NATIONAL MONUMENTS: Murkowski bill would limit presidential powers
Phil Taylor, E&E reporter
E&E: Thursday, February 12, 2015
Alaska Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan this week introduced a bill to limit the White House's ability to designate national monuments.
S. 437, which Murkowski first introduced last July, would require the president to gain approval from Congress and state legislatures before designating a monument on federal lands or waters.
If it is a marine monument, the president would also need approval from lawmakers in states within 100 miles of its boundaries. All monuments would need to be vetted by a National Environmental Policy Act review.
"It is clear that this White House is more concerned with securing its environmental legacy than protecting the economic well-being of Alaskans," Murkowski, who is chairwoman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said in a statement. "My legislation is designed to make sure economic activity like fishing and responsible resource development is not put at risk -- and family incomes damaged -- by a stroke of the president's pen."
Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) introduced a similar bill last month (E&ENews PM, Jan. 15).
Conservation groups are strongly opposing Murkowski's bill, calling it a threat to the scenic, cultural and archaeological wonders that presidents of both parties have protected using the 1906 Antiquities Act.
"Our parks and national monuments are the fabric of America," said Matt Keller, national monuments campaign director at the Wilderness Society. "This measure is entirely out of step with what the American people are asking of their elected officials and says, in effect, that our nation doesn't need any more national parks and conservation lands."
Murkowski has been fuming over a series of Obama administration moves in Alaska that she argues have limited energy development, jobs and public safety. They include Interior Department decisions in late 2013 to bar a road through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge and last month to recommend wilderness protections in the oil-rich Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The president is not allowed to unilaterally declare major monuments in Alaska. The 1980 Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act prohibits land withdrawals of more than 5,000 acres without Congress' approval.
Republicans for years have pushed to reduce presidents' powers under the antiquities law, which offers nearly unlimited authority to unilaterally protect an area from future oil and gas leasing, mining claims, or other perceived threats.
So far, it does not appear Republicans have the votes to break what would likely be a Democratic filibuster impeding the bill's passage to the president's desk, where it would very likely be vetoed.
The Senate last month on a 50-47 vote failed to pass a nonbinding amendment by Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) stating that the president should garner support from governors and state legislatures before designating monuments. It needed 60 votes to pass.
The amendment, which was opposed by Republican Sens. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Cory Gardner of Colorado, would have amended S. 1, the bill to approve the Keystone XL pipeline.
The House passed S. 1 yesterday, but it is expected to be vetoed by President Obama.
The Murkowski-Sullivan bill comes as Obama plans to declare southeast Chicago's Pullman historic district a national monument during a Feb. 19 visit to the city (Greenwire, Feb. 10).
Obama has used the Antiquities Act more than a dozen times to protect federal lands in several states, including more than a million acres in New Mexico and California.
President Clinton designated or expanded nearly two dozen monuments covering more than 5 million acres, including controversial monuments in Montana and Utah.
