WASHINGTON, D.C. — As the U.S. House prepares to vote on a year-end omnibus bill partially intended to fund the government through the upcoming fiscal year, one member of West Virginia’s delegations does not support it.
First District Congressman David McKinley said on Wednesday’s “Talkline” that there isn’t enough in the package legislation to prop up the struggling coal industry.
“We were hoping and intending to use this omnibus legislation as a vehicle to perhaps thwart or roll back some of those concerns so that our coal miners, our families, our businesses could have some certainty.”
His frustrations with the lack of any pro-coal language in the 2,009-page bill handed out early Wednesday morning led to the congressman’s decision to not support it in the current form.
“We don’t have anything on coal ash in here, we don’t have anything on the stream buffer rule that we were promised to have in there, we don’t have anything on that coal miners pension and health care bill that we were working with, we tried to get some riders involving the Clean Power Plan. None of that got into it.”
Negotiations over the bill, which includes the $1.1 trillion stopgap funding measure, have gone on for weeks –a deadline was missed last week, causing the need for a resolution regarding temporary funding– as lawmakers argue over what should and should not be included in the bill.
With so many ideas being tossed into a metaphorical ring to fight for a place in the legislation, McKinley admitted there are some positives, such as the increase in funding for fossil fuel research.
“There are some good things,” he said. “That’s the art of the compromise.”
However, there are not enough positives with the bill in it’s current form for McKinley.
Before the vote on Friday, there is still time for amendments to be offered in a final effort to include items left out previously.
An amendment intended to block the Stream Buffer Rule’s application to underground mines will be offered by McKinley Wednesday.
The rule expands on legislation first enacted back in 1983 by keeping all mining activities 100-feet away from a stream for the purpose of protecting water supplies.
Opponents claim it will eliminate surface mining all together and is unnecessary for underground mines.
“We’re not going to fight the fight on the surface mines, but why would they extend a stream protection on underground mines,” McKinley asked. “Essentially, 300, 400, 500 feet all the way down 1,000 feet below the stream you can’t mine the coal out from underneath that stream? That’s absurd.”
The fate of the omnibus bill is still in the air as representatives work to go through the complete text, and with so much involved, McKinley is not sure it will have bipartisan support.
“I think it’s going to wind up the majority of the members of the House could very well be voting against it, or at least the Republicans,” he said.
The full omnibus bill can be found here.