Wayne Gilchrest

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, this resolution merely authorizes the use of the Capitol Grounds for a brief performance of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus on or about April 3, 1995. This event is intended to be a salute to the 104th Congress and a celebration of the 125th anniversary of the Ringling Brothers Circus. This event promises to be a welcomed diversion for Members, their families, staff, and the general public, and will be free of charge. It will feature traditional circus entertainment, complete with recorded music. Ringling Brothers will assume all expenses and liabilities in connection with this event, which will be presented under conditions prescribed by the Architect of the Capitol and the Capitol Police Board. These officials are currently meeting to discuss the details of this event.

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on the concurrent resolution just adopted.

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, today, I would like to discuss an interesting story about the Endangered Species Act. As the Resources Committee begins to hold hearings on this issue, it is imperative that important facts about endangered species and biodiversity be known. The ESA is vital to maintaining our natural resources and to maintaining our quality of life. I would like to illustrate this by discussing an endangered plant called the Lake Placid scrub mint which is found in only 300 acres in Central Florida. Scientists discovered that insects were not eating this rare plant. With further analysis, scientists found the plant contained a strong natural insect repellent called trans-pulegol, as powerful as any known insect repellent. The possibilities for agriculture are enormous. Scientists also discovered a symbiotic fungus growing on the plant which had evolved only in association with this plant and therefore, was an extremely rare fungus. More analysis found this fungus produced an agent which had strong antifungal properties, with potential for pharmaceutical uses. What are the real-life implications of discovering such agents in rare plants? Curing an array of diseases. The $79 billion pharmaceutical industry relies on natural resources for 40 percent of its prescriptions. Rare plants and animals may very well hold the key to curing the common cold, AIDS, and cancer.

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, Dr. Norse, chief scientist for the Center for Marine Conservation, reminds us that biodiversity and ecosystems do such things as maintaining climate, removing pollutants from the atmosphere, building soils to sustain the agricultural industry, and protect coastlines, and these are essential, all of the things I just described, to human existence. Just as our astronauts are absolutely dependent on expensive, engineered life support systems to sustain them in the cold void of space, what sustains the entire Earth in the cold void of space is the life-supporting functions of the world's ecosystems and biodiversity. These things provide the habitat that all species need, including humans. Unfortunately, our responsibility for being stewards of the land often conflicts with our apparent and obvious need to produce and consume resources. Just as we would never sell the original Constitution of the United States or the Chesapeake Bay to foreign investors for any amount of money, we should not sell our biological diversity for a percentage. We must reexamine our knowledge on these issues.

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, I cannot help but comment on the remarks of gentleman from Arizona when he says we should put people first. I thank all of us agree with that. It is just how we do that which is important. Ignoring certain aspects, like clean water or biodiversity, and then say we are putting all the people first, I think we are losing some important aspects of their multidimensional discussion of property rights, endangered species, clean water, and so on. In my area, clean water is absolutely essential for the quality of peoples lives, not only for their health but for our economy, protecting the wetlands in not a sterile, regimented regulatory form. The way we do it in Maryland, we all sit down at the table and we discuss this issue. Fish and Wildlife is there, the corps is there, the Department of Natural Resources is there, the affected property owners are there. We discuss how we can manage the resources and protect peoples' lives. Mr. Chairman, I want to make two points. One is that the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin] is continuing to refer to the Florida Rock case. Now, he refers to it in an accurate manner. He has not distorted the facts. But I want to bring in some more of the facts that were not included there. It happens to deal with a person that wanted a limestone, in particular a 98-acre parcel piece of property. He bought the property for $1,900 per acre. The Corps of Engineers would not allow him to fill part of that acreage because there were wetlands there. Now, he was going to sell the property because he was not going to engage in limestone mining, so he wanted to sell it for $10,500 per acre. Now, that is a pretty good profit. As a result of the corps' regulation, the appraisers valued the property then at $4,000 per acre. Now, he was a little regulated there. The corps diminished some of the value there. But a profit of $1,900 per acre to $4,000 per acre is pretty significant. But we have to look at some other values here when we are talking about that. That is, what is the value to the quality of the water that is purified by the wetlands to the neighboring property owners? Then what is the value of their property, the neighboring property owners, if the wetlands were filled in, water is degraded? Who is going to buy their homes, their property? Is that then diminished? So the question in my mind, at least, is should we compensate people to refrain, or stop them, refrain them from degrading the value of somebody else's properties by filling in those wetlands? Now, there is one other thing I want to bring out. One of these famous, wonderful Dear Colleagues that are circulated around the House for a number of reasons, there was a ``Dear Colleague'' circulated that a Maryland couple was denied the right to shore up their property because of an endangered beetle. And as a consequence of that, 15 feet of the bank fell off while they were trying to wait for a permit. Well, here are the facts: It was a piece of property in Lusby, MD, which had a high bank. The guy that lived there wanted to move because he knew the erosion problem was so bad. So he did not even pay the mortgage, the bank took over the property. This couple purchased the property at a very low price. While they were living there, they realized there is a problem because 15 feet of their bank falls off. It was at that point, after the 15 feet fell off, that they applied for a permit to put some riprap around it so no more would be falling off. The Federal Endangered Species Act, in its infinite flexibility, at least in the State of Maryland, was going to permit that shoring up. But the State of Maryland, which has an Endangered Species Act more strict than the Federal act, was a little bit more inquisitive. Now, they have built the riprap, they are protected at this point, and the State of Maryland Endangered Species Act is going to become more flexible, modeled after the Federal program. There still needs to be some flexibility with the Federal program, I grant you that. But one last point: A beetle, a fairy shrimp, a butterfly, let us not forget the fact that biodiversity offers us a tremendous amount of good things for medicine, for agriculture, for a whole lot of good reasons. I just wanted to get those points out.

