[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 148 (2002), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 17254-17262]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




   DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will now resume consideration of H.R. 5093, which the clerk will 
report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 5093) making appropriations for the Department 
     of the Interior and related agencies for the fiscal year 
     ending September 30, 2003, and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Byrd Amendment No. 4472, in the nature of a substitute.
       Byrd Amendment No. 4480 (to Amendment No. 4472), to provide 
     funds to repay accounts from which funds were borrowed for 
     emergency wildfire suppression.
       Craig/Domenici Amendment No. 4518 (to Amendment No. 4480), 
     to reduce hazardous fuels on our national forests.
       Dodd Amendment No. 4522 (to Amendment No. 4472), to 
     prohibit the expenditure of funds to recognize Indian tribes 
     and tribal nations until the date of implementation of 
     certain administrative procedures.
       Byrd/Stevens Amendment No. 4532 (to Amendment No. 4472), to 
     provide for critical emergency supplemental appropriations.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the first 
15 minutes shall be under the control of the Senator from Nevada or his 
designee.
  The Senator from California is recognized.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I rise today to speak to the issue of 
fire suppression in our beautiful national forests, an issue that 
concerns every American because those are our forests, and the policy 
that we follow must be a balanced and good policy to make sure we 
preserve that incredible God-given resource. Many people heard the 
prayer today, and we think about the spiritual needs and we think about 
our obligations. I believe one spiritual obligation we have is to 
preserve in this country the wonder and beauty that God gave us.
  Madam President, like many of my colleagues, I have watched with 
frustration and anger and sorrow as millions of acres of forests have 
been destroyed each year by catastrophic wildfires. This year the fire 
season has been particularly severe in my State of California, as well 
as in a number of Western States, such as Arizona and New Mexico.
  After an extremely destructive fire season in 2000, the Departments 
of Agriculture and Interior took the promising step of developing what 
is now referred to as a National Forest Plan. Among other things, the 
fire plan clearly indicates that priorities should be given to the 
clearance of brush, undergrowth, near communities and homes. The fire 
plan clearly says the most important way to stop the damage to the 
people and to their property is to clear the undergrowth near 
communities and homes.
  Consensus emerged around the idea that, yes, there would have to be 
some thinning of trees and clearing of brush but not clearing of the 
old-growth trees, which actually take a very long time to burn and are 
important to keep in our forests.
  We thought we had an agreement with this administration. Yet recent 
GAO reports indicate the USDA and the Department of the Interior have 
been ineffective and inefficient in implementing that fire plan.
  So what has happened? We have an ineffective and inefficient 
situation happening in the Department of the Interior and the USDA, and 
we have out-of-control fires. Well, Senators Craig and Domenici have 
come forward with what they say is a solution. What is it? Let's be 
clear.
  Their amendment proposes to waive the National Environmental Planning 
Act, known as NEPA, which is a critical law in the Nation, and they 
would limit the public's ability to challenge agency decisions and 
restrict what we call judicial review. In other words, a judge would no 
longer be able to take a look at what is happening and intervene, which 
is a very important part of our balance of powers. If Senator Byrd were 
here, he would no doubt hold up the Constitution. The judicial branch 
is very important and the Craig-Domenici amendment would essentially 
weaken that leg of our Government in order to allow for the cutting of 
precious old-growth trees.
  So the approach of the Craig-Domenici amendment, and the reason I am 
here--and I see my colleague from Washington and I assume she is here 
to speak on the same issue, so I will be brief. The approach gives the 
agencies complete discretion to engage in thinning and salvage logging 
at will. To me, this is a recipe for disaster. The waiver of 
environmental safeguards and elimination of judicial review are not 
steps to be taken lightly, and I believe there is no justification for 
it because they are not the source of the problem.
  There is actually evidence to the contrary. In a recent letter to 
Senator Craig, the GAO determined that only 1 percent of hazardous fuel 
reduction projects were appealed in 2001 and none had been litigated. 
GAO found that the list of appellants not only included conservation 
groups, which have been attacked here as being radical in some way for 
exercising the rights that citizens have, but GAO found that the other 
appellants were recreation groups, industry interests, and individuals.
  If you see a project is destroying our forests, that road should not 
be closed off to our citizens. The GAO finding confirmed for me that 
our environmental laws, the appeals process, public participation, and 
judicial review are not the source of the problem, nor can we blame our 
forest woes on environmentalists. That isn't the point. The 
environmentalists are trying to do the right thing.
  I want to show you two charts of the burned forest area in Oregon 
that President Bush recently visited. The President tried to simplify 
the issue and suggest that areas that are thinned will not burn, and 
areas that are left alone will be subject to catastrophic fire. But 
that is simply not the case.
  Here is a chart showing a thinned area. Notice, there are no large 
trees left. This forest was burned to cinders. There were no large 
trees there when the fire erupted. See how it looks.
  Here is a second chart showing an adjacent area that wasn't thinned, 
left in its natural state, and it did not burn at all. It did not burn 
at all because these large trees are very slow to burn.
  Madam President, I don't suggest there is a simple answer to this 
complex problem, but we need to do a lot more than just trash our 
environmental laws and say people can no longer go to the courts to 
protect this God-given resource.

[[Page 17255]]

  In California, the Forest Service took the time to do the necessary 
environmental reviews. They produced a plan referred to as the Sierra 
Nevada Framework. We just received a letter from someone I believe you 
know, Madam President. Our secretary for Natural Resources in 
California, Mary Nichols, recently wrote in a letter to Secretary 
Veneman, the Secretary of Agriculture:

       The framework--

  Meaning our framework in California--

     is the first landscape scale national forest management plan 
     that balances the need for fire risk reduction through fuel 
     treatment with environmental protection.

  The fuel reduction plan in that framework has been agreed to by most 
of the mainstream environmental groups. Why? Because it was done 
thoughtfully and with full consideration of the environmental 
implication.
  Secretary Nichols of California goes on to explain that the 
President's proposal and efforts to undermine existing environmental 
laws, which is exactly what I believe the Craig amendment does, will 
only serve to polarize the debate, she says, and it will unravel the 
good work that has happened in places such as California.
  There are many people on the other side of the aisle who talk a lot 
about States rights. Here is a State, my home State, that reveres its 
national forests and wants to protect them. The State of California 
will be undercut by this amendment because the amendment would say to 
our people in California: If you do not like what is happening, if you 
believe the forests are being destroyed, you are limited in your 
judicial access.
  There is a great deal of scientific evidence that thinning and 
clearing activities should be concentrated in the areas immediately 
adjacent to communities to protect those communities.
  A recent study completed by the U.S. Forest Service's Fire Sciences 
Laboratory in Montana found that the only thinning that is needed to 
protect homes was within the ``red zone'' of 150 to 200 feet around a 
building.
  I wish to quote from the person who is an expert in fire suppression, 
Jack Cohen. He said:

       Regardless of how intense the fire is, the principal 
     determinant is based on the home and the exterior 
     characteristics.

