Assateague Island Administrative History

Although the act authorizing Assateague Island National Seashore was a significant conservation victory, it was widely recognized as a compromise. As with most compromises, none of the parties involved was entirely happy with it. "We felt we had to sell—oversell—economic benefits to the local communities," Stewart L. Udall later confessed, characterizing the connecting road and concessions development requirements as a trap we built for ourselves to get the legislation enacted." [1] When there is dissatisfaction there tends to be resistance, sometimes to the point where—if circumstances have changed sufficiently—the compromise is discarded for a new beginning. This was what happened with Assateague.

If Secretary Udall had built a trap, he was determined to keep out of it as long as possible. "I think it important. . .to make it clear to the people on the Virginia end that the actual building of this road has a low priority in our development program," Udall wrote George Hartzog in August 1966. "It is my own feeling that it would be improvident to build a road until a successful dunes stabilization program is well under way. There are other reasons why the road should have a low priority, but it seems to me that the absence of a protective barrier dune is a most compelling argument for the present. The Park Service director in turn pleased Director John S. Gottschalk of the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife (BSFW) by confiding that he had no intention of requesting appropriations for the connecting road from Congress. In this position he was fortunate to have the sympathetic understanding of Representative Julia Butler Hansen, chairman of the House subcommittee on Interior appropriations. [2]

The One—Sheet Master Plan

Despite this intended and actual foot—dragging, the Service nevertheless had to come forth with a master plan for administration, development, and use of Assateague encompassing all the requirements of Public Law 89—195. A planning team headed by Ben Howland began field studies in the spring of 1966; it ultimately included Phil Smith, Gene Smith, and Jesse Grove from BSFW and William Smith and Bertrum C. Roberts from the Park Service.

In response to the concerns of BSFW and others opposing the connecting road through Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, early planning consideration was given to running the road across a causeway to the north end of Chincoteague Island. At the insistence of Senator A. Willis Robertson of Virginia, the Senate committee report on the seashore legislation had explicitly opposed such a bypass of the refuge, and Senator Robertson now forcefully reminded Secretary Udall of his position: "In order that I may not be put to the rather unpleasant task of making an issue of this matter with colleagues in both the House and Senate, I would appreciate a letter from you saying that you intend to carry out the Senate plan to give Virginia a direct access to the new Park and not waste several million dollars for the construction of a road and bridge that would give Virginia access in name only, merely to humor a few Biologists who are opposed to a public highway through a waterfowl refuge." Robertson and Representative Thomas N. Downing had wanted the road to follow an oceanfront alignment behind the dune line. On June 28 Udall approved a compromise alignment down the bay side of the refuge that appeared to satisfy the Virginians. [3]

It did not take long for the two Interior bureaus to disagree about administrative responsibilities for maintenance of barrier dunes, management of recreation on the refuge beach, and development of support, information, and interpretation facilities in Virginia. Shortly after the Assateague bill was signed, John Gottschalk made clear his intention that BSFW should acquire and manage the recreational holdings of the Chincoteague—Assateague Bridge and Beach Authority with funds transferred to his bureau from the Park Service. Superintendent Bert Roberts, representing Park Service interests at the seashore, felt otherwise. "As I try here to visualize the possibilities of a separate operation of recreation facilities and activities by each Bureau, the inconvenience to the visitor, the duplication, the expense, and the lack of flexibility, the need to work out a division of responsibilities agreement similar to that at Cape Hatteras—Pea Island Refuge seems imperative," he wrote George Hartzog in March 1966. "I believe we should make every effort to convince the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife of this. . . ." [4]

Because BSFW was unequipped to take over the functions of the Authority, the Service acquired them that October. Meanwhile Assistant Secretary of the Interior Stanley A. Cain, who had jurisdiction over BSFW and the Park Service, attempted to resolve the differences between them on the planning issues. In a memorandum of September 2, 1966, he recommended that the proposed seashore visitor center in Maryland be operated by the Park Service and give 75 percent of its focus to the seashore as a whole and 25 percent to Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge; that the proposed visitor center in Virginia be operated by BSFW with reversed percentages of focus; and that the Service undertake all road patrol and supervision of intensive recreation areas. [5]

