Congressional Record, Volume 158 Issue 83 (Tuesday, June 5, 2012)

[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 83 (Tuesday, June 5, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H3439-H3440]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

SALMON LAKE LAND SELECTION RESOLUTION ACT

Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules
and pass the bill (S. 292) to resolve the claims of the Bering Straits
Native Corporation and the State of Alaska to land adjacent to Salmon
Lake in the State of Alaska and to provide for the conveyance to the
Bering Straits Native Corporation of certain other public land in
partial satisfaction of the land entitlement of the Corporation under
the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the bill is as follows:

S. 292

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ``Salmon Lake Land Selection
Resolution Act''.

SEC. 2. PURPOSE.

The purpose of this Act is to ratify the Salmon Lake Area
Land Ownership Consolidation Agreement entered into by the
United States, the State of Alaska, and the Bering Straits
Native Corporation.

SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.

In this Act:
(1) Agreement.--The term ``Agreement'' means the document
between the United States, the State, and the Bering Straits
Native Corporation that--
(A) is entitled the ``Salmon Lake Area Land Ownership
Consolidation Agreement'';
(B) had an initial effective date of July 18, 2007; and
(C) is on file with Department of the Interior, the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources of the Senate, and
the Committee on Natural Resources of the House of
Representatives.
(2) Bering straits native corporation.--The term ``Bering
Straits Native Corporation'' means an Alaskan Native Regional
Corporation formed under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement
Act (43 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.) for the Bering Straits region of
the State.
(3) Secretary.--The term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary
of the Interior.
(4) State.--The term ``State'' means the State of Alaska.

SEC. 4. RATIFICATION AND IMPLEMENTATION OF AGREEMENT.

(a) In General.--Subject to the provisions of this Act,
Congress ratifies the Agreement.
(b) Easements.--The conveyance of land to the Bering
Straits Native Corporation, as specified in the Agreement,
shall include the reservation of the easements that--
(1) are identified in Appendix E to the Agreement; and
(2) were developed by the parties to the Agreement in
accordance with section 17(b) of the Alaska Native Claims
Settlement Act (43 U.S.C. 1616(b)).
(c) Corrections.--Beginning on the date of enactment of
this Act, the Secretary, with the consent of the other
parties to the Agreement, may only make typographical or
clerical corrections to the Agreement and any exhibits to the
Agreement.
(d) Authorization.--The Secretary shall carry out all
actions required by the Agreement.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Washington (Mr. Hastings) and the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Grijalva)
each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Washington.

General Leave

Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that
all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their
remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under
consideration.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Washington?
There was no objection.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, S. 292 ratifies the Salmon Lake Area Ownership and
Consolidation Agreement signed in 2007 by the State of Alaska, the
United States, and the Bering Straits Native Corporation.

{time} 1740

The agreement resolves overlapping claims to certain public lands by
the State of Alaska, the United States, and the Bering Straits Native
Corporation. The claims arose from the implementation of the Alaska
Statehood Act of 1958 and the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of
1971.
Though similar legislation sponsored by the gentleman from Alaska,
and the sponsor in the House of this bill, Mr. Young, passed by 410 0
in the 111th Congress, the Committee on Natural Resources undertook
regular order on S. 292, including a hearing in the Subcommittee on
Indian and Alaska Native Affairs, and a markup in the full committee,
which reported the bill out favorably.
I am unaware of any opposition to S. 292, and so I urge full House
support for the motion to suspend the rules and pass this bill today.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S. 292, a bill that ratifies an
agreement between the United States, the Bering Straits Native
Corporation and the State of Alaska by transferring certain Federal
lands to the Bering Straits Native Corporation and the State of Alaska.
S. 292 is the result of years of negotiations between the parties
regarding overlapping land selections made by the Bering Straits Native
Corporation under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act and the State
of Alaska under its Statehood Act.
The bill reasonably and sensibly finalizes each party's interests in
the land around Salmon Lake, an area of great importance to the people
of the Bering Straits region.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield
as much time as he may consume to the author of the legislation that
the last Congress passed, the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young).
Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, it's been said this is a simple
bill. In a way it is simple, but it solves a great problem.
As mentioned by the chairman and the ranking member, this bill
probably wouldn't necessarily be passed if it wasn't because of the
conflict we had between the State when we passed statehood, the Native
Land Claims Act and, of course, the BLM. There is no one that objects
to this bill. It solves a very important problem for the local people
and the subsistence-style living. It also takes care of the
recreational areas that they can be utilizing. And it's the right bill
to do for the State of Alaska and Alaska natives.
Mr. Speaker, I'd like to speak on another subject for a short moment
which I believe relates to this. For the people listening to this great
display of legislative action on the House floor, we'd like to remind
them, you know, Little Red Riding Hood, do not go to sleep.
Just because the prices of gas have been dropping at the pumps, do
not be lured into the idea that everything's going to be okay, because
I've watched this now in my 40 years here go up and down, up and down;
and every time we start to do something, start moving forward for self-
dependency on our fossil fuels, those that are providing us the fuel
from overseas at cost of great bloodshed and a flood of dollars, they
take and drop their prices. When doing so, we start getting lulled back
to sleep, and we don't do anything. And then they'll jack the prices up
again, and the whole economy will not recover.
So I'm asking the public to understand one thing: do not go to sleep.
Just because you go up to the pump station now and put that nozzle in
and say, oh, my, gas is only $3.60 when it was $4.15, headed to $5.
Watch it very closely, ladies and gentlemen. Watch this, everybody on
the floor of this House, because you are going to sleep.
Oh, everything's fine and dandy. We do not have to worry about this
anymore. Our good friends in the Middle East will take care of us. Yes,
the good friend in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez.
Think about this a moment, ladies and gentlemen. We're just where we
were back in 1972 when we passed the

