Land Rights Network
American Land Rights Association
PO Box 400 – Battle Ground, WA 98604
Phone: 360-687-3087 – Fax: 360-687-2973 – E-mail: alra@landrights.org or alra@governance.net Web Address: http://www.landrights.org
Legislative Office: 507 Seward Square SE – Washington, DC 20003

Land Grab Bill (CARA) Is Back

From the Keep Private Lands In Private Hands Coalition:

It’s hard to believe but Don Young (R-AK) and George Miller (D-CA) just introduced on Friday HR 4100 which is virtually the same as CARA, the giant 3.1 billion dollar per year guaranteed trust fund that failed to pass in 2001.
This is a permanent Trust Fund that will guarantee huge amounts of money for land acquisition and condemnation. It will undermine local communities, destroy local economies, severely damage small business, cost thousands of jobs, force rural families into the cities and generally destroy rural America.
They are calling it the Get Outdoors (GO) Act, HR 4100. They say it is different From CARA. But most of the money is available to buy land and take it off the tax rolls. We call it the “Get Out (GO) of Rural America Act.”
Young called CARA the Conservation and Reinvestment Act. We called it the Condemnation and Relocation Act. HR 4100 is no different. It’s the money. That gives the Federal land agencies huge power. Even when the money goes to the states, the Feds largely control the agenda.
From where we sit when someone calls a chicken a duck, and we see that it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck, no matter what Young and Miller say. The Get Out (GO) of Rural America Act walks and looks like CARA.
To get caught up on the evils of CARA and now the Get Out (GO) of Rural America Act, go to < www.landrights.org > Click on the Starburst.
Everything that applied to CARA now applies to the Get Out (Go) of Rural America Act.
The Get Out (GO) of Rural America Act will destroy more private property than any legislation in history. No inholder will be safe anywhere near a National Park, National Forest, Wildlife Refuge, National Trail, National Seashore, National Recreation Area, National Scenic Area and many more.
It will force thousands of farmers and ranchers off their range. It will wipe out the mining industry and do great damage to the oil industry. It will undermine private forestry. It will destroy local tax bases, which will force taxes up for those that remain and ultimately turn rural American into a playground for the rich.
Young and Miller say, “The $3.125 billion annual spending resulting from the GO Act is about 3% of the annual healthcare costs associated with obesity related illness. While it is likely that over time GO related programs will reduce obesity and obesity related heath-care costs, revenues from off-shore energy production will be used as a permanent source of funding.”
“Addressing the obesity crisis in this country takes more than the strong will of individuals. It requires the political will of Congress to invest in recreation opportunities for people to Get Outdoors!”
They want to fight obesity by condemning your land. They want to increase your taxes by over $3 billion a year to do it. Over 15 years that would be over $45 billion.
They could buy 15 million really good treadmills for that kind of money and really help folks fighting obesity.
Organizations presently supporting the “Get Out (GO) Act include:
The Nature Conservancy, Trust for Public Land, the Izaak Walton League of America, the National Parks and Conservation Association, National Wildlife Federation, Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association , United States Soccer Foundation, the Outdoor Industry Association, the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Americans for Our Heritage and Recreation, the National Coalition for Promoting Physical Activity, the American Hiking Society, and many other local and regional groups
The race is on. The greens and their allies will seek to enlist as many Congressmen and Senators as co-sponsors. They will seek to get organizations like the Farm Bureau, NRA and National Association of Counties to support the bill like they did with CARA.
You need to act fast.
Here’s what you must do quickly.
1. Call your Representative to let him or her know you oppose the Get Out (GO) Act, HR 4100. You may call any Congressman at (202) 225 3121. Tell him no trust fund period. No new entitlements. Insist that all funding go through the traditional appropriations process.
2. Call your Senators at (202) 224-3121 with the same message.
3. Send him or her an e-mail AND a fax if you have that capability even if you have called.
4. Call any organizations you are a member of to urge them to not sign on to HR 4100. The Farm Bureau, National Association of Counties and NRA should be first on your list.
5. Send us the Names, addresses, Zip, Phone, Fax and e-mail of anyone you think should be kept informed about the Get Out (GO) of Rural America Act. Send us directories of allied organizations. Help us build a team that can defeat the giant international green industrial complex.

