Victor Fazio: “I think this debate will once and for all, contrary to a rumor circulating on the floor, this amendment is not an…”

“I think this debate will once and for all, contrary to a rumor circulating on the floor, this amendment is not an attempt to clarify the pronunciation of the gentleman's name and mine, but it is the Fazio substitute to the DeFazio-Petri amendment that we are about to vote on. I am offering this on behalf of the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. McDade] and on behalf of the gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Skaggs] and the gentleman from Colorado [Mr. McInnis]. This is an attempt to allow a process undergoing success in Colorado, the so-called Roemer-Shoettler process, to downsize and change the Animas-La Plata water project. It will assuredly reduce the cost of this project by over $400 million. But we have ongoing responsibilities to the Ute and Mountain Ute Indian tribes. Those tribal water rights need to be honored. We need to complete this process. We need to have a bill that can be supported broadly on this floor. The gentlemen from Colorado, Mr. McInnis and Mr. Skaggs, would not be supporting this if they did not believe this process was working to the benefit of their constituents. My view is that this amendment, offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Petri] and the gentleman from Oregon [Mr. DeFazio], will interfere with that process and not allow us to accept the results of it and move to completion of an endless legal hassle which has kept these native Americans from getting their water rights.”