Floor Statements

I thank the chairman of the Agriculture Committee, and I certainly appreciate the chairman of the Subcommittee on Waterways for his leadership.

I rise today in support of H.R. 935.

Mr. Speaker, the last thing we need in agriculture right now is more regulation. Pesticides are and have been an integral part of insuring that our Nation continues to produce the world's most abundant, safe, and affordable food supply. As it stands today, pesticides already go through a minimum of 125 safety tests before being registered for use. On top of that, they are subject to strict labeling and usage requirements, as the Agriculture Committee chairman alluded to in his remarks.

Passage of H.R. 935 will clarify congressional intent that Clean Water Act permits are not required for lawful pesticide applications and protect pesticide users from abusive lawsuits.

I thank the chairman. I am glad to be here today in support of H.R. 4315 and to emphasize the point that this is not just a Western thing. We certainly hear a lot about Oregon's northern spotted owl, about California's delta smelt, and we have heard about--the lesser prairie chicken has been cited, but I doubt many of you have heard about the rabbitsfoot mussel.

I have a map here that indicates the range of the rabbitsfoot mussel, and I can assure you the folks in Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Missouri have become very well familiar with the rabbitsfoot mussel.

What the critical habitat designation proposal could do, and certainly in States like Arkansas where 70 percent of Arkansas' rivers and streams would be impacted, it would have a direct and costly impact on farmers and ranchers and municipalities who rely on those waterways for drinking water, private landowners and local governments who are trying to build and improve roads and bridges, and small and large businesses across the State of Arkansas that use water in manufacturing the products that help keep Americans employed.

The 21st Century Endangered Species Transparency Act will go a long way to bringing some common sense and sanity back to the protection of vulnerable species, and that is what we should be about.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for his work on H.R. 5021, which I rise in support of this afternoon, which provides greater certainty and sufficient funding for infrastructure projects across the Nation. Without an immediate solution for the highway trust fund, our State highway departments are left wondering if there will be adequate funding to continue any infrastructure improvement.

In March of this year, the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department warned that, without congressional action to remedy the highway trust fund shortfall, continuing with highway and infrastructure contracts that were scheduled for April letting would have threatened the ability to pay contractors. As a result, 10 vital projects totaling over $60 million were either put on hold or forced to find alternative methods of temporary financing.

My colleagues have described similar scenarios in their own States, meaning that across the Nation new infrastructure projects have already ground to a halt, threatening general contractors, their employees, suppliers, and putting at risk the jobs that are both directly and indirectly supported by these projects.

I think most lawmakers can agree that ensuring that we have a reliable and modern infrastructure on land, water, rail, and air is critical. With the Senate announcing last week an agreement with Chairman Camp and House leaders to enact a short-term funding

solution, we can now turn our attention back to a multiyear transportation bill that will provide long-term assurance to States for financing infrastructure improvements.

In moving forward with a long-term bill, we can spend time with stakeholders and constituents--the ultimate users of the infrastructure--and allow them to weigh in on what is being considered. As we return our focus to long-term legislation, we must also examine how to reform the highway trust fund so that taxpayers will know how their dollars are being spent. With costs increasing and funds at a premium, we owe our constituents a more transparent system that demonstrates effective use of their money on infrastructure improvement.

I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting H.R. 5021, and I look forward to working on a long-term, comprehensive transportation bill to ensure our Nation's future growth. We can't continue to beat the drum to attract businesses, add jobs, and improve the economy if we are not willing to use our authority to invest in our Nation's infrastructure.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, first, I want to thank the chairman and the committee for their hard work putting this bill together. I know it has taken a lot of time and effort to get here, and I appreciate that.

My amendment addresses a very real threat to the lives and livelihoods of Arkansans and Americans across the country and the citizens and businesses in areas of the depletion of aquifers and lack of water for agriculture during times of drought.

The Bayou Meto and Grand Prairie projects in my district, which are well on the way to completion, will provide an economical and environmentally sensible alternative for protecting aquifers from catastrophic depletion and provide both a renewable agriculture water supply, as well as a valuable role in water quality and quantity control efforts for one of our Nation's most critical waterways, the Mississippi River.

