"The Abandoned Mine Land program has made thousands of Americans living in the coalfields safer, but the job is not finished," said Norton. "Even after 25 years of extraordinary national effort, we still have almost $3 billion worth of high-priority hazards to health and safety waiting to be cleaned up. The President has proposed legislation that will let us get more Americans out of danger and do so much more quickly."

The Office of Surface Mining (OSM) collects fees on current coal mining to fund reclamation of coal mine sites abandoned before 1977. However, OSM's authority to collect the fee is scheduled to expire September 30. President Bush's proposed legislation would continue the program, direct more reclamation money to high-priority problems and accelerate the rate of reclamation for the most dangerous sites.

Montana certified in 1990 that had addressed reclamation of its high-priority coal sites. The President's proposal would pay Montana over 10 years the estimated $46.9 million allocated to Montana in the AML fund.