On the recordJuly 9, 2014
I wanted to make a point on this particular Portsmouth facility and the Department of Energy's seeming inability to help communities transition. Whether it is coal-fired utilities and the issues that coal country faces in general or here you have a facility that is important in the Nation's defense looking back and looking forward, and so many times it just seems that when technologies change, when situations change, the local people who have invested their lives just get spit out. I just wanted to put that statement on the Record, because I know the Department of Energy is listening today, and we have the ability in this country to transition communities. Maybe in places like Portsmouth we should be doing more on renewables, because America is going to need renewables; and maybe there is a way the Department of Energy could be more creative, whether it is natural gas, whether it is storage of certain material and so forth. But to put all those people out of work, without a plan, without a transition plan, it is like, you know, the private sector giving them the pink slip at Christmas. That is when they always give them the pink slips, right before Christmas. It is so heartless. Here you have a community that is going to be heavily affected. So I just wanted to say on the Record, Mr. Chairman of the full committee, that I just feel that the Department has been a bit laggard, and I would hope that they could work with us in a more constructive way.…
