Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 2361) making appropriations for the Department of the Interior, environment, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2006, and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 287 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

This resolution provides for an open rule on H.R. 2361, the Interior Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2006, and provides for 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations.

For the purpose of amendments, this rule provides for priority recognition to Members who preprinted their amendments in the Congressional Record, and the rule also allows for certain points of order to be raised in the course of consideration of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, this bill deals with filibusters in the U.S. Senate. Actually, Mr. Speaker, it does not, but until you say that magic word the media does not send its attention to the fact that the House is actually continuing on with the input of good government in our processes, so this bill actually, for which I am pleased to stand before the House and support the rule on the underlying legislation, is the Interior Appropriations Act.

I appreciate the hard work and the hard choices that the subcommittee chairman, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Taylor), the gentleman from California (Chairman Lewis), the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks), and many others have put into making and putting this essential funding bill together, which does live within the budget discipline, and in fact reflects the priorities of this Congress.

At the same time, it reflects important committee priorities within the budget itself. We realize that this Congress, this Nation, does not have the money to do everything. But what we decide to do we should do well.

By prioritizing the needs, this provides, for example, an increase in six of the eight EPA programs for the environment. It provides for a $118 million increase for Indian health services, a $25 million increase over last year's funding level for restoration of the Everglades.

These are simply examples. A few others. Provides for National Heritage Area grants and historic preservation, something that to an old history teacher I appreciate. This bill provides important resources to help manage our Nation's public forest resources and our national parks.

It includes, for example, a $70 million increase for the national parks base funding, but at the same time $440 million to help reduce the backlog of national park maintenance. That is how these bills and these monies should be prioritized, to help preserve and enhance these unique national treasures.

It also provides for a record amount of funding to the national fire plan, and gives the Department flexibility in these accounts to help prevent and fight the annual onslaught of raging fires on public lands in the West, which have plagued many areas, especially California in recent years.

I am also pleased in particular that the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) has been diligent in funding the vital Payment in Lieu of Tax Program, or PILT, which so many western and rural counties depend upon for these vital public services.

Since this is an open rule, any Member will be allowed to offer germane amendments. This is a good rule. I think it supports a good bill. I strongly urge their adoption.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the rule.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, once again with this particular rule being open, it allows any Member who wishes to, to bring an amendment to the floor. It is the wonderful prerogative of the Members to do that. It is also very nice to note that the Committee on Appropriations which is tasked with trying to prioritize needs and fund those that are truly significant in that prioritization, and in this particular situation, the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks) in a very collegial way have done just that, and have presented a good and balanced bill.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I appreciate the comments from the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), and I commend the gentleman for the one statement he asked us all to do which is to go to our State and local leaders and find out what their priorities happen to be.

I would like to do something unique so far in today's debate and talk about something that is actually in the bill, and something about which we will be debating later, and preface it with the comment of why, when we try to prioritize, should we spend new taxpayer money for new recreation areas and programs when some of the existing programs, long- time recognized, long time in the bill, are not totally and fully funded.

If I could, Mr. Speaker, I come from a western State that has a great deal of Federal land. In fact, 67 percent of my State is owned by the Federal Government. If we add military lands on top of that, it is almost 80 percent owned by the Federal Government. And, unfortunately, my State is not the worst situation. There are States that have more of their land owned by the Federal Government.

Oftentimes I have Members come to the floor and say these lands belong to all of us, but the cost of maintaining those lands is not borne by all of us; it is borne by the citizens who happen to reside within those particular States.

Now I am an old teacher, and as I look at the situation of education, I find a unique phenomenon that the area of this country in which education funding is growing the slowest, the area of this country where the classrooms are the largest, the area of this country where the student population is increasing the fastest, and the area of this country where State and local commitment in tax base is being paid by their citizens all happen to be found in the 13 States of the West. And the common denominator for all is the amount of public lands that happen to be in these particular States.

Those Members east of the Rocky Mountains sometimes do not comprehend the concept because there is very little of your land owned by the Federal Government, and you can maximize the amount of input, but you cannot do it in the West.

One of my counties has an area known as the Black Box, something that no one in Utah would ever try to raft down. One of our good constituent friends from another State decided to come and raft in the area of the Black Box; and, unfortunately, he lost his life doing it.

The problem is my County of Emery had to expend its resources and have their rescue team risk their lives to retrieve the body. All of the money that was budgeted for that year's critical rescue missions was expended on that one individual entering from the east using all of these public lands. All of the cost of that was borne by the citizens of that particular county, which means once again these lands belong to all of us, but the expense attached to these lands do not belong to all of us.

There is a program that we have long had called ``payment in lieu of taxes,'' which recognizes the burden placed upon the West and the burden that should be funded. From the mid-1970s until the early 1990s, virtually no new money was placed in this program. It was flat funding for almost that whole period of time. This Congress put $1.4 million of new money into the burgeoning problem of trying to pay for the Federal lands in the West. Under the direction of the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) and others on the subcommittee, that has increased significantly, almost doubling. They have recognized the need, but they have never fully funded the cost imposed on western States through payment in lieu of tax funding.

