Television Consumer Freedom Act of 2013

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to call up as pending amendment No. 802.

If there is objection, I can talk about the amendment now. I will talk about the amendment now and then attempt to call up the amendment later in the day. I thank the Chair.

Mr. President, the amendment I am trying to get pending for the WRDA bill would delay the increase in flood insurance rates for people in this country who are going to be suffering in unbelievable ways. And I am not just speaking of homeowners or business owners but communities across America. This isn't a Louisiana issue. It is not a Louisiana- Texas issue. It is a national issue, as this chart will show.

These are all the States in the country that have flood insurance policies. Starting with Florida, which has the most, there are over 2 million flood insurance policies in the State of Florida. Texas is second with 645,000. Louisiana has 486,000 policies. California, the fourth State, has 256,000. New Jersey has 240,000. South Carolina has

205,000. New York has 178,000. North Carolina has 138,000. Virginia has over 100,000. Georgia has close to 100,000. Mississippi has 75,000.

Time and time again, I have been on this floor, warning about affordability problems in the National Flood Insurance Program and offering proposals to address this. Despite my advice and objections, last summer Congress made a mistake and passed the Biggert-Waters bill which contained huge rate flood insurance rate increases for many homeowners and businesses.

Our families and entrepreneurs across the Nation are beginning to see the disastrous consequences of that vote now. Some already see their premiums rising by 25 percent a year and many more will see these changes over the next 2 years. These rates must be stopped until an affordability study can be conducted and Congress can react to those results.

FEMA has never done an affordability study--it cannot even quantify how strong an impact these exorbitant rates will have on our citizens. In the bill last summer, Congress required FEMA to conduct an affordability study. Don't you think we should wait for that and know if these rate increases are affordable before we start such rapid increases? Congress can't possibly have asked FEMA to conduct this study and not want to use those results to make an informed decision on how best to structure rate changes.

I can tell you that the 480,000 policy holders in Louisiana are already telling me the rates are not affordable. Families and businesses in Louisiana are already paying exorbitant rates for flood insurance and some could see those rates go up dramatically under these proposals. Eliminating grandfathered rates, as the--Biggert-Waters bill did, means their property values will plummet.

If people cannot afford flood insurance policies, they will drop out of the program. When future disasters hit, they will be entirely dependent on federal aid to help them rebuild.

I agree that the National Flood Insurance Program needs to be self- sustaining, but not on the backs of Louisiana families and businesses and not on the backs of all 5.5 million policies holders in the National Flood Insurance Program. This is not the right way.

Flood insurance is not just about business and commerce; it is about culture; it is about a way of life; it is about preserving coastal communities; it is about being resilient in storms. We must make the flood insurance program resilient without endangering the financial future of our coastal residents.

This is a very serious issue, and I thank the chair, Senator Boxer, who has worked so hard on the underlying WRDA bill, which is so important. I also thank those Members who came to the floor last night. I understand Senator Menendez gave a very fiery and passionate speech about the problem he faces in New Jersey. I thank Senators Schumer, Gillibrand, and Lautenberg for cosponsoring this important amendment.

We want to work with the chairman and the ranking member to pass a WRDA bill. There is no State that benefits more from the WRDA bill than Louisiana, and I am extremely grateful for her leadership not just on this bill but on the RESTORE Act, which she helped shepherd through, which has helped the gulf coast in immeasurable ways, and her support of the FAIR Act on revenue-sharing, which will help the gulf coast get the revenues we need--just as interior States have--to build our own levees and not have to be such a drain on the Federal Treasury.

We can and are willing to do our own work. But the flood insurance bill, known as Biggert-Waters, never passed the Senate, and I wish to call that fact to Senators' attention. The bill was never brought to the Senate floor. The flood insurance bill that is called Biggert- Waters came out of the Banking Committee with a bipartisan vote--a similar bill. That was a House bill, and so a similar bill came out of the Senate, but it never came to the Senate floor for a vote. None of us ever got to debate it on the floor.

If you are not on the Banking Committee, wake up because this bill is going to affect your State, and if you are not on the Banking Committee, please listen to what I am about to say.

The bill never came to the Senate floor although some of us protested that at the time. There are statements in the Record that show the protests any number of us made at the time. The bill then sort of went dark. The next time it appeared, it was tucked into the Transportation bill, which had the RESTORE Act in it and the Biggert-Waters flood insurance, which might have passed the House of Representatives--I am not sure. Maybe it just came out of the House committee. I am trying to get clarification on whether this bill ever was passed by either body, and I will get that clarification in a few minutes. But it most certainly never came to the Senate floor, so no one here, except members of the Banking Committee--which Senator Vitter is a member of, and so he knows this issue very well--voted on this.

So while it is not a surprise to me, it may be a surprise to others to find out that flood insurance rates based on the reform bill that was tucked into the Transportation bill and into the RESTORE Act bill are now going to raise rates by 25, 50, or 100 percent on home owners. And when the grandfather clause expires--which was put in the bill to grandfather many property owners--my constituents tell me their properties will become worthless.

One can understand that a property worth even $1 million or $\1/2\ million or $250,000 has a flood insurance premium attached to it of a reasonable amount of money--$500, $600, $700. And that is still a lot of money, but people who live along the coast understand that we have to pay a little higher flood insurance rates and we have to build smarter and better, which we are doing as fast as we possibly can with the monies we have. There is not a coastal community in America that is not fully awake after Katrina, Rita, Gustav, Ike, and Sandy. Trust me, from the east coast, to North Carolina, to the entire gulf coast region, we are awake. We are understanding what is happening, and we are trying as hard as we can to make our communities as resilient as possible.

