[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 55 (Thursday, March 29, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4140-S4145]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      THE GREAT AMERICAN OUTDOORS

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I wish to make remarks about three 
matters of importance to the great American outdoors, all of which have 
been happening this week and which are important for our country.
  First, I wish to comment on a provision the Senate struck from the 
Iraq supplemental appropriations bill this morning when we were 
considering it. We struck it in a procedural move based upon a point of 
order I raised. The provision was a billboard amnesty proposal that was 
inserted into the middle of legislation that was supposed to be in 
support of our troops.
  I called it a billboard amnesty proposal because it suddenly would 
have treated as legal billboard sites that have been illegal for 40 
years and effectively would have gutted the Highway Beautification Act 
of 1965, which is one of the legacies of a former First Lady, Lady Bird 
Johnson.
  I think this deserves a little attention and a little explanation 
before we leave it because it was a full-scale assault on one of the 
most important pieces of legislation that helps keep our country 
beautiful at a time when we are growing and struggling to preserve open 
spaces.
  There are three problems with this billboard amnesty proposal, as I 
saw it. First, the proposal would have done for the billboard industry 
something the law doesn't allow for churches, doesn't allow for 
schools, doesn't allow for businesses, doesn't allow for any other 
structures that since 1965 have been on illegal or nonconforming sites.
  This is what was happening. In 1965, at the urging of President 
Johnson and Mrs. Johnson, the Nation decided it would restrict 
billboards, both in terms of their location and their size. As we often 
do with legislation, we looked ahead and said the billboards could not 
be located in some places and had to be within a certain size. As the 
interstate system grew across the country, much of it is relatively 
free of large billboards or has a limited number of billboards.
  The question then arose about what do we do about the billboards and 
signs that were already up prior to 1965. The decision was made by the 
Congress at that time to say we will leave those signs up, we will 
grandfather them in. As long as they stay up, they are fine, but when 
they fall down, they will be gone. In other words, we have been waiting 
for 40 years for those sites to die a natural death. That was the 
compromise in 1965. Many of these billboards are large billboards and 
are in places we don't want--rural areas, scenic areas across the 
country--but that was the decision we made.
  The problem with this legislation, as it came into the supplemental 
appropriations bill for troops, is it said suddenly all the billboards 
in 13 States that are on sites where it would be illegal to put a new 
billboard were suddenly legal. In other words, it was instant amnesty, 
overnight amnesty for illegal billboards.
  There are a lot of billboards like this. For example, in the State of 
Tennessee, there are nearly 3,000 billboards on sites where they would 
not be permitted under current law, but when those billboards fall 
down, they can't ever put them back up. We have known that for 40 
years. In North Carolina, there are probably 2,600 illegal sites, in 
the sense that when the billboards wear out, fall down, act of God 
knocks them out, they can't be put back up. In South Carolina, there 
are 2,200; in Florida, 6,000; in Oklahoma, 1,400; and in Alabama, 912. 
In a moment, I will put in the list of those in each State.
  What the provision that we struck from the bill said was, because 
there were some hurricanes down South, in all these places where 
billboards on illegal sites were knocked down by a hurricane, they 
could be put back up. That raises a lot of questions. What is the 
difference between a billboard being destroyed by a hurricane and being 
destroyed by lightning, or it becoming water damaged, or it falling 
down because it is rotting, or some other act of God?
  The whole idea in 1965 was when the billboards wore out, or an act of 
God destroyed them, they were gone. They were gone. We have been 
waiting for 40 years for that to happen. So in comes the billboard 
lobby and, suddenly, we have first a proposal to exempt all these 
billboards across the country--instant billboard amnesty for all the 
billboards in every State--even though the hurricanes were in the 
South.
  Finally, that original proposal from the billboard industry got 
narrowed down to 13 States, which included Tennessee--we don't have a 
lot of hurricanes in Tennessee--and Kentucky. Hurricanes in Kentucky?
  I think what is happening here is the billboard lobby is doing its 
best to reclaim all those billboards that have been illegal for 40 
years by saying because of this hurricane or that drought or that 
lightning strike, suddenly we want them rebuilt in every State. That is 
a pretty good thing for all the billboard companies, because by and 
large they have bought them up from all the small farmers. They weren't 
worth very much because the owners knew when they fell down, the 
billboards could never be replaced. So what could be better for the big 
billboard lobby than to suddenly get instant amnesty for all these 
sites and instant riches overnight for those companies?
  I don't blame them for trying, but I think the Senate was exactly 
right to say, wait a minute, we can't do this. Not only is it an 
affront to the troops to be cavalierly talking about a wet kiss to the 
billboard lobby in the middle a debate when we are supposed to be 
helping the troops in Iraq, I think it is an affront to Lady Bird 
Johnson and all those across America who, for 40 years, have tried to 
keep our country, about which we sing, beautiful. One of our greatest 
values is we sing and believe in America the beautiful.
  This motion was put into the legislation by the Democratic leader. I 
want to make very clear I don't question his motives, and I respect 
what he does. I appreciate the courteous way in which he treated the 
discussion he and I had on this. I told him if there were some 
injustices that have to do with States in the South that have been 
somehow unevenly treated by the law or impacted by the hurricanes in a 
way nobody anticipated, I would be glad to work with him and other 
members of the Environment and Public Works Committee, on which I 
serve, to correct those injustices. But the Senator from Florida, Mr. 
Martinez, was a cosponsor of my amendment to get rid of this provision. 
The Senator from Alabama, Mr. Shelby, was a cosponsor of my amendment 
to stop this billboard amnesty. So who is the billboard lobby trying to 
protect here, when the Senators from those States--Tennessee,

