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Moccasin Bend, Chattanooga Tennessee

For history and more information go here

TN - Bend park bill passes, but Senate, House differ -- (21 Nov 2002)
TN - Preserving the Bend's history Bill to make Chattanooga peninsula part of park system stalled, but expected to pass -- (1 Nov 2002)
WA - Moccasin Bend Park May Be Saved By Lame Duck Session -- (23 Oct 2002)

http://www.timesfreepress.com/2002/jun/13jun02/webLN13MoccasinBend.html
Thursday, June 13, 2002

Senators consider plan for Moccasin Bend By Andy Sher, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- U.S. senators at a hearing on legislation to make Moccasin Bend part of the National Park Service expressed concern Wednesday about allowing the mental hospital and golf course there to remain in use longer than a 1998 federal study recommended.

"The study basically indicated that this could be feasible, but these incompatible uses had to be out of there by 2009," said Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo. "That is not happening."

Members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks are evaluating whether to close the Moccasin Bend Mental Health Institute between 2015 and 2035, while allowing the Moccasin Bend Public Golf Club to remain open indefinitely. Under the legislation, the golf course land would be transferred to the park if and when the course ceases to operate.

The panel took no action Wednesday on the legislation. The U.S. House of Representatives passed the bill last year.

Testifying before the Senate panel, Jay Mills, vice president of the Friends of Moccasin Bend, said the area "contains one of the most important and rich complexes of archaeological and historical sites to be found inside any city in the United States, chronicling 10,500 years of history."

P. Daniel Smith, special assistant to National Park Service Director Fran Mainella, said the federal agency officially remains opposed to the legislation because of President Bush's moratorium on new parks until a backlog of repairs at existing parks can be eliminated. [ Smith/the NPS recommended that no action be taken on this bill in the current Congress due to budget and administration restraints. ]

However, Mr. Smith told senators the issue is "complex" because of the rich history of the site, which figured prominently in the Civil War struggle for Chattanooga. The site also served as home to American Indians for thousands of years, he said.

"The Civil War is of itself enough to bring a large portion of this site into the system as an addition," Mr. Smith said. "Because of this 10,000 years of history and the Trail of Tears history, we really strongly recommend that we try to work this through."

Mr. Smith noted that most of the land on Moccasin Bend is owned by the state and Chattanooga. He said National Park Service representatives are discussing with Tennessee lawmakers the possibility of obtaining written commitments from the city, county and state on land transfers and an agreement on operational issues.

Other facilities on the nearly 1,000-acre site, on a Tennessee River peninsula near downtown Chattanooga, include a Chattanooga Police Department firing range, WDEF radio transmission towers and a model airplane facility.

At one point, Sen. Thomas asked why Chattanooga officials didn't act on their own to create a park at the site. But as the hearing ended, he told National Park Service officials and local boosters he hopes "that we can work to do something that would be helpful."

Earlier, Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., urged panel members to work with Tennessee lawmakers as well as Chattanooga, Hamilton County and state officials on the issue. Last year, Rep. Wamp successfully sponsored a bill creating a national historic site on Moccasin Bend.

Rep. Wamp said the situation with the state hospital and the golf course is the "exception and not the rule. But they are real problems that we can work through," he said. "And we're willing to negotiate and really compromise as long as we don't run over local government." [ one of the major concerns of the senators was why an "incompatible use" like the golf course would be allowed an unlimited time extension. they were surprised (and not pleased) that the dates for acquiring all the parcels of the land were so far off ... 35 years to infinity! ]

The president of the Friends group, Mickey Robbins, later said the senators raised some "legitimate points" about the use of existing facilities. He said he hoped their concerns would be outweighed by the "tremendous" cultural factors, and he was "heartened" by Sen. Thomas' final remarks.

Wamp Says Senate May Require Changes On Moccasin Bend Bill
Future Of Mental Hospital May Be Back On The Table
posted February 12, 2002
http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_17866.asp

Getting the bill to make Moccasin Bend a national park through the U.S. Senate may require some "minor changes," Rep. Zach Wamp said.

Rep. Wamp said the issue of the future of the Moccasin Bend Psychiatric Hospital may have to be revisited.

Rep. Wamp, who has already shepherded the bill through the House despite National Park Service reservations, said he met with NPS officials recently. "I asked what would it take to get the Park Service's full support - not just neutrality - on this bill."

