To require collaborative monitoring of forest health projects.

HEALTHY FORESTS RESTORATION ACT OF 2003

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The regular order is under the previous order
the Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 1904, which the clerk will
report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

A bill (H.R. 1904) to improve the capacity of the Secretary
of Agriculture and the Secretary of the Interior to plan and
conduct hazardous fuel reduction projects on National Forest
System lands and Bureau of Land Management lands aimed at
protecting communities, watersheds, and certain other at-risk
lands from catastrophic wildfire, to enhance efforts to
protect watersheds and address threats to forest and
rangeland health, including catastrophic wildfire, across the
landscape, and for other purposes.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. REID. We need the manager of the bill on the floor for the
majority. Senator Bingaman is ready to offer an amendment. He was here
all day yesterday.
What we would like to do is have Senator Bingaman offer his
amendment--I have not spoken to the two leaders--have that set aside
temporarily and then move to the Leahy amendment. They will both be
relatively short in time, and then we can arrange an appropriate time
for voting on these.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I may speak
for 5 minutes as in morning business.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Good Economic News

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, as we prepare over the next several minutes
to shift gears back to a very important piece of legislation, I just
want to take this opportunity to comment on another issue and that is
the issue of the economy. There is very good news, news that was
released today, and that is that the economy grew by 7.2 percent in
this last quarter--in July, August, and September. This to me is really
a spectacular piece of news, especially as we know the people are
following this economy very closely, especially to see what the
response is to the President's tax relief package several months ago.
Mr. President, 7.2 percent is spectacular in so many ways. In fact,
it has been nearly 19 years--I guess the last date was in 1984--that
the economy last saw such growth. This news is not totally unexpected.
For the last several days I have come to the Senate Chamber to suggest
that this is the sort of figure we could expect, in large part because
of the policies we enacted earlier this year, specifically the tax
reductions which we knew would result in such growth. Indeed, we are
now seeing that hard data of growth--7.2 percent in the last quarter.
This positive news was also reflected and added to by this morning's
numbers which showed that personal consumption has increased at 6.6
percent as well. It is interesting that consumption makes up about 70
percent of our economic growth. That is, 70 percent of all of this
economic growth is accounted for by consumption. If we looked at just
that impact of consumption alone, we would have seen growth in our
economy of 4.6 percent.
Equally if not more important for the longer term, another measure,
business investment, grew by 11.1 percent. To me, this suggests we will
continue to see growth well into the future as they rebuild, as they
reinvest, as they retool their factories and prepare for the future.
Government spending, another component of growth which accounted for
much of the growth earlier this year, was not the most important factor
accounting for today's news. Indeed, Government spending only increased
about 1.4 percent. I say that because a lot of people say we are just
spending so much these days in terms of Government; that is why the
economy is growing. But as the figures show, most of that growth is in
this dramatic increase in consumption, an increase of 6.6 percent
according to today's news.
Maybe lost in the big news this morning is what really matters in
this growth--the jobs issue. The Department of Labor reported this
morning that the initial claims for unemployment declined by 5,000 last
week, affirming this downward trend in unemployment. So this morning we
have good news released. The numbers released today indeed indicate a
ramp up to recovery. I do expect the growth in the quarters ahead will
settle down to a more realistic and sustainable level.
The point is, we are making progress. We are making real progress.
The policies we put into place are beginning to take hold.
We clearly have a lot more work to do. We must do more to create jobs
and bring economic recovery to all of our citizens. Thus, we really
can't rest on these reports today. But at the same time, in this body
we must continue to work toward reducing the cost of doing business in
this country.
I immediately turn to issues we are talking about, both on the floor
and off--health care, energy, class action, litigation costs. We need
to remove barriers to investment and economic growth so employers can
create jobs.

Our work here in the Congress must go forward with renewed
dedication. Today we do see firsthand the effects of the President's
economic policies. Such results should encourage all of us to work even
harder to bring economic recovery to the doorstep of every American.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I, too, am pleased at the good news that the
GDP has gone up. But for the 3 million people who have lost jobs, J-O-B
is more important than G-D-P. This last month, another 46,000 jobs have
been lost in this country; during this administration, more than 3
million jobs. This is the only President since Herbert Hoover who has
had a net loss in jobs. I think this is very unfortunate. I hope the
GDP continues to grow and in the process create jobs.
Mr. President, the distinguished chairman of the committee that has
jurisdiction of the bill now before the Senate and I spoke with the
majority leader and minority leader a few minutes ago. It is the wish
of the distinguished chairman of this committee, the manager of this
bill, that when an amendment is offered--unless there is some
exception--we are going to debate that and vote on it, dispose of it
one way or the other.
As we spoke to the majority leader, the distinguished Senator from
Mississippi and I--everyone should be--we were both in tune with the
majority leader. Today's votes are going to take 20 minutes. After 20
minutes, the majority leader said he is going to ask that the clerk
announce the vote. There are going to be people who miss votes, but
that is their problem. All staffs who are listening to me, everyone
should understand, if the majority leader follows through on what he
said--and I am confident he will--a few people will miss votes. But I
think fewer will miss them the second time and fewer the third time.
If we are going to finish this most important bill, we cannot have
votes going 40 minutes, and that is what they were going yesterday. It
is unfair to the managers of the bill, unfair to the Senate, unfair to
the country.
I hope that following the vote of Senator Bingaman, we will stick to
20-minute votes, no matter who isn't here for the vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, let me compliment the distinguished
acting leader. He correctly states the content of the conversation that
we had which included the majority leader. The custom, in recent
history anyway, has been to accumulate amendments and then have the
votes stacked to occur at a certain time. That is well and good, if you
know how many amendments you have. We don't have a finite list of
amendments. That is one thing we need. If Senators would let us know
which amendments they intend to offer, we can probably manage this bill
more efficiently and save time for everybody.
We want to finish the bill tonight. That is my intention. I think
that is

[[Page S13601]]

the intention of the acting Democratic leader as well.
The regular order is, if you have an amendment, come and offer it. We
will debate it and dispose of it. We will give you a vote on it and
move to table it or we will accept it.
Senator Bingaman is here with an amendment. It is an important
amendment. I understand that he is going to seek the floor and offer
that amendment. We will debate it and dispose of it.
I very much thank the two leaders for their effort to help move this
bill along and ensure that the votes we have are held to a minimum
amount of time. We are going to try to enforce that.
I thank everybody concerned.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, if I could say one additional thing, we have
run a hotline on our side. We are very close to having a finite list of
amendments. That will be offered on this side. We know the intense
interest in this bill from all sides. No one exemplifies the interest
in this bill more than the Senator from Oregon. Senator Wyden has been
very responsive to the bill that is before us. He has been here
virtually every minute this matter has been on the floor. Like so many
people who are concerned about this, he wants this bill to be completed
as quickly as possible. I think with the cooperation of the Senate we
can do that.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I will be very brief. I want to recognize
my friend from New Mexico who has spent a lot of time on this bill and
has an important amendment.
As we go to the amendments this afternoon--particularly those from my
side--I think it is critically important that the bipartisan compromise
which was consummated yesterday in a 97-to-1 vote on the floor of the
Senate not become unraveled today. This is, in my view, the only bill
that can make it to the President's desk. It is a balanced approach on
management. It ensures that the public has every single opportunity to
participate in the debate about forestry but, at the same time, it does
not establish a constitutional right to a 5-year delay on every
conceivable matter that may relate to the forestry sector.
In particular, it provides for potentially lifesaving hazardous fuel
reduction projects in our national forests. We have to respond to what
we have seen in California. It is a heartfelt need in that State.
If this legislation as set out in the compromise doesn't become law,
what we have seen in California in the last few days, and as we saw in
Oregon last year, is going to be what the country faces year after
year.
I am very interested in working with our colleagues in an expeditious
manner. I thank Senator Cochran again for all of his cooperation.
Senator Bingaman has been waiting for a long time.
I intend to work with all of our colleagues on this amendments today.
What I especially look forward to is completing the work on this
legislation. It was a very exciting development to have yesterday's
vote by such a large plurality. It shows what you can do if you stay at
it and try to find common ground in an area that is about as
contentious as you can find. As Senator Cochran noted, we hope
colleagues will bring amendments to the floor and move expeditiously.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.

Amendment No. 2031

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Bingaman] proposes an
amendment numbered 2031.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To provide the Secretary of Agriculture with the authority to
borrow funds from the Treasury to pay for firefighting costs that
exceed funds available and to provide funding to conduct hazardous
fuels reduction and burned area restoration projects on non-Federal
lands in and around communities)

At the appropriate place, insert the following two new
sections:

SEC. __. BORROWING AUTHORITY FOR FIRE SUPPRESSION.

