no wonder that health problems are so significant, and I
hope we can find a way to do more with that. But thank you very
much for taking the time to be all the way down here and all of
you, of course, for coming from all over the country.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, and thank you all for being here.
William, I sympathize with your problem. It has always amazed
me that states can go out and open up gaming and then try to
restrict it when tribes try to do it on their reservations. We
kind of went through the same thing.
Mr. Harris. Going through that----
Mr. Simpson. Same issue in Maine. Kind of went through the
same thing in Idaho for a lot of years and if a state decides
that they don't want to do gambling--Utah has decided that--
they don't do anything. And they have been able to control it
because they don't do it.
But it is kind of hypocritical for an awful lot of states.
You say the State Supreme Court ruled against you. Do you
challenge that now in the U.S. Supreme Court?
Mr. Harris. That is what we are going to have to look at
and see if it is going to be--it is something we wish to go
further with. Oh, sorry. That is where we plan to go next. But
we will look at that issue. And the tribe did, in 2005, try to
appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court on the issue of rule to--South
Carolina Supreme Court, and no, the U.S. Supreme Court didn't
take it up. So I don't know if they will take this one up or
not.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. Well, I sympathize with the problem that
you are facing there, and I guess it is just an education issue
more than anything else. Trying to get people to understand if
they visit--I was surprised when we visited a few years ago,
Ms. McCollum and I and Tom Cole.
Gaming, whether you agree with gaming or not, has done a
great deal on a lot of reservations. Unfortunately, the bad
thing that it has done is a lot of people say, oh, we don't
need to fund that because Indians have all those monies from
gaming. It is not true for every tribe. Some tribes it is just
a little bit. They get the kind that helps them. Others make a
great deal out of it, and how the tribes use it is different
within each of the tribes, whether they individually pay
members of their tribes or whether they take the tribal portion
and use it to build hospitals and schools. They have done some
great things around the schools, and the tribes are better off
because of it.
So it is a challenge still for all of us.
Mr. Harris. Well, let me just touch on one subject that
when you said, you know, the tribes benefits. It is not only
the tribes that benefit, it is the surrounding communities that
benefit and it is also the states that benefits.
Mr. Simpson. That is true.
Mr. Harris. So it is not just a trial benefit.
Mr. Simpson. That is true. Thank you all for being here
today. I appreciate it very much.
Mr. Billie. Thank you.
Mr. Socobasin. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Our next panel. My eyes are so bad I can't see
that small print anymore. Mr. Carroll, Nathan Small. I thought
I saw Nathan when he walked in. Mr. Joel Moffett and Mr. Joel
Moffett. We have you here twice.
Mr. Moffett. Should I bring multiple hats?
Mr. Simpson. Yeah, we have you here twice.
Mr. Moffett. I don't trust the guy following me.
Mr. Simpson. Which Joel showed up today? Mr. Carroll, you
are first.
Mr. Moffett. Only one of them, though.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
UNITED SOUTH AND EASTERN TRIBES
WITNESS
KITCKI CARROLL
Mr. Carroll. Vice Chairman Simpson, the Members of the
Committee, other Members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to speak to you today on behalf of the United South
and Eastern Tribes, otherwise known as USET. We are in a tribal
organization representing 26 federally recognized tribes from
Maine down to Florida across to Eastern Texas.
My name is Kitcki. I am a proud citizen of the Cheyenne
Arapaho Nation of Oklahoma. I am equally proud to be a United
States citizen as well, and I serve as Executive Director for
United South and Eastern Tribes.
Briefly, USET tribes are within their Eastern Region and
Southern Region, Plains Region of the Bureau of Indian Affairs,
and also the national area of Indian Health Services covering a
large expanse of land compared to other BIA and IHS regions.
Due to this large geographic area, the USET tribes have
great diversity. From an economic standpoint some of our tribes
have highly developed economies while others remain mired in
poverty.
First, on behalf of USET and those tribal member Nations, I
wish to express our appreciation of this Committee's consistent
support for increased funding for federal Indian programs. Your
support reflects the commitment by this Committee to honor its
fiduciary trust obligations. It provides the critical resources
necessary to ensure for the provision of vital programs and
services within our communities.
However, I would be remiss not to take this opportunity to
state for the record that fulfillment of the fiduciary trust
obligation still continues to evade us. As a consequence, our
efforts to rebuild our tribal Nations after years of failed
federal policy moves forward at an unacceptable pace. Because
of this reality, many of our communities are still plagued with
proportionate rates of poverty, unemployment, health
disparities, among other social and communal challenges. We
must be stronger governmental partners to reverse this reality,
and Congress must constantly remind itself of the unique and
special relationship that it has with tribal Nations.
All of you particularly understand the history of U.S.
tribal relations, the related government-to-government trust
relationship and our status as tribal nations providing for the
needs of our citizens.
Regardless of whether a congressional district has a tribal
Nation presence, all Members of Congress must come to realize a
strong tribal community equates to a stronger America.
I implore all of you to assist us in our education of those
Members of Congress who do not share in your understanding or
commitment to the sacred trust obligation.
Today and tomorrow you have already heard and you will
continue to hear from many respected and dedicated tribal
leaders throughout Indian Country about issues, opportunities
and challenges that are most important to the respective tribal
Nations. Everything you will hear is important, and everything
is a priority as we collectively strive to improve the overall
well-being of our communities and people.
Today I wish to highlight a few areas from my written
testimony that USET believes to be principled and systemic in
nature. USET firmly believes that greater appreciation of these
points will help to move towards greater fulfillment by the
Federal Government by meeting its fiduciary trust obligations.
First, the role and actions of this committee defend
American values, defense and execution of the trust
responsibility and the protection and promotion of tribal
sovereignty should always be a priority. This committee can and
should demand that all federal Indian programs be funded in a
manner consistent with this important American value, our
Nation's commitment to its first people.
Two, the Constitution, treaties and the laws of the United
States serve as the foundation to our nation-to-nation
relationship. From the early stages of the United States, the
founders recognized the importance of America's relationship
with Native nations and Native peoples. They wove important
references to those relationships into the Constitution.
Natives influenced the founders in the development of the
Constitution as recognized by the 100th Congress when the
Senate and the House passed a concurrent resolution
acknowledging the historical debt the United States owes to
Indian tribes.
Three, because of the history, the trust obligation of the
Federal Government to Native peoples as reflected in the
federal budget is fundamentally different from ordinary
discretionary spending and should be considered mandatory in
nature.
At a 1977 U.S. Congress American Indian Policy Review
Commission Report stated, the purpose behind the trust is and
always has been to ensure the survival and welfare of Indian
tribes and people. This includes an obligation to provide those
services required to protect and enhance any lands, resources
and self-government and also includes those economic and social
programs that are necessary to raise the standard of living and
social well-being of the Indian people to a level compared to
the non-Indian society.
Four, the specter of sequestration remains. Although this
may seem early to raise this concern, USET urges this Committee
to educate other members of the House that the application of
sequestration to Indian violates the trust responsibility.
Five, fully funding contract support costs is a significant
achievement, but it should not come at the expense of program.
Congress provided that the Indian Health Service and Bureau of
Indian Affairs must pay the full amount of contract support
costs in the fiscal year 2014 as they are contractually
obligated to do. However, Congress, while fully funding
contract support costs in fiscal year 2014 did so principally
the restoration of sequestration funding. This meant that fully
funding contract support costs was at the expense of other
federal Indian programs. Full funding of contract support costs
must come without a penalty, mainly a reduction in program
funding or effective permanent sequestration of the new program
funds.
Additionally, some of the past contracts for cost claims
must be prioritized and resolved expeditiously.
Seven, the United States is a global leader and must
demonstrate leadership for other nations by fairly and justly
meeting its moral and ethical obligations to tribal Nations as
expressed in the United Nations' Declaration of the Rights of
Indigenous People.
Eight--sharing must finally be fixed as it directly erodes
our collective sovereignty, and we implore you to include--
fixed legislation in the Appropriations Bill language.
So in conclusion, USET recognizes that we are in
challenging times and that all Americans must be called upon to
sacrifice for the common good of all. USET suggests, however,
that when it comes to sacrificing for the good of all Americans
that the historic record demonstrates that nobody has
sacrificed more than Native Americans. We ask that this
committee continue to support and advocate for a budget based
on American values that reflects the trust responsibility and
fair and just dealings with Indian tribes. Thank you very much.
[The statement of Kitcki Carroll follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Nathan, it is good to see you
again. Welcome to Washington. I have to admit, when I went out
and visited the immersion school, they taught me how to say
welcome, and I can't remember how I was supposed to say it.
Mr. Small. You will have to repeat that class I guess.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah, I will.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
FORT HALL BUSINESS COUNCIL, SHOSHONE-BANNOCK TRIBAL GOVERNING BODY
WITNESS
NATHAN SMALL
Mr. Small. Good afternoon everybody, Chairman Simpson and
Vice Chair, Ms. McCollum and Ms. Pingree who just stepped out I
guess. But anyway, my name is Nathan Small. I am the Chairman
of the Fort Hall Business Council of the Governing Body of the
Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of Southeastern Idaho. First I would
like to thank Representative Simpson for his help in enforcing
flexibility with the Bureau of Indian Education regarding our
sixth grade and his help with flexibility using the existing
funds to educate our juveniles.
First and foremost, I want to discuss our healthcare needs
and the dangers of sequestration. In only six months last year
sequestration imposed $220 million in cuts to Indian health.
This led to 3,000 fewer admissions and more than 800,000 fewer
visits. Bottom line, people got sick and they suffered.
In fact, despite the increase in Indian health funding, we
are already in priority one, 6 months into this fiscal year.
That means we are in a life and limb situation.
Indian health should not be a discretionary program.
Through treaties, the United States took hundreds of millions
of acres of our homelands, and in return, one of the most basic
promises it made was to provide healthcare to our people.
To prevent future harm, I urge you work to exempt Indian
healthcare from sequestration and to forward fund Indian
health.
Second, I ask that Congress fund long-term elder care
services and direct IHS to work with tribes on a plan to
address long-term elder care which is a growing need throughout
Indian Country.
Last, on healthcare I want to point out the most cost-
effective way of improving the future of our people is through
effective mental health and substance abuse treatment. Our Four
Directions Treatment Center is one of the few Native-run
centers in the United States on a shoestring budget. It is
doing its best to help our community. The program reduces costs
for public safety and long-term disease and helps to heal our
community. I ask the Subcommittee to increase funding for the
IHS mental health and substance abuse treatments.
I now want to turn to the needs of our at-risk kids. Native
youth are among the most vulnerable groups in America. They
suffer the highest dropout rates and the highest suicide rates.
In the last few months, government studies confirm these tragic
facts. In the 2013 Indian Law and Order Commission Report
stated that Indian Country juveniles' justice exposes the worst
consequences of our broken justice system.
One of the purposes of building our Justice Center was to
improve the lives of our at-risk youth. This Justice Center was
purchased or built on tribal money and through a loan. So the
government did not help us in getting that building there. To
meet this vision, we have to rehabilitate our kids, which
includes educating and heal them. If we don't, we might as well
sentence them to a life in prison. Education and treatment are
the last and only hope. However, the BIA and IHS have
completely ignored these needs. The 2013 report confirmed that
the BIA has not requested any and Congress has not funded
treatment and education for juveniles--from BIA-funded
detention centers like our Justice Center.
Last year, thanks to the work of this Subcommittee,
Congress authorized tribes to use BIA correction dollars to
provide education to Native youth in custody. This will help
relieve some of the burden. However, more needs to be done. We
ask the Subcommittee to direct the BIE to permit teachers to
teach juveniles and direct the Indian Health Service to permit
professionals to treat and heal our at-risk youth. Currently,
these agencies prohibit this.
I have three final requests. First, Indian roads are our
only link to economic development. This link is badly broken.
We have some of the most dangerous road in America. I urge the
Subcommittee to increase funding for the BIA's road maintenance
program.
Second, I ask the Subcommittee to direct EPA to force the
cleanup of the Eastern Michaud Flatts Superfund site on our
reservation. The hazardous waste from this now-closed plant has
polluted our sacred hunting grounds, is poisoning our
groundwater and is harming the health of our people. The EPA
wants to cover up this mess, but for the tribes in Southeast
Idaho, it must be cleaned up.
Finally, if Congress moves to reauthorize the Federal Land
Transaction Facilitation Act as requested in the President's
budget, it must first acknowledge the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes'
property rights to hunt, fish and gather on federal lands under
the 1868 treaty with the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes.
In closing, I want to again thank the Subcommittee for this
opportunity and for your dedication in Indian Country. The
bipartisan work of this Subcommittee is unmatched and we
applaud all your efforts. Thank you. It is good to see you, Mr.
Calvert.
Mr. Calvert [presiding]. Good to see you, Mr. Small, Good
to see you.
[The statement of Nathan Small follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Next, Joel Moffett, the Nez Perce Tribal
Executive Committee. Thank you for coming. Looks like you had a
hard time here today.
Mr. Moffett. Yeah, you know the sacrifices we make as
tribal councilmen.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NEZ PERCE TRIBAL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
WITNESS
JOEL MOFFETT
Mr. Moffett. Well, good afternoon, Honorable Chairman, Vice
Chairman, Committee Members. My name is Joel Moffett. I serve
as Vice Chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe, and thank you for the
opportunity to provide testimony here while you evaluate and
prioritize the funding levels of the U.S. Government and how to
reconcile that with the needs of Indian Country and honoring
the treaties and executive orders that you have made with the
tribes.
The Nez Perce tribe does a wide array of work and provides
a multitude of services to the tribal membership as well as the
community at large. We have two health clinics, tribal police
force, social services program, comprehensive natural resources
program that does work in forestry, wildlife, fisheries, water
quality, air quality, habitat restoration.
The Nez Perce Tribe has long been a proponent of self-
determination for tribes and believes its primary obligation is
to protect the Treaty Reserve Rights of the Nez Perce Tribe and
its members, and all of the work that we do back home is guided
by the principle. As a result, the tribe works with a lot of
federal agencies. And this work cannot be accomplished unless
the United States continues to affirm and follow through on its
trust responsibility and properly fund these programs.
Regarding Indian Health Service, our two health clinics
provide service to 3,820 patients last year and that
represented 47,600 individual visits, and that doesn't even
count pharmacy and laboratory visits. That is just medical
provider visits. Our expenditure total for fiscal year 2013 was
almost just short of $13.5 million, and our purchase and
referred care costs for outpatient services was $4.3 million.
So the tribe supports the proposed $200 million increase in
funding over fiscal year 2014 levels for IHS. But it is also
important to note that this increase still lags far behind
where funding should be to offset the growth in the programs
and medical inflation which is huge.
Also, the $50 million increase in funding proposed for the
purchase and referred care is vital. But it, too, falls well
short of the true need in Indian Country. Finally, the tribe
fully supports the $617 million that has been proposed by the
President to be allocated for contract support costs. Full
funding of these allocations is essential and important and is
appreciated.
Regarding the BIA, the tribe supports the funding levels
for contract support costs as well proposed in the President's
budget of $251 million. We also support the increased funding
overall for the BIA. The tribe supports the $12 million
commitment in the President's budget to address the Child and
Family Welfare in Indian Country and job training issues. This
Tiwahe initiative is important and recognizes that the
significant gap in culturally sensitive social service programs
and the high unemployment due to lack of adequate job training,
that plagues a lot of our reservation communities.
In relation to the BIA public safety and justice budget,
the tribe advocates for at least $351 million in funding
proposed in the President's budget. The Nez Perce Reservation
covers 1,200 square miles. It covers five counties, mixture of
tribal, non-tribal residents, checkerboard, and through all
that we provide a full law and justice program, fully trained,
staffed police force, tribal court, prosecutor. And then we
actually cover the costs of all those offices. We have to
supplement them. The BIA doesn't come up with a sufficient
amount of funding. So $718,000 would make up a shortfall for
the law enforcement, $339,000 for prosecutorial services,
$300,000 for prison board. And the funding for these programs
needs to be increased to account for these shortfalls in
funding that the tribe has to absorb to continue the operation
of these vital services on the reservation.
In regards to education, the tribe requests $42 million for
Johnson-O'Malley funding, $5 million for tribal education
departments, $88 million for tribal colleges. We have a branch
of the Northwest Indian College on our reservation. It is the
second-highest students that we have in higher ed go to
Northwest Indian College. It is vital, and we request increased
funding for that.
It should be noted that the scholarship funding we receive
from BIA has been stagnant for the last decade, and you have
all seen the graphs on the cost of tuition over the last, you
know, a couple of decades. I think I saw a congressional study
over 30 years of 12-fold. And so we need the scholarships to
keep pace with inflation and the cost of higher education
tuition.
The tribe also relies on the BIA for funding its work
related to endangered species protection of the tribe's treaty
resources including Chinook and Steelhead salmon. The BIA
Endangered Species Program should be restored at $3 million as
it provides tribes with the technical and financial assistance
to protect endangered species on trust lands. But the funding
has actually declined significantly over the last 8 years.
The tribe supports funding for the Fish and Wildlife
Service and the Forest Service. First, the Tribal Wildlife
Grants administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a
really cost-effective expenditure for the government. You get a
lot of bang for the buck. It is a small pot of money but has
had huge successes. Since 2005, Nez Perce received four grants
totaling $800,000. That has allowed us to work on such diverse
issues as gray wolf monitoring, bighorn sheep research and rare
Platte conservation. Continued funding for the Tribal Wildlife
Grant Program will allow tribal recipients to build capacity
and maintain involvement in key conservation issues. It should
be noted that this is a competitive grant, and so the awards
are based on the quality of the proposal, but in that
framework, the funding was still reduced in 2012 and 2013, and
the tribe strongly urges this Committee to increase the funding
to $8 million as it provides a large return on a small
investment.
In closing, thank you for the opportunity to testify today,
and as you can see, the Nez Perce Tribe does a tremendous
amount of work in a variety of areas, and it is important that
the United States continue to fund this work and uphold its
treaty obligation to the tribes. Thank you.
[The statement of Joel Moffett follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and we are now going to recognize
Joel Moffett, Chairman of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish
Commission.
Mr. Moffett. I should have had a little break of it, gee.
Mr. Simpson. You used up a minute of your 5 minutes on----
Mr. Moffett. I yielded a minute to the Honorable Joel
Moffett.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
COLUMBIA RIVER INTER-TRIBAL FISH COMMISSION
WITNESS
JOEL MOFFETT
Mr. Moffett. Well good afternoon again, and putting on this
hat, I serve as Chairman of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal
Fish Commission, and that is a coalition of four tribes: The
Nez Perce Tribe, the Acoma Nation from Washington, the Warm
Springs and the Umatilla Tribes from Oregon.
It is my pleasure to address you today regarding funding
needs for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission and
the fisheries programs of its four-member tribes.
Our base program funding comes from BIA, the Rights
Protection Implementation Account, and our programs are carried
out pursuant to the Indian Self-Determination and Assistance
Act. We conduct a comprehensive treaty rights implementation
program intended to maintain compliance with our tribal
treaties, court orders, regional intergovernmental agreements
and international salmon treaties. Together our tribes manage
and co-manage lands equivalent to the size of the State of
Georgia. We are leaders in ecosystem management working in
collaboration and partnership with five states, 13 federal
agencies and several private entities.
The CRIFC and our member tribes have a goal through the
region's efforts to halt the decline of salmon, sturgeon and
lamprey populations and rebuild them to levels that support our
ceremonial and subsistence in commercial harvests. To achieve
these objectives, we have emphasized the highest level of
scientific rigor, cost-effective management strategies and
holistic approaches for the protection of our first foods.
While many of the Pacific Coast salmon stocks remain in
distress, our tribes are building Columbia Basin successes,
acre by acre, tributary by tributary and stock by stock. As an
example, I would like to hand out a brochure on the Snake River
Fall Chinook Program, and if you turn to the interior pages,
you can see in no uncertain terms the success of our program as
the graph. So if you look in the mid-'90s, 20 years ago, we had
just a couple thousand Snake River Fall Chinook come back to
Idaho. They had to go over eight dams, go up the Columbia and
up the Snake River, and just this past year, this past fall, we
had 56,000. And that is because of tribal supplementation
programs, tribal hatcheries. And you can see that our----
Mr. Calvert. And so for the record, hatcheries do work?
Mr. Moffett. Hatcheries do work.
Mr. Calvert. Good. I want----
Mr. Moffett. Yes. Yeah. Exactly.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Some people to hear that.
Mr. Simpson. The right people aren't here to hear that.
Mr. Moffett. We need a megaphone to shout that. If you run
them right, they are successful. They can rebuild the runs. The
abundance is coming back. Everyone is enjoying the runs,
tribal, sports, commercial fishermen, and also we are bringing
back the wilds. You can see in that graph is the wild
component, and the total, the blue, is the total amount of Fall
Chinook coming back.
So we are on our way to accomplishing the goal of giving
these stocks off of the ESA list, and we can do that with
proper management of our hatcheries.
We deeply appreciate the Subcommittee's ongoing support for
tribes in our core programs including the Rights Protection
Implementation, but the need remains high. We are asking the
Subcommittee to meet or exceed the President's request for
these based programs for CRIFC and our member tribes,
specifically $7.7 million for the Columbia River Fisheries
Management under the Rights Protection Implementation, $4.8
million for the U.S./Canada Pacific Salmon Treaty, $500,000 for
youth program initiatives, $352 million for the public safety
and justice and just to give you scale, we have a tribal
fishing zone on the Columbia River. We call it Zone 6. It is
150 river miles, and you have two states. And this funding for
public safety and justice is critical to provide the funding
for the conservation enforcement staff that we have, to provide
safety and effectively manage our fisheries. You know we have
fisheries all year round now because of the successes. We are
bringing them back. You know, Fall Chinook, Spring Chinook,
Summer Chinook and Steelhead through the winter. So we need our
folks out there on the ground to ensuring that the fisheries
are carried out according to the regulations and we are
providing safety and emergency response to people out on the
river.
One thing I would like to talk about is a congressional
requirement that was put on the Appropriations Bill by
Congressman Norm Dicks a couple years ago, and it required all
salmon that are produced in federally funded hatcheries to be
visibly marked. The cut the adipose fin off the top of the
salmon, and you know, in these hard-budget times, we understand
it is hard to find money lying around in the couch and increase
funding, so we want a closer examination, scrutiny, on these
mass marking programs. We don't believe it is accomplishing the
goal of bringing back the stocks and getting them off of the
ESA list, and we think it is a waste of taxpayer dollars. But
we want to see that analysis done so that you can see if it is
consistent with ESA delisting and prevailing laws and
agreements such as U.S. v. Oregon, the Pacific Salmon Treaty
and the Columbia Basin Fish Accords.
The CRIFC and the member tribes are working hard towards a
unified Columbia River hatchery strategy to replicate the
success that I handed out in the brochure. And this sort of
gives individual salmon managers the flexibility to make case-
by-case decisions whether to mark the fish or not or in what
percentage they want to mark them. We don't think there should
be a mandate just because you receive federal funds for your
hatchery.
In summary, the CRIFC and its four member tribes have
developed the capacity and infrastructure to lead and
protecting, restoring and rebuilding Columbia River Basin
salmon populations. Our collective efforts to protect our 1855
Reserve Fishing Rights for the next seven generations through
collaboration and partnerships with the states, federal and
non-Indian community is showing some success to provide
healthy, harvestable salmon populations for all citizens to
enjoy. This is a time when increased effort and participation
are demanded from all of us, and we ask for your continued
support of a coordinated comprehensive effort to restore the
shared salmon resource of the Columbia and Snake River Basins.
Thank you.
[The statement of Joel Moffett follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much. We need to have you come
up to California and run our bay delta salmon.
Mr. Moffett. We would welcome that.
Mr. Calvert. Sorry, coming down. You are obviously doing a
better job than we are.
Any questions from the panel?
Mr. Simpson. I have some but I will talk to you
individually about them later on.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Well, not a question, just a comment. We have
heard this just recently, and now from you, that IHS should go
toward more doctor payments at a Medicare-based rate. But I
want to just reiterate that you would like the savings put back
into Indian health because this is so under-funded and so
desperately needed. I look forward to hearing what is going on,
as you gentlemen have been saying, on the other side of the
rotunda because I think we are ready to go over here on the
House with your request.
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Mr. Carroll. Mr. Chairman, can I have----
Mr. Calvert. Yes.
Mr. Carroll [continuing]. One comment.
Mr. Calvert. Yes.
Mr. Carroll. I was in the audience a little bit earlier
when you guys were having your conversation on roads. I just
want to offer one thing. It may take 30 seconds.
I am one of the eastern area representatives for BIA on the
Tribal Interior Budget Council, TIBC. Every year, tribal
leaders are asked to go through a process and prioritize what
their greatest needs are. One, we take issue with the fact that
they are even identified as needs. These are obligations that
the United States owes to Indian County.
But one thing that I want to make note of in this contract
support cost, you know, USET fully supports the full funding of
contract support costs but again not at the expense of program.
So specifically on this issue of roads, in fiscal year 2012,
BIA dollars were at 2.5. Fiscal year 2014 enacted was at that
same level. What happened to fully fund that contract support
costs is programs took a hit. So the very thing that you were
talking about earlier, roads was one of those line items that
took a hit. They took a 4.3 percent hit when they are already
severely underfunded.
So again, we fully support because this is what should be
going on from day one is full payment of contract support costs
but not at the expense of programs that are already severely,
severely underfunded. So I just wanted to make that point.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Thank you for your testimony. I
appreciate your attendance. And we are going to call up the
next panel and then I am going to make a special introduction
here. First, I will introduce the panel. Mr. Dennis Smith, Sr.,
Tribal Chairman of the Shoshone-Paiute Tribal Business Council;
Mr. McCoy Oatman, U.S. Alternative Commissioner, Pacific Salmon
Commission; Mr. Charles Clement, President of the Southeast
Alaska Regional Health Consortium; and Mr. Andy Teuber, Chair
and President of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium.
After you are seated, I am going to recognize our colleague
and friend, Don Young of Alaska, who would like to read an
introduction of all the Alaskan tribes testifying today. And
you will not be able to stay for the whole hearing, I
understand, but I will be happy to recognize Mr. Young.
Mr. Young. Mr. Chairman, thank you, and thank you for your
courtesy. It is always a pleasure to allow me to introduce my
constituents, being I am the only Congressman they have. Good
or bad, I am the only one here.
But Charles Clement serves as the President and CEO of
Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium and the Intertribal
Consortium of 18 federally recognized tribes. President Clinton
has--what tribe?
Mr. Clement. Metlakatla.
Mr. Young. Metlakatla, okay. An Athabascan and of the
Killer Whale Clan. Now, keep in mind, Mr. Chairman, this is way
to the south and then we have Andy Teuber who serves as chair
and president of the Alaska Native Health Consortium, a
nonprofit organization that provides statewide medical care,
sanitation and social services. It operates a state-of-the art
Alaska Native medical center in Anchorage. And may I say, Mr.
Chairman, Andy serves as probably one of the finest medical
institutions in the United States of America. They have done
well with the money this Committee has been able to achieve for
them and does an outstanding job and I am just very proud of
that organization.
If I can, Mr. Chairman, I will not be able to stay and
introduce everybody else, but can I introduce them now?
Mr. Calvert. Sure.
Mr. Young. Okay. The next panel you will have Ms. Donna
Galbreath. She started at the Southcentral Foundation as a
family primary care center and she is of Athabascan heritage.
And Patty Brown-Schwalenberg is the executive director of
the Chugach Regional Resources Commission, a nonprofit
intertribal fish and wildlife organization. She is enrolled as
a member of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa
Indians. How she got on there I am not sure but she is with the
Indians of Wisconsin. But anyway, I am just giving her a bad
time.
Angela Cox serves as the vice president of the
administration of Arctic Slope Native Association, the largest
area up next to where they do the whaling, et cetera. They have
a tribal health organization that is located in Barrow and
serves eight federally recognized tribes.
Elsie Sampson Vaden serves as the self-governance
coordinator of Norton Sound Health Corporation, the tribal not-
for-profit healthcare organization in Nome, which serves 15
villages. And originally Elsie is from Noorvik and has worked
for the Norton Sound Health Corporation since 2001, just about
as long as I have served in Congress.
Jessica Mata-Rukovishnikoff serves as the primary care
services regional administrator at the Aleutian Pribilof
Islands Association, a federally recognized tribal organization
of the Aleut people. Jessica works on implementing and
overseeing the association's primary care services.
And Victor Joseph is the current president and former
health director of the Tanana Chiefs Conference, a consortium
of 42 Native villages primarily in the Fairbanks area,
including my hometown, Fort Yukon, and he is a member of the
native village of Tanana, which is below Fort Yukon. And we
will have a little discussion about that later on.
But these are all great Alaskans, who traveled here, and
have done a good job. And we have done well with the money this
Committee has been able to appropriate over the years and we
hope they continue that.
I want to offer one last thing, Mr. Chairman. You take all
the land east of the Mississippi to the Atlantic Ocean to the
tip of Maine to the tip of Florida, that is part of Alaska. In
that area they have 253 Congressmen and 52 Senators. So just
keep that in mind; there is only one of me.
Mr. Teuber. But we have got Don Young.
Mr. Young. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Teuber. I would rather take on the 253 than you.
Mr. Calvert. Me, too.
Well, thank you for your participation, Don. First, we have
Dennis Smith. You probably feel a little left out; you are from
Idaho. I have heard of that state. It is a great state, and
also thank you for your service to our country. And you are
recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
SHOSHONE-PAIUTE TRIBAL BUSINESS COUNCIL
WITNESS
DENNIS SMITH, SR.
Mr. Smith. Thank you. I am not only from Idaho; I am also
from Nevada. My reservation, the line runs right down--the
middle of our reservation is half in Nevada and half is in
Idaho.
But anyway, I would like to start out by thanking you
people. I really do appreciate you people. I think you heard
some testimonies from the brothers and sisters here about the
real need for some more money. We know it is tight and we know
it is tough but we have got to remember trust responsibility.
First of all, good afternoon, Chairman Calvert, Ranking
Member Moran, and Members of the Subcommittee. My name is
Dennis Smith and I am Chairman of the Shoshone-Paiute Tribes of
the Duck Valley Indian Reservation. Thank you for inviting me
to testify. I also want to thank this Subcommittee and our
Congressman Mike Simpson for their long-standing support for
Indian Country and for listening to tribal leaders. We have
great needs and limited resources. If the Subcommittee does not
increase the President's modest 2015 funding request for Indian
Country, our needs will only increase. The President asked for
a 1 percent increase to BIA funds for 2015, less than 1 percent
for Indian education needs, and a 4 percent increase for IHS
services and construction programs. What is needed so great in
Indian Country for public safety and health services: staffing,
facilities, construction, operation and maintenance, housing,
and broadband. These modest increases are too small to address
tribal needs.
Duck Valley is a large ranching and farming reservation in
northern Nevada and Idaho. The reservation is about 400 square
miles and about a 2\1/2\ hour drive from Boise, 2 hours from
Elko, Nevada. We are faced with many challenges this year and
2015 funding will be critical to how well we recover from the
sequester cuts in 2013. These cuts forced us to make difficult
choices and reduce services to our members. I would like to
focus on contract support cost funding, irrigation and other
drought assistance and public safety and healthcare to
illustrate how important federal appropriations are to Indian
Country.
First, thanks for standing up to the Administration and
rejecting their proposal last year to cut our contract support
costs. Our battle with IHS over contract support cost
shortfalls which were featured in a December article in the
Washington Post, and I would like for you to know that was--I
cannot remember her name, but she came to the Duck Valley
Indian reservation, spent 2 days with us, came back, put it in
the newspaper, and there has been a lot of concern about that,
what she learned from our little reservation in our isolation
and what is going on. Bless her for doing that. We really do
appreciate it and I think if some of you here did not get that,
I wish you guys would get in touch with her and get that
article and take a look at what she has seen out in our
country, one of the most isolated reservations in any country.
But I tell you what, we are proud we are natives. And
regardless of what the Federal Government does to us, we are
going to survive. Grandpa above assures us of that. We do not
give up, I always say in my prayers or whoever. Never, ever
give up on hope, I say. Keep faith, hope, and love life. You
give up on hope, you are lost. Do not ever give up on that.
And like in 2005 when I had just settled and paid is
probably after a Supreme Court when that IHS has chosen to
fight tribes. Now, that is a pretty harsh word but that is the
way we feel about it. That is the way we feel about it. Please
urge IHS to promptly settle outstanding contract support
claims. I wrote Dr. Roubideaux and agreed to settle our old
claim for $4.5 million. We are desperate for these dollars.
I understand maybe 2 years, 1\1/2\ ago, Choctaw and
Cherokee came, bless them for getting and meeting with the
President of the United States. And when they had a meeting
with the President of the United States, after they laid it out
about contract support and other issues, especially contract
support costs, from what we understand, they went back and were
telling in Indian Country the President says that is really a
no-brainer. Why is that? Because you have got a judgment from
it. You can go over and you can get into that judgment and you
can pay these.
Now, I think it is really a sad day in the Federal
Government's time when you come back now and show them this
$4.5 million. Where in the world are we going to get $4.5
million? Well, if you make them do their job and pay us every
year because the Supreme Court ruled you have a legal, binding
contract with these tribal governments, you got it. Take care
of it. But we let it go, we let it go. And we come back. Now,
we are saying $4.5 million.
I got my attorney over here. I talked to Dr. Roubideaux. I
am a member of the Self-Governance Advisory Committee on IHS
and BIA. And the last time I was in D.C. we met with them. I
said, Dr. Roubideaux, I am going to get a hold of you and we
are going to set up face-to-face, none of this smoke signal,
none of this computer, none of the teleconferences. I want to
sit across the table from you and we are going to negotiate our
contract support costs. I have got people here in Washington,
D.C., that want to go and sit and listen to that and I welcome
them. You people need to hear, you guys need to know what in
the world is going on behind those closed doors. If I were
sitting over there and you are here, you probably do not know
what is going on. I want you people to understand that because
that is a huge issue.
And this is how bad it is that when we do not get our
contract support cost we have to go right down the line to all
of our programs in Indian Health Service providing healthcare.
We take a little here, a little there, little there, little
there. So what we do is we cut our services to our tribal
membership. And if somebody is lurking around and somebody is
going to tell Indian Health Service you had better go check out
Duck Valley because they are not providing good quality--how
can we? When you have got $4.5 million, that is a big chunk of
change and that has a lot to do with providing healthcare to
our people. I mean this is important.
I got a call in to her, like I said. Wednesday I am going
to drive all the way over there and I am going to set up a
meeting with her. I am going to say, Dr. Roubideaux, you told
me 4 months ago we would have this meeting. I have been writing
you, leaving you messages. You do not set up a meeting with me
so I am here today. I am telling you I am coming back the week
of the 20 something or whatever. I am going to meet with you
and Kevin Washburn. There are going to be issues that need to
be resolved. And I tell you what, I may get a hold of this
Kimberly at the Washington Post and put an article in there. We
have got to wake up back here and stuff.
Mr. Calvert. I agree with you. We need to keep focus on
that, Mr. Smith, and we certainly appreciate your testimony.
Mr. Smith. Good, good. Second, we are experiencing a
terrible drought that is affecting our ranchers and farmers and
we are working with the Department of Agriculture, FSA, NRCS,
USDA, the Farm Bureau. Eighty percent is for food, 20 percent
is for farming and ranching. But the BIA's budget for
irrigation projects and drought relief is inadequate. Families
may have to stop ranching and farming and leave the reservation
to find work as costs rise due to the drought.
I want you guys to understand how important it is because
we are so isolated. We really have the Indian Health Service,
BIA, Elko County School District. Other than that, we do not
have anything. We produce some of the best beef you ever want
to go and find. You know, what do they call that? We do not
pump a whole bunch of medicine into them. We do not go and
fertilize the heck out of our land.
Mr. Calvert. Organic.
Mr. Smith. Yes, organic. There you go. Thank you, sir. And
we go right down to Mr. Simpson's area and we buy their
replacement heifers and we go buy them. We are proud of what we
have got. But a guy like me, ever since I was just a little
guy, whenever you are old enough to realize what life is about,
on my grandma and grandpas' side, on both grandpa's side we had
livestock, we had horses, we had cattle. It may be coming to
the point where I am going to sell out. I cannot afford when
that wild horse reservoir, there is no water. We cannot
irrigate. We are in bad shape.
Mr. Simpson. Mr. Chairman, I would tell you that Dennis
told me earlier today that he could not even introduce himself
in 5 minutes and now you know.
Mr. Smith. You know, I appreciate that because it is hard.
It is hard. You know, we bomb, steal, rob whatever to get an
airplane ticket to come back and talk to you guys and only got
5 minutes. I mean it is hard for us guys to try to tell you
guys----
Mr. Calvert. I understand. We have a lot of people out here
today.
Mr. Smith. Right. Right. So are you telling me I am
through?
Mr. Calvert. Well, can you just maybe wrap it up in 30
seconds? We have taken up 10 minutes rather than the 5, but----
Mr. Smith. Well, I appreciate it. And when you get through
listening to me, you go home tonight, you are going to sure
like it. You are going to say, boy, we gave that man a chance
to talk. I will.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Smith. I will. I will cut it off because my testimony
is in the written part of it anyway so you guys can read that.
Mr. Calvert. Your complete testimony is in the record.
Mr. Smith. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. We will be looking closely at that. So thank
you.
Mr. Smith. But anyway, I appreciate everything you do for
us.
Mr. Calvert. Thanks, Dennis. Thank you very much.
Mr. Smith. Thank you very much.
[The statement of Dennis Smith follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Next, Mr. McCoy Oatman, the U.S. Alternate
Commissioner, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
PACIFIC SALMON COMMISSION
WITNESS
McCOY OATMAN
Mr. Oatman. Thank you, Honorable Chairman and committee
Members. My name is McCoy Oatman. I have the privilege of
serving on the Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee with Mr.
Moffett, who testified earlier. I serve as the treasurer for
the tribe. I was going to have him give his testimony but I
think he has done enough today. But I serve as alternate tribal
commissioner for the U.S. Section of the Pacific Salmon
Commission. Ron Allen is the principal commissioner and he
would have been here today but he had other obligations.
The U.S. Section prepares an annual budget for
implementation of the treaty. The integrated budget details
program needs and costs for tribal, federal, and state agencies
involved in the treaty. The tribal participation in the Pacific
Salmon Treaty process is funded in the Bureau of Indian Affairs
budget, which Mr. Moffett talked about earlier. Tribal programs
are essential for the United States to meet its treaty
obligations. And also recently tribal programs have been taking
on more management responsibilities due to the decrease in
funding to state agencies.
So in order to meet the increased obligations under the
2009-2018 Pacific Salmon Treaty Agreement the 24 affected
tribes identified costs at $4.8 million for tribal research
projects and participation in the Pacific Salmon Treaty
process, which is an increase of $520,000 over the fiscal year
2014 enacted level. The funding for tribal participation in the
Salmon Treaty is a line item in the BIA's budget under the
Rights Protection Implementation, Wildlife and Parks, Other
Recurring Program Areas.
Under the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service programs, the U.S.
Section identified needs as follows: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service participation in the treaty process is identified at a
base level of $417,000. The Pacific States Marine Fisheries
Commission's Regional Mark Center receives support from the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to provide data services to the
PSC process. Those costs are identified at $315,000. This
funding level represents an increase of $75,000 over the fiscal
year 2012 enacted levels for the Mark Center. The Regional Mark
Center is utilized to meet treaty requirements concerning data
exchange with Canada. These program recommendations are
integrated with those of the state and federal agencies to
avoid duplication of effort and provide for the most efficient
expenditures of scarce funds.
A copy of the integrated U.S. Section Budget Justification
will be made available to the committee. The budget summary
justifies the support needed to carry out necessary functions
in implementing the treaty. Funding to support activities under
the Pacific Salmon Commission comes from the Departments of
Interior, State, and Commerce. Adequate funding from all three
departments is necessary for the U.S. to meet its treaty
obligations. All of the funds are needed for critical data
collection and research activities directly related to
implementation and are used in cooperative programs involving
federal, state, and tribal fishery agencies and the Department
of Fisheries in Canada. The commitment of the United States is
matched by the commitment of the Government of Canada.
Mr. Chairman, the United States and Canada established the
Pacific Salmon Commission under the Pacific Salmon Treaty of
1985 to conserve salmon stocks, provide for optimum production
of salmon, and to control salmon interceptions. After more than
20 years, the work of the Pacific Salmon Commission continues
to be essential for the wise management of salmon in the
Northwest, British Columbia, and Alaska. The Commission
provides a forum to ensure cooperative management of salmon
populations. In 2008, the U.S. and Canada successfully
concluded lengthy negotiations to improve this management,
including the adjustments to the coast-wide abundance-based
management regime for Chinook salmon, also known as the Chinook
Agreement, and the framework for abundance based-management for
southern Coho populations. The agreement is intended to last
through 2018. The U.S. and Canada completed a revised Fraser
River sockeye and pink chapter in 2013.
Finally, I would just like the Committee to take into
account the fact that the value of the commercial harvest of
the salmon subject to the treaty, managed at productive levels
under the treaty, supports the infrastructure of many coastal
and inland communities. The value of the recreational fisheries
and the economic diversity they provide for local economies
throughout the Pacific Northwest and Alaska is also immense.
The value of these fish to the 24 treaty tribes in Washington,
Oregon, and Idaho goes far beyond their monetary value.
I would like to finish with as we say in tribal
communities, as the salmon go, the tribal communities go. And
so as you see from Mr. Moffett's testimony earlier, when the
populations are up, you know, it is really good for the
communities, for our economy, also for our well-being as you
will see people talk about diabetes and things of that nature.
And if we had more of our traditional foods to rely on, then we
would not have as many health problems as we have today.
So with that, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your time
today.
[The statement of McCoy Oatman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Oatman. I appreciate your
testimony.
Mr. Charles Clement, President of the Southeast Alaska
Regional Health Consortium.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
SOUTHEAST ALASKA REGIONAL HEALTH CONSORTIUM
WITNESS
CHARLES CLEMENT
Mr. Clement. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My name is Charles Clement. I am the President and CEO of
Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium. It is an
intertribal consortium of approximately 18 tribes in the
panhandle of southeast Alaska. If you are not familiar, the
panhandle of southeast Alaska is mostly islands, which makes
delivering healthcare and health services throughout the region
unique and somewhat challenging and difficult.
I have a couple items here I would like to discuss with you
and maybe recommendations or suggestions for consideration.
Much of what I will be talking about has probably been talked
about previously and will be talked about again, so I do not
want to belabor some of it. But I think the uniqueness is
possibly some fairly small technical corrections that this
committee may be able to employ that they be able to go a long
ways towards resolving some of the challenges that many tribes
and tribal organizations throughout Indian Country face.
First, I would like to talk a little bit about contract
support cost claims, which have been mentioned several times in
my short time here, but I think one of the things that I would
like to focus on is really the idea that the solutions are
largely in front of us now, thanks to the work of this
Committee in the last session. But challenges remain
specifically around settling old claims. And I think what would
make sense is it seems it would be very easy for this body to
insert language into the appropriations that would direct the
IHS to use the existing shortfall reports.
These reports have been compiled every year, as far back as
I am familiar with all of our claims already listed on a
report. And that report is good enough for the IHS to give to
you to describe their claims in very specific detail. I am not
sure why it is not good enough for them to use to settle our
claims. It seems one of those things, you know, good for the
goose, good for the gander. And it would make resolving these
outstanding claims very timely, very efficient. And I think
people would be well served if people could get on with all the
important work that they have to do and the agency could stop
hearing from the tribes, the committees could stop hearing from
the tribes, and things would be able to move forward in a
reasonably timely fashion.
We have at least $30 million of outstanding claims. Like
the gentleman prior said, those dollars are spent. They have
come out of direct services that would otherwise go towards
people who very much need those services throughout Indian
Country. And so I think if it would work, it would seem to make
a lot of sense to go ahead and insert that language to direct
them to use the report.
And if there are errors, which have been claimed in the
past, I think the chances are that there are fewer errors than
there are corrections, and we could deal with the errors on the
report one by one instead of, you know, right now it seems like
we are doing it backwards. We are assuming everything is wrong.
The chances are everything is probably not wrong. Maybe there
are a few things that need to be straightened out, but it would
be easier to rectify those problems than to spend all of our
time just starting from ground zero because what has been
happening is an incredible amount of resources are being spent
and utilized to fight tribes. You know, auditors are hired and
lawyers are hired and it makes it a very inefficient and
adversarial process, which I think by the work of this
committee, the work of the Supreme Court, the work of, you
know, eventually the administration, we have all gone to the
place where we all understand that this needs to get wrapped up
but yet we are still here dragging our feet and making people
essentially, you know, making people beg for their money that
is rightly and justly due them. And there is really no need for
it.
The other thing I would like to talk a little bit about is
now that largely at least for '14 and '15 these issues of
contract support costs are hopefully behind us and we look
forward to the new challenges that we need to face, I think one
of the greatest areas of opportunity is really investing in the
IHS program space. Specifically I think for us, you know, we
look at the opportunity to develop facilities. Right now, if
you look at throughout Indian Country there is a backlog of
somewhere between 25 and 30 years of the facilities development
based on existing appropriations. And the challenge with that
is at some point in time it was a first-come, first-served
process which people got in line. You know, they needed a
facility, they got in line, they got on a list, and it is
ranked by virtue of when you stepped in line and it does not
really reflect the need throughout Indian Country. And it also
does not reflect the challenges.
And what I am getting at is right now at the rate at which
facilities are funded within the IHS, there are more facilities
falling into disrepair and un-serviceability than there are
facilities coming online. You know, so essentially for every
facility that comes online to go offline because the investment
window is not strong enough. And I think what to me would make
sense is there is an opportunity to look at the list and figure
out how to prioritize it in a more meaningful way rather than
essentially a first-come, first-served lineup.
But also with the passage of the Indian Health Care
Improvement Act, the reauthorization, there is the ability to
do repair and replace funding, which the agency--and I do not
think the Administration or any of the congressional bodies
have dealt with before, but there is an opportunity to really
be more thoughtful about how those facilities are ranked and
developed and maintained, and I think there are any number of
ways to do it.
You know, I mean this is really for you to consider but I
think the reality is the thoughtfulness, you know, in
consideration of these financial times, there needs to be more
thought put into how these things are organized and make sure
we are not throwing good money after bad or wasting money or
letting facilities fall into disrepair. So I think asking the
agency or addressing the agency to take a look at a more
thoughtful way to come up with facilities development, repair,
and maintenance sort of efforts would make a lot of sense.
So, Mr. Chair, thank you.
[The statement of Charles Clement follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much.
Next, Mr. Andy Teuber, Chair and President of the Alaska
Native Tribal Health Consortium.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ALASKA NATIVE TRIBAL HEALTH CONSORTIUM
WITNESS
ANDY TEUBER
Mr. Teuber. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Vice Chair McCollum.
I am the president and chairman of the Alaska Native Tribal
Health Consortium, which serves 229 tribes across the State of
Alaska. The State of Alaska, as our Congressman Young stated,
is a large place to try and do business and particularly
difficult to try and ensure that the needs of the U.S. or the
Nation's neediest and most vulnerable people are being met when
transportation and communication difficulties exist as they do.
We would love to welcome you, members of the committee, to
Alaska to try and see for yourselves precisely what it is that
causes the challenges that we confront, but we also want to
represent issues for the entire nation. And so I would ask that
my written testimony be entered for the record.
Mr. Calvert. Everyone's full testimony is entered into the
record.
Mr. Teuber. Thank you very much.
And I will touch on a couple of items that my predecessor
Mr. Clement in his testimony gave and focus on contract support
costs, the Village Built Clinic Lease Program, and also the
solution that he had described on how we might look to reinvest
resources to keep our facilities online.
For fiscal year 2015, the IHS budget, we are requesting
many of the same things that you have heard other witnesses
testify today about. Contract support costs, restoration of
sequestration cuts, the IHS advanced appropriations, and for a
definition of ``Indian,'' which I think this committee could
provide some solution to within the Affordable Care Act.
In addition to those which are covered in my written
testimony, during my time today I would like to focus on
finding the solution for Mr. Clement's issue, the renovation
and expansion of existing IHS facilities. And while the item
was brought up as a matter of discussion, I think that we have
a solution that we might be able to present that would allow
this committee to effectively address that very issue.
So according to the IHS 2012 report to Congress on
healthcare facilities needs, the average age of IHS-owned
health facilities is over 30 years old and over \1/3\ of IHS
hospitals and health centers are over 40 years old. This is in
contrast to the average age of private sector hospitals, which
is in the area of 9 or 10 years.
As existing facilities age, without renovation or
expansion, they become increasingly inefficient to operate and
costly to maintain. In addition, this disrepair often prevents
the deployment of new technology or medical best practices.
So this is a solution that I would like to propose to the
committee is the reauthorization of the Indian Health Care
Improvement Act in 2010 amended Section 301 to direct the
Secretary of HHS to ensure that the renovation and expansion
needs of IHS and travel facilities are fully and equitably
integrated into the IHS healthcare facility priority system and
to consult and cooperate with tribes to develop innovative
approaches to address unmet needs for construction of health
facilities.
Next on the Village Built Clinic Program, the Village
Built, or VBCs, are essential to carrying out the Community
Health Aide Program in the villages of rural Alaska. Community
health aides are often the only health providers available in
rural communities and are of critical importance to the Alaska
Tribal Health System. CHAP practitioners use VBCs to provide
CHAP services in all of our 200 plus villages.
The majority of VBC lease payments from IHS have not
substantially increased since 1989, and current funding is not
nearly sufficient to cover inflationary increases and the cost
of repair or renovation of the facilities needed to keep them
in safe condition. Under Section 119 of the Indian Health Care
Improvement Act, the IHS is responsible for operating the CHAP
program. Many VBCs are struggling to meet operating costs to
stay open and maintain adequate conditions. Without VBC
facilities to provide CHAP services, the CHAP program cannot
properly be operated. To ensure the continued operation of CHAP
program, the IHS has a responsibility to provide lease payments
that cover the actual costs of operating.
For fiscal year 2013 an estimated 4-1/2 million dollars was
provided for the VBC lease program by IHS as part of the
recurring base budget. This amount likely only covers a little
over 1/3 of the full cost of operating VBCs. We request an
additional $8 million for the operation and funding for the
program for fiscal year 2015. We would be looking for $15
million for the renovation and expansion funds.
And finally, Mr. Chair, I would like to thank this
committee for its leadership in addressing the contract support
cost issue that has hindered tribal health programs for
decades. Not only did this committee reject the CSC cap that
was proposed in fiscal year 2014 but it saw to it that tribal
health programs were finally provided the CSC funding they are
contractually due. We are pleased to see that the
administration is now following the guidance provided by the
committee and requested full funding for IHS contract support
costs for fiscal year 2015 in the President's budget request
and we request that this committee continue its leadership and
diligence on the issue to fully fund IHS contract support costs
in fiscal year 2015.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
[The statement of Andy Teuber follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And thank you all for your
testimony. And we will have just a comment from me.
Obviously, contract health support costs is a big deal. We
were happy to resolve this last Congress as far as what we are
going to do from this point forward. Obviously I think the
administration, I do not know what they are spending in trying
to--I have got a feeling the administration is spending a lot
of money trying to not make a deal. I think they might be much
better off if they sat down with Dr. Roubideaux and others and
met with the individual tribes to get these things worked out.
And I do not think there is any disagreement with anybody here
that they need to do that. If there is a dispute about the
cost, they need to resolve that but it seems like they have
plenty of time to do that. So certainly I think we would all
agree that this is something that needs to occur. With that,
are there any additional questions?
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
First off, thank you for your testimony on the salmon and
the negotiations and having the right people at the table.
Negotiating with Canada about fish is very, very important. We
have different issues in the northland but we also have to go
toe to toe or head to head with our Canadian brothers and
sisters every once in a while, so thank you for your comments
on that.
Mr. Smith, we do look at your full testimony because I am
going to ask these two gentlemen a question based on
telecommunications.
I know a lot of quality rural healthcare is provided with
upgraded telecommunications--good cameras linking to hospitals
and that. You can speak on behalf of probably Alaska--maybe you
can speak on other parts of the country that you are doing some
of that.
Mr. Smith is just asking for $250,000 just to close the
loop on his reservation for better telecommunications. He
points out, if he is correct--and I am sure you are, sir--that
is 29 percent of the total budget for telecommunications. So I
know there is money in ag for rural telecommunications.
I have heard from Leech Lake about telecommunications needs
as well. It is really a hodgepodge putting this together. Could
you tell me as we talk about upgrading our schools, we also
need to talk about upgrading our healthcare facilities like
telecommunications. Maybe Alaska has a leg up on it because you
started out in the days of kind of communicating with radio, so
maybe you are far more advanced in using telecommunications for
healthcare.
Mr. Teuber. Thank you for your question. Speaking on behalf
of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, which really
works with tribes and tribal organizations across the state to
ensure that distance delivery for telemedicine and telehealth
care services is made possible, oftentimes the ability to have
a provider in one of our village communities is not there. You
cannot have a dentist or a doctor that will serve as a resident
of a community. And so distance delivery really becomes
essential.
And we have employed technology that allows for that to
occur but it is technology that is predicated on the assurance
that those broadband connections exist. And while technology
continues to improve that allows for decreased bandwidth to
make effective videoconferencing and other services usable, the
importance of ensuring the funding for the subsidized
connections is there.
And I would say that for other parts of the state because
the program really was not designed exclusively for the rural
parts of the Nation but also for the urban part, that that
subsidy is extremely important to ensure that for education and
healthcare both, that that broadband connection or conductivity
continues to exist. We have in the areas of healthcare
proprietary technology that allows for the operation of
telemedicine and telehealth, so both on the behavioral health
side and on the actual primary or ambulatory care side. So I am
happy to describe for the benefit of the committee through
written correspondence additional information that might help
you.
Ms. McCollum. That would be great. Mr. Chair, the VA is
doing that a lot with mental health. I saw in rural North
Dakota and South Dakota and working with Sanford medical how
they use some of the cameras and equipment available. They
either let somebody know that they need to see a specialist
right away. Sometimes the specialist can provide triage while
they are moving forward. So I just think it is good for our
kids, it is good for our health, and we should figure out a way
to do that.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Smith. Mr. Calvert, real quick.
Mr. Calvert. Yes, sir.
Mr. Smith. I really want to thank you for your comments
about how you guys thought you had this resolved and contract
supports for somebody in that system is spending a lot of money
not to get this thing done. The only thing the Federal
Government and IHS have done is make some attorneys really
happy because, boy, they are sitting down, they are really
going at this.
And the last thing I want to say is I would like to invite
you or anybody when I get this meeting set up by Dr. Roubideaux
that if somebody in this system here could go out there and
actually hear what we are going through with Dr. Roubideaux,
that would give you guys a real insight.
Mr. Calvert. I appreciate that. I will see if we can do
that. But we need to get this thing resolved.
With that, this panel is released. Thank you very much.
Appreciate it.
The next panel is going to be Ms. Donna Galbreath,
President of the Southcentral Foundation; Ms. Patty Brown-
Schwalenberg, Executive Director of the Chugach Regional
Resources Commission; Ms. Angela Cox, Vice President of the
Arctic Slope Native Association; and Ms. Elsie Sampson Vaden,
Self-Governance Coordinator for the Norton Sound Health
Corporation.
Everybody, thank you for attending. And in case you have
not heard, we are trying to stay within the 5-minute rule. So
when the little green light is on, you are great, but when that
little yellow light is on, that means we have 1 minute
remaining. And the red light means we are done.
I am going to recognize Donna Galbreath first, President
of Southcentral Foundation.
Ms. Galbreath. Hi.
Mr. Calvert. Hi.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
SOUTHCENTRAL FOUNDATION
WITNESS
DONNA GALBREATH
Ms. Galbreath. Hi. I am Donna Galbreath and I am actually
the medical director for quality assurance for Southcentral
Foundation I am testifying on behalf.
SCF is a tribal organization that provides medical, dental,
optometry, behavioral health, substance abuse treatment, and
tertiary OB/GYN and pediatrics for about 120,000 Alaska Native
American Indian people who live in Alaska. I am really excited
to tell you that, thanks to the efforts of this committee, our
Mat-Su Clinic is now open and we just received the staffing
funding packet last week. So we are really excited to get that
clinic fully staffed. It is quite an opportunity. Since we have
opened our clinic less than 2 years ago, the population that we
served at that clinic has increased by 60 percent.
I also want to thank the committee for helping us
successfully defeat the administration's proposal last year to
cap contract support costs. These costs go to pay for health
insurance for our employees, employee technicians, accountants,
attorneys, human resources, all the costs that go into
administrative costs for running a successful healthcare
system. We hope IHS's funds that are promised to fund these
costs in 2014 come through. And we will not have to deduct
these costs from services we are already providing, as other
people have already said.
However, if IHS only continues to pay a portion of our
contracts, we will never be able to keep pace with the needs of
our expanding population to provide competitive salaries to
recruit and maintain talented healthcare professionals and to
provide high-quality care for what our people deserve. Just in
Anchorage alone, our population increases to the point that
every year we could hire a full team of healthcare providers to
satisfy that need. So our needs are continuing to increase.
This is not a small issue. Our claims which are unresolved
exceed $200 million. We are way overdue to settle this. IHS
needs to settle these claims. IHS knows about this. It is very
simple math actually. They know what they owe us, they know
what they paid us, and they know what they have not paid us. We
do not need expensive audits. We do not need to have request
for documentation all the time, and we do not need to go into
renegotiation on what they are going to reach us because we
reached these agreements 15 years ago and they were good faith
agreements. We want to ask this committee to take whatever
measures you can to see that our claims are fully resolved this
year.
As for current appropriations, we encourage the committee
to focus primarily on general program increases. In prior
years, the increases have been mainly with contract health
services, which is very, very important and I understand that,
but you cannot ignore the rest of the programs at all,
especially for tribal organizations that provide direct
services like Southcentral Foundation does.
Priorities should also be placed on overcoming the 2 years
of sequestration that have occurred. And the reason that I say
2 years is because last year's increases were diverted by
Indian Health Service to cover contract support cost
shortfalls. These increases to general funds should also take
into account inflation, population growth, dental services,
mental health, and health education programs. These accounts
were significantly impacted by sequestration and have not been
restored.
To summarize, SCF requests continued full funding for our
contracts, resolution of our issues with Indian Health Service,
and that the appropriation focus on the general program
increases.
I want to thank you again for all the support that you have
provided us and I want to thank you for allowing me to testify
on behalf of Southcentral Foundation and the people we serve.
Thank you.
[The statement of Donna Galbreath follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Ms. Patty Brown-Schwalenberg, Executive Director,
Chugach Regional Resources Commission.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
CHUGACH REGIONAL RESOURCES COMMISSION
WITNESS
PATTY BROWN-SCHWALENBERG
Ms. Brown-Schwalenberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you to the Committee for holding hearings. I
think it is really important for the native voices to be heard,
and this opportunity is, I feel, very valuable. So I appreciate
that on behalf of my colleagues and I.
The Chugach Regional Resources Commission is an intertribal
fish and wildlife commission based in south-central Alaska, so
we serve the 7 tribes of the Chugach region in Prince William
Sound and Lower Cook Inlet dealing strictly with natural
resource issues, subsistence, marine animals, migratory birds,
that sort of thing.
So I wanted to testify today on two parts of the Interior
budget. One is the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the other one
is the Fish and Wildlife Service.
So the Bureau of Indian Affairs, under the Trust Natural
Resources Management, there was a decrease in the natural
resources sub activity by $76,000 and a decrease in fish and
wildlife and parks by $246,000. And these were just diverted to
other subaccounts. And it is really difficult to get funding
for natural resource management anywhere, states, tribes,
whatever. So if we could possibly bolster that program back up
and at least replace the money that was taken, it would be nice
to even get an increase, but we know the battle when you are
reviewing the budget, so we would really like to get that money
back to where it was.
The Fish and Wildlife Service budget has $46.9 million in
their budget and it is a $166,000 increase over 2014 and a
$71.7 million increase for Resource Management. So our
relationship with the Fish and Wildlife Service is that we
handle the spring and summer subsistence harvest of migratory
birds for the State of Alaska for the rural communities. We
have been funded through the Fish and Wildlife Service budget
for about $1 million a year since the Migratory Bird Treaty Act
was amended back in the late '90s. And that funding has
steadily decreased. We are around about 700,000. And that
funding is not specifically identified for the Alaska Migratory
Bird Co-Management Council, so we are basically dependent upon
the goodwill of the Region 7 directorate to decide if we were
going to get funding or not. So it would be our request that
some of that increase for resource management be diverted to
the Alaska Migratory Bird Co-Management Council in Region 7.
I, along with the rest of the tribal people that have been
testifying, support the fully funding of contract support, and
we would like to thank you for the support we have gotten in
the past for the work that we do at the Chugach Regional
Resources Commission. In addition to the migratory bird
management and marine mammal activities, we also have worked on
tribal natural resources curriculum development with the
University of Alaska Fairbanks, the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, and the Native American Fish and
Wildlife Society. So we are able to put these curricula in
place at the K through 12 level and we have piloted the program
in the Chugach region. So we are working to try to institute
that. So what it does is it takes traditional knowledge and
partners it with science so it will hopefully encourage more
young people to pursue higher education degrees in the natural
sciences.
Also, we are looking at climate adaptation planning with
the assistance from the Bureau of Indian Affairs funding. And
our stellar program, the Alutiiq Pride Shellfish Hatchery, has
been doing some groundbreaking work in the culture of clams,
other shellfish, and red king crab and blue king crab. So we
are working with many partners on that project in the Kodiak
area and in the Aleutian Pribilof Islands. They have not been
able to harvest crab for over 20 years, so we were trying to
figure out what happens to the crabs, where they go when they
are born, and if there is any way that we might be able to
figure out why that population is not returning and maybe
enhance the population, maybe not in my lifetime. It may be in
10 years or so. Anyway, so that is one of the exciting things
that we have been working on.
So just in closing, I thank you for the funding that we
have received in the past, the $410,000. I would urge you to
sustain that funding in the BIA's 2015 budget and again
increase the funding for the BIA's Trust Natural Resource
Management programs and discourage the BIA from decreasing
funding for sub activities like natural resources and fish,
wildlife, and parks.
We also urge the Subcommittee to support the President's
request for increased funding for Fish and Wildlife Service but
to again designate $1 million of the proposed increase to the
Alaska Migratory Bird Co-Management Council and support the
administration's proposal to fully fund the contract support
costs.
So thank you for the opportunity to provide this
information and it is an honor to be here. And I would like to
thank you again.
[The statement of Patty Brown-Schwalenberg follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady for her testimony.
Next, Ms. Angela Cox.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
ARCTIC SLOPE NATIVE ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
ANGELA COX
Ms. Cox. [Speaking native language.]
Good afternoon, Honorable Chair and Members of the
Subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify before
you today regarding the fiscal year 2015 budget for the Indian
Health Service. My name is Angela Cox. I am Inupiaq from the
northernmost tribe in the United States, and I serve as the
vice president of administration for Arctic Slope Native
Association in Barrow, Alaska.
We are proud to report the opening of our new hospital in
Barrow has been a great success, happening on time and on
budget. We can now provide more specialty services like CT
scans and physical therapy on location and without the need to
send our patients across the state to access these services.
Additionally, we are expanding our use of telemedicine and have
developed a home model for primary care services so that the
people we serve no longer have to leave their communities to
obtain the basic healthcare they deserve.
We are proud of these achievements and know we could not
have done it without the contributions we received from this
committee. For these reasons, we cannot thank you enough.
I would also like to thank the Committee for making full
funding of contract support costs a reality. On that topic, we
are fortunate to be one of the few tribes that have resolved
our pending claims for underpayments of these costs in prior
years. However, we had to wage a decade-long litigation battle
against the Indian Health Service to get there, including three
Court of Appeals decisions, a Supreme Court ruling, and 18
months of intense and costly negotiations. We hope the IHS
changes its policies, becomes more transparent and willing to
share data with the tribes, and pay the money and does so on
time so tribes never again have to deal with the expense and
delay of a legal battle simply to receive what we were promised
in the first place.
To help facilitate this process, we ask this committee to
support advanced appropriations for IHS, which would give the
agency the flexibility it needs to adapt to changing funding
levels that occur throughout the contract year. We would also
like to thank the Committee for its continued support of the
Contract Health Services Account, now called the Purchased/
Referred Care Program, without which our people would not be
able to obtain healthcare unless it was available inside our
own facility.
I can assure you that flights from the North Slope to
Anchorage are not cheap and one cannot even fly commercially
from Barrow to Seattle directly, but these two cities have the
closest facilities for highly specialized care. In this year
alone we have purchased care from the Seattle Children's
Hospital for 18 pediatric cardiology patients, paid for
medevacs from the surrounding villages to our facility in
Barrow and purchased ophthalmology services for over 40
patients. Without the PRC program, these services would not be
available.
I must say a word about the agency's proposed
implementation of the new medical coding system. IHS has
indicated that this change will require 31 software patches,
each of which will need time to be tested and perfected.
However, IHS's planned release of monies would not have given
us enough time to complete these updates thereby crippling our
current medical billing system. And now that we have additional
time to comply, we ask that this committee designate special
funding for the agency so they can have the new system up and
running in time.
The last issue I would like to quickly mention that you
have heard about previously is the Village Built Clinic Lease
Program. You have heard how important it is to rural Alaska.
Our CHAP program needs those VBCs. In 2013 an estimated $4.5
million was provided for the VBC lease program only covering a
little over \1/3\ of the operating cost necessary. So we do
request an additional $8 million for VBCs for fiscal year 2015.
In conclusion I simply want to say quyanaq, or thank you.
It is a great pleasure to be here today.
[The statement of Angela Cox follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much.
Next, Ms. Elsie Sampson Vaden, Self-Governance Coordinator,
Norton Sound Health Corporation. You are recognized.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
NORTON SOUND HEALTH CORPORATION
WITNESS
ELSIE SAMPSON VADEN
Ms. Vaden. Thank you. Thank you so much. I appreciate the
opportunity to be here, too.
Our healthcare system at Nome is a tribally owned regional
hospital and it is operated under the Indian Self-Determination
Act agreement, and we have 15 village-based clinics. We just
moved out of our 66-year-old hospital into our new hospital and
we have been there for over a year and it is making such a
world of difference just allowing us to have more services that
we can provide in the primary acute-care areas, including
chronic disease prevention management and increased trauma and
emergency services.
IHS provided us in fiscal year 2014 staffing package
funding that is about $400,000 short of what was signed into
the validated resources requirements methodology. The amount
should be $8.8 million and not $8.4 million. Staffing package
funding is recurring and the shortfall of $400,000 annually
plus associated contract support costs is a considerable amount
of money and will affect our ability to make crucial hires. We
already have one of the highest health professional shortage
areas scores in the nation.
One of the things that I do in the region there is I am on
the volunteer ambulance department, and when we pick up a
trauma patient within the community or one that is medevaced
from the villages and we have to assist sometimes with CPR, so
even when we get into the emergency room, we continue to assist
doing CPR. And when you are doing compressions on a family
member, it makes it very painful sometimes. And that is the
request that we are asking that we can get our professional
people there so we can just deliver our patients and not feel
like, you know, we have to carry the pain around when you lose
a patient when it is a family member.
So we ask the Subcommittee to work with the IHS to see if
this shortfall can be made up in fiscal year 2014, and if not,
then to provide these funds in the fiscal year appropriations
bill.
On the Village Built Clinics, as I indicated, we have 15
village-based clinics. It is absolutely crucial to provide
healthcare to our villages. These clinics are leased by the IHS
and they house the Community Health Aide program and some
visiting dentists and doctors come in and they provide that
healthcare as well. Most of the time in some of our smaller
villages we do not have the space to give up or we have one or
two exam rooms with a population of 884 or even 300 people. You
know, we have to find another place within the community if we
need to get specialty care into our villages.
So we really appreciate the teleconferencing equipment, the
teleconferencing and the Afghan equipment, because it really
makes a difference in being able to work with the doctors in
Nome and with the health aides in the villages. That has saved
lives and we really appreciate those tools.
The lease rental amounts have not been increased since
1989. IHS instead takes a position that this is all the funding
that Congress has appropriated. There is no line item in the
IHS budget for village-based clinics. In fact, the lease rental
is of construction and IHS could use maintenance and
improvement funding or other discretionary for this purpose.
The result is that many of the VBCs are unsafe or have had to
be closed temporarily.
I have some pictures here that I can share with you because
they say pictures speak a thousand words. So the Indian Health
Care Improvement Act requires that there be a Community Health
Aide Program in rural Alaska in part of what is having the
clinic space for them to work. We ask that Congress provide at
least an additional $8.5 million for the VBC program, as Angela
alluded to earlier.
I also want to thank this subcommittee for its role in
bringing about full funding for the contract support in fiscal
year 2014, and we are hopeful that this will also happen in
fiscal year 2015. We join with others in Indian Country in
supporting placing contract support costs on a mandatory
funding basis. It is a legal obligation and should be treated
as such.
On injury prevention, northern Alaska is a dangerous place
to live and work due to its climate and the Bering Sea. We have
an injury prevention program funded in part through and IHS
grant which is now in its 4th out of 5 years. And under the IHS
program, IHS pays for 2 percent from the budget and we provide
safety education in the areas of transportation and home
environment and would like to increase education on elder fall
prevention and do not have the facilities to care for more than
a handful of elders who may fall and need assistance to
recuperate.
Not only will the injury prevention program be able to
educate our elders and the tools that we have like the ice
cleats so they will not fall, I mean, you know, hips break
easy, arms break easy, wrists break. You know, at that age, you
know, we need to be able to teach them how to use these tools
that we have for them. And we have a safety shop in our
hospital, and having some of that equipment and products, we
have increased our sales on ice cleats, those float coats, and
other safety products.
And I was thinking about this and I thought, boy, if I can
come back to this Committee and say in 6 years thank you so
much for continuing to provide the injury prevention program,
when I am 65, I will say, listen, I am still here without a
broken bone because you allowed me to have the ice cleats. You
allowed me to have the vest where I am visible in the dark if I
am taking a walk or, you know, boating with a float coat on. So
I would like to do that in 6 years when I am 65 and say thank
you to all of you for that. So funding for injury prevention is
a good investment saving pain and healthcare dollars, and for
elders, helping them to stay in their homes. We ask Congress to
place more resources and emphasis in the IHS budget on this
matter.
Finally, our testimony covers two matters that affect this
Subcommittee but that will require authorizing legislation.
First, we support placing the IHS on an advanced appropriations
basis. Second, we support allowing the IHS and tribal Medicare
health providers utilizing the purchase referred care package
to charge Medicare-like rates for nonhospital services.
Thank you for supporting us and our brothers and sisters in
Alaska and I will continue to pray for all of you.
[The statement of Elsie Sampson Vaden follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your prayers.
And thank you for your testimony.
And ice cleats, I am from Southern California near Palm
Springs. I did not know what ice was until I got here to
Washington, D.C., and I still do not know what ice is compared
to Minnesota or to Michigan. But I have been to Barrow, Alaska,
a couple of times and what I certainly respect about Alaska is,
as Don was pointing out, is its size. It is a big, big state
and a lot of remoteness is up there. I went up there with Ted
Stephens once and it is just a big, big place and difficult to
manage because of the separation distances. And so it is a
special place that we need to work with you on as a committee
and make sure we take care of our responsibilities.
Certainly, teleconferencing is a great technology. I
imagine getting the internet throughout a state that size is a
difficult proposition but it has to be done over time. So I
look forward to working with you on that.
Any other questions?
Mrs. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Do you want to go first?
Mr. Calvert. No, go ahead. You go ahead.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. A couple of things. We
were colder in Minnesota--you should have been in Wisconsin
this winter--than Alaska was. I woke up every morning to hear
what the temperature was in Alaska and went, yes, I wish I
lived there. Yes, it was colder in Minnesota and Wisconsin. You
still have more snow, though.
I am going to look into the relationship that you have with
U.S. Fish and Wildlife because I know tribes have the Circle of
Flight in the Great Lakes region. You do not have a similar sit
down with them?
Ms. Brown-Schwalenberg. No. What happens is because of the
change in the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the creation of the
Co-Management Council, the council consists of one tribal
representative, one state representative, and then a native
caucus of attendant native representatives from each of the
regions where the birds occur and where the subsistence
activities are happening. And so regulations are proposed and
then adopted by the Service Regulations Committee here in
Washington, D.C., but we do not really have any input into the
budget. So because it is a regulation based, you know, with the
amendment----
Ms. McCollum. Yes.
Ms. Brown-Schwalenberg [continuing]. They are willing to
put the money into it. But what my fear is is if the leadership
changes at the Region 7 level, we may not always be able to
enjoy the level of support that we are at this point in time.
And so in order to secure that funding I think it would make
everyone feel a little more comfortable if there was an actual
designation for the Migratory Bird Co-Management Council.
Ms. McCollum. I will take a look into that and learn more
about it. Thank you.
I do not want to make an assumption but it is my
understanding from talking to some of my physicians that
voluntary gun locks often prevent a juvenile from committing
suicide. So if you could maybe comment on that and then I will
ask my other question.
When I was with Chairman--well, you are still the chairman
of Energy and Water--Simpson, we visited an IHS hospital and
they did not do delivery there because, let's face it, IHS's
delivery record is not very good and Indian Country's mortality
rate is not very good. So do you identify high-risk? Are you
delivering at IHS hospitals or are you referring people out?
Those are the two questions I have.
Ms. Sampson Vaden. For the gun locks we do get some of
those in Nome where we go out for grants to try to come up
with--for the 15 surrounding villages we have 10,000 tribal
members and that is not counting the rest of the community
members within each village. So, yes, it costs money to get
those things, I mean fire alarm systems, smoke alarm systems.
