Larry Craig

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. It is very important there be research conducted at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) that supports the EM mission of the Lab. I would point out that the INEEL has been designated as the lead Environmental Lab in the DOE Lab complex. If INEEL is to lead, there must be funds available to exert such leadership.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I would like to announce for the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land Management of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will take place on Tuesday, October 5, 1999 at 2:30 p.m. in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C. The purpose of this hearing is to receive testimony on S. 1608, a bill to provide annual payments to the States and counties from National Forest System lands managed by the Forest Service, and the revested Oregon and California Railroad and reconveyed Coos Bay Wagon Road grant lands managed predominately by the Bureau of Land Management, for use by the counties in which the lands are situated for the benefit of the public schools, roads, emergency and other public purposes; to encourage and provide a new mechanism for cooperation between counties and the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to make necessary investments in federal lands, and reaffirm the positive connection between Federal Lands counties and Federal Lands; and for other purposes. Those who wish to submit written statements should write to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. 20510. For further information, please call Mark Rey at (202) 224- 6170.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I would like to rise today to pay tribune to one of Idaho and America's finest veterans, H. Melvin ``Mel'' Napier, of Boise, ID. There is no question Mel Napier is a true American patriot and a leader, from his participation in the military, to his work on behalf of veterans, to his contributions in the community. The Air Force has a very special tradition in Idaho, and Mel has long been part of that tradition. Enlisting in the U.S. Air Force during the Korean conflict, Mel served 4 years on active duty and 8 years in the Air Force Reserves as a meteorologist. He has also been a stalwart veteran advocate. His active membership and leadership in the American Legion led him to be selected to be National Vice Commander in 1982-83. In 1983, Mel began his service as State Adjutant for the Legion, and he has served in that capacity until this September. Mel's service to our country makes it clear that he has never been afraid of challenges, hardships or hard work. Idaho is privileged to have Mel and his family as residents. I am honored to stand before the Senate today and tell my colleagues about Mel; however, I do this with mixed emotions. Mel Napier recently stepped down as State Adjutant for the American Legion, a position he held for 16 years. It is a special individual indeed who commits to that kind of service on behalf of all the men and women in uniform who have proudly served our great nation. In sum, I would like to thank Mel for his tremendous contribution to our country, and most of all, to America's veterans. I know that Mel will not be leaving the American Legion, or ending his service to veterans because he will no longer serve as State Adjutant, but I do think that this is a very appropriate time to give Mel our thanks and show our gratitude for his service. Mr. Napier, thank you, congratulations, and Godspeed.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, let me also join with the Senator from Utah for what I think he spoke very clearly about: the run amok of Government and the idea that we are going to craft public policy through the courts of our land. I believe that is the fundamental responsibility of the Congress, both the House and the Senate. Yet we have seen this administration and the trial lawyer community of this country decide that. First, it is tobacco. They are going to tell the world how to think and then tell the States and the Federal Government what the policy ought to look like. Now they are turning on the gun manufacturers. I don't care where you stand on the issue of guns. What is wrong in this country is to suggest that trial attorneys will meet in the dark of night to decide what group they are going to take on next, amass their wealth for the purpose of making hundreds of millions more, and then turn to the Congress and say, now that we have made these findings, go legislate a policy. I don't believe that is the essence of the foundation of our representative Republic.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I came to the floor today to speak about an event which happened this past Saturday that in many States across the Nation went relatively unnoticed. It was National Public Lands Day. It was a time for all Americans to recognize the value we have in our public lands and a time for all of us to give a little something back by volunteering a Saturday to lend a helping hand to improve our public lands. If you were out and about, you noticed volunteers both in this city on some of our parkways and across the area. But across the Nation, over 20,000 volunteers took some of their precious time. We all know that weekend time in a busy populace is a precious time and, by taking it, they performed over $1 million worth of improvements to our public lands--from helping construct to simply cleaning up and picking up. In recognition of National Public Lands Day, I want to spend a few minutes today reflecting on the value of our public lands and on what the future holds for them. There are about 650 million acres of public lands in the United States. They represent a vast portion of the total land mass of our continent. However, most of these lands are concentrated in the West. Coming from Idaho, I recognize that very clearly. There are some States where over 82 percent of that State's land mass is public. In my State of Idaho, it is nearly 63 percent of the entire geography that is owned, managed, and controlled by the Federal Government, or by the citizens of this country. There can be a great beneficial effect for our public lands, for all of us. For starters, there are a great many resources available on our public lands--from our renewable forests to the opportunities to raise cattle on them, to drilling for oil, to mining for minerals from the surface. And the subsurface of our public lands holds a great deal of resources. We all depend on it for our lives. Without question, our public lands have been the treasure chest of the great wealth of our Nation. Many of our resources have come from the utilization of the resource of the public land. Having these resources available has afforded not only the opportunities I have spoken to but it has clearly advanced some of our governmental services because most of those resources reap a benefit to the Treasury, and from the Treasury to our schools, our roads, and our national defense. All of these resources and their revenues have helped ease the tax burden on the average taxpayer. Not only are the taxpayers of our country rightfully the owners of that public land, but we, the Government, and all of us as citizens are beneficiaries of those resources. Just as important though is the recreational opportunity and the environment that our public lands offer. Every day, people hike and pack in the solitude of our wilderness areas, climb rocks, ski, camp, snowmobile, use their off-road vehicles, hunt, fish, picnic, boat, and swim--the list goes on and on of the level of recreation and expectations we have coming from our public land. Because the lands are owned by all of us, the opportunity has existed for everyone to use the land within reasonable limits. Certainly our responsibility as a policymaker--as I am, and as are all Senators--in shaping the use of these lands, I am hopeful that this year Republicans and Democrats in the Senate