Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 2657) making appropriations for the Legislative Branch for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes.
Legislative Activity
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Motion to reconsider laid on the table Agreed to without objection.
July 9, 2003 • 5:58 PM
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Introduced in House
July 8, 2003
The House Committee on Rules reported an original measure, H. Rept. 108-191, by Mr. Linder.
July 8, 2003
Rule waives all points of order against the bill and against its consideration.
July 8, 2003 • 9:10 PM
Placed on the House Calendar, Calendar No. 78.
July 8, 2003
Considered as privileged matter. (consideration: CR H6393-6396)
July 9, 2003 • 3:22 PM
DEBATE - The House proceeded with one hour of debate on H. Res. 311.
July 9, 2003 • 3:23 PM
The previous question was ordered without objection.
July 9, 2003 • 3:45 PM
POSTPONED PROCEEDINGS - The Chair put the question on passage of the resolution, as amended, by voice vote and announced that the yeas had prevailed. Ms. Slaughter objected to the voice vote based on the absence of a quorum. The Chair subsequently announced that further proceedings were postponed until later in the legislative day.
July 9, 2003 • 3:47 PM
Considered as unfinished business. (consideration: CR H6418-6419)
July 9, 2003 • 5:48 PM
Passed/agreed to in House: On agreeing to the resolution Agreed to by recorded vote: 411 - 13 (Roll no. 342).
July 9, 2003 • 5:58 PM
On agreeing to the resolution Agreed to by recorded vote: 411 - 13 (Roll no. 342).
July 9, 2003 • 5:58 PM
Motion to reconsider laid on the table Agreed to without objection.
July 9, 2003 • 5:58 PM
Voting History
1 vote recorded • Roll call available
Floor Debate
20 membersWhat members said about H.Res. 311 on the floor
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Floor Debate
20 membersWhat members said about H.Res. 311 on the floor
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to…
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)
Priorities, Mr. Speaker. Again and again the majority has used legislation and procedural tactics to force its priorities through the body. The majority passed another massive tax cut for the wealthiest people that provided no relief for low-income families with children and allowed practically no debate on the bill. They passed a hollow plan to write a blank check to the pharmaceutical companies and called it a prescription drug plan, again allowing little debate.
Last night the Committee on Rules demonstrated that tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans are more important than education, the goals of the No Child Left Behind Act, public health, the needs of older Americans, and help for those who are suffering due to the impotent economy. H.R. 2660 falls far short of the funding levels needed to sustain important programs that should be our priorities.
The bill increases education funding, but the increase falls $700 million short of the funding increase promised in the budget resolution for the 2004 fiscal year. These funding levels do leave children behind. H.R. 2660 provides an increase in Title I spending, but it is approximately $300 million less than the $1 billion promised in the budget. Because the programs designed to leave no child behind are again underfunded, school districts will lose money, and our children will lose educational opportunities.
My district in New York will lose more than $700,000. The Niagara Falls City School District will lose over $100,000, and Buffalo City schools will face a loss of almost $900,000.
Only $1 billion of the $2.2 billion budgeted for special education is appropriated. Pell grants allow 307,234 students to attend New York colleges and universities, yet the funding for Pell grants is frozen at current levels. And the current levels of funding cover less than 40 percent of the cost of a college education at a 4-year public university.
The legislation also funds public health programs, which are truly some of the most important services that the Federal Government provides. However, H.R. 2660 provides few additional
resources for health services and public health. Quality health care is out of the reach of far too many Americans. Recent press accounts have highlighted severe problems with the oversight of the State Medicaid programs, and States face financial crises. Over 3 million people in New York depend on Medicaid, and, across the Nation, 4 million children rely on State Children's Health Insurance Programs, SCHIP, for health care. In New York, over a half a million children rely on SCHIP. There are no increases in funding for childhood immunization grants or for the program that provides the scholarships for nursing students, despite the serious shortage of nurses in this country.
Despite these tax cuts which were made, actually what we are doing is shifting the burden to the middle class, and then, obviously, the programs that we care about are being cut, and while we are doing that, issuing these tax cuts that were supposed to do such wonderful things, the economy slowly staggers along. And the result of the stagnant economy is that 6.4 percent of all Americans are unemployed. That is the highest number in almost a decade. We have the largest deficit we have ever had in our history, and more than 9 million Americans who want to work and support their families cannot find work.
Are we going to help these millions of Americans until they are able to find jobs? No. We either freeze the funding levels for programs to help low-income Americans at the same level as last year, or it reduces funding levels. And because of inflation, the bill would leave the victims of poor economic policy with fewer resources.
Natural gas prices are rising and will likely be 50 percent higher by this winter, but the funding for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program was slashed by 10 percent. This bill will literally leave 635,000 New York households that rely on LIHEAP in the cold. And believe me, last year it was cold.
Before the July 4 recess, the older Americans were given a hollow promise of insurance coverage for the astronomically high cost of prescription drugs. Now, H.R. 2660 comes back again to take a swipe at elderly Americans. Almost 200 million older, home-bound Americans rely on Meals-on-Wheels. The allocated funding levels for the Meals-on- Wheels program would force serious cuts in the services, resulting in 4.6 million fewer meals delivered. Our priorities are not providing fewer meals to home-bound elderly Americans.
Last night the Committee on Rules passed an open rule for the consideration of the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education appropriations for the 2004 fiscal year. Also last night the committee rejected an amendment to add $5.5 billion to this appropriations bill. The additional funds could be added by reducing the tax cuts from $88,000 a year to $60,000 for those making more than $1 million. Because the majority refused to grant a waiver in the open rule, the amendment is out of order. The $5.5 billion in additional funds from the big tax cut would go to education, to public health, to services for low-income and elderly Americans, and more. Meals-on-Wheels would keep rolling. Education funds would go to the children and make sure that truly no child is left behind, and would provide the health care immunization shots for children, and it would keep houses warm during the icy winter.
Every day we as elected representatives make choices. The appropriations process requires us to make difficult choices sometimes. But the Federal Government, we know, has a finite amount of money, and we must choose wisely how to allocate the resources. The appropriations process for the 2004 fiscal year is incredibly more difficult because Federal funds have been severely depleted. The billions of dollars in tax cuts given to the wealthiest Americans have depleted it. This House has chosen to fund millionaires rather than fund programs for elderly Americans, the 9 million people unemployed, and children's minds and bodies. That is the wrong choice.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.
I am afraid my good friend, the chairman of the Committee on Rules, did not pay very much attention to what I was saying. I do not recall at any point saying that we would like to add more money. What we were talking about were the extraordinary cuts that have been taken to programs that people have learned to really rely on. It has always been the basic tenet of this government that we want to make sure that everybody has the opportunity to rise equally, have an opportunity to have good education, have the opportunity to enjoy good health.
What we have done in this measure, and I continue to say that the reason the resources are not there are because of the tax cuts, is that we are taking away the rights of many children to go to Head Start, to get a good education that we want them to have; we are taking away their SCHIP program, which provides health insurance for them, and what is very disturbing, too, is that the elderly have already taken hits.
I yield to the gentleman from California.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.
The gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier) better hope for that because otherwise America will be pretty disappointed to find that they have been left behind, not just the children but the elderly, the middle class, all the rest of them, and certainly the unemployed.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 6 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the minority whip.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 4\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Tauscher).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), the minority leader.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) for a response.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) for a unanimous consent request.
(Mr. OBEY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks, and to insert tabular material.)
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, we have a rather strange procedure going on here. We are going to be called in to vote on the previous question on one rule and on the rule for legislative branch. I do not know in what order, but I want to give a little talk about this.
First, I want to urge Members to vote ``no'' on the previous question on the HHS bill. If that previous question is defeated, I will offer an amendment to the rule that will make in order the Obey substitute to restore funding for the numerous programs which have been shortchanged in this bill. It will also make in order the Obey amendment to restore cuts to States for their child health care programs under Medicaid and SCHIP. Both of these amendments were submitted to the Committee on Rules last night and rejected by the majority.
H.R. 2660 provides funding for some of our most vital services, services that touch the lives of every American family, from education to preschoolers, from low-income families to college tuition assistance, to Meals on Wheels for the elderly and medical research; and as critical as they are, we have drastically underfunded them in this bill. The Obey substitute will help restore some of the desperately needed funds.
The second Obey amendment will help financially strapped States provide child health care to the uninsured children. The cost of both of the amendments will be offset by reducing the 2004 tax cuts for those with incomes in excess of $1 million, cutting their tax break from $88,000 to $44,000. We believe the millionaires can spare a few dollars to help restore the funding.
Whether or not Members are Republicans or Democrats, they should be concerned about the lack of an adequate funding for the critical programs and services in this bill. Virtually every American is affected by this bill, whether it is health care, education, medical research for the elderly, LIHEAP, so on. The Obey amendments
would help fix the terrible funding deficiencies in the bill and help States provide health care to children who are not covered by health insurance. Again, they would do so with no additional cost to the deficit.
I urge Members on both sides of the aisle to vote ``no'' on the previous question. A ``no'' vote will not stop the House from taking up the Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, but a ``yes'' vote will prevent the House from considering the important amendments. Please vote ``no'' on the previous question.
Mr. Speaker, I need to explain that we have another vote coming up on another appropriations bill. That is the rule for the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, which we hope will come first. We are not certain. We are urging a ``yes'' vote on that rule so that Members can go on record of voting to self-execute out the language that was put into the bill by unknown persons or persons unknown which would expand dental and vision coverage for Members and employees of the House. Again, we urge a ``yes'' vote on that to go on record to self-execute that, and a ``no'' vote on the previous question, which we believe will be called first.
I ask unanimous consent that the text of the amendments be printed in the Record immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.
Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time and for her leadership in managing the rule on this very difficult bill. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the previous…
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time and for her leadership in managing the rule on this very difficult bill.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the previous question and to making the Obey amendment in order. I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) for his great leadership for America's children and families and for his giving us an opportunity today to reverse a decision that the Republican leadership has made that is detrimental to those children and those families.
I do this with great regret, Mr. Speaker, because I have the deepest admiration, and he knows it, for the chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula). I had the privilege of serving under his leadership on the committee and watched him in action for a number of years. I know that his priorities are in the right place. Unfortunately, the priorities of this bill are not in the right place. And how could they be when the Republicans in the weeks leading up to now have bled, have starved the budget of the resources to meet the needs of America's children.
The previous speaker said, oh, you never have enough money. This is not about endless money. This is about money promised by President Bush in the Leave No Child Behind bill. Instead, the legislation that will come before us under this rule, if this rule passes, would leave millions of children behind because of the $8 billion shortfall in the President's own Leave No Child Behind bill.
We see here a continuation of the pattern of the credibility gap, of the rhetoric, versus the harsh realities of the budget, and those realities are made all the more harsh because of the tax cut. The gentleman from Wisconsin gives us an opportunity this afternoon to correct the situation, somewhat.
The Obey amendment would simply say that if you make $1 million a year, your tax cut will be $44,000 a year instead of $88,000 a year. That is an additional tax cut. With that money, we can put around $5 billion into the Labor-HHS bill and help to redress some of the shortfalls contained herein, and also help with children's health in addition to the education provisions.
Earlier today, the Democratic staff of the Committee on Appropriations in our office put forth a report, which I hope that everyone will take advantage of, which is entitled GOP Funding Bill Shortchanges America's Children by Underfunding Key Education Priorities. Instead of giving $88,000 and instead giving $44,000 to those making $1 million a year, we can instead fund the following programs. And let me just talk about how the GOP shortchanges children, and then we can talk about redressing it.