We are not completely to blame for the increased frequency of the storms or the rising sea levels. We all have a share of that, and it is happening, and we are on the frontline. Our communities have been devastated. Our people are literally drowning. We lost 1,800 people in Katrina--2,400 between Louisiana and Mississippi--from drowning and literally dying through these storms. We lost several hundred people in Sandy. So we understand what is happening, and we are doing everything we can.

This flood insurance bill that never passed this Senate--and I am not sure it passed the House, but it did come out of both committees, different versions of it--is now known as Biggert-Waters. I understand Mrs. Biggert is no longer a Member of Congress, but Congresswoman Waters is here. So the bill was pushed as a way of getting the Flood Insurance Program on a financially sound footing. I understand that.

We most certainly don't expect all the people of America to subsidize coastal communities, some of which may be second homes, et cetera. But in my communities, we are not talking about second homes; we are not talking about vacation properties, in large measure. We are talking about primary homes of fishermen, of dock workers, of people who work on the river, of boat captains, of industries such as the oil and gas industry, the roughnecks, the engineers who have to work, by the nature of their work, near the coast, which is where the trade and commerce of this Nation comes from.

If we could operate our trade and commerce only on railroads and highways, maybe we could all go live in Oklahoma or in Nevada. But, Mr. President, you are from Hawaii. You understand we have coastal communities all the way from Oregon to California to Texas to Louisiana to Mississippi; and, yes, there are some lovely vacation spots along the coasts. But there are also communities like those I represent, such as in Terrebonne Parish and Lafourche Parish and Jefferson Parish, where people wake up before the Sun and do not come home until it is dark. They are working at coastal businesses that are very important to the entire economic strength of this Nation.

This bill, Biggert-Waters, puts the entire burden of supporting coastal communities on the people who live on the coast, while some people who have a lot of money and can afford a mountaintop view go on the top of the mountains in other States. I am not picking on Colorado and Utah, but those come to mind--multimillion-dollar homes with beautiful views that look out across lots of land. Maybe they are not mindful of the work that is done on our coasts.

This is an issue that is important for the whole Nation. To have this bill pass--and I knew it when it happened. Mark Pryor, I understand, put something in the Record at the time, but now we are on the water resources bill, a very important bill for coastal communities. It is an opportunity for us to fix this bill or to get a reprieve for a short period of time until we can find a better approach for thousands of properties along the coast--whether it is in Texas or California or Florida or New York or New Jersey that was battered badly by Sandy-- rather than to put additional stress on these communities.

While I do not have the specific answer as to how to fix it in the long term, my amendment would simply hold off these rate increases for a year. It does not repeal the bill. It will just hold off these rate increases for a year, giving these Members in Congress time and an opportunity to fix what is terribly broken and to try to find a better, more affordable way to do so.

There are 480,000 policy holders in Louisiana who are already complaining about the flood insurance rates as they are today. When I go home now--and I go home often, very frequently--this is all people are talking about. There are other important issues that are going on, but I do not blame them, and I certainly understand it as a homeowner in Louisiana. Our delegation understands this. People are saying they are getting notices from their company that their insurance is going to go up hundreds if not thousands of dollars. What happens with respect to the grandfather clause, which is about to happen in October of 2014?

This flood insurance issue is a very important issue for the people in Louisiana, as I said, in Texas, in Mississippi, and in Florida, and that is what my amendment will address. My amendment is not pending, but I filed an amendment. We are waiting for a CBO score. We most certainly want to offset this if we can find the revenue it will take to offset this temporary reprieve.

I ask both the Republican and Democratic leaders to work with me and work with the other Senators who are interested in finding a solution to send a signal to these coastal areas that Congress understands the pressures of flood insurance in our low-lying areas--that would be in Maryland or Virginia or New York or New Jersey--that we hear them. We understand what is about to happen, and we would like a chance to try to adjust it, to fix it, et cetera, et cetera.

I am going to be working with the leadership. I know there are other Members who have amendments important to the WRDA bill. It is not my intention to stop this WRDA bill. It is a bill I certainly support. Louisiana can be greatly benefited. I thank Senator Vitter for his strong work as the ranking member of the EPW Committee on WRDA. We have some very important authorizations.

Let me also say something about this WRDA bill in relation to actual dollars. I sit on the Appropriations Committee for energy and water. I appreciate serving on that committee. Our job is to actually find money and direct funding to build some of these water resource projects.

Just yesterday, Senator Feinstein held a hearing--she chairs our committee; Senator Lamar Alexander is our ranking member--on the budget for the Corps of Engineers. I see my good friend Ben Cardin here and others who are very interested in projects on the WRDA bill, but they will be shocked to know when we asked--I asked--Jo-Ellen Darcy, the leader of the Corps of Engineers, the civilian leader of the corps, what was the number of backlogged projects, new construction projects that were backlogged and how much money was in the bill to build them this year, the first number was $1.6 billion. That is how much is in the appropriations bill roughly to build new water projects in the country, $1.6 billion. It sounds like a lot of money until you hear the second answer.

