John Peterson

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I rise today with a heavy heart. I rise today to honor Richard Lee Wiles, my friend, my former economic development and technical education coordinator, and a man who was as brilliant and farsighted as he was straightforward and unpretentious; the kind of man who brought dignity and integrity and a great deal of expertise to everything he did in life. I am sad to report that late in June, Richard, or Dick as he was known to friends and strangers alike, passed away while conducting his duties on behalf of people of the 5th district of Pennsylvania. Dick was more than an employee. He was a true friend and a loyal confidant. Dick graduated in 1958 from East Brady High School and in 1963 from Penn State University where he received a bachelor's degree in agriculture and later a master's degree in communication. For many years he operated Nova Productions, a public relations firm that was very successful. But, Madam Speaker, more than just a knowledgeable counselor and an able communicator, Dick Wiles was truly a renaissance man. Evidence of this can be seen during his high school and college years when to pay for his education, Dick started and was an active member in a well known dance band, The Rhythm Knights. Indeed, he was a gentleman of the highest order who could cook, sing, fish, hunt, dance, paint, write poetry and prose, and charm everyone present within the sound of his voice. I used to joke that his charm almost earned him a seat in the Pennsylvania General Assembly over 25 years ago when he came within a few hundred votes of defeating a long- term popular incumbent, despite receiving absolutely no support, financial or otherwise, from the party structure or apparatus. Madam Speaker, Dick Wiles was one of the most politically savvy and intelligent, gifted people I have ever met. What made him special, though, was how he selflessly used his talent to serve his neighbors and better his community. More than once Dick told me that he loved his job so much that he felt guilty for receiving a pay check. But more than a humble public servant, Dick will be remembered as a humble servant of God, a man who deeply cared about the condition of his country; a husband who cherished his beautiful wife, Barbara; a father who loved his wonderful daughters, Julia and Jennifer; a grandfather who pampered his four lovely grandchildren, Seanna, Taylor, Alex and Colin; and was fond and took great care of his sister-in-law, Debbie, and her son, Ricky; a friend who reminded us all of what could be accomplished with a little hard work, gritty determination and general good will towards his fellow man. He was one of the finest conversationalists I have met and one of the most inquiring minds I ever dealt with. His interests were broad. His memory was phenomenal. Two years ago, Dick lost his lovely wife, Barb, unexpectedly. Since then he lived alone in east Brady and was very lonely. I knew that and I always had chatted with him often and always enjoyed those conversations, but I made it a habit to call him numerous times per day. I talked to him several times daily. I would call him on my way to the Capitol for a vote. I would call him in my apartment in the evenings. We would have lengthy chats. I would call him when I was traveling in my district at home because I have a large rural district. I enjoyed those visits I think more than he because he gave so much. Madam Speaker, Dick was a phenomenal leader on several issues. He helped me develop technical education in the 5th district by helping equip our high schools with the newest, latest technology, and bringing technical schools and community colleges to help train our adults for the skilled technical jobs that are vital in today's high-tech economy. That was an education that we lacked. He also was my staff person who was my specialist to help promote tourism in the 5th district. He was my steady voice on Governor Rendell's Pennsylvania Wilds Working Group, a group joining 13 counties together in beautiful north central Pennsylvania to develop our tourism potential, an area rich in natural beauty, historic sites and scenic Route 6, Pennsylvania's elk herd, Kinzua Lake and the Allegheny National Forest. Dick truly loved his work and he was so good at it. He truly adored his family, his community, his State and his country. He was always a gentleman. Dick, we really miss you. Madam Speaker, I humbly submit these comments to the Record, and I humbly commit his spirit to the communion of saints above. May Dick rest in peace.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. I thank the chairman and the ranking member. I will hope and pray that they come through for rural America. Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my amendment.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I have great respect for the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and the incredibly difficult task he and his staff have had before them to write this bill. I think he did a remarkable job and I want to commend him. My amendment would simply make a modest adjustment to the bill by restoring funding for two vital rural health programs to their fiscal year 2005 levels. Specifically, my amendment allows for increases to rural outreach grants by $28.511 million and $8.825 million to rural health research. This $37 million increase is offset by a reduction to OSHA. As Members may know, rural programs across the Federal budget continue to be proposed for cuts or elimination. As cochairman of the Congressional Rural Caucus, I feel obligated to rise and share my concern. Some argue that the Medicare bill we passed