Douglas Alexander: “I wish to, in the remaining time, mention two other proposals that have to do with the great American outdoors.…”

“I wish to, in the remaining time, mention two other proposals that have to do with the great American outdoors. Yesterday, a group of 17 Senators and Congressmen from North Carolina and Tennessee took a historic step by writing a letter to Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne about the so-called ``Road to Nowhere'' through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The point of the letter was to suggest to the Secretary three things: No. 1, Mr. Secretary, bring to a conclusion within 30 days the environmental impact statement that has been going on for several years about whether to build this road--the $600 million ``road to nowhere'' through the park--and recommend, Mr. Secretary, that no road should be built. That is the first step. The second step is one we can take ourselves in the Congress once the Department of the Interior has said that no proposal for road construction would be appropriate environmentally. The 17 of us believe we should reprogram the remaining money from the environmental impact statement, which we judge to be $5 million, $6 million or $7 million, and give it to the citizens of Swain County, NC, who have waited since 1943 for just compensation for the promise the Government made to them at that time to compensate them for the road that was flooded when Fontana Dam was built.”