mr. brennan, you are recognized for five minutes. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. sorry about that. thank you for this opportunity to testify on behalf of the national restaurant association and restaurant industry, as you said in my introductioni'm from the ralph brennan restaurant group, i've been involved in the restaurant industry in new orleans for almost 30 years and my family has been in the restaurant business for more than 60 ars, weoperate 12 restaurants, nine in new orleans. gulf seafood is an important ingredient in all of our menus. i want to thank you for holding this hearing and i appreciate the opportunity to tell the restaurant industry's partf the story. ours is on industry that employs an estimated 2.3 million employees in the gulf coast region, restaurants generat be a $77 billion in annual sales. since april 20th when oil began flowing into the gulf of mexico, our coast line, sea life and tourism economy are again in great jep appeared. after hurricane katrina roared ashore on august 29, 2005, businesses knew how to return to normal or what we c