Greg Gianforte

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Webb Brown of Helena for his decades of leadership in advancing Montana's business community and our job creators. Mr. Brown recently announced his retirement after 20 years as president and CEO of the Montana Chamber of Commerce and executive director of the Montana Chamber Foundation. A fifth-generation Montanan from Trout Creek, Mr. Brown has been a strong voice and tireless advocate for Montana businesses since the early 1990s. Before taking the helm of the Montana Chamber of Commerce in 1999, he led business development organizations in Thompson Falls, Lewistown, and Billings. Under his steady leadership, the Montana Chamber has grown larger and stronger, effectively advancing the interests of Montana businesses at the local, state, and federal levels. Mr. Brown has been instrumental in spearheading many initiatives to cultivate a more competitive climate for businesses in Montana. I got to know him as we worked together on initiatives promoting entrepreneurship and expanding telecommuting to bring our kids back home to Montana. With the help of Mr. Brown and the Montana Chamber of Commerce, entrepreneurship has flourished in Montana. Our state leads the nation in entrepreneurship with more than 1 in 10 Montanans owning a business, according to a 2016 Kauffman Foundation report. Mr. Speaker, for his dedication to making Montana more business friendly, for his commitment to creating jobs and opportunity for more Montanans, and for always putting Montana first, I recognize Webb Brown for his spirit of Montana.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Joan Nye of Columbus for her efforts to prevent suicide in Montana and the support she provides the survivors of suicide loss. Ms. Nye serves on the executive board of the Montana chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) and has led the organization for a decade as its chairwoman. She facilitates a support group for survivors of suicide loss and has been an active member of the Suicide Prevention Coalition of Yellowstone Valley since its formation in 2004. The group sponsors monthly meetings, outreach events, fundraisers, and seminars. A survivor of suicide loss, Ms. Nye chairs the AFSP Montana chapter's education committee which focuses on suicide prevention education and training. She helps health professionals, family members, and others learn to identify the risk factors and warning signs of suicide and how to seek help. Ms. Nye is a key organizer of the Out of the Darkness Yellowstone Valley Walk, which raised nearly $90,000 in September for AFSP to invest in research, education, outreach, and support services. Her efforts are critical in Montana which has one of the highest suicide rates in the nation. On average, a Montanan dies by suicide every 33 hours. Tragically, it is the eighth leading cause of death in Montana, and it is the second leading cause of death for young Americans. Suicide, however, is preventable, and dedicated and compassionate advocates like Joan Nye are helping to save lives and end the stigma surrounding suicide. Mr. Speaker, for her selfless devotion to the survivors of suicide loss and her tireless efforts to prevent suicide in Montana, I recognize Joan Nye for her spirit of Montana.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the time. Mr. Speaker, like many Montanans, I have a deep respect for our environment. I support protecting our rich and diverse wildlife and believe we can support multiple uses of land while conserving species. Unfortunately, we have seen environmental groups use misinformation and litigation to keep species listed that have already recovered. In 2013, the Obama administration's Fish and Wildlife Service evaluated the gray wolf populations across the United States. It found that the species no longer warranted protection under the Endangered Species Act. Rather than celebrating the recovery, serial litigants and extremists filed lawsuits to stop the process. Montana has been fortunate. Through Federal legislation, the wolf has been delisted in Montana since 2011. Even without ESA protection, the species has continued to recover to a point nearing overpopulation. While the focus of this legislation is wolves, a similar issue is playing out in Montana over the grizzly bear in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem. Just last year, the grizzly bear was delisted there. I celebrate the recovery of the species, but it had recovered more than a decade ago, according to scientists who have spent their lives studying the grizzly. Using sound science and reliable data, they found the ecosystem reached maximum carrying capacity of the grizzly bear 16 years ago, but serial litigants have repeatedly thwarted the delisting efforts of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The unnecessary delay in delisting species has created unnecessary stress on the bears and impacted our communities. The overpopulation of the grizzly pushes them into our communities and increases the opportunities for attacks. We must address the flaws in the Endangered Species Act to ensure species are delisted when they have recovered, and to prevent the law from being used as a bludgeoning tool for special interest groups to block critical projects. Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 6784 and the rule that we are considering, the Manage Our Wolves Act, and I urge passage of the bill.