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Gardner’s public lands bill is in trouble after missing key deadline last week

By Hannah Metzger hannah.metzger@gazette.com November 10, 2020 | updated 5 years ago

President Donald Trump’s administration failed to meet the Nov. 2 deadline to submit a list of conservation projects to be funded by the Great American Outdoors Act, putting in jeopardy the bill that Sen. Cory Gardner touted in his unsuccessful reelection campaign.

The public lands bill, signed into law by Trump on Aug. 4, would provide permanent funds for the Land and Water Conservation Fund and allocate $9.5 billion for public land maintenance over five years.

“I am astounded by their vendetta against conservation funding they celebrated just days ago,” said New Mexico Congresswoman Deb Haaland, a Democrat.

“It was obvious from the start that their support of the Great American Outdoors Act was a ploy to win votes in a close election year,” she said.

Gardner, along with fellow Republican Sen. Steve Daines of Montana, centered his campaign on the GAOA. Gardner’s campaign even went as far as to compare him to President John F. Kennedy, who promised to fund LWCF in 1962.

“I brought both parties together to finally fulfill a conservation promise John F. Kennedy made in Pueblo, Colorado, more than 50 years ago,” Gardner said at the time.

Neither Gardner nor Daines have spoken about the failed deadline. Gardner has not responded to requests for comment.

Missing the GAOA deadline could set back dozens of conservation efforts and put others in danger.

The preliminary list of proposals submitted by the Interior Department included several Colorado projects, including $8.5 million for the addition of Sweetwater Lake and protection for 1,100 acres of the San Luis Valley along the Colorado-New Mexico border, reported Newsline.

The draft also included $116 million for projects throughout the Bureau of Land Management, National Park System and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

“We are disappointed by the administration’s inexplicable inability to comply with the requirements in the Great American Outdoors Act,” said Bill Lee with the Trust for Public Land. “This is a really troubling failure.”

The Department of Interior had 30 days to submit a list of projects to Congress, a list which was already drafted back in April.

However, the department claims that making the submission is not their job, but the President’s.

“Per the law…Interior did not fail to meet the deadline,” a department spokesperson told Outside, saying that the GAOA states, “The President shall submit to Congress detailed account, program and project allocations of the full amount made available under subsection (A) for fiscal year 2021, not later than 90 days after the date of enactment of the Great American Outdoors Act.”

The lawmakers who wrote the GAOA have said submitting the project list is Interior’s responsibility.

Congress members including Haaland are now calling on the Trump administration to submit the project list.

If the DOI and the Trump administration fail to act, Congress could step in; however, without the GAOA, funding for numerous conservation projects and the timeline in which the GAOA could be acted on again is uncertain.

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Hannah Metzger hannah.metzger@gazette.com

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