NEWS: PRESS RELEASE ARCHIVE

Update on the Udall Amendment to the Interior Appropriations Bill

Hadar Susskind
COEJL Washington Representative

Washington, D.C. (July 25, 2003) - Thanks to all of you who made calls and send emails and faxes on RS 2477, the Udall amendment. Here's a quick update on how the amendment fared during House consideration of the Interior Appropriations bill. The amendment, in its original form, would have halted the Administration's implementation of the disclaimer rule and opened huge tracts of land to development. As a last ditch effort to weaken the Udall amendment, Representative Charles Taylor (R-NC), chairman of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, offered a watered-down version of the Udall amendment. While the Taylor amendment exempts national parks, refuges, monuments, wilderness areas, and wilderness study areas from disclaimers (a significant victory for the good guys), it still leaves 400 million acres of Bureau of Land Management and national forest lands vulnerable to RS 2477 claims. The Taylor amendment passed by a vote of 226-194, followed by passage of the Udall amendment by voice vote. The Senate is likely to consider the Interior Appropriations bill in September. Stay tuned...

For the original Action Alert and background information, click here.