  In terms of protecting houses and other community structures, the 
immediate vicinity is what is relevant.
  We need to have buffer zones around communities so those communities 
are safe, and we need to protect the old-growth forests. Yes, we can 
thin the underbrush. We must. We should. But we should not cut down the 
old-growth trees.
  Yet the Forest Service continues to direct thinning activities to 
remote areas of our forests where the risk to people and property is 
minimal. Less than 40 percent of the forest areas that have been 
thinned are in the so-called wildland-urban interface, which is the 
buffer zone between communities and forests.
  There is also abundant scientific evidence that thinning should 
target small diameter trees and underbrush to most effectively reduce 
fire risk.
  Aggressive logging of big fire-resistant trees, while appealing to 
the timber industry, actually increases the risk of fire. The L.A. 
Times published a story yesterday, which I will submit for the Record, 
that explains this well. In general, logging leaves behind highly 
flammable brush materials; it leads to dense new growth that poses a 
fire hazard; and the removal of large trees cause soils to dry out, 
leading to increased fire severity.
  A scientific assessment completed in the Sierra Nevada in 1996, for 
instance, found that, ``Timber harvest, through its effects on forest 
structure, local microclimate and fuel accumulation, has increased fire 
severity more than any other human activity.''
  Yet the Forest Service continues to give high priority to thinning 
projects that involve large valuable trees. These large trees are fire 
resistant--and therefore should be the last ones to be removed. But 
repeatedly they are removed because they are economically valuable in 
commercial timber sales.
  In November 2001, the Inspector General at USDA completed an audit of 
the Forest Service's implementation of the National Fire Plan. The USDA 
audit ``questioned the propriety of using approximately $2.5 million of 
National Fire Plan Rehabilitation and Restoration Program funds to 
prepare and administer projects involving commercial timber sales.''
  I want to show a picture of a Forest Service ``thinning.'' What's 
left is a few trees and absolutely nothing on the ground. The area 
looks like a tree orchard. While this may be good for the promotion of 
new timber stands, it hardly preserves any of the ecological values 
normally associated with a natural forest.
  The reality is that we have Federal agencies implementing fire 
projects that make sense if the primary goal is increasing timber 
volume, but make no sense if the primary goal is reducing the risk of 
fire while preserving the ecological integrity of our forests.
  Given the agencies' apparent inability to overcome their timber bias, 
we would be guaranteeing a future filled with fires if we gave them the 
broad discretion the Republican amendment would allow.
  What is needed is language that provides the agencies with specific 
guidelines and priorities about where thinning and salvage activities 
should take place.
  While we have been unable to reach agreement with our Republican 
colleagues on this matter, I am pleased that I have been able to work 
constructively with my colleagues Senators Daschle, Bingaman, Reid, and 
Cantwell to craft an alternative proposal.
  This alternative will encourage aggressive and focused forest 
management in the buffer zone areas between communities and forests. 
This buffer zone, which is defined in the amendment to be within one 
half mile of community structures, is the area where the Forest Service 
has said the most aggressive thinning should be done.
  Such specificity will insure that the Forest Service and BLM make the 
protection of Californians and others the highest priority.
  Because of the agencies' propensity to turn thinning and salvage 
projects into timber sales, this amendment also directs the agencies to 
protect large trees and prohibit the development of new roads, which 
are generally associated with the removal of commercial timber.
  It is unfortunate that we need to be this prescriptive. However, as I 
have noted, there is good reason to be skeptical that the Forest 
Service and BLM can be left to their own devices.
  Without the public watching over them, and without any mechanism for 
challenging agency actions, the Republican amendment will exacerbate 
the problem. The agencies will continue to engage in senseless thinning 
and salvage logging in the middle of remote roadless areas--driven more 
by a thirst for commercial timber than by the need to protect homes and 
communities.
  To me, that is an intolerable outcome and it is the reason I oppose 
this proposal and have worked with others to craft an alternative.
  I conclude by saying we have seen some disastrous fires. We have to 
take action, but we know what we have to do. The studies have been done 
by the Forest Service, by many of our States, and by the GAO. The Los 
Angeles Times sums it up very well. They did an exhaustive study and 
came up with some conclusions. I will share those with my colleagues, 
and then I will yield to my friend for the rest of our time.
  I will quote from this article. There was an investigative reporter 
who went out to study the fires. It ran on September 17:

       The Bush administration's timber-cutting prescription for 
     the West's wildfire epidemic runs counter to the record of 
     the last half century, when large forest fires erupted on the 
     heels of the heaviest logging ever conducted by the U.S. Fire 
     Service.

  They had a chart in that newspaper. They showed that where you save 
the old-growth trees, you save the forests, you save the communities. 
The facts

[[Page 17256]]

are in. Let's not use this tragic, horrible spate of wildfires as an 
excuse to let the loggers cut down the old-growth trees and pocket the 
money while our forests are left completely devoid of anything that 
makes them the gift that God gave us.
  There is an editorial in today's L.A. Times. I will quote from it, 
and then I will cease:

       We have to cut the nation's forests to save them.

  That is how they open.

       That seems to be the Bush administration's rationale for 
     its misnamed Healthy Forest Initiative, now before the 
     Senate.

  It goes on to say that the Senate should defeat the Craig amendment 
and that there are other more reasonable and effective approaches.

       Existing laws let the Forest Service do its job, provided 
     it files environmental impact reports and stays clear of 
     protected areas. In fact, President Bush can thin as many 
     trees as he wants to right now. He just can't take a saw to 
     the nation's environmental protections in the process.