[[Page S4141]]

Alabama, and Florida--say we don't need that sort of protection? But I 
am happy and willing to work on that legislation.
  I also wish to make it clear to my colleagues this is not a new 
subject for me. In the 1980s, when I was Governor of Tennessee, the 
legislature and I--and the legislature was Democratic at the time--made 
10,000 of our State roads scenic highways. We put little mockingbirds 
up, and we said no new billboards and no new junkyards. Tennessee is a 
beautiful State, and we wanted people to enjoy it as they drove across 
the country. The only regret I have is we didn't think of cell towers 
being invented. We all use them, for our cell phones and our 
BlackBerries. In Tennessee, they seem to be having a contest to see who 
can invent the biggest and the ugliest cell tower and stick it in the 
most scenic place. But we created those scenic highways in a bipartisan 
way.
  In the mid-1980s, I was chairman of the President's Commission on 
Americans Outdoors, with Gilbert Grosvenor, the head of National 
Geographic, and Pat Noonan, president of The Conservation Fund, and one 
of our major recommendations was a system of scenic byways, which the 
Congress has now created across our country.
  Our people want to see our beautiful country and they want reasonable 
limits on what we are doing. They certainly don't want to see us, in 
the middle of legislation to support our troops, to have suddenly 
attached to the appropriations bill an instant billboard amnesty 
proposal. I am glad that is out of the bill, and I congratulate the 
Senate for doing what we did this morning. It will come up through the 
regular committee, if we ever need to do that. The proposal was a big 
wet kiss to the billboard lobby, and a kissing line in which I don't 
care to stand, and I appreciate the Senate action.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
a letter from several organizations--Scenic America, the U.S. 
Conference of Mayors, the National League of Cities, the American 
Planning Association, and other groups--expressing their deep concern 
about the provision we knocked out of the supplemental appropriations 
bill that would have gutted the Highway Beautification Act.
  Following that, I wish to include a chart from Scenic America that 
has a list of the number of nonconforming billboards in every State. 
There are 63,000 of those sites where it would be illegal to put up new 
billboards. The whole thrust of this billboard amnesty proposal would 
have been to turn those illegal sites into legal sites overnight, 
beginning with these 13 States and perhaps expanding to other States in 
the future.
  Also, I wish to include two newspaper articles, one from the 
Washington Post and one from USA Today, which alerted the Senate this 
week to this provision in the appropriations bill, which slipped in 
very quietly under the heading of ``highway signs.''
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                   March 27, 2007.
     Hon. Lamar Alexander,
     U.S. Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Alexander: We are writing to express our deep 
     concern about a provision related to the Highway 
     Beautification Act's rules governing the destruction of 
     nonconforming signs by hurricanes that was added to the 
     Senate's supplemental appropriation bill. We strongly believe 
     this legislation would do significant harm to the core 
     principles underlying this 42-year-old law and will impair 
     the ability of state and local governments to remove 
     nonconforming billboards from their communities. Moreover, it 
     will also undermine local governments' ability to regulate 
     nonconforming land uses in general by carving out an 
     exception to long-standing legal and regulatory practices not 
     available to any other business entity. Because this is a 
     substantive measure that properly belongs within the 
     jurisdiction of the Environment and Public Works Committee, 
     and because it would be extraordinarily damaging to 
     communities in 13 states, we urge you to seek the removal of 
     this provision from the final bill.
       As you know, this is the third attempt within the past year 
     to weaken this important provision of the HBA and, once 
     again, the offending legislation avoided the formal scrutiny 
     of the authorizing committees with jurisdiction. Policy 
     matters of this importance deserve to be dealt with directly 
     through appropriate legislative channels, not through 
     nongermane appropriations measures.
       But this legislation is wrong not just procedurally, it is 
     wrong on its merits. This measure permits state legislatures 
     in FEMA Regions IV and VI to opt-out of one of the last 
     remaining effective provisions of the Highway Beautification 
     Act, which is already heavily weighted to the advantage of 
     the outdoor advertising industry. One of the principal 
     compromises made at the time of the HBA's passage was that 
     nonconforming signs would be removed by attrition over time. 
     These signs, often many decades old, are located in places 