This compromise did not appeal to George Hartzog, who shared his Assateague superintendent's aversion to a joint recreational and interpretive role with BSFW. Responding to Cain's memorandum, he reminded the assistant secretary of a prior policy of assigning recreation responsibilities to the Service where two or more bureaus were involved, as at Cape Hatteras. He enclosed an advance copy of a task force report revealing wasteful duplication with the U.S. Forest Service at Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area. "This duplication did not result from conflicts between our agencies," he wrote. "On the contrary, we have enjoyed the closest and most cordial of relationships with the Forest Service at Flaming Gorge, just as we have with the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife at Cape Hatteras, and as I am sure we will at Assateague. The point is simply that bureaucracy has a tendency to duplicate no matter how well intentioned the people involved." He closed by suggesting that Cain might want to reconsider the sharing of recreational responsibilities at Assateague. [6]

As the two bureaus squabbled, the master planning effort bogged down. "We have found that the lack of a master plan is becoming increasingly cumbersome and embarrassing," Superintendent Roberts complained to the chief of the planning office in November. "Can this work be resumed soon?" The planning office chief relayed the plea to the Division of New Area Studies and Master Planning in the Washington Office:

The park is badly in need of an approved plan not only to guide the overall management and development, but also for public relations with the local communities. We understand that local pressures are building for answers to questions of vital importance to these people and until the plan is approved Mr. Roberts can do nothing but fight an evasive delaying action. . . . Anything you can do to get the plan off dead center and moving toward approval would be greatly appreciated all around.

The Washington Office response attributed the delay to Assistant Secretary Cain's September 2 memorandum and the Director's efforts toward reconsideration. [7]

Cain made a second attempt to assign administrative functions in a memorandum of March 28, 1967, to the two bureau directors. The Park Service would manage all lands in the national seashore except Assateague State Park and Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge above Toms Cove Hook, which would remain under BSFW. The Service would thus have sole responsibility for recreation at the hook. The bureaus would jointly operate the temporary visitor contact facility erected by the Service in the traffic circle on Chincoteague Island (where the access road acquired from the Chincoteague—Assateague Authority began), the entrance checking station at the Chincoteague end of the bridge to Assateague, and the visitor center in the wildlife refuge when built. The Service would construct, maintain, and patrol all roads and would be responsible for all dune construction and stabilization on Assateague; construction within the refuge would accord with specifications approved by BSFW. A plan for hunting in the Pope Bay area in Maryland comprising both NPS and BSFW lands would be jointly developed and managed. The bureaus would collaborate on brochures and other publicity. [8]

Virginia entrance station and former Chincoteague-Assateague Bridge and Beach Authority bridge, c. 1970.

These instructions did not give the Service all it had hoped for, but they served to revive the planning effort. On June 1 Roberts forwarded to his regional director a large map of Assateague on which the development proposals had been drawn and an explanatory narrative "laboriously ground out by the...master plan team" over a week in May. "We believe that the plan generally follows the guidelines established by Assistant Secretary Cain's memorandum of March 28, 1967," he wrote. "A great deal of time was spent in knit picking words and ironing out interpretations of Secretary Cain's memo. The Bureau people obviously had instructions to take the tightest possible view; and even as the document is, they felt like they would receive criticism from their Regional Office for some of the items therein.... Our deliberations went to the detail of what letterhead to use." [9]

The "one—sheet master plan," as it came to be called, centered development (outside Assateague State Park) at North Beach, Fox Level, and Pope Bay in Maryland and Toms Cove in Virginia. The connecting road was shown in the alignment approved by Secretary Udall the preceding year. Motels, restaurants, trailer spaces, fishing piers, related recreational facilities, and parking for a total of 6,000 cars were indicated for North Beach and Toms Cove. Another 7,500 cars could be accommodated at Fox Level and Pope Bay, where snack bars and other concessions were planned. There would be 500 campsites at Fox Level and a boaters' campground on the side near North Beach. Two public waterfowl hunting areas were shown on the bay side of the Fox Level and Pope Bay areas. Beach buggy use zones were designated on the beach. The planners estimated the total development to cost $48,651,000, including about $4 million in private investment for concessions.

