To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 122 West Elwood Avenue in Raeford, North Carolina, as the "Bobby Marshall Gentry Post Office Building".

Mr. Chairman, today we are debating a bill that claims to improve Federal regulations, reduce red tape and paperwork. Unfortunately, the substance and the timing of this bill make it clear that we are engaged not in public policy but in public relations.

This bill is part of the congressional Republicans' Hire Our Workers plan, also called the HOW plan. This is a public relations strategy designed to make the public think that Republicans in Congress have a plan to increase jobs and revive the economy, but in reality the plan is all show and no substance.

My Republican colleagues are going to spend a lot of time today talking about their opposition to paperwork, but here is what they will not tell us. The Bush administration and the Republican Congress have presided over record increases in paperwork. President Bush consistently rails against paperwork. He urged paperwork reductions as a Presidential candidate, as President-elect, in every year of his administration, and on at least seven separate occasions thus far this year. Just 2 months ago, President Bush said: ``We need to stop harassing small business owners and entrepreneurs with endless amounts of regulation and paperwork.''

So how do his policies match up? Last year Americans spent 700 million more hours filling out government forms than they did during the last year of the Clinton administration. This was not an accident, and it was not the product of an out-of-control bureaucracy. Most of the increase came from legislation supported by the administration and passed by the Republican majority in the Congress. In fact, the major culprits are the tax bills that President Bush promoted and Congress passed.

The administration and the Republican leadership are putting this bill before the Congress so they proclaim they are doing something about governmental red tape.

They are doing something. They are increasing record levels of the amount of paperwork that we have to deal with.

The gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney) and I released a reported today that documents how paperwork has increased under the Bush administration, and I am going to insert this report with my comments today. What is happening on paperwork is just like what has happened on so many other issues. The President says he is a fiscal conservative, but he has driven our Nation deep into debt. The President says he is behind education, he is the Education President, but he will not fund the No Child Left Behind Act.

And with this bill we see that when the President says he will cut paperwork, what actually happens is that he increases paperwork.

This public relations campaign on paperwork is especially distressing because there are real regulatory problems this Congress is ignoring. These include the increased politicization of science and the undue influence of special interests. But unless we adopt the amendment that the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney) and I will be offering, this bill will do nothing to address these fundamental problems. This legislation will not improve the economy, reduce paperwork, or enhance the well-being of this country. It will only make it harder for agencies to carry out their mandates to protect public health, the environment, and other values. This Congress should be taking real action to address real problems.

I urge my colleagues to vote for our amendment when we offer it later in the debate.

House of Representatives, Committee on Government Reform--Minority

Staff, Special Investigations Division, Revised May 2004

Government Paperwork Burdens Have Increased Substantially Under the

Bush Administration

(Prepared for Representative John F. Tierney, Representative Henry A.

Waxman)

Executive Summary

President Bush has made reducing the burdens of completing

government paperwork a key item in his economic agenda. In

speech after speech, he emphasizes that ``we must reduce

unnecessary government regulation and red tape so businesses

can focus on consumers and customers, not paperwork.''

Contrary to the President's rhetoric, however, total

government paperwork has increased substantially under the

Bush Administration to an estimated 8.1 billion hours in

fiscal year 2003. Last year, Americans spent over 700 million

more hours filing out government paperwork than in the last

year of the Clinton Administration. The largest annual

increase in paperwork burden ever measured occurred under the

Bush Administration in fiscal year 2002.

Government paperwork increased again in fiscal year 2003.

In its most recent data on paperwork burdens, the Bush

Administration relies on ``adjustments'' to show a nominal

reduction in the federal paperwork burden in fiscal year

2003. However, adjustments in agency paperwork estimates do

not necessarily reflect any actual reduction in the number of

hours that Americans spend filling out paperwork. Focusing on

the real impacts on Americans, GAO reports that ``[d]uring

fiscal year 2003, the total paperwork burden, exclusive of

adjustments, increased again by about 72 million burden

hours.''

Statutory changes promoted by President Bush and enacted by

Congress, particularly to the tax code, are among the largest

sources of the increased paperwork burden. The Administration

is also pursuing new regulatory changes that will impose

additional paperwork burdens on Americans, including

increased paperwork requirements for low-income families.

I. President Bush's Promises To Reduce Paperwork

President George W. Bush has frequently criticized the

amount of ``paperwork'' required by the federal government.

From the very outset of his campaign for the presidency,

President Bush emphasized his commitment to reduce government

paperwork. In an address in Los Angeles in September 1999,

for example, President Bush said:

``The only thing we know for sure is that federal money

comes with a lot of regulations and paperwork. By one

estimate, this consumes about 50 million hours each year--the

equivalent of 25,000 full-time employees just to process the

forms. . . . New layers of federal mandates and procedures

have been added to the old until their original purpose is

long forgotten. It is a sad story of high hopes, how

achievement, grand plans, and unmet goals. My administration

will do things differently.''

Since being elected, President Bush has continued to

promise to reduce government paperwork burdens. He argues

that paperwork ``stifle[s] innovation and the entrepreneurial

spirit,'' and he has said that ``we must reduce unnecessary

government regulation and red tape so businesses can focus on

consumers and customers, not paperwork.''

In a speech last December, President Bush stated:

``And a lot of times government has a tendency to over-

regulate, which is a non-productive cost to these small

business owners who would rather be employing people and

making it easier for somebody to find work, than filling out

reams of paperwork that probably doesn't get read anyway.''

President Bush has repeatedly stated his commitment to

reducing federal paperwork requirements and he made doing so

a key element of his ``Six-Point Plan for the Economy.'' In

September 2003, President Bush stated: ``We need to

continue to work for regulatory relief on small and large

businesses, so that instead of filing needless paperwork,

you're working to make your work force more productive and

to meet the needs of your customers.'' In November 2003,

he stated: ``We've got to cut useless government

regulations. We need to do it at the federal level. . . .

We need to make sure our entrepreneurs are focused on job

creation, not filling out needless paperwork.'' In March

2004, President Bush reiterated these points:

I bet you spend a lot of time filling out paperwork. I bet

not much of your paperwork is ever read. The government needs

to let you focus on your business, on developing goods and

services. It needs to let you focus on hiring people, rather

than spending hours filling out paperwork. In order for us to

keep jobs here at home and expand the job base, we need

better regulatory policy at the federal, state, and local

level.

Just over a month ago, President Bush said: ``We need to

stop harassing small business owners and entrepreneurs with

endless amounts of regulation and paperwork.''

President Bush has also touted actions he has taken to

reduce paperwork. In May 2003, he highlighted the

establishment of a task force on reducing paperwork:

To enhance economic security for working people throughout

the economy we must reduce the burden of regulation and

litigation on small businesses as well. Employers don't want

to spend their time and resources filling out forms or

fighting junk lawsuits. They want to be out on the shop floor

or behind the cash register creating profits and jobs. And

that is why this administration has launched a task force to

find ways to reduce paperwork and small-business owners in

America. We must enact regulatory and lawsuit reforms so that

our business owners can do what they do best: create jobs.

