William Tauzin: “I want to speak about another national wildlife reserve. It is not in the cold north of ANWR. It is not in the frozen…”

“I want to speak about another national wildlife reserve. It is not in the cold north of ANWR. It is not in the frozen tundra along an Arctic coast, which is already producing just a short distance away, in Prudhoe Bay, an amazing amount of resources for the good of our country. It is the national wildlife reserve located in deep south Louisiana. It is called Mandalay. It is beautiful. And if my colleagues think there are any critters running around in the Arctic, or in the ANWR, they should come to Mandalay. It is so rich in wildlife, with fish diversities of which one could never imagine. We call Louisiana 'Sportsmen's Paradise,' there is so much fish, so much wildlife there. In fact, when I came to Washington as a young freshman, I told the Department of the Interior they had to get the alligators off the endangered species list quick or put us on, one or the other. We have alligators, fish, turtles, and every kind of wildlife a person can think of in Mandalay Wildlife Reserve. There are also 100 producing wells. Each one of those wells produces for the good of our country. It produces in an environmentally safe way. Royalties from that production goes back into protecting Mandalay and the 5 million acres in Louisiana that we protect as wildlife areas, including Mandalay. We do it in an environmentally sensitive way in the heart of a region that is so full of wildlife it cannot even compare to the Arctic and ANWR.”