[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 89 (Wednesday, July 12, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6498-S6538]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 
                                  2001

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will resume consideration of the 
Interior appropriations bill, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 4578) making appropriations for the Department 
     of Interior and related agencies for the fiscal year ending 
     September 30, 2001, and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Wellstone amendment No. 3772, to increase funding for 
     emergency expenses resulting from wind storms.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, we are finally back on the appropriations 
bill for the Department of the Interior. We will be on it from now 
until 6:30 this evening, when I understand we go back to the Defense 
authorization bill.
  We have made some very real progress in the last 24 hours in the 
sense that we have a finite list of amendments that can be brought up 
on this bill. The difficulty is that, as I count them, there are 112 of 
those amendments that are in order at this point. The distinguished 
Senator from West Virginia and I both hope and believe that many of 
them will not be brought up, but this is notification to Members that 
if they are interested in having their amendments discussed, if they 
want to get the views of the managers of the bill on those amendments, 
they should be prompt. We want to hear from everyone this afternoon 
because we want to finish the bill today or, more likely, tomorrow.
  One amendment that is ready to go is the amendment proposed by the 
senior Senator from Minnesota, together with the junior Senator from 
Minnesota, that is technically, I believe, the business of the Senate 
at the present time. I now see both Senators from Minnesota here, 
prepared to deal with that amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.


                           amendment no. 3772

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, the pending order of business is 
amendment No. 3772. I can be very brief.
  First, I thank my colleague, Senator Grams, for joining me in this 
effort. We have two amendments, I believe. I say to my colleague from 
Minnesota, I also join him in his effort.
  We are both focused on the same question: a storm that happens about 
once every thousand years, a massive blowdown in northern Minnesota. We 
are both committed to helping get to the Forest Service the necessary 
resources to deal with the massive blowdown. There is a lot of 
important work to be done. This storm has been a nightmare for our 
State. One very positive outcome of the storm is the way in which the 
people in Minnesota have come together.
  I thank Senator Gorton and Senator Byrd for accepting this amendment. 
It would restore about $7.2 million needed in emergency funding. It is 
critically important, and I thank my colleagues for their support. 
People in northern Minnesota will appreciate their support as well.
  I say to Senator Grams, I have to leave the floor soon, but I also 
support the amendment he is introducing. I have another engagement. I 
am proud to be a cosponsor on that amendment with my colleague.
  It is my understanding this amendment will be approved. I wonder 
whether we could now voice vote it.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I think we want to let the other Senator 
from Minnesota speak.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am sorry.
  Mr. GORTON. The managers are prepared to accept the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. GRAMS. Mr. President, I join with Senator Wellstone to speak 
about the urgent need for cleanup and fire threat reduction funding in 
northern Minnesota. I first want to thank Senator Gorton for his 
willingness to work with me on this crucial issue for our state.
  As many of my colleagues know, I've been working with my colleagues 
in the Senate, including Senator Wellstone, Senator Gorton and Senator 
Stevens, for months to ensure that this crucial funding would be 
available for the Superior and Chippewa National Forests. I've made my 
request repeatedly, in both letters and

[[Page S6499]]

in conversations with the Appropriations Committee and the Senate 
Leadership. My colleagues on the Appropriations Committee gave me their 
assurance that the needs of Minnesota would be met.
  I just returned from hearing over five hours of testimony in northern 
Minnesota on last year's storm and its dramatic aftermath. Regardless 
of political affiliation or the specific interests of those testifying, 
everyone agreed that the most crucial need in northern Minnesota was 
the reduction of the tremendous amount of downed timber scattered 
across the Superior National Forest and the Boundary Waters Canoe Area 
Wilderness. Right now, there are over 450,000 forested acres in 
northern Minnesota upon which lie millions of broken, dead or dying 
trees. Right now, those downed trees pose a fire threat that the Forest 
Service cannot model. If they're not first burned in a catastrophic 
fire, many of those trees will become ridden with disease, creating 
another threat for nearby forested areas that weren't impacted by the 
storm.
  While much of the area most impacted by this storm lies within a 
federally designated wilderness area, the region is also known for its 
many homes and resorts and for the diversity of recreational activity 
it offers. Most importantly for those of us who represent the area is 
the protection of the lives and property of those who live in and visit 
this wonderful area of Minnesota. That's why I've insisted that there's 
an immediate need to reduce the threat of catastrophic fire and provide 
the Forest Service with the funding it needs to conduct cleanup and 
fire threat mitigation efforts.
  I want to take a moment to address the process through which we 
arrived at this point. As I said earlier, I've been working with the 
Appropriations Committee for a number of months to secure this 
important funding. I first wrote to Senator Stevens on March 15th 
seeking emergency funding in a supplemental appropriations bill for 
cleanup activities this year. I then wrote to Senator Gorton on April 
12 asking that he include $9.249 million in emergency funding to 
address the pressing needs of the Superior and Chippewa National 
Forests. When the Agriculture Appropriations bill passed through the 
Appropriations Committee, I was pleased that my request had been 
approved and would soon be before the full Senate. And finally, when 
the Military Construction Conference Report was brought out of 
committee, we were successful in getting a $2 million down payment on 
the $9.249 million and a commitment that the remainder would soon 
follow in either the Interior bill or in the Agriculture bill. As I 
said earlier, the agreement reached today between Senators Gorton, 
Byrd, Wellstone and me fulfills the commitment I received almost two 
weeks ago.
  There have, however, been some suggestions that the funding we're 
discussing today had been approved in the House of Representatives and 
then stripped out by the Senate. However, the House has never passed a 
single dime in emergency funding for northern Minnesota. I would also 
like to address claims that the Senate had somehow stripped this money 
out and ignored the needs of northern Minnesota. I've been in almost 
constant contact over the past few months with the Senate Leadership 
and with the Appropriations Committee. I have been assured repeatedly 
that this money will be available for Minnesota and that the pressing 
needs in this region of my State would be met no later than on the 
Agriculture Appropriations bill and hopefully on this bill. I'm 
grateful that now those needs will be met, consistent with the previous 
assurances I had received.
  I would also like to mention that this is not the end, but the 
beginning of our efforts to ensure the safety and well-being of the 
people who live in or visit northeastern Minnesota. Reducing the threat 
of fire, protecting human life and property, and ensuring the continued 
economic viability of this region of our State should be our number one 
priority. I intend to see to it that those concerns are addressed by 
the Federal Government in the coming weeks, months, and years.
  To that end, I intend to secure, through an amendment I have already 
filed, additional funding of $6.947 million for blow-down recovery and 
fire threat reduction efforts in northern Minnesota for fiscal year 
2001.
  As, again, Senator Wellstone mentioned, he is joining me on this 
amendment as well in support of this request. This money will provide 
the Forest Service in northern Minnesota with the funding they need in 
the coming fiscal year so that they can continue the cleanup efforts 
beyond October of this year. This is a massive cleanup effort that will 
cost millions of dollars and will continue for years past fiscal year 
2001. I hope we can reach agreement with Senator Gorton and Senator 
Byrd to accept this important amendment as soon as possible.
  Again, I thank Senator Gorton, Senator Stevens, the staff of the 
Appropriations Committee, and Senator Wellstone for working with me for 
so many months to secure the funding needed to protect the lives and 
the property of the people of northern Minnesota.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask my colleague from Washington 
whether we can voice vote my amendment.
  Mr. GORTON. I believe we are ready to take a voice vote on this 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 3772) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Washington 
and my colleague from Minnesota for their help.
  Mr. GORTON. We are working with the two Senators from Minnesota on a 
follow-on amendment. I hope we will be in a position to accept that 
relatively quickly.
  Mr. President, two amendments were inadvertently left off the list 
for consideration. I ask unanimous consent that Senator Thomas' 
amendment regarding a management study be included, and Senator 
Lincoln's amendment on black liquor gasification be included under the 
agreement.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, we started with 112 amendments. We have 
adopted 1 and added 2, so we are now at 113. With that, the floor is 
open. I believe the Senator from Michigan is here to speak on one of 
his amendments.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan is recognized.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I rise to talk with respect to one of the 
amendments on that list of 113, one that I had planned to offer, which 
would basically be an amendment that embodies a bill I introduced, S. 
2808, the purpose of which was to temporarily suspend the Federal 
gasoline tax for 150 days, while holding harmless the highway trust 
fund and protecting the Social Security trust fund.
  Obviously, this is not the type of legislation that would normally be 
brought on an appropriations bill. I have traveled throughout the State 
of Michigan in recent weeks where we are confronting gasoline prices 
that are so high that the motorists in our State and people in 
industries that depend on the purchase of gasoline and other fuels are 
up in arms at a level I don't believe I can ever remember.
  Whether you are in the Abraham family, which owns a minivan and pays 
$50 to fill up the tank, or whether you are a family that has multiple 
minivans and fills up more than one tank a week, or whether you are a 
farmer who has many needs in the production of agricultural commodities 
for the use of motor vehicles and other machines that require oil and 
fuel, or whether you are in the automotive industry that depends on the 
purchase of SUVs, light trucks, and other American-made automobiles and 
motor vehicles, or whether it is the tourism industry that requires 
reasonably priced gasoline in order to make sure that summer vacation 
plans are carried out--and tourism is an economic sector that remains 
strong--regardless of your role in my State, you are very upset because 
today the price of gasoline in Michigan is almost 75 to 80 cents higher 
than it was a year ago. In

[[Page S6500]]

fact, this Monday, a national survey of gasoline prices indicated that 
in the city of Detroit, in the metropolitan area, we have the highest 
gasoline prices in America.
  Something needs to be done about this. We have heard Senator 
Murkowski and others on the Energy Committee talk about a variety of 
long-term strategies, ranging from the development of domestic energy, 
to addressing alternative energy sources, to conservation. We have 
talked a little bit here about regulations that have increased the cost 
of fuel development. We have talked about it in the Senate and have 
heard about issues that range from whether or not the oil companies are 
in some sort of collusive effort and are gouging the consumers of 
America.
  We have heard all of these things. But the bottom line is, taking 
action in any of those areas will not dramatically change the price of 
gasoline in the short run. We may, if we develop more domestic energy 
sources, be in a better position to control production and supply and, 
as a consequence, price. We may, if we address certain regulations, 
make it possible to change the price. But none of that is going to 
happen overnight.
  In my State and across the Midwest, and really across the entire 
country, people want action sooner, not later. There is only one thing 
we can do as a Congress that will bring action sooner rather than later 
with respect to the price of gasoline, and that is to temporarily 
suspend the Federal tax on gasoline of 18.4 cents. Overnight, at every 
filling station in America and every gas station, the price of gasoline 
would theoretically come down by about 18 cents. Believe me, people 
will show up to buy that less expensive gasoline.
  In Michigan, just a few days ago, a gas station, having heard my plea 
to suspend the Federal gas tax, reduced the price of gasoline for 2 
hours at that station in the Detroit metropolitan area by 18.4 cents. 
There were lines of traffic a quarter mile virtually in every direction 
to get into that station because people who had been desperate to pay 
less for gasoline had the chance to do so--for 2 hours at least.
  Our State's economy and the Nation's economy is being affected by 
these high fuel costs. Recently, I conducted a hearing in Warren, MI. 
We heard from people in the Michigan agricultural community who 
indicated to us that, according to their estimates--and, in fact, we 
heard from a family farmer himself who said they expect their net 
family farm income this year to be approximately 35 percent lower than 
it was projected to be. But we heard from people in the Michigan 
automotive community who indicated that already they were beginning to 
see indications of a shift from the purchase of new vehicles made in 
America to the purchase of imported vehicles.
  I think many of us remember back when we had energy problems in the 
1970s and we saw a shift away from American-manufactured vehicles to 
foreign imports, and what that did not just to the economy of Michigan 
or the auto industry but its rippling effect across the entire economy 
of this country.
  We heard from others as well. We heard from consumers who came to 
that hearing and talked about the impact on their families and the sort 
of things they could no longer afford to do.
  It is not only people who came to the hearing that I heard from. Last 
weekend, I was up in Traverse City, MI, to participate in the annual 
cherry festival. I was confronted by a group calling themselves the 
``Traverse City Gas Can Gang.'' When I was walking in the parade, they 
were imploring me, and virtually all other political figures present at 
that parade, to do something about the gasoline tax because basically 
they couldn't afford the price of gasoline.
  I had a press conference in the city of Alpena, MI, and a lady senior 
citizen attending the press conference told me she had to walk to the 
press conference. She was interested in what I had to say about gas 
prices. She walked because she couldn't afford to pay for gas in order 
to drive. She was not a young constituent. She was an elderly senior 
citizen.
  But I am not the only one confronting these kinds of constituents. 
These high prices across America are substantially more than they were 
a year ago. The metro Detroit area currently suffers under the highest 
gas prices in the country. Even though the price has come down from 
approximately $2 a gallon, it is still approximately $1.85 a gallon 
this week. These prices are 40 cents a gallon higher than they were in 
May of this year. That is a 27-percent increase in 2 months.
  Of course, it is not in Michigan alone. Across the country people are 
confronting the same kind of significant increases. In June of 1999 gas 
prices in my State averaged just over $1.13 a gallon in Detroit, $1.17 
a gallon throughout Michigan. One year later, gas prices were averaging 
$2.14 a gallon in Detroit, and just under $2.08 a gallon in the State 
of Michigan as a whole. That is almost a 90-percent rate of inflation 
for gas in the State.
  As I pointed out, former Soviet Republics don't suffer inflation this 
aggravated. Even with the recent slight drop in gas prices, it is still 
56 percent higher this year than it was 1 year ago.
  There are a lot of possible explanations. There are a lot of factors 
that have come into play. This Congress and this Senate have a 
responsibility to deal with the long-term issues. But we also have a 
responsibility to provide relief in the short term, if we can. That is 
what can be accomplished if we were to temporarily suspend the Federal 
gas taxes. Eighteen cents a gallon would make a big difference to the 
people in my State.
  This is not insignificant. It is more than a 10-percent reduction in 
the price of regular gasoline. For the typical one-car or one-minivan 
family, that would mean savings of $150 over the next 5 months. For 
those who are in the trucking industry, of course it would reduce their 
diesel prices by almost 25 cents a gallon. That would make a huge 
difference for them in terms of their bottom line as well.
  My proposal is designed to simultaneously reduce the price at the 
pump and protect the road-funding dollars that many of our States, 
including certainly mine, are counting on from Washington. We would 
replenish any lost revenue to the highway trust fund at the same time 
we would suspend the gas tax.
  As you know, we are confronting for this year as well as for the next 
year record high surpluses of non-Social Security dollars. Our proposed 
amendment would, in fact, use those non-Social Security surplus dollars 
to make sure that highway funding remains constant.

  It is our projection and estimation that over the next 5 months the 
suspension of the gas tax would reduce the highway trust fund by 
approximately $6.5 billion. Our amendment would replenish those dollars 
from the general fund.
  Indeed, the language of our amendment states specifically that 
nothing in this subsection may be construed as authorizing a reduction 
in the apportionments of the highway trust fund to the States as a 
result of the temporary reduction in rates of tax.
  In short, the proposal embodied in my legislation and in the 
amendment I had planned to bring to the Interior bill would suspend the 
gas tax and make sure the highway funds continue to flow by using non-
Social Security surplus dollars.
  When we initially sought to bring this amendment on the Interior 
appropriations bill, it was unclear what the Senate schedule would be 
with respect to other appropriate legislation where we might bring this 
amendment. I am happy to hear this morning that a unanimous consent 
agreement was entered into which will allow us to take up tomorrow the 
estate tax--the death tax--legislation that has been discussed over the 
last day and a half, and that amendments such as this one would be in 
order at that time.
  Indeed, I have already been in consultation with our leadership as to 
securing one of those amendment slots to bring this amendment in the 
context of the tax bill, which is clearly a more preferable vehicle for 
us to address these issues. It is my plan to return to the floor 
tomorrow when that tax bill is before us with one of the amendments to 
be offered on the Republican side.
  Before I leave, I wish to make it very clear to my colleagues that 
this is a serious problem--not only in Michigan but across the country. 
If we continue to have to pay gas prices of the level we are paying 
today, even though they

[[Page S6501]]

have come down slightly in the last couple of weeks, it is going to 
have a very serious impact on the economy of this country. It is going 
to hurt our agricultural sector, our tourism sector, our automotive 
sector, and it will have a rippling effect across America. That means 
it is not only a problem for somebody who owns a minivan or for 
somebody who drives a truck; it is going to ultimately be a problem for 
all of us.
  I believe over time a lot of this will be alleviated as supply and 
production increases by Saudi Arabia and others begin to take effect. 
But I can't wait that long. My constituents can't wait that long. We 
need to do something sooner, not later.
  I believe the one thing that makes sense to do, that we can afford to 
do, that will make a difference immediately, and that will provide the 
consumers in my State with an opportunity to be able to afford 
gasoline--or at least more easily afford gasoline--is for us to 
recognize that we are going to have a huge surplus this year, a 
projected surplus next year, and that a little bit of that surplus over 
the next 5 months can be used to protect the highway trust fund and 
give consumers a break. I believe in doing that.
  We will do something that will be immensely supported by the people 
across America who have to fill up their tanks once or twice a week by 
average working families in this country for whom a rise of 63 percent 
or 90 percent in the price makes a big difference. I believe it is an 
action that we should take. The last time we voted on it, there were 
approximately 43 votes in favor of a gas tax suspension. But that was 
before these prices crested to the level of today. I believe the Senate 
should have one more vote on this. I look forward to this debate 
tomorrow.

  At this time, I will withdraw from the list my amendment and allow 
the Senator from Washington to continue with other amendments on this 
bill. I thank him for his indulgence. I look forward to debating this 
issue tomorrow.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I am grateful to the Senator from Michigan 
on two fronts: One, that we will not have to deal with the amendment on 
this bill--at least not on the subject of the bill itself--and 
substantively for bringing up a vitally important issue; and for his 
dedication, which I am certain was key to giving him the ability to 
bring this amendment to the floor of the Senate on a bill for which it 
is relevant and in a way that Members of the Senate will be able to 
vote on it. I wish him good fortune in that quest. His case was 
persuasively stated.


                           Amendment No. 3773

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 3773.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Washington (Mr. Gorton) proposes an 
     amendment numbered 3773.

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 167, line 15 of the bill, insert the number ``0'' 
     between the numbers ``1'' and ``5''.

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this is a technical amendment. It is to 
correct an improper citation to public law referenced in the bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 3773) was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 3801

   (Purpose: To approve the reprogramming of funds for computational 
         services at the National Energy Technology Laboratory)

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, on behalf of my colleague from West 
Virginia, I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Washington (Mr. Gorton), for Mr. Byrd, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 3801.

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the end of Title III of the bill insert the following:
       ``Sec.  . From funds previously appropriated under the 
     heading ``Department of Energy, Fossil Energy Research and 
     Development,'' $4,000,000 is immediately available from 
     unobligated balances for computational services at the 
     National Energy Technology Laboratory.''

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this confirms a reprogramming of an energy 
program in the State of West Virginia over which there have been some 
technical difficulties, and assures that money previously appropriated 
will be used for the purpose stated in the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 3801) was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 3802

    (Purpose: To amend the amount provided for the State of Florida 
   Restoration grants within National Park Service land acquisition)

  Mr. GORTON. I send a further amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Washington [Mr. Gorton] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 3802.

  Mr. GORTON. I ask unanimous consent reading of the amendment be 
dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 127, line 11, strike ``$10,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$12,000,000''.

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this corrects a figure in the bill to 
bring it into conformance with the committee report and the intention 
of the committee in passing a bill. In other words, it was simply a 
drafting error.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 3802) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. I move to reconsider the vote on all three amendments.
  Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, that is all I can deal with at the present 
time. I repeat--and I know my friend from Nevada is with me on this--we 
do have a very substantial number of additional amendments. It looks as 
if somewhere between 6 and 10 may require rollcalls. I particularly 
urge we start the debate on significant policy amendments to this bill. 
This is a request to Members who were eager to list amendments for 
debate to come to the floor and present those amendments.
  Mr. REID. I say to my friend, this bill may not be around very long. 
This may be the only opportunity to offer these amendments because the 
two leaders have outlined a tremendously difficult legislative program 
in the next 2\1/2\ weeks. This may be the only time in the Sun for some 
of these amendments.
  Mr. GORTON. We are going to the tax bill tomorrow with 20 amendments 
or so in order for it. Members desiring to deal with this Interior 
appropriations bill need to present themselves on the floor with those 
amendments as promptly as possible.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 3803

 (Purpose: To provide funding for expenses resulting from windstorms, 
                            with an offset)

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk for Mr. 
Grams and Mr. Wellstone, and I ask that it be immediately considered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Washington [Mr. Gorton], for Senators 
     Grams and Wellstone, proposes an amendment numbered 3803.

  Mr. GORTON. I ask unanimous consent reading of the amendment be 
dispensed with.

[[Page S6502]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 126, line 16, strike ``$207,079,000,'' and insert 
     ``$202,950,000, of which not more than $511,000 shall be used 
     for the preconstruction, engineering, and design of a 
     heritage center for the Grand Portage National Monument in 
     Minnesota,''.
       On page 165, line 25, strike ``$618,500,000,'' and 
     inserting ``$622,629,000, of which at least $6,947,000 shall 
     be used for hazardous fuels reduction activities and expenses 
     resulting from windstorm damage in the Superior National 
     Forest in Minnesota, $3,000,000 of which shall not be 
     available until September 30, 2001''.

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this amendment was discussed a few moments 
ago by Senator Grams and approved by Senator Wellstone. It deals 
further with the emergency in Minnesota they discussed earlier. I was 
delighted at the wonderful cooperation between those two Senators. I 
agree with their description of the emergency. I ask the amendment be 
agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 3803) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, the chairman of the subcommittee and I are 
here on the floor. We are very eager to have Senators who want to call 
up amendments come to the floor and call up their amendments. I urge 
Senators: Make haste and come while the time is running and ripe. At 
some point we have to call up our amendments or go to third reading. It 
is a little early to go to third reading, but I would plead with 
Senators not to wait. This is an excellent opportunity. If I had an 
amendment to the bill, I would be eager to see a moment such as this 
when other Senators are not seeking recognition, and I would be eager 
to come to the floor, work out my amendment with the two managers, and 
be on my way back to the office and other things.
  So I make that urgent plea because at some point, if Senators do not 
come to the floor with their amendments, I may move to go to third 
reading and get the yeas and nays on that. Of course, if that motion 
carries, there can be no more amendments. I am not saying I will do 
that yet, but there will come a time. That is a good fiddler's tune: 
There will come a time, there will come a time someday. This is your 
chance, now. Staffs of Senators who are working on amendments, this is 
your chance. Get your Senator here and let's get the amendments and get 
votes.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Grams). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                           Amendment No. 3804

  (Purpose: To provide additional funds for Payment in Lieu of Taxes 
                                program)

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask 
for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Wyoming [Mr. Thomas], for himself, Mr. 
     Hatch, Mr. Burns, and Mr. Grams, proposes an amendment 
     numbered 3804.

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 112, line 20, strike ``$693,133,000'' and insert 
     ``$689,133,000 of which not to exceed $125,900,000 shall be 
     for workforce and organizational support and $16,586,000 
     shall be for Land and Resource Information Systems''.
       On page 113, line 14, strike ``$693,133,000'' and insert 
     ``$689,133,000''.
       On page 115, line 19, strike ``$145,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$148,000,000''.

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, this is an amendment that deals with a 
program called Payment In Lieu of Taxes. Last year there was an 
appropriation of approximately $135 million. This year we intended to 
increase that amount. We have a letter that came from 57 of our 
colleagues urging an increase. We have changed the amendment to where 
it would be an increase in funding over the proposal by $3 million, 
bringing it up to $148 million.
  This is substantially below what the authorizations are. However, I 
do understand the difficulty of the funding. I appreciate the 
opportunity to work with the chairman and the ranking member.
  Basically what this does, of course, is provide payments to the 
States for the public lands that are owned there, public lands that if 
they were privately owned would be taxed and would be an income source.
  These counties, despite the fact there is no taxable income, continue 
to carry on their services--lease services, hospital services, other 
kinds of services. So really it is sort of a fairness issue when the 
Federal Government has substantial amounts of ownership.
  In Wyoming, 50 percent of the State belongs to the Federal 
Government. We have counties that run as high as 96 percent being 
federally owned lands and many that are over half. So this is sort of a 
payment to them. The Nation, of course, benefits from this ownership, 
but the counties have to pay the ticket.
  I will not go into great detail. But I urge this amendment be agreed 
to.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter that was sent 
to the chairman be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the letter was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

                                                  U.S. Senate,

                                   Washington, DC, March 17, 2000.
     Hon. Slade Gorton, Chairman,
     Hon. Robert C. Byrd, Ranking Member,
     Subcommittee on Interior, Senate Appropriations Committee, 
         U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senators Gorton and Byrd: We write to request your 
     support for a multi year process that will lead us to full 
     funding for the Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) program on 
     public lands across the country.
       We believe the most favorable course of action would be to 
     appropriate the full authorization level of PILT by FY 2010. 
     The Bureau of Land Management has informed us that the 
     authorized PILT funding level under PL. 103-397 in FY 2005 
     will be approximately $335 million based on current inflation 
     rates. We realize there are many important needs to be 
     addressed in the Interior Appropriations bill this year. 
     However, a five-year $20 million per year increase would help 
     more than 2000 counties and local governments meet the 
     mandates imposed upon them by an ever increasing public land 
     base. Additionally, it would allow the federal government to 
     work toward fulfilling a commitment it made to counties in 
     1976 when Congress passed the original PILT act in a fiscally 
     responsible manner.
       You are keenly aware that counties, on behalf of the 
     federal government, provide many critical infrastructure 
     servides--including police, search and rescue, fire fighting, 
     road maintenance, garbage collection and other services. 
     Because of the amount of public lands in these counties, they 
     do not have the ability to raise the necessary funds through 
     traditional property taxes.
       In the past public lands provided many economic benefits to 
     local communities through multiple use activities such as 
     grazing, mining, oil, gas and timber. The monies generated 
     also stayed in public land counties. These resource 
     activities face ongoing pressures and hardships, and are 
     being replaced by people recreating in these areas. The 
     effect is an increased demand for services often far in 
     excess of resources that the tourism dollars bring to these 
     rural communities.
       It is common for federal land ownership in some counties to 
     exceed 50 percent to more than 90 percent. With the trend 
     toward additional acquisitions by the federal government of 
     private taxable land, we believe it has become an absolute 
     necessity that Congress meet its obligation and begin a 
     process that will lead toward full funding of PILT within a 
     reasonable period of time. Absent this, we fear counties will 
     have no choice but to reduce or eliminate essential public 
     services on public lands due to budgetary constraints. Please 
     know you have our full support as we move forward working 
     with you

[[Page S6503]]

     on an incremental increase for PILT which allows for this 
     critical program to eventually realize its full authorization 
     level.
           Best regards,
         Craig Thomas; Mary L. Landrieu; Tim Johnson; Kent Conrad; 
           Frank H. Murkowski; Richard Shelby; Conrad Burns; Mike 
           DeWine; Ben Nighthorse Campbell; Byron L. Dorgan; Jon 
           Kyl; Jesse Helms; Jim Bunning; Dick Lugar; Barbara 
           Boxer; Michael B. Enzi; Rod Grams; Spencer Abraham; 
           Larry E. Craig; Mike Crapo; Orrin Hatch; Wayne Allard; 
           Dianne Feinstein; Gordon Smith; Chuck Hagel; Pete V. 
           Domenici; Patrick Leahy; Judd Gregg; Olympia Snowe; Bob 
           Smith; Strom Thurmond; Kay Bailey Hutchison; Tom 
           Daschle; Ron Wyden; Jim Inhofe; Richard H. Bryan; Harry 
           Reid; Patty Murray; Paul Wellstone; Trent Lott; Chuck 
           Robb; John Edwards; Mitch McConnell; Jim Jeffords; Max 
           Cleland; Jeff Bingaman; John Breaux; Rick Santorum; 
           John Ashcroft; Dick Durbin; Max Baucus; Kit Bond; Tim 
           Hutchinson; Bill Frist; Carl Levin; Paul D. Coverdell; 
           Blanche L. Lincoln;

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, we have worked with the Senator from 
Wyoming on this subject, a subject in which he has been interested, I 
believe, ever since he came to the Senate, and one in which I am 
interested as well.
  The bill does include an increase for this Payment In Lieu of Taxes. 
This money is very important to many counties--rural counties almost 
entirely--that have much or most of their property owned by the Federal 
Government.
  I would like to be more generous than this. I think this is about as 
far as we can go. I appreciate the willingness of the Senator from 
Wyoming to come up with a reasonable increase. I am willing to accept 
it. I believe my colleague is as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I have no objection on this side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 3804) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I thank the chairman and Senator Byrd for 
accepting the amendment, and also Senators Hatch, Grams, and Burns for 
cosponsoring this amendment. I think it is useful. I appreciate it very 
much.
  Mr. STEVENS. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. DORGAN. I am happy to yield to the Senator.


                     Amendment No. 3774, Withdrawn

  Mr. STEVENS. I ask unanimous consent my amendment No. 3774 be 
withdrawn.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Thomas). The Senator has a right to recall 
his amendment.
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 3774) was withdrawn.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I begin by complimenting Senator Slade 
Gorton and Senator Robert Byrd, the chairman and the ranking member of 
the subcommittee that brings this legislation to the floor. The 
Interior appropriations bill is a very important piece of legislation, 
but it faces the classic problem of trying to meet unlimited needs with 
limited resources. Senator Gorton and Senator Byrd had a very difficult 
task, but they have done quite a remarkable job and have certainly 
earned my compliments and I hope the compliments of my colleagues for 
the job they have done.
  I wish to speak for a few moments, however, about a very difficult 
problem that is encountered by a group of Americans who suffer some of 
the highest unemployment rates, some of the most difficult health 
problems, and the most difficult challenges of any Americans. I'm 
speaking of Native Americans.
  We have in North Dakota four Indian reservations. I frequently visit 
these reservations and meet with the tribal chairs, men, women, and 
children who live there. The conditions in some cases on these 
reservations are very much like those of a Third World country. The 
unmet health care needs are devastating. The unemployment rates in some 
cases are as high as 50, 60, and 70 percent because these areas are so 
remote and there are simply no jobs. And the quality of education 
regrettably is not up to the standards it should be.

  As I talk about these problems today, I want to point out that this 
bill, for the first time, makes some significant steps in the right 
direction. This is an important moment. This appropriations bill does 
make some important progress in dealing with the issues of Indian 
health care and Indian education.
  Yet there is so much left to do. The people in America who live in 
Indian country have the highest rates of poverty in our country. Over 
30 percent of Native Americans live in poverty. The unemployment rate 
on Indian reservations in North Dakota averages 55 percent. Compare 
that to the unemployment rate of around 4 percent in the United States 
as a whole.
  To help address the problems that Native Americans face, President 
Clinton recommended a $1.2 billion increase, government-wide, for 
priority health care, education, economic development, and other 
infrastructure needs in Indian country. I am particularly pleased about 
the President's recommendations in some key areas, including the $300 
million he proposed for BIA school replacement and repair. This is $167 
million more than the current level, the largest ever single year 
investment in BIA school infrastructure. The President's budget also 
proposes a $200 million, or 10-percent, increase in the Indian health 
services budget.
  The increased funding levels in the Senate bill, even though they 
represent significant progress under difficult circumstances, still 
fall significantly short of both the President's budget request and 
what we need to do. Unfortunately, the House-passed Interior bill is 
far, far worse. We are going to fall short once again of meeting the 
actual needs of Native Americans.
  Let me talk for a moment about the health care needs in Indian 
country. A Native American living on the reservation is 12 times more 
likely to have diabetes than the average American--not double or triple 
or quadruple but 12 times more likely to have diabetes--and 3 times 
more likely to die from diabetes. An American Indian is five times more 
likely to die from tuberculosis, four times more likely to die from 
chronic liver disease, 3 times more likely to die in an accident, 
especially an automobile accident, and nearly twice as likely to commit 
suicide.
  I recently visited the Indian Health Service hospital in Fort Yates, 
ND. I have here a picture of that hospital. It has been around for a 
long while. It doesn't have an emergency room. The folks who use that 
hospital don't have access to an operating room, and they therefore 
can't deliver babies because they don't have an operating room. The 
emergency room is in the midst of the waiting rooms, so when an 
emergency occurs, everyone in the waiting room has to clear out. It is 
not visible in this picture, but there is a little old trailer house 
where the dentist practices. The 1 dentist practicing in that trailer 
serves 5,000 people.
  Now this dentist is no doubt providing the best service that he can 
given the circumstances he has to work in, but just imagine the kind of 
dental care that is provided by 1 dentist for 5,000 people. Do you 
think that dentist is constructing difficult bridges or other 
complicated treatments for teeth that are in trouble, or is he more 
likely pulling teeth? This is at Fort Yates, ND, on the Standing Rock 
Indian Reservation.
  The current funding for the Indian Health Service is about 43 percent 
less per capita than health care spending for the U.S. population 
generally. The Indian Health Service spends about $1,400 per patient, 
compared to the national per capita amount per patient of $3,200.
  Let me also talk for a moment about education on the reservations. 
Again, I appreciate the leadership of Senator Gorton and Senator Byrd 
in providing $276 million for BIA school replacement and repair in this 
coming fiscal year.