In most of the Mississippi Delta, aquifers provide significant portions of water used for ag irrigation. With the increasing water demands of agriculture, businesses, and municipalities, aquifers across the country, especially the alluvial and Sparta-Memphis aquifers which supply much of the Mississippi Delta, face the increasing threat of depletion.

This takes the immediate form of drastically lowering well yields and the requirement to drill more often and deeper to access sufficient quantities of water.

Bayou Meto and Grand Prairie were designed to address the threat of aquifer depletion, both to ease demands on aquifers and to ensure a steady and renewable water supply for agriculture in Arkansas' Mississippi Delta region.

First authorized in 1996, these projects are a framework of canals, pumps, and pipes that pull excess water from the delta's rivers in times of abundance and store it for future use.

During periods of drought, farmers are able to take from those canals and reservoirs, instead of further depleting the aquifers or taking from the rivers and streams that feed the Mississippi, helping ensure a continued and reliable water supply, both for agriculture and municipalities.

In addition to the ag benefits, Bayou Meto and Grand Prairie will work to ease demands on the water table, help mitigate the flood damage done to homes and businesses, ensure a safe and steady food and water supply for American citizens, and provide a habitat for various amphibians and waterfowl across the South.

Most importantly, Bayou Meto and Grand Prairie will support jobs for a region of our country persistently above the national unemployment rate.

Without these two important projects, Mississippi Delta farmers will be forced to continue depleting aquifers, the same aquifers municipalities and businesses depend on, risking losing their livelihood.

Mr. Chairman, with that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the chairman for his commitment.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to engage in an important colloquy with Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Aderholt of Alabama and the ranking member of the Livestock Subcommittee on the House Ag Committee, Mr. Costa of California, regarding the issue of mandatory country of origin labeling, or COOL, for beef, pork, and poultry.

Mr. Chairman, as you know, I strongly support discontinuing the overreaching country of origin labeling regulations that not only burden our Nation's livestock industry, but threaten massive retaliatory tariffs from Canada and Mexico on a vast range of U.S. industry and products.

I appreciate your work in the Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee to include a directive in the bill's report language requiring USDA to discontinue enforcement of COOL, should the WTO compliance panel rule against the United States when they make their decision in a few weeks.

However, I believe the final appropriations bill should include the strongest language possible to prevent any further harm to the livestock industry and all industries threatened on the retaliatory trade list.

COOL represents yet another failed policy of the Federal Government, imposing costly and burdensome mandates on private sector industry. While the primary goal of COOL is to give American-grown meat a competitive advantage, the result has been exactly the opposite.

As a direct result of this policy, we are not only seeing sharp increases in the cost of marketing and selling beef and pork, but trade retaliation from our closest trading partners will cost us billions of dollars in trade, which will kill U.S. jobs, harm our competitiveness, and have a long-term negative impact on American industry.

As you prepare for conference, I hope we can work together to make sure the final bill provides the most appropriate response to this problem.

With that, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Costa).

I yield to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Aderholt).

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Command Sergeant Major William E. High, Jr., of the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization, or JIEDDO, who will retire from the United States Army on May 22, 2014, after 32 years of distinguished service.

Today, one of the greatest threats faced by our servicemen and -women is the IED. While serving at JIEDDO, Command Sergeant Major High worked tirelessly to ensure our men and women serving in harm's way have the necessary capabilities and training to protect them from this lethal threat.

His contributions made a profound difference and enabled the organization to achieve tremendous success in countering the IED threat.

Command Sergeant Major High's numerous awards and decorations include the Legion of Merit, Bronze Star Medal, Defense Meritorious Service Medal, Meritorious Service Medal, Joint Service Commendation, and Army Commendation Medal, among others; and he also served as a drill sergeant during his 32-year career.

I am proud to share in the celebration of Command Sergeant Major High's military career. I would also like to congratulate his wife, Ingrid, and his children--Brant, Jared, Nathaniel, and Gabriel--whose love and support has aided and strengthened Command Sergeant Major High as he served our great Nation.

I wish him all the best in his retirement.

