[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 48 (Thursday, April 25, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H1668-H1669]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     URGING MEMBERS TO CONSIDER COSPONSORING IMPORTANT LEGISLATION 
                      CONCERNING SCIENCE EDUCATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) is recognized 
for 5 minutes.
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, we are at the end of Earth Day week. I have 
always felt that if one is a Member of Congress, the best way to 
celebrate Earth Day and the week in which it occurs is to legislate. 
After all, we are Members of Congress. We can do more than hug trees 
and go to river sites.
  Congress is now all entangled in the energy bill and the ANWR 
controversy, but there are many noncontroversial matters that need to 
be taken up in legislation.
  I invite Members to go on to two bills I introduced this week. One is 
called the Academic Excellence In Environmental Sciences Act of 2002. 
It aims to make environmentalists and scientists

[[Page H1669]]

of young people. We have a real dearth of scientists today. More and 
more of our kids are going off and doing other things. Yet, in a very 
real sense, these youngsters are the best messengers for the 
environment, especially since they are going to inherit whatever 
environment we leave them.
  This bill would encourage hands-on recycling to help children 
cultivate habits that conserve our resources. While they are at school 
they learn how to do recycling. My aim is also to help them concretize 
their interest in science and their understanding of scientific 
concepts, so as they learn about recycling, science comes alive for 
them, and they are encouraged to study math and science, to get 
interested in science earlier, and to maintain that scientific 
interest.
  I see the need for it. I just nominated five of my youngsters to the 
academies, and I am encouraging my school systems to do more with 
science and math in order that I will have more youngsters to nominate 
to the academies.
  Getting them involved in recycling helps them to understand science 
better.

                              {time}  1530

  Second bill is called the National Urban Watershed Model Restoration 
Act. It is aimed at the problem of urban watershed. We all know and 
love watersheds in the great blue yonder, but the fact is our great 
cities are often located right in the center of watersheds, terribly 
polluted. I use my own river, the Anacostia River, which runs through 
our neighborhoods, as a model for the country so that this notion of 
working with the EPA, with the Corps of Engineers, and importantly 
involving the community in clean ups and in preservation of the 
watershed is what I seek to accomplish.
  This would not be cleanup activity. It would be scientific. It would 
not only clean up communities; it would be a scientific watershed clean 
up, but done in collaboration with the community so that when it is 
cleaned up it stays cleaned up. We are located right here on the banks 
of Anacostia, but my folks cannot get to the Anacostia.
  We are about to develop the waterfronts; and when, in fact, the 
waterfronts get opened up, what they will see is a river polluted by 
the national government, the Government of the United States of 
America. That is why I think we ought to begin here with the Anacostia 
and then go to the great watersheds. They are in New York. They are in 
L.A. They are in Baltimore. They are across the United States. Because 
they have been in cities, people have not paid much attention to them. 
They have been polluted industrially or, in our case, by the Federal 
Government. This would be on a 75/25 percent basis use Federal, State, 
and local funds to begin the cleanup of urban watersheds.
  You cannot revitalize a community without revitalizing its river. 
When you do both, you transform an entire city and an entire area. We 
would never allow such polluted rivers to be in our countrysides. We 
must not allow them to encroach on our large cities, especially since 
these cities are now beginning to develop along the waterway. We are 
doing that in the District of Columbia, our Nation's capital. The one 
difference between us and you is the Federal Government is responsible 
for our pollution.
  We are going to begin here and spread this idea throughout the 
country. I would like my colleagues to go to both of these bills and 
look for their ``Dear Colleague'' letters soon.

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