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Late Breaking News |
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| Date: August 6, 1998 4:06 pm Contact: National Parks and Conservation Association Jerome Uher 202-223-6722, ext. 122 |
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Latest News Releases
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National Park Lands Targeted for Giveaway by House; Three Bills Chip Away at Protected National Areas | ||
| WASHINGTON - August 6 - The 105th Congress today continued its effort to
strip away the safeguards of our national parks as the House Resources Committee approved
three measures that will turn over federally protected lands to private interests and
weaken protection of the parks, said the National Parks and Conservation Association
(NPCA). "Some legislators in this congress are working to destroy the essence of the National Park System, which is to protect our greatest places for all of us," said William Chandler, NPCA Vice President for Conservation Policy. "National parks are meant to be places for all Americans to enjoy, not havens for a privileged few." The most potentially damaging of the measures approved by the panel is the so-called "National Park Enhancement and Revitalization Act," sponsored by Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.). The bill, H.R. 4158, is a national park giveaway, authorizing the sale and/or leasing of national park lands for residential use. Private citizens already occupy over 1,600 cabins, houses, cottages, and trailers on publicly-owned park land. These structures, along with the land on which they stand, were purchased by the National Park Service under special agreements that allow sellers to use them for a limited period before they are conveyed to the park. H.R. 4158 would allow these lands to become permanent private homesites within national parks. Similarly, H.R. 4144, sponsored by Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), sets a precedent whereby people with wealth and influence can purchase private estates within our most beautiful public parks. The bill promotes a land exchange that would privatize federal property in park wilderness and establish a permanent private enclave for one affluent family. H.R. 4414 would also radically alter Congress' original vision for Cumberland Island National seashore, a unique national park where visitors can experience the last remaining barrier island wilderness on the East Coast. H.R. 4144 would prevent visitors from experiencing the park in its natural state by exempting an area along the main road that runs the entire length of the island's wilderness area from wilderness designation. This was never the intent of Congress, which instructed the National Park Service to "avoid motorized vehicle traffic" on the main road when it created the park in 1982. The third bill, the "Ivanpah Valley Airport Public Lands Transfer Act," would authorize the sale of federal lands located directly outside the Mojave National Park and Preserve for the development of a commercial airport of unspecified size to serve Las Vegas. The legislation completely overrides the formal local planning process for the study and evaluation of airport expansion issues; it fails to delineate the specific public lands that would be put up for sale or the specific purpose of the proposed airport facility; and it makes no mention of the environmental review processes needed to address potential impacts on the neighboring Mojave National Park and Preserve. "All three of these bills mock the purpose of the National Park System, which is to ensure park integrity for future generations," said Chandler. ------ The National Parks and Conservation Association is America's only private nonprofit citizen organization dedicated solely to protecting, preserving, and enhancing the U.S. National Park System. An association of "Citizens Protecting America's Parks," NPCA was founded in 1919 and today has nearly 400,000 members. A library of national park information, including fact sheets, congressional testimony, position statements, press releases and media alerts, can be found in NPCA's "Press Room" on the World Wide Web at http://www.npca.org. -0- |
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