[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 146 (Monday, September 15, 2008)]
[House]
[Pages H8053-H8054]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 TULE RIVER TRIBE WATER DEVELOPMENT ACT

  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 2535) to direct the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a 
study on the feasibility and suitability of constructing a storage 
reservoir, outlet works, and a delivery system for the Tule River 
Indian Tribe of California to provide a water supply for domestic, 
municipal, industrial, and agricultural purposes, and for other 
purposes.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 2535

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Tule River Tribe Water 
     Development Act''.

     SEC. 2. STUDY.

       (a) Authorization.--Not later than 2 years after funds are 
     appropriated for this section or the signing of a reserved 
     water rights settlement agreement by the Tule River Tribe and 
     other settling water users, whichever is later, the Secretary 
     of the Interior, acting through the Bureau of Reclamation, 
     shall complete a feasibility study to evaluate alternatives 
     (including alternatives for a phase I reservoir storage of an 
     amount of water not to exceed 5,000 acre feet) for a 
     domestic, commercial, municipal, industrial, and irrigation 
     water supply for the Tule River Tribe of the Tule River 
     Reservation.
       (b) Report.--Upon completion of the study conducted under 
     subsection (a), the Secretary of the Interior shall transmit 
     the study to the Committee on Natural Resources of the House 
     of Representatives and the Committee on Energy and Natural 
     Resources and the Committee on Indian Affairs of the Senate.
       (c) Authorization of Appropriations.--There is authorized 
     to be appropriated to the Secretary of the Interior 
     $3,000,000 to carry out this section.

     SEC. 3. CONDITIONS FOR FUTURE PROJECTS.

       No project conducted in relation to the feasibility study 
     conducted under section 2 shall provide water supplies for 
     the proposed Tribal casino to be located in proximity to 
     California Highway 190 near Lake Success, or any other Tribal 
     casino, except--
       (1) the casino in its current form and dimensions operated 
     by the Tribe on the Tule River Reservation; and
       (2) any lodging, dining, entertainment, meeting space, 
     parking, or other similar facilities which may be constructed 
     in the future in support of current on-Reservation gaming 
     activities, or in support of any future expansion of on-
     Reservation gaming activities.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentlewoman from 
Guam (Ms. Bordallo) and the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop) each will 
control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Guam.


                             General Leave

  Ms. BORDALLO. 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 material on the bill under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from Guam?
  There was no objection.
  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  (Ms. BORDALLO asked and was given permission to revise and extend her 
remarks.)
  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, the Tule River Water Development Act, 
sponsored by our colleague from California, Congressman Devin Nunes, 
would authorize the Secretary of the Interior, through the Bureau of 
Reclamation, to complete a feasibility study that would evaluate 
alternatives for a water supply for the Tule River Tribe of the Tule 
River Reservation. The Tule tribe views this as a very important first 
step in settling their water rights claims.
  This bill has received bipartisan support and I ask my colleagues to 
support its passage.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  This bill, H.R. 2535, introduced by our California colleagues, Devin 
Nunes and Jim Costa, is the first step towards improving the water 
supply situation on the Tule River Indian Reservation. This bill 
authorizes the Bureau of Reclamation to conduct a feasibility study to 
capture more surface water on the Reservation.
  I urge my colleagues to support this bipartisan measure.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield as much time as he 
may consume to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Salazar) who will speak 
on the previous bill.
  Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the chairwoman, and I want 
to thank Chairwoman Napolitano for all of her hard work on many of the 
water bills that are before us today. I also want to thank Congressman 
Nunes and Congressman Costa from California. Being rural water Members, 
they understand the importance of water to rural America.
  Today I would like to speak on H.R. 3437, the Jackson Gulch 
Rehabilitation Act of 2008. I introduced this bill after hearing from 
my constituents in Mancos, Colorado, including Gary Kennedy, who is the 
superintendent of the Mancos Water Conservancy District. Gary told me 
about how every spring as the snow melts he is terrified that they are 
going to have a catastrophic failure in the system. And it is only a 
matter of time.
  The Jackson Gulch project is critical to southwest Colorado and has 
stored and delivered water for domestic, agriculture and recreational 
uses for over 50 years.
  The Jackson Gulch Reservoir supplies water to the town of Mancos and 
the Mancos Rural Water Company. Many of my constituents in the area 
depend on the agricultural land to make a living. They cannot afford to 
lose their water supply.
  Also of critical importance, Jackson Gulch is the sole supplier of 
municipal water for the Mesa Verde National Park. Mesa Verde National 
Park was founded in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt and is one of 
our Nation's most treasured archeological sites. Almost 600,000 
Americans each year enjoy Mesa Verde National Park and rely on the 
water of the park that they receive from Jackson Gulch.
  This bill is critical to extend the life of Jackson Gulch Project. 
The project was authorized in 1939, and construction of the project was 
completed in 1949. Over the past 60 years, the canals and facilities 
have exceeded their life expectancy and are in dire need of repair.
  Congress is faced with a simple decision: Tackle the problem of 
rehabilitation for $8 million today or wait for a catastrophic failure 
and face a $30 million price tag for replacement tomorrow. Without 
action, it's only a matter of time before we have a major failure