     that no longer permit them and are, by definition, 
     undesirable. Like all nonconforming land uses they are 
     subject to permanent removal when they are destroyed by acts 
     of God. They cannot be replaced or rebuilt for the simple 
     reason that it is now illegal to build a new sign at that 
     location.
       Each state currently defines what constitutes ``destroyed'' 
     in its agreement with the federal government implementing the 
     law. Usually, ``destruction'' is defined as some percentage 
     of the structure or the value of the sign. When a 
     nonconforming sign is harmed in a storm, and crosses the 
     threshold from merely damaged to destroyed, its permit is 
     revoked and it must be permanently removed, just as any 
     nonconforming structure would be under similar circumstances. 
     Case law and common practice have long held that the owner of 
     a nonconforming destroyed structure is not entitled to 
     compensation and certainly cannot rebuild it. Billboards 
     are--and should be--no exception. Congress should not treat 
     billboard companies differently from any other business that 
     owns nonconforming structures destroyed in hurricanes.
       We are deeply concerned that the continued weakening of the 
     enforcement provisions of the HBA will render the 
     nonconforming designation meaningless, in effect converting 
     these signs into permanent structures. Incidentally the 
     legislative language permits these signs to be rebuilt with 
     modern materials that will make them virtually 
     indestructible, a notion completely at odds with the original 
     intention of the law. The crippling of the storm-destruction 
     provision effectively removes any hope that the thousands of 
     old, nonconforming billboards littering our highways will 
     ever be removed. Many of these signs are over 30 years old; 
     some, much older. They were purchased with full knowledge 
     that they were subject to destruction by natural causes and 
     ultimate removal, and should not be granted special 
     protection, particularly given their notoriously adverse 
     impact on the quality of community life.
       The provision requires state legislative action in order to 
     take effect, and in virtually every instance in recent years 
     state legislation dealing with billboards overrides local 
     authority. Ultimately, local prerogatives will almost 
     certainly be trampled, and, in fact, will need to be in order 
     for the bill to have its intended effect of protecting the 
     interests of billboard companies. This is an instance where a 
     federal standard protects local governments better than a 
     policy crafted in state legislatures.
       In addition, you should be aware that the outdoor 
     advertising industry has been embroiled in significant legal 
     and administrative disputes involving the potentially 
     improper rebuilding of nonconforming signs destroyed in 
     recent hurricane seasons. This measure is a transparent 
     effort to short-circuit ongoing court cases as well as 
     administrative disputes between FHWA and state departments of 
     transportation and between state DOT's and the industry. 
     Further, Congress should not be swayed by spurious claims of 
     hardships faced by sign companies or advertisers in the wake 
     of recent storms. Most of the destroyed signs are owned by 
     very large media corporations which purchased the signs from 
     the original owners with full knowledge of their 
     nonconforming status, and affected local businesses face no 
     shortage of alternative signs for their advertising messages.
       This provision is an affront to the core principles of 
     well-established federal law and threatens local authority, 
     and represents a violation of congressional procedures and 
     basic democratic principles. A supplemental appropriation 
     bill should not be used to make substantive changes to a 
     policy that is completely nongermane to its purpose. Citizens 
     and stakeholders should not be frozen out of the legislative 
     process in an effort to promote the interests of a powerful 
     industry. We strongly urge you to protect American 
     communities, the prerogatives of local governments, and the 
     long-standing federal interest in the beautification of our 
     national highway system by seeking the removal of this 
     provision from the supplemental appropriations bill.
       If you would like further information about this issue and 
     its implications, please don't hesitate to contact Kevin Fry, 
     the president of Scenic America.
       Thank you for your consideration of this important matter.
       Sincerely,
         Scenic America, The United States Conference of Mayors, 
           National League of Cities, The American Planning 
           Association, The American Society of Landscape 
           Architects, The American Institute of Architects, The 
           Surface Transportation Policy Partnership, The National 
           Association of Towns and Townships.

