Kent Conrad: “I rise today to offer an amendment to H.R. 3759, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations legislation. My amendment…”

“I rise today to offer an amendment to H.R. 3759, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations legislation. My amendment would repeal certain provisions of the Three Affiliated Tribes and Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Equitable Compensation Act--title 35, Public Law 102-575. The Equitable Compensation Act was enacted into law on October 30, 1992, after many years of hard work and careful negotiation. The primary purpose of this legislation was to correct a historic injustice by compensating two Indian tribes for land they lost to the Garrison and Oahe dam projects in the 1940's. To accomplish this, the act establishes two economic recovery trust funds, worth a total of $240 million, from which the tribes will be able to draw future interest payments for such purposes as economic development, education, health care improvement, or environmental management. Secondary provisions in the act provide that excess Government lands purchased for construction of the reservoirs be sold back to former owners or their heirs. While this remains a worthwhile goal, the Federal agencies responsible for administering the sale of lands estimate the procedure will cost nearly $21 million, over five times the estimated value of the land involved. As I am sure you will agree, it would be impossible to justify spending that amount of money to return land worth so much less. Pursuing this land return would be particularly irresponsible in light of our current Federal budget crisis.”