Two proposals for unconventional access to Assateague were rejected during the plan's formulation. The Fox Level area of the island had long been used for light aircraft landings, and the planning team, upon Bert Roberts' encouragement, originally included this use. A designated landing strip was deleted from the plan at the request of NPS Associate Director Howard W. Baker, who doubted the need for it. (Despite the issuance of warning citations to pilots, unauthorized landings continued, and Roberts continued to believe the practice "compatible with the intent of this recreation area.") [10] Also discarded was the idea of a public transportation system in lieu of private automobile access to Assateague. "We reduced such a plan to feasibility and costs and found it to be out of the possible, not only because of congressional limitations, but because it was contrary to several of the explicit sections of the legislation," Roberts later explained. "These factors, combined with a very strong indication that visitors seeking barrier island recreation would not use a mass transportation system, led us to abandon this plan." [11]

The one—sheet master plan, bearing the date September 5, 1967, was approved by representatives of both Interior bureau directors in Washington September 19. It could not be circulated generally until its review by the interested committees and members of Congress. Roberts chafed at the further delay in bringing this about: "We have been making excuses to the press, to interested groups, to the public, and to the various governmental bodies as to why our master plan cannot be made public." In January 1968 Secretary Udall signed off on a memorandum from the two bureau directors approving submission of the plan to Congress "within the next month." The submission eventually occurred on June 4 at an open meeting of the Subcommittee on Parks and Recreation of the House Interior and Insular Affairs Committee, at which members of the Maryland and Virginia delegations were present or represented. There was no dissenting discussion, enabling Service officials to refer subsequently to the plan as having received congressional approval. [12]

The Opposition Organizes

There was dissent aplenty in other quarters, particularly among those environmentalist and conservation groups who had opposed the development mandates in the seashore authorizing legislation. Representing this sentiment, the National Parks Association commissioned Jonas V. Morris of Morris Associates, Washington, D.C., to prepare a counter—plan. "Assateague Island, Maryland and Virginia: A Recreation Plan for a National Seashore and its Surrounding Region" appeared in December 1968 and was widely circulated. The Morris plan called for only a stabilized sand road on the island with visitors to be transported there by buses alone. The concession accommodations were limited to campsite and primitive lodge—type facilities. The absence of automobiles rendered parking facilities unnecessary.

The sponsors of the Morris plan did not hesitate to attack the National Park Service for proposing to despoil Assateague, frequently failing to note the legal requirements dictating the bureau's course. The attacks rankled Bert Roberts, who found them unfair and the attackers' counter—proposals infeasible and unrealistic. "Labeling us as 'precise and deliberate' despoilers is a little much," he responded to Anthony Wayne Smith, president and general counsel of the National Parks Association. ". . .[I]f everything in the master plan is built in future years at this recreation area—and you know we do not want or expect this to happen—it will involve a very small percentage of the land ..." To a fellow seashore superintendent he wrote, "With respect to Assateague, the [Morris] report contains many errors and assumptions and generally ignores the key planning mandates of the legislation. However, it will probably excite certain groups and bring in some dues and memberships, which might be the name of the game!" [13]

The one—sheet plan was a "conceptual plan" requiring detailed elaboration of its proposals before they could be implemented. Service planners were continuing with this effort in late 1968 and early 1969. Responding to the flood of critical public comment generated by the National Parks Association and the Morris plan, the Service issued a form statement on its course of action in March:

This Service is currently preparing a detailed master plan for this national seashore in accordance with the Act of Congress that authorizes the area. The master plan will be based on a conceptual plan concurred in by the Director of the National Park Service and the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife and reviewed with the Maryland and Virginia congressional delegations.... It is expected that the master plan will be completed and available for public inspection during the summer of 1969. [14]

Senator Joseph D. Tydings of Maryland, among the sponsors of the 1965 Senate bill on Assateague, had not opposed its enactment with the development mandates and raised no objection to the resulting Service plan at the congressional presentation in June 1968. But in May 1969, with a vocal segment of the public protesting, he expressed his indignation to the new Secretary of the Interior, Walter J. Hickel:

I am shocked to learn that the National Park Service has drafted a master plan that includes provision for two 100 room motels with restaurants; a 32 foot wide road; hard surface parking for 14,000 cars and dozens of carry out food shops. . . . This is a gross misinterpretation of the intent of Congress and the act that created this National Seashore. The purpose was to preserve this unique area, not to turn it into just another seashore resort, which is what the reported plan would do. . . . I feel that visitor accommodations should be placed on the mainland and hard surfaced roads and parking facilities be kept to a minimum so that visitors can enjoy the wildlife and the natural beauty of this rare primitive area. [15]

Tydings requested a meeting to review the master plan and was informed of one already scheduled for this purpose on June 18 with Anthony Wayne Smith and other conservation group representatives. The conservationists met separately with George Hartzog and NPS officials and John Gottschalk and BSFW staff. Hartzog held firm, telling the delegation that the plan had been dictated by the Assateague legislation and accepted by Congress, and that there could be no reconsideration or revision without a change in the law. He refused their request to halt construction of a sewage treatment facility at North Beach, stating that it was needed to correct sanitation problems from existing visitor use. [16]

