Magna Water District Water Reuse and Groundwater Recharge Act of 2008

Mr. President, I hope I am not wearing out my welcome. I know that I have spoken more today than the other Members. I was proud this morning to have achieved a small--but I think significant-- victory, as I pressed for a rollcall vote which would have required the Senate to come back tomorrow, but in acquiescing on that, I was able to introduce a bipartisan piece of legislation with key Members, including Senator Cochran, Senator Hutchison, Senator Conrad, Senator Lincoln, and Senator Pryor on a piece of very important legislation for farmers and for the agricultural community and rural communities throughout the Nation.

Hopefully, by this piece of legislation being filed today and the work that can go on over the next few days before the lights go out in this Chamber and we all leave to go home for the election, something could be done to help rural America because the big bailout package, no matter how it is structured, will not really reach to the problem quickly enough and the regulations have not been written for the bill that is in place to help them. So between the bill that doesn't have regulations written and the bailout package, which has nothing at this moment for them, we are trying to stand in the gap and provide some sort of bridge assistance for the farmland of America and the rural areas and to give our farmers some hope until we can come back and address their needs. I am pleased to have at least accomplished that today. While I am speaking, Members of the House--both Republicans and Democrats--are putting a bill together and circulating letters so that, hopefully, we can accomplish something before we leave.

I did have an option to hold up the Defense authorization bill, as the Presiding Officer knows. It was a bill that the Presiding Officer and Senator Warner spoke about. It passed in record time--in less than a minute, as I recall--because I was standing right here when it did. I could have exerted my ability as a Senator to object but, not only out of respect for the Presiding Officer as well as the Senator from Virginia but also out of respect for the men and women who wear a uniform, I did not think that it was an appropriate vehicle to use to make my point. I am certain the people of my State would agree with that, and so I did not. That does not mean I won't continue over the course of the next several days to use other vehicles, other opportunities to press this case.

Leaving that subject for a moment, I wish to spend a moment to again talk about the need for coastal protection and restoration in Louisiana. I have spoken about this topic hundreds of times and will for the next 15 minutes do it once again.

Louisiana's coast is literally washing away. Even if we didn't have Katrina or Rita--the major storms that affected us in 2005--and even if Gustav

and Ike had never happened, the devastation along Louisiana's coast is substantial. It affects a little bit of the Mississippi coast as well and a small portion of east Texas. I am sorry I do not have Texas on this map. Southeast Texas is very much like southwest Louisiana in topography. So what I am saying affects them as well. Of course, southwest Mississippi, our neighbor to the east, the southwestern part of Mississippi is protected by this great wetlands, but it is basically the Mississippi delta area.

One hundred years ago, the Mississippi River delta consisted of 7,000 square miles of coastal marshes and swamps, making it one of the sixth or seventh largest delta complexes in the world. The delta's growth depended on periodic flooding of the Mississippi River that drains 41 percent of the continental United States, with the river sediments gradually settling in the surrounding wetlands. So as the sediment came down the Mississippi River, this is how this area was built. Of course, it took thousands and thousands of years, but that process still exists to this day. The Mississippi River and the sediment come down and overflow this great delta.

Portions of the State I represent have grown up on this delta. This is New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, and Lake Charles right here, the four major cities in Louisiana. I don't have to explain to people-- even people who have never been to New Orleans or to the cities I mentioned--how important and rich this land is, not just for agriculture and forestry but also for fisheries, both commercial and sports fishermen, as well as the great cities that call this area home.

We have been trying to stay high and dry and out of the water for over 300 years. If we don't act more urgently in this Congress, it will be a losing battle.

Since the early 1900s, this national ecological jewel has lost 2,000 square miles of coastal wetlands, with the expectation of another 500 square miles by 2050. Again, these hurricanes seem to be happening more frequently and with more ferocity in the way they rush to our shore. Their increased velocity and frequency are wreaking havoc on many parts of the coast from Florida to the east coast, but particularly the State I represent.