  The Federal government has a trust responsibility to provide an 
education

[[Page S6504]]

to Indian children. This is not a luxury or some discretionary choice. 
We have a trust responsibility to Indian children, just as we have a 
responsibility to provide for an education for the children of our 
military personnel residing on or near military bases. The Federal 
government runs the Department of Defense school system. We also have a 
trust responsibility to run the school system through the BIA. We have 
not done that very well. We are woefully short of the funds that are 
needed to keep these schools up to standard. Even with the funding 
increases in the Senate bill, there will continue to be a nearly $700 
million backlog in repair and replacement of BIA schools.
  The GAO says the schools that are serving these Indian children are 
among the poorest schools in the Nation. Yes, that is among all 
schools, even those in the inner-cities, where they also have a lot of 
problems. But the worst school facilities in the Nation are those on 
the Indian reservations.
  This is a picture of a school on the Turtle Mountain Reservation. 
This happens to be the Ojibwa Indian School. This is a fundamentally 
unsafe school, as many health and safety investigations have found. One 
day, my fear is that something awful will happen at that school and 
people will say, How did that happen? It will happen because nobody 
paid attention to the warnings.
  This is a picture of the fire escape. Notice, it is a wooden fire 
escape, which is rather unusual--a fire escape made of wood. This is 
clearly a fire code violation.
  The children of the Ojibwa school are attending classes in trailers 
that have been constructed because the main school building is over 100 
years old and has been condemned. So the kids are now put in the mobile 
units and are required to scurry back and forth, up and down these 
stairs, in the dead of winter in North Dakota, with temperatures at 30 
below zero and with the wind blowing. The people who have inspected 
these facilities from time to time have found all kinds of problems 
with them. This wooden fire escape is simply one of many.
  This is a picture of the plumbing at the school in Marty, SD, the 
Marty Indian School. Take a look at that plumbing. See if you want to 
take a drink of the water from those pipes. Or take a look at this 
rusted radiator. Not exactly the modern radiator needed to keep the 
students warm in the dead of a South Dakota winter.
  Or, to return to another picture of the Ojibwa school, where the 
ground beneath the gymnasium is giving way. For safety purposes they 
have put up plywood, and that plywood is all that separates children 
from danger as the ground gives way under the corner of the gymnasium.
  We have to do much better than this. We can and should do better than 
this. We have a responsibility to these kids. I have come to the floor 
many times and talked about these needs. I know I am repetitive, and I 
know people say that they have heard it all before. But frankly, a lot 
of these people don't have much of a voice in this appropriations 
process.
  A little third grader, Rosie Two Bears, once asked me: Mr. Senator, 
are you going to build me a new school? I realize I can't build Rosie a 
new school even though she desperately needs one. She goes to a school 
that is terribly inadequate. Rosie goes to a school with sewer gas 
coming up through the floors of one classroom, which they had to 
evacuate once or twice a week. She goes to a school in which there are 
150 students with 1 water fountain and 2 toilets, a school with no 
playground.
  The fact is, we can do better than that. This bill makes some 
significant improvements in health and education. For that, I commend 
all the folks involved. On the Appropriations Committee, I tried to 
make even more improvements, and I'm glad I was able to do that 
marginally in the area of tribal college funding. However, I come to 
the floor to say we have to do better.
  The superintendent of the Wahpeton Indian school, Joyce Burr, told me 
a while ago about a little girl attending that school. Many of these 
kids are sent to that school from around the country, and they come 
from troubled backgrounds, many without much of a family or home to go 
back to. Joyce told me the little girl came to her near Christmastime, 
when the school was going to close during the 2 week holiday at 
Christmas and the children would be sent back to their reservations, to 
their families. This little girl, a third or fourth grader, went to the 
superintendent and said: I would like to stay over at the school during 
the Christmas break. I know the school isn't going to be opened, but I 
promise if you let me stay here I won't eat very much. She had no place 
to go, so she was asking if she could stay at the school all alone over 
the Christmas break, promising, ``If you let me do that I won't eat 
much.'' We must do much better for these children.

  On the other end of the education spectrum, with respect to tribal 
colleges, I want to say we are starting to make some progress there, 
for which I am very grateful. The tribal colleges represent an 
extension of educational opportunity and a way out of poverty. I went 
to a tribal college graduation once and met the oldest graduate in the 
graduating class. She was 42 or 43 years old, with four children, whose 
husband had left her. She was cleaning the toilets and the hallways at 
the tribal college and decided she was going to try and improve her lot 
in life by attending the college.
  The day I was there, she graduated. I can hardly describe the smile 
on her face that day. This woman decided, with grim determination: I am 
going to graduate from this college. I know I am cleaning the hallways 
and bathrooms, but I want to do more than that. Through grit and 
determination, the help of relatives and scholarships, and because the 
tribal college was right there, guess what--the day I showed up to give 
the graduation speech, this proud woman graduated from college. Good 
for her.
  Or the instance of Loretta. Loretta had dropped out of school. She 
was an unwed teenaged mother. Now she is a doctor, a Ph.D., a real 
expert on education who eventually went on to teach at a tribal college 
for awhile. She did that by herself, but she did it because we put in 
place a system of tribal colleges that give people like Loretta the 
opportunity to go to school and get a college education. That is why 
tribal colleges are so important. Frankly, we contribute only about 
half as much per student at tribal colleges as we do to other colleges 
around the rest of the country. We need to do better than that. I am 
pleased to say this piece of legislation starts down that road.
  Let me conclude where I began. I am here because I am pleased we are 
making progress. These are important, critical issues. We cannot ignore 
the circumstances that exist on Indian reservations. It is easy enough 
for some people to say that this is the way Indians want to live. That 
is not the case at all. These are Americans who are beset by poverty, 
lack of opportunity, lack of jobs, a bad health care system, and a 
crumbling education system that we must improve. I believe we are 
taking the first steps in this legislation to do that. For that, I 
commend my colleagues who brought this bill to the floor --Senator 
Gorton and Senator Byrd.
  I say to them, I will be back again next year, as we continue our 
work in the Appropriations Committee, saying that we have done a lot, 
we have made some first important steps and thanks for that. But let's 
continue to try to address these education and health care needs on our 
reservations for Indian Americans. Let's try to do even more in the 
coming fiscal year.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bunning). The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the Senator is eloquent and persistent and 
has had great successes, and I am sure he will have great successes in 
the future. I thank him for his comments and his support.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I wonder if I can engage in a discussion 
with the distinguished chairman, Senator Slade Gorton, on the bill 
before us.

[[Page S6505]]

  By way of some opening remarks directed at the fine, excellent job he 
has done on this bill, I want to talk with him for a moment about what 
we have done for the U.S. Government-owned-and-maintained Indian 
schools in the United States in the Interior appropriations bill.
  First, when we are finished supplying the numbers for the Record, 
which are obviously in the bill, it should not go unnoticed that this 
is the first time we have substantially--and I mean substantially--
increased the money for the construction of Indian schools owned by the 
U.S. Government. Let's not be confused with public schools. These are 
schools that if the Federal Government does not pay for, I ask my 
chairman, nobody will pay for them, right; they belong to us?
  Mr. GORTON. The Senator is entirely correct.
  Mr. DOMENICI. And they are maintained by us. As the accounts will 
show, not only are we in a terrible state of disrepair, in terms of 
those schools that need management money, but we have a huge backlog of 
schools that should be built--that is, built anew--because the 
facilities that Indian children are occupying are truly intolerable.
  Thus far, have I stated what the Senator from Washington has 
attempted to accomplish in this bill?
  Mr. GORTON. The Senator from New Mexico is correct, but I really need 
to say more to respond to him in the affirmative. He has perhaps been 
the most eloquent, though he has been certainly strongly supported by 
the Senator from North Dakota on that side of the aisle, our friend, 
Senator Inouye, from that side of the aisle, and the Senators from 
Arizona, in attempting at least to begin with the huge backlog in the 
absolute necessity of constructing new Indian schools that are 100 
percent our responsibility and for renovating and repairing those that 
can constructively be renovated and repaired.
  The Senator from New Mexico also knows how difficult this has been in 
past years because while the President of the United States has always 
asked us for big increases in the budget really for spending more money 
than we thought overall was appropriate to spend, he has always ignored 
these Indian school needs.
  This year, in this budget, the President did dramatically reverse 
himself and did ask for a generous appropriation for new Indian school 
construction. That partnership, and the bipartisan partnership on the 
floor of the Senate, gave me the ability of drafting this bill to begin 
both appropriate new construction and a large number of repairs and 
rehabilitation.
  I would be deficient in my own duty if I did not say that the first 
person who saw this need--not only saw this need but spoke eloquently 
to this need--was the Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Is it not true one other major function of activities 
that we must do in behalf of Indian people has to do with health care, 
wherein we have hospitals and medical facilities that are run by the 
U.S. Government for the Indian people? There, again, we have just been 
barely getting by in terms of keeping them open and properly 
maintained, and they are rather good medical facilities, I say to the 
American people. It is not like the public schools that we are ashamed 
of because they are in such disrepair.

  Mr. GORTON. The Indian schools.
  Mr. DOMENICI. The Indian schools, yes. They are in such a state of 
disrepair. Indian health is in pretty good health. In this bill, the 
President asked for substantially more money, and we were able to fund 
a substantial increase in Indian health money in the Interior 
appropriations bill; is that correct?
  Mr. GORTON. The Senator from New Mexico, in this instance, as in the 
earlier instance, is correct.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, for a period of about 4 years, I was 
joined with bipartisan letters that we sent to the President of the 
United States and to the Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of Indian 
Affairs saying: Will you please put in your budget a 5- or 6-year 
proposal to pay for the great backlog we have in Indian school 
construction which, I repeat, only we can make. It is not a question of 
somebody being generous or kind in building an Indian school. These are 
Indian schools we own, we operate, and we pay the teachers--we being 
the United States of America.
  The President, after a visit--not the last visit he made to Indian 
country which was to New Mexico, but one just before that, which was 
his first visit to Indian country as a President--came back and talked 
about doing something to enhance economic development--that is, jobs--
for Indian people.
  I was very privileged to be at the White House and discuss the issue 
with him personally, after which time we joined with a bipartisan group 
of Senators and put together a package that strengthened our 
construction and maintenance of schools, that did somewhat more for 
Indian health and a few other things. The aftermath of that was the 
introduction of a bill, and the aftermath of that is the bill on the 
floor which increases funding in these very important areas.
  In closing, the funding in this bill, which essentially resulted from 
that meeting in the White House to which I just eluded, and then 
joining a bipartisan group of Senators, really is not going to move us 
much in the direction of better jobs in Indian country for the Indian 
people. All of these things that I mentioned are a necessity.
  Essentially, there is something basic that the Indian leaders and 
local communities and the National Government are going to have to do 
that will make the climate in Indian country better for private sector 
job growth. I do not levy any criticism at anyone individually, but it 
is quite obvious that tax credits alone will not do it, for we did that 
4 years ago. The most extensive tax credits were passed to give Indian 
communities a chance to bring in private sector jobs. It is still on 
the books. It is a huge tax credit per Indian employee. We passed 
accelerated depreciation at the same time. If somebody builds a plant, 
they get to accelerate the depreciation much more rapidly than if they 
were next door in non-Indian country.
  The problem is that the combination of all of that has not worked to 
create any large acceleration in the number of Indian people being 
employed in Indian country in permanent jobs.
  I submit it will take a kind of a change in the attitude of Indian 
leaders. I think they are beginning to understand that. Businesses will 
not go even to an Indian reservation in America with tax credits and 
other benefits if, in fact, they are not satisfied with the business 
climate on the reservation; that is, if they can go 50 miles to a 
community off reservation and believe they have a lot more certainty of 
law, more certainty with reference to rules and regulations, they are 
not going to be coming to Indian country.
  I have been urging that the Indian leaders, while they claim their 
sovereignty, understand that every government entity that claims 
sovereignty, from time to time, shows that sovereignty by giving up a 
little bit of it, by waiving a piece of it, or by entering into an 
agreement where they share responsibilities with another unit of 
government, frequently called intergovernmental agreements. These 
things are going to have to happen if we are going to bring jobs to 
Indian country.
  There is much more to be said about it. There are many people who 
have tried, and I do not know just when it will work or when it will 
start working to any significant degree, but I am confident that this 
year we took a giant step in terms of the public responsibility. There 
are things moving around, either at the White House or out in Indian 
country, that are trying to move this whole attitude issue in a 
direction of business feeling more comfortable on Indian country.
  I thank the chairman, again, for the bill with reference to the 
Indian people and I thank the committee that worked with him to bring 
it here.
  Having said that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S6506]]

                           Amendment No. 3795

(Purpose: To provide for a review committee for certain Forest Service 
                                 rules)

  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 3795.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Idaho [Mr. Craig] for himself, Mr. 
     Hutchinson, Mr. Crapo, Mr. Thomas, Mr. Enzi, Mr. Bennett, Mr. 
     Hatch, Mr. Nickles, and Mr. Smith of Oregon, proposes an 
     amendment numbered 3795.

  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place in the bill insert the following 
     section:

     SEC.  . REVIEW COMMITTEE FOR FOREST SERVICE RULES.

       (a)(1) From the amount appropriated for ``Forest 
     Products,'' a sum of $1,000,000 shall be made available until 
     expended to the Secretary of Agriculture for the purpose of 
     reviewing certain proposed rules concerning the planning and 
     management of National Forest System lands referred to in 
     paragraph (2).
       (2) The proposed rules subject to this section are the 
     proposed road management and transportation system rule, and 
     proposed special areas--roadless area conservation rule 
     published at 64 Federal Register 54074 (October 5, 1999) and 
     65 Federal Register 11676 and 30276 (March 3 and May 10, 
     2000), respectively.
       (b) With the funds allocated pursuant to subsection (a)(1):
       (1) The Secretary shall appoint an advisory committee in 
     accordance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act and 
     subsection (d) of persons knowledgeable, and reflecting a 
     diversity of viewpoints, concerning issues related to the 
     planning and management of National Forest System lands. The 
     appointments shall be made as soon as practicable after the 
     date of enactment of this Act.
       (2) The advisory committee shall--
       (A) review and evaluate the proposed rules referred to in 
     subsection (a)(2) and their prospective implementation, 
     particularly as to their cumulative effects and the manner in 
     which they relate to each other, are integrated, and will 
     function together, including any inconsistencies or conflicts 
     in their goals, purposes, application, or likely results and 
     determined whether and in what way they may be improved; and
       (B) submit a written report to the Secretary describing the 
     results of the review and evaluation of the proposed rules 
     required by, and any recommendations for improvement of such 
     rules determined pursuant to, subparagraph (A), including any 
     supplemental or minority views which any member or members of 
     the advisory committee may wish to express.
       (3) The Secretary shall make the report of the advisory 
     committee required by paragraph (2)(B) available for public 
     comment and submit the report to the Congress, together with 
     a written response of the Secretary to the report and the 
     public comment on the report.
       (c) No funds appropriated by this Act or any other act of 
     Congress may be expended for further development or 
     promulgation of the proposed rules referred to in subsection 
     (a)(2) prior to 60 days after the date of submission to the 
     Congress of the report of the advisory committee and the 
     response of the Secretary pursuant to subsection (b)(3).
       (d)(1) The advisory committee appointed pursuant to 
     subsection (b)(1) shall have no more than 15, nor less than 
     9, members who may not be officers or employees of the United 
     States. The Chair of the advisory committee shall be selected 
     from among and by its members.
       (2) The members of the advisory committee, while attending 
     conferences, hearing, or meetings of the advisory committee 
     or while otherwise serving at the request of the Chair shall 
     each be entitled to receive compensation at a rate not in 
     excess of the maximum rate of pay for grade GS-18, as 
     provided in the General Schedule under section 5332 of title 
     5, United States Code, including travel time, and while away 
     from their homes or regular places of business shall each be 
     reimbursed for travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of 
     subsistence as authorized by section 5703 of title 5, United 
     States Code, for persons in Government service employed 
     intermittently.

  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, amendment No. 3795 to the Interior 
appropriations bill deals with the U.S. Forest Service's proposed 
roadless initiative. My amendment would earmark $1 million from the 
Forest Service's timber sales account and direct the Secretary of 
Agriculture to charter an advisory committee, under the provisions of 
the Federal Advisory Committee Act, to review the proposed rules and 
the accompanying draft environmental impact statement for the roadless 
area initiative. The advisory committee would be charged to provide the 
Secretary with advice on improving the proposed rule and the draft 
environmental impact statement.
  My amendment would further prohibit the Secretary from spending any 
additional appropriations under this or any other act on the further 
development of the roadless area rule until the Secretary has received 
the report of the advisory committee.
  Let me tell you why I am offering such an amendment. To date, the 
subcommittee that I chair, the Forests and Public Land Management 
Subcommittee, has held three oversight hearings on the roadless area 
initiative launched by our President last fall. I can tell the members 
of this committee unequivocally that this is the most slipshod 
rulemaking effort I have seen--the worst example--in over 20 years as a 
federally elected official.
  Let me note an example we have found in an examination of the 
communiques with the White House. For example, this is a letter to 
Raymond Mosley, Director of the Federal Register. This comes from an 
officer within the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
  She says:

       Would you please correct our mistakes. In our haste to get 
     the notice to the Register as quickly as possible, we failed 
     to notice that the document heading was missing.

  There has been such a phenomenal rush to judgment on this effort to 
fulfill the President's political agenda with this issue that all of 
the people have made mistakes and have had to go to the Federal 
Register's office to amend them. It is not unlike what we saw Katie 
McGinty do just this week with TMDL rules, where this Senate, 2 weeks 
ago, spoke to the fact that this rule ought to be delayed. The 
President withheld his signature of the MILCON appropriations bill, 
allowing the EPA to accelerate.
  I suspect when we begin to examine the rules that have come out of 
EPA, signed by Katie McGinty yesterday, we will find the same kind of 
mistakes were made only because of a quick political rush to judgment 
to try to either circumvent the acts of Congress or to deny the public 
the kind of input that is important and justifiable in these kinds of 
procedures.
  Among the numerous procedural violations of the Federal statute, I 
think the most egregious is the willful violation of the Federal 
Advisory Committee Act, an act that this administration has had trouble 
complying with many times. I could cite examples where other courts 
have ruled after the fact of the rulemaking that, yes, this 
administration had been in violation of FACA. Our oversight record and 
the executive branch's documents obtained during the oversight process 
provided a clear record of these violations.
  Between May and July last year, a small group of environmental 
activists met with the White House, the Department of Agriculture, and 
Forest Service officials to develop what eventually became the proposed 
rule about which we are talking. All of these meetings were held behind 
closed doors with no notification provided to the public. Advice and 
materials were solicited from the environmentalists by executive branch 
officials in the form of legal memoranda, technical documents, polling 
data, media relations material, and paid advertising in support of the 
proposal. Here is an example: George Frampton, head of CEQ, from Mike 
Francis at the Wilderness Society. Through all of these processes, what 
they are suggesting is that we submit to you the necessary materials 
from which you can move to deal with this issue.
  I think it is fascinating we find Mike Francis saying: I attach a 
draft of the ``letter to the chief'' concept that Charles, Mike, and I 
have worked on as an idea to provide historical linkage to the 
President.
  Ironically, the very letter that George Frampton then sends to the 
Secretary of Agriculture proposing this rulemaking was a parallel 
letter, almost identical, word for word. Mr. Frampton, before our 
committee, did make reference to the fact that, yes, they were very 
similar, if not alike. That letter came from the Wilderness Society 
itself.
  In many cases, these materials were used by executive branch 
officials in charge of developing the proposed rule. For example, the 
polling data was used by lower level officials to brief their 
superiors. In another instance, there was direct consultation between 
the outside groups and the administration to coordinate paid and earned 
media efforts.

[[Page S6507]]

  Let me repeat that. Government officials sat down with outside groups 
prior to the rulemaking process and determined that they would launch a 
paid media campaign. There was even dialog within these memoranda that 
we gathered that suggested dates and times and the kinds of media 
markets we are talking about. Of course, I have referenced the letter 
to the Secretary from George Frampton, which is a mirror image of the 
letter that was proposed by staff at the Wilderness Society.

  In response to the questions before my subcommittee, administration 
officials conceded that the issue of compliance with the Federal 
Advisory Committee Act was never raised in their meetings or 
deliberations, and counsel was never consulted on the matter.
  This group of environmental advisers was in every way but one an 
advisory committee to the Federal Government. The one exception was 
that the committee was never chartered under the provisions of the 
Federal Advisory Committee Act. Had they been chartered, the 
composition of the committee would have had to have been balanced or at 
least more balanced than it was, and their meetings would have had to 
have been published and open to the media and to the public. In other 
words, the process of sunshine and public participation would have had 
to have been involved in this very process.
  Those are citing just a few of the differences and what I believe are 
substantial violations. Left to its own devices, the administration 
will not correct the legal violations. They have been cited and 
examples have been given, both in my committee and at a comparable 
committee in the House. Lawsuits have been filed. Yet they will not 
respond. They are simply charging ahead to a pre-November deadline so 
that all of this fits into the political context that they chose to 
bring it into by the very announcement of the President last October.
  I think, therefore, it is up to Congress to correct these violations 
and the resulting inequities. We must, unfortunately, intervene if we 
want to see the rule of law followed and direct the Secretary to follow 
the law and charter an advisory committee legally under FACA. Then a 
broader range of interests will have the opportunity afforded to a 
selected few with connections to high-level administration officials as 
insiders and friends. The advice they will offer to improve the 
proposed rule will be offered in the sunlight of public disclosure and 
ultimately cause the reaction, as it should, of public opinion. It will 
not be offered in secret, and it will not be offered behind closed 
doors as it was. This would restore the rule of law and sunshine in 
Government.
  The reason I offer this is the magnitude and the significance of the 
issue. Some who are from States that are not impacted by large public 
landownerships or some who oftentimes think that environmental votes 
are just easy and free to make because they have little or no 
consequence to their constituency ought to react to this by saying that 
the administration stepped beyond the rule of law, clearly outside of 
the intent of what Congress designed in the Federal Advisory Committee 
Act.
  This is the magnitude, the significance of what I am talking about. 
This chart is significant only as a visual. These red areas represent 
approximately 42 million acres of existing Forest Service wilderness. 
Every acre of this 42 million was heard before a House and Senate 
committee. It was a give and take between the delegates of the State 
and other Senators and Representatives. It was debated on the floor of 
the House and the Senate, and it was ultimately passed, all 42 million 
acres of existing Federal Forest Service designated wilderness. In 
other words, the public process was full.
  What the President announced in October and what has been going on 
behind closed doors--with now a few public hearings--is the yellow or 
nearly 60 million acres of public lands now up for redesignation by 
this President.
  What does that represent? It represents the whole State of 
Massachusetts and the whole State of Rhode Island and the whole State 
of Connecticut and the whole State of New Jersey and the whole State of 
Delaware and the whole State of Pennsylvania and the whole State of 
Maryland and the whole State of West Virginia. Sixty million acres of 
land are being decided by this President and a few of his 
administrators with Congress not speaking a word. Never before in the 
history of this country has an action of this magnitude been taken 
without full public process and without action and participation on the 
part of the Congress itself.
  What I am suggesting by my amendment is meager in relation to the 
impact of what is going on behind the doors of the White House and USDA 
and the Forest Service. I am asking for $1 million out of the forest 
road fund.
  I am asking that the Secretary inform an advisory committee of 
independent people, and that they advise us on the fact that FACA was 
or was not violated. I think the significance here is, if the President 
had operated under the law, or we believed that he did, I may not be 
here on the floor; although, I probably would be because I am dedicated 
to a public process. I believe that what my colleagues did in the 
sixties--the Democratic Party--in causing all meetings to be open and 
public and registered, and being the primary authors of the act, I 
think that is the right thing to do because I think the public ought to 
be involved. That is why we are here today--to involve the public in 
something that represents all of these States, 60 million acres of the 
public's land and the ultimate future of how that land will be managed. 
That is what is important about this amendment.
  Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. CRAIG. Yes, briefly.
  Mr. DURBIN. The Senator has made reference to the fact this is going 
to be an open, public process by this advisory committee. In the 
Senator's amendment, there is no reference to any public meeting by 
this committee. On page 2, line B(3), there is a reference that this 
advisory committee report will be available for public comment. That is 
the first use of the word ``public.'' There is no reference to the 
sunshine committee having any public hearings.
  Mr. CRAIG. If I may answer, it is because this committee is 
formulated under FACA. Go to the Federal Advisory Committee Act and 
there before you will be all the terms by which this committee will be 
structured. So instead of listing page after page of documentation, I 
am simply saying that the Secretary will constitute a committee under 
FACA to make determinations as to whether the appropriate actions have 
been taken.
  So the Senator is right; I didn't list all of those things. But you 
and I operate under the Federal Code. The Federal Code is there and 
that is why we have done that.


                    amendment No. 3795, as modified

  Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator yield for another question?
  Mr. CRAIG. Just one more question, briefly.
  Mr. DURBIN. I thank the Senator for that. It is almost like a debate 
on the floor. Will the Senator consider putting this language in: The 
advisory committee shall have public sessions, open for public review?
  Mr. CRAIG. Most assuredly I will. I think the Senator knows exactly 
what I am saying. If he wants the guarantee that FACA will be used, I 
will be happy to restate it.
  I ask unanimous consent that the words ``full public meetings'' 
appropriately be placed at the right stage of this. I will work to 
comply with that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 3795), as modified, is as follows:
       At the appropriate place in the bill insert the following 
     new section:

     SEC.  . REVIEW COMMITTEE FOR FOREST SERVICE RULES.

       (a)(1) From the amount appropriated for ``Forest 
     Products,'' a sum of $1,000,000 shall be made available until 
     expended to the Secretary of Agriculture for the purpose of 
     reviewing certain proposed rules concerning the planning and 
     management of National Forest System lands referred to in 
     paragraph (2).
       (2) The proposed rules subject to this section are the 
     proposed road management and transportation system rule, and 
     proposed special areas--roadless area conservation rule 
     published at 64 Federal Register 54074 (October 5, 1999) and 
     65 Federal Register 11676 and 30276 (March 3 and May 10, 
     2000), respectively.
       (b) With the funds allocated pursuant to subsection (a)(1):

[[Page S6508]]

       (1) The Secretary shall appoint an advisory committee in 
     accordance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act and 
     subsection (d) of persons knowledgeable, and reflecting a 
     diversity of viewpoints, concerning issues related to the 
     planning and management of National Forest System lands. The 
     appointments shall be made as soon as practicable after the 
     date of enactment of this Act.
       (2) The advisory committee shall, with full public 
     participation and open public meetings in accordance with the 
     Federal Advisory Committee Act--
       (A) review and evaluate the proposed rules referred to in 
     subsection (a)(2) and their prospective implementation, 
     particularly as to their cumulative effects and the manner in 
     which they relate to each other, are integrated, and will 
     function together, including any inconsistencies or conflicts 
     in their goals, purposes, application, or likely results and 
     determined whether and in what way they may be improved; and
       (B) submit a written report to the Secretary describing the 
     results of the review and evaluation of the proposed rules 
     required by, and any recommendations for improvement of such 
     rules determined pursuant to, subparagraph (A), including any 
     supplemental or minority views which any member or members of 
     the advisory committee may wish to express.
       (3) The Secretary shall make the report of the advisory 
     committee required by paragraph (2)(B) available for public 
     comment and submit the report to the Congress, together with 
     a written response of the Secretary to the report and the 
     public comment on the report.
       (c) No funds appropriated by this Act or any other act of 
     Congress may be expended for further development or 
     promulgation of the proposed rules referred to in subsection 
     (a)(2) prior to 60 days after the date of submission to the 
     Congress of the report of the advisory committee and the 
     response of the Secretary pursuant to subsection (b)(3).
       (d)(1) The advisory committee appointed pursuant to 
     subsection (b)(1) shall have no more than 15, nor less than 
     9, members who may not be officers or employees of the United 
     States. The Chair of the advisory committee shall be selected 
     from among and by its members.
       (2) The members of the advisory committee, while attending 
     conferences, hearing, or meetings of the advisory committee 
     or while otherwise serving at the request of the Chair shall 
     each be entitled to receive compensation at a rate not in 
     excess of the maximum rate of pay for grade GS-18, as 
     provided in the General Schedule under section 5332 of title 
     5, United States Code, including travel time, and while away 
     from their homes or regular places of business shall each be 
     reimbursed for travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of 
     subsistence as authorized by section 5703 of title 5, United 
     States Code, for persons in Government service employed 
     intermittently.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico is recognized.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I say to my good friend, Senator Craig, 
that under our Constitution this body was enacted to have two Senators 
from every State. I hope every State is concerned with what happens in 
other States. I will be the first to admit that it is very easy not to 
pay attention to the speech the Senator just made because, obviously, 
there are whole States--many of them--that don't have this problem 
because they have no vast public ownership in the midst of their 
cities, out in their countrysides, or built right up against 
communities, be it the Bureau of Land Management or the Forest Service. 
So there is a tendency not to pay attention when a couple of States 
come to the floor and show some very dire problems that exist in the 
management of the public domain.
  I have a few issues today that won't all be raised on this amendment 
I will offer. But before the Interior bill is finished, I will talk 
about some very serious problems out in the Southwest, which is more 
than one State. Over the last 3 or 4 weeks, New Mexico has had its 
share and then some. So I want to talk about, first, a substitute that 
I am going to offer, which the distinguished Senator Craig understands 
I will offer. I hope we can vote on both his suggested amendment and 
the one I am offering as a substitute.
  But I think we have come to the conclusion--he and I and others--that 
if we can pass the substitute today and have it go to conference with 
the distinguished chairman and ranking member supporting it in the 
manner that it will receive support in the Senate--which I think is 
rather overwhelming--we will be satisfied that that is a good day's 
work and something that is very important for the forests of our 
country, which many Senators don't know about because they don't have 
any public forests. But they can take it from a group of us that the 
forests of the United States, whether they are run by the Forest 
Service or whether they are run by the Bureau of Land Management, are 
in terrible shape today.
  Of course, there are people in the country who can talk about how 
they got that way. But I say to my good friend from Illinois, I know he 
doesn't have time, but it would be a pleasure to take him out to some 
areas surrounding Santa Fe, NM, or the areas that our good friend, 
Senator Feinstein, will talk about in her State, or that Senator 
Bingaman has observed as he toured Los Alamos. The fire there and the 
fire on the other side of the State took almost 30,000 acres. It would 
kind of pale in comparison to that incendiary on the top of the hill 
that almost burnt down Los Alamos.
  Let me tell you the reason we are offering this substitute. It is 
because there is an emergency existing in our forests that has to do 
with cleaning up the forest so that we can lower the threshold for 
fire. Anybody paying attention to the 48,000 acres that burned around 
Los Alamos would quickly come to the conclusion that the forest was 
almost like a storage of gasoline on the ground in barrels, and that 
when a fire started, it was just like gasoline burning because we never 
cleaned the forest. All over the place were knocked down trees with 
debris and trees that were so close together that if they started 
burning, it was just like the wind. The wind was blowing at 35 to 45 
miles an hour in both of our fires. With the hazardous waste on the 
ground that we never clean up because either we don't have enough 
money, or there are certain people in the country who fight even 
cleanup, where you take the small logs in the forest and you take the 
kindling that has been accumulating and take it out of there and either 
control burn it or let it be used by those who can find usage for that 
kind of a resource.

  So we have a substitute today that is called the Hazardous Fuel 
Reduction Act. We are asking the Senate to find that an emergency 
exists out there in our forests. I am very pleased to say that a number 
of Senators concur that there is an emergency and that we ought to put 
some money up in the state of emergency and get on with cleaning up 
these forests.
  I thank my cosponsors today. We have done this without a lot of work 
because I have to do this rather quickly upon my return from New 
Mexico, seeing that the city of Santa Fe, NM, could possibly burn 
because the community is in direct contact with the forest. The 
watershed for the city of Santa Fe, which many people like to visit, is 
right up in the mountains and is filled with kindling and with 
hazardous waste waiting to burn. So what I have done is ask a few 
Senators to join me today. I will quickly summarize what we are doing.
  The Senators who joined me are from both sides of the aisle. On the 
Democratic side, we have Senator Feinstein and my colleague, Senator 
Bingaman. On the Republican side, in addition to myself, we have 
Senators Kyl and Craig. I am sure Senator Craig would quickly indicate 
with me that if we wanted to circulate it, we would get many more 
Senators. The point is, we want to get this disposed of on this bill 
and not cause a great delay for the two distinguished managers.
  Let me say up front that we don't change any environmental laws. We 
have worked at this, and we have had everybody work at it. We have not 
modified NEPA and we have not changed any other laws of that type in 
this measure. This measure will allow the Secretaries of Agriculture 
and Interior to use all current authorities for fuel reduction 
treatments. It will give new authority for using grants and cooperative 
agreements for fuel reduction.
  It is at the sole discretion of the Secretaries. There is nothing 
mandatory about it, that they can provide jobs to local people in the 
local communities for fuel reduction activities.
  In my State--which might be different from California--there is a 
very huge built-up desire on the part of people living in the rural 
communities of New Mexico to want to join in partnership through their 
communities and put people to work helping to clean up the forests.
  There is nothing in this substitute that says we are going to log the 
forests. Yet if there is an opponent who comes to the floor to argue 
against this by some who do not want it, they will

[[Page S6509]]

say it is just another way to log the forests. If anybody says that, 
read the amendment. I don't choose to read it today, but it does not do 
that. In cleaning the forest, they will cut some small logs, but it 
will be pursuant to a plan which will show that the primary reason for 
all of this is to get rid of some of that hazardous fuel that has been 
piling up waiting to be burned.
  In addition, the Secretaries will be able to include in some of this 
work nonprofits and cooperative groups, such as the YCC, or other 
partnerships and entities that will hire a high percentage of local 
folks. The Secretary has to publish a list.
  The other things were options and discretionary. This one has to be 
published by September 30, identifying all urban wild land interfaces.
  That is what we are worried about--not the whole forest, the 
interface, the communities at risk from wildfire, and, identify where 
fuel reduction treatment is going on, or will start by the end of the 
year. Then by May they will have to say why they have not and cannot 
treat the rest of these communities where the interface has occurred. 
For any reasons not limited to lack of funds, they will have to state 
why.
  Finally, the Forest Service has to publish its cohesive fire 
strategy, which they have in draft form. They haven't published it. 
They will have to publish it and simply explain--not delay, but just 
explain--any differences in current rulemaking and how the new policy 
of closing roads could impact with firefighting. I know they don't want 
to do this.
  The truth is that is the only way the public is going to find out how 
conflicts are occurring and whether they should be resolved or whether 
we should leave them lingering out there in a state of combat, ending 
up almost daily with lawsuits filed with one side trying to beat the 
other with some select group of environmentalists in nature most of the 
time filing these lawsuits.
  I repeat that there is nothing that exempts environmental, labor, or 
civil rights laws. There is a lot of permissive language in here and 
very little that is mandatory.
  But from what this Senator has seen of the forests after these two 
enormous fires, it is pretty obvious that the professionals will want 
to employ these techniques to get started where the interface of 
communities with forests have occurred to some major degree.