(a) In General.--The Secretary of the Treasury shall, upon
the request of the Secretary of Agriculture, make available
to the Secretary of Agriculture, out of any money in the
Treasury not otherwise appropriated, such sums as may be
necessary in each fiscal year to carry out fire suppression
activities. The Secretary of Agriculture may make such
request only if fire suppression costs exceed the amount of
funding available to the Forest Service for fire suppression
in a fiscal year.
(b) Audit.--Not later than 180 days after the Secretary of
Agriculture exercises the authority provided by this section,
the Inspector General of the Department of Agriculture shall
submit to the Secretary and to the Congress an audit of
expenditures of funds provided under this section. Upon a
determination by the Inspector General that specific amounts
of such funds were used for purposes other than fire
suppression, or upon a determination that specific
expenditures of such funds were both unreasonable and
excessive, the Secretary, not later than 30 days after
receiving the audit of the Inspector General, shall reimburse
the Treasury, out of unobligated balances for the Forest
Service for the fiscal year in which the funds were provided,
for the amounts so identified by the Inspector General.

SEC. __. COMMUNITY PROTECTION AND BURNED AREA RESTORATION.

(a) In General.--During fiscal years 2004 through 2008, the
Secretaries shall carry out a joint program to reduce the
risk of wildfire to structures and restore burned areas on
non-Federal lands, including county-owned lands, tribal
lands, nonindustrial private lands, and State lands, using
the authorities available pursuant to this section, the
National Fire Plan and the Emergency Watershed Protection
program.
(b) Cost Share Grants.--In implementing this section, the
Secretaries may make cost-share grants to Indian tribes,
local fire districts, municipalities, homeowner associations,
and counties, to remove, transport, and dispose of hazardous
fuels around homes and property to--
(1) prevent structural damage as a result of wildfire, or
(2) to restore or rehabilitate burned areas on non-Federal
lands.
(c) Non-Federal Contribution.--The non-Federal contribution
may be in the form of cash or in-kind contribution.
(d) Appropriation and Availability of Funds.--The Secretary
of Treasury shall make available to the Secretaries out of
any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated
$100,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2004 through 2008 to
carry out this section, which shall remain available until
expended.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, although I interrupted the clerk before
the clerk was able to read the entire amendment, I think probably the
best way for me to start my description of the amendment is to go
through and read some portions of it so Members know what I am
proposing.
There are two parts to the amendment. It adds two new sections to the
bill in order to provide meaningful new authority and actual resources
to protect communities at risk from unnaturally intense catastrophic
wildfire.
We had a little bit of debate yesterday--and we will again today--
about what exactly has been the problem and what the policy mistakes
and failures are here in Washington that have contributed to this
problem.
I would suggest to you that the major failure which has occurred here
in Washington that has contributed to the problem is the one I am
trying to address with this amendment; that is, inadequate funding with
which to proceed not only to fight fires but to do the necessary
thinning and the necessary restoration activities that we are all in
agreement need to be made.
The first section that this amendment would add reads as follows: I
will read through the most significant parts of it. It says:

The Secretary of the Treasury shall, upon the request of
the Secretary of Agriculture--

And, of course, that is where the Forest Service is located, in the
Department of Agriculture--

make available to the Secretary of Agriculture, out of any
money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, such sums
as may be necessary in each fiscal year to carry out fire
suppression activities. The Secretary of Agriculture may make
such request only if fire suppression costs exceed the amount
of funding available to the Forest Service for fire
suppression in a fiscal year.

What we are saying is we are going to do our best here to appropriate
money for fire suppression; that is, firefighting activities. But to
the extent that we fall short, the Secretary of Agriculture can go to
the Department of the Treasury and get funds with which to do that
firefighting.
We have a second part of this section. It is an audit provision. It
says:

[[Page S13602]]

Not later than 180 days after the Secretary of Agriculture
exercises the authority provided by this section, the
Inspector General of the Department of Agriculture shall
submit to the Secretary and to the Congress an audit of
expenditures of funds provided under this section. Upon a
determination by the Inspector General that specific amounts
of such funds were used for purposes other than fire
suppression, or upon a determination that specific
expenditures of such funds were both unreasonable and
excessive, the Secretary, not later than 30 days after
receiving the audit of the Inspector General, shall reimburse
the Treasury, out of unobligated balances for the Forest
Service for the fiscal year in which the fund were provided.
. . .

Essentially, we are doing an audit. If there is any misuse of funds,
if they are used for anything other than fire suppression, then the
Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture shall essentially take
those funds out of their hide and deal with the situation that way.
That is the first part of the amendment.
The second part of the amendment that I am offering is entitled,
``Community Protection And Burned Area Restoration.'' It says, in
general:

During fiscal years 2004 through 2008, the Secretaries [the
Secretary of Agriculture who has jurisdiction over the Forest
Service and the Secretary of the Interior] shall carry out a
joint program to reduce the risk of wildfire to structures
and restore burned areas on non-Federal lands, including
country-owned lands, tribal lands, nonindustrial private
lands, and State lands, using the authorities available
pursuant to this section, the National Fire Plan and the
Emergency Watershed Protection Program.

We are talking about funds to do restoration work on land that the
Federal Government doesn't own.
The second part of this talks about cost share grants. It says:

In implementing this section, the Secretaries may make
cost-share grants to Indian tribes, local fire districts,
municipalities, homeowner associations, and counties, to
remove, transport, and dispose of hazardous fuels around
homes and property to--
(1) prevent structural damage as a result of wildfire, or
(2) to restore or rehabilitate burned areas on non-Federal
lands.

This is still on non-Federal lands. It says the non-Federal
contribution may be in the form of cash or in-kind contribution, and
then it authorizes the appropriation of $100 million in each of those
years, 2004 through 2008, to do their work, to make these grants, to
help these non-Federal agencies and entities deal with the problems.
Much of the fire we have seen on television in recent days is, in
fact, not on Federal land. They are desperately in need of assistance
from the Federal Government. This is assistance that would be of that
type and should be in place every year.
I will go through a more complete description of the amendment. The
amendment does add two new sections to the bill to provide meaningful
new authority and actual resources to protect communities at risk from
unnaturally intense catastrophic wildfire. If we are not going to add
real resources as part of this bill, we are, in fact, making a false
promise to the American people. We can give all the speeches about how
we are going to pass the bill, the President is going to sign it,
everything is going to be rosy, the clouds are going to clear, and we
are going to be in the sunny uplands--the broad sunny uplands, is the
way Churchill said it.
The reality is, if we do not provide resources to help, it is a false
promise. This amendment will try to help provide those resources.
The first part of the amendment allows the Forest Service to borrow
funds from the Treasury to pay for firefighting during the years in
which available funds do not cover costs. Someone might say that is a
pretty rare occasion, a year when the funds available do not cover the
cost. Let me cite the last 3 years: 2001, 2002, and 2003, Forest
Service firefighting funding.
We have three columns on my chart: The President's request, what was
actually appropriated, and what was actually spent, what we wound up
spending out of Federal Government funds to deal with this problem.
In 2001, the President requested the Congress appropriate the budget
he sent us of $291 million. Fortunately, through the good offices of
Senator Cochran and other Members, we did better than that. I very much
appreciate that. Senator Byrd deserves credit, as do other Members on
the Democratic side. We appropriated $469 million--not quite twice what
the President asked for, but it is getting close. The amount that was
actually needed was $683 million. So we missed it by a little--we were
more than $200 million short of what the Forest Service actually had to
spend for firefighting in that year.
In 2002, the President asked for more. He said $291 million was not
enough, how about $325 million. This is for the whole country. He said,
$325 million ought to be plenty for the whole country. In fact, we
appropriated a little less than he asked for, $321 million. What was
actually needed was $1.28 billion. So we missed it by not quite $1
billion. That is $1 billion that was spent by the Forest Service of
funds not appropriated to them for this firefighting activity.
In 2003, which we just finished, the President said we need $421
million. The Appropriations Committee said no; let's make it $418
million. We spent over $1 billion--$1.02 billion.
There is a shortfall each year. It is a question of whether the
shortfall is $1 billion, a couple hundred million, but every year we
have done this. At least since this President has been in town, we have
seen a significant shortfall. What I am trying to do is begin to
address that problem.
The real problem that needs to be addressed with respect to the
Forest Service situation is the practice of borrowing. Every time we do
this, every time we give them much less money that turns out to be
needed for firefighting, they have no choice but to take money from
other accounts in order to deal with that problem. They do that.
Let me point out for the year 2002, the year we had the total amount
transferred out of other accounts to fight fires was $1.02 billion.
What did that come from? It came from different accounts, but a big
chunk of it came out of accounts that are the accounts we are saying in
the Senate are our highest priority. We want money for forest
restoration, we want money for thinning of forests, for getting the
underbrush out of the way so we do not have the fires. In fact, that
funding is not available to the Forest Service because they are too
busy using it to fight fires rather than to get ahead of the problem
and deal with that.
There are many examples I will cite of the problem we are dealing
with. In my home State of New Mexico, we have a publication, a 1-page
sheet the Forest Service issued called ``Effects of Transferring Money
to Fire Suppression.'' That is what this chart is reflecting. All of
the money on the chart was transferred to fire suppression, to
firefighting. This was issued in April by the Forest Service with
regard to New Mexico. It says the 2002 fire season was intense. The
cost of suppressing these fires was nearly $1.3 billion. The Forest
Service transferred $1 billion from other discretionary and mandatory
accounts to defray fire suppression costs. Over $55 million was
borrowed from national forests in Arizona and New Mexico. Some critical
projects in New Mexico were postponed for up to 1 year as a result of
fire borrowing. These included wildland/urban interface fuels projects,
in the Carson National Forest, in the Gila National Forest, in the
Lincoln National Forest, in the Santa Fe National Forest; a contract
for construction of a fuel break around the community at risk in the
Cibola National Forest was postponed for 6 months.
What they have to do when they shift the money out of these accounts,
they have to put that forest thinning or forest restoration project on
hold because they cannot afford it. They are too busy fighting fires.
We need the money to fight fires. We have caused them to do that every
year.
A similar problem exists in many other States. I will indicate a few
of those, States that have a great interest in this legislation. I have
a document called ``Summary of Effects of Transferring Money to Fire
Suppression.'' As a result of recent fire transfers in which money has
been transferred from various Forest Service accounts to pay for
emergency wildfire suppression, critical Forest Service projects were
postponed or canceled throughout the West. There are literally hundreds
of examples of unfortunate consequences