The construction of flood control and navigation levees along the Mississippi River, which we had to do for the commercial activities of our Nation, had the side effect--the unfortunate side effect--of blocking deposits of the Mississippi River sediment into the surrounding wetlands. Without these sediments, the coastal system has slowly subsided, turning these wetlands into open waters.

I read a letter an hour ago about a farmer, Wallace Ellender, whose father was a Senator. As a young girl, I remember Senator Ellender. He testified in committee that his farm that used to sit close to the shore, they now had to swim 30 miles in open water to the island on which he used to picnic as a child. This is the largest loss of lands. If the enemy was taking this much land, we would literally declare war and attack them. That is how great is the land loss. The enemy is water, rising tides, more frequent storms, and climate change.

I am not here only to complain. I am here to offer a solution, the solution we have passed by this Congress--which I commended Senator Domenici for this morning because without him, it never, ever would have happened--that we have decided as a State to take President Truman up on his offer that he made to us in 1949 to use a portion of our offshore oil and gas revenues that come to the Treasury, $10 billion a year. The people of Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi, from the offshore oil and gas off our coasts, contribute to the Federal Treasury billions and billions of dollars. Since the year I was born, 50-plus years ago, we have sent over $117 billion to the Federal Treasury to fund all sorts of programs--domestic and international, including supporting the wars that have been waged on behalf of this country. We have contributed the second largest portion outside individual income tax.

With Senator Domenici's help and with my leadership, we led an effort to take President Truman up on an offer that we were too foolish to accept at the time and passed the Domenici-Landrieu Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act. I am proud to add my name on that bill which will redirect 37.5 percent of these revenues to the coast to secure these wetlands, to build these levees, to protect not just New Orleans but Baton Rouge, Lafayette, and Lake Charles, to protect the Ellender farm, to restore the culture and protect the great Cajun culture of south Louisiana--many of the people still speak French, as the original settlers to this area--and to preserve the culture of our fishermen and oystermen.

Mr. President, you can appreciate that because being from Michigan, you have quite a diversity of constituents you represent. I don't know Michigan, of course, as well as I know Louisiana. I am certain you have pockets of immigrants who have come to Michigan who have proven themselves to be outstanding citizens.

I met with a very strong, strapping man who came to Louisiana probably when he was a child, I imagine as a young teenager. He is now pushing 50 to 60. He met with me not too long ago over a small table in Plaquemine, LA. He had his sleeves rolled up. His arms were quite large. He is an oyster fisherman. He came from Croatia. He had no money in his pocket when he arrived, but he and his sons have been oyster fishermen down in this area for decades.

He looked at me and he said: Senator, I could not love a country more than I love America. I came here as a penniless child, he said, and I have been trying to make a living fishing in the oyster beds in Louisiana. His son was sitting right next to him. He said: But Senator, if we don't do something, all that we have done for these decades will be lost.

I share that story. I am sure Senator Mikulski could tell a story about her fishermen from Maryland, and I am certain Senator Carper could relay a similar story from Delaware, and I am certain, Mr. President, that you have similar stories from people who came here, not born in America, but came here looking for a chance and in their quest to find that chance have provided so much wealth, more than you can imagine, for themselves and their families and for all of us, as well as people who were born in south Louisiana, who were born here, or working side by side with those who came, looking for a new life decades ago to preserve this great place. If we do not step it up, if we do not expedite this effort, their work will have been for nought.

A couple of years ago, we passed a bill that will give us revenue sharing to try to build the levees. We went actually after the storm--I was so devastated after Katrina thinking where could we find help, where could we find a plan. I traveled to the Netherlands, to Europe, to look at the systems they have. I brought 40 elected officials, both Republicans and Democrats, with me, laymen and engineers, to say: If the Netherlands, which is a small country that can fit inside the State of Louisiana--this is our State. The Netherlands is so small it could fit inside Louisiana. It is a powerful nation but a small one. It has the same problems as we do. If their levees break, they will lose their entire country. So they don't fool around with it as we do in America. They actually build levees that hold. They have great engineering. We have great engineers here, but we are not giving the support or tools they need to do this job. So our land continues to wash away while the Netherlands has managed to save itself.

