Lawmakers in the West are criticizing an Obama administration proposal to end funding for some states to clean up abandoned coal mines while allowing a competitive grant process that could send Western taxes to mines in Eastern states.

For the third straight year, the White House budget request proposes ending payments to Wyoming, Montana, Louisiana and Texas and three American Indian tribes it says are no longer in need of funding to remedy abandoned mines.

Previous efforts ran into opposition from Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), who argued that cuts to the Abandoned Mine Land Program would eliminate the ability of noncertified states to use funds for non-coal projects (E&E Daily, March 4, 2010).

Democratic lawmakers in Montana this week struck similarly critical tones about President Obama's proposal.

"If he's taking money away from the cleanup of reclamation, that kind of thing is not healthy," said Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who last December helped secure $12 million from the fund to support coal mine cleanups in his state.

Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) yesterday said that while he supports efforts to reduce the federal deficit, he could not support Obama's proposal because it unfairly affects rural Americans. Under the mining provision, Baucus said, coal produced in Montana would still be subject to a tax, but the revenue would go to clean up mines in Eastern states like Virginia and Pennsylvania.

"We need to attack the deficit in a way that doesn't put the burden on the backs of Montanans and rural America," he said in a statement. "This budget shows that D.C. bureaucrats don't understand what's important for rural America."

The Obama budget for fiscal 2012 proposes cutting $8.1 million from the fund and sending the remaining money to be competitively allocated to the highest-priority abandoned coal sites.

The budget also proposes legislation to establish a new fee on hardrock miners to fund competitive grants to clean up abandoned mines of minerals such as gold, silver, copper or uranium.

"Altogether, this proposal will save $1.3 billion over the next 10 years, focus available coal fees to better address the nation's most dangerous abandoned coal mines, and hold the hardrock mining industry responsible for cleaning up the hazards left by their predecessors," according to the budget document.

The budget also notes that under the current system, funds for reclamation are distributed based on a production-based formula, often missing the highest-priority abandoned mines. States are also able to use the funds on hardrock mines, for which there is no dedicated funding.

"This proposal also allows mandatory funding to be focused on the highest-priority abandoned coal mine sites to eliminate public health and environmental hazards across the nation," said Joe Pizarchik, director of Interior's Office of Surface Mining.

But Baucus said the newly proposed hardrock mining fees do not make sense in states like Montana, which is already responsibly cleaning up its sites.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar last year said he was not thrilled with the cut but said it was among a host of decisions his agency had to make in tough fiscal times.

"I think states like New Mexico and Montana ... put these monies to good use," Salazar told Bingaman last year. "It's not something that, frankly, I'm excited about. It's a painful cut, but it's something that [the Office of Management and Budget] and the administration and Interior felt was appropriate to move forward with to try to balance the budget."

Bingaman yesterday said he had not yet been briefed on the fiscal 2012 proposal.

Reporter Elana Schor contributed.