last year fixed rural health care and that we do not need to continue to fund rural programs, but this is comparing apples to oranges. The Medicare bill increased reimbursements for rural hospitals and doctors, while outreach grants that we are dealing with generally do not involve hospitals. Outreach funds go to a variety of providers that saw no benefit from the Medicare prescription drug bill, such as public health departments, community health centers, rural health clinics, mental health providers, and other community-based organizations that provide the finest care to our poorest. Outreach grants run for 3 years with applicants being eligible for up to $200,000 per year. Outreach grants emphasize collaboration by key community groups, requiring at least three health care providers to come together to apply for the funding. The idea of the grants is to provide start-up funds to innovative approaches to health problems in rural areas with the applicants using the 3 years to make the program self-sustaining. According to a study by the University of Minnesota, more than 80 percent of programs established with outreach grants were still operating 5 years after Federal funding expired. My amendment also restores funding for the $9 million rural health research program. This money supports eight rural health research centers around the country and also supports the Secretary's National Advisory Committee on Rural Health, which is composed of national leaders on rural health care and has an important role in shaping administration policy. The rural research centers help us understand how CMS payments interact with the reality of rural health practice, including the wage index issues researched by the University of North Carolina and physician payment issues researched in the past by the Rural Policy Research Institute in Nebraska. The rural research line also funds the Secretary's National Advisory Committee on Rural Health which submits an annual report to the Secretary, the only rural-specific report our Secretary of Health may ever see in a given year. This funding line also carries out the function of evaluating Federal regulations within the Office of Rural Health Policy. Eliminating this program would effectively cut off the only rural policy shop within HHS. If rural health fails, there are no winners. People travel long distances to more affordable, less accessible health care settings in our suburban areas. No one wins. Families are displaced, people are long distances from their loved ones and their support team, and the system pays considerably more, so there is no savings. This is the worst possible time to eliminate funding for these programs. As the health care world continues to evolve, we have to ensure that rural America has a seat at the table of Congress and the administration. We need to restore funding for these two vital rural health programs I have just shared with you. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I am not going to take a lot of time here to defend the cut in OSHA, but I will say that I have a lot of friends that work in plants and refineries and mills in my district, and if there is an agency that could better utilize their enforcement dollars, it is OSHA. I have many union workers, close friends of mine, that talk about the nonsense-type things that OSHA comes in and tinkers with when they could come in and instruct, because most employers today want to run a safe shop. If they had the process where they would come in and instruct, go after the real safety issues instead of the nit-picking issues that they do, I do not believe this small cut in OSHA would cost us one life. If OSHA used modern technology, they could double what they do in saving lives. I want to say this in conclusion. Rural health care is struggling in America. We have always been at the short end of the payment system. We have always had to deal with less payment for the very same procedures. I was in the food business. I was in the retail business. Only in health care does the smallest get paid the least. When you go to a small store, you expect to pay a little more. But the big hospitals, the big institutions who have the volume, who have the multitude of customers and use those expensive pieces of equipment morning, noon, and night get paid more. It is the most unfair part. And why should rural citizens not have adequate equal access to good health care? But let me tell you what happens too often. They leave their families, drive hundreds of miles away to an urban center that they are not even comfortable in, and the system will pay 50 percent more for the same health care that could be given to them in their own community. Nobody wins. And sometimes people die. Mr. Chairman, I will reluctantly withdraw this amendment in hopes that the chairman and the ranking member will see that these two programs do not go unfunded in the final conference report.