Alan B. Mollohan: “the gentleman's amendment shines the light on the problem we have in this bill: to provide additional funds for one…”

“the gentleman's amendment shines the light on the problem we have in this bill: to provide additional funds for one account, you have to raid another account. There has to be an offset. That is why so many of the account funding levels are very similar this year as to last year. In this case, the amendment seek to add funds for EPA Superfund clean-up efforts. It is a good thing, certainly. I think that all of us or at least a great majority of us support the Federal Government playing an important role in providing some of the resources that communities across this country need to ensure that former industrial sites are not a health risk and are reclaimed and reused. The funds permit EPA to not only provide resources for removal and remedial actions, but also to ensure that primary responsible parties contribute to the clean-up of the site, all very good things. As an indication of the support for these efforts, the bill as presented provides $1.275 billion for the hazardous substance Superfund. This represents a small increase of $10 million from the current year's funding. The amendment would add a further $114 million to the account in bringing the funding level to what the administration requested, but at what cost? To allow for the increase the President proposed, cuts and program elimination throughout the bill would be the cost.”