NEWS RELEASES
Bill Protecting Public Lands Passed by Senate
Editor's Note: This news item was retrieved and first published through The Washington Post's website.
The Senate recently passed a bill protecting millions of acres of land and hundreds of miles of wild rivers across the country and establishing four new national monuments honoring heroes including Civil War soldiers and a civil rights icon. More specifically, protecting 1.3 million acres as wilderness, the nation’s most stringent protection, which prohibits even roads and motorized vehicles.
According to Washington Post writer Juliet Eilperin and Dino Grandoni, "The bill, which the Congressional Budget Office projects would save taxpayers $9 million, enjoys broad support in the House. It permanently withdraws more than 370,000 acres of land from mining around two national parks, including Yellowstone, and permanently authorizes a program to spend offshore-drilling revenue on conservation efforts. The proposed existing national park expansions include Death Valley, Joshua Tree, Kennesaw Mountain, Ocmulgee Mounds, and Fort Frederica National Parks. The new national monuments being erected are St. Francis Dam Disaster (Calif.), Jurassic (Utah), Medgar Evers Home (Miss.), Mill Springs Battlefield (Ken.), and Camp Nelson (Ken.). “We have also worked for months on a bipartisan, bicameral basis to truly negotiate every single word in this bill — literally down to one one-tenth of a mile for [a] certain designation," Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski said as she urged her colleagues to vote for the bill on Monday.
For more specifics and details on the bill and what it entails, view here.