         Amendment No. 3806 To Amendment No. 3795, As Modified

      (Purpose: To protect communities from wild land fire danger)

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I send the amendment in the nature of a 
substitute to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Domenici) proposes an 
     amendment numbered 3806 to amendment No. 3795, as modified.

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       In lieu of the matter proposed to be inserted, insert the 
     following:

                  TITLE   --HAZARDOUS FUELS REDUCTION

                       DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

                       Bureau of Land Management


                        Wildland Fire Management

       For an additional amount for ``Wildland Fire Management'' 
     to remove hazardous material to alleviate immediate emergency 
     threats to urban wildland interface areas as defined by the 
     Secretary of the Interior, $120.3 million to remain available 
     until expended: Provided, That the entire amount is 
     designated by the Congress as an emergency requirement 
     pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A) of the Balanced Budget and 
     Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, as amended: Provided 
     further, That the entire amount shall be available only to 
     the extent an official budget request, that includes 
     designation of the entire amount of the request as an 
     emergency requirement as defined by such Act, is transmitted 
     by the President to the Congress.

                       DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

                             Forest Service


                        Wildland Fire Management

       For an additional amount for ``Wildland Fire Management'' 
     to remove hazardous material to alleviate immediate emergency 
     threats to urban wildland interface areas as defined by the 
     Secretary of Agriculture, $120 million to remain available 
     until expended: Provided, That the entire amount is 
     designated by the Congress as an emergency requirement 
     pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A) of the Balanced Budget and 
     Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, as amended: Provided 
     further, that the entire amount shall be available only to 
     the extent an official budget request, that includes 
     designation of the entire amount of the request as an 
     emergency requirement as defined by such Act, is transmitted 
     by the President to the Congress: Provided further, That:
       (a) In expending the funds provided in any Act with respect 
     to any fiscal year for hazardous fuels reduction, the 
     Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Agriculture 
     may hereafter conduct fuel reduction treatments on Federal 
     lands using all contracting and hiring authorities available 
     to the Secretaries. Notwithstanding Federal government 
     procurement and contracting laws, the Secretaries may 
     hereafter conduct fuel reduction treatments on Federal lands 
     using grants and cooperative agreements. Notwithstanding 
     Federal government procurement and contracting laws, in order 
     to provide employment and training opportunities to people in 
     rural communities, the Secretaries may hereafter, at their 
     sole discretion, limit competition for any contracts, with 
     respect to any fiscal year, including contracts for 
     monitoring activities, to:
       (1) local private, non-profit, or cooperative entities;
       (2) Youth Conservation Corps crews or related partnerships 
     with state, local, and non-profit youth groups;
       (3) small or micro-businesses; or
       (4) other entities that will hire or train a significant 
     percentage of local people to complete such contracts.
       (b) Prior to September 30, 2000, the Secretary of 
     Agriculture and the Secretary of the Interior shall jointly 
     publish in the Federal Register a list of all urban wildland 
     interface communities, as defined by the Secretaries, within 
     the vicinity of Federal lands that are at risk from wildfire. 
     This list shall include:
       (1) an identification of communities around which hazardous 
     fuel reduction treatments are ongoing; and
       (2) an identification of communities around which the 
     Secretaries are preparing to begin treatments in calendar 
     year 2000.
       (c) Prior to May 1, 2001, the Secretary of Agriculture and 
     the Secretary of the Interior shall jointly publish in the 
     Federal Register a list of all urban wildland interface 
     communities, as defined by the Secretaries, within the 
     vicinity of Federal lands and at risk from wildfire that are 
     included in the list published pursuant to subsection (b) but 
     that are not included in paragraphs (b)(1) and (b)(2), along 
     with an identification of reasons, not limited to lack of 
     available funds, why there are no treatments ongoing or being 
     prepared for these communities.
       (d) Within 30 days after enactment of this Act, the 
     Secretary of Agriculture shall publish in the Federal 
     Register the Forest Service's Cohesive Strategy for 
     Protecting People and Sustaining Resources in Fire-Adapted 
     Ecosystems, and an explanation of any differences between the 
     Cohesive Strategy and other related ongoing policymaking 
     activities including: proposed regulations revising the 
     National Forest System transportation policy; proposed 
     roadless area protection regulations; the Interior Columbia 
     Basin Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement; and 
     the Sierra Nevada Framework/Sierra Nevada Forest Plan Draft 
     Environmental Impact Statement. The Secretary shall also 
     provide 30 days for public comment on the Cohesive Strategy 
     and the accompanying explanation.

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President and fellow Senators, many of you for a 
week or more watched on the nightly news as the forests surrounding Los 
Alamos National Laboratory, America's most renowned scientific 
laboratory, in spite of some of the negatives that have come forth with 
reference to security--that laboratory which has supplied us with the 
very best by way of science expertise and nuclear weapons expertise, 
not the second best, but the best for the entire era when it was 
America versus the Soviet Union--we watched each night as that fire got 
closer and closer to that laboratory. In fact, it burned some 
buildings, albeit none were critical to the future of the laboratory.
  We watched it move literally huge distances at night when the winds 
were blowing. We watched it go from an adjoining forest called 
Bandelier National Forest. We watched it grow from a tiny spot where 
park people had impropitiously started a fire to clear away a piece of 
land. They started with their torches, and there it went out of 
control--48,000 acres, 440 residences burned to the ground. When you go 
back and look, you see that these forests were in desperate need of 
being cleaned so that the kindling on the surface would be at a much, 
much lower temperature.
  That brought forth from this Senator and others a very significant 
cry: Let's get on with doing some of this cleanup. Let's give them 
additional authority in this bill and some emergency money. Let's see 
if we can get it done.

[[Page S6510]]

  I thank the cosponsors. I thank the chairman for his attention and 
for his giving me confidence to offer this amendment because this is 
the appropriate vehicle. It is my hope that Senator Slade Gorton will 
support this measure before we are finished.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise to add my support to the 
amendment of the distinguished Senator from New Mexico. I think this 
amendment is both needed and timely. It would provide emergency funding 
to address what has become a very dangerous fuel buildup on millions of 
acres of national forests.
  In April of this year, the General Accounting Office released a 
report entitled ``Protecting People and Sustaining Resources in Fire 
Adapted Ecosystems, a Cohesive Strategy.'' The underpinning of this 
report is this comment:

       The most expensive and serious problem relating to the 
     health of national forests in the interior west is the over-
     accumulation of vegetation.

  The report goes on to say that throughout much of the interior west, 
dense vegetation and dead material is continuing to accumulate. Each 
year in the absence of treatment, more forests become high risk, choked 
with dense accumulations of small trees and dead wood. These 
accumulations of fuel and more damaging fires are more dangerous and 
more costly to control, especially during drought years.
  As the GAO report points out, many experts attach a sense of urgency 
to the management of these ecosystems. Because of the high proportion 
of the total area classified as high risk--in this report it is what is 
called class 3--combined with the fact that without treatment more 
vegetation will grow into these high-risk conditions, it is apparent 
that time is running out for a strategy to successfully avert high 
cost/high loss consequences.
  That is the backdrop for this amendment. The amendment would provide 
emergency funding to move ahead on this program. Because dead and dying 
and small-diameter trees and thick underbrush have accumulated in our 
national forests, the possibility of serious and highly destructive 
forest fires have dramatically increased. Without any action on our 
part, it is going to continue to increase in the future.
  Senator Domenici, several of our colleagues, and I share the belief 
that we have a true emergency on our hands. The Forest Service has 
identified 24 million acres of land in the continental United States as 
being at the absolute highest level of catastrophic fire risk. Almost 
fully one-third of this--7.8 million acres--lies in California. That is 
more than any other State.
  Last year in my State--and we counted it forest fire by forest fire--
over 700,000 acres of forest burned down. Several people lost their 
lives and dozens of structures were burned. Seventy-thousand of these 
acres were prime California spotted owl habitat in the Lassen and 
Plumas Forests.
  Last year, $365 million was spent nationally by the Federal 
Government putting out fires and rehabilitating the land. Of this, $144 
million, or approximately one-half of the U.S. total, was spent in one 
State; that is, California. I think the money would be much better 
spent preventing fire rather than cleaning up after that fire.
  The entire Sierra Nevada mountain range national forests continue to 
be classified as the highest fire risk. This includes the newly 
designated Sequoia Monument, over 361,000 acres. It includes the Plumas 
and Lassen Forests in and around Quincy, where forest fires in the past 
have destroyed homes and businesses and spotted owl habitat. It 
includes areas such as the Lake Tahoe Basin, where one-third of the 
forests are either dead or dying. And the probability of major fire 
conflagration remains and grows each year. Such a fire would 
permanently destroy the water quality of the lake.
  Through the turn of the 20th century, the U.S. population was 
predominantly spread out and agrarian. Forest fires burned naturally at 
fairly predictable intervals, and they burned hot enough to restrict 
encroaching vegetation and prevent fuel from loading up on the ground 
but not hot enough to kill old growths. Forests in the United States 
survived in this fashion for literally thousands of years.
  By the middle of the 20th century, however, an increasing population 
began to occupy new urban wild land zones on what had once been 
forests. Suddenly, forest fires had to be put out or suppressed in 
order to protect the surrounding communities. It seemed intuitive to 
simply continue fighting fires as they arose and leave the forests 
untouched. So nothing was done to groom the forests, to remove dead and 
dying trees, to reduce undergrowth, to prevent subsequent 
conflagrations.
  What is called ``fuel load'' has grown to astronomic proportions in 
many of our national forests. Dead and dying trees, which were no 
longer consumed by fire, lingered while brush began to build up at 
ground level. Newer, different species of trees, no longer stifled by 
natural fire, began to crowd out some of the older growth trees. 
Forests became crowded and severely fire prone.
  Anyone who wants to look at that should get a copy of this report. On 
page 23 of the report it points out how our forests have changed in 
species composition and forest structure. The first picture taken is 
the forest in 1909. We see old growth trees; we see them spaced; we see 
very little vegetation on the ground. That is because there had been 
these hot, fierce fires in the past.
  Next is a 1948 photo of that same part of the forest. We see changes. 
We see changes in the species composition, the structure, as fire had 
been excluded for many years.
  In a picture in 1990, the area is totally dense and we cannot see 
through it. At that time--and most of our forests are like this now--we 
had an overabundance of vegetation. This stresses the site and 
predisposes the area to infestation from pests, disease outbreaks, and, 
of course, catastrophic fire.
  That is where we are today.
  It is evident to me that the Forest Service's decade-old policy of 
fire suppression has failed. It is time to look anew at how we can 
better manage our forests.
  In California, for example, fire-intolerant Douglas and white fir 
have grown underneath old growth ponderosa pine. What is the result? 
The newer firs, which are not resistant to fire, create potential fuel 
ladders that permit a fire to reach the top, or what is called the 
crown, of old growths for the first time. Old growth pine which 
previously was impervious to fire, since rarely did a fire ever reach 
all the way up to its crown--with this new fuel ladder, fire threats to 
old growth pine have become very real.

  Drought periods have further stressed the forests, predisposing them 
to infestations of pests, disease, and of course severe wildfire. The 
bark beetle has gone through the Tahoe forests like a forest fire. One 
can see miles of forests standing dead after an infestation. The dead 
trees remain, year after year after year.
  California forests provide homes for dozens of endangered and 
threatened species, including the marbled murrelet and the spotted owl. 
It is an understatement to say that today the risk of fire is the most 
serious threat to these species. I really believe that to be true. It 
may be the most immediate short-term environmental threat our western 
forests face. That is why this amendment and this funding is so 
important. It is imperative that the Forest Service use all available 
tools to clean up the forests and reduce fire risks.
  The one-size-fits-all approach of the Forest Service, I believe, must 
be changed. Each forest is different. Topography is different, 
geography is different, climate is different, soils are different, 
vegetation is different, the kind and type of trees are different, in 
different places throughout the United States. What is proper 
stewardship for a California forest may not be proper stewardship in 
Pennsylvania or Alaska or Montana. We have to look at the area and look 
at the fire risk differently. A flexibility of management must be 
employed to fix the problem. Dead and dying trees should be removed. 
Overgrowth should be thinned. Mechanical treatment and controlled burns 
must each be used separately and carefully in conjunction with each 
other. If we don't do this, incidents of serious fire will only 
continue to increase.
  As I said, it is only a matter of time before a cataclysmic fire 
strikes Lake Tahoe, with potential loss of life, habitat, and property. 
Already, run-off and problems associated with erosion have

[[Page S6511]]

threatened Lake Tahoe's world-renowned crystal blue waters. The last 
time I was there, scientists told me that if we don't reverse the trend 
of eutrophication of the water, which removes its clear crystal blue 
look, in 10 years it will be too late and we might as well not bother. 
A serious fire could make this happen even sooner.
  This amendment helps provide funding to remove dead and dying trees 
from Lake Tahoe National Forest where almost one-third of that forest 
today is dead or dying.
  Last year, Senators Reid, Boxer, Bryan, and Congressman Doolittle, 
Congressman Gibbons, and I introduced the Lake Tahoe Restoration Act to 
authorize the necessary funding to deal with this problem. It is very 
timely that this bill will be marked up by the Senate Energy and 
Natural Resources Committee on Thursday and has already been marked up 
at the subcommittee level in the House.
  The Domenici-Feinstein amendment could be used in that forest. It 
could almost be used in the Quincy area. In 1998, Congress 
overwhelmingly passed the Quincy Library Group Project.
  This legislation authorized a 5-year demonstration project based on 
the forest management plan assembled by the Quincy Library Group, a 
coalition of local environmentalists, public officials, timber industry 
representatives, and just plain concerned citizens who came together in 
the Quincy Library so they could not yell at each other, to resolve 
longstanding conflicts over timber management of national forests in 
the area.
  The project, which is only a pilot, is to see if there is not a 
better way to manage our forests by combining strategic fuel breaks 
with selected mechanical thinning and controlled burn. I have had some 
disagreements with the Forest Service in the past over Quincy, but I 
believe the project is back on track and I am determined to see, if I 
can, that funding is appropriated to complete the project to the letter 
of the law.
  I want to quickly speak about one other thing. One of the possibly 
most cataclysmic fires could occur in the newly designated Sequoia 
National Monument. This is about 366,000 acres. Once the monument was 
declared, two timber mills closed down. I have been working with the 
community in that area to be able to put forward a removal of hazardous 
fuels. These trees are the largest trees in the world. Around these 
large trees have built up this dense underbrush, this fuel load that I 
have spoken about. If this is not removed, this underbrush creates the 
kind of fuel ladder that can effectively destroy the Sequoias.
  The State of California additionally has prepared an adaptive 
management plan and had been working in the Sequoia area. What they 
showed was, as you clear certain limited areas around the giant 
Sequoias, that the giant Sequoias actually grew bigger and grew fatter 
and were much healthier for it. It is my hope that over the next few 
years we can reduce the fuel loading on 24 million acres that the 
Forest Service has identified as being at this level 3. Level 3 is the 
most significant fire threat. Then focus on the other 18 million acres 
at jeopardy.
  Let me just recount. One-third of all of the national forests at 
catastrophic fire level in the United States are in the State of 
California. It is the entire Sierra Nevada range, it is the Sequoia, it 
is part of the Plumas and Lassen National Forests, and of course the 
Tahoe National Forest. There is, indeed, a lot to be done if we are not 
only to protect our endangered species but also protect the property 
and the people who live in these areas as well.
  I think Senator Domenici's legislation is timely. It is well thought 
out. I think making this an emergency and moving in the class 3 areas 
and being able to remove this underbrush is a major step forward in 
prudent forestry management all throughout the West.
  I thank the Senator. It was a delight to work with him. I yield the 
floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Crapo). The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I will take a few moments to clarify where 
we are because I think some of our colleagues are slightly confused as 
to the amendment I offered dealing with the roadless area review and 
the FACA committee process, and the amendment our colleague from New 
Mexico has offered, and the Senator from California has just spoken to, 
dealing with fuel reduction in our forests.
  There is no doubt, what I was attempting to do dealt specifically 
with the roadless area rule specific to whether there had been a 
violation of the Federal Advisory Committee Act. I was asking the 
Secretary to formulate an advisory committee to review that.
  I had visited with Senator Domenici and several things came together 
that I think are important for us to deal with in the immediate. First 
of all, there have already been two lawsuits filed against this 
administration on the Federal Advisory Committee Act process as it 
relates to the roadless area review process. We believe a judge will 
make a decision on those two lawsuits, as to their validity and their 
ripeness, by mid-August. What is important here is for the courts to 
clarify whether FACA, as a law, is either real or dead letter.
  Let me explain that. This administration has been accused and found 
in violation of FACA on several occasions. But the problem is, once the 
court has made that determination, the rule was already on the ground. 
So it is like they violated the law, but so what. The process is over 
with.
  What the court will decide this time is, Is FACA a law that should 
intervene prior to a final rule and cause an administrative agency to 
change its course of direction or action prior to a final rule? That is 
what will happen in August.
  I have decided it is important we do not get in front of that ruling 
by the courts. I think it is very important for this Congress to know 
whether the law it crafted, known as the Federal Advisory Committee 
Act, is a dead letter or if it is operative. Right now, based on 
findings, it is a Catch-22: Yes, they violated the law but so what; the 
rule is already in place.
  That is not the intent of Congress. The intent of Congress is to 
cause a cause of action change in a rulemaking process if the Federal 
Advisory Committee Act has been violated.
  Then enters the Los Alamos fire and Senator Bingaman and Senator 
Domenici trying to resolve that particular crisis of bad policy and bad 
decisionmaking coming together to not only create a catastrophic 
environmental situation but also ultimately to cost the taxpayers of 
this country $1 billion, or somewhere near that. That is the tip of an 
iceberg of a current forest health problem to which the Senator from 
California has spoken so clearly.
  What the Senator from New Mexico and the Senator from California saw, 
witnessed, experienced, with hundreds of lives and hundreds of families 
and lives displaced----
  Mr. DOMENICI. Thousands.
  Mr. CRAIG. Is the nature of a catastrophic event that is in the 
nature of forest health.
  We now have 22 million acres of our forested lands in crisis because 
of the fuel loading that has been talked about because of a management 
style of the last 50 years. Yet there seems to be no desire to deal 
with this on a constructive, environmentally positive basis that begins 
to remove that fuel.
  The amendment of the Senator from New Mexico, of which I am now a 
cosponsor, which is a substitute offered to my amendment, goes at this 
problem in a very real and direct way. That is why I think it is so 
important that we move forward. I have been advised--and I agree--we 
should allow the courts to act on the Federal Advisory Committee Act. 
We will find out whether we have a real law or whether we have a false 
law; whether it works or it does not work. We will know that by mid-
August. If they rule otherwise, we have either to come in and revise it 
or I think the Congress should act and intervene against the President 
in his rulemaking process, outside the public policymaking process of 
the Congress itself. But in the meantime, there is no question in my 
mind, with my activities, looking at the U.S. forest-managed lands--
last week I was in Great Falls, MN. Last year, on July 4, they had a 
472,000-acre blowdown. There are fuel loading problems in that State 
and every other State in the Nation that has public forested lands, 
that are phenomenal in their nature.
  Let me explain. The Senator from New Mexico, Mr. Domenici, talked 
about literally having barrels of gasoline on the ground, in equivalent 
Btus of fire capability. It is believed that in

[[Page S6512]]

these areas, 22 million acres, at least at the top of the stack, that 
fuel loading equivalency is nearly 10,000 gallons of gasoline per acre 
in equivalent Btu or firepower.
  Yet our Forest Service and this administration choose not to do 
anything about it. If we are good stewards of the land, we will not 
allow the stand-altering, environmentally crazy policy of catastrophic 
fire of the kind in the forests of New Mexico and the kind that are 
burning across the West today to be the policy of the management of our 
forests.
  I would be the first to tell you we ought to reenter fire as a 
management tool of the ecosystems of our forests, but fire ought not 
enter an acre of land that has 10,000 gallons of gasoline stored in the 
form of slash and dead and dying timber in equivalent Btu's. That we 
cannot tolerate, or it will truly destroy the land as we know it, the 
environment as we know it, the riparian areas as we know them, and 
certainly habitat for any wildlife, let alone any kind of constructive 
management that would provide the needed fiber for our public in home 
building, paper, and so many materials we have wisely used our forests 
for over the years.
  I support Senator Domenici, Senator Bingaman, and Senator Feinstein 
as a cosponsor of this substitute. It is critically important.
  In closing, in the substitute there is an important analysis, and it 
is an analysis that deals with the roadless problem. If the amendment 
of the Senator from New Mexico becomes law, it will cause the Forest 
Service to develop a cohesive strategy for protecting people and 
sustaining resources in fire-adaptive ecosystems; in other words, a 
fire strategy to deal with these kinds of fuel loadings. It would then 
have to place that strategy against the other rulemaking processes that 
are underway.
  One of those rulemaking processes is the roadless area review or the 
roadless area protection proposal, to see whether that proposal denies 
the Forest Service the ability to manage these lands to protect them 
from catastrophic fire. I find that an important test and a necessary 
analysis of where we are going and how we want to manage these lands.
  It also causes them to look at the areas of concern of the Senator 
from California--the Sierra Nevada framework and the Sierra Nevada 
draft plan environmental impact statements. All of those deserve to be 
examined in light of the fire situation we have on these public lands 
at this moment. We cannot idly sit by and watch hundreds of thousands, 
if not millions, of acres a year burn in wildfires, destroying wildlife 
habitat, destroying fiber that could be constructively used and, most 
important, dramatically altering the ecosystems of those areas that 
embody these catastrophic fires.
  I support the substitute. It is important we stay in focus on the 
Federal Advisory Committee Act. The courts will rule in August, and 
then Congress will be able to act according to that ruling if, in fact, 
the courts have decided the Federal Advisory Committee Act is a dead 
letter in public law.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, first, I commend my colleague, Senator 
Domenici, for this amendment and indicate I am very glad to be a 
cosponsor of it. It is an important amendment which is much needed in 
my State and throughout much of the country.
  The problem has been well described by Senator Domenici, Senator 
Feinstein, Senator Craig, and others. I do not need to elaborate on 
that to a great extent, except to say there are many communities in our 
State of New Mexico which genuinely feel threatened because of the fact 
that they are adjacent to our national forests and the forests have 
been allowed to build up underbrush in a way which makes them a fire 
hazard--communities such as Santa Fe and Los Alamos, which have been 
mentioned, Ruidoso, Cloudcroft, and Weed. I know my colleague was 
visiting with citizens in the small community of Weed, NM, about this 
very issue. There is no question the time has come when it needs to be 
addressed, and this amendment will allow us to do that on an emergency 
basis. It is, as I said before, much needed.
  Let me give a little background. Even before this year's catastrophic 
fires, which have really been a wake-up call to all of us about the 
significance of this problem, particularly the fire at Los Alamos, the 
Cerro Grande fire, but the Scott Able fire in the southern part of New 
Mexico, the Cree fire in the southern part of New Mexico, and the 
Viveash fire in northern New Mexico--we have had a series of fires. 
Over, I believe, 65,000 acres in my State have burned so far this year. 
That does not begin to approach the number of acres perhaps in 
California, as cited by the Senator from California, but it is a great 
many acres for our State considering the amount of forests we have. 
Well over 400 homes have been destroyed in our State. So the problem is 
very real.
  Last year, in the first session of this Congress, I was very pleased 
that, on a bipartisan basis, Senator Domenici and I cosponsored a bill, 
S. 1288, entitled the Community Forest Restoration Act which attempted 
a demonstration project in New Mexico to begin dealing with this 
problem of the urban wild land interface, to begin thinning of forest 
areas near these communities.
  In putting this legislation together, we were able to get the 
cooperation not only of the communities themselves but of many of the 
groups which take a great interest in the health of our national 
forests, including several of the major environmental groups. I thought 
this was major progress. The bill passed the Senate unanimously. It 
went to the House of Representatives. It has been marked up in 
subcommittee. It will go to the full committee next week.
  This legislation was very small. It was a demonstration project. It 
was aimed only at New Mexico communities, but it set a good precedent 
for the type of thing we are talking about, where the Forest Service 
and the other Federal land management agencies could make grants 
available to community groups to deal with this problem in a very real 
and responsible way.
  I particularly appreciate the statement Senator Domenici made in his 
presentation that this amendment, to provide substantial additional 
funding to the land management agencies to deal with the problem, does 
not involve any change in environmental laws.
  Also, this amendment does not involve any change in NEPA, the 
National Environmental Policy Act. This does not waive that law. This 
amendment is consistent with those laws. We are providing resources and 
directing that a substantial effort take place to deal with this 
problem around the communities that are adjacent to our national 
forests. It is very important that this happen.

  I want to have printed in the Record three documents that are 
important as background. One is a letter that the New Mexico delegation 
sent to Mike Dombeck, the Chief of the Forest Service, on May 19 of 
this year, urging that the Forest Service come forward with a proposal 
for how they will begin to address this problem. The second document is 
a response by Chief Dombeck to me on the subject. And the third is a 
followup response to Senator Domenici from Chief Dombeck, also alluding 
to what the Forest Service thought they could do to address this very 
real problem.
  I ask unanimous consent that these three letters be printed in the 
Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See Exhibit 1.)
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me mention one other aspect of this 
which I think is significant, and that is the Forest Service has a 
program called a Cooperative Fire Protection Program which they try to 
use to educate people who own homes in or near the forests and also to 
work with people who have private homes in our forests, that are 
private property, so the benefits of some of this clearing, some of 
this thinning we are talking about can also be realized by the people 
who have those homes, and those homes can be better protected as a 
result.
  One thing that became obvious to me as a result of the Los Alamos 
fire was that there had been a thinning that had taken place around the 
laboratory itself, around many of the structures of the Los Alamos 
National Laboratory; and because of that, because of that thinning 
activity, there was a dramatic

[[Page S6513]]

reduction in the fire risk to those facilities. We had much less damage 
there than we wound up having in the town of Los Alamos, where, of 
course, no similar thinning or no similar fire risk reduction 
activities had occurred.
  I think it is very important that we try to take what we have learned 
about how to reduce the risks of fire and apply that in a responsible 
way, and do so as soon as possible.
  For that reason, I am very pleased to see this amendment being 
considered. Again, I compliment my colleague for proposing the 
amendment.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.

                               Exhibit 1

                                    U.S. Department of Agriculture


                                               Forest Service,

                                    Washington, DC, June 16, 2000.
     Hon. Pete Domenici.
     Hart Senate Office Building,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Domenici: With the Senate in final stages of 
     completing the fiscal year 2000 emergency supplemental 
     appropriation, I want to provide you with the information you 
     requested on Forest Service capability to significantly 
     reduce the risk of catastrophic fire in wildland-urban 
     interface areas.
       I know you agree that the tragic fires in New Mexico and 
     those currently burning in Colorado, are focusing our 
     attention on the critical need to reduce hazardous fuels 
     throughout the national forests and particularly areas 
     adjacent to urban interface areas. The emergency supplemental 
     appropriation gives us an opportunity to immediately take 
     action to avoid similar fire disasters in the future.
       Enclosed is information identifying agency capability to 
     respond in the immediate and near future based on estimates 
     for completing environmental assessment work. This work can 
     be accomplished within existing authorities. We have 
     established projected implementation based on the date that 
     all planning under the National Environmental Policy Act, 
     Endangered Species Act and other statutes will be completed:
Acres:                                              Implementation date
    59,722........................................................(\1\)
    189,098..................................................12/31/2000
    291,575..................................................09/30/2001
\1\ Currently ready.
       I want to be sure that as the supplemental bill moves 
     through the appropriations process, you have all the 
     information you need to provide focus on the need to address 
     this critical issue without letting the legislation get 
     overburdened and consequently threatened by other agendas. My 
     staff and I are ready to respond in order to assure you have 
     all necessary information available.
                                              Mike Dombeck, Chief.


       Wildland Urban Interface Hazardous Fuel Treatment Projects

       Listed below are the acres by Region grouped by the date 
     all NEPA, ESA, review, and other planning actions will be 
     completed and the projects will be completed and the projects 
     will be ready for implementation. For the last two groups, 
     planning is well underway and may be completed prior to the 
     date listed. Includes all costs for implementation and 
     monitoring.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                          Implementation
                    Region                       Acres         cost
------------------------------------------------------------------------
  ALL PROJECT PLANNING COMPLETED--IMPLEMENTATION CAN BEGIN IMMEDIATELY
 
    1........................................     14,483     $2,425,000
    2........................................      5,000      1,400,000
    3........................................     16,085      3,981,000
    5........................................      8,700      2,267,000
    6........................................      3,350        844,000
    8........................................      7,600      2,830,000
    9........................................      4,504      1,404,000
                                              --------------------------
      Total..................................     59,722     15,151,000
                                              ==========================
          ALL PROJECT PLANNING WILL BE COMPLETED BY 12/31/2000.
 
    1........................................     34,150      2,050,000
    2........................................      7,000      1,800,000
    3........................................     56,126     19,380,000
    5........................................      4,869      2,866,000
    6........................................     35,969      4,787,000
    8........................................     27,970      9,422,000
    9........................................     23,014      3,106,000
                                              --------------------------
      Total..................................    189,098     43,411,000
                                              ==========================
           ALL PROJECT PLANNING WILL BE COMPLETED BY 9/30/2001
 
    1........................................     34,150      9,415,000
    2........................................     18,500      5,125,000
    3........................................    140,270     21,201,000
    5........................................     25,215      6,964,000
    6........................................     52,535      7.315,000
    8........................................      9,080      3,335,000
    9........................................     11,825      3,401,000
                                              --------------------------
      Total..................................    291,575     56,756,000
------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                                          
                                  ____
                                   U.S. Department of Agriculture,


                                               Forest Service,

                                     Washington, DC, May 23, 2000.
     Hon. Jeff Bingaman,
     U.S. Senate, Senate Hart Office Building, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Bingaman: Thank you for your letter dated May 
     19, 2000. Like you, I am deeply concerned about the potential 
     for unnaturally intense, catastrophic fires and their impact 
     on communities in New Mexico and throughout the United 
     States. The events of recent weeks make clear that we cannot 
     stand by idly and allow the health of our forest and 
     grassland ecosystems to deteriorate to the point that they 
     cannot provide basic ecological services and pose a risk to 
     the safety of our communities.
       Unhealthy forest ecosystems evolved through decades of past 
     management and fire suppression. Restoring their health and 
     resiliency and protecting our communities from unnaturally 
     severe wildland fires will take many years. That reality, 
     however, is no excuse for inaction.
       If emergency funds were made available, we would limit 
     their use to the urban-wildland interface or within 
     designated municipal watersheds that are determined to be at 
     highest risk of unnaturally occurring catastrophic fire. Our 
     activities would focus on the least controversial areas by 
     concentrating on restoring fire-dependent ecosystems and 
     reducing fire risks adjacent to wildland urban interface 
     areas. We would define urban-wildland interface in one of the 
     two following ways:
       Where urban or suburban populations are directly adjacent 
     to unpopulated areas characterized by wildland vegetation. 
     (Urban and suburban areas are defined as places where 
     population densities exceed 400 people per square mile of 
     area.)
       Where people and houses are scattered through areas 
     characterized by wildland vegetation. These are areas where 
     population density is from 40 to 400 people per square mile.
       Treatment methods to minimize fire risk and restore land 
     health in the interface areas would include: thinning, 
     removal or over-accumulated vegetation and dead fuels, 
     prescribed fire, and fuel breaks. All required project level 
     planning, monitoring, consultation, and implementation would 
     be included in our vegetation treatments. Our objective would 
     be to leave forested areas in the interface in a range of 
     stand densities that more fully represent healthy forest 
     conditions.
       Priority for treatment will be given to interface areas 
     that historically experienced low intensity, high frequency 
     fire and where current conditions favor uncharacteristi- 
     cally intense fires.
       Projects may also be undertaken in other fire regimes where 
     threats to populations or their water supplies are acute.
       We would ensure that additional appropriations are spent in 
     a manner that maximizes on-the-ground accomplishments and 
     minimizes controversy, delay, and litigation. For example, 
     projects would be implemented using service contracts that 
     hire local people, volunteers and Youth Conservation Corps 
     members, or by using Forest Service work crews, where 
     appropriate. Where tree removal is necessary to reduce fire 
     risks, these emergency appropriations would only be used to 
     remove trees that are under 12 inches in diameter. 
     Merchantable material that is generated as a byproduct of 
     vegetative treatments could be sold under a separate contract 
     to local industry or the public. We must also monitor our 
     progress and report our results to Congress and the American 
     people to demonstrate our accountability.
       The type of program I describe will lead to demonstrable 
     results and improvements in the near future. I must make 
     clear, however, that a one-year emergency appropriation will 
     not remedy what ails our forests and threatens our 
     communities. We must fund and build a constituency for active 
     forest restoration based on ecological principles. For 
     example, we can partner with local communities to reduce fuel 
     hazards, improve building codes, and suggest fire resistant 
     landscaping to reduce fire risk. Such efforts can reduce 
     insurance premiums, prevent wildland fires from destroying 
     homes, reduce costs associated with fire suppression, and 
     protect our treasured forests.
       We expect to soon release a strategy to more broadly 
     address wildland fire risks across National Forest System 
     lands. We need a sustained level of funding to ensure that we 
     can restore fire-dependent ecosystems and protect the lives 
     and property of people in our communities. Restoring our 
     forests not only makes our communities safer, it provides 
     jobs--high paying, quality, family wage jobs.
       Thank you for your continued interest in the health of our 
     lands and the well-being of our communities.
           Sincerely,
     Mike Dombeck, Chief.
                                  ____



                                               Washington, DC,

                                                     May 19, 2000.
     Dr. Michael Dombeck,
     Chief, Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Mike: As you know, fires in New Mexico over the past 
     week have burned more than 65,000 acres in New Mexico and 
     destroyed well over 400 homes. While we commend Forest 
     Service efforts to assist in protecting the lives of New 
     Mexico's citizens, their property, and the public's 
     resources, we are deeply concerned about the potential for 
     future, unnaturally intense, catastrophic fires and their 
     impact on communities in New Mexico and throughout the West.
       The events of the past two weeks in New Mexico demonstrate 
     that we cannot simply allow ``nature to take its course.'' 
     The risks to our communities, Native American resources, and 
     public resources are too great. We must take action to 
     protect our communities and the forest resources upon which 
     they depend. Inaction is not an option.
       In order to provide adequate, or potentially additional, 
     funding to assist the Forest Service in proactively 
     addressing the risk of catastrophic wildland fires that can 
     threaten communities in the West, as well as the health of 
     our lands and waters, we need your assistance. A good first 
     step in providing us with the information we need is the 
     release of the Forest Service report on the subject currently 
     under review by OMB.

