Ron Kind: “I too want to extend my congratulations to the distinguished careers of the chairman and ranking member, and especially…”

“I too want to extend my congratulations to the distinguished careers of the chairman and ranking member, and especially in one regard, and that is that they have been true champions of a great national treasure that we have in the country called the Mississippi River. In fact, in this appropriations bill, we nearly fully fund a very important program affecting the Mississippi River called the environmental management program that is a multistate, multiagency cooperative effort in order to collect data and monitor resources and conduct some habitat restoration on the Mississippi in order to preserve this treasure for future generations. It affects the upper Mississippi in particular, but I have always said that if we blow it up there, there is going to be consequences down south. I look forward to working with these gentlemen throughout the course of the year in reauthorizing the environmental management program, and I too want to again just congratulate them on the leadership that they have shown on this issue, an issue that not only affects me and my constituents in western Wisconsin, but millions of people throughout middle America who appreciate the river and the multiple uses that we all share and use the river for.”