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to talk, sadly, about the fact that America once again is completing another month, another halfway through another year, with no energy policy. Is it important that we have an energy policy? Should we have an energy policy? Well, I happen to think we should. With oil approaching $60 a barrel and natural gas at $7.50 today, that is the highest fuel prices this country has faced, ever. Gasoline, we hear a lot about. In the last 20 years, gasoline prices have increased 86 percent. It is on the news every night. We talk about it as if it is a tragedy. Now, it is painful, because it costs all of us more to drive than we would like. But we have choices there: what size vehicle, what kind of mileage it has, and what trips we take. But in natural gas, the people that use natural gas heat their homes, provide their air-conditioning, run their businesses. They cannot make those same choices. Natural gas prices have increased in the same length of time 550 percent. I want to tell my colleagues, if you heard complaints last winter about natural gas prices for heating our homes, next year is going to be a lot more difficult. Because the gas we put in the ground today will have been paid $7.50 for, and last year at this time it was less than $5 that we were putting into the ground. We put it in storage in the ground at this time of year so we have enough in the winter. We are now 62 to 64 percent dependent on foreign countries for oil. On natural gas, we are 88 percent self-sufficient. We import about 11 percent from Canada and 1 percent is from liquefied natural gas. Like I said before, $60-a-barrel oil is painful but, in my view, $7.50 and continuing rising natural gas prices has the ability to kill our economy, and I will tell my colleagues why. We are an island to ourselves with natural gas prices. When we pay $55 or $60 for oil, the whole world pays that, all our competitors pay that, and we are a very competitive global economy. But when we pay $7.50 for natural gas, Canada pays about $6. Europe is in the $5 range. China, our big competitor, pays $4, giving them another advantage on top of cheap labor and all the other ways they manipulate the economy. Trinidad in northern South America, $1.60. Russia, 90 cents, North Africa, 80 cents. Because of these prices for natural gas and a government here in Washington who will do nothing about it, three industries are leaving our country that are some of the best-paying jobs we have left. Twenty-one fertilizer factories that our farmers depend on closed last year. Why? Because their number one ingredient to make fertilizer is natural gas as an ingredient and as a fuel to make it. The petrochemical companies, again, 40 to 55 percent of their cost is natural gas. They are leaving as we speak. The polymers in plastics, the best jobs in America, are leaving as we speak. We could be totally self-sufficient on natural gas if we made the right decisions. We need to open up many areas of the West that have been locked up, and we need to streamline the permitting process so that natural gas can move forward timely. We need to open up the Outer Continental Shelf, where there is enough gas to totally supply this country for 50, 60 years without any question. With the clean fuel, natural gas is the clean fuel. No NOX, no SOX, a fourth of the C02; it is the nonpolluting fuel, it is the one we ought to be using. We could be using it in vehicles, we could be using it in a lot of ways that we are not using it today to need less oil. But we must open the production of natural gas on our Outer Continental Shelf. Every country in the world, Canada, does and sells it to us. They drill in our Great Lakes and sell it to us. Europe, Germany, England, Norway, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand all produce gas on the Outer Continental Shelf, with no negative impact. A natural gas well is not an environmental hazard. It is a 6-inch hole in the ground with a steel casing cemented at the bottom and at the top, and you let gas out. It is a gas that is a clean burning fuel. And when you are 40 or 50 miles offshore, nobody knows they are there. There are fine beaches where natural gas is produced. There is fine recreation, there is fine fisheries. Natural gas is the bridge to the future of America's economy, and if this Congress does not do something about it, they are going to give the best jobs in America to the rest of the world. In fact, last year one of our major chemical companies moved 2,000 jobs to Germany; not a cheap market. Mr. Speaker, my conclusion is the number one issue facing the economy of this country is the availability and the price of natural gas and the decision is in our hands, this Congress' hands, and we need to make it soon.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, I would like to commend Chairman Lewis, the committee and the staff for their fine work on this bill and the process. We are coming down the home stretch, and we should all be proud of that. This bill contains $10.5 million to pay our heating bill, natural gas. That is a 25 percent increase over last year. When we get that kind of an increase, the Architect asks us for more money and we provide it. If natural gas prices continue as they are, next year we will be looking at a 3 to $4 million increase to heat our Capitol complex for the same amount of heat. We can do that. We will provide the money. But when our folks back home heating their homes, running their businesses have these kind of natural gas increases, I think it is time for Congress to act. As we speak, the fertilizer industry, the petrochemical industry, and the polymers and plastic industry are all making plans to leave this country permanently, because they use natural gas as heat and they use it to make products as an ingredient. Forty to 55 percent of their costs are natural gas. Natural gas prices in this country are an island to themselves. When we buy 58 or $60 oil, the whole world does. Our gas prices this week are $7.60. Canada's are $6, Europe's are 5-something, China's are $4 giving them a huge advantage, Trinidad $1.60, Russia 90 cents and North Africa 80 cents. Folks, we will be looking next year at a 3 to $4 million increase to heat this Capitol. By that time, we will have lost some of the industries that I have talked about, and we will have seniors leaving their homes because they cannot afford to heat them. I am challenging this Congress to deal with the natural gas issue, the clean fuel, the fuel that does not have pollutants, the fuel we have an unlimited supply of for the next 50 to 100 years; and I am challenging this Congress to deal with natural gas.