[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 88 (Tuesday, July 11, 2000)]
[House]
[Pages H5796-H5797]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
UTAH WEST DESERT LAND EXCHANGE ACT OF 2000
Mr. HANSEN. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the
bill (H.R. 4579) to provide for the exchange of certain lands within
the State of Utah, as amended.
The Clerk read as follows:
H.R. 4579
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Utah West Desert Land
Exchange Act of 2000''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSE.
(a) Findings.--The Congress finds the following:
(1) The State of Utah owns approximately 95,095.19 acres of
land, as well as approximately 11,187.60 acres of mineral
interests, located in the West Desert region of Utah and
contained wholly or partially within certain wilderness study
areas created pursuant to section 603 of the Federal Lands
Policy and Management Act of 1976, or proposed by the Bureau
of Land Management for wilderness study area status pursuant
to section 202 of that Act. These lands were granted by the
Congress to the State of Utah pursuant to the Utah Enabling
Act of 1894 (chapter 138; 23 Stat. 107), to be held in trust
for the benefit of the State's public school system and other
public institutions. The lands are largely scattered in
checkerboard fashion amidst the Federal lands comprising the
remainder of such existing and proposed wilderness study
areas.
(2) Development of surface and mineral resources on State
trust lands within existing or proposed wilderness study
areas, or the sale of such lands into private ownership,
could be incompatible with management of such lands for
nonimpairment of their wilderness characteristics pursuant to
section 603(c) of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act
of 1976 or with future congressional designation of the lands
as wilderness.
(3) The United States owns lands and interests in lands
outside of existing and proposed wilderness study areas that
can be transferred to the State of Utah in exchange for the
West Desert wilderness inholdings without jeopardizing
Federal management objectives or needs.
(4) The large presence of State trust land inholdings in
existing and proposed wilderness study areas in the West
Desert region makes land and resource management in these
areas difficult, costly, and controversial for both the State
of Utah and the United States.
(5) It is in the public interest to reach agreement on
exchange of such inholdings, on terms fair to both the State
of Utah and the United States. Such an agreement, subject to
ratification by the Congress, would save much time and delay
in meeting the legitimate expectations of the State school
and institutional trusts, in simplifying management of
Federal lands, and in avoiding the significant time and
expense associated with administrative land exchanges.
(6) The State of Utah and the United States have reached an
agreement under which the State would exchange certain State
trust lands within specified wilderness study areas and areas
identified as having wilderness characteristics in the West
Desert region for various Federal lands and interests in
lands outside of those areas but in the same region of Utah.
The agreement also provides for the State to convey to the
United States approximately 483 acres of land in Washington
County, Utah, that has been designated as critical habitat
for the Desert Tortoise, a threatened species, for inclusion
in the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve.
(7) Because the inholdings to be acquired by the Federal
Government include properties within some of the most
spectacular wild areas in the western United States, and
because a mission of the Utah School and Institutional Trust
Lands Administration is to produce economic benefits for
Utah's public schools and other beneficiary institutions, the
exchange of lands called for in this agreement will resolve
longstanding environmental conflicts with respect to the
existing and proposed wilderness study areas, place important
natural lands into public ownership, and further the
interests of the State trust lands, the school children of
Utah, and these conservation resources.
(8) Under this agreement taken as a whole, the State
interests to be conveyed to the United States by the State of
Utah, and the Federal interests to be conveyed to the State
of Utah by the United States, will be approximately equal in
value.
(b) Purpose.--The purpose of this Act is to enact into law
and direct prompt implementation of this agreement, and
thereby to further the public interest by consolidating State
and Federal lands into manageable units while facilitating
the protection of lands with significant scientific,
cultural, and natural resources.
SEC. 3. RATIFICATION OF THE AGREED EXCHANGE BETWEEN THE STATE
OF UTAH AND THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR.
(a) Agreement.--The State of Utah and the Department of the
Interior have agreed to exchange certain Federal lands and
mineral interests in the State of Utah for lands and mineral
interests of approximately equal value managed by the Utah
School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration wholly or
partially within certain existing and proposed wilderness
study areas in the West Desert region of Utah.
(b) Ratification.--All terms, conditions, procedures,
covenants, reservations, and other provisions set forth in
the document entitled ``Agreement for Exchange of Lands--West
Desert State-Federal Land Consolidation'', dated May 30, 2000
(in this Act referred to as ``the Agreement''), are hereby
incorporated in this Act, are ratified and confirmed, and set
forth the obligations of the United States, the State of
Utah, and the Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands
Administration, as a matter of Federal law.
