A Louisiana senator today said she will do whatever it takes to prevent the Interior Department from using revenue from drilling in the Gulf of Mexico to purchase lands in the West unless the agency agrees to spend more money on projects in her state.

Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) said she read with "horror" the Obama administration's proposal to cancel $200 million in offshore revenues for states to use for restoration of wetlands and other habitat affected by oil and gas development.

And she warned Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and her colleagues on the Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee that they will have to find acquisition money elsewhere, perhaps from states like Wyoming.

"I'm going to use all the power that I have to stop any funding for any programs as long as the money is coming off the coasts," she said.

"So go get your money, Mr. Secretary, from the West. They have plenty of it," she added. "And just let us use our money to save ourselves."

Landrieu has said she is concerned with the department's proposal in its 2013 budget blueprint to cut $200 million from the Coastal Impact Assistance Program and to prioritize land acquisitions primarily in Western states. The acquisitions are funded through the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which authorizes up to $900 million annually from offshore oil and gas revenues.

The fund, which was established in 1965, was designed to use revenues from the depletion of offshore oil and gas resources to support the conservation of other resources: land and water.

But Landrieu said she cannot support using offshore revenues for Western land acquisitions "while we are all literally drowning."

"Do you all remember the water, how high it was, during [Hurricane] Katrina?" she said. "I don't know how long this committee expects me to be a cooperative member. I really don't know how long this administration expects me to continue to try to be supportive. I cannot express anymore that we have had enough."

Salazar said Landrieu's concerns over the impact of offshore oil and gas development are legitimate and that the president's Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force led by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has laid out a comprehensive program for the restoration.

In addition, he said he is hopeful that pending litigation with BP PLC may result in an unprecedented restoration effort following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill.

"My hope is as we work through litigation in the Gulf of Mexico, that we will see the most significant ecosystem restoration project in the Gulf of Mexico that we have ever seen," Salazar told Landrieu at a budget hearing this morning. "Your part of the country is near and dear to my heart, even though I know you are mad."

The Fish and Wildlife Service, which administers the coastal assistance program, said the budget proposal would ensure $269 million is disbursed to restore the Gulf Coast's wetlands, beaches, reefs and other habitats.

The program has received just under a billion dollars over the past five years, and as of January, $565 million remained undisbursed. The budget, if approved, would leave about half of that available to states.

The president's budget would not affect other sources of funding available for coastal restoration, including the $375 million per year that Gulf states will receive beginning in 2017 under the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act.

BP also committed $1 billion to fund early restoration projects.

Amendments in both the House and the Senate call for devoting 80 percent of Clean Water Act fines from the spill -- which could exceed $20 billion -- to be deposited in a newly created Gulf Coast Restoration Trust Fund. The House recently passed its version of that proposal (E&E Daily, Feb. 17).