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               [From washingtonpost.com, March 27, 2007]

 Billboard King Reid Looks To Leave Mark on Senate War Funding Measure

                       (By Elizabeth Williamson)

       In a (quite) large sign that protecting U.S. troops isn't 
     the only thing on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's mind 
     these days, the Nevada Democrat inserted an item into the 
     Senate's Iraq war funding bill--safeguarding billboards.
       Senate debate began yesterday on the bill, which provides 
     $122 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; sets a 
     goal of March 31, 2008, for withdrawing U.S. troops from 
     Iraq; and--if Reid has his way--allows thousands of 
     billboards destroyed by bad weather to be rebuilt.
       For the senator, who has referred to himself as the King of 
     Billboards, ``it's a constituent issue, but it's a value that 
     he believes in,'' said Reid spokesman Jon Summers.
       The battle over billboards began in 1965, when the Highway 
     Beautification Act set a policy that ``nonconforming'' 
     billboards--defined by states but usually meaning those 
     packed closely together, or in scenic areas--would be allowed 
     to die of natural causes. As storms and other acts of God 
     destroyed them, their owners would not be permitted to 
     replace them. Recent hurricanes have fueled a fight between 
     the powerful Outdoor Advertising Association of America 
     (OAAA), which wants to roll back the federal law, and 
     opponents led by Washington-based Scenic America, which decry 
     billboards as ``visual pollution.''
       On March 15, Reid wrote Senate Appropriations Committee 
     Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va) asking for a provision that 
     ``clarifies'' the rules governing rebuilding of ``outdoor 
     structures'' after natural disasters.
       ``This is a matter of personal importance to me,'' the 
     majority leader wrote, a comment that ``goes back to the 
     values,'' Summers said. Meaning that out west, ``there's a 
     big sense of independence, and your property is your 
     property,'' Summers said.
       About 40 billboard companies operate in Nevada. Over the 
     past two years, Reid's Searchlight Leadership Fund has 
     received $6,000 in contributions from the OAAA's political 
     action committee.
       The OAAA represents a booming industry that earned $7 
     billion nationwide in revenue last year, but it emphasizes 
     the role of billboards in advertising local businesses. 
     Association spokesman Ken Klein said Reid's amendment aims to 
     reverse ``a pattern of overreaching'' by the federal 
     government, which threatened to withhold highway funds to 
     Florida when companies rebuilt nonconforming billboards hit 
     by hurricanes in 2004. Reid's bill would have prevented such 
     actions.
       Kevin Fry, president of Scenic America, said: ``The bill 
     carves out an exception to local land-use rules for a single 
     industry that is not available to any other . . . One might 
     reasonably ask why legislation affecting the South and 
     Southeast was introduced by a senator from Nevada.''
       Reid's request went to the Appropriations subcommittee on 
     transportation, which pared it back to apply to 13 mostly 
     hurricane-prone states, instead of all 50. The law would come 
     up for renewal in 24 months.
       Scenic America is fighting the amendment, which ``sets a 
     destructive precedent that will certainly be revisited 
     anytime natural disasters take their toll on nonconforming 
     billboards,'' Fry said. ``The two-year time frame is a 
     joke.''
       The OAAA sees the measure as a ``positive step,'' Klein 
     said. ``Senator Reid is a longtime supporter of mobility, 
     tourism and property rights. We appreciate those 
     principles.''
                                  ____


