Sam Gibbons: “This amendment simply is a small technical amendment which changes a phrase on page 14, line 14, to add the word…”

“This amendment simply is a small technical amendment which changes a phrase on page 14, line 14, to add the word ``surface'' to ``water rights,'' and let me explain by way of this. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department, the Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs are buying and acquiring water rights in a specific location in the Lahontan Valley for the stillwater wildlife and for preservation of an endangered species fish. They are buying property with surface water rights attached to them so that they can acquire the water right, then take away the water right and resell the land. The language in the bill itself provides that the Secretary cannot sell any water rights attached to the land when he puts it back up for resale after his acquisition, after taking the surface water rights away. All we want to do is reassure the folks, and we have a letter from the Secretary of the Interior to this effect, that he does not object to this proposal, that what they are selling is not land without any water.”