Remarks Announcing the Coral Reef and Marine Protected Areas Initiatives at Assateague Island, Maryland - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, May 29, 2000

Thank you very much. Well, first, I want to thank all of our previous speakers. As so often happens when I get up to speak, what needs to be said has already been said.

May 26, 2000

Thank you, Carolyn Cummins, for your kind words and for your years and years of leadership, for Assateague Island and for these beaches. I want to thank the park superintendent, Marc Koenings. This is his last week here, because he has just gotten a new assignment at the Gateway National Recreation Area in New York Harbor, a place I've often a little more interested in, in the last few months. [Laughter] So he's got a very good assignment, and I wish him well.

I want to thank Sylvia Earle, the explorer-in-residence at National Geographic and, in a way, an explorer in residence for the American citizens, as you just heard. I want to thank also the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrator Jim Baker and Deputy Secretary of the Interior David Haynes, who are here.

And I'd also like to recognize the elected officials, particularly the Maryland delegation from the United States Congress, who have been just terrific on these environmental issues: Senator Barbara Mikulski. Thank you, Senator. She came dressed to spend the day here. I hope she does. [Laughter] I want to thank Senator Paul Sarbanes for being here. When I came up, he said, "You know, this is my part of Maryland. And my mother is here, and she is celebrating her 92d birthday today." So welcome to Mrs. Sarbanes, we're glad to see you. Thank you. Give her a hand. That's great. [Applause] She's also got the coolest sunglasses of anybody here, I might add. [Laughter]

I'd like to thank Representatives Wayne Gilchrest, to my left, and Ben Cardin to my right for being here. And I'd like to recognize a guest from all the way across the country, Representative Sam Farr from northern California. He represents the district where Monterey Bay is, where we had our oceans conference 2 years ago, and he's a great friend of the environment. Thank you, Sam Fan, for being here.

I'd also like to thank the mayors, the council members, the State legislators who met me here. And I'd like to recognize Carl Zimmerman, the chief of research management of the Assateagne National Island Seashore, for your work. Thank you all for being here.

Well, I came down here today to get ahead of the Memorial Day rush. [Laughter] And I didn't want all of you who wanted to sit here to be lost in the stampede of fun-seekers. But I thank you for coming. We all know that this weekend marks the opening of the summer beach season, and by the millions, Americans will flock to our coastlines. Beachlines and coastlines are now our number one tourist destination.

Our oceans, however, are far more than a playground. They have a central effect on the weather, on our climate system. Through fishing, tourism, and other industries, ocean resources--listen to this--support one out of every six jobs in the United States of America. Coral reefs and coastal waters are a storehouse of biodiversity. Think about what children here--and we have some children here from Bennett Middle School I met on the way down. And just think about what they see and learn about the timeless movement of the dunes, about the complex life of a coastal marsh--horseshoe crabs, living fossils whose blood provides us a vital antibacterial agent. And I learned today that 5,000 years ago, this island was several miles out in the ocean, brought back closer to shore by the rising of the sea level, something which is okay in small doses but could be very troubling for us if we don't deal with the problem of climate change, global warming, the melting of the icecaps, and the alarming level at which ocean lev els could rise.

Even though they cover--yes, you can clap for that. [Applause] You have to forgive me. When I give these kinds of talks, I veer off the script a little bit. Oceans cover more than 70 percent of the Earth's surface. They are immensely powerful, as anybody who has ever been caught in an undertow can tell you. But they are also very, very fragile. Poisonous runoff from the Mississippi River alone has created a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico that is as large as the State of New Jersey.

Here in Maryland, runoff threatens fish and crabs in the Chesapeake Bay. Globally, already, people have destroyed 10 percent of the world's coral reefs. Another 20 percent are in grave peril.

I saw the changes when I went snorkeling 5 years ago off the. Great Barrier Reefs in Australia. And I read just last week, of the challenges now presented, the second largest barrier reefs in the world, off the coast of Belize. Global warming, as I said, is helping to raise the ocean temperatures to record highs, changing weather patterns, killing coral reefs, driving species from their habitat.

When I was with Sam Farr 2 years ago in Monterey Bay, I went out into the bay with some young researchers from the Stanford center that's there. And they pointed out some small ocean organisms that just 50 years ago were 20 miles to the south. Minuscule organisms that move that far in 50 years.