Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 114 Part 2.djvu/970

 114 STAT. 1608 PUBLIC LAW 106-393—OCT. 30, 2000 Sec. 503. Amendment of the Mineral Leasing Act. TITLE VI—COMMUNITY FOREST RESTORATION Sec. 601. Short title. Sec. 602. Findings. Sec. 603. Purposes. Sec. 604. Definitions. Sec. 605. Establishment of program. Sec. 606. Selection process. Sec. 607. Monitoring and evaluation. , Sec. 608. Report. Sec. 609. Authorization of appropriations. 16 USC 500 note. SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSES. (a) FINDINGS,—The Congress finds the following: (1) The National Forest System, which is managed by the United States Forest Service, was established in 1907 and has grown to include approximately 192,000,000 acres of Federal lands. (2) The public domain lands known as revested Oregon and California Railroad grant lands and the reconveyed Coos Bay Wagon Road grant lands, which are managed predominantly by the Bureau of Land Management were returned to Federal ownership in 1916 and 1919 and now comprise approximately 2,600,000 acres of Federal lands. (3) Congress recognized that, by its decision to secure these lands in Federal ownership, the counties in which these lands are situated would be deprived of revenues they would otherwise receive if the lands were held in private ownership. (4) These same counties have expended public funds year after year to provide services, such as education, road construc- , tion and maintenance, search and rescue, law enforcement, waste removal, and fire protection, that directly benefit these Federal lands and people who use these lands. (5) To accord a measure of compensation to the affected counties for the critical services they provide to both county residents and visitors to these Federal lands. Congress determined that the Federal Government should share with these counties a portion of the revenues the United States receives from these Federal lands. (6) Congress enacted in 1908 and subsequently amended a law that requires that 25 percent of the revenues derived from National Forest System lands be paid to States for use by the counties in which the lands are situated for the benefit of public schools and roads. (7) Congress enacted in 1937 and subsequently amended a law that requires that 75 percent of the revenues derived from the revested and reconveyed grant lands be paid to the counties in which those lands are situated to be used as are other county funds, of which 50 percent is to be used as other county funds. (8) For several decades primarily due to the growth of the Federal timber sale program, counties dependent on and supportive of these Federal lands received and relied on increasing shares of these revenues to provide funding for schools and road maintenance. (9) In recent years, the principal source of these revenues. Federal timber sales, has been sharply curtailed and, as the volume of timber sold annually from most of the Federal lands

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