[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 5]
[Senate]
[Page 6607]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                 TIMBER

  Mr. SMITH. Mr. President, I intended to speak in reference to an 
amendment I was to call up for the supplemental, but because we are in 
morning business I will speak in morning business.
  My amendment would be objected to as out of order, as being 
inconsistent with the supplemental emergency bill. However, I am here 
to talk about an emergency in rural Oregon in timber-dependent 
communities.
  For 100 years, there has been a relationship between the Federal 
Government and rural communities that has been absolutely indispensable 
to our country and to those communities. The deal was this: In those 
States where the Federal Government owns much of the land--in my State 
it owns more than half of the State of Oregon--there would be multiple 
uses of public lands. They would be managed as to their resources 
consistent with environmental law.
  In the case of the State of Oregon, there would be the result of 
timber products, wood products, to build countless millions of homes. 
There would be jobs for people and there would be the types of jobs 
that would create tax revenues that would allow local communities to 
have services.
  In addition to that, there is what are called timber receipts. Local 
communities would get 25 percent of the timber receipts from the 
harvest of public timber. This has been absolutely indispensable to the 
life of these rural communities.
  That deal changed in the 1990s. To show you how devastating this 
change was to my State, we had the listing of the spotted owl. We had 
the Endangered Species Act go into effect. President Clinton and Vice 
President Gore pursued a forest policy that took a harvest of roughly 8 
billion board feet a year down to less than 1 percent of that in many 
national forests. As a consequence, by the end of the 1990s, our 
schools were closing. They operated 4 days a week. Counties had no 
money because many of them have lost up to 60 percent of their 
operating budgets.
  At the end of the Clinton administration, the Congress, with 
President Clinton, recognized the damage, the devastation, being done 
to these communities, so we passed, in 2000, the Secure Rural Schools 
Act to bridge the gap between what had been, the gridlock that existed, 
and the hope for a brighter day when there would be a predictable, 
sustainable level of forestry.
  President Bush and the Congress pursued the Healthy Forests 
Initiative and this President has fully funded the Northwest Forest 
Plan that was the product of President Clinton but never delivered on 
the timber that it promised in the hopes of bridging the gap for these 
communities.
  But still, after all of that effort, 6 years later, we find that only 
a small percent of what was done 20 years ago is available to these 
communities in terms of timber harvest. As a consequence, this secure 
rural schools fund is about to expire.
  I suggest this is a very real, present danger, even an emergency, 
that is appropriate to this supplemental. We ought to include it. These 
are Federal decisions that have been made. They have been made by an 
administration in the 1990s. They have been made by Federal law, the 
law that passed by this Congress. They have been made by courts that 
have enforced that law and have locked up our forests and now have us 
in a bind that is truly an emergency.
  This is a Federal obligation. I need to use every tool as a Senator 
that I have available to me to try to remind this Senate, this 
Congress, of the obligation it has. We cannot abandon these 
communities. We cannot abandon these people. We have to find a way to 
continue to get back to a management level that is consistent with 
environmental law, that allows for multiple uses of the land, the 
harvest of timber, the employment of our people, the production of wood 
products, the receipt of timber taxes, so that schools can remain open, 
streets can remain paved, counties can be safe because they have police 
protection.
  This is not inexpensive. The annual cost of what we did to bridge 
this gap was $500 million a year. Oregon is responsible for 20 percent 
of the merchantable timber in this country. We are not alone in terms 
of the benefit that came from this secure rural schools fund. 
California received $380 million over the last 6 years; Montana, $63 
million; Mississippi received $38.8 million to keep their rural timber-
dependent communities together body and soul.
  We cannot walk away from this until we find a day where we can get 
back to a deal that is sustainable in terms of environmental policy, 
timber production, and the employment of our people. Heaven knows we 
need the timber. We are now a net importer of timber in this country. 
Yet what do we do with our own timber? Our policies are in gridlock and 
our forests are burning.
  Three years ago, there were 500,000 acres burned in southern Oregon, 
larger than the State, I am told, of Rhode Island. Yet that timber 
still stands rotting, a moonscape that, frankly, ought to be allowed to 
at least be salvaged in some degree.
  Until we come to a day where we have a policy that we in the Federal 
Government agree upon, we cannot abandon these rural communities.
  I will at the appropriate time propose my amendment and hope it is 
not ruled out of order.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from 
Oregon for his comments and his leadership on these issues that are so 
important to our forestry owners and people throughout the States who 
depend on incomes from those jobs.
  I ask unanimous consent I be permitted to call up amendments at this 
point.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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