Trump signs major conservation bill into law

President Trump on Tuesday signed a major piece of conservation legislation into law as he and other Republicans seek to tout conservation accomplishments ahead of the elections in November. Trump signed the Great American Outdoors Act, which would provide $900 million annually in oil and gas revenues for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), which helps secure land for trails and parks. The legislation would also provide billions of dollars over five years to address a maintenance backlog at national parks. Trump’s support for the legislation is a reversal of his previous desire to slash the LWCF. In his budget wishlist for the next fiscal year, Trump proposed slashing the LWCF’s funding by nearly 97 percent. The Trump administration’s budget proposals from past years had also suggested significant cuts to the LWCF. Announcing his reversal to support the LWCF funding in March, Trump credited two senators, Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) and Steve Daines (R-Mont.), who are up for reelection this fall and both in races considered toss-ups. Holding either or both of those seats could be key to Republicans’ hopes of keeping their Senate majority. "When I sign it into law, it will be HISTORIC for our beautiful public lands. ALL thanks to @SenCoryGardner and @SteveDaines, two GREAT Conservative Leaders!" Trump tweeted in March. Asked how the lawmakers convinced Trump to support the measures, Gardner told reporters in June that he and Daines had made the argument in a meeting earlier this year with Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “We spoke for probably over an hour or so in this meeting with the president about what the two components meant, how they worked, how they were funded,” Gardner said...MORE

Here is the White House release on the bill:

President Donald J. Trump Is Conserving and Restoring the Majesty of America’s Public Lands

"We’re preserving our land. We’re making our land better and cleaner and safer."
President Donald J. Trump

PRESERVING AMERICA’S LAND: President Donald J. Trump is taking historic action to invest in America’s national parks and public lands.

• Today, President Trump signed the Great American Outdoors Act, which is the single largest investment in America’s national parks and public lands in history.
  • This legislation marks the most significant conservation accomplishment since the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt.
• The act renews our national parks and protects local lands, while also serving as a jobs and infrastructure package that will create over 100,000 additional infrastructure-related jobs.
• The legislation will provide $900 million a year in permanent funding to the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), and will allocate $9.5 billion over 5 years to restore facilities and infrastructure in our national parks and public lands.
• This legislation won the support of more than 850 conservation groups, as well as 43 sportsmen and sportswomen groups.

IMPROVING OUR NATIONAL PARKS: The President’s action will improve national parks and public lands for the American people, while greatly benefitting our Nation’s economy.

• Americans who have turned to our national parks for activities during the pandemic are finding them in need of investment.
  • Estimates place the national deferred maintenance backlog across all public lands at approximately $20 billion.
• The President’s action will help bring much-needed maintenance to our national parks and public lands, which play an important role in America’s economy.
• Last year, over 327 million people visited our national parks, generating more than $41 billion for the American economy.
• America’s outdoor recreation economy accounted for 2.2 percent of GDP and 5.2 million jobs in 2017.
• The LWCF and public lands contribute almost $60 billion to the American economy and support 400,000 jobs through recreational activities.
• According to a recent economic analysis, every $1 million invested in the LWCF supports between 16 and 30 jobs...MORE

Note that nowhere in the news story or the Trump release do the words "land acquisition" appear.
For some of my previous posts on this shameful positioning by the Republicans go here and here.

House aims to vote on public lands legislation by July 4

The House could vote before July 4 on a massive public lands package, a senior Democratic aide told CQ Roll Call. The Senate is scheduled to resume debate Monday and vote to adopt the public lands bill as a substitute amendment to an underlying tax bill. A final vote to pass the amended bill could come as early as Tuesday before it's sent to the House. With 59 cosponsors and Gardner, the bill will almost certainly overcome the remaining procedural hurdles in the Senate and pass. It's unclear if some House members will push to make changes to the bill when it's taken up. A spokesperson for Rep. Joe Cunningham, D-S.C., who introduced the original House companion bill, said the lawmaker expects the House to take the Senate-passed legislation directly to the floor. But the spokesperson added that the exact path through the House is subject to leadership's call. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the legislation would add $17.3 billion to the federal deficit over the next decade. Tom Cors, director of government relations for lands at The Nature Conservancy, who has been in close contact with the lawmakers pushing the bill, told CQ Roll Call, he expects a vote on Tuesday and wide support in the House. "This number-one has been a long standing priority of the conservation community to really address a reliable funding mechanism for not only the Land and Water Conservation Fund, but also for maintenance of our public lands," Cors said, adding that investing in public lands is important as people return to the outdoors and need jobs to get back on their feet after the coronavirus pandemic...MORE