And the gun locks that they use sometimes, they are easy to
break open with a knife, so that is not always secure. We are
looking at every injury prevention way of, yes, committing
suicide. And I can see Big Diomede from Little Diomede, so
Russia is our neighbor.
Mr. Calvert. Can you see that from the front door?
Ms. Sampson Vaden. Right from the clinic.
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Ms. Cox. And then to address your question about high risk
pregnancies, we do feel like over the years have become very
risk-averse. And maybe with our new facility, that may shift a
little bit because of our new labor and delivery and recovery
rooms and new equipment. But, you know, I think we deliver--I
mean the averages may be about 130 babies a year that are born
to parents on the North Slope and we maybe deliver 20 to 30 of
those. So if there is any indication, even if it is their first
child, we usually send them down to the Alaska Native Medical
Center.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simpson. Personally, being from Idaho, Alaska is the
one state I have never been to, one of the two or three, which
is kind of surprising. And I have been invited up there a
number of times and just never made it. Senator Murkowski has
invited me up and Don has invited me up a lot of times. How
long does it take to get from Barrow to Anchorage?
Ms. Cox. Quite long. I started out Saturday evening and got
here yesterday afternoon around 1:00 p.m. And that was Barrow
to Anchorage, Anchorage to Chicago, Chicago to D.C.
Mr. Simpson. How long of a flight is it from Barrow to
Anchorage, about 3 hours?
Ms. Cox. About 2 hours if it is a direct, but there are
very few flights that are actually direct so you usually stop
in Prudhoe Bay or Fairbanks.
Mr. Simpson. It is a big, big state. But thank you all for
being here today. It is one of the challenges we have about how
to get practitioners up into Alaska. I mean you have so many
Alaska native villages that are out in the hinterlands that for
a practitioner, or a dentist like I used to be, to get to these
villages is difficult because they have to make a living, too.
And how do you do that out in some of these very, very remote
areas? And so I know the ADA has tried some different programs
to try and help.
But I appreciate all the testimony that you give us and the
perspective and I will make it up there to Alaska. And quyanaq,
is that the right way to say that?
Ms. Cox. Quyanaq.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Ms. Galbreath. I have one comment that I--well, I actually
have two now. I wanted to say that you are welcome any time and
that you would find the dental program and Alaska pretty
interesting. So it would be nice if you could come.
Mr. Simpson. Yes.
Ms. Galbreath. And I wanted to talk more about OB/GYN. We
are the tertiary center at ANMC and so all of our providers are
the OB/GYNs that work within the hospital there. Alaska, it is
very unique, and because it is so large, we kind of had a
spoke-and-hub system. So you have a lot of different sites that
deliver healthcare but then the tertiary referral comes in to
the main hospital at ANMC. And I work for--it is complicated--
the primary care system but we also deal with the OB/GYN
doctors in the hospital. So we support all the areas for
deliveries that are referred into the hospital and we try to
support rural areas in deliveries because most of the
deliveries happen within Anchorage. So if a provider is out in
a rural area and wants to deliver babies, we allow them to come
in in our hospital and get the numbers up so they can keep
their skills up.
And I also wanted to point out that Alaska has the lowest
infant mortality in the Nation.
Mr. Simpson. Why?
Ms. Galbreath. And it is because we all work together. The
whole state works together on this.
Ms. McCollum. And, Mr. Chair, real quick--what is your
cesarean rate, then?
Ms. Galbreath. It is also the lowest in the Nation.
Ms. McCollum. Yea.
Ms. Galbreath. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. I knew this panel rocked.
Mr. Calvert. Interesting. Okay. Again, thank you very much
for attending and coming a long distance that you flew to get
here.
Ms. McCollum. Good job.
Mr. Calvert. Good job, yes.
Okay. The next and final panel for today is Ms. Jessica
Mata-Rukovishnikoff.
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. It is Americanized now.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Primary Care Services Regional
Administrator, Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association; and Mr.
Victor Joseph, Health Services Director of the Tanana Chiefs
Conference. Okay. Got it.
Okay. Everybody grab a seat.
First, I am happy to recognize--how do you pronounce your
last name again?
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. It is Rukovishnikoff, and it is
actually Americanized. So it is obviously Russian.
Mr. Calvert. A lot of Russians in your part of the world.
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. I will take your word for it and you are
recognized.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014
ALEUTIAN PRIBILOF ISLANDS ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
JESSICA MATA-RUKOVISHNIKOFF
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. I was starting off with good
afternoon but it is a good evening now I guess.
And I am Jessica Mata-Rukovishnikoff. I am an Aleut born
and raised on St. Paul Island, which is the Pribilof Islands,
so around, if you are familiar with the Deadliest Catch, we
have the richest crab and halibut. So we are out north. You
heard from north, the southeast panhandle. We are off towards
Russia but down southwest.
So I am the primary care services regional administrator
for the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association. We were actually
laughing about that because my name, where I work, and my title
is going to take up all 5 minutes.
But APIA is the federally recognized tribal organization of
the Aleut people in Alaska. We have a 13-member board that
governs the association, and each director represents one of
the 13 Aleut tribal governments in the Aleutian chain and
Pribilof Islands of St. Paul and St. George. They are appointed
by the community's tribal governments. They establish overall
policy and direction for APIA and guides the services that we
deliver, including health, education, social, psychological,
employment, and vocational training and public safety.
Our mission is it to provide self-sufficiency and
independence of the Aleuts through advocacy, training,
technical assistance, and economic enhancement, to assist in
meeting the health, safety, and well-being needs of each Aleut
community, and to promote, strengthen, and ensure the unity of
the Aleuts, and finally to strengthen and preserve our culture,
which all leads into why I am here today, to request your help.
There are four issues that I am going to address, and the
first one is funding for reconstruction of the Unalaska
Hospital and Atka Island facility clinic. On June 4, 1942, the
Japanese bombed the BIA-operated 24-bed hospital that we had
out in Unalaska, and then 10 days later the residents of Atka
Island were forcibly evacuated from home by the U.S. military
for their own safety. The military then burned down the
structures on the island to the ground, so the whole village
was burned down, including the health clinic, and this was to
prevent their use by the Japanese.
So as a result, and to this day, the nearest hospital is
800 miles away in Anchorage and not accessible by any roads, so
this would be the Alaska Native Medical Center that Andy Teuber
testified on. So every village out in the Aleutian and Pribilof
Islands fly into Anchorage for everything, so there is no
hospital. We are the only region in Alaska that does not have
our own hospital.
And we would have thought that there would have been
reconstruction and restitution for the loss of these healthcare
facilities but there was not. The Aleutian and Pribilof Islands
Restitution Act limited restitution to partial losses suffered
by Aleut people who were evacuated from our communities from
1942-45. The Aleut people sent to the evacuation camps suffered
horribly. Many died, and those that return home found
everything destroyed, possessions taken, and churches stripped
of religious artifacts.
We want to replace the hospital and clinic through IHS's
Joint Venture Program, which requires non-IHS construction
funds and in turn the IHS will provide staffing and operating
funds. The Joint Venture Program has been successful. It is
competitive, and APIA ranks high on the priority list. We are
in the top five, and just last week, Friday, the IHS invited us
to update our application, so they are moving along so they
must have some money.
The non-IHS funds would come by amending the Aleutian
Islands Restitution Act to provide for $100.4 million to
construct the hospital and clinic. $96.9 million is estimated
for the hospital and $3.5 million for the Atka Island clinic.
Replacing the hospital would save the huge cost of sending
referrals to Anchorage, the airfare for which averages about
$1,400, so 13 villages in our region traveling to Anchorage for
their care. There is also the cost of lodging and meals and the
personal hardship of having to leave the community. People in
Atka are 350 miles away from Unalaska so it is pretty vast a
region and they are often isolated by weather conditions.
Our testimony includes a proposed amendment to the Aleutian
and Pribilof Islands Restitution Act, and we would ask for your
support of such amendment.
The second one is the IHS advanced appropriations, and you
have heard from many tribes and others about the problems
caused by late appropriations and continuing resolutions. The
planning for and execution of health programs, it makes it
difficult under those conditions. The appropriations this year
were signed 3-1/2 months after the beginning, and in fiscal
year 2013, it was 6 months late. So we are getting closer to
October 1, but if we had a year, then we would be able to
assist in planning and help us provide continuity of care,
including recruitment and hiring, which is one of our biggest
issues.
Congress has provided advanced appropriations for the
Veterans Administration's medical accounts, and the IHS, whose
budget is totally devoted to healthcare, should also be
afforded this treatment. Both the VA and IHS provide direct
healthcare and both are the result of federal policies. And we
are thankful to Representative Young and Senators Murkowski and
Begich for introducing the legislation to authorize advanced
appropriations for IHS.
The third one is contract support costs, and definitely
thanks to this Subcommittee for bringing about full funding for
contract support costs in '14 and we are hopeful that this will
also happen in '15. And we join with others in Indian Country
in support of pricing contract support costs on a mandatory
funding basis.
Finally, Village Built Clinics and Medicare-like rates, you
heard from others and we do join them, Alaska native
organizations, in supporting an increase for the Village Built
Clinics. The Atka Island clinic alone is like just falling
apart so I could not even take pictures. And we join with other
tribes and tribal organizations around the Nation in supporting
the use of Medicare-like rates for a non-hospital portion of
the IHS referred and purchased care program.
Thank you for your time and attention to these matters. The
time is definitely now and I invite you to join the Aleut
people in restoring healthcare services in our region and begin
the healing of our people from World War II.
[The statement of Jessica Mata-Rukovishnikoff follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. I thank the gentlelady for her
testimony.
Next, Mr. Victor Joseph, the Health Services Director.
----------
Monday, April 7, 2014.
TANANA CHIEFS CONFERENCE
WITNESS
VICTOR JOSEPH
Mr. Joseph. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the
Committee. I just want to thank you for this opportunity to
testify today.
I am currently the Tanana Chiefs' president and I was just
elected about 3 weeks ago, so relatively new to my job.
First of all, I just want to really thank you for the
support that this Committee has given for approving the
staffing package, for getting the staffing package authorized
and approved. That helped us tremendously. Our services have
increased by over 20 percent and we have seen our user
population increased by about 500. And more and more people are
coming every day, not just recently, that is today. The person
that went back to our services and it was really good and a lot
of it is due to that clinic being built.
And there has been a lot of talk about contract support
costs and I agree with all the requests there. But what I would
like to ask for is to break the current stalemate with IHS and
we ask you to insert language into the appropriation act that
will instruct IHS to settle up based on its own certified
reports. And if there is a problem there on the reports, let's
fix that and let's just end this fight once and for all and
move on.
Purchased and referred care, previously known as contract
health services, I also want to thank you for that recent bump
that we received. But right now, it still is not adequate. TCC
is currently at 63 percent of expenditures in that program when
we are only halfway through the year. If we keep on going at
this pace, we will be done by June and we still have 3 months
left to go or a few months left to go. Increased funding in
there would be really appreciated.
Alaska native women need Congress' help and they need it
now. When we look at the Law and Order Commission Report in
tribal villages and native communities in Alaska, the report
rates that domestic violence is up 10 times higher than the
rest of the United States. Physical assault victimization rates
are 12 times higher. The DVPI program should be substantially
increased, even tripled. We ask you that you have to direct the
IHS director to continue funding this important program and
help us stop this.
Also, too, when it comes to Department of Interior, we ask
the Committee to consider increasing funds allocated to three
specific areas within the real estate service items, the first
one, the Probate in the Trust Real Estate Services budget.
Despite the importance of this program, there are still not
enough funds to cover the need. TCC alone has to deal with a
backlog of 230 cases. A probate backlog locks up the title on a
property and transactions that cannot be processed on lands
with pending probates. Please help us help our people achieve
ownership, self-sufficiency and increasing funding for the
probate program.
The second one is rights and protection and litigation
support. This program helps tribes defend and protect their
trust lands and resources through funding and support
litigation, negotiations, and administrative proceedings. At
TCC we have an ongoing need to provide the protection, and we
receive 40 trespass complaints a year. With proper support we
can continue to help allotment owners so that their rights are
not violated and their resources are not damaged or stolen.
Lastly, environmental quality programs, this program is
critical to our ability to use our land. In development for
housing, leasing, timber, and resource extraction, among other
activities, requires completion of an archaeological
investigation, and that investigation must be approved by the
BIA and the state historic preservation officer. Environmental
quality funds support this activity, which is the first step in
any land development. With Congress' support, we can safeguard
our cultural heritage while also developing our lands and
resources to better the lives of our people.
There are just a couple statements that I would like to add
on this. Ms. McCollum, you were asking specifically about
teleservices, telepresence. I would really like to have an
opportunity later to talk to you about it and what we are doing
at Tanana Chiefs and how we are expanding it through all the
healthcare services throughout our interior. It is vitally
important to us in the delivery of healthcare.
Also, too, village-based clinic lease has been spoken of
several times, no running water or even hooked up to sewer. So
anything that we can do there would be greatly appreciated.
Once again, Mr. Chairman, just thank you for this
opportunity to have a few minutes with you and I look forward
to any questions. Thank you.
[The statement of Victor Joseph follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much.
You know, when you think about World War II, and of course
we always remember the attack on Hawaii, the number of people
we lost and so forth, but one of the forgotten battles is the
battle of the Aleutian Islands. And it was a very bloody
battle. As a matter of fact, we lost a number of military
personnel in that battle and I did not know that there was a
hospital there that was destroyed.
How many members do you have that live in the 13 villages?
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. Tribal members, we have up to
1,800.
Mr. Calvert. Eighteen hundred.
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. Like out in the Pribilofs alone we
have anywhere from 3 to 5,000 people come in around the islands
because of the crab and halibut and salmon fisheries. So
probably five of our villages out in the region, Unalaska
included, anywhere--well, Unalaska is probably like 20,000
fishery people that come in.
Mr. Calvert. And you really can see Russia from your front
porch?
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. Well, yes. I moved to Wasilla, so
I live in Wasilla. Now that I do not live in St. Paul anymore,
I moved to Wasilla.
Mr. Calvert. Well, there you go. Okay.
Ms. Mata-Rukovishnikoff. It is really I see over there.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Well, we certainly need to look into
that problem.
Mr. Moran. What, the problem with seeing Russia?
Mr. Calvert. No, to replace that hospital. Gee, I did not
know that.
I know the issue of domestic violence throughout the native
population is a huge problem and we have to, culturally, deal
with that, along with other issues.
Any other questions?
Ms. McCollum. Victor, how many days are you here? Are you
going to be leaving because I am going to be doing this again
tomorrow.
Mr. Joseph. I am here tomorrow but I would be more than
happy to contact your staff and arrange a teleconference here--
--
Ms. McCollum. Well, see if you can talk to my chief of
staff. Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Joseph. Thanks.
Mr. Simpson. You just said that violence against women was
10 times higher.
Mr. Joseph. On the report that was presented, the Indian
Law and Order Commission reported that women in tribal villages
and native communities in Alaska have reported rates of
domestic violence up to 10 times higher, and this was----
Mr. Simpson. It is 10 times higher, or 10 percent higher?
Mr. Joseph. No, 10 times higher than the rest of the United
States.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. Several people testifying today have
suggested and recommended forward funding for contract support
costs for Indian Health Services. You know what the challenge
with that is, do you not?
Mr. Joseph. I believe I understand the challenges, yes.
Mr. Simpson. And for anybody that does not, the challenge
is while everybody thanks us for the fact that we are
addressing the situation from what it was several years ago,
Indian Health Services and getting additional money in there,
we are still short. I think you said something like it met 60
percent of the need.
And so as we are trying to address that that exists. To do
forward-funding you have got to find another year of funding on
top of that in order to get it forward-funded a year. And until
we can address the need in the annual budget, it is really hard
to find the money to forward-fund anything. While I understand
it would be nice, in fact I bet every agency in the Federal
Government would like forward-funding. There are some things
that make sense that we do it that way when planning is years
out. But it is a challenge to try to do that, and that is one
of the challenges we have frankly.
And while I understand that we are trying to address what
is owed under the purchased contract, things to the different
tribes and the courts that we need to pay. The challenge we
really have is that when we are looking for dollars and we are
trying to increase the funding for the programs right now to
address the need right now, it is hard to go find the money to
take care of what we owe in the past, although I fully agree
that we owe it and I would love to find the money for it. And
if we could find it in the judgment fund, I think that is
wonderful. That is something we will certainly be looking at.
But it is not because we do not want to address these needs. It
is the challenge of trying to address such a great need with
the limited resources.
But I do appreciate the fact you recognize we have been
moving in the right direction.
Mr. Calvert. I think that is exactly what that judgment
fund is for from my perspective.
Again, I want to thank our witnesses and I would encourage
you all to ask our counterparts in the United States Senate to
hold similar hearings so they can listen to you also because
sometimes our difficulties are not here. We tend to agree on a
lot of things. It is just our friends on the other side. As Sam
Rayburn used to say--he was a Democratic Speaker here for many
years--he said the Republicans are our adversary; the Senate is
the enemy.
With that, we are adjourned for the day. Thank you.
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
TESTIMONY OF INTERESTED INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONS
PUBLIC WITNESSES--NATIVE AMERICANS AND ALASKA NATIVES
Opening Remarks of Chairman Calvert
Mr. Calvert. Good morning, and welcome to the third of four
public witness hearings specifically for American Indian and
Alaska Native Programs on the jurisdiction of the Interior,
Environment Appropriations Subcommittee.
I especially want to welcome the distinguished tribal
elders and leaders testifying today, and in the audience. I can
assure you that your voices are heard by this Subcommittee. For
us to listen through these hearings and not feel compelled to
do all we can to try and help would be unconscionable.
Just as they were under the chairmanships of Norm Dicks,
Jim Moran and Mike Simpson, American Indian and Alaska Native
Programs shall continue to be a priority for this Subcommittee.
Before we begin, I have a bit of housekeeping items to
share. Committee rules prohibit the use of outside video
cameras and audio equipment during these hearings. That is to
ensure that if anything is said here today, it is not unfairly
reproduced or out of context. An official hearing transcript
will be available at GPO.gov.
I will call each panel of witnesses to the table, one panel
at a time. Each witness will have 5 minutes to present his or
her oral testimony. Each witness' full written testimony will
be included in the record, so please don't feel pressured to
cover everything in 5 minutes. We will be using a timer right
there to track the progress of each witness. When the light
turns yellow, the witness has 1 minute remaining to conclude
his or her remarks. When the light blinks red, we will ask the
witness to please stop.
Members will be provided an opportunity to ask questions to
the witness, but because we have a full day ahead, which will
be interrupted by votes this afternoon, I request that we keep
these things moving in order to stay on schedule.
Yesterday, a tribal elder expressed his frustration about
flying all the way out here, only to be able to talk to us for
5 minutes. I want to know everyone--I want everyone to know
that I consider these hearings to be just the start of an
ongoing dialogue. I encourage all of you to continue to
communicate with the Subcommittee throughout this budget
process, and not just for the 5 minutes we have here today.
You traveled a long way to be here this week, and I hope
that you will seize the opportunity to meet with other members
of Congress outside of this Subcommittee and, of course, our
friends in the United States Senate, including not just those
representing where you live, but where your ancestor lives as
well. Help us explain the trust obligation and to show not only
the disparities in Indian Country as compared to the United
States population as a whole, but what is possible when
American Indians are fully empowered to exercise their self-
determination rights.
With that, I thank you all again for being here today, and
I am happy to yield now to our distinguished Ranking Member,
but Mr. Moran will be here shortly, so I am going to ask if Ms.
McCollum would like to give some opening remarks.
Opening Remarks of Ms. McCollum
Ms. McCOLLUM. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair. And this has been
very, very good testimony that we had yesterday. I am looking
forward to the testimony today.
You reinforced some of the work that we have been doing,
you gave us directions and suggestions on how to do it better.
So as the Chairman said, I know it is only 5 minutes to speak,
but it is 5 very powerful minutes and then all your testimony
is in the record. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you.
Our first witness today is Ms. Jessica Burger, Tribal
Manager of the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians.
Ms. Burger, you are recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
LITTLE RIVER BAND OF OTTAWA INDIANS
WITNESS
JESSICA BURGER
Ms. Burger. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning,
respected committee members. I am Jessica Burger and I am the
tribal manager of the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians. We
are located in Manistee, Michigan, on the beautiful shoreline
of Lake Michigan. Our Tribal Ogema, Larry Romanelli, was unable
to travel here this morning to deliver this testimony himself,
but he sends his regards to the committee.
We were pleased to see the Administration made a commitment
to stand with Indian Country this year by requesting increases
for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Indian Health Service.
At 34 million and 200 million respectively, the increases will
have a negative--or a total impact to restore our community,
and to also support necessary jobs in our communities.
Appropriations are a good investment. In Indian Country,
when we have meaningful appropriations and the communities
prosper, so does America. It builds strong tribal nations, and
we believe in the strength of tribal nations.
Little River Band is one of the largest employers in our
county. We have 1,300 employment positions that are supported
by our revenues that we generate through gaming operations and
other enterprises, and the federal appropriations we receive
and the programs that we provide to our citizens. That
effectually creates a payroll of over $112 million in a
community of just about 8,500 persons total.
The surrounding community is very reliant upon us, as we
are them, to support our operations, and we believe that this
demonstrates our commitment to government-to-government
relationships, not only with the Federal Government, but with
the local municipalities that we also help subsidize through
tax assessments and other revenues. And a part of our effort is
dependent upon contract support cost. This--contract support
costs are very critical for us to be able to retain and sustain
full-time employment positions, and we are pleased that the
President made a request for full contract support costs for
both the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Indian Health
Service.
And we would ask the Committee as you consider these
requests, that you would also ask the Administration to settle
outstanding claims as expeditiously as possible. My tribe has
pending claims, we are in active discussion for settlement.
These dollars will go directly into providing necessary
programs such as healthcare, law enforcement, tribal courts,
and natural resources management.
We like that there was a new initiative included in the
President's request this year, and that was the Tiwahe Family
Initiative, and that is to address poverty in Indian Country.
We would like to see that appropriation, however, which is at
$12 million, be increased to $20 million, so that will have a
better opportunity to have a further reach in Indian Country,
and we would anticipate that there would be demonstration
projects that would--and we would welcome the opportunity to
collaborate with state and local governments in that
initiative.
We also noted that the President made a request for an
increase in the Bureau of Indian Affairs Natural Resources
line, and I will say that in the Midwest region, we have an
unmet need of approximately $17 million to meet the natural
resources management and enforcement responsibilities that our
tribes have. Little River Band alone has enforcement
responsibility for about 13 million acres in our seeded
territory. That includes the waterways and lands within that
district, and natural resources being a priority for all of our
region, I am sure you will hear other distinguished panels
discuss that today. And we also agree with the President's
request for the increases to the Indian Health Service, and we
would ask the committee to please consider implementing the
recommendations of the National Tribal Budget Formulation
workgroup in enacting a $5.3 billion budget for fiscal year
2015.
For us at Little River, purchased and referred services,
hospitals and clinics, mental health and substance abuse are
priorities, and we recommend that the Committee adopt the
increases that are recommended by the workgroup to sustain and
support the continued services to--and decreasing health
asperities is key, and those increases will assist that
process.
We believe in the partnership of the Federal Indian Trust.
We believe in the partnership of Little River Band and the
Federal Government and our surrounding communities, and the
testimony that I have provided outlines just a few of our
priorities. Tribal self-determination and the ability of tribal
governments to determine how to build and sustain their own
communities is necessary for successful and prospering
communities, and a successful and prospering United States. We
respectfully seek the assistance of the Committee and the
Federal Government to support meaningful appropriations, and we
believe that through these efforts, we can work together to
realize that vision.
And I appreciate the opportunity to speak before the
Committee this morning. [Speaking native language] Many thanks,
and [Speaking native language], all my relations.
[The statement of Jessica Burger follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Next testimony is from Mr. Levi Carrick, Sr., Chairman of
the Chippewa Ottawa Resource Authority.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
CHIPPEWA OTTAWA RESOURCE AUTHORITY
WITNESS
LEVI CARRICK, SR.
Mr. Carrick. Okay. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of
the Subcommittee. My name is Levi Carrick. I am here today on
behalf of CORA, as their Chairman.
CORA is the Chippewa Ottawa Resource Authority, which is
made up of 5 tribes in Michigan that oversees the natural
resources for the treaty area, which includes like about 2/3 of
the State of Michigan. So it is a vast area, like close to 14
million acres. And we have been, excuse me here, I have got to
go in here. Wait a minute, I want to personally express CORA's
appreciation for the Rights Protection of Information Program,
RPI, funding requests for CORA that is contained in the
President's 2015 budget. RPI Program funds enable CORA's tribes
to provide for the exercise by tribal members of the reserved
right to hunt, fish, trap and gather on the lands and waters
that were ceded the United States by our ancestors. These
rights were essential to the existence of our ancestors, and
continue to be essential to the existence of our Indian people.
One of my fondest memories as a child growing up was going
in the woods with my grandmother and my mother harvesting. What
we harvested today, we ate tomorrow. And it was always stressed
that we never take what we don't need, never--always use what
you do take, and they are memories that lasted, you know, to
now. We are taking--that was a healthy way of living, the food
that we gathered. We are taking now and utilizing some of our
resources to bring that back to our young children. This year,
we have taken our healthy start programs and brought our
youngsters out in the woods to harvest rabbits. We have brought
them out on the lake to harvest fish through the ice, utilizing
gill nets, trying to teach them the ways of subsistence that we
are accustomed to, rather than going to McDonald's or
somewhere.
So that has been going pretty well, but we have been doing
it on our own funds that we don't really have. That is why this
natural resource funding that we are getting for this is very
vital.
So because of that, the Tribes have always believed that
these treaty rights continue to exist, and will not extinguish
or diminish by any act of the Federal Government.
In a decision, in United States v. Michigan of '79,
upholding these rights to fish in the ceded waters of the Great
Lakes upheld that belief that we retained. Let us see here. And
the Great Lakes model consent decree that was drafted from that
court decision provided a template our inland resources. And
this was between the United States and Michigan and all the
parties, and we voluntarily entered into negotiations to
resolve the scope of the rights reserved by the Treaty of 1836
for that 14 million acres.
In 2007, that consent decree, it encompassed the nature and
extent of the right to hunt, fish, trap and gather by tribal
members, established the protocols by which the resources are
allocated between the tribal and state license harvesters, and
provides collaborative resource management procedures for the
CORA tribes and the State of Michigan.
I am very pleased to personally thank the Subcommittee for
the inland funds contained in the 2014 Interior Budget as
enacted in the more than $1.6 million. These funds--this is for
the inland resource that was added on for this year that we
are--okay. As the funds have yet to be distributed to the
Tribes, I cannot report on the specific uses to which these
funds will be applied. I can only state that the CORA tribes
are anxious to begin the important and complex task of creating
the programs and hiring the staff needed to carry out in the
inland consent decree.
For fiscal year 2015, the green book clearly identifies the
inland consent decree funds by name. There is a small increase
in the treaty fishery's funding which the CORA tribes support
as necessary effort to partially restore the funds for these
purposes back to their 2010 levels. No increase is requested
for an inland consent decree this year, a decision which the
CORA tribes do not oppose. The CORA tribes will use the
remainder of the 2014 and '15 funds to put in place those
programs and staff for which RPI funds are provided, and to
realistically assess the need for additional funding to carry
out the inland decree's tribal responsibilities.
One final item is included in the RPI funding 2015 budget
for the Inter-Tribal Resource Management Organizations which is
entitled evaluation and research activities. CORA supports an
allocation of those funds among the organizations based on the
percentage that each listed in the tribal organization will
receive in RPI funds, as encompassed in the total amount
request for all RPI purposes for 2015.
For decades, we have been at the forefront of efforts to
protect, enhance and restore the natural environment so that
all human beings can enjoy the fish, wildlife and plants of our
region for generations to come. Already, the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service is asking to consult with us on what type of
resource management that we should replace when the Great Lakes
Consent Decree expires in 2020. The CORA tribes have proven to
be an effective partner with agencies of the United States, the
states and the province of Ontario to manage our natural
resources to the seventh generation and beyond. For these
reasons, the CORA tribe respectfully requests for your support
for fiscal year 2015, RPI funding at a level of $4,463,464 in
reoccurring base funding, which is the amount outlined for the
CORA and the RPI portion of the Department of the Interior's
Green Book for fiscal year 2015.
[The statement of Levi Carrick, Sr., follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you for your
testimony.
Next, Mr. Chapman with the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake
Superior Chippewa.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
LAC DU FLAMBEAU BAND OF LAKE SUPERIOR CHIPPEWA
WITNESS
ERIC CHAPMAN, SR.
Mr. Chapman. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the
subcommittee. My name is Eric Chapman, Sr., Tribal Council
Member with the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa
Indians of Northern Wisconsin.
With me today is Mr. Larry Wanowitz, he is our natural
resource director.
Mr. Wanowitz. [Speaking foreign language.]
Mr. Chapman. We appreciate the opportunity to provide our
testimony regarding the needs of the Lac du Flambeau Band and
our members.
We face many challenges at Lac du Flambeau. One such
challenge that has become a threat to our reservation
community. Over the last few years, we have faced a growing
epidemic of drug abuse. This problem has been initiated largely
by outsiders who seek to sell illegal drugs to our youth, and
the situation has become widespread and dangerous. The problem
is not limited to a single drug, as there is widespread abuse
of prescription drugs, synthetic marijuana and even heroin. Our
tribal government has taken broad steps to address this
problem. We declared a state of emergency, we have stepped up
law enforcement efforts to stop those who sell drugs to our
people. These efforts have led to significant drug busts, and
we believe strong law enforcement along with a viable court
system is key in deterring further wandering. However, we also
recognize that this problem has many dimensions and why law
enforcement and courts are vitally important. Drug abuse
requires a wide range of professionals to help those who are
affected. We need to educate our community, especially our
students, about the dangers of drug abuse, and we need to
provide counseling and support for those who become addicted.
More significantly, we need to provide cultural and economic
opportunities to provide positive and healthy alternatives for
individuals who might otherwise turn to drugs.
One of the great tragedies of the drug abuse problem is
that it affects many of our children. Our children are often
caught up in unsafe situations at home that they have no way
out unless the alternate program steps in. This has led to an
increase in foster care and temporary placements for our tribal
children. We must do more to protect our children.
The Administration budget provides us with some hope in
addressing these problems. The budget provides for an increase
of $5 million for the--welfare Program, and this funding is
badly needed. More broadly, the Administration calls for the
Tiwahe Family Initiative to provide a comprehensive approach to
deal with the kinds of problems faced by many Indian families.
We strongly support this initiative, and hope the Subcommittee
will consider this funding request.
In dealing with our drug crisis, we look to making our
community healthy, and we recognize that the foundation of a
healthy community is a healthy environment. Lac du Flambeau is
a reservation that has abundant water, and reservation in the
north which has great natural beauty. This is our homeland, and
we are committed to preserving our clean water, land and air
for our future generations. This requires broad efforts to
address the environmental challenges we face, including
increased mining activity which threatens our reservation
resources. One important program along these lines is the EPA's
Tribal General Assistance Program. The GAP program provides one
of the tribes to build their environmental capacity, assess
conditions, and gather and analyze data. We strongly support
the Administration's proposed $3.8 million increase in this
program.
Other environmental programs such as the Clean Water Act,
Brownfields, and the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative are
likewise critical to protecting our resources for the future.
Tribes have long been--in natural resource protection and
the Lac du Flambeau Band has a comprehensive natural resource
department with dedicated staff, with expertise in natural
resource and land management. For example, our work includes
stocking fish, collecting water quality data, developing well
head protection plans, conducting wildlife surveys, and
administering-projects. These natural resource programs are
vital to the tribe's future, and we strongly support full
funding for the tribal resource management and development,
tribal fish hatchery operations and management--excuse me,
maintenance, circle of flight and cooperative landscape
conservation.
We particularly would like to note the importance of public
tribes to plan for and address climate change impacts at the
local level. In serving on the tribal council, I also have the
opportunity to function as the chief conservation officer for
my reservation. This includes, for instance, hunting, fishing
and gathering, rights without our reservation boundaries. This
work and that of our conversation office also involves being
first responders in many emergency situations.
I urge the Subcommittee to support increased funding for
conservation law enforcement, which is a major component of
overall public safety on our reservation. I would also like to
expect strong support for the work done by the Great Lakes
Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. That Commission does
vitally important work protecting and implementing our treaty
guaranteed hunting, fishing and gathering rights within the
stated territories.
Education remains a major priority for the Lac du Flambeau
Band. In order for our children to compete international and
global economy, higher education is critical. Given the levels
of poverty on our reservation and the staggering costs of
higher education, many of our tribal members do not have the
opportunity to pursue higher education without some help. We
support increased funding for the BIA Scholarship and IHS
Programs. Tribal health programs have never recovered from the
impact of sequestration. As healthcare costs rise and tribal
population has increased, tribal healthcare remains at risk.
One program of particular concern is Purchased Preferred Care,
which has been tragically underfunded for years, leaving our
people without needed healthcare for part of the year. We
strongly support the Administration's proposed increases in
Purchased Preferred Care, and full funding for all IHS
programs.
We appreciate this Subcommittee's commitment to working
with the tribes to address our needs within the BIA, EPA and
IHS programs.
[The statement of Eric Chapman, Sr., follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Next Mr. Zorn.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
GREAT LAKES INDIAN FISH AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION
WITNESS
JAMES ZORN
Mr. Zorn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Committee. My name is James Zorn, Executive Administrator of
the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. I am
honored today to be joined by the Chairman of our Board, Mic
Isham, the chairman of the Lac Court Oreilles Band of the Lake
Superior Chippewa Indians, who is available if you would like
to ask him some questions about the importance of these rights
to his community. Mr. Carrick is also on my Board, as is Chief
Executive Melanie Benjamin, who I believe is here from Mille
Lacs. So very honored to have them provide me for this
opportunity to tell you about how important these programs are
to their communities.
So on behalf of our 11 tribal nations, and their 40,000
tribal citizens, their families and their communities and
surrounding communities, we are honored to be here today to
thank this Committee for over 30 years of support for these
programs that cover 60,000 square miles and 3 states.
Mr. Chairman, you are kind of the newcomer here, and you
asked us today to tell you what is possible, if you can help
us. Well, I think all of us on this panel are very proud to
tell you what is possible through the power of presence by the
tribes, when they have the capacity to exercise their sovereign
prerogatives with appropriate science, with appropriate policy
participation, with the infusion of traditional knowledge into
co-management of the natural resources, in support of CORA
federal treaty obligations and tribal self-determination.
The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission and
their member tribes undertake a comprehensive treat rights and
natural resource management program, to regulate the exercise
of hunting, fishing, gathering rights, to manage and co-manage
the ceded territory natural resources, especially to protect
what already is very pristine up in our area.
Towards that end, our tribes seek healthy communities. We
like to link, as Mr. Carrick said, get out in the real world,
eat the food that the Creator provided to you, so we can
address these health problems. We are very happy that our
biologists provide the science and management expertise that
helps not only tribal communities, but surrounding communities.
That knowledge is universal. The science that tribes bring to
the table helps everybody.
Same thing with the conservation law enforcement. Our
officers are there for everyone, not just for the tribes.
As we note in our written testimony, we are here to support
the BIA's Trust Natural Resource Management Budget, in
particular, the rights protection implementation. We are here
to support the Great Lakes Restoration Funding. That is all in
our testimony.
One of the real critical things we are seeing right now is
that the tribes are being asked to do more, as others do less,
as other governments, state and federal, face budget problems.
The tribes have a job to do for themselves, and it is through
these programs and with this committee's support that they are
able to do that, to address things like invasive species. We
are particularly proud of our youth initiative where we have 50
kids come to a summer camp up in the National Forest in the UP
of Michigan. It has been in place now since 2009. We are
finally get a class of students that are ready to enter
college, the future natural resource leaders for their tribes.
We have kids who are counselors now. So it is through these
types of programs that we are trying to have the tribes realize
the benefit of their treaty rights, for subsistence, for
culture, for spirituality, for medicinal and economic purposes.
We thank you very much for your support, and we are happy
to answer any questions.
[The statement of James Zorn follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank you all for your testimony, and I
would love to get up to that part of the world. It seems like--
just looking at the pictures, it is a beautiful place. My
experience with the Great Lakes is usually Cleveland and around
Lake Erie and the urban areas. This is not the area that you
are representing, I know. I would like to get up there and take
a good look at that.
Would you like any questions, Ms. McCollum?
Ms. McCollum. Thank you. First a comment, and then I do
have a question on natural resources.
It was when I was visiting Wisconsin tribes back a couple
of years ago that the northern alliance tribes had taken a real
aggressive conversation on what to do about drugs and drug
addiction. Schools and parents and everything that you heard
Eric talk about is really critical, but they also, with their
leadership, work with pharmacies, work with hospitals, work
with Indian Health Service because prescription drug abuse was
a major problem. So when people go in and get prescriptions,
that it was able to be tracked and people wouldn't get large
prescriptions that they could turn around and sell. It is a
model program which I think ``main street'', traditional
America, could use in some of its drug problems. And the first
I heard about the heroin crisis that we are all reading about
in the paper, Indian Country was talking to me about it first,
saying you need to get involved, you need to pay attention to
what is going on.
I would like the folks to just comment on the importance of
water quality. I saw a bag of wild rice on the chair. Did you
bring that, Chairman? Is that your rice?
Mr. Calvert. Yeah.
Ms. McCollum. I just want to note that wild rice is
different--Indian wild rice--there is paddy wild rice and there
is native wild rice. Native wild rice is very, very fragile. It
needs absolutely pristine water to grow in. This is a
livelihood for Native Americans. It is an income, it is
traditional food, it is healing. Could you just maybe--not all
of you will be able to say something about the importance of
working with state EPA, state natural resources, your natural
resources and with universities to keep this rice pristine. We
are fighting for it right now in Minnesota.
Mr. Zorn. I would be happy to address that from a
management perspective. The factors that affect wild rice are
primarily beyond the tribe's control. You know, the habitats
out there are being influenced by invasive species, we have
phragmites, we have purple lustrite, we have changing water
levels. We have pollution that, you know, makes the rice toxic
to eat. You know, the whole notion of what good are the treaty
rights if you can't keep the fish if they are contaminated with
mercury. We have the notion of increasing temperatures. And so
without the research, without sea banks, without fully
functioning wetlands, as we had a tribal elder at one of our
meetings recently say, where is wild rice going to be in 50
years? If that literally migrates north to Canada, we can't
follow it. There is that thing up there called a border now. It
used to be tribes could go freely up there.
And so without this cooperative effort of multiple
agencies, whether it is USDA, whether it is Fish and Wildlife
Service, Army Corps, people who regulate water levels, the
state pollution control agencies to make sure the clean water
standards and non-degradation standards are in place, this wild
rice will disappear quickly. And we do see it, and what we are
seeing now through reseeding efforts, because of funding
through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and the BIA,
that tribal members are relying now about 25 to 30 percent of
their wild rice harvest in our treaty ceded territories on
reseeded and restored rice beds. We see when a rice bed in one
area fails because of a high water event. Now, we have other
places where tribal members can go. So if it wouldn't be for
that adaptation and resilience planning, tribal members would
really be out of luck for what really is a spiritual food, and
that nourishes the body. It nourishes both the body and the
spirit.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson?
Mr. Simpson. No questions.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Moran?
Mr. Moran. All said.
Mr. Calvert. All said? Mr. Cole?
Mr. Cole. I'm good.
Mr. Calvert. Well, I want to thank this panel. And I
understand this epidemic of drug abuse is horrific, and it
seems to affect Indian Country more than most areas. We need to
attack it and we will do what we can to help, but thank you for
your testimony and you are relieved of your responsibility
today.
Voice. Thank you.
Mr. Cole. Mr. Chair, thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And we are going to move to the
next panel.
Ms. Crystal Redgrave, the Interim Superintendent of the Bug
O Nay Ge Shig School. I'm getting better at this. With the
Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe of Minnesota.
Voice. Ojibwe.
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Voice. That's good.
Mr. Calvert. All right. Ms. Melanie Benjamin, Chief
Executive, the Mille Lacs Band of, how do you pronounce that
again? Ojibwe? Ojibwe?
Voice. Ojibwe.
Mr. Calvert. Ojibwe. Ms. Cathy Abramson, Chairperson of the
National Indian Health Board. I can do that. And Ms. Aurene
Martin, heck, we know Ms. Aurene, Member of the Board of the
National Indian Child Welfare Association.
Okay, welcome.
Voice. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. So everybody, good morning.
Voice. Morning.
Mr. Calvert. Good morning. Everybody ready to go. You
probably heard my little lecture about the 5-minute rule, and
the green light and the yellow light, and try to stay--we are
trying to--we have a lot of folks from all over the country,
and so we are trying to listen to all of them.
I will recognize Crystal Redgrave. Thank you.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
LEECH LAKE BAND OF OJIBWE OF MINNESOTA
WITNESS
CRYSTAL REDGRAVE
Ms. Redgrave. Well, good morning. My name is--can you hear
me? Good morning. My name is Crystal Redgrave, and I am
[Speaking native language] of the--nation. I am the
superintendent of the Bug O Nay Ge Shig School. Today I am
testifying on behalf of the----
Voice. You say that so easily.
Ms. Redgrave. Yeah. Bug O Nay Ge Shig. Today I testify on
behalf of the school and the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe on the
need to replace the high school facility. The school is a
tribal ground school, funded by the bureau, it is also
administrated by the Bureau of Indian Education. The estimated
cost is $25 million to replace the facility.
I am accompanied by the Leech Lake Band members--raise your
hand.
Voice. Yeah.
Ms. Redgrave. And Ryan White. Since 2011, the Band has
testified before this Subcommittee on this need. Our hope is
that finally, something, you know, we may spur some action
here. We have serious health conditions and safety risks that
are posed to our students who attend the school.
At this time, I would like to thank Ms. McCollum for her
efforts in supporting the school's initiatives.
The school serves about 200 Native American students K
through 12. The school is unsafe. Many of our students have
withdrawn from the school to attend other schools. It has been
said students are embarrassed about the condition of the
school, and they, therefore, leave the school district, which
results in a lower enrollment rate.
The high school, in the first picture, as you can see, is a
metal-clad iron pole barn. It was not intended for an academic
space, and it is not intended for students to learn in winter--
extreme cold winters in Minnesota. The facility suffers from
rodents, uneven floors, poor lighting, severe sewer problems,
faulty electrical wiring, outdated heated and cooling systems,
the lack of classroom and outer space, and overall we believe
that the safety, the fire and security standards are not met.
The second picture shows the damage from the high school
last year, the weight of the ice and the water, basically, you
know, cracked the wooden beams. This not only damaged this
school, but it also compromised the integrity of the overall
structure.
The third picture shows the damage to the ceilings caused
by the constant leaky roofs, and our O&M job continually does
the patchwork.
The final picture shows a student actually holding her hand
out, catching water that is leaking from the ceiling. Just last
week, the ice melted and caused the roof to cave in, and, you
know, students were passing but no students were hurt.
So as an educator, I have walked the halls of many tribal--
well, many schools, tribal, bureau, private, public, and I have
noticed that there is an extreme difference between the types
of schools that serve native students and those who don't. One
public school that comes to mind was a school in Arizona, and I
visited it and it had this panoramic view of the mountains. It
was beautiful. The technology, there were books, tables that
were not broken, the kids were carrying their tech tools and
they had books, like I said, and that school did not have very
many Native American students enrolled in that, you know, in
that school.
In contrast, schools like Bug O Nay Ge Shig have rickety
tables, broken chairs, outdated textbooks or even no textbooks,
limited technology, poorly ventilated classrooms, wires that
are basically taped to the tin walls, and unreliable access to
technology.
So this is what, you know, in Indian Country, you know, our
school basically fits that description.
The BIA must think that it is all right for our children to
go to school in these conditions, since it requests funding
primarily for improvement and repairs and not on the overall
construction or replacement of facilities. So I am here to say
that the school is beyond a band-aid replace--repair, and we
need to look at replacing that.
The BIA's fiscal year 2015 budget proposes funding to begin
at, for one school, about $3 million, and that is not going
to--that is not sufficient at all. It might have a wall or a
foundation. You can't do much with that. According to the
Bureau, more than 63 schools, including our high school, are in
poor condition, and there exists a $1.3 billion backlog for
construction. So it must be stressed that we need adequate
funding over a sustained period of time in order to address the
issues that our children need in Indian Country.
I just have to remind everybody that we must not forget
Leech Lake Nation was established through a series of treaties
and presidential orders, millions of acres of the Band's
homelands were stolen. In return, the U.S. promised the Band
welfare, which includes education. The Band's forefathers
already paid for the education of their children. These treaty
promises remain the law of the land. Logically if the U.S.
cannot replace the high school and schools as such, then it is
only right that the U.S. begin to cede back land to the
Natives.
I have 2 final comments. First, we recently learned that
our language immersion program will no longer be receiving
funding. We are in dire need; we have an immediate need to
continue this program for next year. So we do ask assistance
for this program.
And second, our students, and I think the panel before, you
know, gave--illustrated the situations in Indian Country, but
as an administrator and as an educator, and being with native
students, I have had very, well, several, more than I want to
even remember, kids coming to me and telling me situations that
they encounter, and one situation that was so riveting in my
mind is a 15-year-old girl came to me and she was having issues
in school. She ended up telling me that--and nobody really knew
how to address her, and she trusted me and she told me
everything, but she said when she was younger, her mother
committed suicide and she hung herself. The daughter fell
asleep underneath her. And so to me, the students that are, you
know, in Indian Country should not have to worry about an
unsafe school because they have other things that they need to
really work through.
So again, I just, you know, stress that there needs to be
adequate funding for native communities, schools. And [speaking
native language.]
[The statement of Crystal Redgrave follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Cathy Abramson, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NATIONAL INDIAN HEALTH BOARD
WITNESS
CATHY ABRAMSON
Ms. Abramson. Hello. Hello. Okay.
Mr. Calvert. There you go.
Ms. Abramson. Good morning, Chairman Calvert, Ranking
Member Moran, and Members of the Committee. Thank you for
holding this important hearing on fiscal year 2015 budget. On
behalf of the National Indian Health Board, and the 566
federally recognized tribes we serve, I submit this testimony.
I am Cathy Abramson. I am the Chair of the National Indian
Health Board, and I also serve as Councilwoman for the Saulte
Sainte Marie Tribe of the Chippewa Indians. And yes, you really
do need to come up north up in Michigan to see the beautiful
country.
First, I would like to thank this Committee for all the
work that has been done to advance healthcare priorities for
our people. In fact, due to the help of many members of this
Committee, we are able to change the minds of the
Administration on the cost care, cost support--contract cost
support. Support--let me say it again. Contract support costs.
For this and all you have done and continue to do for the first
people of this country, [speaking native language], or thank
you.
Despite important changes in healthcare funding that we
have achieved over the last several years, we still experience
many disparities. Devastating risks from historical trauma,
poverty and a lack of adequate treatment resources continue to
plague tribal communities. According to IHS data, 39 percent of
our women experience intimate partner violence, the highest
rate of any ethnic group in the United States. Dental health
concerns also continue to affect American Indians and Alaska
Natives at higher rates than any other Americans. Our children
have an average of six decayed teeth, when children in the U.S.
all races population only have one. This has to stop. America
is too great a nation to stand by while we live with all these
realities.
Enacting a fiscal year 2015 budget that does not
aggressively tackle these issues would be--approval of the
state of affairs in Indian Country.
When considering the level of funding appropriated to IHS,
these statistics do not surprise me. In 2013, the IHS per
capita expenditure for patient health services were just
$2,800, compared to almost $8,000 per person for healthcare
spending nationally. The first people of this nation should not
be last when it comes to health. So let us change that now.
For 2015, NIHB echoes the recommendation of the tribal
budget formulation workgroup and recommends $5.3 billion for
IHS overall. This request would allow the funding to current--
of current services, and include program expansion increases in
several key areas, including Purchased Referred Care, hospitals
and clinics, mental health and alcohol and substance abuse.
These programs represent the core of IHS work in the areas of
most critical need to our people. You will see in NIHB's
written testimony greater detail about each priority.
We also ask that sequestration cuts from 2013 and '14 be
fully restored. Congress did not provide enough funding to fund
contract support costs and restore sequestration or provide
increases in other crucial service areas. Some counts even
received cuts beyond 2013 sequestration level in 2014. This
combined with medical inflation and additional staffing costs
have not really allowed these budgets to move forward. We are
once again losing ground in addressing health disparity
suffered by our people. This cannot happen again.
I would also like to support several policy changes that
will enable our IHS budget to be used in a better way. First,
NIHB strongly supports Medicare-like rates for IHS. In 2003,
Congress enacted legislation to require hospital providers to
only pay Medicare rates when billing IHS through Preferred--
Purchased Referred Care Program, but non-hospital providers did
not have this requirement. We echo the recommendation of the
GAO who said that reimbursements for all providers should be
capped at Medicare-like rates.
Second, advanced appropriations for IHS will allow
tribally-operated and IHS programs to know what kind of funding
they have a year in advance. This would mean that we could not
only save on administrative costs, but it would also be a
better care--provide better care for our people. We could plan
way ahead much better.
Finally, we support the long-term renewal of the special
diabetes program for Indians at $200 million for 5 years. It is
saving lives and taxpayer dollars and must be renewed to ensure
a sustainable, our people get the care they deserve.
Thank you again for this opportunity to testify before the
Committee today, and for all the work you do to support Indian
health. Thank you.
[The statement of Cathy Abramson follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
I think we will just go right along here. Aurene Martin,
you are recognized for 5 minutes. Thank you.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NATIONAL INDIAN CHILD WELFARE ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
AURENE MARTIN
Ms. Martin. Is this still on?
Mr. Calvert. If that little light is on, it is on.
Ms. Martin. Morning, everyone. My name is Aurene Martin,
and I am member of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior
Chippewa. Yay, Wisconsin. I am also a member of the National
Indian Child Welfare Association Board of Directors, and that
is why I am here today to talk to you.
NICWA is the National American Indian and Alaska Native
Association, with over 30 years experience in public policy
development, focused on native families. Our mission is
twofold. First, it is to address issues of child abuse and
neglect in Indian Country, and second, it is to support
compliance with the Indian Child Welfare Act.
Studies show, and I think you have heard some of these
statistics before, they are in our written testimony, but
studies show that native children are over-represented in the
child welfare system, with rates of over, on average, two times
the rate of the general population to be placed in foster care,
and in some states it is over 10 times that rate. Yet, tribal
governments have the most limited access of all governments to
assistance to provide services for these types of families that
have children in foster care.
So, accordingly, the primary focus of my comments today
will be on three program areas at BIA that provide direct
funding to tries to provide these kinds of services.
Our first recommendation is to fully fund programs
authorized under the Indian Child Protection and Family
Violence Prevention Act. It is a mouthful. This Act was first
passed in 1990 to provide tribes with the resources to
establish child abuse prevention and child abuse treatment
services. It also established requirements for background
checks and for reporting of child abuse in Indian Country.
These are the only programs that have been authorized for
federal--under federal law specifically to address child abuse
prevention and treatment services, but they have never been
funded since they were established in 1990.
We know that when children are faced with abuse, when they
are faced with maltreatment, and they are unable to access
treatment services, the residual effects of these--of this
trauma can last for many years, and can affect them for an
entire lifetime. So we think that the Indian Child Abuse
Treatment Grant Program, if funded, would help fill a void that
just isn't being addressed anywhere right now. We also are
recommending that you fund other programs under the Act,
including the Indian Child Protection and Family Violence
Prevention Grant Program, and the Indian Child Resource and
Family Service Center Program. These address prevention of
child abuse, and also provide for a service center to kind of
coordinate these efforts. As I said, these programs haven't
been funded since 1990, but I think that they would fill a huge
void that is out there for tribes.
Our second priority that I would like to talk about is with
regard to the President's Tiwahe Initiative, which would
increase equal funding for tribes in the amount of $5 million.
We think that is great, but we think that it should be
increased even more than that, and we would recommend another
$5 million in funding for that program. On average, or--well,
not on average, actually, more than \2/3\ of tribes that
receive this funding receive an average of $30,000 a year, yet
they have to provide child protective services, family
reunification services, rehabilitation services, case
management, foster care recruitment retention and adoption
services with that $30,000. This increase would be fantastic,
it would be about $75,000 a year per tribe on average, but
there is just so much there to do that we think that more
funding is necessary to achieve that goal.
Finally, NICWA provides benefits to native children across
the country, but the funding really focuses on reservation
services. The problem is that Indian populations are moving to
urban areas, so when the Indian Child Welfare Act was passed,
only 38 percent of Indian people lived off reservation in urban
areas. In the 2010 Census, 67 percent of Indians reported
living in urban areas, that self-identified as Indians, and
yet, there is zero funding for those types of programs.
I can tell you from my own personal experience, having
litigated Indian Child Welfare Act cases, it is a huge burden
on tribes to not only keep track of the caseload of kids that
they have living on reservation, but to keep track of all of
those kids living off reservation, and these kinds of dollars
can really--the small amount of dollars can really go a long
way to help keeping track of those kids. It is hard to do phone
appearances in court, and just having one person there really
would help.
So in closing, I really appreciate the time you have given
me, and I hope that you can look at child welfare and make that
a budget priority this year. Thanks.
[The statement of Aurene Martin follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Melanie Benjamin.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
MILLE LACS BAND OF OJIBWE
WITNESS
MELANIE BENJAMIN
Ms. Benjamin. [Speaking native language] greetings. First,
education. Pine Grove Academy. Our reservation stretches across
3 districts, one over 60 miles to the northeast of Lake Mille
Lacs, and one 80 miles east. These distances make educating our
children a challenge, especially in the winter. We have--school
on the Mille Lacs Reservation in district 1 and 2, but not in
district 3. We have tried bussing the children over 80 miles
from district 3 to the Band's--school in district 1, but that
is over 3 hours a day for our children, 800 miles each week.
About 8 years ago, a group of parents worked with the Band
to establish the Pine Grove Leadership Academy in district 3,
located in a beautiful forest that had a CORA curriculum and
classes in Ojibwe language and traditions, and it worked, but
the leadership academy's authorizer, a private college revised
its internal priorities and made the decision to withdraw its
authorization. The result was the academy was forced to close,
despite being financially healthy.
I want to work with the Subcommittee to reopen Pine Grove
with BIA support. The Band proposes today that Pine Grove
should become a satellite of our BIA supported--school using
21st century technology and smart planning. We require very
little funding from BIA, but we do need BIA support, especially
in training professionals and board members. In fact, we have a
good relationship with the Bureau of Indian Education, but the
BIA is currently unauthorized to support school expansion.
However, this not an expansion. Whether we bus our children
to--school in district 1, or provide them with the--education
through a satellite school in district 3, they would be counted
and supported by BIA either way.
The U.S. Department of Education just reported that Native
Americans in Minnesota have the lowest high school graduation
in the country, the lowest, but a Minnesota report found that
Native American schools are making strong academic gains
because they introduce cultural emersion programs. This is
exactly what we want to do for our children in district 3.
We ask that the Subcommittee respectfully request that BIA
work with us.
Second, IHS diabetes and dialysis. I thank the Subcommittee
for its strong commitment to fighting diabetes in Indian
Country. We say [speaking native language] to our friend Betty
McCollum for being the champion of the Special Diabetes Program
for Indians. Mille Lacs faces the same diabetes challenges
other tribes across America, especially accessing dialysis
within a reasonable driving distance. As a consequence, I have
seen too many of our people just give up. For some of our most
prominent Band members, at some point spending several hours in
the car, in addition to several hours in dialysis just becomes
too much. These Band members who die of kidney failure also die
of our failure to provide them with a better way to get
dialysis treatment. We are working with our neighbors to get a
dialysis unit closer to our aging population, Indian and non-
Indian alike, and ask the Subcommittee to join us in finding
creative ways to provide dialysis to all people in our rural
communities.
Third, the BIA and IHS and self-governance. Mr. Chairman,
over 20 years--25 years ago, a group of tribal leaders,
including my mentor, testified before this subcommittee in
hearings that led to the tribal self-governance demonstration
project. Mille Lacs was one of the original self-governance
tribe. Today, most of these leaders have since walked on, but
those men and this subcommittee made history. They knew the
future of federal Indian policy was Indian tribal governments
making decisions and studying spending priorities, rather than
Washington, and as it became permanent, this Subcommittee
ensured that BIA and Indian Health Service properly implemented
it.
We have two requests: that you remove the language
exempting BIA central office funding from the tribal share
negotiation. There is no sound policy reasons for this, and the
BIA has used this and reorganization to keep significant
appropriations from us. Also, we ask the Subcommittee in
helping in reducing the Indian Health Service and the BIA
withholding of significant money as somehow inherently federal.
We need the money at our reservations.
Thank you for your bipartisan support of self-governance.
Finally, please continue to uphold the promises made to
Indian tribes under the treaties and laws over the past
centuries. [Speaking native language] thank you.
[The statement of Melanie Benjamin follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Ms. Redgrave, if this Subcommittee can provide the funds to
finish the construction of the last three schools on the 2004
priority list, what happens next, and is there a new priority
list and is your school on it?
Ms. Redgrave. I am not familiar with a new priority list. I
have inquired and my investigation is that there is not a
priority list at this point from the Bureau. So----
Mr. Calvert. We were shown a list yesterday, but it was a
regional list that--and I don't have it in front of me and I
don't know if your school was on that list or not. So
apparently there are lists running around the Bureau, so I
guess we need to look into--to find out where that is at, but
we know we have a tremendous need to build schools.
I think it is a common--I think we will all agree that we
need some help on the other body over there in the United
States Senate to also prioritize school construction. So I
would recommend that you also talk to your Senators and let
them know of the need for school construction in Indian
Country.
Ms. Redgrave. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Can I----
Mr. Calvert. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. Would you mind if I ask a question before I
have to go start a hearing. Thank you. I appreciate that,
Betty.
As the Chairman said, we need some help across the rotunda.
We are not doing it fast enough, but it is even slowed down
when both the Administration and the Senate don't put any money
in for school construction, and it is frustrating the heck out
of me.
Ms. Redgrave. Um-hum.
Mr. Simpson. But we will try to solve this.
Let me ask you, does the IHS budget, Cathy, include enough
funding so that every eligible American Indian and Alaska
native can receive preventative dental care at least every 12
months, let alone every 6 months?
Ms. Abramson. No.
Mr. Simpson. How much is it underfunded is it? Do you know?
Voice. Microphone.
Ms. Abramson. I am sorry. I don't know that exact number,
but I will find out.
Mr. Simpson. Substantially under?
Ms. Abramson. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Ms. Abramson. As everything else.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah. I appreciate it. Thank you, Betty,
appreciate that. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. At the risk of making
members of the other 11 Minnesota tribes, think that you are
not deep in my heart, I really think if we took a field trip we
could go to Leech Lake and Mille Lacs as well to look at what
is going on in the immersion schools. If we went, maybe we
could invite someone from the Administration to come with us
and visit the Bug School. And then see how we had a school on
Mille Lacs that was working, but through no fault of their own,
they lost a partner on it, and how it will add significantly to
the number of students who aren't graduating from high school
by not having that put together.
So, Mr. Chair, thank you for the work that this committee
has done in bringing the Bug School forward. None of the
children I represent go there----
Ms. Redgrave. Um-hum.
Ms. McCollum [continuing]. But they are Minnesota students.
And I am so frustrated, I am so embarrassed when I talk to
those students. I did a cable show with them and they talked
about traveling an hour and a half, and all the work that they
went through, and what all the elders have done. Then for them
to have to walk in that building is just a real stain on the
United States of America. I know that there are other schools
like that around the country, but we had an earmark all set to
go--just as we did on the dialysis for Mille Lacs--and they
disappeared. So to the tribes in Minnesota, we are working
together bipartisanly, very, very hard to solve this, but I
think the Administration needs to visit some of these schools.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. We call that a plus-up nowadays,
but--Mr. Cole, do you have any questions?
Mr. Cole. Just quickly, and a quick comment first of all.
My friend, Ms. McCollum is much too modest, quite frankly.
She would care about those kids wherever they went, whether it
was Minnesota or Oklahoma or even California because she has
been tireless working on their behalf.
I don't know if this is a question but we are going to hear
this theme over and over and over today, and it is right that
the United States Government has not met its obligations, and
that we are woefully underfunded, and we are going to see that
in education, and we are going to see that in healthcare, and
we are going to see that in special diabetes programs, and we
are going to see that in Indian Child Welfare, and we are going
to see it law enforcement. I can go through the list.
This Committee has done about as good a job as it could do,
I think, on a bipartisan basis, beginning certainly with
Chairman Dicks and Chairman Moran, working on through Chairman
Simpson, now Chairman Calvert, to try and deal with some of
these things within the context of the interior budget, but my
friend, Mr. Calvert, will find out what his predecessors, there
is just not enough money in Interior, period, to take care of
all the lands, all the parks, all this--but we have tried to
make this actually the priority in terms of increased funding,
particularly in the healthcare area. It is pretty sad when the
Administration does not put any money in for new school
construction. Not a dime. And, we have about 2\1/2\ million to
3 million Native Americans, tribal members. If you put them in
a state, their country--all the reservations together, I am
told would be about the size of Wyoming. There is about \1/2\
million people in Wyoming. I guarantee you they are building
schools some place in Wyoming every year, all the time, and to
not always have a school construction budget is just
inexcusable, and that is why we are in this mess that we are in
today. And I don't aim that just at the Administration, because
there has been a succession of Administrations of both parties
that have done this and bear responsibility. I don't think
either side looks very good in this regard, but this Committee,
for several years, again, on a bipartisan basis, has done a
good job--with what it has. But I think in the end, Mr.
Chairman, we are going to have to do, on these schools in
particular, what we did for military schools. There are only
two groups of students that the United States has direct
responsibility for in Federal Government, and that is the
children of American men and women in uniform, and children
that are in Indian Country where we have a treaty obligation.
What we did, we had the same situation. My friend, Mr. Calvert,
sits on--and my friend, Ms. McCollum, sits on Defense
Appropriations, and several years ago we just got a big
appropriation that put us in a position to deal with about 100
of these schools, and get ahead of the problem. I don't see how
we ever piecemeal it because there are so many situations like
Ms. Redgrave mentioned all across Indian Country. It is not
just simply one particular----
Ms. Redgrave. Um-hum.
Mr. Cole [continuing]. School, or two or three or four. We
are going to have some sort of funding strain that will let us,
as a Federal Government, get ahead. And that is probably true
in other areas too, but particularly with construction which is
expensive. It takes a long time, but the facilities, if they
are cared for, will last a long time. And I do think it makes a
difference to those kids when they walk in the door, what they
are walking into, because it kind of tells them what society
thinks about their chances and their prospects. And we send a
really powerful message with schools.
I know I uncorked here a little bit. All I can tell all of
you is that we will continue to work with you, and I am sure
every member of this Committee will as best as it possibly can,
and we have been robbing, and appropriately so, I would argue,
some of the other areas because at the end of the day, forests
are important, but, trees are trees, people are people. And so
we have got other things that I would like to take care of, but
you have to remember when you are taking care of Indian
Country, you are really taking care of Indian people. And this
committee has a direct responsibility, and more importantly,
this Government does. And we just have not lived up to our
obligations. So you are nice to say nice things to us, but we
have got a very long way to go. And I want to echo my friend,
Mr. Simpson's, remark, please help us in the United States
Senate. And one of the great things, again, we have this
testimony here because Mr. Dicks began it, because he saw so
much of the problems and he wanted to make sure every year
Congress would be confronted in some way with the kind of
testimony that you are offering us. I don't know that the
Senate has the equivalent, and they should, and I think they
would. I mean we have got some good people over there. Mr.
Tester is the new Chairman of Indian Affairs. He is a very good
man, and very interested in this problem, but we need to
confront the Senate, and, frankly, we need to confront the
Administration which overall has a pretty good record. Again, I
am not here to bash the President. There has been a lot--the
Cobell settlement, they're on the right side on Carcieri, they
have done some really good things. They have done some things
like fighting all the way to the Supreme Court against contract
support services that mystify me, but all Administrations
mystify me on Indian Affairs. So again, the President's heart
is in the right place, we have just got to get them to
prioritize just a little bit more in their budgetary process.
So we will continue to work with you on that.
All right, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman, and I thank this panel
for your testimony. We appreciate your coming out here to
testify. You are excused, and we are going to ask for the next
group to come up.
We have a number of hearings going on today. Mr. Cole is
going to cover for me for a little while, and then I will be
back for Mr. Cole to go back to the Defense Committee too,
because we have a Defense going on at the same time here today,
so we are trying to do both.
Our next panel is Mr. Thomas Wabnum, Council Member, the
Prairie Band of--Tom is probably better at this than I am in
pronouncing this, Potawatomi Nation.
Voice. Potawatomi.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. George Thurman, Principal Chief of the Sac
& Fox Nation, Mr. Bill John Baker, Principal Chief of the
Cherokee Nation, and Ms. Alfreda, is it Doonkeen?
Voice. Doonkeen.
Mr. Calvert. Founder and CEO of the American Indians for
Health Quality.
I want to just say welcome to all of you, and I am going to
turn the gavel over to Chairman Cole, and I will be back in a
little while. Thank you.
Voice. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Cole [presiding]. Thank you, gentlemen. Sorry to keep
you waiting. We have one more to come, or is she not here?
Voice. Okay, we are running behind, so we can't----
Mr. Cole. Okay, well, let us--if we can, we will just go in
order. So I am going to begin, Mr. Thurman, with you,
representing the Prairie Band of Potawatomi Nation.
Mr. Wabnum. Good morning, committee members.
Mr. Cole. Good morning.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
PRAIRIE BAND POTAWATOMI NATION
WITNESS
THOMAS WABNUM
Mr. Wabnum. Good morning, committee members. As elected
leaders of our country, I keep you in my daily prayers so that
we can lead your country, my country, our country into
prosperity.
Thank you for this opportunity to present testimony. My
name is Thomas M. Wabnum, Council Member of the Prairie Band
Potawatomi Nation. My reservation was destroyed by the Dawes
Allotment Act. While under federal care, our money was
mismanaged, forcing us to selling our lands, and we were almost
terminated as a tribe in 1954. I lived in a Dawes Allotment
house and have numerous interests in several allotments, but
cannot build a home on any. I attended Indian boarding school,
attended Haskell Indian Nations University, was the tribal
council treasurer, worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and
retired from the Office of Special Trustee for American
Indians. I have an Indian--account, and I am also a Vietnam
veteran. During my employment with BIA and OST, I helped create
the budgets for those agencies.
My testimony sets forth funding priorities for the Prairie
Band Potawatomi Nation, which aligned with the priorities of
the Southern Plains region of the Tribal Interior Budget
Council. The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation currently serves on
the Tribal Interior Budget Council as a representative for the
Southern Plains region. This testimony was also focused on the
Office of Special Trustee and changes needed to that agency.
The priorities include the following: restore pre-sequestration
funding levels and make up for the losses due to sequestration,
adequately fund the Johnson O'Malley Program and Haskell
University, fully fund contract support costs without
detracting from Indian programs, ensure sufficient funding for
aid to tribal governments, focus on increases for human
services programs, appropriate sufficient funds for public
safety and justice, enable the BIA to effectively assist tribes
in energy development, sunset the Office of Special Trustee and
reallocate funding to the BIA and BIA programs.
There are five additional measures that I would like to
talk about, and this concerns the Office of Special Trustee.
In addition to the budget priorities set forth above, there
is a need over overarching reform, and the way the United
States' fulfills its trust responsibility to tribes,
particularly when it comes to the functioning of OST. To
fulfill the United States' obligations to tribes and Indian
people the following reforms are needed: Congress needs to
create an enforceable Indian trust policy in consultation with
the tribes. Congress should create a Department of Indian
Affairs, eliminating the inherent conflict of interest that
often exists between the tribes and the Department of the
Interior. This new department needs to be fully funded and
staffed with experienced tribal-minded people who are motivated
to foster in a new era of fiduciary trust responsibility to
tribes and individual Indians. Congress should create a
Permanent Trust Commission tasked with recommending updates to
federal laws, regulations, policies regarding tribes and Indian
people. Congress must sunset the OST. The $139 million the
President has requested in 2015 for OST should be reallocated
to the new Department of Indian Affairs and the Trust
Commission. Until then, the fiscal year 2015 budget, this money
should be reallocated within the BIA and BIE budgets. Annual
appropriations should include money for tribes to buy back
fraction of the interest until such time as all available
interest can be purchased for tribes. The buy-back program has
funding through settlement of the Cobell class action to
purchase--interest, and now has less than 10 years left to
reach the goals of this program. Also annual land purchases
will generate a savings by reducing the--cost. However, annual
appropriations for this purpose will address the deficiencies
in the current buy-back program and fulfill the United States'
obligation to remedy the crippling consequences of the Dawes
Act.
Each of these five measures must be taken in consultation
with the tribes. These five steps will help the United States
fulfill its trust responsibility to tribes, and ensure the
federal dollars are more effectively spent towards furthering
tribal self-determination. Federal--have consistently been
underfunded or mismanaged, and historically by the same
Department of the Interior. Since BIA inception, multi billions
have been appropriated with deteriorating effects and the loss
of Indian land, money and sovereignty. The BIA's purpose has
been many, removal, incompetent, allotment, termination, self-
determination--reform, consultation and now rebuilding tribal
nations. We can do it better.
The new business success that tribes are having should not
force them to respond to decreasing federal budgets, and being
forced to accept and fund federal trust responsibility
activities. Each fiscal year, tribes are planning for federal
budget cutbacks, and it seems the United States is accelerating
efforts to get out of the Indian business.
Any Indian affairs budget should not suffer cutbacks. This
would allow tribes in the United States to utilize their
financial resources together to strengthen and improve poor
tribal conditions caused by historical inadequate funding. It
always has been termination by appropriation.
We have been invited to attend the budget formulation
process with the BIA, but not for the OST. More importantly,
tribes should attend annual closeout meetings to account for
success or failure of these organizations. The United States
has consistently asked tribes to bury the hatchet, and we have,
but each budget cutback is a strike against our health,
education and welfare of our tribal citizens. We are a
different generation with new technology, and we understand our
problems more than any other. Further, tribes will now become
business partners with states in business win-win situations,
sharing Native American enterprise zones and acting sovereign
to sovereign.
We want to help by utilizing all resources in a manner that
enables a true nation-to-nation partnership. We don't have to
be dependent domestic nations, but rather independent domestic
nations with full cooperation of the United States. We can live
better under a new trust with mutual respect for each other.
Let us not relive a horrible history, but forgive and create a
new future.
[The statement of Thomas Wabnum follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. Thank you, and I want to apologize, I mixed name
and tribes up there at the opening part of that, so that is my
fault.
Mr. Thurman, you are recognized next for your testimony.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
SAC & FOX NATION
WITNESS
GEORGE THURMAN
Mr. Thurman. Okay.
Voice. Press the button.
Mr. Thurman. Since we are one short, do we get more time?
Mr. Cole. I think they are trying to take advantage of it
to get us back on schedule, but we are usually pretty generous
with time here, so----
Mr. Thurman. Okay. Okay, good morning to the subcommittee
members. I am George Thurman, Principal Chief of the Sac & Fox
Nation, from whom emerged Jim Thorpe, one of the most versatile
athletes of modern sports, who earned Olympic gold medals in
the 1912 games.
Although tribes have made some progress in addressing
terribly inadequate public services that many Americans
routinely take for granted, they are still experiencing what
the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights called a quiet crisis of
unmet federal funding needs.
And because of time restraints, I want to address just one
of the requests that we are making, and that is the tribal-
specific request of $4.95 million to fully fund operations of
the Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention Center, under the
Bureau of Indian Affairs, Public Safety and Justice Office of
Justice Services Detention Corrections Account. Eighteen years
ago, in 1996, the Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention Center
opened its doors as the first regional juvenile facility
specifically designed for American Indians and Alaska natives,
as well as the first juvenile facility developed under Public
Law 10472, the Self-governance Demonstration Project Act. At
that time, the Bureau of Indian Affairs made a commitment to
fully fund the Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention Center
operations, however, this commitment was never fulfilled.
Full funding would allow the nation to provide full
operations, including but not limited to juvenile detention
services to the 46 tribes in Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas, rescue
more of our at-risk youth and unserved youth in need of a
facility, like the Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention Center,
re-establish programs we have lost due to inadequate funding,
such as on-site mental health counseling, transitional living,
vocational training, horticulture, life skills, arts and
crafts, cultural education activities, spiritual growth and
learning. It would also offer job opportunities in an area that
is economically depressed, and would fully staff and expand
staff training to address high volume of staff turnover which
will allow for continuity in operations and service delivery.
Most recently, at the fiscal year 2016 Regional Budget
Formulation Session, the Southern Plains tribes continued to
support and endorse full funding for operation of our juvenile
detention center, and included it as a priority in their top 10
budget increases for the fiscal year 2016 Bureau of Indian
Affairs Budget.
The Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention Center has the
facilities, staffing, ability, commitment and capacity to
provide superior detention and rehabilitation services to
Native American youth, as well as any youth in the tri-state
area in need of our services. We do not understand the Federal
Government's desire to fund the construction of more detention
facilities while our beds remain empty. With access to full
funding for operations, the Sac & Fox Nation Juvenile Detention
Center will have the stability to fulfill the mission the
tribal leaders envisioned to help our youth once again find
their way and recover from the ills that resulted in them
coming to our facility. With adequate funding, we believe it is
possible to thrive and benefit the lives of juveniles in our
center, and are desperately in need of our help to develop and
assist them to have a more healthy and productive future. Our
facility is 60 beds. It can be expanded to 120, and we have had
youth in there from as far away as Montana, Arizona, but the
cost is astronomical in transporting these youth there, so it
is more of a regional facility, and that is what--more
facilities are being built regionally, but who is going to fund
them to operate them? We are a good example of that.
