mr. chairman , i thank the gentlewoman from wyoming for yielding me this time . 
i would also like to begin by thanking the people who have worked so hard on this bill , especially the gentleman from north carolina ( mr. taylor ) xz4003981 , who has been very thoughtful about the payments in lieu of taxes issue and has worked well with us in the past . 
we are committed to getting full funding for pilt because the counties in rural america and areas where they are dominated by the federal government need that kind of support . 
i have a map beside me here which is similar to the map the gentleman from colorado ( mr. udall ) xz4004121 had just a moment ago , although we did it in red because we want to represent the statement , so we can see the meaning of a statement that was made by president ronald reagan in 1988 . 
he said : `` i have a map . 
i wish everyone could see it . 
it 's a map of the united states . 
and land owned by the government is in red , and the rest of the map is white . 
west of the mississippi river , your first glance at the map , you would think the whole thing is red the government owns so much property. '' the government owns so much property . 
i do not know any place other than the soviet union where the government owns more land than ours does . 
we have a problem . 
the federal government owns the bulk of the west . 
half of california is owned by the federal government . 
two-thirds of most of the other states in the west are owned by the federal government . 
that means we do not tax those lands , and that means that in the western united states , we pay less per child per education , but we tax our people more per family , because we are supporting the federal government in this environment . 
it is only fair that we pay a reasonable amount in lieu of taxes to cover that shortfall . 
so i urge my colleagues to support this amendment to add a modest sum to the pilt , but a sum that is very , very important to the american people , those who live in these public land areas , and those who enjoy them from the rest of the country . 