Director Gottschalk, reflecting his bureau's lesser commitment to the master plan (and the national seashore generally), told the group he felt the time was right for a review of the plan and for new legislation. BSFW should have full control in Virginia and develop only day-use facilities at Toms Cove, he said, making no effort to conceal his breach with the Park Service. The group met last with Deputy Assistant Secretary Charles Carothers, who spoke candidly but in basic support of the Service's public position: "I am fully aware of the hard fight against the road. This Department and you were allies in it. Now Congress has worked its will and unless Congress changes its mind, we are committed to the road. We think we have found a route that does the least damage to the wildlife and natural values and still meets our requirements in the Act." [17]

The conservationist assault, calling into question as it did the Service's commitment to conservation, if anything increased Bert Roberts' emotional commitment to the plan he had worked so hard to hammer out. To offset the opposition he lobbied for local support, obtaining the Delmarva Advisory Council's endorsement of the plan on June 30. The National Parks Association and its associates simultaneously continued their efforts to obtain congressional support and action, enlisting Representative John P. Saylor, another sponsor of the Assateague legislation, in their cause. On July 22 he attempted to amend a pending Interior appropriations bill to prohibit any funding for the connecting road (although the bill contained no such funding). Representative Downing, reminding his colleagues that the road was integral to the compromise forged for the seashore, opposed the amendment and succeeded in defeating it. [18]

Despite George Hartzog's public stance before the conservation groups, he was no more eager to implement the legislated development provisions than he ever had been. Following the June 18 meeting he declared that the Service would seek no appropriations for the connecting road or island development, other than day—use facilities near the two bridges, for a five—year period, during which time the Service would continue to encourage visitor services by private enterprise off the island. The National Environmental Policy Act enacted January 1, 1970, which would require consideration of alternatives and the preparation of a complicated environmental impact statement before the Service could undertake major development, became another excuse for delay. Around the same time, scientific studies were underway that called increasingly into question man's ability to stabilize dynamic barrier islands like Assateague for any permanent development. [19]

Support for major Assateague development still existed, but it was dwindling. Senator A. Willis Robertson, the most vociferous advocate of the connecting road and concession accommodations in Virginia, had been defeated in a primary election in 1966. By 1970 private visitor services in Chincoteague had so expanded that the local chamber of commerce sought assurance from Interior that competing concessions would not be established at Toms Cove. It was assured that Park Service policy opposed in—park development as long as public needs were being met outside. The road proposal also encountered local opposition from businesses who feared it would siphon tourists off to the north. Learning of these shifts in his constituents' sentiments, Representative Downing dropped his defense of the road. [20]

By the fall of 1971 George Hartzog had abandoned all pretense of support for the master plan's major development proposals. Citing the difficulty of justifying the connecting road with the required environmental impact statement, he told the press, I think that with this kind of development we literally destroy that which we set out to save." Bert Roberts' successor as seashore superintendent, Thomas F. Norris, Jr., and J. C. Appel, manager of Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, drafted and circulated an environmental statement proposing greatly scaled down development and visitor capacity limits for the Toms Cove area. [21] That the Service could now publicly disown Assateague's legal mandates testified to the success of its leadership's delaying tactics in the face of external events and to the virtual collapse of the pro—development forces.

The overt Federal shift in direction was particularly gratifying to the Committee to Preserve Assateague, an umbrella organization of conservation groups and individuals formed in 1970 to carry on the fight begun by the National Parks Association. Judith Colt Johnson of Towson, Maryland, a woman of exceptional persuasiveness and persistence, assumed the chairmanship of the group, which characterized itself as a successor to the original Citizens Committee for the Preservation of Assateague Island. Among its first undertakings was to promote a state investigation of the future of Assateague State Park and the extensive development plans for that area. [22]

Maryland Gets Involved

In response to this organized public interest and upon the formal request of the president of the Maryland Senate and the speaker of the House of Delegates, Governor Marvin Mandel on August 12, 1971, appointed a Joint Executive—Legislative Committee on Assateague Island "to review all aspects of the ownership, development, and utilization of Assateague Island and to make recommendations as to the proper course to be taken by the State of Maryland." The advisability of transferring the state park to the Federal Government was to receive particular attention. [23]

