During a Senate Appropriations Committee markup meeting on Thursday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) spoke about bipartisan work on the Interior and Environment Appropriations Bills.
00:00I will now turn to the subcommittee leaders to present their bills and we
00:06will begin with chair Murkowski. Thank you chair Collins and to Vice Chair Murray
00:12for keeping this important and vital appropriations process going forward. I
00:17know it's been kind of a long slog this past month there's there's just stuff
00:24that could derail a good a good process but I think your commitment and your
00:28leadership directing us has really bought it brought us to a good place so I'm
00:34very very appreciative of that as well as your continued and collective desire
00:39to proceed in a bipartisan manner with this committee and in that spirit of
00:45bipartisanship I'm really pleased to be able to be here as we're marking up the
00:51interior environment and related agencies appropriations bill and to thank my my
00:56colleague and my partner in this Senator Merkley for what I think we did with a
01:02strong thoughtful bill that can pass the Senate on a bipartisan basis this is a
01:08trust-building exercise and we have worked with one another as our staffs have and I
01:12appreciate that that greatly overall this measure includes forty one point five
01:17billion dollars for the Department of Interior the EPA the Forest Service the
01:21Indian Health Service and the arts our bill has targeted increases and strategic
01:25cuts to meet the commitments to tribes develop our resources care for our
01:30public lands fight wildfires and provide for clean air water and soil we all say
01:37that there is never a perfect bill and and ours is certainly not perfect there are
01:42things that we have included that perhaps I would not have and I think Vice
01:50Chair Murray Eric Merkley would would agree with that but there's a lot of middle ground here in
01:56constructive areas where we have chosen to focus as has been mentioned we go a long
02:02way towards fulfilling our responsibilities to Indian country with funding for the BIA the BIE and
02:09Indian Health Service we maintain the advanced appropriations for IHS we include full funding of
02:15tribal lease payments and contract support payments while we also provide some very strategic increases in
02:22the areas of law enforcement public safety and justice community and economic development health care and
02:28probate we protect our public lands I hear a lot from colleagues about the National Park Service and and
02:36making sure that the Park Service can continue to be there for for those of us throughout this country and continue to help
02:43generate hundreds of billions of dollars in annual economic output endless opportunities to enjoy the great
02:49American outdoors we also fund the USGS the Fish and Wildlife Service BLM other DOI bureaus we strike a
02:58balance between energy production conservation and recreation within the EPA accounts we provide for clean water and state revolving funds within the EPA
03:10EPA maintaining these at 2025 levels I think the cuts within the EPA account were made thoughtfully and very carefully to ensure that the agency is going to continue to provide environmental protections and remediation programs that help our states localities and tribes in their efforts to have clean air clean water and clean soil
03:30within interior we also have the arts and so we demonstrate our support for for the arts within this measure
03:37for for the arts within this measure you all know about the Smithsonian institutions the Holocaust Museum is going to see a small increase for educational programs which we think are essential at this time of rising anti-semitism and then the forest service the bill ensures forest service and DOI have the resources
03:59needed to prepare for and respond to devastating wildfires providing nearly 4 billion for suppression efforts while enabling the forest service to continue to support the timber industry and research efforts including those to manage against invasive species I think I heard from just about everybody on invasive species here
04:17we also go beyond just programmatic funding we put in place some guardrails such as incorporating detail tables by reference so we are we are at the I don't know if it's the end of the beginning or the beginning of the end but for us who have been working these interior matters for some time we are certainly one step closer to being able to advance these priorities for our country our regions and our state so I'm going to
04:47I want to thank my colleague Senator Merkley and his team Melissa Ryan Rishi and Anthony as well as my own team Daniel Sarah Aaron and Anna everybody puts in considerable work and we appreciate them greatly I would I appreciate members support of this vital measure thank you madam chair