[[Page S6514]]

       In addition, we would like you to address what actions the 
     Forest Service can undertake to minimize catastrophic fire in 
     the wildland-urban interface; identify appropriate size 
     limitations for thinning of trees; and provide information 
     about specific contractual arrangements that should be 
     employed to most effectively address the risk of wildland 
     fire in the urban-wildland interface.
       Thank you for your continued interest in the safety of 
     communities and the health of our lands and waters. We look 
     forward to your prompt response.
           Sincerely,
     Jeff Bingaman.
     Pete Domenici.
     Tom Udall.
     Heather Wilson.
     Joe Skeen.

  Several Senators addressed the Chair.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I would like to call up amendment No. 
3790.
  Mr. GORTON. This one is not done yet.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I believe we have not finished this amendment yet.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
allowed to call up my amendment and to then debate it at a later time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, if the Senator would yield, I think there 
are just two more relatively brief speakers, and we can then finish 
this amendment.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I would set this amendment aside, but I have to go. I 
could come back, I suppose.
  Mr. GORTON. Then, if it is brief, why don't you go ahead, I suppose.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the Senator's unanimous 
consent request?
  The Chair hears none, and it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Alabama may proceed to call up his amendment.


                           Amendment No. 3790

 (Purpose: To prohibit the use of funds for the publication of certain 
               procedures relating to gaming procedures)

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 3790.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Alabama [Mr. Sessions], for himself and 
     Mr. Graham, Mr. Enzi, Mr. Lugar, Mr. Voinovich, Mr. Grams, 
     Mr. Reid, Mr. Inhofe, and Mr. Bayh, proposes an amendment 
     numbered 3790.

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 225, between lines 11 and 12, insert the following:
       Sec.   . None of the funds made available in this Act may 
     be used to publish Class III gaming procedures under part 291 
     of title 25, Code of Federal Regulations.

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the debate 
on this amendment be set aside pending the time that Senator Campbell 
and others would be here to debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
amendment will be set aside until such time.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, for some time now the Senate has been 
debating, somewhat interchangeably, two issues; one involves protection 
for roadless areas and the other involves the important issue of fire 
prevention.
  I would like to take just a minute or 2 to discuss each one of these 
so that it is clear where we are with respect to this debate.
  The original amendment offered by the senior Senator from Idaho, Mr. 
Craig, my longtime colleague on the Forestry Subcommittee, would have, 
in effect, presented the Senate with a referendum on the President's 
roadless proposal, a major environmental initiative, certainly 
supported by millions of Americans. There have been more than 180 
public meetings on this roadless initiative, and more than 500,000 
comments. This is certainly the centerpiece of the President's 
environmental agenda.
  So had we been presented here in the Senate with an up-or-down vote 
on this roadless proposal, despite my friendship with the Senator from 
Idaho, I would have had to oppose that original amendment strongly. To 
me, the President's proposal on roadless areas makes sense for one 
reason: Protecting additional unspoiled areas can produce gains for 
fish runs across this country, as well as improving habitat and 
watershed quality. These environmental gains outweigh the benefits of 
commercial development on these particular lands.
  A lawsuit is pending in Federal court concerning the FACA issue as 
related to the roadless initiative. Certainly Congress should allow the 
judicial process to operate without interference.
  Several of my colleagues have noted that oral arguments are going to 
be heard on August 7 in that lawsuit. There will be plenty of time for 
the Senate to act with respect to any issues involving the Federal 
Advisory Committee. But I say, as the ranking Democrat on the Forestry 
Subcommittee, I think it would be a great mistake for the Senate to, in 
effect, ashcan the President's roadless area proposal. Fortunately, the 
Senate is not going to be asked to vote up or down on that issue today.
  I have, for some time, along with a number of other colleagues, 
pursued an effort to modernize our policy with respect to both road and 
roadless areas. There is much that we can do that protects both habitat 
and also resource-dependent communities. But to have had a referendum 
on the President's roadless area proposal today, with a lawsuit 
pending, and with millions of Americans in support of that proposal, 
would have been, in my view, a very serious mistake.
  Now we are presented with a substitute proposal, initiated by the two 
Senators from New Mexico, involving fire prevention. At this point, we 
are talking about something very different than the original Craig 
proposal. We are talking about an effort to protect homes and 
businesses, and, by the way, habitat as well.
  I want it understood for the record that this amendment is not going 
to affect the completion of the roadless area initiative. That is why I 
am pleased to be able to say that I intend to support this fire 
prevention initiative. Again, this new amendment does not affect the 
roadless area proposal.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I compliment my friend from Oregon because 
everything he said speaks for me.
  I will be brief, but I think it is important that I put some comments 
into the Record because I have a sense that perhaps Senator Craig may 
be back with a similar amendment at another time, and I think it is 
important to lay the groundwork for why I would not support it at that 
time.
  I do support what Senators Domenici and Bingaman have brought us. I 
compliment them for bringing this to us. I know they have been very 
careful not to do anything in this amendment that would, in fact, stop 
any environmental rules from going forward, in particular the roadless 
rule that we are in the midst of promulgating.
  I will be supporting the Domenici-Bingaman amendment. I am pleased in 
the way it has been presented. It is, in fact, a substitute for the 
Craig amendment.
  Let me ask my friend from New Mexico, does he want to have the floor?
  Mr. DOMENICI. No, thank you, I say to the Senator.
  Mrs. BOXER. All right.
  Mr. President, I have such a good feeling about Interior 
appropriations bills. My friend, Senator Byrd, and Senator Domenici and 
Senator Gorton have worked hard on this Interior bill.
  For California it is so important. It is wonderful. I just got a 
reminder note from Senator Byrd on the wonderful things in this bill, 
for which I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle. Funding for 
the historic Presidio, for Lake Tahoe, so many others, the Manzanar 
historical site. For those of you who may not remember, it was the site 
where Japanese-Americans were essentially interned. We are going to 
make a monument out of it.
  So when I see an antienvironmental rider come on this beautiful bill, 
it is always distressing because, to me, the Interior appropriations 
bill, it seems to me, should be a positive statement of good things 
that we are doing for the environment.

[[Page S6515]]

  So when I heard a rumor that Senator Craig would offer his amendment, 
I decided at that time I would try to talk the Senate out of adopting 
it. And this has become unnecessary.
  So let me quickly say, I am pleased that what is before us does 
nothing to stop this roadless policy from going into effect.
  As Senator Wyden has stated, there have been countless meetings on 
it. The fact is, the roadless areas are the remaining gems of a forest 
system that has been degraded by centuries of logging and other types 
of heavy use. If we look at the big picture, we are really talking only 
about setting aside 2 percent of all our land in this country as 
roadless areas. What an important thing that is for us to do because it 
will in fact preserve our beautiful, priceless environment for future 
generations and preserve the fishing industry, stop erosion. It is a 
very important environmental initiative.
  So there is no misunderstanding, we know there are many inroads into 
these roadless areas. In the next 5 years alone, we are going to see 
more than 1,000 miles of roads inventoried. We are moving into these 
pristine areas.
  At some point, we have to say enough is enough in terms of 
destruction of our natural wilderness and our wonderful natural 
heritage. I think the U.S. Forest Service has taken a bold and positive 
step forward with its effort. I am very glad that nothing in this bill 
will stop them.
  Let me cite a couple of poll numbers. A recent poll done by some 
pollsters from the other side of the aisle found that 76 percent of the 
public supports the protection of roadless areas, and in my home State, 
asking Republicans and Democrats that question, 76 percent of 
Californians support roadless policies.
  We have editorials that I ask unanimous consent to have printed in 
the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

           [From the San Francisco Chronicle, Oct. 15, 1999]

               Clinton Seeks Legacy of Forest Protection

       In recent years, the Clinton administration has been 
     pushing for a more balanced national forest policy, with a 
     group of timber-oriented congressional leaders resisting 
     every step of the way.
       The administration's approach, under U.S. Forest Service 
     Chief Mike Dombeck, was hardly radical. It was entirely 
     consistent with the preservationist vision of President 
     Theodore Roosevelt at the turn of the century when he greatly 
     expanded the amount of national forest. It certainly jibes 
     with the views of most Americans that conservation should get 
     greater priority on public land.
       President Clinton this week took a bold step toward 
     cementing those values by protecting about 40 million acres 
     of U.S. forest land from road building. The proposal would 
     effectively halt logging and mining in those still-pristine 
     areas. About 4 million of the acres are in California, 
     including significant parts of the Sierra Nevada.
       The timber industry, predictably, howled.
       ``These are not the king's lands, they are the serfs' 
     lands, they are the people's lands,'' said Sen. Larry Craig, 
     R-Idaho, arguing that Congress should decide forest policy. 
     In a letter to Dombeck, he argued that the Clinton plan would 
     limit forest access.
       The Clinton plan will not curtail access to any of the 
     380,000 miles of logging roads in national forests--about 
     eight times the length of the interstate highway system. 
     These roads, typically dirt trails wide enough to accommodate 
     a tractor-trailer, have often contributed to erosion, creek 
     sedimentation and other environmental problems.
       This modest but essential effort to curtail further 
     intrusion into the nation's forests will not spell doom and 
     gloom for the timber industry. Less than 5 percent of timber 
     cut in the U.S. comes from national forests, and less than 5 
     percent of that volume comes from roadless areas.
       It is important to note that the Clinton plan is not a done 
     deal; it is the first step in a regulatory process that could 
     take more than a year and most certainly will be influenced 
     by public input.
       Notably missing from the president's eloquent call to 
     conservation was a commitment to include Alaska's Tongass 
     National Forest, the nation's biggest and the heart of the 
     world's largest remaining expanse of coastal temperate rain 
     forest. Tongass has been a major battleground for lawsuits 
     and legislation over logging in an area with healthy 
     populations of grizzly bears, bald eagles and salmon.
       These are the people's lands, natural treasures, and 
     Americans who care about conservation must ensure their 
     voices are heard in what promises to be a contentious 
     process.
                                  ____


                [From The Sacramento Bee, Oct. 22, 1999]

     Fight Over Forests--Which Public Lands Should Remain Roadless?

       President Clinton used the Shenandoah Valley as the vista 
     for his recent announcement to seek permanent protections for 
     up to 40 million acres of pristine, roadless national 
     forests. A more appropriate backdrop would have been 
     somewhere between a rock and a hard place. Seeking to 
     manufacture a legacy of forest protection in his remaining 
     months in office, Clinton faces an uphill struggle.
       The president and Congress are supposed to work together to 
     pass laws that protect forests as wilderness. This is how 
     approximately 34 million acres of the 191 million acre 
     national forest system are now officially protected with the 
     wilderness designation. These 40 million acres that are the 
     target of Clinton's new effort are not now legally designated 
     as wilderness, yet function in nature as such. There are no 
     roads on these lands--each of 5,000 acres or greater--and in 
     many cases they are adjacent to a designated wilderness area.
       The Republican-led Congress, beholden on this issue to an 
     extractionist ideology, is simply incapable of working with 
     the president on wilderness issues, with the sole notable 
     exception of an emerging bipartisan effort in western Utah. A 
     compromise that could serve multiple interests--additions to 
     wilderness areas in return for additional certainty on other 
     lands for timber harvests--is not possible in this political 
     environment. As Republicans use riders attached onto 
     appropriation bills to thwart forestry planning efforts, many 
     environmental groups have taken up the call for no logging 
     whatsoever on any public lands. The average American, 
     meanwhile, uses more paper products than anybody else on 
     Earth.
       As Clinton wades into this ideological war, he has few 
     options. Legally, the strategy with the best chance of 
     permanency is to embody new protections for roadless areas 
     within an environmental impact statement that offers a 
     scientific basis for the action.
       The strategy may prove to be a long shot. On forestry 
     issues in the Sierra, for example, the administration has 
     been unable since 1993 to finish an environmental impact 
     statement that offers final guidelines on how to protect the 
     California spotted owl. Courts, meanwhile, have stalled 
     Clinton's logging strategy for national forests in the 
     Pacific Northwest. Environmental groups successfully 
     challenged the adequacy of the environmental impact 
     statements, which did not include surveys for certain rare 
     species such as mollusks.
       Ironically, the very legal techniques used by roadless 
     advocates to challenge logging plans will be handy weapons to 
     attack Clinton's roadless plan--if the Forest Service manages 
     to produce the environmental documentation before he leaves 
     office. There's not much time left to count mollusks on 40 
     million acres of roadless America. In the forests, the 
     biologists better start counting. And in Washington, leaders 
     on both sides of the aisle should contemplate a bipartisan 
     approach to forestry policy.
                                  ____


                       [From the New York Times]

                  Clinton's Legacy as Preservationist?

       For someone who paid no attention to environmental issues 
     during his first year in office, Bill Clinton may wind up 
     with an impressive legacy as a preservationist. In addition 
     to his earlier programs to restore the Everglades and to 
     protect Yellowstone, the forests of the Pacific Northwest and 
     the redwoods in California, the president recently set in 
     motion a plan that would, in effect, create 40 million acres 
     of new wilderness by blocking road building in much of the 
     national forest.
       In recent months, his secretary of the interior, Bruce 
     Babbitt, has been exploring the possibility of additional 
     action under the Antiquities Act of 1906, a little-known 
     statute that allows presidents, by executive order, to 
     protect public lands from development by designating them as 
     national monuments. If used intelligently, the act offers 
     Clinton a useful tool to set aside vulnerable public lands 
     before he leaves office.
       Because it allows a president to act on his own authority 
     and without engaging Congress, the Antiquities Act is an 
     attractive weapon to any president whose time is running out 
     and who wishes to quickly enlarge his environmental record.
       In 1978, President Jimmy Carter designated 15 monuments in 
     Alaska, which in turn accelerated passage of a bill that 
     added 47 million acres in Alaska to the national park system. 
     Near the end of his first term, Clinton created the Grand 
     Staircase-Escalante national monument on 1.7 million 
     unprotected acres in Utah.
       In the last 93 years, all but three presidents--Richard 
     Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George Bush--have designated at 
     least one national monument. There are now more than 100.
       Congress has never revoked a designation, though it has the 
     power to do so, and some monuments have become revered 
     national parks, like the Grand Canyon. Yet Congress has never 
     really liked the law because it so clearly gives the 
     president the upper hand.
       All it can do is rescind a designation, which is 
     politically difficult. After Clinton's Grand Staircase-
     Escalante designation in 1996, a bill requiring congressional 
     approval of any designation exceeding 5,000 acres passed the 
     House, but died in the Senate.

[[Page S6516]]

       Babbitt is considering a dozen sites. The largest is one 
     million acres on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Others 
     include the Missouri Breaks, along 140 miles of the Missouri 
     River in Montana, and hundreds of thousands of acres in 
     Arizona, Colorado, California and Oregon.
       All the projects are worthy, but as a matter of caution he 
     and the President need to winnow the list to sites most 
     deserving of immediate protection. Western Republicans, 
     complaining about a federal ``land grab,'' are looking for 
     any excuse to revive their attack on the act, which has 
     survived in part because it has been used sparingly.
       Overuse could also divert support from even broader open-
     space initiatives, including what is expected to be another 
     serious push to seek $1 billion annually in permanent 
     financing for the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
       Within these limitations, there is no reason not to use the 
     act, a statute with an honorable history that has produced 
     illustrious results.
                                  ____


          [From the Ventura County Sunday Star, Nov. 7, 1999]

     Prescription For Forest Health Probably Would Kill the Patient

                        (By Arthur D. Partridge)

       The Clinton administration's recent proposal to protect 
     roadless areas in our national forests is already under 
     attack in Congress. One often-repeated objection is that 
     roads are needed for logging, logging is necessary for a 
     healthy forest, and our forests are suffering a health 
     crisis. As prescriptions go, this one verges on quackery.
       The term ``forest health'' is so poorly understood and 
     defined nowadays that it's virtually useless. When first 
     coined, in 1932, it referred solely to insects and tree 
     diseases. Now people use it to encompass fire, storms, or 
     virtually anything. But all of the data, both from the Forest 
     Service and studies by many forestry researchers including 
     me, indicate there's been no change in the real condition of 
     our forests, other than through excess and ill-advised 
     logging.
       In terms of disease and insects, there has been no 
     difference in true forest health for at least 50 years. In 
     fact, a report from the U.S. Forest Service indicated that 
     between 1952 and 1992 the amount of damage from disease, 
     insects and all other major causes--including fire--was less 
     than 1 percent of the standing commercial timber throughout 
     the United States. And the numbers stayed at those levels the 
     entire time, with no ups and downs. The same thing is true of 
     both public and private lands.

                           *   *   *   *   *

       Unfortunately, this basic reality often gets distorted in 
     order to accomplish some kind of cutting plan. In the Pacific 
     Northwest, for instance, we hear that in many regions the 
     Douglas fir is threatened by bark beetles. But when we go to 
     those areas and investigate, we find that a significant 
     problem just doesn't exist. There are some beetles, all 
     right, but the overall beetle population is in decline and 
     the amount of damage is extremely low. Of course if you only 
     look for trees with beetles, you'll find them. But in the 
     whole forest the mortality rates hover around the historical 
     rates of 1 to 2 percent. And this is true of root diseases 
     and other pests, of different species of trees, and in 
     different areas of the country.
       Claiming harm to forest health is merely an excuse to log, 
     but logging in the roadless areas is plain foolishness. The 
     reason they weren't logged long ago is that early loggers 
     knew there was little worthwhile timber in these areas.

                           *   *   *   *   *

       Widespread clearcutting has also brought changes in the 
     water cycles, creating rapid runoff and melting during the 
     spring, leaving little available water during the summer, 
     when it's needed most. Even the local weather has been 
     affected: If you change the structure of the forest, you 
     change wind patterns and rainfall as well.
       In spite of this, I'm more optimistic than I was 15 years 
     ago. Back then, nobody would listen to such concerns. All 
     they could think about was the product and not the results of 
     producing that product. Now even the industry is more 
     sensitive to what it's doing, and it's changing some logging 
     practices.
       We need to continue to improve the way we maintain our 
     forests. If we cut timber, we have to do it more gently than 
     in the past. And we have to stop using wrong-headed excuses 
     like ``forest health'' to log in the few and fragmented 
     remaining roadless areas that America still treasures. If we 
     destroy such areas through needless incursion, we will leave 
     our descendants far poorer than justified by the small 
     immediate profits, and they will wonder what sort of 
     physicians made such poor judgments about health.
                                  ____


  [From the Central and East County Contra Costa Times, Oct. 26, 1999]

                        Forests Need Protection

       President Clinton has directed the U.S. Forest Service to 
     produce an environmental impact statement and develop a 
     proposal that potentially will protect more than 40 million 
     roadless acres of its 155 national forests and 20 grasslands. 
     Reactions from the two most vocal sides insist Clinton has 
     erred, but he is moving in the right direction.
       The timber industry is angry about losing future access to 
     these woods. Where will its product come from? Hmm. Well, 
     probably the same place it comes from now--and that's not 
     primarily federal forests. Only 5 percent of the annual 
     timber load comes from national land and only 5 percent of 
     that comes from areas that could come under protection. 
     Besides, the 380,000 miles of road already in forests--more 
     miles than the interstate system--will still be usable.
       That the plan provides for only 40 million acres and only 
     inventoried, roadless areas 5,000 acres or larger upsets many 
     environmentalists, as does not including Alaska's Tongass 
     Forest. The heart of the world's largest remaining expanse of 
     coastal temperate rainforest, Tongass is under siege, its 
     supporters feel. Logging does take place in specified areas, 
     and efforts to increase cut levels in Tongass are already in 
     progress. Supporters feel an urgent need for more federal 
     protection and were intensely worried when this proposal that 
     excludes Tongass was chosen by Clinton.
       The plan also deals almost strictly with road-building; it 
     will prohibit it, which hampers development. 
     Environmentalists would of course like the regulation to stop 
     logging, mining, many kinds of recreation and other 
     exploitation.
       Clinton went with what was the weakest of his choices of 
     plans, particularly making no rule to protect wildlife, to 
     avoid needing congressional approval. His is an effort to 
     have something happen instead of nothing. Part of the 
     proposal also calls for a 60-day (only about 45 days to go 
     now) public review and comment process, and all sides are 
     hoping your voice will make a difference on what the final 
     plan becomes. (Send comments to: U.S. Forest Service-CAET, 
     Attn: Roadless Areas NOI, P.O. Box 221090, Salt Lake City, UT 
     84122.)
       We encourage you to support this effort. Only about 18 
     percent of the 192 million acres of federal forests are now 
     protected from development. Roadless areas are reference 
     areas for research, bulwarks against invasive species, and as 
     aquatic strongholds for fish as well as vital habitat and 
     migration routes for wildlife species, especially those 
     requiring large home ranges. Tongass by merit of its 
     uniqueness should be included in any plan that will protect 
     it.
       We also would like to see forest lands remain untouched 
     where they can so that they will still be around for 
     centuries to come and our children won't have to explain to 
     their grandchildren what forests were.

  Mrs. BOXER. These editorials are in favor of roadless protections. 
The two Senators from New Mexico have offered us a great service 
because they have essentially, by their amendment, stopped us from a 
very controversial amendment that was antienvironment, that the 
administration would have been very opposed to, and may well have 
caused a veto of this bill. I thank them again.
  I say to my friend from Idaho, Senator Craig, I hope he will not 
bring this back to us. I think it would drive a wedge into the heart of 
our environmental heritage. I hope that will not happen.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I rise in support of the amendment to add 
$240 million to the budgets of the Bureau of Land Management and the 
Forest Service for fuels reduction on our public lands.
  In April 1999, the General Accounting Office reported to the Congress 
that 39 million acres on the national forests in the interior West are 
at high risk of catastrophic wildfire. The GAO also stated in that same 
report to Congress that the ``most extensive and serious problem 
related to the health of national forests in the interior West is the 
over-accumulation of vegetation, which has caused an increasing number 
of large, intense, uncontrollable, and catastrophically destructive 
wildfires.''
  As we've seen this summer on the Rim of the Grand Canyon in my state 
of Arizona, on the Hanford Reach in Washington State, in the community 
of Los Alamos, New Mexico, and now in Colorado and other western 
states, it's time to pay the piper. If we don't spend the money now to 
treat the forests and other public lands, mechanically and through the 
use of fire, we will pay later--and we will pay a lot more.
  The National Research Council and FEMA have recognized wildland fires 
in California in 1993 and Florida in 1998 as among the defining natural 
disasters of the 1990s. The 1991 Oakland, CA fire was ranked by 
insurance claims as one of the ten most costly all-time natural 
disasters. And in terms of damage, the magnitude of these catastrophic 
fires was compared with the Northridge earthquake, Hurricane Andrew and 
the flooding of the Mississippi and Red River.
  As the findings of these organizations reveal, we are setting 
ourselves up for costly and deadly disaster unless we act now and send 
money to the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management for 
hazardous fuels reduction in the wildland/urban interface.

[[Page S6517]]

  In response to the GAO report, the Forest Service is working on a 
Cohesive Strategy to restore and maintain fire-adapted ecosystems 
across the interior West. I've seen a draft of that report, and the 
price tag on the draft is about $12 billion over 15 years to treat 60 
million acres on the National Forest. As I understand it, the Forest 
Service had hoped to release a final Strategy about a month ago, but 
this Administration's OMB has put a hold on the Strategy as too 
expensive.
  I'm not willing to wait until Flagstaff or Tucson or any other 
community virtually surrounded by the National Forest burns. I support 
providing the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management with 
emergency funds, assuming that the Administration designates these 
funds as emergency funds as required by the Balanced Budget and 
Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.
  Mr. President, I also want to draw my colleagues' attention to the 
comments of Stewart Udall that were published in the Arizona Republic 
on Thursday, July 6th. As my colleagues know, Stewart Udall, who now 
lives in the fire-threatened community of Santa Fe, New Mexico, served 
as Secretary of the Interior and represented Arizona in the House of 
Representatives. Mr. Udall notes with complete accuracy that we have 
altered the ecology of our forests and that it is only a matter of time 
before these man-made tinderboxes will ignite. Mr. Udall implores 
citizens to unite and demand restoration plans and aggressive, science-
oriented, landscape-scale restoration action plans to prevent Los 
Alamos-style disasters.
  Mr. Udall praises an organization of which I, too, am proud, the 
Ecological Restoration Institute, located at Northern Arizona 
University, and its leader, Dr. Wallace Covington. Mr. Udall opines, 
and I agree, that with appropriate support, the Ecological Restoration 
Institute can show other forested states how to use controlled burns 
and mechanical thinning to eliminate the threat of devastating fires.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that these remarks of Mr. 
Udall be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

               [From the Arizona Republic, July 6, 2000]

                   Let's Begin To Manage Our Forests

                         (By Stewart L. Udall)

       Santa Fe.--As I survey the charred remains of the ``Cerro 
     Grande'' fire that raged through Los Alamos, N.M., and its 
     National Nuclear Laboratory, I am reminded that we have 
     created an environment that invites a monster to rampage 
     through our forests and threaten many communities.
       In the Southwest, we have whetted its appetite by providing 
     an overabundance of ponderosa pines and by mismanagement that 
     has built a ladder of small, sickly trees that allows fires 
     to leap into the crowns of old-growth yellow-bellies and into 
     our mountain towns and homes. Meanwhile, we have wasted 
     precious time looking for someone to blame and arguing over 
     the definition of logging.
       By altering the ecology of our ponderosa pine forest lands 
     for a century, we have created unnatural conditions where 
     fire can no longer play its natural role. Unhealthy forests 
     abound in the West, and it is only a matter of time before 
     these man-made tinderboxes are ignited and hapless ``disaster 
     areas'' are proclaimed by presidents.
       Before Western settlement began, fire strayed mostly on the 
     ground, working its way through the grasses every few years 
     as nature's steward, cleaning up the debris on the forest 
     floor. Scientists at the Ecological Restoration Institute in 
     Flagstaff have been telling us that the size and frequency of 
     the recent fires have never before occurred in our ponderosa 
     forests. They report, too, that the fires are growing larger, 
     more damaging and more expensive and difficult to suppress.
       Concerned citizens must unite and demand restoration plans 
     and action that will reduce dangers and initiate campaigns to 
     restore our forests and make them resilient and sustainable. 
     Party lines and political agendas have no place in the 
     upcoming battle. Republican Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona and 
     Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, a Democrat, have set an 
     excellent example by locking arms and supporting projects to 
     show what can be done to restore forest lands.
       It will be incredibly short sighted if Arizona's affected 
     cities do not, working in concert with the Forest Service, 
     develop aggressive, science-oriented, landscape-scale 
     restoration action plans and begin to implement them soon. 
     Preventing Los Alamos-style disasters from decimating Arizona 
     communities will test the grit and gumption of the Forest 
     Service. And if emergency measures or funds are needed to get 
     action started, it will also test the foresight and 
     leadership of the state's congressional delegation.
       Arizona's Ecological Restoration Institute is a national 
     asset. It is led by Dr. Wallace Covington, a scientist who 
     knows more about the ecology of ponderosa forests than any of 
     his colleagues. With appropriate support, the institute can 
     show other ponderosa states how to use controlled burns and 
     thinning to eliminate the threat of devastating fires.
       In a rich country, it is downright stupid to spend billions 
     each year to put out destructive fires when modest resources 
     can be invested to prevent such disasters. The bill presented 
     to the federal government for fire suppression and 
     reparations at Los Alamos is mounting daily toward $800 
     million. Experts are telling us this conflagration could have 
     been prevented by forest-management measures costing $15 
     million to $20 million. When will we get smart?
  Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, I rise in support of the amendment 
introduced by the Senator from Idaho, Senator Larry Craig, to require 
the United States Forest Service to establish a Federal Advisory 
Committee Act committee to study and report on the proposed roadless 
area initiative and proposed transportation guidelines rule.
  I have serious concerns regarding the process implemented by the 
United States Forest Service in developing these proposed rules. The 
House Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Forests and Forest 
Health initiated a review on October 28, 1999, requesting documents 
from the Forest Service and the White House regarding development of 
the proposed roadless rule. While reviewing thousands of pages of 
documents provided by the Clinton administration, the committee found 
that the administration had held a number of meetings with, and used 
draft language, legal memoranda, and survey research data prepared by, 
a select group of representatives from national environmental 
organizations including: the Heritage Forest Campaign; the Wilderness 
Society; Natural Resources Defense Council; USPIRG, Earth Justice Legal 
Defense Fund, Audubon Society; and the Sierra Club.
  In addition, the committee found no evidence of any effort to meet 
with or involve other groups or interested parties, and that the USFS' 
push to complete the proposed roadless initiative led to the use of 
poor data and errors in documentation, as is evidenced by letters from 
the National Forests and regional offices to the Washington Office 
expressing concern over the accuracy of the information being 
transmitted. For example, in one letter a USFS employee stated, ``This 
is an estimate that I hope we are not held accountable for.''
  This reliance by a Federal agency upon a select group of individuals 
for the purpose of obtaining advice or recommendations is a de facto 
establishment of an advisory committee, an activity that must be 
conducted in accordance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). 
FACA requires any agencies that establishes an advisory committee to 
file a formal charter, publish notice of all meetings in the Federal 
Register, ensure that all meeting are open to the public, keep minutes 
for each meeting, designate a Federal officer who must be present at 
each meeting, and must ensure that membership of the committee 
represents a cross section of groups interested in the subject--in this 
case the management and use of national forests.
  This provision is also contained in the National Forest Management 
Act of 1976 (NFMA).
  Unfortunately, the United States Forest Service's proposed roadless 
rule was developed without meeting any of the above FACA requirements. 
Instead, the Forest Service developed this rule in meetings with a 
small, insular group that represented only one, limited interest. 
Furthermore, the meetings were conducted behind closed doors and 
without any public notice.
  Once again, the Clinton/Gore administration has demonstrated its 
unwillingness to include those most affected by federal land management 
decisions in developing land use policy. Instead of finding a way to 
include state and local governments, industry, recreationists and any 
other group interested in using and enjoying our national forests, this 
administration has chosen the politics of divisiveness and has excluded 
those who will ultimately have to live with the final decision from the 
development process. The

[[Page S6518]]

only inevitable conclusion from this kind of politics will be first, 
exclusion from the process, and finally exclusion from the forests 
themselves.
  I support this amendment, and encourage the Forest Service to take 
this opportunity rethink its current process and to reconsider its 
proposed actions at a more appropriate level. The decisions being made 
pursuant these rules would be more responsive to local communities and 
forest health concerns if they were conducted properly and not in 
violation of current law.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, as manager of this bill, I have been 
extraordinarily gratified by this debate on something I thought might 
be very controversial, but the Senator from New Mexico and his allies 
have given us a wonderful, totally bipartisan compromise on a 
significant issue, one I believe personally to be very constructive and 
very important. Rather than say anything more about it, I think we 
should take advantage of this opportunity and call for the question.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate on the secondary 
amendment?
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I thank everyone. There have been so 
many people working on this amendment. It has boiled down to a page and 
a half, but it is a very good amendment. It will permit the Forest 
Service and the BLM to do a lot of things they otherwise would not be 
able to do.
  I am very thrilled today. I had originally nicknamed this bill 
``happy forests'' because I thought maybe if we cleaned them up and 
took all this gasoline, using that figuratively, that is waiting around 
to burn them down--I thought they might just smile; they might just be 
happy forests. I want to say that is going to be the title of the bill. 
It has another fancy title. But when it passes today, let us just put 
in the Record, Senator Domenici is going to call this the happy forest 
bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate?
  Hearing none, the question is on agreeing to amendment No. 3806.
  The amendment (No. 3806) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mrs. BOXER. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is now on agreeing to amendment 
No. 3795, as modified, as amended.
  The amendment (No. 3795), as modified, as amended, was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 3807

 (Purpose: To make emergency funds available to the United States Fish 
and Wildlife Service for salmon restoration and conservation efforts in 
                          the State of Maine)

  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask 
for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Maine [Ms. Collins], for herself and Ms. 
     Snowe, proposes an amendment numbered 3807.