Senate headed for late night vote amid standoff over lands bill

Senators are barreling toward a late-night vote amid a standoff over whether to allow amendments to a lands bill. Republicans, leaving a closed-door caucus lunch, said that they expect they will need to return to the Capitol at 1 a.m. Friday for a procedural vote on the bill. "I'm told it's 1 a.m," said Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.). "We would have to have consent, and we don't have that. I think that's primarily over the amendment process." Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) said that the next vote on the lands bill is "going to be one o'clock from the way it sounds." Rounds added that some senators want votes on amendments to the bill and "this is their way of sending a message." He added that it didn't sound like there would be a deal to avert the middle-of-the-night vote. The bill, known as the Great American Outdoors Act, would give $900 million annually to fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which uses oil and gas revenue to fund conservation programs like securing land for national parks. The legislation would separately address a maintenance backlog at national parks. The Senate voted 79-18 to proceed to the bill, signaling that it likely has the support needed to pass the Senate. "I know Senator Lee's got some concerns that he's been pretty explicit about it, but all it takes is one," Cornyn said, caveating that he doesn't know who, specifically, was preventing the vote from being moved up. The Senate generally leaves for the week by Thursday afternoon. But senators have raised concerns over the bill. Lee, speaking from the Senate floor on Thursday afternoon, said the bill represented a "Capitol Hill autonomous zone." "It's telling that the bill we're considering this week called the Great American Outdoors Act was written behind closed doors and is now being ... sealed, walled off from amendments," Lee said. Lee added that the bill is "perpetuating and worsening our already highly problematic federal public lands policy."...MORE

Livestock Groups Oppose Great American Outdoors Act

The U.S. Senate moved forward on considering the Great American Outdoors (GAO) Act (S.3422) on Monday, Sen. Joe Machin’s (D-WV) landmark legislation.
...However, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), the American Sheep Industry Association (ASI) and the Public Lands Council (PLC) and many other affiliate organizations wrote Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, along with other senators urging them to reject the GAO Act and for Congress to retain its role in safeguarding public lands by opposing the GAO Act.
The GAO Act as written creates more than $14 billion in new, mandatory spending and gives federal agencies free rein to spend $360 million per year solely to acquire new private land without any oversight from Congress, according to a statement from NCBA. This raises concern among the 48 livestock and natural resource groups who signed the joint letter, as the groups point out the blatant conflict by pairing the mounting disrepair of current land under federal control and allowing rampant acquisition without accounting for management of future land acquisitions.
"As introduced, the GAO Act, and every other bill that preceded it that contained similar provisions, is an irresponsible way to fix a very real problem. Currently, land management agencies like the U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service, and Bureau of Land Management face staggering backlogs of much-needed maintenance...If passed, the GAO Act sentences hundreds of millions of acres of American land and water to a poorly-managed future," the groups wrote.
To read the full letter and review a complete list of signatories, click here.

