Date: 2014-12-08
Speaker: GEORGE MILLER (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: California

Mr. Speaker. I thank the gentlewoman for her remarks. and I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker. once again. we find ourselves in a situation where a group of people in the Central Valleya small number of farmers in the Central Valleyhave decided that if they cant have it their way. they are just going to roll over the process. Now. we are confronted with a piece of legislation that was. in fact. much of it was withdrawn by the Senator from California because it became apparent to all of the interests in the State that there were no public hearings. there was no public participation. and it was a very narrow group of people sitting in the back room in the Capitol of the United States drafting legislation. where essentially everybody except the people in that room take a hit. The people in the room get a benefit. How do they get the benefit? Because they extract more water than you can currently extract and still keep the State whole. They extract more water from a vibrant. commercial fishing industry. That is why the Senators in Oregon and the Pacific Fisheries Association are against this legislation. This is a fishing industry that is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. and they are at risk if you operate under this legislation because this legislation overrides what the State agencies. what the Governor. what the Federal agencies. and what the Secretary of the Interior did this last time. Mr. Speaker. when we got two surprise storms in March of this year. we went back to the drawing table. and we figured out how we could get more water out of this system to help these farmers in the Central Valley. That was a good faith effort. That was done within the law. Now. what they want to do is eviscerate that law. take away those safeguards. and say. "We are going to take additional water out this system." When they take that additional water out of the system. they take that additional water out of the water quality of hundreds of thousands of people who drink the water from the delta and rely on a fresh water supply. We are quite aware of what happens in these dry years. and if you keep turning the pumps on. those people are going to start suckingthose water districts are going to start taking saltwater out of the delta. They take it at the expense of the delta farmers who pump water in the delta. That water will become saltier and saltier. and they will not be able to plant their crops. They have limited time to plant their crops. as it is. under these droughts. Everybody in this State is paying a price for this drought. but now. in the eleventh hour of this Congress. this group of farmers. these very powerful. small peoplethese very powerful. small peoplehave decided they are going to do it this way. We have seen this before. We have worked year after year to get agreement. and when they cant get their way. they go off to a private meeting. they draft legislation. and that collapses all those talks. and then we start over again. This is about the third or fourth time we have been here because it is their way or the highway. and they absolutely expect that they can take water. These are people who have a contract right. They have a contract right that is variable because they have the lowest water rights in the State. and so what they are trying to do is to say they get to get in line in front of everybody else in the State in exercising their water rights. The fact of the matter is we understand exactly what this is going to do. That is why The Sacramento Bee. the Central Valley newspaper. the Fresno Central Valley newspaper said that this bill deserves to die. This bill deserves to die. Mr. Speaker. I want to praise Senator BOXER for alerting the Membersthey talked about working across the aisle. They worked across the aisle. but not with members of the House delegation who represent this impacted area who stand to lose these jobs and who stand to lose millions of dollars of economic activity. I am not suggesting things are right for the people in the Central Valley or right for people in the State. Our whole State is suffering from a drought. but now. this is an eleventh hour attempt to say that we dont like the way you are coming together to do this. and we are going to take ours first. This is contrary to what the State legislature did on a bipartisan basis and with the participation of legislatures from the Central Valley. from Southern California. from the Imperial Valley. and from north California. This is contrary to what the State and Federal agencies did to try and work out and to get additional water. as we did in March. This is contrary. This is contrary to what the State legislature said about these being coequal values. You have to protect the northern delta region. the origins of this water. and you have to try to have sustainable water deliveries to southern California. The legislature. again. on a bipartisan basis agreed to that. Then. on the bond issue. overwhelmingly. State legislatures voted to put a bond on to try to deal with the drought. a rather remarkable issue. with the support of the Governor. Legislatures from southern California. from the Central Valley. and from north California voted to put it on the ballot. The public across the StateDemocrats. Republicans. and Independents from every region of the Statevoted overwhelmingly to support the bond issue. and now. in the eleventh hour. this small group of people think that they can come and turn those expressions of State legislative intent. of State law. of Federal law. and of State environmental quality laws.