can work together to pass balanced legislation that corrects the abuses by both debtors and creditors in the bankruptcy system. But this partisan attempt to prematurely cut off debate before we even started to consider this bill does not bode well for that effort. I hope that once this cloture motion is defeated, the Senate will begin a reasonable and fair debate on bankruptcy reform legislation that reflects a balancing of rights between debtors and creditors. Those public lands have been a historic and primary responsibility of the Congress itself. However, in the last couple of decades several changes have occurred. We are in the midst of a slow and methodical attack on our very access as individuals to the public land itself. It started with the resources industries. That was the restrictive nature or the change in public policy that limited access by our resource industries and how they might use the land. Some would say, well, that is merely important for the preservation of the land. But what we have also seen is an ever increasing attitude to keep people--just simple people who want to hike or backpack, to have access to that land--off the land or in some way control their very character on the land. Some radical groups are fighting to halt all resource management on our public lands, and they are working to restrict, as I have mentioned, the elemental human access to those lands. On the Targhee National Forest in Idaho, the Forest Service tore up the land to keep people off. I was out touring that forest and came upon over 300 huge gouges in roads that had been contracted by the Forest Service to stop access to the land. It was all in the name of an endangered species. But at the same time, if that kind of damage or destruction had occurred at the hands of a mining company or a logging company, the owners of those companies would have been in court. Here it was merely the forest land saying, oh, well, this huge tank trap or gouge in the road to stop traffic was our way of protecting the land. I am not sure who was the protector in that instance. Additionally, we are seeing the implementation of dramatic changes in the philosophy of the public's access to our Forest Service from openness to an element of closeness. At the time when Gifford Pinchot convinced Teddy Roosevelt to remove forested lands from the public preserve and make them forested preserves, the concept was that these lands were open. While they were protected, to be utilized for forest and to be maintained for water quality and wildlife habitat, always the people could have access. Slowly but surely, there has been a change in that attitude. That attitude has dramatically shifted to one in which the Forest Service would now suggest to you that our U.S. forests are closed to the public unless designated open. Gifford Pinchot would roll over in his grave as not only one of our Nation's great conservationists but one of the great advocates for forested reserves. The reason he would is that he said: If you do not associate the people to their land, ultimately the land becomes the king's land, much like feudal Europe in which the forests were the King's and the serf could not tread on that land unless given express permission by the King. When the forest is closed--and that is what is being talked about today, and in many instances the chief of the U.S. Forest Service, Chief Dombeck, who is an advocate of this philosophy, ``closed unless designated open''--then where do you go to gain permission to access your public lands? You go to the Government. In essence, you go to the King. You go to the ruler. I don't think that is what Americans want. While Americans may differ on how they want their public land managed and for what reason they want it managed, there is one thing I doubt any of us would argue about, and that is that the Federal Government should not have the absolute right to tell our citizens who may or may not tread upon these lands. All of us should be outraged by a Forest Service attitude that it is their land and they control it and they will give permission, they will be the implementors of policy in a way that will determine who is locked off the land. That, in my opinion, appears to be their agenda. That very forest in Idaho I told you about, where large tank traps appeared in the public roads, just in their new forest plan they have changed the philosophy of the management to suggest that all roads are closed and, therefore, the forest is closed unless designated open. Yes, we must manage our public lands responsibly, which includes restrictions on some activities and in some areas with the preservation of the land's environment. For the water quality, for the wildlife habitat, for all of those fundamental reasons, we enjoy our public land base. But we should not sit here so snidely as to suggest that a Federal agency has the right to say you may enter or you may not enter the land. Yet more and more forests and public lands of our country are now receiving those kinds of restrictions. Some people like to hike in our back country, others like simply the peace and the solitude, while others prefer to ride ATVs in the woods. Some prefer to camp in a more developed facility, while others prefer primitive spots. The point is, the recreational opportunities on our public lands should be as diverse as America's public interests. On the same note, we can use the natural resources we need in an environmentally responsible manner and still have plenty of opportunities to recreate. In fact, recreation and resource interests can team together to help each other. In my own State of Idaho in the Clearwater National Forest we have seen a dramatic decline in our elk herds in large part because of a lack of habitat. This is a massive amount of public land. Yet by its management--the suppression of wildfires, the inability of the Forest Service to manage using controlled burns but changing the habitat and the character of the land itself--one of the Nation's largest elk herds collapsed. In the winters of 1996 and 1997, thousands of elk starved to death simply by the mismanagement of our public lands by a Forest Service that would not seek the diversity of landscape that is so critically necessary to maintain those unique elk herds and the vibrancy of the land itself. Rather than fight each other, elk conservation groups, the Forest Service, and the timber industry are coming together to develop a plan to mechanically thin some of the areas and use prescribed burns and others to treat nearly a million acres to increase elk habitat. Yet on the outside there are some conservation groups that say even thinning a tree is cutting a tree and should not be allowed. How absurd. Why deny the right of good stewards to manage land in a way that creates diversity and balance so that Idaho can reclaim its heritage of having a large elk herd, and at the same time having more than 4 million acres of wilderness, and at the same time having a vibrant Forest Service products industry, while at the same time having growth within the State as one of its No. 1 economies tourism and recreation. That is a wise and balanced approach toward managing our public lands instead of this single attitude of ``lock 'em out, preserve, and deny'' the ability to manage public resources in a diverse and balanced way. We need all of our public lands to be used in a way that appeals to all of our citizens, not to just a single, relatively narrow-minded group. Public land management, because of this, is now embroiled in fights, in appeals, in litigation. Every decision made by our public lands managers ends up in court, oftentimes fought out over weeks, months, and years. While all of that has been going on, the Congress of the United States has sat idly by and watched, simply hoping it would play itself out when, in fact, the fight seems to have intensified. Differing interests have to come together to realize we all have one common goal: To use our land in a responsible manner, in a sustainable