I learned a very interesting thing over in the Netherlands when I went, and it was shocking to me. Netherlands has no system of insurance such as we do. We have flood insurance here. It is a bill we actually could not pass in the last few years, but we technically have flood insurance. We have commercial insurance. In the Netherlands, they don't have insurance because their levees are built to withstand a storm once every 10,000 years.

I hate to be the one to be the bearer of bad news, but our levees are not even built to withstand storms once in 100 years. The levees the Netherlands build protect their people once every 10,000 years, so they virtually never break. That little picture everybody might remember, at least those of my age and older, of that little boy with the finger in the dike, that is not how it is. They have the most extraordinary investments and infrastructure you can imagine. They have gates that

open and close. They have diversion systems. I literally have people in their living rooms with buckets trying to keep the water out.

I had elected officials come to my office this week with pictures of everything that their town owned dumped out on the street because the water comes in. And somehow in America we have lost either the interest, the will, or the ability to use the resources we have and the brains that God gave us to figure this out.

Although countries have done it--and I am sure the Netherlands is not the only country that has done it--I am here to tell you America is a long way from getting this right.

I came to the floor to introduce a bill--it is not going to completely solve this problem, but I will send it to the desk because it is going to take more than one bill to do it. In the supplemental bill we passed, the emergency disaster bill, there is a portion in that bill--it is a $1.5 billion portion--that is directed to only one project in south Louisiana. This bill I am going to lay down will suggest that the $1.5 billion that is directed to one project be given to the State in a way that our Governor, who is not a Democrat but a Republican--so I am not doing this with party. He is Republican and I am working with him--to give him and his team an opportunity to use those funds to cover the billions of dollars of projects we have underway.

We have billions of dollars of projects underway. We have $1.5 billion in the bill. So instead of directing it to one particular project, I thought it might be worth discussing the wisdom and the benefit of trying to give it to our State, allowing them to use it in a way that will most quickly benefit the most people.

I want to show the levee structure. We have passed since 1986 eight WRDA bills, water resources development bills. This is the way Congress builds levees all over the country. The red represents Federal levees in Louisiana, the green represents local levees, and then the yellow is boundaries separating our parishes. We don't have counties, we have parishes. Here is St. Bernard Parish. This parish, by the way, with 67,000 people, was completely obliterated in Katrina--completely. Out of 67,000 people, there were 5--5--homes that were not completely inundated up to the roof with water. That is St. Bernard Parish.

Then we have Orleans, and we saw what happened when the levees broke: 70 percent of the city went underwater. What you didn't see was Plaquemine Parish went underwater. This levee helped. This is the only levee in our entire State, Golden Meadow, even though it held in Katrina--you are going to have a hard time believing this, but this little levee held down here in Golden Meadow. But since Katrina, I can't seem to get a dollar to lift it a little higher because the Corps of Engineers, for some reason, doesn't think this is a big priority. It held again in Ike, and it held again in Gustav. They keep telling me there is something wrong, we can't build a levee this way. I said: Since this levee held and yours broke, maybe Golden Meadow knows something about building levees. Nevertheless, we don't have money to help them strengthen that levee, although it has been through four hurricanes now.

In the last WRDA bill, we authorized $6.9 billion of projects, which is the good news, and some of that money will be spent here. By the way, there will be billions of dollars spent around the country on levees such as this. We are only one of 50 States. I most certainly don't think we should get all the money in Louisiana, although we have a lot of the water. The Mississippi River probably deserves a little extra because of that, and we do because it is a water bill, it is not a desert bill. If it were a desert bill, New Mexico would get a good portion of that money. It is a water bill. We have a lot of water, so we get a lot of money.