This last year, this program, traditionally run through the Bureau of Land Management, was taken over by the Department of the Interior with the idea of prioritizing it. They did not. Instead of prioritizing this program, they recommended a cut in this program and increased funding to the administrative overhead of the Department of the Interior.

I commend the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) for recognizing the unfairness of this and by increasing the payment in lieu of taxes to last year's level plus $3 million, but it is still not close to full funding.

I am confident and hopeful that we will discuss that particular issue because it is a well-established program. It is not new, and we should be funding those well-established programs fully before we launch into new endeavors.

I commend the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) for zeroing out the land acquisition budget except for necessary administration costs because it comes up with the same policy: we do not start buying new land until we fully fund those lands that we already own.

We have an opportunity of expanding this in conference. This is one of the issues in this free-flowing open rule that we will be discussing later on. This is an issue where I commend the chairman for doing what he has done in this bill and urge him to continue on, because the citizens of the West, the kids in the West, the education system of the West have been harmed too long by policies that all of us in Congress for over 30 years have been implementing. It is an unfairness that must be dealt with.

I commend the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) and the committee for moving the first step forward. But I hope that we can look at other amendments as this debate goes forward that would look at funding the programs we already have that have been there for many years that desperately need to be fully funded before we launch into others, and that is specifically what an appropriations process should do. It should prioritize our needs. Once again, we can go back to the concept that we cannot fund everything, but what we fund, we should fund well.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

I appreciate the opportunity coming here and discussing this particular open rule that allows for us to discuss the prioritization which is the key element of what we do in every appropriations issue. The gentleman from Wisconsin is free to come here on the floor and talk about whether he believes the prioritization of this committee is accurate or not, whether he believes the Democrat approach would be a tax increase or not. But the same discussion also takes place in another area and it takes place in the committee process before it ever comes to this bill. I am here to still contend that the committee, both Republican and Democrat, did a good job in coming up with a prioritization process.

When the gentleman from Wisconsin talks about the desire for having new land, I do not dispute that nor do I oppose it necessarily. What we are saying is it is part of the prioritization. I would support acquisition of new land once we finally fully fund and take care of the lands we have. This committee has looked into that. This committee put significant new money not just into national parks but to maintain the backlog that we have of maintenance in our national parks. That is prioritization.

This committee recognized by putting PILT up to at least the level it was last year that there is a prioritization that takes place there at the same time. I was saying with PILT, and I will say it again, that what we have to do is fully fund it because it has been looked at for too long, especially when the minority party was in charge here and there were basically no increases in PILT funding, it has been looked at for too long as welfare for the West. It is not. It is rent that is due on that land and if you prioritize the budget, you prioritize those programs first before you expand anything else. I have to commend this committee for actually doing that.

I think there are some areas in which I think they could go ahead and move forward in those particular areas but once again prioritizing those commitments we have already made and fully funding those first. That is what this committee has tried to do. Whether you like or dislike their end product, they should be congratulated for coming that close.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, I have to reiterate the fairness of this open rule and urge its adoption because of that along with the underlying appropriation legislation. No bill is perfect. I am sure we can all come up with issues here and there in the appropriations bill or, for that matter, in any other bill we have where we would like to have it come out differently had we had our way, but in judging this bill as a whole and the process that has been through it to get to the point, I believe it is worthy for Members to support this particular piece of legislation.

And then I do want to talk to my good friend from Florida about what we really did with education in Utah. He is summarizing the New York Times, not reality. But other than that, we will forget that point right now. I will talk later to him about that.

Again, I urge Members to support this rule.

The text of the amendment previously referred to by Mr. Hastings of Florida is as follows:

Previous Question on H. Res. 287--Rule for H.R 2361 FY06 Interior

Appropriations

At the end of the resolution, add the following new

sections:

Sec. 2. Notwithstanding any other provision of this

resolution, the amendment printed in section 3 shall be in

order without intervention of any point of order and before

any other amendment if ofered by Representative Obey of

Wisconsin or a designee. The amendment is not subject to

amendment except for pro forma amendments or to a demand for

a division of the question in the committee of the whole or

in the House.

Sec. 3. The amendment referred to in section 2 is as

follows:

Amendment to H.R. 2361, as Reported Offered by Mr. Obey of Wisconsin

At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the

following:

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Madam Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Chairman, today we present for consideration by the House the Interior, Environment and Related Agencies fiscal year 2006 Appropriations bill as approved by the House Committee on Appropriations.

The bill provides a total of $26.2 billion in funding for programs for the Department of the Interior, Environmental Protection Agency, Forest Service, Indian Health Service, the Smithsonian Institution, and several other environmental and cultural agencies and commissions.

The bill is $823 million below the fiscal year 2005 level, and $435 million above the administration budget request.