[[Page S13603]]

that resulted, including canceled prescribed burns, thinning projects,
timber sales, evasive weed control programs, and emergency burned area
rehabilitation projects.
The consequences are felt beyond dangerous forest conditions, and
they range from the postponement of dam safety inspection to the
inability to finalize a tribal energy development agreement.
I have already given examples from my State of New Mexico. In Idaho,
spring burning projects in the Nez Perce National Forest were
postponed.
A brush-cutting project in Clearwater National Forest could not be
completed.
In Montana, a hazardous fuels reduction project in the wildland/urban
interface of the Bitter Root National Forest was postponed and slated
for possible cancellation.
In Oregon, watershed assessments and restoration activities
associated with the Biscuit Fire were delayed. Numerous timber sales
and wildland/urban interface thinning work was postponed.
In Washington, white pine blister rust thinning and pruning projects
were deferred.
In California, nearly $6 million was transferred out of forest health
vegetation management and ecological restoration accounts in 2003,
resulting in having to withdraw stewardship contracts for wildland/
urban interface fuels reduction projects and the failure to complete
prescribed burns.
So this issue of borrowing is serious. It is one that we need to
address as part of this bill.
I commend Senator Burns and Senator Dorgan, who are the chairman and
ranking member of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, for their
efforts to secure $400 million to repay the accounts from which the
agencies have borrowed to fight fires.
Now, what happens each year, when we, in fact, give the Forest
Service less money for firefighting than they need, we have to come
back the next year in supplemental appropriations and ask for funds
with which to pay back those accounts so they can hopefully get back to
those projects they had to postpone.
My understanding is that this amount, this $400 million, was included
in the conference report that was agreed upon Monday night. I also
appreciate Senator Burns' comments that the $400 million is not the
final word. I believe he said this is especially true since the Forest
Service alone actually borrowed $695 million from other programs so far
in this last year.
However, this year-to-year approach to the fire-borrowing problem is
not an adequate solution. Even when our Senate appropriations
colleagues do everything they can to make sure these accounts are
repaid every year, on-the-ground restoration work is delayed--it is
substantially delayed--while the Forest Service waits for Congress to
pass a supplemental appropriations bill to once again give them the
money they had originally been given but could not use for that
purpose. They had to use it for firefighting.
The events that occurred earlier this year are a devastating example
of that. I have sort of gone through that on this chart. The Senate
approved $289 million in extra wildfire funding in the fiscal year 2003
supplemental spending bill. However, the House dropped it.
On July 28, Senator Burns correctly stated on the floor:

. . . without work in the House to help get these funds, we
will be facing an even more drastic situation.

Nonetheless, the bill that was sent to the President did not contain
these urgently needed funds.
In my State of New Mexico, some critical Forest Service hazardous
fuels reduction projects were postponed for up to a year, last year, as
a result of borrowing to fight fires. These include projects in all
these national forests I have mentioned.
In February 2003, the Missoulian, which I understand is a Montana
newspaper--I assume in Missoula--reported that because of fire
borrowing, Montana and northern Idaho forests ``lost about $80 million,
including $25 million intended for the repair and replanting of forests
burned two years earlier on the Bitterroot National Forest.''
Moreover, as evidenced last year by a $200 million shortfall, the
supplemental appropriations often are not sufficient to provide full
repayment to the programs that have been raided.
So what you have, as we spend what we have on fighting fires--and
there is no choice about that--the Forest Service gives up funds that
were intended for other purposes. In many cases, this restoration work,
that we all are now saying is so important--and I certainly agree is so
important--then we never get around to giving them the full money. We
never get around to replacing all the funds that we have taken.
Mr. President, let me talk a little about the second part of my
amendment. The second part of the amendment provides $100 million
annually to reduce fire risk and restore burned areas on non-Federal
lands.
The Forest Service's own researchers state that 77 percent of all
high-risk areas are on non-Federal lands. In addition, the National
Academy of Public Administration, in their 2002 report, found that 47
percent of acres burned each year are on non-Federal lands. They
concluded that decreasing the fuel on all owners' lands is needed to
address the large scope of the fire hazard problem.
So the second part of the amendment I am offering provides real
assistance to States and to local partners to conduct projects that
will complement the work we are trying to do in national forests and on
public lands.
If we send a bill to the President which just deals with the issue on
Federal lands, and then declare victory, the truth is, we will not have
dealt with the biggest part of the problem. Mr. President, 77 percent
of all high-risk areas are not on Federal lands; they are on land owned
by someone else. This second part of my amendment tries to provide some
level of Federal support to those other entities to do the clearing
they need to do.
Many communities that are adjacent to national forests are doing
their part to better protect themselves from the risk of these
catastrophic wildfires.
For example, last year--this, again, is an example from my home
State--the village council in Ruidoso, NM, adopted new laws that set
fire-resistant construction and landscaping standards and established
forest health and fire danger reduction requirements. However, even
with these new requirements, just a few months ago homeowners in
Ruidoso received notices from insurance companies warning them to thin
the trees on their lots or risk losing their coverage altogether.
Clearly, we need to assist these communities and these homeowners to
quickly accomplish that needed work. We need to attack the problem in a
comprehensive way. If we reduce fuels on public lands, Federal lands,
without also treating the adjacent non-Federal lands, we will not
adequately protect our communities.
I think anyone who has watched television for the last several days
has to believe that is the case. Obviously, many of these subdivisions
are not on Federal land. They are, in some cases, adjacent to Federal
land, but much of the thinning that has to occur, in order to protect
communities, is not thinning on Federal lands.
A lack of adequate funding for forest health projects continues to
constrain our efforts to actively manage the forests to reduce the
threat of fire and insects and disease.
Three years ago, Congress found that funding was the main obstacle to
improving forest health and reducing the threat of unnaturally intense
catastrophic fire.
Specifically, we created the National Fire Plan. The National Fire
Plan talked about $1.6 billion in new funding for programs to improve
forest health conditions. At that time, we all agreed on the need to
sustain a commitment to the National Fire Plan over a long enough
period to make a difference. We were talking about perhaps 15 years.
That meant, at a minimum, sustaining the fiscal year 2001 funding
levels for all components of the fire plan. Unfortunately, we have not
followed through. The administration has systematically and continually
proposed major cuts from that level. In some cases, they have proposed
zeroing out critical programs within the National Fire Plan, including
this burned area, restoration, and rehabilitation, the economic action
programs, the community and private fire assistance.
The administration proposed these extreme cuts and the elimination of

[[Page S13604]]

