Reps. Raul Grijalva and Rob Bishop agree on almost nothing, but the two came together Wednesday to back a bipartisan bill that could steer billions toward a national parks maintenance backlog that reached $11.6 billion last year.
Grijalva, a Tucson Democrat, and Bishop, a Utah Republican, unveiled the Restore Our Parks and Public Lands Act, a bill that would dedicate otherwise unallocated revenues from energy production on federal lands to be used on the backlog, which has reached $531 million in Arizona alone.
“It will not be spent on acquiring more land,” Grijalva said at a news conference Wednesday, backed by Bishop and a bipartisan group of lawmakers. “It will not be spent on maintenance operation. It will go specifically to this issue of how we solve this maintenance backlog.”
The act would provide up to $1.3 billion a year for five years, a potential total of $6.5 billion, for the newly established National Park Service and Public Lands Legacy Restoration Fund beginning in 2019. The bulk of the funds would go to the National Park Service, with smaller amounts dedicated to the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Indian Education...