Nick Rahall: “Okay. I'm ready to close, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, first I want to extend my deep…”

“Okay. I'm ready to close, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, first I want to extend my deep appreciation to all conferees on this legislation, some 47, I believe. I'd like to pay particular word of commendation to the chair of the conference committee, the gentlelady from California, Senator Barbara Boxer. She worked extremely hard on this legislation. She worked tirelessly to resist many, many, many extreme proposals that were lobbed at her by Republican House conferees. She worked to ensure that policies and investment levels of this legislation will serve America, and she did work in a bipartisan fashion. I'd also like to thank my counterpart and the chair of our House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Mr. Mica, for his leadership. He has already spoken, and has many times, of the bipartisan nature in which we started this journey in my hometown of Beckley, West Virginia, and I deeply appreciate the hearings that he started there and his continued outreach across the country. {time} 1140 As this hard road progressed, there were some diversions along the way. There were efforts to sidetrack what we were trying to do in providing long-term funding for this Nation's infrastructure, yet we're here today to hail not the perfect bill--we've heard that many times in this body, and we're not considering the perfect bill.…”