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[Pages S138-S139]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
TRIBUTE TO MAE STEVENS
Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I would like to take this opportunity to
thank Mae Stevens, a member of my legislative staff, for her service on
my behalf to the people of Maryland and the Nation. Mae Stevens has
served as my environmental policy adviser since 2015. In this role, she
has advanced my priorities as the ranking member of the Transportation
and Infrastructure Subcommittee on the Senate Environment and Public
Works Committee. She has dedicated much of her time as a member of my
staff to formulating and advancing sound policies at the intersection
of drinking water, wastewater, stormwater, source water protection,
equity, and affordability. I very much appreciate all that we achieved
during her tenure in my office. Mae has spent more than 7 years on
Capitol Hill and, 9 years prior to that, at various nonprofit
environmental organizations.
Mae enrolled at Columbia University's School of International and
Public Affairs to earn a master of public administration from
Columbia's Earth Institute. After Mae received her MPA, she worked as a
policy adviser in the clean energy program at Third Way. From there,
she joined the office of Representative Russ Carnahan, who represented
Missouri's Third Congressional District. Later, she worked for
Representative Matt Cartwright of Pennsylvania, who represented the
17th Congressional District at the time.
Mae learned about hard work from her parents. Her father Raymond
``Art'' Stevens owned an ice cream parlor in Royal Oak, MI, and her
mother Jaky Van Dox dressed mannequins in clothing stores in the metro
Detroit area. They spent every extra penny they had on ice skating
lessons for their daughter, teaching her the grit, dedication, and
perseverance she uses every day in my office. I know they are extremely
proud of the good work she has done in my office and will continue to
do in private sector.
Mae believes that people in every community across America--urban,
rural, and suburban--have a right to expect that the water coming from
their tap is safe to drink and that Congress will do everything within
its power to ensure that happens. Mae helped me to ensure that, for the
third Water Resources Development Act--WRDA--in a row, Congress
included updates to our Nation's drinking water, wastewater, and
stormwater infrastructure to meet our water infrastructure backlog
demands, while addressing the needs of our communities and our
environment.
[[Page S139]]
Mae also fought for Maryland priorities in the Senate's 2018 WRDA,
including helping me double the amount of Federal funding spent on
drinking water infrastructure, nationally and at the State level, and
reauthorize the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act, WIFIA,
a low-cost financing mechanism for large water infrastructure projects.
Baltimore, MD, is one of 12 projects in nine States that will receive
the first of the WIFIA grants in 2019. This will help the 1.8 million
people served by the Baltimore Department of Public Works continue to
have some of the cleanest, safest, and more reliable drinking water in
the country.
Clean water is not a partisan issue, and Mae worked with her
colleagues on both sides of the aisle and Capitol Hill to develop
legislation that will benefit our aging water resources and
infrastructure. The Senate passed the 2018 WRDA reauthorization by a
vote of 99-1, a testament to the hard, bipartisan work of the majority
and minority staff on EPW, personal staff like Mae, and the committee
members. I was proud to be involved.
Mae conscientiously strives to reduce her personal carbon footprint.
One way she does this is by commuting to and from work on her bike. She
helped me to increase funding for the Transportation Alternatives
Program, TAP, and ensure that cities and counties continue to have a
voice in how Federal dollars are spent on these important programs in
the Fixing America's Surface Transportation--FAST--Act.
As the British primatologist and anthropologist Jane Goodall has
said, ``"You cannot get through a single day without having an impact
on the world around you. What you do makes a difference and you have to
decide what kind of a difference you want to make.'' I want to thank
Mae Stevens for the difference she has decided to make--and will
continue to make--and wish her the best of luck in her future
endeavors. Of course, even though she is leaving the Hill, she will
always be a member of Team Cardin.
____________________