[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 37, Number 3 (Monday, January 22, 2001)]
[Pages 156-158]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
 Proclamation 7399--Establishment of the Virgin Islands Coral Reef 
National Monument

 January 17, 2001

 By the President of the United States

 of America

 A Proclamation

    The Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument, in the submerged 
lands off the island of St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands, contains 
all the elements of a Caribbean tropical marine ecosystem. This 
designation furthers the protection of the scientific objects included 
in the Virgin Islands National Park, created in 1956 and expanded in 
1962. The biological communities of the monument live in a fragile, 
interdependent relationship and include habitats essential for 
sustaining and enhancing the tropical marine ecosystem: mangroves, sea 
grass beds, coral reefs, octocoral hardbottom, sand communities, shallow 
mud and fine sediment habitat, and algal plains. The fishery habitats, 
deeper coral reefs, octocoral hardbottom, and algal plains of the 
monument are all objects of scientific interest and essential to the 
long-term sustenance of the tropical marine ecosystem.
    The monument is within the Virgin Islands, which lie at the heart of 
the insular Caribbean biome, and is representative of the Lesser 
Antillean biogeographic province. The island of St. John rises from a 
platform that extends several miles from shore before plunging to the 
abyssal depths of the Anegada trough to the south and the Puerto Rican 
trench to the north, the deepest part of the Atlantic Ocean. This 
platform contains a multitude of species that exist in a delicate 
balance, interlinked through complex relationships that have developed 
over tens of thousands of years.
    As part of this important ecosystem, the monument contains 
biological objects including several threatened and endangered species, 
which forage, breed, nest, rest, or calve in the waters. Humpback 
whales, pilot whales, four species of dolphins, brown pelicans, roseate 
terns, least terns, and the hawksbill, leatherback, and green sea 
turtles all use portions of the monument. Countless species of reef 
fish, invertebrates, and plants utilize these submerged lands during 
their lives, and over 25 species of sea birds feed in the waters. 
Between the nearshore nursery habitats and the shelf edge spawning sites 
in the monument are habitats that play essential roles during specific 
developmental stages of reef-associated species, including spawning 
migrations of many reef fish species and crustaceans.
    The submerged monument lands within Hurricane Hole include the most 
extensive and well-developed mangrove habitat on St. John. The Hurricane 
Hole area is an important nursery area for reef associated fish and

[[Page 157]]

invertebrates, instrumental in maintaining water quality by filtering 
and trapping sediment and debris in fresh water runoff from the fast 
land, and essential to the overall functioning and productivity of 
regional fisheries. Numerous coral reef-associated species, including 
the spiny lobster, queen conch, and Nassau grouper, transform from 
planktonic larvae to bottom-dwelling juveniles in the shallow nearshore 
habitats of Hurricane Hole. As they mature, they move offshore and take 
up residence in the deeper coral patch reefs, octocoral hardbottom, and 
algal plains of the submerged monument lands to the south and north of 
St. John.
    The monument lands south of St. John are predominantly deep algal 
plains with scattered areas of raised hard bottom. The algal plains 
include communities of mostly red and calcareous algae with canopies as 
much as half a meter high. The raised hard bottom is sparsely colonized 
with corals, sponges, gorgonians, and other invertebrates, thus 
providing shelter for lobster, groupers, and snappers as well as 
spawning sites for some reef fish species. These algal plains and raised 
hard bottom areas link the shallow water reef, sea grass, and mangrove 
communities with the deep water shelf and shelf edge communities of fish 
and invertebrates.
    Section 2 of the Act of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16 U.S.C. 431), 
authorizes the President, in his discretion, to declare by public 
proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, 
and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated 
upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United 
States to be national monuments, and to reserve as a part thereof 
parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to 
the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the 
objects to be protected.
    Whereas it appears that it would be in the public interest to 
reserve such lands as a national monument to be known as the Virgin 
Islands Coral Reef National Monument:
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, by the authority vested in me by section 2 of the Act 
of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16 U.S.C. 431), do proclaim that there 
are hereby set apart and reserved as the Virgin Islands Coral Reef 
National Monument, for the purpose of protecting the objects identified 
above, all lands and interests in lands owned or controlled by the 
United States within the boundaries of the area described on the map 
entitled ``Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument'' attached to and 
forming a part of this proclamation. The Federal land and interests in 
land reserved consist of approximately 12,708 marine acres, which is the 
smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the 
objects to be protected.
    All Federal lands and interests in lands within the boundaries of 
this monument are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from all forms of 
entry, location, selection, sale, or leasing or other disposition under 
the public land laws, including but not limited to withdrawal from 
location, entry, and patent under the mining laws, and from disposition 
under all laws relating to mineral and geothermal leasing, other than by 
exchange that furthers the protective purposes of the monument. For the 
purpose of protecting the objects identified above, the Secretary shall 
prohibit all boat anchoring, except for emergency or authorized 
administrative purposes.
    For the purposes of protecting the objects identified above, the 
Secretary shall prohibit all extractive uses, except that the Secretary 
may issue permits for bait fishing at Hurricane Hole and for blue runner 
(hard nose) line fishing in the area south of St. John, to the extent 
that such fishing is consistent with the protection of the objects 
identified in this proclamation.
    Lands and interests in lands within the monument not owned or 
controlled by the United States shall be reserved as a part of the 
monument upon acquisition of title or control thereto by the United 
States.
    The Secretary of the Interior shall manage the monument through the 
National Park Service, pursuant to applicable legal authorities, to 
implement the purposes of this proclamation. The National Park Service 
will manage the monument in a manner consistent with international law.
    The Secretary of the Interior shall prepare a management plan, 
including the management of vessels in the monument, within 3

[[Page 158]]

years, which addresses any further specific actions necessary to protect 
the objects identified in this proclamation.
    The establishment of this monument is subject to valid existing 
rights.
    Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke any existing 
withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation; however, the national 
monument shall be the dominant reservation.
    Warning is hereby given to all unauthorized persons not to 
appropriate, injure, destroy, or remove any feature of this monument and 
not to locate or settle upon any of the lands thereof.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this seventeenth day 
of January, in the year of our Lord two thousand one, and of the 
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and twenty-
fifth.
                                            William J. Clinton

 [Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 8:45 a.m., January 19, 
2001]

  Note:  This proclamation was published in the  Federal Register  on 
January 22.