  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 121, between lines 18 and 19, insert the following:
       For an additional amount for salmon restoration and 
     conservation efforts in the State of Maine, $5,000,000, to 
     remain available until expended, which amount shall be made 
     available to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to 
     carry out a competitively awarded grant program for State, 
     local, or other organizations in Maine to fund on-the-ground 
     projects to further Atlantic salmon conservation or 
     restoration efforts in coordination with the State of Maine 
     and the Maine Atlantic Salmon Conservation Plan, including 
     projects to (1) assist in land acquisition and conservation 
     easements to benefit Atlantic salmon; (2) develop irrigation 
     and water use management measures to minimize any adverse 
     effects on salmon habitat; and (3) develop and phase in 
     enhanced aquaculture cages to minimize escape of Atlantic 
     salmon: Provided, That, of the amounts appropriated under 
     this paragraph, $2,000,000 shall be made available to the 
     Atlantic Salmon Commission for salmon restoration and 
     conservation activities, including installing and upgrading 
     weirs and fish collection facilities, conducting risk 
     assessments, fish marking, and salmon genetics studies and 
     testing, and developing and phasing in enhanced aquaculture 
     cages to minimize escape of Atlantic salmon, and $500,000 
     shall be made available to the National Academy of Sciences 
     to conduct a study of Atlantic salmon: Provided further, That 
     the amounts appropriated under this paragraph shall not be 
     subject to section 10(b)(1) of the National Fish and Wildlife 
     Foundation Establishment Act (16 U.S.C. 3709(b)(1)): Provided 
     further, That the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation shall 
     give special consideration to proposals that include matching 
     contributions (whether in currency, services, or property) 
     made by private persons or organizations or by State or local 
     government agencies, if such matching contributions are 
     available: Provided further, That amounts made available 
     under this paragraph shall be provided to the National Fish 
     and Wildlife Foundation not later than 15 days after the date 
     of enactment of this Act: Provided further, That the entire 
     amount made available under this paragraph is designated by 
     Congress as an emergency requirement under section 
     251(b)(2)(A) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit 
     Control Act of 1985 (2 U.S.C. 901(b)(2)(A)).

  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, let me begin by complimenting the Senator 
from Washington and the Senator from West Virginia for crafting an 
excellent bipartisan appropriations bill for these very important 
programs that matter so much to each of us in all our States. They have 
worked very well together and brought to the Senate for its 
consideration a bill that deserves support. I commend their efforts in 
that regard.
  The amendment I am offering on behalf of myself and the senior 
Senator from Maine, Ms. Snowe, concerns an issue of tremendous 
importance and urgency to the State of Maine. The issue involves the 
Federal Government's proposal to list the Atlantic salmon in the State 
of Maine under the Endangered Species Act. More specifically, the issue 
before us is whether the Federal Government will support the efforts of 
the State of Maine and other organizations to restore and conserve the 
Atlantic salmon in our State. Our amendment would appropriate $5 
million in emergency funds for this very purpose.
  I will give all of my colleagues an idea of just how critical it is 
for these funds to be invested in our State this year. This situation 
is truly an emergency. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the 
National Marine Fisheries Service have proposed to list certain 
Atlantic salmon in Maine as an endangered species. Under an agreement 
reached last month between the services and the two organizations that 
filed suit in Federal court seeking emergency listing of the salmon, 
the services have agreed to make a final decision on whether or not to 
list the Atlantic salmon as endangered by November 17 of this year.
  I emphasize this point: The services have already given up their 
statutory and--what is usually a matter of course--routine ability to 
seek an extension of time in which to make a determination of whether 
or not to list the Atlantic salmon in our State under the ESA. In 
short, the time is now to demonstrate a Federal financial commitment to 
salmon in our State and that a listing under the Endangered Species Act 
is not necessary to conserve and restore Maine's magnificent Atlantic 
salmon.
  The stakes are decidedly high and the services' rush to judgment 
unfortunate. A decision to list the Atlantic salmon under the ESA could 
threaten the livelihood of thousands of Mainers, particularly in the 
eastern part of the State of Maine. This is one of the most beautiful 
sections of our State; unfortunately, it is one of the most challenged 
economically.
  At risk is a $68-million-a-year agriculture industry employing 1,500 
Mainers, a $100-million-a-year blueberry industry supporting 8,000 
jobs, a developing cranberry industry into which more than $500 million 
has been invested already, and a forest products industry that is the 
linchpin of Maine's economy. As Maine's independent Governor, Angus 
King, put it, a listing would be ``a devastating economic blow to a 
region of the State least able to endure it.''
  The $5 million we are seeking would make a substantial contribution 
to salmon conservation and restoration

[[Page S6519]]

efforts in our State. The funds would be made available to the National 
Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which has made a commitment to us to work 
very closely with the State of Maine to ensure that every single dollar 
is spent effectively. The funds would be used to assist in land 
acquisition and conservation easements to benefit Atlantic salmon, to 
develop irrigation and water use management measures, to minimize any 
adverse effects on salmon habitat, to develop and phase in enhanced 
agriculture cages to minimize the risk of escape, to install and 
upgrade weirs and fish collection facilities, and to conduct risk 
assessments, fish marking, and salmon genetics studies and testing.

  The need for these emergency funds is right now. As noted, a listing 
decision is expected to be made early in the next fiscal year. The $5 
million we are requesting needs to be appropriated prior to the Federal 
Government making its decision on whether or not to list the species, 
if it is to make a difference. We strongly believe that vigorous and 
effective salmon conservation and restoration efforts are needed in the 
State of Maine, but that listing the salmon as an endangered species is 
simply not the way to go. If these emergency funds are not appropriated 
this year, we will have missed an opportunity to convince the services 
that listing Atlantic salmon as endangered is not warranted. And we 
will have missed an opportunity of great importance to the people of 
Downeast Maine.
  I thank the distinguished chairman and the ranking member of the 
subcommittee for their invaluable assistance on this critical matter. 
Senators Gorton, Byrd, and Stevens have worked very hard to help us get 
to this point, and I have confidence that they will see this crucial 
amendment through to its enactment.
  Mr. President, I understand that the amendment is acceptable to both 
managers of the bill, and I will urge its adoption following the 
remarks by the senior Senator from Maine.
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, today I am pleased to join Senator Collins 
in offering this amendment to the Interior Appropriations bill to make 
available $5 million in emergency supplemental funding for the 
restoration of Atlantic salmon. This is an issue that is critically 
important to the State of Maine. In 1997, the Fish and Wildlife Service 
and the National Marine Fisheries Service (the Services) 
enthusiastically endorsed the Maine Atlantic Salmon Conservation Plan 
as the best possible approach to restoring these fish to Maine rivers. 
Unfortunately, this five-year plan was essentially shut down less than 
halfway into its implementation when the Services re-initiated a 
proposed listing under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) on November 17, 
1999.
  This short-sighted action has placed in jeopardy an innovative and 
cooperative restoration strategy involving habitat restoration, water 
quality improvement, and widespread restocking programs statewide. The 
Services have yet to demonstrate what additional benefits will be 
afforded the salmon through such a designation despite my repeated 
requests for such information.
  We in Maine have worked hard and made many sacrifices to restore our 
treasured Atlantic salmon. I continue to believe that a fully 
implemented Maine Plan remains the best means of restoring these fish 
and there is no benefit in cutting short such a promising effort.
  Unfortunately, the Services have entered into an agreement with 
litigants that requires them to make their final listing determination 
by November 17, 2000. This action precludes the possibility of seeking 
a six month extension, as allowed under the ESA, to resolve any 
questions of scientific uncertainty. Many such questions have been 
raised. Questions range from whether or not these fish actually 
constitute a genetically distinct population segment as defined by the 
ESA to whether the Services' river specific hatchery stocking program 
has produced any benefits and is an appropriate restoration strategy. I 
have asked the National Academy of Sciences to thoroughly review the 
quality of the science that forms the basis of this proposed listing. 
This information will guide future restoration efforts in Maine. The 
funding under consideration today will make such a review possible.
  Additionally, the Services have not undertaken a quantitative risk 
assessment to ascertain the relative importance of various factors 
which may influence salmon survival. Without such a risk assessment, we 
have no way of knowing if the Services are focusing on the right 
problems or potential problems and there is no clear way for the 
Services to evaluate what more needs to be done. In essence, the 
Services have no way of knowing if they are asking the impossible of 
the State. The State of Maine has been asking for such an assessment 
for over one year. Since the beginning, the Maine Plan has been 
incredibly dynamic and has evolved to address new problems or concerns. 
In fact, the State has addressed in some form every concern raised by 
the Services. This risk assessment will provide the necessary guidance 
to again strengthen salmon restoration efforts and target limited 
resources most effectively.
  This risk assessment is but one example of the critical activities 
that need to take place prior to November 17th if the Services are to 
make an informed decision as to whether or not to list. The State of 
Maine is poised to take further action, such as upgrading weirs at the 
river mouths, conducing genetic analyses, and testing fish marking 
techniques, that might render a listing unnecessary. Unfortunately, 
despite the tripling of the State budget for salmon restoration, there 
is not sufficient funding available to complete these critical 
activities. If the State is able to complete these priority items prior 
to the November 17th deadline, we may be able to render a listing 
unnecessary. I would hope that the Services will adhere to the letter 
and spirit of the Endangered Species Act and fully consider the 
restoration activities paid for by these funds when making their final 
determination whether or not to list.
  I would like to thank Senators Gorton, Byrd, and Stevens for all of 
their assistance in making sure that this money is made available to 
Maine. I know that they share my concerns regarding the importance of 
the recovery of U.S. salmon populations, particularly Senators Gorton 
and Stevens who have been working hard with people in their home states 
to restore populations of Pacific salmon. The funding we are seeking 
today was originally included in the Agriculture Appropriations bill. I 
am pleased that the managers acknowledge how time sensitive this issue 
is and are receptive to including it on this bill which is moving more 
rapidly. I can assure you that this money will make a tremendous 
difference in our efforts to restore Atlantic salmon in Maine. Thank 
you.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington is recognized.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I have at least three reasons to urge 
adoption of the amendment of the Senator from Maine. The first, of 
course, is the eloquence that she has evidenced in presenting it and 
her persistence in pursuing this particular course of action.
  Second is that this is directly analogous to the first amendment we 
adopted today by the two Senators from Minnesota. It is a decision, 
effectively, that we have already made that this money should be 
appropriated on an emergency basis. It is included in another bill that 
is slower to pass. Unfortunately, it was not included in the military 
construction bill, which did have a number of emergency expenditures in 
it.
  The third comes even closer to home for this Senator because, as the 
Senator from Maine knows, Washington and Oregon, and for that matter, 
California, do have listed salmon species.
  I may say to the Senator from Maine, we got an advance appropriation 
and it didn't prevent the listings from taking place, by any stretch of 
the imagination. But I think it did help my State and the other two 
States to prepare for what is going to be a long campaign toward their 
recovery. The hope that a listing may be prevented is a worthy goal on 
the part of the Senator from Maine. But even if it doesn't happen, this 
will have helped in connection with whatever the steps are thereafter. 
If the junior Senator from Maine would not mind, we can accept this 
amendment now and, of course, give other Senators an opportunity to 
speak. So she is ahead and she might as well win while she has a 
chance.
  Ms. COLLINS. I thank the Senator.

[[Page S6520]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia is recognized.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, we in the minority share the feelings 
expressed by the distinguished manager of the bill. We, too, yield to 
the eloquence and the grace of the distinguished Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I thank both my colleagues for their 
gracious comments and willingness to work with me on this very 
important issue. I urge adoption of the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 3807) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. CRAIG. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois is recognized.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I will be offering an amendment at the 
close of my remarks. It involves a section of this bill which I believe 
was authored by Senator Domenici of New Mexico. I just spoke to him a 
minute ago to tell him I will be offering this amendment to strike his 
section. He said to proceed. He will come to the floor in a few 
moments, and I am sure he is following this debate in the meantime.
  First, I thank Senator Byrd and Senator Gorton for their fine work on 
this Interior appropriations bill. I think I have expressed the 
feelings of many Members of the Senate that this is a spending bill 
that is near and dear to our hearts. It involves so many of our 
Nation's greatest treasures, and the stewardship which they showed on 
this bill will not only reflect their feelings, but will inure to the 
benefit of generations to come, if we do it right.
  This bill is considerably different and, in my estimation, 
considerably better than the bill in previous years. In the past, there 
have been the so-called environmental riders that have been added on a 
variety of different issues. Most of them involved public lands and how 
they were to be used.
  I come from the State of Illinois. We have some public land in 
Illinois. We have a national forest in Illinois. We have part of a 
National Park System--a very small part. I know that some of my 
colleagues from the Western States have a much different situation. 
Many of them represent States where the majority of the land is owned 
by the Federal Government. I am sure that is an awkward situation, at 
best. I can't quite imagine all of the ramifications of that policy, of 
owning that public land and managing it. But I am sure it affects their 
daily lives and the economy of their States.
  Having said that, though, I think all of us, whether we live in one 
of those States with a large portion of publicly owned land or whether 
we live in some other part of the country, have a vested interest in 
this debate about the use of the public lands. The reason we have a 
vested interest is twofold. First, these lands are being managed now by 
this Presidential administration in a temporary way. Soon there will be 
another President. It could be President Gore; it could be President 
Bush. I am not certain what the outcome of the election will be. But 
the next administration will then be handed the responsibility of 
managing this public land.
  Each successive administration, each President, and Congress, for 
that matter, have a voice in determining how that land is to be 
managed. And if they do the job right, in my estimation, they will hand 
off to the next generation succeeding an even better stewardship of 
this Federal land. I drew from my desk a quote from the Congressional 
Record. It is a quote from a former Republican President of the United 
States by the name of Theodore Roosevelt. For those familiar with the 
administration of President Theodore Roosevelt, you know he created the 
first national park and that he had a special interest in conserving 
and protecting our natural heritage and, particularly, in establishing 
public lands to protect them for future generations. This short quote 
summarizes his philosophy and, I might add, my own:

       We must ask ourselves if we are leaving for future 
     generations an environment that is as good or better than 
     what we found.

  That is a very simple, straightforward statement. I keep it in my 
desk here because, quite honestly, when the Interior appropriations 
bill comes up, that question is being asked of us. Are we going to 
manage the public lands of America in a way that future generations 
will look back and say we did a good job and protected that legacy from 
previous generations? It has been handled and managed well under your 
stewardship.
  I think that is the test. It is the test of this appropriations bill, 
and it is the test of every amendment to that appropriations bill. That 
is half of the test. The other half of the test goes beyond our 
obligation to explain to future generations, if we did a good job--it 
goes to the question as to whether or not we have met our 
responsibility to God's creation because on these public lands we find 
a great many species, a lot of different plant life, wild flowers, 
grasses, which are things that, frankly, depend on our good 
stewardship. If we don't treat those lands well, we not only stand to 
disappoint future generations, we stand to destroy our natural legacy.
  So when we talk about environmental issues, a lot of people like to 
categorize those as some kind of bureaucratic gobbledygook jargon in 
Washington. I think it is much more than that. It gets down to those 
two fundamental questions. At the end of the day, when we are called to 
judgment for our public service, can we say to future generations that 
the public lands you entrusted us with are given to you in at least as 
good a shape as we received them, and maybe better, and that we 
protected God's creation in a reasonable and thoughtful way during our 
years of management? That is the underlying debate that we hear on the 
floor of the Senate when we discuss so-called environmental 
riders; that is, questions of environmental policy raised in the 
Interior appropriations bill.

  Let me address the specific issue before us in the amendment I will 
offer. The Bureau of Land Management is part of the Department of the 
Interior. It is entrusted with administering millions of acres of our 
Nation's valuable and diverse public lands located primarily in 12 
Western States, including the State of Alaska.
  Currently, the BLM manages more Federal lands than any other public 
agency. BLM oversees some 40 percent of our Nation's Federal lands--
roughly 264 million acres of surface land predominantly in the western 
part of the United States. But acreage alone doesn't tell the story.
  Our Nation's public lands contain a wealth of natural, cultural, 
historical, economic, and archaeological resources that belong to 
everybody. They are, in fact, part of the Treasury of the United 
States--not in dollar terms, but when you want to measure the assets of 
this country, you would certainly step back and say: I want to include 
not only what we find in our Treasury but our Grand Canyon, 
Yellowstone, Yosemite, and all of the land owned by the people of this 
country. These are our assets that we have a responsibility to protect 
and manage.
  The natural and ecological diversity of the BLM-managed public lands 
is perhaps the greatest of any Federal agency. BLM manages extensive 
grasslands and forests, islands, wild rivers, high mountains, arctic 
tundra, and desert landscapes. As a result of the diversity of habitat, 
many thousands of wildlife and fish occupy these lands. These fish and 
wildlife species represent a wealth of recreational, national, and 
economic opportunities for local communities and States in our Nation.
  The single most extensive use of public land under the jurisdiction 
of the BLM is grazing in the lower 48. Of the roughly 179 million acres 
of public land managed by the Bureau of Land Management outside of 
Alaska, grazing is allowed on almost 164 million acres out of 179 
million, and millions of these acres also contain valuable and 
sensitive fish, wildlife, archaeological, recreation, or wilderness 
values.
  At the present time, the BLM authorizes through the issuance of 
grazing permits approximately 17,000 livestock operators to graze on 
these 164 million acres of public land. These permits and public land 
grazing that they allow are important to thousands of Western livestock 
operators. Many of these livestock operators and ranchers use these 
permits to help secure bank

[[Page S6521]]

loans to provide important financial resources for their operations.
  BLM typically issues grazing permits for a 10-year period on public 
lands. Many current grazing permits were issued in the late 1980s and 
are now expiring in large numbers over 2- or 3-year periods of time. 
These permits numbering in the thousands present the BLM with an 
unusually large and burdensome short-term renewable task.
  We addressed this very issue in previous Interior appropriations 
bills. Can the Bureau of Land Management keep up with expiring permits 
or leases and reissue them in timely fashion so that someone who is 
using the land, the livestock operations, can continue their business, 
not lose money, and not face uncertainty when it comes to financing 
their operations?
  The unusually large number of expiring grazing permits has created a 
dual dilemma for the Bureau and for its many public constituents. 
Western livestock operators who currently hold these expiring permits 
are worried that delays in the processing by the Bureau may cause them 
to lose their permits or otherwise threaten their ability to use the 
permits to secure bank loans for their operations.

  Conservationists-environmentalists--meanwhile believe that the Bureau 
has a responsibility to perform responsibly for the governmental and 
environmental stewardship of these lands and analyze the grazing to 
make certain that if there is to be a renewal it is done in a 
reasonable and responsible way.
  It is entirely understandable to me being from my State that ranchers 
are concerned about issues of security and predictability. So are my 
farmers. I understand this. Likewise, we require the BLM to wisely 
manage and protect our public lands for all Americans.
  The on-the-ground permit level decisionmaking that should legally 
accompany the BLM's permit renewal process is fundamentally important 
to the ecologically sound and multiple-use management of our Nation's 
public lands.
  The BLM must conduct what we call a NEPA, which is the National 
Environmental Policy Act, compliance and land use planning performance 
review before reauthorizing permits. In other words, before they give 
the permit back to the livestock operator to go back on public land to 
use it for grazing, they take a look at public land: How are we doing? 
Are we doing this in a responsible environmental way so ultimately the 
land is not so degraded or changed as to lessen its value or to 
endanger species and wildlife? That is a responsibility of BLM. It is 
an important one.
  To meet the review requirements under NEPA and other existing Federal 
laws and regulations, the BLM uses a lot of different teams composed of 
agency professionals who look at wildlife, range, wild horse, bureau 
and cultural, and recreation wilderness activities. The BLM also 
solicits public comments and relevant information from a wide array of 
people interested in range management, including hunters, fishermen, 
and many others.
  The simple fact is this: On most public land, grazing allotments and 
all of the important decisions that determine the condition of public 
rangeland resources are contained in the terms and conditions of the 
grazing permits and in the annual decision about the amount, timing, 
and location of livestock grazing. These decisions determine whether 
streams in the areas will flourish or be degraded and whether wildlife 
habitat will be maintained or destroyed. Public involvement in this 
process is essential for balanced public management. Without the 
application of NEPA and related laws, the American public has no real 
voice in public rangeland management.
  Let me at this time give you an illustration. A picture is worth more 
than a thousand words. Any Senator is good for a thousand words at the 
drop of a hat. This picture will tell you an interesting story of a 
NEPA review of grazing on BLM land.
  Let me drop some of these acronyms and abbreviations and try to speak 
English so those following the debate will understand.
  The ecological picture here is one of the Santa Maria River in 
western Arizona, which has improved dramatically as a result of permit 
management changes under the environmental policies of the BLM.
  It is important to note that the BLM continues to allow grazing in 
the areas you are looking at. However, they change some of the 
conditions of the grazing. As a result of environmental considerations, 
the grazing permits on the Santa Maria River in western Arizona now 
contain terms and conditions requiring livestock to be kept away from 
the rivers and streams during the spring and summer growing season.
  The Santa Maria River in western Arizona is a rarity. It is a free-
flowing river in the midst of a vast, hot, low-elevation desert.
  The riparian corridor provides essential habitat for dozens of 
species of wildlife, including 15 species listed by Federal or State 
agencies as threatened, endangered, or some other special status. The 
riparian area of Santa Maria and its ability to support wildlife were 
severely degraded by many years of uncontrolled and unmanaged livestock 
grazing in the river corridor.
  The vegetation was literally stripped away. Water was so polluted 
that streambanks were trampled and miles of riverbed areas and riparian 
areas were nearly as barren as the surrounding desert.
  This is the picture of the overgrazed area around the Santa Maria 
River in Arizona. There is the ``before'' picture. Let me tell you a 
little bit about the ``after'' picture, which I will refer to in a 
second.
  For decades, the BLM issued new grazing permits to ranchers along the 
Santa Maria River with no terms and conditions to protect the riparian 
areas.
  Even though the BLM developed the land-use plan that required the 
river to be rested from livestock grazing, that requirement was not 
included in the permits. In the late 1980s, a portion of the Santa 
Maria River received an unplanned reprieve from grazing. The rancher 
who held the permit went bankrupt and had to sell all his cattle.
  The result of 3 years of rest from grazing can be seen in the second 
photo. These are roughly the same areas. This one looks like a stripped 
desert; the second is much different. This is a stream bed from the 
Santa Maria River, showing the natural vegetation and grass that has 
grown back in the grazing area. The riparian vegetation has begun to 
return, the stream banks are rebuilding, and the water is cleaner than 
in other portions of the river.
  In the early 1990s, the bankrupt rancher sold out to a new rancher 
who wanted to restock the river corridor with cattle and start the 
grazing again in this area. The BLM proposed to transfer the grazing 
permit to the new rancher with no NEPA analysis; that is, no 
environmental analysis and no public review. The transferred permit 
would have had the same terms and conditions and ultimately resulted in 
the same condition as seen in the before picture.
  A number of individuals and organizations challenged the BLM decision 
to renew these permits without a NEPA review and public comment. As a 
result of the environmental assessment, the grazing permits on the 
Santa Maria contain terms and conditions requiring that livestock be 
kept out of the riparian area during the spring and summer growing 
seasons. There is now a chance for vegetation to recover and water 
quality and wildlife to be restored.
  The reason this part of the debate is important is it relates 
directly to the amendment I will offer. If the amendment offered by the 
Senator from New Mexico remains in this bill, permit level management 
changes that I have just described will be much more difficult to 
obtain.
  Let me speak for a minute about section 116 of this bill that I would 
strike. This is the so-called grazing right. Most Members of the Senate 
have received letters from virtually every major environmental group in 
Washington, asking them to join in supporting my amendment to strike 
section 116. Here is the reason. This is the third attempt in an 
Interior appropriations bill to allow grazing permits to bypass current 
environmental regulations. Section 116 allows renewal of grazing 
permits that expire in fiscal year 2001 under the same old terms and 
conditions in which the permits were first issued.
  Last year, I offered substitute language to similar offerings by the 
Senator from New Mexico. My language

[[Page S6522]]

would have addressed ranchers' needs for the Bureau to process grazing 
permits in a timely fashion and in a manner by which ranching 
operations and financial arrangements would not be needlessly 
disrupted.
  My intent last year was to not only protect the environment but to 
protect the ranchers, as well, to give them certainty as to when the 
new permits would be issued, and to also say that, where necessary, the 
Bureau of Land Management could step in and make the environmental 
changes to protect an area, changes that could avoid this and result 
more in this type of situation, which I think most of us would agree is 
better stewardship of the land.
  However, I am pleased to report that my efforts to hold the BLM and 
their feet to the fire successfully on their own resulted in change. My 
amendment didn't succeed. But they went on to work to solve the backlog 
of expiring permits.
  The bottom line is this: There is no longer any need whatever for 
section 116 in this bill.
  Let me show a chart in reference to the activity of the Bureau of 
Land Management. The BLM issued 3,872 fully processed grazing permits 
and leases in fiscal year 1999. In fiscal year 2000, the Bureau of Land 
Management is scheduled to issue 2,893 fully processed grazing permits 
and leases; 1,408 have been holdovers from the previous year, but they, 
too, will be renewed this year. In fiscal year 2001, the Bureau of Land 
Management will only be faced with 1,646 permits that have expired, and 
a small carryover of 484 from the previous year, for a total workload 
of 2,130 permits in the next fiscal year. This number is fully within 
the capability of the Bureau of Land Management.
  We will hear from the other side, those supporting this environmental 
rider--that is opposed by virtually every environmental group in the 
Nation's Capital--that we have to put this rider in place to renew old 
permits without review because the ranchers and livestock operators 
cannot be certain that the BLM will meet its obligation to issue the 
new permits as the old ones expire.
  The numbers tell a totally different story: 3,872 permits reviewed 
and approved by the BLM in 1999; this year, another 2,885; in the year 
for which we are appropriating, the numbers will be down around the 
2,100 range. Clearly, the BLM has the capability to handle many more 
permit renewals than we envision in the next fiscal year. There is 
no need for this environmental rider to create exception and to tell 
the old permit holders they don't have to go through the process. The 
process is there. It is timely. It will give them the certainty they 
want about their future. All but 79 of the expiring 2001 permits will 
be completely processed in 2001.

  The BLM has decided to carry over the permits because they concern 
areas near the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument and in the 
Bookcliffs allotment. Because of the environmental sensitivity of these 
areas, the Bureau of Land Management will conduct an environmental 
impact statement instead of the regular environmental assessment.
  The question arises, if the BLM will no longer have a backlog of 
permits, why is there such concern that section 116 be included in this 
bill? Although that question can be easily reversed, the concern is 
that section 116 will create incentives for livestock operators to 
delay renewal of their permits in hopes of avoiding environmental 
compliance by gaining an automatic renewal of their old permits under 
the old terms and conditions.
  Section 116, as presented in this bill, undercuts meaningful 
opportunities for public involvement in a range management process. Is 
that important? Remember the picture from the Santa Maria situation; 
the BLM didn't come up with policies that resulted in the second photo. 
The lands lying in rest for 3 years, and public comments, led to 
changes in permits, which means that instead of desert, we are going to 
have a very beautiful area, an important area for habitat which is not 
environmentally damaging.
  Section 116 undercuts that opportunity for public comment because it 
provides for an automatic renewal of the old permit without going 
through public comment or environmental review. They have to renew 
under section 116 the old permits under the same terms and conditions 
for an indefinite period. It effectively eliminates public input into 
the stewardship of public lands.
  The Senators in support of 116 are saying to the people of this 
country who own these lands all across America: Get out of the way. We 
don't want you to be part of the process. We don't want you to sit back 
and determine whether the livestock operator who has been on this land 
for 10 years has done a good job from an environmental viewpoint.
  Frankly, that is why we are here. Those in Congress and in the 
administration who have responsibility for the management of the land 
have to leave it to future generations in at least as good shape as we 
received it. If we cannot take an objective appraisal of how a rancher 
or livestock operator has managed the land, if we cannot decide that 
perhaps there needs to be a change because the way he is managing the 
lands is destroying it, then frankly we are running away from our 
responsibility.
  Section 116 in this bill, which I strike, does exactly that. It takes 
the public out of the process. It takes the Government, looking at this 
from an environmental viewpoint, an ecological viewpoint, out of the 
process. It says it is an automatic renewal, no questions asked or 
answered. That is why this section 116 is opposed by a wide array of 
groups, including the Wilderness Society, the Sierra Club, the U.S. 
Public Interest Research Group. It is important to note that the League 
of Conservation Voters views this as a very important vote, as well.
  Let me address specifically the situation involving the State of New 
Mexico. The BLM says that New Mexico, which is the home State of the 
Senator who has offered this, will process and issue all fiscal year 
2001 expiring permits, as well as all carryover permits from fiscal 
year 2000. So if we hear the argument on the floor that this backlog is 
hurting the State of New Mexico, the home State of the Senator who 
offered section 116, the facts don't back it up.
  By September 30 of this year, New Mexico is committed to fully 
processing and issuing all 379 carryover 1999 permits and leases and 
179 of the year 2000 permits, for a total of 558. New Mexico plans to 
issue 192 fiscal year 2000 permits, using Public Law 106-113.
  In fiscal year 2001, 221 permits and leases will expire in New 
Mexico. Like the BLM as a whole, in fiscal year 2001, New Mexico will 
process and issue all fiscal year 2000 carryover and fiscal year 2001 
expiring permits, a total of 413.
  This environmental rider, this section, was sold to us in years gone 
by as a necessity because of the backlog of cases on permits. The 
argument no longer holds. The BLM is fully capable of issuing new 
permits after the environmental consideration and public comment 
period, without hardship to the livestock operators and ranchers.
  Let me address one other aspect of this which I think is very 
important. The reason why section 116 should be stricken from the bill 
gets to the heart of the question. Assume for a minute that you have a 
permit for your cattle to graze on public lands. Assume that the permit 
is about to expire and you are now in a position where you are having a 
review by the Bureau of Land Management. They come to a conclusion that 
the way you have used your permit over the last 10 years has been bad, 
you have damaged the land, you have damaged the water quality, you have 
destroyed habitat for wildlife, you may have threatened some species 
that live in that land. So they want to change, in the next permit 
process, the way that you, for example, graze your cattle. If you 
remember the example from the previous photograph, the Santa Maria 
River, they decided at certain times of the year cattle could not graze 
near the river, for many of the reasons I just explained.
  If section 116 goes forward as proposed by the Senator from New 
Mexico, if there is a dispute between the Bureau of Land Management and 
the permit owner, all the permit owner needs to do is to appeal the 
decision by the BLM, and, frankly, he gets to live under the terms of 
his old permit with no restrictions on when the cattle can graze and no 
restrictions on activity

[[Page S6523]]

that might be damaging to the environment. That is the net effect of 
section 116, that we allow any bad actors who are destroying the 
environment on our land, our public land, to continue under the old 
terms and conditions and not face changes that would be in place.
  If section 116 were not part of this bill, the Bureau of Land 
Management could step in with a full force and effect order and say: 
Even while we are debating and appealing this question, you have to 
stop grazing your cattle near these streams and rivers in the summer 
and spring seasons when the area is the most vulnerable.
  The bottom line is, those who support section 116 think environmental 
concerns should be removed, take second place to moving forward and 
renewing the old permits. That is the bottom line. That is what this 
debate is all about. Those who believe, as I do, that this land belongs 
to us and future generations, that this land is in fact the habitat for 
many species and wildlife that need to be protected, believe, I hope, 
section 116 should be stricken.
  Aldo Leopold wrote a great book called ``A Sand County Almanac.'' It 
is one of the classics, legends, when it comes to the West and the 
environment. This is what he said about the land:

       Having to squeeze the last drop of utility out of the land 
     has the same desperate finality as having to chop up the 
     furniture to keep warm.

