Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. PAUL. The question I have for Senate is, Has your government gotten out of control? Have the regulators become so numerous and so zealous that we can't even carry on the ordinary affairs of our government?

We recently had a bridge where a boat ran into the bridge in Kentucky and one could no longer cross the bridge because it is not there. We have to wait for environmental regulations and environmental studies, which sometimes can be 4 and 5 years, before we can repair our bridges and our roads during an emergency. This is crazy. This goes on even in regular affairs, such as trying to replace a sewage plant in our State or throughout the United States. Do we want to live in a country where we have to stop and count how many barnacles are on our bridge before we decide whether to rebuild the bridge? Do we want to stop and count how many mussels are attached to the pier before we rebuild the bridge? In the end we are going to rebuild the bridge anyway, but we spend a year's time or more wasted on these studies but in the end we are going to rebuild the bridge. I will give an example.

We have a small town in Kentucky that has a sewage plant, and the population of the town has outgrown the sewage plant. When it rains, the raw sewage goes into the river. I don't know any Republican or Democrat who wants raw sewage in the river. So we need a new sewage plant in the town. But what does the EPA say? They want to count the mussels. They want to count the mussels in the river and then they want to estimate will there be more mussels or less mussels after we build a new sewage plant. Guess what. When we build a new sewage plant, the raw sewage would not go in the river, which is what we all intend and in the end what will happen but, in the meantime, we waste time and money.

This small town of about 300 people is going to have to spend $100,000 on an EPA study to hire someone to count the mussels. While they are counting the mussels, they are going to have to hire someone to count the Indian artifacts and look for Indian arrowheads. If they find an arrowhead, it may delay it indefinitely. We have gone crazy as a country. We all want some rules. We don't want anyone to pollute our neighbor's property, but the EPA is out of control.

What we need to do is in emergencies or urgencies, when a bridge collapses or a roadway is washed away, we don't need to spend 1 year or 2 or 4 or 5 years doing an EPA study, which basically enriches some contractor that counts the mussels. We don't need to be counting the mussels in this stream. We need to get to repairing the bridge, which we are going to do anyway. We are just going to waste 1 year counting the mussels and paying some contractor $100,000 a year.

So this amendment would allow States to opt out. The bridge we have out in Kentucky has two communities. Many people live in one community and have to drive to the other community. They can't get there because of the bridge. Do we want to wait 1 year because they have to count how many barnacles are on the bridge?

This is a commonsense resolution that should pass, but I will tell you the way Washington works, the other side doesn't want my amendment to pass, even though it has common sense, so they are going to offer an alternative. Their alternative is to say something but do nothing. It is called a sense-of-the-Senate resolution. They will proudly proclaim we need to make it better, and, please, Mr. Regulator, make it better. But they will not change the law.

Mine would actually change the law to allow communities to start rebuilding their bridge or repairing their road almost immediately, in the same location, free of the government regulations. We need to do this at all levels. This is a very small incremental step forward. It is something on which we should all agree. If we watch the vote later on today, we will find out we don't all agree and, instead, the other side is going to say: Say something; do nothing.

This is something we need to, as a society, get started on because we are being killed by regulations. This is one small step on something that should be bipartisan. There are many more steps that need to be taken, because throughout our country millions of jobs are being lost from overzealous regulators. Millions of people's privacy and private property rights are being invaded by these regulators, and this is a very small incremental stop of the encroachment of these regulators.

I urge support of my amendment 1556, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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Mr. PAUL. Madam President, we have a bridge out between Marshall County and Trigg County. It takes 1 hour to go around the lake. What we are asking for is an exemption from onerous and overzealous regulations that can slow the process of rebuilding a bridge or road by years. The average time for an environmental review for a construction project is 4 years.

The other side wants to pay lip service. They want to say something about it but do nothing to fix the problem. The people who live in Marshall County and Trigg County want their bridge fixed. They want to get to work and not take an hour and a half to get to work.

The way we fix this is we get rid of the redtape. The way we do that is by changing the law. So what I propose is that we vote against the say something, do nothing and vote for a reform that actually has teeth and would take away the redtape and allow us to immediately begin to repair our bridges without Big Brother obstructing the reconstruction.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

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Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, currently, the bridge between Marshall County and Trigg County has been collapsed by a disaster. If you were to repair your bridges or repair roads that have been washed out, there is an enormous amount of government redtape that can slow the process down. On average, to get an environmental study done, it can be 4 years at times.

This amendment would remove government redtape and allow us to fix our bridges when we have a disaster--such as a collapse--and fix our roads when a road is washed out.

This is different than the alternative. The alternative we just voted on was: say something; do nothing. This is something that will say something and do something--an amendment that will get rid of government redtape and allow us to repair our bridges in an expeditious fashion.

Often we wait years to go through the government redtape. This cuts through it and allows States to immediately repair and replace broken or collapsed bridges and roads. I urge support for and adoption of amendment No. 1556.

Thank you.

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Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 and section 4(G)(3) of the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010, I move to waive all applicable sections of those acts for purposes of my amendment and ask for the yeas and nays.

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