So I thank you for allowing me to submit these requests on
the fiscal year 2015 budgets.
[The statement of George Thurman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. Thank you very much. You finished ahead of time
which is pretty remarkable, so thanks, because we are running a
little behind.
Just so everybody in the audience knows, number one,
obviously, everybody is scheduled to testify, we are going to
be here, you are going to have the opportunity, but this is
primarily an opportunity for you to put things on the radar
screen, so to speak, for this Committee. So we probably won't
have as much dialog and questions until I abuse my privilege,
which I do quite frequently as my friend, Ms. McCollum, can
tell you, but we are going to try and move it along.
But next if we could, Chief Bill John Baker, great Cherokee
Nation, good personal friend. Great to have you here, Chief.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
CHEROKEE NATION
WITNESS
BILL JOHN BAKER
Mr. Baker. Thank you, Chairman Cole, and Committeewoman
McCollum.
I am Principal Chief Bill John Baker of the Cherokee
Nation, the largest sovereign Indian nation in the United
States. Thank you for the opportunity to share a few of our
priorities this coming year.
The Joint Venture Construction Program is a public-private
partnership that allows tribes to build health facilities.
Funding comes from the tribes' own resources. Tribes apply for
the Joint Venture during a competitive process with IHS, and
they select the facilities for the program. Then IHS agrees to
fund staffing for the construction once it is completed, or for
the staffing once the construction is completed. This program
has enabled Indian Country to build badly-needed facilities.
Since 1992, more than 20 facilities have been built, improving
healthcare in Indian Country and reducing the cost to the
Federal Government. Innovative programs like Joint Venture can
help reduce the $2.2 billion health construction backlog.
Last year, the Cherokee Nation businesses committed $100
million to expand and improve our healthcare system. Our plan
includes building a new hospital in our capital city of
Tahlequah. This will replace an existing hospital which was
built 3 decades ago, and constructed to serve 65,000 patient
visits per year. We outgrew that structure long ago, and we are
seeing 400,000 patient visits a year.
The Cherokee Nation desperately needs a state-of-the-art
hospital, and we have committed millions to the project. I am
here seeking an opportunity to compete for the right to partner
with IHS in a joint venture.
I appreciate the Subcommittee's continued support on Joint
Venture, and thank you for the inclusion in past report
language. I thank Representatives Cole and McCollum for leading
a bipartisan letter to IHS to reopen this program, and
Representatives Moran, Simpson, Joyce, Valadao, for signing on
to the letter.
On the Web site, IHS states they anticipate opening the
applications for Joint Venture in late 2013. That has still not
been done. The only thing delaying construction is the Agency's
delay to opening the program. I request that the Subcommittee
urge IHS to reopen the Joint Venture Construction Program.
Secondly, the Cherokee Nation also invests in our
communities and countless other ways, including education and
infrastructure. We strive to be good neighbors, and we are in
part, through the 8(a) Program. We have leveraged the program
to diversify our non-gaming portfolio, creating opportunities
for tribal citizens and non-citizens alike, 100 percent of our
profits are either reinvested in businesses creating jobs, or
to provide services for our citizens. Congress recently altered
the 8(a) Program through the National Defense Authorization
Act. And Section 811 of that Act requires a justification and
approval for all direct awards within the program over $20
million during the life of the contract. This figure was
intended to be a threshold, however, many federal agencies
believe it is a cap.
We understand the need for a threshold and encourage
accountability in the federal contracts.
Mr. Cole. I think you inadvertently turned off your button
when you shifted. Thank you very much.
Mr. Baker. All right.
Mr. Cole. It will be lit if you are on.
Mr. Baker. Okay, it is on. I--okay. The policy has been a
drastic effect on Indian Country and the Cherokee Nation. A GAO
report revealed 60 percent decline in direct awards, and
revealed no new direct awards above the threshold. We
respectfully request this Subcommittee to work to clarify
language that the threshold is not a cap. The 8(a) Program and
Joint Venter Construction Programs are important recognitions
of federal trust responsibility. As you consider your Bill,
please urge IHS to reopen the Joint Venture, and consider the
guidance to the 8(a) Program that confirms Congressional
intent.
Thank you for your continued support of Indian Country, for
your service to this country, and for giving me the opportunity
to address you this morning. [Speaking native language.]
[The statement of Bill John Baker follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. Thank you.
Let me make a couple of quick comments and I will go to my
friend, Ms. McCollum.
I couldn't agree with you more about Joint Venture. I mean
it is a bargain for the American taxpayer. I have seen this
work in my own tribe. They have participated in that program
and like you, we made a very substantial investment on our own,
with our own dollars, on something that is really effectively a
federal responsibility. We were happy to do it, but we needed
that Joint Venture Program to get up and running. And so again,
any time that we can encourage tribes to invest with us, we
ought to be doing as much of that as we possibly can. It long
term saves money. And on the 8(a) Program, I can assure you,
you certainly will have my cooperation. I think our problem has
been in the United States Senate on that. That is where the
provision came from that was inserted in the Defense
Authorization Bill. I couldn't agree with you more. It has been
misinterpreted, and if you actually look at the records, I
think all the contracting out the government does, less than 3
percent of it goes to Native Americans. So it is not as if
Native Americans are a big threat in this area to somehow cause
somebody else business, but the ability to diversify the
economic base for tribes is just absolutely critical going
forward. So those are 2 really important considerations, and we
will try to work with you on both of them.
Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I agree with your
statements on increasing the ability for contracting, Mr. Cole.
We heard a couple of people testify about detention centers
yesterday, and so this is a reoccurring theme, one of which I
don't think we have a full grasp. I will just speak for myself
right now, but I think there are others who would agree on what
is going on with the detention centers. I am hearing a couple
of themes here. One, we need better schools. Two, we need to
have schools that excite and engage our native youth at schools
that they go to, whether it is immersion or other best
practices in teaching. We heard a lot of that yesterday. When
it comes to the detention centers, I know that there is one I
visited in Minnesota which was built, all the money was put
into it, and then it sits abandoned. So we need to do our
oversight. Whether, as we heard, tribes don't want the funds in
the Department of Justice, they want them in the Bureau of
Indian Affairs. We need to figure out what is going on with
this because there are a lot of facilities sitting empty, there
are a lot of youth who need help, there are a lot of
communities who stand ready to help their youth. Several
witnesses have been bringing it up, even though we didn't ask
any questions about it yesterday. Mr. Cole, this is something
that this committee is very serious about addressing. The drug
problem, educational opportunities that are missed, and a lot
of other things, all lead youth to the facilities. Eventually I
would like to see the facilities closed but not because there
isn't the staff to operate them for the youth who need them
today. I would like to see them closed because we don't have
our youth needing them.
Thank you.
Mr. Cole. Well, we thank the panel for their--yes, sir?
Mr. Wabnum. Mr. Cole, I would like to provide testimony
to--in which I submitted to the Secretary Commission on Indian
Trust Administration and Reform, I believe----
Mr. Cole. Provide it for the record, you bet. We are happy
to have it.
Mr. Wabnum. Yes.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. And I couldn't agree with you more about the
Dawes Commission by the way, but that is a pretty common
sentiment for where I am from.
Mr. Wabnum. Thank you.
Mr. Cole. Thank you. Thank all 3 of you for your testimony.
Appreciate it very much. If we could, we will have our next
panel come up, and that is Mr. Mickey Pearcy, Executive
Director of Self-Governance, Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, Mr.
George Thompson, Chief of the Hickory Ground Tribal Town at the
Muscogee Creek Nation of Oklahoma, Mr. Gordon Howell, Chairman
of the Ute Tribe of, is it Fort----
Mr. Howell. Fort Duchesne.
Mr. Cole [continuing]. Duchesne, that is what I thought,
okay, and Mr. Eaglefeathers, President of the National Council
of the Urban Indian Health Association. So good to have all of
you here. And we will once again proceed in the order called,
if we may. Mr. Peercy, you are recognized.
Mr. Peercy. Good to see you.
Mr. Cole. Good to see you.
Mr. Peercy. I have not seen you since I shaved my head. You
did not recognize me.
Mr. Cole. Well, I do not know whether to tell you you look
better or not, but I think you do. Looks pretty good.
Mr. Peercy. How are you, sir?
Mr. Cole. Very good.
----------
Wednesday, April 8, 2014.
CHOCTAW NATION OF OKLAHOMA
WITNESS
MICKEY PEERCY
Mr. Peercy. I want to thank the Committee on behalf of
Chief Powell for allowing us to participate in this hearing
with the Subcommittee. I submit this on behalf of Chief Powell
and Choctaw Nation, the third largest tribe in the Indian
Nation.
One thing I want to say before I get into the specifics, we
request the Subcommittee work with the tribes and not allow
tribal programs in the Indian Health Service or the BIA to be
subject to any further sequestration or rescissions. It just
puts you back. You never recover from that.
I have several things to talk about, and I will not beat
dead horses because I have heard other testimony. Five things I
want to mention, but I will finish before my time.
One is the joint venture program we have just discussed,
the special diabetes program we have discussed, restoring the
funding to the Office of Tribal Self-Governance, contract
support cost issues, and I just mentioned the sequestration and
rescissions, and I will not go there again.
We just heard Principal Chief Baker talk about the joint
venture. We do recognize that the President's 2015 budget has
recommended $85 million for 2015 in the joint venture. We
request that that be doubled to $170 million. You heard again
of the success stories. It is getting to where that is the only
way facilities throughout Indian Country get established, and
we are interested ourselves in that program, and we need the
solicitation out so we can move forward quickly. It is a long
process, 3- to 4-year process anyway, and we need to get that
started.
Additionally with the joint venture, when we do the joint
venture and we talk about staffing, we need to ensure that
contract support cost is included in that so we are not in the
dilemma that we have been in with contract support cost issues.
The special diabetes program for Indians has been one of
the most successful programs. No one can argue that. You all
have got the books on reports that we have done, and we
appreciate the effort in H.R.--was it 4302--for the 1-year
funding. I spoke with Congressional staff in a hearing 2 or 3
weeks ago, and I know you guys have to run every 2 years, what
I put an analogy to, what if every year you were on the hit
list and you did not know if you were going to be there next
year or not. How do you recruit epidemiologists? How do you
recruit diabetes educators to stay with the program that is
funded year by year? It is just really difficult to keep
quality staff. We are asking for two things. First, somehow we
work together, can we get that permanent? Get it out of the
grant cycle, get it into permanent recurring funding for the
Indian Health Service. And plan B would be 5-year funding at
least at $200 million instead of the 150 is what we are
suggesting, but it is a great program. It has shown remarkable
successes throughout Indian Country. You have heard the
anecdotal stories, and you recognize that it is a successful
program, so why do we have to work every year to hold our
breath and see if it is going to be there on the next one.
Restore funding to the Office of Tribal Self-Governance.
Within the Indian Health Service, you have the Office of Tribal
Self-Governance which has been there since the early 1990s. In
2003, it had a $10 million budget to assist the tribes in
Indian Country. In 2003, $4 million was taken. I am going to
lie on this time thing. But in this year again to offset the
contract support cost issue, another million was taken. Restore
that back to the regular time.
Contract support cost--we appreciate the language to make
the agencies to do contract support cost funding totally, make
them whole, but what they do is, they take money out of the
rest of the program. So a mandate without appropriations does
not get is anywhere.
I am going to quit right there and say we never recover
from sequestration and rescission. We should never have to. In
the Indian Health Service, we are the ones who provide care
just as the veterans do, and for us to get sequestered is not
acceptable. So I would request that we really take a look at
that, and that is my testimony.
[The statement of Mickey Peercy follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. Let me make two quick points in response. Two
years ago, this Subcommittee actually put tens of millions of
extra dollars in contract support because we believed the
figure was much higher than the Indian Health Service did. They
came back and the Administration came back and requested that
we take that out and put it someplace else. We said if we do,
are you sure you can get the Senate to agree. They said they
could; they could not. And we actually lost the money for the
entire health program and in the end it turned out that our
staff on this Committee was much closer to being right about
the true cost of contract support than they were at the Indian
Health Service. So it is a mistake I do not think this
Committee will make again. We did not make the mistake but I
think it is one where we will rely on our own judgment.
Your second point about sequestration is absolutely
correct. Indian health should have never been subjected to
that. Actually, everybody admits that now. It was a mistake in
the original budget. We do have the assurance, which I got
again last night at Rules Committee when Mr. Ryan appeared that
that will never happen again. So even if we go through a
sequester, which we should try to avoid, early next year
hopefully in a large agreement Indian Health Service will not
be subjected to sequester in any different way ever again. So
that does not make you whole for what happened.
Mr. Peercy. It is hard to say without sounding greedy, we
better get our money back.
Mr. Cole. Yeah, well, I do not know if you really want that
in the record but you are right. I do not know, I mean, because
it is very hard to go back in a situation like this. But the
first thing to do is at least make sure it does not happen
again, and that at least appears to have been done. Thank you
very much. Excellent points.
Let me move on to the others if that is okay with Ms.
McCollum, and then we will go to her directly for questions.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, I mean no disrespect. I had foot
surgery and I have an ice bag on my foot, so no disrespect to
the people that I am not facing.
Mr. Cole. The fact that you are here has proven that.
Ms. McCollum. I have not turned my back on you. I love you,
Mr. Cole.
Mr. Cole. That is mutual.
Mr. Thompson.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
HICKORY GROUND TRIBAL TOWN OF THE MUSCOGEE CREEK NATION OF OKLAHOMA
WITNESS
GEORGE THOMPSON
Mr. Thompson. Thank you, Chairman Cole and members of the
Subcommittee. My name is Mekko George Thompson. Some of you
wonder what Hickory Ground is all about. I am going to try to
explain that.
Within nation, each tribal town has religious traditional
and cultural aspects so that is where we come from. We carry
out on our traditions and so forth.
Well, anyway, I am here today on behalf of not only our
nation but our brother and sister nations as well that have
certainly huge debt we are faced with today.
What the issue is about, it is about, you know, we were
removed from the State of Alabama back in the 1830s. Anyway,
since that time our old homelands have been desecrated. There
were 60 human remains that were dug up and put in trailers on
the site. I saw that firsthand, and it was not something that--
what they were, they were wrapped in newspapers and buckets and
put on shelves in a trailer. There was no temperature control
or anything. But anyway, this issue came up on us back in 2006.
It was a big challenge for us because we are religious. But I
realize that the remains that were being dug up were my great-
grandparents. We have ties back to our old homelands.
So that gave me the incentive to look at the issue, and we
have been dealing with this since 2006, like I said, and we
have had numerous meetings with different entities relating to
different agencies. All these years. What I was looking at was
the results. As I was looking at what we were experiencing, I
realized that we have to take another step forward to go before
a committee or something that will help us with our issues, and
one of the things that we are asking for is to, the Poarch
Band, they receive grants for historical preservation, and my
belief is that why should you receive grants when you desecrate
the site. That is kind of defeating the purpose there. And
also, the land that was purchased used federal grants, protect
and preserve grants, but that never came about. And as of
today, they are continuing their destruction, building a $240
million casino expansion and a luxury high-rise hotel right
there where our sacred place was. They removed our remains and
built the casino on top of that.
The Poarch has also used tribal police force to keep our
people away from the site. Under the Religious Freedom Act, I
believe that we have the right to perform our ceremonies.
Recently, last year when some of our warriors were down there
to perform ceremonies, they were locked up for trespass and so
forth. Like I said, the results are in my written testimony, so
I will try to make my time short as I know you people are busy,
so I will end my testimony now.
[The statement of George Thompson follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Cole. We appreciate it, and we appreciate you coming
all the way to give the Committee your views.
Mr. Howell, you are recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
UTE TRIBE OF FORT DUCHESNE
WITNESS
GORDON HOWELL
Mr. Howell. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the
Subcommittee. Thank you for inviting me to testify this
morning. My name is Gordon Howell. I am the Chairman of the
Northern Ute Tribe. The Ute Tribe asks the Subcommittee to
focus on two areas with increased attention and funding that
would make a real difference on a reservation and across Indian
Country.
The first is the tribal law and order, and the second is
energy development on our Indian lands. First, the tribe asks
the Subcommittee to fulfill its trust responsibility to provide
enough funding for law enforcement on our reservation. In the
past 3 years, the Subcommittee provided a small increase to the
BIA law enforcement funding but none of that funding makes it
down to our reservation. Our reservation is the second largest
in the United States, 4.3 million acres, but we have only eight
federally funded officers. This leaves two or three officers on
per shift that is covering an area larger than the State of
Connecticut. This results in long response times, loss of
evidence and difficulty in making convictions. We are pleased
the BIA is requesting an increase of $1.6 million to hire
additional officers in Indian Country but we know that when the
$1.6 million is distributed nationwide, it will not even cover
the increase of gas prices.
Because of a lack of law enforcement on our reservation, we
see a lot more gang activity and see a lot of illegal drugs. In
just the past few weeks we have had kids involved in gang
shootings at each other and on moving cars. Our people and our
homes are caught in the crossfire. It is painful for me to see
our tribal youth falling victim to the dangerous behavior.
We support the Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010, and more
recently, the Violence Again Women Act. These laws should have
been the start of a new era in tribal law and order. However,
we have seen no increase in police officers, no increase in law
enforcement equipment, no increase in drug or gang crime and no
increase in tribal court funding. Congress cannot simply pass
laws and expect change to happen. Congress and the Subcommittee
must also make funding available for the BIA and Indian tribes
can make change happen at the local level.
The second thing is the tribe asks the Subcommittee to
begin taking Indian energy seriously. Indian development on
Indian lands needs the same attention and energy on federal
lands, if not more. Energy development on Indian lands supports
tribal governments, provides jobs, allows us to provide
services for our tribal members, and make less dependent on
federal budgets.
The tribe is a major oil and gas producer. We are only able
to produce 10 percent of our capacity. We have about 7,000
wells that produce 45,000 barrels a day. We also produce about
900 million cubic feet of gas per day. Despite our success in
the oil and gas industry, our partners say that the federal
permit process is still their single biggest business risk.
We ask this Subcommittee to direct the Department of the
Interior to create an Indian Energy Permit Coordination Office
and provide funding for the office to support the energy
permitting process. The office could be organized within the
existing Division of Energy and Minerals Development Office in
Lakewood, Colorado. This concept is supported by a number of
energy tribes in our region including the Coalition of Large
Tribes, which recently passed a resolution supporting the
creation of this office. This office could bring the same
federal permit coordination to Indian lands and provide for
federal lands in Section 365 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005.
In addition, we ask the Subcommittee to redirect tens of
millions in the President's fiscal year 2015 budget for energy
development on federal lands to Indian Country. For the second
year in a row, as you can see in this chart, the President has
proposed no increase in funding in energy development on Indian
lands and provided substantial increases in every other
Interior energy program. If you take a look at the chart, you
can see that there are increases all through this but there is
none for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. And also in energy too,
there is no increase, but there is increase in all the other
departments.
In fact, it has the smallest conventional-energy budget in
the entire Department. The BIA's $2.4 million is only 1\1/2\
percent of $154.8 budget as proposed for the BLM. This is a
failure of the Federal Government's trust responsibilities.
The tribe asks the Subcommittee to redirect funds from BLM
to BIA where additional energy expertise is needed to help
tribes develop the resources and provide jobs for revenues.
Of course, the BLM does provide some energy services to
Indian land. BLM currently processes applications and permits
to drill and does inspections on oil and gas operations. If BLM
continues to provide these services, the Subcommittee should
direct BLM to prioritize inspections of the Indian trust lands
and fees collected for processing, APDs on Indian lands be
included and the state and federal field offices where the APDs
are being processed.
Thank you for your cooperation.
[The statement of Gordon Howell follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Ms. McCollum, do you have any questions?
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Eaglefeathers is not here to talk about urban Indian
health but I want you to know, representing St. Paul-
Minneapolis where there are many, many nations that are living
in the Twin Cities and surrounding area, I will look at his
testimony again more carefully, and Mr. Chair, then I will talk
to you about some of the needs that he pointed out in there.
Thank you, gentlemen.
Mr. Thompson. Mr. Calvert, just one more statement, if I
may?
Mr. Calvert. Sure, very quickly.
Mr. Thompson. I forgot to mention that our Principal Chief,
George Tiger of the Muscogee Nation, is with us today.
Mr. Cole. Welcome.
Mr. Calvert. I have just a quick question and I will turn
it over to Mr. Cole. When you mentioned the Colorado office, is
that the same office that the tribes from the Bakken were
referring to when they wanted to have the coordination out of
one office?
Mr. Howell. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. They referred to it as the Denver office, and
you referred to it as where? Somewhere else in Colorado.
Mr. Howell. Lakewood.
Mr. Calvert. Lakewood?
Mr. Howell. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. We are talking about the same thing?
Mr. Howell. Yes, we are.
Mr. Calvert. I just wanted to put that on the record. Okay.
Mr. Cole.
Mr. Cole. First, just quickly, Mr. Thompson, very smart to
recognize the Principal Chief, so good move.
I want to quickly associate myself with some remarks Mr.
Howell made. Had you been here last week, we had some pretty
pointed questions directed at the BLM on this very issue, so I
could not agree more. We have got tribal governments, we do not
give the ability to tax, and here we have got a source of
revenue that they could have and it ought to be a priority. It
should not be treated routinely the way any other application
coming in because it is literally life and death services to
tribal nations in many cases, and we have a unique opportunity.
I mean, the Utes have been at this for a long time but the
three federated tribes have not, and this is a really
potentially life-transforming experience for them in terms of
being able to get ahead of this, but all our tribes ought to
have the ability to use their resources in a way that they see
fit and ought to be able to develop them at the pace that they
think is appropriate.
I want to ask you one question about a concept that was
presented to me on one occasion by a person in the energy
industry that does quite a bit of development in the Bakken,
and it was this. He said, of course this would always be a
tribal decision but instead of relying on the federal
regulatory regime, which is very cumbersome and expensive and
slow, would it make sense for tribes, if they wanted to--it
would be a tribal decision--to open up negotiations with the
state governments in those various areas and use their services
on their land if they chose do to that. Is that something--
because we usually we find that the state processing is much
faster and much cheaper than frankly what they do, and
honestly, they seem to hold their people for whatever reason a
little bit better. It is pretty tough in all these energy
rights right now to get qualified people for these governmental
positions because we get outbid pretty quickly by the energy
companies themselves. So there is a constant turnover in a lot
of these offices and we have not been able to develop the
professional cadre of regulators honestly that can speed this
permitting process along. So any thoughts you have on that
would be very welcome to this Committee.
Mr. Howell. Okay. My opinion on that is that we are a very
proud people that we are sovereign, and with the state getting
involved, all it does it prolong it because they implement as
well as with the government. They implement more and more
regulations on us, and it just slows down the process.
What I agree with is that like the Coalition of Large
Tribes and all the tribes that are getting together, like you
said, the three tribes that are coming together with us that we
are willing to give our expertise developing it and getting it
together. In other words, we are meeting together all the time
to actually see what is holding up the process and we are
willing to work together and solve the problem because we know
what the problems are.
Mr. Cole. Well, I think the preferred way would be of the
tribes themselves wanted to take over the functions and had the
expertise. That is the best solution, no question about that,
and anything you can submit to this Committee that would help
give us an idea of what we could do to facilitate that so
tribes could self-regulate, you know, controlling your
resources is controlling your destiny, and whether it is the
Federal Government or the state government, you know, I think
our experience in health care has demonstrated that the tribes
that have actually contracted and taking control of their
health care, usually the health care quality improves. Nobody
cares about tribal members like a tribe, and frankly, those
tribal governments then become very responsive to their own
citizens and are saying hey, we want some changes here.
I think the same thing would happen in terms of this
regulatory stuff, and we had a very serious discussion with BLM
to remind them that public land is not the same as Indian land.
They are very different. That is not their land. It is not the
land of the Federal Government. That belongs to the tribes, and
tribal desires ought to dictate what goes on in their own
property.
Mr. Howell. And if you do not mind, you hit it perfect. You
know, we are sovereign, and they treat it like it is public
lands, and that is where they interfere with our energy
processes that they implement and put these regulations on us
like it is public land, and in fact, that is where we are right
now. We are having a lot of issues with Fish and Wildlife, BIA,
BLM and stuff, so you are right. It is not public lands.
Mr. Cole. Well, Chairman, I hope these are areas we can
work on with report language and refocusing, reminding the BLM
and the other government agencies of that reality and making
them prioritize these tribal needs. They ought to go to the
head of the line. They should not just be in the line.
Thank you. Yield back.
Mr. Calvert. Good advice. Thank you.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chairman?
Mr. Calvert. Ms. McCollum, real quick.
Ms. McCollum. If I could, Mr. Howell, really quickly, Mr.
Hall, was in here earlier. I talked to him about some of the
plans that they have of capturing some of the gas so that they
were not doing the flare-ups so that the Bakken was not
brighter in the sky than the Twin Cities. Are you working on
doing some of that yourself with your tribe?
Mr. Howell. We are not flaring.
Ms. McCollum. You are not flaring?
Mr. Howell. No. We have been in this, as Mr. Cole said, in
this oil and gas business for decades, so no, you know, no
disrespect to Texas, but we have been doing this for a long
time and no, we are not flaring nothing.
Ms. McCollum. No, I knew you meant it as no disrespect, and
he is probably looking to your leadership and entrepreneurship
on capturing that. This is not the Committee that deals with
the flaring that is going on, but I just want to point out,
Indian Country treats every resource with great respect and
tries to use everything to its best ability. I wish our oil and
gas producers in the private sector in the Bakken were doing
the same thing.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And I thank this panel for your
testimony, and you are excused, and we are going to introduce
our next panel.
Next is Dr. Robert Martin, President of the Institute of
American Indian Arts; Ms. Carrie Billy, President and CEO of
the American Higher Education Consortium; Ms. D. Bambi Kraus,
President of the National Association of Tribal Historic
Preservation Officers; and Mr. Lloyd B. Miller, Legal
Counselor, the National Tribal Contract Support Cost Coalition,
I think we are missing somebody. Who are we missing?
Mr. Cole. No, we are good.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Very good. There he is. Lloyd Miller.
Thank you for your attendance today. As you know, we are on
a 5-minute rule. The green light is on. That is good. When the
yellow light is on, close it up, and we will try to stay on
time.
So with that, Mr. Martin, you are recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
INSTITUTE OF AMERICAN INDIAN ARTS
WITNESS
ROBERT MARTIN
Mr. Martin. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the
Subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to present
testimony for the Institute of American Indian and Alaska
Native Culture and Arts Development, more commonly known as the
Institute of American Indian Arts.
Mr. Cole, the President of the Student Government sends her
regards, Tawny Growing Thunder. She said to be sure to tell you
hello. She was in your office a couple weeks ago. She has
applied for an internship in your office, and I wish her good
luck with that.
Mr. Cole. I think her chances just went up.
Mr. Martin. All right. The Institute of American Indian
Arts is chartered by the United States Congress and of course,
our core funding comes through this Subcommittee, and for the
last 5 years we have almost matched our $42 million in core
funding with funding from other sources, so I am very proud of
that.
In terms of program and campus development, we have seen an
evolution of the mission of the Institute of American Indian
Arts from a high school to a college. We currently offer
bachelor's degrees in studio arts, indigenous liberal studies,
museum studies, cinematic arts and technology, and creative
writing, and we have also expanded our mission in 2013 by
offering an M.F.A. in creative writing, a low-res program.
Sherman Alexei is on the faculty. We have 29 students currently
enrolled in that program and 46 have been accepted for the next
cohort group in the fall, so we are very proud of launching
that program. Also, our enrollment has doubled from 200 in 2007
to 450 this year, and we have 84 tribes represented.
One of our priorities, of course, has been the campus
build-out. We have a beautiful campus with 140 acres. For the
first 38 years, we were in temporary facilities, and this has
really made a difference in terms of the stability and
permanence of our programs and strategic planning for the
institution. March 26, we opened our fourth building since
2009. It is a welcome center. It provides a front door to the
campus. It is multipurpose. It has student galleries. It also
has offices for admissions and recruitment and administrative
offices and for IT as well, and we also have classrooms there,
so we are very proud of that, and we will continue the build-
out of our campus.
For the fiscal year 2014 budget, I wanted to thank the
Subcommittee for your support. You supported the President's
request of $9.369 million. That really rejuvenated the
institution. We are reinstating and restoring our summer school
program. We are offering a bridge program for the local tribes
in New Mexico and across the region and Nation. We have been
doing recruiting in Alaska and we have 78 applications for the
summer bridge program from Alaska Natives, so we are very
excited about that. But it also allowed us for the first time
to give our employees a small COLA increase. That was the first
time in almost 4 years. The sequestered amount of $8 million
really presented some challenges for us, but thank you for your
support and increasing our budget.
You also supported the President's request for $2 million
in forward funding, and unfortunately during the budget
process, that was lost. In fiscal year 2015, we are asking you
to support that increase that we received in fiscal year 2014
plus $100,000 for a small COLA for faculty and staff, and also
the $2 million that the President is requesting for forward
funding. With the Continuing Resolution that provides
uncertainty and sometimes we do not know what that amount is
going to be until halfway through the school year, and it is
difficult to plan and really do the best job that we can for
our students. The government shutdown was devastating for the
morale of our faculty, staff and students no matter what we
said. You know, we were able with our reserves to continue
operations but they heard rumors, they heard of other agencies
furloughing their employees and so they were expecting the same
thing to happen, and the students were asking about food
service, was that going to be eliminated, were they going to
have to go home. So it really had a devastating effect.
The Institute of American Indian Arts is one of five tribal
colleges that are not forward funding, thanks to the work of
President and CEO Carrie Billy several years ago. About 3 years
ago, they received forward funding, so the shutdown and
Continuing Resolutions do not impact them the way it does the
Institute of American Indian Arts, Navajo Technical University,
United Tribes Technical College and Haskell. So we are hoping
that you will support not only the President's core funding
request for us but also the request for the $2 million in
forward funding.
Thank you again for the opportunity to speak today on
behalf of the American Indian Arts, and if there are any
questions, I will be glad to answer those.
[The statement of Robert Martin follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Martin.
Next is Ms. Carrie Billy, President and CEO of the American
Indian Higher Education Consortium. You are recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
AMERICAN INDIAN HIGHER EDUCATION CONSORTIUM
WITNESS
CARRIE BILLY
Ms. Billy. Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, I am
Carrie Billy, President and CEO of the American Indian Higher
Education Consortium, which is AIHEC, and I ask that my full
statement be included in the hearing record.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, full testimony will be in
the record.
Ms. Billy. On behalf of the Nation's 37 tribally and
federally chartered colleges and universities which
collectively are AIHEC, thank you for this opportunity to speak
about American Indian tribal higher education.
First, I want to thank you and the Committee for your past
support which has enabled tribal colleges to serve more than
88,000 American Indians and Alaska Natives each year through
academic and community-based programs at more than 75 sites in
16 states. Mr. Chairman, your investment in tribal colleges is
yielding a tremendous return. It is transforming families,
communities, tribal nations one student at a time.
Over the course of these hearings, the Committee has heard
about the challenges facing Indian Country. These challenges
are real and they are serious but they are not insurmountable
and they do not define us. Hope defines us. It is in our
ability to look back and hearing our studies and songs, our
history and our language, and from that to shape a foundation
for a better world on our own land. Tribal colleges are the
catalyst for transforming this vision into reality. Tribal
colleges take hope and a pitifully few dollars and shape them
into opportunity.
A few weeks ago, I was talking with a young man who had
been in and out of jail several times. By 18, he dropped out of
high school. He was drinking, getting involved in gangs and he
was a father, at least in name. He had tried different things
to improve his situation--college, the military, short-term
employment. None of these things worked for him, and the gangs
were still calling. When his second child was born, he had to
make a decision and stick with it. He could easily have chosen
a life of criminal behavior, violence, drugs, and eventually,
prison. He would have been a statistic within our penal system,
and without a father, his children might easily have repeated
the same pattern, all at tremendous cost to taxpayers. But he
found Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwa Community College and he
enrolled. Now he is the tribal college student body president.
He is planting community gardens throughout his reservation,
working with high school students, helping his children with
homework and exceling in college. This story is repeated over
and over at tribal colleges.
Mr. Chairman, our funding requests are modest and they are
listed in our prepared statement. I will mention just two, one
that President Martin mentioned. AIHEC is seeking an
appropriation of $22 million to forward-fund the five tribal
colleges that are the only schools whose operating funding
comes from the Department of Interior that are not forward
funded. All other BIE and Interior schools are forward funded,
and they are able to plan multiyear budgets and begin and end
the school year with semidependable funding. Forward funding
will not increase the federal budget over the long term. It
simply allows these vital education programs to receive basic
operation funding on time, which, as Dr. Martin said, is
critically important when the Congress continues to operate on
continuing resolutions. Please help us with this modest
request. I believe that if CBO scored it over 10 years, it
would probably have zero impact.
What will you get for that investment? I can guarantee a
rate of return of at least 14.3 percent. I can guarantee you
hundreds of more stories like the story I just told about that
student. According to an independent analysis, the Nation's
community colleges, which includes tribal colleges, yield a
rate of return of $5.80 for every dollar spent in academic
programs alone. This accounts for a third of all of our
students. Tribal colleges are academic institutions. They are
producing an American Indian workforce of teachers, agriculture
and land management specialists, engineers, computer
programmers, artists and nurses, but they do so much more.
Their community centers, public libraries, tribal archives,
entrepreneurial and economic development centers, child care
centers. They run Head Start programs, establish community
gardens, build wellness centers, conduct regional and
reservation-based research in critical areas such as invasive
species mitigation and Native and traditional plant
restoration. Tribal colleges, more than any other entities in
Indian Country, preserve and revitalize Native languages. They
operate the only GED training and testing facilities in many of
our communities. They work with the K-12 schools, sometimes
even putting math teachers in local high schools at the
college's expense to improve student outcomes and their chance
of graduating from college. They offer dual credit programs and
they do so much more. They do it all with $5,850 per Indian
student.
The only other minority-serving institution funded by the
Federal Government, Howard University, receives about $30,000
per undergraduate student for a total of more than $200 million
in annual operating funding. Tribal colleges receive a quarter
of this amount. We are not asking for even half the amount that
Howard receives. We are asking for the Congressionally
authorized level of $8,000 per Indian student.
In closing, I will just mention that tribal colleges are
growing. In fiscal year 2015, the College of Muscogee Nation in
Oklahoma will be eligible to receive operating funding for the
BIE. Over the past 10 years, six tribal colleges have been
added to the Tribal College Act, but our funding has not grown.
Please help us grow to the authorized level of $8,000 per
Indian student. This request represents hope for thousands of
American Indians and it is a wise investment in success for
America. Thank you.
[The statement of Carrie Billy follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady for her testimony. We
hope that the era of Continuing Resolutions is over and we are
back to regular order.
With that, we recognize Bambi Kraus.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF TRIBAL HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICERS
WITNESS
D. BAMBI KRAUS
Ms. Kraus. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and
members of the Committee. Thank you for your time.
This is the third year that the National Association of
THPOs has appeared before your Committee, and from my point of
view, it is probably one of the more interesting committees
because this really is reality for Indian Country. It is
actually what is going on, and thank you for your time.
I want to make one quick note that I actually served on the
Board of IAI that actually brought on Dr. Martin to head the
institution, and he has done an exceptional job to create both
a functional and a beautiful campus in Santa Fe, so I just
wanted to make my support known.
We are actually talking about a small amount of money that
will make a huge difference in Indian Country for cultural
perpetuation, and in particular, I am referencing three federal
programs that already exist and asking for the creation of
another. The first federal program is the Historic Preservation
Fund that is funded and administered by the National Park
Service. We are actually requesting more money than the
President requested because the funds are not keeping pace with
the need in Indian Country. The number of tribes has gone up
again by 10 in terms of participating in the program so the
Park Service is stating that there will be 151 tribes
participating in the THPO program in fiscal year 2015. So that
is a huge step from where we started in the fiscal year 1996
when there were only 12, so it has gone from 12 to 151, and we
expect the program to keep growing and so we are asking that
the funds keep pace with the interest of the tribes, and we
consider it a success to have so many tribes participating in
the program.
Also funded out of the Historic Preservation Fund are the
state historic preservation officers. We are seeking $50
million in support of their request. I think you will hear from
them next week. And then also $5 million for a new program
called Underrepresented Communities in the National Register
program, and that is a new program, and I believe that most
people in Indian Country would feel like they have an
underrepresented community. We hope that this year will be the
year the tribes can get money directly rather than going
through the states as what is currently the process for fiscal
year 2014.
Moving on to the second national program that already
exists, also administered by the Park Service, is the Native
American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. That is called
NAGPRA, and it has been around for over 20 years, and it has
had some measure of success but there is still a lot of work
remaining to be done. Unfortunately, the funds have been cut by
25 percent over the past 2 years. I have no clear understanding
of why there has been a cut but the need has not decreased.
Rather, the Park Service has apparently not requested the level
that was historic amount of $2.3 million and so I believe that
they are asking for $1.75 million in 2015, and we request that
the amount go back to the $2.31 million.
The other program that already exists is the Smithsonian
Institution, and perhaps we are the only group that is asking
for support for the Smithsonian's repatriation work. They have
quite a few Native American human remains in their possession
and sacred objects, and so we are asking for more money for
them to be able to do their work.
The creation of a new program is within the Bureau of
Indian Affairs. They currently do not have any kind of
mechanism that allows them to have clear authority for cultural
resource work, even though they have the same mandates to
comply with federal laws such as NEPA and the National Historic
Preservation Act.
I think with my last minute and 24 seconds, I want to just
say that this is probably one of the more interesting aspects
of working in Indian Country. The Historic Preservation Act,
for example, has brought the tribes in contact with the
railroads, the historic railroads, on positive train control,
and we are in the midst of finalizing a process that will
streamline it so that the tribes and the railroads can comply
with the Historic Preservation Act in order to implement
positive train control, and I think that without 20 years of
experience with the tribes, we would not have been able to
respond to this, and I just wanted to make sure that you
understand the tribes are stepping forward, they are getting
ready to hire staff in order to make the process go as smoothly
as possible.
And the other aspect that you hear about, you do not
understand how the tribes have a role in it, is that a year ago
when I testified, I mentioned that the country of France was
about to auction off many, many sacred ceremonial objects, and
that auction went forward. We were all unable to stop it. This
year, another unusual situation is that the FBI has discovered
a private collection, and preliminary information is that there
are probably over 100 Native American skeletal remains in his
possession. So I have been asked to try to help get Indian
Country to see if we can get people to start identifying some
of these Native American ancestors and sacred items.
So I just wanted to give you an idea of the type of work we
do, and it is not easy work. It is definitely not easy work,
and I have to applaud anyone who steps forward to help protect
their culture.
So thank you very much for your time.
[The statement of D. Bambi Kraus follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
And next, Mr. Lloyd Miller, Legal Counsel, National Tribal
Contract Support Cost Coalition.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NATIONAL TRIBAL CONTRACT SUPPORT COST COALITION
WITNESS
LLOYD B. MILLER
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Congresswoman
McCollum, Congressman Cole. Let me begin by praising your
lifetime of work, Bambi. You have been a terrific public
servant to Indian Country.
I have been working with Indian tribes for over 20 years on
issues pertaining to contract support costs both in the
appropriations committees and in the authorizing committees but
perhaps most famously in the courts. We have had two Supreme
Court decisions, countless Court of Appeals decisions, co-
counsel in the Ramah class action against the BIA. I am
counselor in unfortunately 55 cases against the Indian Health
Service including the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw tribes,
Citizen Potawatomi, the Red Lake Band, the Riverside Southern
Indian Health, California Rural Indian Health, Tule River. It
goes on and on. It is sad. It is sad because this should never
have happened.
But I want to begin by thanking this Committee. This
Committee took courageous action. It was not easy. The
Administration saw an anomaly in the first Continuing
Resolution. I am sure there was pressure on some members of the
Committee, and you were up to the pressure and you delivered
for Indian Country, and you really did start a course change
under the Indian Self-Determination Act. Never in 39 years have
these contracts ever been paid in full. If Providence were
asked to run a federal hospital, they would be paid in full. If
Acme Construction Company were asked to run a federal
construction project, they would be paid in full. If a private
company were asked to run a BIA prison or jail, they would be
paid in full. But never until you acted this year have tribes
been paid in full on their contracts. It seems ordinary. It
seems natural, the Supreme Court said. So thank you for very
much for your leadership. I know it was not easy.
I have to salute the Administration. In 2015, they have
gotten with the program. They were not last year but they are
this year, and we support the Administration's proposal to
continue the full funding of these contracts. I have noted in
my testimony a couple of technical corrections which I think
would facilitate this contracting process. Now that the
agencies are at full funding of these contracts, and given the
dynamic way in which the contracts are priced, there is a
possibility there could be slight overpayments and slight
underpayments through the course of the year. Adjustments will
need to be made as that occurs. It is important when money
comes back to the agencies it does not go to the Treasury, that
it remains with the agencies so they can pay those who are
slightly underfunded. If it happens late in the year, it is
important that the agencies can use the money in the next
month, even though that may be in a new fiscal year. So that
would require having either some of the money or all of the
money be 2-year money, but these are technical things to now
adjust to the new era.
We have offered some language to improve transparency. This
Committee demands an annual shortfall report from the agencies
showing exactly how they have spent their money on the
contracts; if anything is due, reporting to you on what is due;
if anything has been overpaid, reporting to you on what is
overpaid. This is a very important budgeting tool for you. It
is a very important document for Indian Country. But oddly,
given the trends in other areas, transparency in this area has
gotten worse in the current Administration. This Committee can
make sure that those reports are transparent, that they are
disclosed to Congress in a timely way, and that tribes have an
opportunity to comment on them as they are being developed.
Language along those lines has been included in my testimony.
Finally, I would be remiss if I did not talk about the
claims process, and I am happy to answer your questions, Mr.
Chairman, about this process. In one sense, there is nothing
for the Committee to do. The claims process works on its own.
If a claim is satisfied, if it is settled or if there is a
judgment, it is paid out of the judgment fund. It never comes
through this Committee. But there is a problem, and if I may
distribute some charts, I think they will tell more than I
could possibly tell you about what is going on.
The first two charts will tell you how many claims have
been settled since the Supreme Court decided the Ramah case in
June 2012. The second chart will tell you how many tribes have
claims. You can express it either way. A tribe might have one
claim or a tribe might have 20 claims, so whether you want to
look at it from the standpoint of tribes or the standpoint of
claim years, this reflects our best information to date. The
last document for your information is the actual claims, the
specific tribes and the amounts of the settlements. We have
worked with other law firms to make sure this is as accurate as
possible for the Committee. We will continue to update this.
If the Committee would look at the tribes with settled
claims chart, there is just one thing missing on this chart.
This axis does not go up to 60. It goes up to 200. There are
200 tribe claims, and we have accumulated them so you have 13
tribes piled up here out of 200, and that is in almost 2 years.
The settled claim years document also is telling. The left axis
should go up to 1,600. According to the Director's answers to
questions for the record in the Senate Indian Affairs Committee
provided last summer, there were 1,550 claims at that time
filed against the agency. We know of a number of claims that
have been filed afterwards, so I would guesstimate 1,600. That
is how many have been settled. That is a cumulative amount, so
the last item is the total number of claims settled, about 105
claims.
We work collaboratively with the agency. The agency has
wonderful lawyers. They are lovely people. But this is broken.
It if keeps going like this, we are going to be at it for 10
years, and to what good end, I do not know because the
settlements end up coming pretty much in at where those
shortfall reports arrive, which is what I mentioned earlier.
Those shortfall reports are pretty good shortfall reports. If
we want to get this thing closed in our lifetimes and my
lifetime, I would suggest that the Committee include language
in Sections 404 or 405 of the bill, which would establish a
presumption that the shortfall reports you receive, which are
certified by the agency, are a proper basis for resolving these
claims, and when they are certified, that is the next best
thing to be sworn under oath. They are good enough for
government work. They are good enough to settle historic
claims, and I think most tribes would be satisfied with a
resolution on that basis. Section 405 provides technical
protection for the agencies from the judgment fund coming after
them, and that is appropriate. We support that. No way should
their funds be taken. But if that is going to happen, let us
establish a presumption and get these things wound up.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The statement of Lloyd B. Miller follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony.
Dr. Martin, for the past 2 years you have been requesting
forward funding in order to bring the budget in line with the
school year instead of the fiscal year, and we understand that,
and to bring the budget in line with other but not all tribal
colleges, which are already forward funded. As you mentioned,
in fiscal year 2014 we could not deliver on the forward
funding, thanks to a Budget Committee limitation. Instead, we
changed your 1-year funding to a 2-year funding. If we cannot
deliver on forward funding for fiscal year 2015, does the 2-
year funding at least help a little bit?
Mr. Martin. Not exactly because most of that funding we
will be expending for services such as the summer school
program I mentioned, and we have a growing enrollment and
campus. You know, that is what allowed us to survive during the
shutdown was a reserve, so we are interested in doing that, but
with accounting and our audits, we have to budget and expend
those funds in the given fiscal year.
Mr. Calvert. All right. Ms. Billy, can you give us a sense
of appropriations for tribal colleges as compared to other
colleges that directly receive federal appropriations such as
Howard University here in this area?
Ms. Billy. Well, Howard University receives for their
undergraduate program alone, not their medical school, $200
million a year. That is appropriated through the Department of
Education, or funded through the Department of Education and
Labor HHS appropriation bill. That works out to about $30,000
per full-time undergraduate student.
Mr. Calvert. And what do you receive?
Ms. Billy. The tribal colleges, their funding is about
$5,850 per student, so less than a quarter of the amount that
Howard University receives, and Howard receives that because it
is on what used to be federal trust land, and the tribal
colleges are still on federal trust land.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Miller, just for the record also,
obviously here we understand the judgment fund, but how would
the judgment fund if in fact the agency decided to settle all
these claims out of the judgment account, how would that affect
our deficit, our budget line? How would that affect that, in
your judgment?
Mr. Miller. Well, I think it would affect the federal
deficit infinitesimally but it would have some slight impact.
The Congressional Budget Office, however, no doubt has already
budgeted for the impact of the claims because the Supreme Court
at the time it was making its decision was informed by the
Justice Department that the claims could cost about $2 billion.
So I think the judgment fund is budgeted for the payment of the
claims in the Ramah case.
Mr. Calvert. We have money in the judgment account that is
always there for various claims to the Federal Government for
one purpose or another including obviously this instance. So
this is not anything that--some people would argue that it does
not affect the deficit because it comes out of the judgment
account and that we could go ahead and pay these claims and get
them dealt with quickly.
Mr. Miller. All money costs money, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Yes, all money costs money.
Mr. Miller. I agree with that. All I would say is that
these are past obligations that were already performed so it is
funds that are owed. I would think the American people would
recognize that services rendered to the United States should be
paid.
Mr. Cole. Around here, all money is not money, you know,
because we have arcane rules of scoring, and that actually--
this is one of the few times I have ever seen scoring work to
our advantage instead of our disadvantage. So this is a case, I
actually agree with the Chairman, where I suspect these
compensations could be paid out of a preexisting fund simply
because that is what it is there for and it technically does
not add to the deficit under the CBO rules for scoring. So very
important because it will speed the process if it does not
score.
Mr. Calvert. And I think all of us on this Committee want
us to get this thing resolved and get it behind us as quickly
as possible.
Mr. Moran.
Mr. Moran. Without having to ask, I know what you are
talking about, and I completely agree with you. The three of us
are wholly in accordance on a bipartisan basis. I would like to
think we are bicameral, and more important, I do hope that Mr.
Cole is right. He is on the Budget Committee and has been there
for a while, so if that is the way CBO is going to score it,
that would be terrific. But nice to see you, Mr. Miller.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. It is very nice to see you.
Mr. Moran. It is nice to see you all. I do not have any
questions. Thanks.
Mr. Calvert. I want to take this opportunity to thank Mr.
Moran. This is going to be his last Indian hearing today, and
Mr. Moran has been a champion for Native Americans throughout
this country, and I know will continue to be. So I want to
thank him personally for all the good he has done both as
Chairman and as Ranking Member, and we are going to spend the
rest of the year together. I just wanted to butter you up for
the rest of the year and let you know how good a guy you are.
So I appreciate all you have done.
Mr. Moran. It means a great deal to me. Thank you, Ken, Mr.
Chairman. It is a pleasure working with you and Tom.
Mr. Cole. Would it be appropriate to have a round of
applause?
Mr. Moran. Oh, no. Thanks very much.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Cole.
Mr. Cole. Thank you. Actually, I am not inclined to applaud
because I am pretty mad that he is leaving, and as the Chairman
said, he has been absolutely terrific to work with and has been
a leader on these issues, to say the least. He made a big
difference in the lives of lots of people that are not his
constituents and that he has never met but believe me, their
lives are a little bit better off because of what Jim Moran has
done on this Committee, both in the majority and in the
minority. So a great pleasure to serve with you, my friend.
A couple of things real quickly. Let me start with you, Ms.
Billy. I am curious. You know, one of the good byproducts of
the Cobell settlement was the scholarship program, and we got a
good report out of Interior recently in terms of at least their
activity with the National Fund for American Indian Education,
that some funds are being released. How, if at all, are those
funds impacting tribal colleges? Are we seeing as those funds
become available more Native American students able to use
them?
Ms. Billy. Well, the funds have not become available yet.
In fact, I think the first payment will be some time--they are
actually hoping to distribute the first round of scholarships
for fall fiscal year 2014, and I think it is about $600,000.
Most of that will be for administrative costs, we have been
told, so we are not sure how many scholarships there will be. A
portion will be for Indian graduate students and then the rest
will be for either tribal college students or American Indians
at mainstream institutions. The schools have to have a 4-year--
they have to be for bachelor degree programs or for workforce
development programs. All the tribal colleges have workforce
development programs so I imagine students will get funding for
that. Thirteen have 4-year degree programs and then five,
including IAIA, have master degree programs.
Mr. Cole. Well, it would really be helpful as we go forward
to get your continuing input on whether or not as synergy
develops between what Congress did in that place but this
should be a source. Obviously not every tribal student is going
to want to go to a tribal college, and that is fine. They need
to go wherever they want to go and wherever they think is best
for them, but I particularly hope that the tribal colleges
benefit out of this, and if there is some mechanism that helps
us in that regard or, frankly, if you see too much being eaten
up in other costs that are not directly student related, I
would hope you would bring it to the attention of this
Committee.
Ms. Billy. We will definitely do that. Thank you.
Mr. Cole. And Ms. Kraus, if I could, you talked very much,
and I could not agree with you more, about some of the programs
that are needed from a federal standpoint but we also have a
lot of tribes beginning to do things on their own, which is
really heartening as they get resources. It is amazing. I know
my own tribe maintains an archaeologist in northern
Mississippi. We have the same burial issues, by the way, that
other people have, and we have tried to buy some properties
there both to preserve them, and frankly, to work with local
people sometimes who frankly do not understand that what they
see is kind of innocent trophy hunting really is not, and we
have acquired collections and tried to do it in a sensitive way
both to not set off a stampede and to not punish people for
something that had become something of a local tradition that
they did not see anything wrong with but now they are beginning
to understand and are working with us in a very positive way.
Can you give us some idea of how many tribes are engaged on
their own and some idea of the amount of resources that are
already expending on their own?
Ms. Kraus. Well, in NATHPO's written testimony, we state
that most tribes match the federal program support that they
get by at least two to one because you cannot currently operate
a tribal historic preservation officer program with the funds
that are coming from the Federal Government. So that is just
the tribal historic preservation officer program but there are
indeed a lot of tribes that do not have a THPO program for, you
know, different reasons, but they generally--well, I am
thinking, for example, Chickasaw is doing quite well. But I
think that once they understand, though, the superior benefits
of having a THPO program in terms of efficiencies to implement
the Historic Preservation Act that most do. Whether or not they
take the money is a different story. But thank you for your
comments on collecting. Actually, I think that the THPO program
and just this, you know, growing up of historic preservation is
bringing to general American public this understanding that
collecting Native American skulls is not something that they
should be doing.
Mr. Cole. It has been very helpful, and again, I appreciate
you expanding for the record and for the Committee because
again, this is money that is very similar to seeing money in a
lot of programs that we do. You put a little money in and it is
amazing what gets matched by the tribes, and so it really
multiplies well beyond the federal dollars. You have to
recognize, every time we add a half million or a million
dollars, the multiplying effect is really tremendous because I
think particularly as tribes are able to meet some basic needs,
those that are fortunate enough to have done it, they have
turned to their heritage very quickly. It is something they
want to preserve. Everything from traditional artifacts and
practices to languages and again, the investment that the
tribes are making far, far exceeds anything the Federal
Government is doing, but this is quite often the trigger that
sets that off, so thank you for your work.
And I just want to add, Mr. Martin, I appreciate what you
do.
Mr. Miller, I really appreciate what you have been doing
for a long time, and while I know you are not and should not be
satisfied with these numbers, when I look at where we were and
I look at some of these claims being repaid and how many
millions of dollars have flowed back to tribes because of your
efforts and your coalition's effort. I just want to tell you I
am very grateful, and I am proud of this Committee but somebody
had to bring it to the Committee's attention and keep pushing
it and then tribes did that themselves, and you certainly were
a big part of that, so thank you very much. Yield back.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Just one last comment, maybe a
quick question for Ms. Kraus. How many Indian remains are at
the Smithsonian? Can you approximate that?
Ms. Kraus. I think they started with 18,000. They are split
between the National Museum and Natural History and then the
American Indian.
Mr. Calvert. Is there any other group of people that have
even close to that kind of--it seems a little ghoulish to have
that, and why is our government not moving to repatriate those
remains? Is there some scientific reason? What is their
reasoning behind this?
Ms. Kraus. Well, for example, the Natural History Museum
has a very, very, very high standard where you actually have to
know enough to request a repatriation claim and then they start
researching the actual claim.
Mr. Calvert. There has to be a better way to do that.
Ms. Kraus. Well, I would be happy to work with you and try
to find out.
Mr. Calvert. Yes, because that just seems to me that should
be resolved.
Mr. Cole. If I may, Mr. Chairman, because I actually sit on
the Smithsonian board. Actually, most of my focus has been on
artifacts, and there is a very robust program to try to partner
with tribes. In that case, they try to make sure if it is
leaving the Smithsonian that it is going back to someplace that
has the technical capabilities to protect it, and that is a
negotiated thing with the tribes. I mean, their aim is to get
these things back in many cases to the tribes, and again, I
think they would welcome a dialog in this regard because they
are trying to do the right thing on this. They get a lot of
competing attention, but I would be happy to work with you on
that.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and I thank this panel, and you are
excused. We are adjourning and we will reconvene at 1 o'clock.
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
AFTERNOON SESSION
Mr. Calvert. The Subcommittee will come to order.
Good afternoon, and welcome to the fourth public witness
hearings, specifically for American Indian and Alaskan Native
programs under the jurisdiction of the Interior and
Appropriations Subcommittee. I especially want to welcome the
distinguished tribal elders and leaders that are testifying
today and in the audience. I can assure you that your voices
are heard by this Subcommittee. For us to listen through these
hearings and not feel compelled to do all that we can try and
help would be unconscionable.
Just as they were under the Chairmanships of Norm Dicks,
Jim Moran and Mike Simpson, American Indian and Alaska Native
programs shall continue to be a priority for this Subcommittee.
Before we begin, I have a few housekeeping items to share.
This is important because we are having votes later this
afternoon, and I want to be able to hear from everybody before
we end our testimony today. We have rules about outside video
cameras and audio equipment during the hearings. This is to
ensure that today's hearing is not unfairly reproduced out of
context. Official hearing transcripts will be available at
GPO.gov. I will also call each panel of witnesses to the table,
one panel at a time. Each witness will have 5 minutes to
present his or her oral testimony. Each witness' full testimony
will be in the record. So don't feel pressured to cover
everything in 5 minutes. We will be using this timer to track
the progress of each witness. When the light turns yellow, the
witness will have 1 minute remaining to conclude his or her
remarks. When the light blinks red, we would ask the witness to
stop. And I will be using the gavel this afternoon, because if
I don't, not everybody is going to be able to testify. So I
apologize for that. As long as we stay on schedule, we will not
likely be interrupted by votes. But if we get behind, our last
panel might have to wait for an hour or more. So that is why I
want to try to get this done for fairness to them.
Yesterday a tribal elder expressed his frustration about
flying all the way out here, only to be able to talk to us for
5 minutes, and I want everybody to know that I consider these
hearings just a start of an ongoing dialogue. I encourage all
of you to continue to communicate with the Subcommittee
throughout the budget process, not just for the 5 minutes we
have here today. And many of the leaders of the Native tribes I
know personally, and trust me, they talk to me often.
You traveled a long way to be here this week. I hope that
you will seize the opportunity to meet with other Members of
Congress outside this Subcommittee and the Senate, including
those representing where you live now and where your ancestors
lived as well. Help us explain the trust obligation and show
not only disparities in Indian Country as compared to the U.S.
population as a whole but what is possible when American
Indians are fully empowered to exercise their self-
determination rights.
Mr. Calvert. With that, I thank all of you for being here
today, and there are all kinds of hearings going on. So members
will be coming in and out. We will go ahead and start now.
First I would like to recognize Mr. Tim, is it Ballew?
Mr. Ballew. Ballew.
Mr. Calvert. The second, Chairman of the Lummi Nation. You
are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
LUMMI NATION
WITNESS
TIM BALLEW II
Mr. Ballew. On behalf of the Lummi Nation----
Voice. Press your mike on button, please.
Mr. Ballew. On behalf of the Lummi Nation I would like to--
--
Voice. Get closer to the----
Mr. Ballew. Closer, even? Okay. I thank the Committee Chair
and Members for this opportunity to request the Lummi Nation's
appropriations request for the upcoming fiscal year.
Since time immemorial, the ancestors of the Lummi occupied
and used the vast areas of lands and waters of what is now
known as the Salish Sea to support a fishing lifestyle as well
as residing, hunting, gathering and other purposes. The Pacific
salmon have played a central and enduring role, in Lummis and
other local tribes' subsistence, culture, identity and economy.
In 1855 at the signing of the Point Elliott Treaty in which
tens of thousands of lands were ceded, among other things, a
reserve right to take fish at all usual and accustomed stations
and grounds in common with all citizens of the Washington
Territory was negotiated and also recognized and provided to
the Lummi and local tribes.
Fish stocks have plummeted in the past decade. The Lummi
Nation, and in turn, Commerce and NOAA, have declared sockeye
fish disasters in 1999, 2008 and 2013. And I know it is out of
the purview of this committee, but we do urge Congress to
recognize and appropriate funding of that $4 million sockeye
disaster to restore the stocks of the Fraser River sockeye. And
although the Lummi people did not cause the mass decline of a
once-great wild run, we continue to make efforts to restore the
abundance by operating and maintaining two outdated hatcheries
built in the '70s, the Skookum and Lummi Bay Hatcheries.
These hatcheries provide commercial, angler, subsistence
and ceremonial opportunities to all residents of the Salish Sea
and 15 different user groups outside of the Lummi Nation. Both
hatcheries have struggled with adequate water sources since
their construction. The proposed $13.5 million in the BIA Fish
and Wildlife Parks project and Fish Hatchery program set-aside
for 85 hatcheries is insufficient, and we request that the line
item is increased an additional $5 million to support the fish
hatcheries for all tribal communities.
Furthermore, the Washington State Department of Ecology has
authority under state law to manage the water of Washington
State and presently, and has been for several years, managing
the water rights and water that remains in streams in a way
that harms the fish that are protected under the Treaty of
Point Elliott. The BIA Water Resource Department has a key role
in protecting the water resources that are necessary for the
Lummi treaty right and our way of life.
The bulk of Water Resource Department has proposed funding
that is based on outstanding obligations that the BIA has with
tribes under existing water right settlements and does not
allow the BIA to carry out its trust responsibility to protect
the water rights of all tribes. The Lummi Nation requests that
the Department be funded with $5 million to be proactive in
addressing water rights for not just the Lummis but all of the
tribes of the United States.
To keep in line with the Federal Government's trust
responsibility and upholding its treaty obligations to the
Lummi Nation, we request $230,000 for the newly constructed
Early Learning Childhood Facility, which we run our Head Start
program out of, to furnish and equip and staff two classrooms
for BIE preschool funds. The Lummi currently invested in the
building by fully funding the construction and bringing a new
facility that would allow for twice the amount of students that
we were previously teaching, and there is still an unmet need
for our early learning.
In closing, I would like to highlight that the Lummi Nation
request is very similar to previous years, and we have concerns
it will be the same in the future. We attribute this to the
inability of the trustee to meet its treaty obligations, and if
there is a potential breach of trust, people will continue to
suffer. If Congress continues to defer this fiduciary
obligation, the Lummi Nation requests that, at a minimum, give
Indian Country its freedoms back. Give us that next generation
of policies that will allow us to grow our economies, be fully
independent and also strengthen our sovereignty and fully
recognize our jurisdiction. One such said policy would be the
allowance of tribal Nations to collect its own taxes so that we
can provide more revenues for our tribes and tribal communities
and would allow us to backfill this unmet need.
[The statement of Tim Ballew II follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much for your testimony, sir.
Mr. Ballew. I thank you for the time, and I appreciate your
attention.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Next, Mr. Mel Tonasket.
Mr. Tonasket. Yeah, that is pretty close.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Confederated Tribes of the Colville
Nation Reservation. You are recognized, sir, for 5 minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
CONFEDERATED TRIBES OF THE COLVILLE RESERVATION
WITNESS
MEL TONASKET
Mr. Tonasket. Thank you, sir, and I would like to thank the
Chairman for the time today. I hail from the Colville Indian
Reservation over in Washington State, just to lead into what I
am going to be asking for.
You know, I was born in 1937 in an old government hospital
in the middle of the Colville Indian Reservation which is
divided by three mountain ranges. I don't have some maps like
you are going to see from some other presenters, but that old
hospital was turned into an outpatient clinic in the '50s, and
I eventually came back and ran that old facility as an
outpatient clinic in the early '90s. Same size, same number of
rooms, same--everything was the same. We could not change it
because it was on the historical listing. I would like to say
that when I was born there that we had about 3,200 tribal
members. When I came back to run the facility, we had almost
7,000 members with the same size facility and the same staffing
pattern.
In '07 we were up to almost 9,000 tribal members in the
same clinic, same numbers of everything again. So the Tribal
Council was talked into building another clinic by the Indian
Health Service, but there was no staffing package with it. So
the tribe built it, put in over $3 million, and then we lease
it back to the Indian Health Service for $1 a year. But it is
still the same staffing package. We have also built another
clinic over on the east side of the reservation that is all
tribal.
The reason that I come here today is to remind you that
when Congress authorized the Indian Healthcare Improvement Act
in 2010, it included Section 301(f) which requires IHS to
consult with Indian tribes and tribal organizations in
developing innovative approaches to address all or a part of
the total unmet need of construction of health facilities. That
brought about an Area Distribution Fund, ADF, which is supposed
to help us. This Section 301(f) was supported by more than 500
tribes throughout the United States, but yet, despite the
tribe's support, IHS has not taken steps to implement Section
301(f).
The Colville Confederated Tribes strongly supports the
implementation of funding Section 301(f) as a path forward for
facility construction needs, and we are looking at requesting
about $15 million to fund that section. I would also like to
add that the Colville Tribes would like to support at least a
$10 million increase for police officers' salaries. On the
Colville Indian Reservation, we are about 1.4 million acres of
land as I said, divided by three mountain ranges. And there are
times when we only have one police officer to cover half of
that reservation, and in the wintertime that is really almost
impossible. So we are in critical need. We have trained, we
have sent our officers to academies. We get them trained, and
then because of the salary ranges, we get outbid and they go to
some county or somewhere else so we lose them. So it is really
important for us that we can handle at least $1.67 million to
increase our officers' salaries.
And with that, I would just like to thank you for your
time, and I hope that was short enough.
[The statement of Mel Tonasket follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Yes, sir. You did very good. Thank you very
much. I appreciate that. Next, Ms. Gina James, Vice President
of the Quinault Indian Nation.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
QUINAULT INDIAN NATION
WITNESS
GINA JAMES
Ms. James. Good afternoon, Chairman Calvert, and your
staff. Thank you for this opportunity to testify. Joining me
today is my First Councilman, Tyson Johnson, from the Quinault
Nation.
We have a map over here which shows our reservation.
[Chart]
Ms. James. Quinault entered into the Treaty of Olympia with
the United States in 1855 and 1856. Our reservation consists of
more than 200,000 acres and 26 miles of Pacific Coastline.
Quinault's government offices are in Taholah, Washington, which
consists of two neighborhoods known as the Upper Village and
Lower Village. More than 70 percent of our members live in the
Lower Village which is the ancestral homeland of our people.
This area is a tsunami hazard zone.
We also have a picture of a temporary sea wall of riprap
rock. It is supposed to protect the Lower Village. As you can
see, the seawall borders the village. Our public services are
located in this area.
Two weeks ago, high winds and intense storms caused a
breach in the sea wall, the last picture on the right. The
riprap rock that was meant to arm the sea wall disappeared.
When the sea wall was no longer capable of stopping the ocean
from advancing into the village, Quinault declared a state of
emergency and issued a voluntary evacuation order because our
people and properties in the village were in imminent danger.
There is also a picture there of flooding in our village.
The Army Corps of Engineers approved our request for
emergency assistance and responded with reinforcing the sea
wall with riprap rock. While we appreciate the Corps'
assistance, temporary fixes do not work. Only a permanent
solution will address the ongoing natural disasters that
increasingly damage homes, facilities, utility structures and
erode the natural resources in the area.
Funding from federal and state agencies is too often
emergency based and do not adequately cover preventative
measures to address our increasing hardship, property loss and
infrastructure damage to our village. Because the Lower Village
is no longer safe for our people, we are taking steps to
relocate above the tsunami zone to the Upper Village.
Our relocation project includes working with the BIA to buy
individual allotments in the Upper Village. Our goal is to
develop a safe neighborhood that provides housing and
government services to our members. We hope to secure funding
through a combination of public and private sources. Coastal
tribes suffer the most devastating impacts of natural
disasters. The BIA provides modest funding for activities
related to ocean and coastal planning. However, coastal tribes
need more support.
We urge the Subcommittee to direct the BIA to work with
federal partners that provide specialty assistance to develop a
long-term plan. For coastal tribes, that includes mitigation
support and assistance with relocation plans.
While we take steps to relocate, we are committed to
protecting our homelands in the lower village. As explained
earlier, temporary efforts to reinforce our sea wall are
failing. We need a new concrete sea wall. We request the
Subcommittee to urge the BIA to work with the Corps and other
federal partners to develop the plan to fund the construction
of a new sea wall to permanently protect our homelands.
In addition, our village is limited to a single highway. In
2007, there is the picture of a major storm which downed trees
on the highway and left our village inaccessible to emergency
vehicles for days and contributed to the death of an elder. We
propose linking an unimproved BIA road to a nearby highway so
that our villages have two access points. We urge the
Subcommittee to increase funding for the BIA roads maintenance
program, to address the safety concerns of tribes that have
limited access to their communities.
Another priority for us is restoration of the Upper
Quinault River and productivity of blueback salmon, sockeye.
Quinault has invested $5 in our restoration plan that has the
support of several federal, state and non-government entities.
The BIA invests in similar restoration projects throughout
Indian Country. We urge the Subcommittee to provide $5.79
million over a period of 5 years to support our restoration
project.
Finally, because our reservation is densely forested, we
are vulnerable to the criminal activities of drug cartels. We
invest $500,000 annually to pay for drug enforcement and
interdiction. However, this is not enough. Access to federal
drug interdiction grant programs is difficult. We urge the
Subcommittee to direct the BIA to work with federal partners to
fund drug interdiction efforts, especially for coastal tribes.
In closing, I want to thank the Subcommittee for this
opportunity and for your commitment to address the needs of
Indian Country.
[The statement of Gina James follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony. Mr. Tonasket,
does the BIA have the authority as you understand it and the
flexibility to make police officers' salaries more competitive
or does Congress need to provide that authority or are salaries
instead limited by funding?
Mr. Tonasket. I think it is limited by funding.
Mr. Calvert. You have the flexibility to raise those
salaries if you choose to but it is just a matter of money?
Mr. Tonasket. Yes, sir. We have contracted that function
from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and they don't have any
Bureau of Indian Affairs' officers on our reservation. It is
all put into the tribes' officers.
Mr. Calvert. All right. Thank you.
Mr. Tonasket. Yes, sir.
Mr. Calvert. Ms. James, that road, I was wondering, what is
the estimate on the sea wall? Does the Corp give you an
estimate on a concrete sea wall yet or what it costs?
Ms. James. Preliminary investment is over $3 million.
Mr. Calvert. Three million dollars? Thank you. On the road,
have you been discussing this with the BIA about linking those
roads and is it just a matter of funding or there are other
issues involved?
Ms. James. Yes, we have been discussing with BIA. We were
hoping that we would get some of the funding from the Cobell,
the land consolidation money, but we haven't been rewarded any
funds yet. That would have helped us to purchase interest along
the roadway because there are several parcels, and as you know,
they are highly fractional so there are a couple hundred
landowners or more that we would have to purchase their
allotments or interests from.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Mr. Ballew, one quick question, or a
comment, really. We like fish hatcheries, so I think you will
have some support there from our perspective. I think the
tribes have been doing quite frankly a better job of
restoration of fish stocks than the U.S. Government. So we
congratulate you on the good work that you are doing, and
hopefully we can support you in the future on that.
Mr. Ballew. We appreciate that.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And thank you. This panel is
excused, and we will be going to our next panel, Mr. Joseph
Pavel, Vice Chairman of Skokomish Tribal Nation. I probably
mispronounced that. Mr. David Bean, Councilman, the Puyallup
Tribe of Washington. Mr. Taylor Aalvik, Council Member, the
Cowlitz Indian Tribe and Ms. Twa-le Abrahamson-Swan, Air
Quality Program Manager, Spokane Tribal Natural Resources. I
have got to get some help on pronunciation here. Thank you. Are
we missing somebody?
Ms. McCollum. There she is.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Great. Thank you. Okay. Thank you for
your attendance today. You probably heard we are under a very
tight time schedule today because of votes that are going on
and off, and we are trying to give everybody the opportunity to
testify and ask a couple of questions along the way. I will be
strictly monitoring the 5-minute rule today. I just wanted to
give you notice of that. But we will stay in touch. If you have
any other comments, talk to our staff directly or me, either
way. Mr. Pavel, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
SKOKOMISH TRIBAL NATION
WITNESS
JOSEPH PAVEL
Mr. Pavel. Hello. I am Joseph Pavel. I am the Vice Chairman
of the Skokomish Indian Tribe. I thank the Committee for
hearing us today.
I would just like to note that I am here on behalf of the
Skokomish Tribe to talk about the needs of our community with
respect to the health, education and welfare of our community
and our tribal members. You might know from--you know, we
submitted some written testimony. It is heavy on the law
enforcement, et cetera. You know, health of course is a big
issue and our health needs there. And I think one unique
perspective to our testimony this year would be the natural
resources. We usually rely on Northwest Indian Fisheries
Commission to represent that so that we can make a more
productive use of our time here before the Committee.
But we have a unique need with respect to our shellfish
programs. With recent court orders and some of the settlement
arrangements and stuff, we have evolved a rigorous and complex
system that is highly demanding upon our resources, our staff
resources, and our law-enforcement resources, and I think we
need a little help there, you know. With that decision and the
efforts to implement the conditions that were set out there by
the courts and by joint agreements, we didn't receive any
supplemental funding to--that, you know. With the salmon
decision, with the original Boldt decision, there were
implementation funds provided to meet the responsibilities of
the provisions that were established based upon court order. So
we need a lot of help there.
We have a unique situation with respect to some very
aggressive growers, the grower community. Part of the
settlement was some provisions to protect their interests and
to be able to enhance their interests, and those are in
conflict or competition with tribal interests. So we have
developed protocols and standards to be able to resolve and
address those, but they are very labor intensive and we need
resources to meet those. So enough about that.
You know, this is about the wellness of our communities,
the ailing of our communities and being able to take care of
our people, you know. As councilmen, we accept that
responsibility and you know, we take it to heart, and we are
very sincere about that. That is what brings us here.
Like I said, unfortunately, we lead off with the justice
component but you know, we are talking about the health and
wellness of our community, and when we address it through the
justice system, you know, we are talking about the back end,
you know? We need to be talking about prevention, health,
education, recreational opportunity. That is another issue that
we strive to deal with is try to provide those opportunities
and assets for our community, and we will be visiting our
delegation in the various agencies. We are looking at trying to
serve and address the priorities of our community, and the
community center has been a longstanding issue that our
community has been wanting and addressing, wanting the Council
to address the tribe to address. You know, we have been pulled
in any number of directions, trying to serve some of the
priorities of our people and some of the needs, and we are
slowly taking them off and this one has always been near the
top, and I think it has risen to the top to where we need to
get serious about developing some community facilities and some
community infrastructure.
Right now we kind of missed the boat. Like I said, we were
pulled in different directions with serving the needs of our
people. I think when resources were available, a lot of tribes
took advantage of those opportunities, and we are here now.
Like I said, we will be exploring those opportunities. I would
like to look for the Committee's favor on trying to develop and
enhance those sorts of opportunities. There haven't been
programs in the past. They may still be statutory on the books,
but they are not--you know, funds aren't being appropriated,
and we have gone the way of loans and putting money into
justice systems. You know, the justice dollars have been, you
know, popular of recent. And like I said, that is approaching
the problem from the back end.
