Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S. 2482, a bill to repeal a provision in current law which requires licenses for employment in the business of maritime salvaging in the State of Florida.

S. 2482 is a companion bill to H.R. 4542, which was introduced by the ranking member of our full committee, Congressman John Mica of Florida, and which passed the House as part of H.R. 2830, the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Act of 2008.

Sadly, even though Chairman Cummings has done a great job and even though Mr. Oberstar has done a great job and we've tried to work together on the Coast Guard reauthorization bill, our friends on the other side of the Capitol haven't quite reached agreement with us.

The bill repeals section 80102 of title 46, United States Code, an antiquated provision which dates back in various forms to the 1820s. It requires Federal judges to issue licenses to wreckers working in the State of Florida. Wreckers, now generally known as salvors, provided assistance to ships in trouble in exchange for a portion of the vessel's cargo. In the early 19th century, some argued that these wreckers may have provided assistance that was not needed and then demanded a portion of the vessel's cargo. It sounds a little bit like piracy to me, but I'm not sure.

At that time, the primary Federal presence in Florida was the Federal judiciary. Therefore, Federal judges were given licensing authority over these wreckers. The licensing requirement fell out of use early in the last century. Today, salvage vessels and their crews operating in Florida are regulated under Coast Guard safety, inspection, crew licensing, and environmental standards just like any other vessels operating in United States waters.

The Justice Department has determined the provision is unconstitutional, and S. 2482 repeals this anachronism. I support the bill.

I reserve the balance of my time subject to the chairman.

The gentleman is correct. If you have none, I am prepared to yield back and would yield back.

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

First, Mr. Speaker, let me tell you what a pleasure it is to see you on a Saturday morning, rather than Monday through Friday.

This is a good bill. It is an important bill. We have some reservations that I'm going to talk about in a moment, but I think the fact that you and I are here together with the full committee chairman and subcommittee chairman on a Saturday morning--and I've been advised we'll be here after 1 o'clock tomorrow afternoon on a Sunday, certainly a rare occurrence in the proceedings of the United States Congress. And I was just talking to my colleague, Mr. Lungren from California, and we wouldn't be here doing this important bill if we had permitted Secretary Paulson and some Members of the other body to perform the bum rush and get us to approve $700 billion of taxpayers' money to bail out people that made bad decisions on Wall Street.

So this is really what we call in Ohio a two-fer, in that we have the opportunity to continue to negotiate in a bipartisan way to attempt to resolve these differences. And, at least from my perspective, those differences need to be resolved, that those who created the mess should clean the mess up and private capital should recapitalize the markets rather than the taxpayer. So hopefully those discussions--you know, we're doing important work here today, but those are on a much higher level, I'm sure.

But, you know, the interesting thing, from just a political standpoint for me today, is there's a commercial running back in northern Ohio--where I happen to be from--condemning me for wanting to write a $700 billion check to Secretary Paulson in this matter. And

here, when I woke up this morning and I watched the news, the national media and the national Democratic Party is condemning me and my colleagues for standing in the way of giving $700 billion to the Treasury. So I'm really at a loss for how these things work.

But I am glad to be here on this bill. And I'm glad that we're here on a Saturday to get this bill done. I have run out of superlatives to talk about the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, and I would add to that the chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Cummings. It is beyond a pleasure to work with these gentlemen.

And I think this piece of legislation is an example of why the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is far and above better than any other committee in the United States Congress, because I don't love everything in this bill, I'm sure that the chairmen don't love every piece of this bill, but they have always and consistently approached negotiations on legislation in a way that I think that we would be better served if we practiced in all legislation, and that is, they have their ideas, and as the majority party they are certainly in the position to have more of their ideas than we're permitted to have our ideas, but they welcome our ideas.

And the negotiations on this bill not only began as the hearings that Mr. Oberstar detailed and Mr. Cummings detailed, but we were negotiating this bill, this final product, just a couple days ago because they are still willing to listen to suggestions, and I think that that's a credit to the leadership of Mr. Oberstar and Mr. Cummings. And if, in fact, more committees operated like that, we would be a better place.

As I indicated, Mr. Speaker, I support many of the provisions in this bill, H.R. 6999, the Integrated Deepwater Program Reform Act of 2008. This bill will make significant changes to the Coast Guard's Deepwater program and the way the Coast Guard oversees, manages and carries out the program as the service takes on the lead systems integrator responsibilities.

I do have some concerns, as I mentioned, relative to the requirement over the lead system integrator responsibilities being assumed by the Coast Guard within 180 days of enactment. But I'm going to tell you that that really was the last piece of our negotiations. And again, as for the chairman of the full committee and the chairman of the subcommittee, we could have gone to that meeting and they could have said, that's nice that you have concerns, but too bad. And they acquiesced in doubling that time from 90 days to 180 days, and I am more than grateful for that. With the help of Chairman Oberstar and Chairman Cummings, H.R. 6999 will provide more time for the Coast Guard to build up its own staff, resources, and capabilities than was proposed under the Senate bill.

I fully support the inclusion of the language that would give the Coast Guard enhanced authorities to interdict stateless submersibles and semi-submersibles at sea. And a little bit later we're going to hear from our colleague from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren) who has been a champion of this issue for a number of years.

In recent years, the Coast Guard has been highly successful in stopping the importation of drugs by sea. I think last year they had a record year. These successes have forced the drug cartels to look at better ways for them to avoid Coast Guard assets on their way to the United States.

Recently, the Coast Guard has witnessed a sudden and dramatic increase in the use of submersibles and semi-submersibles by would-be drug importers. This language will allow the Coast Guard to apprehend and prosecute these individuals without forcing Coast Guardsmen to risk their lives to pull out the bales of illegal drugs from a sinking submarine, as is the case now.

And that's a lot of fancy language, but basically, Mr. Speaker, what's going on is these drug dealers are towing submersibles behind boats that have no flag, that have no certification. And when the Coast Guard is about to close in, they pull the plugs, basically, sink the submarine to the bottom of the Earth, and the way that our laws are currently written is the only way you can prosecute these drug dealers that want to poison our society with cocaine and other drugs is for the Coast Guardsmen to jump on board the sinking submarine and try and pull out a little cocaine so that we can prosecute them. This language--and you will hear from some of the champions of this bill in a minute--is important, and I'm glad it's in the bill today.

Lastly, I do want to note that the Coast Guard has concerns that the independent review requirements may lead to increased costs and delays in the delivery of some deepwater assets. I know that we will continue to work with the majority to closely oversee the impacts of the bill on the Coast Guard and acquisitions as we move forward next year and beyond.

