DREXEL HILL, PA – Following up on his visit this week to Weston Solutions Inc., a West Chester-based environmental redevelopment and reclamation company, Pat Meehan, the Republican candidate for Congress, today released a statement on his visit and his views on how to increase usage of environmentally sustainable energy resources, clean energy, and green jobs.
The visit was part of Meehan’s continuing tour of local businesses to discuss economic recovery and job creation issues and policies. In recent weeks, Meehan met with a number of small business owners in the Ridley Park Business District, business owners in Clifton Heights, and toured the light manufacturing and distribution company Capp USA.
“We need to do a better job of encouraging private innovation and public collaboration in the area of environmental sustainability,” said Meehan. “Weston, for example, is currently working in a public-private partnership with the City of Chester to develop the land adjacent to Chester’s new soccer stadium in an environmentally-sustainable manner. This type of partnership between private business and government is the way forward as we move towards a more sustainable future.”
Meehan noted that Weston employs hundreds of individuals in the region and has been involved in many of this nation’s most technically demanding environmental projects, including the installation of pumps in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and the cleanup of the aftermath of the Shuttle Columbia disaster. “Investments in our infrastructure and environmental sustainability mean jobs, and Weston is proof of that,” said Meehan.
Meehan also touted his support for the long-term extension of green energy tax credits, noting that businesses and investment projects require many years of planning and development.
“While Congress has in the past continued to extend these tax credits, I would like to see us lock these credits in on an even longer term basis than currently exists,” said Meehan. “This type of forward thinking is important for the financing of projects that are still in the early planning stages. The more long-term certainty that the federal government can create, the better off we will be in encouraging this type of investment. When businesses cannot accurately estimate the cost of projects, this creates an uncertainty that kills jobs.”
Meehan pointed to recent Congressional testimony by Rob Atkinson, President of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation that highlighted the United States’ competitive disadvantage in this area. Atkinson testified that a recent study by Deutsche Bank found that “generous and well-targeted [clean energy] incentives” in China and Japan will create a low-risk environment for investors and stimulate high levels of private investment in clean energy. These nations rely on a comprehensive and integrated government plan, supported by strong incentives. In contrast, the investment firm notes, the United States is a “moderate-risk” country since it relies on “a more volatile market incentive approach and has suffered from a start-stop approach in some areas.”
“To be competitive in the global economy in the area of clean energy, we have to make investments in clean energy less of a risk for investors,” said Meehan. “That requires long-term strategic thinking by our policy-makers in Congress that has largely been lacking.”
About Pat Meehan
A former U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and the former District Attorney of Delaware County, Pat Meehan has a proven record of rooting out government waste and corruption, prosecuting tough criminal cases, and implementing innovative new programs to make our communities safer. As U.S. Attorney, Meehan helped coordinate the region’s terrorism preparedness and response, held manufacturers responsible for illegally discharging hazardous materials into the region’s waters, and established a group to crackdown on predatory lending. Pat, his wife Carolyn and their three sons Patrick, Jack and Colin, reside in Drexel Hill, Delaware County. For more information, please visit www.meehanforcongress.com.
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