As a small tribe and not having our own school, but we do
have education programs. I would like to speak to that to be
able to have, you know, education resources available to non-
BIA schools or non-tribal schools but just as a program where
we support our community through GEDs. We supplement the public
school system through providing some tutoring and so forth,
after-school programs and you know, computer labs at a small
facility and some tutors and a program manager, and we ought to
be able to--you know, those are things we have made as a
priority with, you know, our limited resources.
[The statement of Joseph Pavel follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. All right. Well thank you. Thank you very
much. Next, Mr. David Bean, Councilman. How do you pronounce
that again?
Mr. Bean. Puyallup.
Mr. Calvert. Puyallup. Okay.
Mr. Bean. Good job.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Bean. You did almost as good as the President did.
Mr. Calvert. There you go. You are recognized for 5
minutes. Thank you.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
PUYALLUP TRIBE OF WASHINGTON
WITNESS
DAVID BEAN
Mr. Bean. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Committee. I want to thank you for this important opportunity
to talk about fiscal year 2015 appropriations, which is an
important step towards honoring your trust responsibility to
the tribes across the United States. I want to talk to you
today about several topics, all of which are related.
First, I would like to talk about public safety and justice
which is the number one priority as providing for the safety
and welfare of our people. The Puyallup Tribe is located in a
highly urbanized area. We are 30 miles south of Seattle in the
State of Washington, right along Interstate 5. It comes right
through the heart of our reservation. And so with limited
resources, you know, we find that working with the neighboring
jurisdictions, the City of Tacoma, Pierce County, and engaging
in cross-deputization type agreements, we are able to stretch
resources. We recognize that. Not just the Puyallup Tribe has
limited resources but the city and the county law enforcement
agencies have limited resources. So we find that by working
together we are able to address, you know, the problems that
plague our communities, and then the most common one is drug
activity.
Being on Interstate 5, it is considered a major drug
corridor. And so to protect our members, to protect our
community members and neighboring communities, we found that by
working together we are able to address those problems.
We would also like to talk about natural resources
management. We are fishing people, you know. We grew up, we
were right on the water. The Puyallup River, again, goes
through the heart of our reservation. Puget Sound is right
there at our doorstep, and we rely on the health of the Puget
Sound to continue to produce fish stock for our citizens, for
our community members. Non-Natives and Natives alike rely on
the fishing stock, the salmon, that runs in the river and runs
in the Puget Sound. So, you know, we are looking for increased
funding. We appreciate the funding that has put in place. We
stand with the Northwest Indian Fish Commission and their
request for increased funding for Western Washington fisheries
management; fish hatchery operations and maintenance; timber,
fish and wildlife supplemental; and lastly, unresolved hunting
and fishing rights.
In the area of education, the Puyallup Tribe, we consist of
4,400 members. So we are a small tribe. Our land holding is
right around 18,000 acres, yet we serve a Native population of
25,000 Natives from over 200 federally recognized tribes. And
through our school, we have--our Chief Leschi Schools are able
to accommodate up to just over 900 students pre-K through 12
annually. And you know, we are experiencing a large rise in
pre-K enrollment, and if you forecast forward, you know, the
school is going to be beyond its design capacity very shortly.
So we are looking for expanded funding in education, you know,
in the area of tribal grants, school costs for tribally
operated schools, student transportation, school facility
accounts, facility operations and maintenance and Indian school
equalization formula. In addition, the operation of Indian
programs, in child priority allocations, we are looking for
increased funding for these line items generally but
specifically, the Indian Child Welfare, Urban Indian Child
Welfare and Child Welfare Assistance.
And my last two items, the Bureau of Indian Health Services
has historically been underfunded and our ability to offer
quality healthcare to not just our members but the, you know,
20,000-some other federally recognized Indians that live in our
area. We are able to, you know, provide medical assistance, but
the funding simply isn't enough and we need your help in
expanding that funding.
Affordable housing is another component. Now, if you take a
step back, and we recognize that you have to carefully balance
priorities in your consideration of appropriations, and
likewise we at the Puyallup Tribe have to do the same, as well
as in any country, you know? These are ours. They are all
related. You know, if you are able to provide good quality
education, you can reduce the amount of crime on the
reservation and good quality healthcare and affordable housing.
So we are looking for a comprehensive approach. We are looking
for your help, and we certainly appreciate this opportunity to
share our concerns, our priorities with you. And on behalf of
my Chairman, Herman Dillon Sr., who wasn't able to be here
today, you know, back home we raise our hands to say thank you,
and so I am raising my hands to each and every one of you for
the opportunity to be here today, to share our priorities and
to engage in open dialogue with you.
[The statement of David Bean follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Great. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Next, Mr. Taylor Aalvik, Council Member. Did I pronounce that
right?
Mr. Aalvik. That's Taylor Aalvik.
Mr. Calvert. Taylor Aalvik. Okay. Thank you. With the
Cowlitz Indian Tribe?
Mr. Aalvik. Cowlitz, yeah.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
COWLITZ INDIAN TRIBE
WITNESS
TAYLOR AALVIK
Mr. Aalvik. Chairman Calvert, distinguished Members of the
Subcommittee, including our own, Congresswoman Jaime Herrera
Beutler, I am honored to testify today in support of important
funding for tribal Nations. I am also honored and humbled to be
in the company of great tribal leaders that are here today.
My name is Taylor Aalvik. I have served on the Cowlitz
Indian Tribal Council since 2005. The Cowlitz is located in
Southwest Washington State. I carry on more than 150 years of
struggle, perseverance and dedication of my ancestors in the
pursuit of fair and just treatment of our people by the Federal
Government. The Cowlitz Tribe was restored to federal
recognition in 2002, thought we still do not have a reservation
on which to establish much-needed economic basis. Our landless
status makes us even more dependent on adequate funding of the
federal programs under your jurisdiction.
There are seven programs that are critical to our ability
to provide services to our people. My written testimony
provides additional insights. First, we ask that Congress
increase funding for the BIA's Aid to Tribal Government Funding
program from the $24.6 million proposed in the President's
budget to $30 million. This program provides the primary
backbone of support for our tribe's general operations.
Second, we ask Congress to ensure that the IHS
appropriations is adequate and includes a provision to revise
the health facilities construction priorities system as was
directed in the fiscal year 2000 approved Interior
appropriations. We still believe the current system is
antiquated and needs updating.
Third, we ask Congress to support the President's request
of $96.4 million for the EPA's Indian General Assistance
program. This program has allowed us to build capacity for many
natural resource programs and helps us address the health and
well-being of our people.
Fourth, we ask Congress to increase the President's
proposed budget for the fish and wildlife agencies' Tribal
Wildlife Grant program from $4 million to $10 million. This
program has helped to develop positive partnerships with state
and federal managers for recovery of important first foods to
our tribe.
Fifth, we ask Congress to support $1.2 million for the
Secretary of the Interior's leadership and administration
activity for federal tribal collaborative work during domestic
reconsideration for the Columbia River Treaty. This is
important to many tribes who are currently working with the
Federal Government on the future disposition of Columbia Basin
water management.
Sixth, we ask Congress to support the tribal
transportation--proposed increased for BIA administered tribal
transportation programs.
And finally, seventh, we ask Congress to increase funding
for the National Parks Service's NAGPRA Grant program from the
President's $1.6 million request to $2 million. This is an
important program associated with dealing with sensitive
cultural concerns.
The sanctity of the relationship between the United States,
American Indians and Alaskan Natives is embodied in the United
States Constitution, and it is the Constitution which lays out
Congress' special relationship to tribes and we gather strength
from the long continuance of that protection. It is in the
spirit and knowledge that we come as a tribe and as tribal
representatives to lay before you efforts to secure assistance
for our tribal Nations, to grow alongside with the United
States. Since time immemorial, we continue to carry on our duty
as the trustees of this land we revere as Mother Earth. We
believe that it is important not only to provide for our
people's well-being but also work with our neighbors to be a
positive and contributing influence.
Thank you for the work on behalf of Indian Country and for
the opportunity to testify here today. I would be happy to
answer any questions you have.
[The statement of Taylor Aalvik follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony. And
lastly, Ms. Twa-le Abrahamson-Swan. Hopefully I didn't screw
that up too much, Air Quality Program Manager of Spokane Tribal
Natural Resources.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
SPOKANE TRIBAL NATURAL RESOURCES
WITNESS
TWA-LE ABRAHAMSON-SWAN
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members
of the committee. My name is Twa-le Abrahamson-Swan, an
enrolled member of the Spokane Tribe of Indians located in
Northeast Washington. Thank you for the opportunity to share my
personal experiences related to radon and the impacts that
proposed cuts will have across Indian Country.
My testimony concerns EPA funding for the radon categorical
grants known as SIRG, the radon program's environmental program
management and science and technology budget. Radon is the
leading cause of cancer mortality. Radon is a known Class A
carcinogen, and the deaths caused by radon each year are
preventable. Radon is a naturally occurring radioactive gas
released in rock, soil and water from the natural decay of
uranium. Concentrations depend on natural geology and how each
individual home breathes. Testing is the only way to know how
much radon is in each home, office or school.
The U.S. Surgeon General and EPA estimate that radon causes
more than 21,000 lung cancer deaths each year, second to
smoking. According to the Centers for Disease Control, American
Indian and Alaska Natives have a higher prevalence of current
smoking than most other racial and ethnic groups in the United
States, making cigarette smoking plus exposure to radon gas a
serious problem in the health of tribal populations.
Radon has been found in elevated levels in every state. No
area of our country is risk free. Almost one in three homes on
the Spokane Indian Reservation have elevated radon levels
compared to 1 in 15 homes nationwide.
To date, my house has the highest levels identified by our
program with peaks at 53 picocuries per liter and an average of
33 picocuries per liter. EPA's action limit is four. I don't
smoke, neither do my kids, but our risk for lung cancer is the
same as each of us smoking 106 cigarettes per day or 5 packs.
That is at home. In my office, it is a pack-and-a-half a day or
16 cigarettes. In our schools, kids are being exposed to this
odorless, colorless, tasteless radioactive gas. There are
communities like ours across Indian Country and rural America
that don't have any information about radon, let alone a close
place to buy a radon test kit.
Funding to address indoor air quality in Indian Country is
vital. It needs to be increased, not cut.
Since 2004, $3.1 million has been awarded to over 30 tribes
that have participated in the SIRG program. In fiscal year
2013, EPA awarded a total of $7.32 million. Ten tribes received
grants equaling only about 4 percent of the total SIRG budget.
Competing with states and the 40 percent match requirement are
major barriers for many tribes wanting to implement radon
programs. Some tribes are just learning now about their risks
from radon. In February and March of 2014, 24 tribes submitted
radon canisters to the EPA Radon Lab for analysis. There is not
only an interest but a need in Indian Country to address radon
and protect the people.
Our tribe was unable to provide the 40 percent match, so
like other tribes, we sought alternatives. Ninety-nine tribes
have utilized the EPA Radon Lab which is in the process of
closing its doors. The EPA Radon Lab mails canisters at no cost
to newly developing programs, and they have to be mailed back
within one day, which is difficult for a lot of rural
communities. We purchased testing equipment that allows us to
be the lab and measure and calculate our own results. This has
allowed this to become a more efficient and sustainable
program. A radon-resistant new construction building
requirement for all new homes and buildings has been
implemented. Our goal is to keep our people safe by building
right. Directing funds for training programs for tribes in
radon mitigation would help build their internal capacity to
address indoor radon and save lives.
Last year, Congress approved reinstatement of not only this
state funding but reinstated the FTEs in the regional offices
of the EPA so that funding could be properly funded and
administered.
On behalf of the Spokane Tribe, I would like to thank
Congress for both reinstatements and specifically ask for the
following. More details are in the written testimony, but we
are opposing the cuts to the radon categorical grants and
recommending that $14.5 million be allocated to adjust for
inflation, increased ability of SIRG grantees and to fund the
tribes' territories and states. I also support the
Environmental Program Management budget for 2015.
And again, I just want to thank you for this opportunity.
Our Nation needs this program to keep our citizens informed.
Please reinstate the cuts to the SIRG program and the regional
support staff so that we can continue doing this important
work. Thank you for the opportunity to provide this testimony,
and thank you for your attention in this matter.
[The statement of Twa-le Abrahamson-Swan follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Just
as a point, in fiscal year 2014, the Administration proposed
eliminating radon grant funding. We restored the radon grant
funding on a bipartisan basis at $8 million in fiscal year
2014. So I am sure we will be considering that as we go through
the budget process.
Ms. McCollum, you are recognized.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is your home vented
then and who paid for the venting?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. No, it is not yet.
Ms. McCollum. Do you know how much it is going to cost to
have your home vented?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. Each home we are finding is about
$1,200 to $2,000. So it is not a big cost, and it is even
drastically less in new home construction. So it may only add
$200 to $300 in new construction. So for existing homes, we are
finding a lot of roadblocks in finding funding to fix existing
homes.
Ms. McCollum. So, on the reservation would you be applying
to the Bureau for help with housing for venting for radon?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. Yes. We are looking at as many
different sources as we can and trying to find those that don't
exclude radon from their funding opportunities.
Ms. McCollum. Well, thank you. That is something that we
should take a look at and that perhaps should be a requirement
for new construction. I know it is in Minnesota, but I don't
know if that is a requirement for tribal housing. Do you know
if it is a requirement that the Federal Government is putting
on tribal construction or not?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. No. There is no requirement right now.
And a lot of states are unregulated, and it is only an item
that is tested during a real estate transaction. So for
communities of color or disadvantaged communities across the
United States that aren't buying and selling property, we don't
have that advantage of the requirements for testing.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you for your testimony, and thank you
for bringing this up because I hadn't thought about the impacts
on tribal communities of radon. I know that we have a program
in Minnesota, and especially for those of us who are in
northern climates where we are enclosed more at times during
the year. I am sure in some of the southern climates where
there is air-conditioning, there are challenges there, too. So
thank you for your testimony.
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Ms. Herrera Beutler? This is from
your neck of the woods.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you
all for being here. I am learning new things. Last year I
learned a lot, actually. I wanted to mention, too, on the--you
mentioned resources, Pacific salmon and salmon runs and the
importance not just to Indian Country but to the communities as
a whole. I mean, it is incredibly important in our neck of the
woods to make sure that we are protecting those runs.
Mr. Bean. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. And seeing them increase and do what
we can. And I have been asking about our budget, and you
mentioned hatchery and other funding programs. And I am trying
to understand a little bit about what our budget does. I do
know last year we were successful in getting in the CGIS budget
I believe about $60 million for Pacific salmon recovery funds
which was a step forward considering I think it was completely
zeroed out.
Mr. Bean. Right.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. But I would like to identify with you,
with any of the members who are here, other areas where we can
carve out some protection. I am not totally sure how, within
BIA, how they make those determinations, but if we can help
influence that, it is very important to our entire community.
Mr. Bean. If it is possible, we would love to have a
follow-up meeting with you as well as I believe the Northwest
Indian Fish Commission will be following me, and we fully
support all of their comments.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. Okay. Absolutely. Any thoughts or
comments on--it seems like there are some different issues
represented at the table today. So I am learning a lot about
radon as well.
Mr. Pavel. With respect to your prior question, I think,
you know, those salmon recovery funds are certainly very, very
vital. We do a lot of good work with our habitat restoration
projects and some of our research with interest of trying to
maintain and provide harvest in ongoing fisheries. I think the
hatcheries maintenance fund is a key component of being able to
have that.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. Thank you very much.
Mr. Aalvik. In regards to the salmon funding, which is
highly important, there are other agencies that deal with that
that I think fall out of this Subcommittee's jurisdiction. But
I was hoping to address that, but I had to pull that out
because----
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. And I apologize.
Mr. Aalvik [continuing]. I have to take that to another
door.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. As appropriators, everything is under our
jurisdiction.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. Exactly.
Mr. Aalvik. Hey, let's go.
Ms. Herrera-Beutler. With that, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson?
Mr. Simpson. Just quickly. I don't remember a lot of
people, and I don't know if anybody else has brought up the
issue of radon. Has anybody else?
Mr. Calvert. Yes, there was some brief conversation.
Mr. Simpson. Was there? I must have missed that part of it.
So truly, the first time I have heard about it. I know it is an
issue, but apparently it is a big issue on your reservation.
Do you know of any provision in the EPA that allows them to
require a lesser-than-40-percent match?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. They were historically 25 percent, and
I don't know when that was changed.
Mr. Simpson. So they have to do 40 percent match? They
can't do a lower one?
Ms. Abrahamson-Swan. Yes.
Mr. Simpson. We will take a look into that because in STAG
grants we allow under certain conditions a lower match rate
that might be beneficial. Are you, Taylor, as a landless, non-
reservation tribe, trying to acquire land for reservation?
Mr. Aalvik. Yeah, we certainly are. Currently it is under
litigation to other folks that think that we shouldn't have a
reservation where it is at.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Thank you all for being here and
traveling such a long distance. It took Lewis and Clark a heck
of a lot longer to get here than it took you. I think about
that as I fly across this country a lot. Anyway, thank you all
for being here.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for being here. This panel is
excused. We are going to call up our next panel, Mr. Aaron A.
Payment, Vice President, the National Congress of American
Indians. Mr. Tex Hall makes his return with the Great Plains
Region Tribal representative, Tribal Interior Budget Committee.
Mr. Billy Frank, Chairman of the Northwest Indian Fisheries
Commission, and Mr. Phil Rigdon, President of the Intertribal
Timber Council. Mr. Simpson is going to help me right now. We
are kind of going back and forth. We have a Defense
Appropriation meeting going on at the same time. Mr. Valadao
was here to do that, but since Mike was right here, he is going
to help me out. So with that, I am going to turn over the gavel
to Mike, and I will be back in a little bit. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson [presiding]. Mr. Payment.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NATIONAL CONGRESS OF AMERICAN INDIANS
WITNESS
AARON A. PAYMENT
Mr. Payment. My name is Aaron Payment. I serve as the
Midwest Vice President for the National Congress of American
Indians, and I am also the elected Chairperson of the Sault
Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians. It is on. Am I not close
enough?
Okay. And I am also the Chairperson of the Sault Ste. Marie
Tribe of Chippewa Indians, the largest tribe east of the
Mississippi. On behalf of NCAI and Brian Cladoosby, our
President, we thank you for holding this important hearing on
fiscal year 2015 budget for Native American programs.
As Congress considers this budget and beyond, tribal
leaders call on Congress to ensure that the promises made to
Indian Country are honored in the federal budget. Just as we do
not have the discretion over the millions of acres of land we
ceded to create peace and make this great Nation, we ask that
you no longer treat our funding as discretion.
Sequestration-level funding, arbitrarily cap and contract
support and similar practices are perceived by Indian Country
as an abrogation of this trust obligation guaranteed in the
treaties. We ask that you enact an honorable budget, one in
which the Federal Government can be proud and one which puts
the trust in trustee.
Let me begin by saying that NCAI supports the testimony of
the National Indian Health Board, National Indian Child Welfare
Association, National Indian Education Association and the
American Indian Higher Education Consortium. The fiscal year
2015 budget request for the operation of Indian programs is a
$2.4 billion amount, an increase of $33.8 million or 1.4
percent above the fiscal year 2014 enacted levels. The budget
request for the construction account is $109.9 million which is
a decrease of $216,000. The budget also proposes $922.6 million
in tribal priority allocations, that is, TPA, an increase of
$19.3 million over the fiscal year 2014 level or a 2 percent
increase. The request for contract support is $251 million, an
increase of $4 million above the fiscal year 2014 enacted
level. The requested amount will fully fund estimated fiscal
year 2015 contract support costs. NCAI commends the
administration and of course, with the impetus of the Congress
and this body, for requesting full funding for contract support
costs in fiscal year 2015. We recommend that the tribal grant
support costs for tribally controlled schools and residential
facilities also be fully funded. In school year 2012/2013,
tribally controlled grant schools experienced a 36 percent
shortfall of the grant support funding needed as defined by the
administration cost grants formula.
The proposed budget would provide a new $11.6 million for
the Tawhay initiative, $10 million to build on social services
and Indian child welfare, $550,000 to expand job placement
training programs, the BIA law enforcement to create a pilot
project to implement a strategy for alternatives to
incarceration and increased treatment, a $1 million amount to
develop and establish a program for evaluating social service
and community development.
Tribal leaders through the Tribal Interior Budget Council,
or TIBC, have repeatedly called for increases for social
services and Indian child welfare, and with the Supreme Court
ruling last year, this is more important now than ever.
Education increases include half-a-million for JOM to redo
their count for 2015 and the expected increase in the number of
students as a result; $1 million for the ongoing evaluation of
the BIA school system. NCAI also recommends a $263 million
increase for school construction and repair, $73 million for
tribal grants support costs, $431 million for Indian school
equalization program formula funds, $73 million for Indian
student transportation, $42 million for JOM and as a doctoral
candidate in Indian education, former school board president
and then a high school dropout, I am asking for some support
for a logistical regression study to get to the bottom of why
the 92 percent who are not covered under the BIA, 92 percent,
we have a 50 percent dropout rate for Native Americans. We have
the worst dropout rate of any racial ethnic population. This
warrants a national study, and the study is--and I happen to
know because I am a doctoral student--logistical regression
study and what are the factors that influence Natives to
graduate or not.
Public safe communities invite economic investment. The
Indian Law and Order Commission found that tribal Nations would
benefit greatly if law enforcement officers were staffed at
levels equitably to their brothers and sisters in blue. In
2010, the Department of the Interior's High Priority
Performance Goal initiative resulted in a 35 percent decrease
in violent crime. This is to be commended that you funded this,
it worked and we need to expand that effort.
In the BIA, in the proposed fiscal year 2015 budget, the
Department of the Interior current appropriations would
increase by 2.6 percent. For the BIA to approach parity with
that increase, because we lag behind the DOI increase, would
cost just $69.2 million to keep parity with that.
For Indian Health Service, NCAI requests that fiscal year
2015 Congress truly restore the sequestration cuts remaining
from 2013 and adjust for inflation and population growth. While
discretionary spending is not facing sequestration cuts for
fiscal year 2015, NCAI urges you to support advanced
appropriations and continue to advocate for permanent full
exemption of sequestration and budgetary decisions. Again, the
federal trust obligation should not be considered
discretionary.
Finally, I want to give a plug for a clean cursorary fix. I
know that Representative Cole introduced H.R. 279. It is a
bipartisan issue. It has been supported by this committee in
the past. Tribes and associations have supported it. There are
these phantom tribes that apparently don't support it, and I
think that you should ask and expect them to come forward if
they do have any concerns. Otherwise, as far as we understand
in Indian Country, we support universally and united support a
clean fix for cursorary. Thank you.
[The statement of Aaron Payment follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Tex, welcome back.
Mr. Hall. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am subbing in today for
the co-chairs for TIBC on the BIA budget.
Mr. Simpson. Okay.
Mr. Hall. So glad to be a sub to come in.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
TRIBAL INTERIOR BUDGET COUNCIL
WITNESS
TEX HALL
Mr. Hall. The TIBC is the Tribal Interior Budget Council,
and I was one of the founders of this organization back in 1999
in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Previously, tribal leaders would
come into the BIA budget, and the BIA would say, here is your
budget and this is what you get. And so we said, you know, we
are tired of coming to Washington and not having a voice. So
this vehicle represents two regional representatives from the
12 regions of the United States. So all of the tribes elect the
regional members to this TIBC, this Tribal Interior Budget
Council.
You know, for the most part, it has worked very well. You
know, we get to talk about priorities and things like that, but
we are a little disappointed in the 2015 budget. So I will be
real brief, and I will go with our talking points, and our
testimony, Mr. Chairman, has been submitted.
TIBC has repeatedly mentioned that the 2015 budget proposes
an increase of 2.6 percent for all programs but not including
BIA, and to place the BIA at the same 2.6 percent increase will
require an additional $69.2 million over the fiscal year 2014
enacted level which is more than the administration has
proposed. So we really basically have a flat budget. Equally
wrong is attempting to solve these under-funded problems at BIA
by dipping into another federal agency's budget, or stove
piping, and it simply does not work.
For example, funding a sizable portion of Indian law
enforcement through the Department of Justice grants, you know,
affects the base funding at BIA. So we are taking BIA and
giving it to DOJ. We are taking base funding and giving it to
competitive grants. And you heard witness after witness explain
why this was and continues to be a big mistake. It has been
going on for about 12, 15 years now, you know, where the money
has been transferred to the Department of Justice. But stove
piping hurts tribes that are actually in need for law
enforcement funding and it disjoints our program operations and
it wastes dollars. These are taxpayers' dollars that are
wasted.
I wanted to mention that when we put funding in, there are
members of Congress I really believe that don't understand that
this is really, truly, an investment into a tribe's school,
into a tribe's roads. These are public roads. These are for our
students. And when we underfund, or if we are funded at about
49 to 50 percent, it really jeopardizes the viability of a
program, if there actually can really be truly an investment.
So I really want to stress the need for this funding that the
tribes have. They are treaty rights, and they are an investment
into the tribe's programs.
We also support the Tiwahe. The BIA had proposed that
family initiative because it will provide an additional 11.6
million to expand Indian Affairs capacity and address Indian
child, family welfare, and job training issues, and implement
processes to better sustain and keep Indian families together.
So tribal leaders at TBIC have long called for increases in
social services and Indian child welfare, and so case level
standards in my region of the Great Plains alone fall far below
recognized national standards. And while national standards
call for a maximum of 12 active cases per month per social
worker, our social workers in the Great Plains handle an
average of 40 cases per social worker.
Tribal courts were very concerned that if you increase
funding for tribal law enforcement officers, and do not
increase the courts, you know, we are going to have a backlog
of cases. My tribe alone, our court had to dismiss 5,000 cases,
and it is simply because we did not have the staffing to do it.
So we are really, you know, and we are an example of many
tribes, of the underfunding of tribal courts. And, as I
mentioned earlier about law enforcement, approximately $80
million is funded at DOJ. If that would return to BIA, it would
put more officers into the streets, and it would be base
funding, versus competitive grants.
Road maintenance is a huge neglected, underfunded program,
and the road maintenance budget is around 20 million, and it
has been the same for the last 20 years. And recent studies
from Federal highway confirmed that the actual unmet need is
$150 million. So I have asked Kevin Washburn, Assistant
Secretary, and Mike Black to prioritize and look at the
formula, and try to get an increase in the road maintenance
budget for the '16. But the '15 is the same thing, about 20
million plus.
And, finally, contract support, the TBIC has went on record
to say that, you know, to fully fund, you know, appreciates
Congress efforts to fully fund contract support, but when it
takes it from programs, again, it takes it from programs that
are already funded at 49 and 50 percent, really jeopardizes the
actual viability of that program, so it really should be off
budget, so to speak, for contract support. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
[The statement of Tex Hall follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thanks, Tex.
Billy, it is always good to see you again.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NORTHWEST INDIAN FISHERIES COMMISSION
WITNESS
BILLY FRANK
Mr. Frank. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simpson. You bet.
Mr. Frank. Thank my representatives here. They are all
looking good. Saw you all last year. My name is Billy Frank. I
am Chairman of the Northwest Indian Fish Commission, as you
know, and my life goes back to Senator Magnuson, and
Congressman Norm Dix, when he was Chief of Staff for Senator
Magnuson. And, you know, that is a long time ago. Now, I am 83
years old now, and I am going to start going down here pretty
soon. But I would like to have Ed Johnstone come up. He is
sitting right here, and he is a member of the commission, one
of the officers, and he can continue my testimony. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Ed, please give your name for the record.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NORTHWEST INDIAN FISHERIES COMMISSION
WITNESS
ED JOHNSTONE
Mr. Johnstone. Ed Johnstone. I am a member of the Quinault
Tribe in the Northwest Coast of Washington State, and it is a
privilege to be walking with my uncle, Billy Frank, and my
mentor, and a voice that speaks for our people in the
Northwest, and it speaks for the people of the tribes all over
the United States, and we appreciate his leadership.
We are also bringing our appreciation to you, as your
committee has considered over the years the importance of our
programs, both at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the EPA,
under this committee. And we have worked very hard over the
years to represent the needs of our 20 member tribes, treaty
tribes, that were formed after the Boldt Decision in 1974,
1975, and affirmed by the United States Supreme Court in '79.
And some of the prior testimony, when David Bean from the
Puyallup talks about support for the Northwest Indian Fish
Commission, it is likewise that the Northwest Indian Fish
Commission, and all its member tribes, support our tribes. And
the subject that was breached just a little bit about
hatcheries are very important for all of the United States, for
all of the states of Oregon, California, Idaho, Washington.
Through their different programs, not only are Bureau of Indian
Affairs hatcheries, but the Michalak Hatcheries, and other
hatcheries authorized under different acts, Bonneville Power
Administration and so forth.
Those hatchery fish are critical. They are critical for our
salmon recovery plans, that in particular Puget Sound tribes
have under coverage under NOAA, and the Endangered Species Act.
They are critical for communities that thrive on the
recreational opportunity, and they are critical for the tribes
for our way of life, our food, our medicine, our ability to
practice what we have always practiced in the harvest of our
resources.
So hatcheries account through the Bureau for 6.582 for
hatchery maintenance, and the 3.35 million for hatchery
operations are critical to us. And we have got in our written
testimony a little bit of context that talks about our need.
And the need is greater than that, but we appreciate the work
from the committee, and the numbers that we got in '14. And we
have a little bit to work on for '15, but the hatchery
maintenance, and hatchery operations are critical to us.
You know, in those budgets, the first time, there is the
recognition of climate, for instance. There is a small amount
of money in there that is small in the big picture world, but
it is a big number for us. And we are working through the
implementation of those dollars, but we are seeing the effects
of climate on the ground in our villages. We are seeing them
first on the coastal community, and we are seeing storm surges
like we have never seen before, and coastal erosion, and
activities such as that. So the ability for the tribes to be
engaged in this question is very important to us.
So that is just a little bit about what we hope is the
beginning of a recognition that the tribes need to have the
capacity to be in this discussion. And I mentioned earlier the
Pacific Coastal Salmon Recovery funds are very key to those
recovery plans that I mentioned earlier, that, once upon a
time, had a high water mark of 110 million, but, through the
good work of several folks, Congressional, and staff, and the
tribes, and the states, because it is important to the states
that money is still there, not at the high water mark, but we
are still there, and we are still working to restore those
stocks.
So there are the other funds that I mentioned in our
written testimony. I probably spent a little bit of time on the
fish, but, you know, some of those EPA, you know, really feel
for the young lady that is talking about radon, and what she
faces with her children every day must be horrible, to think
about that. So I appreciate Billy, the Northwest Indian Fish
Commission, and our member tribes. We appreciate your help.
[The statement of Billy Frank follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. We appreciate you coming and offering your
testimony here today for the committee.
Phil?
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
INTERTRIBAL TIMBER COUNCIL
WITNESS
PHIL RIGDON
Mr. Rigdon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Subcommittee. I am Phil Rigdon. I am a member of the Yakama
Nation, but also have the honor to represent the Yakama at the
Intertribal Timber Council, and I am the President of the
Intertribal Timber Council. I also oversee Department of
Natural Resources for the Yakama Nation.
Several of the Intertribal Timber Council's requests were
based on the recently issued third Indian Forest Management
Assessment Team report. We mailed copies to the subcommittee
about a month ago, and we do have copies available, but they
are not really for the record in the thing. IFMAT III is the
third report of Indian Forest Management Assessment, an
independent panel of forestry experts convened to produce a
statutorily required assessment of the Indian forests and
forestry every 10 years. IFMAT I and II were issued in 1993 and
2003.
In addition to eight topics mandated by the National Indian
Forest Resource Management Act, IFMAT III examined climate
change and ITC's Anchor Forests initiative, and implementation
of the Tribal Forest Protection Act. IFMAT III finds that
Federal funding of Indian trust forestry is chronically
insufficient, only \1/3\ of the forest service for fire and
forest management on a per acre basis. An $100 million increase
is needed for funding equity. For FY 2015, the Intertribal
Timber Council ask that a first step be taken with BIA forestry
funding by increasing it by $25 million.
IFMAT III also finds that forestry staffing shortages are a
growing problem caused by inadequate funding, and a diminishing
trained workforce. BIA needs an additional 800 forestry
positions. On my reservation at the Yakama, 33 of the BIA's 55
forestry positions are unfilled. The BIA is unable to meet its
trust obligations, and are having an enormous impact on our
ability to continue our businesses, contributing to
unemployment and lack of economic opportunity. ITC asks for a
separate $12.7 million increase to BIA forestry to start a
forestry workforce development program, as recommended by IFMAT
III.
Elsewhere, the BIA natural resource, and within BIA natural
resources, the Intertribal Timber Council requests an
increasing cooperative landscape conservation to $20 million
for tribal input, and increase that there, an increase in BIA
endangered species funding to $10 million, and supporting the
BIA's invasive species proposal at $6.7 million.
In the Interior Wildland Fire Management budget, the
Intertribal Timber Council supports the Administration's
preparedness proposal. It will cover contract support costs,
improve tribal wildfire management capacity, and help
recruitment and training for tribal firefighters, who are truly
a national resource.
We ask that fields management be increased to $206 million,
the amount that was funded in 2010. This is really important to
protect our communities, and to do sound management across the
landscape. Also, the Intertribal Timber Council supports
treating wildfire suppression costs, over 70 percent of the 10
year average through disaster funding. We are pulling too much
money away from doing treatments on the land to cover these
large catastrophic fires. We also support Administration's
Resilient Landscape Initiative to apply needed forestry
treatments beyond the wildland urban interface.
For the Forest Service, the Intertribal Timber Council asks
the subcommittee to specifically encourage two things. The
first is our Anchor Forest Initiative, which seeks landscape
coordination among various forest landowners, including tribes,
the State, Federal, and other local partners to sustain both
forest health and forest product supply, and to maintain local
forest dependent infrastructures.
With Forest Service support and participation, we now have
three anchor forest feasibility study areas in Washington State
and Idaho, and have received express interest from the lake
states, the Midwest, the Southwest. We ask that you urge the
Forest Service to continue its active management in this
initiative.
Finally, we ask you to encourage the Forest Service to
reform the implementation of the 2004 Tribal Forest Protection
Act, or TFPA. This law allows tribes to undertake fuels and
forest health projects on adjacent forest lands, Forest
Service, or BLM lands, that pose a fire disease, or other type
of risk, threat to tribal trust, and cultural resources. But
implementation has been slow, and in 2003 the Intertribal
Timber Council, with the Forest Service, and BIA, we did a
review, with recommendations to improve the Tribal Forest
Protection Act utilization. And we ask you to encourage the
Forest Service to actively embrace, and review, and make the
TFPA implementation a good thing.
And so thank you, and that concludes my remarks.
[The statement of Phil Rigdon follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, and I apologize for having to cut
anybody off, we have got to do the five minute time limit,
because we are going to vote about 2:45 to 3:00, and would like
to get everybody in, and it is courtesy to everybody else.
Billy, one question. Marked, or not marked salmon?
Mr. Frank. You know, they are marked, and they are not
marked.
Mr. Simpson. That is a diplomatic answer. Well, we are
going to have that debate, I am sure, when we are marking up
these bills.--on what to do on marking salmon.
Mr. Frank. Okay.
Mr. Simpson. I have got a little bill to deal with that
little fact, that we are taking all the money out of other
programs in the Forest Service to fight wildfires that will
help address that. I will give you a copy of it. Take a look at
it, and I think we can get it through. Anyway, Betty?
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, thank you.
Mr. Payment, we have been told by the BIE that they are
committed to completing the long awaited Johnson-O'Malley
student count this year. Not next, this year. Every year I have
been hearing, the count is coming, the count is coming. And a
lot of previous testimony has brought up the importance of
Johnson-O'Malley. Could you, on behalf of the National Congress
of American Indians, tell the Subcommittee how we should use
the results of that updated count?
Mr. Payment. Sure. So our funding levels have been
constant, but they have been the same for probably the last 15
to 20 years. And so what it will do is it will give us
corrected counts of the number of American Indians that the
Federal Government is fulfilling the trust obligation to. And
that will, obviously, mean additional funding. But, remember,
our populations are increasing, and we are funded at a level
that is about 20 years old, so it will give us additional
funding. What we do at JOM is we do a number of different
things, recreation, culture revitalization, tutoral support,
anything that we need to do in order to benefit our youth. So
it will be greatly appreciated.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, and thank President Cladoosby,
when you see him, for his great editorial in the Washington
Post on change the name.
Mr. Payment. Yes, absolutely.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Mr. Valadao.
Mr. Valadao. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Quick comment. National
Congress of American Indians, thank you for your support of my
bill, H.R. 3391, the Indian Health Service Professionals Tax
Fairness Act. I appreciate the support. And just one question
for Tex.
In your statement, you made the comment about 5,000 cases
were basically thrown out. How long of a period was that, for
5,000 cases?
Mr. Hall. It was probably about, I would say around four
years, maybe three, four years old. And if you don't address
the court cases, you are denying, you know, somebody a right to
a speedy trial, and it is just a violation of civil rights. And
so man positions, you know, didn't have the funding to take
care of that backlog, and so we had to dismiss them. You know,
and many of them were requests for jury trials and other
things, and that takes staff to get that put together. So we
had to dismiss them.
That was based on our chief tribal Judge, who was a law
trained lawyer for the last 25, 30 years. And so it was really
gut wrenching, she said, to have to do that, to dismiss, you
know, but that is what her recommendation was.
Mr. Valadao. All right. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, and thank all of you for being here
today, and for your testimony. We appreciate it very much.
Next we have Mr. Ralph, the Executive Director of the
Seattle Indian Health Board. Chairman Calvert is braver than I
am.
Ms. McCollum. I am going to tell on you.
Mr. Simpson. And Mr. Andy Joseph. See, I got that through
there. Mr. Charles Norman, and Dr. Jacque Gray, former
President of the Society of Indian Psychologists.
Ralph, do you want to pronounce your last name for me
first?
Mr. Forquera. It is pronounced Forquera, so think of four
carrots----
Mr. Simpson. Okay.
Mr. Forquera [continuing]. And you will never forget it.
Mr. Simpson. I can see that. Floor is yours.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
SEATTLE INDIAN HEALTH BOARD
WITNESS
RALPH FORQUERA
Mr. Forquera. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. My name
is Ralph Forquera. As mentioned, I am the Executive Director
for the Seattle Indian Health Board, and I am pleased to be
here. It is a pleasure to be here with my tribal colleagues
from around the country. I am actually here to represent Urban
Indian Health, the Urban Indian Health Program.
I run the Seattle Indian Health Board in Seattle,
Washington. It is a community health center, was established in
1970 as a free clinic, has been operating ever since that time.
Part of our resources come from the Indian Health Service
through the Title V allocation that comes through this
committee, and we serve both Federally recognized Indians and
non-Federally recognized Indians. I actually come from a tribe,
the Juanenno Band of California Mission Indians. It was a
terminated tribe back in the 1950s, and the tribe was
recognized by the State of California in 1993, so it is now a
State recognized tribe.
The purpose of my testimony is really to provide some
information about the fact that there are a growing number of
Indian people who, for a variety of reasons, are moving to
cities. Many of them are like myself, who do not belong to a
Federally recognized tribe, and so therefore I am ineligible
for a lot of services that go to Indian reservation
communities. We run into a number of similar problems that you
have on reservations. There is a very high rate of mental
illness in the population, and I know the Chairman is very
involved with some legislation regarding mental health issues.
A lot of violence issues. I know the Chair is interested in the
Violence Against Women Act, and things. And we really support
the efforts that have been going on in Indian Country, but it
really has missed the urban Indian population, which is a
growing population, and the need for assistance in that area is
quite grave, and we do our best to try to address it as best as
we possibly can.
Some of you are probably visual, so I would like to pass
out, if I could, just some visuals to give you some indication
of the changes that we have seen in the Native population over
the last several decades. If you believe the Census, seven out
of 10 Indian people are now living in cities around the
country, but a lot of them are like the ones in Puyallup, where
reservations are very close to large metropolitan areas, and so
it is very difficult to be able to figure out which populations
are which in this particular day and age, other than the issue
of Federal recognition.
The Indian Health Service itself has primarily served the
tribal communities and the reservation communities, and the
Federally recognized tribes. The Urban Indian Program has been
getting less and less of the allocation for urban Indian
programs. If you note, we are below one percent of the total
Indian Health Service budget, which is something that we have
tried to keep around that range as best as we possibly can.
There is really a dearth of data around urban Indians
because, again, the Indian Health Service has not really taken
the initiative to look for and to guide the Urban Indian Health
program. A good example of that is in the reauthorization of
the Indian Healthcare Improvement Act that was just passed with
the Affordable Care Act. There was a provision in there to
require that there be a conferring policy with urban programs,
so we had an opportunity to actually be involved in
conversations about how urban Indian health would be
administered in the country.
We are now four years into the Affordable Care Act, and
that policy has still not been enacted, and so we are really
limited in our capacity, then, to be able to influence policy,
as well as to provide feedback about changes that are being
asked of us. And that is a frequent problem, in the fact that,
in our reporting that we are trying to do to let people know
how well we are doing with the resources that we have,
oftentimes we are asked to report in an inappropriate fashion,
as opposed to really reflecting on the programs that we do
offer.
I did want to really thank all of you, as members of the
Congress, really, in general for your support for the extension
of the special diabetes program for Indians. That program, I
think, exemplifies just how well investment of resources in the
urban Indian programs can be helpful. We get five percent of
the special diabetes program for the urban Indian programs
around the country. We serve a significant number of Indian
people with diabetes and pre-diabetes through that program. It
has been a remarkably successful program. I cannot tell you how
much we have been able to save,
in terms of costs associated with complications associated with
diabetes, and so I just wanted to make sure that I thanked the
Committee, all of you, for supporting that particular
initiative. Thank you.
[The statement of Ralph Forquera follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Next, Mr. Andy Joseph, Junior, Chairman of the Northwest
Portland Area Indian Health Board.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
NORTHWEST PORTLAND AREA INDIAN HEALTH BOARD
WITNESS
ANDY JOSEPH, JR.
Mr. Joseph. Good afternoon, Chairman Calvert, and Members
of the Committee. Badger is my name, Andy Joseph, Junior. I
chair the Veterans and Health and Human Services Committee for
the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, and also
chair the Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board, and sit
on the Executive Committee for NIHB. My written testimony has
been submitted to the Subcommittee for the record, and I will
summarize my recommendations.
I want to underscore that there is a Federal trust
responsibility to provide healthcare to Indians, and that, due
to the chronic underfunding of the Indian Health Service, our
people have poor access to healthcare, and suffer high health
disparities. For FY 2015 IHS budget, we recommend the
following.
First, we recommend the Subcommittee to provide adequate
program increases to restore the 227 million that was
sequestered from the IHS budget. Other Federal healthcare
programs were protected to a two percent cut. It does not make
sense to not have a similar protection for the health programs.
IHS is just like Medicaid and the VA, and provides expensive
and vital healthcare services.
Second, the fundamental principle of the Northwest Tribes
is that IHS programs must be preserved by the President and
Congress in the budget process. You do this by funding and
maintaining the current level of healthcare services.
Otherwise, the program is eroded by inflation and population
growth. If current services are not maintained, how can unmet
needs ever be addressed? We recommend in the FY 2015, the
Subcommittee provide at least 223 million to fund medical and
general inflation and population growth.
Third, I want to thank the Subcommittee for support on
contract support cost issues. Contract support cost funding
assists us to administer our health programs and provide jobs
and services in our communities. When contract support costs
are not funded, tribes are forced to absorb these costs by
cutting services, or using their own resources to displace
funding for other program purposes. I urge the Committee to
make sure the Administration continues to obey the law and pay
full contract support cost payments. We recommend the
Subcommittee require the Administration to fully fund IHS
contract support cost payments to tribes.
Four, we recommend the Subcommittee halt funding for
facilities construction, staffing packages as a deficit
reduction strategy, or at least until IHS establishes a new and
fair facilities construction program. It does not make sense to
continue to fund new facilities when we cannot take care of the
current programs. When new facilities are constructed, they
carry a recurring liability for staffing at the expense of all
other tribes. It is more effective to maintain current services
by directing this funding to inflation and population growth
for the benefit of all tribes. If the Committee elects to fund
construction, we recommend funding joint venture and small
ambulatory construction.
Finally, we hope the Subcommittee does not agree to fund
the 200 million as proposed under their Opportunity, Growth and
Security initiative. We support additional funding for
facilities related projects, but not the projects on the health
facilities constructions priority list. The controversy and
unfairness of the IHS facilities construction program are well
documented by many tribes. If Congress provides the 200 million
for facilities related projects, we recommend the funding be
directed to reduce the backlog of essential maintenance,
alteration, and repair, BEMAR. This need is currently estimated
at over 462 million for all IHS and reported tribal facilities.
I would be happy to answer any questions, and thank you for
this opportunity.
[The statement of Andy Joseph, Jr. follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Andy. I appreciate that.
Next is Charles Norman, the American Dental Association.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
AMERICAN DENTAL ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
CHARLES NORMAN
Mr. Norman. Yes. Good afternoon, Chairman Calvert, Members
of the Subcommittee. I am Dr. Charles Norman, President of the
American Dental Association, and a private practicing dentist
in Greensboro, North Carolina. The ADA appreciates the
opportunity to testify on the oral health issues that affect
American Indians, Native Alaskans, and the dentists who serve
in the Indian Health Service and tribal programs.
We are pleased that the Administration has recommended
approximately $175 million for the Division of Oral Health, an
increase of roughly $10 million over the last budget cycle.
However, this increase will only allow the Division to maintain
its current programs and staff its new facilities, leaving
virtually nothing to address the increasing oral disease rates
in this population.
Tooth decay in Indian Country has reached epidemic
proportions. According to data from the Navajo Tribe, tooth
decay is present in 48 percent of one-year-olds, and up to 94
percent of four-year-olds. The decay rate of preschool Navajo
children is the highest in the nation.
Several years ago the ADA organized the Native American
Oral Healthcare Project to work with the tribes in Arizona, New
Mexico, North Dakota, and South Dakota. The Dental Associations
in those states have held many meetings with tribal leaders in
order to hear their concerns regarding their needed dental
care. As a result of the project, volunteer dentists in two
states have treated over 1,300 patients, and provided $736,000
in donated dental care. Additionally, the Arizona and New
Mexico Dental Associations are working with the Navajo Nation
to develop a 10 year oral health plan for incorporation within
the tribe's health and wellness plan.
We are also working to help tribes develop new oral
healthcare professional, the Community Dental Health
Coordinator. The CDHC focuses on oral health, education,
prevention, early intervention, and connecting people for their
dental care. They work in the communities to educate people
about diet, dental hygiene, and how good oral health results in
better overall health. Today eight American Indian CDHCs are
serving in 15 sites.
We could provide even more care through volunteers if IHS
would streamline its credentialing process. Last year, 30 South
Dakota dentists volunteered at IHS dental clinics for one to
four days per year. All had valid state licenses. In the end,
only two dentists actually were credentialed, and even then
process delays prevented them from treating a maximum number of
patients.
The ADA thanks the Committee for including report language
in the current Omnibus Bill urging IHS to establish a
centralized credentialing system. Unfortunately, IHS has not
heeded the Committee's directive. Therefore, we respectfully
request that the Committee direct IHS to work with the ADA to
develop a better credentialing system for volunteers.
The ADA, and its States' chapters, are committed to
improving oral healthcare for Native people, but the Division
of Oral Health need additional resources. In 2012, dental care
expenditures in the United States reached $111 billion, or $353
per capita. The proposed 2015 budget for IHS dental programs
allows only $83 for the 2.1 million people served by the IHS.
That is each. That amount does not even cover one dental visit
a year.
To bring oral healthcare parity to Indian people, the
budget for the Division of Oral Health would have to rise above
$560 million. Now, we recognize that level of funding is not
going to happen this year, and so we recommend that the
committee include an additional $4 million for the Division, as
we have detailed in our written report.
Thank you for allowing the ADA to testify. We are committed
to working with you, IHS, and the tribes to aggressively reduce
the level of oral disease in Indian Country. Thank you.
[The statement of Charles Norman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Dr. Gray, you are recognized for five minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
FRIENDS OF INDIAN HEALTH
WITNESS
JACQUE GRAY
Ms. Gray. Good afternoon, Chairman Calvert, and
distinguished Committee Members. I am Dr. Jacque Gray, a
psychologist, and a Choctaw and Cherokee descendant from
Oklahoma, and for over 30 years I have worked to address mental
health needs of American Indians. I am currently the director
of the Seven Generations Center of Excellence and Native
Behavioral Health, and the National Indigenous Elder Justice
Initiative through the University of North Dakota.
As a member of the American Psychological Association, I am
testifying today for the Friends of Indian Health. I lead a
team focused on elder abuse. Recently an elder from one of the
tribes noticed that a woman who regularly attends events had
not been seen for several days. Someone from the Elder
Protection Team was dispatched to her home, where they
discovered she had fallen days before, and could not get up,
therefore, tend her fire to heat her home. Consequently, she
had frozen to the floor. But because the team found her in
time, and was able to get her to the hospital, she survived. A
few hours later, and she would not have.
The sequester last year had a dramatic impact on mental
health services. Counselors are no longer available to provide
on call service or respond to after-hours emergencies. Regular
appointments for people who have attempted suicide have had to
be cancelled so that providers can meet with patients who are
needing to be assessed for suicide. The suicide rate for
teenagers has reached epidemic levels. Poverty, loss of Native
culture and language take a toll and erode the identity,
creating a sense of helplessness and hopelessness. Often the
breakup of a relationship can be the last straw that leads to a
young person to take their own life.
Friends supports the Administration's proposed 2015 funding
level of 4.6 billion, an increase of over 199 million over
current funding. However, the request fails to address health
disparities and need for treatment in Indian Country. Over 154
million of the request goes for medical inflation, pay costs,
and additional staffing for new facilities, which merely
maintain status quo. Additional funding goes to purchased and
referred care, and contract support costs. When everything is
taken into account, the request is only one percent.
The greatest need of Indian people is purchased and
referred care, PRC, that cannot be provided at IHS or tribal
facilities. Last year the PRC program denied almost 147,000
services, costing over $760 million. The increased demand for
services is due to an aging population, a rise in the cost of
healthcare and transportation services, and the fact that most
IHS and tribal facilities are dependent upon the private sector
for secondary and tertiary care. The situation is not going to
change.
The Administration's 2015 budget would increase the PRC
amount by 50 million, leaving it short by $710 million. We know
the committee cannot appropriate this amount in one year, but
we urge you to propose a plan for fully funding the PRC program
within five years. Having a sufficient healthcare workforce
would help reduce the need for PRC funding. The IHS has over
1,500 healthcare professional vacancies, yet, due to a lack of
loan repayment funds, the Service denied 577 applicants'
requests to work in IHS. An additional 29 million is needed to
fund the outstanding requests.
It is often said that Americans enjoy the best healthcare
in the world, however, the President's budget request does not
allow Native people to make the same statement. We urge the
Committee to move beyond the Administration's proposal and
provide the needed increases as we have outlined.
In conclusion, the Friends thank the Committee for its
continued support of IHS, and we look forward to working for
you to decrease mortality and morbidity rates of American
Indians and Alaskan Natives. Thank you.
[The statement of Jacque Gray follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony. Interest of
time, I am going to hopefully just have some quick questions by
our panel before we get to the last panel, and get to the vote.
Ms. McCollum. Just really quick, thank you for your
comments on urban Indian healthcare. It is something that we
need to look at and do more consultative work on, but we have
to fund up healthcare. We cannot take it out of tribal
healthcare to fund urban healthcare, and that has been, I
think, the biggest friction between moving forward. So thank
you for your comments.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Simpson?
Mr. Simpson. Yeah. Thanks, Charles, for being here today,
and testifying on behalf of the American Dental Association. I
do not have any questions, but I do want to say we have with us
today, and I want to recognize, Judy Sherman for her tireless
efforts on behalf of the American Indian, Alaskan Natives' oral
healthcare for the American Dental Association, and healthcare
in general on behalf of Friends of Indian Health. She has been
an invaluable resource to this Committee over the years, and I
understand you are retiring. I hope I still have a chance to
talk you out of it. Anyway, thank you for all your work.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Any other Members? With that, I
thank this panel for your testimony, and I will introduce the
next panel. Thank you very much.
We do not have a lot of time, but I would hate to have our
last panel wait around for an hour while we vote, so I am going
to ask them to come up right away. Mr. Mark LeBeau, the
Executive Director of the California Rural Indian Health Board,
Mr. Michael Garcia, Board of Directors Delegate, and Ms. Brandi
Miranda, Vice President of the Board of Directors. I normally
do not have to apologize for them actually being ahead of
schedule on the floor today, but they are, and----
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, I might leave a few minutes early.
It takes me a little longer to limp over.
Mr. Calvert. I know.
Mr. Simpson. I would get there and try to tell them to keep
the vote open.
Mr. Calvert. Okay, good. All right. I will be happy to
recognize Mr. Mark LeBeau, and we are going to stick as close
to possible this five minute rule here, so----
Mr. LeBeau. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
THE CALIFORNIA RURAL INDIAN HEALTH BOARD, INC.
WITNESS
MARK LEBEAU
Mr. LeBeau. Good afternoon, Chairman, and Committee
Members. My name is Mark LeBeau, and I am California Rural
Indian Health Board's Executive Director. I am also a citizen
of the Pit River Nation from Northern California. Thank you for
providing CRIHB the opportunity to testify about funding of the
Indian Health Service.
CRIHB provides healthcare services and technical assistance
to 11 tribal health programs, and is supported by 30 Federally
recognized tribes in California. There are a number of tribal
clinic representatives that are here today, including Charlene
Store, Fern Bates, Ruby Rawlings, Willie Carillo, Laura Borden,
Larry Hendricks, Lisa Elgin, Jessica Stalato, Yolanda Lathin.
CRIHB was founded in 1969 to bring back healthcare services to
tribal communities in California. Since 1969, California tribes
have built a network of 32 tribal clinics, which serve more
than 80,000 users in California.
The first request that we have is that this Committee fund
the IHS programs and services at levels that equal and exceed
pre-sequestration levels. We know that the proposed budget is
4.6 billion for the Indian Health Service, which is a 200
million increase from Fiscal Year 2014. This is not enough to
meet all unmet needs throughout Indian Country, as it would
literally take over 14 billion to fully fund the Indian Health
Service system.
Our second general request is to fully fund contract
support costs. We thank the Committee, the leadership on this
Committee, for increasing funding in the January 2014 Omnibus
Appropriations Act to ensure more funding for contract support
costs, and partially restore funds lost to sequestration. Going
forward, full funding of contract support costs continues to be
critically important to continuity of healthcare. Full funding
must be achieved without reducing direct healthcare services,
or important line items within the IHS director's budget, such
as a special diabetes program for Indians.
CRIHB has testified before about lack of fundamental
fairness, and IHS allocation of contract health services, now
referred to as purchased and referred care. This inequity has
resulted in compromised care for our service population. It has
been documented in numerous Government Accountability Office
reports, the most recent from June of 2012. The foundation of
the allocation method is the use of base funding. It is not
tied to any measure of actual need. Instead, it is based on
what a given program received the year before.
After reviewing contract health service funding, the GAO
wrote that, ``IHS's continued use of the base funding
methodology undermines the equitable allocation of IHS funding
to meet the healthcare needs of American Indians and Alaskan
Natives.'' This inequality is compounded by a lack of access to
the Catastrophic Health Emergency Fund within the IHS system.
The CHEF fund may only be accessed when care for a single
episode of care for a patient exceeds a threshold of $25,000.
This threshold is not difficult for tribal health programs with
access to an IHS funded hospital to meet.
Unfortunately, because California tribal clinics are
grossly underfunded and under facilitated to start with, it is
almost impossible for California's tribal clinics to meet this
spending threshold to access the fund. Today CRIHB asks this
committee to require IHS to develop and use a new method to
allocate all CHS program funds to account for variations across
areas. We also agree with GAO that IHS should be required to
use actual cost of CHS users and methods for allocating
funding.
We also ask that the Committee require IHS to re-evaluate
its facilities priority system, which has not been
substantially revised since 1991. The current list creates a $1
billion backlog that will prevent applications for new
facilities for the next 15 to 20 years. Most of the listed
facilities would provide in-patient care that today is provided
as out-patient care everywhere else. California does not have a
single IHS facility, and there are no California facilities on
the list. It is not for lack of trying. In the absence of IHS
facilities, California tribal clinics have devoted significant
resources of their own resources to obtaining clinic space.
Unfortunately, this often diverts scarce resources from
direct patient care. Today we ask you to require IHS to re-
evaluate the facilities priority criteria. We also request that
the appropriation for facilities maintenance be significantly
increased. The M and I funding is at its lowest level ever in
the California IHS area. The current level is below the
mandated Federal level of funds necessary to maintain real
property assets.
Lastly, we ask the Committee to fund the next phases of the
southern and northern California YRTC centers. Culturally
appropriate treatment that is close to home is critically
important in treating American Indian youth. Thank you for the
time.
[The statement of Mark LeBeau follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman for his testimony. I am
sorry--Mr. Garcia, you are recognized.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
SOUTHERN INDIAN HEALTH COUNCIL
WITNESS
MICHAEL GARCIA
Mr. Garcia. Good afternoon. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. If you could make your powerful statement in
less time, we would appreciate it.
Mr. Garcia. Chairman Calvert, and Members of the Committee,
I thank you for inviting me here to testify today. My name is
Michael Garcia--I am sorry. Okay. There we go. My name is
Michael Garcia, and I serve on the Board of Southern Indian
Health Council, and as the Vice Chairman of the Ewiiaapaayp
Band of Kumeyaay Indians, one of the seven member tribal
governments which make up the council. It is truly an honor to
be able to share with you some of the opportunities, the
challenges facing the Southern Indian Health Council.
We at Southern Indian Health Council are passionate about
the work we do to help our people. Part of this work is direct
services. We operate an out-patient medical clinic, a dental
clinic, a community health program, a family services program,
and a pharmacy. There are some services, however, that we
cannot provide directly. For services such as emergency care,
cancer treatments, and many others, we must refer our members
to outside facilities. Since there are no IHS hospitals in
California, this means that our members must either travel to
an IHS facility in another state, or we must send them to
private facilities. As you can imagine, both of these options
can be very expensive.
Over the past couple of years, this Committee, and
Congress, has increased our funding for these referrals, called
purchased and referred care, and for that we thank this
committee. But I am here to tell you that, even with these
increases, it is still not enough. Last year we received $1.3
million for purchased and referred care. Of that 1.3 million,
$300,000 was used to pay for the medical costs resulting from
one accident, and that $300,000 did not cover all the medical
costs from that accident. We had to deny medical care to two of
the people involved because their injuries were not bad enough.
Every year we must rate how important each person's needs
are, and often we can only provide care to the ones that have
the most dire needs. I know that the members of this Committee
are often faced with tough choices. In fact, this Committee is
considering many tough choices with this very budget, so I know
the committee can imagine what it would be like to have to tell
someone that they just are not sick enough, or hurt enough, so
they will not be getting care.
And even when making those tough judgments, and denying
care to those who are not facing life threatening illnesses, we
still have to supplement this care with our own tribal dollars.
But when almost everything is going to pay for the most dire
need, that leaves little or nothing to go to other kinds of
care. Non-emergency medical care, mental health counseling,
suicide prevention, and drug and alcohol abuse, to name a few.
To be able to provide such services, we need your help. Please
help us help our people by increasing the budget for purchased
and referred care.
The burden on this care was even more strained up until
last year. This is because, until last year, we did not receive
full contract support cost funding. But, thanks to this
committee, we are set to receive full contract support costs
for Fiscal Year 2014 and 2015. This will have a huge effect on
our ability to provide services. For the first time ever, we
will be able to fund our programs at the level intended by the
Indian Self-Determination Act, the level the Secretary would
have provided, because we know we will be receiving full
contract support cost funding. Thank you again.
However, we must acknowledge that this is not always the
case. In fact, until this year, we never received full funding
of these costs. We have had to hire lawyers and file claims
against IHS to try to force it to pay what it promised it would
pay at the beginning, and yet we still have not received what
is due to us. IHS even knows how much it did not pay us because
it calculated it every year, and put it in a report it gave to
Congress. We cannot understand why IHS will not pay us what
those reports say are owed.
So we are asking you to tell IHS it must pay us what the
reports say we are owed. We understand there might be mistakes
in reports, and we are happy to work with IHS to correct any
mistakes. Southern Indian Health Council is not asking for more
than what it rightfully should have gotten, but it should not
take years to do that, as it is taking now, and we ask for your
help to speed up this process.
And perhaps the prettiest words a Committee can hear, in
closing, at Southern Indian Health Council, we are proud of the
work that we do, and we know we can achieve more with your
help. Thank you again for having me testify here today.
[The statement of Michael Garcia follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman. Before I recognize
Brandi, I am going to go ahead and miss this vote to get
through this panel, so if the two of you need to go vote you
still have a little bit of time. There are 200 left to vote--I
am going to go ahead and recognize Brandi.
Brandi, Vice President of the Board of Directors,
Riverside-San Bernardino--my own area.
Ms. Miranda. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. I know you are squeezed as the last person,
but you can always call me on the telephone----
Ms. Miranda. Okay.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. If you ever--
Ms. Miranda. Great.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Want to. But, Brandi, you are
recognized for five minutes.
----------
Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
RIVERSIDE-SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY INDIAN HEALTH CONSORTIUM
WITNESS
BRANDI MIRANDA
Ms. Miranda. Thank you, Chairman Calvert. And, quick
correction, I am actually Treasurer. I appreciate the
promotion, but our Vice President might kind of disagree a
little bit. Chairman Calvert and Members of the Committee,
thank you so much for the opportunity to be here today. My name
is Brandi Miranda Greany, and I am a proud member of the
Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians, and the Treasurer of the
Riverside-San Bernardino County Indian Health Board of
Directors. I would like to thank this Committee for its efforts
to ensure contracts are fully funded. Full funding is so
important for our organization to continue to serve the ever
expanding Native population in our area.
As I mentioned in my written testimony, if not for our
reserves, we would have had to cut our entire Outreach
Department in 2013 due to the cuts caused by sequestration.
These funding cuts have real impacts. As a part of this
proposed cut, we had planned to eliminate a nursing director,
five public health nurses, 10 patient escorts, and nine
community health representatives.
My mother, Carol, was a community health representative on
our reservation for 10 years. She shared a story with me that I
would like to share with you today. My mom and a public health
nurse were doing a home visit on one of our tribal elders who
was a diabetic patient. He lived alone, did not have much
family to check on him regularly. As the public health nurse
checked his vitals, my mom started asking him some basic
questions, what his name was, if he knew what day it was. She
noticed he was becoming very lethargic. She immediately went
back to the clinic and grabbed the doctor and said, I really
think you need to come and see this patient. The doctor left,
checked on him. The patient was going into a diabetic coma.
If it was not for my mom and that public health nurse going
to check on that man, he quite possibly would have died. So, as
you can see, a cut of that entire department is very, very
difficult, and it is an important part of maintaining our
patients' health.
The sequester may have been a one-time occurrence, but IHS
has been underpaying our contract support costs for a very long
time. I would like to thank the Committee for eliminating the
proposed appropriation caps on contract support costs, and
fully funding these costs in 2014 and '15. However, our fight
is far from over, as we are still fighting for the dollars we
are owed from past underpayments, dollars we can use to hire
doctors and specialists, and continue to build more clinics.
As an example, our Board recently had to make the difficult
decision as to whether or not we could afford to cover breast
reconstructive surgery for a patient recently diagnosed with
breast cancer. Unfortunately, we were unable to approve it due
to being underfunded. And now that we filed a lawsuit, we have
learned that IHS believed we were overpaid, even though our own
books and the shortfall report submitted to Congress tell us
otherwise. And even though IHS actually tried to cancel our
settlement session last week, we came to D.C. anyway to meet
with the government.
Now, they seem to acknowledge that we were underpaid all
those years, but their current approach to the settlement still
resulted in an outcome that is truly laughable, and, quite
honestly, a slap in the face. It is time the government does
the right thing and settle these claims at once, using a method
that is not based on guesses and presumptions that the tribe
was acting improperly, but relies on a fair method, giving the
benefit of the doubt to the tribe, as the Self-Indian
Determination Act requires.
Another issue that largely impacts the health of our
organization is funding for contract health services, now
called purchase and referred care dollars. First we ask that
you continue prioritize funding in this area, because we do not
have an IHS funded hospital, or specialists, so when our
patients need complex or specialized care, we must send them to
private facilities, and when we do so, we must pay the full
amount charged by these private providers, so we need more
funding to provide a comparable amount of care.
Second, we ask that you extend Medicare-like rates for non-
hospital specialty services so that we can make our CHS dollars
go further.
Lastly, I must say a few words about the Special Diabetes
Program for Indians. This program has allowed us to provide
more specialized diabetic care, care that is vitally needed, as
diabetes is the number one diagnosis in our community. For
example, we were able to hire a podiatrist, Dr. Roli, who is
able to properly address wound care in diabetic patients. He is
working hard to reduce the number of patients that require
amputation. However, for the patients that do still require
amputation, we, unfortunately, cannot provide coverage for
prosthetics, meaning these patients must live out their lives
bound to wheelchairs. These diabetes programs are necessary,
and should become permanent.
Thank you once again for the opportunity to provide a
glimpse into my community, and the health needs of our people.
[The statement of Brandi Miranda follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And I apologize again for our
having to expedite this panel. But one last thing I wanted to
say, this contract services issue, from everything I have heard
in the last two days, is probably number one on most people's
list, and repayment for, obviously, money that you are due, and
we are going to work to try to make that happen.
I want to thank everybody for being here. I want to
reiterate this is an ongoing dialogue, not just five minutes
once a year, please stay in touch with us, and keep us updated.
And say hi to Mark and Holly, and we are adjourned.
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
TESTIMONY OF INTERESTED INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONS
PUBLIC WITNESSES
Mr. Calvert. The Committee will come to order.
Good morning, and welcome to the first of two public
witness hearings this morning and this afternoon. The
Subcommittee will hear from a cross-section of individuals
representing a wide variety of issues addressed by the
Subcommittee.
The Chair will call each panel of witnesses to the table,
one panel at a time. Each witness will be provided with 5
minutes to present their testimony. We will be using a timer to
track the progress of each witness. When the button turns
yellow, the witness will have 1 minute remaining to conclude
his or her remarks. Witnesses who speak less than 5 minutes
will score big brownie points with the Chairman and the Ranking
Member. I think he probably feels the same way.
Mr. Moran. Unless we have questions of them.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. Well, then, that is different.
Members will have an opportunity to ask questions of the
witnesses, but in the interests of time, the Chair requests
that we keep these things moving to stay on schedule. We have a
lot of people here, and this is also a getaway day, so I am
afraid a lot of people may disappear on us.
The Chair also wants to remind those in the hearing room
that the Committee Rules prohibit the use of outside cameras
and audio equipment during these hearings.
Mr. Calvert. I am now happy to yield to my good friend, Mr.
Moran, for any remarks he may wish to make.
Mr. Moran. Thank you, my good friend.
This is a good hearing. I am here particularly to hear Mr.
Reising, because I had known him when he was a college football
player, and he actually became wholly paralyzed and he has
struggled back from that and now he is doing some wonderful
stuff, as I am sure the other folks are also doing here on the
panel. So, I am anxious to hear from them. We appreciate you
giving them the opportunity to speak.
Thanks, Chairman.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
First I would like to recognize Mr. Trent Clark, Board
Member of the Idaho Humanities Council, Federation of State
Humanity Councils.
Mr. Clark.
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
FEDERATION OF STATE HUMANITIES COUNCILS
WITNESS
TRENT CLARK, BOARD MEMBER, IDAHO HUMANITIES COUNCIL
Mr. Clark. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I do represent the Idaho Humanities Council. I live in a
small mining community in Representative Simpson's district. I
know the Congressman very well, and he is familiar with the
situation of a small, rural mining town like I come from.
I am here representing, as you mentioned, the Federation of
State Councils, and we are here to support an appropriation of
$154.5 million for the National Endowment, and as a critical
component of that, the State-Federal Partnership portion of
that, $46 million.
To preface my remarks, I want to quickly reference some
research that has been done. Dr. Vince Covello of Columbia
University is kind of the well-established authority on public
opinion formation. He did some research back in the 1990s. It
became pretty much the basis of many of our federal
communications manuals. You'll notice agencies ranging from EPA
to the Fish and Wildlife Service cite the Covello principles of
public opinion formation. His theory is sometimes described as
the hit theory because he says the public forms their opinions
based on hits of information that they receive and they process
these hits and from those hits they form an opinion.
What is sometimes not referenced much is a very excellent
paper he wrote about how not all hits of information are equal,
and he describes the most valuable hits of information, and
these are the hits that would come to a person who is kind of
in their comfort zone. They have their sources of information.
They listen to their trade representatives or their company or
a favorite news broadcast, and they are comfortable with that,
and they go along through life with pretty much one source of
information, and then all of a sudden comes along a hit of
information that Dr. Covello described as surprise with
insight, and these hits of information that are surprise with
insight do an amazing thing in our modern American democracy.
They cause a person to stop and reevaluate and want to become
engaged.
So when we talk about a populace that is engaged in their
own government, there is nothing that can be done more valuable
than to provide many of these hits of information that are
filled with surprise and insight, and what I am here to tell
you is that is what the National Endowment for the Humanities
is designed to do. It is to offer up a platter of surprise and
insight for the American people, and more specifically, the
State-Federal Partnership would be kind of the doorstep
delivery of that surprise with insight. We take surprise and
insight out to the communities and offer them to neighborhoods,
let people see in their own backyards some information that
makes them stop, reevaluate, reassess, look and become engaged.
They may show up at a town meeting or a forum and ask you
questions, Congressman, because they have been surprised and
they have seen some new insight.
And I want to for the rest of my testimony give you some
examples. The full written testimony has many, many of these
examples but I wanted to cite just a few. One of the first ones
is in the State of Idaho where the Humanities Council in Idaho
chose to offer up a series of seminars and some discussions
focused on public opinion leaders. Folks like the city council
in my own little town of Soda Springs, Idaho, would show up at
these meetings where we would discuss the concept of
wilderness. It is very timely because 2014 is the 50th
anniversary of the Wilderness Act of 1964, but a lot of folks,
again, they fall into the mode of wilderness is the buzzphrase.
You are either for wilderness or you are against wilderness,
and they know the topic by the sound bite.
What the Humanities Council did is, it came in and it said
let's talk to you about why did Congress enact this Act in the
first place and what does it do and how does an agency manage
the land differently if it is wilderness versus if it is a
national park or if it is a national monument. What that whole
process has done is, it has listed the issue above the sound
bite so that now city council members are actually discussing
well, what really do we want to have happen. We want people to
come and visit. Well, maybe setting the land aside where people
don't visit is not the thing we want to do. And so the whole
discussion about wilderness has become deeper and richer and
more meaningful, and also I would point out, Congressman
Simpson would verify this, it has become a lot more easy for
him to explain the difficult subtleties of these issues that
you here in Congress have to deal with, and sometimes if the
public is not engaged, they miss those subtleties, and so it
helps that process.
Another council that has done some amazing work is in
Oklahoma, and they have a program in Oklahoma that brings the
American roots music to the communities there, and I would love
to have that in Soda Springs. The little town of Frederick,
Oklahoma, got that opportunity to experience, again, surprise
and insight about where music traditions come from. It brings
about understanding, and that is something that we need.
Thank you very much.
[The statement of Trent Clark follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Peter Meineck, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL HUMANITIES ALLIANCE
WITNESS
PETER MEINECK, CLINICAL ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF CLASSICS, NEW YORK
UNIVERSITY
Mr. Meineck. Thank you. My name is Peter Meineck, and I am
a Professor of Classics at New York University and the Founding
Director of the Aquila Theatre Company and a proud member of
the Bedford Fire Department in New York.
As I came here this morning and I walked through the
wonderful classical columns of George Stewart's Rayburn Office
Building, I was reminded of the way of which our relationship
to the classics and the cultures of ancient Greece and Rome has
had a profound impact on so many facets of American identity
and society. This classical influence is not a thing of the
past but a vibrant, living, cultural force that is constantly
developing, adapting and inspiring. So we can appreciate the
plays of Sophocles or Shakespeare as classics just as we know
that the dramas of Pittsburgh playwright August Wilson will one
day also enter this ever-evolving canon.
So Bedford, New York, where I live is the home of John Jay,
the author of several of the Federalist Papers, signatory to
the Declaration of Independence and our first Chief Justice.
Like almost all the members of the Continental Congress, Jay
received a classical education and could read both Greek and
Latin. In fact, Thomas Jefferson was so enthusiastic about his
knowledge of Greek and Latin, he exclaimed, ``I thank on my
knees, him who directed my early education, for having put into
my possession this rich source of delight, and I would not
exchange it for anything. So John Jay well understood that
knowledge was essential if the American experiment was to
succeed, and in a letter to Pennsylvania delegate--and I was
able to read these letters because of a great archive at
Columbia University that is funded by the NEH. He wrote,
``Knowledge is the soul of the Republic and the only way to
diminish the weak and wicked,'' and he echoed this theme in
1789, writing ``Knowledge is essential for the duration of
liberty.'' He also said, ``There is more light and knowledge in
America diffused through the mass of the people of this country
than any other.''
With this in mind and this idea of knowledge, which is, I
think, what the NEH is all about, diffusing knowledge, creating
liberty, I would like to brief the NEH-funded public program
that I directed called Ancient Greeks' Modern Lives that used
the works of Homer and the Greek tragedies to foster informed
public discussions on the veteran in American society. So for 3
years between 2010 and 2013, the program toured in 31 states,
staging 244 live events, which was public readings,
discussions, lectures, reading groups, film screenings and
theatre workshops. We hired 62 classics professors and sent
them out into the field where they worked with professional
actors, librarians, museum curators, performing arts center
staff and members of veteran organizations. All in all, 111,000
people attended the live events, and an additional 678,000
visited the Web site, which works out to a cost to the Federal
Government of around one dollar per person, which I think is a
pretty good deal.