LINK

Interior secretary defends budget amid heated criticism of Trump policies

Interior Secretary David Bernhardt faced a contentious hearing Wednesday with the Senate Appropriations Committee filled with accusations he is working on behalf of the oil industry and ignoring climate science. “When I look across the landscape, here's what I see,” panel ranking member Tom Udall (D-N.M.) said. “In three years, this administration has actively worked to dismantle 50 years worth of protections from bedrock environmental laws, decimated Bears Ears and Grand Staircase Escalante national monuments, ignoring the voices of native communities, weakened protections for endangered species and dismantled migratory bird protections, put an anti-public lands zealot in charge of managing public lands, adopted a drill-at-all-costs approach for managing or public lands and abandon any and all efforts to fight climate change.”Bernhardt was also criticized over his choice to lead the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), William Perry Pendley, and efforts to vastly reduce the bureau’s employees in Washington, relocating them out West. Pendley, prior to joining Interior, spent his career advocating for selling off public lands and worked for groups that often sued the federal government over land policy. Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) said Pendley is “not just bad, but horrible on public lands. I think you know it, I know it.” “Do not deny — do not deny — the fact that he has been front and center on selling our public lands,” Tester said. Bernhardt defended his decision to hire Pendley. “Since the day he walked into the department, one of his first acts was to add land to BLM, and he will not support large-scale sales of federal land or transfers. He will not under my watch,” he said. Udall also asked Bernhardt to supply information on how many BLM employees have accepted reassignment or left the agency in the wake of a decision to relocate the agency, which the secretary agreed to supply later. The controversial relocation has proceeded despite objections from some lawmakers about its funding and legality, as well as concerns the move is meant to undermine the bureau itself. “It's no secret that I oppose the move, and I still have questions and concerns about whether the move will actually improve the agency's effectiveness, but the reorganization is moving forward and I'm going to do what I can to support the bureau employees during this process,” Udall said...MORE

But look at what they agree on: Trump and the libs want to spend more money to purchase private property and increase the size of the federal estate:

Members of both parties spoke at length about their support for President Trump’s newfound interest in the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). The fund uses oil and gas revenue to fund a variety of conservation efforts, such as securing land for parks. But Trump had suggested cutting its funding by as much as 97 percent year after year, including in his most recent budget proposal.
He reversed himself on Tuesday, calling for "a Bill that fully and permanently funds the LWCF and restores our National Parks" in a tweet.

No matter the feds already own more than one out of every four acres in the US.
No matter they have grossly mismanaged federal lands.
No matter they have an $11billion backlog in maintenance costs (i.e., they can't afford what they already have).
None of that matters. Trump is now right there with the libs and enviros supporting more of a bad thing.
They all agree our real problem is that there is too much private property in the US, and they are united in their efforts to solve this problem. Bipartisanship in action!

Full funding of Land Water Conservation Fund passes key Senate hurdle

A key Senate panel has voted to fully and permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), a move that conservation groups see as a significant victory. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources committee voted Tuesday morning to permanently authorize and completely fund the program, which was established in 1964 to help with outdoor projects on public lands. The bill passed with bipartisan support out of the committee and now faces a full floor vote. The LWCF, which was permanently reauthorized this spring, receives most of its revenue from on- and offshore oil and gas drilling. The House Natural Resources Committee in June passed a bipartisan bill that, if signed into law, would dedicate $900 million of annual royalty funds to LWCF. Members on both sides of the aisle celebrated the move, calling it an important step to continue to invest in public lands. Conservation groups called the passage of LWCF permanent funding a crucial step.  “Fully and permanently funding the Land and Water Conservation Fund keeps a promise to the American people, that this important and effective conservation tool will be available for future generations,” added Kameran Onley, director of U.S. government relations at The Nature Conservancy...MORE

Here is what the bill, S. 1081, actually says:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. Short title.

This Act may be cited as the “Land and Water Conservation Fund Permanent Funding Act”.

SEC. 2. Permanent full funding of the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

(a) In general.—Section 200303 of title 54, United States Code, is amended to read as follows:

Ҥ 200303. Availability of funds

“(a) In general.—For fiscal year 2020 and each fiscal year thereafter, amounts deposited in the Fund under section 200302 shall be made available for expenditure, without further appropriation or fiscal year limitation, to carry out the purposes of the Fund (including accounts and programs made available from the Fund under the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015 (Public Law 113–235; 128 Stat. 2130)). (emphasis mine)

See the language indented and underlined by me. What does this mean? Under current law dollars for federal land acquisition must compete annually with other federal programs. When Trump signs this bill into law, dollars for federal land acquisition will no longer have to compete - they will be on automatic pilot - $900 million each year must be spent on land acquisition.

What about programs to provide for our national defense? They must still compete, which means Republicans place a higher priority on government acquisition of private property.

What about funding research to find a cure for cancer or certain childhood diseases? They must still compete, which means Republicans place a higher priority on having less private property and more government owned and managed property than they do on the 600,000 people who die of cancer each year.