This is a balanced, bipartisan bill. It provides significant increases for our national parks, Indian schools, hospitals and clinics, wildfire programs; forest health is a high priority, and the Healthy Forest Initiative is fully funded.

The Payments in Lieu of Taxes program has a healthy increase of $30 million above the budget request, and more than $3 million above the 2005 level. Despite our very tight allocation, the Committee believes it is important to provide this increased funding for PILT.

There is an increase of $64 million for operations of our National Park System, including a $30 million increase specifically designed for individual units of the National Park Service. This targeted park base increase will benefit all of our parks.

The bill also restores critical funding for science programs, historic preservation programs, National Forest Systems programs, and Save America's Treasures grants. Finally, we have restored critical environmental education, research and rural water programs in the Environmental Protection Agency, and provided some limited increases for initiatives proposed in the budget request, including Superfund, homeland security, school bus retrofits, the Clean Diesel Program, Methane to Markets Initiative, and the Brownfields Program.

The budget request for EPA, while substantially below last year's level and proposed increases in that budget request, were funded by elimination of many critical mission essential programs.

We heard from nearly every Member of the House asking that we provide funding for EPA programs that were eliminated or reduced in the budget. The program restoration and increases for the various programs and agencies in this bill are offset by the decreases in land acquisition, construction, and State grant programs, and by lowering the amount provided for the increases proposed in the budget request.

This is a balanced bill. It is within the 302(b) allocation for budget authority and outlays. It provides the needed funding to keep the agencies in the bill operating at a reasonable level.

It does not provide a lot of funding for new initiatives. The choices made by the Committee were tough and fair and responsible. I urge all of my colleagues to support the bill.

At this point, I would like to ask that a table detailing the accounts in the bill be inserted in the Record.

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Madam Chairman, I would like to thank the staff of both the minority and majority staff, and Mr. Dicks, and all of those who have worked with the Committee in producing this. We have had outstanding participation, and I thank all of them for their participation.

Madam Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Sherwood).

Madam Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Istook).

Madam Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Before I recognize the next speaker, I want to point out that it is not, as I am hearing, that we are obliterating the clean water State revolving fund or the arts funds. We are funding the arts and humanities $259 million, the same as the 2005 year. We are funding the State revolving fund $850 million, the same as we did in 2005.

Unfortunately, with the costs and the deficit we have now, we cannot continue to put more and more in. We are trying to do the best we can by consistently funding our needs in this area.

Madam Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King).

Madam Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder).

(Mr. SOUDER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Chairman, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that debate on this amendment, and any amendments thereto, be limited to 20 minutes, to be equally divided and controlled by the proponent and myself, the opponent.

Madam Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Chairman, the gentlewoman is obviously speaking seriously about the arts and humanities. Certainly we support both and have done so generously in this bill. The American public supports arts now by over $9 billion. The government's support is a very minimal part of that $9 billion. In fact, this increase would be an even smaller part of that $9 billion, and so it would be hardly noticeable inside the total support of the arts.

What we are having to sacrifice, though, is to reduce funding for the administration of the Department of the Interior by $8 million and administration of the Forest Service by $7 million. This will cost some 200 staff positions in the Department of the Interior and Forest Service. They are responsible for 634 acres in the United States. This is a primary obligation we have. It is not supported by $9 billion of public support. It is primarily supported with the funding that this Committee has the duty to appropriate.

That is why we are trying to do our primary job by maintaining the levels that we did and to find a balance to show our support for the arts and do the mandated portion that we must do for the Department of the Interior and the Forest Service.

Members can count on us to continue to support the arts, to watch the oversight of our Committees, and this bill strikes a fair balance between the needs of the arts and our responsibility to land management and Indian programs. I ask Members to join me in opposition to this amendment.

Madam Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Mrs. Johnson).

(Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Madam Chairman, I thank the distinguished gentleman from Arizona for yielding.

I certainly agree that PILT is a necessary funding item. We have added $30 million to it. I agree with the gentleman that we will make every effort to do so as we move to conference with the Senate. As the gentleman from Wisconsin mentioned a moment ago, when you go to the Senate, you cannot always control what happens. We will certainly stand by our statements to decrease the spending on land if we can manage that, and we will count on the House to support us in that area.

But I do thank the gentleman for calling this to our attention, and we certainly support what he is thinking about.

The gentleman is correct. In no way should this study delay or disrupt either phase I or II of the planned cleanup of the Hudson River or any other ongoing Superfund project. I will work with the gentleman to consider modifications to clarify this in the conference agreement.

I thank the gentleman from New York for his good work on the Hudson River program and for bringing the need for clarification of the intent of the study to my attention.

Madam Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.

I agree with the gentleman that invasive species pose a threat to the marine environment, and we do provide funds in the bill reported by the Committee to address the Invasive Species Act. We have also provided other invasive species funds to stop that in areas of timber and things coming in from imports. For instance, the hemlock wooly adelgid is one of the invasive species that are threatening one of our species and may wipe it out in plant area.