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Gabriel ``Gib'' Swan who, for over a decade, knits winter hats and donates them to cancer patients, children, the less fortunate, and many others. A Montana native and a graduate of St. Mary's High in Great Falls, Gib started knitting hats as a hobby more than 12 years ago when his wife, Roberta, gave him a kit and taught him. Now 85, Gib has produced more than 1,000 hand-knitted hats that have been donated to homeless shelters, non-profit assistance providers, cancer centers, and local schools. Gib, known throughout the community as the ``Mad Hatter,'' knits hats of all sizes and colors and never accepts payment for his work. Nearly everyone at his senior living community has one of Gib's hand-knitted stocking caps. Mr. Speaker, for his kindness and steadfast generosity in giving of his time and talents to provide comfort to others, I recognize Gib Swan for his spirit of Montana.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on the topic of my Special Order.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Garrett). Honoring Barbara Rose Johns

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring the Chamber's attention to the wildfires that have devastated our country this year, consuming nearly 7.7 million acres across 12 States. This figure, however, doesn't account for the lives tragically lost, the homes destroyed, or the livelihoods that went up in flames. This doesn't account for the smoke from these wildfires that swept from many of our Western States into the Midwest, creating poor air quality. The House has passed measures to reduce the severity of our wildfires and improve the health of our forests. Last November, the House passed the Resilient Federal Forest Act, written by my friend from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman). The legislation provides commonsense reforms that will benefit our forests, economy, and the environment. Conservationists, organizations, foresters, stakeholders, and local leaders throughout Montana recognize the need for reforms to get us managing our forests again. Unfortunately, the other Chamber, mired in obstruction, has not taken up the bill. The House, however, has not lost our focus, including critical forest management reforms into other legislation. Looking across the West and seeing the devastation of the wildfires this year, I know we can't afford to wait. I am honored that many of my colleagues are joining me here tonight who recognize the threat of catastrophic wildfires and want to do something about them. I look forward to hearing from them. At this time, I yield to the gentleman from Utah, John Curtis.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah for his comments, and especially for his leadership on this important issue, bringing the knowledge of local government here to this House to help us deal with this devastating situation out west. At this time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arizona, Mr. Paul Gosar, for his comments on wildfires.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arizona for his principled approach to getting reform so we can start managing our forests again. At this time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Thompson), for his comments on wildfires.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania, especially that he is a member of the Western Caucus joining us there, and pointing out the national implications of the massive wildfires we have out west on resources back east; on the forests that you have in Pennsylvania and the resources there.

Mr. GIANFORTE. The gentleman mentioned many of the things that--the livelihoods, the lives. You know, the other thing that we often neglect is the amount of smoke that is discharged into the air and the effect on people with asthma and other lung issues. I am sure many, many have died as a result in our communities, so it is a public safety issue as well.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for his comments. This past summer, nearly 7.7 million acres have burned across America. Wildfires consumed thousands of acres in Glacier National Park. The Howe Ridge Fire in Glacier National Park consumed over 14,000 acres. I was there. I saw the devastation. It destroyed homes on the shores of Lake McDonald. These are historic national buildings, lost to fire. Last year in Glacier National Park as well we lost Sperry Chalet, which also had historic value and had created memories for thousands of tourists who had visited that facility. Our courageous firefighting efforts did save the main Wheeler cabin, with great effort. It even threatened the Going-to-the-Sun Road. I met with the incident commanders there and the brave firefighters at the Howe Ridge Fire. Last summer, we saw similar behavior. Nearly 8.5 million acres burned in our country last year. In Montana alone, last summer, Mr. Speaker, we lost 1.25 million acres. Just to put that in perspective, 1.2 million acres is the equivalent of the entire State of Delaware, burned in Montana last summer. And I saw the destruction firsthand. I was on five of these fires, visiting with the incident commanders, and seeing devastation. In one county alone, we burned 270,000 acres, and we had over 60,000 cattle with no grass. Fortunately, we were able to work with the Department of the Interior to get retired grazing allotments in the C.M. Russell opened up to fill that need for those ranchers, but those livelihoods were suspended. The habitats were destroyed. Smoke hangs in the air. My own driveway in Bozeman, Montana, on mornings when the fires are burning the worst, we come out to cars covered with ash that we have to brush off before we can drive them. The air quality is dangerous and unhealthy. And even where there weren't fires, we saw