As the program progressed, we met more veterans from Iraq
and Afghanistan, mostly keeping silent at first, who were
perhaps even suspicious, and we noticed older veterans making
contact with them, talking to them. One program participant, a
U.S. Army Ranger sergeant who had served in several tours of
Afghanistan and Iraq, said, ``I liked that the experiences were
filtered through classical myths. This distance allows both
performers and audience members to use their imaginations in an
empathetic way, rather than merely evoking sympathy. This also
helps free us from anachronistic terms such as PTSD or
psychological wound, or whatever else they want to use to
describe someone who has undergone a significant change due to
military service. Classical myth places the emphasis back on
character and story, and helps reject the laziness of labels.
The abstract nature of myth also allows individuals to reflect
on their own experiences with the subject at hand, and to flesh
out the experience with some combination of memory and
imagination,'' and those are his words, not mine.
It was remarkable to see how the classical stories elicited
so many different deeply personal and heartfelt responses. At
one event in a military museum in Iowa, a long serving
noncommissioned officer of the Iowa National Guard latched on
to the tension inherent in the moment in Book 23 of Homer's
Odyssey, when the hero is finally reunited with his wife,
Penelope. This Iowan and his wife recognized the intimacy of
something simple between them that could suddenly transcend the
long separations of multiple deployments. Like Odysseus
himself, who is moved to tears when he hears tales of the
Trojan War sung by a bard, there were many sniffles in the
audience at this beautifully simple and completely human moment
that was captured and written down in a foreign land some 2750
years ago, for the humanities constantly remind us what it
means to be human.
In Mississippi, a leather-clad member of Rolling Thunder,
the veteran motorcycle group, responded quite differently to
the same passage. After hearing the Homeric simile of how
Odysseus felt like a drowning man, he stood up and said ``I
have told nobody this, not even my wife here, but when I came
home from Vietnam I threw my uniform in the trash at the
airport and went home in disguise, just like Odysseus, and I
too felt like a drowning man, all that death. I didn't think I
could love anyone or be loved by anyone again. I felt like I
was drowning, until my girlfriend, my wife here, gave me her
hand and rescued this drowning man. How did Homer know this?''
The aim of my testimony today has been to try to convince
you of the continued power of the classics in American life and
how the National Endowment of the Humanities has allowed a
truly national program to flourish. Their prestigious awards
help create media and institutional interest in the program and
attracted additional funding from private foundations and
individuals. Their selection process is highly rigorous, and
the expert advice and tireless help of their program staff is
not short of priceless.
I want to just end--I have got 8 seconds--with one quote of
someone far more articulate than me, Martin Luther King, in his
last speech from the mountaintop who said, ``I would move on by
Greece, and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see
Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes
assembled around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and
eternal issues of reality.''
So the NEH does this. It enables those discussions of great
and eternal issues of reality via its excellent public
programming and sends them out across the nation helping us to
empower our democracy with that most valuable of human
resources: knowledge.
Thank you very much.
[The statement of Peter Meineck follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Jesse Reising, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
WARRIOR SCHOLAR PROJECT
WITNESS
JESSE REISING, COFOUNDER AND CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD
Mr. Reising. Thank you, Chairman Calvert, Members of the
Subcommittee. It is an honor to be here today to express my
support for the full funding of the National Endowment for the
Humanities. I am the Chairman and Cofounder of the Warrior
Scholar Project. With the support of the NEH and private
resources, we host two-week-long humanities-based academic boot
camps to facilitate veterans' transition from the military to
college.
The GI Bill and other forms of tuition assistance provide
veterans with the resources to attend college but many
transitioning veterans have not used academic skills since high
school and must adjust to a fundamentally different social and
cultural environment.
Much like boot camp transforms civilians into soldiers, we
use immersion in the humanities to transform soldiers into
students. Instead of using pushups and pullups to condition the
body, we use Thucydides and Herodotus to condition the mind.
Consisting of 14 hours per day of intensive academic
seminars, workshops, discussions, and one-on-one tutoring
sessions, the Warrior Scholar Project is designed to unlock
veterans' full potential to succeed in college and become
leaders on campus. Engaging with veterans in an academic
setting on a subject about which many of them have strong,
visceral, patriotic feelings such as the foundations of
democracy causes their intellectual curiosity to become
insatiable, and in the process of evaluating how democracy has
evolved, they develop critical thinking skills necessary for
success in any field. They have learned how to frame their
ideas in an academic context. They discover that they can
access classical texts that they previously thought were
impenetrable. They realize that despite the fact that they have
been carrying a rifle around the Hindu Kush Mountains for the
past decade, they have much to offer in an academic setting,
and much of what they have learned in the military translates
into being a successful student.
They come to understand that their professor is not their
drill instructor. Not only are you allowed to engage with your
professor on the ideas, you are expected to, and no longer are
they more intimidated by their four-page essay assignment than
they were by their latest deployment.
It is powerful to witness these battle-hardened veterans
not engaging in the normal barracks banter during their smoke
breaks but instead debating finer points of de Tocqueville with
their traditional non-veteran peers with whom they previously
thought it impossible to relate.
Departure from the military, especially a premature
departure, can leave a person feeling stripped of a sense of
meaning and purpose. Study of the timeless values and
principles that may have motivated many of them to serve in the
first place reawakens their drive to search for that sense of
purpose and helps them better understand their experiences as
they try to make sense of a world in which they may have had to
take the life of another to defend. They are forced to reflect
upon what is important to them, what motivates them, why they
chose to serve, to debate such questions as what is democracy
and is democracy inherently good. It forces them to imagine new
ways in which they can fulfill their sense of civic duty now
that they are once again civilians.
During our pilot year, we were surprised when one of our
students suffering from post-traumatic stress told us on the
third day that for the first time since he returned from Iraq,
he had slept through the night without any nightmares. His mind
was too consumed contemplating democracy and globalization.
Other veterans have made similar claims, and we are currently
working with psychologists at Yale to study the potential
rehabilitative benefits of this kind of program.
After completing the Warrior Scholar Project, veterans
think of themselves not only as veterans but as student-
veterans, or, more aptly, as warrior-scholars, and they have
the tools to find a new mission and build a new identity after
life in the military.
We have already received nearly three times as many
applications as there are seats in this year's programs. We
look forward to continuing to work closely with the NEH staff
as we scale up to meet this demand. We hope to share what we
have learned through this experiment as broadly as possible,
and we are grateful that the NEH has used its network and the
realm of higher education to serve as a conduit of information
through which we are able to share best practices. Without the
support of institutions like the NEH, the curriculum would not
have traveled far beyond the desk of our Co-Founder and
Executive Director, Chris Howell.
The protection of freedom demands not just a strong
military but an active and informed citizenry capable of
distinguishing truth from mere sophistry. The humanities are an
excellent vehicle through which to develop the skills essential
for critical inquiry, and by promoting reflection on what it
means to be a citizen, studying the humanities fosters a civic
ethos and helps illuminate the path through a virtuous civilian
life.
With the withdrawal from Iraq and the drawdown in
Afghanistan, we need the support of the NEH now more than ever
to meet the growing needs of returning veterans. The strength
of our democracy depends on it.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The statement of Jesse Reising follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Moran. A terrific program. Maybe we can put a word in
for it when we talk about NEH in the report. This is the kind
of thing we like to hear about. It is a great initiative. Thank
you.
Mr. Calvert. Next, Mr. Waddell Stillman, Historic Hudson
Valley.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
HISTORIC HUDSON VALLEY
WITNESS
WADDELL STILLMAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Stillman. Good morning. My name is Waddell Stillman. I
am the President of Historic Hudson Valley. We are a regional
history museum founded in 1951. We operate a network of
national historic landmarks in the Hudson River Valley of New
York, a National Heritage Area. Each year, 250,000 visitors
come to our sites for tours, school programs and cultural
festivals, helping to create jobs and drive tourism.
The NEH has underwritten pivotal projects and leveraged
significant private funding in our organization since the
1970s. Just recently, the NEH support leveraged the largest
programmatic grant in Historic Hudson Valley's history,
$643,000 from the New York Community Trust. Neither this grant
nor the resulting program, which is called Pretends to Be Free:
Imaging Runaway Slaves, would have transpired without the
validation of previous NEH support.
Some 14,000 New York City public schoolchildren will take
away powerful lessons from this program including many from
Congressman Josee Serrano's 15th District, the poorest
Congressional District in the Nation.
But before I go any further, let's turn to the 18th
century, a time when slavery thrived in both South and North
and newspaper ads like the one I am about to read from appeared
routinely. These ads are primary documents from our past, and
soon they will serve as tools for teaching young people about a
painful chapter in our Nation's history. From the New York
Gazette September 30, 1762, I quote: ``Runaway last evening
from his master, in Orange County, Johannes Blauveldt,
blacksmith, a Negro fellow. He is about 5 and a half feet high,
full faced, black hair, about 20 or 22 years old. He had been
whipped the day before he went off, which may be seen pretty
much on his right side. He pretends to be free. Whoever takes
up and secures the said fellow, so that his master may have him
again, shall have three pounds reward, and all reasonable
charges paid by Johannes Blauveldt.''
Imagine seeing such an ad today in any context, let alone
in a New York daily newspaper. Imagine sitting in a 7th-grade
classroom in the Bronx and seeing these words for the first
time. What would your reaction be?
Let me read to you the words of two students who
participated in our pilot of the Pretends to Be Free program in
Ossining, New York. Here I will quote from a statement by
Kahlilah L.: ``The biases contained in an ad written by a slave
owner affected me greatly in part because I am an African
American myself. The ways they describe slaves were that they
were like lost dogs, not as humans. And from Kahlilah's
classmate, Kirsten S., ``Slavery is always associated with the
South. Many fail to recognize that New York, a northern state,
used to be the largest slave-holding state of the North during
the 18th century. The way African Americans were treated, born
into cruelty and unjust realities, looked down upon and not
even recognized as humans, were all results of one genetic
trait: their skin color.'' This summer we will train the first
group of teachers to present Pretends to Be Free in New York
City classrooms.
Long before our first African American President took
office and 12 Years a Slave won the Academy Award for Best
Picture, the NEH recognized the importance of illuminating the
history of slavery in the colonial North. Pretends to Be Free
is among a number of programs that resulted from the NEH's
investment in our multiyear effort at Philipsburg Manor. That
is our living history museum located in Congresswoman Nita
Lowey's 17th Congressional District, about 30 miles north of
Manhattan.
In the 18th century, Philipsburg Manor served as a trading
outpost of one of the wealthiest New York City businessmen of
his day and one of the largest slaveholders in New York State.
Before the NEH made planning and implementation grants, this
history went untold at Philipsburg Manor. We at HHV have this
powerful history in our hands and yet we had not grasped it.
The NEH decided to invest in this material at a time when no
other funder would. NEH recognized this as a uniquely American
story.
The NEH's investment in our work has been strategic,
forward thinking and collaborative. Our colleagues at the NEH
have been hands-on, insightful partners. They have provided
unwavering guidance on what at times was a rocky journey in
presenting the difficult subject of slavery. Our experience
offers a prime example of how early NEH support can be used to
leverage additional funds and deepen an organization's reach in
the community.
All of us at Historic Hudson Valley urge fiscal year 2015
funding for the NEH at the Administration's requested level.
Thank you.
[The statement of Waddell Stillman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and we certainly thank all of you
for your testimony. Any questions?
Mr. Moran. No. It is all powerful testimony, and I happen
to know Mr. Reising, and he is one of my son's closest friends.
It is a terrific initiative that he has taken, but all of you,
thank you for what you do.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and I think we all agree that the
National Humanities is an important program, so we will give it
consideration.
Thank you for your attendance. You are excused.
We will ask the next panel to come forward: Mr. Ford Bell,
President of the American Alliance of Museums; Ms. Pamela
Hogan, Executive Director of Fender Center of the Performing
Arts and a constituent from my home town, Corona, California--
you came a long way--Americans for the Arts. Next, Ms.
Elizabeth Hughes, Deputy Maryland State Historic Preservation
Officer, Maryland Historic Trust, the National Conference of
State Historic Preservation Officers, and Mr. Thomas Cassidy,
Jr., Vice President for Government Relations and Policy, the
National Trust for Historic Preservation.
Welcome. If you did not hear my opening statement, we are
under a 5-minute rule. We have a lot of witnesses here today,
and a getaway day, so I am probably a little stronger on the
gavel than I would normally be but it is just the environment
we are in today, so I apologize for that.
But we thank you, and I now recognize Mr. Bell for 5
minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN ALLIANCE OF MUSEUMS
WITNESS
FORD BELL, PRESIDENT
Mr. Bell. Chairman Calvert, Ranking Member Moran and
Members of the Subcommittee, and Congresswoman McCollum from my
home state, thank you for the opportunity to testify this
morning. My name is Ford Bell. I am President of the American
Alliance of Museums, the world's largest museum organization.
The Alliance is proud to represent the full range of our
Nation's 17,500 museums, which employ 400,000 people and spend
more than $2 billion annually on educational programming.
My written testimony requests funding for a number of our
field's priorities including support for the Smithsonian
Institution and the Save America's Treasures and Preserve
America programs. But I will focus my comments this morning on
the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities and the
Historic Preservation Fund.
The National Endowment for the Humanities awards grants to
nonprofit institutions including museums for educational
programming and the care of collections. Last year, it made 123
awards to museums totaling over $11.5 million and supported our
State Humanities Council in every state and U.S. territory. In
2012, those Humanities Councils supported over 3,000 events in
museums and reached an audience of over 13 million people. By
supporting these activities, NEH helps advance museums' roles
as institutions of lifelong community learning and keepers of
our cultural historic and scientific heritages.
The National Endowment for the Arts provides direct federal
funding to states' arts agencies and makes competitive grants
to nonprofit arts institutes including museums. Last year, NEA
made more than 130 awards to museums totaling over $4.6
million. These grants help museums undertake exhibitions,
publications, conservation, public art works, public
programming, and more.
For example, the Fender Museum of the Arts Foundation in
Corona, California, received a $10,000 grant last year for its
Kids Rock Free Museum Education program. They are going to
elaborate on that, as you will hear more. The museum's program
provides professional-caliber instrumental classes to low-
income and underserved students.
Receiving a grant from the NEA confers prestige on
supported projects, strengthening museums' ability to attract
matching funds from other public and private funders. On
average, each dollar awarded by the NEA leverages $9 from other
sources.
We urge the Subcommittee to provide at least $154.5 million
each for NEA and NEH.
There is one additional request related to NEH that will
not involve appropriating one cent of extra money, which should
be good. Since 1975, the NEA's Arts and Artifacts Indemnity
program has allowed museums to apply for federal indemnity on
major exhibitions, saving them roughly $30 million in insurance
costs every year. The program has separate caps per exhibition
and an overall limit for both international and domestic
exhibitions, and Congress has periodically raised those limits,
most recently in 2007. Museums report that the current caps are
making it difficult to obtain indemnity on objects that would
have been covered in the past, exposing them to increased
insurance costs. As this problem grows, it will force museum
exhibitions to limit their scope or fail to go forward. We join
the Association of Art Museum Directors in urging the
Subcommittee to include language increasing the limits for this
program, which operates at virtually no cost to the taxpayer,
having paid out just two claims over almost 40 years of
existence.
The State and Tribal Historic Preservation Offices carry
out the historic preservation work of the Federal Government on
state and tribal lands. Historic preservation is critical, not
just to protect our heritage but to enhance local economies.
Funds invested in building rehabilitation have been shown to
create more jobs and more retail activity than those spent on
new construction. In order to continue this important work, we
request $50 million for the State Historic Preservation Offices
and $15 million for the tribal offices.
Thank you once again for the opportunity to testify this
morning on behalf of the vital work museums are undertaking in
your districts and across the Nation.
[The statement of Ford Bell follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Bell, for your testimony.
Next, Pamela Hogan with the Fender Center for the
Performing Arts. Welcome, Pamela, all the way from Corona. You
get the long-distance award, I think, so far.
Ms. Hogan. Well, it is my pleasure to be here, especially
at cherry blossom time.
Mr. Calvert. Get the microphone over there, and you are
recognized.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
WITNESS
PAMELA HOGAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, FENDER CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS
Ms. Hogan. Thank you. So again, I am very pleased to be
here at cherry blossom time. I feel that because you have so
many people speaking to you today, that it might be better if I
just play music for my 5 minutes.
I think that the people that asked you to join you today
wanted me to share what is so important about the NEA Challenge
Grant that we did receive for our Kids Rock Free School of
Music. The Fender Museum was started about 16 years ago under a
public-private partnership, and Mr. Calvert would know that
Fender Musical Instruments Corporation has a factory in Corona.
Between the city and the newly formed nonprofit and Fender, we
had a vision, or the founders had a vision of bringing not only
museum exhibits about the legacy of Leo Fender but also sharing
music education, and so the Kids Rock Free School of Music was
born. Fender and Roland Corporation filled the rooms with
instruments for the children, and today we still have many
children coming in. It is a very noisy, active place. We love
it. And the NEA Challenge Grant that we received helps us to
serve more children. A few of the ways that it does that, I
would like to share with how it has an impact with us.
The credibility of NEA is bestowed on us when we receive
grant funding, and that endorsement is something that is
meaningful to the community, to the parents in our program, and
NEA drives new opportunities. It allows us to serve more of
these children who are unable to pay for lessons and whose
families were affected by the high foreclosure rate in our
area, the low unemployment, and so now, though, they are taking
lessons, and I would like to share with you a story about one
of our fee waiver students. Tyler is a drum student, and he
used to play like this, his head down. He was very shy. And
after lessons, after support from his teachers and being able
to be in those classes because of the NEA grant, he now plays
with pride. He told me the other day how he is developing his
portfolio for his college applications. He will be the first to
attend college in his family. These are the types of children
that are at our center and thriving every day.
The NEA grant does leverage other funds for us. It helps us
involve the rest of the community. Parents volunteer for us.
Other corporations like the Lucas Oil and MAV-TV in Corona are
supporters of ours, and they are very pleased to be able to put
music into kids' lives as the NEA does.
I would also like to talk about how the NEA helps us build
communities. We are a proud member of the Americans for the
Arts and these types of organizations help us build
relationships with other organizations, other arts
organizations, including Arts Alive, a newly formed cultural
arts council in Corona, and these relationships help us to
build on those organizations that help support the economy. We
employ local people, we buy from local merchants, and we bring
people to our events and where they are spending money in our
local economies and bringing support for local and state
revenue. So we are very pleased to be a part of that whole
cycle of arts organizations, and we are working very hard to
use the NEA grant and leverage support for it in our community.
We support the $155 million of funding for National
Endowment for the Arts for fiscal year 2015, and again, I thank
you for allowing me to come, and I would entertain any
questions.
[The statement of Pamela Hogan follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Great job, Pamela. We live in a great city, do
we not?
Ms. Hogan. Yes, we do.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony. We will come
back to you.
Elizabeth Hughes. Elizabeth is with the National Conference
of State Historic Preservation Officers. You are recognized.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF STATE HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICERS
WITNESS
ELIZABETH HUGHES, DEPUTY MARYLAND STATE HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICER,
MARYLAND HISTORICAL TRUST
Ms. Hughes. On behalf of the 59 State Historic Preservation
Offices, which includes both states and territories, and SHPOs,
for short, I want to thank you and members of the Subcommittee
for your support.
SHPOs operate under a one-of-a-kind federal-state
partnership where the National Historic Preservation Act sets
the policy and the states through the SHPOs administer much of
the program on behalf of the Department of the Interior and the
Advisory Council in Historic Preservation.
The Historic Preservation Fund was created to provide the
resources to state and tribal preservation offices to implement
the program with states providing a minimum of 40 percent
matching funds.
The National Historic Preservation Program differs greatly
from other conservation programs in that it is primarily one of
assistance, not acquisition. The Federal Government does not
own, manage or maintain responsibility for most of our historic
assets. Instead, this program through the SHPOs provides
individuals, communities, local and state governments and
federal agencies with the tools they need to identify,
preserve, maintain and utilize the historic assets important to
them.
SHPO responsibilities are diverse, and I will highlight
just a few. Identifying and documenting America's historic
places is a key element of the preservation program and one
that is lacking at the current level of appropriation. I want
to share with you just one example of why this activity is so
important. In 2010, Colorado experienced its worst ever
wildfire at that point in time in the Four Mile Canyon historic
mining communities just west of Boulder. The wildfire resulted
in the loss of numerous and undocumented historic buildings,
which led the Colorado SHPO working with the Boulder County
certified local government to find a historical and
architectural survey that identified and documented the
historic buildings that were spared. The survey was then used
as a resource by the county, state and federal agencies to
determine where to direct future hazard mitigation and in-slope
stabilization efforts. This information was also used to ensure
that the historic character of the surviving areas was
incorporated into the rebuilding program.
When tragedy struck again last year, this time in the form
of massive flooding, thanks to the survey information already
collected, the county, state and federal agencies were able to
quickly direct resources to protect, stabilize and rebuild in
this area. This is just one brief example of why having
accurate, up-to-date and easily accessible information is
imperative. Doing so also increases the efficiency of nearly
all other projects that we work on from working with private
industry on development to state transportation planning
projects to federal large-scale energy projects. Every single
project and the American people benefit from having this
information at hand.
A recent survey found that states estimate only 35 percent
of their land area has been surveyed for historic buildings and
structures and less than 10 percent has been surveyed for
archaeological sites. SHPOs also estimate that only half of
their inventory documents are digitized, and 75 percent
reported they have 10,000 or more resources that are indeed of
resurvey since the original survey has been conducted 20 to 30
years ago.
With these needs in mind, we are asking that in addition to
the $50 million for SHPOs for operating funds, the Committee
also provide $6 million a year in each of the next 10 years to
survey inventory and digitally record our Nation's historic
resources. This information would help expedite the historic
preservation review process, called Section 1 of 6, another
essential responsibility for SHPOs. Each year we review over
250,000 cases and meet a 30-day review deadline. However, at
least 100,000 of these cases are now handled through
subagreements that increase efficiency, exempt routine
activities and allow for standard treatments without review.
SHPOs also conduct 90 percent of the review work for the
Historic Tax Credit program, which since inception has created
$109 billion in private investment, nearly 2.4 million jobs,
and rehabilitated over 39,000 historic buildings.
I want to thank the Committee for providing $500,000 for a
focused initiative to recognize historic sites associated with
underrepresented populations, and I request that the Committee
consider increasing the amount to $5 million for fiscal year
2015.
We also support the request of $15 million for Tribal
Historic Preservation Offices, and the request of our partners
at the NEA and the NEH, which you have heard from earlier
today.
Lastly, in the next few years we will celebrate the 50th
anniversary of the National Historic Preservation Act and will
seek to reauthorize the Historic Preservation Fund. We look
forward to working with the Committee to recognize these
landmark pieces of legislation, which create American jobs,
revitalize Americans' rural and urban environments, and
preserve irreplaceable pieces of American history.
Thank you very much.
[The statement of Elizabeth Hughes follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Mr. Thomas Cassidy, National Trust for Historic
Preservation.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL TRUST FOR HISTORIC PRESERVATION
WITNESS
THOMAS CASSIDY, JR., VICE PRESIDENT FOR GOVERNMENT RELATIONS AND POLICY
Mr. Cassidy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the
Subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to present the
National Trust testimony on fiscal year 2015 appropriations. My
name is Tom Cassidy. I am the Vice President for Government
Relations. The National Trust is a privately funded nonprofit
organization chartered by Congress in 1949. We work to save
America's historic places.
Before I highlight just a few elements of my written
testimony, I do want to express our appreciation for Mr. Moran,
who is not here now, but in the 15 years that I have had the
privilege of working with the Subcommittee, Mr. Moran has been
the one constant. There have been changes of leadership, a lot
of change of staff, but Mr. Moran has always been here, and he
has been a good friend, and the Nation's natural and historic
resources have benefited from his leadership and the Nation is
a better place because of his service. So thank you, Mr. Moran,
my Congressman too.
Elizabeth described very well the significance of the
Historic Preservation Fund and gave a full description of its
funding needs and opportunities. I wanted to thank the
Committee and highlight one program that you funded for the
first time in the fiscal year 2014 Omnibus, and that is a
program to provide competitive grants for underrepresented
communities to secure listings on the National Register of
Historic Places and National Historic Landmarks.
The National Register is the official list of the Nation's
historic places worthy of preservation. Currently, there are
86,000 entries included on the National Register. However,
current estimates place the combined representation of African
American, American Latino, Asian American, American Indian,
Native Alaskan and Native Hawaiian sites on the National
Register and less than 8 percent of all total listings. We
would support an increase in funding for this competitive
grants program to $5 million, which would begin to correct this
imbalance and ensure that the stories of all Americans and the
full spectrum of the Nation's cultural heritage are preserved
in our system of historic places.
I also wanted to touch briefly on the profound maintenance
backlog challenge of the National Park Service, which you all
know far better than I. But of the nearly $12.3 billion in
deferred maintenance, $4.5 billion is for the maintenance
backlog of 27,000 properties that are on the National Register.
Without funding, the condition of these properties will
continue to deteriorate and become even more expensive to
repair in the future. We support the President's request for
the Park Service construction budget, NPS operations, and also
the request for the Department's youth programs, and I would
like to highlight two small programs that have the capacity to
bring additional private investments into the parks that can
help abate this backlog.
First, as part of the trust commitment to advance the goals
of the 21st Century Conservation Service Corps, we have
recently launched what we call the HOPE Initiative, Hands-On
Preservation Experience, where we are training youth in
preservation skills while helping to protect historic sites
within park units. The first project has just been launched up
in Shenandoah National Park, where with funding not from the
Park Service but in this instance, the concessionaire, Delaware
North, we are rehabilitating the historic Skyland Stables. We
hope to launch 100 of these projects by the Centennial of the
Park Service.
Second, I would like to thank the Committee for including
not only in the fiscal year 2014 report language but in
previous years as well, you have highlighted the opportunity to
use historic leasing to abate the maintenance backlog, and I
would just underscore the significance of that. We have had a
number of conversations with the Park Service. They are making
progress, but there are continued opportunities to expand the
use of leasing and bring significant private investment into
the parks and make these places available to the public, which
many of them are not now.
So I would urge continued attention and oversight and
engagement in this issue because it really is making a change.
It is slow, it is going to take a while, but your continued
engagement is making a real difference, and as I see my time
has elapsed, I will stop now.
[The statement of Thomas Cassidy follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and thanks to this panel.
Pamela, I am just curious. How many students do you have
now?
Ms. Hogan. We have about 400 students come in, taking one-
hour-a-week lessons, in guitar, keyboard, drums and voice.
Mr. Calvert. Well, it is a great program. I know that Mr.
Miller is involved in that, Eric Clapton and a lot of the----
Ms. Hogan. Correct. Steve Miller has been a big supporter
of ours.
Mr. Calvert. The next generation of rock and roll.
Ms. Hogan. That is right. That is right.
Mr. Calvert. For all us old guys up here, it is very
important.
Ms. Hogan. You would love it. They also play classic rock
music. We enjoy it a lot.
Mr. Calvert. Any questions for this panel?
Mr. Simpson. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. I do have a question. How come we have this
poster over here that just shows a certain district in
California. I do not see a map for Idaho's second CD or Utah's,
or others.
Ms. Hogan. You would probably see just as many arts
organizations in those areas.
Mr. Simpson. I know. I appreciate that, and there really
are, and a lot of people do not understand the importance of
the arts and what it does, and historic preservation is very
important. I will give you a brief example. Back when we used
to do those Congressionally directed spending things that some
people called earmarks, I did some for a variety of things in
Idaho, and one of them was to restore the Wilson Theater in
Rupert, Idaho. If you have ever been to Rupert, Idaho, it is a
town of about 3,000 or 4,000 people. They have a beautiful
little community that has a park in the middle. It is one of
those communities that, you know, all the businesses are around
the park and everything, and the Wilson Theater was there, and
it was a historic part of this community and it had been run
down. If you see the pictures of it, it has been abandoned and
they went in with a small grant from the Federal Government to
start it, and all of a sudden the community got behind it and
it was almost all done by private donations and private work by
people there, and they have rebuilt this building and it is
going to be a community center, and it is absolutely beautiful
and brings back the history of it, and the other businesses
around this square went wow, they are starting to shape this
up, maybe we ought to do something with the fronts of our
businesses, and all of a sudden you saw a whole community
revitalized because of a small federal grant that started it
all. That is the kind of impact it can have besides preserving.
As I went through it and they were in the middle of
rebuilding, some of the old guys that were there when it was a
theater and stuff told me the stories about, yeah, I met my
wife right up there in that dark corner. I mean, it is history,
and I will tell you briefly before we move on, the guy said to
me, one day a bunch of kids snuck into this theater and it was
during a scary movie. One guy had a chicken under his coat.
They went up in the balcony and they threw that chicken off the
balcony in the middle of a scary part, and of course, on the
screen it is flapping around, people are screaming and stuff.
He said do you know who that kid was? I said no. He said Lou
Dobbs. He grew up in Rupert, Idaho.
Mr. Calvert. That explains it all. Okay. Well, I thank this
panel. Thank you for your attendance.
Ms. Pingree. Mr. Chair, can I sneak in here?
Mr. Calvert. Oh, I am sorry. I apologize.
Ms. Pingree. No, no, it is okay. I am so quiet down here.
I just wanted to reinforce, I really love my colleague from
Idaho's story because I was going to stay something somewhat
similar. I am lucky enough to represent the State of Maine, and
between this panel and the last panel, NEA, NEH, Historic
Preservation is exactly the same kind of thing. They are often
small amounts of money to help communities that are in a time
of transition. Historic Tax Credits have been a huge boon for
us in trying to preserve buildings that would otherwise have a
hard time finding the investment, particularly in the arts. I
represent a lot of fishing communities, and a somewhat similar
story of one is that when the last sardine packing factory
closed, people really thought it was going to be the end, and
because of, I think, NEA money helping with, a little bit of a
gallery. Most of the brick buildings on the street got
restored. Lots of galleries, lots of restaurants, lots of
attractions, and also other substantial businesses that have
been able to continue and balance between the arts.
I have been supporting this issue for 20 years since I was
a state legislator, and I think because of the efforts of so
many of you and other people just like your programs, people
have completely turned around in my state. Where they used to
think that arts money was sort of this like why should we
bother with that, it is not our core mission in this state, we
are manufacturing, fishing, farming, and now virtually every
community has a sense of, if you can get just that little piece
or that credit or preserve this historic site, it can have a
huge economic impact, and people think about it very
differently.
So these resources are critically important. What we do at
the federal level is extremely important, and I know my state
is always looking for more. So thank you for all that all of
you to.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady.
Next, we are going to have our next panel: Mr. John Garder,
Director of the Budget and Appropriations for the National
Parks Conservation Association; Mr. Daniel Rice, President and
CEO of the Ohio and Erie Canal Coalition, and a member of the
National Alliance of National Heritage Areas; Mr. Eric
Eikenberg, CEO of the Everglades Foundation; Mr. James
Lighthizer, President of the Civil War Trust; and Mr. Ian
Glick, Chairman of the United States Park Police Fraternal
Order of Police.
We are having votes going on, so Mr. Simpson is going to go
vote and then he will come back and I will vote, and we will
just kind of go back and forth as we go along on this. So I
apologize if you see all this commotion going on.
If Mr. Garder will take the mic, turn on the button and the
light comes on, and we are on a 5-minute rule but we appreciate
your attendance. You are recognized for 5 minutes, Mr. Garder.
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL PARKS CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
JOHN GARDER, DIRECTOR OF BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS
Mr. Garder. Thank you, Chairman Calvert. I appreciate you
having me here. Ms. Pingree, Congressman Stewart, it is a
pleasure. I am John Garder, Director of Budget and
Appropriations with the National Parks Conservation
Association. For nearly 100 years, we have been looking out for
our national parks and the people who love and enjoy them. We
have long enjoyed a good relationship with this Subcommittee
and have been encouraged by your bipartisan work, and
congratulate you on your Chairmanship position. I also want to
commend your staff, Dave and Rick and others, who have been
very helpful over the years.
Our request for this year is $2.6 billion for the National
Park Service, which essentially mirrors the President's
appropriated request but rejecting his $9 million request for
reduction in the National Heritage Area program. We have been
encouraged that members of this Subcommittee and its Senate
counterpart have expressed concerns about that cut.
In particular, we are prioritizing the $47 million proposed
investment in park operations as well as $10 million to the
Centennial Challenge program. We know and respect that it has
been a challenging time for this Subcommittee over the last few
years, and you all have had a constrained allocation. That is
part of why our board and council in their visits to the Hill
yesterday encouraged support for the Wildfire Funding Act. That
is something we recognize as very important to address the
budgetary concerns that that has caused to constrain this
Subcommittee as well as of course the need to address fire
suppression without borrowing from accounts within the
Department of the Interior and the Forest Service as well.
I will note that I am also the Lead Coordinator the
Coalition of Conservation and Environmental Groups, and in that
position have sought the support of other groups for that
Wildfire Funding Act and also have sought robust participation
in letters to the full Committee here and in the Senate in
order to encourage more a robust 302(b) allocation.
Mr. Calvert. All of what you are saying is going to make
Mr. Simpson very happy, and I think most of us all support
that.
Mr. Garder. Yes. Thank you.
The sequester, of course, has been very damaging as well as
the government shutdown. That has had an impact to ranger
levels, to visitor resources. That was a damaging time and had
an impact of course on the economies of local communities. As
Congresswoman Pingree knows well, that had an impact to, for
example, communities around Acadia National Park, and then of
course, when the government shutdown came, that enhanced those
economic challenges of the community of Bar Harbor and other
communities. And so we hope that in fiscal year 2016 the
sequester will not be returning because that was so damaging to
our national parks and to the visiting experience. We hope as
well of course that a shutdown will not reoccur but are
encouraged that really damaging development did outline to the
American public and to Members of Congress the vast economic
importance of national parks, which we have outlined to you on
a number of occasions, and I need not take your time again
except to say at least that every dollar invested in the Park
Service yields $10 in economic activity, which is an
extraordinary return on investment.
We are concerned, as many Members of Congress are, about
the deferred maintenance backlog, which has developed over the
years due to a number of things including reductions in park
operations, transportation, which addresses half of the
deferred maintenance backlog, as well as the reductions in the
construction account, a reduction in half over the 4 years in
today's dollars. So it is important for us to see that
addressed.
Director Jarvis testified to this Subcommittee last week
that ranger levels just are not what they use to be and that
the modest investment in park operations proposed by the
President would restore some of those rangers so critical to
cyclical maintenance of course which prevents the backlog from
growing as well as to those visitors' services that have a
direct connection to the economies of surrounding communities
because they are so important to the visiting public.
So of course, that investment in park operations would
address fixed costs. It would get some of those rangers back
and would start putting parks back, sending them back to where
they need to be as we approach the Centennial of the Park
Service but, of course, would not restore those ranger levels
to where they need to be.
We are encouraged that the President has sought legislation
to address the deferred maintenance backlog in a more robust
way. That builds on the Bush Administration's proposal for
legislation that would have mandatory funding to address the
deferred maintenance backlog and also a robust investment in
the Centennial Challenge, which would be a wise investment in
leveraging private dollars. We are excited about the
Centennial. We hope Congress can build on that.
In my closing comments as well, we are supporters of Land
and Water Conservation Fund. I hope that that can be supported
through legislation that would make that fund mandatory so that
the vision of $900 million per year can be recognized.
And finally, the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act,
we have been encouraged that Members of Congress have
recognized the importance of reauthorization of that bill. It
needs to be done, at least temporarily, by the end of this
calendar year so that the Park Service can continue retaining
those fees that are so important.
Thanks for having me.
[The statement John Garder follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Mr.
Rice, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ALLIANCE OF NATIONAL HERITAGE AREAS
WITNESS
DANIEL RICE, PRESIDENT AND CEO, OHIO & ERIE CANALWAY COALITION
Mr. Rice. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Subcommittee. My name is Dan Rice, and I am President and Chief
Executive Officer of the Ohio & Erie Canalway Coalition and Co-
Executive Director of the Ohio & Erie Canalway National
Heritage Area based in Akron, Ohio. I am privileged to be here
today to represent the 49 Congressionally designated National
Heritage Areas and to speak in support of the National Park
Service's Heritage Partnership Program.
Before I address the fiscal year 2015 budget request
pending before the Subcommittee, I would like to thank you on
behalf of all the National Heritage Areas for your steadfast
support over the past several years as well as the Subcommittee
staff, particularly Dave and Rick. You have just been
outstanding friends and supporters.
We fully appreciate that without the backing of each and
every one of you, we simply could not go it alone and most, if
not all of what has been accomplished over the past three
decades, would have been impossible.
As many of you know from firsthand experience, National
Heritage Areas have come to personify the model of public-
private partnerships that are vital to accomplishing the
mission of the National Park Service. Each National Heritage
Area works to develop dynamic partnerships among local
governments, nonprofit organizations, corporations, foundations
and others interested in conservation, resource development and
interpretation as a means to greater community and economic
development, and the fact is, these model collaborations work.
Recent studies undertaken by the National Park Service
verify that National Heritage areas are effective in conserving
nationally significant resources and they are implementing
their management plans with a high level of public engagement
and that they are leveraging their federal funding with
private, local and state resources by as much as five to one.
Consider for a moment that National Heritage Areas create
an overall annual economic impact on our communities of $12.9
billion, that they directly support 94,000 jobs while another
54,000 jobs are indirectly supported, and that National
Heritage Areas are responsible for generating $1.2 billion in
revenue paid into the Treasury in the form of payroll taxes,
income taxes and business taxes.
By almost any measure, the returns and benefits to our
Nation and communities far exceeds the modest federal
investment made by this Committee, and it is not just dollars
and cents that define the value of a National Heritage Area.
Indeed, as National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis has
stated, National Heritage Areas strengthen, complement and
support units of the national park system and are a vital part
of the National Park Service mission.
Unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, despite the nearly universal
support for National Heritage Areas, the Administration has
suggested that funding for this important program be
significantly reduced. On behalf of the Alliance of National
Heritage Areas, we think that recommendation would be a
shortsighted mistake and one that would severely undercut local
community and economic and conservation initiatives for
virtually no savings at all whatsoever.
Consequently, we urge the members of the Subcommittee to
follow the past practice and retain full funding for the 49
National Heritage Areas. As Director Jarvis has stated,
National Heritage Areas are places where small investments pay
huge dividends, providing significant benefits in communities
across the country and in partnership with our national park.
Working in partnership and collaboration with private, local
and state partners, we are stimulating community and economic
development, generating jobs and creating legacies for future
generations.
Mr. Chairman, I again thank you for this opportunity to
testify this morning, and this concludes my prepared remarks,
and I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.
[The statement of Daniel Rice follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Mr. Eric Eikenberg, CEO of the Everglades Foundation.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
EVERGLADES FOUNDATION
WITNESS
ERIC EIKENBERG, CEO
Mr. Eikenberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Calvert, Ranking Member Moran, Members of the
Committee, good morning, and thank you for this opportunity to
testify today. My name is Eric Eikenberg, and I am the CEO of
the Everglades Foundation based in Miami. We are a science-
based and research organization working toward restoring and
protecting America's Everglades.
I had the great honor of serving as Chief of Staff to your
late colleague, U.S. Representative Clay Shaw, during his 26-
year tenure in Congress. Congressman Shaw was a champion of the
Everglades. He authored the comprehensive Everglades
Restoration Plan, which is the blueprint for restoring and
protecting this vital ecosystem.
We are also pleased that the members of the Florida
Congressional Delegation on both sides of the aisle remain
steadfast in their commitment to America's Everglades.
We also recognize the vital work of this Committee. The
Everglades Foundation deeply appreciates this Committee's
ongoing support of Everglades restoration. During the past 20
years, this Committee in a bipartisan way has done more than
any other to advance the effort to restore and protect this
national treasure.
America's Everglades is an enormous and unique watershed.
This special place encompasses numerous federal interests
including 14 National Wildlife Refuges, two national parks, a
National Preserve and National Marine Sanctuary. Everglades
National Park is a crown jewel of the National Park Service
that draws more than 1 million visitors and generates more than
$146 million in visitor spending annually.
I am happy to report also, Mr. Chairman, that Everglades
restoration is working. All authorized projects are underway.
Several significant projects are in the final stages and we are
seeing success. The endangered Florida panther is returning to
the Picayune Strand. Scientists report that the C-111 Western
Project is already exceeding expectations, restoring freshwater
prey fish and habitat for the American Crocodile and Roseate
Spoonbill, all in just 1 year.
The 2013 completion of a 1-mile bridge along Tamiami Trail
is already improving water flow into Everglades National Park,
resulting in a more vibrant and healthier natural wonder.
These examples remind us that nature will rebound when we
take steps to undo the damage. With your sustained commitment,
the largest ecosystem restoration project in the world is
poised for success in protecting 67 endangered and threatened
species.
As you consider fiscal year 2015 appropriations for the
Department of the Interior, we ask that you invest in restoring
America's Everglades at the level included in the President's
recommended budget of $62.4 million. This will be money well
spent. An independent report by the Mathers Economics Group
found that for every dollar spent on Everglades restoration,
there is a $4 return. Restoration provides thousands of jobs
from construction workers to engineers. As work is completed,
jobs are increased in the fishing, hunting, boating, tourism,
real estate and other industries.
I am also pleased to report, Mr. Chairman, that with the
leadership of Governor Rick Scott and the Florida legislature,
our state-federal partnership has renewed strength. Recently,
Governor Scott matched National Park Service Director Jon
Jarvis's $90 million spending plan with $90 million from the
State of Florida to pay for the next 2.6 miles of Tamiami Trail
bridging. Director Jarvis and Governor Scott should be
applauded for working together and demonstrating a willingness
to remove obstacles and to get the job done.
While we have made significant progress, the greater
Everglades ecosystem continues to suffer from projects not yet
completed. During last summer, billions of gallons of polluted
water were dumped from Lake Okeechobee into the St. Lucie and
Caloosahatchee estuaries, causing environmental and economic
devastation. Children were told to stay out of the water. The
solution is within the comprehensive Everglades Restoration
Plan and the funding needed to complete it. Sustained funding
to keep restoration projects on schedule is critical to
avoiding collapse of the ecosystem, the economy and the
drinking water supply for 7.5 million Floridians and millions
of tourists.
The Everglades Foundation appreciates your continued
support in restoring and protecting America's Everglades, and
Mr. Chairman, just in my closing comments, on behalf of the
Everglades Foundation Board of Directors, I want to thank the
Ranking Member for his dedication and his tireless efforts on
this project as well as Chairman Simpson and his leadership as
the most recent Chair, and we look forward to working with you,
Mr. Chairman, as we go forward.
Thank you very much.
[The statement of Eric Eikenberg follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Clay Shaw was a good friend of all
of us who knew him.
Next, James Lighthizer with the Civil War Trust.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
CIVIL WAR TRUST
WITNESS
O. JAMES LIGHTHIZER, PRESIDENT
Mr. Lighthizer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am Jim
Lighthizer, as you said. It is my privilege to be President of
the Civil War Trust, which is a private sector Civil War
battlefield preservation organization. We have 50,000 members
in every state in the union, and we have been around for about
14 years.
I am here to speak in support of the Civil War Battlefield
Protection program, which has been authorized and reauthorized
all the way back to 2002, and with respect to this program,
this Committee has been very kind to us over the years, so I am
here to say thank you as well.
This program is somewhat unique in that the American
heritage land that we seek to save has been defined by a
committee of historians that the Congress appointed so the land
we are seeking to save and have been saving over the last 14-
plus years is land that your agents said we ought to save, and
we have been able to save under this program over 16,000 acres.
The other thing that is special about this program, in my
opinion, is that the people asking for the money--us--have skin
in the game. It is a one-to-one match. So it leverages federal
money one to one but it also requires the other half to come
from someplace other than the United States government, either
state governments, local governments and predominantly the
private sector, and in 14 years we have raised over $130
million, and a lot of it has gone to match the money in this
program and it has helped us raise that money because of this
match. So it has worked both ways.
It is an effective program. In the end, you do not own the
land--you being the Federal Government--you do not have the
maintenance costs; we have the maintenance costs. We pay the
taxes, et cetera. It is only from willing sellers. But the most
important thing, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, is
that this is our American heritage. This is the story of
America, and this is what we are trying to save, and with this
program, we have been able to be pretty doggone successful, in
my opinion.
And let me just conclude, I mean, obviously we would like
full funding, which is $10 million. I also recognize having
been on your side of the table once upon a time as a recovering
politician and having people with unlimited needs and you
having limited resources, I know you all will do the best you
can. We are grateful. It has been a great partnership.
I would also like to thank the former Chairman, Mr.
Simpson, and the Ranking Member, Mr. Moran, two great guys that
have been real friends of preservation, and I want you guys to
know I appreciate it. So thank you.
[The statement of O. James Lighthizer follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman. I am going to turn this
over to Mr. Simpson for a few minutes while I rush down to the
Floor to vote, and I will be back right away.
Mr. Simpson [presiding]. Mr. Glick, you are up.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
U.S. PARK POLICE FRATERNAL ORDER OF POLICE
WITNESS
IAN GLICK, CHAIRMAN
Mr. Glick. Good morning. Thank you, Chairman Calvert,
Ranking Member Moran, both of whom have just left, and
Subcommittee members. Thank you for the opportunity to testify
today. My name is Ian Glick. I am a police officer with the
United States Park Police. I am also the Chairman of the United
States Park Police Fraternal Order of Police representing the
rank-and-file members of the U.S. Park Police.
I am here to advocate on behalf of that rank-and-file
membership and on behalf of a very important albeit small
federal law enforcement agency, United States Park Police. I
need to speak to you today about the critical need to replace
one of the U.S. Park Police Aviation Unit's aging helicopters
maintained by the National Park Service and to advise the
members of this Subcommittee what we have identified as an
important financial issue within this great agency.
As the oldest one of the oldest uniformed federal law
enforcement agencies in the United States, the Park Police is
one of the few full-service federal law enforcement agencies
with both federal and state authority. We serve not only the
Washington metropolitan area, but also have field offices in
New York City protecting the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island
and San Francisco. While we do not have the Golden Gate Bridge,
we have the land on both sides of it, so that is probably an
important factor. We are also deployed quite frequently to
recovery efforts, most recently in New Jersey after Tropical
Storm Sandy as well as in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina.
One of the areas requiring timely action is in the Aviation
Unit of the U.S. Park Police. This unit provides aerial support
to U.S. Park Police operations and is located just over a mile
away from the U.S. Capitol in Anacostia. The U.S. Park Police
have three helicopters: Eagle 1, 2 and 3, Eagle 1, purchased in
1999; Eagle 2, purchased in 1989; and Eagle 3, purchased in
1983. All three U.S. Park Police helicopters have surpassed the
DOI replacement benchmark of 5,000 hours by wide margins and
their flight readiness and operating safety may soon be
compromised, if not already. Eagle 1 has 6,400-plus flight
hours; Eagle 2 has 9,000 flight hours and Eagle 3 has nearly
10,000 flight hours. On average, the unit logs more than 700
hours of flight time per year.
The Aviation Unit is the only fully functional, multi-
jurisdictional, multi-mission law enforcement aviation unit in
the District of Columbia. Nobody else replicates what we do in
D.C. It supports the Metropolitan Police Department, the
Maryland State Police, public safety agencies in northern
Virginia, the U.S. Secret Service, the U.S. Marshals Service,
U.S. Capitol Police, the Department of State and other local,
state and federal agencies as well as being an integral part of
the Maryland State med-evac system.
The Aviation Unit performs multiple missions including
criminal searches, surveillance, med-evacs, search and rescue,
escorts for the President and the Vice President and other
dignitaries, and any terrorism missions. Again, we are the only
med-evac, SWAT and rescue-capable aircraft in the District of
Columbia.
The Aviation Unit also provides air support for
demonstrations and public gatherings such as the annual Fourth
of July celebrations on the National Mall and Presidential
inauguration, to name just two of the most notable.
In addition, the unit provides air support for law
enforcement activities specific to the Nation's capital such as
clearing Occupy D.C. from McPherson Square and most recently
the horrific shooting at the Navy Yard. The Aviation Unit has a
wide range of missions due to its unique flight authority
within the most restricted air space in the world coupled with
a seven-day-a-week, 24-hour-a-day, 365-days-a-year mission.
To meet these standards along with the 24/7/365 mission
readiness, the Aviation Unit depends on having at least two
fully mission-capable helicopters at all times. Both Eagle 1
and 2 are twin-engine helicopters, Bell 412, whereas Eagle 3 is
a single-engine aircraft used primarily for in-house pilot
training and to accrue flight hours in a more affordable
manner.
I want to highlight the importance of having two fully
mission-capable aircraft available. These helicopters often
undertake very precarious missions such as low-altitude rescues
over water or difficult terrain. A single-engine helicopter is
unsafe in these conditions and cannot provide the torque and
lift necessary to hover in orbit for long periods of time. To
underscore this, the tragedy at the Navy Yard last fall is an
example of the hazardous missions performed by the U.S. Park
Police.
Some of the more prominent missions you may be familiar
with--Air Florida, 1998 shooting here in the Capitol, 9/11
where Eagles 1 and 2 both controlled the airspace and med-
evacked the wounded from the Pentagon. The shooting at the Navy
Yard this past fall further demonstrates the complexity of the
missions performed by the Aviation Unit, and we would ask
respectfully that Congress include $14 million in the National
Park Service fiscal year 2015 budget to replace Eagle 2 with a
new twin-engine Bell 412 or comparable mission-appropriate
helicopter. Further, we would strongly oppose the National Park
Service replacing Eagle 2 with a less costly single-engine
helicopter inappropriate to the unit's mission. That would
render the unit's ability to perform all of its mission nearly
impossible.
Thank you for your time today.
[The statement of Ian Glick follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Why would you replace Eagle II instead of
Eagle III?
Mr. Glick. Sir, Eagle III is a much smaller aircraft out of
the three, and because it is smaller, it consumes fuel at a
much lesser rate. So by having this older aircraft that is on
hand, we can use it for accrual flight time for pilots who may
not have met the flight time required for that particular
month. It is also used for doing training that might encompass
other officers, and honestly, taking the 412s up is more
expensive. It is just much more costly.
Mr. Simpson. Did the President request this in his budget?
Do you know?
Mr. Glick. No, he did not, sir.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. The National Park Conservation
Association--sorry I missed you and your testimony. I am here
now. Unfortunately they make us do that voting thing
occasionally and it just screws everything up. But an important
date is coming up with the centennial of the Park Service and
so forth. It is interesting that the debate between the
Everglades--it is not debate but if you listen to both
testimonies, it kind of shows the challenges that we face.
Park Service dedicates $90 million to Tamiami Trail. The
number one backlog maintenance problem with the parks is roads
and bridges for the national parks. I am not sure how much the
Park Service gets out of the gas tax. Do you know? I do not
know what the total is they get but that is up for
reauthorization and that needs to get done. And if there is a
way that we could bump the percentage up that they get to
address both the backlog and the challenges, I mean I suspect
the $90 million--well, this is new. That probably would not be
part of a backlog issue.
But that is the challenge we face in trying to do it and I
support what you are doing in the Everglades and look forward
to working with you on that. But we also have this issue so
there are a lot of challenges trying to address limited
resources and we have to figure out how we do that in this
coming year and we have to make sure that we get that in the
transportation bill that is being debated. So appreciate it.
Heritage areas, we always have challenges to heritage
areas. The expiration date runs and we extend those sometimes
through appropriations. We have done several of those in the
last few years and we always get challenged by our Resources
Committee. It sometimes does not want us to do that but yet
will not take up the reauthorizations. Where are we with the
reauthorization of these?
Mr. Rice. Mr. Simpson, basically they are still pending. We
have legislation that has been introduced in the Senate to
reauthorize 12 of the National Heritage areas that are
basically up for sunsetting, but there has been no action in
either the House or the Senate.
And really, your comment earlier about the theater in Idaho
is really a great example of where a limited role of the
Federal Government can leverage tremendous amounts of local and
private and state investment and it really makes a tremendous
impact on the community. So I really appreciated your story.
Although I do not have something as colorful as loving a
chicken going to theater, but we have countless examples of
projects like that throughout the country where a limited
investment by the Federal Government has just made a tremendous
impact on local communities. And really, it is generating jobs.
Mr. Simpson. Yes.
Mr. Rice. I mean that is the bottom line. It is all about
community and economic development. Our project in Northeast
Ohio, the highway in Erie Canal, it was built to transport
goods, and by revitalizing that, as Congressman Joyce did with
his tremendous support, we have been able to document about
$300 million of community and economic development impact
because of the project. And that is private money and that is,
you know, putting taxes into our local treasuries as well as
generating jobs.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Well, Dave just told me we extended 12 areas by 2 years in
the fiscal year 2014 omnibus, but there are others that come up
all the time and we need to have a more ordered process of
making sure we get the reauthorizations done so that actually
we do not have to do those things in the appropriation bills,
which, you know, anytime we step out of our lanes, it causes
controversy and the interior bill has enough controversy
without that.
But, Jim, you may be the only person I know that actually
served with Ulysses S. Grant. I am just kidding.
Mr. Lighthizer. That was a cheap shot.
Mr. Simpson. That was a very cheap shot.
Thanks for all you do in preserving these historic areas of
the Civil War and we enjoy working with you on that.
Mr. Lighthizer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simpson. Questions?
Mr. Joyce. No, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Dan did a nice
job of just answering the question I was going to ask him. I
apologize for being late, I was on the floor voting. Chairman
Simpson beat me here.
Mr. Simpson. I am nimble on my feet.
Mr. Joyce. You are very quick. I will give you that. I
appreciate all of you being here, especially Mr. Dan Rice and
the hard work you are doing for the Ohio & Erie Canalway &
National Heritage Areas.
Mr. Simpson. Next panel, Mr. Dick Pedersen, Environmental
Council of the States; William Becker, Executive Director of
the National Association of Clean Air Agencies; Marlene
MacEwan, Cancer Survivors against Radon; and John Calkins,
Association of State Drinking Water Administrators.
Mr. Pedersen, you are up first.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ENVIRONMENTAL COUNCIL OF THE STATES
WITNESS
DICK PEDERSEN, PRESIDENT
Mr. Pedersen. Thank you, Mr. Simpson, Chair Calvert, and
Ranking Member Moran, and Members of the Subcommittee. Good
morning, sir, and thank you for the opportunity to appear
before you today to discussed the proposed fiscal year 2015
budget for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
I am Dick Pedersen, Director of Oregon's Department of
Environmental Quality, testifying as president of and on behalf
of the members of the Environmental Council of the States,
including your state, sir.
States are on the front line of implementing programs
authorized by Congress and delegated by EPA. States take this
responsibility seriously and do this by using a combination of
federal and state funding. Federal funding is provided to
states through grants from the Environmental Protection Agency.
This grant funding is critically important. The proposed net
change to the fiscal year 2015 funding for states is an
increase of $20.1 million nationally. While modest and
acknowledging that the needs exceed this proposed allocation,
states encourage Congress to provide this critical funding.
I want to call your attention to five specific areas in the
budget. First, there is a need for increased state flexibility
in the dollars provided. A number of the proposed funding
increases are accompanied by budget justification language that
appears to limit states' ability to use these funds to respond
to state priorities and needs. Two examples are directions to
strengthen nutrient management efforts and directions to
develop approvable state plans for reducing carbon dioxide and
supporting state and local greenhouse gas permitting.
While states may agree and appreciate funding for specific
EPA priority efforts, states must have increased flexibility to
budget for and implement work activities. Directed funding
undermines state flexibility and needed support for ongoing
every day environmental program implementation.
The second specific area is the states' opposition to the
proposed shifting of funding for work related to air quality
from Section 103 authority where no state match is required to
Section 105 authority where a 40 percent state match is
required. This shift effectively reduces the amount of federal
funds available to states to deliver clean air to all
Americans.
The third area is the need for key investments in
electronic permitting and reporting. Many states and EPA have
taken proactive steps to invest in electronic permitting and
reporting. These systems allow information to be received,
reviewed, and acted upon more quickly, serve to facilitate job
creation, and create a more efficient and transparent
government system while helping industry comply. The modern age
of electronic infrastructure is certainly upon us and the
regulated community and the public we serve desperately want us
to come of age. Therefore, states urge you to fund the request
for $25.7 million for the Environmental Information Categorical
Grants to invest in state e-enterprise activities.
Fourth, we have concerns over the rescission of state grant
funds. The fiscal year 2015 President's budget request includes
a $5 million rescission of unobligated federal funds intended
for states. States oppose such rescissions. Rather, states seek
maximum flexibility to work with EPA to reallocate these
valuable funds to support important state environmental work.
Finally, I want to underscore the importance of state-
revolving funds. The fiscal year 2015 President's budget
request is proposed at $580 million less than fiscal year 2014
enacted levels for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State
Revolving Fund. These monies are a significant and critical
funding source to assist communities of all sizes in meeting
compliance mandates and creating jobs. It is also important to
note that Drinking Water State Revolving Fund cuts translate to
a loss of state personnel that provide drinking water
protection to citizens by helping communities, particularly
those rural communities that rely on this help.
Mr. Simpson, Chair Calvert, and Members of the
Subcommittee, I thank you for considering my testimony today in
support of critical funding for states. I am happy to answer
any questions that you might have. Thank you.
[The statement of Dick Pedersen follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Pedersen.
Next, Mr. William Becker, Executive Director of the
National Association of Clean Air Agencies.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF CLEAN AIR AGENCIES (NACAA)
WITNESS
S. WILLIAM BECKER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Becker. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Simpson. My
name is Bill Becker. I am the Executive Director of the
National Association of Clean Air Agencies, or NACAA. We are an
Association of air pollution control agencies in 42 states,
D.C., four territories, and 160 major metropolitan areas across
the country.
The Clean Air Act gives our members primary responsibility
for implementing our nation's clean air laws and regulations.
We have three major recommendations on the President's fiscal
year 2015 budget. 1) Grants to state and local agencies under
the Clean Air Act be increased $35 million above the
President's request; 2) States and localities be provided
flexibility as to how they spend that money so it is not
targeted; and 3) as Mr. Pedersen said, that grants for
monitoring fine particulate remain in Section 103 authority
rather than 105 authority because of the matching requirements.
I would like to touch on these three issues very quickly.
First, with respect to the amount of the grants, the
President's budget calls for increased funds, a net of $15
million over fiscal year 2014 levels, and within this request,
they are proposing a $24.3 million increase for new greenhouse
requirements but a cut of $9.3 million for our core programs.
These are the foundation of our air pollution control efforts.
We are pleased that the Congress recognizes the importance of
laying the groundwork for implementing these greenhouse gas
emissions standards. These requirements, these guidelines are
going to be complex, they are going to be resource-intensive,
and they are going to be expensive. And they are going to
require states and localities to collect emissions data to
implement permitting programs, to continue to meet with
stakeholders to make sure the guidelines are fair and
equitable, and to begin developing implementation strategies.
At issue, however, is that the President proposes to fund
those activities with cuts out of our core implementation
efforts, our core programs. And as I mentioned, the President's
budget proposes to cut these programs by over $9 million. These
programs are critical to our effort. The sad fact is that more
people die or get sick from air pollution than from almost any
other environmental or even domestic problem facing this
nation. There are literally tens of thousands of people who die
prematurely each year from air pollution and millions of others
who suffer disease as a result of exposure to air pollution.
Our members are working tirelessly and without sufficient
resources to implement the Clean Air Act. On a day-to-day basis
as part of their core programs, they are collecting emissions
inventories, they are carrying out complex modeling, they are
analyzing extensive data, they are developing state
implementation plans, they are operating monitoring networks,
they are conducting inspections, they are taking enforcement
actions against noncompliant facilities, and they are issuing
permits to the covered facilities, including some of the minor
sources.
We have struggled with insufficient resources for many
years and while the Clean Air Act envisioned that federal
grants to state and local agencies would fund up to 60 percent
of the cost of our air pollution programs, in reality, the
Federal Government has funded not the 60 percent but 25
percent, and states have been forced to assume the remaining 75
percent.
A study that we conducted a few years ago identified a
shortfall of $550 million in federal grants for state and local
programs, and while we understand that Congress is not able to
provide increases of that kind, even the modest increases we
are requesting would really, really help. So we are asking for
$35 million above the President's request not only to fund the
greenhouse gas obligations but also to fund the core program
initiatives I mentioned.
Second, with respect to flexibility, we strongly believe
that any increases we need for greenhouse gases and the core
programs not be targeted but be allowed to be spent flexibly so
that state and local agencies can spend the money where it does
the greatest good. We think this is really important. If the
state wants to spend it entirely on greenhouse gases and the
EPA is okay with that, fine, but if an agency wants to spend
most of its money on core program elements, then they should be
able to do that.
And finally, as Mr. Pedersen said, with respect to
particulate monitoring, our recommendation will not cost the
Federal Government one penny. It is merely to ask again that
Congress retain the funding of the monitoring for fine
particulate under Section 103 where no match is required rather
than Section 105 where there is a match. We are concerned that
if it is shifted, as the President's budget allows, many areas
will not be able to meet their obligations.
So in conclusion, we are asking for $35 million increase
above the President's request, we are asking for flexibility in
how to spend the money, and we are asking that monitoring be
retained in Section 103.
And I thank you.
[The statement of S. William Becker follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Next, Ms. Marlene MacEwan, you are recognized for 5
minutes. You are with the Cancer Survivors against Radon.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
CANCER SURVIVORS AGAINST RADON (CANSAR)
WITNESS
MARLENE MACEWAN
Ms. MacEwan. I am. Thank you, Chairman Calvert and Members
of the Committee. My testimony concerns EPA funding for the
Radon Categorical Grants known as SIRG and the radon program's
Environmental Program Management and Science and Technology
budgets. I testify today on behalf of my beloved late husband
Bob, who is no longer alive to speak out about radon. I also
submit this on behalf of Cancer Survivors against Radon, a
nonprofit educational organization that has not received grants
from the U.S. EPA.
Bob lost his battle to radon-induced lung cancer more than
9 years ago. We had never heard of radon and that is a big part
of the problem with the radon threats in America. Bob was
diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer on July 24, 2003. He was
a healthy 48-year-old father of four. We were devastated. How
could this happen to us? He was rarely ever ill. His doctor
estimated that the cancer had been in his body for 2 years,
which allowed the cancer to widely metastasize. We were
baffled. Bob had never smoked. But with some research, we
learned that radon exposure is the leading cause of lung cancer
among non-smokers. We bought a test kit at Home Depot for $12,
including the lab test, and we tested our home.
I called the EPA to ask about radon. I was told that the
average radon level in our area in Lake Oswego, Oregon, was 1.8
picocuries per liter, which is below the action level of 4
picocuries per liter. However, our home tested at 57.2, more
than 14 times the EPA action level. We had no idea.
Losing my husband has been devastating. Our future together
and with our family was gone in a moment. Bob lost everything
and everyone, an awful tragedy that has taken its toll on all
of us and will be with us for the rest of our lives.
More radon awareness would have saved Bob's life, so why is
the EPA closing down state radon programs? Bob could have lived
if we would have known about radon. When we bought our house in
1991, we did all the necessary tests and inspections that go
along with real estate. Unfortunately, radon testing was not
one of them. In fact, in 1991 it was not even offered to us as
a possibility. One out of every 15 homes in the U.S. is
estimated to have radon levels at or above EPA action level
standards of 4 picocuries per liter, which is 8 million in
total. Today, because of radon awareness, radon testing is
often recommended as an optional test during the inspection
process. Even with these recommendations, most homes go
untested. Mandatory testing and mitigation is necessary for our
homes and places of work and education to be safe.
Bob lived for 15 months and 10 days after diagnosis. His
death has been a major loss for me, my children, Bob's parents,
his brother, and our one grandchild and friends. I now have 7
grandchildren, 6 of which Bob will never be able to hold or
share their lives. This tragedy could have been avoided.
Lung cancer kills more people than breast, prostate, colon,
and pancreatic cancer combined. Radon alone kills more
Americans, about 21,000, each year, more than AIDS at 17,000,
drunk driving at 10,839, drowning at 3,650, home fires at
3,500, secondhand smoke at 3,400. Radon kills 55 Americans each
day, twice as many women as breast cancer and three times as
many men as prostate cancer.
Contrary to the EPA budget rationale, the State Indoor
Radon Grant program is not a redundant program and it is not a
duplicative program. Given the EPA's radon program voluntary
nature, SIRG is the only infrastructure that exists in the
United States of America to prevent further tragedies like the
one that has affected my family. It impacts other Americans at
a rate of 21,000 deaths every year. I note that this mortality
statistic, as cold and hard as it is, is based on outdated
census data of only 260 million Americans.
Forty-five state radon programs and up to 12 tribal
programs rely on SIRG to support radon awareness and education
of our citizens. Many programs provide free or low-cost test
kits to citizens in immediate need who cannot afford to test.
Stay radon programs work with community-based university
extension services, and they also partner with organizations
like the American Lung Association and other health and
education services provided to make sure that consumer
awareness is high and that they are able to find and locate
trained service providers. This will be lost if SIRG is not
funded.
And in the unregulated states such as Minnesota and
Colorado, SIRG funding provides the mechanism for the state
Departments of Health to do outreach to citizens and assist in
training and update certified radon professionals and to
provide consumers with listings of those certified
professionals. With technical support and their own staff and
the support of industry, Minnesota and Maine, a regulated
state, have created innovative policies for radon-resistant new
construction, addressing the problem before a home is built.
Maine, Ohio, and Illinois have enacted specific requirements
that work to address the proper testing and mitigation of
multifamily homes that adhere to the best practices of up-to-
date American national standards. Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio
have created specific requirements for testing and fixing
daycare centers. There are many more success stories.
On behalf of the members of CanSAR and their families,
especially those who can no longer speak to this issue, I
specifically asked for the following: Radon Categorical Grants.
For fiscal year 2015, EPA has proposed zero. That is absolutely
nothing. I am opposing this cut and recommending that $14.5
million be allocated to adjust for inflation. This request
mirrors other requests that you will receive from the groups
active on radon issues.
Additionally, the Regional 11.9 FTEs that oversee SIRG were
cut by EPA in its fiscal year 2014 submittal to Congress. The
FTEs need to be reinstated if the SIRG funding is to be
properly managed. We learned yesterday, verified by EPA, that
the FTE was not loaded into the regional budgets for fiscal
year 2014. Without the FTE to administer the grants and
restoration of the radon grant funding can have no impact.
Therefore, we bring this to the committee's attention and ask
that the committee address it to ensure the EPA will indeed
load a requisite FTE into the regional budgets to administer
the Radon Categorical Grants for fiscal year 2014 and fiscal
year 2015.
I support the Environmental Program Management budget for
fiscal year 2015, page 531, as submitted by the agency. I am
also requesting that $75,000 be reinstated under the state
program Science and Technology budget to ensure grants to
establish U.S. STAR radon chambers to inter-compare with
international STAR chambers to maintain quality assurance of
reference for the national radon standard.
Our nation needs this program to keep citizens informed.
Please reinstate the cuts to SIRG programming and the regional
support staff so that the states and tribes participating can
do their job. Together, we can save lives.
I do want to point out that these are people that have been
members of CanSAR that are no longer members of CanSAR because
they pass away from radon-induced lung cancer. This is the
president of CanSAR. She is the cofounder of CanSAR and she
lost her 10-year fight with lung cancer due to radon exposure
in November of last year and we miss her dearly.
And I would be happy to answer any questions.
[The statement of Marlene MacEwan follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Well, thank you for your testimony.
Ms. MacEwan. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for your testimony and we are sorry
for your loss.
Ms. MacEwan. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Next, Mr. Calkins, you are recognized for 5
minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ASSOCIATION OF STATE DRINKING WATER ADMINISTRATORS (ASDWA)
WITNESS
JOHN CALKINS, PRESIDENT
Mr. Calkins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Committee Members. I
am John Calkins, President of the Association of State Drinking
Water Administrators, or ASDWA, and Administrator of the
Arizona Drinking Water Program. ASDWA represents the state
drinking water programs in the 50 states, the five territories,
D.C., and the Navajo Nation in their efforts to provide safe
drinking water to more than 275 million Americans.
We respectfully request that for fiscal year 2015, the
Subcommittee appropriate funds for three key programs at levels
that help to ensure appropriate health protection for
Americans. The first two involve dedicated funding for states;
the third, the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund, includes
funding for both infrastructure and state programs.
States are responsible for ensuring compliance with federal
regulations covering over 90 regulated contaminants for over
155,000 regulated public water systems, but state activities go
well beyond simply ensuring compliance at the tap. They
administer very challenging multifaceted source-to-tap
programs.
Why are more funds needed for the Public Water System
Supervision Program? The number of federal regulations continue
to grow while at the same time federal funding support has been
basically flat. State drinking water programs are now engaging
critical phases of implementing a series of new and risk-based
challenging water rules. States have often been expected to do
more with less and have always responded with commitment and
ingenuity.
But state drinking water programs are in crisis. Simply
put, insufficient federal support increases the likelihood of
contamination events that puts the public health at risk. The
fiscal year 2014 appropriated level for the PWSS program was
$102 million, or about $2 million per state, at a level that
has not appreciably increased for about the past decade. States
recently identified an annual shortfall nationally of about
$240 million between available funds and funds needed to
administer their programs. We therefore respectfully request
that Congress appropriate $200 million for the Public Water
System Supervision Program to more appropriately account for
the enormity of the tasks that are facing the states.
This is why I flew in from Arizona today for this 5-minute
opportunity to present this, our main request of you today.
There are no other groups that you will be hearing from about
this other than me in an aggregate, but please do not allow
this lone voice to be drowned out in all the other worthy
requests you will be hearing today. There is no more critical
need than this, a relatively small increase to help ensure safe
drinking water for all Americans.
The state drinking water security responsibilities since
the events of September 2001, as well as more recent
experiences of devastating floods, droughts, hurricanes, and
wildfires, states have taken extraordinary measures to meet the
security and emergency response-related needs of the drinking
water community. States have provided assistance, training,
information, and financial support to their water systems.
After 7 years of supporting the state security programs through
a small grant of approximately $5 million in EPA's
appropriation, no funds have been provided for this purpose
since fiscal year 2009 and none were by the Administration for
fiscal year 2015. ASDWA respectfully requests $10 million in
fiscal year 2015 funding for the state security initiatives.
The Drinking Water SRF program, the primary purpose of the
Drinking Water State Revolving Loan Fund or DWSRF is to improve
public health protection by providing loans to improve drinking
water infrastructure, thereby facilitating water system
compliance with drinking water regulations. The payback on the
investment in the program has been exceptional. $16 billion in
grants and $2 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
funds since 1997 have been leveraged by states into nearly $24
billion in infrastructure loans for projects that have improved
public health protection for millions of Americans.
State drinking water programs have also used the DWSRF
funds to support technical assistance and training needs of
their drinking water systems. Up to 31 percent of these funds
can be set aside for that purpose.
More funds are needed for the Drinking Water SRF program.
The Drinking Water SRF program request in the President's
budget exhibited a downward trend. $750 million was requested
for fiscal year 2015 versus $909 million appropriated by
Congress in fiscal year 2013. At the same time, EPA's most
recent need survey indicated that drinking water system needs
totaled $384 billion over the next 20 years. ASDWA respectfully
requests $1.3 billion in fiscal year 2015 funding for the
Drinking Water State Revolving Fund program.
In closing, a number of incidents in the U.S. over the past
several years have led to illnesses or deaths from unsafe
drinking water serve as stark reminders of the critical nature
of the work that state drinking water programs do every day and
the dangers of inadequately funded programs. Vibrant and
sustainable communities are dependent on safe and adequate
water supply of drinking water. A strong state drinking water
program supported by the federal-state partnership will ensure
that the quality of drinking water in this country will not
deteriorate and will in fact continue to improve so that
Americans can be assured that a glass of water is safe to drink
no matter where they travel or live.
Thank you.
[The statement of John Calkins follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
There are questions, I am sure.
One thing, Mr. Becker, my area in Southern California is
probably the most regulated air in the country, I suspect, and
rightfully so. We have had a significant air issue over the
many years. Matter of fact, my close friend and colleague wrote
to the South Coast air quality board, Jerry Lewis, back in the
day, back in the 1960s. It has been a bipartisan effort over
the years to clean up air in Southern California.
But one of the more successful programs that is supported
by Senator Feinstein, myself, and many others is the DERA
program and it has remarkable results. You know, around here we
spent a lot of money on the studies and endless reports and so
forth, but when we have a real program that takes a dirty truck
off the road and replaces it with a truck that has 90 percent
less particulate, 2.5, and a significant improvement on ozone,
why would EPA ask to eliminate or zero out the program?
Mr. Becker. Is that a rhetorical question?
Mr. Calvert. Rhetorical, yes. I am going to get a little
feedback here.
Mr. Becker. Okay. So if I had more than 5 minutes of
testimony and more than 4 pages, we would have had probably
half a page on DERA because we worked on legislation. We were
very supportive. It leverages $1 for every $7 in benefits. It
ameliorates much of the diesel particulate black carbon problem
and it makes a lot of sense to fund. I can only guess that it
is such a popular program and bipartisan that possibly EPA may
just assume that there is a support here to fund it on top of
everything else.
Mr. Calvert. Yes. You are probably right.
Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Could you tell me what the difference between
Section 103 authority and Section 105 authority is other than
the 40 percent match?
Mr. Becker. There are a few differences. Section 105
authority is meant for more the day-to-day implementation
efforts. Section 103 is used in large part for monitoring for
research, for development. They are very closely related and
there is probably some intermingling, but the states get
generally get funded out of 105, although the fine particulate
monitoring network has always been in Section 103.