I support this bill and, with the comments that I've made, ask all Members to do the same.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume before I yield to the gentleman from California just to say that the chairman has hit the nail on the head when it comes to Great Lakes shipping. And he, again, deserves great credit for, after 7 years, moving the Water Resources Development Act.

And I would just add to that, the gentleman from Michigan sitting behind me and to my right, Vern Ehlers, and the chairman's work on the Great Lakes Legacy Act, which has the opportunity to clean up the contaminated hotspots within the Great Lakes. And as a result of that-- and I'm not trying to be a pig about it or anything--but as a result of that, one of the first major cleanups was in the Ashtabula Harbor; $53 million, and the Ashtabula Harbor was dredged for the first time in over 35 years.

So when the chairman talks about shallow drafts and the cost that it increases to shipping and having to make three trips instead of one trip, the chairman is exactly right. And I look forward to continuing to work with him in a bipartisan way to move this along.

It is now my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to one of our experts on submersibles, the gentleman from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren).

Mr. Speaker, at this time it is my pleasure to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas, a member of the subcommittee, Mr. Poe.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas as well as the gentleman from California.

At this time we are without additional speakers, and I would yield back the balance of my time and urge passage of the bill.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to the Republican Leadership standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information for publication in the Congressional Record regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 2638, Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and Continuing Appropriations Act of 2009:

Electronics Liquid Cooling for Advanced Military Ground and Aerospace Vehicle Projects.

Account: Research, Development, Test and Evaluation, Air Force; Aerospace Propulsion.

Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Parker Hannifin Corporation.

Address of Requesting Entity: 9200 Tyler Boulevard, Mentor, OH, 44060

Madam Speaker, tonight we are gathered to pay tribute to three of our Members from Ohio who are retiring, and we are going to speak about them in order. But, Madam Speaker, this has been a tough Congress for the Ohio delegation, the 110th Congress. Last year, our long time colleague and friend Paul Gillmor passed away suddenly and unexpectedly, and, of course, just a month and a half ago our good friend and long time colleague Stephanie Tubbs Jones passed away unexpectedly as well.

The news gets worse for us as we now arise to talk about three of our friends who have made the decision to retire: The dean of our delegation, Ralph Regula; one of our great cardinals when we were in the majority, Dave Hobson, ``Uncle Dave''; and former judge and the highest ranking woman in the Republican leadership, Deborah Pryce.

Before we extol more, I guess our new dean from the other side of the aisle, from Toledo, Marcy Kaptur, has asked to spend a couple of minutes with us, and I yield to the gentlewoman.

I thank the gentlewoman, reclaiming our time. And as I introduce the other Ohio Members and others from perhaps around the country to speak about our honorees, I am going to say a couple of things about each of them before I hand it off to our colleagues.

First is the dean of our delegation, Ralph Regula from Navarre, Ohio. I know his wife, Mary, is with us this evening and watching on in earnest. And if you ever saw a partnership, there is a partnership, Ralph and Mary Regula. Of course, Mary is a star in her own right because of her work at the First Ladies' Library and all that she has done.

Just two quick things about Congressman Regula. When I was trying to figure out whether I wanted to run for Congress in 1994, I came to visit Congressman Regula. And if you have been to his office, it is on the third floor of the Rayburn Office Building, and it looks like the Capitol is actually in his office when you look out his window. I think the Congressman saw me sort of admiring the view, and he said, ``Well, don't get too excited. It is going to take you about 30 years to get a view like this.''

The second thing that is often forgotten now that we are in the 110th Congress, when Congressman Regula was in charge of Interior, he was the cardinal on the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, there was a furious assault by very conservative Republicans elected in 1994 against the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Humanities and the Arts, and Congressman Regula was really put under the gun and told that, look, you have got to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. No more NPR, no more National Endowment for the Arts, no more National Endowment For the Humanities.

Congressman Regula was true, Ralph was true to his Republican provisions, but I would dare say that there wouldn't be public funding for those entities today if Ralph Regula hadn't stood up as a stalwart in 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1998. So anybody listening this evening that enjoys Public Broadcasting and thinks that it has a place in our American experience, I think needs to thank Congressman Regula.

I will talk more about Hobson and Pryce in a minute, but it is my pleasure to yield to my friend from Columbus, Mr. Tiberi.

I thank the gentleman very much. Do you want to say somebody else before we go to somebody else?

I thank the gentlelady, the new dean of our delegation or soon to be dean of our delegation from the Democratic side for those reflections and thoughts. Before I yield to our next Ohioan, Jean Schmidt, from southern Ohio, I want to talk a little bit about Dave Hobson.

I think it's appropriate that Ms. Kaptur talked about she doesn't know what Representative Hobson is going to do. A lot of us have been getting phone calls from his wife, Caroline, saying please find something for him to do so that she doesn't have to spend so much time with him.

Most of us in the delegation call him Uncle Dave. Again, going back to 1995, aside from all of the other things that Congressman Hobson had to do, Newt Gingrich was the Speaker at the time in the 104th Congress. He assigned Congressman Hobson to babysit John Kacich, who was the Budget Committee chairman at the time, just to make sure that Congressman Kacich, who has a tendency to be a little exuberant, controlled that exuberance.

This Congress, this historic Congress that has the first woman as Speaker of the House, Ms. Pelosi of California, who sort of ribbed Congressman Hobson about the fact that every time the Speaker of the House goes on a trip, she needs a Republican, obviously, for it to be bipartisan. For some reason it is always Congressman Hobson.

I think that it's appropriate that Ms. Kaptur talked about infrastructure. Because even though Dave is from Springfield, Ohio, and that's his district, down around the Dayton area and his loves are Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, so many things, he, like Ralph Regula when they were cardinals, took care of all of Ohio.

If you had a problem, if you had a concern, if you had a need, he didn't say I am going to take care of me first. He said I am going to take care of Ohio and the country first and many of the things that are being built. Just in my

district, the Ashtabula River and harbor, he helped to secure $53 million to help clean up contaminated sediments. That never would have happened without Congressman Hobson.

It's now my pleasure to yield to my good friend and colleague from Ohio, Jean Schmidt.

(Mrs. SCHMIDT asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

I thank the gentlelady very much.

Our next speaker is another Ohioan, who is new to us. Before I introduce him, as promised, I want to say a couple of things about Deborah Pryce. As a couple of us have indicated in this Congress, I indicated it was historic because Ms. Pelosi is the first Speaker of the House. Deborah Pryce became another ceiling breaker when she became the chairman of the Republican conference.

