George Miller

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, yesterday was a sad day for our Nation, a sad day because the Republicans threw in the towel. They gave up and they capitulated. Rather than make the tough choices to save Social Security, to save Medicare, and to pay down a $5 trillion debt, Republicans simply gave up and did what they thought was the easy thing to do, provide for an irresponsible tax cut that forecloses the financial future for many, many, many Americans who must rely on Social Security, who must rely on Medicare, and to the next generation that is hoping to have low interest rates, hoping to have a good economy so they can buy a house and form families and raise their children. But, no, rather than pay down the debt, the Republicans would rather risk high interest rates for the whole Nation and for small businesses. We tried this once in 1980. It has taken us 20 years, I repeat, it has taken us 20 years to dig out of that debt that the Republicans gave us in 1980. Now, for the first time in history, we have an opportunity to save Social Security, to save Medicare and to pay down the debt. But the Republicans have given up and thrown in the towel. How little courage they have.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I do not want to take a lot of time with this amendment, but I want to join the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) in his remarks against the amendment. I think the fact of the matter is there is a reason this is a pilot program. There are a lot of glitches. We still have problems. The gentleman is on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. I still cannot get from one bus system to another bus system in the Bay area, but they are working on it. It is coming together. And here maybe the forests in the gentleman's district are too narrowly defined in terms of fees, and we will go to an annual pass.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, if there is ever a situation that cries out for oversight, this is one that does. As my colleague, Mr. Goodling, has recounted, this project has been controversial from the outset; and he has played a continued and constructive role in trying to mediate that process. But it started because the process started backwards. It started with the National Park Service trying to avoid congressional authorization for a major visitor center, a visitor center that all of us agree is sorely needed and must be brought to fruition. But the fact of the matter is that the visitor center plans that have been devised before were ones where they took the plan and then tried to develop a management plan to make it fit. When we asked them for actuarial information and we asked them for their business plan, when we asked them for the facts and figures with respect to the cash flows and whether or not this would be sustainable or not, or whether or not the Park Service would end up inheriting the facility that could not carry itself financially, they dodged the information. They hid the information from all of us for a very, very long period of time, came up with inaccurate information, came up with information that they knew in fact was inaccurate and presented it to our staff on the Committee on Resources. I think the fact what we see is that by trying to skirt the process, they have probably lengthened the process. The committee, the authorizing committee, has established authorized major visitor centers throughout this country, and we have done it in the midst of great controversy, but we have provided the forum by which those controversies could be reconciled. So far the National Park Service has been unable to do that. We still do not know what the economics of this plan will be and whether or not they believe the taxpayer holding, if, in fact, the projections, which are fairly robust and fairly optimistic, turn out not to be true. So I think the gentleman is quite correct in asking for this limitation on the expenditures of money for this agreement until such time as we have an opportunity to provide that kind of congressional oversight, and I say that with all due respect and great respect for my colleague and my chairman on the Committee on Education and the Workforce, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling). I had talked to him about this almost 2 years ago when I was trying to get information from the Park Service and recognized his ongoing involvement, and I have tried to pull back from that because both he and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha) and others were working out to try to see whether or not something could be resolved. We still find ourselves in a situation where the Park Service has failed to come up with a workable plan both from the point of the affected community and from, I think, economics in terms of one that is sustainable for this magnificent battlefield park. And I would say that I absolutely agree with the gentleman, and I think the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Klink) and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha) and others who have been involved in this process. The goal is to get a new visitor center. This park deserves better. The artifacts, the history, all of that that is being maintained there needs to be preserved in a better fashion, needs to be more accessible to the public and to the people who study the history of the Civil War, and certainly the battle of Gettysburg; and I think this amendment is quite proper, and I would hope that the committee would support it

