On the recordApril 30, 2015
I want to thank the gentleman for being dogged on this issue. We share his concern. We had a great hearing with all the commissioners of the NRC. They also understand this concern. It was the Aim Project 2020 that they put together that realized that they have too many staff and they need to reduce it. They want to do it in a responsible way. In the full committee, we adopted an amendment to reduce their budget by $25 million. That is in addition to the fact that they had carryover fund that they could have spent last year that they won't have available this year. Their budget is going down; whether it is the right amount or not, we don't know yet, but we are going to keep on this because we want them to reestablish their credibility in the world. They need to do that because they are a regulatory agency that is very important, and they do incredibly important work. We are going to be holding hearings again on this next year when we do their budget to make sure they are following through on their commitment to reduce their size and scope, particularly the rulemaking authority that they have got out there. Many people believe they are writing far too many rules, and some believe it is because they have too many employees. I appreciate the gentleman offering this amendment and the discussion and offering to withdraw the amendment.