                    [From USA TODAY, March 27, 2007]

                Bill Would Shelter Unsightly Billboards

                            (By Kathy Kiely)

       Washington.--A bill the Senate takes up today to provide 
     emergency funds for military operations and Katrina victims 
     also would help billboard advertisers that donated tens of 
     thousands of dollars to Democrats and Republicans for the 
     2006 election.
       A provision tucked into the $122 billion measure at the 
     request of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., would 
     exempt older billboards in 13 Southern states, stretching 
     from Florida to New Mexico, from regulation under the 1965 
     Highway Beautification Act.
       The provision would let billboard companies rebuild signs 
     damaged by hurricanes even if the new ones violate laws 
     regulating the size and placement of outdoor advertising. 
     Reid says he's trying to protect the rights of businesses 
     hurt by the storms: ``Why shouldn't they be able to replace 
     their property like anybody else?''
       Kevin Fry of Scenic America, a non-profit group that 
     opposes Reid's move, says there's a good reason: The 
     billboards are eyesores that would be barred today.
       Fry says Reid's efforts would be ``a grotesque weakening'' 
     of the Highway Beautification Act, a legacy of President 
     Lyndon Johnson's wife, Lady Bird. It lets states regulate 
     billboards along federal highways.
       Fry says states often prohibit signs that are too large, 
     too close together or located along rural and scenic routes. 
     About 75,000 signs built before the regulations remain, Fry 
     says: ``It's the worst kind of blight.''
       Hurricanes destroyed some in Florida and Gulf Coast states 
     in 2004 and 2005. Hal Kilshaw, vice president of Lamar 
     Advertising of Baton Rouge, one of the advertising firms 
     pushing to rebuild, says, ``States should be able to 
     decide,'' not Washington.
       For the 2006 election, the Outdoor Advertising 
     Association's political action committee (PAC) gave $143,000 
     to Republican and Democratic candidates for Congress, 
     according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a non-partisan group that 
     tracks contributions. Lamar gave $70,000 to congressional 
     candidates, the group says.
       Reid's PAC received $16,000 from outdoor advertisers, 
     according to PoliticalMoneyLine. In a letter to senators last 
     week, Reid said the exemption ``is a matter of personal 
     importance to me.''