The Republican Labor-HHS bill cuts education for America's children by a total of $9.2 billion below the levels authorized by the President's No Child Left Behind Act and the IDEA Reauthorization Act, with the key highlights as follows: IDEA, funding for children with special needs. Parents, children, school districts, teachers, anyone concerned about education throughout the country are crying out for the Federal Government to keep its promises to children with special needs. As a result of this bill, America's children with disabilities will lose
$1.2 billion in IDEA grants below the level promised in the Republican IDEA Reauthorization Act. In their own bill. The rhetoric, the reality, the harsh credibility gap.
Shortchanging after-school learning opportunities. As a result of the GOP bill, America's children will lose $750 million in after-school program funding below the level called for in the No Child Left Behind bill, the President's own No Child Left Behind bill.
Failing to fund highly qualified teachers in every classroom. Under the bill, America's teachers will lose $350 million in teacher quality grants below the level called for in the President's No Child Left Behind bill. It goes on and on and on.
Sadly, as my colleague, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Tauscher), mentioned, as a result of this bill, America's children will lose $583 million in Impact Aid grants below the level authorized. And this is for children of military personnel, another blow to military personnel and their children. As you know, they do not make enough and are unworthy of the expanded tax credit, but that is another bill, another day. Part of the pattern, however.
The list goes on and on about how the GOP funding bill shortchanges children in America, and we have it broken down State by State for those who are interested in this information. So I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for giving us an opportunity to correct some of that. But this is tragic.
Education does more for our economy, educating American people, early childhood, K through 12, higher education, postgrad, lifetime learning for our workers does more for our economy than any tax cut, tax credit, tax gimmick, tax break that you can name. It returns more money to the Treasury than anything you can name. It is more dynamic, to use the Republican word in budgeting, than any initiative you can name. It is also not only good for our economy, it is fundamental to our democracy to have an informed population, an educated population. It is good for our international competitiveness as well. But most of all, it is important to the self-fulfillment of our children.
And so we have a series of broken promises that the Obey amendment would correct. This is a defining vote for the Republican Party. If they vote for this bill, then all the statements that they make claiming to support education are simply unreal. Republicans cannot proclaim their commitment to our Nation's schools and then withhold their support for funding to the level that the President has in his own bills. They cannot tell our children and parents, we care about schools, and then watch our decaying classrooms fill with greater numbers of unprepared children.
Kids are so smart. You cannot tell children that education is important to their self-fulfillment and to their lives and to their livelihood later in life, you cannot tell them it is important that they should place a value on it if we do not place a value on it. Children get a mixed message when they hear us say it is important, but not important enough for us to give you the smaller classes, indeed the smaller schools that all the scientific evidence says is good for you; that we do not give you the schools that are wired for the future; the after-school programs, the qualified teachers, the funding for disadvantaged children and the funding for children with disabilities. If it is important, then it should be important in our spending priorities as well as in our investments.
Just 3 months ago the Republican budget resolution promised $1 billion for Title I, but the bill on the floor today falls $334 million short of this promise, denying quality instruction to 140,000 disadvantaged schoolchildren. The Republican budget resolution also promised a $2 billion increase for special education, but this appropriation bill, as I mentioned earlier, provides $1 billion, a 55 percent discrepancy between what they promised and what they propose to deliver. The Obey amendment provides the full amount promised in the budget resolution for both Title I and special education.
This is a great bill, usually. This is a great opportunity. In our service on that committee, anyone who ever served there always called this the people's bill. It dealt with Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education. It is lamb-eat-lamb. There is no place to go get money in the bill to correct some of the mistakes in it, because everything in the bill is good. And under these circumstances, everything is being starved, so you have to put additional funding in the bill.
The gentleman from Wisconsin has given us a way to do that. Without his correction, we are stuck. We are stuck with a bad bill that is underfunded, leading to underinvestment in our children's education.
And in terms of other aspects of the bill, in terms of health, patients and advocates for cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's and AIDS have all been clear: We must strongly support increased research at the National Institutes of Health. The fruits of medical research are truly miraculous. Despite this proven record of success and the opportunity to fund vital research, the Republican bill provides the smallest increase for NIH in more than 15 years. The only amendment provides substantially more funding to advance the science that is helping us find cures.
Mr. Speaker, in conclusion, I want to say that the Obey amendment helps Republicans keep their own promises and takes advantage of important opportunities to help the American people. The Republican leadership should be thanking the gentleman from Wisconsin. They should be thanking him. Instead, they will not even allow a vote on his proposal. What are they afraid of? Are they afraid that they are going to have to shrink one of their big tax cuts in order to invest in America's children? Probably.
I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question and vote to support the Obey amendment.
Mr. Speaker, I said the other night in the debate on Medicare that on this floor of the House people can misrepresent the facts, and that is okay; but if you call them on it, you can be questioned on questioning the veracity of your colleague.
Well, I seriously not only question the veracity of my colleague, I challenge him, because I have voted for every defense bill practically since I have been here. And the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), my colleague, can testify to that, as can all of the chairmen of the Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense. So either the gentleman knows not of what he speaks, or he seriously is misrepresenting the facts.
Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 312 and ask for its immediate consideration. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30…
Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 312 and ask for its immediate consideration.
Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 312 is an open rule which provides for 1 hour of general debate, equally divided between the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and the ranking member, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), on H.R. 2660, the fiscal year 2004 Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related agencies appropriations bill.
The rule waives all points of order against consideration of the bill and against provisions in the bill, except as specified in this resolution. After general debate, any Member wishing to offer an amendment may do so, as long as it complies with the regular rules of the House.
The bill shall be read for amendment by paragraph, and the rule authorizes the Chair to accord priority in recognition to Members who have preprinted their amendments in the Congressional Record.
Finally, the rule permits the minority to offer a motion to recommit, with or without instructions.
Mr. Speaker, we have before us today the Labor, Health and Human Services appropriations act for fiscal year 2004, a funding package that makes good on our promises to America's children, workers and families. Before I summarize the main components of this package, a larger context must be established so that Members of both sides of the aisle fully understand what we are debating here and what is at issue today.
When Members of Congress met in subcommittee and in committee to write this appropriations package, planning the most effective and efficient way to fund many of these domestic programs for education, for health care, for labor, they did not pick random funding levels. Setting funding levels was not decided by a game of darts or ``eenie, meenie, minie, moe.''
A war in Iraq, a slowly recovering economy, and limited government revenues placed very clear and very real limitations on the resources, and the need to be fiscally responsible with the taxpayers' dollars was great. Despite these challenges, the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) and the gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Regula) and their colleagues created a funding plan that reflects our priorities, meets our goals, and places the greatest funding in the areas we need it most.
So when they drafted a plan to fund teacher quality grants, they thought of the millions of students who learn something new each day when they are taught by well-qualified teachers; and when they created a package to give assistance and training to dislocated workers, they thought of the many unemployed men and women who diligently search for a new job, but always seem to meet a dead end; and when they thought to craft a plan to help critical agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes of Health, they thought of America's communities, which need increasing assistance in fighting the growing threats of terrorism, especially those of bioterrorism. As a result, we have seen dramatic increases in both agencies, even after NIH's funding has doubled over the past 5 years.
When they considered the significance of programs, such as the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, they thought of all the families who are forced to forego other needs in order to afford heat for their homes during cold winter months; and when they created a plan to provide comprehensive nutrition programs for women, infants and children, they thought of the thousands of soon-to-be and new mothers who wanted to provide the best possible care for their children and themselves by eating right and living healthy lives.
Mr. Speaker, I mention these things at the risk of sounding repetitive, because the debate over this appropriations plan is likely to turn quite heated. These Members of Congress that I have mentioned, the ones who have worked so hard under the constraints of very finite resources, may not be rewarded here today. Instead, they may very well be maligned by many of our colleagues from the other side of the aisle who will suggest that this plan is cruel and that those that have created it are uncaring.
So when these opponents begin to suggest that the amount of money is indicative of the size of a person's heart, I would ask them to ponder a quote by one of our former presidents, Ronald Reagan, who said, ``The size of the Federal budget is not an appropriate barometer of social conscience or charitable concern.'' And that is so true.
Do we have limited resources to spend? Yes. Can we still meet America's needs with those limited resources? Absolutely. And is more money always the best answer or the only answer? Absolutely not.
For example, in 1994, when my colleagues from the other side of the aisle controlled Congress, the Labor-HHS appropriations plan increased education spending by a mere 2 percent, and even then there were no additional education reforms. The message of their plan was more spending equals better education; more dollars equals better education.
Now, fast forward to 2002 when the Republican-controlled Congress increased funding by 18 percent: 2 percent when they had it, 18 percent when we have it. And we also implemented the landmark No Child Left Behind plan to allow local school districts more flexibility in exchange for greater accountability and for student achievement.
Our message: more efficient and effective spending equals a better education.
Mr. Speaker, funding America's priorities can be both generous and responsible, and this appropriations package is proof positive of that fact. It provides significant increases for vital programs and services while maintaining wise stewardship over taxpayers' dollars.
One issue that I have championed for many years, greater funding for children's medical hospitals, received significant increases in this bill, and I want to thank both the chairman and the ranking member for recognizing the need for continued support for those working to improve children's health and end critical and deadly diseases.
But all Americans are touched in one way or another by this legislation. The gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Regula) has provided tremendous leadership, working tirelessly to assure that Congress spends generously, but wisely. As a result of that fact, as the gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Regula) says, we should call this legislation the Hope Act, because it provides hope for nearly every single person in America it touches.
Hope for new medical cures, hope for stronger schools, hope for a new job. Whether you are an at-risk youth who will be able to attend an after-school program, or whether you are a senior who will benefit from increased efficiency and improved service in receiving your Social Security benefits, or whether you are a child who will receive better care from the extra assistance for children's hospitals and the teaching that goes on in them, the message that this appropriations plan sends out is very clear. Our priorities are the same, and our commitment is unwavering: quality education, adequate quality health care, safe work environments, and secure jobs. These are our goals, and they are reflected in this funding package.
I urge all of my colleagues to pass the rule and approve the underlying bill.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield such time as he may consume to my very distinguished colleague from the grand State of California (Mr. Dreier), the chairman of our Committee on Rules.
(Mr. DREIER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from the State of Florida (Mr. Foley).
Mr. Speaker, we reserve our time on this side for the time being.
Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time remaining.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 additional minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham).
Mr. Speaker, I am most pleased to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula), my distinguished colleague, the dean of the Ohio delegation, and the chairman of the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, who has done such great work to bring this bill to the floor of the House.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, in closing, this really is the Hope Act. This bill will provide the needed funding to supply people with new skills and new opportunities, hope for a better job. It will lay the groundwork for new medical cures, hope for the gift of life, and it will provide for stronger schools and a better education, hope for a brighter future. The message is clear and our commitment is unwavering. Quality education and health care, safe work environments and secure jobs, these are our goals and are reflected in this funding package. I urge my colleagues to support this open rule and adopt this important legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 311, I call up the bill (H.R. 2657) making appropriations for the Legislative Branch for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes,…
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 311, I call up the bill (H.R. 2657) making appropriations for the Legislative Branch for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I wanted to say that the legislative branch bill is somewhat the inside baseball bill, the operating budget for the U.S. Capitol. It includes not just the legislative branch per se but the Capitol Hill Police, the Library of Congress and the Government Printing Office, the General Accounting Office and many other important government agencies which we all depend on.
