Senate Restores Some Funding for Land & Water Conservation Programs

News Release

Senate Restores Some Funding for Land & Water Conservation Programs
Conservation funding falls far short of state requests, remains at historic low; over $700 million still missing from collected federal royalty payments

Subscribe to WildAlerts

WASHINGTON, DC (June 29, 2006) -- Today the Senate Appropriations Committee voted to substantially increase funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund, adding back well over $100 million to the levels passed by the House last month. The funding includes $78 million* for LWCF Federal land acquisition (only $26.8 million in the House bill), $30 million* for LWCF State Assistance (zeroed-out by the House), and $50 million* for Forest Legacy (only $9.3 million in the House bill).

“This administration and Congress have made budgeting choices that have emptied the coffers and shortchanged important programs for preserving critically endangered open spaces,” said Sarah Neimeyer, director of budget and appropriations for The Wilderness Society. “We’re happy to have some funding for essential conservation projects, but it’s a fraction of the need.”

Although the Senate increased funding for the vital Forest Legacy program to $55 million, six times the level approved by the House, it still falls short of the President’s budget request of $61.5 million. The Forest Legacy program has been an effective tool used to assist states in conserving threatened private forestlands through purchase of lands or development rights from willing landowners. Participating states submitted project requests for Forest Legacy funding totaling over $200 million this year.

“The Senate had the wisdom to restore conservation funding close to or slightly exceeding the President’s budget after the House cut it to the bone,” said Tom Gilbert director of Eastern Forest conservation for The Wilderness Society. “Still, the funding remains far below the needs expressed by the states and jeopardizes scores of critical efforts to preserve threatened forests and open spaces.”

Even projects deemed important by the president and included in his budget request were left stranded by both the House and Senate, including Whitehurst Forest in North Carolina and Lower Penobscot Forest in Maine.

“The failure to provide much greater funding for conservation is hard to explain,” added Neimeyer. “These are programs that Americans love. They benefit every state and the states vigorously support them. Treating them like a budgetary afterthought hurts us all.”

The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) is the nation’s primary source of money to conserve land. Each year the fund is authorized by Congress to receive $900 million in royalties from offshore oil and gas drilling and to reinvest those funds to expand recreational opportunities and protect America’s national forests, parks and wildlife refuges.

Growing pressure from development sprawl and the sale of millions of acres of timber company lands threaten to change the face of the American landscape in just a few decades. A recent U.S. Forest Service report, “Forests on the Edge,” warned that over 40 million acres of private forests, primarily in the East, are likely to be developed by 2030, resulting in significant impacts to water quality, wildlife populations, timber production, scenic quality and recreational opportunities. (To view the report, see http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/pnw_gtr636.pdf)

*NOTE: These figures do not include funds for operations and management, which total $50 million for LWCF and $5 million for Forest Legacy.

Senate Interior Appropriations Committee: Federal LWCF

Agency	State	Program	Amount
FS	AK	Tongass	500,000
FWS	AK	Yukon Flats (Doyon land exchange EIS)	500,000
FS	AL	Alabama National Forest	1,500,000
FWS	AR	Cache River	495,000
BLM	CA	California Wilderness	500,000
BLM	CA	Coachelle Valley Fringe-Toad-Lizard (ACEC)	500,000
FS	CO	Arapaho - Beaver Brook	3,000,000
FS	CO	Ophir Valley	1,000,000
FWS	CO	Arapaho	1,000,000
FWS	CT, NJ, NY, PA	Highlands Conservation Act	1,000,000
FWS	FL	St. Marks	1,700,000
FS	GA	Chattahoochee (Georgia Mountains Riparian)	1,150,000
FWS	HI	James Campbell	8,000,000
FWS	IA	Driftless Area	250,000
FS	IL	Shawnee Disappearing Habitat	500,000
FS	IN	Hoosier Unique Areas	500,000
FS	KY	Daniel Boone NF	750,000
FWS	KY	Clarks River	250,000
NPS	KY	Cumberland Gap--Fern Lake	640,000
NPS	MA	Cape Cod National Seashore	2,000,000
FWS	MA/CT	Silvo O. Conte	4,000,000
FWS	MD	Blackwater	400,000
NPS	MI	Sleeping Bear Dunes	1,845,000
FS	MN	Chippewa/Superior/ MN Wilderness	500,000
FWS	MN/IA	Northern Tallgrass Prairie	495,000
BLM	MT	Blackfoot River Special Recreation Management Area	5,000,000
BLM	MT	Chain of Lakes RMA/ Lewis and Clark NHT	1,250,000
FS	MT	Helena & Lolo Blackfoot Challenge	2,000,000
FS	MT	Selway Valley	2,600,000
FS	MT	Flathead Swan Valley	3,000,000
FS	MT	Gallatin Greater Yellowstone	1,600,000
FWS	MT	Rocky Mountain Front	2,500,000
NPS	multistate	Civil War Battlefields	4,000,000
FS	ND	Dakota Prairie – Little Missouri River	3,500,000
FWS	ND	North Dakota Prairie Project conservation easements	250,000
FWS	ND/SD	Dakota Tallgrass Prairie	250,000
NPS	NE	Niobrara	250,000
FWS	NH	Lake Umbagog	1,000,000
FWS	OR	Upper Klamath Lake--Barnes Tract	2,475,000
FS	OR/WA	Columbia River Gorge	500,000
NPS	PA	Flt. 93	5,000,000
FWS	RI	Rhode Island Refuge Complex	1,000,000
FS	SD	Blackhills Lady C Ranch	500,000
NPS	TN	Great Smoky Mountains(Gt. Tapoca)	500,000
FWS	TX	Lower Rio Grande Valley	150,000
NPS	TX	Big Thicket National Preserve	2,000,000
BLM	UT	Colorado River SRMA	1,300,000
FS	UT	Bonneville Shoreline Trail	2,000,000
FWS	VA	Eastern Shore	2,277,000
FS	VT	Green Mountain	1,100,000
FS	WA	Cascade Checkerboard/Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie	978,000
NPS	WA	Ebey’s Landing	500,000
NPS	WA	Lewis and Clark Station Camp	500,000
FS	WI	Chequamegon – WI Wild Water Ways	2,500,000
NPS	WI	Ice Age Trail	1,000,000
FWS	WV	Canaan Valley	2,500,000
NPS	WV	Gauley	750,000
NPS	WV	New River Gorge	500,000
Total Land Acquisition			88,205,000