Then I asked her how many projects are in the queue for funding, ready to go, meritorious projects, urgently needed new construction. She said $60 billion worth. We have $1.6 billion in the budget to spend, and we have $60 billion worth of projects. We follow these numbers pretty closely because many of those projects are in Louisiana. So while it is important to get the WRDA bill passed, which is authorizing not only new projects, but it is also putting in some very important corps reforms to expedite the way some of these projects are built, the real problem and the real dilemma is closing the gap between what we have authorized and what we can actually afford to build.

Again, there is only $1.6 billion in the corps budget for new construction, and pending, even without this WRDA bill, is $60 billion worth in backlogged, authorized, important programs in all of our districts. With this WRDA bill there are an additional $23 billion in authorizations. So, yes, I support new authorizations. Yes, I support the WRDA bill. Yes, I most certainly support the reforms to the Corps of Engineers that are embedded in the language of this WRDA bill, but I cannot allow this to move forward, at least without raising a red flag and asking for some reprieve on the flood insurance issue.

I want to be flexible. I want to be open. I want to be a team player. This is not the time for my way or the highway. I have tried as much as I can to avoid that kind of politics because it is very difficult for all of us to move forward together. I have so much respect for Senator Boxer and a good bit of respect for Senator Vitter who is the ranking member. But this is the only way I know right now to raise this issue and to say we cannot, in Louisiana, with 480,000 flood insurance policies, manage to build our communities, to recover. We are doing beautifully. We would like to go faster, but you have not heard a lot of complaints coming from us. Our people are working hard, rolling up our sleeves. Our communities are coming back. We are using the insurance money. We are using the community development block grant money to build as smart and quickly as we can.

We have created the Water Institute. Every single one of our parishes has gone through what we call charrettes and community meetings to see how we can elevate our homes and build them more resiliently.

This is a huge and very tough burden to lay on the shoulders of the people in our coastal communities, not just in Louisiana but in Terrebonne and Lafourche, in Cameron, Calcasieu, Saint Mary Parish, and the river parishes, Saint John, Saint James, Saint Charles and Jefferson Parish. It is hurting north Louisiana as well.

We have flood insurance policies all the way up in our State. We would have flood insurance. Why would we have flooding? Because we have the Mississippi River. We are happy to have the Mississippi River, but the Mississippi River does not belong only to us. May I remind everyone that the Mississippi River, the Missouri River, the Ohio River are the spine, the backbone of our commerce for the whole Nation? Why should the people of Louisiana, who drain the entire continent--the mouth of the river runs right through New Orleans--why is it the people who live in south Louisiana have to pick up 100 percent of that risk? That is the way this bill is structured, to put on us the burden, 100 percent, instead of spreading it to everyone, to the whole country, in a reasonable and responsible way.

The way this bill is structured is to say we have to be self- sustaining in our flood insurance policies. We are sorry, but the people who live at the mouth of the Mississippi River, which provides commerce and wealth and creates huge amounts of wealth and jobs for all of us, have to take the water and pay for it ourselves. That is not going to work for us. It is not working for us. That is why I am standing on this floor. I want to work this out.

I am open to a number of suggestions. I hope the Senators who have lots of flood insurance issues, such as the Senators in Missouri and Illinois and the Senators in other States, will

give us some suggestions about how to move forward.

If this bill had passed the Senate and it was the will of the Senate and I had been on the losing side of that, I would not be standing here today. This bill never came before the Senate. It never came before the Senate. It was tucked into a bill that we had no chance to amend--none. You cannot amend a bill coming out of conference. There was no chance to amend this, no chance to fix it, which is why I hope my colleagues will understand and be patient with me. This is not about losing an issue last year and coming back and crying about it. This is about we never got a chance to even talk about this on the Senate floor.

This is a water bill. It has everything to do with the subject matter. It is not ``not germane'' to the subject matter of this bill. I would like to have a vote on my amendment or a vote in some way to declare that we are acknowledging this problem; that we might not have a solution today, but we most certainly are willing to work on it because this is devastating for coastal communities all over the country.

It is not fair for our working coast--whether it is fisheries or oil and gas or wind or manufacturing--for our coastal communities, our commerce and trade, to pick up the entire burden of this Flood Insurance Program. Let's try to be reasonable. I am going to be as patient as I can. I understand how important this bill is to everyone. I am most mindful of how important it is to my State. We have been trying to get a WRDA bill out here on the floor for several years, and we finally have one.

I am going to leave my amendment as it is. It is not pending. It has been filed. I am going to ask for this vote to be worked out, and until then I will object to any other amendments coming up for a vote until we get some way forward.

Again, I want to be flexible, I want to be open, and I would like eventually to see the WRDA bill passed.

I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, as the Chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, I have pledged to improve and expand employment training and development programs for our Nation's servicemembers and veterans.

While our country continues with its economic recovery, we must ensure that veterans are not left behind. Veterans possess the skills, the discipline, and the leadership necessary to succeed in a 21st century workforce. Coupled with an array of practical skills, it would seem that transitioning to civilian employment after separation from service would be effortless. Yet we continue to find high unemployment rates among veterans, especially the youngest generation. Through their service and sacrifice, each of our Nation's veterans have earned a fair shot at a job,

a fair shot at supporting their families, and a fair shot to prosper and resume their lives back home.

Although unemployment numbers are getting better for everyone, there is still reason for concern and work to be done. The unemployment rate for our youngest veterans, ages 18-24, transitioning from the military, averaged 20 percent in 2012, compared to 15 percent for non-veterans between the ages 18-24. Furthermore, in 2012, the unemployment rate among post-9/11 veterans was nearly 10 percent, while the unemployment rate for all veterans and non-veterans was less than 8 percent. This trend continues into this year, with our younger post-9/11 veterans encountering the most difficulty finding employment.

