Statement of Administration Policy: H.R. 5503 - Department of the Interior and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill, FY 1993

(House Rules)
(Sponsors: Whitten (D), Mississippi; Yates (D), Illinois)

The purpose of this Statement of Administration Policy is to express the Administration's views on the Department of the Interior and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill, FY 1993, as reported by the Committee.

The Administration has a number of serious concerns with the Committee bill.

The Administration urges the House to consider a realignment of the funding priorities ln the Committee bill. The Committee has provided unwarranted increases to the President's request for a variety of construction projects and research and operational programs. These include increases for low-priority Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) programs and for infrastructure and operations in the territories. As discussed below, the Administration believes that these increases should be redirected to high-priority natural and historical resource conservation programs that are of national significance.

The Committee has provided inadequate funding for recreation, resource protection, operational and cyclical maintenance, tree planting, hazardous waste clean-up, and other initiatives for our public lands. This is particularly surprising given the increasing demand on the part of the American public for outdoor recreation opportunities.

The Committee's funding level for America the Beautiful (ATB) programs is roughly $270 million (14 percent) below the amounts requested by the President. While failing to provide adequate funding for high-priority natural and historical resource conservation, the Committee has provided funding for non-essential and often demonstrably ineffective programs. The attached table compares these reductions in parks, wildlife, and outdoor recreation programs to additions made by the Committee for low-priority projects and programs.

As the table shows, while the Committee added $170 million above the request for low-priority BIA programs and an unrequested $33 million for infrastructure and operations in the territories, it cut $270 million from the Administration's request for public lands.

At a time when visits to our national parks and forests are at record levels, placing them under increasing stress, the Administration believes that funds to protect these valuable resources should not be reduced. The Administration urges the House to restore funding to requested levels for nationally significant resource protection and tree planting programs.

These include:

• Federal land acquisition, including Headwaters Forest in California and Idaho recreational lands;
  
  
• The partnership with the States to support outdoor recreation, for which the Administration requested $60 million and the Committee provided $28 million;
  
  
• The President's program to plant one billion trees a year;
  
  
• The program to protect America's remaining battlefields, which are threatened by imminent development and other intrusive forces;
  
  
• The "Targeted Parks" initiative to improve monitoring and protection of parks facing acute natural resource problems;
  
  
• Challenge cost-share programs for parks and refuges, which would foster public/private partnerships to restore and enhance these areas;
  
  
• More seasonal park rangers to provide visitor services and increase resource protection; and
  
  
• Establishment of the ATB Passport that is specially designed to provide 12 months of access to a wide variety of Federally administered outdoor recreation areas.

Further, the Administration believes that proper preservation of the sites and structures that hosted nationally significant historic events is critical. The Administration strongly recommends that the House restore $5 million for historic preservation efforts at our Nation's historically black colleges and universities as well as Montpelier (VA), James Madison's ancestral home.

The Administration opposes the continuation of Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) oil and gas leasing moratoria on all activity in Bristol Bay, Alaska; on Sale 164 in the Atlantic; and on Sales 137 and 151 in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico. Sales 164 and 151 are contained in Interior's final 1992-1997 natural gas and oil leasing plan and would cost the Treasury $10 million in bonus bids if not held on schedule. Reforms in Interior's new leasing plan make the OCS oil and gas program more selective, judicious, and environmentally sound, making these legislative moratoria inappropriate and unnecessary.

Language in the Committee bill would prevent the transfer of technical responsibility for dam safety from the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) to the Bureau of Reclamation. Lives are at risk as long as serious and long-standing safety deficiencies go uncorrected at various BIA dams. BIA has failed to correct these deficiencies. The Administration must be permitted to take reasonable, alternative steps to do so before a tragedy occurs.

The Administration continues to support grazing fees as set by Executive Order, and opposes the increase contained in the Committee version of the bill. The House is urged to eliminate the proposed increase. The House is also asked to delete the Committee prohibition on issuance of mineral patents. Changes in the 1872 Mining Law are needed, but a patent prohibition would unduly interfere with current law and procedures. Such a prohibition could result in "takings" of private property, exposing the Federal Government to substantial financial compensation for such actions.

The Administration strongly objects to the Committee's 40- percent reduction in funding for the President's new natural gas research and development program. The National Energy Strategy (NES) concluded that expanded use of domestically abundant natural gas resources could increase energy security and improve the environment. This reduction would impede the development of ultra-high efficiency technologies for gas consumption, which the nation requires to achieve our NES goals.

The Administration strongly objects to the Committee's continued refusal to lease the Elk Hills, California, oil field to private industry. Leasing is the method the U.S. Government has used consistently elsewhere in this country to ensure the sound development of Federally owned oil and gas resources in a manner that protects the Government's interests.

Private industry would pay the government $1.2 billion or more for the right to lease Elk Hills. Private industry would also invest hundreds of millions of dollars in needed production equipment at the oil field, thereby eliminating the need for Congress to appropriate scarce budgetary resources for those purposes. It is important to note that if the House were to adopt the Administration's leasing proposal, the projected $1.2 billion in receipts would be available for high-priority domestic discretionary programs.

The Administration objects to the Committee's inclusion of $42 million for a new Emergency Pest Management account, while reducing the regular discretionary funding for Forest Pest Management under the State and Private Forestry account by $22 million. The Administration strongly objects to the approach taken by the Committee because it would preclude the use of funds from the emergency account unless the President declares an emergency, thus exempting all expenditures from applicable spending limits.

Because pest suppression costs can be reasonably anticipated and funded in advance, the Office of Management and Budget would not recommend to the President that he designate appropriations for this purpose as "emergency" requirements. The Administration urges the House to fund Forest Pest Management operations at the level of anticipated needs and to do so within the domestic discretionary spending limits established by the Budget Enforcement Act (BEA).

The Administration commends the Committee for fully funding Interior and Agriculture wildland firefighting programs as proposed by the Administration; terminating funding for unnecessary Urban Park grants; and requiring non-Federal cost sharing for the first time to complete construction of the FDR Memorial.

The attached data table can be downloaded in PDF format by clicking this link