You may remember that it wasn't a good year, a couple of years, 2005, 2006, for the Republican party, but somebody who was always cheerful, who was always helping Members with whatever their difficulties were, whoever was crafting messages and making sure that as we left Washington to return to our districts we had the tools necessary to do our jobs and communicate what it is we are doing, Deborah Pryce, in fact, did that. I am particularly fond of her because her prior life, she served as a judge, and my prior life was as a prosecuting attorney. She always brought that skill.

We serve on the Financial Services Committee together and, in the crisis that this country is now facing today, with the crisis of confidence on Wall Street, and the work that we have to do, Deborah Pryce as ranking member is a leader. She will continue to be a leader as she, in fact, exits the Congress.

Jean Schmidt made the observations about the challenges of being a woman in the United States Congress. Aside from that, on a personal level, I think the time that Representative Pryce has served in the Congress have had incredibly high highs, and incredibly low lows. Through all of that, she has always performed her job as a professional, one, and, two, whenever possible, with a smile on her face. If you really want to see a smile on her face, the day that I remember her smile being the widest was the day she brought her daughter, Mia, to the Financial Services Committee. I think Mia actually voted a couple of times on some matters.

My only complaint about Representative Pryce is a couple of years ago there was a fundraiser that she and Representative Tiberi had for me down in Columbus, for which we are all grateful for when our friends help us. Pat got up and gave this really long-winded introduction and made me sound better than I was. Deborah stood up and said, well, Steve LaTourette is here, he is a little different, he is a little weird, but please welcome him. Even though her observations were correct, it wasn't the warmest introduction that I can recall receiving.

It's now my pleasure to yield 3 minutes to one of our new friends, Bob Latta from Ohio.

I thank the gentleman very much.

Now, Madam Speaker, we're going to hear from our three retiring Members in order of seniority. The first, as I indicated, is Ralph Regula, the dean of our delegation. I don't know what we're going to do without Ralph around here.

As he comes to the microphone, I will just tell you that, when I, again, was elected in 1994 and I thought I'm a lawyer and that I was a prosecutor and that I'd like to be on the Judiciary Committee, Ralph put his arm around me and said, ``Son, you're going to the transportation committee.'' It was the smartest decision I ever made because I saw that the Judiciary Committee had the impeachment of President Clinton and all of this nonsense. The transportation committee is a bipartisan committee, as the Speaker knows, and to build America is not a bad thing.

It is now my pleasure, as we begin the final 15 minutes allotted to us, to yield to the dean of our delegation, Ralph Regula.

Madam Speaker, I thank the Dean of our delegation. And after that set of remarks, you know why this will be a hole in our delegation and for the country that we're not going to be able to replace.

Our next retiring Member has been described in a lot of different ways already, but there isn't an energy and or a water project across the country that doesn't have Dave Hobson's imprint on it. Never his name, because that wasn't what he was about. He was about making sure that we had the best infrastructure in the country when it came to energy and water.

And Congressman Regula again spoke of the fact that Newt Gingrich put Uncle Dave in charge of watching John Kasich, and I reflected on why that was. And I think it's because Congressman Hobson never gets upset; he's always placid. He's always calm. He never raises his voice. And what better influence could we have in dealing with Chairman Kasich.

It's now my pleasure to yield to Congressman Hobson.

I thank you, Dave, very much.

And before we recognize our last retiring Member, we've been joined by another new member of the Ohio delegation. And I want to express my appreciation and apologize to Congressman Manzullo and the Illinois delegation. We were supposed to split this hour 50/50, so anybody tuning in at home and wondering where the Illini delegation celebration is, we're going to talk, use our last few minutes; and then in the next hour stay tuned because Congressman Manzullo and the Illini bunch will come marching out on to the field.

And just to Congressman Hobson, I don't know if Congresswoman Pryce wants the record to reflect that she played the entire Ohio State band. I think perhaps had played all the instruments in the Ohio State band would be a better way of turning it.

It's now my pleasure to yield 1 minute to one of our new Members, Jim Jordan.

The last retiring Member we have from Ohio is certainly not least, and we've talked about her service on the Financial Services Committee.

Madam Speaker, when I joined the committee, I think we had six Ohioans on the committee, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Paul Gillmor, who's passed, Bob Ney, who is not with us anymore, Pat Tiberi, he's now been promoted, Mike Oxley was the chairman, and Congresswoman Pryce who of course is, I think, the third or fourth ranking Republican on the committee. And now, with all these retirements and passings, I'm the only one going into the next Congress if I'm lucky enough to be re- elected.

And so I'm kind of sad that they all left me, but I will always cherish serving with them, and it is my pleasure to recognize the gentlelady, Ms. Pryce.

Thank you, Deborah.

General Leave

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5

legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the subject of this Special Order.

I think I have about 1 minute left, and I'm not going to insult Mr. Manzullo by giving him a minute to talk about his retiring. So he's come up with some parliamentary scheme to make it all work and honor Mr. LaHood and Mr. Weller, who are both classmates of mine, who are retiring.

But I think, Madam Speaker, from this last hour, which we didn't know it would take an hour, but we should have expected it would have taken an hour for each of our retirees, we are richer for having served with Ralph Regula, David Hobson, and Deborah Pryce; and we in the institution will be poorer with their retirement, but we will always remember the gifts that they have given us; and it shall be our challenge, both Republicans and Democrats as Members of the United States Congress, to stand on their shoulders and follow in the example that they've set for us.

I thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you for yielding the time.

Congratulations to you, Mr. Goodlatte and Chairman Peterson, for this bill. I voted for it last time, and I will vote for it again today.

But the difficulty is that we find ourselves with about 5 days left in this 110th Congress. There was a famous emperor of Rome, Nero, who fiddled while Rome burned. I just want to talk a little bit about what we've been doing for 2 years since gas prices went up and the Democratic majority took over in January.

When they took over in January, gas was at $2.20 a gallon which was high, but people still said, ``Okay. I can still get by on that.'' But Congress, rather than dealing with what was going to begin to happen, on that day, January 29, we congratulated the University of California, Santa Barbara soccer team for doing swell stuff. I like soccer. I bet everybody that's on that team, their moms and dads, are proud of them. But when gas is going up, what are we doing that for?

Next one, February 6, it's gone up 60 cents a gallon. February 6, 2008, we declare National Passport Month here on the House floor. That's the most important issue in America, apparently, to the majority.

It passed $3 for the first time in my lifetime, and we're commending another soccer team, the Houston Dynamos. I bet they're a great soccer team, too, but gas is $3. The most important issue that we're debating on the floor of the House of Representatives is congratulating the Houston Dynamos.

