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sion — have remained approximately the same. We are looking 

 at 



Mr. Synar. I am more interested in the number of monitors. 



Mr. Frampton. What has happened is that more of that funding 

 has gone into personnel costs, and in the last 2 years the oper- 

 ations portion of the budget, which is what supports the monitor- 

 ing, has gone down, and so the major area that has taken a hit is 

 the monitoring. 



Mr. Synar. Why? Why did you do that? 



Mr. Christiano. My name is John Christiano. I am Chief of the 

 Air Quality Division at the National Park Service. 



Our monitoring budget is approximately 80 percent of our divi- 

 sion budget excluding personnel. Anytime we have increases in per- 

 sonnel costs, cost-of-living increases, those kinds of things, it has 

 to be offset someplace in the budget. 



Mr. Synar. How did the biological survey affect your air quality? 



Mr. Christiano. We had two FTEs that went to the biological 

 survey and about half a million dollars. 



Mr. Synar. Did you request money to maintain your level of 

 monitoring? 



Mr. Christiano. I did through the Park Service process. I am not 

 sure how well — obviously, it didn't compete well with other prior- 

 ities the Park Service had. 



Mr. Synar. Did it survive? 



Mr. Christiano. We did not receive an increase. 



Mr. Synar. On June 4, 1993, David Carr, who you saw testify 

 earlier, sent you a letter with a list of options for addressing the 

 air pollution problems in the Great Smoky Mountains National 

 Park and the Shenandoah National Park. Aside from addressing 

 the regional haze, the letter went on to suggest that you meet with 

 EPA to develop a joint strategy, carry out your responsibilities, and 

 recommended including forming a task force to protect air-related 

 values. Have you created that task force? 



Mr. Christiano. Well, we do meet with EPA regularly, we work 

 very well with our colleagues at EPA. We have done — we are par- 

 ticipating in the new source review task force, we are participating 

 in SAMI initiative, all of which EPA is involved with. 



Mr. Synar. I want to pin you down. Is there a task force or you 

 are just meeting with them on air quality related matters, on air 

 quality related values? 



Mr. Christiano. I am not sure if you would define it as a task 

 force. We have biweekly phone calls at least with other Federal 

 land management agencies and EPA, and are working together to 

 try to establish common 



Mr. Synar. Do you think this task force might be helpful given 

 what we have heard today? 



Mr. Christiano. Cooperating with other agencies certainly has 

 helped, I think. 



Mr. Synar. Mr. Frampton, how does the Park Service decide 

 when to issue an adverse impact determination? 



Mr. Frampton. How does it decide when to do that? 



Well, I would let Mr. Christiano respond to that, too. 



Mr. Christiano. Thank you. 