manner, in a balanced manner, in the kind of way that will meet most of our interests, and do so to assure a quality environment and an abundant wildlife habitat. I believe all of those things can be done. Over the last several years, I have held over 50 hearings on the management of the U.S. Forest Service and why it can't make decisions, and when it does, why those decisions are in court. Why has it become largely the most dysfunctional agency of our Federal Government? Yet it has a phenomenally great legacy of appropriate management and responsible caretakership of the land. As a result of that, I have introduced S. 1320, a comprehensive reform on the public land laws primarily governing the Forest Service but also reflecting on the BLM. However, until we all realize there is room for everyone on our public lands instead of just ``lock 'em up and keep 'em out'' solely in the name of the environment; that we can utilize our resources in a wise and sustainable manner; that we can continue to accept these lands in a way that offer a resource to our Treasury, along with a resource to our mind; then I think we will continue to be in litigation. Successful management of our public lands realizes a balanced approach, a diverse approach, and one that I think our country can take great comfort in the legacy of the past. In all fairness, we ought to be a bit embarrassed about our current situation. Last Saturday was National Public Lands Day. It shouldn't be viewed as just one that talks about the quality of our parks and recreational areas. It should be reflective of the millions and millions of acres of public lands in my State and other Western States that by their own diversity assure an abundant resource, abundant revenue, and opportunities not only for recreational solitude but economic opportunity in the communities that reside on and near those public lands. I hope a lifetime from now our public lands will be as vibrant as they are today, but will be managed in a much more diverse and multiple-use way than it appears we are heading at this moment. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I thank the Chair. I ask unanimous consent that, following my remarks, Senator Domenici may have 10 minutes to speak.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, are we currently in morning business?

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I announce that the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Mack), the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain), and the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Nickles) are necessarily absent.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. As we refocus this debate on the issue of royalties, obviously the Senators from Nevada and Massachusetts and California were focusing the issue of royalties on public land resources on education. There was a critical vote in the Senate last week which they strongly opposed--and some of them spoke against it--that directly associated resources with education. That was the issue of timber, timber cuts, stumpage fees flowing back to local schools. Will the Senator respond to that? We are talking out of both sides of our mouths if we are saying that royalties are all for education, and yet just this last week, they voted against education in timber- dependent communities across this country that have had their budgets cut 50 and 60 percent. The Senator from California voted that way, and the Senator from Nevada voted that way. Will the Senator from Wyoming respond to that?

Mr. CRAIG. Will the Senator from Wyoming yield for a question?

Mr. CRAIG. The point I am making is, every time the Forest Service is allowed to cut a tree off public lands, 25 percent of that stumpage fee goes back to the local school district to be spent for schools. For good reasons, we have reduced the timber program by 70 percent in the last 7 years. I have a school district in my State that is not feeding its kids today and asking them to bring brown bags because the vote of the Senator from California, along with the Senators from Nevada and Massachusetts, denied them the right to cut trees on the clear water forests in my State. Can I get exercised about this? The Senator from Oregon supported me because he has a school district that is only allowing its kids to go 4 days a week instead of 5. So if we are going to use oil royalties for that argument, quit speaking out of both sides of your mouth because just last week you voted that way. We have always balanced our natural resources for the good of the environment and for the good of the public that is associated with them. The Senator from Wyoming knows that. We graze on Wyoming public lands and we take oil and coal from under Wyoming public lands--State and Federal lands. Some of that money goes back to the local communities. Yet this administration wants to decouple that. I am glad the Senator from California is concerned about public land resources and local education, but you cannot be selective in this business. You have to share and associate. What I hear is a tremendously narrow and selective argument. I thank the Senator from Wyoming for yielding because that is a bogus argument that is being placed by the Senator from California, unless she wants to stand up with the Senator from Idaho and say: I recognize the need to balance timber sales in northern California because the money goes to the schools in northern California, as they do in Idaho. That is called balance. That is called sharing. I thank the Senator from Wyoming for yielding because you just cannot have it both ways in this business without someone such as me standing up and saying, foul ball, foul ball, bogus argument, unless you are willing to say: Wait a minute, I recognize your problem; we have it in the timberlands of Northern California. Oil is an issue. It is an important issue. We want a fair return on that. The Senator from the State of Texas is trying to build that kind of fairness into this debate. I thank my colleague from Wyoming for yielding. I yield the floor to him.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 1757

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues from Oregon, Senator Wyden and Senator Smith of Oregon to introduce the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self Determination Act of 1999. Perhaps as much as any other state, our counties have suffered as federal forest lands have been beset with conflict, and as the receipts promised to counties for educational purposes have decreased dramatically. Senator Wyden's counties are also suffering, as are other counties throughout the West and the country as a whole. Today, we wish to propose a solution to this problem. When the National Forests were withdrawn from the Public Domain at the turn of the century, they were established with a basic commitment to local governments. Gifford Pinchot and other visionary conservationists of that day persuaded often-skeptical Federal and local government officials that retention of lands by the Federal Government, the creation of forest reserves, and the sustainable management of these forests would be good for local people, good for local governments, good for the country, and good for the environment. Pinchot and his peers based these assurances on the proposition that the proceeds from the sustainable management and sale of the fiber, forage, and other resources from these reserved Federal lands would be shared between the local and Federal Governments. Consequently, cooperative management between local governments and Federal land managers--both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management-- has been a hallmark of good intergovernmental cooperation in many of our states, including Oregon and Idaho. In many cases, local governments have incurred costs from increased police, search and rescue, and fire protection associated with federally owned lands. Our Federal forests have been crucial to the education of our children. Receipts