Then $3.77. That should have gotten our attention. So what did they debate? Did we debate this bill or an energy policy? No. We declared National Train Day on that particular day with gas at $3.77.

Goes up on May 20, $3.84. On that particular day, I gotta tell you, we passed--and I don't even know what these are--Great Cats and Rare Canids Day. Maybe, Mr. Speaker, you know what a canid is. Somebody told me maybe it's a dog. But we're not debating energy. Our constituents are paying $3.84 a gallon for the first time in their lives, and we're recognizing great cats and canids.

Well, surely at $4 a gallon we have America's attention, the mighty House of Representatives, the new majority is going to debate energy. Nope. We declare the International Year of Sanitation.

I gotta tell you, Mr. Speaker, then it hits $4.14 on June 17, 2008. I bet we're going to debate energy now. I bet we're going to do this bill. No. We did the Monkey Safety Act. Folks, I love monkeys. They're cute, they're cuddly, they're everything else; but for crying out loud, when it costs $80 to fill up your gas tank, the most important issue in the United States of America is not the Monkey Safety Act.

It's time for this majority to quit monkeying around with our gas prices. It's no coincidence, Mr. Speaker, that at the same time we're doing the Monkey Safety Act, unemployment in this country goes from a little over 4\1/2\ percent to where it is today, over 6 percent.

Quit fooling around. Quit horsing around. Some people say, Well, this chart doesn't go far enough. We also did some other important things after we got back. We declared National Watermelon Month, and we also indicated that we were going to recognize Bo Diddley. He's a great guy. I'm all for honoring him. But it's time that we tell our friends on the other side, You haven't done diddley about oil and gas.

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

Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 1241 recognizes Ensign DeCarol Davis for her extraordinary achievements as a cadet at the United States Coast Guard Academy. Ensign Davis graduated in May of this year as the valedictorian of her class of 2008, and is currently stationed with the Prevention Department at Coast Guard Sector New York.

During her 4 years as a cadet, Ensign Davis was selected as the Academy's first Truman Scholar, honored as the 2007 Arthur Ashe, Jr. Female Sports Scholar of the Year, and served as the president of her Academy class. Ensign Davis also became very involved with student activities on campus and in the surrounding community of New London.

Ensign Davis is a shining example of the quality of men and women who make up the leaders and ranks of our Coast Guard, and I hope that the House's action today will encourage our young people to learn more about the Coast Guard Academy and the Coast Guard.

I support this resolution honoring Ensign Davis for her achievements.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, it's my pleasure to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble), a former Coast Guardsman himself.

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

Mr. Speaker, this is a good resolution. This is a worthy honor. I urge all Members to support it.

The only reason I wanted to take a little bit of time is, after Mr. Coble spoke I was reminded that at our last Coast Guard hearing Mr. Coble made the observation that he had served in the Coast Guard some period of time ago and he wondered what happened to the ship that he had actually served on. And as Mr. Coble left the room, I felt bad, and even though we're a bipartisan bunch here, one of the Members on the other side of the aisle said he thinks he saw the ship in a tall ships museum. And I think that that was an unfair slight to Mr. Coble and I'm sure that that's not true.

I urge passage of the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman from Florida, the ranking member of the full committee, for yielding.

I rise today, Mr. Speaker, in support of H.R. 6493, the Aviation Safety Enhancement Act of 2008.

Commercial aviation is enjoying the safest period in the history of flight. In fact, there hasn't been a wide-body aircraft passenger fatality since 2001. This excellent record is the result of the hard work of the FAA's Office of Aviation Safety, which has some 6,900 dedicated employees, including 3,800 FAA aviation safety inspectors, who oversee approximately 19,000 aircraft, including the 7,000 aircraft that make up the entire U.S. commercial airline fleet. Their charge is as important as it is large.

Even with such an excellent record, however, the aviation community and the FAA must remain vigilant in protecting the traveling public. H.R. 6493 is an important bipartisan bill that will go a long way towards addressing the inadequacies in the FAA's oversight programs discovered during the Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General audit earlier this year.

In addition to efforts already undertaken by the FAA, this legislation creates an Aviation Safety Whistleblower Office; requires modification of Customer Service Initiative to eliminate references to airlines and certificate holders as customers; establishes post- employment restrictions for FAA flight standards inspectors, a 2 year ``cooling-off'' period; requires reassignment of FAA principal supervisory maintenance inspectors, rotates the SPMIs every 5 years; requires an FAA headquarters review of the Air Transportation Oversight System database with the establishment of a team to review the ATOS database every month, requires monthly reports of any regulatory trends, which a description of any should include corrective actions if appropriate. A quarterly report to Congress is also required.

I want to applaud the FAA for the level of safety it's overseen in recent years, and I urge my colleagues to support this legislation that will continue to build upon the already impressive safety record of the Federal Aviation Administration.

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

I want to begin my remarks by thanking the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, and I will have a little more to say about the body on the other side and how it contrasts with how Mr. Oberstar and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on this side operates.

I also thank the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor) for his dogged pursuit of this, and all of the other Members that Mr. Oberstar mentioned; and in addition one who he by oversight forgot, Candice Miller of Michigan, who was in the boat business before she came to Congress. And like most of us who live up on the Great Lakes, when she goes home, she hears about this.

I actually saw a couple of boaters the weekend before last, and they said that with all that is going on with fuel prices, they paid $500 to fill up their tanks to go out and boat, and they certainly didn't need an incidental discharge permit authorized by the Environmental Protection Agency to go out walleye fishing.

Relative to the way the two bodies work, when this matter was brought to the chairman's attention, he immediately said well, draft a piece of legislation, put it in, let's find out everybody that is interested. We will have hearings. We did in the subcommittee and the full committee. We had a markup, we prepared the bill, and then we waited and we waited and we waited.

Then today, I know some people who may keep track of the schedule of the House of Representatives may have seen the schedule for today's suspension calendar printed, and it said we would be considering H.R. 5949, and I just would ask people to not adjust their television sets, it is not a mistake, we are in fact doing the Senate bill because the great slumbering dinosaur that is the august body on the other side of the Capitol awoke from that slumber earlier this morning and in fact passed Senate 2766, which I am happy to say is identical word for word with the House bill and so we are going to consider the Senate bill because unlike others, we have no pride of authorship, we are more interested in getting this bill to the President for his signature to help alleviate the pain that some 13 million, 14 million boaters would have.