Mr. Speaker, I'm honored to be joined here by my colleagues from Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Kansas, Tennessee, Alabama and the states that have been impacted by the devastating storms that occurred earlier this week. While we had hoped that the entire Mississippi and Arkansas delegations could join us, Representatives Gregg Harper and Alan Nunnelee from Mississippi, and Representative Tim Griffin from Arkansas, are back home today coordinating with the federal, state and local officials who are organizing disaster assistance efforts. Tomorrow Representative Griffin will be touring the devastation in Arkansas' second district with Secretary Johnson from the Department of Homeland Security.

All these delegations have spent hours keeping close contact with one another and with officials in Arkansas, in particular regarding the tornado that ripped through Vilonia, Mayflower, El Paso and Perrin, leaving a path of destruction in central Arkansas and the same is true for the other affected states. The destruction we've witnessed is heartbreaking and our prayers go out to those affected by all these devastating storms, especially those who lost loved ones. All of us would like to thank the first responders, volunteers and neighboring communities for all their assistance, donations, prayers and tireless efforts during this difficult time. Their hard work and dedication has saved countless lives. We also urge those who can to continue to help in any way they can to assist in the recovery and rebuilding of neighborhoods and communities that were impacted by these storms.

We also honor and remember those we lost. Representative Griffin asked that I share a story of one of his constituents, U.S. Air Force Master Sergeant Daniel Wassarn, who served as load master instructor with the 138th airlift wing at the Little Rock Air Force Base. The master sergeant lived in Vilonia, Arkansas with his wife, Suzanne, and his two young daughters. According to reports, Master Sergeant

Wassam sacrificed his own life to shield his 5-year-old daughter from falling debris. His example of selflessness and bravery during this disaster is one all Americans and Arkansans can admire.

I now ask for a moment of silent prayer to honor all the victims of those recent tragic events.

Mr. Speaker, I am honored to be joined here by my colleagues from Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Alabama, and the States that have been impacted by the devastating storms that occurred earlier this week.

While we had hoped that the entire Mississippi and Arkansas delegations could join us, Representatives Gregg Harper and Alan Nunnelee from Mississippi, and Representative Tim Griffin from Arkansas are back home today coordinating with Federal, State, and local officials who are organizing disaster assistance efforts. Tomorrow, Representative Griffin will be touring the devastation in Arkansas' Second District with Secretary Johnson from the Department of Homeland Security.

All these delegations have spent hours keeping in close contact with one another and with officials in Arkansas, in particular, regarding the tornado that ripped through Vilonia, Mayflower, El Paso, and Paron, leaving a path of destruction in central Arkansas. And the same is true for other affected States.

The destruction we have witnessed is heartbreaking, and our prayers go out to all those affected by all these devastating storms, especially those who lost loved ones.

Our delegations would like to thank the first responders, volunteers, and neighboring communities for all of their assistance, donations, prayers, and tireless efforts during this difficult time. Their hard work and dedication has saved lives.

We also urge those who can to continue to help in any way they can to assist in the recovery and rebuilding of the neighborhoods and communities that were impacted by these storms.

We also honor and remember those we lost, and Representative Griffin asked that I share a story of one of his constituents, U.S. Air Force Master Sergeant Daniel Wassom, who served as a loadmaster instructor with the 189th Airlift Wing at Little Rock Air Force Base.

Master Sergeant Wassom lived in Vilonia, Arkansas, with his wife, Suzanne, and his two young daughters. According to reports, Master Sergeant Wassom sacrificed his own life to shield his 5-year-old daughter from falling debris. His example of selflessness and bravery during this disaster is one all Americans and Arkansans can admire.

I now ask for a moment of silent prayer to honor all the victims of those recent tragic events.

Amendment Offered by Mr. Blumenauer

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 1, rule I, I demand a vote on agreeing to the Speaker's approval of the Journal.

Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of National Women's History Month, honoring Arkansas' first female Supreme Court Chief Justice, Betty Clark-Dickey.

Born and raised within Arkansas' First Congressional District, Mrs. Dickey has served as an educator, attorney, prosecutor, commissioner, and chief legal counselor to the Governor.

In 2004, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee appointed Dickey to fill the position of chief justice for the Arkansas Supreme Court, making her the first woman to ever occupy that position.