from the sale of Federal timber and other commodities have been a vital component of county school and road budgets. In many cases, these funds have supported school lunches, special education, and a variety of assistance measures for disadvantaged children. In a very real sense, the bounty of our forests has allowed us to give a hand to our most needy rural children, including Native Americans and Hispanics. So this should be the one federal program through which concerns for the ``environment and education'' can be fulfilled by the same thoughtful actions. However, we live in a different time, and federal forest management policies have become a source of considerable controversy. Timber sales have been reduced. Revenues both to the Federal treasury and the counties have decreased precipitously. Consequently, our rural school systems are in crisis. Unfortunately, rather than coming together to forge a solution to these problems, the extremes on both sides of the equation are moving further apart. And they are placing our school children in the center of the controversy. One group seems to want to hold our school children hostage--to use the diminishing receipts and the deteriorating school systems as leverage to advantage their side of the forest management debate, favoring increased timber harvests. The other extreme would make our rural school children orphans--sending them out into the wilderness with no secure financial support in order to expedite the achievement of their goal of eliminating federal timber sales. Senator Wyden and I reject both of these extremes. We reject the notion that we cannot provide the school systems with additional support, without increasing timber harvesting. At the same time, we reject the proposition that we should completely ``decouple'' the support for rural schools from any responsibility on the part of the federal land management agencies, thereby totally separating local concerns from federal land management. Gifford Pinchot articulately outlined the responsibility that the Federal Government generally, and the Forest Service and BLM specifically, assumed when the Federal forests were withdrawn from disposal or later retained in Federal ownership. In its simplest terms, this is a responsibility to provide local governments with a source of revenue that they are otherwise denied as a consequence of their inability to tax federal lands. That responsibility is still as relevant today as it was at the turn of the century or during the Depression. It is still relevant today, irrespective of what options we choose for how to manage our Federal forests. Indeed, the most telling flaw in the proposal to decouple county payments from timber receipts is the notion that this responsibility-- willing assumed by the Forest Service at the turn of the century and BLM during the Depression--should be transformed into either the sole responsibility of the federal taxpayer, or no one's responsibility as it becomes another entitlement program which the Federal Government and taxpayers feel free to eliminate or reduce as their needs dictate. Our proposal starts by establishing a set payment amount with which the counties can provide support for rural school systems. This set payment is based upon an average of representative years of timber receipts. In this respect, this proposal is similar to that offered by the Clinton Administration, and to H.R. 2389 being considered in the House. But here is where the similarity stops. We would not establish a separate appropriations line--which in all likelihood would be underfunded like the existing Payment in Lieu of Taxes System. Nor would we impose the responsibility to meet this payment on the Forest Service's or the BLM's annual budget. Instead, we provide the Forest Service and the BLM with the authority to use any available receipts to meet these payments, and--only if these receipts fall short--to make up the difference from unobligated funds in the General Treasury. The intent here is to retain an obligation on the part of the Forest Service and the BLM, but to provide some flexibility in meeting this obligation. Based upon our experience with the Quincy Library Group, the Applegate Partnership, and elsewhere, we have come to conclude that the best, recent decisions concerning federal resource management have enjoyed significant, local input. That is why our proposal contains a unique element--Senator Wyden's idea, actually--to foster both local consensus and federal accountability around the management of federal lands. Only 75 percent of the money to be given to the counties is provided for the traditional school and road programs. The remaining 25 percent would be provided to the counties for federal land management investments. The counties may fund either commercial or noncommercial projects on the federal lands at the recommendation of local advisory groups, and with the agreement of federal land managers. Projects must comply with all environmental laws and regulations, and must be consistent with the applicable land management plan. Any proceeds from revenue generating projects will be split equally between the affected county and the federal land management agency. The county share will go to supporting schools and roads, while the federal share will go to infrastructure maintenance or ecosystem restoration. Any funds left- over because of a lack of local agreement will be reallocated to counties where agreement on resource stewardship priorities has been reached. This proposal is as value-neutral concerning the resource debate as we could make it. It neither encourages nor discourages a particular resource management outcome. But it does have a very heavy prejudice that Senator Wyden and I have become very passionate about. We are in favor of people of goodwill reasoning together to improve the quality of their lives and the quality of our environment. We cannot legislate an end to conflict. But we can use the legislative process to create an environment in which people are motivated to resolve their differences. That is what we think this bill does.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues from Oregon, Senator Wyden and Senator Smith of Oregon to introduce the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self Determination Act of 1999. Perhaps as much as any other state, our counties have suffered as federal forest lands have been beset with conflict, and as the receipts promised to counties for educational purposes have decreased dramatically. Senator Wyden's counties are also suffering, as are other counties throughout the West and the country as a whole. Today, we wish to propose a solution to this problem. When the National Forests were withdrawn from the Public Domain at the turn of the century, they were established with a basic commitment to local governments. Gifford Pinchot and other visionary conservationists of that day persuaded often-skeptical Federal and local government officials that retention of lands by the Federal Government, the creation of forest reserves, and the sustainable management of these forests would be good for local people, good for local governments, good for the country, and good for the environment. Pinchot and his peers based these assurances on the proposition that the proceeds from the sustainable management and sale of the fiber, forage, and other resources from these reserved Federal lands would be shared between the local and Federal Governments. Consequently, cooperative management between local governments and Federal land managers--both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management-- has been a hallmark of good intergovernmental cooperation in many of our states, including Oregon and Idaho. In many cases, local governments have incurred costs from increased police, search and rescue, and fire protection associated with federally owned lands. Our Federal forests have been crucial to the education of our children. Receipts from the sale of Federal timber and other