I may bring you an issue then, because I just think in some of these States that have this huge swath of jurisdictional issues, especially Federal land, it seems like we should figure out this.

Thank you very much, Mayor. And just for folks here in the room, these are pictures from that fire, and it is incredible devastation that occurred.

I really do not see any other entity, aside from the Federal Government, that can really force people to the table to have that conversation.

we thought this was a great win-win not only for the Forest Service but the Coast Guard for equipment that is desperately needed.

Does it need more? I am giving you a softball there.

We know since the 1990s the amount of money for suppression has gone from about $1 billion to $3 billion.

As a former mayor myself, I know firsthand how important it is to have personnel and resources to prevent and fight fires when they occur.

I thank the Presiding Officer and thank my friend from Oregon. I appreciate the opportunity to be on the floor today to talk about veterans care. It is an important issue that is not only critical to my State but across the country. As we…

For Alaska to have a fire of that magnitude in May is unheard of.

I think we had to bring in two Canadian water tankers, if I remember right, in addition to our crew.

In the appropriations process. So that is a real positive for all of us.

This is our effort to move the Senate into the 21st Century as we do this testimony.

I can tell you, when I said that--and I know Mayor Navarre was there when we were doing an incident press conference, and I said that.

I hate to use the word, but 'surplus' planes from the military that we--who knows what they were going to do with them.

Do we believe that we have good resources for their continued maintenance and upgrade?

We just want to have a strategy that has an action plan that we can look at and determine if we can fund it, help it, make it happen from the State, local, private, Federal level.

I wish to speak as if in morning business to talk about one issue, IRS overreach. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Before I do that, I do want to say to my friend who just spoke, I am one of those who loves biennial budgets. I think it is a great idea and one we should continue to work toward. It makes work a little bit better and we also get a little…

We have a huge Alaska Native veteran population, American Indian population, in Alaska: 150,000-plus.

As a former mayor, we would fire them. They would be gone.

Without accountability we are never going to solve this problem.

Sometimes, you have got to have some heads roll in order to get the system to shape up.

It is critical that we figure out the systematic problem.

It has now become a systemic issue that I am now seeing in others.

If they are cheating, they are not trustworthy.