Amendments to FY 2006 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill
05/17/05
U.S. House
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Representative,
The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) is the political voice of the national environmental community. Each year, LCV publishes the National Environmental Scorecard, which details the voting records of Members of Congress on environmental legislation. The Scorecard is distributed to LCV members, concerned voters nationwide, and the press.
When the FY 2006 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations bill reaches the House floor this week, LCV urges you to oppose any anti-environmental riders to the bill. LCV also urges you to support the following amendments to the FY 2006 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations bill:
Chabot (R-OH)-Andrews (D-NJ) Amendment to End Taxpayer Subsidies of Logging Roads in the Tongass National Forest. Taxpayer-subsidized logging in the Tongass has cost the taxpayers millions. In 2004 alone, the Forest Service lost nearly $48 million of taxpayer money on the logging program and logging roads in the Tongass. This amendment, which passed the House in 2004 by a vote of 222-205 but was not included in the final bill, will prevent the Forest Service from spending taxpayer dollars in FY 2006 on new road-building in America’s Rainforest.
Stupak (D-MI)-Shaw (R-FL)-Pallone (D-NJ)-Jeff Miller (R-FL) "Anti-Sewage Dumping" Amendment. The EPA has proposed a policy that will allow sewage treatment plants to routinely discharge inadequately treated sewage into our lakes, rivers, streams and coastal waters. The EPA's policy will allow more viruses, parasites, toxic chemicals and other pollutants into our waters by weakening longstanding Clean Water Act safeguards. The EPA's new policy would allow operators to bypass full treatment any time it rains, even when there are feasible alternatives. The amendment will prevent EPA from finalizing this policy.
Hastings (D-FL) Environmental Justice Amendment. Executive Order 12898 requires the EPA "to make achieving environmental justice part of its mission by identifying and addressing, as appropriate, disproportionately high and adverse human health or environmental effects of its programs, policies, and activities on minority populations and low-income populations." The Hastings amendment is needed to ensure that EPA takes the next steps to meet its obligations under this Executive Order, beginning with identification of minority and low income communities that are experiencing unfairly high levels of air and water pollution and exposure to toxic waste.
LCV urges you to support the three pro-environmental amendments mentioned above. In addition, LCV is very concerned about inadequate conservation funding in the bill, including the harmful cuts to the Land and Water Conservation Fund and clean water funding. LCV’s Political Advisory Committee will consider including votes on these issues in compiling LCV’s 2005 Scorecard. For more information, please call Tiernan Sittenfeld or Barbara Elkus in my office at 202-785-8683.
Sincerely,
Deb Callahan
President, LCV
