Providing for Consideration of H.R. 2537, Beach Protection Act of 2007

Floor Speech

Providing for Consideration of H.R. 2537, Beach Protection Act of 2007

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Ms. CASTOR. I thank my good friend and colleague from the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, oftentimes there is great irony here in Washington, and here is another example. The House will consider today this rule and the Beach Protection Act. The intent of the Beach Protection Act is to protect America's beautiful coastlines from water pollution. But here is the irony: Big oil interests have filed an amendment that puts our beaches and America's coastlines at risk. Their proposed amendment seeks to open up our beautiful coastlines to offshore drilling of oil and gas. New offshore oil and gas drilling represents a real hazard to our marine environment, especially in my home State of Florida and the Tampa Bay area.

The beaches, the coastal environment, marine resources and our billion-dollar tourism industry in Florida should not be sacrificed for a small amount of oil and natural gas because the oil and natural gas that is projected to be recovered if we open up our offshore areas to drilling, it is projected to provide less than 1 month, 1 month supply of oil and gas.

In addition, researchers at the Department of Oceanography at the University of South Florida have warned that it would only take 24 hours for an petroleum spill in the eastern Gulf of Mexico to sully Florida's panhandle beaches and then sweep through the gulf's powerful loop current, travel through the Florida Keys and contaminate estuaries and beaches from the Everglades to Cape Canaveral.

We only have to look back to 2005, Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Rita, and Hurricane Wilma ended up resulting in many oil and gas pollutants seriously affecting the beaches in the Gulf of Mexico. The storms caused 124 oil spills into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. During Hurricane Katrina alone, 233,000 gallons of oil were spilled. There was 508,000 gallons of oil spilled during Hurricane Rita. A full year after Hurricane Katrina, BP admitted that a damaged oil well valve in the Gulf of Mexico was still leaking oil.

The knee-jerk reaction to take every opportunity, even a bill called the Beach Protection Act, to open up our beautiful coastline to additional oil drilling, especially in hurricane-prone waters like Florida's gulf coast is ridiculous, not just ironic.

So let's stay true to the Beach Protection Act, fight water pollution, strengthen our natural resources and our tourism economy and vote down the Peterson amendment today.

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