Mrs. Dickey has not only succeeded professionally, but she has done it all while raising a family. She reared four biological children and one foster child: John, Laura, Ted, Rachel, and Cindy; and she has 11 grandchildren.

Mrs. Dickey's son, Ted, called her a ``high achiever who is never afraid of big things,'' and said of his mother, ``She embodies love and justice simultaneously.''

A little more than a decade after Mrs. Dickey first took office, Arkansas will have its first Supreme Court female majority in 2015, further cementing Dickey's status as a pioneer in a multitude of areas in the State of Arkansas.

Mr. Speaker, please join me and the entire State of Arkansas in honoring

the service of all women, including Betty Clark-Dickey.

Mr. Speaker, on Thursday, March 6, 2014 I was inadvertently detained on rollcall votes 101, 106, 109, and 113. Had I been present to vote, I would have voted ``yes'' on each. In addition, I was inadvertently detained on rollcall votes 102, 103, 104, 105, 110, 111, and 114. Had I been present to vote, I would have voted ``no'' on each.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 311) to direct the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to change the Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure rule with respect to certain farms.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on H.R. 311.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the Farmers Undertake Environmental Land Stewardship Act--or the FUELS Act--is an important piece of legislation that brings much-needed relief to the Nation's agricultural community. H.R. 311 is a bipartisan bill that currently has 73 cosponsors from Members on both sides of the aisle.

It passed the House unanimously last Congress and again last year as an amendment to the farm bill. Additionally, this legislation has gained the support of more than 30 producer organizations, including every major farm group.

The EPA-mandated SPCC--or Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure--rules requires that oil storage facilities with a capacity of over 1,320 gallons make costly infrastructure modifications to reduce the possibility of oil spills.

These mandated infrastructure improvements, along with the necessary inspection and certification by a specially licensed professional engineer, would cost farmers tens of thousands of dollars.

The SPCC program dates back to 1973, shortly after the Clean Water Act was signed into law. In the last decade, it has come down harshly on agriculture, and the rules have been amended, delayed, and extended dozens of times, creating enormous confusion in the farming community.

On top of that, the EPA has failed to engage in effective outreach to producers and cooperatives on SPCC's compliance.

The FUELS Act is simple. It revises the SPCC regulations to be reflective of a producer's spill risk and their financial resources. The exemption level would be adjusted upward from an unworkable 1,320 gallons of oil storage to an amount that would protect small farms, 10,000 gallons.

The bill would also place a greater degree of responsibility on farmers and ranchers to self-certify compliance if their oil storage facilities exceed their exemption level. To add another layer of environmental production, the producer must be able to demonstrate that he or she has no history of oil spills.

The University of Arkansas conducted a study, concluding that this bill would exempt over 80 percent of producers from SPCC compliance, saving up to $240 million in costs in Arkansas alone. For the entire country, it could save small farmers up to $3.36 billion.

The last thing the government should be doing is imposing an expensive regulatory burden on farming families. There is no scientific justification for such action, bolstered by the fact that the EPA cannot provide data or even anecdotal evidence of agricultural spills.

A 2005 USDA report found that more than 99 percent of farms surveyed haven't experienced a single incident. In fact, one year after this report was published, EPA endorsed the 10,000-gallon exemption threshold I am proposing in this bill. Unfortunately, they moved the goalpost again a few years later.

By the nature of their occupation, family farmers are already very careful stewards of the land and water. No one has more at stake than those who work on the ground from which they derive their livelihood.

I urge support of the FUELS Act and our Nation's small farmers.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlelady for her comments. I would say that the 10,000-gallon threshold that we have described here is actually taken right from the EPA.

Up to 2005, they were perfectly comfortable with the 10,000-gallon threshold, so we are basically saying that we definitely want to work with the EPA and use the thresholds that they see as viable or that they did see up to that point.

The other thing is that, in agriculture, it is not a one-size-fits- all type of a scenario, where there are different scales of production and different levels of production.

Economies of scale are certainly better equipped and use lots more fuel on their farm, and so we are trying to implement some guidelines that do respect the financial resources as well as the size of the operation.

