GOP lawmaker says federal land plan unlikely to ‘dramatically’ affect Nevada

Benjamin Grove

Thursday, April 14, 2005 | 10:59 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Nevada will likely continue to reap massive profit from sales of federal land in Clark County, a key House lawmaker said today.

The federal law that created the land-sale plan likely will not be "dramatically" altered by siphoning profit to the federal treasury, said Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., chairman of the House Resources Committee.

Pombo is still negotiating with Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., a veteran member of the panel, over possible changes to the 1998 Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act. The law created a comprehensive plan in which certain parcels of public land would be sold at auction and all profit used in Nevada: 85 percent for a special land use and protection account; 10 percent for water programs; and 5 percent for state education.

President Bush in February proposed a huge change to the act: funneling 70 percent of the land sale profits to the federal treasury to offset the deficit. White House budget officials say the nation's taxpayers deserve some share of money from federal land sales. It would take an act of Congress to change the 7-year-old law.

Nevada lawmakers have fiercely lobbied colleagues to kill the proposal, seeking to protect profit that could top $1.2 billion this year alone -- far more than original estimates.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and John Ensign, R-Nev., said they had secured enough support from their allies to thwart the proposal in the Senate.

But in the House, Pombo has shown interest in Bush's plan, without backing a specific change.

In an interview today, Pombo deflected several questions about whether he believes a certain percentage should be re-directed to the U.S. treasury.

But he said he expected that in the end, Nevada will continue to reap about "the same amount of money."

"It's a lot more than anyone originally anticipated, but you have to be fair to Nevada in this," Pombo said in an interview. "The federal government owns most of Nevada. They are at a disadvantage because of that, and I think anything we work out has to hold Nevada harmless."

In their discussions, Pombo has not signaled to Gibbons that Pombo intends to support an amendment that would direct a percentage of profit away from Nevada, Gibbons said.

"He's not telling me anything," Gibbons said. "I am telling him. I'm the one driving this train."

Gibbons added, "One hundred percent will stay in Nevada -- that's our goal,"

Gibbons acknowledged Pombo had not guaranteed him of that.

"He's got his own work to do," Gibbons said.

If any changes are made to the law, it is likely to be an amendment that would increase the percentage of money used for education from 5 percent to more like 35 percent, Gibbons said.

"This would be one of the first times that growth would start to pay for growth," Gibbons said.

Neither Pombo nor Gibbons could say when exactly when they might agree on a possible change to the law.