In June 2003, President Bush took credit for an executive

order that purported to reduce paperwork burdens, stating:

``I'm concerned and mindful about what paperwork and

regulations do to small businesses. So I put down an

executive order that requires all federal regulatory agencies

to minimize the burden on our small businesses.''

II. Paperwork increase under the Bush Administration

There is a large gap between President Bush's rhetoric

about the need for paperwork reduction and the performance of

his Administration. According to data from the General

Accounting Office and the Office of Management and Budget,

the burden of government paperwork on American citizens has

actually increased substantially under the Bush

Administration. At the same time as President Bush has been

promising to reduce paperwork burdens, Americans are actually

spending more time doing paperwork than ever before.

A. The Requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act

The primary tool for measuring and controlling paperwork

requirements imposed by federal law and regulations is the

Paperwork Reduction Act. Collecting information is essential

for the government to collect taxes, administer programs, and

enforce laws. The Paperwork Reduction Act aims to make these

information collections as efficient as possible. It requires

agencies to estimate the time it will take to fill out a form

or otherwise provide information to the government, obtain

approvals of larger information collection requests from the

Office of Management and Budget, and reduce the overall hours

of paperwork by a given percent each year.

Each agency is required to submit a report each year

providing the number of paperwork burden hours that the

agency imposed during the previous year. The annual PRA

reports from each federal agency provide a picture of the

total hours of paperwork required by the federal government.

For the past several years, GAO has analyzed these reports

annually at Congress' request. This report relies on the

analyses provided by GAO, as well as data provided to

Congress from the Office of Management and Budget.

B. Total Paperwork Burdens

The annual paperwork burden today is over 700 million

burden hours higher than it was when President Bush took

office. In fiscal year 2000, the annual paperwork burden

imposed by the federal government was measured at about 7.4

billion hours. By the end of fiscal year 2003, the annual

paperwork burden stood at 8.1 billion burden hours. This is

an increase of nearly 10%.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) accounts for more

paperwork than any other federal agency, with 81% of the

total paperwork hours. In contrast, EPA currently accounts

for only 1.8% of federal paperwork burden, and the Department

of Labor, including OSHA, accounts for only 2.0% of federal

paperwork burden.

C. A Record Increase in Paperwork Burdens in Fiscal Year 2002

The first two years of the Bush Administration saw large

increases in the number of hours of paperwork burden. In

fiscal year 2001, the federal government required 7.6 billion

hours of paperwork, an increase of 290 million hours from the

year before.

In fiscal year 2002, the increase in the paperwork burden

was approximately 570 million hours. Almost 300 million hours

of this increase was due to program changes that added or

reinstated paperwork obligations. This was the largest

increase in paperwork since the Paperwork Reduction Act was

amended in 1995. The total paperwork burden for fiscal year

2002 was 8.2 billion hours.

D. Increases in Paperwork Burdens in Fiscal Year 2003

This year, the Administration is reporting a small decline

in the overall number of reported paperwork burden hours from

last year's record high of 8.2 billion hours to 8.1 billion

hours.

According to the General Accounting Office, however,

``[t]his year, the story, while on the surface may appear

encouraging, is not.'' GAO's analysis reveals that the

purported drop in government paperwork is entirely due to

``adjustments'' that ``are not the result of direct federal

government action but rather are caused by factors such as .

. . agency reestimates of the burden associated with a

collection of information.'' GAO concludes that ``[d]uring

fiscal year 2003 the total paperwork burden, exclusive of

adjustments, increased again by about 72 million burden

hours.''

E. Causes of the Paperwork Increases

Much of the increases in paperwork burden since fiscal year

2000 has been driven by statutory changes proposed by the

Administration and passed by Congress.

The largest sources of statutory increases in paperwork

have been the recent tax law changes, which have introduced

substantial additional complexity and burden for individuals

and small businesses in filling out

their tax forms. For example, Americans spent an additional

330 million hours filling out tax paperwork in fiscal year

2002, with the implementation of the Economic Growth and Tax

Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 and other IRS regulations.

Similarly, the IRS reports that its implementation of the

Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003

``generated an estimated 113.9 million additional hours of

burden.''

One example of the increased paperwork is the changes to

the taxation of capital gains in the Jobs and Growth Tax

Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003. To implement these

provisions, the IRS made numerous changes to Form 1040, Form

1040A, and associated schedules. Among other changes, the IRS

added 13 extra lines to Schedule D, which taxpayers must file

to report their capital gains and losses. Overall, just this

portion of the paperwork changes driven by the Jobs and

Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003 increased the

paperwork burden for individual taxpayers by over 16 million

hours in fiscal year 2003. For families with modest incomes

and few capital gains, the increased paperwork burdens

significantly offset any benefit from the capital gains tax

reductions.

The paperwork increases have also hit small businesses.

Together the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of

2003 and the 2000 Community Renewal Act added complexity to

Form 1120S and its associated schedules. These forms are used

by S corporations, which are often small businesses or the

self-employed. Due to these added complexities, S corporation

filers spent almost 12 million additional hours filling out

tax forms in fiscal year 2003.

F. Increases in Future Paperwork Burdens

Additional paperwork increases are likely in fiscal year

2004 and future years under policies being pursued by the

Bush Administration. For example, the Bush Administration

will require labor unions to report extensive new financial

information starting in fiscal year 2004. Under the new rule,

all unions with annual receipts of at least $250,000 will be

required to report almost all of their receipts and

disbursements. It is estimated that roughly 4,500 labor

organizations will have to comply with this requirement, only

65 of which are large international unions. One union, the

Airline Pilots Association, estimates that the required

reports will produce 15,863 pages, or about five-and-a-half

feet of paper, each year.

Based on a survey of unions, the new reporting requirements

were estimated to cost unions somewhere in the range of $700

million to $1.1 billion per year. The same report estimated

that fullfilling the new reporting requirements would require

on average, roughly 353 hours per union employee, per year.

The Bush Administration is also currently testing new

paperwork requirements for low- and moderate-income families

to demonstrate their eligibility for the Child Tax Credit

portion of the Earned Income Tax Credit. This is an important

tax credit for workers in low wage jobs and the recently

unemployed who have children to support.

Under the pilot program that applies to 50,000 individuals,

persons seeking the credit must supply proof from a third

party that the child they are claiming under the Earned

Income Tax Credit lived with them for more than six months in

that year. The individual must produce official records

meeting the proof requirements, an affidavit from a third

party, signed under penalty of perjury, or a letter on

official letterhead from a third party, such as a landlord or

social service agency employee. The IRS estimates that this

new requirement imposes an additional 40 minutes of paperwork

burden for each person filling out these forms.

III. Conclusion

As a candidate, George Bush railed against government

paperwork burdens and promised that ``[m]y administration

will do things differently.'' As President, Mr. Bush

continues to urge reductions in government paperwork burdens.

But in practice, the Bush Administration has actually

increased paperwork burdens. Today, Americans are filling out

far more paperwork under the Bush Administration than ever

before.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4 minutes of debate time.

H.R. 2432, the bill that is before us today, is intended to improve the way that Federal agencies create and implement regulations, but in its current form this legislation will do nothing to address the most serious threat to the integrity of the regulatory process: political interference with science.