  I hope we will not adopt the Craig amendment. We are working on other 
ways to compromise this matter. I hope we can get together.
  I yield to my friend from Washington, Senator Cantwell, who has been 
a leader on the environment since she came to the Senate. I yield my 
remaining time to her.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, how much time remains?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. In total, there are 27 minutes 
remaining to the Democrats.
  Ms. CANTWELL. I thank the Chair.
  Madam President, I rise today to speak about the need for a national 
debate on how best to manage wildfires and improve forest health. I 
thank my colleague from California for being here this morning to 
articulate a vision about how we can move forward to protect old growth 
while being mindful about how much work really needs to be done before 
we can come up with a solid proposal.
  That is why I am here to speak this morning. I believe the amendment 
we will offer today does not further the debate in the direction we 
need to go but instead focuses on the controversial issues of weakening 
our environmental protection laws and limiting meaningful public 
participation.
  While I appreciate the sense of urgency that this year's fire season 
has brought us--and I believe the fire seasons in last several years 
have made all of us anxious--I believe the reasonable way of dealing 
with this situation is through the legislative committee process.
  I applaud my colleagues who are on the Energy and Natural Resources 
Committee who have had much discussion about this problem and are very 
anxious to take the Governors' report that was done on the national 
fire plan and efforts to better implement it. We need to do that 
through the legislative committee process where we can hold hearings 
and talk to the experts and concerned members of our communities.
  Trying to solve this important issue with a rider to an 
appropriations bill is unwise. It would be wrong to think that we could 
reverse hundreds of years of misguided forest fire management 
suppression policy with a rider on an appropriations bill.
  One of the most significant concerns I have about the amendment, as 
my colleague from California mentioned, is that it does waive important 
environmental laws. Under this amendment, the agencies will no longer 
be required to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act. 
Furthermore, the amendment eliminates the administrative appeals 
process and limits judicial review.
  We do need to move forward, and I applaud my colleague from Idaho for 
wanting to take this issue to the next level and for the focus that he 
has given to the issue. But I believe critical to this debate is the 
central issue of trust because after decades of documented problems 
with forest management by the Forest Service, it is no wonder that 
citizens are now skeptical about the plan before us today, which would 
allow timber companies to thin on ten million acres might really be 
motivated more by economics than improving healthy forests.
  If we go so far as to restrict a citizen's legal right, that is the 
wrong approach, but I believe working within the existing framework of 
environmental laws and allowing for the appropriate process for 
projects in areas near communities is the right approach.
  This basic step needs to be taken--to prevent the catastrophic 
wildfires that we have all experienced. This step has already been laid 
out in the laws of this country. In the 10-year comprehensive strategy 
on collaborative approach for reducing wild land fire risk to 
communities and the environment which was issued in May, this strategy 
was the highest priority.
  We need to make sure we are treating fires in communities that could 
be most effective in protecting lives and in protecting homes.
  The work done in a community in Roslyn, which is in my home State, 
demonstrates that protecting our forests has little to do with cutting 
big trees far away from homes but, rather, treating areas adjacent to 
communities.
  Now that is not to say we do not have to look at fuel reduction and 
that fuel reduction is not critically important in other parts of our 
national forests, but the key thing we have seen in this fire season is 
the loss of homes and loss of areas that I think are the interfaces on 
which we need to focus.
  The joint efforts of local citizens, the local fire department, the 
Washington Department of Natural Resources, and the U.S. Forest Service 
produced a plan in our State to clear brush and other fuel materials 
from a buffer zone around this town of Roslyn. I support more funding 
to do thinning, prescribed burns, and hazardous fuel reduction in our 
efforts to manage our forests.
  I think all of those need more discussion and more time and energy 
put into them and, as we will see with the Byrd amendment, more 
resources financially to obtain that goal since those funds have been 
subverted in the past.
  I also support providing the Forest Service and BLM with adequate 
funding to do the hazardous fuel reduction projects so each year we do 
not find ourselves in the same situation where the Forest Service 
diverts the funds from fire accounts in order to pay for fire 
suppression.
  So let us make that clear. Let us divide the accounts. Let us make 
sure we are doing work both for suppression and for the prevention 
efforts we need.
  The point is clear, we can protect our communities from fire, and we 
do not need to waive environmental protection laws or limit public 
participation to do so. In closing, I would like to urge my colleagues 
to support Senator Byrd's amendment to provide more funding for fire 
suppression efforts. However, I add a note of caution, that if we take 
this approach with the rider my colleague from Idaho is offering, I do 
not think it is in the best interest of the forests or the American 
public. This rider is too overreaching to be put on this legislation. 
Let us go back to the committee process, let us have the hearings, and 
let us push forward together.
  I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record an editorial from the 
Seattle Times that talks about the need to move ahead but that we 
cannot have, as this article says:

       This administration's attempt to confuse and cloud the 
     issue of fire suppression by laughably proposing timber 
     thinning can only mean a return to unregulated clear-cutting 
     on our Nation's forestlands.

  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the Seattle Times, Sept. 7, 2002]

                          Don't Hold Your Fire

                            (By Tommy Hough)

       The recent Bush administration proposal to suspend 
     environmental laws and eliminate the public's right to appeal 
     Forest Service decisions should be viewed as nothing less 
     than a transparent attempt to increase commercial logging in 
     our national forestlands, which has been this 
     administration's stated intention since Day One.

[[Page 17257]]

