House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) today issued subpoenas to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for documents they have failed to produce as part of the Committee’s oversight into the Obama Administration’s decision to retroactively subject 2012 Secure Rural School (SRS) payments to the fiscal year 2013… Read more »

A Wyoming first: No bids for coal mining tract in Powder River Basin By Laura Hancock At 10 a.m. on Wednesday, U.S. Bureau of Land Management employees in Cheyenne gathered to unseal envelopes containing bids and checks from coal companies hoping to score the rights to dig in the Powder River Basin. But there were no envelopes to open. No companies bid on the coal lease, said BLM… Read more »

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) and Subcommittee on Water and Power Chairman Tom McClintock (CA-04) sent a letter to Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell highlighting the lack of transparency surrounding the National Blueways Program and seeking answers to critical questions that the Obama Administration has continually refused to answer. This letter… Read more »

Today, the House Natural Resources Subcommittee held a legislative hearing on H.R. 2824, the Preventing Government Waste and Protecting Coal Mining Jobs in America Act, legislation to protect American jobs, save taxpayer dollars, and support U.S. energy production by stopping the Obama Administration from imposing coal regulations that would cost thousands of American jobs and devastate… Read more »

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) and Water and Power Subcommittee Chairman Tom McClintock (CA-04) today applauded the Senate passage of H.R. 678, the Bureau of Reclamation Small Conduit Hydropower Development and Rural Jobs Act, which would create new American jobs and by authorizing more production of clean, renewable hydropower and eliminating bureaucratic… Read more »

Today, the House Natural Resources Committee held an oversight hearing on “Transparency and Sound Science Gone Extinct?:The Impacts of the Obama Administration's Closed-Door Settlements on Endangered Species and People.” The hearing examined the need for data transparency as it relates to federal decisions on implementing the Endangered Species Act (ESA). This hearing was part of a… Read more »

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) today sent a letter to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) Director Dan Ashe seeking additional information following the Department of the Interior Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) Management Advisory, issued on July 11, 2013, regarding the FWS’s inaction on whistleblower complaints related to violations of the… Read more »

Today, the House Natural Resources Committee passed H.R. 1526, the “Restoring Healthy Forest for Healthy Communities Act” by a voice vote. This legislation renews the federal government’s commitment to manage federal forests for the benefit of rural schools and counties, improves forest health and helps prevent catastrophic wildfires. “Across our country, rural forest communities… Read more »

Today, the House Natural Resources Committee approved H.R. 2728, the Protecting States’ Rights to Promote American Energy Security Act by a bipartisan vote of 23-15. This bill, authored by Rep. Bill Flores (TX-17), would protect American jobs and American energy production by limiting the Obama Administration’s ability to impose duplicative regulations on hydraulic fracturing on federal… Read more »

Yesterday, the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water and Power held a field hearing in West Plains, Missouri on “Stopping Federal Land and Water Grabs: Protecting Property Rights from Washington, DC Edicts.” The hearing examined the harmful effects of the Obama Administration’s National Blueways Order that imposes a unilateral federal watershed designation process with… Read more »