Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 120.djvu/1382

 PUBLIC LAW 109–294—OCT. 3, 2006

120 STAT. 1351

Public Law 109–294 109th Congress An Act To authorize the Secretary of the Interior to provide technical and financial assistance to private landowners to restore, enhance, and manage private land to improve fish and wildlife habitats through the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Partners for Fish and Wildlife Act’’. SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSE.

Oct. 3, 2006 [S. 260]

Partners for Fish and Wildlife Act. 16 USC 3771 note.

16 USC 3771.

(a) FINDINGS.—Congress finds that— (1) approximately 60 percent of fish and wildlife in the United States are on private land; (2) it is imperative to facilitate private landowner-centered and results-oriented efforts that promote efficient and innovative ways to protect and enhance natural resources; (3) there is no readily available source of technical biological information that the public can access to assist with the application of state-of-the-art techniques to restore, enhance, and manage fish and wildlife habitats; (4) a voluntary cost-effective program that leverages public and private funds to assist private landowners in the conduct of state-of-the-art fish and wildlife habitat restoration, enhancement, and management projects is needed; (5) durable partnerships working collaboratively with willing private landowners to implement on-the-ground projects has lead to the reduction of endangered species listings; (6) Executive Order No. 13352 (69 Fed. Reg. 52989) directs the Departments of the Interior, Agriculture, Commerce, and Defense and the Environmental Protection Agency to pursue new cooperative conservation programs involving the collaboration of Federal, State, local, and tribal governments, private for-profit and non-profit institutions, non-governmental entities, and individuals; (7) since 1987, the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program has exemplified cooperative conservation as an innovative, voluntary partnership program that helps private landowners restore wetland and other important fish and wildlife habitat; and (8) through 33,103 agreements with private landowners, the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program has accomplished the restoration of 677,000 acres of wetland, 1,253,700 acres

VerDate 14-DEC-2004

13:05 Jul 12, 2007

Jkt 059194

PO 00002

Frm 00095

Fmt 6580

Sfmt 6581

E:\PUBLAW\PUBL002.109

APPS06

PsN: PUBL002

