Bruce F. Vento: “I rise in opposition to this. I commend my colleagues for trying to work out a compromise for his legislation, which he…”

“I rise in opposition to this. I commend my colleagues for trying to work out a compromise for his legislation, which he realizes has some problems or is flawed, but the fact is that this is just a perfect political solution: The President is able to declare, and then Congress will do what Congress has done, and that is sit on its hands and nothing would happen. So it does not really put anything on us. It is the same problem that we had. We are right back where we started from. We are chasing our tail around a tree here. That is really what this amendment does. I appreciate the fact that they have 2 years to go out and convince the public, but we have had many decades to try to convince them about the red rock country of southern Utah and we still have not come to a conclusion by setting a certain amount aside for conservation purposes. That is the problem with this amendment. Far worse than that, this amendment says that 30 days before we have to send the proclamation to the Governor. I understand the gentleman's problem with the Governor and other people not being informed, but I want the gentleman to understand my problem. My problem is I do not think the taxpayers should get ripped off in the process. And once we set this proclamation in writing and put it out there, obviously it is open season in terms of making claims and making changes, and I think most of those are spurious, quite frankly. That is my concern. So we have those two problems.…”