Ken Calvert: “Mr. Speaker, we have talked about many of the reasons why the Salton Sea is worth saving. I think that there is…”

“Mr. Speaker, we have talked about many of the reasons why the Salton Sea is worth saving. I think that there is agreement on both sides of the aisle that we want to save the Salton Sea. The difference between the approach of the majority and the minority in this case is that we actually want to do something about it. For over 30 years I have been reading newspaper articles about this study and that study, about amounts of money that have been going in to look at the catastrophe of the Salton Sea, and nothing has happened, and yet again today we talk about yet another study that leads potentially nowhere. The great difference between the proposal today by the Salton Sea Task Force is that we actually are going to do something about a problem that has existed for a long time, not talk about it, but actually do something about it. People have talked about the birds, the fish, the recreational resources that are going to waste. We can talk about that until the sea dies. And, Mr. Speaker, Sonny was a person that spoke plainly, so I will speak plainly: It is time that we do something about this, and that is why we are here. Fifteen million people live near the Salton Sea. Actually much more than that around the southwest United States utilizes it and have for many years. It would be a shame if today we let this opportunity pass us by.”