president's all of the above energy strategy. i also appreciate where the energies is found is not necessary where the demand is. it requires moving energy in many cases, particularly in the west, across public lands, so i look forward to balancing the interest of transmission with the other competing interest that the rareas agencies are dealing with in many cases fulfilling their commitment under the laws of this body that are passed from the fish and wildlife service to the b.o. it is complicated. i look forward to doing so. >> we'll need your help to develop the renewables onshore and off. it is going to take, you know, that infrastructure and again, your agencies going to have to be creative in helping us get it done. it which is unthing to say we want it. it is another thing to do it. >> i understand. you are committed? >> yes, sir. >> the last question i will shift to the water project. in our state, we have congressionally-authorized

water project. it has been authorized for quite some time that would actually bring water to the missouri river to the red river valley to the larger communitiesment we have gone through the process at length but we still need to complete the record of decision, the record of decision. will you look into this? will you help me work through the bureaucracy to complete that, again, it has been congressionally authorized, but we still have to go through all of the bureaucratic steps to get the record of decision. i believe the dor is supportive. will you work with me to look into it to see if we can get the record of decision signed which would come to you? >> i would happy to be work walk on that. >> thank you. >> again, thank you for coming by my office as well. >> while the senator from north did a cotes here. i would like to take note of the fact that in our first hearing on gas and i referenced

a couple of times in the course of the morning. i was particularly struck by the question that's the senator from north dakota gave to francis who is a renown environmentalist at the natural resources defense council. if you looked that dialogue, as you prepare for the discussion, between people and the energy field and the environment, particularly on the question of fracking. i really came away from that discussion between the senator from north did a deet and the senator was w a sense this is not a bee debate for the fainthearted. think this is something we can get done. thank the senator from are north did a coat tat for your comment. >> you had a long morning. as you can tell, there is enormous in frommests. the senators who have remained would like to spend a few more minutes. i think with your leave, maybe we'll try to confine it to one more question from the senators who remain. that is. >> absolutely. >> all right.

i wanted to ask you if i might, i will give you a question about the writing as you know. >> okay. >> the department has been involved. the department trying to bring the parties together. i want to ask about forestry which is important to our state. on the east side of oregon, i have been able to put together an agreement between the timber industry and the environmental community for the sixth national forest on the east side. even before the bill has been enacted into law, the industry has told me that the cut has gone up, litigation has gone down. and the environmental community feels comfortable with the kind of collaboration going on. that of course is a forest service effort on the east side. that is outside of your province. the reason i bring it up is the reason it is working on the east side is we have been able to actually build trust between the timber industry and the

environmental community, as you you know, that is the coin of the rm in this whole discussion about natural resources. the past proposals that have been brought up on the west side of oregon, which is involving, of course, the owens land, have not been able to build that same kind of trust between the timber industry and envirnlal folks, and so things have really, it has been impossible to really move forward. so i am making that a special priority and those lands, those owen sea lands are in your province. that is something that is in the jurisdiction of the department of interior. and we are really looking at what amounts to a dual track on the west side. one is we have got to get the timber cut up. we think that can be done consistent with the environmental laws, and certainly for the next, at least a year, we are going to need, as we look at long-term

approaches, some bridge funding, particularly for the secure rural, that was not in our schools, roads and police will be flattened. so i will ask you one question on the issue of getting the timber cut up on the west side in particular, the timber industry tells me that there is a problem with the bureau of land management and the way protests sales are being addressed on the west side. in effect, you got timber sales being protested, the blm fails to address them, and there is a focus on planning some additional new sales. so then a lot of this process just goes to an appeals process. the interior board of listened appeals, the industry says the projects, in effect, just go to die. there is no decision made. what happens is we are sort of in a no machine's land. we got the worst of all worlds. we are not getting the timber cut. we are hot getting the saw logs

to the mills. it is kind of this employment program in the appeals process. it is just seems to me that we ought to be able to do both. we ought to be able to address the protest and move forward with new sales and i would just like to have you're surance. i don't think it reflect well on the agency either to not be able to deal with protests as well as new sales. i would just like you're surance that this will be something that you will get into early on because without it, we are not going to be able to get the cutup which is essential with all the economic hurt in these communities and i think it is going to make people feel less confident even with respect to the short term need which is to pass the secure rural schools extension for autolesion a period of time. can you assure me that you will

make this priority early on? >> senator, i appreciate from being northwest the importance of timber on the rural community, the school funding, and also in keeping the mills operating with reliable source of timber and if there is a great example on the eastern side of the state that we can learn were. i look forward to work back the colleagues and you to do a good job of meeting the needs that you expressed. >> just understand, and i appreciate that, they are different. the east side, of course, the forest service and your lands, of course, are checkerboardses so they are different. what has been built on the east side is trust between the timber industry and the environmental community, and that is why we are already seeing good results. we don't have that trust on the west side. so i appreciate your willingness to follow up on that early on. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