But the gentleman is right, and I will work with him to see if we can increase funding in this area in the conference report. I note there are some small increases included in the bill for invasive species efforts by the Fish and Wildlife Service also. So we will try to work with him to increase his request.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I certainly sympathize with the gentlewoman and other Members who have already spoken. I support PILT. In fact, we increased it some $30 million in our bill. And as we indicated with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake) a few minutes ago, we will certainly do more and we appreciate their bringing it to our attention.

But the Department of Interior is responsible for one-fifth of the land in the United States and manages programs that affect over 4 million Native Americans. This amendment would eliminate 110 staff positions and drastically impact the management of numerous important programs, including the management of PILT, the very program that this amendment is intended to help. The PILT program is managed using staff from the Department Management account.

The Interior bill is a balanced bill. In developing this bill, The Committee made a number of difficult choices. If we had additional resources, I believe PILT would be a deserving program and I certainly would try to increase it. But I urge my colleagues to defeat this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that further debate on this amendment, and any amendments thereto, be limited to 10 minutes, to be equally divided and controlled by the proponent and myself, the opponent.

Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks).

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the debate on this amendment and any amendments thereto be limited to 10 minutes to be equally divided and controlled by the proponent and myself, the opponent.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Mrs. Johnson).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The amendment increases payments in lieu of taxes $4.8 million and reduces the National Endowment for the Arts by $15 million. This Interior bill is a balanced bill. In developing this bill, the committee made a number of difficult choices. If we had additional resources, I believe PILT would be a deserving program, as we have said over and over again here today. But to unbalance this bill at this time, I must rise in opposition. I encourage my colleagues to do the same thing.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

The gentleman is correct. In no way should this study delay or disrupt either phase 1 or 2 of the planned cleanup of the Hudson River, any other ongoing Superfund site, And I know of no party involved that wishes that delay.

I will work with the gentleman to consider whether modifications to the language are needed to further clarify this point.

I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Sweeney) for his good work on the Hudson River cleanup and for bringing the need for clarification of the intent of the study to my attention. I like forward to working with the gentleman and learning more about Port Edwards' needs.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I would be happy to discuss this matter with the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr).

I understand the gentleman's concern over this issue, and appreciate his desire to see the facility built. I would be pleased to assist in a meeting with the gentleman and agency officials on this matter.

I thank the gentleman for his commitment to this issue.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

I thank the gentlewoman from Guam (Ms. Bordallo) for raising the budget issues. The committee recognizes the uniqueness and development needs of the War in the Pacific National Historical Park in Guam.

We will work with the National Park Service to remedy this situation. I thank the gentlelady for her efforts and look forward to continuing to work with her on this matter in the future.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that all debate on this amendment and all amendments thereto be limited to 20 minutes, 10 minutes to the proponent and 10 minutes to an opponent, myself.

Mr. Chairman, I yield my 10 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) and ask unanimous consent that he control the 10 minutes of time.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order on the gentleman's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I make a point of order against the amendment because it proposes to change existing law and constitutes legislation in an appropriations bill and therefore violates clause 2 of rule XXI. The rule states in pertinent part: ``An amendment to a general appropriations bill shall not be in order if changing existing law.'' The amendment imposes additional duties.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. Terry) having assumed the chair, Mr. Shimkus, Acting Chairman of the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union, reported that that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2361) making appropriations for the Department of the Interior, environment, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2006, and for other purposes, had come to no resolution thereon.

Madam Chairman, I yield myself 6 minutes.

First of all, I want to thank the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) for his commendable work for putting together this Interior, Environment and Related Agencies appropriations bill for next year.

This bill is basically good, considering the budget allocation that our subcommittee received. As always, the chairman and his staff have included me in the process of putting together the bill, and for that I am very appreciative. Such cooperation is a hallmark of the Interior Subcommittee, and it is the chairman who sets the tone.

While the bill we are considering today represents hard work all around, I must note that it falls short of properly funding many programs. The reason for this failure is the inadequate budget allocation we have. The shortfall compared to the 2005 Interior bill adds up to more than $800 million.

As you know, this is the first year that the Interior Subcommittee has funded the EPA, and what a challenge it is proving to be with the President's budget proposing a cut of more than $500 million from last year. These are very deep holes to fill.

Let me switch to a positive note by praising the decision by the administration and the chairman to fully fund uncontrollable costs such as pay COLAs and rent.

Now, this may sound like just a matter of fact, but it makes all of the difference in the world in our national parks on whether they can operate properly. Over the last few years the administration has been proposing unrealistically low funding levels to pay for these uncontrollable costs. This year the budget did include the funding to meet these costs, and I applaud the chairman for including them in the bill, and I hope that the administration will continue to propose full coverage of uncontrollable costs in future budget submittals.

I also want to express my gratitude to the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) for the continued effort to increase funding for the operation of our national parks. I think we have a great team to make sure that the national parks, certainly the most beloved of our Federal public lands, receive enough money to provide our constituents the visit they expect and deserve.