The original House bill was introduced to exempt recreational boaters from having to obtain an EPA permit for incidental discharges that are determined to be normal to the operation of the vehicle. The House passage today will prevent 16 million recreational boaters from being subject to Federal fines of up to $32,500. And let me repeat that, $32,500 a day for a guy who owns a 19-foot Starcraft that has an incidental discharge in Lake Erie.

What is an incidental discharge? An incidental discharge is if it rains and water pours off the deck of your boat; if you are out fishing and you have a cooler and you want to dump the melted ice over the side of the boat, that is an incidental discharge. In my part of the Great Lakes basin, we are a little heartier and maybe a little cruder than others, and sometimes we will go out with a cooler filled with liquid refreshments while we walleye fish, and sometimes that leads to a call of nature. That is an incidental discharge from a recreational boat that would have been subject to this discharge permit because of this judge in California.

And the Congress had to act because the judge indicated that these regulations go into effect in September. The EPA has already drafted model regulations so they were ready to go. And although the matter is on appeal, if we don't take action and get the President to sign it, it is going to be a big problem.

So again, I am very, very thankful to Mr. Oberstar and the other members of our committee. I am very thankful for the prompt action of the House of Representatives and thankful for the action of the United States Senate earlier today. I urge everybody to support this piece of legislation.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time it is my pleasure to yield to a distinguished Member of the House from Connecticut (Mr. Shays) for such time as he may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time for the purpose of closing on our side.

Mr. Speaker, again I want to thank Chairman Oberstar. This again is an example of how our committee works in a bipartisan way to deal with real issues affecting real Americans.

Just a couple of statistics for the purpose of the Record. In just the State of Ohio, there are over 415,000 recreational boats registered with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. One in every five boats registered in Ohio are located within the seven counties that I represent in northeastern Ohio. The Clean Water Act amendments that the court was allegedly interpreting were designed to deal with ballast water and to prevent the additional scourge of invasive species coming into our waterways, which those of us in the Great Lakes and the coastal regions know, the zebra mussels, the round goby, the sea lamprey, the Asian carp, we are all familiar with how terrible it is when something foreign to our ecosystem is introduced.

But the fallacy of the court's decision is that 99 percent of recreational boats don't have any ballast water so it would be tough for an invasive species to sneak into something that didn't exist. And, in fact, this court ruling would have even covered a kayak. If you, Mr. Speaker, wanted to go kayaking on the Cuyahoga River, you would have needed an EPA discharge permit for the purpose of your kayak.

Clearly it made no sense. There is no body or plethora of science that indicates that invasive species have hitched into inland water on kayaks or pontoon boats. This is a ruling that didn't make sense. And, sadly, it is taking congressional action, and I am glad that in this instance congressional action has taken place in both bodies and the President hopefully will soon sign this legislation. Again, my thanks to all who were involved.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Again, I want to praise a number of our colleagues, first and foremost among them, the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, who introduced just yesterday, I think, H.R. 6556, and, again, would indicate that anyone that followed the House schedule doesn't need to adjust their television set. We are, in fact, doing Senate 3298 and not House bill 6556.

Again, it's thanks to the pressure, and I didn't know I was citing a biblical verse before, but give thanks to the pressure exerted by Chairman Oberstar indicating that we were prepared to proceed.

Just a quick story about those 200 meters to the other side, there is a rather famous clock on the other side of the Capitol called the Ohio Clock. Every time I have been over there it doesn't seem to be working, but it's right twice a day, and I think once today at least and in passing these pieces of legislation, the United States Senate has sent us a good piece of legislation, which we can send on to the President.

I rise in support of Senate 3298, and this has been the result of bipartisan, bicameral discussions by a number of Members on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

The House is taking action to approve this bill in conjunction with the recreational boating measure that we just passed, the court decision which would require this permitting business that we have talked about that was never contemplated by the Clean Water Act.

The bill will exempt small commercial vessels and all fishing vessels from obtaining these permits for 2 years while the agency studies the nature of impacts and discharges that are normal to the operation of these vessels. Following the submission of the required report, Congress will have better tools to determine if these discharges should be regulated or exempted, as is the case with recreational vehicles.

Enactment of this legislation and its companion will carry out an agreement made with Chairman Oberstar to address the entire scope of vessels that will be impacted by the pending EPA permit program.

I, again, want to commend Chairman Oberstar, thank him for working with us, and on our side of the aisle someone who has been dogged, and, I think, concerned as Gene Taylor of Mississippi was on the Democratic side of the aisle, on our side of the aisle Mr. Young of Alaska and Mr. LoBiondo of New Jersey were afraid that because we have 14 million recreational boaters, perhaps we would deal with that issue and then leave this issue hanging in limbo.

But, again, as a result of the reaching across the aisle and across the Capitol, can-do spirit of Chairman Oberstar, we were able to come to this moment in time. I guess the only thing that we can hope, is if the reference to the slumbering dinosaur is accurate, that 2 years is enough time for them to again awaken from their slumber and solve this problem when this moratorium expires.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time it's my pleasure to yield such time as he may consume to one of the aforementioned champions on this issue, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. LoBiondo).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of our time for the purpose of closing.

Mr. Speaker, just a couple of observations. I am glad that, again, Mr. LoBiondo has singled out Gene Taylor of Mississippi, who is a tireless champion on a number of these issues, and was dead set, as was Mr. LoBiondo and Mr. Young, on making sure that this piece moved with the other piece. And in honor of Mr. Taylor today on the floor, I actually wore chinos and a blue blazer, which is the Taylor national uniform, to commemorate his participation in the House of Representatives.

The other thing, before I came over to the floor I got the benefit of an e-mail that is being sent around by some environmental groups indicating that this somehow is a dangerous bill and is going to lead to pollution. And again, I will tell you, for those that are weak at heart and maybe nervous about that type of communication, first, again, over 99 percent of the recreational vehicles and vessels we are talking about don't have any ballast water. So the ballast water and invasive species issue that we are attempting to deal with is a nonstarter, literally, a red herring.

The second piece, and that is that somehow we are authorizing the discharge of noxious chemicals and pollutants into the water stream is also not correct, in that that was taken care of in the Oil Pollution Act of 1990. And what we are truly talking about here, Mr. Speaker, are incidental discharges, as I think I described during the discussion of the other bill.

I am grateful that we were able to permanently take care of our recreational friends; that we now have a 2-year window with which to collect additional data to make sure we get it right on fishing vessels.

I again commend Mr. Oberstar and our committee and our friends in the Senate for getting it to us; and hopefully President Bush will sign this soon, and this problem will be taken care of.