The committee reported to Governor Mandel in March 1972 after a series of meetings at which concerned Federal and state officials and private citizens offered their views. As strongly advocated by James B. Coulter, secretary of the Maryland Department of Forests and Parks, the report supported retention of the state's only seashore park. But it recommended severe curtailment of the development proposed therein, advising that individual campsites be limited to 350 units rather than the planned 500 and that other facilities be minimized and directed to day use. It further recommended that the Federal Assateague legislation be amended to delete the mandates for the connecting road and concession accommodations, and that Maryland join with the Federal Government in a new seashore master plan respecting the ecological sensitivity of the island and bay. The conservation interests were clearly in the ascendancy; the only dissenting committee member was Delegate Russell O. Hickman of Worcester County, who filed a minority report opposing repeal of the development requirements. [24]

In a letter of April 7 to Rogers C. B. Morton, now Secretary of the Interior, Governor Mandel endorsed the recommendations of the Joint Executive—Legislative Committee. Secretary Morton responded the following month, suggesting that the time had come for a review of the Assateague legislation with Maryland and Virginia officials. In September, Secretary of State Planning Vladimir A. Wahbe, who had chaired the Joint Executive—Legislative Committee, told the Environmental Matters Committee of the Maryland House of Delegates that his committee's report had been favorably received by representatives of both state governments and the Interior Department. The legislature approved a resolution in May 1973 commending the committee and urging the Governor to work toward implementing its recommendations. [25] These events and expressions of opinion followed closely upon a well orchestrated and highly productive letter—writing campaign by the Committee to Preserve Assateague and sympathetic organizations.

Worcester County, as represented by Delegate Hickman, was the last holdout for major development on Assateague. In January 1974, however, the attorney general of Maryland advised that state law would not authorize real property taxation of the concession accommodations the county had fought to prescribe on the island, so that county assessments would be limited to the personal property associated with the concessions. "In balancing the minimal losses of revenue derived from personal property tax against the preservation of non—commercial natural environment of Assateague Island, together with supportive commercial enterprises on the mainland in Worcester County, I can only find that the scale weighs heavily for the latter alternative," Secretary Coulter wrote the county commissioners. [26]

Congress Has a Better Idea

And so it came to pass that on April 4, 1974, new legislation was introduced by Senators Charles McC. Mathias, Jr., and J. Glenn Beall, Jr., of Maryland, Representative Robert E. Bauman of Maryland, and Representative Downing of Virginia to repeal sections 7 and 9 (mandating the concessions developments and the road respectively) of Public Law 89—195, the seashore authorization. [27] These bills died in the 93rd Congress but were reintroduced the following year as S. 82 (Mathias—Beall), H.R. 241 [28] (Downing), and H.R. 7407 (Bauman). The Marylanders' bills additionally authorized Federal compensation to Worcester County for taxes lost from the repeal of Section 7. Representative Downing's bill included authority for the Secretary of the Interior to undertake "a comprehensive plan for the lands and waters adjacent or related to the seashore" and to provide a public transportation system for visitors to the Virginia portion. It further directed that "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no Federal loan, grant, license, or other form of assistance for any project which, in the opinion of the Secretary, would significantly affect the administration, use, and environmental quality of the seashore shall be made, issued, or approved by the head of any Federal agency without the concurrence of the Secretary unless such project is consistent with the plan developed pursuant to this section."

Assistant Secretary Nathaniel P. Reed supported the thrust of the Senate bill in a May 9, 1975, letter to the Senate Interior Committee that characterized Assateague and similar barrier islands as "mobile resources." "Contrary to the belief of many," he wrote, "these islands are not being washed away but rather are moving landward by the very forces which were fundamental in their origin, namely wind and water. It would be folly to attempt to halt their migration. Consequently, the construction of permanent facilities which parallel the shoreline...would not be in the interest of sound resource management for the national seashore." He recommended a substitute for S. 82 that included its repeal provisions but deleted its specific reimbursement authorization for Worcester County; instead, a comprehensive plan would explore the development of taxable services on the mainland. The Interior substitute also contained the secretarial concurrence provision in the Downing bill and the final $1,350,000 increase in Assateague's land authorization ceiling. [29]

