mr. chairman , i am here to support the long overdue peterson amendment . 
i come from florida . 
we will not hear a lot of folks talk about this . 
it is a hot political issue . 
all of us are equally concerned about preserving the environment . 
since my days in the legislature , i have always supported the safe and environmentally sound development and exploration of natural gas off the coast of florida . 
i helped participate in the development of the section 181 prohibitions . 
i oppose oil drilling . 
we can safely extract natural gas . 
for all of the 1990s , and many of my colleagues were here , our policy was to convert coal and oil-generating plants to natural gas , and we have done that in over 30 of our plants in florida , and we have got more coming online . 
my colleagues saw that we pay just about double the price . 
this not-in-my-backyard does not cut it . 
we can keep it offshore , but we can still do it soundly and safely . 
i support the amendment . 
