Political Quotes

“I appreciate the gentlewoman's courtesy. I was listening to our friend from Louisiana, and I sympathize with much of what he was saying. I have been working on flood insurance reform for 20 years. {time} 1300 We are caught in a dynamic here where it is never really good enough and there are challenges for people who played by the rules at the time. The problem is that we are not doing a good job of evaluating, moving forward, and making the changes. It is true that some of this has an impact on Louisiana. I am sensitive to that. But at the same time, there are policies that have been resisted by some of those same state leaders. We must swallow hard and understand that we are on a path here that impacts people all across the country. We do not have accurate flood maps, and people resist updating them. We have many people who are paying far less than the actuarial costs for their flood insurance. There are millions more who are subsidizing all this because they are paying unfair premiums. We do not invest in pre-disaster mitigation. We will save $4 in disaster relief for each dollar we invest upfront to protect property and lives. I am prepared to support the underlying bill. It is not perfect. There are changes that I would make. I understand some of the challenges that people are going to suggest in terms of the impact on some lower-income citizens. I sympathize with that, but the answer is not to continue to keep people in harm's way.…”