Move over, Harry Reid — Rep. Heath Shuler (D-NC) has become the new king of Capitol Hill real-estate riches. The Tennessee Valley Authority just announced a new water-access deal for members of an investment group, which includes Shuler, the former Volunteer quarterback. Just coincidentally, Shuler happens to sit on the House subcommittee that oversees the TVA (via Instapundit):
TVA has approved a water-access deal for a development group whose investors include U.S. Rep. Heath Shuler, D-N.C., who sits on a committee that exercises oversight of the federal utility.
On June 3, TVA CEO Tom Kilgore approved a transaction that provides 145 feet of water-access rights along the shoreline of Watts Bar Reservoir in Roane County to an entity called The Cove at Blackberry Ridge LLC. In exchange, The Cove agreed to relinquish 150 feet of water-access rights in Rhea County and also provide approximately $15,000 for a bank stabilization project at a different location on Watts Bar Reservoir.
Investors in The Cove at Blackberry Ridge include Shuler, a first-term Democrat from western North Carolina who is a former star quarterback for the University of Tennessee football team. Shuler sits on the House transportation committee’s Subcommittee on Water Resources and the Environment, one of two congressional panels that provide formal oversight of TVA.
A financial disclosure statement filed by Shuler for 2007 showed his investment in The Cove fell in a range between $5 million and $25 million.
Wow. I guess a middling career in the NFL still pays pretty well, huh? He has at least $5 million tied up in The Cove, and perhaps as much as $25 million. With that kind of investment, I’d say that Shuler needs to make sure it pays off for him, right?
How fortunate he just happens to sit on the committee that can make TVA’s life very, very uncomfortable. I’m sure that all of this is just coincidental, though. Shuler probably cares more about good water access policy than he does about millions of his own money going down the drain … right?
Right?
Sure.