Mr. Simpson. Okay. And the reason I ask that is because we
have had tribes testifying the last few weeks and the issue of
radon came up with the tribes and the fact that one of the
challenges is that the 40 percent match and also in these very
rural areas, the tribes can't come up with a 40 percent match
to do anything about it. And they were wondering and I was
wondering if there is some program that allows a reduced match
rate in various areas depending on economics where we have done
that with some other programs. And I do not know if there is or
not but that is something that we will be looking into.
And let me just say that, you know, the challenge is this.
And I am sure you know this and you have probably all heard of
it before. We talk about state revolving loan funds. I love
them. I think they do a great job, but they are inadequate.
They are inadequate if we put another $1 billion into it. They
are inadequate if we put another $10 billion into it. The
reality is we fund for drinking water and wastewater probably,
what, $2 billion in our bill, something in that neighborhood,
$2.5 billion in our bill matched by state, right, at some
level. So if you took all of what local governments and states
are putting in and what the Federal Government is putting in,
what, a year, maybe 5, 6, $7 billion nationwide. We have got a
$700 billion backlog. This means in 350 years we can address
the backlog that exists today. And it might be even higher than
that if you ask the American Society of Civil Engineers--who
are going to testify next--it might even be higher than that.
The problem is is it puts huge pressure on a budget with
limited resources here and we talk about increasing it by $100
million more or $300 million more. We can't do that. It puts a
lot of pressure on the rest of the budget to do that and it
does not fix the problem. And somehow we have got to come up
with a better way to fund the infrastructure of this country
and wastewater and water systems is one of them. And I do not
know how we do that but it is going to take all of us putting
our heads together and finding a different way to do it because
we are not doing it now.
Anyway, I appreciate you all being here today. I look
forward to working with you on these challenging infrastructure
issues that we face and we hope to address the radon issue
across this country.
Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Just one last comment on radon, we think that
it is in particular areas and obviously sometimes it can be in
particular houses in a neighborhood and no rhyme or reason to
where that may be located. So we need to take a serious look at
how we deal with this in the future. So we appreciate your
testimony.
Thank you for your attendance. You are excused.
We will now introduce the next panel.
Mr. Brian Pallasch, American Society of Civil Engineers;
Ms. Ruth Hubbard, the National Rural Water Association; Mr.
Chad Lord, the Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition--I
figure Mr. Joyce and Ms. McCollum ought to be here for this--
and Dr. Robert Wiedenmann, former president of the
Entomological Society of America.
Are we all here? Okay.
We are on the 5-minute rule. You have probably heard of
that. We are trying to, because of time limitations today,
enforce that. So we appreciate your indulgence.
And with that, Brian, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN SOCIETY OF CIVIL ENGINEERS (ASCE)
WITNESS
BRIAN PALLASCH, MANAGING DIRECTOR, GOVERNMENT RELATIONS &
INFRASTRUCTURE INITIATIVES
Mr. Pallasch. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Simpson, good to
see you.
My name is Brian Pallasch. As was stated, I am the managing
director of Government Relations and Infrastructure Initiatives
for the American Society of Civil Engineers. I am pleased to be
here today to talk to you about the EPA budget and the USGS
budget.
Unfortunately, the President's proposed budget for EPA
continues the Administration's unfortunate trend of
shortchanging critical public health infrastructure. As has
already been stated I think a few times, the President proposes
to reduce spending on drinking water and wastewater
infrastructure from nearly $2.4 billion enacted in fiscal year
2014 all the way down to $1.75 billion in this coming year. It
is about a 25 percent cut in funding that we need for our aging
water infrastructure, as you so eloquently put.
ASC's 2013 report card, which we released last year, gave
the nation's wastewater and drinking water system the identical
grades of D, which is a slight improvement from a couple years
ago when it was a D minus, and that would be near failing, so
that is progress, not great progress but it is moving in the
right direction.
However, we know this has impacts on our nation's bottom
line. In 2011 we actually released a comprehensive study on the
potential economic cost to the nation if we do not start
investing in our water infrastructure. The Failure to Act
reports determined that current investment in water
infrastructure systems are not able to keep up with the current
need. We found that if current investment trends persist, by
2020 the anticipated capital funding gap will grow to more than
$84 billion. This investment gap may lead to $147 billion in
extra costs for businesses and a further $59 billion cost for
households. In the worst-case scenario in that year 2020 the
U.S. can lose almost 700,000 jobs due to this bad water
infrastructure.
The average annual effect on the U.S. economy is expected
to be $416 billion in lost GDP by 2020. Not investing in our
water infrastructure ultimately means future cost to households
and businesses. A water main break, of which there are nearly
240,000 a year or about 700 a day--I did not break that down to
the hour but it is quite a few--it not only disrupts traffic
but shuts down businesses and commerce. A water main break can
also impede emergency response and damage other critical
infrastructure.
Although America spends billions on water infrastructure
investment every year, drinking water systems still face an
annual shortfall of at least $11 million in funding every year,
and that is needed to replace aging facilities that are near
the end of their useful life and to comply with existing and
future federal regulations.
The investment shortfall for wastewater is similar and it
has been estimated to be nearly $300 billion over the next 20
years. These shortfalls actually do not account for any growth
in demand for drinking water and wastewater over those next 20
years, which is part of the troubling part of the equation
here. Nevertheless, EPA's drinking water budget, as the
gentleman said on the last panel, for fiscal year 2015 is only
$757 million for the SRF program. That is a 16 percent decline.
The clean water budget is even more dire. It is slated to
get $1 billion next year for the clean water SRF, which is
about a 30 percent cut from the fiscal year 2014 enacted
amount. We recognize that Congress is dealing with fiscal
issues if you will and a growing federal debt and deficits, but
the remedies for these problems must not come at the expense of
programs aimed at protecting our public health from the dangers
of increased contamination in our rivers, lakes, and streams.
We are recommending, although a little bit difficult, $2
billion for the clean water SRF and $1.5 billion for the safe
drinking water SRF in fiscal year 2015.
For the U.S. Geological Survey, which is one of the
nation's foremost science agencies, they produce scientific
data that is essential for the protection of the quality of
economically vital water resources, for the prediction and
monitoring of natural hazards, and for dozens of other
critically important technical needs.
The Administration's budget is a little bit of an increase
in this area. It is up about 4 percent from last year to 1.073
billion to get you the last decimal there. We are encouraged
that the fiscal year 2015 request includes $210 million for the
agency's water programs. That includes some modest increases
for stream gauges that would enhance our ability to monitor
high priority sites sensitive to drought, flooding, and
potential climate change impacts. The USGS operates
approximately 7,000 gauges nationwide. These gauges provide
real-time data which is used for flood and drought prediction,
recreation, and infrastructure planning. Our members use those
things every day and they give me interesting stories about how
they use them for planning bridges and other things.
The budget proposes $120 million for the agency's natural
hazard programs that assess the nation's exposure to
earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, wildfires, and other
hazards. We support the President's request in this area.
And I will stop now and be happy to answer any questions.
[The statement of Brian Pallasch follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Great. Thank you, Brian. I appreciate that.
Next, Ms. Ruth Hubbard, Executive Director of the National
Rural Water Association.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL RURAL WATER ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
RUTH HUBBARD, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, MINNESOTA WATER ASSOCIATION
Ms. Hubbard. Chairman Calvert, Ranking Member Moran, Mr.
Simpson, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to discuss EPA funding directed by this
Subcommittee to help small and rural communities comply with
federal rules under the Safe Drinking Water Act and Clean Water
Act. My name is Ruth Hubbard. I am the Executive Director of
the Minnesota Rural Water Association representing over 950
small and rural communities that must comply with all EPA
regulations and have a very important primary responsibility
for supplying the public with safe drinking water and
sanitation every second of every day.
My purpose in appearing before you is to explain the
importance of providing small and rural water and sewer systems
with training and technical assistance necessary to comply with
the ever-expanding federal requirements. Of the billions of
dollars provided to the EPA by this Subcommittee every year,
small and rural communities will tell you that they see and
feel the most benefit from the dollars provided to onsite
technical assistance initiatives. We urge Congress and this
Subcommittee specifically to ensure that EPA follows
congressional intent by including the operative provisions of
H.R. 654, the Grassroots Rural and Small Community Water
Systems Assistance Act, in your 2015 bill and fully fund the
authorized amount.
Over 94 percent of the country's drinking water supply
serves populations under 10,000 persons. These small
communities want to ensure quality drinking water. Local water
supplies are governed by people who are locally elected and
operated by operation specialists whose family drinks the water
every day.
When it comes to providing safe water and compliance with
federal standards, small and rural communities have a difficult
time due to the limited customer base and lack of technical
resources and staff. As a result, the cost of compliance is
often dramatically higher per household. The smallest town in
Minnesota has to comply with the same regulations as the Twin
Cities or Los Angeles, both of which have entire engineering
departments. My main point here is that communities do not need
to be told they have to comply; they need to be shown how to
comply in the most cost-effective manner.
For example, in the city of Herman, Minnesota, with only
117 homes, here is how this assistance works. The city was
having problems with excess rainwater entering the collection
lines and overloading the sewer system. The city was very close
to being fined when a technician visited onsite, calibrated the
lift station to get accurate flow readings, discussed the
overloading problem, and gave the operator a plan to solve it.
The city implemented the plan and avoided the fine, returning
to compliance and was able to reduce the amount of wastewater
entering the plants, thus saving them additional dollars in
avoiding an expensive upgrade. This example is being repeated
in hundreds of communities each week thanks to the funding
provided by this Subcommittee.
In closing, I will highlight the very positive policy
provisions this Subcommittee has included in the EPA budget in
the last few years. First, please continue to increase funding
for the state revolving funds. These are critical to help meet
the demand for water project funding in all communities, often
created by compliance costs.
Second, we are very appreciative of the Subcommittee's SRF
policy on ``forgiveness of principle'' directed to disadvantage
communities. This is a critical issue for the most burdened
communities.
And finally, we urge you to resist calls for the new water
infrastructure programs and policies such as the proposed WIFIA
legislation that will result in more public water subsidies
being available for private profit-making corporations and more
financially sound communities and will result in the EPA water
infrastructure subsidies moving from the neediest communities
to a handful of more financially strong communities.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee. I
am eager to respond to any questions.
[The statement of Ruth Hubbard follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thanks to the lady for her testimony.
Chad Lord, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
HEALING OUR WATERS-GREAT LAKES COALITION
WITNESS
CHAD LORD, POLICY DIRECTOR
Mr. Lord. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and
Members of the Subcommittee. It is an honor to provide this
testimony about our Great Lakes.
My name is Chad Lord and I am the policy director for the
Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition. Our coalition joins a
bipartisan group of over 50 Members of Congress and Senators in
asking you to support $300 million for the Great Lakes
Restoration Initiative in fiscal year 2015. We deeply
appreciate the trust that you have shown the region over the
last 4 years and ask you to maintain this support.
Thirty million people rely on the Great Lakes for their
drinking water and the entire country benefits from the
commerce that depends on these waters. We recognize that the
Federal Government is our partner in an endeavor to help heal
the lakes through undertaking one of the world's largest
freshwater ecosystem restoration projects.
Nongovernmental groups, industries, cities, and states are
forging public-private partnerships to clean up toxic hotspots,
restore fish and wildlife habitat, and combat invasive species.
We do this work because cleaning up the Great Lakes is critical
for the health and quality of life of the region. It also
drives economic development in communities all around the
basin.
Our nation's efforts to clean up the Great Lakes also
create jobs. These jobs include wetland scientists,
electricians, engineers, landscape architects, plumbers, truck
drivers, and many others. One hundred and twenty-five jobs were
created for a project to restore fish and wildlife habitat in
Michigan. One hundred and seventy-four jobs were created--some
of which were filled by at-risk youth--to remove dams and other
barriers in the Milwaukee River system.
A more specific example is the story of Jim Nichols of
Carry Manufacturing in Michigan. I met Jim last year. He told
me how the GLRI projects were adding new orders for his
manufacturing business. Their employees are being kept busy
building submersible pumps for GLRI projects that flood duck
habitat or drain areas to reestablish native habitat for sport
fishing. The jobs go up when you begin counting the men and
women at other companies who manufacture the pipes to the
pumps, the control structures in which the pumps are housed,
and the hunters and anglers and wildlife watchers that benefit
from the improved environment the pumps helped create.
And the job of restoring the lakes is producing results. A
Pennsylvania area of concern was delisted last year, the first
since 2006, and a second U.S. AOC since they were established
in 1987. Between 2010 and 2013, 29 beneficial use impairments
at 13 AOCs were removed, more than tripling the total number
removed in the preceding 22 years.
Based on Fish and Wildlife Service monitoring, GLRI-
sponsored actions are increasing self-sustaining populations of
native species important to the Great Lakes. For example,
efforts in the Saginaw River watershed have contributed to now
self-sustaining quality populations in the Saginaw Bay,
Michigan.
Our coalition has documented more than 100 specific
restoration success stories like these across the region, which
you can find at our website at www.healthylakes.org.
How the region is accomplishing this work is as impressive
as what we are doing. The GLRI as a model for large landscape
scale restoration. It ensures that the focus remains on the
highest regional priorities that were identified through our
1,500 person stakeholder process in 2005 that produced our
restoration blueprint. It also provides an outlet for the U.S.
to meet its obligations under the new Great Lakes Water Quality
Agreement with Canada.
Additionally, the GLRI sought to fix problems the
Government Accountability Office identified in 2003 when it
complained that there was inadequate coordination among federal
agencies and between federal and nonfederal stakeholders. The
GLRI lets federal agencies quickly convert their funding to
supplement restoration activities through existing authorized
programs. This allows for funds to move quickly through
interagency agreements onto the ground. The GLRI provides an
orchestra leader, accelerates progress, and avoids potential
duplication of effort, all of which help save taxpayers money
while focusing efforts on the highest consensus-based
priorities.
Unfortunately, the health of the Great Lakes continues to
be seriously threatened by problems such as sewage overflows
that close beaches, and while we have cleaned up 2 AOCs, there
are still 27 more to go. Algal blooms in Lake Erie and other
lakes still result in canceled charter boat tours, closed
beaches, and threaten public health. Our work is not done.
First, please maintain support for the Great Lakes
Restoration Initiative. Second, please remove all doubt that
the region is on the right path and pass legislation that
specifically authorizes the GLRI. Currently, EPA is using
existing authorities coupled with legislative language that you
provide as a statutory basis for its coordinating role.
Legislation like Representative David Joyce's will create
greater certainty for the program and allow everyone to focus
on getting the job done.
And lastly, we feel we need a better coordinated effort
around research monitoring and assessment. Please ensure that
the region's scientists are engaged in producing and helping
implement, coordinate, and better communicate all the federal
and nonfederal research, monitoring, and assessment that is
already ongoing and also required as necessary for future
success.
Thank you again for the opportunity to share our views with
you. The GLRI is delivering results. More work remains to be
done. Cutting funding now will only make projects harder and
more expensive the longer we wait.
I yield back.
[The statement of Chad Lord follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson [presiding]. Thank you.
Mr. Wiedenmann.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA
WITNESS
ROBERT N. WIEDENMANN, FORMER PRESIDENT
Mr. Wiedenmann. Thank you, Mr. Simpson, Mr. Stewart. Thank
you for the opportunity to testify. Good morning to you.
My name is Robert Wiedenmann. I am the head of the
Department of Entomology at the University of Arkansas, and
there I work on biological control of insects and weeds,
invasive species.
But I am here today in my role as past president of the
Entomological Society of America, or ESA. With nearly 7,000
members, ESA is the largest organization in the world that
serves the scientific and professional needs of entomology. On
their behalf, I am here to request robust fiscal year 2015
appropriations for the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest
Service and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which
carry out critical entomological-related activities.
Advances in forestry and environmental sciences, including
the field of entomology, help protect against threats that
impact our nation's economy, public health, and food security.
The Forest Service forest and rangeland research budget
supports the development and delivery of scientific data and
innovative technologies to improve the health, use, and
management of the nation's forests and rangeland. Within forest
and rangeland research, the invasive species program area uses
scientifically based approaches to prevent the introduction and
reduce the spread of the impact of invasive insects and weeds,
which have serious economic and environmental consequences for
the nation. One species alone, the emerald ash borer, costs
Americans nearly $5 billion a year in direct costs.
ESA strongly opposes the proposed cuts to forest and
rangeland research that are in the President's fiscal year 2015
budget request, especially the 8 percent reduction of funding
for invasive species research and development.
ESA also requests continued investment in the Forest Health
Management Program within the Forest Service, which conducts
critical mapping and surveys on public and private lands to
monitor and assess risks from potentially harmful insects,
diseases, and invasive plants. The program also provides
assistance to state and local partners to help prevent and
control outbreaks that endanger forest health.
For the Environmental Protection Agency, ESA requests full
support for the pesticide licensing program area, which
evaluates and regulates new pesticides to ensure safe and
proper usage by consumers. Pesticides registered by EPA protect
public health and the nation's food supply by controlling
insects that act as disease vectors or invasive insects that
endanger our environment. EPA's activities support the use of
integrated pest management, or IPM, which uses entomological
knowledge and other science-based knowledge to manage insect
pests. The use of IPM often reduces costs and results in a more
targeted use of pesticides.
ESA also requests that the Subcommittee maintain support
for the EPA State and Tribal Assistance Grant on pesticide
program implementation.
Finally, ESA supports a proposal in the President's fiscal
year 2015 budget request to establish a $45 million multiagency
initiative addressing pollinator health. As part of the
initiative, EPA would examine the potential impact of
pesticides on bees and ensure that pesticides represent
unacceptable risk to pollinator health.
Pesticides are an important part of safe production of
crops that feed our nation. Equally, food production is reliant
on healthy populations of bees and other pollinators.
Pesticides represent just one of the many threats that bees
have. Continued entomology research in these agencies is needed
to understand the complexity of colony collapse disorder and
tease apart the multiple stresses that threaten bee health.
EPA's role in the pollinator initiative is critical to balance
the risks that pesticides may pose to bees with the benefits
that pesticides provide for crop production.
I want to thank you for the opportunity to offer the
Entomological Society of America's support for Forest Service
and EPA programs and I am happy to answer any questions.
[The statement of Robert N. Wiedenmann follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you all for your testimony. I went up
one day to the Nez Perce reservation and they have a program
that they are working with the University of Idaho on that does
exactly what you are talking about. They bring in the natural
bugs to kill some of the invasive species from other places and
it is fascinating to watch because 3 or 4 years before I was up
there in South Fork, there was a weed that had come in and had
yellow flowers and the whole hillside was just yellow and they
did not use any chemicals to kill it. They released some of
these bugs and today it is gone, amazing stuff. But that is
good work that you all do and your society does. I appreciate
it.
I am surprised that Joyce and Betty were not here to
protect the Great Lakes because if Kim was still here he would
tell you if they are not going to protect them, he is taking it
to California because they have a severe drought there.
But anyway, you both bring up very challenging problems we
face with the infrastructure, not just water and wastewater
infrastructure but infrastructure across the board in this
country and it is something Congress is going to have to deal
with. I think that our infrastructure needs are the second
biggest problem next to the debt and deficit and getting it
under control. Until we get the debt and deficit under control,
we cannot do any of our other priorities. So I appreciate your
testimony and thank you for being here today.
The last panel this morning is Kathy DeCoster, Vice
President and Director of Federal Affairs for the Trust for
Public Land; Alan Rowsome, Senior Director of Government
Relations for Lands for the Wilderness Society; and Reid is the
president of the Wilderness Land Trust.
And I am going to go vote.
Mr. Calvert. I think Mike might have already mentioned we
are operating under a 5-minute rule. We appreciate your
attendance and we are anxious to listen to your testimony.
And with that, Ms. DeCoster.
Ms. DeCoster. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. You are recognized.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE TRUST FOR PUBLIC LAND
WITNESS
KATHY DECOSTER, VICE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR OF FEDERAL AFFAIRS
Ms. DeCoster. I really appreciate the invitation to testify
this morning and also just wanted to express gratitude to you
and the other members of the Subcommittee for the time you
spent listening to everyone, whether it is me or others. It is
I think an unknown and underappreciated use of your time so we
appreciate it.
I am Kathy DeCoster, Vice President and Director of Federal
Affairs for the Trust for Public Land. I am here to talk about
a set of federal conservation programs that are under your
jurisdiction that have a very significant impact at the local,
state, and federal levels. These are programs that bring
numerous public benefits. They enjoy wide community support.
They leverage significant other dollars and they support local
economies.
In my written testimony I cover a number of those programs
but I did want to focus in my 5 minutes today on the Land and
Water Conservation Fund. We understand the many challenges you
face in putting your bill together and appreciate your support
for LWCF and the other programs in the last bill, in the fiscal
year 2014 Omnibus bill. I know that was a challenging bill to
put together so we really appreciate that.
We do support the budget proposal for full funding for
LWCF, and as it relates to your bill, we know that proposal is
split between discretionary funds and mandatory funds. We hope
that you will be able to find at least the $350 million that is
budgeted in the discretionary side and the President's
proposal. Those funds will support a number of specific
conservation projects that we and others are working on in many
states. It will also support grants to states and local
communities through the other side of programs under LWCF.
Our overall goal that we have been working on is to ensure
that the $900 million that is deposited every year into the
LWCF account is used to support conservation, outdoor
recreation needs across that entire spectrum from local to the
federal. And without that broader commitment on the way up to
$900 million, we see a number of conservation opportunities
that could be lost. We are working on a 22,000 acre forest in
Maine that supplies 4 percent of the nation's maple sugar
operations. We are working on trail access outside Salt Lake
City. All those are in the broader, bigger ask but they are
important projects to those communities.
The bigger number will also help fund additional grants to
states through the state and local program and would fund a
UPARR program, which provides improvements to parks and
playgrounds. And that is something that my organization works
quite a lot on, making sure communities have a safe place to
play and easy access to that.
So we really appreciate the comments you have made recently
about trying to work on a solution on that mandatory side. You
and Mr. Simpson have very helpfully talked about that so we
look forward to working with you on that. We know the mandatory
side is not something that will occur in your bill but we hope
we can work with you all on that.
You will no doubt hear from others on this panel and
elsewhere about specific conservation needs, national trails,
forest conservation, historic sites, battlefields, park in-
holdings, habitat protection, and wilderness in-holdings. And
LWCF supports all of these needs and more at the state and
local level. You may know we are working with Riverside County
to implement that Habitat Conservation Plan they were
instrumental in putting together years ago and that helps with
a balanced approach to endangered species protection and
development and it is kind of a win-win solution so LWCF
supports that.
We are working with one of the major forest landowners in
the country in Idaho on a project that would protect drinking
water for about 500,000 people in northern Idaho. LWCF helps us
and many others find those conservation solutions that matter
to communities and leave a very important legacy for the
future, for jobs, for the local economies, and for, you know,
quality of life in those communities.
On the federal acquisitions side, those agency acquisitions
we see fill in some critical missing pieces of the public land.
The suite of agencies that manage public lands, they protect
important national resources. They help solve management
problems if you think about the checkerboard--I do not even
know what to call it--the situation that was left over from the
railroad checkerboard agreement. That is a management challenge
for most agencies. And it also opens up access to recreation
when we protect those sites.
And then the suite of state and local programs, so Forest
Legacy, the State and Local Assistance Grants, the Battlefield
Grants, Section 6, and the Urban Park Program, they all help
states and local communities meet various needs, jobs in the
woods, public access for hunting and fishing, close-to-home
recreation, wildlife habitat protection, and safe places to
play, and historic sites.
And so we look at LWCF as an incredibly important program
that is not one-size-fits-all and so one community may need one
kind of program that is under LWCF and another may need a
different type of program. But together, they allow
conservation to be accomplished across the board, across the
entire continuum from cities to wilderness.
I just want to also mention we do support the set-aside
under the Park Service state and local grant program that you
included in the '14 bill and that is proposed in the budget for
'15, the $3 million for a competitive grant program. We see
that as leveraging significant other dollars in those
communities that will apply for those grants, and we want to
work with you on its successful implementation.
So just in closing I wanted to reiterate that LWCF offers a
flexible approach to conservation across that entire continuum
to help meet some challenges and support community needs and we
would urge you to fund it again understanding again the
challenges that you have.
So we value the role you all play in making sure that
conservation is achieved in the most strategic way possible and
we will work with you to figure that out. Thank you.
[The statement of Kathy DeCoster follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Well, thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Mr. Alan Rowsome, the Wilderness Society. You are
recognized----
Mr. Rowsome. I am sorry. I am battling a cold here so I
think I can get through it----
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
Mr. Rowsome [continuing]. Just fine.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE WILDERNESS SOCIETY
WITNESS
ALAN ROWSOME, SENIOR DIRECTOR OF GOVERNMENT RELATIONS FOR LANDS
Mr. Rowsome. Chairman Calvert, on behalf of the Wilderness
Society and our 500,000 members and supporters, we thank you
for the opportunity to testify before the Subcommittee today.
We are excited and pleased by your ascension to the chair seat
and we would also like to thank all of your staff around the
room for their commitment to the many federal programs and
projects that support our public lands.
Before starting, it is important to acknowledge that the
budget times we live in have and continue to demand creative
and innovative problem-solving, but at the same time, we must
be clear that the allocation for the fiscal year 2015 Interior
Environment bill will not be sufficient to meet the needs we
all know exist on our national parks, forests, wildlife
refuges, and wilderness areas.
2014 is the year when we should we celebrating two of the
most important conservation achievements of our nation's
history: the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act, and the
Land and Water Conservation Fund Act. Instead, we continue to
face chronic underfunding of both our National Wilderness
Preservation System and a long-standing broken promise of the
American people of offshore oil royalty revenues that are
intended to fund the LWCF.
Our 110 million acres of wilderness nationwide are severely
underfunded despite providing the purest and often most sought-
after outdoor recreation experiences one can have. With a very
small $5 million increase in fiscal year 2015 spread over all
four agencies or a mere 45 cents per acre, wilderness managers
could manage trails more effectively, hire more law enforcement
agents, provide better education programs, and do baseline
assessments necessary to understand the unique nature of these
incredible wildlands. These dollars would easily pay for
themselves with increased visitor experiences, less backlog of
stewardship plans, better training for wilderness
superintendents, improved interagency coordination, and less
litigation risk due to management and consistency. We urge the
committee to consider a $5 million increase for agency
wilderness management to commemorate this, the 50th anniversary
of the Wilderness Act.
Mr. Chairman, your commitment to finding a long-term
solution to the Land and Water Conservation Fund is welcome and
much appreciated. The Wilderness Society looks forward to
working with you to make it a reality. We support the
President's proposal of $350 million in discretionary funding
for LWCF, as well as the additional $550 million in mandatory
dollars that is recommended to reach the fully funded level of
$900 million.
LWCF has increasingly become a toolbox of conservation
utilized differently in local communities depending on their
specific needs and opportunities. In California alone, the
fiscal year 2015 LWCF request contains prudent acquisitions
within all four land management agencies, several working
forest projects within the Forest Legacy Program, significant
cooperative endangered species dollars, and the highest
allocation of local state park grant funding in the nation.
These investments will provide critical access points to
hunters and outdoor recreation enthusiasts across the state,
allow farmers and ranchers to continue to make a living while
placing their lands under conservation easement, protect
habitat and species to ideally avoid ESA listings, and provide
urban underserved youth with opportunities to experience the
outdoors and live a more healthy life as they can better
appreciate the amazing natural heritage of our country.
Given that funding for these important conservation
programs will be difficult to find, the Wilderness Society is
also a strong proponent of the President's proposal to better
manage wildfire funding. As you know, fire seasons are longer
and more severe than ever, and the recommendation of $954
million in new budget authority under the flame suppression cap
will eliminate the need to pillage other conservation accounts
to pay for the suppression of our worst fires. We hope that at
the very least this proposal begins a true discussion about how
the Federal Government pays for fire costs in the years ahead.
TWS is also a very strong proponent of transitioning our
country to a sustainable energy economy by developing our
renewable energy resources quickly and responsibly. We believe
renewable energy is an appropriate use of the public lands when
sited in an area screened for habitat, resource, and cultural
conflicts. Identifying and avoiding those conflicts early on is
essential to ensure our local communities, counties, and the
clean energy industry are allied around smart projects that
grow our economy. For example, planning for renewable energy in
places like Southern California where we have the Desert
Renewable Energy Conservation Plan will help avoid costly
conflict in delays and allow important public input.
This budget should also include needed funding to designate
transmission corridors and low-conflict places on public lands
to ensure future lands can be sited with confidence in the West
and allow for the expansion of renewable energy.
In closing, I defer to my written testimony to highlight a
number of other important conservation priorities worthy of
support and strong funding. They are prudent investments that
help local economies create jobs and provide livable,
sustainable communities. The Wilderness Society appreciates
your commitment to our public lands and wild places and we look
forward to working with you now and in the future to ensure
that we steward our nation's natural resources in a
responsible, balanced way.
Thanks for the opportunity to testify today and I would be
happy to take any questions you might have.
[The statement of Alan Rowsome follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Great. Thank you for your testimony.
Next, Reid Haughey. Thank you for coming. You are with the
Wilderness Land Trust. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
WILDERNESS LAND TRUST
WITNESS
REID HAUGHEY, PRESIDENT
Mr. Haughey. Thank you, Chairman Calvert. I appreciate the
opportunity to speak with you today. And I would also like to
acknowledge the patience and support of my wife who is willing
to have me be several thousand miles away on her birthday. So I
would like the record to reflect that.
Mr. Calvert. So noted.
Mr. Haughey. Yes. Thank you very much.
My name is Reid Haughey and I have the distinct pleasure of
working for the Wilderness Land Trust. We have been an
organization around for 22 years focused solely on the
acquisition and transfer of in-holdings within designated and
proposed wilderness areas. And I am here today to both thank
the committee for its long-standing and steadfast support for
the in-holding accounts within the Land and Water Conservation
Fund and to ask that continue to consider modest annual funding
of about $3-$5 million per agency on into the future.
These have been very helpful and effective in both
completing our nation's wilderness areas and also being able to
keep the promise to the private landowners that are within the
wilderness areas that if they wish to sell, that the United
States will be ready to buy their property.
So why should we worry about this? The National Wilderness
Preservation System, when established by Congress, also
includes private lands that mostly are remnants of 19th century
congressional expansion in the West within it. And many of
those landowners are trying to figure out what to do with their
lands that are within these now designated wilderness areas and
oftentimes wish to sell and move their assets somewhere else.
We as conservationists wish to acquire the property, complete
the wilderness area so that it can serve the purpose that it
was intended to serve when it was designated.
So annual funding in our experience has been that only
about 3 to 5 percent of these properties come on the market in
any one year, about once a generation. And small modest annual
funding, as Congress has been willing to do in the past and we
hope will continue to do in the future, has been very effective
at meeting that need when those landowners wish to sell.
So we are not asking for a new program or an expansion of
what Congress has historically been doing; we ask that it
continue to fund those in-holding accounts.
I should note that for the 50th anniversary of the
Wilderness Act, the Land Trust undertook an inventory of all of
the in-holdings within the National Wilderness Preservation
System. When we started 22 years ago, we estimated that there
were 400,000 acres of lands within the system, private lands.
There are state lands, there are native corporations that are
lands in Alaska and whatnot. But in the lower 48, there were
400,000 acres of private in-holdings. That now is down to
180,000 acres over that generation's worth of work. We think it
has been a very effective and meaningful program over these
last 20 years and hope that it will be continued.
So we think consistent funding is vital to being able to
complete this work, is vital to being able to secure the
wilderness areas that Congress has worked to preserve and hope
that you will consider that in this upcoming year.
Thank you.
[The statement of Reid Haughey follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. I hear a common thread on the Land
and Water Conservation Fund and, as you know, we have several
challenges. Mr. Simpson is working on a wildfire bill, which I
support, many people support, which we need to pass or we
cannot put that in our bill under the budget rules subject to a
point of order.
On the Land and Water Conservation Fund we would like to
resolve that, too, but we have another problem, PILT, Payment
In Lieu of Taxes, which in these small rural areas that have a
predominance of federal land is extremely important in how they
fund their communities.
And then on a side note we have this Secure Rural Schools
issue with the small school districts in the rural communities
that have struggled to pay for their children's education.
So those are challenges that we have to do. We probably
cannot get them all done this year unfortunately in this budget
process, which is somewhat condensed, but it is something that
we need to work on together to resolve. It is not just the
Appropriations Committee that can resolve this. We pay the
bills, obviously, but I would suggest that you work with the
authorizing committees. I am sure you do. Mr. Bishop will be
the incoming Chairman of that Committee. I think he has some
ideas that would hopefully move the ball forward on this, too,
and he understands that these are challenges that we all face
as we move forward because it affects every part of the budget,
not just wilderness and consistent funding. But it affects all
of our budgeting processes as we move forward, so it is a big
challenge.
But we thank you for your testimony and we will recess
until one o'clock. Thank you.
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AFTERNOON SESSION
Mr. Calvert. Committee will come to order. Good afternoon.
Welcome to the Subcommittee's second public witness hearing.
This afternoon the Subcommittee will be hearing from a cross-
section of individuals representing a wide variety of issues
addressed by the Subcommittee.
The Chair will call each panel of witnesses to the table,
one panel at a time. Each witness will be provided up to 5
minutes to present their testimony. We will be using this time
to track the progress of each witness. When the button turns
yellow, the witness will have one minute remaining to conclude
his or her remarks. The witnesses who speak less than 5 minutes
get Brownie points with the Chairman.
Members have an opportunity to ask questions to the
witnesses, but in the interest of time, we are going to try to
stay right on schedule. Chair would also remind those in the
hearing room the rules prohibit use of outside cameras and
audio equipment during these hearings.
So I would be happy to yield to my friend Mr. Moran, but he
is not here, so we will just go ahead and go ahead with the
hearing. First I would like to call Scott Steen, President and
CEO of American Forests. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN FORESTS
WITNESS
SCOTT STEEN, PRESIDENT AND CEO
Mr. Steen. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Subcommittee. My name is Scott Steen. I am President and CEO of
American Forests. I thank you for the opportunity to appear
before you today to present our Fiscal Year 2015 Appropriations
recommendations.
Founded in 1875, American Forests is the oldest national
non-profit conservation organization in the U.S. During the
last 139 years American Forests has served as a catalyst for
many of the most important milestones in the conservation
movement, including the founding of the U.S. Forest Service,
the Conservation Corps, the National Park System, and the
growth of the urban forestry movement. Since 1990, American
Forests has funded more than 1,000 forest restoration projects,
and planted more than 46 million trees in all 50 States and 44
countries.
When most people think of forests, they think of rural
wilderness areas, but the reality is that much of our Nation's
populations live in urban forest and ecosystems. Urban forests
make a significant contribution to the quality of life in
communities across the country, and they are vital to creating
and maintaining healthy, livable communities of all sizes.
Urban forests enhance air and water quality, reduce energy use,
increase property values, and provide quantifiable health and
wellness benefits to our citizens. Creating and maintaining a
healthy tree canopy also creates demands for green collar jobs
in a sector poised for rapid growth.
The U.S. Forest Service Urban and Community Forestry
Program is the key Federal program to deliver technical,
educational, and urban forest research assistance to
communities nationwide. In 2013 UNCF's work benefitted 7,292
communities, and nearly 198 million people, more than 60
percent of the U.S. population. The program received its
highest level of funding in FY 2012, and even at that level, it
was an incredibly modest investment, when compared to the
benefits the program provides. Funding has been decreasing ever
since. Urban forests are integral to communities striving to
create healthier and more sustainable environments with smart
green infrastructure. We urge this committee to return UNCF to
the FY 2012 amount of $31.3 million
With regard to our Nation's broader conservation efforts,
we have been encouraged by the Forest Service moves, most
recently, their interest in accelerating the pace of forest
restoration on our National forests. With 65 to 80 million
acres in need of restoration, this is no small feat. The Forest
Service's collaborative forest landscape restoration program is
an important tool in furthering this work. This program was
created in 2009 to promote job stability, reliable wood supply,
and forest health, while reducing emergency wildfire costs and
risks. In the first 4 years of the program, projects funded
through CFLRP have reduced hazardous fuels on 580,000 acres to
protect communities, generated 814 million board feet of
timber, made nearly 2 million green tons of biomass available
for bioenergy production, and enhanced habitat on 474 miles of
streams.
American Forests supports the Administration's request to
increase the overall funding cap of CFLR to $80 million in
their FY 2015 request of $60 million. We understand this
requires legislative action, and encourage the Subcommittee to
include such language in the FY 2015 Interior, Environment, and
Related Agencies Appropriations Bill.
Finally, funding wildfire suppression has been an ongoing
struggle for the Forest Service and the Department of Interior.
As wildfires become more frequent and more severe, Congress
needs to find a better solution to provide dedicated funding to
address this issue year after year. American Forests
respectfully requests the committee address the wildfire
suppression funding issue by including language from the
bipartisan Wildfire Disaster Funding Act co-sponsored by Mr.
Simpson in the FY 2015 Interior, Environment, and Related
Agencies Appropriations Bill.
This language provides the structure to fund a portion of
the U.S. Forest Service and Department of Interior wildfire
suppression costs through a budget cap adjustment under the
Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, as
amended. This would provide the U.S. Forest Service and the
Department of Interior with a funding structure similar to that
used by other agencies who respond to natural disaster
emergencies.
Thank you, and I appreciate your consideration of my
testimony.
[The statement of Scott Steen follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank the gentleman.
Next, Mr. Bill Imbergamo, Executive Director, Federal
Forest Resource Coalition.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
FEDERAL FOREST RESOURCE COALITION
WITNESS
BILL IMBERGAMO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Imbergamo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the
opportunity to be here on behalf of the over 390,000 men and
women who rely on National forest timber for their livelihood.
And I want to thank you and this Subcommittee for your support
for increased management of our National forests. As you know,
up to 85 million acres of the National forests are in need of
restoration, according to USDA's February 2012 report. However,
irrational fire budgeting, complex and burdensome analysis
requirements, and stalling tactics by groups who oppose forest
management make it very difficult for the Forest Service to
expand the pace and scale of management, and address this
restoration backlog.
These factors prevent the agency from reducing fire danger,
protecting communities and watersheds, and supply badly needed
raw materials to economically distressed rural communities. We
are pleased to see the 3.1 billion board foot goal in the
Administration's budget request. This would represent a 19
percent increase in outputs from last fiscal year, and would be
the highest level since 1998. It would, however, still not come
close to capturing annual mortality, and represents less than
half of the amount called for in current forest plans.
A vital part of this effort is ending the destructive
practice of fire borrowing. And as you know, this disrupts
program delivery, and does nothing to ensure accountability. We
strongly support the bipartisan approach of H.R. 3992, the
Wildfire Disaster Funding Act, as do a majority of the members
of the Subcommittee, and most of the other witnesses here
today. As the chief mentioned to you 2 weeks ago, the Act will
simply ensure that fire suppression expenses can be met in the
year they are incurred, without disrupting the management
needed to reduce fire danger over the long haul.
Beyond this point, however, we differ with the
Administration's approach to increasing the pace and scale of
management on our forests. We suggest a more direct approach to
protect our forests, stimulate the rural economy, and safeguard
habitat. We recommend increases, and support active management
and ensure accountability, including 15 percent increases each
in National forest timber management, wild land hazardous
fuels, and capital improvement and maintenance. These programs
directly fund land management by taking advantage of new
authorities in the Farm Bill.
We believe the Forest Service can make substantial progress
if Congress signals these programs as the highest priority.
Increasing timber management and hazardous fuel funding will
help manage forests, while generating receipts to due needed
work elsewhere in the National forests. Whether the funds
derive from commercial timber sales or stewardship contracts,
the value of timber removed can help extend needed treatments
across the landscape. Investing in capital improvement and
maintenance is necessary in light of the massive $5.7 billion
backlog in deferred maintenance.
This backlog does not just impact the roads my members use
to access raw material, but it directly impacts the
recreational users of the entire National forest system.
Campgrounds, roads, and visitors' centers are all in need of
repair, and my members do not just live and work on the
National forests, we recreate there as well.
We are here to make these targeted investments, and set a
target of 3.5 billion board feet, excluding personal use
firewood, for Fiscal Year 2015. In doing so, we would urge the
committee to put an end to the Integrated Resource Restoration
pilot project in Regions 1, 3, and 4. These pilots, in place
since 2010, have not resulted in lowered costs for the Forest
Service, whether the metric is units of wood produced, or
number of acres treated.
The 3 pilot regions rely heavily on personal use firewood
to meet their timber targets. Up to 40 percent of output in one
of the regions is personal use firewood. And in Montana, since
the region became an IRR pilot, timber outputs have declined by
more than 58 percent. We can no longer support this program,
even as a pilot, and urge you to end the experiment this year.
We support continuation of the collaborative forest
landscape restoration projects already underway, but we do not
support the proposed expansion of CFLR in the President's
budget. Current CFLR projects have struggled to increase
outputs, and our members, in some cases, do not see reduced
conflict as a result of these projects. For instance, a small
2,000 acre project in Montana was enjoined for more than 2
years, and the standing timber has lost most, if not all, of
its value.
Further, the Administration's proposed expansion would
require reconvening the review panel, and going through the
process of soliciting new projects, which would divert
resources from implementing current projects, or simply
investing more in needed management outside of project areas.
More rapid results on the ground can come through existing line
items and be implemented in Fiscal Year 2015.
There is little debate about the need to increase
management on the National forests. Strong wood markets, and
the newly enacted Farm Bill provisions, provide an opportunity
to expand management across the landscape. Only Congress can
decide whether to prioritize management that can help pay for
needed restoration, and whether we meet domestic and
international wood demand using timber from our national
forests, which must be milled domestically before it can be
exported. To paraphrase our favorite bear, only you can decide
to act now, or let the negative trends in forest health and
rural economic distress continue. Thank you.
[The statement of Bill Imbergamo follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Next, John Barnwell, Director of Forest Policy, the Society
of American Foresters.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
SOCIETY OF AMERICAN FORESTERS (SAF)
WITNESS
JOHN BARNWELL, DIRECTOR OF FOREST POLICY
Mr. Barnwell. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and Members of
the Subcommittee. My name is John Barnwell. I am Director of
Forest Policy of the Society of American Foresters. I am
pleased to share a few comments on behalf of the 12,000 forest
professionals working across this country.
SAF shares common interests with colleagues on these
panels, including recognizing the importance of funding for
forest pests and invasive species response, increasing the
volume of timber harvested from Federal lands, and our
reservations about expansion of the Integrated Resource
Restoration line item beyond a pilot program, so I will use
this time to focus on 3 key areas identified as priorities by
our members.
First, fixing the unacceptable cycle of fire borrowing that
has hindered all forest management activities on Federal lands.
Second, providing the necessary funding for U.S. Forest Service
research and development in the Forest Inventory and Analysis
Program. And third, extending the Bureau of Land Management
Forest Ecosystems Recovery Fund.
I will talk a little bit about fire. The conversion of
persistent drought, infectious disease outbreaks, and
urbanization creates a difficult and costly fire management
situation that will continue to constrain Forest Service and
Department of Interior resources for the foreseeable future.
The Forest Service and Department of Interior were forced to
transfer $636 million from non-fire accounts in Fiscal Year
2013 to fund fire suppression. These transfers are now common
practice, with the Forest Service reporting transfers of $3.4
billion from non-fire accounts since 2002. Most of these funds
were returned the next fiscal year, but with 65 to 82 million
acres in the National Forest System in need of restoration,
this approach to funding wildfire suppression must not
continue.
SAF appreciates the leadership of this Subcommittee on this
issue in the past, and urges you to consider adding language in
the Fiscal Year 2015 Appropriations Bill that changes how
wildfire response and suppression costs are funded. Accounting
for the small percentage of costly wildfires that escape
containment by making disaster relief funds available in severe
fire years would allow the agencies to invest in programs
designed to reduce fire risks over time.
Now I will talk a little bit about research and
development. Successful companies finance research and
development programs to build business advantage and stay on
the cutting edge, but forestry research capacity in the United
States continues to decline. University research budgets are
shrinking, and grants available for forestry research have
dwindled. Investments in forestry research are investments in
the future health and sustainability of our Nation's forests.
Ignoring research and development threatens U.S.
competitiveness in emerging markets and the ability of forest
managers to meet tomorrow's challenges with current science and
technical information. SAF encourages this Subcommittee to
consider a funding level of $231 million for Forest Service
research and development, with particular emphasis on
prioritizing research efforts and transferring knowledge to
forestry professionals working in the field.
The Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis Program is
the backbone of U.S. forestry. It provides the only national
census of forests across all ownerships. Through FYA, the
Forest Service, partnering with State Forestry Agencies in the
private sector, collects and analyzes forest data to assess
trends on issues such as forest health and management,
fragmentation, and forest carbon sequestration. This data helps
to inform investment decisions, account for forest carbon
stocks for climate negotiations, and support planning and
management decisions made on private and public lands.
SAF encourages this Subcommittee to reverse the trend of
spending cuts and return FIA to the Fiscal Year 2010 funding
level of $72 million. This $72 million funding level, which is
approximately $5 million higher than the President's budget,
was also endorsed by a diverse group of stakeholders. SAF asks
that this letter to the Subcommittee dated March 24, 2014 be
entered into the record.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, all material will be
entered into the record of this hearing.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Barnwell. I will close with an issue that does not
have a funding request attached. SAF members are troubled by
the pending loss of the Bureau of Land Management Forest
Ecosystem Health and Recovery Fund, commonly referred to as the
5,900 Account. This fund allows the BLM to use a portion of
receipts from sales of timber and wood products not returned to
neighboring counties to fund management activities. The 5,900
Account reduces budgeted dollars required to operate public
demand forestry. This loss of revenue will leave few dollars in
the tight PB budget for forest ecosystem restoration
activities. SAF recommends that this account be reauthorized,
and not allowed to expire at the end of Fiscal Year 2015.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today, and
I welcome any questions you may have.
[The statement of John Barnwell follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Thank you, John, I appreciate
that.
Next, Jim Karels, Vice President of the National
Association of State Foresters.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF STATE FORESTERS (NASF)
WITNESS
JIM KARELS, VICE PRESIDENT
Mr. Karels. Thank you, Chairman Calvert, for the
opportunity to testify before the Subcommittee this afternoon.
My name is Jim Karels, and I am the Florida State Forester. I
am also the current Fire Committee Chair, and Vice President
for the National Association of State Foresters, NASF. Today I
will highlight NASF's Fiscal Year 2015 appropriation request
for State and private forestry programs, and for State fire
assistance programs.
As stewards of more than 2/3 of America's 751 million acres
of forest land, State foresters deliver technical and financial
assistance, along with forest health, with water, and with
wildfire protection for responsibilities on our Nation's
private forest lands. My written statement today includes a
complete set of priorities, recommendations from NASF that deal
with the Forest Stewardship Program, the Urban Community
Forestry Program, Forest Health, and FI, Forest Inventory
Analysis, which are partners we will talk more, and are talking
about this afternoon.
I will use the balance of my time to talk about State fire
assistance and landscape scale restoration budget line items.
State fire assistance addresses fuels and fire threat on non-
Federal lands, and is a critical tool to reduce the risk to the
communities, to the residents, to property, and to our
firefighters that help prepare for our wildfire events. State
fire assistance is very important in 3 major areas. One, it
provides funding assistance for non-Federal lands for hazardous
fuel treatments at a minimum of one-to-one matching, sometimes
much more from the private land or the State and local.
It helps communities prepare for wild land fire events.
There are 70,000 communities across this country at risk to
wild land fire, and this program allows us to come in and
develop community wildfire protection plans that helps those
communities prepare for the fire threat that they know is
there. It helps them be ready when and if the fire starts.
And finally, a third one, and maybe the most important one
of the State fire systems, is the ability to equip and train
local fire departments and local firefighters, the volunteer
fire departments, the State and local firefighters that respond
as the first responders to all types of fires in all
jurisdictions, both State, local, and Federal jurisdictions.
And by training and equipping them, and making them efficient,
and keeping them safe, this program helps to prevent some of
those catastrophic million dollar fires that start both on
Federal and State land.
As you consider greater investments in hazardous fuel
treatments on Federal lands, please remember State fire
assistance is our primary Federal mechanism to help communities
prepare for wildfire. We ask for your support of the State Fire
Assistance Program in Fiscal Year 2015 at $86 million.
This recommended funding level was also endorsed by a broad
coalition of stakeholders, and we ask that this letter dated
April 2, 2014 to the Subcommittee be entered into record.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection the full statement will be
entered into the record, and other documents.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Karels. And, Chairman, I would like to thank you both
for the support, and the thoughtfulness of the Wildfire
Disaster Funding Act. The process that we deal with in State
fire assistance of being able to implement these programs, and
then having to juggle through and do fund transfers, what we
call fire transfers when that happens, because of the U.S.
Forest Service's funding, and when the spending is so high that
we have to transfer those funds, the same funds that we use to
prevent and to mitigate these fires, now we are transferring
back to the suppression, that work is not getting done, and the
fire problem continues to grow. So this Act, the Wildfire
Disaster Funding Act, is paramount to finally putting a stop to
where we are going, and starting to get ahead of the fire
problem across this Nation.
I will shift gears a little bit and say we appreciate the
support of the Subcommittee for our State forest action plans,
and our landscape scale restoration budget line item. The LSR
line item codifies the current competitive allocation which
began under the direction of the Farm Bill. State foresters
feel we can do more with the LSR, and the Fiscal Year 2012
Appropriations Subcommittee directed the Forest Service to look
at that flexible funding that allows the State Forestry
agencies to, with accountability, reallocate based on the
highest priority needs of the State forest action plans. We ask
that, in support of this Landscape Scale Restoration Program,
we ask for your support of this line item at 23.5 million in
Fiscal Year 2015.
We would like to work with the Subcommittee as well to
direct that, in addition to the funding at competitive
allocation, that competitive allocation process, also a portion
of that LSR funding be made available to State Forestry
agencies for further implementation of their State forest
action plans.
That concludes my testimony, and thank you for the
opportunity.
[The statement of Jim Karels follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman. And a testament to Mr.
Simpson, every member of the Interior Subcommittee, both
Republican and Democrat, as I understand, are a co-sponsor of
his fire legislation. So I think that you are probably going to
hear from Mike and Betty both that we need your help in getting
co-chairmen from all over the country, and all different kinds
of political backgrounds, to get behind this legislation. But I
will let Mike carry on from here, because I have got to----
Mr. Simpson. Well, I just appreciate you being here today,
and for your support of this bill. It is very important, if we
are going to be able to manage these accounts. And what a lot
of people do not understand is, they think we are trying to
spend more money on wildfire fighting. I actually want to spend
a whole lot less money on wildfire fighting by trying to do the
things that will prevent the catastrophic fires, or as many of
them as possible.
We are not trying to spend more money. We are trying to
manage the account different so that, as you mentioned, we do
not have to borrow out of every other account all year long.
So, consequently, you cannot do timber sales, you cannot do
trail maintenance, you cannot do hazardous fuels reduction,
because all the money has been spent fighting wildfires.
It just makes sense. There are members in this House that
we have got to convince of that, but we have had good support
on that, and anything you can do to help other members of
Congress understand the importance of this, and what we are
trying to do, would be very helpful. I appreciate you all being
here today.
Mr. Calvert. CBO says it is budget neutral. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Gentlemen, maybe you can help me understand a little bit
about something we heard from the Forestry Department. I come
from Minnesota. I notice that--St. Paul Campus grad, I bet?
Mr. Karels. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. Yes.
Mr. Karels. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. Same degree as my nieces have. We put in a
Forestry Council, and it was very controversial. A lot of the
environmentalists were really worried about it. I put my neck
out on the chopping block and supported it. It was absolutely
the right thing to do. So I come from this as a person who
knows that forestry and timber is part of our economic engine
in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. I appreciate the work
that Mr. Simpson has done, and all of you alluding to invasive
species. This committee is really stepping up in a bipartisan
way to address.
But my question is, and Scott, you had mentioned it, the
urban forestry account being zeroed out the way that it is.
Here is my concern. I have nothing against State foresters,
having 2 nieces who have graduated to do what you do, okay? So
I do not hate State foresters, but, when we found out that was
zeroed out. And the money was going to State foresters, what
guarantee is it. The League of Cities was not involved in the
discussion, and CSL, the counties, all the rest. I do not know
if the large urban parks organizations were involved in it. I
do not see the guarantee that some of it is going to go into
urban areas. And railroads coming through St. Paul found out
that that is how the ash boards come into the Twin Cities, and
then those railroads sit there, and they go other places.
So, either explain to me, or tell me how this needs to be
fixed. I do not want to just trust me on this.
Mr. Steen. My understanding is urban was not zeroed out,
but it was significantly reduced. And----
Ms. McCollum. Well, compared to what it was even 15 years
ago, it is----
Mr. Steen. Absolutely.
Ms. McCollum [continuing]. Gone.
Mr. Steen. And, I mean, we believe that this is a fund
that should be actually expanded. Urban forests have enormous
value to communities all over America, and this pool of money
was used in, I think, very responsible ways to fund all sorts
of projects that benefitted 60 percent of the population of the
country. So we absolutely support restoration of those funds to
2012 level.
Mr. Karels. And same from our end. Urban and community
forestry is very important. It is one of the programs, for
example, in Florida that we oversee, and, from NASF, our
support is at 31 million. So it is a critical program to us, so
we are not part of that, where you said zeroing it out.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, I am going to learn more about
this, because if this is just a block grant to State foresters.
I have a problem with it, if it does not have something in it.
And just to close, here in Washington, D.C. right now there
is a person going through with a drill, drilling down into the
base of the trunk of some of the most oldest, beautiful trees
you can find, large drill, going in, going down to the roots.
We are going to lose a lot of trees with that. The police
department, it is not their top priority. It is not like health
and safety, but those are the kinds of things that we face in
urban areas that can take out a whole canopy really quick.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. And, if there are no further
questions, I want to thank this board, and you are excused, and
we will move on to the next panel. Thank you.
Next, Mr. Tom Martin, President and CEO of the American
Forest Foundation, Mr. Hank Kashdan, former Associate Chief of
the United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service,
partnered the caucus on fire suppression funding solutions, Mr.
David Forsell, President of the Board of Directors of the
Alliance for Community Trees, and Mr. Joel Holtrop, Board of
Directors Chair, The Corps Network. Welcome.
You probably heard our instruction about a 5 minute rule.
We are going to be pretty strict on that because of time
requirements today, but we appreciate your attendance, and we
will start with Mr. Martin for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN FOREST FOUNDATION
WITNESS
TOM MARTIN, PRESIDENT AND CEO
Mr. Martin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Committee. It is wonderful to be here. My name is Tom Martin. I
am the President and CEO of the American Forest Foundation. We
are a conservation group. Our mission is quite simple, to
protect and enhance America's family forests for present and
future generations, and do it in conjunction with our partners,
many of whom will be before you today.
So why are family forest owners important? Well, quite
simply, they own the biggest segment of America's forests. It
is not the Federal government, it is not the warehousers and
the Plum Creeks of the world. It is folks like my family, that
have a couple hundred acres in Wisconsin. Those folks hold the
key to whether this mishmash of ownerships that make up
America's forests are going to be healthy. I am here to talk a
little bit about what this Committee and this Congress can do
to help those folks who have an incredible love of their land,
have the tools to be better stewards of that land.
So, as you think about forests, why are they important to
us? They are important because they produce clean water. Half
of Americans get their drinking water off our forests. Clean
air, forests sequester annually 12 to 15 percent of our carbon
emissions. Hunting, migratory birds, all of those kinds of
things, and yes, a million good paying jobs here in America.
And as you think about, how do you keep those forests healthy?
It means making sure that our Federal forests are healthy, that
our large private landowners manage their land well, and that
family forest owners have the tools they need to contribute to
that health.
Three things I would like to focus on that are before you
today. The first is the Forest Stewardship Program, and that is
the program that most directly works with private landowners in
this country. We recommend a level of $29 million. That program
has slipped in recent years, and with that the ability to reach
out to land owners. These folks love their land, but they too
often think if you let nature take its course you will get the
results you want. And as you have heard and talked about this
morning, there are enormous amounts of threats out there to the
forests.
Unfortunately, only 5 percent of these landowners have a
written management plan, only 15 percent have ever talked to a
natural resource professional. This program, the Forest
Stewardship Program, works with State foresters, the Forest
Service, and others to engage these landowners in good
stewardship. They can make a contribution to our healthy
forests. They need the tools to do it.
Secondly, as you think about the patchwork of ownership, it
is important to think about the landscapes that we have got out
there that we can protect, and that we can restore. We
recommend that the committee adopt the $23 million level that
is in the President's budget. And I think about this, frankly,
as a natural extension of what came out of the Bush
Administration, with their cooperative conservation. They said,
let's look at places on the landscape without the guard to
ownership type, and let's make an ecological, social, and
economic impact that is positive. I think measuring that is
really important, so as you think about the investment, think
about how we are going to measure the impact there as well.
And, finally, I, like others, would like to raise my voice
in support of all the work you are doing to fix the fire budget
problem. And I think I would like, in my spoken remarks, to
talk about a different impact that it has. Everybody has talked
about the programmatic impact. We have enormous demands on our
Forest Service from many different directions. And you ask a
Forest Manager, what are you going to do to address these
folks?
And they start out, they are hard charging, and they have
got good ideas, and they want to get out and get it done. And
then they get to, well, wait a minute, you cannot implement
that project yet because we have a fire, so you need to hold
off on that. And that happens year, after year, after year. And
what it does to the culture of any institution, that kind of
uncertainty, is it has timidity in the face of real problems.
And it strikes me that that cultural problem is just as
important as the programmatic ones.
So, as you debate and weigh how you are going to help
protect America's forests, think about the family forest owner,
who owns the biggest segment, and think about how they fit with
the other forest ownership types so that this mosaic of
ownership can keep producing all those benefits we rely. Mr.
Chairman, I do have a letter for you, and hope I can offer it
for the record. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Martin. Thank you very much, sir.
[The statement of Tom Martin follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
And, next, Mr. Hank Kashdan, former Associate Chief of the
USDA Forest Service, Partner for the Caucus on Fire Suppression
Funding Solutions. Did you set the hearing schedule today?
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
PARTNER CAUCUS ON FIRE SUPPRESSION FUNDING SOLUTIONS
WITNESS
HANK KASHDAN
Mr. Kashdan. Well, Mr. Chairman, and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for the invitation to be here. Mr.
Simpson, thank you so much for being one of the original
sponsors of the Wildfire Disaster Funding Act. You know, talk
about being amongst friends here, this is one of the greatest
opportunities of testifying I have ever had.
I retired about 3-1/2 years ago as the Associate Chief of
the Forest Service. I spent 37 years in the Forest Service. One
of my later jobs was the agency's budget director, which I did
for 6 years. One of those years I administered the largest
transfer of fire funds to pay for suppression that ever
occurred in the agency's history, about $990 million in one
year. 4 of the 6 years we transferred funds out of other
accounts to pay for wildfire suppression, so this is an issue
that I have lived personally, and it is an issue that has been
important to me for the past 15, 17 years.
As a retiree group, we are very active amongst the Wildfire
Funding Coalition. Many of the members you have heard from
already I would imagine you will continue to hear from. You
know, we represent a very broad spectrum of viewpoints on
natural resource management, but we are 100 percent unified on
the need to fix this fire funding problem.
We are supporting this bill for 3 principal reasons, and a
lot of it that you have already heard today. First of all,
program disruption. These fire transfers occur at the height of
the field season. July and August is when the decisions are
made to make those transfers. That is when projects are being
executed on the ground. It is incredibly disruptive to the
agency.
More and more, with budgets being tighter, the work on the
ground, I think Mr. Martin here mentioned, work being done on
the ground is by partners, and volunteers, and other third
parties, who have scratched together the funds, scratched
together the resources, carved time out of their schedules to
perform this program of work, and then along comes the Forest
Service and cancels the work in order to pay the costs of
wildfire suppression. And then those projects get added on top
of the next year's program of work. And, in fact, sometimes you
have got 2 years' worth of cancelled projects added on to the
next program of work, and it is an extremely wasteful and
costly process.
The second point, we are disrupting some of the very
projects that will reduce the future expenditures on wildfire.
I believe being released just today is a study in the McColony
River Watershed (ph) of California that shows, by performing
forest health treatments, you avoid two to three times the
costs of wildfire suppression. It is a tremendous savings that
all of us, as former managers in the Forest Service, felt
fairly strongly that, when you proactively take forest health
action, you reduce the long term cost of wildfire suppression.
And sometimes science and studies take time to catch up to
that, and what is happening is that that is being validated
today by these studies.
And I have personally seen the effect. I recall, on the
Deschutes National Forest in Oregon, a wildfire raging across
the landscape, coming up to an area that had been treated, the
fire laid down, moved through the stand at a much cooler
temperature, and, in fact, was probably somewhat helpful to the
natural ecosystem.
The third point is that wildfires are natural disasters,
and this Act treats them as such. Mr. Chairman, I grew up in
Claremont, about just a stone's throw from your district, and I
grew up in the 1950s and 1960s, and I remember the fires across
the landscape, but I also remember 2 or 3 months that you could
count on there not being fires. That is not the case in
Southern California. Fire season is all year long. Elsewhere in
the country it is the same. Our fire seasons are getting
longer. As people are ever expanding into the wild land urban
interface, communities, and lives, and infrastructure are even
greater at risk. And when you have a major wildfire, you have a
natural disaster, and this Act treats it as such.
So we are very grateful for the support. Some of the
opponents to this are talking about, well, this does not change
the actual costs of fires. Well, it does, over the long haul.
The point that is so beneficial here is this is about program
disruption, keeping the focus on investing to avoid future
costs, and considering these fires as natural disasters.
So let me close with that. Thank you very much for the
invite here, and we really appreciate your support.
[The statement of Hank Kashdan follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
David Forsell, you are with the Alliance for Community
Trees.
Mr. Forsell. Yes. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ALLIANCE FOR COMMUNITY TREES
WITNESS
DAVID FORSELL, PRESIDENT OF BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Mr. Forsell. Dear Mr. Chairman, and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you so much for the opportunity to speak
with you today. My name is David Forsell. I am actually
President of Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, a non-profit
organization whose mission is to help people and nature thrive
in our community. We have about 30,000 volunteers each year.
But I also serve as President of the Board of Directors of the
Alliance for Community Trees, on whose behalf I am testifying
today.
Alliance for Community Trees is a national non-profit
organization founded to establish a national voice for urban
and community forestry. Through the efforts of 200 member and
program partner organizations in 44 States, over 5 million
volunteers have planted 15 million trees and assured their care
in cities and towns across the country, where 83 percent of
Americans live. My testimony will focus on 2 programs of the
U.S. Forest Service, the Urban and Community Forestry Program,
and urban forestry research. I will alter the flow of my
written testimony a little bit here, starting with our
recommendations for Fiscal Year '15, and following with a few
comments about the importance of these programs.
The President's Fiscal Year '15 proposal for the U.S.
Forest Service Urban and Community Forestry Program is $23.7
million. That is a 16 percent reduction from the Fiscal Year
'14 enacted level. With extended drought, and severe storms,
and invasive pests creating unusual stresses on our community
forests, and also on municipal budgets over the past years, we
argue that it is not the time for further reductions in this
program. We urge the Subcommittee to provide to $31.3 million
for this program in Fiscal Year '15, consistent with the level
enacted in Fiscal Year '12.
Federal urban and community forestry funding truly is an
investment. It is leveraged by forestry professionals in many,
many American cities and towns. In Indiana, more than 60
communities, 2\1/2\ million people, are served by this program,
and we all work very hard to leverage that money. The amazing
benefits of urban trees, I am going to focus on research now,
absolutely would be a mystery if it were not for the Federal
government's research investments. Carbon capture, storm water
interception, the psychological and physical benefits to green
space to urban and community folks, avoided infrastructure
costs.
The knowledge gained through the research at a Federal
level is absolutely fundamentally important to the work that we
do. And, to that end, we urge the Subcommittee to provide
funding for forest and range land research at $298 million for
Fiscal Year 2015. This reflects funding for basic forest
research at 226 million, consistent with Fiscal Year '14, and
funding for forest inventory and analysis at $72 million.
So, looking to the future, as reflected in the Forest
Service's strategic assessments and plans, the Urban and
Community Forestry Program, and urban forestry research, are
uniquely positioned to help the Forest Service, and therefore
the whole Federal government, address the growing urban
environmental challenges and opportunities that people face
across the country. No other Federal agency can match the
expertise, nor the leadership capacity, to help our nation
address these urban issues with trees in forests. The Forest
Service's Urban and Community Forestry Program and urban
forestry research are a model of integration, where program and
research staff work together to develop the information, and
the tools, and the advice that we all need in American
communities.
I wanted to give you 3 examples of our Alliance for
Community Trees members' projects. Tree Pittsburgh received a
grant from the U.S. Forest Service in 2011 to create the city's
first urban forest master plan. A host of non-profits have
joined the local government to activate this imaginative and
comprehensive strategy. The Sacramento Tree Foundation is
engaged in cooperative research, looking at human health
impacts of urban trees with the U.S. Forest Service. And in my
hometown, Indianapolis, working under an EPA consent decree,
our local water utility, Citizens' Energy Group, is working
over the next 10 years to eliminate all but 5 percent of
combined sewer overflows into our river and streams.
Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, my organization, is partnering
with Citizens' Energy Group in one neighborhood on a 100
percent natural system storm water/sewer separation project.
10,000 functional native plants will be planted. 200 trees will
further reduce storm water runoff, and the strategy will save
the utility money, compared to a standard solution, and the
work is creating jobs for young people, which is probably the
most exciting thing of all.
One young lady who works in tending and planting trees in
Indianapolis of our 80 that we hire each year is off to study
sustainability and chemical engineering at Overland College
because of her experience with urban trees and community
forests. Clean water, better, more beautiful neighborhoods,
workforce development, these are just some of the returns that
community and urban forestry and research funding bring, and I
so appreciate the opportunity to tell the urban story and the
community story to all of you. Thank you.
[The statement of David Forsell follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Next, Mr. Joel Holtrop, Board of Directors, The Corps
Network.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE CORPS NETWORK
WITNESS
JOEL HOLTROP, BOARD OF DIRECTORS CHAIR
Mr. Holtrop. Chairman Calvert, and Members of the
Community, my name is Joel Holtrop, and I am the Chair of the
Board of Directors of The Corps Network. The Corps Network is
the national association of service and conservation corps.
These corps are comprehensive youth development programs that
provide their participants with job training, academic
programming, leadership skills, and additional support through
a strategy of service that improves communities and the
environment.
I served over 3 decades with the United States Forest
Service, retiring as Deputy Chief of the National Forest System
2\1/2\ years ago. Much of the work that we do will be in vain
if there are not people who appreciate how and why we protect
America's treasured places and resources, and this is why I am
proud and honored to serve as the Chair of The Corps Network's
Board of Directors.
The Corps Network requests the committee's support for
Fiscal Year '15 programs that will allow public land and water
management agencies to engage young adults and veterans to meet
our Nation's backlogged maintenance needs, address youth
unemployment, and prepare a diverse group of youth to be the
next generation of leaders.
I would like to tell you about Chris Thomas, a former Corps
member with the California Conservation Corps, and a veteran,
having served in the United States Marine Corps in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Chris has faced many challenges in his life.
During Chris's 4 years in the Marines, he was wounded twice. He
received shrapnel in his chest, and was stabbed, leading to a
medical discharge. Soon after his discharge, he joined the
California Conservation Corps. Through the Conservation Corps,
Chris learned how to accept and embrace diversity. As a crew
leader with the Corps, Chris led others in planting trees,
habitat restoration projects, and fire fuel reduction. Chris is
not sure what his life would look like today without the
California Conservation Corps.
In 2013 alone, over 100 Corps programs across the country,
through their collective efforts as members of the Corps
network, maintained and improved 2,900 urban parks, built and
maintained 8,000 miles of trails, and protected communities
from the devastating effects of wildfire. At present our member
Corps has enrolled 26,000 Corps members a year, the majority of
whom come from disadvantaged backgrounds, and are looking for a
second chance to succeed in life.
Corps members received a wide range of personal and
professional development opportunities and services, including
the hard work, guidance from adult leaders who serve as mentors
and role models, academic programming designed to lead to a
high school diploma or GED, opportunities to pursue
certificates and credentials with demonstrated value, and a
modest stipend, all to prepare them for post-secondary
education and labor market success.
Each year Corps complete hundreds of high quality and often
technical projects on public lands and waters. Project sponsors
consistently express a high degree of satisfaction with the
quality of work. By using Conservation Corps, Federal land and
water management agencies achieve more with their operating
budgets. Research conducted by the National Park Service
indicates that hiring Conservation Corps to complete
maintenance and trail projects resulted in a cost savings of
over 50 percent.
We respectfully request the Subcommittee fund the following
accounts, operation of the National parks in the Centennial
Challenge for the National Park Service, the Department of
Interior Youth Programs Account, and increased funding for all
the operational accounts of the DOI bureaus and the U.S. Forest
Service.
Beginning with the creation of the Civilian Conservation
Corps during the Great Depression, and over 80 years,
continuing to the recent launch of the 21st Century
Conservation Service Corps initiative, organizations like
California Conservation Corps and Minnesota Conservation Corps
have helped millions of young Americans gain job training,
further their education, and contribute to America's
communities through service and the conservation of National
and State parks, forests, and other treasured places.
As a career public land manager, I understand how important
Conservation Corps are to the missions of the land management
agencies. I hope that you will provide the funding to put
thousands of youth and returning veterans, like Chris Thomas,
to work restoring some of America's greatest historical,
cultural, and natural treasures. With the approaching National
Park Service Centennial, with billions in backlogged
maintenance across all the land management agencies, with
record youth unemployment, and with the cost savings nature of
public-private partnerships, this funding is an absolute win-
win for our country. Thank you.
[The statement of Joel Holtrop follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. Mr. Kashdan, we come from the same
area. I remember as a kid we used to have forest fires all the
time--the National forest--burning right on down to the city
line. But a lot of those fires too were purposely set, to clear
out the underbrush, and they were done quite often, at a very
strong management profile. This is before 1990, of course. And
I remember in the National forests, of course, you had timber
operations that would cut trees, and then that stopped.
Do you see any correlation in how we manage the forests
starting in 1990 to these catastrophic fires we have now? Do
you think we maybe mismanaged, or maybe looked at science wrong
at that time?
Mr. Kashdan. Well, let me----
Mr. Calvert. Is that a part of it?
Mr. Kashdan. Let me speak to that, and--I mean, the
Coalition here, which is a very broad viewpoint. So what I do
want to say is that clearly the buildup of hazardous fuels, for
a variety of reasons, insect and disease, longer seasons of
drought, and some hazardous fuels, and indeed some projects
where some active management that should have taken place that
did not, all those are causal factors for where we are today,
as well as suppression strategies, so----
Mr. Calvert. I think we are all together on Mike's bill
because the way we have to--does not matter what the reason is
now, we have a catastrophic fire. But I just want to say that
some of us in the West believe that it was not entirely an
accident. I mean, there may be other factors involved, but we
believe also, many of us, that we did not manage the forest
like we used to.
And the old timers, your predecessors, I have talked to, I
am sure many of us have talked to, they say, well, if you do
not take out those mature trees, and do it in the right way,
and manage the underbrush, and do the things that we used to
do, then these fires are entirely predictable.
Mr. Kashdan. Well, from the standpoint of the National
Association of Forest Service Retirees, I mean, we are very
much on board with the need for multiple use management, active
management, as a key way of reducing that risk. And when we say
forest health activities, that is very much included in that.
Mr. Calvert. Yeah. As we go forward, I think that should
be into consideration.
Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have to make a
plug for what Joel was talking about with the youth
conservation club. I could shamelessly, I had no idea this was
going to happen this afternoon. Show you pictures of me----
Mr. Forsell. Right.
Ms. McCollum [continuing]. Outside of Voyager's National
Park with Youth Conservation Corps. And let me tell you how the
money came together for this project. It was to clean up the
Root River. It was on private land. All the private landowners
were excited about it. It was to clean up some damage that had
been done by not great logging practices in the past to restore
walleye habitat and fish habitat into the chain of Voyager's
Lake. Nature Valley had money in there. There was a Root River
Fishers' Club that raised money. The National parks were out
there helping, volunteering on their own time.
It was just such a compilation of so many people coming
together. So that was good in and of itself, but talking to
these kids from the Twin Cities area, many of them recent
immigrants. They got forestry. They understood what it meant to
cut timber. Where the wood from their houses came from, and
wood for their paper, and all that. They had a better
appreciation for our National Park system. They were talking
about science in a way that they said they would not have been
at the beginning of the summer.
So I do not know how much--I am sure you can do the dollar
leverage on it, but it is amazing. It is phenomenal. It is
transformative, not only for the landscape and the communities,
but for those young adults themselves. So I had my request in,
and now you know why.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. I just happen to have some pictures here of
some wildfires--I am just kidding. I like to tease Betty. She
likes to tease me too, so----
Ms. McCollum. I will show you my big fish.
Mr. Simpson. Anyway, thank you all for being here today,
and I have got to tell you, urban forestry is something that we
really do not think about as much here in the United States as
they do in some other countries. I was over Ramstein Air Force
Base in Germany, and I was going around with the Commander, and
he was showing me different things. And they had a couple trees
out there, you know, they had some forest lands on the air
base, and a couple of red ribbons on--I said, what are those?
He says, those have to come out. I said, well, why those? He
says, you have got to go talk to the urban forester. We have to
manage them according to the guy that does all that.
It is in the town, beautiful green spaces within their
communities, and they are managed, and they look beautiful. So
some of them are a lot more active than we are here.
Mr. Forsell. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Forsell. Thank you. I often tell folks, if you care
about jobs, care about the urban forest, if you care about
environment, if you care about property value. There are so
many reasons to invest in urban and community forests. Take
your pick.