(c) Condition.--Before exchanging any lands under this Act,
the Secretary of the Interior and the State of Utah shall
each document in a statement of value how the determination
of approximately equal value was made in accordance with
section 206(h) of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act
of 1976 (43 U.S.C. 1716(h)), provided that the provisions of
paragraph (1)(A) of section 206(h) of such Act shall not
apply. In addition, the Secretary and the State shall select
an independent qualified appraiser who shall review the
statements of value as prepared by the Secretary and the
State of Utah and all documentation and determine if the
lands are of approximately equal value. If there is a finding
of a difference in value, then the Secretary and the State
shall adjust the exchange to achieve approximately equal
value.
SEC. 4. CONVEYANCES.
(a) Conveyances.--All conveyances under sections 2 and 3 of
the Agreement shall be completed within 70 days after the
date on which the condition set forth in section 3(c) is met.
(b) Maps and Legal Descriptions.--
(1) In general.--The maps and legal descriptions referred
to in the Agreement depict the lands subject to the
conveyances under the Agreement.
(2) Public availability.--The maps and descriptions
referred to in the Agreement shall be on file and available
for public inspection in the offices of the Secretary of the
Interior and the Utah State Director of the Bureau of Land
Management.
(3) Conflict.--In case of any conflict between the maps and
the legal descriptions in the Agreement, the legal
descriptions shall control.
SEC. 5. COSTS.
The United States and the State of Utah shall each bear its
own respective costs incurred in the implementation of this
Act.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Utah (Mr. Hansen) and the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller)
each will control 20 minutes.
[[Page H5797]]
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Hansen).
Mr. HANSEN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, H.R. 4579 introduced by myself, would facilitate a major
land exchange between the Secretary of the Interior and the State of
Utah. Within the West Desert of Utah lies hundreds of thousands of
acres of wilderness study areas. For decades now, the school trust has
owned lands within these WSAs with no ability to generate revenues from
these lands, which is their constitutional mandate.
Earlier in this Congress, the Secretary and the school trust began
negotiating a land exchange to remove these lands from the WSAs to
ensure that those lands would not be developed and to ensure that the
school children of Utah could benefit from the lands they have owned
since statehood.
This exchange trades approximately 106,000 acres of State land for
approximately 106,000 acres of Federal land. This is an equal value
exchange that benefits both the conservation of our lands and the
school children of Utah. We bring to the floor today an amended version
of the legislation which ensures that the values are equal and that the
work of the State and the Department of Interior will be independently
reviewed. I appreciate the minority working with us and the Department
to craft an amendment that guarantees this as an equal value exchange.
I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 4579.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such
time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this legislation, H.R. 4579, that
would ratify an agreement reached May 30 between Interior Secretary
Babbitt and Utah Governor Levitt to exchange Federal and State lands in
the West Desert of Utah. Such legislation is necessary because the
proposed exchange does not comply with the requirements of the Federal
Land Policy Management Act and other applicable law.
The agreement between the Secretary and the Governor has only
recently been finalized, and the hearing held by the Committee on
Resources raised several questions. Fortunately, I think we have been
able to address the questions that were raised with respect to
appraisal of these lands and the process by which the BLM went through
this and raised concerns about the general, if you will, BLM appraisal
process with respect to land exchanges.
Clearly here the worry was that valuation methods were used that had
no basis in law or policy and could not stand up to the appraisal
standards. But I think the fact of the matter is that while that
process was far from ideal, I think also we have a unique situation
here in the sense that there is a benefit in this exchange, especially
in the fact that we will have the opportunity to consolidate Federal
land holdings in many wilderness study areas and other lands found to
have significant wilderness qualities, and I think that is important.
So some of these lands in and of them themselves may not have great
value, but in terms of management and the consolidation impact, I think
that clearly this exchange is needed, and I believe the bill now
contains provisions that will provide reasonable process for assessing
the value of the proposed land exchange before it is implemented.
The language provides that the Secretary and the State of Utah will
each prepare a statement of value for the lands to be exchanged. In
addition, the two parties will select an independent qualified
appraiser who will review those statements of values and all relevant
documentation to determine if the lands are of approximately equal
value. I think this in fact will make the bill acceptable.
I really want to thank the sponsor of this legislation, the gentleman
from Utah (Mr. Hansen), for all of the effort that he has put into this
legislation to address these concerns. I think it is clearly a bill
that the House should now support.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance much my time.
Mr. HANSEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for
his comments.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentleman from Utah (Mr. Hansen) that the House suspend the rules and
pass the bill, H.R. 4579, as amended.
The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor
thereof) the rules were suspended and the bill, as amended, was passed.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
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