One of my friends put a note on his Facebook page today with a link to a Grand Forks Herald story in which North Dakota Republican Congressional Candidate Rick Berg says we should begin drilling for oil under Theodore Roosevelt National Park. He said “and now for an incredibly stupid idea . . . “ Boy was he right. Let me reprint the first few paragraphs from the Herald’s story:
Drilling for oil underneath western North Dakota’s Theodore Roosevelt National Park and other federal lands nationwide could be a way to ensure Social Security funding for the long haul, Republican U.S. House challenger Rick Berg said.
During a meeting with The Forum’s editorial board Wednesday, Berg discussed his ideas for how to make the Social Security system viable for future generations. He said one option is drilling for oil and other mineral resources on federal government land.
“There’s a huge opportunity right now to take those mineral assets that are on the federal government’s balance sheet and shift them to Social Security,” Berg told the editorial board.
He said the national economy also needs to improve so more Americans will have jobs and pay into the system.
Money gained from more drilling on federal land would amount to “billions of dollars” from North Dakota resources alone, Berg said. He did not have specific data available on Wednesday.
The federal government already allows drilling on some public land, including the national grasslands in western North Dakota.
But drilling is banned in national parks with only a few exceptions — and Theodore Roosevelt National Park isn’t among them, park Superintendent Valerie Naylor said.
“Drilling is not allowed in national parks, as a general rule,” she said. “It’s important that we preserve the land for future generations.”
But Berg said he would include national parks — and specifically, Theodore Roosevelt National Park — when discussing areas of untapped mineral resources the U.S. government could use.
I’m disappointed in Rick on this one. He shows a basic lack of understanding of a very important part of North Dakota here.
There are a million acres of federally-owned national grasslands in western North Dakota’s badlands. Virtually all of it is open to drilling for oil. The federal government already rakes in millions and millions of dollars annually from leasing it to the oil companies. It rakes in millions and millions more, and will get to the billions Rick is talking about, in royalty payments from the oil the oil companies are taking out. That has been going on for years, since oil was first discovered in 1954 in western North Dakota.
Thanks to the efforts over many years of one of our state’s most conservative and irascible Congressmen ever, William Lemke, we managed, in 1947, to set aside about 70,000 acres—just a couple of per cent of our state’s spectacular Bad Lands—as a National Park honoring Theodore Roosevelt.
As a National Park, it enjoys the protection from development that has turned, not just the million acres of federal land out west, but the several million acres of private and state land as well, into one of the country’s major oil fields. Theodore Roosevelt National Park is a tiny island in a sea of scoria roads and sand colored tanks.
So Rick, listen up: Not only is the National Park sacrosanct, but it is insignificant compared to the million acres of federally-owned land already being drilled. This is not news to most North Dakotans, and you, of all people, should know better. The federal government is already reaping huge royalty and leasing checks from its federal lands in western North Dakota.
If what you meant to tell the Forum editorial board is you want to shift that revenue away from helping to finance general government and put it into Social Security, then tell us what taxes you want to increase to replace that revenue. But keep your drilling rigs away from the National Park. Good God, man, are you that desperate? That greedy? Is nothing sacred? Drill, baby, drill. National Parks be damned. That thinking makes me sad. And angry.
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