During a House Appropriations Committee hearing before the congressional recess, Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN) questioned Interior Secretary Doug Burgum about reservation oversight.
00:00Well, and thank you for your service as well, but a great idea on the air support because in these big areas, whether it's unmanned or manned, this can be super helpful tools, and we've got the technology to deploy in these large areas.
00:13We need to do it.
00:15Thank you, and just to follow, if I could, on that, with these, we held some hearings on murdered and missing indigenous peoples, and the challenge we have is after listening to all the testimony,
00:28we had the FBI come in and testimony, give us testimony from the agents and stuff.
00:35Some of the problems we found is that if you have a reservation the size of Connecticut and you've got two officers on patrol, you get a domestic violence call, it's two hours later before you can get there, it's over.
00:47So we've got to do something about that, and that's what we're trying to address, but the biggest issue is jurisdictional issues between the state, the feds, the local law enforcement.
00:58Somehow we've got to resolve, if you ever read a chapter on Indian rights and so forth, when you get to law enforcement, it is crazy because it is different if you are an Indian on a reservation or if you're an Indian off a reservation or if you are a non-tribal member that's an Indian on that reservation.
01:15It becomes a joke trying to figure it out.
01:17Anyway, Ms. McCollum.
01:18Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the discussion on our tribal sisters who have suffered.
01:29Senator Kateri-Bergen, I had a kickoff at the defense meeting, but I did read your testimony.
01:35It's good to see you as the family from Oaks, North Dakota, spending time in Williston and Sydney, Montana.
01:44I know where the trains run on time and where they change the time in Mandan.
01:52Through no fault of your own, we're working with a great disadvantage here because we're trying to discuss the budget without any details.
02:00We're still trying to put it together.
02:01We did get a skinny budget, and then it has a 30.5% cut to the Department of Interior, which I think, speaking for myself, being a former chair with other former chairs sitting here, we think deserves a whole lot more money for the work and the job that we have to do.
02:19So to see a cut is really disappointing for us.
02:26We're trying to do things, many of the things that we talked about here, schools, law enforcement, clean water, having the personnel out there to work locally.
02:36So right now you're also finalizing plans to lay off thousands of employees through the department.
02:42We're still trying to figure out what DOGE did do, didn't do, can do, cannot do.
02:47So you've got a lot on your plate trying to figure out what we do to keep public employees where they need to be, providing the services that our constituents are demanding from us.
03:00Cutting park operations, you know well, you mentioned it, fewer park rangers to keep our visitors safe.
03:06To do the education that we need to do with the next generation about how important our natural resources are.
03:13And then there's just less maintenance of trails and national landmarks and that.
03:17The people go to visit the great state of North Dakota.
03:21I'll throw South Dakota in there just to keep everything good in the five-state area.
03:26Just to see what's happening.
03:28And it's those personal connections.
03:30One of the things that I found really alarming is the 39% cut to the U.S. Geological Survey.
03:37That's the scientific backbone of your department, the flow of water, water that sustains life, water that sustains our economy, whether it's crops.
03:47And then water, as we well know with what happened at Fargo-Moorhead, it's still fresh in everybody's mind if you're around there, what happens when there's floods.
03:53So I hope, Mr. Chair, that as we have a little more money coming our way, that we don't forget the U.S. Geological Survey.
04:05Well, they propose, we dispose.
04:11And then, so this is perfect.
04:14Leads into what Chairman Cole was saying about making sure that there's money for historic preservation.
04:18So the cuts of $900 million from Tribal Nation's public safety school infrastructure, you heard it.
04:26I just have to reiterate, we're very, very concerned about that.
04:31So, as I said, we haven't seen much of your budget.
04:34So let me turn to something that isn't budgetary, which I normally don't do in this committee.
04:39I'm going to have my staff hand you a letter.
04:42This letter was sent on April 8th by me and other members of the Minnesota delegation.
04:48It is, and I can imagine how many letters you have, and maybe this one wasn't at the tip top of the first pile that was on your desk.
04:58The Mississippi National River Recreation Area was established by Congress in 1988 as a partnership park.
05:05MINRA, as it's called, and the Park Service, they work with 25 local governments, state and tribal nations,
05:10and other partner organizations to conserve, interpret, and manage a 72-mile stretch of America's greatest river, the Mississippi River,
05:18also a working river.
05:21It incorporates local parks, like the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, named after my friend and predecessor,
05:27who sponsored the MINRA organization.