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I wish to, in the remaining time, 
mention two other proposals that have to do with the great American 
outdoors.
  Yesterday, a group of 17 Senators and Congressmen from North Carolina 
and Tennessee took a historic step by writing a letter to Secretary of 
the Interior Dirk Kempthorne about the so-called ``Road to Nowhere'' 
through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
  The point of the letter was to suggest to the Secretary three things:
  No. 1, Mr. Secretary, bring to a conclusion within 30 days the 
environmental impact statement that has been going on for several years 
about whether to build this road--the $600 million ``road to nowhere'' 
through the park--and recommend, Mr. Secretary, that no road should be 
built. That is the first step.
  The second step is one we can take ourselves in the Congress once the 
Department of the Interior has said that no proposal for road 
construction would be appropriate environmentally. The 17 of us believe 
we should reprogram the remaining money from the environmental impact 
statement, which we judge to be $5 million, $6 million or $7 million, 
and give it to the citizens of Swain County, NC, who have waited since 
1943 for just compensation for the promise the Government made to them 
at that time to compensate them for the road that was flooded when 
Fontana Dam was built.
  The third thing we asked the Secretary to do was in the next 
administration budget for fiscal year 2009, recommend to us what the 
rest of the cash settlement should be to Swain County, and include the 
next installment of that settlement in the budget, but without taking 
the money from the National Park budget.
  What is historic about this is it was not just the number of Senators 
and Congressmen, it was the fact it was Senator Dole from North 
Carolina as well as Senator Corker from Tennessee. It was Congressman 
Shuler, a Democrat from North Carolina, as well as David Davis, a 
Republican from Tennessee. We also have support from the Governors of 
both Tennessee and North Carolina for the proposed cash settlement to 
Swain County in lieu of the road.
  The road is a bad idea. It has been a bad idea for a long time. The 
Great Smoky Mountains National Park is the largest, most visited 
national park in the United States by a factor of three, with 10 
million visitors a year. It is managed as if it were a wilderness area. 
This road, costing more than $600 million, would go straight through 
the most pristine part of the largest wilderness area in the eastern 
United States. And $600 million I believe is an understatement of what 
it might cost. There would be very difficult places to go through. It 
is hard to think it could be built without spending a lot more money.
  I congratulate the Congressman from North Carolina, Mr. Shuler. He 
grew up on one side of the Great Smoky Mountains in Swain County, and I 
grew up on the other side in Blount County. Fifteen years ago, I was 
president of the University of Tennessee and he was its quarterback. 
Today, he is now the Democratic Congressman from Swain County and that 
area, and I am the Republican Senator from east Tennessee. We agree on 
what to do, and we believe it is time for the Secretary of the Interior 
to accept our suggestion, say there will be no road, and let us get 
busy giving the people of Swain County $6 million or $7 million this 
year, and in future years compensate them properly.
  Also Congressman Shuler and I and others say that in this process we 
must do a better job of helping the descendants of those who once lived 
in what is today the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to be able to 
get across Fontana Lake to the gravesites. That may seem a small matter 
to those who have not heard of this before, but that

[[Page S4144]]

park was taken, by land condemnation oftentimes, from those people and 
their families and their ancestors. It was then given to the Federal 
Government. There is a great sense of ownership of that park by the 
people of North Carolina and Tennessee, and it is only right that as a 
part of this settlement we make it easier for Swain County to help 
descendants of those who once lived within the park to get to their 
historic gravesites.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed at this point 
in my remarks a copy of the letter from the 17 Members of Congress from 
North Carolina and Tennessee to the Secretary of the Interior.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                Congress of the United States,