  I hope Members of the Senate, Democrats and Republicans, will step 
back and acknowledge the obvious. The BLM can meet its obligation. It 
can renew these permits. It can do it in an environmentally sound way. 
It can leave this land in as good shape as we received it and maybe 
better. It can leave a legacy to future generations, and even future 
ranchers, of which they can be proud. We do not need to carve out an 
exception here. We do not need to walk away from our environmental 
responsibility. We do not need to take the public out of the process of 
debating the future of public lands.
  A few minutes ago one of my colleagues from Idaho came to the floor, 
very critical of the Clinton administration because he said they went 
through a process on roadless lands in the national forests and they 
were not public enough. The facts are otherwise. There was room for a 
lot of public comment. But now we are going to hear those who defend 
section 116 come forward and say: Take the public out of the process. 
Automatically renew the permits. Don't make the evaluation.
  That is shortsighted. That does not meet the standard and test that 
Teddy Roosevelt and so many others before us established for this 
Nation. If we do this, we are not managing this land in the best 
interests of the taxpayers and the best interests of our children and 
in the best interests of God's creation.


                           amendment no. 3810

   (Purpose: To strike the provision relating to renewal of grazing 
                          permits and leases)

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I send the amendment to the desk and ask 
for its immediate consideration
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Illinois [Mr. Durbin] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 3810.

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       Strike section 116.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. BURNS. Mr. President, I listened with great interest to the 
comments of the Senator from Illinois on striking section 116. Let me 
preface my point by saying the language in the bill is the same 
language that was in last year's bill. There is a reason for it. 
Contrary to the argument being voiced by one side of the aisle, this is 
compromise language. It passed the House and the Senate last year. It 
was cleared by the Council on Environmental Quality and signed into law 
by the President.
  As part of his speech, the Senator from Illinois showed us a picture 
of rangeland in poor quality. Well, I could take that same picture in 
Yellowstone Park. There is not one cow in Yellowstone Park, not one. 
There are a lot of buffalo, though. It is all managed by educated, 
competent land managers. The problem is, they have a hard time cutting 
back on the herd there. So let's not say that all the ranchers in the 
world are the rapers and the pillagers of the land, because we can see 
range in worse shape being managed by the National Park Service.
  I go back on open range, range country, with the BLM and Government 
land back to the 1950s, and even a little before that. I can remember 
riding into Chicago with cattle for J.C. Penney at the old 
International Stock Show. So I know a little bit about these cattlemen. 
I know a little bit about grass. I know a little bit about rain. I know 
a little bit about sunshine.
  If it had not been for the ranching community in our public lands 
States, there would also be no wildlife on that range because there is 
no water. For the most part, the land that was not claimed under the 
Homestead Act was land without water. Water was later developed on that 
land by the people who leased it from the government. To water their 
cattle they built reservoirs and wells. They also used pipelines. 
Anyplace livestock can graze, one will find wildlife.
  There was an organization formed just after World War II. The country 
was coming out of a depression and also some devastating years of 
drought in the thirties. There are probably not a lot of folks standing 
around here who know much about that. I do not see that much gray hair 
around.
  An organization was formed to improve the range. It was called the 
Society for Range Management, long before Government had established 
any kind of environmental rules, long before there was an establishment 
of the BLM and guidelines for the men and women who would judge the 
quality of the range. Government did not fund the Society for Range 
Management. It was strictly funded by those stockmen who ran livestock 
on public lands. The Taylor Grazing Act was then established, and that 
is what governs how we handle permits today.
  I want to talk about the Society for Range Management. Every year--
and I started this in Montana by the way--we have Montana Range Days. 
About 300 to 400 people show up for a 3-day camp. They sleep on the 
ground, and they sleep in the back of pickups. The people run from 
little shavers in the first grade to seasoned stockmen. During the 3 
days, we identify the grass, the foliage, noxious weeds, the carrying 
capacity of a particular strip of range.
  I started that when I went into the broadcast business in 1975 
because rangeland is the basis for the economies in the eastern 
counties of Montana. And as a result, the grazing permits on public 
lands are vital for Montana.
  The range today carries a lot more livestock, a lot more recreation, 
and more activity overall because of a group called the Society for 
Range Management. They have been responsible, and that is something we 
should recognize. Oh, sure, you can take a picture of an area after a 
drought and it won't be pretty. But as I said, I can show you that in 
Yellowstone Park where the buffalo took the grass into the ground. I 
can show you that in Jackson Hole. I can show you that around Devils 
Tower in the Black Hills, and the rangeland of North Dakota. I could 
probably show you some pastures in the State of Illinois that are 
privately owned and are overgrazed. There are always one or two bad 
examples that one can magnify and say the whole world is doing this to 
my or our land.
  I have yet to see any government organization that has taken care of 
its land, or our land, as well as a private landowner who has made an 
economic and cultural investment in that land. It just does not happen.
  Last year, we compromised with those opposing the language that we 
would solve the problem of renewing the permits. We told them that in 
accepting this compromise, the language before us today, we would have 
to come back each year until the Bureau of Land Management cleared up 
the current backlog of permits.
  The State of Montana does not have as much BLM acreage as some other 
States. I do not think we have as much as our neighboring State to the 
south,

[[Page S6524]]

Wyoming. They probably also have more people employed by the BLM 
because of the environmental laws that have been passed. Some of those 
BLM folks are very good land managers, but they are also hamstrung by 
some very narrow-minded people who think they know more about the 
rangeland than they do or the stockmen who run it.
  In the meantime, there is a huge backlog of grazing permits that have 
gone unapproved, and that is the heart of Section 116. If they get the 
backlog cleared up, this language goes away. What is to fear? If the 
permit work is done and the permits have gone before the board, this 
language goes away. We are making sure everybody plays fair--just fair. 
That is all we are doing.

  We are good to our word, and with the BLM's failure to process the 
backlog of permits, we have used the same compromise language we did 
last year to prevent kicking family ranchers off the land through no 
fault of their own. They get their work done. That is the bottom line. 
It cannot get any more definitive than that.
  I do not want America to think that what I heard spoken before is an 
accurate assessment of our public lands because I will show you land 
managed by a stockman that lays next to what the Government manages, 
and there is a big contrast. It is huge. I will take the stockman's 
land 9 times out of 10 because I have seen it. I have seen the growth. 
I have seen the maturity and the things we put in place in range 
country to make it better, and we have done it with our own money. We 
did not do it with Government money. We did it with our own money to 
improve that range country.
  I support my good friend from Illinois in the area of good 
environmental practices, but it is my belief that it is not just 
Government employees who understand good environmental practices. It is 
done all through farm and agricultural country, whether it be on public 
lands or private lands.
  This change does nothing to impact the compromise language of a year 
ago.
  I oppose striking section 116. I think it is necessary, understanding 
there are those who do not want anything, anybody, or any livestock on 
those lands whatsoever, and particularly people. I can put faces on the 
people who use these lands very conservatively and improve these lands.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I say to Senator Durbin, I apologize for 
not being present on the floor when he gave what is always an eloquent 
speech, which he also did in this instance, with some very marvelous 
background information. Since that graphic is so alive, I suggest that 
the Senator should know when the vote starts he has to take it down.
  In any event, the good Senator from Illinois said there is no good 
reason to continue to support the Domenici amendment from last year. 
Incidentally, on an up-or-down vote on the Durbin amendment last year--
he will get up and say it is a different amendment, but essentially it 
is the same issue--58 Senators voted against Senator Durbin in favor of 
the Domenici amendment and 37 voted against the Domenici amendment, and 
5 did not vote. I am looking at those who did not vote on the Domenici 
amendment, and I think the numbers will get more lopsided, I say to the 
Senator from Illinois, because more of them will go my way than his 
way.
  So we want everybody to understand that we still need what we needed 
last year. I will answer the rhetorical question, which was, there is 
no good reason for doing this again. I will say, there are 1,300 good 
reasons to do it this year, for there are 1,300 Americans--some in my 
State, some in the State of the Senator from Montana, some in the State 
of the Senator from Wyoming, but there are 1,300 permits that are still 
not done, and those are for the years 1999 and 2000. We have 2\1/2\ 
months left in 2000. But there are 1,300 permits backed up for 
processing that are not completed.
  Let me make sure that in just a few minutes everybody understands 
what this means.
  If you were to come around 5 years ago or 6 years ago and ask, what 
is the issue with the National Environmental Policy Act and the grazing 
permits--as I told my friend from Illinois last year, it did not exist 
because nobody thought that renewing a grazing lease qualified under 
the National Environmental Policy Act--get this--as a major Federal 
action.
  But it has happened in this administration. They have concluded that 
these 10-year leases we give to ranchers, which are policed by the U.S. 
Government, are subject to NEPA. Be it the Forest Service rangers or 
the BLM rangers--they police these permits. They see that they are 
managed right. That is their job.
  Incidentally, during that 10-year lease, if they violate it, they are 
penalized. If they do not take care of things, they get their allotment 
cut. It is not operating in a vacuum. It is operating all along with 
the rancher trying to make a living and the Government saying: Do it 
right.
  Then here comes this administration and it says: Why don't we make 
both Forest Service permits and BLM permits go through a National 
Environmental Policy Act review for each and every one.
  I can tell the Senator, they heard from me then, but all they heard 
from me were two things: One, it really isn't needed; and, two, if you 
are going to do it, you will never get it done on time.
  I turned out to be right on both scores because, I say to the good 
Senator from Illinois, in my State, for each and every NEPA evaluation 
that preceded a lease renewal, about one from my entire State was 
changed significantly. That means across the board, 99 percent-plus of 
the time, the NEPA analysis found nothing needed to be dramatically 
changed.
  As I said to the administration way back then, NEPA analyses aren't 
needed. And then secondly, I said: You will not get them done on time.
  Lo and behold, 2 years into that process, we started getting letters 
from ranchers and property owners saying: Look what is happening. They 
are making us do a NEPA statement, but they have not done the work yet, 
for the Government does the NEPA statement. They have said: What is 
going to happen when our lease expires?
  Nice question. The administration could say: We are not ready to give 
it to you because we have not done the environmental impact statement 
on each and every grazing lease, which almost everybody looking at the 
land says is unnecessary. But let us conclude that they had authority 
administratively to impose NEPA. Incidentally, they never got authority 
from Congress. Senator Scoop Jackson was the author of the NEPA law.
  It would be very interesting if we could ask him from his place, 
wherever he is on high: Scoop, did you ever think that a grazing lease 
renewal was a major Federal action under your law? And I swear, if he 
is listening, he is turning over in his grave because ``major Federal 
action'' meant a major Federal action, not renewals of every single 
lease on the grazing lands of America, which are thousands.
  Nonetheless, when I offered my amendment last year, all it said was: 
Look, Federal managers, because of your own fault, you did not get the 
NEPA work done. Here is all the money you need. How much money do you 
need? I remember in the Interior bill they asked for more funding. The 
distinguished chairman gave them that money, so they had no more 
complaints. They got every bit of the money they needed to do it.
  They set about to complete each and every impact statement on leases 
that were expiring. The problem is, they have not gotten it done yet. 
All we said is, since you are the ones that are supposed to get it 
done, and you did not get it done, then you renew their lease. Give 
them the renewal, but write in this law and on that renewal that as 
soon as the NEPA work is finished --get this, my good friend, the 
Presiding Officer--as soon as the NEPA work is done, whatever your 
conclusions are, you have a right then to impose them on the permit.
  I have every confidence in the world, since I believe only one lease 
in New Mexico had any major changes made because of NEPA, that this law 
that I am asking to continue again--because they are still behind--will 
do no damage to the public domain.
  Let me make it very clear. There are some marvelous environmental 
groups in the United States. They have taken on some fantastic causes. 
Albeit they

[[Page S6525]]

do not like my voting record, that is all right with me. I like some of 
the things they have done. I do not necessarily ask how they want me to 
vote before I vote. I saw too much of that when I was a young Senator.
  I saw Senators come to the floor, knowing little or nothing about it, 
who said: How are the environmentalists positioned on this vote?
  They would say: They are an aye. They would vote aye.
  I just do not happen to be one of those Senators. I am kind of proud 
of that, to be honest. I do not think anybody should come to the floor 
and say, I better vote with them. I hope I am informed before I get 
here.
  In spite of what I just said, and that some of the brightest 
Americans are leading these environmental groups, believe it or not, I 
say to my fellow Senators, they have made this little amendment a major 
American environmental test. Using my name, they have spread it far 
across the country: The Domenici amendment is calculated to destroy the 
public domain, to let ranchers ranch without having the Federal 
Government oversee their growing malignancy which is destroying 
ranchlands.
  I say to my friends, it did not destroy any because they did not find 
anything wrong on most of them. There is a chance they will not get 
completed on time, and we just ought to stay where we were last year 
because there are too many Americans who are desperately afraid of the 
arbitrary action that can be imposed on the rancher by lawsuits. They 
are afraid of arbitrary actions of people who represent the Federal 
Government.
  They kind of cry out to us, when we go meet with them, saying: Just 
don't do another thing to us, not giving us our lease renewal, when we 
had nothing to do with the reason for the denial.
  I can't put it any more succinct. That is the way it is.
  I urge every Senator to do something very simple, and just send a 
word back that the proof in the pudding is that the NEPA reviews are 
not saving the public domain. They are just costing a lot of money, 
taking a lot of time. At least we ought to say to the ranchers who 
manage well--which is the overwhelming number--we are not going to hold 
you hostage out there and do what the distinguished Senator from 
Illinois recommends, which is that it is no longer mandatory that you 
proceed in a manner that the Domenici amendment last year said. That 
law allowed the renewal and then, in due course, when the NEPA analysis 
is finished, act accordingly, with the Government losing no rights. He 
would say the Government may do that if they want to. Everybody should 
know, if you turn the amendment into a ``you can do it if you want to, 
Federal Government,'' you know what is going to happen, at least for a 
while: The environmental pressure on the Department will be great 
enough that they won't do it for anybody. A ``may'' will turn into 
``thou shalt not.''

  I don't think that is fair. I have high regard for the Senator from 
Illinois. We were just talking before this debate, saying maybe one of 
these times we are going to be on the same side. I was thinking, if 
that happened, we might just overwhelm the Senate. We might get 99 
votes.
  In any event, I am sure hoping he doesn't get 99 votes tonight. I am 
hoping I get the same number I got last year, maybe even a few more who 
have thought about it a little bit. Those who understand that it is 
kind of ridiculous to claim this amendment that Domenici put in this 
bill is going to wreak havoc on the public domain.
  I will go anywhere to debate this issue with anyone as to whether 
this justifies being a major environmental issue. If it does, we must 
not have very many environmental issues around. They must have paled 
from the horizon if one of the major environmental issues in America is 
this issue. This is an issue where the Government doesn't do its work 
and therefore can't give the rancher a 10-year permit renewal, which he 
might be completely entitled to. The agency just hold them in abeyance 
and says: When we get through with our work, we will give you a lease. 
In the meantime, maybe you will lose your financing.
  A lot of Senators know about ranchers and financing. I wonder what 
the banks would do if their leases were not as certain as they have 
been because the BLM or the Forest Service can just say maybe we will 
be able to renew the permit.
  I have spent a lot of time on the floor between the happy forest and 
perhaps the happy solution to this environmental issue. We will have a 
vote pretty soon.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I won't take a long time. My friends have 
covered many of the details.
  This issue is not about the pictures that were shown by the Senator 
from Illinois. It has nothing to do with overgrazing or not 
overgrazing. That is not the issue. I hate to see it be left that way 
because it really has nothing to do with that. It has to do with what 
happens until the BLM can get to that piece of land to make the study 
to decide what to do with the lease. It is pretty simple.
  Here is what it says:

       The terms and conditions contained in the expiring permit 
     or lease shall continue in effect under the new permit or 
     lease until such time as the Secretary of Interior completes 
     the processing of such permit or lease in accordance with all 
     applicable laws and regulations, at which time such permit 
     may be canceled, suspended or modified, in whole or in part, 
     to meet the requirements of such applicable laws and 
     regulations. Nothing in this section shall be deemed to alter 
     the Secretary's statutory authority.

  I am sorry to say that doesn't fit much with what the Senator from 
Illinois described when he discussed this bill. I do think we need to 
briefly talk about what does it do.
  It allows the BLM to have more time to complete the necessary 
environmental reviews for renewing permits and leases. By providing BLM 
more time, they are less susceptible to litigation and therefore less 
costly to the taxpayer, and it is more likely that BLM will not rush to 
finish their job and do a complete job of their review when the time 
comes. The language provides a better method for stewardship of Federal 
lands by having the BLM and the rancher work hand in hand on it. It 
provides the means for the agency to utilize sound processes and 
procedures. That is what they claim they have not had time to do. This 
provides that.
  It subjects the permittee or lessee to potential modifications by the 
BLM of the terms and conditions, once the reviews are completed. It 
doesn't give them carte blanche. BLM is still able to revoke a 
permittee's grazing privileges at any time. They can do that.
  It provides more stability, consistency, and security to ranching 
families. That is very important to us. Fifty percent of Wyoming 
belongs to the Federal Government. Most of that is BLM land. It is 
multiple-use land; it was designed to be under the law. This is a 
renewable resource, and it is done that way. I know that doesn't mean 
much in Chicago, but it means an awful lot in Wyoming, out where the 
Federal lands are. We have to talk about that.
  The language eases the end-of-the-year backlog, of course, for BLM.
  What does the language not do? It does not lessen the responsibility 
of the rancher in abiding by the terms and conditions of the permit or 
lease. It does not limit BLM's authority to manage grazing on public 
lands. It does not exempt the permittee or the lessee from any 
environmental law. It does not grant a permit in perpetuity. It simply 
provides for 10 years, until it is changed by the BLM.
  It does not allow BLM to delay or ignore compliance of any 
environmental law or regulation, since BLM is mandated in those time 
lines to do those things.
  Why is this language necessary? Frankly, it is very disappointing 
that the Senator from Illinois is back the second year in a row to 
fight against western livestock ranchers. This issue--BLM not being 
able to complete the required environmental renewal process on expiring 
grazing permits--is not the permittee's fault. The backlog was created 
by the administration, by the BLM. For some reason or other, the 
Senator from Illinois prefers to penalize the ranchers rather than hold 
the agency accountable.

  Striking this section in the bill is really detrimental to management 
of these lands. The Senate language, which I agree with, states:


[[Page S6526]]


       The inability on the part of the Federal Government to 
     accomplish permit renewal procedural requirements should not 
     prevent or interrupt ongoing grazing activities on public 
     land.

  When they get back to doing their job, it continues on. It is pretty 
simple. It has worked. It can work in the future. I think it is 
important we have the same language President Clinton signed into law 
last year.
  As a matter of fact, after being contacted by the cattlemen, he said:

       . . . the final 2000 budget does provide BLM with $2.5 
     million that will enable the agency to effectively conduct 
     detailed reviews before renewing livestock grazing permits 
     and leases to ensure environmental compliance. I am confident 
     this funding will help us protect both the public lands and 
     the livelihood of hardworking ranchers.

  That was from President Clinton's letter.
  That is where we are. What we need to do is vote against this 
amendment and allow the system to continue to work as we proved it can 
work last year.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, in a few moments we may be voting on a 
motion to strike section 116 of this appropriations bill. That is the 
amendment offered by our colleague from Illinois. I hope Senators will 
join with us, as they did last year, in opposing this kind of striking 
of language.
  The Senator from New Mexico has said it so clearly, as have the 
Senator from Montana and the Senator from Wyoming. They have caused all 
of us to understand where we are in the process of reexamining the 
grazing permits of western livestock grazers.
  I don't think we have put it in the context we ought to for the 
Senator from Illinois. If we had, maybe he would be less inclined to 
come to the floor with this issue in hopes of gaining another 
environmental certificate this year from the Sierra Club for his 
charging, dynamic rhetoric on behalf of the environment.
  Let me for a moment, if I may, deal with this in a hypothetical way. 
What if there had been a lawsuit in Rosemont, IL, that suggested the 
air traffic coming into O'Hare Airport was causing air congestion 
within that air shed and that air quality could not be arrived at there 
without changing the character of the management of the O'Hare Airport 
by reducing its flights by 50 percent?
  Of course, the Senator from Illinois and I know--he lives in that 
region; I fly in and out of that region--if you do that, O'Hare Airport 
is out of business. Thousands and thousands of people would be laid 
off, if that were to become a Federal rule or a restriction against 
that activity. More importantly, this is a hypothetical case.
  There is a lawsuit that the air traffic coming in and out of O'Hare 
has created a situation that disallowed that area from gaining its air 
quality standards. So EPA is in there examining it and establishing a 
rule to see whether O'Hare can continue to manage its air flights in 
and out in a way as to sustain its viability and meet the air quality 
standards. But the rule hasn't been made at a time that the judge has 
said: Either get it done or I will enforce a reduction in air traffic 
by 50 percent.
  The Senator from Idaho likes that idea, so I come to the floor on the 
appropriations bill for the Department of Transportation and say: I 
want to strike an amendment the Senator from Illinois has in there. 
Let's extend this period of time and allow EPA to complete its 
rulemaking process so that we can keep O'Hare alive.
  I think it is important that we put all of these kinds of things in 
context. Illinois is not a public grazing State. Idaho is, New Mexico 
is, Arizona is, Montana is, and so is Wyoming. What the Senator from 
New Mexico has said is that under today's environmental laws, and 
yesterday's environmental laws, these grazers will be allowed to graze 
during that period of time in which the permit process, through an 
examination by BLM or the Forest Service, is ongoing to reassess their 
permit and to adjust and change it in concert with current 
environmental law. I don't know why he would want to stop that. 
Obviously, he tried last year and the Council on Environmental Quality 
agreed with us, we defeated that amendment, and the environment is 
better today because of it.
  I hope our colleagues will stand with the Senator from New Mexico, as 
they did last year, and say to the Senator from Illinois that we are 
not going to put ranchers out of business. We live with environmental 
law, we are sensitive to it, and we believe in it. We are not going to 
arbitrarily do as I suggested in my hypothetical case with O'Hare 
Airport, which is an area that is not of my interest, but it is an 
interest of the Senator from Illinois because it is in his State. I 
don't know much about it, but in my example I want to come in and 
arbitrarily change the name of the game. Of course, he would work to 
disallow that, and this Senator would respect the Senator from Illinois 
for saying that is not my business; that is the business of the Federal 
Aviation Administration and the State of Illinois, the city of 
Rosemont, and the Senator from Illinois--not the Senator from Idaho. I 
think that is the issue here.
  In 1878, the diaries of a cavalry officer in charge of the cavalry in 
eastern Oregon, northern Nevada, and southern Idaho reflected the 
following:

       I believe the grazing lands of this region to be 50 to 60 
     percent depleted.

  That was in 1878. Why? No BLM management. No Federal land management. 
No standards. Large grazing herds out of the Southwest swept through 
that country and their history, of course, has filled our history books 
with the nostalgia of the great trail drives. But there was a young man 
who was used to the land, and at that time he made an observation that 
the grazing in the region he used to ranch in and that these Senators 
are concerned about had already been depleted by over 50 percent--in 
1878.
  I can say to the Senator from Illinois, because of the standards 
established by the grazing industry, the environmental community, the 
Federal Government, U.S. Forest Service, and BLM, many of those lands 
are much better today than they have ever been. In fact, everyone who 
knows the western grazing lands and the riparian zones the Senator so 
eloquently spoke of know that they are hundreds of percent better than 
just a few decades ago. In fact, let us not forget that when the 
Secretary of the Interior, at the beginning of his tenure back a few 
years ago, wanted to go out and find some bad grazing examples that he 
could talk about to change his grazing land policy, his staff came back 
and said: Mr. Secretary, we can't find any. We can't find the kind of 
examples you want to bad mouth the grazing industry and management 
policies of the Forest Service and BLM because grazing has 
substantially improved and is continuing to improve.

  That is what the Domenici provision, section 116, is all about--
continuing that relationship of progressive improvement, 
environmentally, for the benefit of our country and for the benefit of 
the wildlife, but also for the benefit of the grazing industry.
  Improved grazing and better grass in our country means fatter cattle. 
By the way, we sell them by the pound. I am not at all embarrassed for 
saying that. That is the way the industry works, in a balanced and 
necessary way. I thought it was important to bring this debate into 
context to the Senator from Illinois, who knows more about the subject 
I proposed hypothetically than I do. I suggest that I probably know a 
great deal more about public land grazing than he does. I and my family 
have used public lands for grazing for over 100 years. I have walked on 
them, I know the changes, and I have helped to get improved standards. 
We are doing it right on the public lands of the West today, and a 
great deal better than we used to do it. I think it is important that 
we recognize grass as an asset and a natural resource that can be used 
for a multitude of reasons. One of those reasons is to produce red meat 
protein for the American consumer. That is what the issue is about. I 
hope my colleagues will join with me in denying the Senator from 
Illinois his motion to strike.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Voinovich). The Senator from Alabama is 
recognized.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I want to speak on another subject, so I will yield to 
the Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. I thank the Senator. Mr. President, if there is no other 
Senator wishing to speak the first time on

[[Page S6527]]

this, I will speak briefly in conclusion. I have spoken to the chairman 
of the committee. It is my hope that I can ask for the yeas and nays 
and that we can schedule a final vote on the amendment, as well as on 
any other pending amendments at a later hour when all Senators 
reassemble. If that is acceptable, I will speak for a few moments in 
conclusion.
  Mr. GORTON. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. DURBIN. Yes.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the majority leader has indicated that he 
hopes we can continue debating this bill and finish it tonight, or at 
least get to a point tonight where it can be finished, perhaps, with a 
vote on final passage tomorrow. I think that is possible, and this will 
be part of it.
  So I hope the Senator from Illinois will finish his remarks on it. We 
will ask for a rollcall, and then we will set voting on it aside until 
we find out how many other amendments there are. I believe the Senator 
from Nevada, Mr. Bryan, wishes to come in with an amendment that would 
require a vote. The Senator from California, Mrs. Boxer, may have an 
amendment. Senator Nickles may have one. I am not sure about the 
Senator from Alabama. But there are a fairly small number that will 
require votes. I strongly suggest that anyone who feels that his or her 
amendment cannot be accommodated as a part of a managers' amendment--
and we have a very large one now that includes many of the proposals 
made--if anybody wants to have a vote or debate, they really need to be 
on the floor very promptly to do so because we would like to go ahead 
and finish. With that, I thank the Senator from Illinois.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois is recognized.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, let me say in conclusion on this amendment 
that I have the highest respect for my friend from New Mexico. I often 
wonder why each year I decide to take on the chairman of the Budget 
Committee, and the powerful Appropriations Committee, with usually 
predictable results on the floor of the Senate. He has, much to my 
consternation, read last year's rollcall, which is another dagger to my 
heart on this same issue.
  Notwithstanding that, I am going to soldier on here because, as the 
Senator from New Mexico does, there are times when you stand up and 
fight for something you believe in, even if you may not prevail. I 
still have the highest regard for him and all of my colleagues on the 
other side of the issue. I respect the fact that many of them have a 
much more personal knowledge of ranching and livestock operations than 
I do. When I think about Senator Burns of Montana and all of his years 
as a rancher and auctioneer, he stared more cows in the eye than I will 
ever be able to.
  I listened to my friends, Senator Thomas, Senator Craig, and Senator 
Domenici. I can readily see that these are men in the Senate who 
represent areas with many more ranchers and many more livestock 
operators with much more personal knowledge on this subject, 
notwithstanding that I come to the floor not trying to preach to them 
about ranging practices but trying to ask them to at least respect the 
process of trying to protect our public lands.
  The Senator from Idaho--I have heard this argument every year when I 
introduced this type of amendment--has basically said: Why are you 
sticking your nose into issues about the West? You live in the Midwest. 
When it comes to an issue such as O'Hare Airport, we would expect you 
to stand up and talk about it, being from Illinois. But goodness' sake, 
why are you talking about grazing in 13 Western States if you are from 
a Midwestern State?
  I say to the Senator from Idaho that I think we all bear 
responsibility, no matter where we are from, for the stewardship of 
public lands. It isn't only Senators who represent Western States. It 
is all of us.
  Frankly, if those lands are left to future generations, each one of 
us should take an interest in it, whether we live in Florida, or 
Illinois, or Maine. We all have a responsibility for those public 
lands--that Public Treasury, those resources that we count on so much.
  I also say to my friend from Idaho that when we stand here and debate 
gun safety issues representing large cities where a lot of people are 
victims of gun violence, he stands up on the floor many times and tells 
us what he thinks gun policy should be in the city of Chicago. He 
thinks that is his opportunity and responsibility as a Senator from 
Idaho. So it works both ways.
  I think he will concede the fact that, being elected to the Senate, 
we are not restricted in what we can speak to. We may be restricted in 
our success about what we speak to.
  But let me also say that I want to get down to a couple of things 
that were not mentioned at the outset that should be mentioned. For 
those livestock operators who choose to graze on public lands, this is 
worthy of mention. The grazing fees paid by those ranchers and 
livestock operators are a bargain. They are an absolute bargain. This 
Congress and a President decided that we will continue to give these 
ranchers and livestock operators access to land owned by the people of 
the United States so they can make a living grazing their cattle for 
fees that are, frankly, a fraction of what they would pay on private 
land.
  The Federal grazing fee for 1999 was $1.35 per animal unit month 
grazed. By contrast, the average grazing lease rate for private land is 
currently more than $11--almost 9 or 10 times the amount these same 
livestock operators are paying to graze on the lands owned by the 
people of the United States. In 1996, the fees charged on State land by 
Western States ranged from $2.18 to $2.20. There was not a single State 
that leased its grazing land to local livestock operators at a fee as 
low as the Federal Government.
  In addition to the subsidized fees, ranchers with Federal permits 
enjoy subsidized range improvements. As a result, livestock operators 
with Federal grazing permits actually have lower production costs and 
higher profits than livestock ranchers without Federal permits.
  As we talk about hardship that we may be creating for livestock 
operators, let us at least concede at the outset that we are giving 
these permit holders a bargain to make a living. I have not stood here 
and criticized ranchers and livestock operators, nor would I. In my 
State of Illinois, we have livestock products and a lot of farmers. I 
respect the men and women involved in my State, as I do in any other 
State. Nor am I bringing this issue before the Senate to try to put any 
ranchers out of business.

  There is one fundamental flaw in the argument on the other side. It 
is the suggestion that if you had a 10-year permit that expired, that 
the Bureau of Land Management would cut you off and not give you the 
right to continue to graze land while they are going through the 
reissuing of the permit process.
  I don't know of a single case where that has happened. The BLM goes 
out of its way to continue the grazing rights of these livestock 
operators, even while they are debating the terms of the new permit.
  The suggestion has been just the opposite--that they somehow want to 
get the ranchers off the land. The only time I have read about that is 
in a situation where they have a rancher or a livestock operator using 
Federal land in a way they think is harmful to the environment. I think 
that is reasonable because BLM has a responsibility to protect those 
public lands from environmental damage.
  Let me also address one other thing. The Senator from Montana got up 
and said there are people managing Yosemite and Yellowstone. There is 
buffalo and wildlife there, and many of them can destroy land just like 
any other livestock. I bet that is true. I don't question that it is 
true. He also went on to say that he thought when it came to range 
management that we should basically leave it up to the livestock 
operators to decide what is good for the land. I think that was his 
conclusion. I think this is a fair summary of his conclusion. I guess 
in some instance that would be true.
  In my home State of Illinois, there are farmers who are responsible 
environmentalists. They think twice before they apply chemicals. They 
think about the right thing to do to avoid the loss of good topsoil, 
and about siltation going into the streams that run into the water 
supplies of surrounding towns. My hat is off to them. I usually spend 
Earth Day with farmers because I respect a lot of them. They take this

[[Page S6528]]

very seriously. I will tell you that conversely there are some I 
wouldn't put in that category. There are good and bad.
  But let me tell you what the BLM has to say about the acreage that is 
being grazed by livestock now under their control. They estimate that 
only about a third of a total 160 million acres grazed by livestock are 
in good or excellent ecological condition--one-third. Worse yet, even a 
higher percentage--almost 70 percent of riparian areas, streams, and 
rivers and their associated fish and wildlife habitat--are in a damaged 
condition: A third in good condition; 70 percent near streams in bad 
condition. The General Accounting Office attributes the vast majority 
of these resource deficiencies to abusive and excessive grazing 
practices.
  When I come before you and show this photo, they say this isn't the 
real world. But the statistics suggest that overwhelmingly this is the 
real world. This is a grazing situation where, unfortunately, someone 
put cattle on this land, and they grazed it down until it looked like a 
desert. For 3 years after bankruptcy, the land had a chance to recover 
in the Santa Maria River area of western Arizona. This is what we have 
to show for it.

