When it comes to budgeting in Congress, the devil is in the details.
And the devilish detail in the big budget proposal on Capitol Hill this week, authored by Representative Paul Ryan, is a proposal to sell off of millions of acres of our public lands.
When it comes to budgeting in Congress, the devil is in the details.
And the devilish detail in the big budget proposal on Capitol Hill this week, authored by Representative Paul Ryan, is a proposal to sell off of millions of acres of our public lands.
President Obama released his 2013 budget request to Congress on Feb. 13, and it contains strong funding for conservation and renewable energy programs. In a tough budget climate like the one that we’re currently in, finding bright spots in the federal budget can be difficult.
As yet another sign of how far the Congress is taking the country off track, keep an eye on how Congress fills the time while the debt ceiling debate stalls.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) uses fees from offshore drilling permits to acquire critical lands within park, refuge, forest, BLM land boundaries. In Fiscal Year 2010, $266 million has been allocated to LWCF for protection of important places such as the Cascade Siskiyou National Monument in Oregon, Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Maryland, Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in Michigan, and the Lewis & Clark National Forest in Montana, among others listed here.
This spreadsheet outlines Federal Land & Water Conservation Fund, Forest Legacy and Stateside LWCF, and Total Federal and Stateside LWCF Budget and Interior Appropriations.
With Congress back in session, our staff and policy experts have been working full-speed with members of the presidential transition team and with members of Congress to prepare them on steps they can quickly take to right many of the environmental wrongs of the past eight years.
Federal fire suppression costs have increased significantly in recent years, exceeding $1 billion in five of the last seven years. As suppression activities continue to increase, so does the suppression budget since it is based on a 10-year rolling average. Because the agencies’ budgets are essentially flat year to year, to off-set these increases funding for critical programs has been significantly reduced and more and more of the land management agencies’ budgets are being used for wildland fire management.
Bi-partisan letter from more than 120 members of the U.S. House of Representatives to House Subcommittee on Interior Appropriations, requesting funding for the Forest Legacy Program and state and federal Land and Water Conservation Programs.