Without good science for policymakers, we cannot make the best policy judgments. We as policymakers or the regulatory agencies need good science, science that has not been interfered with by politicians. That is why the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney) and I are offering this amendment to establish an independent commission to investigate whether science is being politicized and to make recommendations to Congress to protect scientific integrity.

This amendment responds to the concerns of the scientific community. Twenty Nobel Laureates, major scientific organizations, and leading scientific and medical journals have protested a pattern of political interference with science by the Bush administration. This pattern has involved gagging scientists, suppressing research, and rewriting reports to eliminate scientific answers that conflict with the administration's political or ideological agenda. It has also involved misleading the public and Congress on key scientific facts, manipulating performance measures for ideologically favored programs, and stacking advisory committees, scientific advisory committees stacked with people who will come up with the right political answer.

The Bush administration's interference with science has undermined efforts to protect the public's health, safeguard the environment, and even provide accurate information about the war on terrorism. We have a report that we have prepared called ``Politics and Science in the Bush Administration,'' and it goes through a whole pattern of interference with scientific decisions.

We have heard about the interference with scientific research at the National Institutes of Health. We have heard about suppression of information where the environmental scientist wanted to talk about the global warming issue, but their report was taken out of the overall category of information about environmental problems in this country. We know that this administration favors the kinds of programs that would talk about abstinence for sex for teenagers, and they do not want to really talk about some of the other programs that have a broader perspective, including family planning.

But even in the last couple of days, we have another example where we even are seeing that accurate information that is needed for us to have about the war on terrorism is being stopped. The State Department did a report on patterns of global terrorism; and according to the report, terrorist attacks fell to a record low in 2003. At the press conference releasing the report, Deputy Secretary Armitage said: ``You will find in these pages clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight.''

But this is a fabrication resulting from manipulation of the data. In fact, significant terrorist attacks reached a 20-year high in 2003. It is deplorable

that this administration would manipulate data to make it seem like terrorism is less a threat than ever when, in reality, the very opposite is true.

I ask my colleagues today to join me in supporting this amendment. It is supported by a wide range of groups, including the League of Conservation Voters, Planned Parenthood, and the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Respect for evidence and the scientific process is not a partisan issue. I urge that we take the responsible step of supporting an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the politicization of science and restore scientific integrity across the Federal Government.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, the August report was updated on November 13, 2003. They are practically identical reports.

Whatever the amendment provides. It does not make too much difference. It is the same report with the same substance outlining the political interference with science by the Bush administration.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to point out that science has already been politicized by the Bush administration, and that is what our report has pointed out. This report was favorably received in the leading scientific journal Nature. It was cited dozens of times in scientific and medical literature, including the New England Journal of Medicine and Science.

The issue that we pointed out is named the fifth most important story of 2003 by Discover magazine. When we point out how the Bush administration has politicized science, we are accused of being supporters of left-wing organizations and we should not politicize science.

Let us get an independent, bipartisan commission to review whether science has been manipulated and distorted and otherwise subjected to political pressures by this administration.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

There is no transparency when this administration appoints people to a lead poisoning scientific committee and puts a person on who represents the industry point of view, comes right from the industry, and then comes in and recommends a level of lead that is harmful to kids.

It is not transparency when references to global warming are taken out at the insistence of the White House, the EPA administrator is forced to drop it out of his or her analysis of overall problems.

It is not transparency when we have Web sites that say to women, you should worry about having an abortion because it could lead to breast cancer when there is no scientific basis for it.

What we have is continuous interference in scientific decisions by the political people in this administration.

We need to respond to the concerns that have been raised by 20 Nobel laureates, by Science Magazine, Nature Magazine, New England Journal of Medicine, leading scientific organizations, including the American Academy For the Advancement of Science, by making sure that we have good scientific data, not politicized scientific data.

We are calling for a bipartisan commission to examine this politicization of science that we are now seeing so frequently by this administration, so that we can stop it and let the policymakers make the decision based on good science.

Our country is losing its edge as a leader in science because scientists do not want to work in an atmosphere where an administration wants to just do favors for the right-wing religious extremists who want to stop science that might offend their notions of what they think is appropriate. And they do not want to work for an administration in the scientific area where industry groups that reward this administration with campaign contributions are rewarded by having the science distorted to suit their needs.

I ask for support for the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I rise to address H.R. 2432, the Paperwork and Regulatory Improvements Act of 2004. We are talking about this bill today because House Republicans are concerned that they are being criticized for the millions of jobs that have been lost under this administration.

House Republicans have decided that instead of taking action to create jobs, they would make a plan to talk about taking action to create jobs. Each week they have a different theme. This week they are talking about cutting red tape. The bill we are considering, however, does nothing to cut red tape.

As we will hear later from the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), this bill does nothing to reduce the hours that Americans spend filling out paperwork. In fact, the hours Americans must spend filling out paperwork has increased dramatically under the Bush administration.

This bill will also do nothing to improve the regulations issued by the Bush administration. In fact, some provisions of the bill will actually make the regulatory process worse.

I have a letter that I would like to enter into the Record to appear after my statement, Mr. Chairman, from the League of Conservation Voters opposing this bill. This letter states, ``At best, this bill would result in a waste of money at a time when Federal resources are shrinking; at worst, it would contribute to a loss of vital protections for millions of Americans.''

The League of Conservation Voters also expresses in their letter support for an amendment the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) and I are offering that would establish an independent commission of distinguished experts to investigate the politicization of science in the regulatory process. The League of Conservation Voters thinks this is such an

important issue that Members may find their votes in the League of Conservation Voters scorecard.

Leading scientists, including 20 Nobel Laureates, have said the political and ideological distortion of science is a major block to effective government action on a wide range of health and environmental issues. This administration is injecting itself into the regulatory process to manipulate science and to manipulate agency regulations to suit industry.

Over and over we hear about agency proposals that are rewritten by the Office of Management and Budget to fit the needs of industry without regard to the expertise of agency scientists and other experts. The administration's proposal on mercury pollution is one recent example. The gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) will describe these particular problems in more detail at a later time.

We should not be here just talking about cutting red tape, Mr. Chairman. We should not be passing legislation that will weaken important regulatory protections that aim to ensure a safe and healthy environment for our children. What we should be doing is taking positive steps to make the regulatory process better for all Americans.

League of Conservation Voters,

May 18, 2004.

Re: Oppose H.R. 2342, Support the Waxman (D-CA)/Tierney (D-

MA) Amendment

U.S. House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Dear Representatives: The League of Conservation Voters

(LCV) is the political voice of the national environmental

community. Each year, LCV publishes the National

Environmental Scorecard, which details the voting records of

Members of Congress on environmental legislation. The

Scorecard is distributed to LCV members, concerned voters

nationwide, and the press.

LCV urges you to oppose H.R. 2432, which would require the

Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to assess the

feasibility of imposing regulatory budgeting on major

agencies. Regulatory budgeting is a misguided concept that

elevates the interests of regulated industries over all other

considerations. At best, this bill would result in a waste of

money at a time when federal resources are shrinking; at

worst, it would contribute to a loss of vital protections for

millions of Americans.