The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), the ranking member, and I have worked very closely on our bill this year, and its total spending is $2.7 billion, which is a decrease of about $34 million below last year, or about 1.2 percent. It is 10 percent below the actual request. Every agency has had to take reductions, and we have had to say no to many of our friends to get to this number, but we think that we have been fair across the board.
For example, this bill does not require any reductions in the current force, and it fully funds the traditional COLA of the leg branch employees at a level of 3.7 percent.
The other thing the bill does, along with keeping a very tight line on the fiscal side of it, is that it does not provide any new authorizations. So we are not changing anything in this bill. It is what we refer to as a clean appropriations bill.
One issue that has come up is the U.S. Capitol Police, and they do a great job; and we all here in Congress depend on them, not just every day but really every hour, to keep the U.S. Capitol safe. This is a unique building in that it is a historical building. It is a tourist site in itself; and then, in addition to that, Members of Congress are conducting business in it. So we have lots of people, a mom, dad, the three-and-a-half kids who come up from Peoria, as the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) would always remind us; as well as the 435 Members of Congress and 100 Members of the Senate conducting business here and hearing from all kinds of constituency groups. Yet throughout all of it, the Capitol Hill Police keeps it safe so that the tourists, the business people and those in government and all the employees can enjoy a safe working environment.
Since September 11, we have funded 512 new positions for the Capitol Police. That is a 37 percent increase in a year and a half. The salary account has grown from $113 million in fiscal year 2002 to a requested level of $218 million in fiscal year 2004, so a 93 percent increase in a 2-year period of time for the salary account.
General expenses for the police have climbed from $6.7 million in 2001 to a requested level of $72 million in fiscal year 2004, a 975 percent increase. All this has already been done. This is all in the name of security, and we absolutely have supported it.
In addition, there has been another $167 million that has been appropriated in supplemental funds. This committee, on a bipartisan basis, can take pride that the Capitol Hill Police Department has moved into the 21st century with a 20 percent increase in salaries over the last 2 years and a lot of other changes that are beneficial to the police officers in terms of recruitment, hiring and retention. But the budget request for fiscal year 2004 includes an increase of 25 percent for the salary account and an increase in general expenses of 158 percent.
Increases cannot be sustained at the allocation that we have been given. So at this time we are not going to increase more staffing, as we want them to absorb the growth that we have already given them.
Another issue that we spent a lot of time on in committee is the Capitol Visitors Center. The Capitol Visitors Center is something that started out at one level, and is now at a completely different level in terms of spending. The scope of the job changed because we have put in some additional office spaces and because of some security concerns. Yet at the same time we, on this committee, are very concerned that the spending has gotten out of hand.
We have not put in a $48 million estimation for additional expenses. We understand the other body has done so; but at this time, the House bill has not and we intend to have a lot of discussions about that before we move forward on it. At present, there are still 37 items, according to a recent GAO study, which are unknown in terms of additional expenses. So our committee is trying to get a good grip on the Capitol Visitors Center--but we are very, very concerned about some of the expenses.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of it, but I certainly am proud of it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood).
(Mr. LaHOOD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. Speaker, I say to my friend from Maryland that I believe it is the intent of this committee to conform with whatever the other Federal employees end up getting in terms of COLAs.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Kirk).
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and say I believe this is a very interesting proposal. I think it is a promising idea and something there is probably a lot of good bipartisan support for.
I have sponsored the Congressional Arts Awards Program in my former district for 10 years and have always been amazed by the talent that is out there amongst 15-, 16-, and 17-year-olds, and so I would like to see the brilliance that is there from the 15-, 16-, and 17-year-olds as well.
I remember when I had a science project. We wanted to study if there were more protozoa in a stream where water was moving or a pond where it sat still; and we could not conclude anything, but it was very interesting. My sister studied phototropism and geotropism, and I still remember her project as well.
I am always amazed when I go to State science fairs to see the brilliance of these kids and what they are doing. I think this has a lot of potential. It is really an issue that the Committee on House Administration needs to look at, and so I would like to join the gentleman in seeking their guidance and possible action from that committee because we probably would not need to do an appropriations. I am not sure, but we do need to talk to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ney) and the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Larson) and seek their guidance on it.
I believe that Members could use their existing Members representational allowances so we probably would not appropriate more money, but we will see about that. I want to assure the gentleman that I think we can find a way that Members can sponsor such a high school science competition awards program in their district.
Mr. Speaker, I would agree with the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) and understand the need for scientific advice to Members of Congress on complex issues, and I support reports that assist Congress with its work.
For this reason, the committee has funded since fiscal year 2002 technology assessments to be completed by the General Accounting Office; and once again, the report accompanying this bill requires the GAO to allocate funding for three studies related to issues facing Congress. With a staff of over 3,200 employees, GAO is in a position to contract for scientific assessments, and an independent expert determined in fiscal year 2002 that the GAO approach and results were sound.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I wanted to emphasize on behalf of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) and me the great work that our staff has done. Liz Dawson and Tom Forhan have done a great job on this bill. Chuck Turner, Kelly Wade, Jack O'Neill, Tim Aiken have all worked very diligently with us, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) and I and all the committee members appreciate everything they have done.
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Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), for yielding me this time, and I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) for his leadership on this bill.…
Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), for yielding me this time, and I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) for his leadership on this bill.
This is an institutional bill. This is a bill which is designed to allow the legislative body to carry out its constitutional functions of overseeing a mammoth executive department and to make sure that, in fact, we have checks and balances. So although it may not be exciting, it is critical, as all of us, I think, on this floor know, to the exercise of our constitutional responsibility. So I clearly rise in strong support of this legislation.
Obviously, any measure that trims spending from a previous fiscal year does so by proposing reductions in some programs. I would like to comment on a few provisions that are particularly important. One arm of Congress for which H.R. 2657 proposes a 1.3 percent reduction is the United States Capitol Police. We have all talked about that. Many of my colleagues know that on the Committee on House Administration and on the Subcommittee on Legislative for a number of years, I have been a strong supporter, as most people in this body have, of the Capitol Police. It symbolizes, it seems to me, the safety of democracy in many ways. Of course, as all of us know, tragically, a few years ago, we lost two members of the Capitol Police force, Officers Gibson and Chestnut, protecting democracy and this House, these visitors that come to their Capitol, and, yes, the Members and staff who work here.
Mr. Speaker, I have looked at this budget very carefully, and I am confident that the proposed $212 million that have been appropriated for the time being are sufficient. I know the committee wanted to ensure that that was the case, and I thank them for their careful study and review, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) has said the same thing.
Since 1997, and particularly since the tragedy of 9/11 and the tragedy that occurred to us in this Capitol, Congress has substantially increased the size and budget of the Capitol Police. I believe that was warranted. In 1997, we appropriated $75.39 million, almost .4 million. In 2003, we appropriated $240 million, a very substantial increase, appropriate given the security concerns.
Make no mistake about it, these large increases were essential to make up for deficiencies that we saw and that we were confronted with when we discovered tragically in 1998 the Capitol Police needed more resources to secure all access points and protect not just the lives of the people who work here, but also, as I said, the visitors.
The events of 9/11 were another wake-up call that no American landmark is off limits to terrorists, including the Capitol complex. Most of us believe that that plane that those brave passengers brought down in the fields of Pennsylvania was, in fact, being directed at this Capitol dome, one of the great symbols of freedom in the world.
Let me speak about Chief Gainer. Chief Gainer does not come from Maryland, but he is still a very good fellow, as the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) said. I want to thank he and his able staff. These increases have been invested in a wide range of essential programs by Chief Gainer and his people; an expanded force, better equipment, protective infrastructure, and improved training. But as the report accompanying H.R. 2657 points out, there is concern over the continuation of such large growth for the Capitol Police without a comprehensive strategic plan.
I think that report is correct. Fortunately, a strategic plan is being developed. Once completed, it will help the Capitol Police deploy their resources in the most efficient manner possible with the greatest protection possible.
A second area that is getting a reduction is the Architect of the Capitol. As many know, the Committee on Appropriations has been concerned about the level and quality of the project management and acquisition planning in the Architect of the Capitol's organization, particularly with regards to the construction of the Capitol Visitors Center. I am a strong supporter, as I think all of us are, of this facility, but the committee is correct in being concerned about the construction schedule and the construction cost. Later this month an oversight hearing on the CVC will be held. I am confident this hearing will help us make more informed spending and policy decisions with regard to the visitors center.
One matter that should concern every Member of this body, in addition to the visitors center, is the fair treatment of workers, including temporary workers, employed by the legislative branch. I want to thank Liz Dawson and the staff of the committee both on the majority side and on the minority side for continuing to focus on this. Section 133 of the Legislative Appropriations Act of 2002, which became law on November 12, 2001, prohibits the Architect of the Capitol from employing temporary workers for long periods without providing eligibility for employee benefits.
Mr. Speaker, this is not happening. Much to my dismay, the Architect has not implemented section 133 more than 2 years after it was the law of the land, despite the clearest of congressional intentions and the fact that the General Accounting Office has determined that section 133 provides the Architect with the authority to treat temporary workers fairly. This is unacceptable behavior.
During markup 2 weeks ago, I offered an amendment which was adopted by voice vote which restates section 133. My expectation with this amendment is simple: That Mr. Hantman will finally appreciate that Congress meant what it said 2 years ago when it instructed his office to fairly treat temporary workers.
One provision of today's measure that does distress me, and I follow up with what the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) said, I agree with him 100 percent, we need to thank our staffs, incredibly talented, skilled, critical people to the accomplishment of our objectives and our responsibility. But in this bill, unfortunately, the raise we have given them is less than the raise that we give to all other executive employees.
I am very hopeful that before we complete consideration of this bill, in the final analysis our employees will be given the 4.1 percent increase that I hope that all the executive department will be given and that we have already given to the military. Our staff is incredible. We ought to say thank you. But in addition to that, we ought to ensure that they are treated at least as well as we expect our executive department employees to be treated as it relates to the COLA.
I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I appreciate that.
I say to the gentleman from Georgia that I know what he says to be the case. I meant no criticism, but the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) had observed, and I wanted to make sure our employees knew, that we are going to treat them as well as we are hopefully also going to treat the executive employees, and so I appreciate the chairman's comment on that.
I do also, with the time the gentleman from Georgia yielded to me, want to again congratulate him and the committee on the mass transit benefit program that he has included in this bill.
With that, Mr. Speaker, let me say that I appreciate the work of the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran). They have brought a good bill to the floor that all our Members can support and that will serve this institution and the American people.
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Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the bill. There has been a pretty good level of bipartisan cooperation on this bill, and it is reflected in…
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the bill. There has been a pretty good level of bipartisan cooperation on this bill, and it is reflected in the vote that we are going to have. I doubt that there will be many, if any, voting against this bill, even though I am told by the Committee on Rules last night, this is the first time that an appropriations bill or an appropriations subcommittee has reported a bill that was funded at a lower level than the previous year. Is the gentleman aware of that?
I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
We do not expect that to happen with every bill.
We had a fairly tight allocation, discretionary caps were pretty tight; but I think that it serves the Nation well. We are $290 million below the President's request and $34 million below last year's funding level; but given the limitations of the allocation, I think that the chairman and the members of the committee on both sides of the aisle have been prudent and fair.