I yield back the balance of our time.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

And I want to add my congratulations to Mr. Oberstar and Mr. Mica as the leaders of our full committee and Ms. Brown and Mr. Shuster, the leaders of the subcommittee, for getting to this point.

And I won't rehash all of the good things about this bill that have already been mentioned, but I want to highlight two things. One is thanks to some good work by Mr. Kummant who is now the head of Amtrak. We had a number of labor organizations who were operating without contracts for 8 years. And now those contracts have been tentatively settled, and Mr. Kummant is working hard, together with authorizations contained in this bill, money set aside, and perhaps appropriations for the Congress to implement those agreements, and clearly that's a good step forward, not only for the travelling public but for Amtrak and for people who work on the airlines.

And the second thing I want to highlight is sort of the hidden treasure of this bill, and that is the $350 million a year each year for 5 years. Again, the brainstorm of the chairman, Mr. Oberstar, to implement high-speed intercity rail transportation in this country.

And I thought that it's more than symbolic that the fellow who was Speaker pro tem for most of the session this morning, Mr. Jackson of Chicago, should be replaced by Mrs. Tubbs Jones of Cleveland. And wouldn't it be wonderful to have a high-speed corridor go from Chicago, Illinois, to Cleveland, Ohio, and give people who are choking on the high cost of gasoline who don't want to fly that short distance to have the opportunity to go 120, 130, 150 miles an hour between Chicago and Cleveland. And that's the vision that Mr. Mica has talked about, and that's the vision that Mr. Oberstar has implemented in this bill.

It's a good piece of legislation, and it is really going to put the United States on the right track, as it were, and I'm grateful for all of your hard work.

I thank the gentlelady for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of S. 496, the reauthorization of the Appalachian Regional Commission. While we would have enjoyed having the House bill on the floor, we appreciate very much having the Senate bill. I want to express my thanks during the first part of my remarks to the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar of Minnesota, for really making sure that this happened. I had the pleasure of being the chairman of this subcommittee in a couple of previous Congresses ago, and this is a difficult bill to navigate through the House and the Senate.

And the fact that we're here today is a tribute to the leadership of the gentleman from Minnesota. I also thank the ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Mica of Florida. And I want to thank a colleague of mine from Ohio, because in this bill we have added three counties in Ohio to the 29 counties in Ohio already located within the ARC. And the last county was Columbiana County added in 1990. We now are adding in this bill Ashtabula, Trumbull and Mahoning Counties.

And the fact that they're in the bill is not only a credit to Mr. Oberstar, Mr. Mica and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, but also to Mr. Tim Ryan, the Congressman from Youngstown, who shares at least two of those counties with me. And we saw the vital need to have them included in the ARC. And we're very grateful.

On the Senate side we are grateful to Senator Voinovich for making sure these counties, despite the fact that we have been at this 5 years, and every year we get the counties added in the bill, and then it goes over to the Senate and somebody has a goofy idea over there and they drop out. This year I'm grateful that Senator Voinovich and our colleagues in the House have maintained these three counties in the bill. And just the way when my friend and colleague from Ohio (Mr. Space) was speaking, we recognize the value of John Kennedy's vision when he dispatched folks to look at the conditions in Appalachia. And we've really moved light years from that.

The ARC is a template for economic development in all of those regions. And we just want to be part of it. If you look at a map of the State of Ohio, the only sort of areas of white, and white being where there is no Regional Development Commission, Federal Commission, are the three counties that are being added today.

Just one example, Kinsman, Ohio, the home of Clarence Darrow, the famous orator and attorney, is looking at a major sewer project. We are working with the United States Department of Agriculture, but by being in the ARC, they will get extra points, extra opportunities to make that a reality. So when you are dealing with 300 landowners and a price tag of $20 million, the assessment isn't astronomical in terms of $70,000 or $80,000 just to hook up the water and sewer.

So we are excited about this opportunity and very grateful that this bill has come to the floor in a way that adds these counties.

I would say to Mr. Space that we are all suffering, rural America, suburban America, exurban America. I don't like to trumpet in a partisan fashion on the floor, but I will tell you the folks in my part of Ohio want us to do something. They have said enough arguing. You have a lot of brainy ideas in Washington, DC. It is time to stop favoring one group over the other. Let's bring it all together and let's talk about oil, let's talk about coal, let's talk about nuclear, let's talk about renewables, but get it done so I can put gas in my gas tank.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to rise in support today of the Senate amendment to H.R. 802, the Maritime Prevention Pollution Act of 2008. I want to give credit and pay tribute to the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, and the chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Cummings of Maryland, for their diligence in working this bill and working the will of the committee and today the will of the House. I join Mr. Oberstar in expressing my regret that the other body has not acted in as prompt a fashion, and therefore we may be too late with this legislation. Hopefully that isn't the case.

This type of legislation is exactly what our committee should be about. Those of us, as the current occupant of the chair who hails from the Great Lakes region, as does the chairman of the full committee, know the great work that has gone into the restoration of the Great Lakes over many, many years. I am reminded as I listened to the chairman talk about the action or inaction of the other body that Johnny Carson, before the restoration of Lake Erie in particular was in full swing, used to joke that Lake Erie was a place where fish went to die. I think it is appropriate to say that at this moment in time, the Senate, regardless of who is in charge, is a place where bills go to die.

This bill will implement international requirements to reduce air emissions from ships for purposes of U.S. law and will establish more stringent standards for the emissions of airborne pollutants from ships as well as the sulfur content of fuel oil used in United States waters.

As Members may remember, the House first passed this bill in March of 2007, again thanks to the splendid leadership of Chairman Oberstar and Chairman Cummings, with a broad bipartisan majority. Since that time, the bill has languished in the other body, to the point where we may well be prevented from voting on proposed amendments to the underlying convention at the next meeting of the International Maritime Organization. As a result, our abilities to push for strengthened measures have been significantly weakened.

Nonetheless, this is important legislation. I am pleased we will be sending it to the President as a first step to improve environmental conditions in our ports and along our coasts. I urge all Members to join me in supporting this legislation.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I know that it will come as a surprise to the Speaker that I spend just a couple of minutes talking about energy today, and I want to talk about it in the context of our committee.

I think the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Oberstar, can probably cite the statistic, but every year I have been here, and this is my 14th year in the United States Congress, the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, I think under both Republican and Democratic leadership, has distinguished itself in the bipartisan and efficient way in which we craft our legislation and actually get something done, when the other body is willing and when the chief executive is willing to sign it.