Regulatory budgeting caps the costs that government can

impose on the private sector each year, regardless of the

need for public protections. Under this system, once the

``budgeted'' cap has been reached, agencies must cease

fulfilling their mandates--polluters get a free pass,

workplaces go unprotected, and hazardous foods move into

commerce.

OMB should be directed to account for actions that have

taken place over the past three years as scores of critical

safeguards have been weakened, rescinded, or abandoned in

progress. LCV has noted with alarm the accumulating threat to

public health and the environment caused by the rollback of

regulations intended, to prevent destruction of the ozone

layer, reduce air pollution, prevent neurological harm to

children, reduce public exposure to toxins and contaminants,

preserve crucial habitat for endangered species, ensure clean

drinking water.

LCV supports the Waxman-Tierney Amendment to create a

Commission on Politicization of Science in the Regulatory

Process. The Commission would evaluate regulatory activities

to determine the extent to which political considerations

have undermined the quality and use of the science, and

report within 18 months. This commission will address

concerns among scientists and government professionals that

political considerations are unduly influencing regulatory

decisions.

Americans expect that the science used in development of

regulations is not colored by politics. Please oppose H.R.

2432 and support the Waxman Amendment. LCV's Political

Advisory Committee may consider including votes on this issue

in compiling LCV's 2003 Scorecard. If you need more

information, please call Betsy Loyless in my office at (202)

785-8683.

Sincerely,

Deb Callahan,

President.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), the ranking member of the full committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, as I noted, under this administration, we have had the largest increases in the number of hours of paperwork burden ever.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Mrs. Eddie Bernice Johnson).

Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleague to stay around for the amendment that the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) and I will present to talk about politicization of particular projects and policies.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Maloney).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, I continue to be amused by the railing on the other side of all this paperwork burden as if they did not understand that the cause of that was their own administration. The President ran on a platform of cutting back the regulatory burden on businesses; and if you go back in history during that period of time before 2000, you can see speech after speech telling us how terrible the paperwork burden was and what he was going to do to improve it. But the fact of the matter is if you look at the report done for the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) and for me, it states clearly, ``The annual paperwork hours today is over 700 million burden hours higher than it was when President Bush took office.'' In the year 2000, it increased by 7.4 billion hours. In 2003 it went up to 8.1 billion hours. It is an increase of over 10 percent.

The Internal Revenue Service accounts for more paperwork than any other Federal agency with 81 percent of the total paperwork burden hours. Yet that is exactly where most of the increases came. The largest sources of statutory increases in paperwork have been the recent tax law changes. They have been introduced and made a substantial additional complexity and burden for individuals and small businesses in filling out their tax forms.

And that, Mr. Chairman, is the reason for the increase.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Yes, I have additional speakers coming.

Mr. Chairman, I have two more speakers on their way over.

Mr. Chairman, how much time do I have remaining?

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1\1/4\ minutes.

Mr. Chairman, let me reiterate some of the things I may have touched on earlier and maybe one new point. The bill that we are talking about here today really does not reduce paperwork or improve the regulatory process. One of the problems it has, it talks about a study on regulatory budgeting, but yet it does not define the term ``regulatory budget.''

In prior hearings, the subcommittee chairman indicated he thought this was going to set a cap on the cost that an agency's combined regulations could impose on the public. An agency with a regulatory budget would then face an arbitrarily set cap on how much its regulations could cost industry in any given year; and under that system, no consideration whatsoever would be given to why the regulation was needed. Once the agency hit that cost cap, it cannot issue any more regulations even if another regulation is needed to save lives, prevent injuries, protect our environment, or improve homeland security.

One good example of this is the EPA recently announced its new clean air, nonroad diesel rule that, according to the EPA, will cut emissions from industrial and other diesel-powered equipment by over 90 percent. If the EPA had a regulatory budget and had reached its cap for the year, it would not have been able to issue that rule, no matter how necessary the rule or how much pollution it would have cleaned up. That essentially is one of the major problems with this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I think that we cannot allow that type of a study to even start down that path. We do not want to be measuring things just on costs, without factoring in safety obligations and other improvements in homeland security, our environment and preventing injuries.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Solis).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/4\ minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time.

I just say, Mr. Chairman, I think we have heard adequate reasons here why this bill comes up short in what would be a help in any sense in types of burden relief. It does have to be a situation where we are concerned about who is responsible.

One of the colleagues on the other side of the aisle raised that issue that we should not be, but hopefully, we need to enlist the support of this administration and a majority here to help get the burden down, and this administration has had record increases in paperwork burdens, mostly because of the Internal Revenue Code changes that they have made, which have substantially added to that situation.

Not only did it not address the recession and not address the job losses, which have been historic, it also failed to do anything about reducing paperwork burdens and, in fact, increased that substantially.

So I think that this debate has made that clear, Mr. Chairman. I would advise folks to please read the report the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) and I had done and introduced in the Record and vote against this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition; and though I rise to claim the time in opposition, we do not oppose the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, Congress did create a 3-year pilot program in the Truth in Regulating Act, the so-called TIRA act, of 2000. That required the General Accounting Office to report on economically significant rules, if asked by the chairman or the ranking minority member. Authorization for funding was included in the bill; but, unfortunately, during the entire 3-year pilot program, Congress never appropriated any money to fund the project. Because of this, the pilot program never happened.

The bill before us today would make this pilot project permanent, oddly enough. The amendment of the gentleman from California (Mr. Ose) would provide authorization of $5 million each year to fund the project; but the General Accounting Office has said it would need $8 million in actual funds,

not just promised funds, in order to perform the extra work required in this provision.

What the General Accounting Office really supports is making this provision a pilot project instead of making it permanent, which seems to make eminent sense, given the fact that the original pilot program was not able to be conducted. We should fund the pilot program and find out whether it even works before we make it permanent.

Mr. Chairman, I submit for the Record a May 11, 2004, letter from the General Accounting Office comptroller, David Walker, to the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman). In this letter, Mr. Walker writes, and I quote, ``If Congress wants TIRA to continue, we believe it should do so as a pilot project rather than as permanent authority.''

The entire letter is as follows, Mr. Chairman:

United States General

Accounting Office,

Washington, DC, May 11, 2004.

Hon. Tom Davis,

Chairman, Committee on Government Reform, House of

Representatives.

Dear Mr. Chairman: The Truth in Regulating Act of 2000

(TIRA), Pub. L. No. 106-312, 114 Stat. 1248 (Oct. 17, 2000),

became effective on January 15, 2001. (Codified at 5 U.S.C.

Sec. 801 note.) TIRA contemplated a 3-year pilot project,

during which GAO would perform independent evaluations of

``economically significant'' agency rules when requested by a

chairman or ranking member of a committee of jurisdiction of

either House of Congress. The independent evaluation would

include an evaluation of the agency's analysis of the

potential benefits, potential costs, and alternative

approaches considered during the rulemaking proceeding. Under

TIRA, GAO was required to report on our evaluations within

180 calendar days after we received a committee request.

