[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 15 (Wednesday, February 25, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S948]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I am here today to speak about one of the 
federal government's bureaucracies: The Army Corps of Engineers. More 
specifically, however, I note recent actions and inactions by the Corps 
that provide excellent examples of a DC government bureaucracy intent 
on accomplishing its own agenda at its own pace, and out of touch with 
the American people.
  The first situation I will address involves specific direction by the 
Congress of the United States. The Corps is required to provide the 
Senate Appropriations Committee with an outline of its proposed study 
on the economic, biological and social implications of a drawdown of 
the John Day Dam reservoir on the Columbia River. Specific instructions 
were given to provide this information to the Committee within 90 days 
of the President's signing of the fiscal year 1998 Energy and Water 
Appropriations bill. The President signed the bill on October 13, 1997. 
As of today, more than 130 days later, we still have not seen the 
report.
  Mr. President, the Portland District of the Corps sent the report to 
its Washington, DC, headquarters in mid-December. But, there is still 
no final document. Assuming that the Corps

[[Page S948]]

began work immediately after the bill was approved by the President, or 
even a month earlier, the field office spent between eight and twelve 
weeks preparing the report. It has now been nine weeks since it was 
sent to Headquarters for approval, and we still have no idea when the 
Corps will finally issue it. Should a document take longer to be 
approved than it did to be drafted? Apparently, if it is to be approved 
by the Corps, it does. But it shouldn't.
  Why is this document important? Countless residents of the rural 
Pacific Northwest rely on the benefits that the Columbia and Snake 
River dams provide to our region and our nation. If the Corps of 
Engineers is to study the drawdown of a major multi-purpose federal 
project like the John Day Dam, it is imperative that its plans be 
subjected to an open review by those of us sent back here to 
Washington, DC to represent these communities. Without the formal views 
of the Corps, these communities are left with excessive and inexcusable 
uncertainty over the future of their livelihoods.
  Mr. President, I will continue to wait for the Corps to provide a 
report. I do not intend to wait patiently.
  While I am on the topic of waiting, I will address a second issue. 
The communities in the Tri-City area of Washington state have been 
waiting since 1996 for the Corps of Engineers to complete a legally 
required transfer of riverfront land to local governments. The Corps 
has claimed that it does not have the funds to begin the process, and 
although it has recently begun working with the local communities to 
come to a resolution, it still claims it cannot complete the process 
without an additional appropriation from this Congress. Along similar 
lines, the Corps claims that it cannot come up with approximately 
$60,000 to manage the Wallula, Stateline and Juniper Canyon wildlife 
habitats, and must lease the management of this important, pristine 
land to the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. 
This transfer of land management has raised many serious questions in 
the minds of a number of my Tri-City constituents, who have yet to 
receive a comforting answer.

  Taken on their own, these incidents might not seem odd. The very same 
office of the Corps that claims poverty in these latter two cases, 
however, sees fit to spend freely in other areas. Mr. President, I am 
sure you are aware of Kennewick Man. Kennewick Man's remains were 
discovered in July, 1996, on the shore of the Columbia River, near 
Kennewick, Washington. Using carbon dating techniques, scientist have 
determined Kennewick Man's remains to be more than 9,000 years old, by 
far the oldest human remains ever found in North America. This 
represents a major breakthrough for the study of ancient peoples in 
North America.
  Mr. President, what would be the logical thing to do with the land on 
which Kennewick Man was discovered? Should we study if further, or 
cover it with boulders? Some of our nation's most esteemed 
anthropologists and archaeologists have answered--as I am sure you or I 
would--that we should allow the site to be studied further, in the hope 
that we can learn even more about early North American inhabitants. But 
that is not the way the Corps sees it. If the Corps has its way, it 
will helicopter tons of ``rip-rap''--large stones--to the river and use 
them to cover the site, after which it will plant numerous willow 
trees, completely covering, and possibly destroying, important 
geological and archaeological evidence. Scientists studying the site 
claim that this will erect an ``impenetrable barrier'' to future 
research.
  How much will it cost to cover this important site? The Corps has not 
disclosed its estimate, but I have been told by people in the local 
community that it is likely to cost at least $100,000, and perhaps as 
much as $250,000. In addition, the Corps claims, that should scientists 
want to study the site in the future, the boulders and trees can be 
removed--at a cost of course. How much? Another $100,000. Even then the 
boulders are likely to have crushed any remaining archaeological 
objects and possibly changed the chemical makeup of the soil, rendering 
future tests worthless.
  Mr. President, if the Corps of Engineers cannot come up with $60,000 
to manage important wildlife habitats, and cannot put together enough 
money to begin satisfying its legal requirement to transfer land to 
local authorities, how can it possibly justify spending upwards of a 
quarter-million dollars, which the Congress never appropriated, to 
cover a potential gold mine of archaeological information with boulders 
and trees? Of course It cannot. In fact, it has not even attempted to 
do so. The Corps spokesman in Walla Walla has refused to answer 
specific questions about the pending contract to cover the Kennewick 
Man site. If this bureaucracy has its way, it will ignore the concerns 
of the residents of its district, lease important and pristine land to 
an outside group to manage, and then apparently use that money to cover 
a site to which countless members of the scientific community have 
requested access. This is nothing short of unbelievable.
  Mr. President, The Corps of Engineers has a lot of explaining to do. 
It owes answers to Congress and it owes answers to the people of the 
Tri-Cities. I sincerely hope it will be more forthcoming in the near 
future than it has been in the recent past. If not, I anxiously await 
an opportunity to question the Corps of Engineers during this year's 
appropriation process.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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