Sufficient funds have been provided to cover all mandatory expenditures, and the budget assumes the full 3.7 percent COLA increase for salaries. I support the chairman's decision to withhold making any new appropriation for the Capitol Visitors Center and slow down the pace of the Architect's other construction projects because a recent GAO review took issue with the Capitol Visitors Center projected cost estimates.
That GAO review found that the total cost of the project could potentially climb to as high as $395 million,
read $400 million, when it started out at about $300 million. I think that it behooves the Congress to take a very close look. We are going to have another hearing on it, and we do not intend to scrimp on the funding of it. Since it is going to be done, we want it done right, but we want to make sure we have a full handle on all of the cost increases.
So we are going to withhold any new funds and reevaluate how we should proceed. We need to gain better control over potential cost overruns and engage in those substantive discussions, particularly with the House and Senate leadership.
I also want to touch on another topic, as the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) did, and clarify to the Members of the House that this bill supports and respects the men and women in law enforcement who serve on the Capitol Police force. They have toiled under stressful and difficult circumstances, particularly since September 11, 2001; but since that date, the Capitol Police have seen their manpower grow by 37 percent. So until a strategic plan, which the subcommittee directed the police to undertake last year, is completed and shared with the members of the subcommittee and open to review by outside experts, this bill postpones action on this portion of the police chief's request. That is the responsible way to deal with the request in my view, and I agree with the chairman again.
Should the Capitol Police's full workforce increase be merited, the funds will be there. In the meantime, full funding for overtime pay for the police, the COLA increase, the longevity differential, the special training, the specialty pay and all the other recruitment and retention incentives are all preserved and fully funded in this bill.
The employees in the agencies who work for us are indispensable, if we want this legislative body to continue to perform and to perform well.
Mr. Speaker, the bill before us today is a sound bill. It is tight, but it is responsive to addressing the needs and the obligations of the entire legislative branch. That is why I support it and encourage my colleagues on this side of the aisle to vote for it as well. I trust that it will be unanimously approved, and with that, we only have I think three more speakers.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute, before I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), because up front I want to acknowledge the committee staff, since the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) has referenced them. We have some terrific staff people on this appropriation subcommittee: Liz Dawson, who does a wonderful job; Chuck Turner; Kelly Wade; Jack O'Neill on the personal staff of the gentleman from Georgia
(Mr. Kingston); and, of course, our appropriation staff, Dave Pomerantz, Tom Forhan, and my own staff person Tim Aiken.
I want to say right up front that they have done a great job on this bill. Even though it might not be the most exciting bill, it has as fine a staff as you would want to find on the Hill.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the distinguished whip of the Democratic Caucus, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).
(Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) for a colloquy.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 8 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt) for a colloquy.
Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the efforts of my colleague from New Jersey and agree that the Congress could use more scientific expertise. I regret that this amendment was not made in order. I had urged the Committee on Rules to make it in order.
I do have some concerns about how the Architect would absorb a $7 million cut, but I think Congress would benefit from a restored capability to conduct more technology assessments. Unfortunately, I do not think that the support is there within this body to recreate the original Congressional Office of Technology Assessment.
As my colleague knows, I have worked with the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) to establish a core competency within the General Accounting Office through a pilot program to conduct technology assessments. The pilot program's first report using biometrices for border security was both timely and helpful as Congress used some of the report's findings in crafting legislation to create the Department of Homeland Security.
Technology assessments can help us craft better policies and laws. There is report language accompanying this bill which directs the GAO to conduct three more technology assessment studies in fiscal year 2004. I would like to work with my colleague to explore ways that we can increase this capability for technology assessment in the Congress and establish a more stable foundation and a more certain future.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey. I believe it would be beneficial for our subcommittee to get advice from a bipartisan group on exactly these scientific issues. It would be useful to receive recommendations on what would be the most efficient, timely, and useful way to make sure that the core capability that has now been created can be placed on a more stable foundation and have a more certain future for a support agency such as the OTA to provide scientific advice to Congress.
Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, let me begin by complimenting my colleague, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce), who chairs our Republican Conference, on her superb statement. I think she really hit the nail on the…
Mr. Speaker, let me begin by complimenting my colleague, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce), who chairs our Republican Conference, on her superb statement. I think she really hit the nail on the head when she quoted Ronald Reagan, making it clear that the commitment in one's heart to priorities is not based on the size of the Federal budget.
It is interesting that as I listened to my friend, the gentlewoman from Rochester, New York, go through the litany of concerns that she has with this bill, and we are regularly hearing from the other side of the aisle that we are spending too much, we are concerned about the deficit, and they try to paint it as if Republicans only are the ones who are responsible for spending. I know that there are many who believe that this tax cut; because one of her closing lines here, I was struck with that, that we somehow are appropriating dollars, and that is how I inferred it, because she said we are spending dollars on millionaires and cutting off those who are in great need.
Nothing could be further from the truth. What we have done, Mr. Speaker, and I know that my friend, the ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations, is focused on this tax cut, we put into place a jobs and growth plan, which, frankly, is already beginning to work. We know that the best way to ensure that we have the resources necessary to deal with these issues is for us to make sure that we get the economy growing.
The challenge that we face fiscally here is that we have seen a slowdown that began the last two quarters of the year 2000, and we are emerging from that. Virtually every economist has acknowledged that the economic recession that took place in the early part of 2001 was, in fact, the shallowest economic recession since the Great Depression. Why? In large part due to the fact that we put into place an economic growth plan, and it is one which I think we should stick by.
Now, let us talk about the bill and this legislation itself. I know that my friend, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce), has very appropriately pointed to the hard work and success of the chairman of the full Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) as well as the chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula). We obviously are living with very, very challenging fiscal constraints that have been imposed on us by the budget which passed this House, and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) was one who, as has been said by the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), willingly stepped forward as a subcommittee chairman and chose to, without complaint, live within the strictures imposed by the 302(b) allocations that, in fact, do have limitations on the amount that can be spent. But it is important to note that his pursuit of vigorous reforms and dealing with priorities will, in fact, allow those very important needs to be met.
Now, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) likes to refer to this as the Love Thy Neighbor bill, because with 280 million Americans, virtually everyone is touched by some aspect of this bill, whether it has to do with health issues, education issues, we can go right down the line. We all as Americans are touched by this. So it is for that reason, as we look at a wide range of these very important, serious, challenging societal needs, that he has come forward with a fiscally responsible measure that will allow us to address those.
I would like to take just a moment, Mr. Speaker, to talk about one of those needs. He very generously allowed my colleague, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions), and me to join with the very capable writer and commentator George Will in testifying before his subcommittee about the need for us to ensure that the National Institutes of Health has the resources necessary to deal with the challenge of Down Syndrome. I have friends, included among them George Will and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions), and my former staff director of the House Committee on Rules, Vince Randazzo, who have in their family children who are
faced with the challenge of Down Syndrome. And I believe that the recognition that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) has made in reporting out this measure will go a long way towards dealing with that challenge for future generations.
Mr. Speaker, we can go all the way down the line in looking at all of the diseases that exist; we can look at all of these different issues. And we know that there are some who have talked about the idea that we may not be providing the same kind of increase for the National Institutes of Health that have been provided in the past. Since 1994 we have doubled the level of spending for expenditures for the National Institutes of Health, and the gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Regula) has very appropriately said that with large Federal bureaucracies, it takes a while to absorb many of these resources that are provided. So while my friend from Rochester talked about the fact that we should be increasing funds for this and this and this and this, all of these issues, which are obviously priorities and are a concern to all of us, we have to recognize that within the structure that is there today, we have got to allow these resources that have been increased dramatically over the past several years, as I said, since we won the majority, doubled at the National Institutes of Health, we have to allow it to be absorbed. That is why I think when I talked about reforms earlier, that is the kind of thing that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) is pursuing in his measure.
So, Mr. Speaker, as the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) said, we are going to hear a lot of rhetoric as the debate begins on this measure. There are going to be a lot of people who will try to paint those of us who are supporting the very important work of this committee as being less than concerned about those who are in need. Nothing could be further from the truth. We are doing it responsibly, we are doing it within the fiscal constraints that have been set forward, and we are doing it with a great deal of compassion.
So I urge my colleagues to support this rule and to support the very important measure that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) has worked so hard on.
Mr. Speaker, will the gentlewoman yield?
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I would say, I know as I see the chairman of the subcommittee here, this view that somehow Draconian cuts are going to take place that jeopardize the opportunity for people to be in the Head Start program dealing with SCHIP and a wide range of things I believe is a real stretch. Let us look at this bill, which I believe is going to pass and be successful, and I believe it is a measure that will, in fact, meet those very important needs that are out there.
Mr. Speaker, I want to say to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) that she made two statements I agree with. She said this is a good bill, perhaps not as much as they would like, but it is…
Mr. Speaker, I want to say to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) that she made two statements I agree with. She said this is a good bill, perhaps not as much as
they would like, but it is good given the constraints we have; and, secondly, education is a high priority. We agree it is a high priority, so much so in the last 8 years we have doubled the money that went to education, and we have tripled the money for the special needs children. Members need to keep that in mind.
Also, keep in mind we are not debating a tax bill. That is behind us. That was a Committee on Ways and Means issue. We are debating a bill within the budget constraints given to us, an allocation which is about $138 billion. We have tried, and I want to say that the minority members as well as the majority members had input in trying to allocate the priorities and the resources in the best possible way.
Now, we have heard about the letter from the administration, and I understand that because the administration has priorities that are somewhat different than the Members of this House. But if I read the Constitution correctly, the House of Representatives has the responsibility for setting policy, not executing it, but setting it. So if there is some difference, it is because we reflect 435 Members' priorities and 280 million people. This literally is the people's House. As such, in this bill we have tried to reflect the things that are important to the people of this Nation given the constraints.
I want to say for the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), the gentleman worked diligently to get some additional funding so we could meet the needs of the people of this Nation. I think we should not lose sight of that. This is a good bill. I hope all Members between now and tomorrow will familiarize themselves with what is in this bill. A ``no'' vote will be a vote for $1 billion less for special needs children. A ``no'' vote will be a vote against $680 million give or take for education. A ``no'' vote will be a reduction in impact aid, and on and on. It will be a reduction in an amount for NIH.
Let me point out that it was this Republican majority that doubled the NIH budget over a period of 5 years. They have the highest number of projects, research projects, ever in history, something like 34,000 grants that have been made to do research on the medical health of this Nation. Let us remember that a lot of good things were done. This bill does have hope, and it has compassion; and that is our responsibility, to give the people of America hope that there will be better things ahead, and it does, and that we have compassion.
I do not want to debate totally the bill tonight, we will have plenty of time for that tomorrow, but I just point out that our colleagues both on the majority and the minority side will familiarize themselves with what this bill does. We tried to be fair and I think the minority members of the subcommittee will agree that every opportunity was made to have witnesses and hear testimony from all aspects of America. If Members could sit in the hearing room and see the row of wheelchairs and needs of kids, we have tried to address that. We probably had more hearings than any other subcommittee because we are trying to represent the problems that challenge 280 million Americans, whether it is health care, whether it is people who have lost their job and want an opportunity to get some new skills, or whether it is the education needs of our young people. I think we have reflected that. It is the people's bill.