[[Page H3440]]

Trans Alaska pipeline. We had an embargo. People were lined up to buy
the gasoline; lined up and actually shooting at one another because it
was, at that time, 36 cents a gallon. And we built the Trans Alaska
pipeline, and we lowered that price very rapidly.
As it went down, and the economy came back and people weren't
shooting at anyone anymore, they were doing, in fact, one thing that we
need to do today. That is the reality that we must start producing our
own fossil fuels. Yes, fossil fuels, not wind power, not solar power.
Yes, they're good. But fossil fuels that move objects.
Everybody listening to this show today, keep in mind every time you
get in that car you're moving weight. Every truck that delivers a
product to the grocery store and to anyplace you buy is moved by fossil
fuels, not just made by fossil fuels, moved by fossil fuels, the
trains, the planes, the ships, and, yes, the automobile.
We will spend this year close to $300 billion buying fossil fuels
from people that do not like us, do not even tolerate us most of the
time, would like to kill us every time.
And why this Congress and why the administration, yes, the previous
administrations--no one's innocent in this project--will not set forth
an energy policy that doesn't involve just wind power and sun power,
but involves all the powers that we have to produce energy for the
people of America. The coal, yes, we're going to burn cheap coal. It
can be burned and should be burned. But most of all, the oil which
we're still importing from abroad. That's what we have to do.
So I ask you, don't go to sleep, ladies and gentlemen, because the
persons that raise the price of oil are there, and they will do it
again. And this Congress will say, oh, we've got to do something. We'll
have to do something. And by the time that prices go so high that it
affects our economy, it will start going back down when we try to do
something.
I'm saying that the leadership on this side of the aisle, we have an
energy package. It's been sent over to the other body. I know I'm not
supposed to mention that other body. In fact, I'm not. It's the other
body. And it has not passed any energy legislation. We've done it on
the House side numerous times, not just this year and last year, even
some of the years before. We have passed energy legislation.
But it's time for this Congress, a reflection of the American people,
to rise up and say we are going to do something so those people that
have been hurting us all these years--$4 trillion worth of oil has been
spent in the last 14 years overseas. Trillion, ladies and gentlemen.
That was equal to the national debt.
But take $4 trillion off the existing debt, see where we would be
today. We wouldn't have the unemployment rate. The President wouldn't
have to say, well, it's getting a little better. The economy is better
than it was, they say. But it all relates back to the cheap energy,
energy that could be afforded by the working class people of America,
the working class people of America, not the rich that can afford it,
the working class that provide the economy to this machine that we have
called a democracy.
So I'm asking the American public and this body to wake up. Wake up
and let's do what's right. Wake up the other body and do what is right
for the future of this Nation.
Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, I know that the gentleman from Alaska will
be pleased to know that the production of fossil fuels from our public
lands is at a record high, and the percentage of our oil from imports
is dropping every year.
The bill before us today resolves competing land claims. We support
that.
I yield back the balance of my time, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I urge adoption of this legislation and
yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings) that the House suspend the
rules and pass the bill, S. 292.
The question was taken.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the
ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a
quorum is not present.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further
proceedings on this question will be postponed.
The point of no quorum is considered withdrawn.

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