       How shameful too, that President Bush would so callously 
     use a disaster such as the recent wildfires in southwest 
     Oregon to launch the media spin for a plan designed to roll 
     back 20 years of good sense and good environmental 
     legislation, and in part enable the president to fulfill some 
     inappropriate, slimy promises made to timber baron 
     contributors and related special-interest groups during the 
     2000 campaign.
       This administration's attempt to confuse and cloud the 
     issue of ``fire suppression,'' by laughably proposing 
     ``timber thinning,'' can only mean a return to unregulated 
     clear-cutting on our nation's forestlands. Has any 
     administration ever been so brazenly vacant and cynical?
       Since this scheme was no doubt in part cobbled together by 
     forestry professionals, I'm guessing it may have occurred to 
     them that old-growth forests actually act as a natural 
     suppressant of fire, even in the driest years. Granted, that 
     would be bad for business, but the awful secret the Bush 
     administration and the timber industry doesn't want you to 
     know is this: Fire is not bad. Fire is simply one part of 
     nature's long-term, delicate balancing act.
       Drought and flames aren't a problem any more than rain and 
     flooding are a problem. The problem is man and his meddling 
     ways and 120 years of forest management (i.e., unrestricted, 
     subsidized logging), screwing up and knocking out of whack a 
     natural process which had been working fine in North American 
     ecosystems for thousands, even millions of years.
       We've knocked forest rhythms so far off by removing fire as 
     an element that nature isn't even allowed to compensate with 
     small-scale burns to clear away underbrush and tinder (unless 
     it's a manmade ``prescribed burn''), gently changing the way 
     the elements effect the forest floor, and paving the way for 
     pioneering species and new trees. We may as well have removed 
     rain from the equation.
       The mature Ponderosa and lodgepole pines in the American 
     West as well as the big, old-growth Douglas firs, hemlocks 
     and spruces here in the Pacific Northwest are designed by 
     nature to survive burns with their thick bark and rich 
     moisture content, while the fires create temperatures for the 
     big trees to be able to rapidly seed. In fact, the longer a 
     tree lives, the more it is able to withstand fire (whew, 
     that's bad for business too!).
       The juvenile trees growing in the wake of the ceaseless 
     clear-cuts that have left literal quilt marks on the tapestry 
     of the region's forests are the ones most susceptible to 
     catastrophic fire and drought, and while fire ideally should 
     clean the forest floor an acre here and an acre there, 
     manhandled nature is forced to wait for a drought to reclaim 
     the other half of the natural equation, when everything is 
     bone dry and hasn't been allowed to burn for 100 years. 
     Instead of cleansing the forest, fire now destroys the 
     forest, in a catastrophic fasion nature never intended.
       That thinning excess timber, a natural reaction to logging 
     and clear-cutting as the forest slowly tries to weed itself 
     out, is somehow the Holy Grail solution to forest fires is to 
     buy into cheap, message-of-the-day stupidity. Does the 
     president really think Americans are just going to stand idly 
     by and let their treasured national forestlands be threatened 
     and destroyed? Has it not occurred to the greedy minds and 
     special interests that floated this scheme that we all share 
     and live in the same environment, of which forests are an 
     integral, absolute part, no matter which side of the 
     political or ecological fence you may be on?
  Ms. CANTWELL. I suggest the absence of a quorum, with the time 
charged equally against both sides.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BOND. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. BOND. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed as in 
morning business for 5 minutes to introduce legislation.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered. The Senator from Missouri is recognized.
  Mr. BOND. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. BOND pertaining to the introduction of S. 2967 
are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills 
and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. BOND. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. CARNAHAN). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I rise today to express my strong 
support for the Craig-Domenici hazardous fuels reduction amendment 
which is currently before the Senate. It is my hope that we can come to 
a consensus on this issue for the benefit of the forests, the animals 
that inhabit them and, more importantly, the people whose homes are 
near them.
  In my home State of Nevada, our all-time worst fire was in 1999. That 
season set an all-time record for the severity and breadth of fire 
damage. Nevada experienced over 1,100 fires which burned almost 2 
million acres. To put that in perspective, in 1999 the total number of 
fires was 135 percent of the 5-year average and the total acres burned 
were almost eight times what we normally burn during 5-year periods. 
More acres were burned during a single 10-day period in August than had 
burned in any entire previous season on record.
  I am afraid 2002 could be another year like 1999. This year, Nevada 
is experiencing its fourth year of drought that has been classified 
from ``moderate'' to ``exceptional.'' Large fire activity began in mid- 
to late-May--about 3 to 4 weeks earlier than normal. And, quite 
honestly, we have been very lucky compared to other States such as 
Arizona, Colorado, Oregon, or California. We are grateful for that. But 
we know all too well that Nevada's fire season lasts longer than other 
States'. We still have the potential of a devastating fire season yet 
to come this year. With the current extreme drought condition combined 
with the buildup of dead and dying fuels, Nevada is placed in the 
``extreme'' and ``advanced'' categories for potential fire behavior.
  I am particularly concerned about the Lake Tahoe Basin. When my 
family visited that area in August, I noticed the dry conditions of the 
area. There is no question that Lake Tahoe is a blazing inferno waiting 
to happen. The Lake Tahoe Basin is under the highest risk of wildfire 
potential. The entire region is classified as a class 3 risk for 
catastrophic fire.
  What is so distressing is that the land of this area is so 
environmentally sensitive. A catastrophic fire in the basin would 
result in an incredible amount of damage to communities. Homes and 
structures worth billions of dollars would be lost. Lake Tahoe, one of 
the Nation's crown jewels, could lose its defining quality of lake 
clarity. Millions of tourists come every year to recreate in the basin. 
Key recreation areas would be destroyed. A fire could cause tremendous 
damage to the sensitive watershed which feeds not only Lake Tahoe but 
supplies water to communities in Reno, Carson City, and the rest of 
northwest Nevada, eventually emptying into Pyramid Lake.
  The ecological consequences are distressing as well. Lake Tahoe is 
home to one of our Nation's proudest symbols--the bald eagle. Other 
endangered and threatened species are native to the basin. Their safety 
is threatened by fire.
  It is clear to me and anyone who actually goes out into the forests 
that something must be done to reduce the fuels buildup to prevent the 
outbreak of catastrophic fire. That is why I am an original cosponsor 
of the Craig-Domenici amendment.
  Currently, 74 million acres nationwide are classified as class 3 
forests, which is the highest risk for catastrophic fires. The Craig-
Domenici amendment will limit action to only 10 million of the 74 
million class 3 acres. It is an emergency amendment. It only addresses 
7 percent of the problem. I wish it would address more of the problem. 
Highest priority will be given to wildland-urban interface areas, which 
are areas near homes and communities, municipal watersheds, and 
forested areas affected by disease, insect infestation, and windthrow.
  The amendment seeks to cut through the bureaucratic mess that is 
currently in place that often needlessly delays implementation of these 
projects.
  It also seeks to expedite the judicial process. Too often, these 
essential fuels reduction projects are halted by frivolous lawsuits. 
Ultimately it is the forest and wildlife habitat that suffer.

[[Page 17258]]

  That is the case in my State where two projects in the wildland-urban 
interface were challenged by an outside party. The challenger was not 
even from Nevada. All the people in Nevada had agreed--
environmentalists in Nevada, the Forest Service in Nevada, the BLM in 
Nevada, and all the local people in Nevada--that this project was 
meritorious and was good for the environment. Yet somebody from the 
outside challenged in court and was able to block this important 
environmental project.
  Public land managers must be allowed to manage the land. 
Unfortunately, only one dissenter can stymie a completely collaborative 
effort to clean the forests. Without proper forest management, an 
accidental blaze can turn into a flaming inferno which can sterilize 
the land and destroy the habitat for many endangered species of plants 
and animals.
  The groups that are against our efforts claim they are 
environmentally friendly. What is environmentally friendly about 
obstructing sound management projects from going forward? Wildfires 
contribute heavily to air pollution, destroy wildlife habitat, and kill 
endangered species.
  While we were in Lake Tahoe this summer, the entire basin--which is 
truly one of the most beautiful areas in the world--was filled with 
smoke from the fires from far off in California and from Oregon. 
Anybody who is against air pollution ought to be for stopping and 
preventing these forest fires.
  Extremists in the environmental community claim they are concerned 
about the welfare of wildlife habitat and forest health. Yet they 
oppose commonsense projects that seek to lessen the devastating effects 
of catastrophic wildfires. This amendment seeks to ensure that fuel 
reduction projects continue in spite of these extremists.
  This legislation is absolutely necessary. It is necessary this year. 
It was actually necessary last year and many years before. Every year 
we talk about how we need to save the forests, but we do nothing to 
clean the forest to reduce the intensity of fires. We must be able to 
conduct these fuel reduction projects. Advocates on both sides of the 
aisle and both sides of the political spectrum agree on this. They are 
essential to continue the health of our forests. We have waited long 
enough. Our forests have waited long enough.
  I say to my colleagues, let us get this done. The fires we have seen 
this year are unprecedented. I, for one, am committed to do all I can 
to ensure that forests are protected, watersheds are protected, homes 
protected, and, most importantly, people are protected.
  I yield the floor.
  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. CRAIG. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I rise today to speak about a matter that 
I find deeply troubling. An ``Inside the Beltway'' column in the 
September 19, 2002, Washington Times reveals that a correspondent 
working for National Public Radio, in what appears to be a flagrant 
violation of all standards of professional journalism and ethical 
conduct, has set about to enlist the help of environmental radicals in 
order to concoct a story concerning thinning projects on our national 
forests. I find this abhorrent for two reasons.
  First, it reveals the desperate lengths to which the environmental 
community is willing to go to their quest to lock up our public forests 
and prevent efforts aimed at protecting and restoring health to our 
public forests from going forward.
  Second, and perhaps more troubling to me, it suggests the complete 
lack of intellectual honesty and the apparent complicity of a nonprofit 
organization, established by Congress for the purpose of educating our 
public, in fabricating stories and spinning the news in a manner that 
is devoid of objectivity and at odds with the fundamental tenets of 
sound journalistic practices.
  Let me read from a message that was sent out by a news correspondent 
working for National Public Radio seeking assistance from members of 
the environmental community. The message reads as follows:

       Hey there. Put on your thinking cap and give me your best 
     example of a `thinning project' where they went in and did 
     the opposite. I'm working on a story about trust, which is at 
     the heart of all this . . . and I want to use just one 
     example of where the FS [Forest Service] and the industry 
     flagrantly abused the public's trust on a thinning project . 
     . . in short, concrete evidence as to why the environmental 
     community is distrustful of the FS and industry's so called 
     thinning projects.