Mr. Speaker, I would point out again that we have doubled education in the last 8 years. We have tripled the money that goes to special needs. We have increased the commitment to math and science. We have heard a lot about that, that we need more math and science teachers; and we have addressed that in the bill. We have addressed the fact that we need more highly skilled teachers in the classroom. We all can see that classroom teachers can make a world of difference. We have recognized that in the bill that is before Members.
I would point out that in terms of NIH, we have recognized their needs. Actually, a lot of construction is taking place out there, so we have focused resources, given a 6 percent increase in program funding, which is an important element to ensure that the requests that come to NIH for research can be met. That is why we have the greatest number of research projects going on right now in the history of NIH. That is a tribute to the Republican leadership in doubling the budget of NIH.
The Centers for Disease Control, we put substantial increases there because that agency has a special responsibility in terms of homeland security; and they are addressing it, and they recognize that infectious diseases are a real threat to this Nation. A former Senator said at a breakfast I was at that the greatest threat is bioterrorism, and we have tried to recognize that by giving CDC a substantial increase in funding. CDC is the watchdog in the sense that they are always looking out to keep these things away from America's shores and to give help to others.
One of the things that we are trying to do with this bill is to streamline the health care delivery system. We have said let us make it seamless, every way from CDC to the local State health agencies to the local agencies so if there is a problem in a community, there is an immediate response all the way to CDC. Again, we are putting a protection in place for the health of American citizens.
As far as job training, in this bill we increase the amount that goes to the Department of Labor to help the communities across the Nation have job training programs so they will be able to help those that are displaced because of imports, because of a shifting consumer market in products, again a recognition of the needs of people. This really is a people's bill. This really is a fair balance. I do not think that it is partisan. I think in constructing this we took the $138 billion that were available and said what can we do in the fairest possible way to meet the needs of education, health research and to meet the needs of those who need job retraining. I hope Members in the minority will look at what is in this bill and realize how valuable it is to the American people, and they will think twice before they vote against all of these programs that are very important to the people of this Nation.
Mr. Speaker, I originally had intended to vote for this resolution and this bill, but then about an hour ago my staff brought it to my attention something which they discovered about this bill.…
Mr. Speaker, I originally had intended to vote for this resolution and this bill, but then about an hour ago my staff brought it to my attention something which they discovered about this bill. Buried in the bill, in fact, not in the bill at all, but in the budget for the House Administrative Office, is a $750,000 item that would begin to provide expanded dental care for Members of Congress and their staff July 4 of next year. No Member on this side of the aisle, to my knowledge, knew anything about it, and no member of our staff knew anything about it. I am only the senior Democrat on the Committee on Appropriations, and yet I did not know that that provision was at all tied into this bill.
So we called the majority staff and asked about it, and they told us that they did not know anything about it. I believe the person that my staff talked to on the majority side, but I do not know what that means in terms of who put that provision in the bill. I assume the tooth fairy. But somebody did. And until that provision is removed or until we have an assurance that it is going to be removed, and I understand that the majority is going to remove it, nobody on this side of the aisle intends to vote for this rule or the accompanying bill.
I happen not to have any objection to the idea that we provide dental coverage for every American in this country, but it was only 1 week ago when this Congress chiseled on Medicare benefits and chiseled on prescription drug benefits for retired seniors in this country, and for us to then find out that somebody has the bright idea that while we are chiseling on benefits for everybody else in this society, we are going to have an expanded medical benefit for Members of Congress is more than I am going to swallow.
And I want to say something else. I am tired of people in Congress who want to provide benefits for themselves who will not provide those same benefits for the people we represent. I will never forget the experience I had last year when I went to a town named Antigo to open a small dental clinic for low-income people, and there I met a young woman whose husband had been sick for months. I think he had MS, but I am not sure. And she told me that there had been about 67 dentists in that four-county area. Only half of them would take Medicaid patients because of the low reimbursement rates. She told she went to every single one of those dentists trying to get some help to have the braces taken off of the teeth of her oldest child; could not find a single dentist to do it. So she finally held the kid down while the father took the braces off with a pair of pliers.
I have had a bellyful of Washington politicians who want to deny people like that the needed healthcare, and yet will countenance this kind of end run in this bill today. I do not know who knew about this, but, by God, somebody knew about it, and I do not believe it was anybody on our committee on either side of the aisle. But it is a disservice for whoever tried this. It is a disservice not just to the taxpayer, but to every single Member of this House on both sides of the aisle because those Members, after they voted for this bill, they would have found out that they had voted blindly for a bill which allowed this to happen, and the public would have been justifiably angry, and the Members would not have been to blame.
So I am glad that this is going to be taken out, but I am mad as hell that this ever happened. And I know the gentleman from Florida had nothing to do with it, and I know his staff had nothing to do with it, but I wish to God whoever did would 'fess up.
I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments and his assurance. I know he is an honorable man, and I know that he would not have sneaked anything like this through. I want to know who did this, but I do not want it passed off to some low-ranking staffer in this place. Somebody got an order from somebody to do it, and every last Member of this House has a right to know who gave that order.
I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time.
Reserving the right to object, Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder) to explain the impact of this amendment.
Further reserving the right to object, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object, I thank the gentleman for that explanation.
Mr. Speaker, I want to make it clear I do not oppose any member of this society being able to have dental coverage or vision coverage under their insurance program. I would be very happy if my employees had it. I think all employees ought to have that coverage. I think all Americans ought to have that coverage. So I do not want this language to be misinterpreted as meaning that we are opposed to the idea.
I think what we are all opposed to is the idea that this bill would slip this into law without having an open public debate about it so that it can be honestly dealt with and above-board in open-door sunlight fashion.
And I would like to yield to the gentleman again to comment on this. I would like him to explain to the House exactly what the process will be so that every Member can be confident that they know what they are doing when they vote on both the rule and the bill.
I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object, I would simply like to make one correction. My understanding is that it is not actually the language in the bill which provides this. My understanding is that the key language was contained in the budget of the Chief Administrative Officer, which is financed by this bill. So we actually have to go to that document in order to discover the offending language.
Further reserving the right to object, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston).
Mr. Speaker, continuing my reservation, I thank the gentleman.
I just want to clear up one procedural question. I think Members need to know which action will adopt the language which strikes this from the bill. Will it be the adoption of the rule, or the passage of an amendment after the bill is under consideration?
If Members want to assure this provision is not in the bill, and if they want to be on record voting against any possibility that this will happen under this bill, they will vote for the rule.
Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.
Mr. Speaker, we have heard a lot of rewriting of history in the last hour or so. I want to make one thing clear, if House Republicans had their way and if we had passed the bills which originally…
Mr. Speaker, we have heard a lot of rewriting of history in the last hour or so. I want to make one thing clear, if House Republicans had their way and if we had passed the bills which originally passed the House under Republican leadership the last 5 years, instead of increasing education funding by $19 billion over that 6-year period, we would have decreased it by $15 billion. That is the bottom line summary of the facts.
Now, let me get to the problem with this rule. Over the last 2 years, Congress has provided more than $2 trillion in tax cuts; a huge percentage of those tax cuts have been targeted to the top 1 percent of earners in this country. The majority party has pretended that there are no consequences and no cost to those tax cuts. Well, there are. First of all, every single dollar is paid for with borrowed money. That means that for the fiscal year in which this bill is going to be effective, we will pay $26 billion more in interest. That makes no sense. For less than half of that, you could fix every appropriations bill that we are going to pass.
Consequence number two of the trillions of dollars in tax cuts is that there is no money left on the table except table scraps to deal with the problems of Medicare, to deal with the problems of prescription drugs, and to deal with other needed investments.
Of the 13 appropriations bills that will come before the House this year, this is the bill that contains most of the funds for those needed investments. And I think we need to take a look at what is happening to this bill because this is the bill that demonstrates where the chickens come home to roost because of the cost of the outlandish tax packages that this House has passed.
Now, in order to get moderate Republican votes for the original budget resolution, the Republican majority in this House promised that they would provide significant funding for title I and special education in order to get the votes of those moderates. So they promised that they would raise that funding to a very high level. The problem is that for title I we have a bill today which is almost $400 million below that funding level. And for special education we have a bill which is $1.2 trillion, below the amount promised in the Republicans' own budget resolution. So it is apparent that what happened is that they could not afford both to pay for their tax cuts and keep their promises on education, so they are breaking their promises on education.
Secondly, the President said when we passed No Child Left Behind, ``no more money until we reform the programs.'' So we reform the programs. I voted for those reforms. And guess what? The check is not in the mail. The money now is not coming. This bill is going to be $8 billion for education below the amount that was promised for the funding scheduled for No Child Left Behind. In addition, this bill contains a number of other problems. It brings the 5-year progress that we have had in doubling NIH to a halt.
You ask the people who are going to contract cancer, Parkinson's, Lou Gehrig's disease, MS, you ask them this year whether they think an $88,000 tax cut for a millionaire is more important than continuing our efforts to double again NIH medical research. I know the answer you will get because they are in my office every day begging for help.
In addition to that problem, if you take a look at some of the other problems, this committee cuts LIHEAP, the low-income heating assistance program, by $200 million below the President's budget and below last year. It cuts 3 million congregate meals for senior citizens under the Old Americans Act. It adds 200,000 people to the backlog that the Social Security Agency will experience in trying to meet disability claims, for instance. And it comes up $400 million dollars short, well, I have already said $400 million short, in basic title I programs.
The problem with this House and the problem with this rule is that if this rule is adopted, nobody in the House can fix the problems in the bill that I
have just described because the rule locks us in to past decisions on tax cuts, and it says, ``Sorry, boys and girls, you cannot do a blessed thing about it except fiddle around the edges.''
So, Mr. Speaker, I am going to ask people to vote ``no'' on the previous question. If it goes down, I will offer two amendments, one would close the gap between No Child Left Behind and other education funding. It would raise $5 billion in additional funding for education for needed funds for health care, and I would offer a second amendment which would provide $2.9 billion in increases by increasing every State's share that they receive from the Federal Government under Medicaid so that we can guarantee that not a single poor child will be tossed off the Medicaid or SCHIP rolls in any State of the Union.
The budget process has been managed in a way that is trying to hide the impact of those tax cuts on education, on health care, on workers. This amendment reestablishes those linkages for all to see. In a democracy, you should not hide from your choices. You should make them quite clear. What a vote for this rule will do is to lock in the decision that we have made to have our kids pay for tax cuts for millionaires. That is a lousy choice. Anybody who makes it ought to be ashamed of themselves.
Mr. Speaker, I just want to correct something the gentleman just said.
The fact is, going all the way back to 1978, there has never been a year when the Democratically controlled Congress provided a federal contribution for IDEA less than 7\1/2\ percent. In fact, in 1979 it was 12\1/2\ percent; in 1983, 9\1/2\ percent.
The fact is everybody understands, this is the same Republican majority that tried to eliminate the Department of Education, that tried to shut the government down in order to force deep cuts in education. They had to be dragged kicking and screaming into supporting education increases in 5 out of the last 6 years, and now they are taking credit for the funding increases which the Democrats forced on them mostly during the Clinton years.
I do not mind them rewriting history, but I certainly hope they do not expect us to believe it.
Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During…
Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 311 is a closed rule providing for the consideration of H.R. 2657, the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act of 2004. H. Res. 311 provides 1 hour of debate in the House on the bill equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations. The resolution waives all points of order against the bill and against its consideration, and it provides one motion to recommit with or without instructions.
Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by first noting the first-class work of the Legislative Branch Appropriations Subcommittee in bringing this legislation forward to the House floor. It was particularly refreshing to see the chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston), and the ranking minority member, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), testifying in support of their work product before the House yesterday.
It is a fiscally responsible bill that will ultimately encourage greater productivity and meaningful savings, and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) is to be commended for his management oversight that will certainly ensure that organizational changes are administered better within the legislative branch's agencies.
Mr. Speaker, this is not the largest appropriations bill and it is not the most important. However, this appropriations bill is important because it sets the tone for what the House leadership and the Republican House are working towards in terms of fiscal responsibility, effective organization, and result-focused management across the Federal Government.
In brief, this appropriations bill provides $2.7 billion in funding for fiscal year 2004, including funding for the House, the Capitol Police, the Congressional Budget Office, the Architect of the Capitol, the Library of Congress, the Government Printing Office, and the General Accounting Office. It is important to note, however, that this $2.7 billion figure is 1.2 percent less in total dollars than in the current fiscal year. This decrease represents a reduction in funding of almost $34 million compared to the current fiscal year.
While Congress at times has demonstrated difficulty in restraining itself from spending money, it strikes me as a significant event that this bill before us today cuts the congressional
budget for fiscal year 2004. It is an indication that there is a continued commitment to make the government work more efficiently and that that commitment begins with ourselves in the legislative branch.
Mr. Speaker, this rule ensures the orderly consideration of the legislative branch funding legislation. I urge Members to support the rule so we may begin to debate this important legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I could not be more in agreement with the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey). We do have an amendment here we are going to ask unanimous consent to be added to the bill that would put limitation and delete that language so that no expansion of that service be available.
Let me just add this. This is not the first time I have seen this happen. Some years ago I was involved in the settlement of some final appropriations bills, and language was put into the bill to dramatically change the Native American health system, and it was found and stripped out, and it found its way back into the bill. When that happens at any level, the person who is responsible for it ought to be fired at that moment. I hope we can do that in this case.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the pending resolution be amended by the form I have placed at the desk.
Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Speaker, the impact of this amendment would just delete any possibility that any increases or expansions of dental care or vision care will be expanded.
Mr. Speaker, as we have just learned in the last hour or so, and the chairman has just learned it here, someone somewhere slipped language into the leg branch bill that expands dental and vision health insurance benefits for Members and employees of the House. And I agree with the gentleman from Wisconsin. A fair and open discussion of expansion of these benefits for everyone is a legitimate course for this House to take and vote up or down, but to hide it in a bill and slide it in is simply inappropriate.
This language is eliminating language on the leg branch bill, and it says that none of the funds in this act may be used to provide that expansion of dental or vision benefits. It puts a limitation on those benefits where they are correct right now in the current form.
Mr. Speaker, I believe the gentleman is correct, and if he would not mind yielding to the chairman of the subcommittee, he has something to say on it, too.
If the gentleman would yield further, I think we know where to start now.
If the gentleman will yield further, it will be the adoption of the rule will strike the language.
That is correct. The adoption of the rule will put in place limiting language that will prevent any expansion of those benefits.
Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution, as amended.
The previous question was ordered.
Mr. Speaker, I do not know if this is the most boring bill in the House; but it is certainly one of the most boring, there is no doubt about it. Maybe that is why it is going to get almost a…
Mr. Speaker, I do not know if this is the most boring bill in the House; but it is certainly one of the most boring, there is no doubt about it. Maybe that is why it is going to get almost a unanimous vote, but I really came to the well of the House today to say thank you to so many people who work in this institution who we all take for granted.
We show up here every day. We have these folks taking down all of our words, and we can pick up the Congressional Record and read it. We have all of these folks that are behind me who show up every day and do all the work and we take all the credit.
And there are many, many thousands of people like that in this House who do a great job for the Members and do a great job for the public, and that is what this bill is all about. It is taking care of the 10 major offices and funding the 10 major offices that make all of us look good as Members of Congress: The staff in the Architect's office; and when we need legal advice, there are people here who give us legal advice; when we need medical attention, there are people who can give us medical attention, and the list goes on and on.
As a former staffer, I want to say thank you to all of the staff who work hard in this institution to make the 435 Members and the 100 Members in the other body look good. They do not get the appreciation, they do not get the thanks that is so well deserved. And they do work hard, and they make this place tick. They make it operate. When we are gone, they are still here. And when we are gone, they really continue to keep the Capitol open.
I know that it is fashionable to take our hats off to the Capitol Hill Police, and I certainly want to do that. They work really hard, and they provide the protection. But there are lots of other people, hundreds of other people in this Capitol who do such great work for so many of us and for the public who come here. We owe them a big debt of gratitude for what they do, and that is what this bill is about, to say to them we want to continue to fund the work that you do to give you a little bit of an increase and to say thank you for what you do.
I also want to make mention of two other items. One is the Capitol Visitors Center. I know that we are going to have some additional hearings on that. I know we are going to have some additional meetings on it. I know that there is a big hole in front of the Capitol, and a lot of people wonder what it is all about. It is the responsibility of this subcommittee to take charge of that and to really have responsibility for it.
I know it has been sort of a leadership-driven project, but it is up to the Congress to come up with the money to fund this, and we do have the responsibility for it. I think we take that responsibility seriously, and we want to make sure it is done correctly and done right, and that it turns out to be a state-of-the-art visitors center, but done in a way that comports with the fiscal concerns that I think many of us have about what it will cost when it is complete.
The other issue I want to raise is one that is near and dear to my heart, and I am someone who has been pushing for this. Again, as a former staffer, I think it is important, and that is the idea that in this bill there is language and there is money to continue to study what it would take to put a footprint for a staff gym. Again, many of the people who work in this building and work long hours do not have access to the kind of facility that would allow them to get the kind of exercise that is necessary to stay healthy.
As an interim step, we were able to develop an agreement with Gold's Gym where any staffer can go to any Gold's Gym in the metropolitan area and have access to those facilities at a very, very reasonable cost. And I want to thank the staff who have made those arrangements possible. But in the end, my goal is to make sure that right here on the Capitol campus there is a facility for our staff so that they have a facility available so they can stay healthy and stay in good shape, just as the Members have available to them a very nice state-of-the-art facility for themselves both on the House and the Senate side. I really want to make sure that goal is achieved. We are making progress on it, and I think we will continue to make progress as we move ahead.
I know a lot has been said about the Capitol Hill Police, and I certainly support them. I want to say a word about the Chief of the Capitol Hill Police because he is from Illinois. I think Terry Gainer is doing a great job. I think we are fortunate to have such an outstanding law enforcement person in charge of the Capitol Hill Police. I have known Terry since he was the director of the State police in Illinois, where he did a great job. He then came to the city of Washington and worked with the chief of police and did a great job there, and now he is right here in our midst, and I think doing a good job, and I want to compliment him. And even though he was not allowed everything he wanted in this bill, I think people want to continue to work with Chief Gainer and continue his efforts to make sure that our facilities are secure.
So I compliment the chairman and the staff and the ranking member, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), for the work in our subcommittee, and I think we have done good work, and I encourage all Members to support the bill.
Mr. Speaker, I am always glad to be present at the annual exhibit of inconsistency on the Republican side. When we talk about this bill, first of all, they denounce us for claiming that additional…
Mr. Speaker, I am always glad to be present at the annual exhibit of inconsistency on the Republican side. When we talk about this bill, first of all, they denounce us for claiming that additional funding is important in showing we support programs. They then go on to brag about how much additional funding they have provided for the programs.
I must say I sometimes do agree that simply throwing money at problems is not necessarily a good idea. I just wish I was not one of the only few Members who thought that yesterday when we did $400 billion in about 3 minutes for the Defense Department, not all of which is exquisitely well spent.
Here, as I said, they brag about how much they spend and then try to denigrate spending as a measure. Dollars are not some totem. They are a measure of resources, and the dollars we make available are the resources we are making available.
As was pointed out previously, it is the Bush administration that is disappointed in many aspects of this bill, and I am quoting them directly. I am reading the statement of administration policy. There is six disappointeds, eight underfundeds and a lot of other negative words, but here is the one that I think most impressive to those advertisers of compassion on the other side.
The committee reduced the administration's request for the Social Security Administration by $168 million. Without these resources, SSA may not be able to reverse the steady increase in the backlog of disability claims.
Understand what the Bush administration has said. Vote for this bill and we will almost certainly increase the backlog of our disabled fellow citizens who cannot get money on which to live. Yeah, I think more money would be a good thing here. I agree with the administration. Let us understand what is at stake here.
The chairman of the Committee on Rules said he congratulated the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee, who I must say many of us admire and do not want to get him in trouble by expressing how much we sympathize with the dilemma that he is in; but revealingly, the chairman of the Committee on Rules said he credited the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee for agreeing to abide by these constraints. Good for him, he agreed to abide by these constraints.
Let us technically point out, and I love the gentleman, I know what pressure he is under, but he voted for these constraints he is abiding by. They talked about the Federal budget as if it had descended from the sky, the House budget resolution; and somehow these wonderful people in the House who would really love to help not build up the backlog on disability found themselves constrained by this thing called the budget. Apparently it came in a horror movie, stepped off the screen and it constrained them. They voted for it. They imposed this restriction on themselves, and that is the game we are playing.
We have the Republican majority first say in the specifics that they are for a lot of programs. Then to pay for the tax cut, what happens is this, they go to these constituencies and tell them how much they support these programs. They then give into ideological pressure and vote for very large tax cuts while we are fighting two wars.
Now, the notion that we can finance two wars with three tax cuts has not previously been known in human history; but having done that, they are now unable to fund the programs that they told people they loved. So what do they do? They pass a tax cut. Then they pass a rule which does not allow them to consider the tax cut when they vote to underfund the programs. This is a perfect example of tying their own hands.
It is what I have called before the reverse Houdini. Unlike Houdini, who was tied in knots and had as his act getting out of the knots, my Republican colleagues, particularly those compassionate ones, tie themselves in knots and then their public act is to say, boy, would I love to help you if I was not tied up in these knots. Well, it is the tax cut that keeps you from funding Social Security so that you do not get the build-up in disability that the President talks about. It is the tax cut that you voted for.
What we are asking for is let us do priorities. Let us not have the tax cut done months ago, a budget done months ago, and now act as if those things which you voted for and you gave us are somehow acts of God that bind us. Let us reopen this and let us deal as rational human beings. Let us put on the one side Social Security disability and the other important programs, Downs Syndrome, et cetera; and let us put on this side the tax cut for the rich, and let us make rational decisions about which is more important.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time. I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) who have worked and labored over this bill for…
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time. I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) who have worked and labored over this bill for quite some time. I want to thank them for their dedication to a number of key principles in this bill; but I first must take some exception because it seems no matter what we are talking about on this floor, it is always not enough. There is never enough provided for the bills that they would like to pass on to the taxpayers.
We keep hearing about deficits, and I know they know a lot about deficits on the other side because for 40 years they rolled the deficits up to a $5.7 trillion mortgage on America's future. We talk about giving some tax relief to American taxpayers, but we have a disconnect because we talk in this Capitol like it is our money rather than theirs.
