The Department of the Interior recently announced it will open eight Regional Climate Science Centers for climate adaptation research, the first of which will be based out of the University of Alaska. During today's OnPoint, David Hayes, deputy secretary of the Department of the Interior, explains the need for these regional centers and discusses Interior's budget request for the research facilities. He also discusses DOI's actions on oil and gas leases and gives an update on the Indian trust settlement.

Transcript

Monica Trauzzi: Welcome to the show. I'm Monica Trauzzi. Joining me today is David Hayes, deputy secretary of the Department of the Interior. Deputy Secretary Hayes, nice to have you back on the show.

David Hayes: Great to be here, Monica.

Monica Trauzzi: The Interior Department recently announced it will be opening eight regional climate science centers, the first of which will be at the University of Alaska. What's the goal of these climate science centers and the research that you hope will come out of these centers?

David Hayes: Well, Monica, we are seeing, at the Department of the Interior, the impacts of climate change on our resources. As you know, we manage 20 percent of the land mass of the United States. We're the largest water provider in the country. We are manager of wildlife resources across the entire nation, both migratory birds, endangered species, other species. We manage 35,000 miles of coastline. We're seeing the impacts of climate change on coastal resources, on our wildlife resources, on our water resources. Our land managers are seeing the impacts of invasive species, expansion of pests, etc., all because of climate change. What we're doing is bringing science to the equation and through regional centers helping to understand what resources are being impacted in various regions so that that information to get to land, water, and wildlife managers and they can make good decisions about how to react and adapt to these impacts.

Monica Trauzzi: So a big adaptation issue here. Why Alaska first?

David Hayes: Well, primarily because, first of all, we're housing these climate centers in universities around the country and we will be going out for competitions to offer the opportunities for universities in different regions to bid on hosting these climate centers. In Alaska, frankly, there's one university that stands head and shoulders above everyone else, which is the University of Alaska. They have such wonderful climate science going on already that we didn't have to wait for a competition for them. So, we announced them as our choice and we're moving forward with the competitions on the others.

Monica Trauzzi: These will be expensive to start up and maintain. At a time when other departments and agencies are needing to make big cutbacks, what's the justification for increasing the budget for this program?

David Hayes: Well, it's so central to the mission of our entire department. Our 70,000 employees are out on the ground every day trying to manage for impacts of climate change and so the Congress has been very supportive. We had terrific support in our fiscal year '10 budget. We had $40 million to set up our climate centers with a focus on wildlife, but also other impacts, and then we also have additional money to help our land, water and wildlife managers take that information, work with their communities, and help develop adaptation approaches across the landscape to take that science data and then act on it in a sensible way.

Monica Trauzzi: How does this program relate to the legislative discussions that we're seeing on the Hill relating to a cap and trade or some movement on climate change?

David Hayes: Well, to be honest, this is going forward regardless of the legislative effort. Again, we have an obligation to deal with the changes in hydrology, for example in the Colorado River basin or in California, because we have obligations to deliver water to municipalities, to farmers, etc. So, we have to understand better what climate change is doing to that hydrology and then we have to make good, sound decisions going forward in how to react to it. And the climate centers and also our landscape conservation cooperatives will help us do that.

Monica Trauzzi: Switching gears, there's been a lot of discussion about your department's actions relating to oil and gas leases and a new report by the National Commission on Energy Policy supports the restrictions that the administration has put on public lands drilling, but it does recommend that your department consider offshore drilling along the entire Outer Continental Shelf. Where do discussions stand on that particularly?

David Hayes: Well, Secretary Salazar will be making an announcement soon on the Outer Continental Shelf issue. We had to go back after a court struck down the Bush five-year plan. We had to go back and cure the legal defects in the current five-year plan, particularly as applied to Alaska. We've been doing that. At the same time, we've been getting information about the next five-year plan and it's been an enormous undertaking, both to cure the legal deficiencies and then to deal with the new five-year plan. But we're within weeks of an announcement on our direction with regard to offshore drilling.

Monica Trauzzi: There have been concerns that DOI's oil and gas regulations are killing jobs in the U.S. What impacts are these regulations having on the ground? Do you know yet?

David Hayes: Well, Monica, that's an accusation without substance. The reality is that what we're trying to do is bring balance back into oil and gas decisionmaking, leasing decisionmaking. This is something I've personally been involved in from the days of my confirmation hearing and the issues with Utah. What we found was that BLM's plans provided no guidance to folks in the field to decide where and how it made sense to do oil and gas leasing. Our major reform is to suggest that we have a more disciplined process upfront to help identify the areas that make the most sense for oil and gas leasing and to take out of the equation the potential for every lease being protested, which is what's happening right now. Things have ground to a halt because there's not been consideration of a balanced approach and we're bringing that balance back.

Monica Trauzzi: The Indian trust deal is another big issue your department has been dealing with. It's a $3.4 billion settlement for mismanaged trust for American Indians. Many have said it's too small a number, that more money should have been put towards this. How did this settlement decision come and what's the source for the funding?

David Hayes: This settlement came from months of negotiations last summer when the president came in and Secretary Salazar came in. We wanted to try to put this 13 years of bitter litigation behind us and establish a new trust relationship with our Indian trustees. The Secretary and I and solicitor Hilary Tompkins all were personally involved in striking this settlement. We believe it's a very fair settlement, a generous settlement. The plaintiffs, who have been relentless in a positive way in terms of advancing the concerns of the class-action of Indian trust holders, agree that this settlement is fair and appropriate. We are waiting for congressional action. Right now we're helping answer questions about it. We hope that it will be approved very quickly and we can get that money out to Indian country and turn the page on this litigation.

Monica Trauzzi: OK, we're going to end right there. Thank you for coming on the show, nice to see you again.

David Hayes: Nice to see you Monica, thank you.

Monica Trauzzi: And thanks for watching. We'll see you back here tomorrow.

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