Well, what about the fact the feds can't take of the lands they already own (29 percent of the total land area in the U.S.) and they have billions of dollars of deferred maintenance. The National Park Service alone has $12 billion in deferred maintenance which includes "bridges, tunnels, paved parking areas,  paved roadways, buildings, housing, campgrounds, trails, waste water systems, water systems, unpaved roads, unpaved parking areas, utility systems, dams, constructed waterways, marinas, aviation systems, railroads, ships, monuments, fortifications, towers, interpretive media, and amphitheaters."

What do the Republicans say about that? They have an answer: SPEND MORE MONEY!

The same Senate committee on the same day approved S. 500, the “Restore Our Parks Act”, which states in part:

“(b) Establishment.—There is established in the Treasury of the United States a fund, to be known as the ‘National Park Service Legacy Restoration Fund’.

“(c) Deposits.—

“(1) IN GENERAL.—Except as provided in paragraph (2), for each of fiscal years 2019 through 2023, there shall be deposited in the Fund an amount equal to 50 percent of all energy development revenues due and payable to the United States from oil, gas, coal, or alternative or renewable energy development on Federal land and water that would otherwise be credited, covered, or deposited as miscellaneous receipts under Federal law.

“(d) Availability of funds.—Amounts deposited in the Fund shall be available to the Secretary without further appropriation or fiscal year limitation. (emphasis mine).

 Will they raise your taxes to pay for this? Yes, but in a round-about way. These funds were deposited in the U.S treasury, and were on the income side of the ledger.  Now they will be spent on parking lots, towers, amphitheaters, etc.,and will go on the spending side of the ledger and thereby increase our national debt. Congress must pay the interest on our national debt each year, and that is funded by taxpayer dollars. They count on you not noticing this round-about way of dealing with your tax dollars.

So there you have it. Congress places a higher priority on federal land grabs and housing for Park Service employees than they do on our national defense or curing cancer.

Do you still think the enviros aren't calling the shots on Capitol Hill?

Why It's Smart To Support The Public Lands Fueling the Recreation Economy

Cassidy Randall

Some recent editorials have expressed surprise at Western Republican Senators Steve Daines’ (MT) and Cory Gardner’s (CO) support for a bill to permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which safeguards natural areas and has created parks, trailheads, and outdoor recreation access in all 50 states across the country...MORE

It is never a good idea to put any federal program on automatic pilot. Those funds for land acquisition will no longer have to compete with other programs for funding, as that funding will now be mandatory, by law.

Funds for our national defense have to compete with all other funding requests. 
Funds for research on human diseases have to compete with all other funding requests.

Funding for public lands and outdoor recreation is more important than funding our nation's defense forces? Or funding research to cure life-threatening human diseases? That is ridiculous! 

Senate approves largest public lands bill in a decade

The Senate on Tuesday approved a major public lands bill that revives a popular conservation program, adds 1.3 million acres of new wilderness, expands several national parks and creates four new national monuments. The measure, the largest public lands bill considered by Congress in a decade, combines more than 100 separate bills that designate more than 350 miles of river as wild and scenic, create 2,600 miles of new federal trails and add nearly 700,000 acres of new recreation and conservation areas. The bill also withdraws 370,000 acres in Montana and Washington state from mineral development. The Senate approved the bill, 92-8, sending it to the House. Lawmakers from both parties said the bill’s most important provision was to permanently reauthorize the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund, which supports conservation and outdoor recreation projects across the country. The program expired last fall after Congress could not agree on language to extend it. The hodgepodge bill offered something for nearly everyone, with projects stretching across the country. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said the bill enhances use of public lands and water, while promoting conservation and sporting activities such as hunting and fishing. The bill includes provisions sponsored by more than half of the senators, Murkowski said, applauding a “very, very collaborative” process...MORE

This legislation contains 12 new Wilderness areas in New Mexico, 10 within the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument and 2 in the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument.

Republicans on federal land acquisition - from bad to worse

I have previously posted on the compromise reached between Rob Bishop (R-Utah0 and Raul Grijalva (D-Az) to permanently reauthorize federal land acquisition through the Land and Water Conservation Fund. The key word here is authorize. Actual funding would still occur in the annual appropriations process. That apparently is not good enough for the Republicans in the Senate, who want to make the funding mandatory, i.e., not subject to an annual appropriations bill. The spending would be mandatory, in effect creating another entitlement program.