  In 1967, Congress passed the Public Broadcasting Act. This act 
authorized the creation of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, 
CPB. The Act called on CPB to encourage ``the growth and development of 
noncommercial radio'' and to develop ``programming that will be 
responsive to the interests of the people.'' National Public Radio, 
NPR, was established in 1970 as a private, nonprofit organization to 
provide leadership in national news gathering and production and 
broadcast of radio programming responsive to the interests of American 
citizens.
  I would ask my colleagues how is this biased effort at attempting to 
sway public opinion in the public interest? NPR appears to have allowed 
its news people to sink to new lows to scrape together a story to 
incite and inflame public opinion. Is this the kind of reporting we 
should expect from a national news organization established by Congress 
to promote news gathering in the interest of American citizens? I think 
not.
  It is a sad day when our national news organizations must engage in 
fabricating stories by listening solely to one side and a sadder day 
still when these stories are presented by these organizations to an 
unsuspecting public as a balanced reporting of the facts.
  This message authored by the NPR correspondent was distributed by way 
of an environmental group mailing list. The forwarding message from an 
organization called ``Wild Rockies'' is also revealing.
  The sender reveals that environmental groups have ``successfully 
appealed/litigated'' many thinning projects and also ``tied up'' many 
more thinning projects. In short, the author of this message is making 
plain the fact that these groups have been successful in causing the 
very sort of unnecessary delays that we are attempting to prevent with 
the amendment introduced by Senators Craig and Domenici.
  These environmentalists have demonstrated that they will stop at 
nothing--even shamefully dishonest practices--to impede, delay, and 
quash efforts by the Forest Service and Department of Interior land 
management agencies to restore health to our forests. We cannot let our 
precious American forests be held hostage by these extremists, nor 
should we stand idly by and allow these zealots to continue to hold our 
forests hostage by employing these sort of unethical and distasteful 
tactics.
  Shame on NPR for what appears to be an utter and complete lack of 
balance in news gathering practices. Shame on Wild Rockies and the 
other environmental groups that would conspire to mislead the public in 
this way. And shame on us, if we fail to enact legislation that will 
enable us to protect our precious public forests from these 
irresponsible sham artists and unethical charlatans who seek to deceive 
rather than truthfully inform our citizens on the conditions that exist 
on our forests and what needs to be done to move them toward a 
healthier state.
  Madam President, we have just heard from another one of our 
colleagues, in this case Senator Ensign from the State of Nevada, talk 
about the conditions and situations that exist in that State and in the 
northern end of the High Sierras of California and Nevada. The 
conditions he talks about are real and very severe.
  I used to chair the Forestry Subcommittee in the Senate. During that 
period of time, we examined the condition of the Sierras and especially 
what

[[Page 17259]]

is known as the Greater Tahoe Basin area. In fact, our colleague from 
Nevada, Senator Reid, grew very concerned as to the state of health of 
those forests.
  It was, at that time--a couple of years ago--very obvious those 
forests were in rapid declining health conditions, bug kill was 
rampant, and at some time in the very near future that forest could be 
consumed in wildfire that would wipe out the whole of the Tahoe Basin.
  Of course, as the Senator just spoke, it is a beautiful area. Lake 
Tahoe is renowned for its beauty. That is why folks from all over the 
country have gone there to build phenomenal homes, to enjoy that 
beauty. And, of course, at risk at that time in the investigation was 
the reality that wildfire would wipe out many of those multimillion-
dollar homes that were sprinkled around the lake, both on the Nevada 
side and on the California side of that lake, and the whole tourism and 
resort industry that exists there--another example of a forest crying 
out for a thinning and cleaning and management program that could 
reverse the state of the health of that forest.
  We struggle mightily to solve a problem that has come upon the 
Interior appropriations bill, of which my colleague from Montana, who 
has now joined us, is the ranking member of that subcommittee which 
funds Interior issues.
  I submitted some days ago a second-degree amendment to Senator Byrd's 
amendment to increase fire funding, to try to find a compromise, to 
develop some degree of active management in these very critical areas 
of concern that are, in part, driving the wildfires of at least the 
western forests at this moment and are realities of growing conditions 
in all of the public land forests around our country. And that is a 
state of health, a state of fuel loading, and dead and dying trees, and 
therefore optimum fuels that, under the right conditions, ignite into 
the catastrophic fires that we have experienced this year.
  But yesterday I became aware of an interesting episode going on aside 
but a part of this debate out on the public side of things--I should 
say the private side of things--that I find very interesting. This 
morning that was highlighted in the ``Inside the Beltway'' column of 
the Washington Times, an article by John McCaslin. It is worth your 
time and interest to read it because I do believe it demonstrates 
something that is in an apparent complicity of efforts between national 
radical environmental groups and an organization funded by this 
Congress, National Public Radio.
  It is obvious to me that there was an effort underway to try to show 
to the public that what I was debating, and others were debating, 
simply was not the case. And the e-mail transaction that was going on 
out there demonstrated quite the opposite because fundamental to what 
Senator Daschle did for his home State of South Dakota, and what we are 
trying to do here, is to design a way to create a more active process 
that disallows the obvious and constant use of the appeals process and 
temporary court injunctions to deny any activity on our public lands, 
and especially in these critical areas that are so fire prone.
  And, of course, the article is fascinating in what it says because 
what it basically says is: Can you show me a thinning process?--calling 
the environmental groups that would give us the worst case scenario, in 
other words, a contradiction to what I and others have been saying is 
being done, and can be done effectively, in the thinning and the 
cleaning of these fuel-loaded areas.
  And the answer is, I think, quite fascinating. The answer is: No, we 
can't show you any because we have them all under appeal, and we have 
them all blocked.
  The very thing we have been arguing is the very thing that is 
reality, by the admission of the environmental groups themselves.
  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, will the Senator yield without losing his 
right to the floor?
  Mr. CRAIG. I am happy to yield.
  Mr. BYRD. When you said, ``We have them all blocked,'' that kind of 
caught my ear. And I am wondering about these appropriations bills. 
Somebody has them all blocked. Here is my friend from Montana who is 
the ranking member. We have been here at our posts on duty. When are we 
going to unblock the barriers to getting our appropriations bills 
passed?
  I have a question of the distinguished Senator.
  Mr. CRAIG. Sure.
  Mr. BYRD. And before I pose the question, I preface it by saying 
this: I can appreciate what the distinguished Senator is trying to do. 
The other day I said to him, on the floor: If you will remove your 
amendment here, if we can vote for cloture, on the one hand, and get on 
with this bill, if you offer your amendment on another bill, I will 
support it.
  Mr. CRAIG. Yes.
  Mr. BYRD. But my friends on that side did not vote for cloture. 
Whatever the vote was at that time, they did not vote for cloture. So 
they have not helped me to get on with the appropriations bills. 
Consequently, I made a generous offer at that point, but I am concerned 
about that offer.
  The Senator did not take me up on it. Senators on that side did not 
take me up on that. They did not help remove that block. I want to look 
at the Senator's amendment again when it comes time to vote on it. I am 
concerned about judicial review, about that aspect of it and some other 
things.
  Mr. CRAIG. Sure.
  Mr. BYRD. But the Senators had me on board at that time if that would 
have helped to take the plug out of the dike and let these bills pass. 
I am concerned, may I say to the distinguished Senator----
  Mr. CRAIG. Sure.
  Mr. BYRD. He is a member of the committee. I am concerned about the 
way these appropriations bills are piling up around here, and when we 
are headed for a continuing resolution.
  Now, would the Senator have a suggestion as to when we might have 
another cloture vote on that very question of the other day? A motion 
to reconsider was entered on that vote, I believe. Am I correct, may I 
ask----
  Mr. CRAIG. That is correct, as I recall.
  I do not, in any way, question the Senator's sincerity. You offered 
to solve it in one way, and I reciprocated by offering to solve it in 
another.
  I would go immediately to a unanimous consent for an up-or-down vote 
on the Craig second degree. That is an immediate solution that could 
occur in the next 35 or 40 minutes. That is a clear and clean and 
within-the-rules solution to a problem. I believe my side feels that I 
deserve a vote. And I know that the Senator is a stickler for the rules 
of the Senate and an advocate of them and strongly supportive of them.
  I want to facilitate this process. The money you have so generously 
helped us get----
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time controlled by the minority has 
expired.
  Mr. CRAIG. I ask unanimous consent for 1 more minute.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CRAIG. To fit into this Interior appropriations bill is critical, 
to pay back the funds within the Department of Agriculture and in the 
U.S. Forest Service that have been expended for the very fires about 
which we are concerned. This has to happen. Clearly, it is critical for 
the operation of the Forest Service. What is also critical, in my 
opinion, is that the Congress respond in a responsible way to the 
crisis.
  You, as chairman, and if you are chairman again in the new Congress 
or someone else is, should not have to be asking the taxpayers to pay 
out an additional $1 billion to $1.5 billion to $2 billion more a year 
because clearly a public policy is failing out there at this moment to 
address a crisis and, therefore, we are asking the taxpayer to pay for 
it. That is really what hangs in the balance here. They are intricately 
locked, I do believe. That is why I think it is so fundamentally 
important we vote on it at this moment.
  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, will the Senator yield?
  Mr. CRAIG. I am happy to yield.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.

