Karen Bass: “I want to say a couple of things. First of all, from my perspective, from the perspective of a businessman, this…”

“I want to say a couple of things. First of all, from my perspective, from the perspective of a businessman, this amendment is nothing but a pig in a poke. The fact of the matter is logs do not fly. They will not sprout wings and fly out of the forests, and somebody will have to pay for these logging roads. Now, contracts for timber are let exactly the same way a contract would be let to build a building or parking lot or anything else. There is a sale price and cost of sales, and then there is a back charge or credit the cost, especially of capital improvements, into the sale price. These roads are going to get built, unless we plan to end timber harvest completely in this country, which would be a terrible idea. We will not end up saving money, because the bids will have to be lowered in order to cover this capital expense. So let us defeat this amendment and get on with the business of approving this Interior appropriations.”