[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 6]
[House]
[Page 7905]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




            CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE UPCOMING HURRICANE SEASON

  (Mr. PETERS of California asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PETERS of California. I rise today as chair of the Climate Task 
Force in the House Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition. June 1 
marked the start of hurricane season, and this is a reminder that we 
must start planning ahead for extreme weather that we now face 
regularly, while also recognizing the cost of inaction.
  Taxpayers spent $136 billion on disaster relief in just the last 2 
years. However, FEMA estimates that every $1 spent on planning, 
preparation, and prevention yields the Nation $4 in future benefits. We 
are facing harsher droughts, deadlier heat waves, more severe storms, 
and, in San Diego, increasingly intense wildfires. In 2012 alone, 
wildfires burned 9.2 million acres in the United States, an area larger 
than the States of Delaware, Rhode Island, and Connecticut combined.
  There's no clear national plan for how to make our society more 
resilient in the face of extreme weather. This is unacceptable. We 
deserve better. Developing a planning structure for community 
resiliency is necessary. It will reduce Federal spending, save lives, 
and it's what Washington could do more of. We must act now.

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