"prepared statement"
"The purpose of this bill is not to shield agricultural operations from RCRA citizen suits, but rather to ensure that if state or federal regulators are otherwise seeking compliance through civil, crim..."
"I thank my colleagues for being here today to talk about their legislation."
"I represent hardworking farmers of central Washington State."
"The goal of environmental rules should be to assist ag producers to improve nutrient management and reduce the environmental footprint, not to subject them to lawsuits that threaten to put them out of..."
"This legislation seeks to encourage farmers to be proactive stewards and create a climate to reinforce farmers' ability to trust that they, as they work with regulators, that their efforts to address ..."
"Citizen lawsuits were intended to put citizens in place of the regulators if the regulators failed to do their jobs."
"The smaller dairy family wasn't able to put up the millions of dollars for defense, and so they closed their dairy."
"RCRA, or the Resource Conservation Recovery Act, was never intended to apply to manure or crop residue returned to the soil as fertilizer or soil conditioner."
"To help address the issue, Congressman Newhouse introduced the Farm Regulatory Certainty Act, which now has 65 bipartisan cosponsors in the House."
"I want to thank you for holding this hearing, and also express my appreciation to Congresswoman McMorris Rodgers for her main sponsorship of this bill."
"The listing process will more closely adhere to the realities on the ground."