Mike Ross: “Currently, Arkansas residents pay on average $1.69 per gallon of mid-grade gasoline. Thousands of my constituents depend…”

“Currently, Arkansas residents pay on average $1.69 per gallon of mid-grade gasoline. Thousands of my constituents depend on their cars to get to and from their jobs or on tractors or equipment to tend to their farms each and every day. I live in a very rural district, and they simply cannot afford the drastic increase in gas prices that they are being forced to pay. With the summer season expected to be as hot as last year, we will probably have in Arkansas a drought for the fourth year in a row, and I anticipate that we are headed for a repeat of last year's overheated oil prices, the highest since 1990. In fact, we have already seen indications that the price is growing steadily. A recent national survey shows that the price of gasoline has skyrocketed 17 cents in the last 4 weeks alone, bringing the national average to $1.82 a gallon. These prices are unjustified, and our response to bring these prices down must be immediate. I call on the President and the administration to tell OPEC to increase their levels of oil production, which they cut as recently as March by a million barrels a day. It is wrong that a handful of foreign countries can get together and have a lot to do with dictating the price of gasoline at the pumps in south Arkansas.”