First Posted: 1/30/2015

CLARKS SUMMIT — Congressman Tom Marino, R-10, laid out three initiatives he described as “game changers” in Washington D.C. during a town hall meeting with constituents on Thursday, Jan. 29 at the Ramada Hotel.

Marino believes there should be a term limit of 12 years in office, only one subject at a time should be voted on, and no leader should be able to stop a piece of legislation from going to the floor for a vote if it makes it out of a committee.

“Leadership on both sides of the aisle doesn’t believe in any of this,” he said. “We can do this legislatively, but the states can do this through constitutional convictions. I think we need the states to get the ball rolling.”

According to Marino, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), through the Army Corp of Engineers, has tightened restrictions on farms through the Navigable Waters Act.

“They’re saying if it rains and a mud puddle forms on the property or even if there is spilled milk in a dairy farm, the EPA has control of that farm,” he said.

Keith Eckel, owner of Eckels Farm in Clarks Summit, is worried about the implications of regulations on farms in Pennsylvania.

“I have a very serious concern about the EPA regulating the agricultural industry in this state,” he said. “I think it’s absolute overreach and it probably threatens the use of one-third of the acreage in the state. I was president of the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau in the 1980s and we worked with Pennsylvania leadership, at that time, to establish a new management program in the state. The overreach that we’re seeing now is taking away the power of the state, but it’s really threatening the use of our farmland.”

Marino was recently appointed as a chairman of the subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial and Antitrust Law and believes changes need to be made regarding regulations.

“We need to do a lot of reforming our regulatory system,” Marino said. “There are too many laws and rules on the books that haven’t been run through Congress.

“Over the past 50 years, Congress has given too much authority to the executive branch,” Marino added. “We’re going to start looking at duplications and laws that are three or four times what they should be. We’re going to start dismantling them. We’re going to do tax reform, I think you’re going to see major changes on the tax code.”

Marino described Obamacare as a “serious economic problem.”

“We’re going to appeal and try to replace the program,” he said. “It’s probably the worst piece of legislation ever passed in the history of this country.It’s going to be a long, drawn out, expensive process. I think everyone should have health care and if there are those who can’t afford it, then we, as Americans, have to help those individuals, but (Obamacare) was not to way to go about it.”