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. (Mr. George Miller of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I yield to the gentleman from Oregon.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment. Those who oppose this amendment would suggest that somehow one day the Solicitor in the Department of the Interior woke up and redefined the law. The fact is that the law is clear on its face and no location of a millsite shall exceed 5 acres. That is what it said in 1872, and that is what it says today. The history is, in 1872, a month later the General Land Office issued the regulations expressly limiting millsite locations to 5 acres. In 1891, the Secretary of the Interior rules that it limits it to 5 acres. In 1903, the Acting Secretary of Interior rules in the Alaska Copper Company, the area of such additional tracts is by the terms of the statute restricted to 5 acres. In 1914, ``Lindley on Mines'' says it is restricted to 5 acres. And it goes on through this in 1960, when Congress looks at it and goes back and says, ``A millsite may, if necessary for the Claimant's mining or milling purposes, consist of more than one tract of land, provided it does not exceed 5 acres in the aggregate.'' In 1968, the American Mining Congress says that it is 5 acres. They do not like it, but it is 5 acres. This is not about that. What this is about is the mining industry that has done everything they can to keep us from having a reform of the mining law. And the gentlewoman from Wyoming (Mrs. Cubin) recited the pale effort of the other side to pass mining law reform with royalties that turned out to be phantom royalties that meant nothing. It was 5 percent of nothing is nothing when they got done, and the environmental protections and all the rest. And the President is absolutely right to protect the environment and to protect the taxpayers of this country by not going along with that legislation. But this is the law as it is today. And what the mining law companies have decided is they want to go out onto public land and dump their waste onto public land, to build their cyanide heap leaching pads out on public land, and when they are done extracting the ore, they will leave, and the public would be the steward of these waste sites. Well, they have already done that. We have seen this movie. This mining industry has left us with 12,000 miles of streams that suffer from toxic metals and wastes that dribble into those steams; 180,000 acres of lakes where toxic metals are there loaded with lead, cadmium and arsenic. There are more than 500,000 abandoned mines. Yes, this is a boom and bust industry. Right now it is not looking so good. Gold is down below $300. When they leave these facilities, yes, they leave us with the waste; they leave us with the toxics. Right now we expect that the government is going to have to pay between some $32 to $72 billion to try and reclaim these mines, to try to get rid of the toxics, to try to get the materials out of our streams, out of our lakes so that people in the West can enjoy the land that has been spoiled by these mining operations. To have them now come along and dump their waste on public lands in violation of law, the Solicitor was absolutely correct in his opinion. He was restating the law as it is today. The mining companies do not want to come into the authorizing committee and have a mining law reform and change this to make it 10 acres or 20 acres or whatever they think it should be, under whatever conditions. No. They want to come into an appropriations bill like they did when we were worried about funding the war in Kosovo. They thought that would be a good vehicle to allow them to dump their waste onto public lands, and they got away with it. It turned out to be such a good deal in the Kosovo appropriations that here they are now back in the appropriations process in the Senate. These people do their best work in the middle of the night. They do their best work in the middle of the night. They do not want a debate on policy, about where the waste should be, and the size of these tracks for waste. They do not want a debate on royalties. They do not want a debate on rents. Why? Because since 1872, they have been fleecing the taxpayer. They have taken billions off of the lands that are owned by the people of the United States and paid nothing. Now, if they take it off of the land of a rancher next door, they pay him 7, 8 percent gross royalties. If they take it off State lands, they pay them a percent of royalties. It is just Uncle Sam that does not get paid. No wonder they are in here with a single shot amendment in the Senate bill to try to overturn the Solicitor's opinion, because they do not want this debate. They do not want the debate. So what are we left to? We are left to, on the appropriations bill, trying to stop them from continuing to fleece the taxpayer and take over these public lands for the purposes of dumping their waste. For those of my colleagues who were not familiar with this process, these leach pads are hundreds of feet high. They are huge. They are constantly sprinkled with cyanide to leach out the gold. We move hundreds of tons of dirt and rock and ore and waste to get an ounce of gold. That is this process. Technology has changed the nature of gold mining. Why do we not have a debate on modernizing the gold mining industry? Why do we not have a debate about this industry that now can go into such low grade ore to make this kind of profit? Can they not pay the people of the United States something for the use of the land? No. Their alternative is to come here in the middle of the night and try to strike another rider on the appropriations bill so that they will not have to have that debate. We ought to support the Rahall-Shays-Inslee amendment.