[Federal Register Volume 66, Number 14 (Monday, January 22, 2001)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 7364-7367]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 01-2104]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register / Vol. 66, No. 14 / Monday, January 22, 2001 /
Presidential Documents
[[Page 7364]]
Proclamation 7399 of January 17, 2001
Establishment of the Virgin Islands Coral Reef
National Monument
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
The Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument, in the
submerged lands off the island of St. John in the U.S.
Virgin Islands, contains all the elements of a
Caribbean tropical marine ecosystem. This designation
furthers the protection of the scientific objects
included in the Virgin Islands National Park, created
in 1956 and expanded in 1962. The biological
communities of the monument live in a fragile,
interdependent relationship and include habitats
essential for sustaining and enhancing the tropical
marine ecosystem: mangroves, sea grass beds, coral
reefs, octocoral hardbottom, sand communities, shallow
mud and fine sediment habitat, and algal plains. The
fishery habitats, deeper coral reefs, octocoral
hardbottom, and algal plains of the monument are all
objects of scientific interest and essential to the
long-term sustenance of the tropical marine ecosystem.
The monument is within the Virgin Islands, which lie at
the heart of the insular Caribbean biome, and is
representative of the Lesser Antillean biogeographic
province. The island of St. John rises from a platform
that extends several miles from shore before plunging
to the abyssal depths of the Anegada trough to the
south and the Puerto Rican trench to the north, the
deepest part of the Atlantic Ocean. This platform
contains a multitude of species that exist in a
delicate balance, interlinked through complex
relationships that have developed over tens of
thousands of years.
As part of this important ecosystem, the monument
contains biological objects including several
threatened and endangered species, which forage, breed,
nest, rest, or calve in the waters. Humpback whales,
pilot whales, four species of dolphins, brown pelicans,
roseate terns, least terns, and the hawksbill,
leatherback, and green sea turtles all use portions of
the monument. Countless species of reef fish,
invertebrates, and plants utilize these submerged lands
during their lives, and over 25 species of sea birds
feed in the waters. Between the nearshore nursery
habitats and the shelf edge spawning sites in the
monument are habitats that play essential roles during
specific developmental stages of reef-associated
species, including spawning migrations of many reef
fish species and crustaceans.
The submerged monument lands within Hurricane Hole
include the most extensive and well-developed mangrove
habitat on St. John. The Hurricane Hole area is an
important nursery area for reef associated fish and
invertebrates, instrumental in maintaining water
quality by filtering and trapping sediment and debris
in fresh water runoff from the fast land, and essential
to the overall functioning and productivity of regional
fisheries. Numerous coral reef-associated species,
including the spiny lobster, queen conch, and Nassau
grouper, transform from planktonic larvae to bottom-
dwelling juveniles in the shallow nearshore habitats of
Hurricane Hole. As they mature, they move offshore and
take up residence in the deeper coral patch reefs,
octocoral hardbottom, and algal plains of the submerged
monument lands to the south and north of St. John.
[[Page 7365]]
The monument lands south of St. John are predominantly
deep algal plains with scattered areas of raised hard
bottom. The algal plains include communities of mostly
red and calcareous algae with canopies as much as half
a meter high. The raised hard bottom is sparsely
colonized with corals, sponges, gorgonians, and other
invertebrates, thus providing shelter for lobster,
groupers, and snappers as well as spawning sites for
some reef fish species. These algal plains and raised
hard bottom areas link the shallow water reef, sea
grass, and mangrove communities with the deep water
shelf and shelf edge communities of fish and
invertebrates.
Section 2 of the Act of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16
U.S.C. 431), authorizes the President, in his
discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic
landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and
other objects of historic or scientific interest that
are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the
Government of the United States to be national
monuments, and to reserve as a part thereof parcels of
land, the limits of which in all cases shall be
confined to the smallest area compatible with the
proper care and management of the objects to be
protected.
WHEREAS it appears that it would be in the public
interest to reserve such lands as a national monument
to be known as the Virgin Islands Coral Reef National
Monument:
NOW, THEREFORE, I, WILLIAM J. CLINTON, President of the
United States of America, by the authority vested in me
by section 2 of the Act of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225,
16 U.S.C. 431), do proclaim that there are hereby set
apart and reserved as the Virgin Islands Coral Reef
National Monument, for the purpose of protecting the
objects identified above, all lands and interests in
lands owned or controlled by the United States within
the boundaries of the area described on the map
entitled ``Virgin Islands Coral Reef National
Monument'' attached to and forming a part of this
proclamation. The Federal land and interests in land
reserved consist of approximately 12,708 marine acres,
which is the smallest area compatible with the proper
care and management of the objects to be protected.
All Federal lands and interests in lands within the
boundaries of this monument are hereby appropriated and
withdrawn from all forms of entry, location, selection,
sale, or leasing or other disposition under the public
land laws, including but not limited to withdrawal from
location, entry, and patent under the mining laws, and
from disposition under all laws relating to mineral and
geothermal leasing, other than by exchange that
furthers the protective purposes of the monument. For
the purpose of protecting the objects identified above,
the Secretary shall prohibit all boat anchoring, except
for emergency or authorized administrative purposes.
For the purposes of protecting the objects identified
above, the Secretary shall prohibit all extractive
uses, except that the Secretary may issue permits for
bait fishing at Hurricane Hole and for blue runner
(hard nose) line fishing in the area south of St. John,
to the extent that such fishing is consistent with the
protection of the objects identified in this
proclamation.
Lands and interests in lands within the monument not
owned or controlled by the United States shall be
reserved as a part of the monument upon acquisition of
title or control thereto by the United States.
The Secretary of the Interior shall manage the monument
through the National Park Service, pursuant to
applicable legal authorities, to implement the purposes
of this proclamation. The National Park Service will
manage the monument in a manner consistent with
international law.
The Secretary of the Interior shall prepare a
management plan, including the management of vessels in
the monument, within 3 years, which addresses any
further specific actions necessary to protect the
objects identified in this proclamation.
The establishment of this monument is subject to valid
existing rights.
[[Page 7366]]
Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke
any existing withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation;
however, the national monument shall be the dominant
reservation.
Warning is hereby given to all unauthorized persons not
to appropriate, injure, destroy, or remove any feature
of this monument and not to locate or settle upon any
of the lands thereof.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
seventeenth day of January, in the year of our Lord two
thousand one, and of the Independence of the United
States of America the two hundred and twenty-fifth.
(Presidential Sig.)
Billing code 3195-01-P
[[Page 7367]]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TD22JA01.185
[FR Doc. 01-2104 Filed 1-19-01; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3195-01-C