Today's Politico reports:

House Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah), he of the compromise extending the Land and Water Conservation Fund, has a warning for his friends in the Senate - don’t try to make this spending mandatory. Bishop is a key player in trying to complete a reauthorization of the fund, which takes part of the money raised through oil and gas sales on federal land and then spends it on conservation projects. But making spending from the fund mandatory — as envisioned in a bipartisan Senate bill — would “probably blow it up in the House,” Bishop’s stance could add significant additional hurdles to the fund’s reauthorization. LWCF supporters prefer mandatory funding for the program because they say Congress chronically shortchanges it — creating a growing backlog of projects — and because the appropriations cycle has been so unpredictable, Anthony writes. A group of dedicated Senate LWCF backers led by Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) say they won’t let up in their quest to get the program reauthorized. "I believe we will ultimately win this fight because our colleagues know this is the right thing to do,” Burr said on the Senate floor. “We're going to be relentless." The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to mark up an LWCF reauthorization bill next Tuesday.

Grijalva, Bishop craft surprise deal to save land acquisition fund

Just yesterday I wrote about the House Natural Resources Committee passing a bipartisan bill to spend $6.5 billion for federal lands infrastructure. Unbeknownst to me on the same day they passed a bill to permanently fund the Land & Water Conservation Fund, used primarily for land acquisition.

A House committee unanimously approved a surprise, bipartisan plan to save a popular land conservation fund Thursday, just weeks before it was set to expire. Reauthorization of the $900 million Land and Water Conservation Fund had stalled as the Republican chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee and the panel’s senior Democrat locked horns over it. But Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, and Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Tucson, came together this summer to begin hammering out the agreement that was approved by the committee Thursday. “I was tired of it,” Bishop said after the vote. “I wanted to get it done.” The bill still needs to work its way through the House and Senate before Sept. 30, when the current fund is set to expire, but lawmakers said they are optimistic that they can make a deal. The Land and Water Conservation Fund, created 54 years ago, lets state, local and federal governments use federal mineral revenues to acquire and improve lands for public uses. Bishop had been pushing a replacement that would have limited federal land acquisition to a small portion of the fund, with most of the money dedicated to everything from park maintenance to offshore energy exploration to protection of historic battlefields. That plan also would have limited the amount of land the government could buy in Western states. But the compromise unveiled Thursday did away with most of those restrictions. Instead, it requires that states and the federal government each get 40 percent of the fund and the remaining 20 percent be unallocated, to be used for whatever is needed in a given year. The measure also restores the fund permanently, removing expiration dates that were in previous bills...MORE

The article also says Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tx), saying “When we hit the $1 billion and $10 billion in deferred maintenance, it seemed clear that we should not be buying land until we get this backlog down”, offered an amendment to prevent further land acquisition until the deferred maintenance had been handled. The Republican controlled committee defeated his amendment.

 Rep. Paul Gosar, (R-Az) offered an amendment that called the federal government to sell an acre of land for every acre it bought, basically preventing the federal estate from expanding. The Republican conrolled committee voted it down.

Apparently the Republicans aren't opposed to the disappearance of private property, just as long as the state governments get their fair share.

I can't write any more about this today as it is making me ill.

Rathbun responds to LWCF article

How a conservation fund helped sink Trump's budget-trimming efforts

Floyd Rathbun said...

Absolutely with Trump.

Saying that the LWCF has not cost taxpayers is cute, but the fact is the cost to our communities when private property, including land, becomes federally controlled property is huge.

As one small example, Environmentalists (some kind of Conservancy) bought the Rosaschi Ranch in Lyon County Nevada and soon sold it to the US government. Now under US Forest Service regulation, USFS became the managers of what had been a productive ranch. Millions of dollars changed hands when the Enviro-Conservancy sold their interest to the government, so at least that group of conservationist (environmentalist) associates prospered.