commodities have been a vital component of county school and road budgets. In many cases, these funds have supported school lunches, special education, and a variety of assistance measures for disadvantaged children. In a very real sense, the bounty of our forests has allowed us to give a hand to our most needy rural children, including Native Americans and Hispanics. So this should be the one federal program through which concerns for the ``environment and education'' can be fulfilled by the same thoughtful actions. However, we live in a different time, and federal forest management policies have become a source of considerable controversy. Timber sales have been reduced. Revenues both to the Federal treasury and the counties have decreased precipitously. Consequently, our rural school systems are in crisis. Unfortunately, rather than coming together to forge a solution to these problems, the extremes on both sides of the equation are moving further apart. And they are placing our school children in the center of the controversy. One group seems to want to hold our school children hostage--to use the diminishing receipts and the deteriorating school systems as leverage to advantage their side of the forest management debate, favoring increased timber harvests. The other extreme would make our rural school children orphans--sending them out into the wilderness with no secure financial support in order to expedite the achievement of their goal of eliminating federal timber sales. Senator Wyden and I reject both of these extremes. We reject the notion that we cannot provide the school systems with additional support, without increasing timber harvesting. At the same time, we reject the proposition that we should completely ``decouple'' the support for rural schools from any responsibility on the part of the federal land management agencies, thereby totally separating local concerns from federal land management. Gifford Pinchot articulately outlined the responsibility that the Federal Government generally, and the Forest Service and BLM specifically, assumed when the Federal forests were withdrawn from disposal or later retained in Federal ownership. In its simplest terms, this is a responsibility to provide local governments with a source of revenue that they are otherwise denied as a consequence of their inability to tax federal lands. That responsibility is still as relevant today as it was at the turn of the century or during the Depression. It is still relevant today, irrespective of what options we choose for how to manage our Federal forests. Indeed, the most telling flaw in the proposal to decouple county payments from timber receipts is the notion that this responsibility-- willing assumed by the Forest Service at the turn of the century and BLM during the Depression--should be transformed into either the sole responsibility of the federal taxpayer, or no one's responsibility as it becomes another entitlement program which the Federal Government and taxpayers feel free to eliminate or reduce as their needs dictate. Our proposal starts by establishing a set payment amount with which the counties can provide support for rural school systems. This set payment is based upon an average of representative years of timber receipts. In this respect, this proposal is similar to that offered by the Clinton Administration, and to H.R. 2389 being considered in the House. But here is where the similarity stops. We would not establish a separate appropriations line--which in all likelihood would be underfunded like the existing Payment in Lieu of Taxes System. Nor would we impose the responsibility to meet this payment on the Forest Service's or the BLM's annual budget. Instead, we provide the Forest Service and the BLM with the authority to use any available receipts to meet these payments, and--only if these receipts fall short--to make up the difference from unobligated funds in the General Treasury. The intent here is to retain an obligation on the part of the Forest Service and the BLM, but to provide some flexibility in meeting this obligation. Based upon our experience with the Quincy Library Group, the Applegate Partnership, and elsewhere, we have come to conclude that the best, recent decisions concerning federal resource management have enjoyed significant, local input. That is why our proposal contains a unique element--Senator Wyden's idea, actually--to foster both local consensus and federal accountability around the management of federal lands. Only 75 percent of the money to be given to the counties is provided for the traditional school and road programs. The remaining 25 percent would be provided to the counties for federal land management investments. The counties may fund either commercial or noncommercial projects on the federal lands at the recommendation of local advisory groups, and with the agreement of federal land managers. Projects must comply with all environmental laws and regulations, and must be consistent with the applicable land management plan. Any proceeds from revenue generating projects will be split equally between the affected county and the federal land management agency. The county share will go to supporting schools and roads, while the federal share will go to infrastructure maintenance or ecosystem restoration. Any funds left- over because of a lack of local agreement will be reallocated to counties where agreement on resource stewardship priorities has been reached. This proposal is as value-neutral concerning the resource debate as we could make it. It neither encourages nor discourages a particular resource management outcome. But it does have a very heavy prejudice that Senator Wyden and I have become very passionate about. We are in favor of people of goodwill reasoning together to improve the quality of their lives and the quality of our environment. We cannot legislate an end to conflict. But we can use the legislative process to create an environment in which people are motivated to resolve their differences. That is what we think this bill does.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I rise to engage the Chairman in a colloquy concerning the use of the Public Lands Program funds. In its report, the Committee has raised serious concerns--supported by findings of the General Accounting Office--about how funds have been awarded under the Public Lands Program. To correct this problem, the report gives several specific directions to the Federal Highway Administration and a list of projects that should be funded by the Secretary. I would like to draw the Chairman's attention to a request made by the state of Idaho for $6.0 million from this program to make needed improvements to U.S. 89 from West Forest Boundary to Bishoff Canyon. This project would improve safety and capacity of the highway, which provides the only significant access into the Caribou National Forest in the region for hunting, fishing, mountain biking, hiking, camping, and snowmobiling. Of the total project distance of 8.3 miles, about 6.6 miles (80 percent) is located within the forest boundary. The highway and also provides connections to Jackson Hole, Yellowstone Park, and Bear Lake. Timber sales in the area require logging trucks to negotiate a very narrow and slow speed route, inconsistent with safety and the route's designation as a National Highway. The Idaho Highway Needs Report shows multiple deficiencies for this segment of roadway, including pavement width, foundation, drainage, shoulder condition, accident rate, and overall combined rating. The requested $6.0 million will complete the work presented under the 1991 ISTEA Demonstration project, supplementing $18.0 million in demonstration funds. The limits and scope of the ISTEA demonstration project are not being expanded. Additional funds are requested to cover the cost of moving almost 2 million cubic yards of unanticipated earth and rock. In fact, without supplemental funds, the original demonstration project would need to be shortened and limited.