[[Page 17260]]


  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, I took at least 3 minutes of the Senator's 
time. I ask unanimous consent that the distinguished Senator from Idaho 
may have 3 additional minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BYRD. I thank the Senator for yielding.
  Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I repeat what is a phenomenally 
frustrating concern of ours, that the Public Broadcasting Act that 
created NPR authorized the use of public money and what appears now at 
this moment to be an effort to go out and find a worst case scenario to 
refute arguments being placed on the floor. That is not the role of the 
public broadcasting program in this country.
  I am extremely pleased that this article appeared. We became aware of 
that e-mail traffic yesterday. I am glad some journalists have the 
right and the willingness to step forward and say: Wait a minute. This 
appears to be a complicit act of a nonprofit organization established 
by Congress for the purpose of educating our public but not 
misinforming our public. That appears by every evidence to be exactly 
what was underway.
  What fell out of it was the very basis of the argument I and others 
have been placing for some time and why my amendment or a version of my 
amendment in dealing with these critical areas and in dealing with 
allowing a process to move forward that cannot be just summarily 
blocked by an appeal but does not yet close the courthouse door is very 
critical to all of us.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, how much time remains on the pending bill?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 11 minutes.
  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 15 
minutes, a total of 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I will today offer an amendment to 
expedite forest thinning on our national forests and public lands. I am 
pleased that Senator Daschle is a cosponsor of this amendment. I would 
like to thank all of my colleagues who have worked with me to craft 
this amendment and who offered invaluable input and expertise.
  Everyone in the Senate wants to do what we can to reduce the threat 
of catastrophic wildfire. We all agree that we need to accelerate fuels 
reduction activities because the risk of severe fire is so high. 
Ongoing, drought, past fire suppression policies, and excessive 
harvesting of timber have all contributed to the problem. All of us 
also agree that it is much better to devote limited resources to 
proactive efforts to reduce fire risk rather than paying to fight the 
fires once they occur.
  I have tried for years to improve the Federal agencies' forest 
thinning program in a variety of ways. I am also a vocal proponent for 
spending Federal dollars conducting proactive forest restoration to 
reduce fire risk rather than continuing to spend billions of dollars 
each year fighting fires. Although some may contend that restoration 
costs too much money, over the long-term, it is much less expensive 
than fighting fires. Restoring our lands is the preferred alternative 
for the environment as well because, unfortunately, important species 
habitat burns right along with the forests during a fire.
  The main obstacle constraining us from substantially increasing our 
proactive efforts to reduce fire risk is a lack of adequate funding. As 
Oregon Governor and cochair for the Western Governor Association's 10-
Year Fire Plan John Kitzhaber states, ``it will take a significant 
investment of resources--far greater than what is envisioned to be 
saved through process efficiencies.'' Ever since Congress first funded 
the National Fire Plan 2 years ago, I have continually emphasized the 
need to sustain a commitment to the fiscal year 2001 funding levels 
over a long enough period of time to make a difference--at least 15 
years.
  Most fuel reduction projects will take several years to implement. It 
is critical that the agencies have reliable funding to complete the 
projects they start. If funding is obtained to thin trees the first 
year, but not to complete the slash disposal and reintroduce fire 
through prescribed burning the following years, short-term fire risk 
will be increased. Around the villages north of Truchas, some villages 
face a tremendous danger of fire due to slash left from thinning. 
According to the agencies themselves, mechanical thinning comprises 
only 19 percent annually of all hazardous fuels reduction activities.
  Adequate funding means, at a minimum, sustaining fiscal year 2001 
funding levels for all components of the National Fire Plan. The 
Western Governors Association recently sent a letter to Congress urging 
full funding of the National Fire Plan at the fiscal year 2001 funding 
levels. Similarly, recently the National Association of State Foresters 
compiled projected funding needs for the National Fire Plan over the 
next 10 years based on collaborative efforts with State governments, 
the Forest Service, and the Department of the Interior. The Western 
Governors' Association endorsed the State Foresters' projections. The 
General Accounting Office estimates that the cost to reduce fuels is 
about $725 million per year for the next 15 years, GAO/RCED-99-65.
  The funding levels in the bill we are currently considering are far 
below the State Foresters' and GAO's projected funding needs. For 
example, while hazardous fuels reduction was increased in fiscal year 
2001 and has remained relatively constant since that time, the State 
Foresters' analysis includes $100 million more for hazardous fuels 
reduction than the Interior appropriation bill provides. The State 
Foresters project that hazardous fuels reduction also will need to 
steadily increase over the next 10 years.
  Other important programs that are part of the National Fire Plan, 
including economic action programs, community and private land fire 
assistance, and burned area restoration and rehabilitation have been 
drastically cut--and some have been zeroed out--by the administration 
over the last two budget cycles. For some accounts included under the 
National Fire Plan, but not all, Congress has made up the difference. 
However, it would certainly be much easier to fully fund the National 
Fire Plan with the administration's support.
  Funding constraints clearly affect the ground restoration work. In 
New Mexico, there are several restoration projects that could make a 
meaningful difference in reducing the risk of catastrophic wildfire if 
funds were available. Here are some examples:
  One, Dry Lakes Project, El Rito Ranger District, Carson National 
Forest.--This mechanical thinning and prescribed burning fuel reduction 
project is located on the Tusas Ridge to the southwest of the community 
of Tres Piedras. The ridge has an unusually high incidence of 
lightening strikes which put the community at high risk. Tres Piedras 
is on the State list of highest priority areas. The district used 
fiscal year 2001 funding from the National Fire Plan to thin a large 
area but could not find sufficient funds in fiscal year 2002 to 
complete the prescribed burning. This is particularly troubling because 
several forestry experts agree that thinning trees without follow up 
work to reintroduce fire with prescribed burns, the fire risk will 
increase.
  Two, in southern New Mexico, Otero County Commissioner Michael 
Nivison has worked tirelessly to encourage broad community involvement 
within the context of existing laws and procedures. Unfortunately, the 
group found that lack of funding was an obstacle to moving forward with 
sensible forest thinning plans. In April 2002, I requested the 
necessary additional funds from the Washington office of the Forest 
Service because no additional funding was available from the Lincoln 
National Forest's budget or the Southwest Region office budget. The 
minimum funding needed was $1 million to complete thinning projects 
within the wildland/urban interface in the Rio Penasco watershed and 
for watershed analyses to prepare future restoration

