[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 94 (Thursday, June 7, 2018)]
[House]
[Pages H4956-H4957]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 
                                  2019


                             General Leave

  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include 
extraneous material in the consideration of H.R. 5895, and that I may 
include tabular material on the same.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Idaho?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 923 and rule 
XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House 
on the state of the Union for the further consideration of the bill, 
H.R. 5895.


 =========================== NOTE =========================== 

  
  June 7, 2018, on page H4956, the following appeared: The SPEAKER 
pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman 
from Idaho? There was no objection. The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to 
House Resolution 923 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House 
in the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union for 
the further consideration of the bill, H.R. 5895.
  
  The online version has been corrected to read: The SPEAKER pro 
tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Idaho? There was no objection. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant 
to House Resolution 923 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the 
House in the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the 
Union for the further consideration of the bill, H.R. 5895.


 ========================= END NOTE ========================= 

  Will the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney) kindly resume the 
chair.

                              {time}  2039


                     In the Committee of the Whole

  Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the 
Whole House on the state of the Union for the further consideration of 
the bill (H.R. 5895) making appropriations for energy and water 
development and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 
30, 2019, and for other purposes, with Ms. Tenney (Acting Chair) in the 
chair.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The Acting CHAIR. When the Committee of the Whole rose earlier today 
pursuant to House Resolution 918, a request for a recorded vote on 
amendment No. 39 printed in part B of House Report 115-711 offered by 
the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Norman) had been postponed.
  Pursuant to House Resolution 923, the further amendment printed in 
part A of House Report 115-712 shall be considered as adopted.
  The text of the further amendment printed in part A of House Report 
115-712 is as follows:

       Page 165, after line 14, insert the following:
       Sec. 239.  For an additional amount for the Department of 
     Veterans Affairs, $1,138,000,000 for the programs and 
     activities authorized in the VA MISSION Act of 2018 and the 
     amendments made by such Act, which shall be in addition to 
     amounts otherwise made available in this Act for such 
     purpose, of which--
       (1) $600,000,000 shall become available for the Veterans 
     Community Care Program under section 1703 of title 38, United 
     States Code, as amended by the VA MISSION Act of 2018, on the 
     effective date specified in section 101(b) of such Act; and
       (2) $253,000,000 shall be available for the Family 
     Caregivers Program under section 1720G of title 38, United 
     States Code, as amended by such Act:

      Provided, That amounts made available under this section 
     shall remain available until September 30, 2020.

  The Acting CHAIR. No further amendment to the bill, as amended, shall 
be in order except those printed in part B of the report and available 
pro forma amendments described in section 4 of House Resolution 918.
  Each further amendment printed in part B of the report shall be 
considered only in the order printed in the report, may be offered only 
by a Member designated in the report, shall be considered as read, 
shall be debatable for the time specified in the report equally divided 
and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, may be withdrawn by 
the proponent at any time before action thereon, shall not be subject 
to amendment except amendments described in section 4 of House 
Resolution 918, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of 
the question.


                  Amendment No. 1 Offered by Mr. Nolan

  The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 1 
printed in part B of House Report 115-712.
  Mr. NOLAN. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
  The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Page 5, line 13, after the dollar amount, insert 
     ``(increased by $1,000,000)''.
       Page 7, line 16, after the dollar amount, insert ``(reduced 
     by $1,030,000)''.