Section 6(b) of the Act, however, provided that the pilot

project would continue only if, in each fiscal year, ``a

specific annual appropriation not less than $5,200,000 or the

pro-rated equivalent thereof shall have been made for the

pilot project.'' Section 6(c) of the Act directed GAO to

submit to Congress, before the conclusion of the 3-year

period, ``a report reviewing the effectiveness of the pilot

project and recommending whether or not Congress should

permanently authorize the pilot project.'' During the 3-year

period contemplated for the pilot project, Congress did not

enact any specific appropriation to cover TIRA evaluations.

The authority for the 3-year pilot project expired on January

15, 2004.

On June 11, 2003, Congressman Ose introduced H.R. 2432

that, in section 5, would make TIRA's pilot permanent. In

August 2003, GAO provided staff of Congressman Ose with

amendments to H.R. 2432 to make clear that the same

limitation enacted in TIRA would continue if H.R. 2432 was

enacted, that is, GAO could not conduct any TIRA evaluations

without a specific appropriation enacted by Congress. (GAO's

proposed amendment enclosed.)

The GAO has conducted no TIRA evaluation. Therefore, in our

view, if Congress wants TIRA to continue, we believe it

should do so as a pilot project rather than as a permanent

authority. Moreover, we cannot support any proposal to make

TIRA permanent, such as H.R. 2432, without the inclusion of

language that makes clear that a specific appropriation must

be enacted before GAO can conduct TIRA reviews. In a recent

GAO report, we noted that the Office of Information and

Regulatory Analysis within the Office of Management and

Budget (OMB) has reviewed approximately 600 ``economically

significant'' rules a year since 1994. While realistically

GAO would only be asked to review selected rules, any

expansion of GAO's scope without additional dedicated

resources would pose a serious problem for us, especially in

light of what will likely be increasing budgetary

constraints. It would also likely serve to adversely affect

our ability to provide the same level of service to the

Congress in connection with our existing statutory

authorities.

TIRA evaluations will require a significant amount of

resources that cannot be absorbed within, for example, GAO's

fiscal year 2004 appropriation, given the substantial present

workload at GAO, our current backlog of pending requests, and

the anticipated need for contracting for specialized

expertise to assist us in our evaluations of particular

rules. Accordingly, we respectfully request that H.R. 24321

be amended to condition GAO's obligation to conduct

independent evaluations on the enactment of a separate and

specific annual appropriation. To cover the cost of such work

we propose an amendment to H.R. 2432 authorizing an annual

appropriation of $8,000,000 for fiscal year 2005.

Thank you for your consideration of this important matter.

Sincerely yours,

David M. Walker,

Comptroller General of the United States.

Enclosure.

amendments to the truth in lending regulating act

Section 5 of Public Law 106-312 is amending by striking

everything after the heading and inserting the following:

(a) There are authorized to be appropriated to the General

Accounting Office to carry out this Act $8,000,000 for fiscal

year 2005.

(b) For each fiscal year thereafter, there are authorized

to be appropriated an amount equal to the prior fiscal year's

authorization plus an amount calculated by multiplying the

prior year's authorization by the change in the Consumer

Price Index as prepared by the Department of Labor for that

fiscal year.

Section 6 of Public Law 106-312 is amended by striking

subsection (b) and inserting the following new subsection

(b):

(b)(1) Absent a specific annual line item appropriation in

the General Accounting Office's appropriation for fiscal year

2005 of not less than $8,000,000 for this purpose, the

General Accounting Office shall not conduct in fiscal year

2005 any independent evaluations as authorized by this Act.

(2) Absent a specific annual line item appropriation in the

General Accounting Office's appropriation for each fiscal

year thereafter of not less than the amount authorized for

that fiscal year by section 5(b) for that purpose, the

General Accounting Office shall not conduct in that fiscal

year any independent evaluations as authorized by this Act.

The underlying bill that we are considering has other problems also, Mr. Chairman, and I will mention those briefly.

One is the provision that would require targeted agencies to participate in a study on regulatory budgeting. And I talked a little about this in the last session we had. An agency with a regulatory budget faces an arbitrary cap on how much its regulations can cost industry. The benefits of regulation, such as saving lives or preventing injuries, are not even considered under such a regulatory budget.

A study of regulatory budgeting may seem harmless enough, but it actually is not. It is one step down the path of regulatory budgeting that would be a step too far. The underlying bill requires every agency to submit every year to the Office of Management and Budget the annual costs and benefits of all rules and paperwork, to the extent feasible, for the entire agency and every program.

Mr. Chairman, I am concerned the committee report states this provision, and I quote, ``requires Federal agencies to submit annual estimates of the costs and benefits associated with the Federal rules and paperwork for each of their agency programs.''

We have not offered an amendment to strike this provision because the committee majority informed us before we considered the bill that this provision is not intended to require agencies to conduct any extra cost-benefit evaluation beyond that which they already prepare. Expanding the use of cost-benefit analysis would divert resources from the work that agencies are supposed to be doing to carry out their core missions, and it would not add value or improve the quality of decision-making in the regulatory process.

I could go on, Mr. Chairman, with the problems in this bill; but the bottom line is this bill does nothing to improve the regulatory process and could, in fact, result in a worsening of the regulatory process.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I will just use the couple of remaining moments to talk about something that both of the last speakers raised.

I think it is important to note that while we are all concerned about paperwork burdens, especially on small businesses, the Internal Revenue Service accounts for more paperwork than any other Federal agency. It is 81 percent of the total paperwork hours. In contrast, the Environmental Protection Agency only accounts for 1.8 percent of Federal paperwork burden; the Department of Labor, including OSHA, only accounts for 2 percent of the Federal paperwork burden. So, again, we get back to the point that if we really want to do something about this, we could look at the tax bills that were passed by this administration which increased the paperwork burden 290 million hours in one year and 570 million in another year and continue to be going at a record pace.

We should be concerned about that, and we should be concerned again about the regulatory budget aspect that is being suggested in this bill. Again, it does not do enough to take care of the issue of regulations needing to be in place to save lives, to prevent injuries, to protect our environment, or to improve homeland security. All of those things must be factored in every bit as much as the dollar cost. And this whole idea of regulatory budgeting would not allow for that. It would in that sense be counterproductive and against the interests of the American people.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I am always amazed to see how frightening it is for our colleagues to be confronted with a nonpartisan study, and that would be by a commission that was appointed by the President and by members of that party and members of this party.

One of the speakers talked about this being political and partisan. Basically, we are in an atmosphere here that is political by nature. It is our obligation, if the President is putting a twist onto different regulations and either avoiding their implementation or manipulating them and missing science altogether, our obligation is to make sure this is set right; and a commission should look at it to make sure that all regulations are either enforced or implemented based on good, hard science and not ideology and politics, as many are accusing the President of doing.

We should not stop with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. We should go on to the New York Times that editorialized that ``the administration belittled, misrepresented, altered, or quashed multiple reports suggesting a clear link between greenhouse gas emissions and the burning of fossil fuels like coal and oil.''

The Chattanooga Free Press wrote that ``the Bush administration has elevated its political agenda, ideology and vested interests over substantive scientific concerns about the environmental and health consequences of its policies.''