  What I am suggesting is that the statistics and the studies do not 
back up the statements on the floor which suggest that this land is 
being managed so well. There is a need for the BLM. There is a need for 
the environmentalists. There is a need for public comment.
  That is what I think needs to be protected. That is what section 116 
would deny us. Frankly, that is what this debate is all about.
  It has been the suggestion of my friend from New Mexico--not a 
suggestion but his notation of the rules of the Senate--that when the 
time comes for a vote that I am required by the rules of the Senate to 
remove this photo from the floor. So my colleagues who have not been 
here for this debate cannot come in and see exhibit No. 1, in my case, 
for the passage of my amendment. I can understand it. I know why the 
Senator from New Mexico doesn't want my colleagues to look at this 
photo. This tells the story as to what section 116 is all about.
  I made it a point--because I have such high respect for the chairman 
from New Mexico--to ask those who are well versed in the rules of the 
Senate. Once again, the chairman from New Mexico is right. I have to 
remove this photo under the Senate rules. I will probably appeal that 
to the Supreme Court at some later time. But, for today, I am going to, 
obviously, follow the rules of the Senate.
  But it is of interest to me that the Senator from New Mexico doesn't 
want our colleagues to see this photograph. I hope they are watching it 
as we broadcast this debate on the Senate floor. It tells the story.
  This is the bottom line. The BLM is going to process these 
applications. They are going to get them done on time. There is no need 
for this amendment. They are going to take a look. In the rare case 
where they find a livestock operator who is misusing Federal lands that 
he is getting for a bargain price--where he is misusing land, 
destroying the ecology, endangering species, and destroying riverbeds 
and riparian areas--they are going to make him sign a change. If the 
Senator from New Mexico prevails, they will lose the authority to do 
that. They will have to renew the permit under the old conditions.
  That is my objection to it. That is why I think it should be 
stricken.
  I sincerely hope we have a better outcome on the vote. If my 
colleagues have followed the debate and have had a chance to see this 
photo, which concerns my colleague so much, I am hoping they will 
support me in my motion to strike section 116.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senator be 
permitted to leave his picture up for the vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DURBIN. May I respond to my colleague from New Mexico?
  Mr. DOMENICI. The Senator has been responding for 20 minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. The Senator from New Mexico is a gentleman, a scholar, 
and will receive a reward, I am sure, from the civil liberties group 
for defending the first amendment.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Senator, let me say the idea of putting posters around 
has proliferated. I don't think we ought to add more to the confusion 
of a vote by having them around. I had no intention to pass judgment on 
the validity of your exhibit, which I find very difficult to interpret 
and rather irrelevant, but besides that, I don't have anything to say 
about it.
  Let me say, why strike a provision that the Federal Government's 
inaction cries out to be left in this bill, which was signed by the 
President last year? I might even tell my friend from Illinois, can you 
believe it, I talked to him personally on this issue because he wanted 
to understand what the hoopla was about. I will not paraphrase him, but 
he signed the bill with this provision in it. It does no one any harm, 
and nothing has happened to say it has hurt the environment in this 
past year. And this issue has nothing in the world to do with how much 
ranchers are paying.
  If we ever get into a debate upon the issue of, are they getting a 
great deal from the Government, I will bring from my State name after 
name of ranchers who are just not even making a living on the Federal 
domain today. Whatever price he suggested, they just can't hardly make 
a living under the rules and regulations of the U.S. Government.
  That has nothing whatever to do with this issue. The assertion is not 
correct that the BLM has to leave correctable degradation in place and 
issue a new permit while damage could continue on the property. Read 
the amendment. Whatever power the Bureau of Land Management has, it 
keeps. That means if they issue a permit and they had the authority to 
make a correction to its terms to fix a problem, they still have it. 
Nothing is missing.
  This provision lets the rancher feel a little more comfortable. He is 
not as denuded and vulnerable by having no permit until they get ready 
to issue it to him after they finish processing, which in the past 
would have taken a couple of years, maybe 2\1/2\ years. Now BLM is 
getting closer to finishing processing of all the expiring permits. I 
am glad. The amendment is working.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I believe the Senator from Illinois wanted 
a rollcall. I ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. GORTON. I ask unanimous consent we lay this amendment aside and 
proceed to an amendment by the Senator from Oklahoma.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Oklahoma.


                           Amendment No. 3812

   (Purpose: To provide $7,372,000 to the Indian Health Service for 
     diabetes treatment, prevention, and research, with an offset)

  Mr. INHOFE. I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate 
consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Inhofe], for himself and Mr. 
     Nickles, proposes an amendment numbered 3812.

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place, add the following:
       Sec. ____. Notwithstanding any other provision of this 
     Act--
       (1) $7,372,000 shall be available to the Indian Health 
     Service for diabetes treatment, prevention, and research; and
       (2) the total amount made available under this Act under 
     the heading ``National Foundation on the Arts and the 
     Humanities'' under the heading ``National Endowment for the 
     Arts'' under the heading ``grants and administration'' shall 
     be $97,628,000.

  Mr. INHOFE. After going through that rather lengthy amendment of the 
Senator from Illinois, there should be a little relief that this 
amendment should not be controversial. This amendment takes the amount 
of money that was increased--increased--to the National Endowment for 
the

[[Page S6529]]

Arts and transfers that to a fund for Indian diabetes. It is the Indian 
Health Service for Diabetes.
  Probably the least understood illness in this country is that of 
diabetes among Indians. It is a chronic disease. It has no cure. There 
are two different types. Type II is what we are addressing, diabetes 
among adults. Among American Indians, 12.2 percent of those over age 19 
have diabetes. This is the highest risk of any ethnic group.
  One Pima tribe in Arizona has the highest rate of diabetes in the 
world, about 50 percent of the tribe between the ages of 30 and 64. In 
Oklahoma, a lot of people are not aware, during the 1990 census, 
preliminary figures show the largest percentage of Indian population 
and the largest number of Indians of any of the 50 States. We spent a 
lot of time talking to our Indian population and looking at the 
problems that are peculiar to that population.
  Not long ago, I spent some time at an Indian hospital in Talihina, 
OK, operated by the Choctaws. Case studies include one young male 
patient I talked to, 20 years of age, who already has been partially 
blinded with diabetes. He is already suffering from renal failure. He 
has a 40-year-old father who has gone blind. They recently had to 
amputate his leg, and probably the other one will go next. In one 
family, the father and mother both have type II diabetes. The mother is 
going to start dialysis next month. The son, who is 20 years old, has 
eye and kidney damage. The daughter is 17 years old and suffered a 
stroke, requiring weekly medical care. She has a 3-year life 
expectancy. The average life expectancy of the American Indian patient 
with diabetes is only 45 to 50 years.
  It is very peculiar to the Indian population. It is very clear to see 
our money is better spent there and we can actually try to do something 
through research, through medication, through programs, to get the 
Indian population where they can be treated, where they know how to 
deal with infections they don't know how to deal with now.
  It is unacceptable that, nationwide, 12.2 percent of the Indian adult 
population has type II diabetes. There is no cure. It is not a lot of 
money but will go a long way toward saving lives, not just in Oklahoma 
but in the Indian population all over the country.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington State.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, with all respect, it seems to this Senator 
that this amendment is more about the National Endowment for the Arts 
than it is about the Indian Health Service.
  To give a comparison, the amount of money for the Indian Health 
Service in this bill is more than $2.5 billion. The amount for the 
National Endowment for the Arts cultural institutions is $105 million. 
As a consequence, this amendment would add to the Indian Health Service 
something less than one-third of 1 percent of the budget of the Indian 
Health Service --something less than one-third of 1 percent. It would 
subtract from the National Endowment for the Arts some 7 percent of the 
amount of money appropriated to it.
  Our bill provides a $143 million increase for the Indian Health 
Service for next year over the current year, more than the entire 
appropriation for the National Endowment for the Arts. I find it ironic 
it was less than an hour ago that this Senator was praised by the 
Senator from New Mexico, who is a vocal advocate for the Indian Health 
Service, for the generosity with which we were treating that service.
  Of the amount we are talking about for the Indian Health Service, $56 
million is specifically for improved clinical services, which obviously 
could include diabetes treatment and prevention efforts. But even more 
significant in connection with this amendment is the fact that the 
Balanced Budget Act of 1997 provides $30 million a year for 5 years 
specifically to accelerate diabetes efforts for Native Americans. This 
year is the fourth such year. So there is $30 million for the fourth 
consecutive year for the specific purpose of this amendment.
  On the other hand, the National Endowment for the Arts has not had a 
single increase in its funding since 1992. In many respects, the $7 
million increase for the National Endowment for the Arts is symbolic; 
$7 million is real, but in a sense it is symbolic--but it is an 
important symbol. It is far less than the President's budget has in it. 
In fact, one of the elements in the long letter from the Executive 
complaining about this bill is that we are not generous enough with the 
National Endowment for the Arts.
  But when we had our great debates on that subject during the mid-
1990s, one of the focal points of the debate was that the National 
Endowment for the Arts was not using its money correctly and was 
funding objectionable artistic efforts, objectionable groups, and 
organizations and individuals. In the intensity of the debate, I 
believe in 1995 and 1996, an extensive list of reforms was imposed on 
the National Endowment for the Arts with respect to the way in which it 
spent its money and made its grants.
  Now far more of its money goes to grants to the States. More of its 
money is spread more broadly around the United States, particularly to 
relatively small communities rather than a concentration in New York 
and Washington, DC, and Los Angeles and San Francisco. In other words, 
the very reforms that were demanded by the Congress have been, I think, 
cheerfully and thoroughly carried out by the National Endowment for the 
Arts in a manner quite responsive to what Congress asked for. To 
continue to punish the Endowment for the sins of its predecessors, or 
the supposed sins of its predecessors, seems to me to be perverse. I do 
not believe it appropriate for literally the 10th straight year either 
to reduce or freeze the appropriation for the National Endowment for 
the Arts.

  I would have to say I think it is doing good work. It is one of those 
fields in which relatively small grants provide sort of a Good 
Housekeeping Seal of Approval to a multitude of arts organizations 
around the country, and provides a tremendous help to them in securing 
private contributions for their efforts. Some say the money that we 
provide through the National Endowment for these organizations comes 
back tenfold, fiftyfold, a hundredfold in private and local 
contributions.
  It does seem to me long past time that we recognize the changes in 
the National Endowment and reward them for a job well done, even though 
the reward contained in this bill is modest. I said 2 days ago when 
this debate began that last year we included such a modest increase. 
The House was adamant about freezing the appropriation for the 
Endowment and we ultimately receded to the House. I said then I don't 
intend that should happen this year. I think it is time for the House 
to recede to us. I think it is time to deal fairly with an important 
part of the culture of the United States, and I think this amendment is 
unnecessary for the purpose for which it is stated because we have far 
more money in the bill already for the purpose of this amendment than 
is included in the amendment itself.
  I believe we should leave this modest increase and encourage the 
National Endowment for the Arts to continue the good work and to 
continue to follow the dictates of this Congress about the way in which 
it does that work, rather than to continue to punish it for perceived 
past sins which I am now convinced have long since been cured.
  For that reason, Mr. President, I oppose the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. I thank the Senator from Washington for his comments. I 
do not agree, obviously. I do think, though, I find two reasons to 
disagree with his arguments: One, to use percentages, as to what 
percentage this represents that would be decreased from the NEA as 
opposed to increase for diabetes because of the seriousness of this; 
the second thing is why carry this into a discussion and a debate on 
the merits of the National Endowment for the Arts.
  If we were to do that, I would be glad to join in that debate. In 
fact, I voted many times to defund the National Endowment for the Arts. 
However, that is not this amendment. Right now they have, from last 
year, $97 million, the NEA, and they are talking about not keeping it 
level but increasing it by $7.3 million. I am saying the $7.3 million 
is going to end up saving lives, particularly lives of Indians with 
diabetes, as opposed to rewarding and increasing the appropriation to 
the NEA.
  I think we need to look at it in that light. As I said, it is just 
incredible for

[[Page S6530]]

people to comprehend the seriousness of this affliction among the 
Indian population. Yes, I am prejudiced. Yes, the State of Oklahoma has 
the largest number of Indians of all 50 States, and there are a lot of 
States that do not have that concern. I can tell you right now, we are 
going to do everything we can.
  What the Senator from Washington says is true. We have increased it 
by some $30 million and it is going to be increased again over the next 
4 years. However, every incremental increase is going to have a very 
positive effect on the research and the treatment of the Indians with 
diabetes. So I am going to ask for the yeas and nays on this for a 
vote.

  Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. INHOFE. I have no objection to setting it aside and voting when 
we vote on the rest of the amendments.
  Mr. GORTON. Have the yeas and nays been ordered?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. They have.
  Mr. GORTON. I ask unanimous consent the vote on the amendment be set 
aside. I had told Senator Bryan we could go to him next. Does the 
Senator from Alabama----
  Mr. SESSIONS. I had an amendment I did want to talk on tonight. I 
wanted to take 2 minutes on one other subject, to thank the 
distinguished floor leader of the bill. I could do one of those, if 
Senator Bryan is ahead of me. I have been here longer than he has, I 
think.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Washington for 
his understanding and support, accepting an amendment I offered 
involving the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, AL. Last year, about 
this time, Senator Abraham and I submitted a bill to give a 
Congressional Gold Medal to Rosa Parks. That bill was passed in the 
Senate and the House, and the President presented it to her last summer 
in the Rotunda of the Capitol in a most remarkable ceremony.
  Rosa Parks, as most people know, was a native of Alabama, Tuskegee. 
She moved to Montgomery. She was a seamstress. She was riding on a bus 
one day, the bus was full and she was tired, and simply because of the 
color of her skin she was asked to go to the back of the bus and she 
refused and was arrested. That arrest commenced the Montgomery Alabama 
bus boycott over that rule, leading to a Federal court lawsuit that 
went to the Supreme Court, in which the Supreme Court held that kind of 
segregated public transportation was not legal and could not continue.
  The leader of that boycott turned out to be a young minister at 
Dexter Avenue Baptist Church by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. The 
Federal judge who originally heard the case was Frank M. Johnson, Jr., 
one of the great Federal judges in civil rights in American history, as 
far as I am concerned. Fred Gray was an attorney involved. Mr. Fred 
Gray, one of the first black attorneys in Montgomery, told the story in 
his book ``Bus Ride To Justice.'' How little did they know that the 
events they started on that day in 1955 would commence a movement that 
has reverberated, not only in Montgomery, in Alabama, but throughout 
the United States and, in fact, throughout the world, to a claim for 
rights and freedom and equality--great ideals.

  Troy State University in Montgomery, a 3,000-student university, is 
building a museum and library on the very spot of this arrest. These 
funds will help create in that building a museum to Rosa Parks with an 
interactive video friendly to visitors and children about the story of 
what happened on that day and the importance of it.
  I thank the distinguished Senator from Washington for supporting us 
in this effort.
  I see Senator Bryan. Mr. President, I say to him, I had 15 minutes on 
an amendment I called up earlier. Would it be all right for me to go 
ahead? I have a time crisis.
  Mr. BRYAN. I inquire of the Chair, there is a unanimous consent 
agreement that at 6:30 p.m. draconian things happen. I do not want to 
be precluded from offering my amendment.
  Mr. GORTON. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. BRYAN. I will be happy to yield.
  Mr. GORTON. The majority leader said 6:30 p.m. can come and go. If 
there is a prospect of finishing this bill tonight, the defense debate 
will be diverted. I think we can finish, I hope, by 8 o'clock this 
evening. The Senator is protected.
  Mr. BRYAN. As long as I am protected, I will be happy to yield to my 
friend from Alabama, and I ask unanimous consent that I be next in line 
for the purposes of offering an amendment after our distinguished 
colleague from Alabama.
  Mr. GORTON. I put that in the form of a unanimous consent request.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BRYAN. I thank the distinguished floor manager.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask the Senator to yield 30 seconds 
for an inquiry. I have an amendment that is pending with reference to a 
water situation in my State. I ask unanimous consent to follow Senator 
Bryan whenever he has finished.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Alabama.


                           Amendment No. 3790

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I offer amendment No. 3790 to the 
Interior appropriations bill. It will prevent the Secretary of the 
Interior from utilizing regulations that he has issued which would 
grant him the authority to approve class III casino gambling for Indian 
tribes in States throughout the United States in which class III 
gambling compacts between the State and a tribe have not been entered.
  This amendment had been adopted in the past several years. An 
identical amendment was accepted last year by voice vote. The original 
cosponsors already this year are: Senators Graham, Reid, Bayh, Grams, 
Enzi, Lugar, Voinovich, and Inhofe. Others are signing on.
  Essentially, this amendment will prevent any 2001 funds allocated to 
the Department of the Interior from being spent on the publication of 
gaming procedures under the regulations found under part 291 of title 
25 of the Code of Federal Regulations, which by now is probably 100,000 
pages of regulations issued by the different Secretaries.
  The intent of this funding restriction is to render these regulations 
inoperative next year only so the Department can take no action under 
the regulations until a case brought by the States of Alabama and 
Florida concerning the legality of these regulations is first resolved. 
In fact, Secretary Babbitt himself has expressed on numerous occasions 
his desire for the Alabama-Florida case to be decided first.
  This amendment simply seeks to place the Secretary's public 
commitments in law to ensure that a Federal court has the opportunity 
to rule on the validity of these regulations prior to any departmental 
action next year. This is an important and timely amendment. I urge 
anyone who is concerned about local control and freedom and concerned 
about bureaucracy and the spread of gambling within this country to 
join me in support of this amendment. I want to take a moment to 
provide some background.
  In April of 1999, Secretary Babbitt promulgated final regulations 
which empower him to resolve gambling controversies between federally 
recognized Indian tribes seeking to open a class III gambling 
operation--that is generally casinos--in a State which has not agreed 
with him to enter into a compact with the tribe or has not agreed to 
waive its 11th amendment right to exert sovereign immunity from suit.
  As a result, tribes located within certain States, such as Alabama 
and Florida, would be able to use these regulations to obtain class III 
gambling facilities by negotiating directly with the Secretary of the 
Interior in Washington, DC, even if the people of the State itself 
remained opposed to the spread of such gambling or even if the types of 
gambling sought were illegal under State law.
  In my opinion--and the Attorneys General Association of the United 
States has written us in opposition to this Babbitt rule and regulation 
and in support of this amendment--in my

[[Page S6531]]

opinion, these regulations turn the statutory system created under 
IGRA, the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, on its ear because they 
undercut a State's ability to negotiate with tribes and because it 
places the gambling decisions in the hands of an unelected bureaucrat 
who, as a matter of law, also happens to stand in a trust relationship 
with the Indian tribes, not an unbiased arbiter.
  Not only do these regulations offend my notions of federalism, but 
they also promote an impermissible conflict of interest between the 
tribes who are asking for a class III gambling license and the 
Secretary of the Interior who enjoys a special relationship with them. 
He is not a neutral arbitrator and was never given this power to 
arbitrate these acts by the Congress. I do not believe these 
regulations are a valid extension of his regulatory power.

  It is breathtaking to me, in fact, and it is another example we in 
Congress are seeing of unelected, appointed officials, through the 
power of the Code of Federal Regulations, implanting policies that may 
be strongly opposed by a majority of citizens. Indeed, none of these 
people is elected.
  My concerns about these gambling regulations were shared by the 
attorneys general of Alabama and Florida who filed a suit in Federal 
district court in Florida to challenge the validity. This lawsuit is 
currently working its way through a Federal court, and its resolution 
will provide an important initial reading as to whether these 
regulations are, in fact, legal and constitutional. Allow me to share 
some of the legal questions raised in the suits.
  The States point out that the regulations effectively and improperly 
amend the Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act because:

       . . . under IGRA, an Indian tribe is entitled to nothing 
     other than an expectation that a State will negotiate in good 
     faith. If an impasse is reached in good faith under the 
     statute, the tribe has no alternative but to go back to the 
     negotiating table and work out a deal. The rules 
     significantly change this----

  That is, the rules by Secretary Babbitt--

     by removing any necessity for a finding that a State has 
     failed to negotiate in good faith.

  Further, the lawsuit points out:

       The rules at issue here arrogate to the Secretary the power 
     to decide factual and legal disputes between States and 
     Indian tribes related to those rights. Pursuant to 25 U.S.C., 
     section 2 and section 9, the Secretary of the Interior stands 
     in a trust relationship to the Indian tribes of this Nation. 
     The rules set up the Secretary, who is the tribes' trustee 
     and therefore has an irreconcilable conflict of interest as 
     the judge of these disputes--

  Between a tribe and a State.

       Therefore the rules, on their face, deny the States their 
     due process and are invalid.

  I think the concerns raised by the States are legitimate, that these 
rules are, in fact, seriously flawed. But do not take my word for it 
alone. In fact, even Secretary Babbitt admits that the test of legality 
should be passed first.
  On October 12, 1999, the Secretary contacted Senator Gorton--who is 
managing this bill, and doing an excellent job of it in every way--and 
wrote him:

       If (a) I determine that a Tribe is eligible for procedures 
     under those regulations, (b) I approve procedures for that 
     tribe, and (c) a State seeks judicial review of that 
     decision, I will not publish the procedures in the Federal 
     Register (a step that is required to make them effective) 
     until a federal court has ruled on the lawfulness of my 
     action.

  Similarly, on June 14 of this year, the Secretary wrote 
Representative Regula, the chairman of the House Subcommittee on 
Interior and Related Agencies, to further clarify his position on these 
regulations. He offered these thoughts:

       I feel it is very important for the court to clarify and 
     settle the Secretary's authority in this area. I anticipate 
     that the court ruling in the Florida case will be favorable 
     of the Secretary's authority to promulgate the regulation.

  I disagree. But he goes on:

       However the Department will defer from publishing the 
     procedures in the Federal Register until a final judgment is 
     issued in the Florida case, whether by the District Court or 
     on appeal.

  I have written the Secretary to ask him to write me a similar letter 
and have not yet heard from him.
  All the amendment I am offering would do is to back up those public 
statements with the force of law, by ensuring that the Department could 
not spend funds to publish these procedures until a Federal appellate 
court had finally ruled on them. They would not seek to repeal the 
regulations, nor would they affect any existing compacts with States 
that wish to negotiate a compact with a tribe.
  Personally, I would support an outright repeal of the regulations, 
but for now I am content to make the Secretary's own words binding 
because I believe that legal review of these regulations is needed and 
proper, and that he should not be allowed to take action until such 
time as a court has made a final ruling on the merits of these 
regulations, which are, indeed, breathtaking.
  Make no mistake about it, it is an important issue in my State. As I 
speak, there are reports in the local papers that Alabama's lone 
federally recognized tribe--we have one tribe--is in the process of 
finalizing a deal with Harrods, which would result in the future 
construction of a casino on land operated within the small town of 
Wetumpka, AL, not far from Montgomery.
  No Indians now live on this land. It is land they simply own. It is 
about 180 miles from the small tribe lands that exist there. Because 
Alabama has not entered into a compact with the tribe, to allow them to 
put a casino there, they have gone to the Secretary of the Interior and 
had him issue regulations that would give them the power to override 
the State of Alabama's decision not to have casinos anywhere in the 
State.
  They have a power to compact. They have a power to say no on certain 
things. Alabama does have a dog track. The Indians would be entitled to 
a dog track. They have bingo and related activities at the Indian 
tribal lands further to the south in the State, but they are not being 
allowed, under the State's negotiating position, to have a casino, a 
position that I would support.

  Allow me to quote a few of the public comments that were made 
concerning this effort. The office of the Governor of Alabama, Governor 
Siegelman, has stated:

       The governor is ``adamantly opposed'' to casino gambling in 
     any form within the state and will take whatever steps are 
     necessary to stop it.

  That is a Democratic Governor.
  Attorney General Pryor, a Republican, has stated that the Attorney 
General:

       . . . will take whatever action necessary to prevent 
     illegal gambling by any Indian tribe in the State of Alabama 
     [because Attorney General Pryor] believes Babbitt has no 
     authority to allow gambling by Indians in states where such 
     gambling is prohibited by law.

  Representatives Everett and Riley oppose any future casino 
development.
  Mayor Jo Glenn of Wetumpka--I think everybody in the city council has 
written me about it--has expressed her strong opposition to the 
presence of a casino in her town and wrote me:

       Our infrastructure and police and fire departments could 
     not cope with the burdens this type of activity would bring. 
     The demand for greater social services that comes to areas 
     around gambling facilities could not be adequately funded. 
     Please once again convey to the Secretary our City's strong 
     and adamant opposition to the establishment of an Indian 
     Gambling facility here.

  The Secretary does not have to live with the community whose nature 
is changed overnight by a major Harrods gambling facility. He does not 
live in that community. He is not elected. He is not answerable to 
anybody. Yet he thinks he has the power to tell them what they have to 
do and dramatically change the nature of that town and the lives of the 
people who live there. No, sir.
  The Montgomery Advertiser wrote:

       Direct Federal negotiations with tribes without State 
     involvement would be an unjustifiably heavy handed imposition 
     of authority on Alabama. The decision whether to allow 
     gambling here is too significant a decision economically, 
     politically, socially to be made in the absence of extensive 
     State involvement. A casino in Wetumpka--not to mention the 
     others that would undoubtedly follow in other parts of the 
     State--has implications far too great to allow the critical 
     decisions to be reached in Washington. Alabama has to have a 
     hand in this high stakes game.

  Unelected and unaccountable, the Secretary of the Interior has issued 
regulations that would completely change the nature of beautiful 
Wetumpka, a bedroom community to Montgomery, AL, and a historic 
community in its own right, against its will. It is a shocking and 
amazing event, in my view.

[[Page S6532]]

  Clearly, the unmistakable sentiments of the Alabama public can be 
heard through these diverse voices. Not only would the regulations 
allow the tribe to obtain permission to engage in activity that is 
currently illegal under Alabama law, but the actual placement of the 
casino itself would result in the destruction of an important 
archaeological site that is listed on both the National Register of 
Historic Places and the Alabama Historical Commission and the Alabama 
Preservation Alliance's list of historic ``Places in Peril.''

  The site that is most frequently mentioned for development is known 
as Hickory Ground, and it is an important historical site that served 
as the capital of the National Council of the Creek Indians, and was 
visited by Andrew Jackson, and which contains graves and other 
important subsurface features.
  The site is, in fact, revered by other Creek Indian groups within the 
State and the Nation, as represented by the comments of Chief Erma Lois 
Davenport of the Star Clan of Muscogee Creeks in Goshen in Pike County 
who stated:

       Developers' bulldozers should not be allowed to destroy the 
     archaeological resources at the Creek site.

  What is ironic about the choice of this site by the tribe is that the 
land was acquired by the tribe in 1980 in the name of historic 
preservation in an attempt to prevent the previous landowner from 
developing the site for commercial purposes.
  In fact, the tribal owners of this site once wrote:

       The property will serve as a valuable resource for the 
     cultural enrichment of the Creek people. The site can serve 
     as a place where classes of Creek culture may be held. The 
     Creek people in Oklahoma have pride in heritage, and ties to 
     original homeland can only be enhanced. There is still an 
     existing Hickory Ground tribal town in Oklahoma. They will be 
     pleased to know their home in Alabama is being preserved.

  As you can see, should the tribe receive the ability to conduct class 
III gambling and construct a casino, Alabama will run the very real 
risk of losing an important part of its cultural heritage, as will 
Creek peoples throughout the country.
  It is for these reasons I am offering this amendment. We should not 
allow these gaming regulations to go into effect until we have had a 
final ruling of the court. We should not allow the Secretary of 
Interior to promulgate these regulations when he has an untenable 
conflict of interest. I think it is appropriate to put a 1-year 
moratorium on it.
  I am glad to have broad bipartisan support from Senators Graham, 
Reid, Bayh, Grams, Inhofe, Voinovich, Lugar, and Enzi.
  I ask unanimous consent that Senator Mack be added as a cosponsor of 
the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. L. Chafee). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. This is an important matter, Mr. President. I care 
about it. I believe it is important from a governmental point of view. 
The Chair understands, as a former Governor, the importance of 
protecting the interest of the State to make decisions the people of 
the State care about and not have them undermined or overruled by 
unelected bureaucrats in Washington.
  I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record a letter to me from 
the Attorney General of the State of Florida, Robert Butterworth, and a 
letter from the Attorney General of the State of Alabama detailing 
eloquently their objections to the Babbitt regulations.
  There being no objection, the letters were ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                 State of Florida,


                                   Office of Attorney General,

                                                    July 12, 2000.
     Re Amendment to H.R. 4578

     Hon. Jeff, Sessions,
     United States Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Sessions: This letter is presented in support 
     of the rider that you will be sponsoring on the Interior 
     Appropriations Bill preventing the Secretary of the Interior 
     from issuing procedures which would allow class III gambling 
     on Indian lands in the absence of a Tribal-State compact 
     during the fiscal year ending September 31, 2001. Such a 
     rider would be welcomed by the State of Florida and I 
     strongly support your effort to so restrict the actions of 
     the Secretary.
       In April of 1999, the Secretary promulgated final rules 
     allowing him to issue procedures which would license class 
     III gambling on Indian lands in a State where there has been 
     no Tribal-State compact negotiated as required by section 
     2710(d) of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. Florida and 
     Alabama immediately challenged those regulations asserting 
     that they are in excess of the authority delegated to the 
     Secretary by Congress in IGRA and that they are inconsistent 
     with IGRA's statutory scheme. In letters to various members 
     of Congress, the Secretary stated that he would allow the 
     litigation to conclude prior to finalizing any such 
     procedures through publication in the Federal Register. 
     During recent deliberations on a House measure similar to the 
     one you propose, the Secretary indicated that he would 
     forbear publication until after the completion of any 
     appeals.
       Such a promise by the Secretary is not legally binding on 
     this Secretary or any successor. If the trial court rules in 
     his favor and the States appeal, the State of Florida faces 
     the prospect of the Secretary publishing final procedures for 
     Florida Tribes thereby licensing full scale casino gambling 
     on Indian lands in our state while the appeal is pending. 
     Should the States prevail on appeal and the Secretary's 
     actions are determined to be invalid by either the Court of 
     Appeals or the Supreme Court, Florida will be faced with an 
     intolerable situation. The Tribes will have invested in and 
     opened full scale casinos which will then be deemed illegal 
     under IGRA. In the past, the federal government has been 
     either unable or unwilling to see that the requirements of 
     the law--IGRA--be faithfully enforced. Both the Seminole and 
     Miccosukee Tribes in Florida have for some time operated 
     uncompacted class III gambling operations with no response 
     from the responsible federal officials.
       I believe that your proposal is in order. The proposal is 
     consistent with the Secretary's position that the court 
     should be given an opportunity to rule on the validity of his 
     regulations prior to the implementation of any gambling 
     purporting to be licensed under them. By preventing the 
     Secretary from acting in the next fiscal year, the proposal 
     protects all concerned from a miscarriage of justice and will 
     inject the certainty necessary for proper relations among the 
     parties to this dispute.
       Thank you again for your continued attention to this very 
     important matter and I remain at your service to help in any 
     way I can.
           Sincerely,
                                            Robert A. Butterworth,
     Attorney General.
                                  ____

                                   Office of the Attorney General,


                                             State of Alabama,

                                                    July 11, 2000.

     Re Sessions-Graham Amendment to H.R. 4578

     Senator Jeff Sessions,
     United States Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Sessions: I write in support of the amendment 
     that you and Senator Graham have proposed to H.R. 4578, the 
     FY 2001 appropriations bill for the Department of the 
     Interior, which would prohibit the Secretary of the Interior 
     from using appropriated funds to publish Class III gaming 
     procedures under part 291 of title 25, Code of Federal 
     Regulations.
       As you know, substantial questions have been raised 
     regarding the Secretary's authority to promulgate Indian 
     gaming regulations. At the Notice and Comment stage, the 
     Attorneys General of several states, including Alabama, 
     pointed out that the Secretary lacked statutory authority to 
     promulgate procedures that would allow Indian tribes to 
     obtain gaming compacts from Interior rather than by 
     negotiation with the States. The Attorneys General also 
     pointed out that the Secretary had an incurable conflict of 
     interest that would preclude his acting as a mediator in 
     disputes between the tribes and the States because he is a 
     trustee for the tribes and owes them a fiduciary duty. After 
     the Secretary overrode these objections and promulgated 
     Indian gaming regulations, the States of Alabama and Florida 
     filed suit in federal district court to challenge the 
     Secretary's action. That lawsuit remains pending.
       The proposed rider preserves the status quo and allows the 
     federal courts to resolve the issues raised in the lawsuit 
     filed by Alabama and Florida. More particularly, the rider 
     precludes the Secretary from spending appropriated funds to 
     take the last step necessary to allow a tribe to conduct 
     Class III gaming over State objection. The Secretary should 
     withhold this final step until the Alabama and Florida 
     lawsuit has been resolved and all appeals are precluded.
       The rider will not only preserve the status quo, it will 
     preclude injury to the States and any tribe that may rely to 
     its detriment on Secretarial action that has not been 
     conclusively held to be statutorily authorized.
           Very truly yours,
                                                       Bill Pryor,
                                                 Attorney General.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator seek to make his amendment 
the pending amendment?
  Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent the amendment be made the 
pending amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There appears to 
be a sufficient second.