Now, the first case of anthrax and the first death of anthrax happened in my county, in Palm Beach County, JFK Medical Center. So I know firsthand the efforts our local public health officials and the CDC and others had in grappling with this emerging concern and epidemic, at least at that time, a concern that panicked many Americans. And thanks to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and this committee, they have added substantially to the budgets for the Centers for Disease Control, for Community Health Centers, for the National Institutes of Health. In almost every one category we look at, significant and substantial increases in every category. Monies for special education grants, more money for title I. Prioritizing Reading First fully funds the program at the requested level of $1.15 billion. Improving teacher quality. It is not about how many teachers we have. It is the quality of those teaching. My father was a teacher and principal in the public school systems, so I know a little bit of what I speak. And when I see the improvements to help teachers grapple with the ever-changing dynamics, we are particularly proud of the fact that this bill does, in fact, have increased funding. Yes, an increase of 4 percent from fiscal year 2003.
Now, I guess if the other side had their choice, it would be 20 percent; and we would pass the bill on to those same taxpayers that they are seeming so critically concerned about when it comes to deficit spending. If you are in college and you have a Pell grant, we are maintaining that level at the highest maximum grant in the program's history. Infectious diseases, enhances CDC resources for preventing and controlling emerging infectious diseases. Threats such as SARS, West Nile Virus and monkey pox; 24 million of new, additional dollars in that category alone. Homeland security, bio-defense program supported at $1.625 billion dollars in NIH. Ryan White increase of $24 million for a total funding of $2 billion.
How can anyone say this bill does not meet the test of time? Faith- based and community initiatives increasing the compassion capital fund at $50 million, and mentoring children of prisoners at $25 million. Abstinence education, which is important.
So as we scan the bill and as people listen to our voices, I hope they will not be dissuaded by some of the harsh rhetoric. Yes, we are having some tax relief for taxpayers. We are, in fact, having a chance to give those very hardworking Americans a chance to make their ends meets, to pay their bills, to be able to spend on their families. I do not think that there is anything wrong with a firefighter and a teacher who work side by side, husband and wife, who are raising kids, to have a little bit of tax relief. In fact, I do not hear anybody from the other side of the aisle offering to rebate their tax funds to the Treasury. I think it is fair to help balance the budget. I think it is fair to help fund programs that are important to America. I think it is important to give tax relief to American families.
I think we can do it all. This is not about single choices. This is about balancing our priorities and our needs. This bill, the full committee bill on Labor-HHS and Education does that dramatically, does it efficiently, does it effectively, and provides for the kind of programs that I think Americans have long come to expect of their Federal Government.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.) Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I…
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder) for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, each week in the Committee on Rules, I see my colleagues using procedure to kill substance and stifle debate. And again last night, the Committee on Rules passed a closed rule on the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act. This closed rule prohibits all amendments.
I am again concerned to see that our obligation to debate and deliberate is sacrificed in the name of efficiency. The legislative calendar for the month of July is very full. We have much work to do, but this does not diminish or negate our obligations as Members of this body.
The Committee on Rules rejected an amendment to transfer funds from the general administration account in order to carry out the Technology Assessments Act. The closed rule prevents offering that same amendment from the floor. We lose the opportunity to consider the amendment and to discuss the Office of Technology Assessment for the Congress and the office's mission to consider the impacts of technology.
The closed rule also bars an amendment that would apply the Buy American Act to procurement of manufactured goods by the House. Who could disagree that we should buy American-made products for our offices, especially when unemployment is at 6.4 percent, the highest it has been in 9 years, and the economy continues to limp along?
Should we have an opportunity to discuss whether or not the desks in our offices, paid for by the American taxpayers, should be made in America? Sure we should.
Other issues in this bill merit discussion. The funding level for the Capitol Police is lower than in the 2003 fiscal year, and the funding is almost $80 million less than the Capitol Police requested. The closed rule provides only 1 hour of debate but will not allow this to be discussed. With the continual terrorist threats to the U.S., we should at least discuss the funding needs of the Capitol Police. We ask them to put their lives at risk every day to protect our staff, our visitors, and us; yet we refuse to take the time to discuss their funding levels.
H.R. 2657 provides the Architect of the Capitol no additional funds for the Visitors Center. Today's Washington Post published an article on the delays and cost overruns on this project, which we are all concerned about. The Committee on Appropriations expressed serious concerns about the management of the project; and, indeed, there are certainly questions to be asked.
We still have to ask questions about the expatriate corporations benefiting from this massive construction project. All of these serious concerns warrant further deliberation on the funding levels for the Architect of the Capitol; but, unfortunately, the Committee on Rules continues to trample on the rights of the minority. This venerable institution warrants a fair, open, and deliberative process in considering legislation; and I regret this is another opportunity lost.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), the ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).
Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I yield back the balance of my time.
Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute Offered by Mr. Linder
Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.
Mr. Speaker, I am proud of the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and what we have done. These are considerable tough times, and it is not due to a tax break ``for the rich'' that the left on every…
Mr. Speaker, I am proud of the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and what we have done. These are considerable tough times, and it is not due to a tax break ``for the rich'' that the left on every bill states, but you can never spend enough money; but I think we have done a pretty good job.
If we take a look at, for example, IDEA was mentioned. I was a subcommittee chairman, and we authorized IDEA when we were in the minority. The maximum was 6 percent funding that the Democrats ever put forth for IDEA, 6 percent. We are up to over 18 percent since we have taken the majority.
Title I, we have increased the funding for title I; and Mr. Speaker, I sorely resent comments from the left that state that the only thing we want to do is help the rich.
I am dedicated on education and medical research; and I work very, very hard in that direction. What I am upset at, the money that we raise for California not only in formula but for the additional funds that we are sending California for title I, Governor Gray Davis is taking the additional money that we sent to California and putting it in county mental health. He has taken away the money.
When they talk about tax rates for the rich, in 1993, when they had the majority, they taxed the middle class when they said they would not, and they said well, only Democrats voted for that, no Republicans. Why did Republicans not vote for that tax increase? They cut military COLAs, which they demagogue every day on this floor. They cut veterans COLAs, which they demagogue. They increased the tax on Social Security, and they took every dime out of the Social Security trust fund, and they taxed the middle class the highest tax ever, which also hurt the military. There is no occasion they want tax relief. They always want a tax increase for additional spending and big government programs.
New York cost $200 billion just to rebuild. That does not include $83 billion just in lost revenue; and then we look at the airline industry, we look at the hotel industry, we look at the stock market and what has happened. Yes, there is depreciation of funds along with the war on terrorism. Maybe we can take the money back from New York and fund all these programs. I do not want to do that because they needed that money, but for that other side and the left to come out and say that Republicans only care about the rich, it hurts because they know it is not true, but it is political gamesmanship before an election.
Mr. Speaker, the maximum amount that the Democrats, when we were in the minority, ever funded IDEA was 6 percent. Regardless of the percentage that they increased it, the total amount was 6 percent. We are up to 18 percent. Do not try and rewrite history.
Mr. Speaker, it is almost laughable. The gentlewoman from California talks about Republicans cutting education. Well, we have increased education higher than they ever did.
Mr. Speaker, they cannot stand it. The Republicans have taken over the issue of education and prescription drugs, and they just cannot stand it. It is killing them.
The gentlewoman talks about the poor military. In 1993, the gentlewoman from California voted to cut military COLAs when they were on food stamps. She voted to cut veterans' COLAs. She voted to increase the tax on Social Security and take the money out of the Social Security Trust Fund. The gentlewoman from California's highest rating on defense is 36 percent. Her average is 16 percent. Sixteen percent.
I would say to the gentlewoman from California, if she is so interested in helping the military, two-thirds of a military bill is pay and allowances.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to enter into a colloquy with the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston), the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Houghton). Mr. Speaker,…
Mr. Speaker, I rise to enter into a colloquy with the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston), the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Houghton).
Mr. Speaker, yesterday I submitted an amendment to the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act bill to provide $7 million to revive the Office of Technology Assessment as authorized by the Technology Assessment Act of 1972. During its 23 years of existence, OTA provided Congress with highly respected, impartial analysis of complex scientific and technological issues and their impacts on current legislation. When OTA's funding was eliminated in 1995, Congress lost a valuable and unique resource.
Although my amendment was not ruled in order, I would like to use this opportunity to discuss with the chairman the need for more scientific advice in Congress.
Mr. Speaker, science and technology have pervaded almost every aspect of
our society. Most, if not all, of the bills that come to the floor of the House include technological components. Technology has played and will continue to play an important role in many of the issues such as economic development, homeland security, and environmental stewardship, which this body has dedicated so much time and money to address.
Mr. Speaker, if the OTA were still in existence, it is likely we would have received I think in a timely way reports that address the importance of research in early childhood development as it relates to Head Start or technology needed to ensure intraoperability of first responder communication devices in high-rise buildings, scientific evidence regarding the safety of genetically engineered food, or a comprehensive assessment of the technology available to ensure the safety of our airlines and shipping ports.
Would my colleagues, the ranking member on this committee and the chairman and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Houghton), agree that many issues such as these that we deal with on a daily basis are highly technical and that we could use more help in evaluating the merits of such legislation dealing with such matters?
I yield to the gentleman from Virginia.
I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman and the ranking member for their efforts in directing the GAO to conduct three pilot technology assessments, and I am sure they would agree with me that three reports is not nearly sufficient to meet the needs of Congress.
I would suggest that we need a capacity to conduct upwards of 40 reports a year. Now, whether housed in the GAO or in a re-funded OTA, we need to provide the support to ensure a sustained capacity in-house to conduct a significant number of studies and maintain a professional staff to accomplish this objective. Currently, we are not providing the GAO with sufficient funds to achieve this objective.
I yield to the gentleman from New York.
Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would like to thank the three gentleman for agreeing to enter into this discussion on the importance of providing balanced bipartisan technology assessment, an approach to begin the process that will allow this Congress and our successors to utilize more of the empirical, fact-based, scientific and technical expertise needed to shape a sound public policy.
Mr. Speaker, H.R. 2657 appropriates nearly $295 million to the Architect of the Capitol for fiscal year 2004. The Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, on which I serve as Ranking…
Mr. Speaker, H.R. 2657 appropriates nearly $295 million to the Architect of the Capitol for fiscal year 2004. The Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, on which I serve as Ranking Democratic Member, is the authorizing committee with jurisdiction over the Architect's activities relating to the Capitol, the House and Senate Office Buildings, and the Capitol Grounds.
Let me state at the outset that I have great respect for the Architect, Mr. Alan Hantman. In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks and the release of anthrax in some of the House and Senate Office Buildings, Mr. Hantman's office did a tremendous job in ensuring the safety and security of the Congress, those working in the Capitol buildings, and the visiting public. He has rightly made the security of everyone who works in and visits the Capitol his number one priority. In addition, Mr. Hantman has initiated a program to maintain and renovate the Capitol building and has promoted the construction of the Capitol Visitor's Center--a place where the American people can come and learn more about the inner workings of their government. The U.S. Capitol, and all that it represents, is the citadel of democracy, and the Architect has done a fine job of caring for it.
However, the knowledge of these accomplishments only serves to heighten my great disappointment in the Architect over the manner in which his office has proceeded with unauthorized construction activities, specifically and most recently the demolition of the Tip O'Neill House Office Building. The Architect of the Capitol never sought a specific Committee authorization for the demolition of the O'Neill Building. Moreover, in December 2002, then-Economic Development and Public Buildings Subcommittee Ranking Member Jerry Costello and I wrote to the Architect to express our concern that the Architect's office was not authorized to demolish the O'Neill Building and to request a description of the demolition project and specific cost estimates for the project. The Architect has never answered our letter.