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the gentleman for his remarks and associate myself with his remarks. This research is, in fact, very important. If somebody does not like the title of some particular research grant, they have now decided they just going to cut it. As my colleagues know, if they did not go out and talk to the people in the south about the forests and how they were going to manage it and how they were going to deal with it, somebody would be in here blistering the Forest Service's rear end saying, ``You're changing policy without talking to the people in the area.'' We are having big deliberations in the State of California about the future of the Sierra Nevada, all kinds of parties are involved in this because those forests are becoming less and less timber resources and more and more recreational assets for the 30 million people in the State of California. Do my colleagues know what? The Forest Service has to go out and do that kind of research to see what the people in the small communities think, see what the people in the foothills think, see what the people in the LA basin think about these resources, about the management of that. Now this one, I guess they are talking to people in the southern United States about the southern forests. But as my colleagues know, it is kind of the height of intellectual illiteracy to just decide they do not like the title, so we are going to cut this money without any investigation as to exactly what is taking place here, and the fact of the matter is that many, many of the forests, as the gentleman has pointed out, are under serious threat from all kind of diseases and what have you, and this research is fundamental to that proposition in trying to keep the productivity of the forest up, to try to keep these forests surviving into the future so people can use them for multiple uses.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, the gentleman makes a very important point. His amendment leaves intact enough money in this account plus the salvage amendment to go ahead and harvest the 3.5 million board feet that we anticipate harvesting this year. So we have the opportunity by going to the administration's number in the Fish and Wildlife account to improve the forests, to improve their productivity, and to improve the multiple use of those forest. The salvage account remains intact, as does $197 million out of the timber management account, and we should approve the amendment.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I think many of the points have been made, but let me suggest that, in two instances, the suggestion was that we need this amendment because an Indian tribe was seeking to build a reservation on some land that they would purchase that was not part of their trust lands or not part of their reservation. In that instance they cannot build that casino. That land cannot be taken into trust under the existing law today without the Governor's approval. That has been true in a number of different States. Whether it is in Cape May or whether it is in Florida, to take lands into trust for that purpose under IGRA is not allowed without the approval of the Governor. In other instances, this Congress has decided that lands would be given to Indian Nations, and the restrictions were that they could not be used for gaming purposes, because that decision was made both in some cases by the tribes who were seeking recognition and seeking the lands and those who did not. But let me just say that this amendment is a very dangerous amendment, because this is not about States' rights. This is about whether or not we try and nullify the sovereign rights of the Indian Nations in this country. Because as we now recognize, and as we recognized when we passed IGRA, the Indian Nations have a right to engage in gaming if, in fact, that State is engaged in gaming. That is settled. We put in IGRA so that it could be a process by which the State would then be included in that decision-making process. There would be a process to develop a compact in the case of Class III gaming if the State had Class III gambling. The problem comes when the State does not bargain in good faith, and then the State goes and hides behind the immunity, that they cannot be sued, that somehow, then, that ends the process. That is why IGRA envisions the Secretary of Interior then coming in as a trustee for the Indian Nations, an arbiter of this to try to put together a process by which then the Indians can have the rights that they are guaranteed under the Constitution. So this is not about usurping the States' rights. It is about protecting the Indians' rights. Again, as said by a number of people here, if States do not want casino gambling, all they have to do is outlaw casino gambling. We had a ballot measure to allow Indians in California to have casino gambling, to have slot machines, which we do not readily have in California, or it is open to discussion. A big campaign was run against that. It was run by the Nevada gaming and hotel people. They did not think California should have gambling. It looked to me like somebody trying to protect market share, not a high moral principle. But the fact of the matter is the State decided that they wanted to go ahead and have these compacts, and the Governor and the Indian Nations are now working out those compacts to provide for some form of Class III gambling. That is the process that is at work. But in some instances, even in the early days in Arizona, the Governor said no. But we cannot be arbitrary here because they have a right to this. That is why we created this escape valve measure. That now is being challenged in court. Properly so. People have a right to do that. The State of Florida and Alabama have sued over these regulations. The Committee on Appropriations made the wise decision to wait and see what the outcome of that lawsuit was before we put our thumb on one side of the scale of justice here. So this amendment, not only is misguided in terms of the problems that people have in fact described, because those are taken care of, and the Governor can keep that from happening, but it is also misguided in terms of the effort that somehow this is about a protection of States' rights when, in fact, the law recognizes the problem when a State simply says we will have Class III gambling in our State, we just will not allow the Indian Nations to do it. The Supreme Court says they have a right as sovereign nations to engage in those same activities that are legal in those States. If we have a law that says it is not legal, then they cannot engage in that. But recognizing the sovereignty of these nations and their trusted responsibility and all the history that goes along with it, the court said they have a right to engage in that same legal activity. This is an amendment to strike that down, because this is an amendment that lets the chief executive officer of a State in the most arbitrary fashion decide that he will not approve or she will not approve a compact, and the game is over. That is contrary to the sovereignty of these nations. It is contrary to the IGRA legislation that was passed by this Congress. I think it is contrary to the best judgment of the Committee on Appropriations to await the outcome of the court in making this determination. I hope that we vote against the Weldon-Barr amendment. It is an ill- conceived and misguided amendment that does not address the problem that it is purported to speak to.