funding, notwithstanding the clearly identified demand for these
programs. We hear that demand from communities in all of our States
where forest fires have burned in excess in recent years.
This provision, this amendment that I am offering, will also provide
actual dollars to restore the burned areas on non-Federal lands. After
a fire is extinguished, communities often face equally hazardous
threats from landslides and flooding. There has been very little
attention to that as yet because the fires continue to burn in
California. But once those fires are out, we will start hearing about
flooding and landslides. There needs to be assistance to deal with that
as well.
In creating the national parklands 3 years ago, Congress provided
$142 million for burned area restoration and rehabilitation.
Nonetheless, in its fiscal year 2002 budget request, the administration
requested $3 million--not $142 million--for burned area restoration and
rehabilitation. In fiscal year 2004, they requested no funds for this
account.
The amendment I am offering will provide funds for urgent community
needs for activities such as soil stabilization after fires occur. The
question we are faced with today is: Are we going to legislate
solutions that will really make a difference on the ground?
I very much appreciate the provision in the Cochran amendment that
authorizes $760 million, but as we all know, authorizing a certain
level of funding in the Congress is not an adequate solution. In fact,
agency officials tell me under current law there is no ceiling on the
amount of money that could be appropriated to address this problem.
Providing actual dollars, as my amendment does, clearly is part of the
solution.
I urge my colleagues to support both sections of this amendment. This
is an important issue. I believe that if we pass this legislation
without dealing with both of these issues--the borrowing problem and
the problem of not providing funds for work on non-Federal lands--we
will be falling far short of where we should be.
I urge my colleagues to support the amendment.
I ask unanimous consent that Senator Reid of Nevada be added as a
cosponsor of the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Alexander). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. BINGAMAN. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, after looking at this amendment, I see it
clearly increases mandatory spending and, if adopted, would cause the
underlying bill to exceed the committee's section 302(a) allocation.
Therefore, I raise a point of order against the amendment pursuant to
section 302(f) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask that the applicable sections of the
Budget Act be waived.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is the Senator making a motion?
Mr. REID. I am.
Mr. COCHRAN. I ask for the yeas and nays on that.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, let me speak very briefly to the amendment
of the Senator from New Mexico. I will be very brief. It is a debatable
motion.
Mr. WYDEN. Parliamentary inquiry.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho has the floor. Will the
Senator yield for an inquiry?
Mr. CRAIG. For a parliamentary inquiry only.
Mr. WYDEN. I ask unanimous consent to be recognized very briefly
after Senator Craig before we go to a vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I will be brief. The Senator from New
Mexico makes eminently good sense. There is no question that we have a
funding problem. I have spoken with the Assistant Secretary and the
Chief. I chair the Forestry Subcommittee and the committee on which the
Senator is the ranking member. What I am suggesting we do--because the
motion that has just been made in this budget point of order is an
appropriate one--is to reexamine the whole funding mechanism of the
Forest Service. Your figures are accurate. The kinds of programs that
go unfunded now, that would help to begin to correct our forest health
problem that is in part driving these fires, is a very real question.
As you know, the Forest Service used to have a cash cow. We called it
logging. Those revenues flowed in, and money moved around from
different accounts. You could borrow, as we did during fire seasons,
and they got replenished. So you raise a very important point. But it
is a point that we need to totally reexamine. To actually allow the
Forest Service to borrow from the Treasury without going through the
appropriating process, in my opinion, doesn't really give us the kind
of fiscal control and responsibility we all ought to have.
Certainly as ranking member of the authorizing committee and as a
member of the authorizing committee myself, you and I, on an annual
basis, ought to aggressively look at this budget, knowing that we have
fallen far short, and deal with it in an appropriate way. But we have
not done that.
You recognized, appropriately, the Senator from Montana, who chairs
the Subcommittee on Interior that funds this, and others. We ought to
get at it in an aggressive way. I have already tasked the Assistant
Secretary and the Chief to look at a variety of mechanisms that fit the
funding shortfalls that we need to create the new mechanisms necessary.
But I don't believe that direct ability to borrow from the U.S.
Treasury by an agency itself, without the authority of the authorizing
committee and the appropriators, is an approach we ought to undertake
at this time. It is, however, an issue whose time has come, and we
ought to deal with it in the appropriate fashion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have already indicated I want to make
sure the compromise we voted on yesterday does not unravel. I will
support the amendment of the Senator from New Mexico because I believe
it will allow us to go forward and make sure the work that the
bipartisan group did is not in vain.
The bottom line is very simple: To get the money to put the fires
out, fire suppression, you have to go out and steal from every single
Forest Service program around and then hope that at some point down the
road you are going to get repaid. It makes a mockery out of any effort
to responsibly budget in this area. In our part of the world, we see,
in effect, funds robbed from nonprofit organizations such as Wallowa
Resources, a small nonprofit in eastern Oregon.
My only concern about putting this off is that if we don't deal with
this issue now, the question is, When will we deal with it? This is an
extraordinarily important question. It will not, in my view, unravel
the compromise which I will fight like crazy to protect, despite the
fact that I think what the Senator from Mississippi and the Senator
from Idaho have said has considerable validity as well.
I hope we will support this amendment and then figure out in the
course of the afternoon some way in which we can find some common
ground on this issue. Today the process of just stealing from every
program around to fight fires really becomes almost farcical. The
Bingaman amendment responds to that. I hope my colleagues will support
it.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me briefly respond. I know the point
of order has been made. A motion has been made to waive the Budget Act.
First, I ask unanimous consent to add Senator Cantwell as a cosponsor
of the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BINGAMAN. I appreciate the good intent of my friend from Idaho in
saying that this is something on which we ought to start working or on
which we ought to work. The reality is, this is our best chance. This
legislation is likely to go to the President, likely to be signed into
law in some form. If we don't take the opportunity this legislation
presents to fix this problem, it

[[Page S13605]]

will remain unfixed. We can have all of the assurances we want from the
administration, but the reality is, the administration is under very
severe budgetary restraints as it goes into this next year. We in
Congress are under very severe budgetary restraints. Everyone around
this place is going to be looking for ways to save money. That means
that when it comes to actually providing the resources to fight fires,
the course of least resistance is to do what we have always been doing,
what President Bush has done in the last several years: Ask for way too
little money for firefighting. And then, when it turns out that you
need an extra billion dollars, tell the Forest Service to take it out
of their other accounts.
That is exactly what we have done in the last several years. We are
getting ready to do that again. I, for one, am not persuaded that the
concern the Senator from Idaho has expressed here is shared by all in
the administration. I am confident he believes the issue is one that
should be addressed. But each of us, as we know, has different
priorities for what needs to be addressed. I would say this is a fairly
low priority for the people putting the administration's budget
proposal together, which we are going to receive this next January.
I very much think this issue needs to be addressed as part of this
bill. Again, as I said a couple of times in my earlier statement, if we
pass this bill without addressing the resource problem and the
borrowing problem I am trying to get at in my amendment, we can give
all the speeches we want, issue all the press releases, have all the
press conferences we want saying what a great thing we have done for
the American people, but 77 percent of the areas at highest risk are
not going to have any Federal resources available to them.
In addition to that, the thinning activity, much of the forest
restoration activity we all say we favor, is not going to be funded. So
we need to deal with this as part of this bill.
Frankly, I am sorry to see the decision has been made to try to deal
with this as a procedural vote. I think this is an important enough
issue that we ought to have an up-or-down vote on it and let people
express their point of view. When you raise a Budget Act point of
order, basically what you are saying is this is not a big enough
priority to justify changing the way the budget now sits. If that is
the conclusion of most Members of the Senate, then I think shame on us.
If we have the fires going in California, we have all the other
problems we all talk about, and we are not willing to put that to the
front of the priority list, then I think shame on us.
I very much prefer to see us have an up-or-down vote on this
amendment. Obviously, that is not possible now with the Budget Act
point of order and the motion to waive the Budget Act.
I will yield the floor, but I urge my colleagues to support the
motion to waive the Budget Act.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion. The
yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr.
Edwards), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), and the Senator
from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman) are necessarily absent.
I also announce that the Senator from Nebraska (Mr. Nelson) is absent
attending a family funeral.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``yea''.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 36, nays 60, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 421 Leg.]

YEAS--36

Akaka
Baucus
Bayh
Biden
Bingaman
Boxer
Cantwell
Clinton
Corzine
Daschle
Dayton
Dodd
Durbin
Feinstein
Graham (FL)
Harkin
Hollings
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnson
Kennedy
Kohl
Landrieu
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Mikulski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Reed
Reid
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Schumer
Stabenow
Wyden

NAYS--60

Alexander
Allard
Allen
Bennett
Bond
Breaux
Brownback
Bunning
Burns
Byrd
Campbell
Carper
Chafee
Chambliss
Cochran
Coleman
Collins
Conrad
Cornyn
Craig
Crapo
DeWine
Dole
Domenici
Dorgan
Ensign
Enzi
Feingold
Fitzgerald
Frist
Graham (SC)
Grassley
Gregg
Hagel
Hatch
Hutchison
Inhofe
Kyl
Lincoln
Lott
Lugar
McCain
McConnell
Miller
Murkowski
Nickles
Pryor
Roberts
Santorum
Sessions
Shelby
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stevens
Sununu
Talent
Thomas
Voinovich
Warner

NOT VOTING--4

Edwards
Kerry
Lieberman
Nelson (NE)
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 36, the are nays
60. Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn not having voted
in the affirmative, the motion is rejected. The point of order is
sustained and the amendment falls.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I would like to ask how long that vote took.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Twenty-nine minutes.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I don't know what more we can do here. I
want everyone to know we are doing our best over here to move these
amendments. We have a lot of them over here. We are trying to move
them. We can't do it if we waste a lot of time on these votes. I want
everyone within the sound of my voice to know that we cannot finish the
bill if these votes take 30 or 40 minutes. Everyone should understand
that.
There are going to be people coming and asking: When can we leave? I
have a plane. Are we going to have votes tomorrow?
We will have votes for days, the way this is going. We cannot finish
this bill tonight with these votes taking as long as they are taking. I
am disappointed, frankly, that the majority leader wasn't here to
terminate the first vote. If we limit votes to 20 minutes, people would
stop straggling in. It is not fair to the Senate.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, the Senator from Nevada is exactly
correct in the fact that we are going to have to have more cooperation
to move this bill along. We agreed before this vote that we could cut
off votes after 20 minutes. We had the endorsement of that by the
majority leader. But because Senators were on their way to vote and
people told us they were on their way to vote, the vote dragged out
longer than that.
I hope Senators will cooperate with the managers of the bill and
leadership and let's get here and vote when the buzzer sounds and not
wait until the last minute. These votes are going to be cut short. I
hope everyone will cooperate with us.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, with the understanding of the manger of this
bill, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Montana, Mr.
Baucus, be recognized for 15 minutes to speak on the bill and whatever
else he wishes to speak on; further, the Senator from New Mexico, Mr.
Bingaman, who still has a number of other amendments that he wishes to
be offered be recognized to offer the next amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is
so ordered.
The Senator from Montana.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, first, I thank my friend, the Senator from
Nevada, and the managers of the bill for their accommodation.
It is vital that we pass this legislation this year.
Montana recently suffered from devastating wildfires, as have other
western States. As the Senator from California, Senator Feinstein
pointed out repeatedly, the current news from Southern California is a
painful reminder of a very large problem.
Across this country forests are threatened by insects, disease and
the build up of hazardous fuels. The impacts of these conditions are
real. And they play out year after year, fueling large fires that
destroy lives and homes, diminish water and air quality, and destroy
wildlilfe habitat.

