Ron Kind: “Again, I appreciate this gentleman's leadership and the committee's work in regards to refocusing our attention on a…”

“Again, I appreciate this gentleman's leadership and the committee's work in regards to refocusing our attention on a great need in our Nation. I wanted to also mention to my colleagues that I, along with the other cochairs of the Wildlife Refuge Caucus, recently introduced legislation called the Repair Act. We had a nice hearing before the Natural Resources Committee last week that would hopefully provide singular focus on one of the great threats facing our refuge system, and that's invasive species, plants, animals. What we are trying to do is establish an important public and private partnership by working with friends groups, with Federal, State, local agencies, but other nonprivate organizations, so we can develop a battle plan to deal with these invasive species, try to get out ahead of the curve, which is one of the great threats facing the entire refuge system today. So I would hope my colleagues would take a look at the legislation that we have recently introduced. Hopefully we will have the cooperation of the committee, be able to move it to the floor for consideration, so we can start providing a singular focus and a good plan in place to deal with the invasive species threat that we are facing in this Nation. Again, I thank the committee for the work that they have done, they have produced a good product here, and I would encourage its passage.”