                                   Washington, DC, March 28, 2007.
     Hon. Dirk Kempthorne,
     Secretary, Department of the Interior,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Secretary: Considering the significant 
     environmental and economic costs associated with building the 
     North Shore Road--or the so-called ``Road to Nowhere'' 
     through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park--we ask that 
     you begin immediately to work with us to provide a cash 
     settlement to the citizens of Swain County, North Carolina, 
     rather than further constructing the road.
       We recommend these three steps:
       First, within the next 90 days, the National Park Service's 
     Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) should endorse a cash 
     settlement to Swain County instead of any further 
     construction on the North Shore Road.
       Second, upon completion of the EIS, the Administration 
     should support legislation that will be introduced in 
     Congress to reprogram the funds remaining from those 
     originally appropriated for the EIS, currently about $6 
     million, and give those funds to Swain County as the first 
     installment of the settlement.
       Third, in January 2008, as a part of its fiscal year 2009 
     budget request to Congress, the Administration should include 
     in its budget the next installment of the full cash 
     settlement to Swain County. This funding should come from 
     outside the National Park Service budget in the form of a 
     special request.
       The United States made a commitment to Swain County in 
     1943, when it flooded a highway in connection with the 
     creation of the Fontana Dam, to build a new road through what 
     had become the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The U.S. 
     Supreme Court, however, held in 1946 that there is no legal 
     obligation to satisfy that commitment by building another 
     road. A cash settlement instead of a road is precisely the 
     kind of ``common sense adjustment'' that the Supreme Court 
     envisioned.
       A road through the Park would damage the largest and most 
     pristine wilderness area in the eastern United States. Such a 
     road would cost at least $600 million, more than 75 times the 
     annual roads budget of the Great Smoky Mountains National 
     Park. In addition, a good highway now exists outside the Park 
     between Bryson City and Fontana.
       This sort of settlement has been recommended by the elected 
     Swain County Commission and the governors of North Carolina 
     and Tennessee, and is supported by the undersigned members of 
     the North Carolina and Tennessee congressional delegations.
       After over 60 years of controversy, it is time to bring 
     this matter to a close. The solution we are endorsing will 
     protect America's most visited national park, save taxpayers 
     hundreds of millions of dollars, and fulfill a promise to the 
     citizens of Swain County, North Carolina.
           Sincerely,
         Lamar Alexander, Elizabeth Dole, Bob Corker, U.S. 
           Senators; Heath Shuler, David Davis, G.K. Butterfield, 
           Zach Wamp, Bob Etheridge, Lincoln Davis, Walter Jones, 
           Bart Gordon, Mike McIntyre, Jim Cooper, Brad Miller, 
           John Tanner, David Price, Steve Cohen, Members of 
           Congress.

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Finally, Mr. President, how much time do I have 
remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 4 minutes.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, last night I attended the annual 
meeting of the National Parks Conservation Association, and I spoke to 
them, and I wish to repeat a suggestion and a proposal I made there.
  I said to these leading conservationists from across the country that 
22 years ago, in 1985, President Reagan asked me to head up what we 
called the President's Commission on Americans Outdoors. It was to be a 
successor to Laurance Rockefeller's Commission on Outdoors a generation 
earlier. The Rockefeller Commission was one that was remembered for 
advocating a lot of Federal action, such as the Land and Water 
Conservation Act and the Wild and Scenic Rivers legislation.
  Our commission in the mid-1980s looked around the country and called 
for a prairie fire of concern and investment community by community to 
keep our outdoors great. We identified threats to the outdoors at that 
time: exotic pollutants, loss of space through urban growth, and the 
disappearance of wetlands. We recommended some strategies for dealing 
with the future, which have become fixtures in the outdoor movement, 
such as conservation easements, scenic byways and greenways, and we 
recommended $1 billion a year from the sale of renewable assets, such 
as oil, to succeed the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
  Mr. President, since I see no one here, may I ask unanimous consent 
for an additional 5 minutes to complete my remarks?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, another generation has passed. There 
are new challenges and new opportunities. My proposal to the 
conservationists last night was it is now time for a third President's 
Commission on Americans Outdoors to follow the Rockefeller Commission 
in the 1960s and our commission in the 1980s. It would be an 
opportunity to look ahead for another generation and tell our country 
what we need to do to create places for us to enjoy the outdoors in 
appropriate ways, an opportunity to create a new conservation agenda.
  There is some unfinished business that is obvious. Special Federal 
support for conservation easements expires this year. The conservation 
royalty, which we enacted in the last Congress, giving one-eighth of 
the money we acquire from drilling in the Gulf of Mexico to the Land 
and Water Conservation Fund, is only a beginning to fully funding land 
and water conservation. We need to codify the Environmental Protection 
Agency's new clean air rules about sulfur and nitrogen, which are so 
important to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, as an example. 
Urban growth is still swallowing up open space.
  There are new challenges and opportunities that were barely on the 
agenda 25 years ago: Climate change, the 100th birthday of the National 
Park System in 2016, invasive species, and new technology which offers 
both promise and challenge.