Mr. GILCHREST

Mr. GILCHREST. Reclaiming my time, I just do not want to make it worse.

Mr. GILCHREST. No; I would not say it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to control all the ecosystems and I am not sure how much time I have, Mr. Chairman, but property owners, local government, people in general need to cooperate with each other to find solutions to some of these problems that are vexing this institution.

Mr. GILCHREST. An ecosystem in Idaho, for example, would be an area where you have a certain type of tree, a certain type of animal life, a certain type of insect and so on that has evolved in that particular area and depends on that type of vegetation, that type of a full range of other animals like--I do not want to bring up wolves now, but let's say a moose is going to eat a certain type of vegetation. In my area an ecosystem on the Eastern Shore would be a little bit different because we have deer, we have geese, we have fox and so on. So ecosystem is different from one place to another, but an ecosystem is an area where you have animals, plants and insects that will depend on each other to survive.

Mr. GILCHREST. Yes, I will.

Mr. GILCHREST. Biodiversity means all of the species on this planet that have evolved over millions of years that have created, literally, life on the planet. We have air because of living organisms on this planet. We have purifying techniques in life forms on this planet for our atmosphere. We have animals in the oceans, for example, a whole range of species, from microorganisms right on up to whales that interact with each other that cause what we call the balance of nature. The planet Earth exists the way we know it, we breathe the air, drink the water, eat the food, we find medicines in the natural environment to cure diseases. This happens as a result of over millions of years of evolution of different species reacting with each other to form the planet Earth.

Mr. GILCHREST. When we reauthorize the Endangered Species Act, we can certainly address those problems that have happened. When we reauthorize the Clean Water Act, we can do that for wetlands. This Porter amendment makes sure, it reemphasizes, it directs the agencies so that they will be told by us and we have the responsibility, that you must inform that person as far as the impact of their property is concerned and the value of their property whether it is diminished or whether it is not diminished. The fifth amendment still holds true. But my problem with this bill as it stands without the Porter amendment is that in my mind it is going to create a huge, litigating, bureaucracy that we cannot anticipate.

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, I was not referring to the Committee on the Judiciary authorization of this bill. It is clear that they authorized this bill. I was referring to the authorizing committees that deal with the problems. We are going to be dealing with the problems that the Endangered Species Act and the clean water, section 404, and the wetlands----

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, I cannot agree with the gentleman more. I just would like to make a couple of quick points. One, I really do believe that the problem with the Endangered Species Act or wetlands should be dealt with in the authorizing committees and not in this fashion. The fifth amendment is clear that if your property is taken away for the public good, that is taken, actually your property is then rendered useless to you, because the Government has taken that property entirely. If your property is taken away for the public good, you should be compensated fair market value. The more sticky question comes when we see how the regulators regulate the laws that we pass, and that is, should you be compensated if your property is regulated to prevent public harm. That is the fine point that I do not think we should address on the House floor. We should leave that up to the courts. Any problem with over regulators should come from the reauthorizing committees.

