GLRI funds have been effectively deployed to protect safe clean drinking water supplies, clean up toxic sites, protect wetlands and shorelines, hold off invasive species from entering the Great Lakes, and safeguard aquatic resources.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We want to put that into just nothing more than bad memories.

They need you to be a warrior for them.

I would like to focus my first round of questions on contract support costs, and the 105[l]s.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I thought that we were going to be a little more competitive, perhaps, in the Community Wildfire Defense Program Grant.

I appreciate that. Again, we certainly, I am certainly hearing from the Native leaders about the need to prioritize Tribal participation within the conservation of the Cooperative Management.

This is an environmental injustice that we have discussed, it is an environmental injustice caused by the Federal Government.

A lack of promises made and promises unfulfilled. A little bit of a pulling the rug out from underneath us.

I had mentioned in my last question there, Chief, the Southeast Alaska Sustainable Strategy, $25 million spent so far and, it is always described as quote, 'An initial investment'.

I think it has to be done at whatever expense necessary.

Okay. So maybe you can work with us on some of this TA that we are looking for?

Well, and Madam Secretary, if I may, because I was at that roundtable with Secretary McDonough.

I appreciate that. But our situation here is, at the end of 2022, the unobligated balance for IHS was $6 billion.

I hope that you and your team will be able to explore ways in which CDS projects can be awarded faster.

EPA's mismanagement has led to elevated PM 2.5 emissions even though Congress has provided almost $100 million for wood stove changeouts.

Thank you Chairman Jeff Merkley, Ranking Member Lisa Murkowski, and Members of the subcommittee for your leadership to reduce pollution in rivers, improve clean water access, safeguard public drinking water supplies.

But I do want to impress upon you that right now the community leaders, the mayors of the Borough of the Kenai Peninsula, as well as within the Anchorage area, they are coming to me, not for more in appropriations, because they are not…

It is my hope that we can continue our bipartisan tradition to prioritize the needs of Native communities.

What I am trying to drill down though, is whether or not there is legally defined reference definitions.

I think we have made upholding the Federal Government's trust responsibility a bipartisan priority, and it needs to continue to be so.

I appreciate that. Again, we certainly, I am certainly hearing from the Native leaders about the need to prioritize Tribal participation within the conservation of the Cooperative Management.

I think it has to be done at whatever expense necessary.

What is the rationale between--with just enacted levels when it comes to MMIW across the country?