Mr. Simpson. Well, one of the challenges we have,
obviously, is that our budget Forest Service spent, you guys
know this better than anybody else, 14 percent of their budget
was on fighting wildfires. Today it is roughly 48 percent, 50
percent. And you mentioned 2 things that are very important.
One is the fact that this urban/wild land interface is getting
into places it was never meant to get into before.
Everybody that builds a house out there in that wild land
wants the boughs of the trees touching their roof. I understand
that. That is what I would want. But it is very expensive to
try to save those structures once a fire starts out there, and
we have got to do something about it. We have to get people to
understand fire-wise, prevention techniques when they do
buildings around communities.
But the other thing that was important, and people actually
need to visually see this, I went up to see what it took to
fight one of these wildfires when they had the Clear Creek fire
up in Salmon. There were 5,000 people up there fighting this
thing. And, I mean, it is a city that they built, essentially,
to fight this fire, and the challenges they face. We went over
it one day in a plane, and you could see where everything was
just black. I mean, it was burnt to the ground.
And then all of a sudden there is this green island out
there, and then on the other side it is black again. I said,
how did that happen? He said, we did a prescribed burn there 2
years ago. And just as you said, it came down hot, and when it
got down there, it just cooled down, crept through the forest,
blew up on the other side. We need to actively manage a lot of
these forests, and particularly around areas that have cost us
a lot of money to fight them. So I appreciate your support for
the bill that we are trying to do.
As I said, we are not trying to spend more money. We are
trying to manage an account better so that the Forest Service
can do their job better. And it is not just if you live around
someplace that has wildfires. If you have any interest in any
part of the Interior bill, whether it is the Smithsonian,
whether it is, the National Zoo, or whatever it is, you ought
to care about this, because how much we are spending on
wildfires is affecting our ability to fund other things in this
bill. So I appreciate your support, and the more people you can
talk to in Congress, to co-sponsor this bill, it will help us a
great deal. So thanks for being here today.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and do not forget our friends in
the United States Senate. I thank this panel. You are excused.
We will call up our next panel, Dr. Brian Haggard, the
National Institutes of Water Resources, Robert Gropp, Chairman
of the United States Geological Survey Coalition, John
Palatiello, Executive Director of MAPPS, the National
Association of Mapping, Surveying, and Geospatial firms, and
Mr. John Geissman, Professor of Geoscience, University of
Texas, Geological Society of America. If you will please come
up and take your seats? You probably heard that we are under
the 5 minute rule. We are enforcing the 5 minute rule as close
as possible.
I will recognize Brian Haggard of the National Institute of
Water Resources.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL INSTITUTES FOR WATER RESOURCES (NIWR)
WITNESS
BRIAN HAGGARD, DIRECTOR, ARKANSAS WATER RESOURCES CENTER
Mr. Haggard. Chairman Calvert, Mr. Simpson, and Mrs.
McCollum, who just stepped out----
Mr. Calvert. No, she is right here.
Mr. Haggard. There she is.
Mr. Calvert. She is showing her fish. She held it out.
Ms. McCollum. When you do the Conservation Corps separate,
you can catch fish.
Mr. Calvert. We know how she--she holds the fish way out
there. Looks like it is 5 feet tall. All right, Mr. Haggard, we
will not take that from your time.
Mr. Haggard. I am Brian Haggard, Director of the Arkansas
Water Resources Center at the University of Arkansas, and also
President of the National Institutes for Water Resources. Thank
you for this opportunity to testify in support of the Water
Resources Research Act program. I want to thank you for your
strong support of our program, especially because this marks
our 50th anniversary.
On July 12, 1964 President Johnson signed into law the bill
that authorized the establishment of our program. Our program
is funded as part of the USGS's budget, representing a State-
based network of institutes that links State and Federal water
interests and the academic expertise within our universities.
We are the only Federally authorized research network that
focuses on applied water research, education, training, and
outreach.
Our program has two components. The first provides base
funding for each institute, where each Federal dollar invested
must be matched with $2 from a non-Federal source. The second
is a nationally competitive grant program, requiring each
Federal dollar to be matched from $1 from other sources. The
matching requirements of our program ensure that each State
invest in its water resources research program and student
training, and we leverage this Federal investment at an
astonishing ratio of about 16 to 1 across the institutes on
average.
It is our base funding in the Water Resources Research Act
that holds all of this together. The institutes specialize in
identifying water problems within their State, developing
solutions to those problems, and engaging with our stakeholders
to implement those solutions. My institute, the Arkansas Water
Resources Center, has sponsored research on the potential
formation of disinfection byproducts when treating drinking
water. These complex chemicals are potential carcinogens, and
are regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act. The results of
these studies provide critical information to our water
treatment plants and districts, ensuring that safe drinking
water is available for the citizens of Arkansas.
Because of the drought and water shortages in arid regions,
the California Water Center has sponsored research on citrus
and avocado production problems using reclaimed municipal waste
water. The use of reclaimed water can influence soils and crop
production because it contains high amounts of dissolved salts
and other elements, like Boron. The studies suggest that
farmers might have to adjust their irrigation practices, or
manage soils with gypsum or other amendments, to irrigate with
reclaimed water and sustain crop production.
Idaho Water Resources Research Institute has predicted how
water demand and use in the Boise River influence communities,
economics, and climate in the important Treasure Valley. The
Minnesota Water Resources Center has helped regional resource
managers consider how managing mining waters and habitat
restorations influence mercury accumulation in fish in the
important St. Louis River estuary.
For 5 decades our institutes have addressed critical water
problems, answered essential research questions, and trained
over 25,000 students. Today our institutes continue to fill the
roles assigned by Congress in 1964, as well as further USGS
National Water Mission. We recommend that the Subcommittee
provide $8.8 million to the USGS for the Water Resources
Research Institute Program for Fiscal Year 2015. The Water
Institute directors recognize the fiscal challenges facing our
Nation and Congress, but we also want to support the USGS
coalition request to appropriate $1.2 billion for the USGS in
Fiscal Year 2015.
Thank you, and on behalf of all 54 institute directors
across the U.S. and its territories, I want to thank you for
this opportunity to testify, and for the Subcommittee's strong
support of the Water Resources Research Act program. It is
greatly appreciated.
[The statement of Brian Haggard follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Mr. Haggard.
And next, Mr. Robert Gropp.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
USGS COALITION
WITNESS
ROBERT GROPP, CHAIRMAN
Mr. Gropp. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Committee, appreciate the opportunity to appear before you
today. I also will do my best to earn my Brownie points that I
heard you were offering earlier. I will try. Again, my name is
Robert Gropp, and I am the Director of Public Policy for the
American Institute of Biological Sciences, but I am appearing
here today as Chairman of the U.S. Geological Survey Coalition,
which is an alliance of more than 70 organizations spanning the
breadth of the scientific and data use initiatives of the USGS.
And it has sort of come together years ago around recognition
of the important role that USGS science plays not just for
Department of Interior initiatives, and things like fire
suppression, but for the Nation as a whole. And so I have
provided a full statement for the record. I would like to just
highlight a couple of our general points.
Mr. Calvert. Your full statement, without objection, will
be entered into the record.
Mr. Gropp. So, as you know, the USGS is a unique agency in
that it has a full breadth of biological water, geospatial,
geological sciences, which really affords a unique opportunity
for the agency to come together around complex problems and
challenges, whether it is water quality, resilience to
environmental change, climate change, things like that, in
performing wise management of natural resources, or energy and
mineral assessments, and mitigating the ramifications of that.
So it is a unique blend of scientific expertise that can be
brought to bear on these hazards.
First of all, we appreciate all of your efforts over the
past years to, in a bipartisan fashion, provide strategic and
important new investments in the USGS, and to stave off
damaging cuts to the programs. As you know, scientific research
is a unique thing that requires sort of a consistent and
predictable funding trajectory to be able to prevent
disruptions in data gathering and analysis that can sort of
destroy long term data sets, which the USGS maintains a lot of.
So we appreciate that effort.
We recognize, as does everyone else, the constraints that
you are under. But, given that, to the extent that you can, and
that there is money you can find, we appreciate it. Ideally the
Coalition would like to get as close to 1.2 billion as
possible, which would involve the current budget, plus a
restoration of the 41 million in cuts that largely come from
staff reductions, as well as cuts to scientific and core
science programs, administrative support functions, as well as
a number of ongoing research projects, such as wildlife and
fish assessments, water quality programs, and the like.
And so, in addition to that, that number includes 75
million for available research opportunities that have been
identified by the agency in 5 areas, from energy and minerals,
to climate resiliency, to land management, and ecosystem
assessments, sort of across the board initiatives that could be
tapped to move the agency and the science forward. So, to the
extent possible, that would be wonderful. We would appreciate
that.
Really, other than that, I do not want to continue on too
much, other than to say that, again, we are a bit concerned
about some of the cuts that are proposed in there, in that when
you start cutting some of the scientific core functions, of
course, science functions that support things like the
bioscience data initiatives and so on, it is maybe a short term
savings, but there are long term ramifications.
And the other thing that I would comment on, I think that
the USGS has done a remarkable job in the last couple of years
in trying to protect science through creative measures to
contain costs by limiting travel, and participation in some
conferences and things, and I know that they are trying to
build that back into the budget. And, as a scientist, I would
like to encourage as much support as possible for the USGS to
be able to send its people to conferences. Scientific meetings
are incredibly important for exchange of knowledge for
advancing ideas, for professional development, morale of the
scientists, just the general broader scientific community. And
so, to the extent that the committee help support USGS making
those efforts possible, re-engaging in some of the professional
development and training initiatives that have sort of been
stalled a little bit to meet budget conditions, that would be
greatly appreciated.
[The statement of Robert Gropp follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Next, John Palatiello?
Mr. Palatiello. Palatiello.
Mr. Calvert. Palatiello? Well, you got it.
Mr. Palatiello. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. You are recognized for 5 minutes. This has
been a real tongue twister of a week.
Mr. Palatiello. Took me 4 years to learn how to--
Mr. Calvert. Okay.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
MAPPS--THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MAPPING, SURVEYING AND GEOSPATIAL
FIRMS
WITNESS
JOHN PALATIELLO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Palatiello. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee,
I am John Palatiello, and I am the Executive Director of MAPPS,
which is a trade association of private sector geospatial
firms, and I am also a consultant to the National Society of
Professional Surveyors, which represents licensed professionals
in the surveying community, both in public practice and the
private sector.
This Subcommittee has a great success story that is not
well known. The Subcommittee helped transform USGS, beginning
in the mid-1990s, from being a source of competition for
private mapping firms to a full cooperative partner, and a
source of business for the private sector. And, as a result,
the USGS now has a very modern, responsive, and cooperative
geospatial program.
There are 2 issues that we are here to discuss today. One
is the 3DEP, or 3 dimensional elevation program, in USGS. Both
MAPPS and NSPS enthusiastically support this program, and we
respectfully urge the Subcommittee to try to fully fund the
President's request, or, if possible, increase the
appropriations level to meet an extraordinary demand for
current accurate elevation data for the nation.
3DEP will satisfy that demand with consistent high quality
topographic data, and a wide range of other 3 dimensional
representations of the Nation's natural and constructed
features. The applications that will benefit from 3DEP include
flood risk management, agriculture, water supply, homeland
security, renewable energy, aviation safety, and many others.
USGS conducted a very comprehensive study that shows that there
are more than $13 billion in annual benefits to the program,
and a benefit-cost ration of 4.71 to $1 invested.
The National Academy of Public Administration recently
published a study called ``FEMA Flood Mapping, Enhancing
Coordination to Maximize Performance''. It was requested under
the Biggert-Waters bill in 2012. The NAPA report just came out
a few months ago, and it recommended that OMB should use the
3DEP implementation plan for nationwide elevation data
collection to guide the development of the President's annual
budget request. In other words, this should not be funded
entirely through FEMA, or not entirely funded through USGS,
because there are a variety of agencies, Corps of Engineers,
Bureau of Reclamation, variety of Federal agencies, as well as
State, local, and private beneficiaries of this program. We
think 3DEP represents a best practices model for coordination,
interagency and intergovernmental cooperation, and a strong
public/private partnership with the private sector.
While 3DEP is a success story, there is one area where
there is need for improvement that I would like to bring to
your attention today, and that is the fact that the Federal
government and Department of the Interior lacks a current
accurate inventory of the land that it owns. This has been
recognized by GAO and the National Academy of Sciences, and it
is potentially costing us billions of dollars.
On the other hand, the government inefficiently maintains a
plethora of often single purpose, or non-interoperable land
ownership databases. Secretary Norton, under the Bush
Administration, testified before this Subcommittee in 2005 that
in Interior Department alone they use over 100 different
property management systems. Now, in our discussion with folks
at the Interior Department, little has been done to reduce or
consolidate this proliferation of land inventories.
So we would urge the Subcommittee to include language
requiring the Secretary to conduct an inventory of inventories.
We think this will improve land management. It is a classic
example, in today's GIS technology, of map it once, use it many
times. Or, as Congressman Lamborn of Colorado said in a
hearing, the mantra seems to be, map it many times, and hoard
the data. That should not occur anymore. So we think this
inventory of inventories will help us identify what can be
eliminated. If you do it once and do it right, you can save
money by eliminating these duplicative programs.
So, 3 requests. One is we would love to see the full 146
million for 3DEP, but there is 5 million in the President's
request. There is 236,000 for Alaska mapping, 1.9 million for
National map modernization, and the full 60.4 million for the
National Geospatial Program. We would like to see the
Subcommittee go back to language it had in the '90s that
reaffirms the USGS use of the private sector, with a certain
percentage, and, again, we would like to see some leadership on
reforming our land inventory activities. Thank you very much,
appreciate it.
[The statement of John Palatiello follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
And next, Mr. John Geissman, Professor of Geosciences,
University of Texas.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA
WITNESS
JOHN GEISSMAN, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT DALLAS
Mr. Geissman. Thank you, Chairman Calvert, Members of the
Committee. Thank you for the opportunity today to testify on
behalf of the Fiscal Year 2015 budget for the U.S. Geological
Survey. My name is John Geissman. I am the past President of
the Geological Society of America. It is the oldest
professional geoscience society in North America. We celebrated
our 125th birthday last year. We are a society of over 25,000
members, representing all States in the country. Our
memberships comes from industry, academia, as well as
government, and we also represent 90 countries throughout the
world. We are also a member of the Coalition for the U.S.
Geological Survey.
Many of my comments in my oral testimony, and in my written
testimony, copies of which are provided here for the record----
Mr. Calvert. The full statement will be entered into the
record without objection.
Mr. Geissman. Thank you, sir. Really reiterate the
wonderful comments made by my colleagues already, so let me
just cut to the chase about a couple of issues related to the
U.S. Geological Survey and its budget for the future.
Most of the USGS budget is allocated for research and
development, and, in addition to underpinning the activities of
the Department of the Interior, this research is also used by
communities across the Nation to assist in land use planning,
emergency response, natural resource management, engineering,
and education. All of these partnerships allow the U.S.
Geological Survey to leverage a variety of different monetary
sources, making the most out of Federal research dollars.
And let me just highlight a few important research areas
that the U.S. Geological Survey is, of course, presently
involved with. One, first and foremost, is natural hazards.
Maybe I should not say first and foremost, but of great
importance is natural hazards. These remain an issue regarding
fatalities and economic losses throughout the world. We know
very, very well that several areas in our country are extremely
vulnerable to natural disasters.
And yes, I agree with you that many forest fires are indeed
natural disasters in the comments made earlier. These include
earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, landslides, as evidenced by
last month's major natural disaster in the Stillaguamish River
Valley in Northwest Washington. And, as a matter of fact, U.S.
Geological Survey maps had very, very nicely demonstrated that
that area affected, and all of the homes destroyed, were
sitting right on top of an older landslide. The survey has
compiled a very detailed map throughout the country of
potential landslide disasters, as well as potential earthquake
and volcanic disasters.
I would like to draw, in terms of not too ancient history,
today is the first anniversary of the largest landslide in
North America in historic time that is not related to a
volcano. And that landslide is not associated with a single
human calamity, nor any property destroyed, any. That landslide
took place in the Bingham Canyon Mine, run by Kennecott Copper,
and the reason that there were no effects from this landslide
is it was so intensely monitored. We, the community, knew
exactly when that landslide was going to happen. Warnings took
place, and the area was evacuated, just a year ago.
Through the U.S. Geological Survey, research improves our
understanding of these geologic hazards, and allows for better
planning and mitigation in these areas to reduce future losses.
So we urge Congress to support USGS efforts to upgrade its
natural hazards monitoring and warning systems to protect
communities from the devastating personal and economic effects
of natural disasters.
My second example here is that energy and mineral resources
are critical to the National security and economic growth of
our country. Even commercials say so. The U.S. Geological
Survey is the sole Federal information source on mineral
potential production and consumption. USGS assessments of
energy resources, such as shale oil, and gas, and geothermal
resources, are essential for making informed decisions about
the Nation's energy future. We are greatly concerned about
potential cuts to mineral resources related programs and their
effect on the ability of our Nation to safely develop new
resources.
And just finally, to close, current history, I believe, is
demonstrating that we live in the century of the geosciences,
the study of the solid earth, the atmosphere, and hydrosphere.
The impact of cuts to the U.S. Geological Survey budget, and
other Federal budgets related to the geosciences, or the next
generation of geoscience professionals, will be huge. And on
that note I conclude, and thanks very much for your attention.
[The statement of John Geissman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and thank you for your comments.
There has been discussion here about mapping, and especially
from Robert and John, and we had BLM out here the other day
testifying about completely remapping all of BLM's property,
which is significant, obviously, in the United States. But it
is interesting to note we have not done a good job of it, or of
mapping U.S. property throughout the United States, and doing
the overlays on that, what kind of resources it has, or what
kind of natural problems or advantages it may have.
Nowadays, with satellites, and other technical means, do
you have any comments on how we can do this, does anybody have
any idea what something like this would cost to do if we did it
in an organized, efficient, using both the public and private
sector to put together a good set of maps that is very
accessible, and people can look up on, like, Google Earth and
be able to zero in on any piece of property? Any comments?
Yeah.
Mr. Geissman. I will just make a quick one, that is
included in my formal testimony, and that is the preservation
of the Landsat mission, I think, is essential to at least a
part of the solution to this problem, regardless of how it is
preserved, through the number of different government agencies
that keep it going.
Mr. Palatiello. The question of the cost is difficult to
answer, Mr. Chairman, because you mentioned several different
layers, and each of those layers adds a cost. The level of
detail and accuracy that you want in each of those is a factor
of, at what altitude to you fly? Either the satellite imagery,
or the aerial photography, or hopefully, in the not too distant
future, the UAV, so you can get real low altitude and real high
resolution data.
The 3DEP program, which is the----
Mr. Calvert. Good luck on that, yeah.
Mr. Palatiello. Well, we are getting there. We are hoping
to get there.
Mr. Geissman. Can't we use the NSA's?
Mr. Calvert. Yeah. They are also under our jurisdiction.
We do not do that.
Mr. Palatiello. That is a subject for----
Mr. Calvert. I want to make everybody relax here. We are
not doing that.
Mr. Palatiello. That is a subject for a whole other
hearing. To do a 7 year repeat cycle on the elevation data, it
is 147 million a year. To do the parcel layer for land
ownership of the entire country, the National Academy estimates
it being, I think 247 million. So the public lands are about a
third of the country, so to do the parcel layer of the Federal
land ownership would be about a third of that.
I know that you all chuckled when I said we are looking for
an inventory of inventories. We believe that we could pay for
the parcel layer of the Federal land by eliminating the waste
that is in duplication of stovepipe land inventories that are
being conducted today. It truly is map it once, use it many
times.
I could get you a number for the record. There is an
initiative called the National Spatial Data Infrastructure that
has 7 framework layers of data that the Federal government is
attempting to accomplish. I believe there is a dollar figure on
what the estimated cost of that is, and I would be happy to try
to provide that for the record.
Mr. Calvert. And there may be ways to pay for that----
Mr. Palatiello. Yes, sir.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. So we can have a discussion?
Mr. Palatiello. Yes.
Mr. Calvert. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Just 2 points. I was laughing about the
mapping and the inventory stuff because it sounds like what you
really need is a good librarian. But I was going to say, there
is a lot of information out there. I am sure there are ways to
collect it. But with climate change, what is going to happen in
the coastal areas. What is going to happen in some of the
lakes? With lake shore property having a good database to work
off of will be very important. Several States I know have
shoreline, and depth of water, and everything else for
boundaries, and that possibly changing.
And then with USGS, I will just speak to what is happening
in the Twin Cities. We are finding we are going through our
water much faster than we thought we did. What is happening to
our reservoirs, our artesian systems and everything, is really
quite frightening. So I think there is going to be another
layer that USGS is going to be asked to be involved in, which
is going to make managing our water resources, and how we treat
our water, what chemicals we allow to put in our water, going
to be even more important for future generations.
So I think you described--there is a lot of work to do, and
very little resources, so thank you.
Mr. Palatiello. Could I comment?
Mr. Calvert. Very quickly.
Mr. Palatiello. Ms. McCollum, number one, on the
librarian, the USGS is a wonderful custodian and archive of
geospatial data. And to Mr. Simpson's point about accessibility
to this data, they do a very good job of making that data
accessible, so I really give them credit on that, number one.
Number two, the National, what is it, hydrologic data set
is one of the more robust that USGS and the Water Resources
Division does maintain. With regard to coastal and lakes, we
will be happy to talk to you. There is a bill that Mr.
Ruppersburger and Mr. Young of Alaska have to create, actually,
through NOAA, a digital coast framework of digital geospatial
data for both the coastal areas and the Great Lakes of the
United States to build exactly the kind of data set for sea
level rise, lake level rise, and the inland impacts of that as
well.
Ms. Simpson. Thank you all for being here. Thanks for the
work that the Water Resources Institute is doing across the
country. I know they do important work in Idaho, and I suspect
everywhere else, but nobody has mentioned stream gauges. Make
sure you keep stream gauges going out there. It seems like a
minor thing, but it is a big thing. And once you interrupt the
science of that, by taking stream gauges out, all of a sudden
you have interrupted that science. Appreciate all you guys do.
Mr. Palatiello. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Appreciate you coming out. You are excused.
Thank you for your attendance. Excuse me.
Our next panel, Mr. James Ogsbury, Executive Director of
the Western Governors' Association, Mr. Terry Mansfield, Board
of Directors, Partners for Conservation, Mr. Hildy----
Ms. Angius. Miss.
Mr. Calvert. What is that? Okay. Hildy Anguis----
Ms. Angius. Angius----
Mr. Calvert. Angius----
Ms. Angius [continuing]. Like the cow.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Like the cow----
Ms. Angius. Like the cow.
Mr. Calvert [continuing]. Mojave County Arizona Board of
Supervisors. Okay--close. And Mr. Mark--is it Mustoe?
Mr. Mustoe. Mustoe, yes.
Mr. Calvert. Mustoe, Co-Owner and Manager of the
Clearwater Seed Company, former Chair, Environment and
Conservation Seed Division, American Seed Trade Association.
Welcome. You have probably heard my talk about 5 minute rule.
We appreciate your being here. We want to hear from each one of
you. And, James, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
WESTERN GOVERNORS' ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
JAMES OGSBURY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Ogsbury. Mr. Chairman, and Members of the
Subcommittee, my name is James D. Ogsbury. I am the Executive
Director of the Western Governors' Association. WGA is a
bipartisan organization that represents the governors of the 19
westernmost States and 3 U.S. flag islands. The governors very
much appreciate this opportunity to testify before you today.
As you know, an overwhelming majority of Federally owned
and managed land is contained within the boundary of Western
States. The West has vast tracts of forestlands and rangelands
that are susceptible to fires and invasive species infestation.
The West is home to countless species of plants and animals,
many of which are the subjects of litigation and regulatory
processes under the Endangered Species Act. And the West faces
serious challenges with respect to drought and water
management.
For all of these reasons, and many others, the Western
governors recognize the importance of your work, the importance
of this particular Subcommittee, and the regional impacts of
your recommendations. They appreciate the enormity of your job,
and are prepared to help you help them as they endeavor to
bring their resources, expertise, and leadership to bear on the
problems and opportunities confronted by Western States.
With respect to many Federal efforts, States are more than
stakeholders. They are co-regulators. They have Constitutional
responsibilities. They are a level of government that is close
to the people, with specialized competencies and knowledge that
should be deployed for the more efficient administration of
government programs. Western governors are anxious to partner
with Federal agencies in ways that promote efficiencies and
cost-effectiveness.
On that point, Western governors believe that it would be
beneficial if States were to assume a greater role in the
design and execution of Federal policies, programs, and
regulatory decisions, the impacts of which are localized and
dramatic within Western States. Many Federal statutes
explicitly outline a strong role for States. Many others
delegate authority to States for their execution. This
Subcommittee can play a central role in building upon the
statutory model to create a new paradigm for an authentically
cooperative Federal-State relationship.
I know that you are just as concerned with how scarce
taxpayer dollars are spent as you are with the allocation of
budget authority and outlays. As you provide oversight and
direction to the agencies within your jurisdiction, we
encourage you to think about productive engagement of State
resources. To this end, WGA offers a number of specific
recommendations, which are outlined in greater detail in my
written testimony. I will briefly summarize those suggestions.
Last year the Subcommittee included language in its report
directing Federal land managers to use State fish and wildlife
data and analyses as principal sources to inform land use and
land planning decisions. We thank you, and encourage you to
reiterate and strengthen this language for Fiscal Year 2015.
Western Governors believe that States should be full and
equal partners in the implementation of the Endangered Species
Act, and should have the opportunity to participate in pre-
listing and post-list ESA decisions in the establishment of
quantifiable species recovery goals, in the design and
implementation of recovery plans, and as parties in
administrative and judicial actions involving ESA.
Several Federal statutes, including the Clean Water Act,
Clean Air Act, and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act vest
the States with the role of co-regulator with the EPA. That
role would be significantly enhanced by greater State
representation on the Science Advisory Board. The Subcommittee
is urged to ensure that EPA achieves more balanced SAB
representation, to include State participation that constitutes
no less than 10 percent of the membership of SAB Subcommittees
and subject matter panels.
On March 25 the Administration unveiled a proposed rule of
the EPA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers intended to clarify
the jurisdictional reach of the Clean Water Act. WGA is
concerned that States were insufficiently consulted in the
development of this proposal, and encourages Congressional
direction to EPA to more meaningfully engage the States in the
creation of rulemaking such as this, which had the potential to
fundamentally redefine the roles and jurisdiction of States.
With respect to funding levels of jurisdictional programs,
WGA recommends full funding of a permanent mechanism for the
Payment In Lieu of Taxes Program, as well as continued funding
of the Secure Rural Schools Program. Because State
responsibilities for species conservation are increasing in
number and complexity, the Subcommittee is urged to reject the
$8.7 million to the State and Tribal Wildlife grant program
proposed by the Administration.
This Subcommittee is well informed regarding the pressing
problem of fire borrowing. You have heard a lot about that
today. WGA supports legislation that would solve this budgetary
issue by creating a funding structure similar to that used by
FEMA in response to natural disasters. During last year's
government shutdown, certain National Parks were kept open
through the initiative and efforts of Western States. The
Subcommittee is encouraged to compensate those States for the
cost they incurred in shouldering a Federal obligation.
Does red mean stop? We offer these recommendations in the
spirit of cooperation and respect, and we are prepared to
assist you in any way as you discharge your very important
obligations and responsibilities.
[The statement of James Ogsbury follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Red means stop.
Okay, next we have Terry Mansfield with the Partners for
Conservation.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
PARTNERS FOR CONSERVATION
WITNESS
TERRY MANSFIELD, BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Mr. Mansfield. Thank you, Chairman Calvert.
Voice. And that light means your mike is on.
Mr. Mansfield. Chairman Calvert, Members, thank you very
much. My name is Terry Mansfield, I am a landowner from Cheney,
Washington, and a Board member of an organization, Partners for
Conservation. On behalf of Partners for Conservation, thank you
for the opportunity to provide comments on the 2015 Interior
Appropriations Bill.
I am a rancher, consulting wildlife biologist from eastern
Washington, is my background. Partners for Conservation is a
landowner-led nonprofit organization, working cooperatively
with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
We respectfully request that the Subcommittee support the
following funding allocations: Funding of $75 million for the
Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program; funding of $55 million
for the North American Wetlands Conservation Act; funding of
$14 million for the Joint--for the Habitat Joint Ventures
within the North American Waterfowl Management Plan Program;
funding of $900 million for land and water conservation, and
funding of $58.7 million for state and tribal wildlife grants.
As a member of Partners for Conservation, I just briefly
provide a little background. Our principles, we belief firmly
that collaboration gets work done, local lessons have national
impact, voluntary incentive-based programs create trust and
foster success, and sustainability is achieved by balancing
ecological and economic means.
We are a growing organization. We are seeking to have a
goal of representation in 50 states. We currently have a
membership extending from Montana to New Mexico, and California
to Florida.
Just a little bit of background. I live and work in eastern
Washington. My wife and I own a ranch. We raise cattle and
sheep. We--our goal is to maintain a sustainable livestock
operation, and also enhance fish and wildlife habitat values on
our property. We entered into a voluntary conservation easement
for wetland restoration in our area.
Just briefly, I would like to touch on what motivates me to
be involved with Partners for Conservation, and why I am in
support of the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program. The
simple answer is public and private partnerships need to work
cooperatively to focus our energy and available funding on
cost-effective programs, to sustain agriculture while
conserving our natural resources. It is my firm belief that
there is a sweet spot in which we can focus our collective
efforts to leverage financial resources to sustain working
agricultural lands while conserving those valuable resources.
In my area, roughly 75 percent of the area is privately
owned. The Federal Government agencies can't do the
conservation all alone. They need the support and cooperation
of private landowners.
In my particular case, on our ranch, we entered into a
Department of Agriculture conservation easement, but we
partnered that, we had Ducks Unlimited doing engineering, we
had partners for Fish and Wildlife advising on our technical
assistance on restoration, we also worked with the Washington
Department of Fish and Wildlife, the state agency. I would
submit that the Partners Program is a core group that allows
for this partnership to work. It is extremely successful. It
produces results through voluntary partnerships.
I just touch on national. In the last 25 years, the
Partners Program has assisted 45,000 landowners in conserving
over 1 million acres of wetlands, 3 million acres of upland
habitat, and restored 11,000 miles of streams. They end up
leveraging, for each dollar appropriated, approximately $8 in
project spending and over $15 in overall economic returns. The
program is highly supported by landowners.
I want to also touch on the other programs and how they
fit. Why should PFC and me as a rancher be in support of those
programs? Well, land and water conservation, state wildlife
grants, the joint ventures and the North American Waterfowl
Conservation Act, they all fit together, they are all tools to
be used by the Partners for Fish and Wildlife, and the state
wildlife agencies, and delivering effective programs on private
lands.
The land and water conservation funds are a classic example
of flexibility. Flexibility that can be used for local
solutions to leverage dollars, and one of the most effective
tools that we have seen, and firsthand examples by our Board
members from California to Florida, South Dakota to Kansas,
involves that fund source for acquiring conservation easements
in high priority areas.
Finally, I request the $58.7 million for state and tribal
wildlife grants. That is the local connection with the state
priorities, they tend to serve to keep common species common,
and get ahead of the federal listing requirements that happen
when we don't act proactively and collaboratively.
We also recognize the value of--in the face of the budget
challenges you are--you and your colleagues are looking at, we
certainly realize tough decisions need to be made. We also
realize though the value of sharing with you the on-the-ground
experience from landowners.
Mr. Chairman, I greatly appreciate the opportunity. PFC,
Partners for Conservation, invites you to come visit any of our
ranches to see firsthand how we put it on the ground.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The statement of Terry Mansfield follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you for the invitation and thank you
for your testimony.
Next, Hildy Angius, Chairman, Mohave County Arizona Board
of Supervisors. Welcome.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
MOHAVE COUNTY ARIZONA BOARD OF SUPERVISORS
WITNESS
HILDY ANGIUS, CHAIRMAN
Ms. Angius. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and
Members of the Subcommittee, and thank you for the opportunity
to provide this testimony.
My name is Hildy Angius. I am the Chairman of Mohave County
Arizona Board of Supervisors. I have traveled here today to
inform you about a recent U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services
decision to end a 52-year-old rainbow trout-stocking program at
the Willow Beach National Fish Hatchery. The Service's decision
will have a severe economic impact on Mohave County, the
nation's fifth largest county in square miles, because the
program helped support a multimillion dollar recreational
fishing and tourist industry in the region, an industry that
makes up over 30 percent of Mohave County's economy. We believe
that the Service is acting contrary to law, public policy and
science, and is doing so without sufficient public
participation and transparency.
I ask this Subcommittee to prioritize resources to help
restore the Willow Beach rainbow trout-stocking program, and
the economic stimulus it provides to my region.
The Willow Beach Hatchery is located along the Colorado
River near the border of Nevada and Arizona, within Mohave
County and the Lake Mead recreation area. The hatchery was
established in 1962 to raise rainbow trout for release into the
Lower Colorado River system, to help mitigate for impacts to
that system from the construction and operation of the Hoover
and Davis Dams. The hatchery was established pursuant to the
Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act, and the 1959 Memorandum of
Understanding between the Bureau of Reclamation, National Park
Service, and the Fish and Wildlife Service. That 1959 MOU is
still in effect today.
According to a study prepared for the Arizona Department of
Fish and Game, recreational fishing within Mohave County in
2001 alone contributed $74.5 million to the local economy, and
supported approximately 1,682 jobs. It would be hard to imagine
a more effective federal stimulus program for our region, yet,
on November 24, 2013, Mohave County learned that the Service
was terminating the Rainbow Trout Propagation Program at the
Willow Beach Hatchery. The Service claims that it lacks
sufficient funds to repair a broken waterline that delivers
water from Lake Mohave to the trout ponds at the hatchery. The
Service has known since 2010 that its water delivery system was
in need of maintenance, but failed to take corrective measures.
My county is now suffering because of that failure. In fact,
the Service's incompetence in managing the water delivery
system resulted in the death of over 60,000 fish last year. The
tragedy was completely avoidable.
Now the Service is claiming that it has no choice but to
eliminate the entire trout program because it can't afford to
fix a pipe. We believe the estimates to fix that pipe are
greatly exaggerated. The Service will tell you that they aren't
shutting down the Willow Beach Hatchery. Well, that is true,
but going forward, they will spend all available funding on
raising endangered bony tail chubs and razorback suckers using
an alternative water supply. While endangered species recovery
efforts are obviously worthwhile, Mohave County has been
struggling to understand where the Service gets its authority
to unilaterally alter the fundamental purpose of this critical
mitigation hatchery.
David Hoskins, Assistant Director for Fish and Aquatic
Conservation, has told me personally that it was a 2002
Congressional policy change that altered the focus of the
nation's mitigation fish hatcheries. Although I have requested
it, I have not been provided, nor have I seen any evidence of
that being true. Instead, we fear the Service is attempting to
shift the blame for the economic crisis currently threatening
my county onto Congress.
We also fear that the Service is ignoring its legal
obligations to evaluate potentially serious environment effects
associated with terminating trout operations. Rainbow trout are
a food source for the striped bass, or stripers as we call them
locally. If that food source is taken away, the stripers are
likely to prey on bony tail chub or other endangered species.
This probability was confirmed by a senior Fish and Wildlife
Service official in February.
Federal agencies are required by law to evaluate the
environmental, economic and socioeconomic consequences of their
actions before taking action. We are not aware of any--analysis
that has been performed by the Service to support its decision.
Any decision to shut down the program requires careful
evaluation and study, and certainly a lot more public and
stakeholder engagement than what has been provided to date,
which has been zero.
In closing, I am here to ask your help on behalf of Mohave
County. We respectfully request that immediate steps be taken
to prioritize the use of existing resources, to fix the pipe
and resume the trout-stocking program. Please take action to
ensure that the Service can't unilaterally circumvent Congress
by prioritizing suckers over trout. Please fulfill the
mitigation commitments that were made to communities along the
Colorado River over 52 years ago.
Thank you for your time.
[The statement of Hildy Angius follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, Ms. Angius. Thank you for your
testimony.
Next we have Mr. Mark Mustoe, you are with the American
Seed Trade Association.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN SEED TRADE ASSOCIATION
WITNESS
MARK MUSTOE, CLEARWATER SEED LLC
Mr. Mustoe. Yes. Thank you. Chairman Calvert and members
of the Committee, thanks for the opportunity today to testify
before you.
My name is Mark Mustoe. I am co-owner and manager of
Clearwater Seed Company in Spokane, Washington. We are a grow-
our-own company, producing high quality native grass and forb
seed for restoration. My farm is located in north central Idaho
near Kendrick.
I am honored to be here today representing the American
Seed Trade Association. Founded in 1883, ASTA represents over
700 companies involved in seed production, distribution and
plant breeding. My testimony includes recommendations for the
U.S. Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management,
regarding native seed development and procurement. And I would
just like to present my written copy for the record.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, that will be put into the
record.
Mr. Mustoe. The Environmental and Conservation Seed
Committee of ASTA represents approximately 80 percent of the
companies that sell seed to the U.S. Government for
restoration, reclamation and conservation projects by the
Bureau of Land Management. The vast majority of these companies
are small, but many have been in the seed production business
for decades. We appreciate the work of the BLM, but we are
concerned that their policies and directions in regard to site-
specific native seeds are not practical in the existing budget
climate.
We recommend that the BLM revisit its current practices,
and allow more known and introduced and tested native species
to be used in fire reclamation and restoration projects. We
also recommend that they recognize the work of USDA's
Agriculture Research Service, and Natural Resource Conservation
Service, plant material centers on appropriate species for BLM
projects.
Our comments today are grounded in both seed science and
practical seed production. We support the use of tested and
proven native seeds that can be successfully grown for seed
production. The assumption that we can restore a changing range
lane site simply by using only site-specific natives or
indigenous seed is unproven at best.
The ecosystems that the BLM wishes to restore function
differently today than they did historically. Ecological damage
to western rangelands due to fire and invasive weeds is
accelerating, making it harder for unproven species to grow and
thrive. The BLM is downplaying the significance of general
adaptation, of varieties for successful restoration, and
placing primary importance on the geographical origin of the
seed.
Since 2001, the BLM has spent over $70 million on native
plant material development efforts. The BLM has stated that its
plan is to develop 1,000 native restoration workhorse species,
250 of which would have new specific guidelines for restricting
the transfer of seed from one location to another. The
development of new plan materials is duplicating work already
being done by USDA. Instead, those funds could have been used
by the BLM to secure millions of pounds of already available
seed to successfully restore thousands of acres. Furthermore,
it is not feasible or scientifically justified to have seed
companies produce and store small quantities of 1,000 different
local ecotypes of seed. Before any of these new plant materials
are recommended by BLM, field testing to provide evidence of
their potential to succeed needs to be conducted. Our records
document that the BLM frequently seeks to develop and procure
seeds from unproven species which are deemed local ecotypes.
This dramatically increases the cost of seed, and also puts in
jeopardy the land that will be left open to erosion and
invasive plants should that planting fail.
The fiscal year 2014 Omnibus Appropriations Bill included
the following language to express the need for greater
transparency for BLM procurement, and I quote, ``The Committee
is concerned that seed procurement procedures and priorities
are duplicative and add unnecessary costs to Bureau programs.
The Committee instructs the Bureau to establish a system to
publicly communicate its yearly estimated seed needs by
variety. The BLM must implement the fiscal year 2014
appropriation language. In addition, we recommend the following
instructions be added this year: 1, that the Bureau should give
a higher priority to the most cost-effective and readily
available seed varieties in its purchasing decisions, where
appropriate, and 2, that the Bureau should coordinate with the
plant material centers at the USDA's Natural Resource
Conservation Service, and the Agricultural Research Service in
making such determinations. ASCA wholeheartedly supports
ongoing funding for proactive restoration and reclamation
projects. Our goal is no different than the BLM's. Restoration
of more public lands, with a real commonsense approach for a
better environment for all.''
I thank you for the opportunity today to testify, and will
certainly answer questions.
[The statement of Mark Mustoe follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Calvert. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Mr. Ogsbury, a very--a couple of issues. The Western
Governors' Association is a bipartisan group. I think your co-
chairman is--now is the Governor of Colorado and the Governor
of Nevada, is that correct?
Mr. Ogsbury. That is correct, sir.
Mr. Calvert. Is it also true, recently, that the Western
Governors' Association came out against a new rule that EPA is
proposing on the waters of the United States?
Mr. Ogsbury. First of all, I should clarify, the chairman
of WGA is Governor Hickenlooper of Colorado, and the vice
chairman is Governor Sandoval of Nevada.
And it is not technically correct to say that we oppose the
rule. We expressed concerns about the procedures associated
with its development. We think the states were insufficiently
consulted at the front end of the rule-making process.
Mr. Calvert. The Science panel has not concluded its
results.
I would hope that the Western Governors would stay in
communication with the committee as we move forward on this
issue. It is gaining a lot of interest.
Mr. Ogsbury. We appreciate that----
Mr. Calvert. And----
Mr. Ogsbury. [continuing]. And we have developed, I think,
a very cooperative relationship with the Subcommittee and with
the staff, and we appreciate your----
Mr. Calvert. And did the Western Governors' Association
come out yet in favor of Mr. Simpson's Bill? I will be----
Mr. Ogsbury. We have come out in favor of the principles
behind the Bill.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. And one last issue regarding the sage
grouse, you mentioned endangered species, that is probably on
top of your list I suspect?
Mr. Ogsbury. Very much so, sir.
Mr. Calvert. And we are going to work very closely with
Fish and Wildlife and with the BLM and others, to hopefully
make sure that it isn't listed. And Dan Ashe the other day
indicated to us very strongly that nothing will occur before
September 2015, giving us time to do the necessary things. I
hope that the Governors participate to make sure that we don't
have such a listing.
Mr. Ogsbury. Well, if I might, sir, the Governors are very
much involved in the Sage Grouse Task Force, which was
established originally by then-Secretary of the Interior
Salazar and Governor Hickenlooper and Governor Mead of Wyoming.
They have invested untold time and resources and manpower to
avoid a listing, and to protect the species. And those efforts
continue, and will commend your attention to the sage grouse
inventory that was published by the Western Governors'
Association, that is a--that represents a compendium of the
efforts of the various states to protect the----
Mr. Calvert. And we appreciate your ongoing interest in
that.
Mr. Ogsbury. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Calvert. One comment and then I will turn it to Ms.
McCollum.
Ms. Angius, you are not alone on the many voices we have
heard lately from people across the country who love fishing
and the National Fish Hatchery System. I can assure you that
this Subcommittee will act aggressively to sure-up the
Fisheries Program. We like fisheries here.
Ms. Angius. Thank you very much.
I just want to add that Willow Beach is an anomaly. It has
to do with this pipe that Fish and Wildlife is saying that they
cannot find the money anywhere----
Mr. Calvert. How much are we talking about?
Ms. Angius. They are saying anywhere between $1.5 to $9
million. It is quite a swing. Our engineers have----
Mr. Calvert. That's enough for government work.
Ms. Angius. Yeah. I have----
Voice. Yeah.
Ms. Angius. Our engineers have assessed it and we believe
it is under $\1/2\ million, if that much, and we are prepared
to even help along if even asked.
Mr. Calvert. Okay. We appreciate that.
Ms. Angius. Happily.
Mr. Calvert. We appreciate all the help we can get.
With that, Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Mustoe, I am a little confused. I don't want to leave
here confused about what your goals are.
On page 2, you say the BLM's native plant material
development and procurement efforts are unrealistic and
unsustainable goals for the Federal Government. But then at the
end you say the Bureau should give a higher priority to the
most cost-effective and readily seed available varieties in
purchasing decisions, where appropriate.
I am taking this from your testimony that you don't support
anything the BLM is doing with seeds.
Mr. Mustoe. No, no, no. I----
Ms. McCollum. That is why I wanted to give you a chance.
Mr. Mustoe. Yeah, no, thank you. No, as stated, we wholly
support restoration, wholly support the use of sound science,
use native species and introduced species. What is happening
though is the BLM is pouring millions of dollars into what I
would call recreating the wheel of plant development. There are
already dozens of species of plant material available that were
growing, that have come out of plant material centers, and they
are going and collecting and they are reinventing the wheel,
and while all this time and money are being spent, I would say,
in trying to develop hundreds of plant materials. It doesn't
make sense--
Ms. McCollum. How?
Mr. Mustoe. [continuing]. When they are already there and
available.
Ms. McCollum. I understand the tension. I went through this
with the nurseries in Minnesota when we were reintroducing some
native species. I know there can be sweet spots to be found.
Mr. Mustoe. Um-hum.
Ms. McCollum. Because we don't want to necessarily just
lose the potential of having native seed together, so I just
wanted to be clear.
Mr. Mustoe. And----
Ms. McCollum. [continuing]. Where you were. Thank you.
Mr. Mustoe. [continuing]. Supporters of native seed and
what we have been doing.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
Mr. Mustoe. Thanks very much.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Simpson. Along those same lines. Are you aware of any
delays in BLM efforts to reseed burned over areas because of
new genetic requirements for seeds that are too localized to be
commercially viable?
Mr. Mustoe. We have seen it in the forest service
especially, that sites that have not been seeded, period,
because they are asking for a specific, site-specific seed from
that fire, and, quite frankly, unless we knew 5 years ago there
was going to be a fire there, and we collected it and then put
it in a breeding program, we wouldn't have it. So they are
choosing to not seed at all with natives that are perfectly
native. Bluebunch wheatgrass is bluebunch wheatgrass, but when
you are put in a box and you can't move it more than 30 miles,
and this has been moving and transferring with animals and
birds for thousands of years.
Mr. Simpson. Okay, thank you.
Mr. Mustoe. Yeah, thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Hildy, the Chairman of the Mohave County Board
of Supervisors, I have a feeling the Fish and Wildlife Service
has got their hands filled with you.
Ms. Angius. Well, we, you know, we have our ongoing issues,
and, you know, we had a public hearing about this, and anything
you guys can do to help us, we would appreciate it.
Mr. Simpson. I guarantee you we will look into it.
Ms. Angius. Thank you very much.
Mr. Simpson. Mr. Mansfield, beyond the Fish and Wildlife
Service's programs that you mentioned, how else can the Fish
and Wildlife Service work better with private landowners such
as in their refuges or endangered species programs?
Mr. Mansfield. Mr. Simpson and Mr. Chairman, I think there
are a number of ways, and I think open communication,
collaboration, just that mindset. I think the Partners for Fish
and Wildlife Program is the only program with the Service that
is dedicated to cooperative relation, to working with private
landowners. I think there are some great successes out there,
and I think emulating that and moving it out. I think the
refuge system has made some positive steps, in some cases,
partners biologists to work on the private lands are actually
stationed on the refuges. Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge
near my ranch is one example. And I think that tends to, quite
frankly, broaden the role. I think the local community
appreciates the Service and their program. I think it is a two-
way street on communications.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Mansfield. Build trust, build relationships. Government
agencies can't do it alone. I think there are outstanding
models through the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program to
essentially put a wider hat on the Service in some of those
rural landscapes where conservation needs are contentious, and
we can make progress.
Mr. Simpson. I think we are going to be more successful in
the future working with private landowners, and I have worked
with the birds of prey representatives in the Peregrine Fund,
with the falcon in Texas and working with local landowners and
ranchers. You find out when you work together, you can actually
solve some problems. I think you are going to see more of that,
and hopefully we will be more successful in stopping the
extinction of some of these species, and getting them delisted.
So I appreciate all you do. Thanks for being here from the
Western Governors' Association. We will work on a lot of things
together. Governor Otter is always very supportive of the
Western Governors. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you, and we thank the panel. You are
excused.
Introduce the next panel. And at this point, Mr. Simpson is
going to take over so I can catch an airplane. So I will leave
it to you.
Mr. Simpson. [presiding] Okay, are there any names you
can't pronounce there? No?
Voice. Plumer.
Mr. Simpson. Ms. Christy Plumer, Director of Federal Land
Programs and U.S. Government Relations for The Nature
Conservancy; Mr. Gary Werner, Executive Director, Partnership
for the National Trails System, and John Calvelli. Calvelli.
John. The executive vice president for public affairs of the
Wildlife Conservation Fund.
We are under the 5-minute rule, as you all know.
Ms. Plumer, you are first. Go ahead.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE NATURE CONSERVANCY
WITNESS
CHRISTY PLUMER
Ms. Plumer. Thank you. Thank you, Congressman Simpson,
Ranking Member Moran, and Members of the Subcommittee.
My name is Christy Plumer, I am director of federal land
programs with The Nature Conservancy's U.S. Government
Relations Department.
The Nature Conservancy is an international, nonprofit
conservation organization, working in all 50 states and around
the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters
for nature and people. Our mission is to conserve the lands and
waters upon which all life depends.
As we enter the fiscal 2015 budget cycle on another year of
a challenging fiscal environment, the Conservancy continues to
recognize the need for fiscal austerity. Our budget
recommendations this year reflect a balanced approach, with
funding levels consistent with the President's budget. Requests
are in rare instances such as wild land fire or funding for the
states reflect specific program needs.
Of particular note, we wish to work with the Subcommittee
and the authorizing committees on identifying permanent funding
solutions for wildfire funding, the Land and Water Conservation
Fund, and payment in lieu of taxes. And wish to thank you,
Congressman Simpson, and Ranking Member Moran for all of your
work on this front, both the competitive stateside program of
Land and Water Conservation Fund as well as making this linkage
between LWCF--so we really appreciate your efforts on those
fronts.
The Conservancy is concerned about the increasing impact of
wildfire suppression funding on interior funding levels, and
urge Congress to support efforts to enact the Wildfire Disaster
Funding Act. I know you have heard a lot about this today, but
again, thank you. All Members of this Subcommittee are now
cosponsors of that legislation, and we really appreciate your
support for that.
The process of funding suppression for the Department of
Interior and USDA Forest Service will create budgetary
stability and accountability, while liberating critically
needed appropriations funds within the Interior allocation. For
the Land and Water Conservation Fund, the fiscal year 2015
present budget proposes establishment of a dedicated long-term
funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund, both a split
of mandatory funding as well as current appropriated funding at
the $350 million level for appropriated, $550 for the
permanent.
Obviously, this is going to be a huge lift, and something
that we want to work with the Subcommittee and members of the
authorizing committees to move forward. Obviously, other
important programs funded by LWCF, the Forest Legacy Program,
Section 6 Program, both housed under that LWCF framework are
also very important to the Conservancy, and ones we want to see
continue to remain in there, as well as stateside LWCF Program.
So we look forward to working with you there.
On other fronts, the Conservancy supports the Western
Governors' Association's request for the Subcommittee to
consider issuing a recommendation for land management agencies
within its jurisdiction, to utilize State Fish and Wildlife
data and analyses to inform the land use, land planning and
related natural resource decisions of those agencies.
We have significant concerns about the reduced funding in
the State and Tribal Wildlife Grant Program, and obviously I
know that is of import to the Subcommittee, and something that
members have expressed interest in raising that funding level
this year.
And finally, I cannot speak about appropriates without
mentioning the increasing cost of wildfire suppression, and the
impacts of all agencies and programs funded by the
Subcommittee. In the last 2 years, over $1 billion were
transferred from non-suppression programs at the Forest
Service, Department of Interior, when annual suppression funds
were exhausted. This places incredible strain on the budgets of
already constrained agencies that are forced to stop their
other land management responsibilities, including the very ones
like restoration, that have the ability to reduce the risks and
costs of wildfires. Additionally, the last 2 years of transfers
were repaid, not from emergency supplementals, but from the
next fiscal year's Interior Bill, further reducing levels going
to other programs funded through the Interior Bill.
Suppression predictions are not getting any better for the
current fiscal year, or the next, and this is neither
sustainable nor an efficient method of running a budget, as we
all know. Congress currently holds the solution, and that is
the Wildfire Disaster Funding Act. Through its enactment, first
responders will be provided with the upfront resources and
agencies and programs funded by the Subcommittee will be
provided with that needed stability. Just as important as
appropriately funding suppressing is funding those activities
that reduce the cost and risk of fire. Conservancy recommends
investing in forest restoration activities like hazardous
fuels, and the collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration
Program. The Conservancy's additional recommendations are
included in our written testimony for the record.
Thank you for this opportunity to testify.
[The statement of Christy Plumer follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Christy.
Gary? You always give me one of those trail maps and it
makes me want to go hiking on a trail.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
PARTNERSHIP FOR THE NATIONAL TRAILS SYSTEM
WITNESS
GARY WERNER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Werner. Wonderful. Thank you, Congressman Simpson, and
Congresswoman McCollum. I am Gary Werner. I am the executive
director of the Partnership for the National Trails System. I
am here today representing the citizen stewards of the 30
national scenic and historic trails, to thank you, your
predecessors and your staff on this Committee for over 2
decades of continuous funding support and oftentimes very
critical guidance being given to the 3 agencies that administer
and manage these trails.
I want to gladly report to you and assure you that our
commitment as your partners continues to grow. It is as strong
as ever. In 2013, we are--organizations volunteers who recorded
more than 1.1 million hours of volunteer labor, the fourth year
in a row at that level, amounting to, with the financial
contributions, about $36 million worth of support for the
trails. Congress was able to provide $24 million that year to
the Park Service, the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land
Management for these trails. So the public-private partnership
here is strong. We are hoping it could be a bit stronger.
The first request I have is that these trails, although
that map looks like they are all there on the ground, none of
them is really fully complete or finished, and so we are
requesting that you appropriate for 2015 a little over $16
million to the Park Service, a little over--about $8.7 million
to the Bureau of Land Management, and about $9.1 million to the
Forest Service to operate these trails. That amounts to about a
$9 million increase over what the President's budget is
requesting for the trails, but you need to consider them, as I
say, works in progress that continue to need investment, both
on the public side and on the private side.
Like the Nature Conservancy and the organizations this
morning supporting the Land and Water Conservation Fund, we
fully support the President's budget request for the full $900
million, and we also support the efforts to find a way to get
to that by the mandatory funding, and if that includes linkages
with payment in lieu of taxes and other vital services, we
encourage you to be creative in all of that.
In particular, we want to ask you to full fund, at $57.7
million, the National Trail System Collaborative Landscape
Planning Proposal included within the President's budget. That
will fund the purchase of 53 parcels of land along 15 national
scenic and historic trails, including several in Idaho on the
Nezperce, and California national historic trails, and on the
North Country National Scenic Trail in Michigan.
We also ask you to substantially increase funding for the
Challenge Cost Share Programs of the Park Service, the Forest
Service and the Bureau of Land Management. For the Park Service
in particular, $4 1/2 million, for the Bureau of Land
Management, $5 billion--million, and as you have done in the
past, we would ask that you provide the guidance that the Park
Service, about a third of that money should come for the
National Scenic and Historic Trails. We have successfully
leveraged the money in the past at a 3 to 1 ratio, and
oftentimes as much as a 10 to 1 ratio.
The other assistance we would ask you for is in the Bureau
of Land Management's budget, which, as you know, is faced--it
is a programmatic budget with subactivity accounts, the
National Scenic and Historic Trails are units of the National
Landscape Conservation System, but they do have no line budget
in that budget, no subactivity account. Rather, they are
currently funded out of 8 or 9 separate subactivity accounts,
whereas the other units of that National Landscape Conservation
System, the wilderness areas, the national monuments and
conservation areas, do have individual subactivity accounts.
This puts the Bureau's involvement with the Park Service and
the Forest Service at a disadvantage in administering and
managing those trails, when they have the bulk of the
responsibility on the ground.
Last thing I would ask you for, and this is in regard to
the Forest Service's budget with the trail maintenance backlog,
we support what I think was mentioned this morning by the
Wilderness Society, at least $85 million for--per year for the
Trail's account in the Forest Service, if there is any chance
of getting the backlog built down. We are perfectly happy and
willing and able, without volunteers, to play a major role in
that effort, but the $77 million level that is being requested
by the President this year just is not enough to address with
that.
And so again, I thank you very much for not only the
funding, but the guidance and support you have given over the
years in this experiment in public-private citizen stewardship
of public resources.
[The statement of Gary Werner follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Gary.
John.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
WILDLIFE CONSERVATION SOCIETY
WITNESS
JOHN CALVELLI, EXECUTIVE VP FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS
Mr. Calvelli. Good afternoon, Congressman Simpson,
Congresswoman McCollum. Thank you for the opportunity to offer
testimony on fiscal year 2015 Interior Appropriates Bill.
I am the executive vice president of public affairs for the
Wildlife Conservation Society, which was founded in 1985 with
the help of Teddy Roosevelt, with the mission of saving
wildlife and wild places worldwide. Today, WCS manages the
largest network of urban wildlife parks in the United States,
led by the flagship Bronx Zoo, and globally we work in more
than 60 countries to protect 25 percent of the world's
biodiversity.
Internationally, we have reached a crisis with regard to
the international trafficking of wildlife. U.S. Government
estimates compiled by the Congressional Research Service last
summer showed that illegal trade in endangered wildlife
products, including elephant ivory, rhino horns and turtle
shells, is worth at least an estimated $7 to $10 billion
annually, and because of the lucrative nature of this
enterprise, there is increasing evidence that transnational
criminal organizations and terrorist groups that are involved.
Groups like Al Shabab, Lord's Resistance Army, The Genguide.
And in other major trafficking operations such as drugs, humans
and weapons, they are also now getting engaged in wildlife
trafficking as well.
On the ground in African and elsewhere, WCS scientists are
seeing firsthand the devastating impact poaching is having. In
2012 alone, we estimated that 35,000 African elephants were
poached for their ivory. That is an average of 96 elephants per
day, or 1 killed every 15 minutes. The subspecies of African
forest elephants has seen a decline of 76 percent since 2002.
Continued poaching at these rates may mean the extinction of
forest elephants within a decade.
The Federal Government recently announced a national
strategy for combatting wildlife trafficking, which is designed
to provide a framework for a whole government approach to
addressing wildlife trafficking. Several programs within the
Bill form the foundation upon which the strategy is built. The
Multinational Species Conservation Fund, managed by the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service, provides funding to conserve a
number of global priority species. WCS has used money from MSCF
programs to help sustain wildlife populations by stopping
poaching, reducing human-wildlife conflict, and protecting
essential habitat. These programs are highly efficient,
granting them an outsized impact because they consistently
leverage 2 or 3 times as much in matching funds from
corporations, conservation groups and national governments.
WCS requests that $10 million be appropriated for the MSCF
for fiscal year 2015, equal to the fiscal year 2009 funding
level.
Similarly, the Wildlife Without Borders global and regional
programs are a great investment in addressing cross cutting
threats to ecosystems and wildlife such as disease outbreaks,
human-wildlife conflict and the bush meat trade. In fiscal year
2015, WCS recommends funding the Wildlife Without Borders
Program equal to the President's request of $7.2 million.
Within the Wildlife Without Border Program is the
Critically Endangered Animals Fund. This is a fund actually
that is less than $1 million, which was created in 2010 to
provide grants to protect the most imperiled species on the
planet.
Also within Fish and Wildlife Service, I would like to
highlight the Office of Law Enforcement. Many of the new
responsibilities placed on Fish and Wildlife Service by the
National Strategy will be enforced by OLE, and WCS supports the
President's request for $67-$66.7 million.
We would also encourage the Committee to support the OLE's
effort to deploy personnel at key embassies overseas to
facilitate investigations involving species that are victimized
by illegal trade.
I would like to encourage the Committee to support an
appropriation of $58.7 million, equal to fiscal year 2014
levels, for the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants Program, which
gives states and tribes funding to implement conservation plans
to protect declining wildlife and habitats before protection
under the ESA is necessary.
And finally, WCS supports an appropriation of $8 million,
equal to last year's funding level, for the U.S. Forest
Service's International Programs, which helps to improve the
sustainability and legality of timber management processes
overseas. This translates to less underpriced timber,
undercutting U.S. producers, which in last estimate, I believe,
was approximately costing America about $1 billion.
I appreciate the opportunity to share WCS's perspectives,
and make a case for continued investment in conservation, which
reaffirms our global position as a conservation leader,
improves our national security, and builds capacity and good
governance in developing countries.
Thank you.
[The statement of John Calvelli follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. John, you didn't--because you were focused on
the poaching.
Mr. Calvelli. Yes.
Ms. McCollum. I appreciate what you said, and the comment
about the embassies. I have brought the groups that do
international work whether it is Smithsonian, U.S. Fish and
Wildlife, USGS, Parks, all together. The embassy continuity is
a concern of embassies changing over. U.S. Fish and Wildlife
or, if we even have the Park Service go in and do some of the
training. This will create the continuity that we don't have in
the embassies. I am hearing from the ambassadors that they
wouldn't mind having the continuity.
Mr. Calvelli. Um-hum.
Ms. McCollum. Have you heard that too?
Mr. Calvelli. Yes, we have heard the same thing, and I
apologize, I was watching the clock because I know you have had
a long day, and----
Mr. Simpson. Appreciate it.
Mr. Calvelli [continuing]. I worked here for 12 years so I
know your time is valuable, and I left some of that out. The
fact is the continuity issue is very important, but more than
that, just trying to get Fish and Wildlife Service employees
into these embassies has been somewhat daunting at times, just
because of logistics. And we can go into some specific details
on a one-on-one, but we just feel that getting people on the
ground to help with some of this, especially in places like
Tanzania, would be very, very helpful.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you.
Mr. Chair, I think our challenge is going to be for some of
our colleagues on the floor to explain why we would have Park
Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife expending funds
internationally because you and I both heard the rhetoric, but
I think we have an opportunity with briefings in that,
especially around with the poaching to maybe change some minds.
Mr. Calvelli. I just wanted to share one kind of incredible
statistics. We are headquartered in New York. New York,
according to one study that was done, has as large an ivory
market as Beijing. We are part of the problem, not part of the
solution, number one. Number two, based on whatever studies you
want to look at, it is anywhere from 25 percent to 1/3 of all
ivory in the U.S. is illegal, which basically means it is being
poached by these organizations. So fundamentally, if you are
buying a piece of ivory, you may be funding terroristic
activities.
This is not about--this is--forget morality for a moment,
we are being foolish if we don't do something, and we can stop
this on the ground. We have to change. We have a three-part
strategy which is stop the killing, stop the trafficking and
stop the demand. At the end of the day, we need to be making
sure that we have people on the ground, helping to stop that
trafficking from going on because if we don't, there won't be
any elephants left to save in the wild.
Ms. McCollum. And the cost of ivory was equivalent to the
cost of gold, and rhino was----
Mr. Calvelli. Rhino to heroin. So we are at real--at this
point because if we don't do something, especially rhino horn,
there is a belief that it has certain medicinal properties, but
when you look at ivory, this is only for ornament. It is
ornamental in nature. We actually can do something about that.
Mr. Simpson. So as you know, the Fish and Wildlife Service
is talking about a rule to clamp down on the legal sale of
ivory, ivory that is sold by people for a variety of different,
ornamental reasons, firearm, and many other purposes.
Mr. Calvelli. Um-hum.
Mr. Simpson. It is completely legal.
Mr. Calvelli. And----
Mr. Simpson. And I realize that it is sometimes difficult
to distinguish between what is legal and what is illegal.
Mr. Calvelli. Yes. Yes. That is exactly----
Mr. Simpson. Are we taking value from someone by saying
essentially that you can no longer trade the legal product that
you own?
Mr. Calvelli. So I think first of all, there are ways of
working around some of those issues, and we have actually been
having very, very good conversations with the bow makers of the
United States of America----
Mr. Simpson. Sure.
Mr. Calvelli [continuing]. And there are 50 of them that
are making bows for violins, et cetera. These small----
Mr. Simpson. Sure.
Mr. Calvelli [continuing]. Entities, and we need to kind of
figure out a commonsense solution. I would just pause at one
different perspective, which is Tanzania and Kenya and many of
the poorest countries in the world have destroyed their ivory
stocks, which ostensibly could be worth tens of millions of
dollars, to send a message that we need to do something.
I would ask, could we as a government and as a country make
that same kind of commitment so that we can help save this
species from extinction.
Mr. Simpson. It is easy to make that commitment as a
government, but as an individual that owns something that is of
a certain value.
Mr. Calvelli. Um-hum.
Mr. Simpson. The government by its activities, is going to
make it worthless.
Mr. Calvelli. I completely understand the problem.
Mr. Simpson. That is a challenge. We have to deal with it.
Mr. Calvelli. Yeah. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson. Okay.
Mr. Calvelli. And I--we need to deal with it----
Mr. Simpson. And I am not suggesting there is not a way to
do it, and I am not suggesting that I don't want to stop all
the poaching of elephants either.
Mr. Calvelli. Yeah, exactly.
Mr. Simpson. I appreciate that. I appreciate you are
willing to work on that.
Mr. Werner, if the Subcommittee can increase trail
maintenance activities, how do we do so in a way that shares
the cost with those who would benefit by it? Do you want to
answer that for the record?
Mr. Werner. I don't know. I mean it would be obviously
fees that would be collected by the agencies that administer
the land. There are----
Mr. Simpson. Are there any fees that would go into effect
on the trails that are out there now? If you are going to go
hike one of these trails that you have on your map, are there
any fees that the hiker pays along the way?
Mr. Werner. There would be fees, you know, a number of
them go through national parks, and there would be entrance
fees for the parks, I think. On the national forests in
general, no. On the Bureau of Land Management land, generally
no.
Mr. Simpson. There are rec fees on a lot of our national
forests when you go park at a certain place.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson. Sometimes you have to have certain----
Ms. McCollum. Honor boxes.
Mr. Simpson. Right.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson. No, they are actually more than honor boxes.
Ms. McCollum. Well----
Mr. Simpson. You have to have a permit that is kind of
like a snow machine tag or something similar.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson. Or they will get you to come back to your
parking place and there will be a ticket on your car.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson. And it is usually 50 bucks or something like
that. Those are some of the things that have been implemented,
and there has been opposition to it, there has been support of
it, and the money stays in the region to help those forests and
to help. I don't have a problem with it because it helps
maintain the parking lots and bathrooms.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson. Is there anything similar to that on any of
the trails?
Mr. Werner. There----
Mr. Simpson. I am not suggesting for the public that we do
it.
Mr. Werner. Right.
Mr. Simpson.
Mr. Werner. No.
Mr. Simpson. I am just inquiring.
Mr. Werner. As you can well imagine, one of the challenges
with trails that are thousands of miles long is that a lot of
the access points to them are not on public land, and so----
Mr. Simpson. So you wouldn't suggest we put a snow machine
sticker on our forehead when they go?
Mr. Werner. No. I am just saying----
Mr. Simpson. But is it something to think about?
Mr. Werner [continuing]. It would be difficult.
Mr. Simpson. How are we going to maintain these things and
declining resources and trying to find the funding to do these
things. We are trying to find creative ways to mend some of
these things, and I appreciate that.
Mr. Werner. I understand that, and I know that--I
mentioned the volunteer hours and we have been tracking them
for close to 20 years, and they keep increasing----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Werner [continuing]. And I think there is----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Werner [continuing]. And I won't say it is a
limitless, but I think there is a much larger pool of people
out there, you heard all of the Service Corps testimony earlier
today, of sources of help outside the government to do the
physical work----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Werner [continuing]. On the ground. The part of it
that I would caution from my experience, and ask you to keep in
mind, is there is no free lunch, meaning you still need enough
money supporting to programs and the agencies that they can
have the right personnel out there to be able to coordinate and
guide the, whether they are volunteers or they are Service
Corps or whatever, in the work. And there has been a tendency
with the tightening budgets in the Park Service, Forest
Service, and Bureau of Land Management, to look at volunteer
and outside labor as essentially like a free labor source,
meaning----
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Werner [continuing]. We don't need the staff to----
Mr. Simpson. Right.
Mr. Werner [continuing]. You know, to help with that, and
that just doesn't work.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Christy, a lot of work the Conservancy does, and you
brought up a really important thing.
Ms. McCollum. Your bill?
Mr. Simpson. Not the only thing, but that was the really
important thing. The second really important thing is the other
issue I am working on, and that is trying to tie SRS, PILT, and
LWCF together, and get them mandatorily funded and out of the
budget. And while we haven't been, it will fall on us if the
mandatory funding that runs out after this year that was in the
Farm Bill goes away. All of a sudden, there is another $400
million hit on our Bill. That affects everything else we do in
the interior bill.
So trying to find the vehicle to tie these together and to
pay do it, it would be nice not to have these uncertainties
that exist with the Land and Water Conservation Fund, PILT, and
SRS where you are doing things over a long period of time, and
landowners need to have some certainty that it is going to be
there. So it is an important thing we all need to keep working
on, so I appreciate you mentioning that.
Ms. Plumer. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
Mr. Werner. Could I respond?
Mr. Simpson. Sure.
Mr. Werner. As you are well aware, the, you know, 50 years
ago the, what would you call it, the trade-off of taking non-
renewable resources, i.e., oil and gas, off the continental
shelf and reinvesting that in this important heritage of the
country in the Land and Water Conservation Fund, maybe is the
model, and maybe the model should be looking at other fees
coming off of energy production in the country, not just non-
renewable but maybe even renewable resources as a way of
reinvesting.
And so I--because I--I mean one approach would be the
offshore oil and gas leases are huge now, okay, but that is not
going to go on forever, but maybe if you--if the basic concept
of we are using up some resource, let us reinvest some of that
in resources that are priceless for all of us, forever. And
certainly, the, you know, the combination of the 3 programs
that you are talking about, that solution would be--I think
would be marvelous. So--and thank you for your efforts.
Mr. Simpson. We will continue working on it until we find
a solution, but we have people--we have groups that have
different interests in different parts of it that are all of a
sudden starting to talk and work together, and see if they can
find a common solution. So that is very important.
Thank you all for being here today.
Mr. Werner. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. We appreciate it very much.
Okay, next, Byron Williams, the executive director of the
Wildlife Society; Joshua Saks, the legislative director of the
national Wildlife Federation, and Will Gartshore.
Mr. Gartshore. That is it.
Mr. Simpson. Is that it?
Mr. Gartshore. That is it.
Mr. Simpson. That was pretty good, I thought. Yeah. U.S.
Government relations for the World Wildlife Fund.
Byron, you are up first.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE WILDLIFE SOCIETY
WITNESS
BYRON (KEN) WILLIAMS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Williams. Well, thank you, Congressman Simpson and
Congresswoman McCollum. I appreciate the opportunity to be here
and to provide some recommendations for you.
I am Ken Williams--Byron K. Williams, with the--I am the
executive director of the Wildlife Society. The Society is a
nonprofit scientific and educational association that was
founded in 1937. We've been around for a while. We have about
10,000 professional wildlife scientists and managers and
another 10,000 or so affiliates dedicated to excellence in
wildlife stewardship through science and education.
There are a number of programs that TWS--for which you have
oversight that TWS actively supports. We've identified many of
those in our written testimony. I'll highlight just a few of
those here today for three agencies.
The first one of those agencies is the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, which oversees State and tribal wildlife
grants--the grants program, which is the only Federal program
that supports states in preventing wildlife from becoming
endangered. It is a primary program supporting implementation
of the State Fish and Wildlife action grants, which detail
conservation actions needed on the ground in every state to
keep common species common and avoid this nightmare of the
Endangered Species Act.
The--it supports the economy by providing 28 jobs for every
one million dollars that are--that is spent, double the number
of jobs supported by road and bridge construction, so it is a
good buy. We recommend Congress sustain this year's funding at
58.7 million dollars for the State Wildlife Grants Program.
The Wildlife Society is a member of the Cooperative
Alliance for Refuge Enhancement. The society supports the
presidential quest for the National Wildlife Refuge Program's
operations and maintenance accounts at 476.4 million. Refuge
system is an exceptionally good investment in that it actually
pays for itself several times over by generating 4.87 dollars
in economic activity for every 1 dollar appropriated by
Congress, yet in recent years appropriations have not only
failed to account for rising costs, but have declined steadily,
resulting in the loss of 324 employees in 2011, equivalent to 9
percent of the staff. We support O&M funding for the National
Wildlife Refuge System for 476.4 million dollars.
The second agency that I would like to make recommendations
for is the Bureau of Land Management. With lands that support
3,000 species of wildlife, including more than 300 federally
proposed or listed species. Historically the Wildlife and
Fisheries management and threatened endangered species
management programs within BLM have been forced to pay for the
compliance activities of BLM's energy grazing and other non-
wildlife related programs, eroding their ability to conduct
pro-active conservation activities and their efforts to recover
listed species. We recommend that Congress appropriate the
president's request of 52.6 million for BLM wildlife management
and 52 million for BLM's endangered species program.
The Wildlife Society is part of the National horse and
Burrow rangeland management coalition that promotes science-
based range land management. We support the requested increase
of 2.8 million dollars for BLM's wild horse and burrow
management program to implement the National Academy of
Science's recommendations and to continue research and
development on contraception and population control. There are
more than 12,000 horses above the appropriate management levels
on the range right now, and there are another 50,000 horses
that are off sight--in off-sight loading facilities. TWS is
very concerned about BLM's emphasis on fertility control alone
as a way to deal with this very large overpopulation problem.
So the requested 80.2 million dollars for the BLMs Horse
and Burrow Program should be provided if--on the proviso that
they continue removing excess non-native horses from the range
at a reasonable rate and focus on additional resources for
habitat restoration. The current report language limiting the
use of humane euthanasia for unwanted and unadopted horses
should be removed to enable BLM to have all the necessary
management tools allowed within the free--within the wild free
roaming horse and burrow Act to bring populations within
manageable numbers for the benefit of native ranges and the
welfare of the horses.
