It doesn't come down in Ohio. It comes down in Connecticut and New York. Western lawmakers vow to block funds for Columbia basin project Key Western Republicans warned the Clinton administration that they will block money to implement a sweeping ecosystem management plan they fear will restrict logging and livestock grazing in the Columbia River watershed. I once was a supporter. The region is home to a number of endangered and threatened species, including chinook and sockeye salmon and grizzlies.
Costs are significant.
But we feel strongly that the investment has been necessary to set the course for long-term sustainable ecosystem health, and the resultant support to people,communities and cultures. But administration officials said the overall impact would be added flexibility for federal land managers at the local level to carry out traditional commercial activities while still protecting fish and wildlife, including some salmon species on the brink of extinction. Logging levels would be smaller than the annual average over the last 10 years for the region, but large than the past three years, and stabilize over time, they said. Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash., a member of the House Appropriation Committee, said Congress never authorized the project that President Clinton ordered in 1993. That brings the grant program, launched in November 1993 to help local governments assess property contamination, to a total of 113 sites.