An egregious misuse of public funds

H.R. 3454 [CBO's cost estimate (PDF)]:

H.R. 3454 would require the Secretary of Agriculture to convey a small parcel of Forest Service land to the Central Advent Christian Church in Alleghany County, Virginia. The land that would be conveyed contains a cemetery used by the church as well as an adjoining tract of land. CBO estimates that implementing H.R. 3454 would have no significant impact on the federal budget. The church would pay for all costs of the conveyance. Enacting H.R. 3454 would not affect direct spending or revenues.

Free-market, non-secular forestry?

Comments

[Larry Sheldon]

I'm not sure what the point of the posting is, ans I know nothing external to it about the matter, but it rather looks like a like of bureaucracy to handle an obvious solution to an obvious problem.

How did the goobermint come to get title to the land in the first place?

[Rick McGrath]

Was the NFS acting in a free-market, non-secular way when they took the land to begin with? If we look in the old Clifton Forge newspapers of the day the NFS action to take a cemetery as forest land would likely have been considered egregious.

Maybe the NFS is giving a high-maintenance piece of land with little environmental value to the only organization willing to absorb the cost and preserve the land.

Congressman Boucher's website offers details that might pull HR3454 out of the "egregious" category and drop it into the "makes sense" category. Specifically, the church has had a special use permit since 1941 to maintain and operate the cemetery, a job the NFS does not want.

Which is greater: the value of an old 8-acre cemetery outside Clifton Forge, VA or the present value of 66 years of non-reimbursed maintenance expenses?

I think the NFS got a deal.

[joshua corning]

technically if adverse possession was applied equally to federal lands as it was to private lands...the church would already own the cemetery.

[BobMc]

Philosophically I sympathize with the original post, but I've travelled in Virginia and have a feel for just this sort of place. Areas that were once farmed are again forested. The National Forests were assigned large relatively unoccupied areas, some of which were once farmed, and had small communities that have shrunk or dissolved. Historic preservation is a use the Forests now embrace, but in this case preservation might be served better under the care of a local church, especially in terms of cost effectiveness. It's not like they'll try to convert the deceased...