The U.S. Senate yesterday passed the 2010 Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill, which allocates $3.5 million to fund operations at the Valles Caldera National Preserve for the fiscal year that runs from Oct. 1, 2009 to Sept. 30, 2010. New Mexico’s U.S. Senators Jeff Bingaman (D) and Tom Udall (D) both voted in favor of the bill. The measure (H.R. 2996) passed by a vote of 77 to 21, and includes a total of $32.1 billion in federal spending. The funds specified for the VCNP represent a 12.5% cut from this current year’s appropriation of $4 million.
The legislation now heads to a conference committee to reconcile it with a different version of the bill that the House of Representatives passed by a vote of 254-173 on June 26, 2009. The two bills differ in total spending by less than one percent. However, both the House and the Senate versions of the bill contain the same $3.5 million line-item for the Preserve, making it very probable that this will be the amount appropriated for the VCNP in the final legislation likely to be passed by Congress for the signature of President Barack Obama.