[[Page 17261]]

projects. Fortunately, after waiting 3 months, the Forest Service 
complied with the request. However, Commissioner Nivison estimates an 
additional $4 million per year for the next 10 years above existing 
funding levels will be needed to successfully complete the forest 
thinning program on the Lincoln National Forest.
  Three, on the Gila National forest, the Catron County Citizens Group 
based in Glenwood is working to establish a sawmill to process small 
diameter wood removed from the forest as part of forest restoration 
projects and has secured non-Federal matching funds for their 
operation. In December 2001, I was notified that Forest Service 
employees had identified several restoration projects that were NEPA- 
ready, however, no funding was available. Once again, after specific 
and repeated requests, the Chief complied with the request to allocate 
an additional $1 million to the Gila. However, a 1-year special 
allocation clearly will not provide the long-term restoration 
investment needed.
  Four, earlier this year, the Chief told me that the Santa Fe 
Municipal Watershed Project is one of the highest priorities for the 
Forest Service's Southwest Region. Nonetheless, at the current rate of 
funding by the agency, the project will be completed in 18 years. If it 
were fully funded at $1 million per year, however, the project would be 
completed in 7 years. This is a critical project for the residents of 
Santa Fe to protect two city-owned reservoirs that hold 40 percent of 
the city's water supply.
  Five, Deer Lakes Fuel Break, Cuba Ranger District, Santa Fe National 
Forest.--This fuel break project was put on the list of suggested 
projects for fiscal year 2001 since NEPA review was complete, but it 
was not funded in fiscal year 2001 or fiscal year 2002. The fuel break 
will protect private homes in a forested subdivision. The Forest 
Service considers this area to be a priority.
  Six, Mt. Taylor Ranger District, Cibola National Forest.--A number of 
fuel reduction projects planned on this district have been held up by 
insufficient funding. All of these projects were small, less than 500 
acres.
  Seven, the Collaborative Forest Restoration Program, created through 
legislation I sponsored two years ago, provides $5 million annually to 
fund a variety of forest restoration projects in many different 
locations in New Mexico. Unfortunately, due to the Forest Service's 
practice of borrowing from other accounts to pay for firefighting, 
action on this year's projects has been suspended since July 8. Because 
the administration was unwilling, until very recently, to support 
repaying these accounts, it is unlikely that work will resume this year 
on these projects.
  Beyond funding constraints, some allege that administrative appeals 
and lawsuits limit our ability to reduce fire risk across the country. 
I am willing to provide new legal authorities and exemptions from 
administrative appeals to address this concern. However, we should 
proceed carefully at this juncture and withhold from enacting sweeping 
changes to Federal law without due consideration. If we need to make 
permanent changes to existing laws, we should do so next year after 
this issue has been debated thoroughly in the Senate including hearings 
and committee business meetings.
  Let me briefly describe our amendment. We propose to exempt from 
National Environmental Policy Act analysis all forest thinning projects 
located in areas that are at the highest risk of fire and remove up to 
250,000 broad feet of timber or 1 million board feet of salvage. We 
prohibit administrative appeals on these projects, thereby saving 135 
days in the process. In addition, we eliminate judicial review granted 
under NEPA for thinning projects within 1/2 mile of any community 
structure or within certain key municipal watersheds. The combination 
of these provisions would save between one and one-half to three and 
one-half years of process.
  Moreover, in order to focus the agencies' work on the highest 
priority ares where human safety and property loss are the most 
serious, we require that 100 percent of hazardous fuels reduction funds 
be spent in the highest fire risk areas, known as condition class 3, 
and 70 percent of those funds be spent within one-half mile of any 
community structure or within key municipal watersheds identified in 
forest plans.
  In order to recognize the role that forest dependent communities play 
in restoring our lands, we require that at least 10 percent of 
hazardous fuels reduction funds be spent on projects that benefit small 
businesses that use hazardous fuels and are located in small, 
economically disadvantaged communities. Finally, in order to provide 
robust monitoring of these experimental new authorities, we require 
multiparty monitoring of a representative sampling of the projects.
  We agree with, and included, many provisions of Senator Craig's 
amendment in our amendment. For example, Senator Craig requires the 
secretaries to give highest priority to protecting communities, 
municipal watersheds, and areas affected by disease, insect activity, 
or wind throw. He requires that projects be consistent with applicable 
forest plans and that the Secretaries jointly develop a collaborative 
process to select projects. We agree with all of these provisions.
  However, our amendment differs from Senator Craig's amendment because 
we felt it was appropriate to enact parameters and limitations along 
with the new authorities for several reasons. First, we are legislating 
without the benefit of the normal authorizing Committee process. If, 
after consideration through the authorizing Committee process, we 
decide to make some or all of these changes permanent, we can do so 
next year.
  Second, the Forest Service has a poor track record with respect to 
supporting projects that do not harvest large trees. One example that I 
am aware of occurred in New Mexico. On the Gila National Forest Sheep 
Basin project, there was broad agreement within the local community 
that a project harvesting small trees would be a win-win. The community 
agreed this project would both benefit the environment and generate 
local jobs while also reducing fire risk. The Forest Service, however, 
rejected the community's proposal and insisted on following a plan to 
harvest large trees.
  Third, many independent analyses have discovered numerous flaws with 
the agencies' existing implementation of the National Fire Plan. For 
example, a recent General Accounting Office report severely chastised 
the agencies for their inability to account for where hazardous fuels 
reduction funds have been spent. Specifically, the GAO states:

     It is not possible to determine if the $796 million 
     appropriate for hazardous fuels reduction in fiscal year 2001 
     and 2002 is targeted to the communities and other areas at 
     highest risk of severe wildland fires.--GAO/RCED-02-259, 
     January 2002.

