Legislation Inching Forward on Great Falls National Park Designation

The Great Falls of Paterson, New Jersey are a natural wonder just miles from downtown Manhattan, and many people don't know of it or its role in launching the Industrial Revolution in the United States. There has been attempts to protect the falls and its environs and turn it into a national park for years, but it appears that efforts are getting closer, despite opposition from the National Parks Service, which thinks that there are too many other parks that have similar features:

The vote by the Senate today could test whether the expanded Democratic majority can overcome a Republican filibuster.

The legislation, sponsored by Democratic Sens. Frank Lautenberg and Bob Menendez, is hardly a done deal.

The Senate must first hold a cloture vote before it can proceed with debate of the public lands bill, a huge bill of which the Great Falls legislation is a part. Three-fifths of the "duly sworn" members — or 59 senators — must vote to invoke cloture before the Senate can begin debate on the bill. Then they would debate for perhaps several legislative days before voting on the bill.

Although the measure was passed in the House of Representatives during the previous session of Congress, it must again be approved in a procedural vote by the lower chamber.

"It's more likely that the Great Falls park legislation will pass in the House of Representatives as part of a larger public land bill," Gray said.

The Senate lands bill combines more than 150 bills to expand wilderness areas and protect other federal lands. It was blocked several times last year by Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn, who has pledged to filibuster. He says the spending in the bill is excessive — almost $4 billion over five years — and that the measure calls for removing millions of acres of federal property from oil and gas development.

The National Park Service also opposed the designation as a national park in 2006 after conducting a study, concluding that construction and management costs of the 109-acre area could be as high as $21 million. It also expressed concern that Paterson's 77-foot-high falls would have to compete for funding with the other 391 areas already in the cash-strapped national park system.

The state is already moving ahead with plans to turn the area into a State Park. Given the importance of the site, National Park designation is warranted, but the current fiscal mess should shelve the national park designation for the time being.