>> the interior department is just now, well, they they are finishing up in one area, and in as were sense the other. these involve two land planning efforts in alaska. they just finished the national petroleum reserve alas cass, the npra plan, and they are close to finishing a revised plan within the national wildlife refuge. they call for 52% of the nation's largest petroleum reserve in the protected status while the plan which is again currently in calls for may wilderness to the 8 million acres of the 17 million-acre refuge that is classified as wilderness. theration 1980 interest lands conservation act contained within is a provision that effectively precludes the administration from declaring major new conservation areas

unalaska. we reforethis as the nomar clause. but both of these plans that are in process now's fekively create new wilderness without the reck sit congressional approval for the deck rigs, so i ask you you that you would respect the 1980 alaska lands act as it relates to the nomar clause when it says that alaska has basically given. we have more wilderness in the state of alaska than in all of the other states combined, so my ask to you is to respect the 1980 law, now in keeping with the chairman's requests that we limit the last to one question, i would ask in view of your comments to senator scott, when he talked about offshore expiration tunes up in south carolina, your response to senator landrieu's comments about activities in the

offshore and the gulf of mexico, the question to you is can you provide the committee your views on offshore development end the arctic ocs? >> thank you, senator. in my work for mobile oil, there was manly not offshore, but certainly arctic development. i appreciated at that time how much it was on the leading edge of technology. i know that the last thing you would want as senator from the state of alaska is any kind of situation like we experienced in the gulf with the deep water horizon, but in fact, we talked about this a bit in your office, so i think what is most important as we, we explore these resources, and i think it is appropriate to explore them, is to do so in a safe and responsible way, and to work with the industry partners, as i believe is the kiss ton the sales that have gone forward, so the industry partners can bring the best science available and explore the

resources in a way that you representing alaska and myself is confirmed for this position can assure that we're not putting the ecological system at risk, yet we are supporting the desire that we discuss to continue to keep the alaska pipeline full. >> i appreciate that commitment, i think we recognized it. it is, it is a new area up there, although not unexplored back in the '80's. there were many out in the arctic, but i would hope that you would continue that commitment to work with alaska, work with those within the industry that are trying to make the efforts to really explore and produce to mark's gin and certainly to those folks that i live and work with. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you senator murkowsky.

>> senator? i have one last question. want to take moment and thank for the a ting lation of what multiple use means because i think it showed a real understanding of our public lands that is all too rare. it does not mean every use on every acre. i understanded if there are lands on our public lands with the highest and the best use may be solar energy production and may be oil and gas development, it may be mining, and i will not get to use those places to effectively hike or camp with my family for probably the rest of my life. but there are also places where the highest and best use is myself or someone else getting to walk around during muzzleloader season and that you cannot do everything on every single acre. think that understanding really gives me a great deal of confidence in your ability to balance these competing interest. i want to ask you one last

question, and you know, you will have no shortage of controversial issues to weigh in to over the next few years. endangered species management, energy production, transmission, all issues that become even more controversial when policy is driven by politics, and that is why i was pleased to hear the characterization earlier by one of the senators, i believe from washington who said something to the effect that science would be your guiding star. as secretary, will you commit to making land and wildlife management decisions based on the best available science? >> yes, sir, i will. >> that is all i have, mr. chair. >> i thank my colleagues. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i have quite a few questions and the witness, i will submit the great majority of those for written answers. i do have a couple of questions. i would like to discussion the business experience because i agree completely in the opening statement you said that there

is a need for business certainty, businesses need have certainty and stability when making long-term decisions. and you lo, as ceo of reo in 2009 you appeared with president obama at the white house. the president touted i as a model company that provides health care benefits to its part-time employees, yet two years later after the apt's health care cost, rei secured a special waiver exempting the employees from the annual benefit limits in the president's health care law. the spokesman for rei, bethany, at the time said the waivers allowed us, she said to continue to cover these employees. you know the american people remember president obama repeatedly promising that if you lake your health care plan, you will be able to keep the health care plan. it just seems based on bethany's comments that if rei, under your leadership, the ceo

