Rural America Solutions Group Co-Chairs Ask Committee Chairmen for Hearings on Federal Power Grab of Clean Water Act Read more »

Drug Cartel Activity Threatens Texas Water Supplies, Lawmaker Says June 21, 2010 FOXNews.com Joshua Rhett Miller Drug cartel activity along the Mexican border presents serious security threats to the area's water supply system, particularly on federally-owned lands in southern Texas, a U.S. lawmaker says. Members of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water and Power held a… Read more »

Border Patrol Charged Millions for Habitat Damage, Republicans Say Enough 'Extortion' June 21, 2010 FOXNews.com Judson Berger Republican lawmakers are calling on the Interior Department to stop charging what they describe as "extortion" money from the Border Patrol -- millions of under-the-radar dollars meant to cover environmental damage stemming from their everyday duties along the… Read more »

Border Patrol Navigating Reams of Regulation to Secure Federal Land June 18, 2010 FOXNews.com Border Patrol agents must navigate a patchwork of environmental regulations dating back decades in order to police for drug cartels, smugglers and illegal immigrants -- often on foot-and-horseback in some of the most vulnerable areas of the southwest border. Border Patrol agents must… Read more »

House Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member Doc Hastings (WA-04) today sent a letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar regarding the recent, abrupt and unexplained Department of Interior (DOI) notice that the distribution of Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) funds would be delayed until “late July.” Nearly 2000 counties in 49 states that are due to be paid their PILT funds in June of… Read more »

Today the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water and Power held a hearing on H.R. 4719, a bill to establish a Southwest Border Region Water Task Force to assess the water supply needs of the region. As part of the hearing, the Subcommittee heard that drug cartel activity along the U.S./Mexican border presents major threats to water infrastructure, including the federally owned… Read more »

Hastings Sends Letter to DOI Secretary Salazar Calling for Answers Over Unexplained Delay in Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) Distribution Read more »

Federal Regs on Environment May Be Hindering Border Security, Lawmakers Say FOXNews.com June 16, 2010 Federal environmental regulations that prevent border agents from expanded patrols of national wildlife parks appear to have had a hand in the government's decision to declare an 80-mile stretch of Arizona-Mexico border a virtual no-man's land. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has… Read more »

The Roughneck's Lament New York Times Rob Harris & Tom Zeller Jr. June 11, 2010 Click here to watch If President Obama's drilling moratorium lasts six months, many oil rigs will leave the Gulf of Mexico, probably for years, leaving workers in the local oil industry scared and frustrated. # # # Print version of this document Read more »

The House Natural Resource Committee today approved, with favorable recommendation, a Resolution of Inquiry (H. Res. 1406) introduced by Ranking Member Doc Hastings and National Parks, Forest and Public Lands Subcommittee Ranking Member Rob Bishop to direct the Department of Interior to turn over to Congress the missing pages and related documents of an “internal memo” detailing plans to… Read more »