The Third District Congressman said the Park Service "is still asking, 'Do we have to leave the future of the hospital open-ended?'" The version passed by the House would set up the Park without the mental hospital at the tip of the Bend omitted, but leaves the option open for it to be added later. The Moccasin Bend Golf Course is also left out, but could be added later.

On the hospital issue, Rep. Wamp said, "I'm a realist. I am willing to listen on that issue and discuss the hospital and how long it will be there. I want to get the national park bill passed."

The state of Tennessee has shown no inclination to close or move the facility, and has been putting new funding into remodeling portions of it.

Rep. Wamp and County Executive Claude Ramsey have stressed the necessity of having a state mental facility in Chattanooga.

Rep. Wamp said he plans to meet soon with Tennessee Sens. Bill Frist and Fred Thompson on the Moccasin Bend park bill.

He said afterwards the work on moving the bill may be shifted mainly to Senate staff members.

Rep. Wamp said he and Sens. Frist and Thompson would be working with staffers from both parties. He noted that Democrats are now in charge of the Senate.

Rep. Wamp said he wants a bill to emerge from the Senate that is close enough to the House version so that a lengthy conference committee action will not be necessary.

He said, "One piece of great news is that President Bush recently signed into law acceptance of the boyhood home of Ronald Reagan as a separate unit of the National Park Service. That lifts the moratorium that was in effect on adding new units to the Park Service."

--- U. S. House Approves Moccasin Bend National Park

From TN Indian Affairs mailing list:

the Chattanoogan.com
http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_14105.asp

U.S. House Approves Moccasin Bend National Park
-------------------------------------------------------------
posted October 23, 2001

The full U.S. House of Representatives unanimously passed the bill Tuesday to make Moccasin Bend a national historic site.

Rep. Zach Wamp hailed the action and said he is "all fired up and ready to move it on to the Senate."

He called Moccasin Bend "a wonderful conglomeration of human life and historical artifacts. When you look down on it from Point Park you know it ought to be part of the National Park system."

The bill had not been scheduled for a House vote for several weeks, but Rep. Wamp was able to expedite it.

He said, "The process has been difficult. There has been opposition along the way." He said the final bill involved compromise and concessions. "Everybody had to give a little." He said, "It's an excellent work product that I'm very proud of."

Rep. Wamp said he wants to get the bill through the Senate "and on to the president's desk so that he can sign it as soon as he lifts the moratorium on new additions to the National Park system."

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine of international copyright law.

From TN Indian Affairs mailing list:

Chattanooga Times Free Press
Wednesday, October 24, 2001
http://www.timesfreepress.com/2001/oct/24oct01/webLN24MOCCASINBEND.html

House gives OK for creation of national historic site at Moccasin Bend
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Andy Sher, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- A proposal to create a national historic site on Chattanooga's Moccasin Bend is halfway home after the House approved the bill here Tuesday on a voice vote. "This is a great day in the history of our city and our region because Moccasin Bend needs to be a separate unit in our national park system," the bill's sponsor, Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., told House colleagues prior to the vote.

Passage of the bill provides momentum for Tennessee's two senators to work on a similar measure in the Senate. Rep. Wamp said that could happen this year or next year.

The bill would create the Moccasin Bend National Historic Site and an interpretive center on about 900 acres of the moccasin-shaped peninsula where archaeologists say Native Americans lived 10,500 years ago. Spanish explorer Hernando De Soto is believed to have visited the site in the 16th century.

Moccasin Bend, separated from downtown Chattanooga by the Tennessee River, also figured prominently in the Trail of Tears -- the forced removal of Indian tribes from the Southeastern United States -- and later it was used by Union troops during the Civil War. Boosters have been pushing for Moccasin Bend to be included in the National Park Service for years. And while the proposal has the official endorsement of the Cultural Preservation Committee of the Intertribal Council of the five Civilized Tribes -- the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Cherokee of Oklahoma, Muscogee (Creek) and Seminole -- the effort has not been without controversy.

"That's great news," said Mickey Robbins, president of the Friends of Moccasin Bend National Park. "Obviously, you have two separate chambers there and each one makes up its own mind, but we think that it bodes very well and we're delighted it is enjoying such broad support." But Tom Kunesh of Chattanooga's Intertribal Association, voiced mixed feelings.

"Well, I have two feelings. One, as most people tell me, something is better than nothing. And two, that it's still not the best legislation that we could have."

