Our Voice: Land conservation fund needs stability

Before leaving for summer recess this month, the Senate set up a way to permanently re-authorize a popular land conservation program that last year was allowed to expire.

It was given a temporary lifeline of three years just to keep it going, but this successful program never should have been allowed to die in the first place.

We hope when federal lawmakers return to work in September they can find a way to give the program the long-lasting stability it deserves.

The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) was established in 1964 as a way to provide tax-free money for land preservation. The revenue is generated from offshore drilling royalties and natural gas leases, with the idea that companies that use natural resources to earn a profit should give something back to the public for conservation.

For 50 years, the program provided billions of dollars to protect parks, trails, forests, open spaces, waterways and shorelines.

At the end of last September, however, the fund hit its expiration date.

All it needed was congressional approval to continue, but efforts to re-authorize the program met with resistance from Republican leaders on the House Natural Resources Committee who said they wanted to re-evaluate it.

A temporary compromise was made, which was a relief but hardly adequate.

Now Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., a ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has included permanent re-authorization of the LWCF in the proposed Senate energy bill.

She is trying to accomplish what lawmakers failed to achieve last year.

Cantwell is touting the LWCF as not only a solid environmental tool, but also an economic driver. In Washington alone, active outdoor recreation generates about $22.5 billion in consumer spending, and it produces $1.6 billion in state and local tax revenues, according to Cantwell’s office.

The conservation program also supports 198,000 jobs in outdoor recreation activities in Washington state, and 6 million jobs nationwide. It is the country’s most successful funding source for national parks, public lands and historical sites

In the Tri-Cities, the fund has helped pay for the 23-mile Sacagawea Heritage Trail along the Columbia River, Highland Park in Pasco, Vista Park in Kennewick and Burlington Park in Connell. The program also has supported the Yakima River watershed, forests near Mount St. Helens, the Lake Quinault area of the Olympic National Park and the Pacific Crest Trail, which runs from the Canadian border to Mexico.

This is a lot of good coming from a tax-free funding source.

Opposition to the program was voiced loudly last year by Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, who managed to squelch the re-authorization effort, saying the fund is flawed and needs reformed. Proponents of leaving the program as is said Bishop was trying to micro-manage it to death.

Fourth District Rep. Dan Newhouse, R-Sunnyside, a first-term member of the House committee, has called the fund a “critically important conservation program” and he sent a letter to Bishop, asking him to reauthorize it long term, but not permanently.

We hope we don’t see a repeat of the same old arguments when lawmakers reconvene in a couple of months. The LWCF supports the environment and millions of jobs, and it needs to continue in such a way that its merits don’t have to be debated in Congress every few years.

Cantwell has made a smart, opening move by including the fund’s permanent re-authorization in the Senate’s energy bill. We hope she can see it through.

This story was originally published July 26, 2016 at 2:56 AM with the headline "Our Voice: Land conservation fund needs stability."