The $30 million the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) has added to the $22 million increase contained in the budget will mean a second consecutive year of very healthy increases in the Park Service operations budget, and I want to pledge to continue to help my chairman to make sure that the Park Service Partnership Program stays on track towards better management.

The biggest concern that I have in this bill is the reduction in spending for clean water activities. First, I must commend the chairman for his decision 2 weeks ago to agree to add an extra $100 million to the Clean Water State Revolving Fund from unobligated EPA funds from previous years. But even with this additional funding, the Clean Water Revolving Fund will be $240 million lower than this year.

If you compare the proposed funding in 2006 to the level in 2004, there is a decrease of nearly $500 million in just 2 years. I know that many of you are hearing from your State and local officials about the effect this cut will have on plans to construct and improve water treatment facilities.

The Federal Government should not be retreating in this fashion from such an important responsibility. For that reason I am going to support an amendment to increase funding for the Clean Water State Revolving Fund.

I must also register my disagreement with the decision to continue to retreat from the commitment made in 2000 to increase funding for the Conservation Trust Fund. If the Lands Legacy conservation agreement was being followed, this bill would have $1.8 billion for the various conservation activities under our jurisdiction. Instead the bill contains only $750 million. I wish this bill did not contain the President's proposal to eliminate funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund Stateside grants program.

I also disagree with the decision to provide no money for land acquisition within the Land and Water Conservation Fund, but I do sympathize that those decisions were tough due to the situation our allocation has caused. Core programs, such as agency operations, must come before grant programs such as these.

Even though the awful fiscal situation we are faced with is the direct cause of these decisions, I do hope that we can better meet the obligations of the Lands Legacy agreement when we ultimately finish the 2006 Interior and Environment bill.

It is gratifying to note that we seem to have come to a consensus on funding on the NEA and the NEH, in that this bill provides level funding compared to this year. I again will be joining with what I predict will be a majority of my colleagues in support of an amendment to increase both of these endowments.

Last year the Interior Subcommittee made a wise decision to be better prepared for the cost of firefighting. We provided $500 million for both fiscal year 2004 and 2005 in emergency funding to prevent the painful borrowing from other Interior and Forest Service programs that has occurred in past years when more fires than were expected depleted the annual firefighting budget.

Although neither the President's budget nor this bill contains such contingency funding for 2006, there is an increase of $120 million over the nonemergency spending level in fiscal year 2005. I hope this is sufficient to meet the challenge of what could be a busy fire season with estimates of higher than average threats in several areas of the country, including Washington State and the Northwest.

I also agree with the decision to restore some of the cuts in the budget to the Indian school and construction account. Even with this added money, this bill contains a cut of $75 million to those important programs, and it is important that we are freezing the funding level for the Indian trust accounting program. I believe we should not spend money at the expense of other Indian programs on a historical accounting exercise that cannot produce the desired results.

Again, I want to thank the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) and his great staff, led by Debbie Weatherly for their hard work on the 2006 Interior and Environment appropriations bill.

I also want to commend Mike Stephens on Mr. Obey's staff and Pete Modaff of my staff for their part in helping to put together this bill. I hoped we could do better, but this is a difficult situation that we are in, and I appreciate the cooperation, the bipartisan spirit in which this bill was created.

Madam Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), the distinguished ranking Democratic member of the full Appropriations Committee, who has played a very constructive role, along with the gentleman from California (Chairman Lewis), in trying to help us move this bill forward today.

Madam Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer), a good supporter of this bill.

Madam Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall), the ranking member of the Committee on Resources.

(Mr. RAHALL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I rise to urge support for the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter) and myself to increase the funding for the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. The amendment would provide an additional $15 million for the endowments--$10 million for the National Endowment for the Arts, and $5 million for the National Endowment for the Humanities. The increase would be offset by reductions in various accounts.

My colleagues may recall that a similar amendment passed the House last year during consideration of the 2005 Department of the Interior bill by a vote of 241 to 185. The amendment provided an additional $10 million for the NEA and $3.5 million for the NEH.

Once again the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter) and I are asking for support for this amendment, and perhaps we can obtain a greater margin than last year.

I have sensed over the last few years that the battle over this amendment has cooled and we can move on knowing that a healthy majority in the

House agrees that these two important programs deserve our strong financial support.

This debate presents a good opportunity to make sure our new colleagues understand the importance of this modest Federal support and how it has such a tremendous impact on every one of our congressional districts. Each of the NEA and NEH grants is modest in size, but it is vitally important to the communities they reach. The Federal money serves as a catalyst to draw in private contributions. In fact, we now know that higher levels of Federal money will leverage even greater private support.