Citing the manipulation of data on caribou in the ANWR and the firing of qualified experts from a lead poisoning advisory committee, the Boston Globe concluded ``at a time when so many issues are grounded in laboratory or field work, this corrupting of scientific evidence misinforms lawmakers and the public and could make scientists unwilling to work for the government.''

And the Philadelphia Inquirer concluded that ``the Bush administration is risking public trust in vital government agencies by putting scientific findings through a political and ideological shredder.''

The Kansas City Star declared that ``it is time for a thorough review.''

So it is not just the Democratic Party over here. I would assume there are members in the Republican Party who are sensible enough to want to have a good analysis of this done, and want to put aside all of the political shenanigans of this administration.

Across the country, editorial page after editorial page acknowledges this is the most political White House we have ever had on these issues; and everybody wants it to stop, stop taking these regulations and manipulating them to say something that is not true or accurate. Let us get the science right.

This is the perfect bill for this to be brought forward in. We are talking about regulations, and it is imperative that regulations are implemented in a proper way based on scientific evidence and not politics.

This White House has politicized this, not this party. I would think my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, if they have a shred of desire to see the integrity of this institution maintained, would join us and vote for this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I want to start by expressing my thanks to Chairman Davis for his kind remarks and for his generosity in allowing us to proceed on this work. I want to add the compliments to my good friend and ranking member from Massachusetts, who has endured the past number of years through hearing after hearing after hearing and whose insights and suggestions have been most helpful. I am grateful to Chairman Davis for his becoming an original cosponsor of this bill.

As I mentioned in my support for today's rule, last June, with bipartisan cosponsorship, I introduced this bill. It makes incremental improvements in the existing processes governing paperwork and regulations instead of fundamentally changing the role of Congress in its oversight of agency rules.

As to the bill itself, it includes the following legislative changes. First, it seeks to ensure reduction in tax paperwork burdens on small business. It seeks to assist Congress in its review of agency regulatory proposals. And it seeks to improve public and congressional understanding of the true costs and benefits of regulations. My manager's amendment makes no changes to sections 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the reported bill.

I will discuss the changes to sections 5 and 6, which I included based on specific requests from the General Accounting Office and the Office of Management and Budget.

As to section 3, let me offer that the overall burden of Federal paperwork and regulatory requirements is staggering and it is a real drain on job growth, productivity, and American competitiveness. Incredibly, Federal paperwork and regulatory burdens have increased, not decreased, in each of the last 8 years. This occurs irrespective of who is in the White House and who is in control of Congress. Currently, the Internal Revenue Service accounts for 80 percent of the total government-wide paperwork burden on the public of over 8 billion hours; that is billion with a ``b.'' To reduce paperwork, section 3 requires that OMB, after consultation with the IRS and two other identified Federal offices, review and report to Congress on actions that the IRS can take to reduce the paperwork burden imposed on small business. For example, the IRS could introduce thresholds below which reporting is not required, they change existing threshold levels, or they could change the reporting frequency, the periodicity at which reports must be submitted.

Section 5 provides for assistance to Congress in its review of agency regulatory proposals. It permanently establishes a regulatory analysis function in the General Accounting Office. In the Truth in Regulating Act of 2000, Congress authorized a 3-year pilot test for this regulatory analysis function, but unfortunately it was never funded. This was partly due to the fact that GAO intended to use contractors instead of in-house expert staff during the test period, which is understandable. They did not want to tool up and then have the pilot test not be funded in the future; so they chose, frankly, a more prudent manner in doing it. The problem is the work never got done because it never got funded. This bill would ensure that the GAO has the in-house expertise comparable to the expertise in the OMB's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and that such services can be provided to Congress as proposals come forward.

On the eve of last Wednesday's full committee markup, GAO submitted a letter requesting various changes in the bill. I did not include these changes in my manager's amendment during the markup because GAO had not provided certain information that my subcommittee had previously requested and which was important to the bill.

OMB's current line item budget for OIRA is $7 million. That is an annual budget. But OIRA has multiple functions besides review of agency paperwork and regulatory proposals and analyses. For example, OIRA is responsible for government-wide statistical policy, information policy, and information technology policy. Since GAO had not provided information about the share of OIRA's budget devoted to regulatory analysis activities, after the full committee markup I asked OMB what proportion of its budget is devoted to review of agency paperwork and regulatory proposals and the related regulatory analyses. The estimate came back at 65 to 70 percent.

As a consequence, my manager's amendment authorizes $5 million in fiscal year 2005 and each year thereafter for GAO to perform its independent evaluations at the request of Congress of certain economically significant rules. GAO will be reviewing the various agency analyses such as its regulatory impact analysis and its regulatory flexibility analysis, the regulatory alternatives considered by the

agency, and the legislative history to ensure that the proposed and final agency rules are consistent with congressional intent.

In addition, GAO asked me to include a delayed effective date of 90 days after enactment, and this provision is included in a new section 5(b).

Section 6 requires certain changes to improve regulatory accounting. In 1996 Congress required OMB to submit its first regulatory accounting report. In 1998 and 2000, Congress enacted additional legislation to make OMB's regulatory accounting reports more useful. Currently, OMB is required to estimate the total annual costs and benefits for all Federal rules and paperwork in the aggregate, by agency, by agency program, and by major rule, and to prepare an associated report on the impacts of Federal rules and paperwork on certain groups such as small business.

To date, OMB has issued six final and a seventh draft regulatory accounting report. Each of the seven did not meet one or more of the content requirements under current statute. Part of the reason for this incompleteness is that OMB has not requested agency estimates, as it does annually for its Information Collection Budget for paperwork and for the President's budget, the fiscal budget of the United States. Section 6(a) requires Federal agencies to annually submit estimates of the costs and benefits associated with the Federal rules and paperwork for each of their agency programs. The caveat for agency input to be provided ``to the extent feasible'' was added to ensure that no further burden on or cost to the agencies occurred.

Currently, the economic impacts of Federal regulation receive much less scrutiny than programs in the fiscal budget. Both the introduced and reported bill versions of H.R. 2432 required OMB to integrate its annual regulatory accounting statement into the fiscal budget so that Congress can review simultaneously both the on-budget and off-budget costs associated with each Federal agency imposing regulatory or paperwork burdens on the public.

Current law requires OMB to submit its regulatory accounting report ``with'' the budget instead of ``as part of'' the budget. However, OMB has never submitted its final accounting statement with the budget. In fact, only once has OMB even published its draft in the Federal Register on the same day as the budget was submitted to Congress. Not submitting the regulatory accounting statement at the same time as the budget or publishing it separately from the budget in the Federal Register has precluded a timely side-by-side comparison for analytic purposes of the on-budget and off-budget costs associated with each major regulatory agency and each of its regulatory programs.

Last July, OMB's OIRA administrator testified that ``OMB believes it could be feasible to issue a separate volume with the budget that contains the final regulatory accounting report and perhaps some related budget information for comparison purposes.''

Nonetheless, at the insistence of OMB, in a letter submitted yesterday to the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Tom Davis), my manager's amendment reluctantly removes the integration requirement, taking from it the ``as part of'' language and leaving it as the ``with'' language. Congress still expects OMB to comply with the law, that is, to issue its final regulatory accounting statement and associated report at the same time as and in a document that accompanies the fiscal budget documents. The House report accompanying H.R. 2432, which is this legislation, provides ample justification for integration, including witness testimony in support of integration and my 9-page April 22, 2004, comment letter to OMB on its draft seventh regulatory accounting report.