not requested the special waiver united nations the health care law that those 1100rei low-wage, seasonal, part-time workers, many of those would have lost the health insurance that they have today. so i look at this and say that you know, rei is not the only entity that received a waiver. the administration granted over 1200 waivers to companies and to unions with the right connections so that they could avoid the negative impacts of the law. and i would assume you made that decision as a smart business decision because you knew the impacts would be dramatic of the health care law. well, there are other laws that are supported by this administration. negatively impact american businesses and there are folks who are looking for waivers for those just like rei appropriately made the decision that said we cannot live under this health care law. one of those laws is the national environmental policy act which negative impact businesses trying to access

federal public lands rather than expanding the waivers under nepa which is known as categorical exclusions the administration has restricted the use of waivers, particularly for onshore oil and gas production. so you know, i look at this, you know firsthand how waivers can help businesses avoid the negative impacts of bad policy and what you would do in terms of committing to help us get waivers for the categorical exclusions because, and clearly, i think many people think rei made a smart business decision by asking for waivers and it is just as important for jobs here that the exclusion be given as well. i would be interested in your comment on that. >> thank you, senator. as a doctor yourself, a the orthopedic surgeon. you recognize the complexity of our health care system. i want to first address the facts around rei's situation

with the affordable care act. number one, our full-time employee plan is fully compliant with the affordable care act and always has been. we never asked for a waiver on that program. in fact it ex peeds the federal standard because we cover all employee united nations the full-time plan if they work an average of 20 hours a week or more over a rolling six-month period. the federal standard is 3 hour. we have a lot. you referenced 1100 those are the numbers that chose to sign up for part time plan pause they are people who have no possible of coverage under any other plan that was affordable to them. they are part time. they are work perhaps multiple jobs and that plan has a 10,000 annual cap. we are coming up on 2014. we will be working to replace that plan with the exchange program so that these part time employees have an opportunity to have health care, so as they

come in to hospitals and work with your colleagues from the medical community, you will get paid for what is done and that is what rei did with the plan so the waiver was tructly for the part-time plan. >> for the plan? the waiver was for the people you were praised at the white house for covering, and were not able to be coveringable are the health care law which is why you applied to the waiver. but the question had to do with the waiver there. >> yes. well, the waiver was because we had a 1 thousand annual cap on the part-time plan which was the only way we could make it affordable. i was optional for us to cover the part time? >> we received praise for the white house for doing something. the white house said one thing, praised you for it, then passed policy that made made it difficult for to you continue what you had been doing and receive praise for it. the question is the categorical excuse? >> senator, i know nepa is a law passed by this body. i know it will be my obligation to use in the work that i do

within the department of the interior. i am not familiar with the details around exclusions or exclusion a iy process or how that may impact businesses, but i would submit that the facts that i provided around the health care are what i am familiar with. are you familiar with the need for season ty which you mentioned in your opening statement and people look for certainty in so many areas but there is so much uncertainty that it is very, very difficult to make decision, i think i am asking that you take a look at these as the opportunities to allow people to continue keeping working in the country and not forcing people out of work. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thanks. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i, too where had a number of questions in reference to you and our witness, i will submit those in writing. we limit to one question. there is a consistent thread in many of the concerns that have been expressed today and

between the concerns just expressed by the senator and many of those which i have which relate to the fact when the federal government creates a lot of lawyers, a lot of laws that create a lot of burdens, burdens that sometimes overlp and conflict with one another. people don't have, they don't have certainty and to some extent they are dependent upon those who administer executive branch age beensies for, for those depart from the standards to do what they think needs to be done. sometimes that can create difficulties with individual is trying to operate within the framework. in part for that reason, congress when it passed, built in to section 102-4, which says that if the policy of the united states that "congress exercise the constitutional authority to withdrew or otherwise designate federal lines for specified purposes and that congress delineate the extent to which the executive

may withdraw lands without legislative action." we recently seen some policy initiatives brought forward by the department of the interior including wild lands and nextal blueways for example. that appeared to address some issues that appear more properly within congress' scope of authority. the scope of authority to withdraw lands from multiple use, for example. as evidence by laws by the wilderness act and the wild and scenic rivers act. and so, i am just hoping that you can give me some assurance if confirmed you will recognize congress' proper role in designating and withdrawing federal land from multiple use. >> senator, i appreciate congress' role. i also will commit to you that with anything that we do around these kinds of issues that we'll get multiple stakeholder toes to the table to discuss them, to make sure we