[[Page S13606]]

The cost of containing these large fires is staggering, straining
State and Federal budgets and devastating local economies.
There are many reasons for the situation we are in today, ranging
from weather and natural cycles to urban sprawl and the fire
suppression policies of the past.
We can't do anything to change the weather and we certainly can't
change the past, but we can use today's knowledge and the wisdom of our
experience to do better.
Neglecting the problem is not the answer; nor is more talk. We have
to try a new approach. The compromise healthy forests bill is not
perfect, but I believe it offers options to more efficiently address
our forest health problems and the consequences they have on real
people. I also believe this bill will help put people in rural
communities back to work in the woods, especially in my State of
Montana.
I have said over and over again that a healthy forests bill must
first allow federal agencies and communities to address dangerous fuel
loadings on a local level, quickly and efficiently. Second, it must
support small, independent mills and put local people to work in the
forests and the mills. Third, it must promote and protect citizen
involvement and be fair to the principles underlying the federal
judicial system. And finally, it must protect and help restore special
and sensitive places like wilderness areas.
I think we have achieved that with this legislation.
People impacted by forest health problems don't belong to just one
political party.
This is a problem that requires all sides to work together. I would
like to commend the tremendous efforts of my Democratic and Republican
colleagues, including Senators Feinstein, Wyden, Cochran, Craig, Crapo,
McCain and Lincoln, who along with several other Senators and myself
worked very had to put together the compromise on healthy forests that
I am proud to support and co-sponsor.
This was no small feat; this bill touches on some very divisive
issues that I wasn't sure we would ever find a way to solve. But, we
did and that is why we are here today having a serious conversation
about actually passing a bill.
I believe the compromise healthy forest bill is responsive to our
need to more efficiently reduce the threat of wildfire while ensuring
adequate environmental protections, citizen participation, and an
independent judiciary.
There is nothing in this legislation that undermines existing
environmental laws, or a person's ability to be involved in decisions
that impact their public lands. In fact, this legislation requires
citizen collaboration beyond existing law--current law does not require
the secretary to encourage citizen collaboration or to hold a public
meeting on proposed projects.
What I believe this legislation does do is help keep the process open
and honest. I ask unanimous consent that an article for today's
Missoulian newspaper, from Missoula, MT, be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

Groups File Lawsuit Over Kootenai Forest Timber Sale

(By Sherry Devlin)

Harvest threatens water, environmentalists argue

Environmentalists filed another lawsuit against the
Kootenai National Forest on Tuesday, hoping to stop a 12.5
million-board-foot timber sale they believe would pollute an
already degraded stream.
At almost the same time, not knowing a lawsuit had been
filed, the Forest Service awarded a contract for the Garver
timber sale to Riley Creek Lumber Co.--which bid $1.3 million
over the advertised price of $230,000.
Filed by Alliance for the Wild Rockies and The Lands
Council, the complaint seeks to stop the Garver sale on
grounds it violates the Clean Water Act and destroys habitat
for species that depend on old-growth trees.
The groups used a similar lawsuit to stop the Lolo National
Forest from logging in areas burned by wildfires during the
summer of 2000.
In that case, environmentalists successfully argued that
the logging would degrade water quality in streams identified
as ``water-quality impaired'' by the state of Montana.
Until the state of Montana sets ``total maximum daily
load'' figures for the streams, the Forest Service cannot
adequately judge how much additional sediment the streams can
handle, the lawsuit said.
Federal District Judge Don Molloy agreed, shutting down all
post-burn logging until TMDL figures are available.
In the Garver sale, the at-risk stream is the West Fork of
the Yaak River, which is also listed as water-quality
impaired.
Logging caused the West Fork's problems, and more logging
will make them worse, said Michael Garrity, executive
director of Alliance for the Wild Rockies.
``It is exactly the same issue as in the Lolo,'' Garrity
said. ``Instead of wasting the court's time and money, the
Kootenai should just follow the judge's ruling.''
(The Forest Service has appealed Molloy's decision to the
9th Circuit Court of Appeals.)
At Kootenai forest headquarters, Supervisor Bob Castaneda
did not know a lawsuit had been filed until contacted by the
Missoulian. He quickly and vigorously defended his staff,
which had just awarded the timber sale to Riley Creek Lumber.
``Ever since the Lolo decision, our approach has been to
have a good analysis of the watershed and to use best
management practices,'' Castaneda said. ``We think through
some restoration efforts and by following BMPs, we can
improve the current watershed condition.''
Would the logging pollute the West Fork of the Yaak?
``No,'' Castaneda said. ``I just don't agree with their
statement. We worked very closely with the Yaak Valley Forest
Council and used a lot of their recommendations in making the
decision. They worked closely with us.''
The Kootenai forest did a number of water-quality surveys
in the Yaak this past summer, he said, and the preliminary
results are encouraging.
``They're telling us the water quality is much better than
what the state suggested,'' Castaneda said.
He also rebutted the lawsuit's contention that the timber
sale would cut into the Kootenai forest's declining base of
old-growth trees.
The forest is, in fact, staying out of designated old-
growth areas, Castaneda said.
In the lawsuit, the Alliance and the Lands Council cite the
Forest Service's own environmental impact statement, which
said the Garver sale would likely have adverse affects on
every sensitive old-growth species in the Kootenai: fishers,
wolverines, flammulated owls, black-backed woodpeckers,
northern goshawks and others.
``It is time for the Forest Service and the Bush
administration to start cleaning up our streams and
protecting our wildlife instead of subsidizing timber
corporations and breaking the law,'' Garrity said.
News of the lawsuit was a double-blow to Jim Hurst, co-
owner of Owens and Hurst Lumber Co. in Eureka. He, too, had
bid on the Garver sale but lost out to the north Idaho mill.
Now, he said, the lawsuit has the potential to make things
even worse for lumbermen.
``It's just more of the same,'' Hurst said. ``Nothing
coming from the environmental community would surprise me
anymore.''
Another lawsuit filed earlier this year by The Ecology
Center stopped several timber sales on the Kootenai forest,
some of which were bound for Hurst's Eureka mill.
The Kootenai's timber sale program has decreased by 75
percent since 1989.

Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, this article demonstrates why the
provisions of this bill would be beneficial to moving fuel reduction
projects forward.
This article describes a lawsuit filed to stop a timber sale after
the timber sale had been awarded. As I understand the situation, the
lawsuit was based on an issue that had not been raised at any time
during the environmental review process or the administrative appeals
process. It was sprung at the last minute just to delay and stop the
sale. It was sprung even after the Forest Service was thanked by other
groups for doing a better job to address old growth issues that had
been raised earlier.
Now, I know that this article is about a timber sale and not a
hazardous fuels project, but the same concerns apply. If someone has
particular concerns about the impact of a proposed project, the
compromise healthy forests bill very appropriately requires that they
raise that issue during the administrative review process before they
can file a lawsuit.
No one is saying the public's concerns are not valid and that they
should not have every right to raise those concerns, and appeal
projects that they do not feel address their concerns. But, they should
not be allowed to use the process simply to stop and delay. That's only
fair. Particularly when we are talking about projects like those
contemplated by the compromise healthy forests bill, which are projects
intended to reduce the risks of dangerous fires. The compromise Healthy
Forests bill simply requires citizens to be thoughtful and thorough
when they oppose projects.
This in turn helps the agencies be more efficient, because they can
do a better job of addressing controversial

