[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 6843-6844]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



             PROTECTING ROADLESS AREAS IMPORTANT TO COUNTRY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, I come to the well today to alert the House 
to a decision that the administration will make this Friday, May 4, 
extremely important to the future of our forests in this Nation, 
because this Friday, this administration will either come to the aid, 
to the preservation of our roadless areas and our Forest Service land, 
or it will take a dive and refuse, in fact, to defend the law of the 
United States that is designed to protect these roadless areas in a 
lawsuit in Idaho. I am here to urge this administration to follow the 
law, to follow the will of the American people to protect these last 
remaining roadless areas in our forest lands.
  Let me tell you why I feel strongly about that. A couple months ago 
the President came to this Chamber and gave a speech that was well 
received. One of the things he said, he quoted Yogi Berra, which I 
liked, he quoted Yogi Berra in the famous quote, ``When you come to a 
fork in the road, take it.'' But unfortunately, recently this President 
has taken the fork and he stuck it in every environmental policy that 
has come before him on his plate.
  May 4, this Friday, is an opportunity for this President to change 
that pattern of failure for our environment by, in fact, defending the 
roadless area policy that needs defending in a lawsuit in Idaho.
  Let me tell you why, clearly, the administration ought to take these 
steps. Number one, the American people want it. In one of the most 
exhaustive processes in adopting the roadless area policy, we have come 
to a very clear consensus that in fact the American people want this 
roadless policy. They want their wilderness areas protected. They want 
their old growth protected from the incursions of roads for clear-
cutting, for oil drilling, for mining.
  How do I know that? I know that because the Forest Service conducted 
over 600 meetings over the last couple of years in every corner of this 
country. In my State of Washington they had scores of meetings, in 
towns like Morton and Okanagan, not just Seattle, but little areas, 600 
meetings, where over 1.6 million Americans told their Federal 
Government what they thought about the roadless policy.
  The results were amazing. In Washington State there were tens of 
thousands of people who contacted their government. You know what they 
told their Federal Government? Ninety-six percent of the people who 
responded in the State of Washington told their Federal Government to 
protect these roadless areas. As a consequence, the last administration 
issued a rule that did exactly that, that followed 96 percent of the 
people in the State of Washington, who responded to this issue, to 
protect these roadless areas.
  So it seems to me, when 96 percent of the people tell their Federal 
Government what they want, the Federal Government ought to respond, 
ought to listen to those wishes. But, unfortunately, following a long 
series of listening to the special interests, we are very concerned 
that the Bush administration will in fact take a dive in this lawsuit 
of folks who are seeking to overturn this rule.
  The reason I say that is a recent Washington Post article that 
revealed that the administration had asked the Attorney General for 
ways to get out from underneath this rule, to in fact take a dive. We 
had testimony in my Committee on Resources a couple of weeks ago where 
a Department of Agriculture official revealed, in fact, they had been 
asked about how to do exactly that in this rule. That would be wrong. 
What would be right would be to listen to the will of the American 
people and let this roadless policy stand.
  I will tell you why Americans feel so strongly about it. It is my 
second point here today. This roadless area policy is required to 
respond to certain American values of taking care of your natural 
world, to preserve it for your heritage and your kids and grandkids and 
great-grandkids.
  In fact, what we found the testimony in these 600 meetings revealed 
is, people do not want to see their salmon habitats destroyed by clear-
cutting, because what we found in the State of Washington is, when you 
do this clear-

[[Page 6844]]

cutting in these roadless areas, you get erosion off the hills and that 
silts up the salmon streams and that destroys the salmon and that 
creates an endangered species, and that ends salmon fishing in the 
Northwest, a heritage that we have enjoyed throughout the generations.
  This roadless area is designed to prevent the end of salmon in the 
Pacific Northwest and other places. We need this administration to 
listen to the people who said we want to preserve our salmon.
  So, Mr. Speaker, in conclusion, I just want to say it is not the time 
to start drilling in our National Forests. We ought to stick with this 
roadless policy. It certainly would be wrong to drill in our National 
Forests at the same time we do not increase the average mileage for our 
vehicles.

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