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Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (MI-12), ranking member of the Natural Resources Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, expressed concerns this week about Chairman Rob Bishop’s (UT-01) draft legislation that would weaken and dramatically restructure the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). Congress allowed the LWCF, the nation’s premier recreation and conservation program, to expire on September 30 for the first time in its 50 year history. Chairman Bishop’s proposal would end the LWCF’s historic flexibility to fund areas of greatest need. It would also distort the original intent of the law by restricting federal land acquisition to only 3.5 percent of annual LWCF funding and diverting 35 percent to non-conservation purposes. 

“I guess I have a very unique perspective here as the spouse of the man who wrote the original law,” Dingell said during the committee hearing. “Much has changed since then -- recreation demand has grown by leaps and bounds, and so have the development pressures on lands we need in our local, state, and federal parks and recreation areas…What hasn't changed, at least until now, is the flexibility Congress gave ourselves in that original LWCF Act to spend more or less money year by year to one LWCF program or another based on the most pressing real-time needs. Even back in the 1960's, Congress made use of that flexibility and adjusted the balance of state and federal spending from year to year.”

For video of Dingell’s questions and answers from witnesses Kristen Sarri, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Policy Management and Budget at the Department of the Interior; and Travis Campbell, Chief Executive Officer at Far Bank Enterprises, please click here.

Created by Congress in 1965, the LWCF has safeguarded natural areas, water resources and cultural heritage sites in every state in the country. In Michigan, LWCF money was used to support the acquisition of the 410 acre Humbug Marsh unit to the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge. This investment protected the last mile of natural shoreline along the U.S. portion of the Detroit River, a deal Dingell said “never could have happened” without investment from the LWCF. 

Dingell is a cosponsor of H.R. 1814, legislation introduced by Natural Resources Ranking Member Raúl M. Grijalva, which would permanently reauthorize the LWCF. The legislation currently has 195 bipartisan cosponsors.