Businesses in the private sector have shown an interest in hiring veterans, but often find that veterans who apply lack industry specific experience to compete with non-veteran candidates. While it is important to ensure we provide programs to help veterans translate their military skills into the civilian sector, there remains a need to: equip veterans with civilian skills and experience necessary to meet the challenges of competing with those who have years of experience in the civilian workforce; find employers who understand military skills; and assist in helping them to readjust back to their local communities.

The Department of Defense reports that approximately one in five enlisted servicemembers separating from active duty have a military- learned skill that is not easily transferable to a civilian occupation. Many of these servicemembers will need to transition into a civilian career field that is different than their military occupation.

We have a responsibility to those who served in the military, and that includes providing practical solutions. I am proud to introduce legislation, The Veterans Equipped for Success Act of 2013, that would provide our veterans the tools necessary to transition to the civilian workforce.

First, the legislation, establishes a three-year pilot program that will partner certain unemployed veterans with employers in the private- sector. In general, the program will provide employers a wage subsidy, up to 75 percent of the wages paid, capped at $14,000 a year, and incentives to hire these veterans. Not only does the program stimulate job creation, but will provide potentially more than 150,000 veterans with the valuable work experience and civilian skills they need to obtain long-term employment.

Second, The Veterans Equipped for Success Act of 2013 focuses on providing employment opportunities and civilian work experience to our younger veterans ages 18-30. Under another three-year pilot program, up to 50,000 participating veterans, at a time, would be paired with private-sector employers for one year and provided a salary from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Employers would provide veterans mentorship, job shadowing, and valuable civilian work experience, while having the opportunity to learn about the work veterans performed in the military and the skills they acquired. The legislation also helps veterans reintegrate into their communities and give back to other veterans.

We have made a solemn commitment to aid veterans by creating job opportunities and providing them with the necessary skills to succeed. There is clearly a need for improved employment opportunities for veterans, particularly our younger transitioning veterans. This legislation would help veterans meet the challenges of competing in the civilian workforce by filling gaps not addressed by current programs. We owe it to our veterans to ensure they have the opportunity to gain valuable skills and work experience to assist them in successfully transitioning into the civilian workforce.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, it is my belief that the inability to provide compensation benefits in a timely manner tarnishes the reputation of the Department of Veterans Affairs and overshadows much of the good work done there. As I have said before, I never want a veteran's negative experience with the claims system to prevent him or her from seeking mental health care or help in battling homelessness. That is why, today, I am introducing the Claims Processing Improvement Act of 2013, a bill that would help to provide veterans and their family members with the timely and accurate claims decisions they deserve.

The fact that nearly 70 percent of claims are pending longer than the Department's goal of 125 days is completely unacceptable. VA knows this, and the Department has set ambitious goals, put forward a plan, and has been working hard to transform the compensation claims system. Despite these efforts, it is clear that much work remains to be done. That is why we must continue to work together to find innovative solutions until the claims system is transformed into one fit for the 21st century.

Now is the time to truly apply all of the latest technological advances, the insight and experience of veterans service organizations, the lessons learned from the wealth of studies that have already looked at the claims system, and the resources of the Federal Government to tackle this problem from all angles and to finally make real progress.

The Claims Processing Improvement Act of 2013 is a critical part of the solution. This bill is a holistic approach to addressing the challenges of the claims system and would provide long-term reforms that will improve VA's claims process from start to finish--from the regional offices located across the nation to the Board of Veterans' Appeals. I would like to highlight just a few of the important provisions in this legislation.

VA must do a better job of showing not only Congress, but also veterans and their survivors about how VA plans to accomplish the ambitious goal of eliminating the claims backlog by 2015. That is why this bill, for the first time, would require VA to publicly report on a quarterly basis information on both VA's quarterly goals and actual production. This would allow Congress and the public to see both the successes and failures of VA's transformation efforts, measure VA's progress, and allow for quicker course corrections when necessary.

At VA regional offices across this country, employees are trying to adapt to a changing work environment as VA continues its transition to a paperless claims processing system. These employees are given credit for work in a manner that does not accurately reflect the realities of an electronic claims processing system. VA's work credit system also focuses almost exclusively on speed, often to the detriment of quality.

During a hearing held by the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs earlier this year, Mr. Bart Stichman, Joint Executive Director of the National Veterans Legal Services Program, commented that ``VA regional office adjudicators prematurely decide claims--without taking the time to obtain and assemble the evidence necessary to properly decide a claim--in an effort to ensure that the average time for deciding an initial claim that is reported to VA managers and Congress is a low number of days.'' I have heard from other veterans service organizations about the need for a cultural change at VA. In order for this change to occur, employees must operate within an environment that accurately reflects the important tasks they are asked to accomplish and an environment that focuses equally on speed and quality.

This bill would facilitate that cultural change through the establishment of a work group designed to reassess the way employees are credited for their work. The work group, tasked with providing solutions, would include the very employees and organizations with the necessary expertise to finally establish a work credit system based on a data driven methodology and one

that is updated on a consistent and predictable basis. VA employees, many of whom are veterans themselves, deserve nothing less.