We have $6 billion. However, in the actual appropriations bill, we only have $1.5 billion. So the best way I can think to take that $1.5 billion, instead of dedicating it to one project, is give it to the Governor and let him, with his team and the legislature, Democrats and Republicans, figure out how to lay that money down on south Louisiana to save as much as we can while we wait and work for the revenue- sharing piece I talked about earlier, the portion of the offshore oil and gas revenues. We are now going to get 37 percent of those revenues, which are moneys that come to the Federal Treasury that if Louisiana weren't willing to produce oil and gas, the country would not have. They might own the resources off our coast, off our 9-mile boundary, but they couldn't access those revenues without the people of Louisiana agreeing.

Remember, Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama are the only States that allow drilling off their coasts, and Alaska, which is not in the lower 48, of course. So because we allow drilling, because we generate $10 billion, we thought instead of coming here hat in hand every year, let us direct some of that money to help us build these levees and then in the meantime, we can get occasionally some money in the water resources bill or in an appropriations bill to add to that so we can start protecting our people. We may not get to 1 in every 10,000 years' storm, but we most certainly need to get past 1 out of every 100 years. We have to move not from a category 3 protection but to a category 5 protection, and we have to do it quickly. So I send this bill to the desk and hope we can consider it at the earliest convenience.

I wish to also send to the desk some more detailed information about what I have spoken about, and I will conclude this portion by saying that this is an urgent matter. I don't know how many storms we have to endure on the gulf coast, America's energy coast, before this Congress realizes this is an economic disaster, it is an emotional drain on people who continue to watch everything they own flood time and time again.

If I thought I could relocate 2 million people to another part--even if I could get them to go, which I couldn't because this is their home--it would be too expensive. Who would stay and run the river? Who would keep these channels open? Who would drill for the oil and gas? We haven't figured out how to do this from unmanned aerial platforms yet. People actually have to go out into this coastline and work hard every day in agriculture, in oil and gas and in fisheries. This operation cannot be run from Kansas City or from Little Rock, AR. It has to be run on the coast. And everybody who lives on a coast, whether you live in Florida or Texas or South Carolina or North Carolina or Georgia understands what I am talking about. We can't relocate everyone to Denver. We have to protect our coasts, and we are doing a terrible job of it in this country. I am one of the Senators who represents the most challenged area in the Nation. Louisiana is not the only . . . .

My predecessor and friend, the late Senator Paul Simon, championed the cause of water for the poor. Ten years ago he wrote an important and foretelling book, Tapped Out, in which he described the world's looming clean water crisis.

Senator Simon was ahead of the curve. He identified this challenge long before many others, and urged the U.S. to lead on it. It is my privilege to carry forward his vision in the United States Senate today.

I take this responsibility seriously--not only to honor my friend and mentor from Illinois--but more importantly to further this country's leadership in making access to clean water and sanitation possible for people in every part of the world.

In 2005, Congress passed the Senator Paul Simon Water for the Poor Act to elevate the position of safe water and sanitation efforts in U.S. foreign assistance.

We have made progress since then. Last year alone, the U.S. helped provide nearly 2 million people with access to a better source of drinking water for the first time. And we helped more than 1.5 million people access better sanitation.

These are encouraging results, but our impact could be much greater. Our current efforts are hindered by limited resources and lack of overall strategy and coordination.

To strengthen U.S. leadership in this area, I am pleased to join with Senators Corker, Kerry and Murray, and Representatives Blumenauer and Payne to introduce new legislation that builds and improves upon the 2005 act.

The Senator Paul Simon Water for the Poor Enhancement Act of 2008 will increase capacity at USAID and the State Department to implement clean water and sanitation efforts.

It will strengthen local capacity by adding a corps of water experts to USAID missions and by training local water and sanitation managers.

It will foster development of low-cost and sustainable clean water and sanitation technologies for use in priority countries.

In short, it will put the U.S. again at the forefront of assuring access to these most basic needs for millions around the world.

