Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman from Oregon. I thank the sponsors of this legislation, Mr. Blumenauer, and I am delighted, along with Mr. DeFazio, to be a cosponsor. Mr. Chairman, I really just want to emphasize the core values of Mr. DeFazio's as to what this amendment represents. The fact is there is a lack of funding. For those of us who are around ports, who are experiencing extreme flooding, there is a lack of funding that the environmental review process has nothing to do with, and it has not led to the backlog of authorized projects that are not being constructed. I support the timely delivery of water resources projects, but I have concerns as to whether the changes made in this bill in the name of streamlining will actually achieve that goal. So I ask and urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this amendment, which will make the construction of already authorized projects a priority, which clearly had no problems with the environmental review process, and I would argue the fact that we should be encouraged to make this truly a jobs bill and support the DeFazio amendment. Mr. Chair, as a cosponsor to Rep. DeFazio's amendment, that would delay the application of the environmental ``streamlining'' provisions in Section 103 until the Secretary certifies that there is sufficient funding to reduce the backlog of authorized Corps projects to less than $20 billion in construction costs, I ask my colleagues across the aisle to support amendment #2.…”