This bill would also address the workforce needs of VA and other Federal agencies with claims adjudication responsibilities. In fiscal year 2012, VA lost approximately 6 percent of its claims staff. This legislation would address employee attrition by establishing a task force to develop a strategic plan and initiate training to support the hiring of veterans in claims processing and adjudication positions throughout the Federal Government. This task force would simultaneously prepare servicemembers for the jobs that consistently need to be filled and create a generation of adjudicators throughout VA who can identify with the experiences of the population they serve.

This bill would address concerns raised by the Disabled American Veterans by ensuring appropriate oversight of the disability examination system and encouraging the use of private medical evidence when appropriate. As Mr. Violante, the National Legislative Director of Disabled American Veterans, pointed out at a Veterans' Affairs hearing on the disability claims system in March, disability benefits questionnaires were ``designed to allow private physicians to submit medical evidence on behalf of veterans they treat in a format that aids rating specialists.'' Making better use of private medical evidence, and awarding appropriate work credit for doing so, would save VA adjudicators precious time, taxpayers the added expense, and would relieve veterans from the stress of excessive medical exams.

While providing veterans with timely and accurate initial claims decisions has been the focus of much attention, I remain very concerned about the staggering number of appeals pending at the Board of Veterans' Appeals. According to the Report of the Chairman of the Board of Veterans' Appeals, there were 45,959 cases pending before the Board at the end of fiscal year 2012. The Chairman's Report also provided the average length of time between the filing of an appeal and the Board's disposition, which was 1,040 days in fiscal year 2012. It is 2 unconscionable that a veteran or a family member had to wait, on average, nearly three years for a decision on an appeal. This bill contains a number of provisions that would improve efficiency at the Board of Veterans' Appeals.

This legislation would expand the use of video hearings in order to serve more veterans, reduce an appellant's wait time for a hearing, and increase efficiency in issuing final decisions on appeals by reducing the number of travel days for employees issuing decisions. However, the right to an in-person hearing would be preserved should the veteran desire such a hearing. This bill would also streamline the appellate process by requiring veterans to more quickly file a notice of disagreement. Many veterans already take quick action but to ensure veterans are protected this legislation would provide a good cause exception in the event a notice of disagreement is not filed in a timely manner, such as in cases where a physical, mental, educational, or linguistic limitation prevented timely filing.

These are just a few of the provisions of this bill, which would positively impact the claims system. This legislation is the result of a collective body of information and insight gathered from Congressional hearings, meetings with veterans service organizations and VA staff, correspondence from veterans, and aggressive oversight by the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

The challenges of the claims system are enormously complex and there is no single silver bullet that will magically solve every problem. The Claims Processing Improvement Act of 2013 would, however, provide a number of the solutions necessary to ensure veterans and their family members receive timely and accurate benefit decisions.

Clearly there is much work yet to be done. I ask my colleagues to join with me in working together to find innovative solutions until we have truly created a claims system fit for the 21st century. As a nation we have asked more of these individuals than most of us can comprehend. We must now honor the promise we made as a nation--to take care of those who have taken care of us.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, for the interest of all Senators, I wanted to thank everyone for cooperating with us. We have handled a number of amendments, one quite controversial and nongermane, but we dealt with it. It is not on this bill, I am happy to say. We are trying to keep this bill a water infrastructure bill. There may be a few exceptions, but, for the most part, that is what we want because it will increase the chances of passage all the way through to get it to the President's desk.

The bill we are dealing with, the Water Resources Development Act, was last authorized in 2007. It is high time we did a follow-on bill. What we are talking about here is flood protection, projects we need all over the country to protect our people from the ravages of floods.

We need to make sure our ports are operational. I know my friend in the chair certainly deals with all these matters in his great and beautiful State of Hawaii. We need to make sure our ports are deep enough, they have enough funding to stay modernized, and can move that cargo in and out with ease. We have environmental restoration. We have to take care of all of our water infrastructure.

I know Senator Merkley is here to say something about the bill, which I am very pleased about, so I am going to be very brief. I will talk for about 2 more minutes and say we have a great committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee, when it comes to infrastructure. We see eye to eye. We work together. Yes, we have our differences, but we can breach those differences.

This bill is a product of working together. It is a product of collaboration--not only in the committee where we work together, but even here when it got to the Senate. We have worked, Senator Vitter and I, with individual Members to meet all of their needs. There are no earmarks in this bill. Whatever we do is setting policy.

It is an exciting bill. It includes reforms I think are important. Most of all, I think the people at home are going to like it because it puts them in the driver's seat and protects them from delays and other problems as they move forward with projects their people need.

We have some terrific supporters of this legislation--I will close these early remarks--with organizations such as AFL-CIO, the Chamber of Commerce, the American Society of Civil Engineers, we have the Association of Equipment Manufacturers. We have many. I will show you the next chart and name a couple: The Transportation Construction Coalition, the United Brotherhood of Carpenters, storm management agency, surveyors, engineers. I think what you see here is mainstream America is behind this bill.

The bad news is our infrastructure has been rated at a D-plus. You can't be the greatest Nation in the world and have an infrastructure that is rated D-plus.

While we have major problems on other fronts in our committee--and I have to admit today was not a good day for me, the committee, or the American people, when the Republicans boycotted the markup of Gina McCarthy to be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency after she answered more than 1,000 questions. She is the most qualified ever to be nominated, having served, how about this, four Republican Governors.

What more do they want? The fact is 70 percent of the American people want clean air, want clean water, want safety reform. Gina McCarthy deserves a vote, not a boycott. They say they don't like her answers. Well, I am not surprised. She is not Mitt Romney's nominee for the EPA, she is not Rick Perry's nominee for the EPA, she is Barack Obama's nominee for the EPA. It is her position, as it is the President's, that we should enforce the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and so on.

