Since first arriving in Congress in 1992, protecting our natural environment and protecting citizens from the dangers of pollution and toxicity have been among my highest priorities, local environmental issues in my district in particular. Recently, the House of Representatives passed the Arabia Mountain National Heritage Area Act (HR 2297), a bill which I introduced and which would transform the Davidson-Arabia Mountain Nature Preserve, a 535-acre park in DeKalb County, Georgia into the Arabia Mountain National Heritage Area. I have also fought for protection of the Chattahoochee and South Rivers. I have fully supported efforts to clean up metro Atlanta's air and to reduce smog. I have aggressively worked in favor of efforts to study and constrain the concentration of landfills in South DeKalb. And I was an original supporter of Governor Barnes's Greenspace Initiative to protect parks and open spaces in local communities throughout Georgia.

I am currently playing a leadership role in the effort to deal with the toxic aftermath of Hurricanes Rita and Katrina, including working with the Katrina Task Force of the Democratic Caucus. In addition to causing oil and chemical spills and the "toxic gumbo" of contaminated floodwaters that inundated the City of New Orleans, the huge storm surge of these hurricanes lifted up the toxic sediment sludge from the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River and deposited it all over the Gulf Coast. The result is that levels of arsenic, polynuclear aeromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs, akin to creosote) and benzo(a)pyrene, all suspected carcinogens, are present throughout the Gulf Coast at levels above what would be necessary to require a clean-up plan by declaring the area a Superfund Site. Harmful organisms such as fecal choliform are also present.

To date the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has done little to protect the local population, and has not presented any clean-up plan. I have. My bill, the Gulf Coast Hurricane Emergency Environmental Protection Act (HR 4139), would require the EPA to develop in comprehensive clean-up plan (see also Title II of HR 4197). A second title in HR 4139 would also establish a screening program for protecting residents from the hazards of household mold.

When this Administration first took office, Vice President Cheney brought in the heads of ENRON and all the big energy companies and simply let them write the new policies on energy and environment. Environmental advocates were not even invited for input.

The simple fact of the matter is: our environment is under assault. Protective legislation that took decades to pass is steadily being rolled back under the Bush Administration. In its budget for Fiscal 2007, the Bush Administration is looking toward environmental programs and protections as a place to cut spending in order to sustain tax breaks for the rich, an illegal war in Iraq that may one day cost taxpayers over $1 trillion, and to cover its inadequate budget (so far) to cover the costs of the reconstruction of the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Since we as a nation cannot afford to sacrifice our the environment to pay for tax breaks to the rich, illegal wars and huge contracts to scandal-ridden military contractors, I have recently joined with other Members of Congress in signing on to letters requesting that:

• funding for Watershed Planning, Operations and Rehabilitation (National Resources Conservation Service) NOT be cut.
  
• funding for the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants Program, our nation's core program for preventing wildlife from becoming endangered in every state, be maintained or increased.
  
• traditional restriction on Department of Interior funds being spent on efforts to open up the Outer Continental Shelf to new oil and gas drilling be maintained.