Political Quotes

“I thank our chairman and manager of the bill for yielding time. I join him in urging that my colleagues oppose the amendment to strike the provision to decommission the Hopper Dredge McFarland. As has already been stated, the McFarland is an expensive, 39-year- old hopper dredge which costs $79,000 a day to operate, more than double what a more technologically capable commercial dredge would cost. The McFarland imposes a wasteful expenditure of scarce resources on Corps dredging projects. The Energy and Water bill will provide money for removing asbestos from the McFarland, another expense we don't need. In addition, it needs between $20 million and $40 million in upgrades to bring its safety and operational efficiency to minimal levels of acceptability in comparison with state-of-the-art private sector dredges. Since 1978 the dredging industry has developed the capability to perform the majority of the Corps' dredging work. This came as a result of Public Law 95-269, which directed the Secretary of the Army to dredge by contract, if he determines private industry has the capability to do such work and it can be done at reasonable prices and in a timely manner. Under the law the Secretary ``shall retain only the minimum federally owned fleet'' to ``carry out emergency and national defense work'' and may set aside ``such amount of work as he determines to be reasonably necessary to keep such fleet fully operational . . .…”