Whether it is regarding the demolition of the Tip O'Neill House Office Building, cost overruns of the Capitol Visitor's Center, or the construction and maintenance of the Capitol buildings, the Architect has a responsibility to be responsive to all Members of this Body, including Democratic Members of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
I understand that earlier this year, the Architect wrote to Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Don Young and stated that with regard to the O'Neill Building site, the Architect of the Capitol will make no further changes to the site ``without the authorization and approval from the appropriate governing authorities.'' I take that to mean that he will seek the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's approval before undertaking any new construction on the site, and I continue to expect a full response to the inquiry that Ranking Member Costello and I made last December. Moreover, I will urge the Subcommittee on Economic Development and Public Buildings of the Transportation Committee to conduct an oversight hearing on the Architect's construction program.
Mr. Speaker, I intended to offer an amendment to the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act that would allow Members to use their representational allowances to promote, sponsor and conduct…
Mr. Speaker, I intended to offer an amendment to the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act that would allow Members to use their representational allowances to promote, sponsor and conduct congressional science competitions among high school students in their district. The very popular Congressional Arts Competition, which allows Members to sanction art competitions within their districts, has been successfully conducted for over 20 years. This competition helps to encourage young people to pursue their artistic education and ambitions and promotes the idea that art should be an integral part of our lives; yet no such congressional competition exists to reward the achievements of young scientists, as I learned last year when I had hoped to conduct such a competition in my district which is, I am proud to say, the home of Cal Tech and JPL and some of the finest scientists on the Earth. House rules prohibit any Member from conducting any competitions except for the Congressional Arts Competition.
Science is integral to our society and to our American spirit of ingenuity and innovation. Science fuels our technological entrepreneurship and has been the basis for remarkable technological advances in the span of only a few decades, including space exploration, biotechnology and medical advances to seek cures to human disease and afflictions, and tremendous gains in computing power, telecommunications, and information management.
As Members of Congress, we must do our part to advance scientific knowledge and scientific explanation as core values of our society. One important way we can engender a sense of excitement about scientific inquiries is to reward the achievements of young scientists by allowing Members to conduct congressional scientific competitions in each of our 435 districts. I look forward to working with my colleagues on this important issue at the earliest possible opportunity.
I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I agree with the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston). The intention is not to seek any additional appropriations, but rather to allow Members to use their existing allowances to host, if they choose, science competitions in their districts.
I think we have seen the dramatic success of the arts competition in stimulating interest in the arts. This would be a way of heightening the awareness of the importance of science in our lives and getting young people engaged. We need more scientists in this country, and this is a good way to tap into that young talent.
I can tell my colleague had a greater head start than I did. I think my science project when I was in school consisted of how to drop an egg from a light tower in a contraption that would not allow the egg to break, which is a little less sophisticated than counting the number of protozoa in a pond. Nonetheless, there are great opportunities for us to reach into our districts, tap into that talent and cultivate the future scientists that will lead this Nation forward. I look forward to working with the gentleman.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time. I would ask my friend from Florida to read the administration's position on the bill where they say, and I unfortunately do not have the…
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time. I would ask my friend from Florida to read the administration's position on the bill where they say, and I unfortunately do not have the time to read, insufficient funding. We fear that we cannot fully carry out the administration's request. We believe that Pell grants are underfunded. We believe that five or six or seven or eight programs are underfunded.
That is the administration, that is not us, asking that more money be spent.
Mr. Speaker, today the Republican Party might as well admit when the television cameras are on and the press and American people are watching, it says one thing, but then as soon as the photo opportunities are over, it says another. This Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill is an unmitigated betrayal of the bipartisan commitment to education in the No Child Left Behind Act. This bill falls $8 billion short of the funding authorized in that act signed by President Bush, congratulated by President Bush, and promised by President Bush to America and to the States, an increase that after inflation is tantamount to a funding freeze.
Just 2 months ago in the conference report on the Republican budget, this Republican majority promised a $3 billion increase for the Department of Education. That is not what we said we ought to spend. That is what you said you ought to spend. Today, it has underfunded that commitment by $700 million on the promise they made 90 days ago, the smallest percentage increase in 8 years. Just 2 months ago, this Republican majority promised to increase IDEA funding by $2.2 billion. Today it would provide less than half of that promise made less than 3 months ago.
This Republican majority promised to increase title I by $1 billion. Today, it would provide $334 million less than promised.
This bill abandons the commitments to the No Child Left Behind Act. It cuts low-income heating assistance, slashes unemployment programs, and breaks our commitment to face the nursing shortage.
The majority's refusal to allow the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) to offer two amendments tells us precisely where its priorities lie. It lies with America's millionaires, not the millions of children that will be left behind by the failure on this bill.
They would give a tax cut, the Obey amendment, hear me now, the Obey amendment would give a tax cut for people making more than $1 million a year of $44,000. That is more than over half of what Americans make in a year. That is what the Obey amendment
would do, give them a $44,000 tax cut instead of $88,000.
Let us put our priorities where our hearts are said to be. Vote against this rule. Vote against this bill.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule and in opposition to the Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill. This bill shortchanges the American people in so many ways it is difficult to keep…
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule and in opposition to the Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill.
This bill shortchanges the American people in so many ways it is difficult to keep track of them all: the No Child Left Behind Act, $8 billion short; the Individuals With Disabilities Act, $1.2 billion short. It cuts LIHEAP funding below $200 million this year. It freezes the Maternal and Child Health Block Grant and the Childhood Immunization Program. It cuts health professions funding, money used to train doctors and nurses, by $30 million.
When our States are being forced to cut their education budgets, this bill freezes the maximum Pell grant and all other forms of Federal student financial aid.
What are we doing here, Mr. Speaker? I will tell my colleagues what this bill is going to do to Massachusetts. The children of Massachusetts will lose over $130 million in title I grants for what was promised in the No Child Left Behind Act. Children with disabilities in Massachusetts will lose over $29 million in IDEA grants below what was promised. Massachusetts will lose $6.3 million in teacher quality grants. UMass Memorial Healthcare will lose millions of dollars that the hospital uses to train doctors who serve in low-income areas, and the children of military personnel based in Massachusetts will lose $4.8 million in Impact Aid.
But the majority seems to have little concern for the children of Massachusetts or their hardworking parents or for the children and families of our country, and children around the world are not treated much better. This bill will cut the International Labor Affairs funding from $147 million to $12 million. The only purpose of that office is to help end the abuse of child labor around the world.
It is too bad that the children in my district and the children across the country and the children around the world do not make millions of dollars in dividend income. If they did, the Republicans would find the money to take care of them.
Mr. Speaker, this appropriations bill is a scandal, and our children deserve much more than a list of broken promises. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question, to give the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) the opportunity to fix this mess. If that fails, I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and a ``no'' vote on the bill.
Mr. Speaker, I was prepared to say as I did at the Committee on Rules that we do not really have a problem with this rule or this bill. It, in fact, is the first appropriations bill, at least that I…
Mr. Speaker, I was prepared to say as I did at the Committee on Rules that we do not really have a problem with this rule or this bill. It, in fact, is the first appropriations bill, at least that I am told, that is less than the previous year. That is because we are suspending some of the funding on the Capitol Visitors Center to make sure we have a full handle on all the additional expenditures, and we are not going forward quite as fast as the Capitol Police chief would like, but it does not imply necessarily any criticism in either respect. So this should have not been a problem. This should have been a rule that we could have probably voiced.
Not now. What we have is a serious affront to the institution. This was found by our appropriations staff person going through the bill. The majority staff was not even told about it. The Chair of the subcommittee was not even told about it. And it is just the kind of thing that makes the entire institution look bad.
We just had a bill yesterday that was not a bad bill. We wanted to make sure that current Federal employees were treated the same as Federal retirees, but it is a very sensitive issue given the fact that we just passed a prescription drug program under Medicare that many of us feel is very inadequate. So when it is compared to the benefits that Federal employees get and the members of the legislative branch get, it looks even worse. But the proposal we have here to provide dental and vision benefits just for the legislative branch, the executive branch does not have them, is the kind of feather-bedding, of taking care of ourselves, of self-serving legislation that comes back to haunt us on both sides of the aisle. And I agree with the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder), that this is serious stuff, and that we have got to find out where it happened and make sure it does not happen again.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this legislation, and I especially want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston), the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), and the gentleman from…
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this legislation, and I especially want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston), the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran), and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) for what has been included as a key project in this legislation.
We are beginning the work of a staff gym in the Congress. I served in the Pentagon, and there we have the Pentagon Officers Athletic Club. It is not a very nice facility, but it keeps the men and women during their headquarters tour in shape before returning to the field or sea. Such facilities are not available to congressional staff. Most large employers with over 5,000 employees in my district have on-site gyms. We employ over 10,000 people in the Congress and have no such facility.
As a former staff member, I think it is time we build a staff gym. We have spent taxpayer dollars for promotion programs on fitness or to fight obesity; we should do that here in Congress. This bill sets aside $100,000 to design a 4,000-square foot facility with male and female showers, lockers and a weight room. It will be ready for the staff in 8 months. We also are looking to expanding shower facilities for runners in Longworth and Cannon. We will have a more complete and permanent facility by July 2004.
This means that men and women who work here in the people's House will be fitter, will handle stress better, and will serve the long hours under low-pay conditions for longer working for our constituents.
Mr. Speaker, I want to reiterate my thanks to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood), but especially to Liz Dawson and Reed Bundy of our staffs who made this new facility a reality.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 2657, the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2004. This is the fourth bill we are considering pursuant to the 302(b) allocations…
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 2657, the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2004. This is the fourth bill we are considering pursuant to the 302(b) allocations adopted by the Appropriations Committee on June 17th. I am happy to report that it is consistent with the levels established in H. Con. Res. 95, the House concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2004, which Congress adopted as its fiscal blueprint on April 10th. Conforming with a long practice--under which each chamber of Congress determines its own needs, appropriations for the other Body are not included in the bill as reported to the House.
H.R. 2657 provides $2.669 billion in new budget authority, which is within the 302(b) allocation to the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Legislative. Outlays of $2.875 billion are also within the subcommittee's allocation. The bill contains no emergency-designated new budget authority, nor does it include rescissions of previously- enacted appropriations.
Accordingly, the bill as reported, complies with section 302(f) of the Budget Act, which prohibits consideration of bills in excess of an appropriations subcommittee's 302(b) allocation of budget authority.
I commend Chairmen Kingston and Young for bringing another appropriations bill to the floor that is consistent with the Budget Resolution.
Bill Text
2 versions available
[Congressional Bills 108th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 311 Engrossed in House (EH)]
In the House of Representatives, U.S.,
July 9, 2003.
Resolved, That upon the adoption of this resolution it shall be in order
without intervention of any point of order to consider in the House the bill
(H.R. 2657) making appropriations for the Legislative Branch for the fiscal year
ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes. The bill shall be considered
as read for amendment. The amendment specified in section 2 shall be considered
as adopted. All points of order against the bill, as amended, are waived. The
previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, to
final passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate on the
bill, as amended, equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking
minority member of the Committee on Appropriations; and (2) one motion to
recommit with or without instructions.
Sec. 2. The amendment referred to in section 1 of this resolution is as
follows:
On page 6, after line 22, insert the following new section:
``Sec. 102. None of the funds in this Act may be used to provide
supplemental dental or vision heath insurance benefits for Members and
employees of the House of Representatives.''.
Attest:
Clerk.