[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 39 (Thursday, March 11, 1999)]
[House]
[Page H1173]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           VOTE NO ON H.R. 45

  (Mr. GIBBONS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. GIBBONS. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 45 is the nuclear waste lottery. We 
bet our homes, our property, the safety of our family, and then if one 
of these nuclear carnivals passes by our property, bingo, we get big 
bucks.
  This is a lawyer's dream. Thousands of innocent people will get a 
large payment of taxpayer money because the transportation of this 
deadly radioactive waste will devalue and endanger their property. Mr. 
Speaker, let me explain.
  Recently the New Mexico State Supreme Court ruled that Mr. John Komis 
of Santa Fe will be awarded more than $884,000 in damages resulting 
from the devaluation of his property simply due to the transportation 
of nuclear waste past his property.
  If H.R. 45 were to pass, almost 80,000 tons of nuclear garbage will 
be shipped across our Nation's highways, destroying property values 
across this country like a string of dominos falling in its path, and 
who will pay for this devaluation of private property? The American 
taxpayer will foot the bill to support a radical, extremely costly 
policy mandated by H.R. 45.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a risk America cannot afford.

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