9/11 Recommendations Implementation Act

9/11 RECOMMENDATIONS IMPLEMENTATION ACT -- (House of Representatives - October 07, 2004)

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 827 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 10.

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Mrs. CUBIN. Mr. Chairman, my home State of Wyoming is the least populated State in this Nation but a proud provider of many of the resources on which America depends.

Wyoming and our neighboring States produce the bulk of our Nation's agricultural and energy resources. We have vast deposits of coal, uranium, and natural gas. Significant portions of our Nation's power plants, pipelines, highways, and railroads cross Wyoming and rural States. We manage and preserve national parks and landmarks, where countless numbers of visitors can be found at any given time.

But perhaps most importantly, however, rural America houses our military landbased nuclear weapons, which are absolutely necessary for our Nation's defense system.

I had submitted an amendment to the Committee on Rules to ensure our first responders in Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska, and Colorado, which house America's nuclear arsenal, had the resources they needed to prepare for a possible threat against these nuclear weapons. In rural America, first responders cannot even communicate sometimes between one department and another like policemen and firemen. We have not had the money to develop those communication systems yet. We have started, but with lower funding in this bill, we will not be able to finish that. Needless to say, I was gravely disappointed when my amendment was not allowed on the floor for a fair debate today. That decision was a vote against the safety of Wyoming citizens and the rest of rural America. In fact, I believe rural America became the whipping post for the large populated areas.

While the needs of first responders in high-population States such as California and New York are addressed in this bill, first responders in rural America are left with the scraps. Rural Americans are spread thin over a lot of land. We have 490,000 people in Wyoming spread over about 100,000 square miles. So one can imagine the difficulty of trying to protect resources and people spread over that area. Money to pay for first responders cannot be appropriated on a per capita basis, as has been suggested.

Rural first responders are the brave individuals who protect our communities after an attack, and those men and women deserve the same respect and resources in Wyoming and rural America as they do in New York.

I thank the chairman for yielding me this time.