John Hansen: “let me just say, the Secretary is given the right to monitor these things. That is what we are doing here. I think he…”

“let me just say, the Secretary is given the right to monitor these things. That is what we are doing here. I think he can probably do a better job than I can sitting back here in Washington, D.C., or anybody else. He has got people on the ground that are doing those things. He has agreed to do it. They have taken an extremely active part in this. The Secretary of the Interior buys into this legislation. He thinks it is a good idea; he feels we are finally resolving a very contentious issue. That OHV thing has been a thorn in our flesh for years. I agree with the gentleman. How do we handle these things? Little by little we are getting a good control on it, and I think in this bill we are getting the control. Now, we can do this, we can just say, Let's just throw this whole thing wide open, let's not pass this bill, let's have unrestricted mining, let's have unrestricted OHVs, let's just desecrate the area. That is basically what we are going to get if we do not pass this bill. We have had some interesting discussion here today, but let us get together, get this thing passed, and give this area some good protection. That is what we are really trying to do.”