smoke from the tragic, destructive California fires that filled our skies in Montana. As bad as the wildfires have been, I have seen the impact of properly managed forests. This year, when I was at the Glacier National Park fire, it was interesting to me, as the incident commanders explained what they were doing there. It turns out there were four fires being managed, all started by the same lightning storm, through lightning strikes. Three of those fires started in national forests where there had been hazardous fuel reductions. The forest had been managed. One started in a national park, and it was such a stark example to me to see that the three fires that had been started by the same storm in the national forests where there had been hazardous fuel reduction, on the day I was there, had been constrained to two to 300 acres each. And yet, the one that started in a national park was burning over 10,000 acres. Now I am not advocating to go log our national parks, just to be very clear. But it is a stark example of the impact. I have been in eastern Montana, southeast of Miles City, and I have seen where the BLM has done forest management. I saw a situation where a fire had burned through a landscape and, in an area where there had been no forest management, no fuels reduction, no thinning of the forest, the fire burned so hot that, even years later, it still looked like a moonscape. Nothing was growing. And yet, when it hit the managed forest, where the forest had been thinned, the fire quickly dropped into the underbrush, burned the grass and twigs, but not a single tree was lost. A year later, that forest was healthier than it was, and yet, the forest that had burned completely will not recover in our generation. This is a stark example. In other areas, where forest management has been done, where trees have been thinned, the water comes back into the streams again, the surface water. These are healthier habitats. So there are many benefits of a properly managed forest. We get more wildlife. There is more habitat. There is more opportunity for sportsmen and women. We have more recreational opportunities. You can gain access to the forests again. We have good-paying timber jobs. Wildfires are less severe, and the health of our communities are not threatened. One of the biggest problems is litigation. We need more collaborative projects, but litigation is one of the greatest obstacles to managing our forests. A good example is the Stonewall Vegetation Project in Lincoln, Montana. I toured that site. It took 8 years to get a permit to thin the forest, and then the lawyers swooped in, arguing the project would disrupt lynx habitat. A judge overturned the permit, and that summer, that entire forest burned. And, Mr. Speaker, there is no lynx habitat anymore. There is no habitat for any animal there because that forest is gone. The House did take action this past year. We passed the Resilient Federal Forests Act that Congressman Westerman of Arkansas authored and I cosponsored. It would get us back into our forests, managing them again. Unfortunately, the Senate, tied up with obstruction, didn't act on it. But we have made progress. Back earlier this spring, we overturned the Cottonwood decision, which has been used as a tool to invalidate existing forest management permits. We have been cutting red tape to accelerate the removal of hazardous fuels. The Forest Service estimates that 6.3 billion dead and dying trees are across 11 States. I know in my own home State, in our State capital, Helena, Montana, if you drive west into the Lewis and Clark Forest, you can look at a hillside and, in some cases, because the forests have not been managed and they have overgrown, nearly 90 percent of the trees are standing. It is a tinderbox waiting to go up in flames. We have also reformed how we pay for catastrophic fires. This was fixed also earlier this year, through legislation in this House, and it was signed into law, that will allow us to treat large fires just like we do large hurricanes when they exceed budgets, because the cost of these fires has expanded so much, it is consuming the majority of the U.S. Forest Service budget. Mr. Speaker, last year, forest firefighting costs consumed 55 percent of the Forest Service budget. That takes away money for trail maintenance and recreational programs. It is consumed in fighting these fires. We have also added some provisions to the farm bill which is now in conference, adding Good Neighbor Authorities, extending that capability for categorical exclusions down to county commissioners and local government so that they can be involved in making our forests healthier. We have also provided for expedited salvage operations so we can cut dead and dying trees at landscape size without the frivolous litigation shutting down these projects. Mr. Speaker, it is time to act. We can't control the weather, but we can control how we manage our forests. It is time to reform how we manage our forests by passing commonsense forest management reform. We need to reduce the severity of the wildfires. We need to get our forests healthy again. This is good for wildlife. It is good for recreationists. It is good for hunting. It creates good-paying jobs in our mills. Montana can't afford for Congress to continue kicking the can down the road and let important projects be tied up in unnecessary, frivolous litigation. This is an urgent issue, and we need to address it quickly. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleagues bringing to the attention of this Chamber the wildfires and the need for forest management reform. The House has offered commonsense solutions to get us back to managing our forests. The evidence shows that a properly managed forest is a healthier forest. We have less severe wildfires. I have seen this firsthand in the field. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the efforts of Mr. Westerman, who has been a leader on the issue and a forester by training, and my colleagues who know the destruction of a catastrophic wildfire brings us to know how critical it is to deliver meaningful reforms. Like my colleagues, I urge the Senate to act on commonsense measures this Chamber has sent so that Montanans can spend the summer in their forests enjoying them, not having to breathe them at home. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, during National Blood Cancer Awareness Month, to honor firefighters Benjamin Brunsvold, Andrew Drobeck, and Blake Meyers who helped the Missoula Fire Department team finish first in the Scott Firefighter Stairclimb. The 2018 Scott Firefighter Stairclimb brought together 2,000 firefighters from over 330 fire departments to compete. The stairclimb, which raised a record $2.61 million in 2018, benefits the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS) and its efforts in the fight against different types of blood cancer. The Scott Firefighter Stairclimb is the world's largest on-air stair climb competition. Held at the Columbia Center in Seattle, the competition features firefighters in full gear climbing 69 flights of stairs, or 788 feet. I congratulate Brunsvold, Drobeck, and Meyers who were the three top finishers for the Missoula Fire Department, helping it claim top team honors for the seventh consecutive year. Brunsvold finished third in the individual competition; Drobeck, a six-time individual winner, placed fourth; and Meyers finished 26th. I also commend the 77 Montana firefighters from 26 departments who took part in the 2018 challenge. With the support of their communities, they raised more than $97,500. Since 2009, Montana firefighters have raised more than $800,000 for LLS. While I congratulate Montana's outstanding firefighters for their performance, the Scott Firefighter Stairclimb is about raising awareness about blood cancer and raising needed resources for research and patient services. Josh Charles, a Bozeman firefighter and a Montana Ambassador for the Scott Firefighter Stairclimb, says, ``It's rewarding to know that fire departments across Montana have embraced the Scott Stairclimb, honoring the cause and the people affected by cancer who fight every day for normalcy. There's nothing better than when a patient or survivor says, `Thanks for helping me fight leukemia.' '' Mr. Speaker, for their excellence in training and performance, service in protecting our communities, and dedication that exceeds the call of duty, I recognize Benjamin Brunsvold, Andrew Drobeck, and Blake Meyers for their spirit of Montana.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 3764) to extend the Federal recognition to the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of my bill, H.R. 3764, the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians Restoration Act. As the only Member from Montana in the House of Representatives, I am proud to sponsor a bill which would extend Federal recognition to the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana. With Federal recognition, the Little Shell Tribe and its members would become eligible for all services and benefits provided by the Federal Government to federally recognized Tribes. The Tribe, as a condition of receiving Federal recognition, services, and benefits, must submit to the Secretary of the Interior a membership roll consisting of the name of each individual member of the Tribe and must maintain such membership roll. The act directs the Secretary of the Interior to acquire, for the benefit of the Tribe, trust title to 200 acres of land within the Tribe's service area to be used for a Tribal land base. I appreciate the work of Chairman Gray and the Little Shell people for continuing this fight for recognition. I urge adoption of the measure. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 5923) to direct the Secretary of Agriculture to exchange certain public lands in Ouachita National Forest, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, for over 20 years, the Walnut Grove Community Church in Jessieville, Arkansas, has sought to gain title to the 4 acres of land on which their church and historic cemetery are located. They have offered 6 acres of land within the Ouachita National Forest to the U.S. Forest Service in exchange. The cemetery and congregation both predate the Forest Service. Since 1938, the church has operated under special-use permits and has had to renew its permit annually since 2002. This situation has left the congregation uncertain about their future on the land they have worshipped on for decades. Furthermore, like any structure built 80 years ago, the church requires maintenance. Unfortunately, its operation under a permit limits the congregation's ability to maintain and improve their church building. Congressman Westerman has introduced a commonsense land exchange that will greatly benefit the community of Jessieville at no cost to the American taxpayer. He should be commended for his work. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the measure, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. GIANFORTE

Mr. GIANFORTE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4824) to allow certain State permitting authority to encourage expansion of broadband service to rural communities, and for other purposes, as amended.