When your Republican Presidents put up nominees for the EPA I didn't agree with, I didn't filibuster them. I said, okay, I will vote no; let them go. It is a sad day for me on the environment side of our committee.

On the public works side of my committee, it is a good day, because we are making progress. We have now about a half dozen amendments that have been cleared on both sides. We are trying to make them pending. We cleared them. We are asking all Senators, please get your amendments in because this can't go on forever. We need to pass this bill, as 550,000 jobs are supported by this legislation. Hundreds and hundreds of businesses are looking forward to our doing this. That is why we have this amazing array of support.

With that, I would say to Senator Merkley, the floor is his.

I yield the floor at this time.

I thank the Senator.

Reserving the right to object for just a moment, and I, of course, will not object, I just want to make it clear that at noon the two leaders are coming to do a back-and-forth. So up until the time they arrive--I just wanted to let my friend know. Then after the leaders, Senator Vitter should be recognized to speak about the issue Senator Landrieu just raised, to be followed by me, if that is OK, if I can do that in the UC? It would be Senator Cardin, the two leaders, Senator Vitter, and myself.

I wonder if the Senator from Washington would enter into a colloquy with me at this time, through the Chair.

I wish to join with Senator Reid in thanking Senator Murray for her amazing leadership. I was on the Budget Committee for several years, and I know that as a result of the Senator from Washington becoming chairman and, of course, being the most senior member next to Kent Conrad for so long, she knows this budget inside and out. It is filled with complexities--the mandatories, the discretionaries, the

defense and nondefense--all the things she knows in her head. She knows how to get us to balance not only in terms of the numbers she will move toward balance in her budget but also in terms of our priorities.

I wish to make sure my people at home understand this. What the Senator from Washington is telling us is that for several years now--2 or 3--the Republicans have been chastising the Democrats for not passing a budget in the Senate; am I right on that?

The reason we didn't do it is we had another law that actually set our caps; am I right on that? So we didn't go through the budget.

All right. So the Senator from Washington decided, with Senator Reid and the leadership team, to bring a budget to the floor. Then--I will never forget it--we stayed here until 5 o'clock in the morning handling over 100 amendments; is that right?

We passed a budget; the Senate passed its version of a budget. The regular order, as I understand it, having asked the Historian to go back and look, is that we then take the House budget and the Senate budget and we go to conference and the conferees resolve the differences. All my friend is asking--and she has asked it or someone has asked it in her stead five times--we are asking our Republican colleagues to allow our leader to name the conferees--of course Senator McConnell will name his--and walk into that conference committee to finish the budget. The budget is unfinished; am I right? We have two versions. We need one version. What the Senator from Washington is telling us, in no uncertain terms, is that the Republicans are stopping this country from having a budget; am I stating it correctly?

Let me say to my friend, I hope she plans to be here as often as she can, and those of us who can help her will be here to continue to ask for conferees so we can get to the next stage.

When Senator McConnell said he would amend the request of the Senator from Washington, was he not prejudging what would happen in the conference? He said no reconciliation, and he said something else. I don't remember the other condition.

And no revenue. That is akin to the Senator from Washington saying, I will go to conference except I don't want to see any more cuts in afterschool programs or senior citizen programs or veterans programs. In other words, we don't take our priorities as individual Senators into the conference. It is a team approach where we will have to compromise.

So isn't Senator McConnell, by laying out his conditions, completely sidestepping regular order?

I thank my friend. I got into this a little bit with Senator Cruz the other day. He doesn't want to go to conference because he is afraid we could pass the Buffett rule. We could come out of there with the Buffett rule, which says the billionaire executive should have to pay the same effective tax rate as a secretary. God forbid. He is afraid of that. So I just say, they are afraid of the process. What are they afraid of? They control the House. We control the Senate. Obviously, in conference we are going to have to meet somewhere in the middle.

It seems to me they have a fear of democracy, and it seems to me--and I don't like to use this word but I will; it rhymes with democracy and it is called hypocrisy. They said they want to do a budget and now they are stopping the budget.

I thank my friend. I want to make sure America understands this. They ran around the country running against our candidates saying our candidates wouldn't do a budget and now they will not allow us to do a budget. It seems to me ridiculous. I am so happy our leader and the Senator from Washington are here to bring this issue the attention it deserves.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, I rise today to speak about the bill we are considering, but also to speak, in particular, about one aspect of the bill. We know the legislation as the so-called WRDA bill, the Water Resources Development Act, and I want to express strong support for the legislation.

This bill is, in fact, bipartisan, which is something we need more of around here. It provides for, among other things, flood protection, safe drinking water, wastewater infrastructure, and protects the flow of commerce along our Nation's rivers and waterways.

I am grateful for Chairman Boxer's efforts, Ranking Member Vitter, and all the Members and staff of the Environment and Public Works Committee for their dedication to writing a bill that addresses the challenges facing our country's water systems.

I want to speak in particular about inland waterways.

Our Nation has--for many years now, many generations--a system of locks and dams that play a vital role in creating and sustaining jobs and supporting economic growth throughout the country.

I know in my home State of Pennsylvania, even though I had been a State official for a number of years, I did not have a full appreciation of what this meant until about July of--I guess it was the first week of July 2007, when I was able to tour and actually see these major barges up close out in southwestern Pennsylvania and to be able to see the movement of coal or other commodities or energy resources across our waterways and what that meant to the economy of southwestern Pennsylvania but, indeed, the economy of our Commonwealth and our country.

