Bruce F. Vento: “Mr. Speaker, I rise in certainly strong support of it. I would just point out to my colleagues that Alaska under the…”

“Mr. Speaker, I rise in certainly strong support of it. I would just point out to my colleagues that Alaska under the land use laws that were passed in ANILCA and in other land use laws is already treated special by permitting airplanes to land within some parks, wilderness and refuges. We do not permit helicopters landing in wilderness or on an open basis in refuges, or certainly in our national parks in the lower 48, and/or any aircraft for that matter, other than that we do have some of the Frank Church wilderness, some landing strips which were preserved there. Congress and the law already treats Alaska special by permitting aircraft and other access with special transportation through these stretches of wilderness of refuge and parks in Alaska. We already do that. What is being proposed here is that you take off almost all restrictions with regards to the penetration of helicopters, ultralights in wilderness, parks refuges in Alaska, basically in such a way as would substantially damage these areas.”