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words, and I rise in support of the amendment. (Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding, and I thank her for her statement and wish to associate myself with her remarks. As she quite properly points out, this has very, very limited impact on the total amount of trapping that takes place on the refuges.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of this amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Wu) and the gentlewoman from Oregon (Ms. Hooley) to transfer this money from the Timber Sales Preparation Fund. The people opposed to this amendment are acting like this amendment would zero it out. There is $197 million left in this fund. But the fact is the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Sanford) got up earlier and talked about what a loser the Forest Service was. We have spent $1.2 billion preparing Forest Service sales, and we have gotten $1.8 billion out of those sales, and only $125 million came into the Treasury. What this amendment says is that there is a more productive area to put the money to use. The fact of the matter is for $125 million we have gotten into the Treasury after all of these sales because we ended up subsidizing all of these sales and built the roads. The fact of the matter is there is a much better place. In the western United States two out of three fishermen fish on the Forest Service lands. That is $8.5 billion annually to the economy, a billion dollars in my State of California alone. In fact, with the proper use of these forests, they are huge economic engines to local communities and States where people can use them for multiple purpose reasons. But the fact of the matter is many of these forests are in a shambles in the watersheds and in the way they have been treated in the past. We can go into southern Oregon and northern California and find forests that were logged in the 1960s and the 1970s and that are in a complete shambles and have not been reforested. The watersheds are damaged, and we are losing the salmon fisheries. And all of that is sustainable economy. All of that drives the resort communities, the tourism, the gas stations and all the business in those areas. So we can get a better return on the investment we make with this money by putting it into the rehabilitation of the watersheds, the rehabilitation of the fish and the wildlife from the scars that have been left in the past of the previous forest practices which were never sustainable and have done a great deal of damage to our forests in this area. This is about a smart economic decision for the communities that are surrounding these forests. This is about protecting the clean water supplies for urban areas. In California, a huge amount of our water is stored in those forests, in those watersheds. We are struggling, spending additional Federal dollars to try to clean up that water so that we can continue to consume it in the State of California. So this is very, very smart use of this money, rather than to continue to put it into sales where we do not generate the kind of revenues that have continued to be a loser, that is a subject of all the GAO reports, money that goes into slush funds. This is the amendment that takes care of that problem. Mr. Chairman, this is about the wise investment, the wise investment in our forests, in management of those forests for all of these purposes and for all of these uses so that we can have improved watersheds, we can stop the decline in the fisheries, we can increase the tourism economy in so many of these communities and we can increase the health of the forests. This is where the money should be spent and the House should support the amendment of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Wu) and the gentlewoman from Oregon (Ms. Hooley) to increase and improve the forest health of this Nation.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman would continue to yield, the fact is, improvements are being made. The public appreciates those improvements. These places are much more friendly to the user. Yes, there is a problem if visitors go to a remote trailhead, and the Forest Service ought to think about if these people ought to be ticketed. The people made the effort to buy a pass. But that is no reason to curtail this program. It is 6 percent, and the fact of the matter is the gentleman knows we cannot find that 6 percent anywhere else. Especially in this budget. The gentleman has fought off all kinds of issues to cut off resources from this bill. We have an issue that is pending to cut off resource from this bill. Without these user fees, the fact of the matter is that the public is going to be denied the kind of access and the use that they want to put these forests to. I appreciate the problem faced by people in the local area, and it is a tough one. They have always viewed this as their ``divine right'' to enter in and out of the forests. But somebody has to maintain them, and we ought to continue this program and support the committee on this and reject this amendment.