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I rise to oppose this amendment. Marijuana is not a harmless drug. The National Institute on Drug Abuse, the American Medical Association and other science-based research institutes have documented the substantial risks of using marijuana. The FDA, on the other hand, has already approved Marinol, which contains THC, a derivative of the active chemical in marijuana, totally undermining claims that there is any need for medical marijuana. If passed, this amendment would open the door for drug dealers to use medical marijuana exemptions as cover for their growing and selling operations. Up until recently, no adequate testing had been done in this country on the devastating effects of marijuana use. If only the young people of America knew of the study that just has been released recently that marijuana use curtails the development of the brain. We have very young people in this country using marijuana, and marijuana curtails the growth of our brain, and our brain is not mature until we are 25 years of age. Anything we do that encourages young people to use marijuana will have a devastating impact on their mental capacity. I speak with a little experience on this. I have some friends who grew up when marijuana was the hot issue, and some of the brightest young people I knew became somewhat dull and have remained that way all of their life because the recent study proves that marijuana use curtails the growth and development of the brain. I have never had a physician tell me that it was needed in his portfolio to treat medical diseases and pain. I have never had a physician, and I have been in the health care field, in the legislative process, for 20 some years. Medical marijuana is not something that is needed in this country. It is a drug that stops the development of the brains in our youth, and it should not become legal in any way, in my view.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, energy prices, specifically natural gas prices, in the United States have reached drastically high levels and are devastating our agricultural sector. Maintaining abundant supplies of natural gas and other various forms of energy are essential to keeping American agriculture competitive within the world marketplace. According to the Fertilizer Institute on May 26 of this year, ``Natural gas is the feedstock for producing nitrogen fertilizer and accounts for up to 90 percent of the cost of its production. As a result of the ongoing natural gas crisis in the United States, 21 nitrogen fertilizer production facilities have closed since 1998. Sixteen of those plants have closed permanently, while five plants remain idle.'' If present policy of denial of access to decades of natural gas reserves continues in this country, the future offers no hope for relief. The U.S. Department of Energy projects that by 2010 the Nation's demand for natural gas will increase by another 30 percent. We cannot continue to have the highest natural gas prices in world. We are at $7, Canada is at $6, Europe is at $5, China is at $4, and the rest of the world is below $2, and two countries are below $1. Mr. Chairman, as we move toward a conference with the Senate, may I have the gentleman from Texas's (Chairman Bonilla) commitment to work with me in securing report language calling for the Economic Research Service to examine the impact of rising natural gas prices on our domestic agricultural economy and the effects that has on American agriculture in the world marketplace?

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I thank him for his answer. Amendment No. 6 Offered by Mr. Chabot

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I offer amendments, and I ask unanimous consent that they be considered en bloc.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, my amendment will remove the words ``natural gas'' from the moratorium that has been in every Interior bill, I am told, for 20 some years, unbeknownst to many Members of this Congress, that prohibits the Department of Interior from leasing or subleasing lands on the Outer Continental Shelf, our greatest reserve for natural gas. The number one economic challenge facing America was not addressed in our energy bill, in my view and the view of many, because we did not adequately deal with the clean fuel, the fuel that has no NOX, no SOX, the least CO2, the clean- burning fuel, natural gas, that can be our bridge to the future. It is threatening home ownership, folks. 76 percent increase in oil prices, 176 percent increase in natural gas prices. Here is what one of our leading employer group says: America has a new energy crisis. This time it is the runaway price of natural gas. Congress must act now to ease the natural gas crisis of this Nation's fragile economic recovery, or it will return to recession. Every recession since World War II has been preceded by a run-up in energy prices and none of the run-up in prices have equaled the run-up in natural gas prices. It is threatening small business. It is the fastest increase in the cost of education. It is the fastest increase in the cost of our hospital health care. It is the greatest threat to our farm community with exploding fertilizer costs. And because fertilizer factories use so much natural gas, 21 of them have quit making fertilizer in America, and all of them are looking offshore to produce fertilizer. Ninety thousand chemical