I thought I heard before our July 4th recess Mr. Oberstar talk about the many numbers of bills that we have actually moved through the House, through the Senate, that have been signed into law, and it far exceeds a lot of the work that some of the other more contentious committees in this body, by their nature, no criticism intended, can compile, and I think it is in direct correlation to and as a direct result of the respect that we have for each other on both sides of the aisle on that committee, and now the stern but fair leadership of the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar).

That brings me to a frustration that I found and encountered over the Fourth of July recess. I was talking to Mr. Oberstar. I didn't quite have the adulation poured upon me at parades that he had in his district in Minnesota. There were some people that thought that $4.10 was a little bit much to be paying at the pump.

But the message that I got pretty loud and clear is that they want us to resolve it. When you pull into the gas station, there isn't a Republican pump and there isn't a Democratic pump and there isn't an independent pump, there is just gas that costs a lot of money today, and someone making $8 an hour in Ohio for a $320 per week gross paycheck is struggling, with $60, $70 filling up the tank to go to and from work.

There are a lot of opinions, and I will get into those in just a second, but I was reminded for the 12 years we were in the majority I happened to be supportive of something known as Davis-Bacon, which is the Federal prevailing wage law, and our committee is responsible for producing the Water Resources Development Act.

We were stymied for years in getting necessary water infrastructure projects out to our communities because of the sort of Davis-Bacon problem, and that is the then majority leader believed that if it came to a vote on an amendment, at that time by one of our colleagues who is not with us anymore, Mrs. Kelly of New York, that that issue would prevail, and much to the dismay of Members in the then majority party, who happened to be a majority of the majority but were a minority of the House, if that vote were permitted to have taken place. That was a frustrating thing, and, sadly, I think we find ourselves there again on this energy question.

There are Members in this House who advocate additional exploration and drilling in the United States, both on and offshore, in the West, in Alaska, off the east coast and the west coast. There are some who say no. There are some who advocate a replenishment and an increased investment in renewable, wind and solar. The gentleman from Minnesota is an expert on photovoltaic electricity, and certainly he has passed legislation that would be supportive of increased research and development of that type of energy generation.

There are those who believe like the French we should add nuclear power back into our portfolio. France, I believe, generates about 80 percent of its power through nuclear power. We haven't had a nuclear power program in this country for a number of years. There are those in this House that object to that and don't think that that is a good idea as well.

But the point is that I think that at $4, $4.10, $4.11, we have reached the price point where the American public, who has to get up and buy food, send their kids to school, pay their bills, pay their taxes and fill up their gas tanks, don't really want to hear why we disagree and what we can't agree on.

I think that they are looking for a solution. And there are a lot of people in both parties who are bellicose on this issue, and I don't intend to do that. But I think I would say that the time to have this national debate is now. We need to determine what direction the country is going to go in. And like most issues, the Democrats aren't 100 percent correct, the Republicans aren't 100 percent correct. But we are expected to be the leaders of the Nation and we are expected to come up with solutions.

So I would hope, not in the spirit of the old Water Resources Development Act where we were not permitted to have the House work its will, that the current leadership of the House would let the Members of the House work their will on what the energy policy of this country should be to give some relief to our citizens.

And since I am in a commending mood, Mr. Speaker, I would nominate the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), the chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, to be the designee of Speaker Pelosi to head up this effort and use the same bipartisan manner he uses on all other issues to get us out of this mess.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, the reason that I nominated the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) as sort of the energy czar of the United States Congress is exactly the reasons that he indicated. If you look at the legislation that has effectively dealt in part with the difficulties we find ourselves in, the gentleman's transit legislation certainly gets people into mass transit and out of their automobiles and saves fuel.

The gentleman's Amtrak legislation is historic, and in the short run a robust Amtrak means good things for America in terms of jobs and moving people to and from work. I think I saw something on the news where they were tracking what has happened to people's behaviors since the price of gas has gone up, and I believe Amtrak has seen a 13 percent ridership increase since gas has increased, a testament to Amtrak, and also a testament to the gentleman's bill that made sure that Amtrak isn't operating hand to mouth as we move through this process.

Similarly, the gentleman's vision for intercity rail in this country is again something where we lag far behind our friends in Asia and Europe, and he has for the first time, at least since I have been here, put real money, $350 million a year for 5 years, into the notion of high-speed intercity rail connections principally in the Midwest of the United States. But all of us recognize that that piece at least is some years away in terms of it being a viable alternative and impacting the cost of gasoline.

So, again, I would make the suggestion that there are good ideas on both sides of this aisle. There are many gifted Members of Congress, both Republicans and Democrats. We should have a national debate. And, for the sake of the people that I represent and others represent, we should get something done and we should get them some relief today.

But, Mr. Speaker, I was talking to Mr. Rayfield and we were trying to remember whether it was General William Tecumseh Sherman who said: If asked, I will not run. If nominated, I will not serve. If elected, I will not serve.

I think that is what the gentleman from Minnesota said to my suggestion and I hope he in fact reconsiders that, because of all of the people in this body, he commands tremendous respect

on both sides of the aisle. He has demonstrated again and again not only as the ranking member in previous Congresses of our committee but now as the chairman that he can put together the best ideas of both sides, and not only move forward ideas that he firmly believes in but find consensus and actually get bills done and signed into law. So I hope the gentleman, unlike my fellow Ohioan, General Sherman, reconsiders.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the chairman of the committee, and I thank him for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, this is my 14th year in the Congress. This is the first year that

we've not had a major dustup over Amtrak, and that is a direct credit to the hard work on our side of Mr. Shuster and Mr. Mica, and on the Democratic side to Chairwoman Brown and the chairman of our full committee, who Ms. Brown has referred to as the guru of transportation. And I think this bill is one that deserves every Member's support.

I was glad that Chairman Oberstar, in his remarks, talked about the high cost of fuel and gasoline, and he talked about airlines. And I just want to throw another one in. Continental Airlines is a big carrier in my part of the world. They just announced they're going to lay off 3,000 people out of a workforce of 54,000. And in talking to them, their jet fuel costs in the last year have gone up $2.3 billion. And if you think about what $2.3 billion means, translated over the workforce, it means that if fuel hadn't gone up by that amount, everybody that works for Continental Airlines could have gotten a raise of $50,000. I mean, we're talking real money.

I just left a presentation by Michael Ward, the CEO, President and CEO of CSX, and his new advertising campaign as he attempts to convince those of us in Ohio and West Virginia and Pennsylvania and Virginia and Maryland to build the national gateway project. They can take a ton, a ton of cargo from Cleveland, Ohio, to Baltimore, Maryland, on a gallon of diesel fuel. Now, that is where we should be making our investments, and if we can do it with freight, we can certainly do it with passenger rail.

