[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 5]
[House]
[Page 6936]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             EARTH DAY 1999

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) is 
recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, this week, we celebrate Earth Day, 
Thursday, April 22. Many will use this occasion to highlight major 
policy issues, as well they should, issues dealing with greenhouse 
gases, the effects of global warming, and the pollution of our world's 
oceans.
  However, I feel that the real power to be demonstrated is at the 
other end of the spectrum, dealing with individual actions. Many of us 
here on Capitol Hill will celebrate Earth Day with a bike ride. People 
from the Capitol, commuters, business people from all over the region, 
will converge on Freedom Plaza on Pennsylvania Avenue, illustrating the 
impact that people can have dealing with this very simple and efficient 
mode of transportation. Yet, we do not need to have everybody trade 
their car in for a bicycle. If people in our community will choose to 
take just one less trip a week, whether that is by foot, by transit, by 
bicycle, or simply consolidating their other journeys to produce that 
one trip reduction, it can have a phenomenal impact in terms of 
reducing air pollution, congestion, and the requirement for more 
investment in infrastructure.
  The most important thing is for people to think about their behavior 
and think about the little things we can do to make things better: 
Shopping locally, or treating their own yard like they would like 
farmers and industry to conserve their property. Whether it is 
conserving water, dealing with native vegetations, using less toxic 
herbicides or fertilizer, we can all make a big difference.
  Mr. Speaker, I think there is plenty of room for us in Congress to 
have an impact on the environment. To be sure, I hope this session will 
deal with things like water policy, spending our money in more 
environmentally responsible ways, in Superfund reform, but I would hope 
that this Congress will also continue the effort to try and focus on 
the little things that we can do to make a difference.
  I am pleased that this year we have finally caught up with the rest 
of America, as the Federal Government has for years told the private 
sector to reduce employee commute trips by single-occupant vehicles. 
Congress has finally started to do what we have asked the private 
sector to do by providing an opportunity for our employees to have 
subsidized Metro passes.
  I am, however, continually embarrassed, as I know most Members of 
Congress are, when the reports come out, as they did last week, about 
our abysmal record of recycling here on Capitol Hill. In the 3 years I 
have been a Member of Congress, the total proceeds from all of our 
recycling effort for over 8,000 employees on Capitol Hill has been less 
than $27,000. I am sure that there are Boy Scout troops in my community 
that have raised more money from recycling Christmas trees, bottles and 
cans than the entire U.S. Congress did in those 3 years. For the year 
of 1997, the net proceeds was $7.51 for recycling high-grade paper. 
There are homeless people around Capitol Hill that make more than that 
in a day recycling bottles and cans.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope as we have a lot of rhetoric around Congress that 
we want to live by the rules that we apply to other people. I hope that 
in the final analysis we will apply that to our individual offices, and 
step up to behave the way we are asking the rest of America to behave 
in terms of recycling. I think our record ought to be something that we 
ought to be proud of, not something that makes us cringe, and I hope 
that each Member of Congress will dedicate themselves this Earth Day to 
make it a record that we can, in fact, show to the American people and 
be proud of.

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