We will not be able to make a sustained difference on the ground with good intentions alone. We need to back up the lofty goals in this bill with resources--money and personnel.

We need to give our development experts the tools and support they need to get the job done well. That is why I've also led an effort in the Senate to increase the number of Foreign Service Officers and to urge the placement of water experts in USAID missions around the world.

This kind of development assistance, helping to build infrastructure and alleviate poverty, is a crucial to our ability to lead and influence other countries.

America's strength resonates not only from its military power but from the power of American ideas and values, from our generosity and diplomacy.

I fear we have lost a measure of that influence in recent years. Our smart power has waned as we've focused our resources and attention elsewhere.

Real leadership from the United States on water and sanitation will help stave off one of the world's looming crises. It will reassert our standing as a leader in the fight against global poverty.

And, once again, Paul Simon was ahead of his time. What element of international development assistance could be more fundamental than ensuring access to clean water and basic sanitation?

We often take water for granted in this country. Turn on the tap, and out it comes--clean, inexpensive and plentiful. Occasionally we hear of water shortages in a handful of states during times of drought. But for the most part, we think little about this crucial resource.

Yet for many people in the world, access to clean water and sanitation are out of reach--and the problem may only get worse.

In the past 20 years, 2 billion people have gained access to safe drinking water and 600 million have gained access to basic sanitation services. This is encouraging progress.

Yet nearly 900 million people still live without clean water, and nearly 2 in 5 do not have access to proper sanitation.

In the past century, global demand for water has tripled, and is now doubling every two decades. Rapid population growth, urbanization, pollution and climate change will add even greater pressures to an already strained system.

This scenario is troubling for a lot of reasons.

First, unsafe water is a serious threat to global health. The World Health Organization estimates that water-related diseases account for about one-tenth of the global disease burden. We lose nearly 5,000 children each day to these diseases, and over 2 million people each year.

We recently expanded our efforts to fight global AIDS--an effort I support--but antiretroviral therapy taken with unsafe water may do more harm than good.

Lack of safe water threatens economic development and political stability. A developing economy cannot grow if its population is too sick to work or if its members are engaged in conflict over water resources, as in Darfur, for example, or in parts of the Middle East.

Nor can an economy grow if its women and girls have to spend many hours each day gathering water rather than engaging in more productive pursuits. The UN estimates that women lose 40 billion working hours each year to carrying water. The economic repercussions are clear.

Water scarcity has a serious impact on the environment, as well. The strain on natural resources will continue as global warming causes glaciers to melt and climate patterns to shift. We can expect key sources of clean water to be altered or eliminated in the process.

So, this is a big problem. But the U.S. is in a position to make a big difference in the lives of the world's poor with strong leadership and investment in global safe water.

U.S. leadership can and will make a difference in this most fundamental development challenge. I urge my colleagues to join with me in supporting this effort to refocus our global clean water activities.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Events of the last decade are stark reminders that security in the U.S. is closely linked to the stability of far-flung places beyond our borders. From food riots to failed states, we have become more aware of how important it is to help the poorest around the world live healthier, more productive, and stable lives.

Foreign assistance for development is not only the right thing to do; it's in our national interest. In the U.S., the responsibility for such development falls largely to the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID.

USAID was founded by the Kennedy administration in 1961. It became the first U.S. foreign assistance organization whose primary emphasis was on long term economic and social development efforts overseas.

During its first decade, it had more than 5,000 dedicated Foreign Service Officers serving all over the world, often in the most difficult of conditions. They helped build clinics in Nepal, provide clean water in Honduras, and boost the agricultural and industrial sectors of Pakistan.

Today, when the U.S. needs to show its leadership overseas more than ever, USAID operates with just 1,000 Foreign Service Officers.

Many people on both sides of the aisle agree that USAID is no longer equipped to do its job effectively. We simply are not meeting the international development goals of the United States.

USAID has not received adequate funding, staffing, or political support--and America's efforts abroad have suffered as a result.