So when we hear the phrase ``locks and dams'' in Pennsylvania, especially in southwestern Pennsylvania, we do not think of some far off concept; we think of commerce and the movement of commerce and the jobs and the economic growth that comes from that.

Unfortunately, this system, this inland waterways system, is facing major challenges--challenges that threaten in ways that some of us could not imagine even a few years ago.

The inland waterways system offers the most cost-competitive way to transport our commodities. It moves some 20 percent of the coal that is used to power our Nation's electricity, much of it from Pennsylvania; also 22 percent of our petroleum products; and more

than 60 percent of export grain, which is moved because of this system.

The shippers who produce or manufacture these commodities are in danger of losing their competitive edge unless we focus on proper funding for the lock-and-dam infrastructure.

Unfortunately, the locks and dams of our Nation have far outlived their design life. There has not been sufficient investment to make headway in replacing these locks and dams. But I am hopeful provisions I and others have worked on in the Water Resources Development Act, which we are considering now, will address the challenges facing this system.

Provisions from my bill--which, by the way, goes by the acronym RIVER; the RIVER Act--that are included in the bill we are considering will institute a number of project management reforms that will make sure future lock-and-dam projects are built in the most cost-effective way possible.

We cannot ask for a greater commitment to the system or a greater investment without making sure we are also providing reforms.

These reforms include risk-based cost estimates and an external peer review process for Army Corps projects across the Nation. This will help ensure that locks and dams in the projects that are undertaken are constructed in the way that is most efficient. We also want to make sure we have cost estimates that are realistic and, of course, avoid cost overruns.

One of the provisions of the bill will also adjust the current cost- sharing system by increasing the threshold for the industry to contribute to major rehabilitation projects to $20 million. This will allow for more funding for lock-and-dam projects, which is badly needed right now.

These provisions in the overall water resources bill are common sense. They also happen to be fiscally responsible proposals that will significantly improve our Nation's inland waterways system and help to ensure our Nation's waterways can continue to be an effective method to ship commodities.

Well, how do we pay for that? Well, a rather interesting development for Washington, which I am about to describe for you: I am grateful so many of the provisions in my bill have been included, but we also need to have an important conversation about how to finance this system and to keep the inland trust fund sustainable in the long term.

I filed an amendment, amendment No. 854, that will raise the barge user fee from 20 cents per gallon to 29 cents per gallon. This fee has not been raised since 1986 and, as a result, is not keeping up with inflation and project costs.

We have great bipartisan support for this amendment. Senator Alexander is leading this effort with me, and the amendment is cosponsored by the following Senators: Mr. Blunt, Mrs. McCaskill, Mr. Durbin, Ms. Stabenow, Ms. Klobuchar, Ms. Landrieu, Mr. Franken, and Mr. Harkin--indicating the wide reach of the inland waterways system and its impact on so many industries in so many States across the country.

The current rate--the barge user fee of 20 cents per gallon--right now is not raising sufficient funding to keep up with operations and maintenance needs along the reach of the system. If we do not make this investment now, it could have dire consequences to multibillion-dollar industries that rely on the use of locks and dams to move their goods. Just consider coal being one of those examples.

All 300 users of the inland waterways system support this increase. Let me say that again because this does not happen very much in Washington: All 300 users of the inland waterways system support this barge user fee increase from 20 cents per gallon to 29 cents per gallon.

Here we have an example of an industry that is forward looking in asking Congress to allow them to pay more in order to make critical investments in their own infrastructure.

In addition to the support of industry, the user fee increase is backed by a diverse array of organizations across the country, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Farmers Union, the National Association of Manufacturers, the American Farm Bureau, the AFL-CIO, and over 250 national and local organizations, including barge operators, agriculture, energy and civics and conservation groups.

In southwestern Pennsylvania alone over 200,000 jobs rely on the proper functioning of locks and dams on the lower Monongahela River. For those who do not know, it is a river on the western end of our State that flows into the city of Pittsburgh--one of the three rivers we describe as part of our landscape in Pittsburgh.

If one of these locks were to fail, it would endanger all 200,000 jobs and have a negative impact of over $1 billion just in that region, not to mention the adverse impact beyond the region. Raising the user fee now will help prevent a catastrophe in the near future.

I understand there are objections to addressing important concerns about including a funding fix for locks and dams in this bill due to the so-called blue-slip concerns that involve the House of Representatives.

I will work to look for other vehicles so we do not continue to kick this can down the road, and I will talk to Members of the House to include this fix in their version.

If we cannot raise revenue on an industry that is asking to pay more so they can invest in their infrastructure, I am afraid the future of our waterways system is in great jeopardy.

Many of my colleagues in the Senate on both sides of the aisle recognize the importance of providing a way to pay for investments we need in our locks-and-dams system, and I urge the House to follow suit. I have no doubt they want to do the same.

We cannot squander critical foundations that have made America what it is. Reinvesting in our Nation's waterways will allow us to seize economic opportunities to remain competitive in the world and protect and create jobs for generations to come.

I will note one citation of history, from a major volume in Pennsylvania history. This goes back to the 1800s when we developed a canal system to move commodities and commerce across our waterways. I will read one sentence from page 180 of a book entitled ``Pennsylvania: A History of the Commonwealth.'' Here is what they said all those years ago in the 1800s, talking about coal:

Through those routes, anthracite coal left Pennsylvania for

England, Russia, Central Europe and Asia.

