Jordan Cove on May 21 appeared to have made an influential friend as Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., spoke of the project's benefits at a committee hearing on gas supply and export. Wyden recognized that the community near the project is divided between supporting it for the jobs and taxes it represents and opposing it for environmental reasons and impacts on residents, but he agreed with John Mohlis, executive secretary for the Oregon Building and Construction Trades Council, that the community could use the jobs after declines in the timber and fishing industries. Wyden promised to work with Mohlis. The council represents about 25,000 construction workers.