On the recordJuly 30, 2010
The gentleman from Washington is mistaken in his understanding or his reading of the amendment that I offer. It's an amendment to OPA. It is not an amendment to the dollar amounts and does not reference dollar amounts. Under OPA, of which I was a coauthor in 1990, quote, the State and local officials designated under this subsection shall develop and implement a plan for the restoration, rehabilitation, replacement or acquisition of the equivalent of the natural resources under their trusteeship. The language of OPA does not clearly enough refer to the level of replacement resources that may be damaged. What we do with this language is clarify the ability to restore those resources that have been damaged with an equivalent resource. That's all it does. It does not have a dollar amount in it.
