Political Quotes

“I am pleased with the bill Senator Domenici and I have produced. Our relationship extends all my time in the Senate on this committee. We have done this bill seven or eight cycles. We have worked together a long time and have worked well together. This has proven to be a difficult bill this year given the very tight budget constraints within which we had to work. We have $367 million in new funding, which is hardly adequate to pay for the many needs in this bill. We added the first $300 million to the Corps of Engineers in the Bureau of Reclamation. I am pleased we added $233 million above the budget for the Corps, but I note that we are $212 million below what we enacted last year. But we need to recognize that by underfunding the Corps of Engineers, we are seriously impacting how they accomplish the mission Congress laid out for them. Project schedules will continue to be lengthened, the maintenance backlog will grow, and solutions to water needs throughout the country will be delayed. We must always remember, as many have said, wars in the future are not going to be fought over land but over water.”