Mr. CRAIG. I rise to seek clarification from the Chairman concerning a provision relating to spending flexibility for high priority transportation projects. As you know, action taken during the 105th Congress established that the states of Idaho, Alaska, and West Virginia can each ``pool'' the state's obligation authority for high priority projects--a flexibility provided to Minnesota under Section 1212(m) of TEA21(m) of TEA21 (later redesignated in technical corrections legislation as Section 1212[g]). This enables federal funds to be directed to the high priority project or projects in the state which are ready to go, rather than ration out obligation authority proportionately to all high priority projects in the state, whether or not ready to go. Section 336 of S. 1143 would provide to New Jersey the same flexibility. However, on page 170 of the Senate Committee report on the bill (S. Rpt. No. 106-55), at the point where the report shows changes from existing law, only the states of Minnesota and New Jersey are mentioned as having this flexibility in obligating high priority project funds. Is it the Chairman's understanding that the flexibility granted to Idaho, Alaska, and West Virginia under Section 1212(g) of TEA-21 is still in force and effect, does not require yearly reenactment, and is unchanged by the amendment contained in the Senate bill?

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I was just informed, and I think it is reasonable, Mr. President, to suggest if Hurricane Floyd sweeps up the coast and destroys some of our timberlands in the next few days, we are going to have the President come to us asking for emergency moneys in these areas to clean up the dead and dying trees in some of those areas, and yet here we are trying to cut it at this moment. I guess we will have to wait and see about Hurricane Floyd and forest health. I yield the floor and retain the remainder of my time.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I want to at least try to shape for the Record some of the facts and statistics that have just been brought out. Last year, commercial sales of logs by the Forest Service produced a profit of $14.7 million. Last year's stewardship sales, the kind that the Senator from Nevada is talking about, for the purposes of forest health, the kind that is going on in the Tahoe Basin, lost the Forest Service $57.4 million. Those are the facts from the Forest Service. It is understandable because when you go in to clean up the dead and dying and to improve the general health of the forested lands, you are dealing with a less valuable stick of timber. But the reality is that what the Senator from Nevada advocates is, in fact, a losing proposition. But I support stewardship, as does the Senator from Nevada, because it improves the forest health, it improves wildlife habitat, and water quality when it is properly done. It is not a money- maker. It is something that will have to be subsidized. Is the Senator from Nevada willing to say that the company that does the stewardship contract for the Forest Service is a subsidized business? He just finished talking about corporate welfare. Is that welfare or is that forest health? Is that an environmentally sound thing to do? I think we are getting our facts a bit mixed up. The road maintenance program was not slashed this year; $10 million was added to it. The Senator from Nevada knows the President's budget, when it came to the Hill, was dead on arrival, and we did not really consider any aspect of it. They wanted more money. They wanted $20 million. We gave them $10 million. So the program was not slashed; it was added to by $10 million over last year's level. It was reduced from the President's recommendation. I believe that shapes the reality of the facts a bit differently. Let me talk a little more about facts. The Forest Service timber program generated directly for personal and business incomes this last year over $2 billion. Personal and business income from the timber program has dropped by almost $5 billion since 1991, for the very reasons we have given, because the Forest Service has reduced its program by 70 percent. We are dealing with less than the 30 percent that remains, and even that produces an income for working men and women and businesses of around $2 billion. The amendment will continue to reduce this. There is no question because you are not going to have the money to do the studies, to do the EISs, to produce the sales, and to recondition the roads necessary to gain access to that timber. There are over 50 timber-dependent communities that each receive over $10 million of personal and business income from the forest timber program. There are almost 150 counties that each receive over $1 million. This income is at risk with the Bryan amendment--no question about it--because he continues to reduce the program. The timber sales program generated $577 million in revenue to the Government and returned $220 million directly to school districts and counties for their roads and bridges. That is the reality of the money from the timber program. It is important to understand that when we talk of allocating tax dollars to the Forest Service, it is done for the purpose of maintenance and of stewardship. All of these create a healthier, more vibrant forest. That is largely the timber sale program today. It is not the large green-cuts program of a decade ago. Still the Senator from Nevada says that is too much and even used phrases like ``corporate welfare'' this morning. I do not think he would say the companies that are in the Tahoe Basin today, thinning and taking out the dead and dying and improving the forest health and ultimately improving the water quality of that basin, are corporate welfare babies. They are industries hired by the Forest Service to improve the health of the forest. The Forest Service timber program generated $309 million in Federal taxes in 1997. This kind of significant economic activity is only when we have a viable timber program. We have reduced it dramatically, the timber program contributed over $700 million in income taxes in 1992. Again, the Bryan amendment will continue to reduce that. We have already talked of the loss of jobs. One-half of the timber program is stewardship or personal use. Sales are used, again, for the purpose of maintaining or improving forest health--thinning, cleaning, reducing the fire hazards and the fuel loads. These types of sales are always, as I have just said, marginally profitable, some of them not, but they are done as part of the responsibility of the Forest Service to progressively improve the general health of our forested lands. We know that Mother Nature, left to her own decisions in forest management, takes a lightning strike where she takes it and oftentimes burns down hundreds of thousands of acres, destroying habitat and dramatically impairing water quality in that immediate area for several years to come. We know that the hand of man, properly directed, can assist in improving the forest health, and that is exactly what many of our programs are about today. The amendment will penalize the Forest Service timber program by reducing activities that are improving the health that I have talked about and the ecosystems about which all of us are concerned. At the same time, the amendment will throw a monkey wrench into a program that is already in trouble and will not contribute increased dollars to the coffers of the Public Treasury. Those are the general issues at hand. Mr. President, how much time remains?

