Watt called on the carpet over coal leasing program

This week a congressional panel's report accused him of mismanaging the federal coal leasing program. An eight-month investigation by the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior concluded that private companies have reaped windfall profits from the program at the expense of taxpayers. It charged that the Interior Department awarded leases of federal land for next to nothing.

A department spokesman said the agency would respond today (April 27), when the assistant interior secretary for land and water resources testifies before the subcommittee.