Here is the article from Environment and Energy Daily,

Environment and Energy Daily, 2nd April 2004
PUBLIC LANDS
Young, Miller look to resurrect CARA under public health umbrella
Dan Berman, Environment & Energy Daily reporter

Reps. Don Young (R-Alaska) and George Miller (D-Calif.) yesterday unveiled a bill that would dedicate over $3 billion annually from outer continental shelf (OCS) oil and gas receipts to land conservation and federal land acquisition programs under the guise of promoting public health and fighting obesity.
The bill, which would divert $3.125 billion a year over 20 years from OCS receipts, is similar to Young and Miller's Conservation and Reinvestment Act, which faced stiff opposition from property rights advocates in the 107th Congress and eventually failed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks changed funding priorities.
But there was little mention of CARA at yesterday's press conference. Instead, armed with statistics on public health and obesity, the House members and representatives from conservation groups promoted the new "Get Outdoors Act," or "GO" Act, essentially promoting land conservation as a way to fight rising healthcare costs.
"Obesity is a public health crisis of the first order," Miller said. "And the Get Outdoors Act is a sensible way to help mitigate that public health crisis."
Obesity-related health problems cost nearly $100 billion annually, according to Miller's office, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently declared obesity on track to overtake tobacco as the leading cause of preventable death in the United States.
Nevertheless, the new GO Act faces an uphill fight in Congress. House Resources Committee Chairman Richard Pombo (R-Calif.) was an outspoken critic of CARA in the 107th Congress and has consistently questioned the need for additional federal land acquisition.
"There are 101 studies that show the quality of the land, the conservation of the land and the environmental sanctity of the land increases when it's in the hands of private property owners and not Uncle Sam in Washington," said committee spokesman Brian Kennedy, who called the talk about obesity "more of a marketing gimmick than anything else."
"It would cost the American taxpayer less to get a membership at Gold's Gym and actually work out than acquire millions of acres of land in the name of health," Kennedy said.
During a full-day CARA markup in July 2001, Pombo failed on two amendments that would have limited land acquisition under the bill. One amendment would have taken the $450 million allotted for federal land acquisition under the Land and Water Conservation Fund and put it toward urban parks and endangered species recovery, while another would have retained private land rights adjacent to federally acquired tracts (E&E Daily, Jan. 13, 2003).
Other pockets of opposition to CARA came from appropriators who were averse to losing control of more purse strings and property rights proponents concerned about the effects of permanently funding a federal land acquisition account under the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
As with CARA, the Go Act would earmark $3.125 billion annually for the following programs:
-----a. $1 billion for coastal states;
-----b. $900 million for full funding of the Land and Water Conservation fund and stateside matching grants;
-----c. $350 million for wildlife conservation and restoration;
-----d. $350 million for the Payments in Lieu of Taxes and Refuge Revenue

Sharing programs;
-----e. $200 million for federal and American Indian lands restoration;
-----f. $150 million for the Historic Preservation Fund;
-----g. $125 million for the Urban Park and Recreation Recovery program;
-----h. $50 million for endangered and threatened species recovery;
-----i. $10 million for the National Maritime Heritage Act.

(Editors note: Most of this money is available to land acquisition and condemnation. Your land.)
Regardless of what the bill is called, Alan Front, senior vice president of the Trust for Public Land, said creating a permanent source of funding for conservation is no less important now than it was in 2001. "The underlying logic of making these funds truly permanent for the benefit of people and wildlife is unimpeachable," Front said.
"Our open space is shrinking and our waist lines are growing," Front said, noting that 2 million acres of open space disappear daily. "Taking those funds that were supposed to go to conservation and putting them into conservation will certainly reverse the first trend and very likely reverse the second."
Please make your calls, and send your faxes and e-mails as quickly as you can. The more of an uprising that occurs quickly, the better chance you have of stopping the bill. When a Congressman commits to support a bill, he hates to remove his name later. Better get to your Congressman early.
And forward this message as widely as possible.