  In addition, in November 2001, the Inspector General for the 
Department of Agriculture found that the Forest Service was 
inappropriately spending its burned area restoration funds to prepare 
commercial timber sales. Similarly, it was recently discovered that the 
Forest Service ``misplaced'' $215 million intended for wildland fire 
management due to an accounting error.
  Finally, another GAO report concluded that, because the Forest 
Service relies on the timber program for funding many of its other 
activities, including reducing fuels, it has often used the timber 
program to address the wildfire problem. GAO states:

     The difficulty with such an approach, however, is that the 
     lands with commercially valuable timber are often not those 
     with the greatest wildfire hazards. Additionally, there are 
     problems with the incentives in the fuel reduction program. 
     Currently, managers are rewarded for the number of acres on 
     which they reduce fuels, not for reducing fuels on the lands 
     with the highest fire hazards. Becuase reducing fuels in ares 
     with greater hazards is often more expensive--meaning that 
     fewer acres can be completed with the same funding level--
     managers have an incentive not to undertake efforts on such 
     lands.--GAO/RCED-99-65.

  The parameters set forth in our amendment will ensure that the 
agencies conduct forest thinning in a way that truly reduces the threat 
of fire. For example, we require the agencies to focus on thinning 
projects that truly reduce the threat of fire, namely removing small 
diameter trees and

[[Page 17262]]

brush. This limitation is based on numerous scientific research studies 
conducted by the Forest Service. Too often, the Forest Service has cut 
large trees because of their commercial value instead of removing 
small-diameter trees that tend to spread fire.
  Our amendment prohibits new road construction in inventoried roadless 
areas because the National Forests already contain 380,000 miles of 
road, as a comparison, the National Highway System contains 160,000 
miles of roads, and the deferred maintenance needs on these existing 
roads totals more then $1 billion. Forest Service analysis reveals that 
roads increase the probability of accidental and intentional human-
caused ignitions.
  A group of respected forest fire scientist recently wrote President 
Bush a letter stating that, ``thinning of overstory trees, likely 
building new roads, can often exacerbate the situation and damage 
forest health.'' Moreover, the vast majority of all trees in the west 
are small, more than 90 percent are 12 inches in diameter or smaller.
  Returning receipts to the Treasury is consistent with a provision in 
the Wyden/Craig County payments legislation enacted 2 years ago and 
avoids existing perverse incentives. Numerous GAO reports reveal that 
existing agency trust funds provide incentives for the agency to cut 
large trees because it gets to keep the revenue. Cutting large trees 
will not reduce fire risk, therefore, we should direct receipts back to 
the Treasury. Jeremy Fried, a Forest Service research specialist at the 
Pacific Northwest Research Station, states, ``If you take just big 
trees, you do not reduce fire danger.''
  The provision in our amendment stating that 70 percent of Hazardous 
Fuels Reduction Funds be spent within one-half mile of any community 
structure or within key municipal watersheds is more flexible than the 
President's fiscal year 2003 budget request which provides that the 
same percentage only be spent near communities. We in Congress must 
ensure that the agencies adhere to our direction that the number one 
priority is to protect communities at risk for catastrophic fire. To 
date, this has not occurred. In fiscal year 2002, only 39 percent of 
the areas where hazardous fuels will be treated are in the wildland/
urban interface. In fiscal year 2003, only 55 percent of the acres 
scheduled to be treated are near communities. Finally, we need hard and 
fast assurance that the agencies will make its investments near 
communities because the National Fire Plan and the Western Governors' 
Association identify protecting people as the number one priority.
  We are willing to provide the agencies with additional authority as 
set forth in our amendment but only to achieve the number of acres 
treated that can be accomplished without a substantial increase in 
funds. My amendment doubles the amount of acreage treated to reduce 
fire risk in the upcoming year form 2.5 million to 5 million acres 
whereas Senator Craig's amendment covers 10 million acres of Federal 
land.
  It is impossible for the agencies, even with the expedited procedures 
included in Senator Craig's amendment, to quadruple the amount of acres 
treated annually. Since fiscal year 2001, Congress has provided about 
$400 million annually for hazardous fuels reduction. With this level of 
funding, the agencies have treated approximately 2.5 million acres each 
year. For fiscal year 2003, the Senate Interior appropriations bill 
provides $414 million for hazardous fuels reduction, fully funding the 
Administration's request. Again, the agencies estimate they will 
complete treatment on about 2.5 million acres. Senator Craig's 
amendment does not provide any additional funds, therefore, it is 
incorrect to purport that now, suddenly, the agencies will quadruple 
the amounts of acres treated.
  Moreover, we do not need to treat every acre of land to reduce fire 
risk. New Mexicans and others living in the west want their government 
to quickly and intelligently address the excessive build-up of 
hazardous fuels. If we're going to leverage limited Government funds to 
solve this problem, we need to figure out in advance which forested 
lands need to be treated and how.
  To act quickly and strategically to prevent catastrophic fires, we do 
not need to treat every single acre of national forest and public 
lands. Instead, we should create firebreaks and other strategically 
thinned areas to stop fires from spreading out of control over large 
areas. A respected Forest Service researcher named Mark Finney has 
estimated that treatments need only address 20 percent of the 
landscape, if thinned areas are strategically placed to make fires move 
perpendicular to the prevailing winds. The Forest Service should 
experiment with Finney's ideas and those of others about how to most 
strategically place thinning projects. The less acres the Government 
needs to treat, the further our existing funds will stretch.
  The board feet levels in this amendment are identical to the levels 
previously set forth for categorical exclusions by the Forest Service. 
Almost 3 years ago, a Federal district court invalidated these 
categorical exclusions primarily because the agency literally lost its 
administrative record. Notably, the court left room for the agency to 
reinstate these categorical exclusions but for some reason the agency 
still has not done so. This approach also will benefit local businesses 
by requiring the agency to implement relatively smaller projects. 
Residents of Truchas, NM, tell me that the using categorical exclusions 
improves the ability of local Federal land managers to make site 
specific decisions that address community needs.
  At this point in time, I do not believe we need to expedite judicial 
review beyond what we offer in our amendment. Prohibiting any temporary 
restraining orders or preliminary injunctions, which is what the 
Republican and administration proposals would do, makes any judicial 
review effectively irrelevant. In addition, on August 31, 2001, the 
General Accounting Office reported that, of the hazardous fuels 
reduction projects identified for implementation in fiscal year 2001, 
none had been litigated.
  In conclusion, our amendment represents a thoughtful, balanced 
approach to expedite forest thinning in a way that truly reduces fire 
risk for communities and the environment.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. BURNS. Madam 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. THOMPSON. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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