Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify on the President's 1999 budget request for the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency.

This budget is an important investment in the American people, advancing a goal I know we share -- protecting the nation's air and water, the food we eat, the land on which we live.

It also is based on a simple premise -- that protecting the environment and protecting public health are good for the economy.

That proposition has been borne out over the past quarter century, and particularly over the past five years. Under the leadership of President Clinton and Vice President Gore, this has been our guiding philosophy -- a fundamental underpinning of our work. The nation's economic health is closely linked with the health of the environment. We've proved it.

Just this year, we've seen that it is possible to eliminate the deficit while strengthening our commitment to a safer, cleaner, and healthier environment for our children.

Environmental protection hand in hand with economic progress. That is a cornerstone of the President's 1999 budget request. Getting results is another.

This budget is the first to reflect EPA's new approach of goal-based budgeting -- linking resources to real environmental results. Such a goal-oriented approach is helping us better allocate our resources, better measure our successes, and keep us in sync with our strategic plan -- just what Congress envisioned when it passed the Government Performance and Results Act.

This approach -- focusing on real environmental results -- is key as this nation -- and this budget -- prepares us to address the critical, emerging environmental challenges of the 21st Century. Global warming is one of those critical challenges -- perhaps the most serious threat we face as a nation. This budget reflects the President's determination that America shall lead the world in meeting the challenge of global warming by reducing greenhouse gases -- and doing so in a way that grows the economy.

New data show that 1997 was the hottest year ever recorded, and nine of the hottest years on record have occurred since 1987. The vast majority of the world's scientists have warned us that if we don't begin to tackle this problem now, we will leave a legacy of climate change and environmental damage that will greatly burden future generations.

EPA will be working with industry to forge successful partnerships -- to find common-sense, cost-effective ways we can meet the global warming challenge. This is part of the $6 billion program in tax incentives and research and development that the President has proposed to encourage innovative anti-pollution technologies aimed at reducing greenhouse gases while at the same time building our economy and building our competitiveness.

This budget will help us finish the job of cleaning up the pollution in our rivers, lakes, and coastal waters.

Clean water keeps our communities healthy and thriving. And President Clinton is determined to see that Americans have safe, clean water in the 21st Century.

The President has proposed new funding to advance his Clean Water Action Plan, which is designed to address today's greatest threats to our nation's waters coast to coast -- including polluted runoff from urban and agricultural areas, the loss of wetlands, and the restoration of our waterways.

It is designed to foster a spirit of cooperation, promoting voluntary cleanup and restoration efforts, and coordinating our work with the Department of Agriculture, other federal agencies, and the states. Most of this new funding will go directly to the states so that we can protect our waters in the most effective way we know: locally, community by community and watershed by watershed.

This budget protects the health of our children. Giving them a healthier start in life is one of this administration's highest priorities -- and protecting our environment is critical to our children's health.

The President is requesting an additional $8 million to further assist us in addressing the unique vulnerability of children to environmental threats. Specifically, we will be making sure that our public health regulations recognize children's special health needs, we will be working with the Department of Health and Human Services to establish six research centers for Children's Environmental Health, and we will provide information for parents to better protect their children from environmental hazards. This budget will help ensure that our neighborhoods are free from toxic waste sites and the blight of abandoned industrial properties. We will continue our work to accelerate cleanup of the nation's worst hazardous waste sites under Superfund. And we will continue to expand and strengthen our enormously popular brownfields partnerships with states, cities and communities -- with an eye toward helping them return these abandoned sites to productive use.

This budget will help clean our air. Last year, President Clinton took action to ensure that our air quality standards are strong enough to protect the public health. This budget request includes $75 million that builds on last year's congressional appropriations to implement the new, stronger clean air standards.

This budget will continue our efforts to strengthen citizens' right-to-know about pollution in their communities -- specifically by improving and enhancing their ability to gain access to this kind of information through the internet and through EPA's new Center for Environmental Information and Statistics.

This budget stands for sound science. To continue to build within EPA the world's best program for environmental science and research, this budget provides funding for programs that will ensure that we have the best science available to develop cost-effective and innovative environmental protections. We believe this is crucial to make today's decisions and to address the environmental challenges of the future.

This budget will expand our work with industries, with the public, with local leaders to find cost-effective and common-sense solutions to our environmental and public health challenges. We will be incorporating lessons learned from the last four years of our reinvention efforts, so that we can get more results like those achieved with the metal finishing industry: new goals that will make our industries operate cheaper, cleaner, and smarter.

This budget aims to strengthen our partnerships with states and tribes -- such an important part of our efforts to reinvent the way EPA works.

This budget enables us to continue our efforts to vigorously enforce the nation's environmental laws. We will send the message to those who violate those laws, that those who pollute the environment and jeopardize public health will be called to account.

In sum, this is a budget for a cleaner, safer, healthier environment for our children and their children to come.  It builds on our past successes.  It identifies the toughest challenges before us. And it strives to address them in ways that provide for the nation's continued economic progress.

Mr. Chairman, I know we share a goal of protecting the environment while continuing on this nation's path of robust economic growth. At EPA, we are working hard to build stronger relationships with the public, the regulated community, and our partners at all levels of government so that we can ensure this happens and provide a more effective and efficient system of environmental protection.

Together, we can lay the groundwork for a new generation of environmental protection, and leave our children and grandchildren with a cleaner, safer, and healthier environment. I look forward to working with you to accomplish these important goals.

Thank you. I would be happy to answer any questions you might have.