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, the morning papers are recounting what took place in the Senate yesterday when the Republicans blocked the efforts to try to provide better health care to people who have health insurance. When the Democrats offered amendments to make it easier for women to choose their primary care physician, to choose an obstetrician/ gynecologist, the Republicans blocked that effort. When the Democrats tried to offer an effort to make it easier for people who are denied services to have grievances against the HMO and the managed care corporations, the Republicans blocked that effort. When the Democrats tried to make it easier for people to go to the nearest emergency room in an emergency and know that they would be reimbursed for going to that emergency room, the Republicans killed that effort. However, the Republicans did decide that they would let women who had had a mastectomy stay in the hospital a couple days longer. Apparently, the Republicans will not let us go to the doctor to detect a cancer, but if we have the cancer they will let us stay in the hospital 2 days extra.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I disagreed with it then, and I disagreed before that was done. I mean, I think that this fund, and, as my colleagues know, I have introduced legislation to provide for the full funding, the full funding on water conservation, half to the Federal side and half to the State side, and an overwhelming number of Members of this House of Representatives supported either my bill or Mr. Young's bill to do that because they are hearing from their communities and also hearing what my colleagues have been telling us about the backlog in national parks and national lands of this country that needs to be done there. We have starved these funds. It has been a bipartisan effort to starve these funds. I am not blaming the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula). He has come in almost at the end of the show where it is even more difficult to try to get his bill out of committee and meet the demands of this country. But that has been a bipartisan effort, but the time has come to reverse it. The time has come to reverse it, and this amendment is a modest step in the efforts to do that.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate that qualifier, and I tried to say that in my rushed opening statement here. That would not be my intent. As my colleagues know, this UPARR money is part of the President's request that my colleagues have tried to deal with, and I guess what I am counting on is, just as the gentleman tried to find additional moneys for the territories out of this account, that his creative talents would also find money perhaps for UPARR, which has such tremendous support on both sides of the aisle. If that is not able to happen, then I would not expect my colleague then to go to the next step, which would be to take money from the territories.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his remarks.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment and I ask unanimous consent that it be considered at this time.

Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to be joined by the gentleman from California (Mr. Horn) and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee) in offering this amendment. This is intended to be a friendly amendment, one that is consistent with the committee's recommendation in its report on page 91. After many years of debate and close votes on this floor, this amendment would put the House clearly on record to end the controversial practice of using taxpayer subsidies to construct roads for commercial timber sales on national forest land. It is a straightforward amendment. Mr. Chairman, the taxpayers have helped construct over 483,000 miles of authorized roads in our national forests. That is a road system that is eight times, eight times longer than the interstate highway system, enough to circle the globe 15 times. While the administration has been happy to request and Congress has been happy to provide funding for new road construction in the past years, we have not been very adept at providing funds for maintaining existing roads. As a result, the Forest Service estimates that there is a backlog of $8.4 million in capital improvements needed on forest roads for heavily used passenger vehicles. Less than 20 percent of the roads are being maintained to the safety and design standards. Under Secretary Jim Lyons and Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck have testified repeatedly before Congress that it is fiscally and environmentally irresponsible to keep building new roads when they do not have the budget to address the annual maintenance needs or begin to address the backlog of maintenance on the existing road system. While I appreciate the committee has provided a $19 million increase in road maintenance, that is still much less than the $500 million annually needed that the agency estimates is necessary to catch up with the backlog of needs. Recognizing that they have a major problem on their hands, the Forest Service is in the midst of an 18-month moratorium on new road construction in roadless areas in most national forests. The purpose of this time-out is to develop a long-term road policy and identify nonessential roads and those roads that should be reconstructed and maintained for safe and environmentally sound practices. In my view, the remaining roadless areas in our national forests are vital reserves and must be maintained for clean water, fish and wildlife habitat, low-impact recreation, and wilderness values. I have joined with the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey), the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee), and the gentleman from California (Mr. Horn), along with 162 of our colleagues, in urging the administration to come up with long-term protections of these critical roadless areas. In closing, I wish to recognize the chairman, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula), and the ranking member, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks), for their work in the committee report to resolve what has been a contentious issue in past years. I also want to acknowledge the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Porter) and our former colleague, Mr. Joe Kennedy, who were pioneers in this effort to reduce taxpayer subsidies to timber roads. Mr. Chairman, I urge the adoption of this amendment.