[[Page H8054]]

and cut off water to Mesa Verde National Park and Coloradans in the 
southwest.
  The most dangerous period is during the spring snow melt when Jackson 
Gulch Reservoir is being filled. If anything happens during that time, 
my farmers, the town of Mancos, and the Mesa Verde National Park will 
be out of business. The estimated cost to rehabilitate the canal system 
is less than one-third of the cost of replacement.
  I urge my colleagues to help us address this important issue for 
southwest Colorado. There are approximately 300, 350 families living in 
the town of Mancos and 100 more living in Mancos Valley. The median 
income in Mancos is only $25,000. Yet in their desperate need for 
water, they have agreed to pay for 35 percent of the cost. They know 
this will stretch their budgets, but they are also willing to do their 
part. Now Congress should do its part and pass this critical bill.
  I want to thank the chairwoman; I want to thank the Speaker.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I want it to be very clear that I 
respect extremely Mr. Nunes and Mr. Costa who have introduced the bill 
that is before us. I also respect Mr. Salazar on the bill about which 
he was just speaking, because all those bills are very well written 
bills. They have gone through what we call regular order in this body 
so that the details have been worked out in a fair and equitable 
process. They are good, decent bills.
  But we meet together on this day of suspensions in a unique concept. 
As we enter into this Hall, there are symbols placed throughout this 
building. And those symbols are there to remind us of certain concepts 
that we should be emulating. Around the top of this room, you see the 
faces, the side views of the icons of law, the great lawgivers of the 
history of this world, with Moses, obviously, who is the greatest of 
all, being the only one with a full face view looking directly at the 
Speaker. They are here because it reminds us that law, even though it 
sounds sometimes counterintuitive, is that factor which allows us to be 
free. Law sets the standard, the example, so that we know where we are 
going and what we are trying to do, which is why we are so offended 
when activist judges are creating law based on their whimsy, not on the 
record of the verbiage itself, why sometimes we also are offended in 
this body when we create wilderness or we create trail systems without 
maps, or we create wild river systems that violate the definition of 
those particular laws and we decide to do so on the whimsy of a simple 
majority vote.
  The gentleman on the right side of the Speaker, when he was Vice 
President of the United States and thus also the President of the 
Senate, designed a set of rules by which the Senate would operate. This 
House has taken those rules, modified them slightly, but uses that as 
the basis of the rules of order for the way we conduct business here. 
And we often refer to that as regular order. But bills have concepts 
that they are supposed to take. If we indeed have a bill coming up 
later this week which has gone through no public input, has had no 
hearings, has had no committee reviews, will possibly not have the 
ability of being amended on the floor or in committee, being written in 
secret and then presented to us at the last minute, a pattern that has 
been pervasive during this session, it violates the message of their 
presence. It violates the concept of what we are trying to do. It says 
to us it is the wrong way to conduct business, because the basis when 
we conduct business out of regular order, when we do things behind 
closed doors and then bring a finished product to a take-it-or-leave-it 
vote here on the floor, is to basically produce a wrong-headed policy.
  That was what these people feared, even though most of them had no 
concept of what a democratic republic was supposed to be, nor did they 
care. They always established what the process should be. We are 
looking at the most significant issue to be faced by this Congress this 
year and have begun in secret, with no hearings, no input, no public. 
It suddenly appears on the floor out of regular order. To do so 
dishonors the memory of each of these individuals who have fought so 
hard to allow us to have a structured way of coming to common solutions 
to real problems. And it is one of those things we should not allow 
ourselves to sink into during this coming week or even the next week.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1415

  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume 
to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Granger).
  Ms. GRANGER. Mr. Speaker, as the previous speaker mentioned, in a 
normal time we would be debating this particular bill that has merit, I 
am sure. But these are not normal times. We are now in the last weeks 
before we adjourn this Congress, and we are not addressing the issue 
that is uppermost certainly in the minds of my constituents, and that 
is the energy crisis.
  I noticed recently we haven't been talking much about the energy 
potential of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR. There are 
rumors that we may have a bill this week on energy, but there is 
nothing mentioned about ANWR. Perhaps that is because the Democrats' 
later energy bill doesn't mention it at all.
  The American Energy Act, however, does give ANWR the attention it 
deserves. The American Energy Act opens the coastal plain of ANWR to 
drilling, limiting the footprint to just 2,000 acres. That is one one-
hundredth of 1 percent of the whole refuge. I know we have all heard 
the comparison, but I think it is worth repeating. That is the size of 
a postcard on a football field.
  ANWR has over 10 billion barrels of recoverable oil. That is over 
twice the proven oil reserves in all my State of Texas. Once ANWR is on 
line, it could produce as much oil per day as the entire State of 
Texas.
  In addition to increasing the supply of oil and therefore reducing 
prices, the royalty and tax revenue from ANWR would be considerable. 
Congress has authorized several programs to help develop alternative 
and renewable energy sources. However, we have not been able to fully 
fund those initiatives, so have not seen the benefit we were hoping for 
when they became law. The American Energy Act reinvests any bonus bids 
and royalty revenue from ANWR into a trust fund to help fund these 
initiatives to develop alternative and renewable energy sources.
  Poll after poll shows that Americans want more domestic production. 
My office is flooded with calls and e-mails begging me to convince 
Speaker Pelosi to allow a vote on drilling in ANWR. We need to increase 
domestic production. We need to develop alternative energy sources. We 
need to make renewable energy sources more effective. Allowing access 
to ANWR, as outlined in the American Energy Act, accomplishes all of 
these objectives.
  Let's heed the call of the American people. After all, that is what 
we were elected to do. Let's take responsibility and vote today to give 
them the relief they so desperately are seeking.
  I invite my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to join us and 
vote for real solutions today, this week, on this energy crisis.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Ms. BORDALLO. Mr. Speaker, I again urge Members to support the bill, 
and I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentlewoman from Guam (Ms. Bordallo) that the House suspend the rules 
and pass the bill, H.R. 2535.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. 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.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.
  The point of no quorum is considered withdrawn.

                          ____________________