[[Page S13607]]

issues--like old growth--earlier in the process, without wondering what
might be coming at them from left field. This is a good example of why
the compromise bill will have real, positive impacts on the ground.
Keeping Montana's small timber mills and forest workers in business
is a top priority for me because of their importance to rural
economies. But, the fact, is we also need this industry to accomplish
the hazardous fuel reduction work on the ground.
I worked in committee to ensure this legislation provides support
for building a thriving forest industry in rural communities. In
particular, I worked with Senators Crapo and Leahy to develop the Rural
Community Forestry Enterprise Program, included in Title VII of the
bill. The Rural Community Forestry Enterprise Program, is intended to
give a much needed economic boost to small businesses and small mills
in rural communities, particularly those in Montana that have been hit
hard in recent years.
The Program would establish forest enterprise centers around the
country, including one in Montana, that would do the following: Ensure
that the Small Business Administration timber set-aside program works
better for Montana and other small mills; enhance technical and
business management skills training; organize cooperatives, marketing
programs, and worker skill pools; facilitate technology transfer for
processing small diameter trees and brush into useful products; and
enhance the rural forest business infrastructure needed for a fuel
reduction program on both private and public lands.
Keeping small mills in Montana in operation is a top priority for
me. These businesses are vitally important to rural economies,
providing good-paying jobs and revenue to local communities. I support
this legislation because I believe we do have a serious problem with
hazardous fuel build-up in our National Forests that we must solve
sooner rather than later.
I also believe the bi-partisan Healthy Forests bill has the elements
necessary to allow local citizens and leaders to make wise decisions
that address this problem efficiently and effectively. We need to pass
this bill.
This is not a problem that we will solve overnight, or even in the
next few years. But, we have to start somewhere, and this is a great
place to start.
I am proud to support this compromise. I ask all of my colleagues to
take a bold step and support it as well.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that,
notwithstanding the order previously entered, the distinguished Senator
from Maine be recognized up to 10 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Maine, Ms. Collins.
Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Mississippi for
his courtesy and also for the extraordinary job he has done in bringing
together people of diverse views on this critical issue of forest
management. I also thank the Senator from New Mexico for agreeing to
let me deliver my comments before he offers his amendment.
Responsible management of our Nation's forests is vital to preventing
the highly destructive forest fires that we are seeing plaguing the
West and also to protecting our ecosystems. I am very pleased the
Senate is moving forward with this important issue which I know matters
greatly to the Presiding Officer as well.
No discussion of a responsible forest management system would be
complete, however, without addressing another threat to our Nation's
working forests and open spaces; that is, suburban sprawl. Sprawl
threatens our environment and our quality of life. It destroys
ecosystems and increases the risks of flooding and other environmental
hazards. It burns the infrastructure of the affected communities,
increases traffic on neighborhood streets, and wastes taxpayer money.
It leads to the fragmentation of wood lots, reducing the economic
viability of the remaining working forests.
Sprawl occurs because the immediate economic value of forests or
farmland cannot compete with the immediate economic value of developed
land in the areas that are experiencing rapid growth.
No State is immune from the dangers of sprawl. For example, the
Virginia State Forester says that since 1992 the Commonwealth of
Virginia has lost 54,000 acres of forest land per year to other uses.
The Southeastern Michigan Council of Governments recently reported that
southeastern Michigan saw a 17-percent increase in developed land
between 1900 and 2000.
In my home State of Maine, suburban sprawl has already consumed tens
of thousands of acres of forest land. The problem is particularly acute
in southern Maine where a 108-percent increase in urbanized land over
the past two decades has resulted in the labeling of the greater
Portland area as the ``sprawl capital of the Northeast.''
I am particularly alarmed by the amount of working forest and open
space in southern and coastal Maine that has given way to strip malls
and cul-de-sacs. Once these forests, farms, and meadows are lost to
development, they are lost forever. Maine is trying to respond to this
challenge. The people of my State have approved a $50 million bond to
preserve land through the Land For Maine's Future Program, and they
contribute their time and their money to preserve important parcels and
to support our State's 88 land trusts. It is time for the Federal
Government to help support these local community-based efforts.
For these reasons, I will be offering an amendment, along with
Senator Harkin, that establishes a $50 million grant program, the
Suburban and Community Forestry and Open Space Program, within the U.S.
Forest Service, to support locally driven, market-based land
conservation projects that will preserve our working forests and farms.
Locally driven and market based are the essential aspects of this
program. This program is locally driven because it encourages
communities and nonprofit organizations to work together with
landowners to help promote sustainable forestry and public access. The
program will allow local governments and nonprofits to compete for
funds and hold title to land or easements purchased with programmed
funds. Projects funded over this initiative must be targeted at lands
located in parts of the country that are threatened by sprawl. In
addition, the legislation requires that Federal grant bonds be matched
dollar for dollar by State, local, or private resources.
This program is market driven because it relies upon market forces
rather than government regulations to achieve its objectives. Rather
than preserving our working forests and open spaces by zoning or other
government regulation at the expense of the landowner, this program
will provide the resources to allow a landowner who wishes to keep his
or her land as a working farm or wood lot to do so.
The legislation also protects the rights of property owners with the
inclusion of a ``willing seller'' provision that will require the
consent of a landowner if a parcel of land is to participate in the
program.
The $50 million that would be authorized would help achieve a number
of stewardship objectives. First, the amendment would help prevent
forest fragmentation and preserve working forests, helping to maintain
the supply of timber that fuels Maine's most significant industry.
Second, the resources would be a valuable tool for communities that are
struggling to manage growth and to prevent sprawl.
Currently, if a town such as Gorham, ME, or another community is
trying to cope with the effects of sprawl and turns to the Federal
Government for assistance, they would find there is no program. My
proposal would change that by making the Federal Government an active
partner in preserving forest land and managing sprawl, while leaving
decisionmaking at the State and local level where it belongs.
There is great work being done in Maine and in other States to
protect our working forests for future generations. I am grateful for
the many organizations that are lending support to this effort and
which have also endorsed my legislation. There is a nationwide network
of organizations that have endorsed my proposal, including the National
Association of State Foresters, the New England Forestry Foundation,
the Nature Conservancy, the Trust for Public Lands, the Land Trust
Alliance, and many others.
By adopting this proposal and incorporating it into this bill,
Congress can

[[Page S13608]]

provide a real boost to conservation initiatives, help prevent sprawl,
preserve special open places, forest lands, and farms, and help sustain
natural resource-based industries.
I thank Senator Cochran in particular for his assistance on this
legislation. It is always a great pleasure to work with him. I hope
this proposal will be incorporated into the final bill.
Thank you, Mr. President.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Crapo). The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from
Maine for her contribution to the legislation we have before us today.
She has been a leader in this effort, and we always appreciate the
opportunity of working with her. I thank her for her kind comments as
well.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.

Amendment No. 2035

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask
for its immediate consideration.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Bingaman] proposes an
amendment numbered 2035.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To require the treatment of slash and other long term fuels
management for hazardous fuels reduction projects)

At the appropriate place, insert the following new section:

``SEC.   . LONG-TERM FUEL MANAGEMENT.

In implementing hazardous fuels reduction projects, the
Secretaries shall ensure that--
(1) a slash treatment plan is completed;
(2) acres are not identified as treated, in annual program
accomplishment reports, until all phases of a multi-year
project such as thinning, slash reduction, and prescribed
burning are completed; and
(3) a system to track the budgeting and implementation of
follow-up treatments shall be used to account for the long-
term maintenance of areas managed to reduce hazardous
fuels.''

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this amendment deals with the issue of
the treatment of long-term fuel management and treating what is called
slash. Many fuel reduction projects require two or more sequential
treatments over several years on the same parcel of land--for example,
an initial timber harvest, followed by the piling and burning of slash,
which is, obviously, the brush and trees that have been cut down.
Completing these followup slash treatments in a timely manner is a
very important part of forest restoration work. It is important because
the slash provides fuel for wildfires, and it provides habitat for
beetles and other insects.
I think we have some studies that demonstrate the insect disease
problem expands where this slash is not properly treated. Everyone
agrees it is important to conduct these followup treatments in
locations where fuel reduction projects have been completed in order to
prevent the area from returning to the condition that puts these
locations at high risk of unnaturally intense catastrophic wildfire.
There is a recent GAO analysis in my State that found the Forest
Service and the BLM completed about only 19 of 39 followup slash
treatments in a timely manner.
In addition, the GAO found the agencies' reported figures for the
acres treated were inflated because they had double-counted acres where
the same acreage was treated in multiyear phases. Where you have this
kind of a slash treatment necessary, we are getting inaccurate
accounting by the Forest Service and by the BLM.
This is troubling because it means the Forest Service and the BLM are
providing inaccurate data with respect to the number of acres on which
this fire threat is actually being addressed. My amendment tries to
ensure there is accurate accounting. In my view, it is a simple and
straightforward amendment. I do not see why it should be controversial.
It is a minor matter in the eyes of some, but the Forest Service's
failure to properly manage this slash treatment has worsened the fire
risk in some areas. Obviously, the focus of this legislation is to
reduce that fire risk.
I think it is an appropriate amendment. I hope this is something the
managers of the bill could accept. If not, obviously we can have a vote
on it.
Let me just briefly describe the amendment in a little more detail
and essentially read it. It says:

In implementing hazardous fuels reduction projects, the
Secretaries--

That is the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of the
Interior--

shall ensure that--
a slash treatment plan is completed;
acres are not identified as treated, in annual program
accomplishment reports, until all phases of a multi-year
project such as thinning, slash reduction, and prescribed
burning are completed; and
a system to track the budgeting and implementation of
follow-up treatments shall be used to account for the long-
term maintenance of areas managed to reduce hazardous fuels.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I am advised this amendment would really
be a recipe for gridlock in that it mandates new requirements for the
Forest Service as well as the Bureau of Land Management--processes they
have to carry out and go through before they can engage in any fuel
treatment processes.
It would require the Forest Service, for example, to prepare a plan
for treatment of slash that contains all of the information and data
specified in the amendment of the Senator from New Mexico. It opens up
the Forest Service to legal challenges if someone has the opinion that
the plan is inadequate for some reason. It forces the Forest Service to
set up a new system for tracking the implementation of fuels treatment
projects, and any followup treatments to them.
The amendment would add new reporting processes to hazardous fuel
work. The amendment calls for the development of a plan which is
already required but requires the agencies to develop multiyear
treatment plans and report on those plans on an annual basis.
The whole purpose of this legislation is to try to help simplify and
get the work done that needs to be done to reduce the chances of
devastating fires like we have seen in California, to manage the
forests in a more effective way, a safer way, for those who live in
those areas, and to get more done in terms of enhancing survivability
from insect infestation and generally improve the overall health of our
national forest resources.

