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Contact: Cassie Smedile
202-225-1002
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Brown-Waite: “Cap-and-Tax Won’t Cap That Well”
Washington,
Jun 15 -
Washington D.C. – U.S. Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite (FL-05) released the following statement in response to the President’s primetime address to the nation:
“This spill has threatened our coastlines, our aquaculture and our local economy. Now we hear from the President that his solution to this mess is to try, yet again, to implement his disastrous cap-and-tax policy. Cap-and-tax won’t cap that well, it will not create jobs, and it will do nothing to prevent this from happening in the future.
“It is time to take a proactive approach. We must mandate that our offshore drilling operations utilize necessary safeguards and ensure that regulators are actually doing their jobs. That is why I am sponsoring H.R. 5313, The Offshore Safety and Response Improvement Act. This bill takes the necessary first steps to ensure that we are never again faced with a disaster of this magnitude.”
Background on H.R. 5313
• Within 1 year require the Department of Interior to promulgate regulations to require offshore oil rigs to have acoustic remote control emergency shut off devices, or report to Congress and the public specifically why such devices are unnecessary.
• Within 1 year require the EPA to revise the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan. The recent accident has highlighted the need for a clear directive about how best to handle oil spills under varying conditions.
• Within 1 year require the EPA & DOI to report on what oil spill cleanup technology the U.S. currently uses, how long such technology & methods have been used, what current clean-up technology is available (used domestically and abroad), what better technology & methods are in development to protect coastlines in the event of an emergency and what current investment/resource level is being dedicated to the development of better cleanup technologies. Unfortunately, much of the technology being used to clean up these spills is the same as it has been for the past 30 years.
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