The third agency I would have a recommendation for is the
U.S. Geological Survey, home to the Cooperative Fish and
Wildlife research units which conduct research for renewable
natural resource questions, participate in the education of
graduate students, provide technical assistance and
consultation to states on natural resource issues, provide
continuing education for national resource professionals. The
Wildlife Society is a member of the National Cooperators
Coalition representing some 84 organizations supporting the
work of the cooperative research units which are located in 38
states, including the great state of Idaho, the great state of
Minnesota, and every other state on this committee except one.
In order to fill current vacancies and enhance national
program coordination the National Cooperators Coalition and the
wildlife Society strongly support an increase in the--the
increase in the president's budget to 18.5 million for the
cooperative research units for fiscal year 2015.
The U.S.G.S. National Climate Change and Wildlife Science
Center plays a pivotal role in addressing the impacts of
climate change. We recommend that Congress fund the National
Climate Change and Wildlife Science Center at the requested 35
million in fiscal year 2015.
Thank you for considering these recommendations. We would
be happy to answer any questions you might have concerning our
request.
[The statement of Byron ``Ken'' Williams follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Byron. Joshua.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
NATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION
WITNESS
JOSHUA SAKS, LEGISLATIVE DIRECTOR
Mr. Saks. Thank you, Congressman Simpson. I am Joshua
Saks. I serve as the legislative director for the National
Wildlife Federation, the nation's largest member-based
conservation and advocacy organization. And for the past 77
years, NWF has represented a broad coalition counting nearly 4
million members and supporters in that coalition that includes
outdoor enthusiasts, birders, hikers, hunters, and anglers, and
more.
And this diverse coalition of members and supporters are
united by a passion for common sense, balanced approaches to
managing wilderness and protecting our environment. Funding
levels detailed in my written statement represent those values
and smart conservation choices our members believe in. And it
is on their behalf I would like to share two key points about
the fiscal year 2015 Interior and EPA Appropriations bill.
The first point is simple. Conservation funding supports a
key American value that encourages economic growth and provides
an array of additional ecosystem benefits, and we need more of
it. Therefore funding for conservation programs, which, by the
way, account for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, are
one of the most effective investments we can make as a nation.
And first, it is a good investment because it is an
investment that we really believe it. Whether it is elk hunting
in Idaho or canoeing the boundary waters or sailing on the
Chesapeake, these are things that are near and dear to
Americans, and that is probably why in 2013 a Pew Research poll
found 65 percent of Americans said they support increasing or
maintaining spending on conservation and environmental
protection.
In addition, protecting something that is so engrained in
the American spirit, we know it is a blue chip investment. It
is an investment that pays off. A recent study found outdoor
recreation, nature conservation, and historic preservation
account for $1.6 trillion in overall economic activity. They
support 9.4 million jobs a year. Outdoor recreation generates
more than $40 billion in annual revenue, and millions of
hunters and anglers in America spend nearly $90 billion a year
on wildlife-related recreation. To invest in conservation and
protecting the environment is to help continue these
industries.
Also, conservation spending is an investment in a
sustainable future. As sea levels rise and storms increase in
strength and frequency, our cities and towns and economies are
at risk. And in 2012, for example, the U.S. faced 11 disasters,
each of which cost more than $1 billion. That is the second
costliest year on record. It is only going to get worse. And
tools like land acquisition and ecosystem restoration, the
things that this Subcommittee pays for, are the things that are
going to protect us from those coming storms.
It is also for these reasons that we request that you
ensure a bus funding for the Department of the Interior and EPA
to fund key programs like Land and Water Conservation Fund,
State and Tribal Wildlife grants, funding for ecosystem
restoration like the Chesapeake, and protection for great
waters and cherished landscapes.
And now let me make my second point, and that is that
funding alone will not protect and restore the environment. We
need strong laws to ensure the quality of the air we breathe
and the water we drink and ecosystems are protected. And
conservation funding is only one side of that two-sided coin.
The Obama Administration certainly understands this, and
recently they have taken steps, administrative steps, to
protect the environment. Of particular note, they have
promulgated rules to reduce carbon pollution from power plants
and mobile sources, and just the other week, they did announce
a long overdue rule making to clarify the scope of the Clean
Water Act. That rule is 20 years in the--or, pardon me. It is 8
years in the making. It protects 20 million acres of wetlands
and 2 million miles of streams.
And in recent years, this Committee has used riders to
challenge some of these landmark environmental laws and these
initiatives by the Administration. And certainly it is the
purview of Congress to think about these things, but they
should be given their due. They should have hearings in the
authorizing committees and certainly shouldn't be cut off by
riders on the floor.
So in closing, we urge you to provide robust funding for
conservation and wildlife and ensure that these bills are free
of policy riders. Thank you for your time.
[The statement of Joshua Saks follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Will.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
WORLD WILDLIFE FUND
WITNESS
WILL GARTSHORE
Mr. Gartshore. Thank you, Vice Chairman and Ranking Member
Moran and the Subcommittee for the opportunity to testify
today. I am Will Gartshore. I am a senior policy officer for
U.S. Government Relations at World Wildlife Fund. WWF is the
largest private conservation organization working
internationally to conserve wildlife and nature. We currently
sponsor conservation programs in over 100 countries with the
support of 1.2 million members in U.S. and more than 5 million
worldwide.
One of our top priorities is supporting efforts to combat
global wildlife trafficking and the current global poaching
crisis, which you have already heard John Calvelli from WCS
talk about a bit. I will try to add and not repeat. We work
closely together with WCS and other organizations on this
issue.
In 2012, WWF launched our Stop Wildlife Crime campaign to
help galvanize interest and support globally including by the
U.S. government to address this issue. So we are extremely
gratified this past year, just a couple months ago, to see the
administration release the new national strategy on combating
wildlife trafficking and also very gratified to see that in the
fiscal year 2014 congressional appropriations, there was
significant additional funding to implement actions related to
that strategy and to addressing this crisis, and we would love
to see that momentum continue in fiscal year 2015.
Most relevant for this Subcommittee are a number of
important conservation and law enforcement programs in the
Department of Interior, specifically U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service, which have essential roles to play in executing that
strategy and in combating the crisis.
So WWF respectfully requests that this Subcommittee fund
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office of Law Enforcement at
no less than the administration's request of $66.7 million in
fiscal year 2015 including additional funding to support the
national strategy and at least $4.8 million for the Lacey Act
Enforcement, which includes one of the wildlife trafficking
actions that the law enforcement office is taking. Also to fund
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office of International
Affairs at the administration's request of $14.6 million. That
includes the wildlife without borders programs that Mr.
Calvelli was speaking about, but also there are scientific and
management authorities which support U.S. efforts are cities
and permitting of legal wildlife here in the U.S. And to fund
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Multinational Species
Conservation Funds at $10 million, which is about $900,000
above the administration's request but consistent with the FY09
number.
The global legal trade and wildlife is worth about $8 to
$10 billion annually. If you include the legal trade in timber
and fish, it goes up to about $20 billion. So it is huge. It is
one of the top five transnational organized crimes globally and
strongly linked to other criminal activities including arms and
drug trafficking and a lot of bad actors in places like central
Africa, east Africa. The U.S. government released--the
intelligence agencies of the U.S. government released an
assessment last September that showed there was significant
evidence linking these activities to even to terrorist-linked
groups.
The numbers, John mentioned the central Africa numbers on
forest elephants, about a two-thirds drop since--in the past
decade. In east Africa, the Tanzania government just released
numbers back in January showing that their Selous Game Reserve
which had been the second largest concentration of elephants in
Africa, the numbers there, they have fallen 66 percent in just
four years, which is devastating. And then rhinos, which was
initially caused us to get our campaign rolling. In South
Africa, which you have about 85 percent of the world's
remaining rhinos, and since 2007 when 13 animals were killed,
last year it was 1,004. That is a 7,000 percent increase since
2007. So it is crazy. And then there are about 3,200 tigers
remaining in the wild, and they are still poached and traded
for their body parts and their bones and their skins.
So the Office of Law Enforcement investigates wildlife
crimes, enforces regulation of wildlife trade, and helps
citizens to comply with the law, also works with other
international and U.S. government entities to carry out its
mission. Its agents and investigators have a central role in
implementing the strategy, as I said, and they are on the front
lines in the fight against wildlife trafficking, working in
nearly 40 designated and nondesignated ports of entry around
the country.
One example of the work they are doing is Operation Crash,
which is breaking up rhino horn smuggling rings here in the
U.S., and there have been about 15 convictions under that
operation already, which has been going for about two years.
Since FY10, the reductions in the agency's budget have caused
the cancellation of plans to hire 24 more special agents and
prevent the vacancies from being filled for 14 frontline
inspectors as well as 3 forensics experts for the Clark R.
Bavin National Fish and Wildlife Forensic Laboratory in
Ashland, Oregon, which is the only laboratory in the world
dedicated to solving wildlife crimes, a unique asset in the
fight against ivory and rhino horn smuggling.
I would note that while we support the Administration's
request, since I submitted this testimony, it came to my
attention that John Calvelli mentioned the stationing of the
attaches around the globe, and there is money in the request
for five of those. They have gotten four times as many requests
from countries for those attaches. So in order to double that
number and meet at least part of that request, additional
funding would be required above and beyond the Administration's
request.
And also between 2018 and 2021, they are set to lose about
60 percent of their 208 agents to mandatory retirement, and
they have not requested additional funding to compensate for
that. So it would need to be over and above the
Administration's request.
In just noting the time, I will say we support the
Multinational Species funds as well as the International
Affairs Office, but I want to just note some success under the
funding provided through Multinational Species. WWF announced--
the government of Nepal announced in March of 2013 that they
had a year of zero poaching, which is the first time that has
happened since 2011. Not a single rhino, tiger, or elephant was
poached in that country for the entire year. And we work
closely with the government of Nepal with help from the Fish
and Wildlife Service, USAid, working with communities, the
government, and the armed forces there patrolling some of those
parks. And it is the combination of the U.S. government
supports, NGO support, and country action that has led to that
success, and it is a great counterbalance to what we are seeing
in a lot of other countries. So thank you very much.
[The statement of Will Gartshore follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Thank you to all. Jim.
Mr. Moran. All three groups are doing great work. We have
come across this in our Defense Appropriations hearings, the
amount of money that is going into terrorist groups that is
gotten through the illegal trade, exotic animals and tusks and
ivory, and devastating populations of elephants, rhinos, and
tigers.
So it is important stuff that the Wildlife Fund is doing
and as is the other related groups, and I appreciate the fact
that you are all collaborating. It is--the National Wildlife
Federation, Wildlife Society, and the related groups, you are
all trying to accomplish the same objective. And that is what
we should be doing, and we are trying. I wish we could get--
provide more resources to you, but we appreciate the people
whose generosity is--continues to fund you.
I don't have any questions so they are doing good work.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, and thanks for all the work you do.
And Joshua, we will have to have a conversation one day. There
are no riders in our bill. They are policy decisions that go
into our bill, and usually those deal with funding. And some of
them are restrictions of funding and other are directions of
funding. But that is what we do. So we appreciate your comments
and look forward to working with you all as we put this bill
together.
Mr. Saks. Thank you.
Mr. Simpson. You bet. Next is Mr. Michael Mace, curator of
birds at San Diego Zoo Safari. Mr. Peter Jenny, president of
the Peregrine Fund. Mr. Bobby Williamson, and Mr. Randy
Streufert. Is that close?
Mr. Streufert. Right on.
Mr. Simpson. All right, I am doing good. Now that we are
getting to the end, I kind of got the hang of it, you know.
Michael, you are first.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE 5 NONPROFIT PARTNERS CURRENTLY WORKING ON CALIFORNIA CONDOR
RECOVERY
WITNESS
MICHAEL MACE, SAN DIEGO ZOO SAFARI PARK
Mr. Mace. Okay, thank you. We want to thank you and the
committee for allowing us to come and talk to you about the
importance of the California Condor Recovery Program. My name
is Michael Mace. I worked for San Diego Zoo Global. I am a
curator there for birds, and we have been involved with the
condor program since its inception for more than 30 years. Our
organization is also working in 40 other countries with many
other endangered species around the world.
This is my colleague, Pete Jenny, from the Peregrine Fund,
CEO and president of the Peregrine Fund, one of our partners.
We are here representing three other organizations: Los Angeles
Zoo, Oregon Zoo, and Ventana Wildlife Society.
The condor is an iconic North American species, an
endangered and dangered species, and it is the largest flying
bird in North America with a nine-and-a-half-foot wingspan. And
it serves a key ecological role in North America, and that is
it is a scavenger, and what that means is it cleans up animals
that have died. What is important to us is that in those
carcasses are toxins that grow like botulism and anthrax. And
by doing this service protects not only wildlife but humans as
well.
Also, as I see this picture on the wall, there is a strong
cultural tie with condors to Native Americans. Even today,
feathers that are molted by condors are used in ceremonies and
rituals.
The condor hit its all time low, almost went instinct,
within only 22 birds left in the world, and that was in 1982.
And U.S. Fish and Wildlife came to San Diego Zoo, the Peregrine
Fund and Los Angeles Zoo and asked us to help them save the
condor, and we did. We went from 22 birds to now more than 400.
There are 412 in the world, of which 230 of those now fly free
in California, Arizona, Utah, and Baja, Mexico.
Through that time, we have been able to produce birds for
release back into the wild. Unfortunately have to intensely
manage them because some of the very threats that caused the
decline are still there. We also applied various sciences like
genetics management, research for spatial ecology and such, and
including canary service and pathology science to help preserve
the species. But those, as I mentioned, those challenges are
still out there in the wild.
All this work has not been without significant burden and
cost to the five partners. We collectively invested more than
$40 million of our own privately-earned money to support this
program. Our annual budget is $3.3 million of which the
partners contribute 82 percent, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service, who oversees the program, provides 18 percent support.
So recently U.S. Fish and Wildlife came to us and said we
acknowledge the fact that the five partners without your
support and scientific endeavors, most likely the condor would
be extinct today, and they acknowledged that. So we remain
committed to the program. We have for more than 30 years, but
without additional federal support, it would be unrealistic for
us to maintain this type of program at this level forever, and
we are asking for that support. Otherwise, we will have lost 30
years of investment to try to save the condor.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Peter.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
THE 5 NONPROFIT PARTNERS CURRENTLY WORKING ON CALIFORNIA CONDOR
RECOVERY
WITNESS
J. PETER JENNY, PEREGRINE FUND
Mr. Jenny. Thank you. Thank you for this opportunity. My
name is Peter Jenny. I am president and CEO of the Peregrine
fund. We are best known probably for leading the successful
recovery of the endangered peregrine falcon, which was arguably
the largest and most successful endangered species recovery
effort in history. We are now also working with the California
condor, and in our facilities in Idaho, we have the most
productive and largest collection of captive breeding condors
in the world. We also manage a wild population of 75
individuals.
The beauty of this program, and Michael covered some of the
problems, but the beauty of this program is that all of the
difficult R and D has been done. We know how to breed them in
captivity. We know that the condors can make it in the wild.
They are breeding on their own. They are dispersing. They are
foraging on their own. The one single problem that stands
between us and total recovery of this endangered species is
lead exposure, and I brought--can I do this? I brought some
visual aids. If we could get hunters to utilize these solid
copper alternative bullets, we would be talking to Fish and
Wildlife Service right now about delisting this species. It is
that simple.
And this is the solution. We have developed a very
effective voluntary program in the state of Arizona to
encourage hunters to voluntarily use these non-lead
alternatives. We have an 80 percent voluntary compliance rate
in the state of Arizona. Our modeling indicates that if we can
duplicate that effort in neighboring Utah, that the lead levels
will be low enough that we will enable the California condor to
be effectively recovered.
I am really hitting the high points here, but this is a
wonderful opportunity for us to demonstrate a private and
public cooperative venture here. This is a doable project, and
if we get together with your support, this can be like the
peregrine falcon, yet another endangered species success story.
We are so close.
[The statement of Michael Mace/Peter Jenny follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Welcome to D.C., and I mentioned
the birds of prey and the Peregrine Fund earlier when we had
another panel up here, and your work with landowners in Texas
on the aplomado falcon and how that has turned out and stuff.
So I appreciate you being here.
Mr. Jenny. Well, thank you.
Mr. Simpson. Bobby.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
FRIENDS OF THE WICHITAS SECRETARY
WITNESS
BOBBY WILLIAMSON
Mr. Williamson. On behalf of the Friends of the Wichitas,
thank you for inviting me to talk about our refuge, and thank
you for the support you have shown over the years.
My name is Bobby Williamson. I live in southwest Oklahoma
near the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. When I was born, I
lived on the refuge. My father worked there. I have continued
to stay at the refuge for over 50 years. My career has been
with Goodyear, but when I am not at work, that is where I am
at.
The friends I work with, they help remove invasive plants,
do fence repair, lead hikes. We are mostly interpreters trying
to share what we know with as many of today's youth who may
someday be tomorrow's refuge staff or just a future friend who
might get the chance to speak at a Subcommittee hearing
someday.
I volunteer with others to support the effort of the
refuge. We work side by side, giving time, money to support the
efforts. My friends are poor, well-to-do, black, white,
Republican, Democrat. Some are religious. Some are not. But for
all of our diversity, we have a common ground: we love the
refuge. This is true in all of our refuges in America. Where
else could you find a government-run organization where manning
is more than 20 percent by volunteers?
To come out and volunteer, our members show that they
really care about something. I donate to many causes, but my
time is given to the refuge. It is what I love and am willing
to stand here and defend. I am an interpreter, a hike leader. I
inherited this from my parents and plan on caring for my refuge
until the next generation takes up where I leave off.
This is something we have inherited and have been asked to
protect for future generations. When you visit a refuge like
ours, you only need to look around, see the bison or the elk
moving across the open prairie, watch a sunset over a mountain
or just watch the stars at night while the coyotes howl back
and forth among themselves to understand what these places
meant to previous caretakers.
It is amazing to think that the early settlers had time to
even imagine leaving these places for future generations. And
in doing so, we expect the same from us, keep it safe, keep it
pure. I have hiked most of the AT, done rim to rim to rim the
Grand Canyon. I have half of the national parks in the country,
a lot of the trail systems that Mr. Warner talked about. But
when I come and I tell my wife about these places, she just
smiles because she knows that I will always be at the Wichitas,
and she is right.
We have been given a treasure to protect. During the Great
Depression, our refuges and parks were there for the CCC and
the WPA. Americans were provided work during a difficult time
in our history building many wonderful treasures. These
treasures are in disrepair and falling down. The Jed Johnson
Tower burned, and the rope has never been replaced. The buffalo
lodge where Teddy Roosevelt stayed was damaged by broken water
lines and has not been repaired.
The Ferguson House burned by a controlled fire on a
military base next door and has never been repaired. This one
is dear to me because when I was born, this was my home. These
are all on the register of historical sites and have not been
repaired. This is wrong. We are not maintaining what we were
given to protect. They gave us so much. What is to be our
legacy?
I can only talk firsthand about the Fish and Wildlife
Service employees at the Wichitas. These people take the time
to explain things to visitors every day. They bend over
backwards to make every visitor feel special. They are a wealth
of knowledge and love to share with others. I would like to
take this time to invite each and every one of you to my
refuge, any refuge, and spend a day, see what it is that we
love so much. See where so many millions have found a place to
go and recharge, explore, or just get away from everyday
stress, a refuge. President Johnson made a statement at the
signing of the Wilderness Act 50 years ago that I think
applies. ``If future generations are to remember us with
gratitude rather than contempt, we must leave them a glimpse of
the world as it was in the beginning, not just after we got
through with it.''
Gentlemen, the $480.4 million for Fiscal Year 2015 is not a
lot on the grand scale of things. It merely maintains the
status quo for a refuge that earns $44.47 for every dollar
appropriated. I urge you to make a statement and protect our
treasures. Make it a jobs package. There is work to be done.
Thank you.
[The statement of Bobby Williamson follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Bobby. Randy.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
FRIENDS OF THE POTOMAC RIVER REFUGEES
WITNESS
RANDY STREUFERT, DIRECTOR
Mr. Streufert. I assume this is on. Vice Chair Simpson,
Mr. Moran, thank you for the opportunity to comment on the
fiscal year 2015 Appropriation for the National Wildlife Refuge
System. My name is Randy Streufert. I am now a nature
photographer. In 2012, I retired after 39 years in the public
service as a federal employee. I held a senior management
position for over 20 years with the last 4 in the senior
executive service. I am also a veteran, having served with the
U.S. Army. In the last year, I frequently served as a volunteer
on the refuges.
Today I am speaking on behalf of the Friends of the Potomac
River Refuges. Ours is a nonprofit organization promoting
appreciation of the wildlife and habitats on the three refuges
in northern Virginia. Those refuges are Elizabeth Hartwell
Mason Neck and Morton, Occoquan Bay, and Featherstone in
Woodbridge, Virginia. These refuges serve a population of about
3.4 million in northern Virginia and the District of Columbia.
This area includes, as you know, a large military contingent at
Fort Meyer, Fort Belvoir, Walter Reed National Medical Center,
and Quantico Marine Base.
Refuges, so much more so than parks, are places set aside
permanently for wildlife. They are places of quiet where one is
surrounded by nature. Although encircled by an urban landscape,
the three Virginia refuges offer solitude and peace of mind
interrupted only by sounds of bald eagles heard overhead,
songbirds in the trees, and frogs in the marsh.
It is precisely this type of environment that is critical
to the healing process for wounded warriors. Secretary of
Interior Jewell recently announced an action plan to benefit
our military members, their families, and those veterans
returning as wounded warriors. The plan would increase services
that support the needs of military families relative to
psychological health, and physical rehabilitation on refuges
and other public land; increase the accessibility of refuges,
parks, and other public lands where active duty military
personnel who have been injured or who are in rehabilitation
resulting of injuries related to military service including
PTSD.
Our veterans and their families have earned the best of
what our government can provide, but there is a problem. The
refuges we support in northern Virginia are unfortunately
representative of many in the national system. They are
underfunded and understaffed. They are ill-equipped to provide
additional services. In the national wildlife refuge system,
over 38,000 volunteers perform 20 percent of all the work as
you have heard before. And there is already at least a 20
percent understaffing level.
The situation for the three Potomac River refuges is
typical. They have a staffing plan approved for 16. They can
only fill 7. They have one law enforcement, one business
services, and one maintenance officer. The plan calls for three
of each. When the maintenance officer was out last month, it
snowed. With no one to plow the roads, the refuge just closed.
I worked with refuge staff. They are all highly dedicated
and represent the highest standards of what we expect of public
servants. As a former manager, I know being one staff member
deep per any activity is a problem waiting to happen. Criminals
know that one law enforcement officer cannot adequately cover
three separate refuges.
The president's budget request for the National Wildlife
Refuge System is $476.4 million. That is less than a 1 percent
increase over this year. Our position is that the level should
be no lower than $480.4 million just to maintain the current
underfunded status. We join the National Wildlife Refuge
Association and the Care Group, a diverse coalition of hunting,
fishing, and conservation, and scientific organizations in
calling for a $900 million annual budget for the refuge systems
operations and maintenance.
Now, without applying basic economic rules, asking for an
additional $425 million during a time when deficits must be
reduced could be a non-starter. But by applying economics with
the findings of the Banking on Nature Study, refuges generate
an average of $4.87 in total economic output for every dollar
appropriated. In economic terms, funding for refuges is an
investment with a guaranteed profit. It is not an increase to
the deficit.
To put that additional $25 million in perspective, please
keep in mind the following. On April 9, 2013, the Government
Accountability Office issued its third annual report exposing
unnecessary duplication and overlapping programs throughout the
federal government. GAO's report outlined more than $95 billion
in potential savings from duplicate programs and inefficient
practices.
In 1982, President Reagan's head of OMB, David Stockman,
announced his engagement to be married. A reporter asked him
who would maintain the family checkbook. He responded quickly
that his wife would since he rounded off figures to the closest
billion.
Providing $900 million to the refuge system will help
wounded warriors and the refuges to be maintained and provide
much needed programs to our citizens. In a $3.9 trillion budget
that includes $95 billion in waste, a $900 million budget is
just a rounding exercise. Thank you for considering our
request, and I hope all of you will visit one of our northern
Virginia refuges.
[The statement of Randy Streufert follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Mr. Moran.
Mr. Moran. Tim Aiken, my legislative director, just
reminded me that MS13, the violent drug and sex trafficking
gang in northern Virginia was actually operating out of the
refuge in Prince William County because there was so little
capacity for law enforcement and monitoring of the refuge. So
it does need, our refuges, need more care given to them, and it
would be nice if we could expand some of the Potomac River
refuges. But there is no point in doing it if we don't have the
personnel to maintain what we have. Chairman has made that
point before.
So thanks for your efforts, Randy. I'll let you handle the
Boise, Idaho organization, sir.
Mr. Simpson. Well, thank you all for being here and for
your testimony and making all the trip out here from Boise. And
actually Boise is not too bad. You don't have to ride a horse
or anything to get around, like you do the other parts of
Idaho. Just kidding. We actually have paved parts where planes
land and stuff. But you guys do some incredible work.
And, you know, Jim, before you retire from Congress, I have
to get you out to Idaho and visit. We could do a trip and visit
NFC, the National Fire Center in Boise. And while we are there,
it is only, what, 10 minutes to get to the Birds of Prey. And
it is incredible the stuff that they have----
Mr. Moran. I would like to do that. You have already got me
rooting for Boise State so----
Mr. Simpson. Anytime I can do that, I have done my job.
Mr. Jenny. Congressman, I can't believe I neglected to say
this, but I neglected to make my ask of members somehow. What
we are fervently supporting is the Fish and Wildlife Service
request for recovery--the request, which is just shy this year
of $88 million. And we certainly support that.
Mr. Moran. Appreciate the one in the President's budget.
Mr. Jenny. Exactly.
Mr. Simpson. And, of course, San Diego Zoo speaks for
itself. You don't have to say a heck of a lot more than that.
They do great work, and the refuges are obviously very
important, and we will do what we can to make sure in these
limited budget times that we have the resources to do what is
necessary.
But before I dismiss this panel, I will tell you a little
story. Before Norm Dicks retired from Congress, in his last
Subcommittee hearing at this table, Norm told us to take care
of the refuge system. And, you know, Mr. Moran has done a
wonderful job of doing that as he became Chairman. He has been
a strong leader for not only the refuge system but so many
other programs in this bill.
And this is the last public hearing that Jim will be at
from this Subcommittee. I have been his ranking member when he
was chairman, and he has been my ranking member when I have
been chairman. And I just wanted to personally thank Jim for
his work on this bill, and we have agreed and disagreed on
issues. But we have always done so amicably, and we have tried
to understand where each other is coming from on certain
issues.
And I really want to thank Jim for the great work he has
done. I hate to see him leaving Congress, but he has been a
valuable partner on this Subcommittee for many, many years. And
as I have tried to help him understand what grazing in Idaho is
like, he has tried to help me understand what the fish in the
Potomac are like.
And so he has been a truly important member of this
Subcommittee, and not only that, just a dear friend. So I thank
you, Jim.
Mr. Moran. I deeply value our friendship, Mike. I really
do. It has been a pleasure to work with you.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you. Okay, next panel. We have Mary Beth
Beetham, director of legislative affairs, Defenders of
Wildlife. Rosalyn Morrison, legislative assistant to Animal
Welfare Institute. And Nancy Perry, senior vice president,
governmental relations, American Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty of Animals.
Mary, you are first.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
DEFENDERS OF WILDLIFE
WITNESS
MARY BETH BEETHAM, DIRECTOR OF LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS
Ms. Beetham. Chairman Simpson, Ranking Member Moran, thank
you for the opportunity to testify. Mr. Simpson, it is an honor
and a pleasure to see you here again today even though you are
no longer the actual chairman, and I am happy to be able to
speak to you today, Mr. Moran, on your last public witness day.
So thank you for the opportunity. I am Mary Beth Beetham,
legislative director for Defenders of Wildlife. Founded in
1947, Defenders has more than 1 million members and supporters,
and we are dedicated to the conversation of wild animals and
plants in their natural communities.
North America is fortunate to have some of the most
abundant and diverse wildlife on earth, more than 200,000 known
species in the U.S. alone. This unique and irreplaceable
heritage is treasured by all Americans both for its aesthetic
value as well as for the very tangible benefits it brings as a
resource.
For example, a third of our food is pollinated by birds,
bats, and insects. Cuts since 2010 to federal programs that
conserve wildlife and habitat have severely undermined sound
management. For example, the Fish and Wildlife Services told us
that funding decreases in the endangered species program
actually delayed the recovery of the endangered Florida manatee
by preventing crucial habitat restoration work. Continued cuts
will likely lead to irreversible harm to vulnerable species and
their habitats. Our nation's wildlife is a treasure and well
worth the investment to properly care for it.
We thank the Subcommittee for working during a final
conference on the omnibus appropriations bill to reverse the
sequestration cuts for many programs, and we hope the
Subcommittee will continue its efforts and provide important
increases for high priority wildlife conservation needs in the
2015 bill.
While our written testimony highlights all of the programs
that we are concerned about, I will just touch on some today.
Of course, it is still a number of them because Defenders
supports many activities. Under the Fish and Wildlife Service,
the President's request proposes a restructuring of the
ecological services activity which includes the endangered
species program.
We are concerned about whether the new structure will allow
for adequate transparency and accountability, particularly in
the large general program activities program elements. Unless
the agency can show that it has adequate controls in place to
ensure the strategic use of this funding and a transparent
prioritization and reporting process, we support maintaining
the current budget structure, and we would support the
increases that are in the request for the endangered species
portion of ecological services to help protect and recover our
nation's most vulnerable plants and animals.
Also under Fish and Wildlife Service, we support the
following increases: $2.5 million that will help to ensure
citing of renewable energy projects in a way that prevents harm
to vulnerable species, $1.8 million for the Innovative
Cooperative Recovery Initiative which is doing a good job
supporting more efficient efforts across landscapes to recover
listed species or national wildlife refuges and surrounding
lands, $3.3 million for cooperative landscape conservation and
$14.4 million for science support that will help to implement
the National Fish, Wildlife and Plants Climate Adaptation
Strategy and meet other priority science needs.
In the Forest Service, we were concerned to see that the
Administration has again proposed merging a number of accounts
including Wildlife and Fish Habitat Management into the
integrated Resource Restoration Account. At this time, we
support continuing IRR as a pilot as directed by Congress so
the agency can demonstrate whether it can adequately protect
habitat for fish and wildlife in a consolidated program.
We are also opposed to the nearly $18 million cut proposed
for Forest Service R and D. We are surprised at that. In the
Bureau of Land Management Budget, we support continued full
funding for the National Greater Sage Grouse Planting Strategy.
However we are concerned that the current draft plans will not
be adequate to conserve the sage grouse. We urge the
Subcommittee to work with the agency to ensure that the plans
are improved.
Also in the BLM budget for the Threatened and Endangered
Species Management Program, we support a $1 million increase
over the President's request that would simply restore funding
to the 2010 level. According to BLM staff reports, the agency
has funding to implement only about 10 percent of the work it
is required to do in recovery plans each year for listed
species on its lands.
No matter where stakeholders stand on all various sides of
the ESA debate, everyone wants to see listed species move
toward recovery. And at the current level of funding, this is a
goal not likely to occur for listed species on BLM lands. We
really ask the Subcommittee to pay attention to that
respectfully.
Finally for the U.S.G.S. we support the $11.6 million
increase for the National Climate Change and Wildlife Science
Center that will support research on the impacts of climate
change on fish, wildlife, and other natural resources. Again
thank you very much for the opportunity to testify. Been a
pleasure to speak before both of you.
[The statement of Mary Beth Beetham follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thanks, Mary Beth. Rosalyn.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
ANIMAL WELFARE INSTITUTE
WITNESS
ROSALYN MORRISON, LEGISLATIVE ASSISTANT
Ms. Morrison. Hello, on behalf of the Animal Welfare
Institute, I want to thank you for this opportunity to testify.
My name is Rosalyn Morrison, and I work for the Animal Welfare
Institute. Our statement details the funding needs of the
agencies involved in white nose syndrome research and
management and of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Office
of Law Enforcement as well as funding redirections needed in
the Bureau of Land Management's wild horse and burro program,
in the National Park Service Program, the management of native
wildlife. For now I intend to focus on white nose syndrome and
wild horses and burros.
We ask Congress to support the Administration's request for
$2.5 million for the white nose syndrome activities of the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service, which is the primary funder of our
efforts to prevent, halt, and remediate white nose syndrome and
to support our request for modest funding for these efforts in
the U.S.G.S, the National Park Service, and the U.S. Forest
Service and the BLM.
Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that white nose
syndrome has killed at least 5.7 million bats so far, and the
disease or the causative fungus is present in 26 states and 5
Canadian provinces. The Members of this Subcommittee are well
aware of the serious economic and ecological consequences of
this loss. Thanks to the support Congress has provided, these
agencies and their partners have made progress in understanding
both the nature and dynamics of remnant bat pollution and white
nose syndrome affected areas, and the nature and dynamics of
pseudogymnoascus destructans infectivity and barilons factors.
In exploring----
Mr. Moran. I am glad she said that.
Ms. Morrison. And in exploring other questions such as
biological control for white nose syndrome.
Another positive development is the creation of the North
American bat monitoring program, which will be pilot tested
this summer. Until now, no coordinated or standard system for
monitoring bat populations has existed within North America. As
a result, wildlife managers and researchers have lacked
accurate data on which to base appropriate bat management
actions.
Money spent on white nose syndrome is a wise investment.
Preventing the spread of white nose syndrome will lend their
assistance to regulatory and other impacts of massive bat die-
offs. The experience gained will aid in responding to future
fungal outbreaks that may affect human health.
Finally, fighting white nose syndrome now will reduce
future harm to the economy for insect-related losses to
agriculture and forestry and the cost of species recovery. An
ounce of prevention truly is worth a pound of cure.
Now I am going to talk about the Wild Free Running Horses
and Burros Act. The wild horses, as much a symbol of our
American heritage, as the image of Uncle Sam and baseball.
Currently, America's wild horses are subjected to gross
mismanagement and mistreatment by the Bureau of Land
Management, which uses a significant portion of its budget to
round up and warehouse wild horses and burros without credible
evidence supporting the need for such removals as recently
documented by a National Academy of Science study.
Furthermore, since 2004, wild horses have been at risk of
being sold to killer buyers who make a profit by sending these
horses to slaughter for human consumption. In fact, in recent
years, hundreds of wild horses have been sold to at least one
known killer buyer. For the last few years, the Committee has
also called on the BLM to find humane solutions to ensure wild
horses remain on the range, but the agency wildly ignores
available options and fails to act responsibly.
It is now Congress to act decisively to ensure that these
animals are neither sent into holding facilities nor sent in to
slaughter. BLM's proposed budget includes a program increase of
$2.8 million for wild horse and burro management. These funds
are to be used for population control research including
ongoing studies that focus on developing more effective and
longer-lasting fertility control agents.
We support these efforts, and we request that any increase
in appropriations under the Wild Free Running Horses and Burros
Act be used solely for the implementation of humane, on-the-
range management methods such as immunocontraception and not
unnecessary roundup.
Finally, we strongly support the continued inclusion of the
no kill language to ensure that BLM does not kill healthy wild
horses and burros. Thank you so much for allowing me this
opportunity.
[The statement of Rosalyn Morrison follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Rosalyn. Nancy, you are the last
public witness.
----------
Thursday, April 10, 2014.
AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS (ASPCA)
WITNESS
NANCY PERRY
Ms. Perry. I feel some pressure.
Mr. Simpson. You know why that is, don't you?
Ms. Perry. Best for last?
Mr. Simpson. We saved the best for last, but they put you
at the last because I hate your commercials. I have to turn the
channel. I am a dog lover, and when I see abused dogs, I want
to go somewhere else.
Ms. Perry. I am not allowed to do our commercial.
Mr. Simpson. That is not the reason. I was just kidding.
Ms. Perry. No, I hear that from literally everyone.
Mr. Simpson. I bet.
Ms. Perry. I am glad to tell you I have no video today.
Mr. Simpson. I think they accomplish what they are
supposed to do.
Ms. Perry. They do. They are effective, and they
demonstrate to all of us that people really do care about
animals in crisis. And so in that vein, I want to thank you for
this opportunity to come and talk about some issues that are of
great importance to the ASPCA. We are the first humane
organization established on this continent. In fact, I sit here
today with you on our 148th birthday today. So I am very
excited to have the opportunity to talk to you about some
issues of great importance to me and to our 2.5 million
supporters. So imagine them behind me on the rim and know that
we are very grateful for this opportunity.
Our mission is to prevent cruelty and to intervene whenever
it is occurring. But our birthright really was in horse
protection because during the day of our birth, horses were in
great trouble in the cities. And now that extends beyond the
cities, and we are very deeply concerned about the treatment of
horses out on the range whether it is on BLM land or on Fish
and Wildlife Service land. We also have a note for you today on
the wolf issue.
So proceeding along with horses first. Obviously these are,
as Rosalyn said, historical icons, and they are revered by the
American public to this day as strongly as ever as when the act
originally passed more than 40 years ago.
And we believe, of course, that they should be treated
humanely and fairly and all management practices should reflect
that. Unfortunately the 40-year program has devolved into a
cycle of roundups and removals that has led to a situation
where the horses are not being treated humanely, not managed
fairly, and available options are not being exercised
appropriately that could prevent that.
BLM recognizes that need for reform now, and the NAS study
that came out recently has been very helpful in pointing out
some options. So we are very encouraged by that. We applaud
BLM's efforts to articulate some possible reforms. We have a
question of moving from intention to action for this agency,
and your Committee, your Subcommittee is critically important
in motivating that change.
So I would outline for you four ways that the ASPCA urges
the Subcommittee to influence BLM in the right direction on
this issue. First of all, including that language that AWI
mentioned just now, the ASPCA supports that and included it in
our testimony. So I won't repeat it for you now, but it
basically would ensure that the agency couldn't proceed with
sales that would lead to the slaughter of these historical
icons.
Also it would ensure no mass euthanasia would take place as
a shortcut to trying to address what has been a human-caused
problem for these animals. And that has been continuously
included over the years, and we believe it needs to be included
now more than ever. Just to point up why we need that, in
September 2012, some published reports showed that BLM sold
more than 1,700 captured mustangs which is more than 70 percent
of all the horses sold under the Burns Rider going back many
years, to a single known kill buyer. And so that is what is
happening with the sales, and that is why we need that language
to be included.
Secondly, we would urge the notion of equilibrium, that we
not remove more horses than we can adopt out. At this point, we
can't afford to take in any more into holding facilities. It is
not fair to the taxpayers, and it is not fair to the horses.
We believe that that can be achieved through the use of the
third item we would urge the Subcommittee to pressure BLM to
include, and that is the notion of much more prioritized on-
the-range management. This is certainly one of the principles
outlined under the Wild and Free Roaming Horse and Burro Act,
that priority should be given to on-the-range management. And
when I say that, I am talking about the PZP immunocontraceptive
technology that we believe has been used highly effectively for
many decades now. Many populations of horses, ponies, even deer
have shown the efficacy of this technique. It is something that
BLM is doing in fits and spurts and only in small amounts, and
they really need to accelerate the percentage of horses that
they treat with this--it is a vaccine delivered by dart. And
they would be able to, over some time, suppress the growth and
even slow or even stop the growth of the wild horse herds where
necessary. And we support that. We think that that is a
pragmatic and humane approach to population control.
So we request that the Subcommittee direct BLM to use that
humane and reversible fertility control method.
We also point out to the Subcommittee that more than 19
million acres have been zeroed out of any wild horses. These
were acres originally identified as habitat for these animals.
Those might provide very fruitful opportunities for rereleasing
horses that are in holding, alleviating tax dollars from being
spent in that way, providing horses with habitat they
originally were supposed to have. Not all of those acres are
available probably due to drought and other reasons. But
certainly out of 19 million, there should be a very thorough
survey conducted to look for a rerelease option.
Finally, we would argue that any roundups that need to take
place obviously should be done humanely and transparently. And
we would ask that BLM institute protocols, and the Subcommittee
could encourage them to do that, that would ensure that
helicopter skids aren't making contact with horses during long
roundup procedures. And that indeed happened, and a U.S.
district court had to warn BLM to ensure that it wouldn't
happen again. So I am not hypothetically speaking
unfortunately. It has occurred.
So that is our final request on the wild horses covered
under the Wild Free Roaming Horse and Burro Act.
Finally, I would just mention there are horses under Fish
and Wildlife Service lands, the Sheldon Wildlife Refuge Area.
Some of those horses have been under a conservation plan to be
rounded up now. In fact, Fish and Wildlife Service has moved so
quickly with that, that they paid one contractor, an adoptions
contractor, $1 million to take several hundreds of those
horses. And now Fish and Wildlife Service cannot confirm the
whereabouts of a single one of those horses. And we suspect
unfortunately many, if not all of them, wound up at slaughter.
So we would urge you to ask BLM to ensure that no horses
under its care, whether they are rounded up on public land of
any sort, would wind up as slaughter.
The final point which is mentioned in our testimony relates
to wolf management, and I just point the Committee to the
recent report that came out that indicated that the science
used to come to a decision to delist wolves was unfortunately
flawed and very, very dated. And we would urge the Subcommittee
simply ensure that Fish and Wildlife Service use the best
available science in moving forward with any such decision
making.
Thank you so much for this opportunity. We really
appreciate your efforts.
[The statement of Nancy Perry follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Simpson. Thank you, and thank you all for being here
today. Jim.
Mr. Moran. Yeah, thank you, Mike. The kill buyers, what
they are doing is transporting them to Mexico or Canada?
Ms. Perry. Both. In fact, there was a--there were a group
of 41 mustangs. They are not, again, not covered under the Wild
Free Roaming Horse and Burro Act. They were actually long, many
generations ago, abandoned in Wyoming, the Big Horn Basin Herd.
And BLM went with--forward with a roundup of those horses, and
then they were given to the Wyoming Livestock Board and sold at
auction. And all 41 went to slaughter. This was just released.
It has just been in the press in the last week, and I would
like to submit some documents to the committee's record that
articulates some of those concerns. So really both countries
take many horses from us for slaughter.
Mr. Moran. And BLM is not being sufficiently aggressive in
terms of sterilizing the mares?
Ms. Perry. That is correct.
Mr. Moran. And why?
Ms. Perry. I would love to answer that question, and I
don't honestly know because going back 15 years, 20 years,
there have been studies for National Academy of Science, GAO.
All of the humane organizations as long as I have been working
on this issue for the last 13 years, we have been submitting
letters, begging the agency to please be more aggressive about
it because we could foresee this day coming. And I am not sure.
I don't know that they have complete faith in the PZP approach
as aggressive enough, but I think we can't let the perfect be
the enemy of the good in this case. And I think seeking out new
technologies that might take decades to develop is not a
sustainable approach when we have something that we have found
very efficacious in many, many very substantial studies, the
PZP approach.
Mr. Moran. It is strange that they are not more aggressive
in applying the--when it just takes a dart. You would think
they would be able to. Mr. Simpson, Mr. Calvert, myself, and
many who are on Natural Resources Committee hear all the time
from people who are complaining that there is a drought in the
West and so horses are being abandoned. You know, they show up
in rivers and stuff. You are saying that there was 19 million
acres that had been available for horses and burros for that
matter. And they are not available now because they're being
used for what?
Ms. Perry. A whole variety of things. I mean some of them
are part of the checkerboard system of public lands under BLM,
and some are unavailable because of land trades and sales that
have occurred because of the checkerboard system. So not all 19
million would be readily available, but when asked about the
possible availability in some percentage of those lands, BLM
has not been able to come up with any survey of that land that
has been zeroed out. In some cases there were periodic--there
were, you know, transitional uses of the land that would
require zeroing out a herd. But now that land may be perfectly
available.
One example, I was just out at Red Rocks right outside of
Las Vegas, and there used to a free roaming herd of horses
there, and a lot of tourists like to go to there because it is
very close to Las Vegas. And so they could get out and see the
horses easily. Those horses were zeroed out and not rereleased.
No horses are out there now even though I saw a perfectly ample
graze available.
So there are all kinds of examples like that. I don't think
I know the answer to how many acres are available, but I
believe there are a substantial number if we looked.
Mr. Moran. So they were rounded up, sold at auction
primarily for horse meat?
Ms. Perry. Probably not sold at auction because much of
that zeroing out occurred prior to the Burns language being
added to the 2004 omnibus Appropriations bill. Some since have
been sold and may likely have been slaughtered, but many of
them would have been put into either short-term holding and
then gone to long-term holding or gone through the adoption
program. So it is hard to say what their fate exactly has been.
Mr. Moran. Yeah. Mr. Healy has informed me that with
regard to white nose syndrome, which is a serious disease that
it has been found now in Michigan and Wisconsin. So we have 25
states with--where that is occurring, white nose syndrome. Very
serious, and it does affect agriculture in all of those states
traumatically.
I don't want to take up your time. You probably have
questions, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simpson. No, go ahead if you have questions.
Mr. Moran. The grey wolf issue as an endangered species
has been a tough one because we have been--the Committee was
trying to work with the states, and it seemed as though the
grey wolf was coming back and was sustainable. But I understand
now that the population has been dramatically reduced again. Is
that true or----
Ms. Perry. Well, I will just say it. I mean I think our
concern is related to this report that was released that shows
that some of the taxonomy concepts that were relied on for the
delisting have proven to be very dated and are no longer relied
upon in the current thinking about wolf populations. And so it
is the very base assumptions for the delisting are very shaky
according to this report. And what that tells us is there is a
need for Fish and Wildlife Service to be much more rigorous in
choosing the data it would rely on moving forward with
decisions like that.
Mr. Moran. But you don't argue with the--apparently what
we are told is that there are--I don't have the numbers in
front of me. But there are a substantial number of pairs of
wolves now in the states such as Wyoming, Montana, and I guess
Idaho where they have been delisted. And, you know, so we hear
from the farmers, you know, and they are very much concerned
about the cattle, particularly the sheep.
Ms. Perry. Yeah.
Mr. Moran. So it has been an ongoing struggle. We lose on
the floor as you know.
Ms. Perry. I know. I understand the dynamic, and it is not
a simple problem to address. It is one of those that balances
federal and state interest. At the same time, I would say that
there are some states that have moved forward very aggressively
with programs that, according to federal scientists, might
appear unsustainable for the wolf populations. I think time
will tell how well we have done for the wolf.
Ms. Beetham. Yeah, if I could just comment, Mr. Moran. I
am actually not the person at Defenders who is up on all of the
statistics, but I can say, and I know Mr. Simpson will disagree
with this, that Defenders has issues and concerns about how the
wolves are being managed currently in the northern Rockies. We
have concerns about the delisting, but also concerns about how
wolves are being managed in the northern Rockies under state
management. And we are watching it very closely.
We are concerned that, like I said I am not the one who is
following the details day to day, but it is my understand that
under the state plan for Idaho, under which wolves were
delisted, Idaho had agreed to manage for 520 wolves. And now
Idaho is saying that they want to manage down to the 150 number
that is basically supposed to be the floor.
Like I said, I am not the one who is following the
statistics day to day. I could be incorrect on the number that
was agreed to in the Idaho plan. But I know Defenders folks
that are following this believe that Idaho is not following the
state plan that they agreed to, but I know----
Mr. Simpson. Well, let me just say in response to--and I
will talk to Jim about this. There are some groups. There are
some organizations that I don't care if there were a million
wolves in Idaho, they would not want them delisted because they
are going to be hunted. And they don't like hunting. I actually
don't hunt myself. I don't like killing animals, but anybody
believed we were going to reintroduce wolves into Idaho,
Montana, and Wyoming in a state where they hadn't existed for a
while and so consequently they were going to boom, and they
did, that we were going to reintroduce them and there were not
going to be management plans as we have with other species, was
living in a fantasy world.
But when they came in as a nonessential, experimental
population, remember that is what they were brought in as, a
nonessential, experimental population. They were brought into
Idaho, Montana, Wyoming. They said as soon as you have 10
breeding pair, 30 total, but 10 breeding pair, we can delist
these because that is enough to sustain itself.
Let me just read you what it says here today. ``The grey
wolf population in the northern Rocky Mountains remains stable
in 2013 in spite of increasingly aggressive hunting and
trapping regimes in Montana and Idaho that have drawn fire from
wildlife advocates. There are at least 1,691 wolves in 320
packs at the end of the year in Wyoming, Montana, Idaho,
Washington, Oregon, virtually unchanged from the 1,674 wolves
in 321 packs the year before according to the interagency
report released today by Fish and Wildlife Service. The
population remains well above the levels identified in wolf
recovery plans which set minimum management targets at 450
wolves and 45 breeding pairs across the six states. That also
include northern Utah.'' They are doing very well. And how do I
know that? Because they are killing sheep everywhere. They are
killing cattle everywhere.
As I told Jim the other day in a hearing, I will bring you
a picture. We will put it on the back wall, and we can all
throw up every day when we come in here and look at it, of 200
sheep that were killed one night by a wolf and five dogs and a
horse. You talk about cruelty to animals, that fits there too.
There has to be some management. That is all we are asking for,
and believe me the state will do a good job of management. They
know that if the numbers get down to a certain level, it goes
back on the list and the feds take over. And they are very
cognizant of that fact.
Are there people in Idaho, in the Idaho legislature would
say let's kill them all? Sure there are, but that is not going
to happen. So what I would like is for everybody to take a step
back and take a deep breath. We have wolves in Idaho. Wolves
are going to stay in Idaho in spite of the rhetoric you hear
from some people. But we are going to manage them. That is kind
of where I come from. Sorry.
Mr. Moran. No, it is understandable, and, you know, Norm
Dicks was very good on this issue. And I tried to, you know,
sustain that advocacy. But the situation does evolve, and we
have to maintain our credibility particularly if we want to
protect the wolves in areas where they are far more endangered
than they are in a state like Idaho, for example.
So it is an ongoing issue, and we have----
Mr. Simpson. Well, Jim, I will be flexible when it merits
it. I tell you how much of a wolf advocate I was. When I first
came here, I had a piece of legislations called PAW, called
Protect American Wolves. And we were going to reintroduce the
eastern timber wolf into the Adirondacks in New York.
Mr. Moran. Really?
Mr. Simpson. They are truly endangered there. There are no
more because they used to go across the Saint Lawrence Seaway
up into Canada and back and forth. Well, we keep the Saint
Lawrence Seaway open now, and they used to travel in the winter
across the ice. They don't do that. So there are none in
northern New York, but guess what. They don't want them. And
all those supporters, all the wolf supporters in Idaho,
Montana, and Wyoming, that supported wolves out there, they
don't want anything to do with introducing wolves back in New
York.
Mr. Moran. There is a legitimate--I mean there are
several. One of them that I have heard that--and it seemed to
be supported by evidence was that when you do have wolves, they
do balance the deer and elk population. And when you have
balance it helps the trout and salmon by improving conditions
for spawning because you have more vegetation along the
streambeds and riverbeds. It's not eaten by out-of-control deer
and elk population who have no natural predators.
So we are trying to maintain the ecology, and you can see
Mr. Simpson really is reasonable. He is a lot more reasonable
than a lot of his constituents would like him to be. So we are
going to--and he is a good person. So we are going to continue
to work on these issues, and, you know, just as we need an
ecological balance, sometimes we need a political balance too.
And we will do what we can.
Ms. Beetham. Mr. Simpson, yeah, and if I could just say,
just to clarify, Defenders is not opposed to management through
hunting either. So just to be clear on our position. And also I
did want to mention too that, you know, we have supported and
worked to create the wolf livestock lost demonstration program
which they did not fund in the President's budget and we feel
that the work that we have done with coexistence to help
ranchers who coexist with wildlife, Defenders has pioneered a
lot of that work. And so we really hope that that livestock
lost program will be funded in the bill and could even use more
money because the nonlethal work is very important to work to
stabilize situations on the ground where you might have--
instead of having a pack that comes in and kills a number of
sheep, you can work with the nonlethal approaches because what
is going to happen is if a pack is removed, then another pack
is just going to come in.
And so, you know, if you can work to stabilize the
situation so the--I just want to take this opportunity to say
that the nonlethal funding as well as the compensation funding
is very important.
Mr. Simpson. This will be my last comment on it. You got
me going when you brought up wolves. Is that when I was in the
state legislature is when the, decided to reintroduce the
wolves over the objections of Idaho and Wyoming and Montana,
and they brought them in. We actually passed a bill in the
legislature that I thought was a bad idea. But it was that we
were so upset that they were bringing them in that the state
could not work with Fish and Wildlife. Our state fish and game
commission, couldn't do anything because they were imposing
these on us.
But I can remember testimony one day in the state
legislature. A wolf expert, and this is why the science always
gets me, and that is why I am a little subject to, you know,
skepticism about the science.
Ms. Perry. Why we need the best science, yeah.
Mr. Simpson. Yeah, your best science might not be my best
science and vice versa. But the wolf expert testified, and we
did have an overpopulation of deer at the time. And he said
what we are really trying to protect is the elk populations and
maintain those because that is what people like.
But he said you don't have to worry about the elk
populations. These wolves go after deer, and they will help
maintain your deer populations. And, they might go after elk if
they run out of deer. Guess what. Come to find out elk are like
prime rib to these wolves. That is what they go after, and that
is what they go after first. In our elk population, the calf-
to-cow ratios dropped through the floor. Maintaining an elk
population is very tough when you have so many of these wolves
running around.
A few years later when I was in Congress, this same guy
came out and was talking to me about grizzly bears and some
things about potentially reintroducing grizzly bears. And I
said aren't you the same guy that testified in the Idaho
legislature about the fact that wolves wouldn't go after elk?
And he actually looked at me and said you know, we really
didn't know much about it then. And you are the expert. I am
not one who denies science. But I fear that we can make science
for whatever outcome we want, and we shouldn't do that. But I
agree with you. We need to look at all of the science on it and
make sure that it makes sense.
Mr. Moran. And I agree with you on hunting too, Mike. I
just can't bring myself to shoot other, you know, innocent
living species, but particularly a beautiful elk, you know. But
I know that is not any issue we are ever going to win. And we,
you know, we have to respect the right of hunters particularly
when there is a surplus. So the only thing we can do is to
determine when there truly is an endangered species, and we are
going to work on this issue of wolves.
It is a tough one, but, you know, we have to work with
consistent data. And we have to work with people who have more
credibility than I do with a lot of these constituency groups
such as Mr. Simpson so----
Mr. Simpson. I noticed we didn't technically delist. What
we did is reinstate Fish and Wildlife Services, or divesting of
them to overturn the court order.
Mr. Moran. Yeah.
Mr. Simpson. We only did that for Montana and Idaho.
Wyoming wanted us to do it for Wyoming, but Wyoming didn't have
an approved state management plan. Arizona wanted me to do it
for Mexican wolves, and I said no, they are far from recovered,
and you don't have a state management plan there.
So I mean we were looking at what the science had done or
supposedly done, the Fish and Wildlife had done, and why they
had delisted in Montana and Idaho.
Ms. Perry. Yeah, we appreciate that.
Mr. Moran. Mike was very thoughtful on the issue.
Mr. Simpson. I am always thoughtful.
Mr. Moran. He doesn't get a whole lot of credit, you know,
from the conservation groups, but he really was extraordinarily
reasonable to deal with. And you know, I am retiring.
Fortunately Mike is not, and he is going to be around for a
while. And he is the kind of person we need to work with
because he does have credibility. And he is a very reasonable
and good person. But thank you for your testimony, and we
appreciate all that you do, not just testifying but what you do
day-in and day-out on behalf of wildlife and the ecology of our
natural resources. Thank you.
Ms. Perry. Thank you.
Ms. Beetham. Thanks.
Mr. Simpson. Thank you all for what you do, and could you
make an announcement so that I know when those commercials are
going to come on.
Ms. Perry. I will get the schedule from my colleague.
Thank you so much.
Mr. Simpson. I appreciate it. Thank you all very much.
Hearing is adjourned.
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I N D E X
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American Indian/Alaska Native Public Witnesses
Day One--April 7, 2014
ORGANIZATIONS
Page
Omaha Tribe of Nebraska.......................................... 2
Rosebud Sioux Tribe.............................................. 7
Tribal Education Departments National Assembly (TEDNA)........... 13
Oglala Sioux Tribe............................................... 22
Inter Tribal Buffalo Council..................................... 29
Mandan, Hidatsa & Arikara Nation................................. 37
The Assiniboine & Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Reservation...... 44
United Tribes Technical College.................................. 50
National Alliance to Save Native Languages....................... 56
Navajo Nation.................................................... 81
Navajo Hopi Land Commission...................................... 88
Santa Clara Pueblo............................................... 96
Acoma Pueblo..................................................... 102
Dine Bi Olta School Board Association............................ 111
Association of Navajo Community Controlled School Boards......... 117
Pinon Community School (Navajo Indian Reservation)............... 122
Rough Rock Community Schools..................................... 128
Lukachukai Community School (Navajo Nation)...................... 136
Dzilth-Na-O-Dith-Hle Community Grant School...................... 143
Ramah Navajo School Board (Ramah-Navajo Indian Reservation)...... 149
National Indian Education Association............................ 155
Ramah Navajo Chapter............................................. 164
Catawba Indian Nation............................................ 171
Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida........................... 176
Passamaquoddy Tribal Government.................................. 182
United South and Eastern Tribes.................................. 191
Fort Hall Business Council (Shoshone-Bannock Tribal Governing
Body).......................................................... 198
Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee............................. 204
Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission...................... 211
Shoshone-Paiute Tribal Business Council.......................... 220
Pacific Salmon Commission........................................ 228
Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium...................... 233
Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium........................... 240
Southcentral Foundation.......................................... 248
Chugach Regional Resources Commission............................ 253
Arctic Slope Native Association.................................. 259
Norton Sound Health Corporation.................................. 265
Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association............................ 275
Tanana Chiefs Conference......................................... 282
WITNESSES
Vernon Miller.................................................... 2
Cyril Scott...................................................... 7
Quinton Roman Nose............................................... 13
Bryan Brewer..................................................... 22
Ervin Carlson.................................................... 29
Tex Hall......................................................... 37
Dana ``Sam'' Buckles............................................. 44
David Gipp....................................................... 50
Ryan Wilson...................................................... 56
Ben Shelly....................................................... 81
Walter Phelps.................................................... 88
Michael Chavarria................................................ 96
Fred Vallo, Sr................................................... 102
Angela Barney Nez................................................ 111
Earl Apachito.................................................... 117
Jeffrey Mike..................................................... 122
Ronald Gishey.................................................... 128
Arthur Ben....................................................... 136
Faye BlueEyes.................................................... 143
Darnell Maria.................................................... 149
Pam Agoyo........................................................ 155
Nancy Martine-Alonzo............................................. 164
Joseph Socobasin................................................. 182
William Harris................................................... 171
Colley Billie.................................................... 176
Kitcki Carroll................................................... 191
Nathan Small..................................................... 198
Joel Moffett...................................................204, 211
Dennis Smith, Sr................................................. 220
McCoy Oatman..................................................... 228
Charles Clement.................................................. 233
Andy Teuber...................................................... 240
Donna Galbreath.................................................. 248
Patty Brown-Schwalenberg......................................... 253
Angela Cox....................................................... 259
Elsie Sampson Vaden.............................................. 265
Jessica Mata-Rukovishnikoff...................................... 275
Victor Joseph.................................................... 282
American Indian/Alaska Native Public Witnesses
Day Two--April 8, 2014
ORGANIZATIONS
Little River Band of Ottawa Indians.............................. 292
Chippewa Ottawa Resource Authority............................... 298
Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa................... 303
Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission.................. 310
Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe of Minnesota........................... 318
National Indian Health Board..................................... 325
National Indian Child Welfare Association........................ 331
Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe........................................ 337
Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation................................... 346
Sac & Fox Nation................................................. 353
Cherokee Nation.................................................. 359
Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma....................................... 372
Hickory Ground Tribal Town of the Muscogee Creek Nation of
Oklahoma....................................................... 378
Ute Tribe of Fort Duchesne....................................... 384
Institute of American Indian Arts................................ 392
American Indian Higher Education Consortium...................... 398
The National Association of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers 404
National Tribal Contract Support Cost Coalition.................. 410
Lummi Nation..................................................... 423
Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.................. 429
Quinault Indian Nation........................................... 434
Skokomish Tribal Nation.......................................... 441
Puyallup Tribe of Washington..................................... 447
Cowlitz Indian Tribe............................................. 453
Spokane Tribal Natural Resources................................. 459
National Congress of American Indians............................ 467
Tribal Interior Budget Council................................... 474
Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission............................ 480
Intertribal Timber Council....................................... 486
Seattle Indian Health Board...................................... 493
Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board...................... 500
American Dental Association...................................... 506
Friends of Indian Health......................................... 512
The California Rural Indian Health Board, Inc.................... 518
Southern Indian Health Council................................... 525
Riverside-San Bernardino County Indian Health Consortium......... 531
WITNESSES
Jessica Burger................................................... 292
Levi Carrick Sr.................................................. 298
Eric Chapman, Sr................................................. 303
James Zorn....................................................... 310
Crystal Redgrave................................................. 318
Cathy Abramson................................................... 325
Aurene Martin.................................................... 331
Melanie Benjamin................................................. 337
Thomas Wabnum.................................................... 346
George Thurman................................................... 353
Bill John Baker.................................................. 359
Mickey Peercy.................................................... 372
George Thompson.................................................. 378
Gordon Howell.................................................... 384
Robert Martin.................................................... 392
Carrie Billy..................................................... 398
D. Bambi Kraus................................................... 405
Lloyd B. Miller.................................................. 410
Tim Ballew II.................................................... 423
Mel Tonasket..................................................... 429
Gina James....................................................... 434
Joseph Pavel..................................................... 441
David Bean....................................................... 447
Taylor Aalvik.................................................... 453
Twa-le Abrahamson-Swan........................................... 459
Aaron A Payment.................................................. 467
Tex Hall......................................................... 474
Billy Frank...................................................... 480
Edward Johnstone................................................. 480
Phil Rigdon...................................................... 486
Ralph Forquera................................................... 493
Andy Joseph, Jr.................................................. 500
Charles Norman................................................... 506
Jacque Gray...................................................... 512
Mark LeBeau...................................................... 518
Michael Garcia................................................... 525
Brandi Miranda................................................... 531
Public Witnesses
April 10, 2014
ORGANIZATIONS
Federation of State Humanities Councils.......................... 540
National Humanities Alliance..................................... 546
Warrior Scholar Project.......................................... 553
Historic Hudson Valley........................................... 559
American Alliance of Museums..................................... 565
Americans for the Arts........................................... 571
National Conference of State Historic Preservation officers
(NCSHPO)....................................................... 577
National Trust for Historic Preservation......................... 583
National Parks Conservation Association.......................... 591
Alliance of National Heritage Areas and the Ohio & Erie Canalway
National Heritage Area......................................... 597
Everglades Foundation............................................ 603
Civil War Trust.................................................. 607
U.S. Park Police Fraternal Order of Police....................... 611
Environmental Council of the States.............................. 618
The National Association of Clean Air Agencies (NACAA)........... 625
Cancer Survivors Against Radon (CanSAR).......................... 631
Association of State Drinking Water Administrators (ASDWA)....... 638
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)....................... 645
National Rural Water Association................................. 652
Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition......................... 658
Entomological Society of America................................. 665
The Trust for Public Land........................................ 671
The Wilderness Society........................................... 678
Wilderness Land Trust............................................ 685
American Forests................................................. 692
Federal Forest Resource Coalition................................ 698
Society of American Foresters (SAF).............................. 704
National Association of State Foresters (NASF)................... 713
American Forest Foundation....................................... 724
Partner Caucus on Fire Suppression Funding Solutions............. 734
Alliance for Community Trees..................................... 740
The Corps Network................................................ 746
National Institutes for Water Resources (NIWR)................... 754
USGS Coalition................................................... 761
MAPPS............................................................ 767
Geological Society of America.................................... 773
Western Governors' Association................................... 780
Partners for Conservation........................................ 787
Mohave County Arizona Board of Supervisors....................... 793
American Seed Trade Association (ASTA)........................... 799
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation............................ 1219
The Nature Conservancy........................................... 808
Partnership for the National Trails System....................... 815
Wildlife Conservation Society.................................... 821
The Wildlife Society............................................. 831
National Wildlife Federation (NWF)............................... 838
World Wildlife Fund.............................................. 844
San Diego Zoo Global............................................. 851
The Peregrine Fund............................................... 851
Oregon Zoo....................................................... 851
Ventana Wildlife Society......................................... 851
Los Angeles Zoo.................................................. 851
Friends of the Wichitas Secretary................................ 857
Friends of the Potomac River Refuges............................. 863
Defenders of Wildlife............................................ 870
Animal Welfare Institute......................................... 876
American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) 882
WITNESSES
Trent Clark...................................................... 540
Peter Meineck.................................................... 546
Jesse Reising.................................................... 553
Waddell Stillman................................................. 559
Ford Bell........................................................ 565
Pamela Hogan..................................................... 571
Elizabeth Hughes................................................. 577
Thomas Cassidy, Jr............................................... 583
John Garder...................................................... 591
Daniel Rice...................................................... 597
Eric Eikenberg................................................... 603
O. James Lighthizer.............................................. 607
Ian Glick........................................................ 611
Dick Pedersen.................................................... 618
S. William Becker................................................ 625
Marlene MacEwan.................................................. 631
John Calkins..................................................... 638
Brian Pallasch................................................... 645
Ruth Hubbard..................................................... 652
Chad Lord........................................................ 658
Robert N. Wiedenmann............................................. 665
Kathy DeCoster................................................... 671
Alan Rowsome..................................................... 678
Reid Haughey..................................................... 685
Scott Steen...................................................... 692
Bill Imbergamo................................................... 698
John Barnwell.................................................... 704
Jim Karels....................................................... 713
Tom Martin....................................................... 724
Hank Kashdan..................................................... 734
David Forsell.................................................... 740
Joel Holtrop..................................................... 746
Brian Haggard.................................................... 754
Robert Gropp..................................................... 761
John Palatiello.................................................. 767
John Geissman.................................................... 773
James Ogsbury.................................................... 780
Terry Mansfield.................................................. 787
Hildy Angius..................................................... 793
Mark Mustoe...................................................... 799
Christy Plumer................................................... 808
Gary Werner...................................................... 815
John Calvelli.................................................... 821
Byron (Ken) Williams............................................. 831
Joshua Saks...................................................... 838
Will Gartshore................................................... 844
Michael Mace..................................................... 851
J. Peter Jenny................................................... 852
Bobby Williamson................................................. 857
Randy Streufert.................................................. 863
Mary Beth Beetham................................................ 870
Rosalyn Morrison................................................. 876
Nancy Perry...................................................... 882
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations on Behalf of
Native American/Alaska Native Issues
American Foundation for Suicide Prevention....................... 896
American Indians for Health Quality.............................. 899
Bristol Bay Area Health Corporation.............................. 902
Central Council of Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska....... 906
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR)
Tribal Health Commission....................................... 910
Council of Athabascan Tribal Governments......................... 912
Fond Du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa....................... 916
Hopi Tribe....................................................... 920
Independent Tribal Courts Review Team............................ 921
Jamestown S'Klallam Tribe........................................ 925
Jicarilla Apache Nation.......................................... 929
Maniilaq Association............................................. 931
National Council of Urban Indian Health.......................... 935
Native Village of Barrow......................................... 938
Native Village of Kotzebue (Tribe)............................... 941
Navajo Nation.................................................... 945
Pala Tribal Historic Preservation Office......................... 947
Puyallup Tribe................................................... 949
Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians................. 953
Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians................................ 956
Santee Sioux Nation.............................................. 960
Shoalwater Bay Tribe............................................. 964
Soboba Band of Luiseno Indians................................... 967
Southern Ute Indian Tribe........................................ 970
Squaxin Island Tribe............................................. 972
St. Regis Mohawk Tribe........................................... 976
Standing Rock Sioux Tribe........................................ 979
Suquamish Tribe.................................................. 983
Ute Mountain Ute Tribe........................................... 985
Yakama Nation.................................................... 987
Yankton Sioux Tribe.............................................. 991
Zuni Tribe....................................................... 995
Written Testimony From Individuals and Organizations--Other Issues
``Ding'' Darling Wildlife Society................................ 1106
Alliance of National Heritage Areas.............................. 1000
American Association of Petroleum Geologists..................... 1004
American Association of Radon Scientists and Technologists, Inc.. 1007
American Bird Conservancy........................................ 1011
American Cultural Resources Association.......................... 1014
American Eel Sustainability Association.......................... 1016
American Fly Fishing Trade Association........................... 1019
American Sportfishing Association................................ 1019
Bass Anglers Sportsman Society................................... 1019
Berkley Conservation Institute................................... 1019
Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation............................. 1019
Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association...................... 1019
Shimano American Corporation..................................... 1019
Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership...................... 1019
American Water Works Association................................. 1033
Association of Clean Water Administrators........................ 1033
Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies....................... 1033
Association of State Drinking Water Administrators............... 1033
Council on Infrastructure Financing Authorities.................. 1033
National Association of Clean Water Agencies..................... 1033
National Association of Water Companies.......................... 1033
Water Environment Federation..................................... 1033
American Forest and Paper Association............................ 1021
American Geosciences Institute................................... 1025
American Institute of Biological Sciences........................ 1029
American Public Works Association................................ 1033
Amy Jordan....................................................... 1036
Appalachian Mountain Club........................................ 1038
Appalachian Trail Conservancy.................................... 1040
APS Four Corners Power Plant..................................... 1044
Association of Art Museum Directors.............................. 1046
Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies....................1019, 1050
Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities................ 1054
Association of Zoos and Aquariums................................ 1057
Aurora Water..................................................... 1059
BHP Billiton Limited New Mexico Coal............................. 1061
Blue Ridge Traditional Arts...................................... 1063
California Institute of Technology............................... 1064
Center for Biological Diversity.................................. 1066
Central Arizona Water Conservation District...................... 1070
Central Utah Water Conservancy District.......................... 1073
Children's Environmental Health Network.......................... 1075
City of Farmington............................................... 1079
Coalition Against Forest Pests................................... 1081
Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Forum...................... 1084
Colorado River Board of California............................... 1087
Colorado River Water Conservation District....................... 1091
Colorado Springs Utilities....................................... 1093
Congressional Fire Services Institute............................ 1228
Cooperative Alliance for Refuge Enhancement (CARE)............... 1095
Dance/USA........................................................ 1099
Denver Water..................................................... 1103
Diana Briggs..................................................... 1105
Edison Electric Institute........................................ 1107
Friends of Balcones Canyonlands National Wildlife Refuge......... 1111
Friends of Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge................... 1115
Friends of California Condors Wild and Free...................... 1118
Friends of Horicon National Wildlife Refuge...................... 1120
Friends of Maine's Seabird Islands (FOMSI)....................... 1122
Friends of Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge................... 1126
Friends of Salmon River Division of Silvio O. Conte National Fish
& Wildlife Refuge.............................................. 1129
Friends of the Florida Panther Refuge............................ 1130
Friends of the Little Pend Oreille National Wildlife Refuge...... 1134
Friends of the Lower Suwannee & Cedar Keys National Wildlife
Refuges........................................................ 1138
Friends of the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge............ 1141
Friends of the Silvio O. Conte Fish and Wildlife Refuge.......... 1143
Friends of the Tampa Bay National Wildlife Refuges, Inc.......... 1145
Friends of White River National Wildlife Refuge.................. 1149
Friends of Willapa National Wildlife Refuge...................... 1152
Geoffrey Mason................................................... 1154
Gloria Linnertz.................................................. 1155
Grand Valley Water Users' Association............................ 1159
Hardwood Federation.............................................. 1161
Humane Society of the United States.............................. 1163
Humane Society Legislative Fund (HSLF)........................... 1163
Doris Day Animal League.......................................... 1163
International Association of Fire Chiefs......................... 1228
International Fund for Animal Welfare............................ 1167
Interstate Mining Compact Commission............................. 1169
Izaak Walton League of America................................... 1173
Jeffrey R. Walters............................................... 1177
Katy Clune....................................................... 1180
Lauren Kritzer................................................... 1181
League of American Orchestras.................................... 1183
M.A. Folklore.................................................... 1187
Margie Lynch..................................................... 1190
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California............... 1191
Middlesex Land Trust............................................. 1194
Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board............................ 1196
National Assembly of State Arts Agencies......................... 1199
National Association of Abandoned Mine Land Programs............. 1203
National Association of Forest Service Retirees.................. 1207
National Association of State Energy Officials................... 1211
National Federation of Federal Employees--Local 5300............. 1215
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation............................ 1219
National Radon Safety Board...................................... 1223
National Taxpayers Union......................................... 1224
National Volunteer Fire Council.................................. 1228
National Wildlife Refuge Association............................. 1230
New England Forest Policy Group.................................. 1234
New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission.......................... 1238
Northern Water................................................... 1241
OPERA America.................................................... 1243
Oregon Water Resources Congress.................................. 1247
Outdoor Alliance................................................. 1251
Patricia Sawin................................................... 1255
Performing Arts Alliance......................................... 1257
Peter Hendrick................................................... 1261
Preservation Action.............................................. 1264
Public Lands Foundation.......................................... 1268
Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM)....................... 1272
Punk Life Zine................................................... 1274
Restore America's Estuaries...................................... 1278
San Juan Water Commission........................................ 1282
Save the Smithsonian Folklife Festival........................... 1284
Southwestern Water Conservation District......................... 1286
State of New Mexico Office of the State Engineer................. 1288
Stephen R. Rickerson............................................. 1290
Subsurface Technologies, Inc..................................... 1292
Sustainable Urban Forests Coalition.............................. 1295
The Conservation Fund............................................ 1298
Theatre Communications Group..................................... 1302
Tri-County Water Conservancy District............................ 1305
Uni-Bell PVC Pipe Association.................................... 1306
Utah Water Users Association..................................... 1309
Whitney Brown.................................................... 1311
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