Jim Baird: “I thank the gentlewoman, and the gentleman from Louisiana as well, and want to begin by extending my condolences to…”

“I thank the gentlewoman, and the gentleman from Louisiana as well, and want to begin by extending my condolences to Jimmy Duncan and his family at the loss of Congressman Duncan's mother. I rise today to support H.R. 4826, a bill to extend section 214 of the Water Resources Development Act of 2000 until December 31 of this year, 2006. This is a commonsense bill that will save jobs and continue to promote economic growth. Section 214 was enacted in WRDA 2000 to permit non-Federal public entities to contribute funds to the Army Corps of Engineers to help expedite the processing of corps permits. This provision has allowed municipalities and ports to move forward with vital infrastructure projects; and in doing so, these entities that are providing funding are given no partiality by the corps in their review of the projects. By funding additional staff to work on specific time-intensive permits, the staff in the corps' budget is freed up to work on the permit backlog. Let me give an example of this: the Army Corps' Seattle district has been utilizing this authority very well. They have seen their total average review time per project reduced from 804 days to just 69 days in the first 3 years of implementation. The city of Seattle alone estimates that for $114,000 spent, they have saved over $5 million.…”