Section 6(b) requires OMB to designate not less than three agencies, or perhaps offices within an agency, to participate in a study of regulatory accounting for fiscal years 2006 and 2007 and then report to Congress on this study. These test will determine if agencies can better manage regulatory burdens on the public. My manager's amendment ensures that OMB will consult with key congressional committees, the Committee on the Budget and the Committee on Government Reform in the House and the Committees on the Budget and Governmental Affairs in the Senate.

H.R. 2432 focuses on process and should result in needed paperwork and regulatory relief especially for small business, and it will help Congress fulfill its constitutional role as a co-equal branch of government.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Biggert).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I would just remind Members that this bill does not speak to any agency in specificity, but only to process.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Schrock), who also happens to be the distinguished vice chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy Policy, Natural Resources and Regulatory Affairs.

Mr. Chairman, how much time remains?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Kelly).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite).

Mr. Chairman, how much time remains on our side?

Mr. Chairman, may I inquire of the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney) as to whether he has additional speakers.

Mr. Chairman, we are down to 3 minutes on our side.

Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous consent for an additional 5 minutes for each side for the purpose of debate on this bill.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman. Under the general rules of debate within the Committee of the Whole, how might we address a shortage of time here treating each side equally?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo).

Mr. Chairman, might I inquire, I believe I have but 1 minute left?

Mr. Chairman, it is my understanding that I have the right to close?

Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of the time to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan) for the purpose of closing.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, this particular amendment is technical in nature. It conforms the text that was sent over from the committee to the expectations of everybody here on the floor. Specifically, it changes the applicable dates. In section 5, it changes the effective date of the GAO requirement to 90 days after the date of enactment. It deletes the integration requirement of the budget and regulatory accounting statement, and it includes consultation with the Committee on the Budget and the Committee on Government Reform of the House and the Budget and Governmental Affairs Committees in the Senate.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays).

Mr. Chairman, might I inquire how much time remains.

If I understand correctly, the gentleman from Massachusetts has the right to close on this? It is my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Regarding the amendment at the desk, it is a technical amendment. It conforms to the actual writing of the bill reported from the committee to the representations we have made here on the floor.

I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts for his kind remarks on the amendment, and I urge its passage.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, this is not the first iteration of this amendment we have seen. We also saw this in committee. While I would describe its purpose as well-meaning and well-intended, my position in the committee and my position today are the same, and that is that this piece of legislation dealing with regulatory processes and paperwork burden is not the proper vehicle to establish a commission dealing with the quality of science that this or any other administration might otherwise wish to entertain.

I would ask the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) just for clarification. The amendment mentions a report dated August 2003, and yet I have a copy here that is updated November 13. Might I inquire as to which report we are working off of?

I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. Chairman, are we working off the August report or the November report?

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, regardless of the date, I would still register my opposition on the basis that this regulatory process and paperwork reduction legislation is not the vehicle by which we should properly discuss the quality of science that this or any other administration might wish to use in the deliberative decisions that they make.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Hayes).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

I just want to reiterate my rationale for not supporting the amendment. If my colleagues look at the amendment, it refers to a report put out by the minority staff entitled ``Politics and Science in the Bush Administration.'' We have not had that report vetted. It was issued by the minority staff. There has been no input by the majority staff or review.

I daresay that that would be a very, very dangerous template to set for this Congress, because who knows what other committees might adopt majority or minority reports and then just jam them down the other side's throat.

I would urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment and instead seek to have it discussed under the purview of the Committee on Science. This particular piece of legislation dealing with regulatory process and paperwork reduction is not the vehicle that should properly deal with this issue. This may well be a very serious issue, but this is not the vehicle where it should properly be discussed.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the amendment.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

There can be little question that sometime in the last decade, the United States entered a new and very different phase of its economic history. In this new phase of global competitiveness, this Nation is being challenged to step up once again and set new standards for innovation and efficiency. At the outset, it should be said that this country welcomes this challenge and we are confident that we have the tools necessary to succeed in this new economy that was largely created at our insistence.

The Paperwork and Regulatory Improvements Act of 2004 is designed to give Congress the tools it needs to respond to the challenge of a global open economy. This bill was originally sponsored by the gentleman from California (Mr. Ose) and is the result of 4 years of ongoing and consistent oversight by his Subcommittee on Energy Policy, Natural Resources and Regulatory Affairs under the leadership of the gentleman from California. Oftentimes this work has been done with little fanfare, but his consistent hard work has borne great fruit. So before I say anything about the bill, I want to commend the gentleman from California for his commitment and dedication to great legislative oversight.

There is no doubt that the Nation's regulatory regime can achieve a great deal of good in the areas of environmental protection and worker health and safety. Beyond that, government has a legitimate need to know a great deal about the corporate and, to a degree, even the personal financial activity of the Nation. Consequently, there will always be paperwork and regulatory demands.

However, when we look at the vast system of paperwork and regulatory demands that exist today, we see that this system is biased in favor of the good we hope to achieve and against the cost of achieving that good to society. Every rule or reporting requirement has a cost, but Congress is severely hampered in its efforts to understand these costs.

We in the Congress have grown comfortable throwing around huge statistics listing millions of hours to describe the paperwork burden government places on the Nation. But we seem to forget that these hours are spent one by one. It is as if we cannot see the forest for the regulatory trees. We may be numb to the burden we have created, but individuals and businesses are not.

When an American businesswoman spends several hours filling out a tax form, that is time she is not spending on her family or her clients. When a business has to hire an environmental specialist to complete an overly complicated, required report, that revenue is not spent in research and development or expansion of the business and hiring more people. These millions of hours are not just hours taken out of the business day; they are hours taken out of people's lives, and the loss of these hours should be taken seriously.

In the decades before the open global economy, Congress could lay these new burdens, one over the other, on the American worker with little concern about what the overall effect would be. But those days are gone. As the world has gradually opened its markets, this country has asked our workers to compete head to head on a global basis with highly skilled and motivated workers from all around the world.

This is a good thing. This competition will require our corporate community to be as efficient and as competitive as ever. But global competition requires our government to be more efficient as well. If we are going to ask the workers of this Nation to compete globally, then we must free them to be as competitive as possible.

Congress has an obligation to do the hard work to understand the costs of regulation as realistically as possible. This bill will give us some of the tools we need to make better decisions on the paperwork and regulatory burdens we place on our workers and businesses.

The bill requires the Office of Management and Budget, OMB, to submit a report to Congress identifying specific actions that the Internal Revenue Service can take to reduce the tax paperwork burden on small businesses. It assists Congress in its review of agency rules by establishing a permanent analytical function in the General Accounting Office to review proposed and final rules for consistency with congressional intent and to ensure the accuracy and completeness of agency accompanying analyses.

Lastly, the bill requires a study to determine the feasibility of regulatory budgeting as a better way to manage regulatory burdens on the public.

The gentleman from California, the subcommittee chairman, has put in many years working on this important issue.

Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from California (Mr. Ose) and ask unanimous consent that he be permitted to manage that time.

Mr. Chairman, please include the attached exchange of letters between Chairman Bob Goodlatte of the Committee on Agriculture, Chairman Jim Nussle of the Committee on the Budget and myself in the Congressional Record at the end of the debate on H.R. 2432 under general leave.

House of Representatives,

Committee on Agriculture,

Washington, DC, May 14, 2004.

Hon. Tom Davis,

Chairman, House Committee on Government Reform, Rayburn House

Office Building, Washington, DC.

Dear Mr. Chairman: This correspondence is in regard to H.R.

2432, the Paperwork and Regulatory Improvements Act of 2003.

As you are aware, the Committee on Agriculture was granted a

sequential referral of H.R. 2432 because of its

jurisdictional interest in agriculture commodity programs

created and reauthorized in the Farm Security and Rural

Investment Act of 2002.

Section 4 of H.R. 2432 amends the Farm Security and Rural

Investment Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-171) by eliminating

provisions that were inserted to ensure the farm bill

programs and payments would apply to the crops of the 2002

crop year.

Knowing of your interest in expediting this legislation, I

will discharge H.R. 2432 from further consideration by the

Committee on Agriculture. I do so with the understanding that

by discharging the bill the Committee on Agriculture does not

waive any future jurisdictional claim over this or similar

measures. In addition, in the event a conference with the

Senate is requested on this matter, the Committee on

Agriculture reserves the

right to seek appointment of conferees, if one should become

necessary.

Thank you very much for your courtesy in this matter and I

look forward to continued cooperation between our Committees

as we deal with these issues in the future.

Sincerely,

Bob Goodlatte,

Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment. We had a very similar measure at the committee markup and defeated it there.

The amendment is supposed to create an expert commission to study the politicization of science and make recommendations for how to protect science in the regulatory process from political and ideological manipulation and interference.

The problem with a commission like this is it is designed to find a problem and highlight it. Whether the problem is real or serious the commission fails if it finds nothing at all.

This is the kind of unfair fishing expedition that can only harm and destroy public faith in the Federal rulemaking process.

Even worse than being unnecessary, the commission is expensive and duplicative, and

its powers are questionable. It will cost $5 million. The commission will also duplicate the work of the permanent congressional office of regulatory affairs the base bill creates. And, the commission would have the authority to enter into contracts, but it is unclear if such contracts could be awarded without any competition. Certainly my colleague didn't intend to provide sole source authority to the commission.

There is no question that the Bush administration is surpassing previous administrations in its commitment to good science. Under this administration, OMB has issued the first information quality guidelines that establish rigorous quality standards for using science when developing regulations.

Mr. Chairman, it does not make sense to fund an unneeded commission with a predetermined finding that will misrepresent the good work of this administration. I'm opposed to this amendment and I ask that all Members vote to defeat it.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy) and my friend the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis) for helping participate today.

I rise today urging my colleagues to support H.R. 4176, legislation that would name the main post office in Raeford, North Carolina, in honor of their long-time mayor and my good friend, Bobby Marshall Gentry. Many qualities Bobby Marshall Gentry had. The old saying is ``They also serve who only stand and wait.'' Let me tell my colleagues for sure, Bobby Marshall Gentry never stood and never waited. He moved forward for his town, for his church, for his family, for his children.

Mr. Gentry was elected to the Raeford City Council in February of 1977 and proceeded to serve the city of Raeford, North Carolina, faithfully for 26 years. In March of 1990, Bob was appointed to the post of mayor after the death of then current mayor, J.K. McNeill. Bob was elected in his own right as Raeford's mayor in 1993 and reelected in 1997 and 2001. He served until his untimely death on October 29 of 2003. He served his country also as an Army veteran of the Korean War.

It is interesting to look at all the things that Mayor Gentry did, but one of his most proud accomplishments in those 26 years, only one time was there a tax increase. There were numerous tax decreases for which we all admired him.

Like most folks in Hoke County, I was shocked and saddened when I heard the news that Bob had died. Today I urge my colleagues to join me in remembering a great man who I am proud to have called my friend.

Mr. Speaker, Bob Gentry was a popular mayor. Folks in the community appreciated, admired and really liked him a lot. In fact, I do not think it is too much of a stretch to say that the Raeford community loved Mayor Gentry. Once, when asked why he ran for office, Bob replied as if it were just simple common sense, ``I enjoyed it so much that I could not resist running again and again.''

Bob was known for his ability to not only accomplish good things for Raeford, but he was able to genuinely have a good time serving and accomplishing these many ends.

Raeford, North Carolina, is a small town in my district, but this small-town mayor was a big-time leader who was constantly looking out for the town and the people. He passionately pursued economic development opportunities. Under his leadership, Raeford was put on track for the largest downtown development in Raeford's history. As a long-time and loyal employee of Burlington Mills for 17 years, he also owned his own small business. He was a contributor. He was a giver.

Mayor Gentry was appointed to the Lumber River Council of Governments board of directors in February of 1990. He served as chairman of this group for several terms and was known by his fellow board members as a leader who believed in starting on time, getting your work done and adjourning on time.

Bob greatly admired another great North Carolinian, former United States Senator Jesse Helms. He once said of Senator Helms, ``His integrity is beyond reproach. When he thinks he is right, he will not compromise his position for political acceptance or gain. His morals are of the highest standards.''

We were members of different political parties, but his admiration for Senator Helms and his befriending of me and shepherding me through the process showed clearly his focus was always people and not politics.

Mayor Gentry was a hardworking mayor. He left a legacy with his community. His vision for the future and his determination made Raeford a better place to live and work.

Mr. Speaker, in a small city like Raeford, you often see your friends and neighbors at the post office. It is the kind of place where people say hello and get caught up on what is happening around town. It is very fitting then that today the Raeford community joins me in support of naming the Raeford Post Office, a building at the center of the community, in honor of our former mayor Bob Gentry.

To his wife Eleanor, I had the privilege, Mr. Speaker, of attending the celebration of his life, the funeral service for him, and to Eleanor, there is a passage of scripture, ``In my Father's House, there are many mansions. I have gone to prepare a place for you.'' Well, Bob Gentry is in heaven right now making sure that water and sewer are taken care of, that the lights are on, and preparing a place for Eleanor and his family and others.

To Marsha, Gary and Mark, his children; to his five grandchildren, Marshall, Lucas, Katie, Kelly and Liam, their grandfather was a wonderful man. He leaves many memories of a life well-lived, a good and faithful servant who has gone on before, who served in many, many ways.

Honesty, integrity, intense commitment, these are the qualities, among many, that signified our friend, Bobby Marshall Gentry.

I urge my colleagues to support this legislation and honor my friend, a fine public servant.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding.

Not everyone knows my friend, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis), did not spend his life in Chicago. He grew up in the rural south, and I bet he knew people like Bobby Gentry, the kind of folks you are glad to see on the streets. It particularly pleases me and the people in my community for the gentleman to stand in honoring the memory and life of a man who grew up in a rural farming community, but did many great things from that platform.

I thank the gentleman for his help and support.