He said the Moccasin Bend Golf Course, a city-county owned and privately operated public course, should have been included. The golf course is excluded, at least for no

w, as is the state-operated Moccasin Bend Mental Health Institute. National Park Service officials say the hospital and golf course are "inconsistent" with a national park and have called for a definitive timetable to phase them out.

But under Rep. Wamp's bill, the facilities would continue operating unless the governments willingly donated their property.

Rep. Wamp said it was a necessary compromise to develop a wide local base of support.

"My one-word description of this moment is 'Hallelujah,' " Rep. Wamp said. "We had our challenges along the way, but we were able to rise and overcome them."

E-mail Andy Sher at asher@timesfreepress.com

http://www.timesfreepress.com/2002/apr/10apr02/WEBLN10PORKBARREL.html Chattanooga Times Free Press, Wednesday, April 10, 2002

'Pig Book' says state triples pork goodies

By Andy Sher, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Congressional "pork barrel" spending tripled for Tennessee in the 2002 federal budget, rising from $50 million in 2001 to nearly $154 million, a government watchdog reported Tuesday.

The figures are part of Citizens Against Government Waste's annual "Pig Book" on pork barrel spending.

The group said the Tennessee spending was among $20.1 billion that Congress included in the 2002 budget.

"It's bigger and fatter than ever," said the watchdog group's president, Thomas Schatz, noting that overall congressional spending rose 9 percent and the number of pet projects rose 32 percent to 8,341. The group listed 71 projects as "pork" in Tennessee. Compared to other states, Tennessee rose from 49th to 32nd in terms of pork barrel spending per person.

Georgia ranked 47th in per capita spending with some $17.22 per person. The state got a total of $144.3 million in congressional pork projects. Alabama ranked No. 13, receiving an estimated $71.80 in pork spending per person and $320.5 million in spending overall.

Nearly a third of Tennessee's estimated $153 million in pork was earmarked for projects in the state's 3rd Congressional District, according to Citizens Against Government Waste figures.

The district is represented by Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., Tennessee's lone member on the powerful House Appropriations Committee.

The Chattanooga congressman is making no apologies for working to secure funding for projects the watchdog group labels as pork.

...

Citizens Against Government Waste's Mr. Schatz said that in order to be a pork barrel project, a project has to meet two of seven criteria. Those criteria can include not being part of the president's budget request and being asked for by only one chamber of Congress.

...

Meanwhile, Bobby Davenport of the Trust for Public Land in Chattanooga, took a dim view of the group's labeling as pork two land acquisition projects.

One is a $1 million appropriation Rep. Wamp secured to purchase property for a proposed historic site on Moccasin Bend. The other was $1 million to purchase land in and near the Tennessee River Gorge near Chattanooga.

"That whole thing just makes my blood boil," Mr. Davenport said of the characterization of the projects as pork. "The Trust for Public Land has worked very hard with our congressman and the National Park Service to get great deals for the taxpayers."

For example, he said, deep water access property on the Tennessee River in Chattanooga sells for $80,000 to $200,000 an acre. Yet, he said, the sale of the Moccasin Bend property would work out to be about $18,000 an acre.

http://www.timesfreepress.com/2002/apr/11apr02/webLN11MoccasinBend.html Chattanooga Times Free Press, Thursday, April 11, 2002

Hospital closure timeline mulled

By Andy Sher, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Moccasin Bend Mental Health Institute could shut its doors by 2035 under a compromise Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., and others are discussing in their effort to create a national park on the peninsula near downtown Chattanooga.

Rep. Wamp said Wednesday that the National Park Service has been pressing for a date when the state hospital would close and the property would become part of the proposed historic site.

He said discussions on legislation creating the 911-acre site are centering on somewhere between 2035 and 2050. The time frame "gives the state just plenty of time to act, gives the entire community plenty of time to prepare, but also has some finality in what ultimately happens with moving the hospital a generation from now to another site in Hamilton County," Rep. Wamp said.

In a House bill passed last year on the historic site, Rep. Wamp had no set date for the hospital's closure. He said a date likely will have to be set to satisfy the National Park Service and win Senate passage.

"We've been asking for a date certain," said National Park Service Director Fran Mainella, who didn't say whether the 2035-2050 time frame was acceptable. "We need to know that it eventually is coming into the Park Service."

Melissa Kuckro, a Park Service legislative liaison, declined to discuss whether the Park Service would accept the 2035-2050 date, saying it is "under discussion internally."