Unfortunately, since 1996, the endowments have been underfunded. The endowments are still being funded below their level of 10 years ago. In 1996, Congress reduced the NEA by 39 percent and NEH by 36 percent. Our amendment does not restore those funding levels of a decade ago, but it does provide an opportunity for the Members of the House to show their strong support for the endowments by approving this modest amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in reluctant opposition to this amendment, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

While I agree that our counties would wisely use increased PILT payments, I think that this bill provides the proper funding for PILT, considering the very tight allocation the subcommittee was given. Like many of my colleagues who represent districts with large amounts of Federal lands not part of the tax base, I understand the difficulties our communities face. That is why I have always strongly supported PILT. But I believe that the $3 million increase that PILT receives in this bill compared to 2005 should be defended, considering the many other programs facing cuts.

In a healthier budget climate, I would gladly support funding PILT at an amount higher than the $230 million

contained in this bill. Unfortunately, we are facing a much bleaker budget reality.

Again, I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to have some time on this side, if we could have 5 minutes of the 10 minutes, if we could work that out.

Yes, I am in opposition.

Four minutes would be fine.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps).

(Mrs. CAPPS asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) who also cares deeply about this issue.

Mr. Chairman, could the Chair give us a breakdown of the time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Davis), who is deeply concerned about this issue, as well as his colleagues from California.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise in opposition to this amendment.

First of all, we had no hearings in the committee about this. I believe that on a subject of this importance, if we are going to take back this protection that we have had on the books almost for the last 25 years, we have to have hearings. We have to bring in the parties and give people good information about what this is all about. That was not done. This amendment came up for the first time in the full committee.

So I believe just on process this amendment should be defeated, and I would tell the gentleman from Pennsylvania that we should take a look at this. The committee should have some oversight hearings. But to come here now without having those hearings, the benefit of those hearings, and to present this and reverse 25 years of Presidential and Congressional cooperation would be a serious mistake. So I oppose the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume. I thank the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop) for the time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to this rule, not because of what it allows but rather because of what it does not allow. As my colleague from the majority noted, this rule permits Members to offer amendments to the Interior and Environment Appropriations bill under the House's 5-minute rule if they do not need waivers of the House rules.

As someone who will be offering an amendment to that bill later today, I appreciate that the majority structured the rule in such a manner. However, I am greatly concerned that the rule blocks the ranking Democrat of the Appropriations Committee, my friend the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), from offering a critical amendment which would have added $500 million to the bill to fully restore EPA's State and Tribal Grant Program, and Clean Water State Revolving Fund to their fiscal 2004 levels.

These two programs allow communities around the country to repair and modernize their water systems, and the underlying legislation greatly underfunds each account.

For the fiscally conservative in the House, the amendment of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) was revenue neutral, paying for itself by capping the tax cut for millionaires at just over $138,000. The amendment of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) could have benefited literally millions of Americans by making their drinking water cleaner. But the Rules Committee, on a straight party line vote, prohibited the House from considering the gentleman's amendment.

Mr. Speaker, we live in trying times with enormous fiscal constraints, many of which have been brought upon ourselves. As the chairman and ranking Democrat of the Interior and Environmental Appropriations Subcommittee will probably note today, they did the best that they could with what they were given.

Indeed they did. Mr. Speaker, I commend the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks) for their hard and perhaps most importantly bipartisan work on this legislation. I do believe that they did the best with what the majority gave them.

The underlying legislation includes funding which is essential to Everglades restoration, in my district and throughout South Florida. The bill maintains funding for the National Endowment of the Arts at its current level, and it increases funding for the National Endowment for the Humanities by a little less than $500,000.

The bill also increases funding for operations at our national parks, as well as a $67 million much-needed increase in funding for the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Despite these increases the underlying legislation makes major cuts in funding to some of our most important environmental and health programs. $240 million has been cut from the Clean Water State Revolving Fund. $110 million from the State and Tribal Assistance Grant Account.

Conservation funding is about $750 million below, or less than half of what was promised when Congress passed the Conservation and Restoration Act in 2000. Overall, EPA's budget has been cut by $300 million.

This is only the second of 13 appropriations measures which this body will consider over the next few months. It is also the second appropriations bill in which we can see the drastic and dramatic effects of the Bush tax cuts. Republicans are going to try and associate domestic funding cuts with the cost of the war in Iraq. It seems like a plausible reason, and certainly one that the public could believe. But the truth is that domestic spending cuts are not occurring to pay for the war, they are happening to pay for the President's tax cuts.

The Republican budget that Congress approved 2 weeks ago only set aside $50 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan combined. The remaining costs, probably another $50 billion or more, if this year is any indication, will be funded by Congress through so-called emergency supplemental appropriations. These emergency costs will be added to the national debt, because we irresponsibly did not budget for it though we knew they were obvious. What has ensued is not the fault of the Appropriations Committee, Mr. Speaker, it is the fault of those who supported the budget resolution.

Later today, some Members will seek to improve the funding shortfalls, which the chairman and ranking Democrat sought to avoid.

For example, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Grijalva) will offer an amendment that restores the President's 33 percent cut for environmental justice programs to the fiscal year 2005 level.

The gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson) will also offer an amendment that will increase funding for the cleanup of brownfields sites by $2 million.