  The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 923, the gentleman 
from Minnesota (Mr. Nolan) and a Member opposed each will control 5 
minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. NOLAN. Madam Chair, I would like to begin by thanking Chairman 
Simpson and Ranking Member Kaptur. I wish the whole country could be 
here to watch how hard you have worked, not just tonight, but 
throughout the year to bring this important legislation before us. It 
would give them great hope and faith in the process, and I commend both 
of you, your committee members, and your staff for the work that you 
are doing here.
  Madam Chair, I will be brief. My amendment would add $1 million to 
the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' aquatic nuisance control program. In 
effect, it would double the annual funding to $2 million for the 
important and critical research that is needed to combat some 1,500 
terribly destructive invasive species in our lakes and waterways, 
including six new invasive species of foreign zooplankton that were 
just discovered in Lake Superior. I am not sure where it came from and 
what kind of damage it will do.
  A little quick history here: I am only going to take a couple of 
minutes. My amendment to the 2014 water resources bill added fish and 
other aquatic creatures to the official definition of invasive species, 
a definition that had been previously reserved only to plants. So that 
opened the door for us to have a way to combat these aquatic species.
  And in so doing, the Congress gave the Army Corps the authority to do 
the research to eradicate invasive species like Asian carp, zebra 
mussels, and so many hundreds of others that are causing so much damage 
to sport and commercial fishing, to shipping, navigation, and to harbor 
maintenance.
  The aquatic nuisance control program is supposed to be leading the 
way with cutting-edge research, and it is doing a good job. But the 
fact is, it is terribly underfunded, leaving little resources to 
address the influx of the aquatic species.
  As a result, the aquatic invasives like zebra mussels have infested 
more than 130 lakes in my own State and thousands of lakes across the 
country. To give you an idea of how fast these zebra mussels, for 
example, spread, a female zebra mussel can produce a half a million 
offspring each year.
  And the simple truth is, the zebra mussels are just choking off all 
kinds of snails and clam and other native fishes--even bird species. In 
fact, they killed over 10,000 loons in Lake Erie alone because they ate 
something that had zebra mussels in them, and the zebra mussels had a 
botulism that killed 10,000 loons. That is how devastating these things 
can be.

                              {time}  2045

  For outdoor recreation, our people are getting their feet cut and 
getting all kinds of injuries by stepping on these zebra mussels. 
Thousands of good jobs and slowdowns of our economy are caused, 
delaying ships as they are painstakingly having to remove these zebra 
mussels. They are just one of more than 1,500 invasive species.
  So I urge my colleagues to approve this amendment so the Army Corps 
can get to work cleaning up our lakes and waterways and putting an end 
to the invasive species that are causing so much costly damage and 
destruction to our lakes and waterways.
  Madam Chairman, I yield to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur).
  Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Chair, I thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. 
Nolan) for yielding me the time.
  Talk about working hard, you are here at 9 o'clock in Washington and 
the day started very early.
  I thank the gentleman for being here and defending the Great Lakes. I 
support his amendment. I personally represent about 200 miles of Lake 
Erie's

[[Page H4957]]

coast, the shallowest and most abundant of the Great Lakes. We know 
what zebra mussels are and quagga mussels. We also know about aquatic 
plants like phragmites that are just invading and causing all kinds of 
problems along our shores.
  The Aquatic Nuisance Species Research Program works on other species 
in other parts of the country, so I thank the gentleman for being a 
champion of the Great Lakes and a champion of so many important causes.
  We know that in our Great Lakes we have about a $6 billion fishery 
that we are trying to protect, but these quagga and zebra mussels are 
spreading rapidly. The gentleman is right. It is just an explosion. 
There is no other way to explain it. They came in in ballast water. We 
tried to adopt ballast water regulations so it has to be dumped when it 
is further up the Saint Lawrence Seaway before those ships come down. 
It didn't happen, so now we have this to contend with.
  We are trying to keep these invasive species out of our lakes. We are 
threatened by the Asian carp. We are trying to fish those out 
temporarily while we try to find a more genetically impactful solution.
  I want to thank the gentleman for transferring $1 million from the 
Corps' operation and maintenance account to increase the Corps' Aquatic 
Nuisance Species Research Program. I commend the gentleman for that and 
thank him for working so late into the night.
  Your constituents are lucky Congressman Nolan is here.
  Mr. NOLAN. Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Nolan).
  The amendment was agreed to.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Madam Chair, I move that the Committee do now rise.
  The motion was agreed to.
  Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. 
Weber of Texas) having assumed the chair, Ms. Tenney, Acting Chair of 
the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, reported 
that that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 
5895) making appropriations for energy and water development and 
related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2019, and for 
other purposes, had come to no resolution thereon.

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