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I want to give some concrete examples of what these particular regulations, what the Endangered Species Act, for example, can do for us, some concrete examples to give you some understanding of the value of natural resources and why they should not become extinct. According to Dr. Susan Mazer, who is a scientist in California: No scientist would have predicted, prior to their analysis in the laboratory, that the Pacific yew tree would prove an effective remedy for cancer, that the periwinkle would be a potent remedy for Hodgkin's disease and leukemia, that yams would be the source of oral contraceptives, or that bacteria from deep sea thermal vents would lead to the discovery of DNA fingerprinting, a critical source of evidence in forensic criminology. In the case of the rosy periwinkle, a road side weed (we laughed at the snail darter) parents of children with leukemia do not laugh at the road side weed, children have an 80-percent chance of being cured or have long term remission as a result of the medicine extracted from this plant. It is also important to note that the agent in the plant that cures the disease cannot be synthesized so we need to continue to have a healthy supply of the plant. Other plant sources have been used for drugs which control tissue inflammation, Parkinson's disease, antidepressants, antibiotics, as well as other life-saving, anti-cancer agents. Cyclosporin is a complex molecule discovered in an obscure fungus, a powerful immunosuppressive agent, it is the basis of the organ transplant industry today. Doctor E.O. Wilson commented in a paper recently published: Many disease organisms, such as a malaria parasite and staphylococcus bacteria, are acquiring genetic immunity against conventional therapeutic agents, and new antibiotics must now be sought elsewhere, most likely in little known species of plant, fungi, and insects if we do not extinguish them first. Dr. Elliot Norse, a chief scientist for the Center for Marine Conservation, reminds us that when an astronaut goes into space, that astronaut has to carry with him a life support system in the cold void of that infinity. Planet earth is in that cold void of infinity. And unless we protect those resources which sustain life for us, then the quality of our life overall is going to be degraded. This is not the right forum to correct the problems in the Endangered Species Act or the wetlands. Those things can be done in committee. I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment.

Mr. GILCHREST. I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. I am one of those veterans that fought overseas to protect property rights, but I think that this particular amendment and this particular bill overall goes a long way in changing the concept of the fifth amendment, because if people's property is taken away for the public good, then those people should be compensated. But there is another side to the story that I do not think is entering the picture enough here this morning, and that is the value of certain Government regulations in the Endangered Species Act to protect biodiversity, and the value and the function of wetlands as far as a filtration tool holding on to problems so there are not floods. I would not stand here and say there have not been problems with these two regulations. There are real horror stories that have to be corrected, especially in the West, whether it is a grizzly bear that ate somebody's sheep and the person was not compensated, whether it was a flood because they found an insect in the ditch and did not let anybody clear the ditch and the flood caused damage to people's homes, or wetlands, there are horror stories. But I do not think we should change the fundamental dynamics of the fifth amendment to the Constitution. We can correct these horror stories. And there are horror stories that happen, in the committees of jurisdiction. Now, what is not being emphasized here----

Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GILCHREST. I thank the gentleman for yielding. In response to the gentleman from Louisiana, the agency, in this case the corps, their action prohibits the filling of wetlands, not building the house. Under the amendment, the wetlands destruction, not the house, is the thing that devalues the property. The other question is does the government, do we the people, have the responsibility to have people feel that they have some sense of public safety, some sense of security. In the real world, there are problems with filling wetlands, with the people downstream, and I do not care if it is 2 miles downstream, I do not care if it is 300 or 400 miles downstream, there has to be some sensitivity when that regulatory agency gives a permit to build, and that will happen because there certainly will not be enough money in the Federal Government to provide all the money for the takings claims that will result as a result of this legislation. The person downstream who has a pond that is going to be silted over as a result of the destruction of a wetland, that person needs to be brought into the process. The gentleman from Florida [Mr. Canady] said earlier that most of that has to do with local zoning ordinance, where do you have your commercial activity, where do you have your residential activity. I think at least in part he is absolutely correct and I would hope that the spinoff, or the result of this legislation, would send a signal to local zoning boards that they had better make sure that they have an understanding that if they are going to manage the growth of their own towns and communities, they have much more responsibility into doing that now if this legislation passes. The last comment I want to make, the gentleman from Oregon [Mr. Wyden] and I want to make sure that all property owners are protected under this legislation, and we hope that our colleagues will give us an ``aye'' vote on this amendment.

Mr. GILCHREST. Reclaiming my time, the Reagan order, the only thing this will offer us an opportunity to do two things: One, to make sure that the agencies are much more sensitive to what happens, and we can reauthorize the Endangered Species Act----

Mr. GILCHREST. Reclaiming my time, the way you do that is through scientific discovery of the strata, of the biology of things, through research, through archaeology, through anthropology, through scientific techniques that can evaluate what species looked like throughout just about the course of time that the Earth has been here. There is a scientific technique to discover those kinds of things. I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. GILCHREST. Reclaiming my time, the study you are talking about, there have been studies in the rain forests of Latin America, there have been studies in Indonesia, there have been studies all over the world, including the United States. The average is, now in the United States we would not have 10,000 species per every 1 million becoming extinct, but we have hundreds of species becoming extinct in the United States as a result of human impact. What do we do, tell all the people to move? No. But you manage the resources with what you have. I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. GILCHREST. I said that before there was human impact on biodiversity and ecosystems, there was one species for every million species on average, for every million species, you would have one species becoming extinct every year. That was before the human impact in the last, let's say 1,000 years. In this particular decade, in an evaluation of our relationship with biodiversity or species on the planet, you have about 10,000 species, plants, insects, per 1 million becoming extinct every year. That is an acceleration.

Mr. GILCHREST. I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. GILCHREST. Am I out of time, Mr. Chairman?