  For example, in terms of promise, carbon recapture from electricity 
plants fueled by coal--that could help make us energy independent, 
clean the air, and deal with global warming all at once; or at the John 
Smith National Water Trail in Virginia, Verizon has a wireless system 
so you can learn about 400 years of history as you go along the water 
trail, using your cell phone.
  On the other hand, technology threatens America's landscape, the 
landscape of which we sing. I mentioned earlier that 25 years ago the 
Tennessee Legislature and I created 10,000 miles of scenic parkways 
with no new junkyards or billboards, and I didn't think of cell towers 
at the time. We now have 190,000 cell tower sites nationwide, many of 
them in scenic places, many of them ugly. That is unnecessary. If we 
had thought about it, cell towers could be camouflaged, colocated on a 
single structure, or located below the ridge tops. We should have 
thought about it and made more of a policy about it.
  At the same time, while it gives many in the conservation movement a 
stomach ache to think about it, we are about to add to the American 
landscape tens of thousands of giant wind turbines that are twice as 
tall as the Neyland Football Stadium at the University of Tennessee, 
with turbines that stretch from 10-yard line to 10-yard line. 
Obviously, there is a place for wind power in our energy future, but 
isn't it right that we should stop and say: Do we want them on our 
seashores and the foothills of the Great Smokies and along the rim of 
the Grand Canyon? I don't think we would. It would be a chance for us 
to have a consensus about the blessings of technology and a consensus 
about view sheds and landscape conservation; in short, a new strategy 
and consensus for America, the beautiful.
  I think this is our greatest opportunity to get around the table and 
take advantage of different ideas, put them together, and go ahead. We 
did that 20 years ago. We had private property advocates and open space 
enthusiasts and conservationists and outdoor recreation people. We were 
all around the

[[Page S4145]]

same table. We had a pretty good rapport. I think we made a difference 
over the last two decades.
  The other day, Tennessee's unusually Democratic newspaper, the 
Tennessean, in Nashville, praised President Bush's centennial 
initiative for national parks--$100 million a year, $3 billion over 10 
years--to help celebrate the 100th birthday of our park system, which 
some have called the best idea America ever had. The Tennessean said in 
its editorial, and cautioned its readers:

       Just because George Bush said it, doesn't mean it's wrong.

  Sometimes I think I need to say the same thing to my Republican 
friends about climate change. Just because Al Gore said it, doesn't 
mean it is wrong. I think we ought to work together to celebrate the 
100th anniversary of the parks, to figure out what we want to do about 
climate change, scenic byways, open space, protecting private property 
rights, and providing more outdoor recreation opportunities. We can do 
that and now is a good time to do it. Why not have a Third President's 
Commission on Americans Outdoors? I believe the next President should 
appoint that commission and that we who care about those issues should 
take time to help him or her be ready with an agenda.
  For me, the great American outdoors is not about policy and politics. 
I grew up hiking on the edge of the Great Smoky Mountains, camping 
there on a regular basis. I still live there. I breathe the air I try 
to keep clean and hike in the park I want to maintain. I want to 
protect the views of the foothills because I look at them when I am 
home, where I am going tomorrow morning. I enjoy riding on the scenic 
parkways and walking on the greenways, and every summer for 25 years, 
our family has gone to the Boundary Waters canoe area in Minnesota 
because it is quiet and clean and we like to catch and eat walleyes.
  I believe there is a huge conservation majority in our country, and I 
believe the next President can capture that majority and help us create 
a new conservation agenda. It is time to create a Third President's 
Commission on Americans Outdoors.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
  Mr. ISAKSON. 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. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask to address the Senate as if in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate is in morning business.

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