James Oberstar: “this bill has a broad consensus now and should pass. It was not always so. At the outset, when the legislation was first…”

“this bill has a broad consensus now and should pass. It was not always so. At the outset, when the legislation was first proposed to revitalize the Louisiana offshore oil port and to revitalize the basic underlying law itself, there was considerable environmental concern and vigorous opposition. In fact, there were concerns expressed by the Department of Transportation that wanted to maintain a very strong regulatory hold on this legislation. Those concerns came to my attention. I discussed these matters with the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Shuster], our chairman, and with the gentleman from New York [Mr. Boehlert] and the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Borski], the chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee, and we set about on our side to resolve within our Democratic ranks the outstanding issues. We brought in the environmental groups, we brought in the Department of Transportation, we heard them out, and we came up with proposals which I think were well received by the majority. We worked out a very fine bipartisan solution.”