Congratulations, Steve and Scott, who have worked very hard on moving this issues forward.

 -----Original Message-----
From: 	Burns, Stephen  
Sent:	Friday, November 09, 2001 8:21 AM
To:	Robertson, Linda; Shapiro, Richard
Cc:	Bolton, Scott; Petrochko, Mona L.; Reyna, Margo; Hartsoe, Joe; Bagot, Nancy; Soldano, Louis; McGee, Johnny
Subject:	HR 3258 - "Reasonable Right-of-Way Fee Act of 2001" introduced

Yesterday Congresswoman Barbara Cubin (R-WY) introduced HR 3258, the Reasonable Right-of-Way Fee Act of 2001.  She introduced this Bill with the strong backing of TelROW (which we chair), as well as several western Democratic and Republican Members of the House who we expect to sign on as co-sponsors in the coming weeks.

Additionally, the bill has the strong support of Congressman George Radanovich (R-CA) who chairs the oversight subcommittee in the House through which this legislations will need to move.

This was an important step in our two year effort to reign in the BLM and US Forest Service's attempts to charge commerce-based ROW fees on our fiber optic and pipeline networks.  It sends the strongest possible message from Congress to the land management agencies that ROW fees need to based on value of the land, and not any "highest and best use" theories or appraisal methodologies.  The Bill will also frame the debate going into next year, during which we expect both a rule making to begin at the BLM, as well as a hearing to be called on this issue by Chairman Radanovich who has promised to hold the agencies accountable.

Attached is the text of the Bill as it was being introduced.

Steve Burns

 << File: CUBIN_018.PDF >>