understand the issues and with you have my commitment to do that. >> i appreciate the commitment you made in that regard. i assume the same commitment would stand there? >> yes, sir. >> thank you. i certainly don't want to cut my friend from utah off? there there another question you feel is particularly important to you and your constituents? >> the monument designation question is important simply because of the fact that, as you were discussing that with senator, it brought to mind, i appreciate your commitment to work with local stakeholders whenever they are dealing with something like a monument designation we had about 2 million acres designated as a monument a few yearst ago in my state. i was not only done with next tensive consultation and input and biin from local officials and residents, it was done completely by surprise. it was, it was brought upon us xom plotly by surprise, it was announced from a neighboring state, and we would like to

have input and so i would really appreciate it if you would commit to me that you would advice the president it is best to work with locals affected by raw decision like that in advance of making such a decision. >> senator, it is certainly consistent of what i believe in and what the white house believes in as well. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> thank my colleague. a number of organizations have sent letters in support of miss juwell's nomination including a letter and a letter signed by 15 environmental groups and a letter from the outdoor alliance on behalf of the number of recreation associations, a number of recreation organizations that represent members in washington state. without objection, they will be included in the hearing record. you have had long morning. as you can tell, these topics certainly generate spirited discussion and energy in natural resources country. so i just want you to know that

you certainly proved to me this morning that a nominee whis petroleum engineer and a corporate ceo and a conservation background is handy in this realm. i thank you. we'll look forward to continuing these discussions. we'll coom the record open for additional questions that colleagues may have. with that the energy and natural resource committee is adjourned. thank you.

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>> according to reports over the weekend, president obama will nominate thomas perez as labor secretary and u san rice. mr. perez the assistant u.s. attorney general for civil rights and mrs. rice is the u.s. ambassador to the united nations. >> a look at congress this week. the house returns tuesday at noon eastern on the agenda, a bill that prohibits the health and human service department from granting waivers to states for work reporters for welfare recipients also work on a measure aimed at streamlining several job training and retraining programs. watch the house live on c-span. the senate returns today at 2:00 p.m. eastern with votes scheduled at 5:30 on two judicial nominations. later in the week, a debate on a deal to fund the federal government for the rest of the current fiscal year. funding runs out march 27th. the house has already passed

the resolution. follow the senate live on c-span2. president obama will make several trips to capitol hill this week to meet with lawmakers from both parties. tuesday, he will meet with senate democrats, wednesday, house republicans, and then on. day, he will meet first with senate republicans and he will later with house democrats. >> we cannot look back years from now and wonder why we did nothing in the face of real threats to our security and our economy. that is why earlier today, i signed a new executive order that will strengthen the cyber defenses by increasing information sharing and developing standards to protect our national security, our jobs and our privacy. >> there are some things that clearly need to be done with the ektive order, but some things can only be done with legislation, so part of my reaction is i wish the president had put as much effort into getting some

legislation passed and then come out with the executive order rather than the other way around. >> look, it has been around for a long time, cybersecurity, and we finished talking about it. we finished kind of wondering what is going to happen because things are happening every single day that is destroying our property, which are taking away from our future and people are very casual about it. the newspapers are casual about it. everybody is casual about it. we are not. we cannot afford to be. >> a look at the president's recent cyber security executive order with senator jay rockefeller and congressman mack thorn pepper troy night at 8:00 eastern on c-span2. >> some of the things that an early american wife was taught to do, she supported her husband's career, usually through entertaining, dolley was both socially adapt and politically savvy, so she could

structure her entertainments in such a way she could lobby for her husband under the guisee of entertaining. she also thought it was important to create a setting in the white house almost like a stage for the performance of her husband and the conduct of politics and diplomacy. >> first lady dolley madison, we'll follow her journey into the woman that history remembers, the wife of the fourth u.s. president, james madison. we'll include your phone calls, facebook comments and tweets on dolley madison tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span and c-span 3 and c-span radio and c-span. org. today on c-span q and a with nobel prize winner jody williams followed by the calls, tweets and e-mails live on washington journal. then the advocacy group for seniors, aarp host a discussion on federal benefits