[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 12]
[House]
[Page 16350]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   GREAT LAKES RESTORATION INITIATIVE

  (Mr. HIGGINS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. HIGGINS. Mr. Speaker, I recently joined my colleagues on the 
Great Lakes Task Force to ask the White House to support funding for 
the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative next year.
  The Great Lakes is the world's largest system of fresh surface water. 
It supports 1.5 million American jobs and $62 billion in wages.
  In western New York, Lake Erie is the focus of an amazing 
transformation of Buffalo's waterfront. Keeping the lake clean for 
recreation and fishing is essential to sustaining that economic growth.
  The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative has also been instrumental in 
the next phase of Buffalo's waterfront renaissance, the Buffalo River. 
$30 million in funding to clean up the river has leveraged $20 million 
in private investment. Now the river that the Federal Government 
declared biologically dead in 1968 will be swimmable and fishable in 5 
years.
  The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative is creating jobs and improving 
environmental quality in my community, and it is producing returns for 
the national economy.
  I encourage my colleagues to support the Great Lakes Restoration 
Initiative funding in the upcoming budget negotiations and to support 
the passage of the Great Lakes Restoration Act, which would authorize 
this program through 2020.

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