MS. WILLCOX. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman.

I am Louisa Willcox, and I am program director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, which is based in Bozeman, Montana. We are comprised of more than 90 local, regional, and national conservation organizations as well as 4,500 individuals committed to the long-term protection of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, which is considered the largest intact temperate zone ecosystem on the face of the earth that remains today.

We and our members are deeply concerned about the legacy of environmental degradation in this land of superlatives, which is in part the product of hard rock mining activities under the direction of the 1872 Mining Law. It is a legacy that we fear will continue unless we tear down the walls to use your expression, Congressman Rahall-unless we tear down the walls of the 1872 Mining Law and build a new system, and this new system for Yellowstone must include a clear Federal authority to deny mining activities if they don't serve the greater public interest, in our case of protecting national treasures such as Yellowstone Park. H.R. 918 begins to construct such a system.

I want to go back and give a little context on Yellowstone and Greater Yellowstone and talk about a few of our problems and then get to the question that you raised earlier, Congressman Rahall, of how and under what conditions to just say no, which you had asked previously.

The integrity of Greater Yellowstone is really measured by abundance, abundance of wildlife, such as our big herds and great bear, as well as the abundance and quality of our waters, which includes the headwaters of the three major drainages of the west. The headwaters are the lifeblood of the agricultural, industrial, and municipal development in the surrounding States, and they also are necessary to replenish our magnificent geysers. I will get back to water in a minute.

Indeed, the watersheds, wildlife, and the beauty of our ecosystem are really the lifeblood of the economy of the region, and it is an economy that our analysis of available State data and census figures show is responsible for 70 percent of the jobs and most of the income in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. These are tied directly or indirectly to the amenity resources and ultimately to the health of Greater Yellowstone.

We show in our testimony that mining contributes presently very little to the economy of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Even in counties considered big mining counties, such as Park County, Montana, for example, mining provided 2.2 percent of the income in 1988, and yet we have cases in Park County where mining practices and abandoned mines have caused serious environmental damage which cuts right into those amenity resources that are our lifeblood for our economy and, indeed, for Greater Yellowstone ecologically.

In our testimony, we talk about 650 abandoned mines in Greater Yellowstone, which have been inventoried, which have not yet been addressed, and we also talk about poor reclamation examples where water quality, fisheries, and even human health and safety have been affected, and you yourself, Congressman, have taken a trip and seen some of the reclamation problems that we have in