The Forest Service is going to end up spending more time, the Bureau
of Land Management as well, in their offices working on plans, than out
doing the work that they were actually hired to do under existing
legislation. This amendment is, as I have said before, a recipe for
gridlock. I urge that the amendment be opposed.
I don't know of any other Senators who wish to speak on the
amendment. I will be prepared to move to table the amendment when those
who want to speak have been heard.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me just say that I think this
amendment is anything but a prescription for gridlock. There is the
suggestion that all sorts of new program accomplishment reports are
going to be required. Those reports are currently produced. And the
real issue is, do we get proper accounting in those reports or do we
not? The GAO has told us we do not. Each year they give us an
accomplishment report, and they list acreage on which they have not
completed the forest restoration work. They have done one of the phases
of that forest restoration work, and then the next year they take
credit for that acreage again by doing another phase. The next year
they take credit for that acreage again by doing another phase.
All we are saying is that acres should not be identified as having
been treated in these annual reports, which are already provided, until
they have done all of the different phases--the thinning, slash
reduction, and the prescribed burning.
We are not requiring additional reports. We are requiring accurate
reports. That is not an unreasonable request.
I am somewhat disappointed. This is an amendment we delivered to the
managers of the bill yesterday, to their

[[Page S13609]]

staff. We asked them to review it, to give us suggestions. If they had
problems with any aspect of it, they did not get back to us, except to
say it is unacceptable. That seems to be the position they are taking
with regard to any and all suggested amendments to the bill.
This is intended as a constructive amendment. I see it as a
constructive amendment to deal with a specific problem that the GAO has
identified as existing with regard to management of the long-term fuel
supply.
With that, I yield the floor.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to table the amendment and ask for
the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The question is on agreeing to the motion to table amendment No.
2035. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. McCONNELL. I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr.
Domenici) is necessarily absent.
Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr.
Edwards), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Hollings), the Senator
from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), and the Senator from Connecticut (Mr.
Lieberman) are necessarily absent.
I also announce that the Senator from Nebraska (Mr. Nelson) is absent
attending a family funeral.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``nay.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 58, nays 36, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 422 Leg.]

YEAS--58

Alexander
Allard
Allen
Baucus
Bennett
Bond
Breaux
Brownback
Bunning
Burns
Campbell
Chafee
Chambliss
Cochran
Coleman
Collins
Cornyn
Craig
Crapo
DeWine
Dole
Ensign
Enzi
Feinstein
Fitzgerald
Frist
Graham (SC)
Grassley
Gregg
Hagel
Hatch
Hutchison
Inhofe
Kyl
Landrieu
Lincoln
Lott
Lugar
McCain
McConnell
Miller
Murkowski
Nickles
Pryor
Roberts
Santorum
Sessions
Shelby
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stevens
Sununu
Talent
Thomas
Voinovich
Warner
Wyden

NAYS--36

Akaka
Bayh
Biden
Bingaman
Boxer
Byrd
Cantwell
Carper
Clinton
Conrad
Corzine
Daschle
Dayton
Dodd
Dorgan
Durbin
Feingold
Graham (FL)
Harkin
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnson
Kennedy
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Mikulski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Reed
Reid
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Schumer
Stabenow

NOT VOTING--6

Domenici
Edwards
Hollings
Kerry
Lieberman
Nelson (NE)
The motion was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move
to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.

Amendment No. 2036

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask
for its immediate consideration.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Bingaman] proposes an
amendment numbered 2036.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading
of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To require collaborative monitoring of forest health
projects)

At the appropriate place, insert the following new section:

``SEC. __ . COLLABORATIVE MONITORING.

(a) In General.--The Secretaries shall establish a
collaborative monitoring, evaluation and accountability
process in order to assess the positive or negative
ecological and social effects of a representative sampling of
projects implemented pursuant to title I and section 404 of
this Act. The Secretaries shall include diverse stakeholders,
including interested citizens and Indian tribes, in the
monitoring and evaluation process.
(b) Means.--The Secretaries may collect monitoring data
using cooperative agreements, grants or contracts with small
or micro-businesses, cooperatives, non-profit organizations,
Youth Conservation Corps work crews or related partnerships
with State, local, and other non-Federal conservation corps.
(c) Funds.--Funds to implement this section shall be
derived from hazardous fuels operations funds.''

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this amendment requires the Forest
Service and the Bureau of Land Management to establish a collaborative
monitoring process in order to assess the environmental and social
effects of a representative sampling of projects implemented under this
act. There are many forest-dependent communities that support
collaborative monitoring of forest projects on public land. This simply
means it is collaborative monitoring. That phrase simply means that
interested communities and individuals may participate with Federal
agencies in monitoring the ecological and social effects of forest
health projects.
Proponents of the legislation that we are considering today
continually state that they want more collaboration at the beginning of
the process. However, unless there is collaborative monitoring of the
effects of the projects, we will never be able to rebuild trust between
rural communities and these agencies.
Congress enacted a similar requirement when authorizing the
Stewardship Contracting Program. In addition, Senator Craig and I
sponsored the community-based Forest and Public Land Restoration Act.
That bill, which was passed by the Senate unanimously, also required
collaborative monitoring. This is a simple amendment. I believe it is
noncontroversial. I hope this is acceptable to the managers of the bill
and can be adopted.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from
New Mexico for this suggested change to the bill. It actually could be
argued it is duplicative of a provision that is already in the bill at
the request of Senator Wyden and Senator Feinstein, but it is not
wholly inconsistent. We think it can be worked into the bill and will
not cause confusion, so I am prepared to recommend that the Senate
accept the amendment. I hope the Senate will vote for the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, just very briefly, Chairman Cochran has it
exactly right. If there is one thing we want to accomplish in the
natural resources area, it is to try to move this bill away from
confrontation to collaboration. That is what we tried to do in the
bipartisan compromise. I think we can reconcile that with the Bingaman
amendment. I urge its support.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate on the amendment?
If not, without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
The amendment (No. 2036) was agreed to.

Amendment No. 2039

Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I am soon going to send to the desk an
amendment.
The people of my State of Vermont, and Americans across the Nation,
mourn with our colleagues, Senator Feinstein and Senator Boxer, and
with the people of California, over the tragic loss of life and
property from the wildfires in San Diego County.
Today, we lost a firefighter from Novato, CA. These brave men and
women on the front lines need to be recognized first in this debate.
Our hearts go out to the firefighters' families and friends.
We have all been riveted by the vivid images we have watched, day
after day, and by the heart-wrenching stories of loss and of bravery
that go with these pictures.
Our hearts go out to all of these families that have lost so much.
And our thanks go out to the courageous and diligent firefighters and
emergency response team members who are fighting those fires and are
doing all they can to protect these communities.
Here in the Congress, we need to do more to protect forests and
communities from wildfires. That is why I introduced the Forest and
Community

[[Page S13610]]

