ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 1992

TUESDAY, MARCH 19, 1991

U.S. SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS,

Washington, DC. The subcommittee met at 10:05 a.m., in room SD-366, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. J. Bennett Johnston (chairman) presiding.

Present: Senators Johnston and Bumpers; also present: Senators Pryor and Breaux.

NONDEPARTMENTAL WITNESSES

OPENING REMARKS

Senator JOHNSTON. The hearing will come to order. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Subcommittee on Energy and Water of the Appropriations Committee. I have seen a number of you earlier this morning and we had a chance to exchange ideas. But greetings again to any and all of you who were not there at the coffee. Too bad about your project [laughter].

Seriously, it is nice to have all of you here today.

I ask that the detailed prepared statements that each of you has worked out very carefully be included in the record, where they will be very carefully reviewed as we make our recommendations on the 1992 Energy and Water Development appropriations bill. And if each witness will briefly summarize or highlight the important parts in his oral testimony, it would be most helpful.

Senator Dale Bumpers is a very influential member of the full Appropriations Committee and, in fact, he gets whatever he wants and he is very greedy, but let me call on him at this point for any comments he may have.

ARKANSAS WATER RESOURCE PROJECTS

STATEMENT OF HON. DALE BUMPERS, U.S. SENATOR FROM ARKANSAS Senator BUMPERS. Mr. Chairman, I want to first congratulate you for the continuing interest you have always shown, not only in just this subcommittee, but all these projects that are so extremely important to us in the lower Mississippi Valley flood control area, and particularly the Red River basin. I have been involved in all of this since the day I was elected Governor, and to come here and find somebody with the determination and dedication to flood con

trol, navigation, recreation, and all the things that go with this has been most gratifying.

WEST MEMPHIS, AR, FLOOD CONTROL PROJECT

I want to point out that we are finally getting going on the West Memphis flood control project. You know, Mr. Chairman, we have worked on that for years, and that is an area where the poor people of West Memphis were being flooded anywhere from one to three times a year. That is going to be corrected, thanks to you and the other members of this subcommittee who have helped me get the appropriations going for that project.

NEED FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

With the utmost respect to everybody here, there has not been anything that has been more important to me ever since I have been in the Senate than the Helena slack water harbor and more recently the Yellow Bend Port in the same area. And, of course, those take on renewed importance now because of the Mississippi River Delta Commission report.

All of us know now, and one of the really great benefits of the so-called Lower Mississippi River Delta Commission was to highlight and dramatize a nagging, irritating problem that has existed for 100 years; namely, poverty in that whole delta area, especially in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas. And those two harbors, we hope, are going to be the origin and the embryo of a renewed economic development in that whole area.

RED RIVER BASIN PROJECTS

And, finally, Mr. Chairman, the Red River Commission will be here and testify. I have been with you on numerous occasions in Louisiana and Arkansas with the commission dedicating locks and dams, revetments, realignments, and other works. I want to emphasize that when it comes our time, everybody will, hopefully, show the same degree of deference and interest in the Arkansas part of the Red River as we have all shown in the Louisiana part. I also want to say we suffered a tremendous setback last year in the most devastating flood, I guess, in the history of the Red River. I know I thought I knew what it was like until I flew over it, and then I realized it was so much worse than I had thought. So now we have this problem, Mr. Chairman, of rebuilding a lot of structures that we spent a lot of money on that were damaged severely in that flood.

RED RIVER EMERGENCY BANK PROTECTION

For example, the Brown Bend realignment, which is so important to us. I remember in 1990, we appropriated funds for that and they were diverted to the Slay Bend revetment project. And then last year we again funded the Brown Bend for $4.1 million, and then the flood came along and we had to use that to repair some damage that was done. So this year, we are requesting $5.8 million for that again, Mr. Chairman, and, hopefully, this year we will not face any disaster or other reprogramming so that we can get that done.