05:30Earlier this year, Elon Musk directed GSA to cancel the leases for the park's operational headquarters
05:36in its only visitor center, located in the lobby of the Science Museum of Minnesota.
05:42Roughly 230,000 visitors last year learned about the biology, the history, and the culture of the Mississippi River
05:48from park rangers through interactive exhibits, including, and I threw a couple of photos in there,
05:54like a flying eagle and how to tie off a barge, something I didn't learn how to do growing up in South St. Paul
06:00on the Mississippi River, but I can tell you it's hard work from trying to do it at the interpretive center.
06:06MINRA is the only park service unit with the mission of interpreting the Mississippi River,
06:12our nation's river that everybody knows how to spell in this country,
06:16and people all around the world know how to spell it.
06:20The Great River's ecological and economic importance to our nation.
06:23But here's the other thing, not only do a lot of urban visitors visit that park,
06:31but people come from all over the five-state area, as you know, to go to that history center.
06:37That's where park rangers are telling them about the grasslands,
06:40Theater of Roosevelt National Park, what's going on in Michigan, in the Great Lakes area.
06:45So it is a huge bang for the National Park Service's buck to be in that in the Science Museum.
06:55So we understand that the MINRA leases are no longer on DOCHA's list,
07:01but we haven't received any official response to my letter yet.
07:05So can we talk about this some more?
07:08Can we meet with other members on this before any further decisions are made about MINRA's future
07:15and losing that one interpretive center in the Twin Cities, you know, because it's the Dakota's, it's Iowa,
07:26it's our cousins from Canada who come down there, all in there being exposed to the Park Service.
07:31I love MINRA, but I love the Park Service even more.
07:34So can we work with your office on this?
07:36Well, yes, we can, and your information matches mine,
07:40which is that these two leases that you're discussing in the letter are off the list.
07:44And so I'm anticipating that we'll have communication confirming that with you.
07:49We've tried to also work both in the St. Corsinic River and on the Mississippi River
07:54to try to get not grandiose monuments to anybody, but to have more Park Service interpretation in that.
08:03And we also need to find a better lease space for MINRA and that that's more on the river.
08:09The last thing I would add is when we were talking about law enforcement picking things up,
08:14I just for the record want to say how grateful I am to the St. Croix Sheriff's Department
08:20for the work that they do on the St. Croix River, because between us and Wisconsin,
08:25there's no other law enforcement first response out there for boaters on the scenic river.
08:30So we try to be a good partner.
08:33We look forward to being an even better partner with you in the future.
08:36Well, I appreciate that.
08:37And I would say when our kids were younger, our favorite camping spot in Minnesota
08:42was the headwaters of the Mississippi up at Itasca, beautiful place.
08:48And when they were younger, they'd been to the science museum, so I've been there with them as well.
08:52And I've also boated in the recreation area.
08:54I've got a sister and a nephew that live in the Twin Cities.
08:57So I understand exactly what you're talking about.
09:00I think the larger principle for this committee when we're saying we need more money for law enforcement,
09:07we need more money for school construction, one thing we maybe need less money for is federal office space.
09:13I mean, we have got so much office space in this country.
09:16And in some cases, we need it.
09:18Some places, it's a prime location, like in this case in the middle of the science museum.
09:21But we've got to, and particularly with the capability for people to effectively work remotely,
09:27or if we want to get more people out on the front lines, you know, more people on a patrol boat,
09:30less people sitting in an office, we have to look at that balance.
09:34And I think that it's the same for every state.
09:36I saw this in North Dakota.
09:38I mean, a little state like North Dakota, when I came there, I said, how much space do we have?
09:41Nobody knew.
09:42It wasn't on a balance sheet.
09:43It turns out we had 24 million square feet of space in little old North Dakota.
09:47And I'm like, do we need that much?
09:48No.
09:49Well, if you can get rid of, consolidate leases, renegotiate leases, do things like that.
09:53And in many cases, the federal government right now,
09:57with the collapse in demand for commercial space coming out of COVID,
10:01the fact that if things were on that list, it didn't mean that we were getting rid of it.
10:05It meant, is there an opportunity to renegotiate a list?
10:07When we renegotiate a lease, when we do that,
10:09that frees up the dollars to spend on the stuff that all of us want to do.
10:12So it is smart for every department to be taking a look at their cost of space
10:20because that's probably an area where we can save without affecting services to our citizens.
10:25It's Minneapolis-St. Paul, but I'm from St. Paul, and we're here to help you.
