New Life for Fund

Money for the Land and Water Conservation Fund has been extended to Dec. 11

It could be monumental mistake to mess with Bandelier funding. (Wikimedia Commons)

By Thomas Ragan

Congress has denied the 60-day extension New Mexico's senators requested  to continue the funding for an important land and water conservation fund, responsible for contributing millions of dollars each year to the Land of Enchantment.

But the good news is that the funding will continue anyway, at least until Dec. 11, under a new deadline outlined in a continuing resolution that Congress passed Wednesday to avoid a government shutdown, Jennifer Talhelm, a spokeswoman for Sen. Tom Udall, D-New Mexico, tells SFR late Thursday.

"But we are still are pushing for the reauthorization of the fund. We're not out of the woods just yet," Talhelm says from the senator's Washington DC office. "While the funding may continue for the next few months, that doesn't mean it's going to continue forever. The only way we can accomplish that is through a permanent reauthorization.

"That way, everybody in New Mexico won't have to worry about it so much."

Known as the Land and Water Conservation Fund, the money has been renewed twice, at 25-year intervals, with that third renewal of reauthorization scheduled for Wednesday. But it wasn't to be.

The fund that kicked off in 1965 has helped to preserve national monuments, protect historical battlefield sites, even acquire major parcels of public land for conservation.

But in the last few weeks, the fund has been held up for political reasons, leading a contingency of senators from the Western states, among them Udall and Martin Heinrich, D-New Mexico, to make a fever pitch for its reauthorization.

Locally, environmentalists as well have tried to outline to the public how important the fund is and how a multitude of parks were built on the money from the funding; even a few salaries among city park employees across New Mexico are funded by it, Santa Fe included.

And so as nonprofits got the word out, Sens. Udall and Heinrich simultaneously doubled up the pressure on Congress, but in the end, there was just this temporary respite, ushered in more to save the government from shutting down as a whole and not so much from their lobbying efforts.

And it's all just a gloomy example of how the federal government is operating these days, says Talhelm.

Just the other day, she notes, Sen. Udall made a very poignant point during a staff meeting, saying that these continuing resolutions that keep the federal government open and the money flowing are "sadly becoming commonplace," considered a normal government procedure due to the gridlock in Congress.

But a few decades ago, if you were to mention the phrase "continuing resolution," it would do "nothing but cause panic," Talhelm quoted Udall as saying.

The fund's revenues are tied to offshore drilling and gas lease royalties, and they are based on the premise that if land and sea are to be drilled for its natural resources, then there should be some sort of mitigation to offset it through conservation practices.

If the fund is not reauthorized, New Mexico stands to lose up to $14 million for the FY 2016, according Talhelm.

In all, nearly $261 million has gone to New Mexico since the fund was created. Among the more notable recipients: Bandelier National Monument, the Fort Marcy Recreation Complex, Glorieta Pass Battlefield, San Lazaro Pueblo Archeological Site, El Rancho de las Golondrinas, Hyde Memorial State Park, Valle de Oro National Wildlife Refuge, Aztec Ruins National Monument, Pecos National Historical Park and Petroglyph National Monument.

Javier Rojo, who's been advocating for the fund's reauthorization for Center of Southwest Culture in Albuquerque, says busting the deadline for the reauthorization was "a monumental mistake" by Congress.

"The most important immediate impact is that starting today, the fund will stop collecting royalties from offshore oil drilling and natural gas, essentially terminating its only source of income," Rojo says. "The royalties will instead go to the general treasury fund. If this continues, and the funds aren't redirected to the fund, the long-term consequence could really be catastrophic for America's public lands."
He says funding to maintain many of the state's national monuments and public parks "would dry up," and thousands of people would eventually lose their jobs. 

Santa Fe Reporter

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