Prior to the sale the ranch irrigated substantial acreage that provided feed for cattle, deer, sage grouse, and song birds. Private ownership and private management provided direct benefits to both the local economy and to wildlife. After the USFS got their authoritative hands on the land and water rights the maintenance of ditches, fields, and hayland crops stopped --- sage grouse disappeared as did the mule deer and song birds. The property no longer contributes to the economy of the community through sale of agricultural products.

A few fishermen now have unrestricted access to that section of the East Walker River. East Walker River became fish habitat after the irrigation reservoir at Bridgeport CA was constructed. Prior to the reservoir the river dried up every few years. With the establishment of fishing opportunities the recreationists weren't satisfied with just going fishing; apparently the federally controlled banks of the river did not look as good as the privately controlled sections of river. So being good socialists they demanded that taxpayers turn the private lands into government lands suitable for taxpayer subsidized recreation.

Once again the government agencies have put into effect the destruction of land management based on capitalism and science which seems to be the underlying goal of programs such as this LWCF.

Motives for this story are also tied into a conservationist day dream promoted by Senator Harry Reid called "Save Walker Lake". Walker Lake is where the Walker River ends. To his minions that meant ending irrigated agriculture upstream from the lake. I guess that Senator Reid would have agreed with the politicians in this story.

LWCF and other programs like this should end very soon.

Thanks Floyd.

Saying it costs the taxpayers nothing is also "cute" in another way. Previously that income went to the Treasury. By diverting that money, either other programs are cut, other taxes are raised to replace that income or the rate of deficit spending goes up. All of those entail a cost.

How a conservation fund helped sink Trump's budget-trimming efforts

The Senate last week narrowly rejected $15 billion in spending cuts sought by conservatives that would have trimmed budgets across the federal government. But it was slashes to a single program — a conservation fund that does not directly cost taxpayers a dime — that helped do the bill in. On Wednesday, two Senate Republicans — Richard Burr of North Carolina and Susan Collins of Maine — joined every Democrat to reject a measure that attempted to chip away at the compromise $1.3 trillion spending package brokered by the two parties in March. Burr voted against the bill because it would have pulled back funding promised to a program called the Land and Water Conservation Fund. The LWCF is a half-century-old program that provides money to federal, state and local governments for the acquisition of land and waters to bolster parks, forests, wildlife refuges and other public areas...Burr's vote against the rescissions package is an early sign of a political tussle that may lie ahead. The LWCF is set to expire at the end of September, and Burr along with a bipartisan group of western senators — including Republicans Steve Daines (Mont.) and Cory Gardner (Colo.) and Democrats Maria Cantwell (Wash.) and Jon Tester (Mont.) — held a news conference in front of the Capitol on Wednesday urging Congress to make the program permanent. The LWCF received a three-year extension in 2015 after lapsing that year...MORE

Where is Zinke on this issue?

When the LWCF was last reauthorized in 2015, only one House Republican voted with Democrats to revive the lapsed program. But that dissenting Republican was Ryan Zinke, who at the time represented Montana in Congress. As a congressman, Zinke also backed permanently authorizing the fund. Last year, he stepped down to serve as President Trump's interior secretary. “It is time for Republicans to return to our conservationist roots,” Zinke wrote in a 2015 letter to the editor published in The Washington Post in defense of the LWCF.

And where is Trump?

But when the White House put forward its fiscal 2019 budget proposal this year, the Trump administration did not promise to support the program's reauthorization — either permanently nor temporarily. In fact, the Trump administration unsuccessfully proposed slashing funding for the program by 95 percent.

I'm with Trump on this one. How about you?

Seven major players in Trump's $1 trillion infrastructure push

Members of the White House, Congress and Transportation Department are all expected to have a major role in shaping President Trump’s $1 trillion infrastructure package. Some may influence which transportation projects are selected for the wide-ranging proposal, while others will play a pivotal role in getting the plan over the finish line. Legislation is still in the process of being crafted, but it could land on Capitol Hill as soon as next month. Here are the seven major players to watch...more

Zinke is not mentioned, but expect he and Senator Lamar Alexander will use this as a vehicle to permanently fund the Land & Water Conservation fund. 

