Rep. Walden: Government’s too big, and it spends too much

Rep. Greg Walden, who represents Baker County in Congress, spoke in Baker City Sunday. (Baker City Herald/Kathy Orr)

“The real problem is government. They are telling us our business and they pass regulations to impose their agenda,” said Judy Price of Baker City.

Walden, whose scheduled 10:30 a.m. arrival was delayed about 90 minutes due to the weather, said some environmental regulations passed during the past 20 years wound up doing more harm than good. He cited damage done to forest health by logging restrictions, as well as industries that have left the country and are making products in China, India and other countries with less stringent environmental regulations and lower wages.

America’s $11 trillion national debt, financed mostly by China, Japan and other foreign countries, is the net effect of the combination of excessive government regulation and government growth in the face of a shrinking national economy, Walden said.

To emphasize his point to the 50 or so people attending the meeting at the Geiser Grand Hotel, Walden compared the nation’s fiscal crisis to a horse race in which the horse is the private-sector economy and the jockey is the government.

“If the jockey is heavier than the horse, you’re not going to win many races that way,” Walden said.

To rein in government spending, Walden said he has proposed and will continue to propose a balanced budget amendment to force the government to live within its means.

Unless serious efforts are made to reduce government spending and reduce deficit spending, Walden said the national debt is expected to triple by 2016.

 With respect to Oregon having one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation for much of 2009, Walden said part of the problem stems from legislators who represent metropolitan areas such as  New York City who pass environmental laws to appease their constituents but have little regard for how badly the regulations undermine economies in rural areas such as Baker County.

“They don’t suffer the consequences. They just want to tell us how to live,” Walden said. “They are shutting down businesses right and left in this country.”

Fred Warner Jr., chairman of the Baker County Board of Commissioners, said the potential closure of the Ash Grove Cement plant in Durkee due to a proposed EPA rule limiting mercury emissions is the biggest threat to Baker County’s economy.

The Durkee plant employs about 115 full-time employees, and is among the larger private employers in the county.

“Ash Grove is the most important thing in my life right now,” Warner said. “Trying to keep the EPA from closing Ash Grove.”

Walden said he has sent letters to the EPA urging officials to approve a sub-category exemption for the Durkee and other cement plants that use limestone that contains higher than normal amounts of mercury.

He said he’s also spoken to Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski, asking him to support the agreement made between Ash Grove and the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality in which the company voluntarily agreed to spend $20 million to install equipment that will remove 70 percent to 80 percent of mercury emissions from the Durkee plant.

Walden said he opposes regulations that would harm a company that’s willing to invest that much money to get as close as technically feasible to the 90 percent mercury emission reductions sought under the proposed EPA rule.

“This doesn’t make sense, unless (EPA’s) whole goal is to shut down this plant down. I think it is,” Walden said.

Kenneth Anderson, a Baker City miner, said easing restrictions on mining, logging and other natural resource extraction industries could give the economy a big boost and generate revenue to help pay off the national debt.     

Walden pointed out the widespread forest health problems, caused in part by logging bans imposed under endangered species regulations, have kept federal land managers from thinning forests that are so overcrowded the trees are dying.

He and Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Ore. introduced a healthy forest restoration bill designed to clean up the forest health problems and produce sawlogs and woody biomass — not just in Eastern Oregon, which Walden said is the case with a forest restoration bill introduced by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., but across Oregon and other Western states.

From the audience, Arvid Anderson, a Baker City forestry consultant, said he and others are concerned that all of the restrictions on logging included in Wyden’s bill could wind up making it even harder to get forest health thinning and other timber harvests approved, not easier as Wyden contends.

Anderson mentioned provisions of Wyden’s bill banning harvesting of trees over 21 inches in diameter, and taking decisions about cutting smaller trees from forest managers and giving the authority to a so-called scientific panel.

Walden he has more than 20 co-signers on his forest restoration bill, but so far House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has refused to schedule it for a hearing.  

Among other bills currently under consideration in Congress, Walden said those he sees as potentially having the most negative effects on natural resource industries include expanding the critical habitat for bull trout.

“You could have 250 miles of the Powder River and its tributaries designated as bull trout habitat” under a federal proposal, Walden said.

“On bull trout, let’s figure out what the recovery plan is before we lock it all up,” Walden said

He likened the bull trout proposal to a customer going into a hardware store and buying everything in stock because he intends to build a house — some day.

“How do you know what you’re going to need without a plan?” Walden said. 

On proposed amendments to the Clean Water Act, Walden said the changes currently  under consideration would extend the authority of the federal government from navigable waterways to all waters of the United States.

Walden said that change could make the CWA so broad it could be interpreted to mean ponds and seasonal creeks, possibly including dry gulches that carry a rush of water a few days out of the year.

Gene Stackle, a manager with the Baker City/County economic development team, told Walden much of the federal stimulus money sent to federal agencies and other entities in Baker County seems to be “going into a black hole.”

He said the city’s $4.1 million stimulus request to help fund a plant for processing woody biomass, which would have created jobs, wasn’t funded, while billions of dollars were doled out for projects of dubious economic value in metropolitan areas, and some rural areas in other parts of the country were funded.

Walden said that instead of sending stimulus money to small businesses to create long-term employment in the private-sector, a strategy proven to revive the economy, the Democratic majority funneled two-thirds of the money to government agencies to cover increased spending, and to “shovel ready” public works projects such as paving roads, which only provided temporary jobs and temporary benefits.

“If you’re going to spend it on public works, at least make it something that’s going to last, like a bridge that will still be around in 50 years,” Walden said.

Other concerns raised by members of the audience included:

• Federal subsidies given to foreign companies building wind farms that are ruining viewsheds in Eastern Oregon and don’t produce a significant amount of energy.

• Federal banking regulations and policies that favor big banks and make it hard for community banks to survive and compete, even though allowing big banks to gobble up little banks costs taxpayers 10 times more than it would cost to help the little bank.

• Regulations proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission imposing climate change rules on traded stocks, without congressional approval.

• Seeking support for federal regulations mandating roll cages for ATVs, a product that Jerry Johnson of Baker City wants to build here and sell all over the country.