[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 117 (Thursday, July 12, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4932-S4933]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                         Restore Our Parks Act

  Madam President, I come to the floor today also to talk about a bill 
called the Restore Our Parks Act and a committee hearing that we had 
yesterday before the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. That 
legislation would provide billions of dollars to address the most 
pressing maintenance needs at our Nation's national park units. 
National parks and monuments are an important part of Colorado's 
history and heritage and of our Nation's shared love of our public 
lands system.
  We know that in 2016, the year the National Park Service was 
celebrating its centennial, Colorado's 12 units managed by the National 
Park Service saw over 7.5 million visitors who spent around $485 
million visiting our national parks in Colorado. However, after years 
of increasing visitation popularity, national park units across the 
country are showing signs of stress and overuse for which programmatic 
funding has not kept up.
  National park units in Colorado account for over $238 million of the 
$11.6 billion in maintenance needs our national parks now face.
  Rocky Mountain National Park, which is one of the Nation's most 
visited parks in the country and boasts the highest altitude paved road 
in the continental United States, has $84 million alone in deferred 
maintenance needs.
  Mesa Verde, Colorado's oldest national park and the first established 
to protect the works of man, needs $70 million to address its deferred 
maintenance backlog.
  The list goes on for Dinosaur National Monument, the Great Sand 
Dunes, and even Bent's Old Fort.
  I have been happy to join with a bipartisan group of colleagues--
Senators Alexander, Portman, King, and Warner, among others--to craft 
and advance legislation that fulfills our promise to the public that 
the upkeep of our public lands is a priority.
  I am also pleased that it is based on a funding model that has worked 
so successfully for the Land and Water Conservation Fund--one of the 
crown jewels of our Nation's conservation programs.
  I would point out that just 20 days ago another group of bipartisan 
Senators was holding a press conference to highlight the need to 
reauthorize LWCF in the next 100 days before that

[[Page S4933]]

authorization lapses. I was a part of that group. We talked about the 
need to have this program reauthorized again before it expires. Now the 
deadline is just about 78 days away.

  I must also mention that we have yet to fulfill our promise on 
funding for LWCF. We need to fully fund that program. It is something I 
hope we can do in the near future.
  While I believe the structure of the Restore Our Parks bill is 
sufficient and that the same will not happen here, we need to ensure 
our full commitment to this new effort, so it doesn't suffer the same 
fate, by making sure we have the funding promised by Congress.
  I urge my colleagues to find a bipartisan path forward to permanently 
authorize and to fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund 
because access to the land we are trying to maintain is as important as 
the parks themselves.
  I again thank my colleagues for coming together on the Restore Our 
Parks Act in recognition of the necessary, overdue fix to address our 
park unit's deferred maintenance backlog that has persisted for far too 
many years.
  Thank you.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sasse). The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Crapo). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to yield back 
the remainder of the time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  All time is expired.
  The question is, Will the Senate advise and consent to the Ney 
nomination?
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the 
Senator from Mississippi (Mrs. Hyde-Smith), the Senator from Arizona 
(Mr. McCain), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), the Senator from 
Kentucky (Mr. Paul), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New York (Mr. Schumer) 
and the Senator from New Hampshire (Mrs. Shaheen) are necessarily 
absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Perdue). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 70, nays 23, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 154 Ex.]

                                YEAS--70

     Alexander
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Coons
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Flake
     Gardner
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hassan
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Jones
     Kaine
     Kennedy
     King
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Manchin
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Perdue
     Portman
     Reed
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott
     Shelby
     Smith
     Tester
     Thune
     Toomey
     Udall
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Young

                                NAYS--23

     Baldwin
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Brown
     Casey
     Cortez Masto
     Duckworth
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Harris
     Hirono
     Leahy
     Lee
     Markey
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Peters
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Stabenow
     Sullivan
     Warren
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--7

     Hyde-Smith
     McCain
     Moran
     Paul
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Tillis
  The nomination was confirmed.

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