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Show Failure of oil shale bill in Senate analyzed (Special to the Vernal Express) By Helene C. Monberg Washington "Gary Hart does not want surface mining in Colorado oil shale country," Jeff Zabler of the Interior In-terior Department blurted out when it became certain that no off-tract leasing bill would pass in 1980. "The industry originally went along with my bill. Then some elements were not willing to see it passed. They wanted to wait for an administration that would pass a bill more to their liking," Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colo., charged. "Gulf Oil Co. and Rio Blanco Shale Co. are pushing very hard for the off-tract off-tract leasing bill. The word is out that if their people working on the bill don't get it thru, their heads will roll," Kevin Markey of Friends of the Earth, who was leading the fight against the bill stated. "Gary Hart has one constituted, Kevin Markey, "a bitter Congressional Republican staffer said, as he helplessly watched a bill, which he said both the Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Energy Committee wanted, die in the deep freeze.. All were talking about the same bill, a House-passed measure which would have allowed holders of oil shale lease tracts to lease the surface of another adjoining federally-owned tract in Colorado and in Utah to build facilities and to dispose of waste, including spent shale. The bill was reported out of the Senate Energy Committee in place of a bill by Hart. Hart retaliated by placing a "hold" on the Committee-backed bill. The bill's status then got even more complex. Altho Hart and his office were reluctant to admit it, Hart put the "hold" on the bill after Markey raised the roof about the House-passed bill being reported out of Committee. It was Markey rather than Hart who announced an-nounced the "hold" on the bill. Hart made it a double whammy. He also persuaded Sen. Dale Bumpers, D-Ark., to put a "hold" on the bill. This means that the bill could not be taken up until the bill's opponents-Hart opponents-Hart and Bumpers had an opportunity to take the Senate floor and try to amend it to their liking. Hart said, and event proved him right, that Senate Democratic Leader Robert C. Byrd, D-WVa., D-WVa., would not cut a deal to allow the bill to be taken up. Byrd was tempted. While the fair housing debate was going oh,c Sen, fcrrinj0 Hatch, ',',R-Utah, , attempted,.', offer a deal to end the debate which Byrd wanted by bringing up the off-tract off-tract leasing bill for oil shale, among other items on the Hatch wish-list. It didn't work. Sen. William L. Armstrong, R-Colo., then searched out a bill which he felt sure the Senate Democratic leadership particularly wanted, the international coffee agreement, and placed a hold on it. When angry coffee buyers called the Armstrong office, the reply was that Armstrong would take his foot off the neck of the coffee bill if the Senate Democratic leadership would bring up the oil shale bill for Senate consideration. con-sideration. It didn't happen. When it was clear that the bill would remain in the deep freeze, there was a lot of finger-pointing. The Interior Department and the Republicans and staff of the Senate Energy Committee blamed Hart. Sen. James A. McClure, R-Idaho, the Incoming chairman of the Senate Energy Committee, even put a statement in the Congressional Record asking, "What is holding up oil shale?" Republican staffers called this correspondent and said the answer was Hart & Co. Hart blamed the industry for doing a flip-flop on the bill. Jack McDonald of Tosco told this correspondent that industry never took a stand on the bill generally, own way or the other. The holders of the two Colorado oil shale tracts, primarily Gulf, Standard Oil Co. of Indiana and the Rio Blanco Oil Shale Co., were those who favored the bill when the chips were down, it developed. Altho these holders of the C-a Colorado lease tract probably would have taken the Hart bill if given no alternative, they greatly supported the alternative Committee-passed bill for two reasons, a letter from Rio Blanco's J.B. Miller, Jr., to the Senate Energy Committee, made clear. One was that the Hart bill required the lessee to pay The custom of giving gold rings as favors at 16 th century cen-tury weddings led one gentleman gentle-man to distribute rings valued at over 4,000 at the marriage mar-riage of one of his servants! When Queen Victoria wed in 1840, she ordered that rings bearing the royal profile in gold and the legend Victoria Regina be given to guests. virtually the full cost of an off-site leased tract, even tho only surface rights would be leased. And the other was that the Hart bill was limited to year 1980, thereby insuring that no other tract leased under the prototype lease program could be mined by the open-pit method. Finally, the Sierra Club thru Kevin Markey became the most effective enemy of the bill. When a deal might have been cut to bring up the bill, Markey was here, watching Hart's every move. Asked what was keeping him in Washington after the decision time appeared to have passed on the bill, Markey replied, "I'm here to keep Gary Hart honest." i..,.i...-ii.i. a in ii I I |