[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 131 (Saturday, September 26, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H8973-H8974]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  REQUIRE FEDERAL AGENCIES TO OBEY ENVIRONMENTAL LAW THEY ENFORCE ON 
                                 OTHERS

  (Mr. NORWOOD asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. NORWOOD. Mr. Speaker, whatever happened to user-friendly 
bureaucrats, if there were any?
  Clear dangerous underbrush from the public area between your house 
and Thurmond Lake that resulted from a

[[Page H8974]]

tornado 4 months ago and, boom, the Corps of Engineers revokes your 
dock permit for violating a shoreline management plan.
  Buy a new house on Lake Thurmond Georgia and fail to replant trees on 
public property that you never cut down in the first place and, boom, 
no lake shore use permit for you.
  Do as I say, not as I do. That ought to be the new motto for the 
Corps' Savannah office. For while they routinely violate the Clean 
Water Act without being penalized, they have no problem lowering the 
boom on individuals who are not in compliance with their mostly 
frivolous rules and regulations.
  But, Mr. Speaker, that will change. Cosponsor H.R. 1194, a bill to 
require Federal agencies to abide by the same environmental laws that 
they enforce on private citizens. Maybe the bureaucrats then will be a 
little more understanding.

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