jobs, some of the best paying jobs in the industrial sector we have left. Polymers and plastics are all looking to move offshore. The production of natural gas on the Outer Continental Shelf is not looked at as an environmental threat by Canada, they sell us gas that they produce, the UK, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, all countries with environmental records. Eighty-five percent of our gas reserves are locked up by moratorium. Why? It is the clean fuel. As I said before, no docks, CO2 one-fourth as much. It is the bridge to hydrogen. It could be bridging us in the transportation field like school buses, transportation systems, taxicabs, delivery trucks, easily changeable to natural gas if it was affordable and we had adequate supply. Natural gas is 25 percent of our energy use today. If we had an adequate supply, it could be the friendly bridge, the environmentally friendly bridge, to lead us to hydrogen, give us time for stronger conservation measures, growing use of renewables and less dependence on oil today. A gas well is not an environmental threat. It is a 6-inch hole that is cemented at the top and cemented at the bottom with a steel casing, and it lets gas out. Canada produces in our Great Lakes and sells the gas to us with no environmental impact. When we look at this map, and this is my concluding comment, the natural gas and oil, when we buy $50 oil, the whole world buys $50 oil; but in natural gas we are at $7. Europe is at $5-something. Japan and China are 4-something, and then we look at a dollar, 90 cents in Russia. Where are industries going to grow? They are not going to grow here. This is the most important amendment we will consider, in my view, in this part of Congress. Natural gas is a tragedy happening, and we can stop it by lifting the moratorium. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie).

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne).

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards).

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene Green). (Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from California (Mr. Doolittle).

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King). (Mr. KING of Iowa asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume to ask the gentleman if we had hearings before it was put in this bill 20 years ago and every year in a row? No. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Pearce). (Mr. PEARCE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica).

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, for the first 2 years I served in Congress, I was fortunate to serve on this committee; and I will have to honestly say I miss that opportunity because I really did enjoy it. The future of America depends on the work of this committee. I want to commend the committee on the work they have done on this bill. I think they have done outstanding work at working through the process of making this a strong bill. It is my belief that our economic future depends on the use of the latest, most modern technology. Historically, the academically gifted in America have unlimited opportunities; but, unfortunately, the technically gifted have too often been left behind because we have undervalued technology education. This bill modernizes Perkins and advances technical education to what I hope is a brighter future. When you look at the delivery of health care, it is about technology. When you look at manufacturing, if we are going to be successful against cheap labor, it is about technology. You talk the whole IT revolution in this country, it is technology. It is what caused it. Marketing is technology. Warehousing and distribution, it is technology. Repairing autos and equipment, it is about technology. Technology is what makes our country work today, and it is vital. We have too often had high schools that were using 1970 technology in the era of 2005. That does not cut it. We have to advance technical education and make sure that America's youth realize that the jobs that are wanting in America have the word ``technology'' beside them. There are many people with 2-year technology degrees that will earn a better income than those with 4-year liberal arts degrees, and we do not offer them adequately in the same manner that we offer academic education. If you look at the successful companies that are competing globally, it is about the massive use of technology. We must make sure that our high schools is where it begins, in the early middle schools, that young people realize the excitement of the technology world and that we have the latest, most modern technology there and that we bridge it into the community colleges. In some of the more progressive States, we have community colleges paralleling at the high schools, joint teaching in the 11th and 12th grade, adding the 13th year and giving a 2-year associate's degree in technology that equips people to go to work more. All of those fields needing the technology workers would be happy if we could do that on a broad scale across this country. I commend again this committee and the staff for putting together a good bill, and let us hope that it is the beginning of technology education being valued in this country, because it must be if we have an economic future because our economy in the future is about the massive use of technology.