Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, first, let me thank my good friend from Hawaii (Ms. Hanabusa) for coming over here to help manage the bill. I know it was an imposition, but I thank her. It means a great deal to me. Mr. Speaker, the Swan Lake hydroelectric project is a remote facility in southeast Alaska that provides electric power to nearly 20,000 of my constituents in the cities of Petersburg, Wrangell, Ketchikan, and the surrounding areas. In 1994, the project's operator began work to raise the dam height by 15 feet, working with the State of Alaska to secure 1,500 acres of land from the Federal Government inside the reservoir's new coverage area. The land was surveyed by the Federal Government and transferred to the State of Alaska in 1997. In 2012, the project operator discovered an error in the Federal Government's survey and determined an additional 25.8 acres of Federal land would be inundated if the water level were raised. There is no disagreement among the Federal and State agencies concerned that an error occurred. H.R. 219 will fix the error by requiring the Secretary of the Interior to correct the survey and transfer the remaining acreage to the State of Alaska. This is a commonsense bill that promotes green energy development at zero cost to the Federal Government. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the measure, and I reserve the balance of my time.”