It is time to make a change.

We should be sending bright, talented public servants to help improve child and maternal health, treat those with AIDS, TB and malaria, provide clean water and sanitation for the world's poor, help farmers and women start or improve their business, and assist reformers and civic leaders to build stronger democratic institutions.

Today, along with Senator Kerry and Senator Murray, I am introducing the Increasing America's Global Development Capacity Act of 2008 to take the first step toward putting the Agency for International Development on firmer footing.

The bill would authorize USAID to hire an additional 700 Foreign Service Officers. This would basically double the current number of development officers available to work in targeted countries. This is fundamental to rebuilding the agency's capacity.

Senator Leahy, Chair of the Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee, shares a commitment to rebuilding USAID. I am heartened by the Subcommittee's recommended increase in funding for USAID's operating expenses for fiscal year 2009. This was a priority for me in the bill, and Chairman Leahy has been very supportive.

My bill also would establish a goal of hiring an additional 1,300 Foreign Service Officers by 2011.

After three years, USAID would have more than 3,000 of talented, committed Americans serving in the world's most difficult locations helping to improve the lives of others. It won't be the 5,000 experts of the 1960s, but it will be a big improvement from today.

Foreign development assistance is as important a foreign policy tool as diplomacy and defense. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is perhaps the most persuasive advocate for rebuilding our civilian development capacity. He argues that we need to engage in nonmilitary ways to pursue global development goals.

The civilian instruments of national security--diplomacy, development assistance, sharing expertise on civil society--are becoming more and more important. Secretary Gates argues

that these tools are good for the world's poor, our national security, and our country.

I agree.

Let us take one concrete step to rebuild that important civilian capacity, which would help improve our ability to help the world's poorest countries and people.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise to introduce legislation that would assist the Magna Water District of Utah to implement a water reuse and groundwater recharge project. The district faces perchlorate- contaminated wells due to decades of rocket motor production at a Department of Defense site operated by Hercules, ATK launch Systems. To address this, the water district has developed a bio-destruction process which combines wastewater and desalination brine stream to destroy perchlorate. This technology gives DOD what it needs to broadly address perchlorate issues at multiple sites in a way that is quicker and cheaper than existing technologies and processes.

This bill, would authorize a 25 percent Federal match for the total cost of this project. In truth, the district has already invested a significant amount of its own funds and is now seeking funds from the federal government on a matching basis. It is critically important for Magna to maintain high quality drinking water for irrigation and preserve the community's valuable water resources while finding a beneficial use of treated domestic and industrial wastewater to destroy a harmful plume of the contaminate perchlorate, that threatens the water resources of this community.

We have but a few days left in this session of the 110th Congress but I feel it important to introduce this bill and ask my colleagues to please review it. I plan on reintroducing this bill early in the 111th Congress and will work on ensuring its passage next year.

Mr. President, I rise to introduce legislation that would assist the Magna Water District of Utah to implement a water reuse and groundwater recharge project. The district faces perchlorate- contaminated wells due to decades of rocket motor production at a Department of Defense site operated by Hercules, ATK launch Systems. To address this, the water district has developed a bio-destruction process which combines wastewater and desalination brine stream to destroy perchlorate. This technology gives DOD what it needs to broadly address perchlorate issues at multiple sites in a way that is quicker and cheaper than existing technologies and processes.

This bill, would authorize a 25 percent Federal match for the total cost of this project. In truth, the district has already invested a significant amount of its own funds and is now seeking funds from the federal government on a matching basis. It is critically important for Magna to maintain high quality drinking water for irrigation and preserve the community's valuable water resources while finding a beneficial use of treated domestic and industrial wastewater to destroy a harmful plume of the contaminate perchlorate, that threatens the water resources of this community.

We have but a few days left in this session of the 110th Congress but I feel it important to introduce this bill and ask my colleagues to please review it. I plan on reintroducing this bill early in the 111th Congress and will work on ensuring its passage next year.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.