WASHINGTON – The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday passed a $30.01 billion bill to fund the Interior Department, Environmental Protection Agency and related agencies. The measure, which passed 16-14, also blocks implementation of the EPA’s plan to address climate change.
It’s the first appropriations bill to clear the committee for these agencies since 2009. It provides $11.05 billion for the Interior Department, $1.18 billion for the Bureau of Land Management, $2.72 billion to fund the National Park Service and $1.43 billion to fund the Fish and Wildlife Service.
Opponents said the measure adheres to “unreasonable” spending limits set by the 2013 budget sequester. Also, they objected to inclusion of provisions that don’t directly affect spending but instead aim to dismantle environmental laws.
The office of Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., who is not on the Appropriations Committee, indicated Bennet generally supports removing the spending caps set by the 2013 sequester.
“(Bennet) believed the sequester was bad policy then, and it’s bad policy now,” said Adam Bozzi, Bennet’s communications director. “There’s no reason we can’t come together to fix the sequester and reduce our debt in a smarter way.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, defended the bill she authored against amendments from Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M. The first amendment Udall offered would increase spending levels by almost $2 billion, much of which he said would help create jobs and fund health and suicide-prevention programs for Native American tribes.
Murkowski reminded the panel of the spending limits. But several members fought this notion. Among them was Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont.
Tester proposed an amendment that would more than double funding allocated to the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which is used to buy land and bodies of water for conservation. He, like Udall, made his amendment contingent on a new budget agreement, such as one reached two years ago by Congressman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Sen. Patty Murray, D- Wash.
“You’re saying there’s nothing we can do about the cap, but we’re the ones running the ship here, and we can change it,” Tester said.
But the money was only the first part of the debate.
The bill included several policy riders – language that would affect law, not necessarily funding. Among them were riders that would defer to state and tribal standards for regulating hydraulic fracturing – or fracking – and one that would block EPA from holding hard-rock mining and mineral-processing industries financially responsible for hazardous waste produced as a result of their operations.
Udall offered two more amendments in addition to proposing higher funding levels. One to strike all riders, and when that failed, one to strike just the language that would block the implementation of the EPA’s carbon regulations. In pushing for the amendment, he cited depleted snowpack and the impact of climate change on the Colorado River.
Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., supported Udall. “This is one member trying to change the law in what should just be a numbers bill,” she said referring to Republicans’ opposition to EPA’s plan to limit carbon pollution.
Murkowski said including policy riders in appropriations bills is one of the few tools available to oppose the excessive regulation coming at states from the current administration. Coal-state senators Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Sen. Shelley-Moore Capito, R-W.Va., joined her in decrying the loss of industry jobs that they say would come from EPA’s new rules for coal-fired power plants.
mbaksh@durangoherald.com. Mariam Baksh is a student at American University and an intern for The Durango Herald.