I'm excited about this bill not only because we're going to stop the sort of nitpicking that's gone on here about how much Amtrak could get as a Federal subsidy. I've been here when we had the administration send up zero as the Federal contribution; I've been here when they sent up $500 million. I think this year they sent up $800 million when everybody agrees that that's not sufficient.

The chairwoman and I have traveled the world looking at passenger rail systems. There is not a passenger rail system in the country, in the world, that makes money and doesn't rely on their government to make a contribution.

We have a societal choice. We can either have people get in their car and pay $4.05 a gallon for one person listening to the radio, or we can convince them that for trips of 400 miles or less that passenger rail is a viable alternative in this country. And Mr. Mica's vision of high- speed passenger rail is a viable alternative in this country, and they can get from point A to point B in a cheap, clean, environmentally friendly way; and this bill moves us in that direction.

So congratulations, I think, go around to Mr. Mica, Mr. Shuster, Ms. Brown, and Chairman Oberstar.

We should be embarrassed, Mr. Chairman, as Americans when you look at what the Asians and the Europeans are doing with passenger rail that we have such a sad state of affairs in the United States of America. It's time to stop it, and I just want to thank all four of the leaders of our committee for including a proposal to make a real commitment for the first time in the history, of recent history of passenger rail to the Midwestern part of this United States.

And I know, I know for a fact that if we put the Federal resources to build a high-speed rail line from Cleveland to Columbus to Cincinnati, people would beg, would beg to be on that train for 120 miles an hour to get their business done.

My congratulations. Good bill. We all need to vote for it.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the amendment that I have offered with Mr. Miller of North Carolina be modified and amended, and I will describe that--but then I know the Clerk has to report it--just by adding 2 words, on line 7, after the word ``foreclosure'' adding the word ``process,'' and on the next line, after the words ``foreclosed property,'' add the word ``maintenance.''

If the gentleman would yield to me on his reservation, I would make this observation to the gentleman and to the House. This amendment that Mr. Miller and I crafted, obviously, one of the things that vexes, and it doesn't matter whether it's financial services or anything else, one of the things that continues to vex and cause tension between the Federal Government and the States is this whole issue of preemption.

So when Mr. Miller came to me with the original amendment, we began to hear some concerns. And quite frankly, the concerns were are you opening the door to a Maryland-type situation, where they can pass a State law that says that nobody can foreclose on property for 5 years, 10 years, 15 years. And clearly, although I happen to think that that kind of abrogation of property rights is an unconstitutional exercise of legislative authority, I understood the concerns.

And so I will tell the gentleman on his reservation that we sought the advice of the OCC and the OTS and received a list of things that are already preempted. And as I think the gentleman has accurately stated, the manner, the process in which foreclosures have happened have always been the purview of the States. And then the boarding up of properties or the maintenance of properties that are foreclosed.

And so it is my attempt through this unanimous consent request, I think, from all Members, and I think Members on both sides of the aisle have some concerns about this. This wasn't limited to Republican Members. There were some Democratic members that had concerns as well. The OCC has indicated to us that this answers that concern. It doesn't deprive them of their authority under the National Bank Act. Some of the banking institutions that were originally concerned about the amendment have indicated the that this is language that they can live with.

And just as a Republican Member of the House, I would say to the gentleman from Georgia, under his reservation, that this is typically the point in our debates where our distinguished chairman of the Financial Services Committee skewers us as Republicans for being for States' rights on some days and being against States' rights on other days. It was my goal to make sure that States' rights were preserved on those things that they've always had the opportunity to regulate, and not impinge upon those, but also recognizing that not all the best ideas in terms of how to proceed on process or maintenance necessarily emanate from this Chamber.

I thank the gentleman for yielding on his reservation.

Mr. Chairman, at this time it's my privilege to yield such time as he may consume to the ranking member of the full committee, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica).

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of H.R. 2830, and I'll tell you why in just a second, but just a couple of editorial notes. One is that it is my belief that this Coast Guard reauthorization is brought to the floor in the best traditions of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. And I want to commend the ranking member of our full committee, Mr. Mica, for his diligence and work, and also for expressing his remaining concerns.

I also want to express my appreciation to the chairman of our subcommittee, Mr. Cummings, who I've had the pleasure now of working with about a year and a half, and I will tell you there is no Member that is more dedicated to not only the mission of the Coast Guard, but the safety of those that they entrust with supervising. It is a pleasure to serve in the post of ranking member with Mr. Cummings as the chairman.

And, also, a special affection for the chairman of the full committee. I made the observation at the beginning of this Congress, and I'll repeat it again today, that obviously, as a Republican, none of us were excited about being thrust after 12 years from the majority party to the minority party, but if there was to be a Democratic Chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, there is no one more deserving, in my opinion, perhaps in the history of the institution, than the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar). He really takes our committee, no matter what the issue, above partisanship to the goals of the Transportation Committee, and that is, safeguarding our waterways and building America.

And, lastly, while I'm saying nice things about people, I am pleased, Mr. Chairman, that the Speaker of the House, Mrs. Pelosi, has installed you as the Chairman of the Committee of the Whole for the consideration of this piece of legislation.

I rise in strong support of this bill. And I am especially proud of the ballast water provisions and the marine safety provisions located within the bill.

This bill will establish national standards requiring the treatment of ballast water to minimize the introduction of invasive species into the Great Lakes and other U.S. waters. The bill will build on a lot of work that has already been done. Those of us that are from the Great Lakes know very well the importance of this issue.

I am disappointed that we'll have a colloquy later with the chairman of the full committee relative to an amendment that was offered at the Rules Committee that would protect millions of recreational boaters from falling under a discharge permitting program designed for large oceangoing vessels. In the absence of this language, come September recreational voters will be facing fines of up to $32,500 a day for violations of program rules. For more than 30 years, Mr. Chairman, both recreational and commercial vehicles were exempted from these programs, and I hope that the majority will join us to develop language addressing these understandings.

As well, when we get to the amendment portion of the bill, I have an amendment that I'm offering with Mr. Boustany of Louisiana that addresses some of the concerns raised by the ranking member, Mr. Mica, relative to waterside security for liquefied natural gas facilities.

Again, I want to thank the Chair of the subcommittee and the full committee for working with us. I want to thank Mr. Boustany for his dogged work to make sure that we come up with a resolution that not only fits with the reality of assets that are available, builds on a long tradition that we established in 2005, but also permits us to move forward with the goal of attaining cheaper energy for Americans through the form of natural gas.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I thank the Chair very much and would reserve the balance of my time.