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor four Samaritans that put their lives at risk to save a young man who was badly electrocuted after a car accident in rural Forest County, Pennsylvania, on February 12th of this year. On that snowy Saturday, Eric Wallace was driving on Blue Jay Road through the Allegheny National Forest, when he lost control of his pickup truck. The vehicle crossed the roadway and rolled over an embankment, landing on the driver's side. Mr. Wallace climbed out of his vehicle, but came into contact with live power lines buried in the snow. Mr. Wallace went down 50 feet from his wrecked truck, his face in the snow and a hand and foot aflame from the current passing though his body. Thankfully for Mr. Wallace, four men happened to be on this rural two-lane road on that winter Saturday. One man, Ron Weisenstein of nearby Sheffield was the first to happen by the accident scene, which he saw from his vehicle. Mr. Weisenstein pulled his vehicle over and ran to the injured passenger. Seeing the power lines across Mr. Wallace's body, Mr. Weisnesten instinctually pulled the victim away from the lines, only to receive powerful shock himself. Michael Brunner was working at his parent's house down the road from the accident when he heard the crash. After having his parents call 911, Mr. Brunner ran down the road to join Mr. Weisenstein. Shortly thereafter, Brian Marshall came upon the accident. Appraising the situation, Mr. Marshall told the two others that he had a rope in his vehicle. Mr. Weisenstein took the rope and wrapped it around Mr. Wallace's left foot, finally pulling him off the downed power lines. The three men found Mr. Wallace to be without a heartbeat and not breathing. Mr. Brunner remembered the CPR training he had received as a Boy Scout in his youth and with the assistance of Mr. Weisenstein was able to get the injured man breathing again. Soon after Mr. Wallace started to breath on his own, Paul Hebert came across the accident. Mr. Hebert, an Emergency Medical Technician visiting the area from Manassas, Virginia, cleared Mr. Wallace's airways and helped stabilize the man until personnel from the Sheffield Volunteer Fire Department arrived. Mr. Wallace was taken by helicopter to the Intensive Care Burn Unit at Mercy Hospital in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and is now on the road to recovery. Mr. Speaker, without the assistance of these four gentlemen who happened to be on this quiet road through the forest on a winter's day, Eric Wallace would have likely died either from electrocution or exposure to the cold. We should all applaud their quick thinking, teamwork, and selflessness to help a fellow man, and I am honored to have the opportunity to highlight their actions.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Madam Chairman, I think I am on a different bill than I just heard described here. I applaud the energy efficiency and conservation in this bill. I applaud the increasing of renewable technologies in this bill. I applaud the hydrogen fuel cell program in this bill. I applaud the next-generation nuclear in this bill. I applaud the clean coal technology. I applaud the incentives for deep gas drilling. That is the one issue I do not think we do enough in this bill. I believe we need to do much more to increase the supply of natural gas, and I hope in conference we can. Current natural gas prices are exporting thousands of American jobs, the best jobs we have, the chemical plants, fertilizer factories, and those who melt steel and ore and use a lot of national gas. We as a country have an island to ourselves with natural gas; they are not world prices. When everybody pays $50 for oil, we have the highest prices for natural gas of all modern countries, and we are losing the companies who use large quantities of it. Just to compare, we are 40 percent higher on natural gas than Europe. We are 50 percent higher than Japan. We are 600 percent higher than South America. We are 800 percent higher than Russia. We heat our homes, our schools, our hospitals, and our businesses with natural gas. It is the bridge to hydrogen. All hydrogen today generally is made from natural gas; it is the easiest way to make it. It can assist us in transportation, with our buses, taxi cabs, delivery trucks, by using natural gas rather than oil. We need, in the final bill, to have a much stronger chapter with natural gas; it is the one area that I think we need stronger in this bill.

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania

Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank both the chairman and the ranking member for bringing this legislation up. It is very simple. They have explained it well. The Allegheny National Forest is a 600,000-acre forest in northwestern Pennsylvania. These parcels were used for some of their management facilities that have now been relocated on the forest in new facilities. Some of these plots of land have nice buildings on them. They are deteriorating. They need to be turned back over into the private sector, into the local government sector. One piece will go to the local fire department in Marionville, Pennsylvania, which will help them expand their service for the community there. Another one will be to the Ridgway Township whose facilities border this land. It will assist them. In fact, the facility will enhance their ability to serve their community. Another parcel will go to the county economic development agency for further development of the economy in that region. The other parcels will be put up for sale, and the cash will be used to enhance the many facilities that are on the Allegheny National Forest. The use of those facilities continues to grow, but there is a lot of maintenance, there are a lot of enhancements needed to serve the growing public use of the forest. I just want to thank the committee and all those for bringing this forward and ask my colleagues to pass this legislation. It is good government.