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, good morning. I am not quite sure I know, for all of the Senators who are listening this morning or who will be asked to vote in about 45 minutes, how to capture the essence of this amendment--the first-degree and second- degree amendments--brought to us by the Senator from Nevada and the Senator from Oregon. I guess the best way to do that is to kind of take a snapshot back to 1989 and 1990 when this country had a vibrant forest products industry and a green sale program on the forested lands, the forested public lands of our Nation. I would be the first to tell you, as I have said over the years, that at that time we were probably managing a level of cut on our public lands that was not sustainable. But it was at that time that the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Clean Water Act began to take effect on those lands. We saw some very dramatic reductions in logging. Here is an example of the kind of reductions we have seen since 1989. The Senator from Oregon just spoke. In his State alone, 111 mills and 11,600 jobs. The Forest Service, by its action, in response to public policy shaped by the Senate, and interpreted by the courts of this country, caused this to happen by disallowing the availability of public saw logs to 111 mills. My State of Idaho: 17 mills, 770 jobs. That is a comparable impact because of the number of mills. I spoke yesterday about my community of Midvale--45 jobs in a 300- person community, a big impact. But that mill is gone, torn down, sent to Brazil to cut down the rain forest. Literally this mill right here, Grangeville, ID, closed for lack of timber, lack of public timber, lack of public timber by public policy, not for the lack of growth of trees on the Nezperce Forest, torn down and sent to Brazil to cut rain forest trees. We have struggled for a decade to try to transform public policy to meet the environmental sensitivity that all of us want the Forest Service to meet. The chairman of the appropriations subcommittee, Senator Gorton, has constantly worked where he could through the appropriations process to shape that new policy. We have now reduced the allowable cut on the public forests of our country, from 1990 to today, by 70 percent, a precipitous drop. In other words, if that were the auto industry, GM and Chrysler would no longer exist. They would be gone. Their plants would be torn down and their people would be strewn across the landscape looking for a new job. But it wasn't the auto industry, it was the forest products industry. We have recognized that and tried to reshape it to meet the environmental standards all of us want our Forest Service to adhere to, but also to wring the politics out of it. So there has been a 70-percent decline in logging for timber harvest since 1990; 140,000 people were employed in that industry in 1990; there are 55,000 today. Think of that tremendous flip-flop. Many of those folks don't have jobs yet. When you come to the public lands- dependent communities and counties of the West and some places in the South and Southeast, the unemployment today is not nearly at full employment as are most of our urban communities. It is at 16 and 17- percent unemployment. These are former loggers, men and women who made their jobs in the logging industry--not cutting trees, but working in sawmills and selling the product. So that is a snapshot of time. That has all happened since about 1989 to 1999. In less than a decade, we have seen the collapse of the forest product industry of this country, all in the name of the environment, while we are still growing more trees now than ever in the history of our country. We are growing more trees now than when European man came to this continent. Our forests, in some instances, are more healthy today, and in other areas they are devastatingly old, with 30 to 40 percent dead and dying. They create phenomenal fire potential situations when the climate goes dry, as they do in the Great Basin West about every 6 years. Yet we have Senators who come to the floor and want to reduce the 70-percent reduction again and again and again. That is exactly the intent of the amendment by the Senator from Nevada. So I scratch my head most sincerely, and ask why. It can't be because we haven't reduced the program. It can't be because we are trying to build environmental sensitivity and shape timber sales so they are much different than they were a decade ago. It must be because the national environmental movement--and the Sierra Club is the best example--in a national policy shaped 3 years ago, said: zero cut of trees on public lands. We don't want to see another tree cut. Somehow, other Senators seem to want to echo that and bring it to the floor. I have to believe that is the driving impetus behind this amendment. I know of no other reason--at least I can't come up with a good one--when you look at the history and recognize what the Forest Service has done. The Senator from Oregon and I are working together to shape policy. The Forest Service has lost its direction. It tried to deal with the National Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act, and as it tried to amalgamate these into the National Forest Planning Act and the national forest plans under which the forest operates. The courts have stepped in time and time again and said, no, you can't do it that way. The reason is that environmental groups have filed lawsuits. We have allowed the courts to become the managers of our public forested lands, not the U.S. Senate. You and I were elected to shape public policy. The chairman of the Appropriations Interior Subcommittee is working to do that. The legislation we have here, which dramatically reduces the overall programs in spending, is to do that. Some instructive words are in there. Even the amendment here, while it is argued to do something different, actually goes out on the land to improve existing roads and make them more environmentally sound. Now, it would be argued by some that these are going to be brand new roads out through a pristine forest. That is really not true in about 99 percent of the cases because the Forest Service is not opening up new land. They are going back now in the States of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho and recutting old land. So they are taking old roads and improving them and putting in culverts and graveling them and making them more environmentally sound so you don't get sediment creating runoff into the streams and damaging the fisheries. Ninety percent of the very money the Senator from Nevada wants to take out of this bill will go to that kind of reconstruction of the roads. Those are the facts. As chairman of the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land Management, in the last 3 years, we have held 45 hearings on the U.S. Forest Service. We turned it upside down and we shook to try to figure out why it was the most dysfunctional agency of the Federal Government. Here is part of the reason why: Because the Congress of the United States, over the last two decades of shaping public policy, didn't blend the policy together and it collided, which caused the Forest Service, in large part, to crash because of lawsuits and