Heinrich Seeks Permanent Reauthorization Of The Land And Water Conservation Fund

U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), a member of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, joined Sens. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Susan Collins (R-ME), Steve Daines (R-MT), and Cory Gardner (R-CO) to introduce bipartisan legislation to permanently reauthorize and fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) to conserve parks, open spaces, and wildlife habitat for the benefit of hunting, fishing, and outdoor recreation. “The Land and Water Conservation Fund has helped protect some of our most treasured public lands and wildlife refuges in New Mexico like the Valles Caldera and Ute Mountain,” said Senator Heinrich. “LWCF also expands opportunities for outdoor traditions like hunting, camping, and fishing that are among the pillars of Western culture, and a thriving outdoor recreation economy. Permanently and fully funding LWCF will help ensure that our outdoor heritage and public lands will be protected for future generations to enjoy."...more

Cantwell, Reichert lead bipartisan effort on LWCF, critical federal funding for parks

You may have never heard of the Land Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), but you've most likely benefited from it. Odds are some of your favorite parks are a result. Since Congress started the fund in 1964, Washington has received a total of $660 million, which has gone to projects like turning an old Naval air station into Magnuson Park. On Monday Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell and Republican Representative Dave Reichert gathered at Gasworks Park in Seattle to call for permanent full funding of LWCF. Secretary of the Interior and former REI CEO Sally Jewell joined them at Gasworks Park, which was renovated from an old abandoned industrial site 40 years ago with money from LWCF. When it expired last year, Senator Cantwell was able to push an extension through Congress; A bipartisan conference put together the plan to fully fund LWCF at $900 million per year nationwide. Congressman Reichert called the LWCF a common sense project and is confident it will pass by the end of the year...more

 Yes, spending money to grow the size of government always seems to be bipartisan.

Hundreds of miles of Colorado wilderness lost to 21st-century development boom

A 21st-century development surge has transformed at least 525 square miles of Colorado, an area bigger than Rocky Mountain National Park, as once-wild land vanishes across the West. The urban expansion, road-building and energy production is causing a breakup of natural space that threatens wildlife as people push into their habitat. A bear walking a random path couldn't go farther than 3½ miles on average before encountering "significant human development," according to an analysis by Conservation Science Partners, being unveiled Tuesday at the Center for American Progress, a Washington, D.C., conservation group.  Colorado ranked second to California (785 square miles) in total natural area affected. Development across 11 Western states now covers more than 165,000 square miles, with more than 4,321 square miles converted since 2001, the "Disappearing West" study found.  And urban sprawl, commerce and drilling claim the equivalent of a football field every 2½ minutes — roughly a Los Angeles-sized area of open land per year...more

So, we have another "crisis" and Congress must act.  An often-used tactic to stir public opinion and help the enviro lobbyists.  And this all happens while the Park Service is pushing their 100th anniversary and the Land & Water Conservation Fund is up for reauthorization.  Just a coincidence, I'm sure.

According to the NRCS, the U.S. contains 1.4 billion acres, 94 % of which is not developed.  That's a helluva lot of football fields.  Do the math and you'll see this is hardly a crisis.

5 Myths about the Land and Water Conservation Fund

Summary

1.	MYTH	The majority of LWCF funding goes to local outdoor recreation projects.
	FACT	The stateside grants program makes up a small and shrinking share of LWCF funding. The majority of LWCF funds are used to expand the federal estate.
2.	MYTH	The LWCF directs $900 million per year into a fund for land and water conservation.
	FACT	There is no dedicated LWCF fund. It is a political and accounting fiction.
3.	MYTH	The LWCF costs taxpayers nothing.
	FACT	When funds are allocated through the LWCF, less funding is available for other federal priorities.
4.	MYTH	The LWCF is critical to protect public lands for future generations.
	FACT	Congress has used the LWCF to expand the federal estate without adequately funding the maintenance and conservation of existing public lands.
5.	MYTH	Permanent reauthorization will advance the original goals of the LWCF.
	FACT	The LWCF must be reformed to advance its original purpose. Without reform, the LWCF should be terminated.

Download a PDF of the report.

- See more at: http://www.perc.org/articles/5-myths-about-land-and-water-conservation-fund#sthash.GhIZUhQc.dpuf