Additionally, I will offer an amendment that will require EPA to identify and take the necessary steps to protect minority and low income communities from bearing a disproportionate burden of poor environmental policy which adversely affects their health and well being.

All communities currently do not share in the burden of health and environmental risks, and my amendment expresses Congress' support for EPA doing what is necessary to protect these communities.

Mr. Speaker, individuals in our country on their own are not going to force power companies to reduce mercury emissions from smokestacks. Individuals on their own are not going to conduct major environmental restoration, and they certainly do not have the capacity to clean up our drinking water. But collectively, collectively, Mr. Speaker, we can all make this happen.

When utilizing the Clean Air Act, EPA can force power plants to come into compliance with new standard reviews. When enforcing the Clean Drinking Water Act, EPA can require cities and counties to provide their residents with safe drinking water.

With innovation that can only occur in a consortium of stakeholders, the Department of the Interior can make major environmental restoration projects a reality.

Enforcement is not free and neither is environmental restoration. Everyone in America shares in the responsibility of contributing his or her own fair share. Is there any Member in this body who is unwilling to pay just a little more to ensure that everyone in America has clean air to breathe? If given the chance, who would not be willing to pool his or her resources with others in his or her neighborhood to collectively ensure that everyone, everyone, has safe drinking water, or that no child will be forced to grow up playing in backyards polluted by dangerous levels of mercury and other toxins.

I do not blame or fault the appropriators for the funding cuts in the underlying legislation; but I do fault the majority in this body for creating a situation in which failure to adequately fund America's needs has become imminent. The American people will feel the same way when they wake up tomorrow and realize that their children and grandchildren will be paying for our fiscal mismanagement for generations to come.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern) with whom I serve on the Committee on Rules.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am a bit confuzzled by the continuing argument of my colleague and friend on the Committee on Rules that his State is impacted by virtue of education formulas. I do not disagree with what the gentleman says, but I find it interesting that the State of Utah, while the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop) is arguing that they are not getting enough money for education, the State of Utah legislature passed measures saying they do not want any Federal money for education. They need to make up their mind so we know what all they are doing out there.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

I will be asking Members to oppose the previous question. If the previous question is defeated, I will amend the rule so we can consider the amendment of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) that was rejected in the Rules Committee last night on a straight party-line vote.

Mr. Speaker, the Obey amendment would add $500 million to the bill to restore funding for the EPA Clean Water State Revolving Fund Program to its fiscal year 2004 levels. This program allows communities around the country to repair and modernize their water systems. I find it incomprehensible that we do not understand the dynamics of that or that most if not all of us in this body do not have communities that would benefit from modernizing our water systems. The Obey amendment offsets these expenditures by capping at just over $138,000 the tax cut for people making over $1 million this year. The Obey amendment pays for itself and adds nothing to the Federal debt while maintaining funding levels in every other program in the bill.

This amendment will correct one of the most serious shortfalls in this bill. It is absolutely critical that this funding be restored. We can fix this today if we allow the Obey amendment to be considered on the floor. But the only way that will happen is if we defeat the previous question.

I want to assure my colleagues that a ``no'' vote will not prevent us from considering the Interior Appropriations bill, but a ``no'' vote will allow Members to vote on the Obey amendment. However, a ``yes'' vote will block consideration of the Obey amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment immediately prior to the vote.

I urge my colleagues in the House to vote ``no'' on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for the time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Peterson amendment. This amendment guts the long-standing bipartisan moratorium that currently protects the Nation's most sensitive coastal and marine areas, areas including California, Florida, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the Pacific Northwest, New England, and the entire Atlantic coast. It is completely unnecessary.

Proponents say that we need to drill offshore to put an end to the high energy prices. The only problem with this argument is that the moratoria are not where the resources are.

MMS released its latest OCS resources survey just last year. Eighty- one percent of the undiscovered, uneconomically recoverable natural gas in the OCS is located in the central and western Gulf of Mexico where drilling is currently allowed and under way.

This amendment means drilling in the coastal areas of the United States where there is not a whole lot of gas and oil, where tens of millions of our citizens have made it clear they do not want any more gas drilling, and it means gutting the Presidential-congressional moratoria that had been in for decades, reaffirmed by Presidents George H.W. Bush, Clinton, George Bush, every Congress since 1982. State officials have also endorsed the moratoria, including Governor Bush, Governor Schwarzenegger.

This House has voted three times in recent years to stop the oil drilling in waters off Florida, California, and the entire OCS. I urge my colleagues to defeat this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Peterson amendment. This amendment would gut the longstanding, bipartisan moratorium that currently protects some of the Nation's most sensitive coastal and marine areas. These moratoria areas include California, Florida and the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, Oregon, Washington, New England, and the entire Atlantic Coast. This amendment is an attack on the moratorium, and an attack on the rights of coastal States and local governments to raise legitimate objections to offshore development that affects their coastlines.