Three days later the Interior Committee's Subcommittee on Parks and Recreation held its hearing on the Assateague proposal. Senator Mathias testified on behalf of S. 82, noting that without repeal of section 7 and provision for reimbursement of the county, "environmentally destructive development could occur with no tax revenues raised to compensate." Of road mandate in section 9 he said, "Here again is an idea which has not stood the test of time. I have heard Assateague described as 'a barren place, swept by wind and sun, its solitude broken only by the shrill cry of wheeling gulls and the metronome boom of the surf.' This hardly the sort of resource that can stand the intrusion of a public road." [30]

Conservation group witnesses strongly backed the repeal provisions but generally sided with Interior against compensation for Worcester County. "In our opinion," a Wilderness Society spokesman testified, "this section could set a thoroughly undesirable precedent by giving legal respectability to the idea that a public body or private person may file claim against the Federal Government for loss of potential benefits which it envisions might accrue to it in consequence of certain plans which the Government may have had at one time." T. Destry Jarvis of the National Parks and Conservation Association (formerly National Parks Association), and vice chairman of the Committee to Preserve Assateague, suggested that with the possibility of competition from island concessions removed, the development of taxpaying visitor facilities off the island would be sufficiently stimulated. Judith Johnson urged that in addition to repealing its development mandates, the Congress amend the 1965 law's language proclaiming the recreational emphasis of the seashore. [31]

On June 2 the Senate committee reported S. 82 amended in accordance with the Interior substitute. The reported bill passed the full Senate two days later and was referred to the House. [32]

There matters moved more slowly. Representative Bauman, now speaking for Worcester County in Congress, expressed several concerns in a September meeting with NPS Legislation Division personnel. He wanted the comprehensive plan in the Senate—passed bill referred to the congressional committees before implementation, as his bill provided. James M. Lambe, the division chief, said the Service would have no objection. Bauman wanted the proposed designation of a wilderness area at Assateague deferred until the plan was completed; Lambe responded that the matter was in the hands of Congress and that the Service would not oppose deferral. Bauman was also reluctant to accept the provision requiring Interior concurrence in other Federal agency actions affecting Assateague, which could hold up coastal zone management programs, use of the outer continental shelf, inland waterway development, local planning and zoning affected by federally funded sewage treatment projects, and expansion of the Ocean City airport. [33]

The House Interior Subcommittee on Parks and Recreation heard testimony on the Assateague bills on February 20, 1976. Park Service Director Gary Everhardt recommended that the Downing bill be amended to conform to the Senate—passed bill, which included the increased land acquisition ceiling. Representative Bauman appeared on behalf of his bill, arguing for its requirement that the comprehensive seashore plan specifically consider compensation for Worcester County: "I am not under an illusion what [Interior's] recommendation will be, but it will at least force them to address what was promised to the people of the area. He denounced the broad concurrence empowerment in the Downing and Senate bills: "I can see the Secretary possibly vetoing the inland waterway which the Corps of Engineers is working on right nearby, a dredging project at the Ocean City inlet, and so forth." Mark O. Pilchard, president of the Worcester County Commissioners, spoke against all bills because none guaranteed compensation for lost tax revenues. Representative Roy A. Taylor, the subcommittee chairman, was unsympathetic to the county position, stating his belief that the establishment of national parklands customarily stimulated sufficient adjacent development to more than offset revenue losses from the Federal land acquisition. Other committee members noted that Worcester County already had Ocean City for a tax base, and that the county had failed to control its unaesthetic aspects. [34]

The consensus of the House committee was incorporated in a new bill, H.R. 13713, introduced May 11 by Representative Taylor with the cosponsorship of Representative Bauman and others. Reported by the committee four days later, it provided for repeal of sections 7 and 9 and a comprehensive plan to be submitted to the congressional committees within two years including recommendations for compensation to Worcester County. Instead of requiring Interior concurrence in other agencies' undertakings, it would allow such actions to proceed after "consultation with the Secretary and full consideration of his views." H.R. 13713 passed the House on June 8, whereupon it went to the Senate and its Interior committee. [35]

The Park Service recommended that the Interior Department express no objection to Senate passage of H.R. 13713 in lieu of S. 82. Foreseeing that other agencies would appeal to the President and Congress if the concurrence requirement were retained and the Secretary vetoed their projects, the Service had come to believe that "the provision in H.R. 13713 for consultation will afford adequate consideration of the Department's concerns regarding the undertaking of any such project, and thus avoid the difficulties of appeals." The Department, however, advised the Senate committee to restore the S. 82 language. It did so, and on August 26 the Senate passed the omnibus H.R. 13713 with the Assateague provisions it had originally voted. [36]

