The New House Starts Work; President Bush's Call for Energy Independence

House Completes 100-Hour Agenda with Time to Spare—With passage on January 18 of legislation to curb tax breaks for conventional oil and natural gas exploration and development, the U.S. House of Representatives completed the 100-hour agenda crafted by the Democratic majority. According to Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, the House passed all elements of the agenda ranging from ethics reform to a minimum wage increase to Medicare prescription drugs in less than 50 legislative hours.

The final measure concerning energy also attempts to address a complex issue associated with royalty payments on production from the Gulf of Mexico. In the late 1990s, when oil and gas prices were historically low, the Department of Interior issued leases that waived royalty payments in an effort to spur domestic production. However, the Department mistakenly failed to include provisions requiring royalties to be paid if oil and gas prices increased above a certain level. Following the dramatic increase in crude prices over the past few years, the Department has attempted to renegotiate some of those leases to require payments once again. To date, leading oil companies have either failed to come to the table or unreasonably delayed renegotiation. The House-passed bill attempts to pressure companies to negotiate in good faith by imposing hefty fees on production from leases that are not renegotiated and by barring recalcitrant companies from bidding on future leases. Under the bill, all revenue generated by reducing certain tax breaks and through royalty payments and fees would be directed to a special Treasury account and used to fund alternative energy development authorized by subsequent legislation.

Speaker Pelosi Proposes Creating Special Climate Change Committee—On January 18, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) proposed creating a special House committee on climate change and energy independence. The Speaker explained that one of the goals of this action is to provide a single forum to discuss the myriad issues related to these subjects. The Speaker also made clear that this committee will not have authority to write legislation—that job will remain with standing committees with jurisdiction over energy, air quality, science, and technology. Although many view this as a positive development, some senior members of Congress, including Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, have expressed concern that it will be unnecessarily duplicative of existing committees. Senate leaders have indicated that that body will address climate and energy issues through existing committees.
 
ASLA Supports Shift in Agriculture Policy—On January 22, ASLA joined more than 350 national, regional, and local groups in calling for key reforms across federal agriculture, conservation, and rural development policy. Those reforms are described in "Seeking Balance in U.S. Farm and Food Policy," which has been developed by a broad coalition led by the American Farmland Trust. Among other things, this statement calls for shifting a portion of the federal dollars from traditional commodity production to innovative conservation, economic development, sustainable agriculture, and small farm initiatives. "Seeking Balance" provides a framework for organizing efforts to modernize and diversify federal agriculture policy as Congress begins a year-long effort to rewrite the Farm Bill.

State of the Union Speech Highlights Energy Independence—In his sixth State of the Union speech last Tuesday, President Bush called for action on a number of proposals that could reduce America’s dependence on fossil fuels. Among other things, the president set a goal of reducing projected gasoline consumption by 20 percent over 10 years and indicated his support for increasing the average fuel economy standards of cars and light trucks. The president also called on Congress to pass legislation to require oil companies to use 35 billion gallons of renewable and alternative fuels by 2017. This strategy would rely heavily on dramatically increasing corn-based ethanol production. Congress is almost certain to place significant focus on energy issues over the coming year, including during development of the 2007 Farm Bill and stand-alone energy policy legislation. The president’s proposals could be considered during this debate.

Scott Kovarovics is Manager of Federal Government Affairs for the American Society of Landscape Architects, skovarovics@asla.org.  For more information about ASLA’s federal policy priorities, please read the Federal Government Affairs column.