very dedicated environmental groups who really do want to shut public timber cutting down. For the first time, yesterday, the Senator from Pennsylvania spoke on this. You would not expect Pennsylvania to be involved in this debate. Yet they have National Forest lands, hard wood lands. They have the same problem. Now lawsuits are being filed there to disallow the cut of red cherry and other woods that are critical to the furniture industry and to about four counties in Pennsylvania. This amendment affects every State in the United States that has a National Forest so designated within its boundaries. In some form, it will impact every one of those States. The second-degree amendment is simply to shift over a little over one-third of the $34 million that is taken out of the program by the amendment of the Senator from Nevada to do research. The Senator from Oregon will argue that it expedites an agenda. I am confident it doesn't because the Forest Service simply can't move that quickly. If they did, they would probably be sued and shut down again. So we can argue on the floor, and we will vote; and it will be a vote on politics a lot more than on policy or substance, tragically enough. I hope the Senate will stand up and say, no, we have reduced the timber sales in the United States by 70 percent, and that is enough. We have to cut some for health reasons, to clean our forest floors, for our stewardship programs, for salvage purposes, get rid of the dead and dying in the bug-infested forests that oftentimes breed the kind of death that when the drought cycle comes and creates the catastrophic fires we have seen through the Great Basin, in New Mexico and Arizona, which we will see once again. This is what is at issue today. I hope the Senate will agree with the chairman of the subcommittee, who spent a great deal of time with those of us who are committed to shaping public policy on these most critical public land issues. I believe that is the substance of the amendments at hand. I know of no other way to tell about it or to understand it. So if you want to keep ratcheting down the cut to a zero amount on our public lands, then you want to vote for Bryan-Wyden because that is their answer. If you do that, we will still build homes, but we will import that lumber from Canada and Brazil's rain forests and from Argentina and Venezuela and all the other areas and even Norway, strangely enough, but it will not be cut here. Hundreds of communities across this country will die because they are dying now. It is just that we haven't gone to their funerals yet. The rest of these mills will close, and this country will not have something it ought to have, which is a balanced, multiple-use, environmentally sound stewardship program for its public lands, which includes some tree cutting where necessary and appropriate. I retain the remainder of our time. Mr. FITZGERALD addressed the Chair.

Mr. CRAIG. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. CRAIG. I am, Mr. President. I yield back the remainder of my time. I move to table amendment No. 1588 and ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, the other morning on the ``Today'' show-- which many of us wake up and listen to as it relates to the morning news or the late-breaking events--there was a Puerto Rican terrorist who the day before had just been released from prison under the clemency that President Clinton had granted him. During that interview, he was consistently asked if he was remorseful, if he was concerned about the lives of American law enforcement officers that had been taken by him and other terrorists such as himself. In all instances, he did not answer. He went on to speak of the cause and the movement and why independence was more important than anything else--independence as it relates to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, not his personal independence. But never once did he speak in any tone that would suggest he was sorry, only that he was glad to be free. I think anyone who had been imprisoned by a court and found guilty would want that. I listened to him and grew increasingly more angry--and I must use that word ``anger''--at a President who is at this instant once again trying to have it both ways on an issue that I know the Presiding Officer and I are very concerned about--and that is the misuse of second amendment rights in our country by citizens of our country. And oh, by the way, that Puerto Rican terrorist is an American citizen, is a citizen of the United States by birth in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. He was not a foreigner who knew nothing about our law; he was an American citizen who violated a Federal firearms statute. When I say I speak with a certain amount of anger in me that we have a President who is living up to his double standard reputation once again in the twilight days of his administration, he is coming to the American people and saying: Give me more Federal firearms laws so I can enforce them and make the streets of America safer. If we have heard it once, we have heard it five times from the bully pulpit of the White House in the last 6 months: And oh, by the way, to all you Americans who did not catch my sleight of hand, I want to release a bunch of terrorists who were accused and found guilty of violating Federal firearms laws and give them clemency. Mr. President, the American people and this Congress are simply not that dumb. We know you live a double standard and that you speak it oftentimes for political purposes. And on this one you got caught. But, because of the power of the office, you moved ahead and done it anyway. For that I am sorry and wish we could pull that back. But at least, as a Senate, we can speak loudly, as the House did, and force this President to be honest with the American people, if not for just a moment because he has not been honest with us. So, Mr. President, if you want to offer clemency, when somebody is found guilty of the misuse of Federal firearms laws, then do not come to this Senator or this Senate and ask for more Federal firearms laws with which you can play. I find myself on the floor more often than I would like defending the second amendment. But I find it necessary and responsible as a Senator who takes an oath of office to uphold our Constitution because I believe the second amendment is, in fact, a constitutional right in this country. But I have been very cautious in directing or steering the Senate in the crafting of new Federal firearms laws to make sure that we do not take away from those fundamental constitutional rights, and yet the President wants sweeping new power in those areas and then wants to arbitrarily and politically decide when to forgive and forget. Sorry, Mr. President, this time you do not get it both ways. Fool me once, my fault; fool me twice, no, I think not. That is what is happening. I am glad the American people have finally caught on. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CRAIG. I ask unanimous consent to speak up to 5 minutes in morning business.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I yield the chairman of the full Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, Senator Murkowski, such time as he may consume.