The possibility of an impasse resulting in no Assateague legislation was broken only in the closing days of the session as Congress hastened to adjourn for the fall election campaign. On September 29 the House concurred in the Senate amendments to H.R. 13713 but with additional amendments, most notably returning from "concurrence" to "consultation" with a specified 30—day period for the Secretary to comment on other Federal actions. It did not restore the language addressing possible compensation for Worcester County, and Representative Bauman, an expert parliamentarian adept at delaying the legislative process when it suited his purposes, expressed his displeasure. Judith Johnson of the Committee to Preserve Assateague lobbied diligently to reconcile the differences. Finally on the last day of the 94th Congress, both houses agreed to and passed the bill as last amended by the House. It received the President's approval October 21. [37] (The Assateague provisions of the act are reproduced in full in the appendix.)

Thus it was that 11 years and one month after Assateague Island National Seashore was legally inaugurated, its planning and development mandates were so fundamentally transformed as to render it "born again." The change of direction long accepted in practice had become a matter of law, and the law now required the charting of a new course for the seashore. The story of the new planning effort, completed only as this is being written, will be told in the final chapter.

Endnotes

¹Interview with Udall, June 2, 1982.

²Memorandum, Udall to Hartzog, Aug. 31, 1966, file D18, Assateague Island National Seashore headquarters (hereinafter cited as ASIS); interview with Gottschalk, June 2, 1982; interview with Hartzog, June 2, 1982.

³Letter, Robertson to Udall, May 31, 1966, file D18, ASIS; memorandum, Director John S. Gottschalk, BSFW, to Secretary of the Interior, June 17, 1966, signed as approved by Udall June 28, 1966, file D18, ASIS.

⁴Memorandum, Gottschalk to Director, NPS, and Director, Bureau of Outdoor Recreation, Oct. 6, 1965, file A4415, ASIS; memorandum, Roberts to Director, NPS, Mar. 29, 1966, file A4415, ASIS; memorandum, Roberts to Regional Director, Northeast Region, NPS, Aug. 2, 1966, file D18, ASIS. (Administrative titles hereinafter may be presumed to identify NPS officials unless otherwise noted.)

⁵Cain to Director, BSFW, and Director, NPS, file A4415, ASIS.

⁶Memorandum, Hartzog to Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks, Dec. 26, 1966, file D18, ASIS.

⁷Memorandum, Roberts to Chief, Office of Resource Planning, Washington Service Center, Nov. 8, 1966, file D18, ASIS; memorandum, Edward S. Peetz, Chief, Office of Resource Planning, WSC, to Chief, Division of New Area Studies and Master Planning, Dec. 30, 1966, file D18, ASIS; memorandum, Raymond L. Freeman, Chief, New Area Studies and Master Planning, to Chief, Office of Resource Planning, WSC, Jan. 10, 1967, file D18, ASIS.

⁸Cain to Director, BSFW, and Director, NPS, file A4415, ASIS.

⁹Memorandum, Roberts to Regional Director, Northeast Region, June 1, 1967, file D18, ASIS.

¹⁰Memorandum, Roberts to Regional Director, Northeast Region, May 12,1969, file D18, ASIS.

¹¹Letter, Roberts to Anthony Higgins, Dec. 17, 1968, file D18, ASIS.

¹²Memorandum, Roberts to Regional Director, National Capital Region, Dec. 7, 1967, file D18, ASIS; memorandum, Acting Director Howard W. Baker, NPS, and Director John S. Gottschalk, BSFW, to Secretary of the Interior, Jan. 18, 1968 (Udall's signature Jan. 24), file D18, ASIS; memorandum, Roberts to Regional Director, Northeast Region, Jan. 30, 1970, file D18, ASIS.

¹³Letter, Roberts to Smith, Mar. 13, 1969, file A22, ASIS; memorandum, Roberts to Superintendent, Padre Island National Seashore, Feb. 12, 1969, file A22, ASIS.

¹⁴"Master Plan for Assateague Island National Seashore," March 1969, file A22, ASIS.

¹⁵Letter, Tydings to Hickel, May 9, 1969, in NPS Washington Office file L1425, Washington National Records Center, Suitland, Md. (hereinafter cited as WASO file_____, WNRC).

¹⁶Letter, Associate Director Edward A. Hummel to Tydings, June 17, 1969, WASO file L1425, WNRC; memorandum, Acting Director Harthon L. Bill to Secretary of the Interior, July 9, 1969, in NPS Office of Legislation, Washington, D.C. (hereinafter cited as WASO—170).

