Vitter says he’ll have greater impact as governor

U.S. Sen. David Vitter, R-Metairie, who plans to run for governor in 2015, said Wednesday he believes he can have a much greater positive impact in that capacity than in the Senate.
Vitter was the guest speaker at the St. Mary Industrial Group’s monthly meeting at the Petroleum Club of Morgan City.
Vitter made the announcement of his plans to run for governor in January. Vitter wants to implement a proper spending plan and tax reforms in order to stabilize the state’s budget and have opportunities for priorities, he said.
“On the spending side, I think we need to be able to share pain where we have a downturn and not just decimate higher education,” Vitter said. He does not want to continue to see those cuts to higher education, he said.
Vitter believes the state can get rid of some unjustified tax credits or exemptions to use those to spur growth and create more state revenue, he said.
The majority of the U.S. Senate is “up for grabs” during the fall elections and will come down to 10 to 12 key races with the Louisiana Senate race between Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-New Orleans, and Bill Cassidy among those races, Vitter said.
Vitter is currently the ranking Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee, which includes infrastructure and everything related to the Environmental Protection Agency, he said.
Vitter worked with Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-California, to pass the Water Resources Reform and Development Act and Water Infrastructure Bill, which was passed a few weeks ago. “It’s a good, solid, bi-partisan bill that does a lot of crucial things for Louisiana,” Vitter said. “It moves forward with important hurricane flood protection including Morganza to the Gulf.”
The bill helps the state’s coastal restoration plan with key projects and brings “long overdue” reforms to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Vitter said. The bill institutes accountability and puts monetary penalties on the corps when it misses deadlines, he said.
Another part of the bill for Louisiana is maritime commerce, which prioritizes dredging, and port, harbor and waterway maintenance, he said.
Vitter is also working on highway projects and would plan to bring an infrastructure focus to the state level if elected governor, he said.
Boxer and Vitter butt heads a lot more on the environmental side of the committee, Vitter said. “I’ve been very active as the lead Republican on the committee, again, leading conservatives, leading Republicans against what has been just dramatic overreach, in my opinion, by the Obama administration EPA,” Vitter said.
Three or four new sets of major EPA rules and regulations are in the works that will have dramatic effects in terms of regulating the energy industry and other industries, he said. Vitter has worked to fight back against overreach by the EPA and limit the negative effects to industry, he said. “Unfortunately, our ability to do that is pretty constrained in the minority,” Vitter said. “But there is a solution to that problem and that’s this fall’s election.”
Vitter referenced the huge growth in the energy sector, and said he is fighting constraints put on the industry. “We are in a historic time because of new technology and horizontal drilling and other things,” he said. “We are discovering and accessing American energy resources that we never imagined existed just a few decades ago,” Vitter said.
Vitter’s father, who is deceased, worked most of his career as chief of production for Chevron and would be amazed by the energy resources available, Vitter said.
“The only question is, is the federal government going to let us get it and really get out of the way in a reasonable way?,” Vitter said.
Without the new energy jobs in the country, right now, the U.S. would still be in a recession, he said. “At the same time, Washington is holding us back,” Vitter said. “I’m working a lot of different avenues to try to remove those roadblocks to try to let us reach our full potential in a responsible, productive way.”
Though the U.S. and state have had oil and gas industry booms in the past, Vitter wants the energy industry boom the country is going through to be sustainable, he said. “I want us all, collectively, to do it differently this time and not just be prosperous by accident but be great by choice,” Vitter said.