Protection Act this summer. This is a bill and an approach that would
make a real difference for communities facing this kind of potential
devastation.
The bill before us now, unfortunately, would not offer the same level
of help.
The bill before us is a well-camouflaged attempt to limit the right
of the American people to know and to question what their government is
doing on the public's lands.
When you look at the tidal wave of regulatory changes the
administration has produced in the last year to cut the public out of
the process, it could not be clearer that the administration does not
want the public or the independent judiciary looking over its shoulder.
Communities that face wildfire threats need real help, not false
promises.
As this chart shows, the administration has been busy creating a
broader number of projects that will be excluded from environmental
analysis under the National Environmental Policy Act, limiting how, who
and when citizens can appeal agency decisions, and even cutting out
other agencies, such as the Fish and Wildlife Service, from advising
the Forest Service on the impact of the actions on endangered species
habitats.
Unfortunately, the bill before us today could be the last in this
series of steps that completely erode the public's trust of the Forest
Service. Many of us saw the aftermath of the salvage rider on our
forests and the public trust. We should not go down that road again.
That is why I am offering an amendment today, along with Senators
Bingaman, Durbin, Harkin and Boxer, to strike sections 105 and 106 of
the bill. These sections go too far in undermining the decades of
progress we have made in public participation and judicial review.
The administration has worked overtime to try to sell the false idea
that environmental laws, administrative appeals and the judicial
process are the cause of wildfires. But they have not been able to back
up their scape-goating with facts. And the facts themselves contradict
their claims.
In May, the GAO issued a study examining delays in all Forest Service
fuels reduction projects, from appeals or litigation, during the last 2
fiscal years.
Contrary to what some advocates of this bill will tell you, the
results show that neither appeals nor litigation have delayed fuels
reduction projects.
As you can see, out of 818 projects, only a quarter were appealed. Of
those, even fewer took more than the standard 90-day review period. In
fact, only 5 percent of all the projects took more than 90 days.
And they can't honestly blame litigation, either, for the delays.
Again, of the 818 projects, only 25 were litigated. Of those, 10 were
either settled or ruled in favor of the Forest Service--meaning that
only 9 out of 818 projects were delayed by court order.
That is only one percent. Where is the ``analysis paralysis'' my
colleagues like to talk about so much?
On the ground, these appeals had even less effect. Of the 4.8 million
acres covered by fuel reduction projects, only 111,000 acres were
impacted by litigation. The numbers simply do not back up the
administration's assertion that appeals and litigation are delaying
projects.
The bill before us today rolls back environmental protections and
citizen rights with no justification at all.
Enough about numbers. The bill before us is really a solution looking
for a problem. So let's take a closer look at the solution on the
table.
First, the bill would make it much more difficult for the public to
have any oversight or say in what happens on public lands, undermining
decades of progress in public inclusion.
In this new and vague pre-decisional protest process, this bill
expects the public to have intimate knowledge of aspects of the project
early on, including aspects that the Forest Service might not have
disclosed in its initial proposal.
Section 105 gives the Forest Service a real incentive to hide the
ball or to withhold certain information about a project that might make
it objectionable such as endangered species habitat data, watershed
analysis or road-building information.
If concerns are not raised about this possibly undisclosed
information in the vaguely outlined predecisional process, the Forest
Service can argue to the courts that no claims can be brought on these
issues in the future when the agency either through intent or
negligence withheld important information from the public.
I want to take a couple of minutes to respond to a couple of
statements that my colleagues have made over the last 2 days with
regard to appeals and judicial review.
First, my colleagues keep talking about ``analysis paralysis.'' This
has become a mantra for those who want to cut the public out of
decision-making and blame appeals and litigation.
When the administration went looking for a problem to fit their
solution of cutting out appeals and judicial review, they came up with
analysis paralysis.
When they went looking for facts to back up this new mantra, they
threw together a Forest Service report that argued that 48 percent of
decisions were appealed.
But when people starting asking questions about the report though,
they found that the Forest Service spent just a few hours gathering
information for the report. The so-called data it was based on was just
phone conversations made in an afternoon.
In fact, the Forest Service does not actually track appeals. Until
the GAO did its independent report, they really had no idea what impact
appeals were having on fuel reduction projects.
But they, and many of my colleagues, already had their talking
points. As we have seen with many other so-called environmental
policies of this administration, facts are never allowed to get in the
way of rhetoric.
When the facts did start coming out this spring, with an independent
study by Northern Arizona University and the GAO, they showed that only
5 percent of projects are appealed and only 3 percent are litigated.
The report also found that opposition was not a leading factor in
slowing fuel reduction projects:

While the issue of formal public resistance, such as
appeals and litigation, has recently been contentious, only a
few local land unit officials we visited indicated that this
type of resistance had delayed particular fuels reduction
treatments.

What the facts do tell is that the main reasons fuel reduction
projects could not proceed were due to the weather and the diversion of
fuel reduction funds to fight wildfires.
Just this summer, while the President was out in Oregon pushing this
bill, the Forest Service was back here cutting fuel reduction projects
because the House Republicans refused to pass emergency funding for
fire suppression.
Let's cut through the smokescreen and focus on the facts before
leaping on board to a solution that will let the administration pick
and choose 20 million acres of forestland around the country to cut
with little real public accountability.
This is not a problem of analysis paralysis but a problem of
situation exaggeration.
Essentially, this provision penalizes citizens and rewards agency
staff when the agency does not do its job in terms of basic
investigation and information-sharing regarding a project.
The other significant change to judicial review is section 106. Even
under the ``compromise'' version of H.R. 1904, the provisions will
interfere with and overload judges' schedules.
This section will force judges to reconsider preliminary injunctions
every 60 days, whether or not circumstances warrant it.
In many ways, this provision could backfire on my colleagues' goal of
expediting judicial review. It will force judges to engage in otherwise
unnecessary proceedings slowing their consideration of the very cases
that H.R. 1904's proponents want to fast track.
Moreover, taking the courts' time to engage in this process will also
divert scarce judicial resources away from other pending cases.
It is also likely to encourage more lawsuits. Requiring that
injunctions be renewed every 60 days, whether needed or not, gives
lawyers another bite at the apple. Something they often find hard to
resist.
Instead of telling the courts when and how to conduct their business,
we should instead be working to find a workable and effective approach
to reducing wildfire risks.

[[Page S13611]]

This bill does not achieve that, but through sections 105 and 106, it
instead poses a real risk to the checks and balances that the American
people and their independent judiciary now have on government decisions
affecting the public lands owned by the American people.
Sadly, this bill is just a Halloween trick on communities threatened
by wildfires. It is not fair to rollback environmental laws, public
oversight or judicial review under the guise of reacting to devastating
wildfires.
It will do nothing to help or to prevent the kind of devastation that
Southern California is facing. It is a special interest grab-bag
shrouded behind a smokescreen.
Let us offer real help and real answers, and let us not allow fear to
be used as a pretext for taking the public's voice out of decisions
affecting the public's lands and for ceding more power to special
interests.
I hope my colleagues will join me in striking these provisions.

Amendment No. 2039

(Purpose: To remove certain provisions relating to
administrative and judicial review)
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I send the amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Vermont [Mr. Leahy], for himself, Mrs.
Boxer, Mr. Harkin, Mr. Bingaman, and Mr. Durbin, proposes an
amendment numbered 2039:

Strike sections 105 and 106.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, there has been considerable attention
paid to the provisions of the House-passed bill which was referred to
in our Committee on Agriculture. The version the House passed has the
same provisions that would change substantially the judicial review and
appeals provisions of current law. When we were looking at the bill in
our committee, it was decided that while we didn't disagree with the
objectives of the House, we thought that there could be more
appropriate language which would help ensure that litigation and
appeals weren't abused to the extent that they created impasses and
gridlock in the process.
I have to give credit to the distinguished Senator from Oregon, Mr.
Wyden, and the distinguished Senator from California, Mrs. Feinstein,
for coming up with suggestions for changes that were included in this
bill that is now before the Senate. It was included in the language of
the compromise that we made to substantially change title I as it
relates to the judicial review section of the bill.
Let me point out that it balances risk, which is what this is about.
Looking at ramifications of approving or not approving a fuel reduction
project can be explained by looking at certain examples from which we
have learned. On the Kenai Peninsula in south-central Alaska, for
instance, over 300,000 acres of forest have been lost to a spruce bark
beetle infestation which we are told could have been avoided but was
not because of litigation and appeals that were generated over the
project's proposal. The Dixie National Forest has 112,000 acres that
have been devastated by the spruce bark beetle as well which could have
been prevented with treatment but was slowed by the appeals and
litigation in that situation.
Over the last 3 years, bark beetles have ravaged forests around Lake
Arrowhead in the San Bernardino National Forest in southern California
causing an 80-percent mortality rate and substantially increasing the
fuel loads of that forest.
What I am afraid we are going to see if the Leahy amendment is
approved is a reversal of efforts that we have made to come to a new
approach which we think will improve forest help. We still have
rigorous environmental safeguards in place, but the suggestions that
courts do not bog down the process with endless appeals and litigation
is one of the goals of this legislation.
I don't know if other Senators want to be heard on this amendment.
But I would be prepared, after Senators have had an opportunity to
express themselves, if they want to debate this issue, to move to table
the Leahy amendment.
I move to table the Leahy amendment, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The question is on agreeing to the motion. The clerk will call the
roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr.
Edwards), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Hollings), the Senator
from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), and the Senator from Connecticut (Mr.
Lieberman) are necessarily absent.
I also announce that the Senator from Nebraska (Mr. Nelson) is absent
attending a family funeral.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``nay.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Smith). Are there any other Senators in
the Chamber desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 62, nays 33, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 423 Leg.]

YEAS--62

Alexander
Allard
Allen
Baucus
Bennett
Bond
Breaux
Brownback
Bunning
Burns
Campbell
Chafee
Chambliss
Cochran
Coleman
Collins
Cornyn
Craig
Crapo
Daschle
Dayton
DeWine
Dole
Domenici
Ensign
Enzi
Feinstein
Fitzgerald
Frist
Graham (SC)
Grassley
Gregg
Hagel
Hatch
Hutchison
Inhofe
Johnson
Kyl
Landrieu
Lincoln
Lott
Lugar
McCain
McConnell
Miller
Murkowski
Nickles
Pryor
Roberts
Santorum
Sessions
Shelby
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stevens
Sununu
Talent
Thomas
Voinovich
Warner
Wyden

NAYS--33

Akaka
Bayh
Biden
Bingaman
Boxer
Byrd
Cantwell
Carper
Clinton
Conrad
Corzine
Dodd
Dorgan
Durbin
Feingold
Graham (FL)
Harkin
Inouye
Jeffords
Kennedy
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Mikulski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Reed
Reid
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Schumer
Stabenow

NOT VOTING--5

Edwards
Hollings
Kerry
Lieberman
Nelson (NE)
The motion was agreed to.

____________________