¹⁷Memorandum, Acting Assistant Director Stanley C. Joseph to Director, June 24, 1969, file A4415, ASIS; memorandum, Acting Director Harthon L. Bill to Secretary of the Interior, July 9, 1969, WASO-170.

¹⁸Letter, W. Darlington Denit, DAC, to Roberts, June 30, 1969, file D18, ASIS; Mary Corddry, "Assateague Plan Backed," The Sun, Baltimore, July 4, 1969, clipping in file D18, ASIS; 115 Congressional Record 26322.

¹⁹National Park Service, "Statement for Management and Planning, Assateague Island National Seashore," 1972, p. 2; Thomas F. Norris, Jr., in minutes, Nov. 5, 1971, meeting of Joint Executive—Legislative Committee on Assateague Island, in "Supplement, Report to the Governor by the Joint Executive—Legislative Committee on Assateague Island," March 1972, copy in Interpretation and Visitor Services Division file, NPS Mid—Atlantic Regional Office, Philadelphia, Pa.; Paul J. Godfrey, "A Report on the Status of National Seashores on the U.S. East Coast as of Summer 1970," prepared for the Chief Scientist, National Park Service, copy in Resource Preservation Division files, NPS Mid—Atlantic Regional Office.

²⁰Letter, Donald J. Leonard to Assistant Secretary Leslie A. Glasgow, Jan. 27, 1970, file D30, ASIS; interview with Thomas F. Norris, Jr., May 24, 1982.

²¹"Assateague Land—Buying Funds Urged," The Sun, Baltimore, Nov. 13, 1971, ASIS clipping file; "Draft Statement of Environmental Impact for Proposed Development of Toms Cove Area," September 1971, copy in file D18, ASIS

²²Judith C. Johnson testimony in U.S., Congress, Senate, Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, Assateague Island National Seashore Amendments...Hearing on S. 82 et al., 94th Congress, 1st Session, May 12, 1975 (hereinafter cited as Senate Hearing, 1975).

²³Letter, Mandel to Secretary of State Planning Vladimir A. Wahbe, Aug. 12, 1971, in "Supplement, Report to the Governor by the Joint Executive—Legislative Committee."

²⁴"Report to the Governor by the Joint Executive—Legislative Committee on Assateague Island," March 1972, copy in file D18, ASIS.

²⁵House Joint Resolution 15, May 24, 1973, reproduced in National Park Service, "Preferred Planning Alternative for Assateague Island Comprehensive Plan," August 1979, copy in NPS Office of Park Planning and Environmental Quality, Washington, D.C.

²⁶Letter, Coulter to Ray Redden, President, Worcester County Commissioners, Jan. 28, 1974, WASO-170.

²⁷S. 3302 (Mathias—Beall), H.R. 13975 (Downing), H.R. 14005 (Bauman), 93rd Congress, 2d Session.

²⁸S. 82, Jan. 15, 1975, H.R. 241, Jan. 14, 1975, H.R. 7407, May 22, 1975, 94th Congress, 1st Session.

²⁹Letter, Reed to Sen. Henry M. Jackson, WASO-170.

³⁰Senate Hearing, 1975, pp. 28—29.

³¹Ibid., pp. 113, 118—19, 134—35.

³²Senate Report 94—163, 94th Congress, 1st Session, June 2, 1975; 121 Congressional Record 16939.

³³Memorandum, Lambe to files, Sept. 10, 1975, WASO-170.

³⁴Unpublished transcript of Parks and Recreation Subcommittee hearing, Feb. 20, 1976, WASO—170.

³⁵House Report 94—1162, 94th Congress, 2d Session, May 18, 1976; Congressional Record, June 8, 1976, pp. H5427—28.

³⁶Memorandum, Acting Assistant Director Eldon G. Reyer to Legislative Counsel, July 15, 1976, WASO-170; letter, Assistant Secretary John Kyl to Sen. Henry M. Jackson, July 23, 1976, WASO-170; Senate Report 94—1158, 94th Congress, 2d Session, Aug. 20, 1976; Congressional Record, Aug. 26, 1976, p. S14653.

³⁷Congressional Record, Sept. 29, 1976, p. H11673, Oct. 1, 1976, pp. H12395, S17733—36; memorandum (re Johnson role), Thomas F. Norris, Jr., to Superintendent, Everglades National Park, Jan. 19, 1978, file D1817, ASIS; Norris interview.