[[Page S6533]]

  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I rise today as I have in prior years to 
oppose the amendment proposed by my colleague, Senator Sessions, 
related to Indian gaming.
  I have had the privilege of serving on the Committee on Indian 
Affairs for 20 years now.
  Over the course of that time, I have learned a little bit about the 
state of Indian country, and the pervasive poverty which is both the 
remnant and result of too many years of failed Federal policies
  There was a time in our history when the native people of this land 
thrived.
  They lived in a state of optimum health.
  They took from the land and the water only those resources that were 
necessary to sustain their well-being.
  They were the first stewards of the environment, and those who later 
came here, found this continent in pristine condition because of their 
wise stewardship.
  Even after the advent of European contact, most tribal groups 
continued their subsistence way of life.
  Their culture and religion sustained them.
  They had sophisticated forms of government.
  It was so sophisticated and so clearly efficient and effective over 
many centuries, that our Founding Fathers could find no other better 
form of government upon which to structure the government of our new 
Nation.
  So they adopted the framework of the Iroquois Confederacy--a true 
democracy--and it is upon that foundation that we have built this great 
Nation.
  Unfortunately, there came a time in our history when those in power 
decided that the native people were an obstacle, and obstruction to the 
new American way of life and later, to the westward expansion of the 
United States.
  So our Nation embarked upon a course of terminating the Indians by 
exterminating them through war and the distribution of blankets 
infested with smallpox.
  We very nearly succeeded in wiping them out.
  Anthropologists and historians estimate that there were anywhere from 
10 to 50 million indigenous people occupying this continent at the time 
of European contact.
  By 1849, when the United States finally declared and end to the era 
known as the Indian Wars, we had managed to so effectively decimate the 
Indian population that there were a bare 250,000 native people 
remaining.
  Having failed in that undertaking, we next proceeded to round up 
those who survived, forcibly marched them away from their traditional 
lands and across the country.
  Not surprisingly, these forced marches--and there were many of these 
``trails of tears''--further reduced the Indian population because many 
died along the way.
  Later, we found the most inhospitable areas of the country on which 
to relocate the native people, and expected them to scratch out a 
living there.
  Of course, we made some promises along the way:
  That in exchange for the cession by the tribes of millions of acres 
of land to the United States, we would provide them with education and 
health care and shelter.
  We told them, often in solemn treaties, that these new lands would be 
theirs in perpetuity--that their traditional way of life would be 
protected from encroachment by non-Indians and that we would recognize 
their inherent right as sovereigns to retain all powers of government 
not relinquished.
  Their rights to hunt and fish and gather food, to use the waters that 
were necessary to sustain life on a reservation and the natural 
resources, were also recognized as preserved in perpetuity to their 
use.
  But over the years, these promises and others were broken by our 
National Government, and our vacillations in policies--of which there 
were many--left most reservation communities in economic ruin.
  It might interest my colleagues in the Senate to know that the 
Government of the United States entered into 800 treaties with Indian 
nations, sovereign nations. Of the 800 treaties, 470 were filed. I 
presume they are still filed in some of our cabinets. Three hundred 
seventy were ratified. Of the 370 treaties ratified by this Senate, we 
found it necessary to violate provisions in every single one of them.
  The cumulative effects of our treatment of the native people of this 
land have proven to be nearly fatal to them.
  Poverty in Indian country is unequaled anywhere else in the United 
States.
  The desperation and despair which inevitably accompanies the 
pervasive economic devastation that is found in Indian country accounts 
for the astronomically high rates of suicide and mortality from 
diseases.
  Within this context, along comes an opportunity for some tribal 
governments to explore the economic potential of gaming.
  It doesn't prove to be a panacea, but it begins to bring in revenues 
that tribal communities haven't had before.
  And then the State of California enters the picture by bringing a 
legal action against the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians--a case that 
ultimately makes it to the Supreme Court.
  Consistent with 150 years of Federal law and constitutional 
principles, the Supreme Court rules that the State of California cannot 
exercise its jurisdiction on Indian lands to regulate gaming 
activities.
  This is in May 1987, and in the aftermath of the Court's ruling, 
attention turns to the Congress.
  Mr. President, it was now in the 100th session of the Congress that I 
found myself serving as the primary sponsor of the Indian Gaming 
Regulatory Act of 1988.
  There were many hearings and many drafts leading up to the 
formulation of the bill that was ultimately signed into law.
  Intially, our inclination was to follow the well-established and 
time-honored model of Federal Indian law--which was to provide for an 
exclusive Federal presence in the regulation of gaming activities on 
Indian lands.
  Such a framework would be consistent with constitutional principles, 
with the majority of our Federal statutes addressing Indian country, 
and would reflect the fact that as a general proposition--it is Federal 
law, along with tribal law, that governs most all of what may transpire 
in Indian country.
  But representatives of several States came to the Congress--demanding 
a role in the regulation of Indian gaming--and ultimately, we 
acquiesced to those demands.
  We selected a mechanism that has become customary in the dealings 
amongst sovereign governments.
  This mechanism--a compact between a State government and a tribal 
government--would be recognized by the Federal Government as the 
agreement between the two sovereigns as to how the conduct of gaming on 
Indian lands would proceed.
  This Federal recognition of the agreement would be accompanied when 
the Secretary of the Department of the Interior approved the tribal-
State compact.
  In an effort to assure that the parties would come to the table and 
negotiate a compact in good faith, and in order to provide for the 
possibility that the parties might not reach agreement, we also 
provided a means by which the parties could seek the involvement of a 
Federal district court, and if ordered by the court, could avail 
themselves of a mediation process.
  That judicial remedy and the potential for a mediated solution when 
the parties find themselves at an impasse has subsequently been 
frustrated by a ruling of the Supreme Court upholding the 11th 
amendment immunity of the several States.
  Thus, while there are some who have consistently maintained that 
sovereign immunity is an anachronism in contemporary times, in this 
area at least, the States still jealously guard their sovereign 
immunity to suit in the courts of another sovereign.
  In so doing, the States have presented us with a clear conflict, 
which we have been trying to resolve for several years.
  Although 24 of the 28 States that have Indian reservations within 
their boundaries have now entered into 159 tribal-State compacts with 
148 tribal governments, there are a few States in which tribal-state 
compacts have not been reached.

[[Page S6534]]

  And the conflict we are challenged with resolving is how to 
accommodate the desire of these States to be involved in the regulation 
of Indian gaming and their equally strong desire to avoid any process 
which might enable the parties to overcome an impasse in their 
negotiations.
  The Secretary of the Interior is to be commended in his efforts to 
achieve what the Congress has been unable to accomplish in the past few 
years.
  Following the Supreme Court's 11th amendment ruling, the Secretary 
took a reasonable course of action.
  He published a notice of proposed rulemaking, inviting comments on 
his authority to promulgate regulations for an alternative process to 
the tribal-State compacting process established in the Indian Gaming 
Regulatory Act.
  Thereafter, he followed the next appropriate steps under the 
Administrative Procedures Act, inviting the input of all interested 
parties in the promulgation of regulations.
  When the Senate acted to prohibit him from proceeding in this time-
honored fashion, he brought together representatives of the National 
Governors Association, the National Association of Attorneys General, 
and the tribal governments, to explore whether a consensus could be 
reached on these and other matters.
  In the meantime, my colleagues propose an amendment that would 
prohibit the Secretary from proceeding with the regulatory process.
  Once again, there have been no hearings on this proposal--no public 
consideration of this formulation--no input from the governments 
involved and directly affected by this proposal.
  Last year, the Secretary of the Department of the Interior made clear 
his intention to recommend a veto of the Interior appropriations bill 
should this provision be adopted by the Senate and approved in House-
Senate conference.
  I suggest that it is unlikely that the Secretary's position has 
changed in any material respect--particularly in light of all that he 
has undertaken to accomplish, including frank discussion amongst the 
State and tribal governments.
  As one who initiated a similar discussion process several years ago, 
I am more than a little familiar with the issues that require 
resolution.
  However, in the intervening years, court rulings have clarified and 
put to rest many of the issues that were in contention in that earlier 
process.
  I have continued to talk to Governors and attorneys general and 
tribal government leaders on a weekly, if not daily basis, and I 
believe, as the Secretary does, that the potential is there for the 
State and tribal governments to come to some mutually acceptable 
resolution of the matters that remain outstanding between them.
  I believe the Secretary's process should be allowed to proceed.
  I also believe that pre-empting that process through an amendment to 
this bill could well serve as the death knell for what is ultimately 
the only viable way to accomplish a final resolution.
  The alternative is to proceed in this piecemeal fashion each year--an 
amendment each year to prohibit the Secretary from taking any action 
that would bridge the gap in the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act that was 
created by the Court's ruling and which will inevitably discourage the 
State and tribal governments from fashioning solutions.
  This is not the way to do the business of the people.
  There are those in this body who are opposed to gaming.
  As many of my colleagues know, I count myself in their numbers. I am 
opposed to gaming.
  Hawaii and Utah are the only two States in our Union that criminally 
prohibit all forms of gaming, and I support that prohibition in my 
State.
  But I have walked many miles in Indian country, and I have seen the 
poverty, and the desperation and despair in the eyes of many Indian 
parents and their children.
  I have looked into the eyes of the elders--eyes that express great 
sadness.
  I have met young Indian people who are now dead because they saw no 
hope for the future.
  And I have seen what gaming has enabled tribal governments to do, for 
the first time--to build hospitals and clinics, to repair and construct 
safe schools, to provide jobs or the adults and educational 
opportunities for the youth--and perhaps most importantly, to engender 
a real optimism that there can be and will be--the prospects for a 
brighter future.
  It is for these reasons, and because of their rights as sovereigns to 
pursue activities that hold the potential for making their tribal 
economies become both viable and stable over the long term, that I 
support Indian gaming.
  And it is for these reasons, that I must, again this year, strongly 
oppose the efforts of my colleagues to take from Indian country, what 
unfortunately has become the single ray of hope for the future that 
native people have had for a very long time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama is recognized.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I just have a minute and then I will 
yield to Senator Campbell.
  Mr. President, Alabama has one very small tribe of a few hundred 
people down at the south end of the State, near my home of Mobile. This 
land is around Montgomery, 150 miles further north, and there are no 
Indians living on it, where they want to build this casino.
  The tribe is a group of the finest people I know. The chief tribal 
administrator, Eddie Tullis, is a long time friend of mine. I admire 
him. I admire what they have done. They have a bingo parlor that has 
been successful and is doing well. They have a motel and a restaurant 
that I eat at frequently. I love the people who are there. I care about 
them. Eddie Tullis recently said in the paper: Jeff is OK. He is just 
letting his morality get in the way of his good judgment.
  I didn't know whether I should take that as a compliment, or what.
  But my view is simply this: I don't think IGRA would have passed if 
the people in the Senate and the House thought that if a State said to 
the tribe: You can have horse racing, you can have dog racing, you can 
have bingo, as we have in Alabama, but we are not going to remove 
casino gambling from the State.
  That is the question I have.
  The Secretary of Interior is talking about stepping into this dispute 
and taking the position that he alone can decide what is done.
  I care about the fine Indian people who are members of the Poarch 
Band in Atmore, AL. I have visited that area many times. I know quite a 
number of them personally. This isn't a personal thing. I think they 
understand it. It is matter of law. I was former Attorney General of 
the State of Alabama. I don't believe this is good policy.
  We ought to pass this amendment.
  I see Senator Campbell, whom I respect highly. I know he wants to 
speak on the matter.
  I yield to Senator Campbell.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Colorado.
  Mr. CAMPBELL. Mr. President, I thank my friend.
  Mr. President, certainly there are Members of this Chamber who are 
downright against gaming. I understand that. As Senator Inouye 
mentioned, even his State has no gaming. But I do not believe that is 
what this debate is about. For me, very frankly, it is about whether we 
keep our word or we do not keep our word.
  The Senator mentioned that literally for every treaty ever signed by 
the Federal Government, Indian tribes ended up losing by virtue of the 
Government breaking the treaty.
  No one speaks more eloquently than Senator Inouye about the 
destructive forces that have been heaped upon American Indians at the 
hands of the U.S. Government. I think he does it very eloquently 
because of his own background. He is a man of great bravery, who just 
received America's highest award. He is a Medal of Honor recipient. Yet 
he fought in a war during which his own people were interned in camps 
at the hands of the Federal Government. Certainly, Senator Inouye is 
held in the highest esteem throughout Indian country, as he is in this 
body.
  But I think many of our colleagues ought to study the old treaties, 
even though most of them were broken--not all--by the Federal 
Government. Indian people have a very special relationship with the 
Federal Government. It would do us well if we read some of the old 
promises we made and didn't keep.
  The Senator talked a little about the problems we have on 
reservations. But

[[Page S6535]]

I don't think it is really understood by people who spend most of their 
time, as we say, ``outside the reservation.'' You ought to go to Pine 
Ridge, SD, where unemployment is 70 percent, usually. It is rarely less 
than 50 percent. It is sometimes higher than 70 percent--where every 
third young lady tries suicide before she is out of her teenage years; 
and young men, too. Too many of them succeed.
  With fetal alcohol syndrome compared to the national average, 1 out 
of every 50,000 babies born in America suffers from fetal alcohol 
syndrome. For those who do not know what that is, that is a disease 
they get when they are inside of their mother because their mother 
drinks. It is about 1 out of 50,000 nationwide. But in Pine Ridge, SD, 
in some years it is 1 out of 4 babies. It is a disease that is totally 
preventable. Yet it is incurable once they have it. They get it from 
their mother drinking too much. They are institutionalized for life, at 
a huge cost in terms of human tragedy and the American taxpayer.
  If you had those numbers in any town in America--whether it is the 
high school dropout rate, or the suicide rate, whether it is death by 
violent actions, whether it is fetal alcohol syndrome, or anything 
else--if you had anything near that in the outside culture, it would be 
considered devastating to that community. Believe me, people would be 
here on the floor clamoring for the Senate to do something about it.
  There are very few things that work on Indian reservations that try 
to bring new money to the reservation.
  In 1988, when Senator Inouye was the leader on the Senate side on the 
Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act, and I was on the House side as one of 
the people involved originally in the writing of that bill, certainly 
then none of us knew that it would grow to such proportions. But 
clearly it has done some good. It is not all good. Obviously, there are 
stresses and pressures. When you increase any kind of economic activity 
in a local community, there are more people on the highways. There are 
more people in the schools and parks. We understand that.

  If you look at the outside of it in terms of what it has done to help 
youngsters with scholarships, what it has done to help senior citizens 
who had no other income, and what it has done to provide money for 
tribes that have been able to invest that money into other enterprises, 
it is overwhelmingly positive.
  I have to tell you that it seems that every year we have to fight 
this fight. Almost every year, somebody comes down here with a 
microphone who wants to take a hit at the little opportunities Indians 
have in Indian country because of gaming.
  I point out, my gosh, that I live on the Southern Ute Reservation in 
Colorado 150 yards from a tribal casino. I see who works it. I see if 
there is any increase in crime--or other kinds of wild accusations we 
sometimes hear on the Senate floor. Believe me, they are mostly wrong.
  First of all, the majority of people who work in the Indian 
reservations are not Indian. At least 50 percent in most of the casinos 
are not Indians. It has helped whole communities. They pay income taxes 
just as anybody else--Indian people and non-Indian. It has put revenue 
into the coffers of the Federal Government and State governments.
  Under Federal law, in 1988, as you know, tribes were limited to the 
types of gaming allowed under the laws of the States in which they 
reside. Some States simply don't allow gaming at all. Therefore, those 
tribes in those States can't do it. We made sure that the tribes were 
factored in in 1988. In my own State, tribes are limited to just slot 
machines and low-stakes table games.
  The State of our friend from New Mexico has a little higher limit. 
Other States have higher limits. But it is with the approval of the 
States under a contractual agreement between the States and the tribes.
  In Utah, there is no gambling whatsoever. Therefore, the tribes 
cannot have any form of gaming.
  The intent of the Federal Indian Gaming Act was that in States where 
gaming is limited or prohibited, tribes would be similarly limited or 
prohibited. It was an agreement made with the States. They were not 
locked out. They were completely included in the process and certainly 
in the dialog when we wrote this bill in the first place.
  There are many tribes and States that sat down and worked out their 
agreements that are binding and effective.
  We often hear about an isolated case where something is not working 
very well. But often we don't study all of the overwhelmingly positive 
effects.
  There are some Governors whom we know who have refused to negotiate 
at all with the tribes in their States, leaving those tribes without 
the ability to legally conduct gaming activities. That wasn't assumed. 
We passed the IGRA Act in 1988. We didn't think there would be some 
Governors who simply wouldn't negotiate and would stonewall and not 
come to the table. But there have been some.
  We should remember how we got here.
  In the wake of the 1987 Cabazon decision by the Supreme Court which 
held that State gaming laws did not apply to Indian gaming conducted on 
Indian lands, States clamored for a role in the writing of IGRA and 
regulating of the gaming on Indian lands. They got it.
  Congress responded in 1988 by enacting the Indian Gaming Regulatory 
Act which provided an unprecedented opportunity for States to 
participate in the conduct and regulation of Indian gaming conducted 
entirely on Indian lands.
  Reverse that a little bit. Do you think Indian tribes are in the loop 
or are able to participate in the conduct of regulation of State 
activities that are off Indian lands? They don't have the voice that 
States do within tribal governments.
  That act was a compromise and for the first time gave the State 
governments a role in what gaming would occur on Indian lands. While 
Congress intended State participation, we intended to participate but 
we never intended that the States' refusal to negotiate would serve as 
an effective veto by any State over a tribe's right to conduct such 
gaming.
  Today's debate is about whether a Governor or State can limit the 
type of activity of certain groups simply by refusing to negotiate. 
That is unfair. I think it is un-American.
  As my colleagues know, I happen to be from the West. Most westerners 
are strong States rights people. We continually harangue the Federal 
Government for eroding States rights. We are always down here over 
business development or use of public lands. If it is good enough for a 
tribe to have to negotiate, then it should also be good enough for the 
State to have to negotiate, as was implied in IGRA.
  While I believe that each State's public policy should determine the 
scope of gaming in that State, I also believe the current state of the 
law gives States what is in reality a veto over tribes. That is 
unacceptable.
  I should point out to my colleagues that in many cases non-Indian 
gaming is promoted and even operated by State governments, such as 
State lotteries. It is an element of competition that should not be 
lost on this body. No one wants to share the revenue if they think they 
can make it all. I understand that. That is American business. But I 
believe some States have refused to bargain simply in order to preserve 
that monopoly on gaming.
  To begin to break the stalemate, the Interior Department proposed a 
process based on the IGRA statute. Senator Inouye alluded to that. 
Though the process may need refinement, I don't believe the Secretary 
should be stopped from developing alternative approaches to this 
impasse.
  I believe it is in the interests of all parties that the Federal 
courts be allowed to render final, binding decisions to clarify the 
authority of the Secretary. That has not been finished. That is ongoing 
now. Adoption of this amendment would certainly short circuit that 
process.
  By the way, there has been a similar amendment already rejected by 
the House of Representatives. I think it will unduly interfere with the 
litigation that is now at hand and deny the parties the clarification 
they need.
  Last year, Secretary Babbitt made a commitment to Chairman Gorton, to 
the Senate as a whole, to refrain from implementing any further 
regulations until the Federal courts, including the

[[Page S6536]]

appellate level, rule on the merits of the legal issues involved. That 
litigation is now endangered by this amendment, which prohibits the 
Secretary from taking any action to implement those regulations, 
including the actions that will allow the matter to ``ripen'' and allow 
it to be pursued to a conclusion.
  Coming from a Western State, I am as supportive as anyone in this 
body of States rights, but those who say this process ``overrides the 
Governors'' are wrong.
  Under the proposal, if a State objects to a decision made by the 
Interior Secretary, that State can challenge the decision in Federal 
court.
  For those who fear the Department is acting without oversight I point 
out that Congress has the authority to review any proposed regulations 
before they take effect.
  As the proposal comes before the authorizing committees, any new 
regulations will get a careful review and if they are found wanting, 
they will not pass.
  I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment and allow the 
process to work.
  Mr. President, I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bennett). The Senator from Washington.


                           Amendment No. 3790

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I believe Senator Sessions is willing to 
withdraw the rollcall on this amendment. It will be accepted by voice 
vote.
  Also, I have a unanimous consent request with respect to the votes 
that have already been ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, that is correct. First, we are asking 
today in this amendment basically what the Secretary has agreed to. He 
has agreed, to the House but not to us, that he would hold off until 
after the appeal, and this 1-year delay would cover the circumstance in 
which we are likely to have a new Secretary come January--whether 
President Bush or Gore is elected. This may not be binding on the new 
one. It will guarantee the status quo until we get a court ruling.
  In light of that and the discussions I have had, I vitiate my request 
for the yeas and nays and ask for a voice vote.
  Mr. CAMPBELL. I have no objection to the voice vote. I will be on the 
losing side, but when we get to conference, I will have a lot more to 
say about it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 3790) was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. NICKLES. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent, notwithstanding 
the DOD concept, that the votes occur in the following order, with no 
second-degree amendments in order prior to the votes, with 2 minutes 
prior to each vote for explanation in relation to the Durbin amendment 
on the subject of grazing and the Inhofe amendment on the subject of 
the National Endowment.


                        CHANGE OF VOTE--NO. 169

  Mr. REID. Reserving the right to object, on rollcall vote 169, I was 
recorded as voting yea and I voted nay. Therefore, I ask unanimous 
consent the official record be corrected. This will in no way affect 
the outcome of the vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. REED. Reserving the right to object, on rollcall vote No. 169, I 
was recorded as voting nay and I voted yea. Therefore, I ask unanimous 
consent that the official record be corrected to accurately reflect my 
vote. This will in no way affect the outcome of the vote.
  Mr. LEVIN. Reserving the right to object, do I understand that the 
unanimous consent request would bring the Senate back to the previous 
order, immediately after those two votes?
  Mr. GORTON. The Senator is correct. Basically, we will have two 
rollcall votes now and then go to DOD. I understand the leaders were 
attempting to arrange to finish Interior on Monday.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request by the 
Senator from Washington?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request of the 
Senators from Nevada and Rhode Island?
  Without objection, their requests are so ordered.


                       Vote on Amendment No. 3810

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I don't believe the Senator from Illinois 
is available.
  Mr. REID. Why don't we waive our 2 minutes? We heard from the 
Senators previously.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time is yielded back. The question is on 
agreeing to the amendment No. 3810. The yeas and nays have been 
ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The result was announced--yeas 38, nays 62, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 175 Leg.]

                                YEAS--38

     Akaka
     Bayh
     Biden
     Boxer
     Bryan
     Chafee, L.
     Cleland
     Collins
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Graham
     Harkin
     Hollings
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Snowe
     Torricelli
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                                NAYS--62

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Baucus
     Bennett
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cochran
     Conrad
     Coverdell
     Craig
     Crapo
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Enzi
     Feinstein
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gorton
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hutchinson
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Kerrey
     Kyl
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Voinovich
     Warner
  The amendment (No. 3810) was rejected.
  Mr. GORTON. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Brownback). Under the previous order, 
there are 2 minutes equally divided prior to a vote on the Inhofe 
amendment.
  The Senator from Nevada.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the two managers of the Defense 
authorization bill, after we complete this vote, in an effort for 
people to understand what is going on, would like to be able to tell 
Members who have amendments to offer to that legislation what the 
sequence would be. Under the order that is now in effect, Senator Byrd 
will be first.
  I think it would be appropriate if Senator Warner and Senator Levin 
could give us some indication how the next amendments would flow so we 
know what happens after this vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished leader.
  We are here to try to convenience the Senate tonight. After this next 
vote, under the order, we go to the defense authorization bill. There 
are only four amendments scheduled in addition to Mr. Byrd's amendment. 
That would make five.
  Senator Levin and I will accommodate the Members who are going to be 
debating tonight. If we can get into some short meeting with them, in 
between these votes right now, perhaps at the end we can announce a UC 
request sequencing the four amendments. That is my intention.
  Mr. LEVIN. If the Senator would yield, there is just one more vote 
now scheduled?
  Mr. WARNER. That is correct.
  Mr. LEVIN. Then we would go to Senator Byrd, who is in the UC, 
dispose of that amendment. Then the other four that are listed are not 
sequenced yet.
  Mr. WARNER. That is correct.
  Mr. LEVIN. We would attempt to sequence them. If we fail, as far as I 
am concerned, then it's whoever gets recognized first. But we are going 
to make a real effort to sequence those amendments and then vote on 
them in the morning.

  Mr. WARNER. Yes. Mr. President, we will try to reduce the times so 
that we are not here for a lengthy period.

[[Page S6537]]

  Mr. REID. The Senators involved are Senators Feingold, Durbin, 
Harkin, and Kerry of Massachusetts.
  Mr. LEVIN. But there are others involved in those amendments.


                           Amendment No. 3812

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there are 2 minutes 
equally divided prior to a vote on the Inhofe amendment.
  Who yields time?
  The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, this is a very simple, straightforward, 
easy-to-understand amendment. It merely takes $7.3 million and puts it 
into the Indian Health Services for diabetes. It does take that out of 
the National Endowment for the Arts, but all it does is take it out of 
the increase. Last year they had $97 million. They are increasing it 
this year to $105 million. All I am asking is to take that $7 million, 
instead of increasing the National Endowment for the Arts, and to put 
it into the Indian Health Services' diabetes program.
  I am prejudiced because I come from the State that has in terms of 
percentages, the largest Indian population. However, I can tell you 
this, that of the national Indian population, 12.2 percent of them have 
diabetes because of the environment in which they live. It is an 
unhealthy environment. There are cases where they have all kinds of 
infections that set in where they are unable to keep from having 
amputations. So it is a very serious thing.
  You will hear from the other side an argument that says we are 
hurting the National Endowment for the Arts. I want Senators to 
remember, when you cast your vote, this does not take any money away 
from the allocation they had last year; it merely freezes that 
allocation in for the coming year. Even with the increase of $30 
million that is currently in this program, that still is less than 10 
percent of the amount of money that is spent for research on cancer and 
AIDS.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  Who yields time?
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this bill includes a $143 million increase 
for the Indian Health Service, an amount much larger than the entire 
appropriations for the National Endowment for the Arts. Due to the work 
of Senator Domenici, there is a $30 million-a-year entitlement for the 
very subject of diabetes control for Indians that is already a part of 
the funding of Indian programs in the United States.
  The National Endowment for the Arts, which has abided by all of the 
restrictions put on it over the last several years by this body, has 
not had an increase since 1992. This is a fair and modest increase for 
the National Endowment for the Arts. It ought to be rewarded for 
following the commands of Congress, itself. The money is not needed for 
the purposes of the amendment because that function is already very 
generously supported both in this bill and through an entitlement.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 3812. The yeas and nays 
have been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 27, nays 73, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 176 Leg.]

                                YEAS--27

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Coverdell
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Gramm
     Grams
     Hagel
     Helms
     Hutchinson
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Thomas
     Thurmond

                                NAYS--73

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Bryan
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Chafee, L.
     Cleland
     Cochran
     Collins
     Conrad
     Craig
     Crapo
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Frist
     Gorton
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hollings
     Hutchison
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Smith (OR)
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thompson
     Torricelli
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden
  The amendment (No. 3812) was rejected.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. BYRD. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                      Unanimous Consent Agreement

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the only 
remaining first-degree amendments in order to the Interior bill other 
than the managers' package of amendments be the following and subject 
to relevant second-degree amendments:
  Boxer on pesticides;
  Bryan on timber sales;
  Nickles on monuments language;
  Torricelli on UPAR;
  Torricelli on highlands;
  Reed of Rhode Island on weatherization;
  Bingaman on forest health;
  Bingaman on Ramah Navajo;
  Feingold on Park Service;
  And Domenici on Rio Grande water.
  I further ask unanimous consent that on Monday, July 17, the Senate 
resume the Interior bill at a time to be determined by the majority 
leader, after consultation with the minority leader, and the amendments 
listed above be offered and debated during Monday's session, other than 
the Feingold amendment which will be debated on Tuesday with 15 minutes 
under the control of Senator Feingold and 15 minutes under the control 
of Senator Bingaman regarding the Navajo amendment; further, with 
consent granted, to lay aside each amendment where deemed necessary by 
the two leaders.
  I also ask unanimous consent that all amendments and debate be 
concluded during Monday's session and the votes occur at 9:45 a.m. on 
Tuesday, with 2 minutes prior to each vote for explanation, with the 
bill being advanced to third reading and passage to occur after 
disposition of these amendments, all without any intervening action or 
debate. Further, I ask unanimous consent that additional relevant 
second degrees be in order if necessary to the first degree after 
disposition of any offered second-degree amendment on Tuesday.
  Finally, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate insist on its 
amendment, request a conference with the House, and the Chair be 
authorized to appoint conferees on the part of the Senate, which will 
be the entire Interior Subcommittee.
  Mr. REID. Reserving the right to object, Senator Boxer has instructed 
me to make sure she has an up-or-down vote on her amendment. It is one 
that is in order. She wants to make sure that if there is a second 
degree she has a right to reoffer her amendment. She is willing to take 
a voice vote. She wants to make sure there is a vote on her amendment, 
and I ask the Chair if that would be permissible under this consent 
agreement.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. That is correct.
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, in light of this agreement, there will be 
no further votes this evening. The next vote will occur in a stacked 
sequence beginning at 9:30 a.m. tomorrow. The Senate will begin the 
death tax repeal at 8:30 a.m. tomorrow, Thursday morning.
  Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I want to comment briefly on the 
Senate's adoption of the Domenici substitute amendment to the Craig 
amendment regarding the President's Roadless Initiative. I was unable 
to be on the floor earlier today when the Craig amendment and Domenici 
substitute amendment were considered.
  First, let me say that I was a cosponsor of the underlying Craig 
amendment and I continue to share his concern about blatant Federal 
Advisory Committee Act violations by this administration in the 
development of their Roadless Initiative. In any case, I don't believe 
``one-size-fits-all'' proposals like the President's Roadless 
Initiative, hatched in the halls of bureaucracy in Washington, D.C., 
can be any substitute for sound land management policies developed in 
collaboration with people at the local level. Oregonians, if given a 
chance, have proven

[[Page S6538]]

time and again that they can be better stewards of the land than 
federal bureaucrats.
  I understand that Senator Craig agreed to the Domenici substitute in 
part because this matter of FACA violations will be considered by the 
courts this August. I trust that the Congress will have an opportunity 
to review this matter this session if the courts fail to do so, and I 
praise Senator Craig for his continued leadership on this important 
issue.
  With that said, I wanted to add my voice to those who spoke earlier 
in favor of the Domenici substitute amendment that seeks to address the 
growing threat of catastrophic wildfire in areas of urban-wildland 
interface. A century of fire suppression followed by years of inactive 
forest management under this administration have left our National 
Forest system overstocked with underbrush and unnaturally dense tree 
stands that are now at risk of catastrophic wildfire. The GAO recently 
found that at least 39 million acres of the National Forest system are 
at high risk for catastrophic fire. According to the Forest Service, 
twenty-six million acres are at risk from insects and disease 
infestations as well. The built up fuel loads in these forests create 
abnormally hot wildfires that are extremely difficult to control. To 
prevent catastrophic fire and widespread insect infestation and disease 
outbreaks, these forests need to be treated. The underbrush needs to be 
removed. The forests must be thinned to allow the remaining trees to 
grow more rapidly and more naturally. This year's fires in New Mexico 
have given us a preview of what is to come throughout our National 
Forest system if we continue this administration's policy of passive 
forest management.
  I believe the Domenici amendment will help this reluctant 
administration to face up to this growing threat to homes, wildlife, 
and watersheds. I commend Senator Domenici and the bipartisan group of 
Senators who worked very hard to craft this compromise.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I am pleased to rise today in strong 
support of H.R. 4578, the Interior and related agencies appropriations 
bill for FY 2001.
  As a member of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee and the full 
Appropriations Committee, I appreciate the difficult task before the 
distinguished subcommittee chairman and ranking member to balance the 
diverse priorities funded in this bill--from our public lands, to major 
Indian programs and agencies, energy conservation and research, and the 
Smithsonian and federal arts agencies. They have done a masterful job 
meeting important program needs within existing spending caps.
  The pending bill provides $15.6 billion in new budget authority and 
$10.1 billion in new outlays to fund Department of Interior and related 
agencies. When outlays from prior-year budget authority and other 
completed actions are taken into account the Senate bill totals $15.5 
billion in BA and $15.6 billion in outlays for FY 2001. The Senate bill 
is at its Section 302(b) allocation for BA and $2 million under the 
Subcommittee's revised 302(b) allocation in outlays.
  I would particularly like to thank Senator Gorton and Senator Byrd 
for their commitment to Indian programs in this year's Interior and 
Related Agencies appropriation bill. They have included increases of 
$144 million for Bureau of Indian Affairs construction, $110 million 
for the Indian Health service and $65 million for the operation of 
Indian programs.
  I commend the subcommittee chairman and ranking member for bringing 
this important measure to the floor within the 302(b) allocation. I 
urge the adoption of the bill, and ask for unanimous consent that the 
Budget Committee scoring of the bill be printed in the Record at this 
point.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

 H.R. 4578, INTERIOR APPROPRIATIONS, 2001, SPENDING COMPARISONS--SENATE-
                              REPORTED BILL
               [Fiscal year 2001, in millions of dollars]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                     General
                                     Purpose     Mandatory      Total
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Senate-reported bill:
  Budget authority...............       15,474           59       15,533
  Outlays........................       15,509           70       15,579
Senate 302(b) allocation:
  Budget authority...............       15,474           59       15,533
  Outlays........................       15,511           70       15,581
2000 level:
  Budget authority...............       14,769           59       14,828
  Outlays........................       14,833           83       14,916
President's request:
  Budget authority...............       16,286           59       16,345
  Outlays........................       15,982           70       16,052
House-passed bill:
  Budget authority...............       14,723           59       14,782
  Outlays........................       15,224           70       15,294
 
 SENATE-REPORTED BILL COMPARED TO
 
Senate 302(b) allocation:
  Budget authority...............  ...........  ...........  ...........
  Outlays........................           -2  ...........           -2
2000 level:
  Budget authority...............          705  ...........          705
  Outlays........................          676          -13          663
President's request:
  Budget authority...............         -812  ...........         -812
  Outlays........................         -473  ...........         -473
House-passed bill:
  Budget authority...............          751  ...........          751
  Outlays........................          285  ...........          285
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note.--Details may not add to totals due to rounding. Totals adjusted
  for consistency with scorekeeping conventions.

  

                          ____________________