And, again, there is no empirical evidence that there have been any kind of spills that would warrant this level of regulation for farmers and certainly not to the degree that 1,320 gallons calls for, and that would catch up virtually every farmer in the United States.

What we are trying to do is to implement some common sense into this in a way that even the EPA has already agreed to in past rules; so I just would, again, urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this important legislation. This will be, I believe, in total, the sixth time that we will have passed this out of the House.

Again, I think this is good commonsense legislation. I urge my colleagues to join in supporting H.R. 311.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on Wednesday, March 5, 2014 I was inadvertently detained on rollcall vote 97. Had I been present to vote I would have voted ``yes.''

Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, March 4th, 2014 I was inadvertently detained on rollcall Votes 91 and 92. Had I been present to vote I would have voted ``yes'' on both.

I thank the gentlelady and her staff for arranging this Special Order to discuss this issue that we have been talking about-- the egregious overreach of the Environmental Protection Agency.

I want to talk about an issue that is very close to you and near and dear to you and that you have helped me on, and that is the spill prevention and containment countermeasures issue, which is facing farmers across the country.

Mr. Speaker, we have taken action on this. If you are like me and if your staff is like my staff, we have fielded countless phone calls from farmers who are concerned about these new rules that the EPA was attempting to roll out with respect to on-farm fuel storage at, really, an unmanageable level. 1,320 gallons was the threshold that would require that the farmers construct these spill prevention and containment countermeasures. For those who don't know what those are, those are berms, or protective dikes, around a storage facility that can cost tens of thousands of dollars to ag producers. Farmers may be land rich--capital rich--but they are not cash rich by any stretch of the imagination, so this adds cost to their operations.

Really, who pays for that?

We have talked about it with our power plants. The ratepayers pay. The American people pay for that because prices go up. Generally, while the farmer bears the burden initially, ultimately, those costs are passed on to the consumer, which is the case in nearly every one of these issues where we see the EPA engaging in overreach.

So we took to the floor to try to change this, and we were successful, not once but twice, in passing by voice vote the FUELS Act. That would have changed the threshold from 1,320 gallons to 10,000 gallons. Between 10,000 and 42,000, you would be required to build the structure, but above 42,000, you would then be required to engage the services of a professional engineer for certification in order to meet that standard for EPA's compliance.

Now, the University of Arkansas did a study on the FUELS Act which addressed the spill prevention and containment countermeasures, and they estimated nationwide that this bill, which was passed successfully on the House floor, would save American farmers $3.3 billion. I don't know about you, but I think this $3.3 billion could do our economy a heck of a lot better service than chasing this problem that really doesn't exist.

Why do I say this problem doesn't exist?

A decade ago, the USDA did an analysis of the spill prevention and containment countermeasures, and they discovered there was little, if any, evidence of farms having any oil spills. In fact, 99 percent of farmers had never experienced an oil spill, and that means that the compliance cost of $3.3 billion is essentially a solution in search of a problem. It really doesn't exist.

What we did was we took that 10,000-gallon threshold directly from the underlying law--the Clean Water Act--that regulates on-farm fuel storage, and they defined, in their own words, 10,000 gallons as being a proper definition of a family farm, of small farm fuel storage. The commodities at this scale are certainly storing more than 10,000 gallons on their farms. Being a farmer yourself, you know that you store in greater quantity than 10,000 gallons, particularly if you are engaged in a larger scale operation. So, number one, the evidence just isn't there to support the 1,320-gallon threshold.

Number two, we had over 30 commodity organizations and agricultural organizations that were in support of the bill. We passed it twice on the floor. The Senate will not move. The EPA continues to move forward, and we continue to be concerned about the EPA's drive to overregulate on-farm fuel storage.

Again, I want to thank the gentlelady for her leadership on this and for bringing this to the attention of the American people, because everything that we have heard tonight and everything that has been talked about has a direct impact on their bottom lines and on the quality of life for their farmers.

I would also like to echo what my colleagues have said. We certainly don't want to see poor air quality or poor water quality. I have kids at home. I love my kids. You love your kids. I know you have small ones at home, too. We are just as committed to a clean environment as anybody is, but we are also committed to the quality of life, to the costs incurred in that quality of life and to a more responsible approach.