House Reverses Stance on Land Acquisition

Press Release

House Reverses Stance on Land Acquisition

U.S. Congressman Sam Graves voted against the Fiscal Year 2008 Interior Appropriations Bill on Wednesday because it included $205 million for new land purchases. Graves successfully fought to get rid of that funding in previous Congresses. With billions of dollars in maintenance backlogs, Graves believes the money can be better spent taking care of our past commitments.

"The federal government already owns 1 of every 5 acres in America," said Graves. "I don't see any sense in buying more land when we cannot take care of what we already own."

The federal government does not pay taxes on any land that it owns which further hurts local communities. Every acre that is taken away from counties and school districts is lost tax revenue. Counties with significant amounts of federal land in them find themselves at a disadvantage.

"This land belongs to the American people and not the federal government," said Graves. "This is another example of the federal government spending money that it doesn't need to spend."

In April of 2003, Graves introduced H.R. 1517 The Land Reinvestment Act, which would halt using federal funds for the acquisition of new lands. The federal government at that time owned 655 million acres, or 20 percent, of the nearly 2.3 billion acres of land in the United States. Graves plans to reintroduce the bill in the coming weeks.

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