Regarding a prior Park Service study that recommended the hospital property be turned over by 2010, Ms. Kuckro said, "we now recognize (that) is too soon."

Located along the Tennessee River, Moccasin Bend is rich in American Indian and Civil War history. A portion of the Trail of Tears crosses the land.

Rep. Wamp said he discussed the hospital closure with some local officials.

"I've been back to talk to the mayor and the county executive, and they understand and will support now a Senate provision, if our senators deem it necessary to get the Park Service's support, to put in a time limit for closure of the hospital," Rep. Wamp said.

Efforts to contact Hamilton County Executive Claude Ramsey were unsuccessful.

"Until we talk to the hospital's officials and understand what possible sunset provisions would be appropriate, we're not in a position to respond," said Todd Womack, a spokesman for Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker.

The future of the hospital has been a politically sensitive subject for years. A state mental health master plan once called for shutting down the facility and transferring long-term inpatient care to a state facility in Knoxville.

Local businessman Mickey Robbins is president of Friends of Moccasin Bend, which backs creation of the historic park. He also serves on a community board that supports the mental health institute and fought past efforts to shut the facility down.

Mr. Robbins said the state's top mental health official, Ben Dishman, recently told the hospital's board that "they really have abandoned the (mental health) master plan."

With regard to a possible 2035 closure date for the hospital, Mr. Robbins said, "over three decades from now gives the hospital a lot of time to develop a new hospital at a new site here in Chattanooga and gain that assurance of permanency."

Gov. Don Sundquist's policy deputy, Justin Wilson, said the congressman has discussed the 2050 date, but said the 2035 date was new to him.

"We don't intend to leave Moccasin Bend until we have a satisfactory alternative," Mr. Wilson said. "Do I believe this will be done before the year 2035? Yes, I most certainly do."

Rep. Wamp mentioned the 2035-2050 time frame Wednesday as he questioned Director Mainella about outstanding issues on the proposed historic site during a hearing of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior and Related Agencies.

Director Mainella said her understanding was that the hospital termination date and the president's moratorium on creation of new parks "are the major issues."

The president issued the moratorium until a backlog of projects at existing parks is eliminated.

http://www.timesfreepress.com/2002/may/09may02/webParkService.html Chattanooga Times Free Press, Thursday, May 9, 2002

Park Service chief to tour Bend

By Andy Sher, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- National Park Service Director Fran Mainella will get a guided tour of the proposed Moccasin Bend National Historic Site on Saturday.

Helping play tour guide will be Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., the congressman at the forefront of efforts to make much of Moccasin Bend part of the National Park system.

"I'm really encouraged," Rep. Wamp said. "This is a very positive development."

Rep. Wamp sponsored a bill in the House last year creating the proposed historic site. The bill is pending in the Senate, and Rep. Wamp said National Park Service support is key to its passage.

Ms. Mainella was scheduled already to be in Chattanooga on Saturday for the dedication of the Tennessee Blueway, a 50-mile stretch of the Tennessee River between the Chickamauga and Nickajack dams with designated access and camping sites.

Chattanooga and Chickamauga Military Park Superintendent Pat Reed said officials asked Ms. Mainella if she would be interested in touring Moccasin Bend, and she was.

"We're delighted about that," the superintendent said.

Moccasin Bend is considered significant in terms of American Indian and Civil War history. It served as a staging area for the Trail of Tears, the forced removal of Cherokees from the Southeast during the 19th century.

Under Rep. Wamp's proposal, the historic site would be administratively attached to the Chattanooga and Chickamauga National Military Park.

Rep. Wamp and the Park Service have debated about how some sites on Moccasin Bend, such as a state mental health hospital, would be treated if a historic site were created. The Park Service has pushed for a set date for the hospital's closure. Rep. Wamp has floated a closure by 2035. Talks continue.

If the bill is approved by the Senate, work could not proceed on the site until a presidential moratorium on new parks, issued because of a backlog in maintenance projects at existing parks, is lifted.

Plans call for Ms. Mainella to travel first to Point Park atop Lookout Mountain to see a panoramic view of the Moccasin Bend peninsula on the Tennessee River. The tour then proceeds to Moccasin Bend where the director will be shown one of the archaeological sites. Superintendent Reed said park historian Jim Ogden will provide commentary on American Indian and Civil War history.

E-mail Andy Sher at asher@timesfreepress.com

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine of international copyright law.

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