enactment of this legislation, if it has not already begun. Further, we suggest that the Subcommittee require the Secretary to institute rigorous validity determinations so that inquiries into all legal deficiencies are part of the normal review. Such deficiencies include, but are not limited to, loss of discovery due to changing economic circumstances, improper or fraudulent location, use of dummy locators, location for nonmining work, abandonment, failure to perform annual assessment work, adverse possession, invalidity due to old contests, requirement of discovery prior to 1920, issuance of conflicting patents, land of no clear value for oil shale, failure to do $500 of improvements on each claim, and a discovery standard that more accurately accounts for the realistic prospect of mining. We would also like to suggest that the Subcommittee request, from the General Accounting Office or some other appropriate investigative and auditing agency, a comprehensive review and investigation of the Department of Interior's processing of previous oil shale claims. Such a review would provide valuable information on the past disposals and how validity determinations were made, in particular the thoroughness and consistency of the Department's past efforts to invalidate oil shale claims. We think this investigation is critical to the rulemaking promised by the Interior Department on oil shale. The rulemaking and investigation could proceed concurrently such that the preliminary report from the investigation would be available to the Department before the final rule is issued. What better time for an investigation to point out the mistakes of the past such that those mistakes are not made again. The lack of success in upholding challenges to oil shale claims in the past should not be taken as an indication that such challenges are futile, but rather as an indication of the the need for specific Congressional guidance in future efforts. The thoroughness and tenacity of the Interior Department in these matters can obviously not be taken for granted. H.R. 643 sets up the mechanism for a claimant to choose between a lease and maintaining a claim. We would urge the Subcommittee to instruct the Department in the report of this legislation that diligence and substantial work on the claim include a $2,000 yearly assessment on each claim or payment in lieu. We further urge the Committee that missing one year's assessment or payment-in-lieu invalidates the claim. We would like to make clear that our participation in discussions of issues over the last several months in Colorado with oil shale claimants does not in any way affect our support for the swift passage of this legislation. In fact, we think this legislation is needed to prevent any further administrative giveaways on the remaining oil shale claims. Thank you once again for the opportunity to present the views of the Sierra Club before you today. Mr. RAHALL. Thank you, gentlemen, for your testimony and reaction to the previous proposals. You know, we could pass a bill perhaps in its current form, H.R. 643, and, as happened last year, pass it through this body and see it go over to the black hole and vanish. Do you all basically support H.R. 643, or do you think some type of compromise is necessary in order to get a bill through the other body? David, what do you think? Mr. ALBERSWERTH. Mr. Rahall, we do support H.R. 643 with the two improvements that we suggested. We would support it without those improvements, but we think that would address a couple of problems that we think could result were H.R. 643 to be implemented. You are right about the problem with the Senate. I think what is important at this time is for the House to go firmly on record, as it has in the past, in expressing the strong bipartisan desire to reform the procedures by which the Interior Department has been dealing with this oil shale issue and take another run at it in the Senate. I think this year, in particular, with Mr. Yates' support of the bill, it signals some additional opportunities that we may have in getting the attention of the Senate on this issue, and I think that those kinds of opportunities may be necessary to pursue as well. I am sure that somewhere along the line some changes may have to be made; that is normal in the course of making legislation, as you are aware. But we strongly support the passage of H.R. 643 in the House. Mr. PEARSON. If I can speak for the Sierra Club, the Sierra Club also is very much in support of H.R. 643, and we think the fact that the House is moving on it is what has really spurred some serious discussion in these negotiations back in Colorado. Without the impetus that Congress gives by the threat of action, nothing much will happen, I don't think. Mr. RAHALL. Could I ask you to submit to the subcommittee a written reaction to the Cattany, Rector, Marathon, Herr proposal that we have heard today? Would you be able to do that on behalf of the national organization, David? Mr. ALBERSWERTH. Yes, I could do that. I am not clear exactly on the request, however. Mr. RAHALL. A written response to the Cattany, Rector, Marathon, Herr proposal that was advanced today. Mr. ALBERSWERTH. Certainly. [EDITOR'S NOTE.-At time of printing, the above-mentioned written response had not been received.] Mr. RAHALL. Gentlemen, I have no further questions. Thank you very much for your testimony. That concludes today's witnesses. The subcommittee stands adjourned. [Whereupon, at 12:40 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] APPENDIX TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 1989 ADDITIONAL MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD February 27, 1989 The Honorable Nick Joe Rahall Chairman Subcommittee on Mining and Natural Resources of the House of Representatives Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs HI-819 House of Representatives Dear Chairman Rahall: I respectfully request that this letter together with my enclosed Statement and the attachments thereto, be inserted into the printed Record of your Oil Shale Hearing of February 28, 1989. In April 1988 I submitted a letter to Chairman Melcher, together with attachments thereto. These documents are in S. Hrg. 100-744, at pages 265-290. urge you and other members of your Subcommittee to review them in connection with my enclosed Statement. I Mr. William Shafer has copies of my four briefs prepared in 1962-1963. These briefs, I request, be inserted into the Record of the Subcommittee's Hearing of February 28, 1989 directly after my letter and Statement. The briefs should be arranged in order of their dates in the record. (Editor's note: --Material referred to in the last paragraph of Mr. March's letter may be found in the subcommittee's files of today's hearing.) (237) |