Mr. Chairman, this amendment is a bad idea for a number of reasons, not least because it is completely unnecessary. Proponents of the amendment say that we need to drill offshore to put an end to high energy prices. The only problem with this argument is the moratoria areas aren't where the resources are. The Minerals Management Service conducts a resources survey every five years. The latest comprehensive analysis assessment was finished in 2003. This assessment includes estimates of undiscovered oil and natural gas that is conventionally and economically recoverable.

We already know, for instance, that 81 percent of the Nation's undiscovered, economically recoverable natural gas on the OCS is located in the Central and Western Gulf of Mexico--where drilling is currently allowed and underway.

The amendment would mean drilling in coastal areas of the United States where there isn't a whole lot of oil and gas and where tens of millions of our citizens have made it clear that they don't want any more drilling.

Mr. Chairman, a little history might be in order here. In 1990, President George H.W. Bush announced an executive moratorium ending new drilling off California, Oregon, Washington, Florida and the entire East Coast. President Clinton extended it to 2012. Both actions were met with widespread acclaim by a public that knows how valuable-- environmentally and economically--our coastlines are. And, of course, Congress has supported these actions for the last 20 years by restricting MMS from spending funds to support any new drilling or pre- drilling activities in these areas.

In addition, President George W. Bush endorsed both moratoria in his FY 06 budget. State officials--including Florida Governor Jeb Bush and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger--have endorsed the moratoria. And, the House of Representatives has voted three times in recent years to stop new drilling in the waters off Florida, California and the entire Outer Continental Shelf. This amendment is bad policy and reflects the misguided attempt to try and drill our way out of energy problems.

Mr. Chairman, the United States has 3 percent of the known resources but we account for 25 percent of demand. Despoiling all of our coastal areas in the fruitless search for ``energy independence'' isn't going to work. Coastal communities continue to speak--in strong bipartisan voices--to protect their State's sensitive coastal resources and productive coastal economies. They are too economically valuable to risk with more drilling. It takes only one accident or spill to devastate the local marine environment and economy.

Mr. Peterson suggests that his amendment would be limited to exploration for natural gas only, and that this approach would somehow avoid the risks of offshore oil drilling. There are serious flaws with this theory. There is virtually no way to explore only for natural gas without exploring for oil.

Moreover, natural gas development also has substantial and long- lasting impacts, including noise, water and air pollution. And it impacts the tourism and fishing industries.

Mr. Chairman, last Congress, 56 Republicans and 172 Democrats voted to protect the OCS Moratorium. In that vote, the House demonstrated its commitment to protecting our vital coastal communities. A vote against this amendment is the same thing--a vote to protect coastal areas from new drilling. We need to reject these attempts to weaken existing protections for our coastal waters.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment.

Assessment of Undiscovered Technically Recoverable Oil and Gas

Resources of the Nation's Outer Continental Shelf, 2003 Update

Using a play-based assessment methodology, the Minerals

Management Service estimated a mean of 76.0 billion barrels

of undiscovered recoverable oil and a mean of 406.1 trillion

cubic feet of undiscovered recoverable natural gas in the

Federal Outer Continental Shelf of the United States.

introduction

This assessment represents an update of selected basins of

the Federal Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). Assessments of the

entire OCS were made by the Minerals Management Service (MMS)

in 1995 and 2000 (MMS, 1996 and MMS, 2001). The next MMS

assessment of the entire OCS is scheduled for completion in

mid 2005. Areas selected for this update included those where

significant new discoveries were made, such as parts of the

Gulf of Mexico, and areas where new geological concepts have

been developed, such as the Atlantic OCS margin and the North

Aleutian Basin of Alaska. Results from this selective update

were combined with the year 2000 assessment results from

other areas to yield the regional totals presented here.

The MMS utilizes a probabilistic play-based approach to

estimate the undiscovered technically recoverable resources

(UTRR) of oil and gas for individual plays. This methodology

is suitable for both conceptual plays where there is little

or no specific information available, and for developed plays

where

there are discovered oil and gas fields and considerable

information is available. After estimation, individual play

results are aggregated to larger areas such as basins and

regions.

This assessment is limited to technically recoverable

undiscovered resources of oil and gas. Unlike MMS's 1995 and

2000 assessments, it does not contain economic analyses of

what portion of these technically recoverable resources are

commercially viable.

resource summary

The MMS estimated that 76.0 billion barrels of oil and

406.1 trillion of cubic feet of gas are technically

recoverable from the U.S. Federal OCS. These results are

presented by area in table 1, which lists mean values as

wells as the 95th and 5th percentile values representing high

and low probability cases, respectively. Greater range

between the high and low values indicated higher uncertainty

in the estimates.

These values represent a 1 percent increase in oil

resources and a 12.1 percent increase in gas resources when

compared with MMS's 2000 assessment. The increases are due to

changes in the assessments of the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico

OCS areas. Both the Alaska and Pacific OCS area resource

estimates are essentially unchanged from 2000. The increases

also account for the approximately 2 Bbbl oil and 8 Tcfg that

were discovered and moved to the reserves category during

this time period.