But the reason that coal was able to get to those places is because we had a system in place to move it.

What we do not want to have today in our time is a system that breaks down because we are not willing to make the investment. As I said before, this investment is supported by all of those organizations but especially the 300 users who are willing to invest more so that tomorrow will be bright and we can move commerce across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and across our country.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to talk about one particular aspect of this bill, which is WIFIA. Before I explain what WIFIA is, I want to thank the Chair for managing this bill in a very bipartisan discussion of the committee. It has come to the floor with full committee examination, thorough debate, and amendment process. Here we are having a very thorough, visible, accountable process for considering this bill on the floor of the Senate. That is a very good example of the Senate working well. Thank you, Madam Chair.

The heart of the WIFIA program is about jobs. It is about infrastructure. Five years after the greatest economic crisis in 80 years, we still face a serious jobs crisis. Too many are out of work and too many are unemployed. A good, living-wage job is the most important pillar of the American dream. There is no public program that can compare to the importance of a living-wage job for the stability and success of a family. We have to do more to create those jobs, a lot more. Wouldn't it be great if we could both create jobs and fill a desperate national need at the same time?

Well, that is exactly what WIFIA--which is short for Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act--does. Low-cost loans for water infrastructure projects create good jobs now while protecting our communities from devastating costs or public health crises in the future. WIFIA does all of this while making taxpayers money over time.

The need for water infrastructure is great. Across Oregon and across America, our infrastructure is aging. That aging infrastructure needs to be replaced. Our communities are growing. The demand for water infrastructure increases, whether it is water treatment on the front end or water treatment on the back end--sending water out to our homes and businesses and then treating it after it comes back. Much of our infrastructure is approaching the end of its lifespan and needs to be replaced.

We should recognize that America is behind much of the world in terms of investing in infrastructure. That is not only not good for our future economy, it is certainly not good for creating jobs. China is investing 10 percent of its gross domestic product in infrastructure. Europe is investing 5 percent. Here in America, which had a phenomenal infrastructure buildup after World War II, we are investing only 2 percent. That is barely enough to repair the aging infrastructure that previous generations so thoughtfully funded, let alone prepare the infrastructure to meet the expanding needs of the Nation.

Infrastructure can be thought of as the bread and butter of success of our Nation. Building and maintaining infrastructure is one of the most effective ways also to create jobs in the short term. Having infrastructure in place is absolutely critical to strong, private sector economic growth over the long term.

It is time to take water infrastructure seriously as a public policy challenge. For too long, we have been putting water infrastructure on the back burner. We are not investing enough in water infrastructure to keep clean, affordable water accessible to all Americans. In fact, we are not even coming close. There is a gap, a significant gap, a growing gap in the area of water infrastructure needs versus actual funding. If we do nothing and stay on the same course, that gap will be $90 billion per year by 2040. That is a disaster for our communities. That gap would leave municipalities with a terrible decision--allow the infrastructure to continue to degrade, which is obviously not a good idea, or have to raise utility rates astronomically to pay for long- neglected improvements.

Already, we are seeing this kind of lose-lose proposition play out in my State in Oregon. Some communities have to set aside their plans because they can't afford them: to expand their infrastructure, to improve their infrastructure, to replace their infrastructure that is aging. Other communities are proceeding to upgrade their infrastructure but at costs that are doubling or even quadrupling the cost of water to the citizens.

We need a new way to finance critical water projects. That is why the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act, or WIFIA, that is contained in this bill, fills a key missing link in our system. Currently Federal funding for water infrastructure and sewage through the Environmental Protection Agency Clean Water and Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Funds Program is helpful, but many projects do not qualify, and we need to expand the amount of funding available.

Into that gap comes WIFIA, modeled after the very successful Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act, or TIFIA, so we have a proven finance model for infrastructure in transportation. Let's take that proven model and apply it to the challenge of our communities on water.

I hold a meeting with our local officials--our city officials and our county officials--before each of my townhalls, and I hold a townhall in every county every year. There is hardly a meeting with multiple officials that goes by that there aren't two or three or four critical water project needs discussed. And that was the motivation for having this WIFIA Program before us today.

I applaud my colleague from Oklahoma Senator Inhofe, who has come forward and said: Let's not only make this work, but let's lower the minimum threshold for projects so we make sure we can get smaller communities, more rural communities involved. That was previously addressed in the bill by saying that smaller communities could aggregate their projects and submit their application, but this was a very helpful addition to the conversation, and I appreciate that type of bipartisan problem-solving which is evidenced in this bill as it is and as in the amendment proposed by my colleague from Oklahoma and passed yesterday.

The reason that funding in this pilot project--and we are talking about $50 million a year for 5 years--is effective is because it has a huge leverage it can fund because it is guaranteeing loans that rarely go bad. The historical default on water and sewer bonds is less than 1 percent. In fact, it is less than one-tenth of 1 percent. So that $50 million to cover defaults can be extraordinarily leveraging. The communities get the funds they need to complete their projects at the lowest interest rates possible, and the American public can sleep soundly at night knowing that the treasury funds being invested are being invested in a manner that is both prudent and productive.

This source of financing will allow communities to take on three types of projects necessary for safe and reliable water systems: repairing the aging infrastructure, upgrading the old systems to modern standards, and expanding the projects to meet growth needs.

Another advantage of this structure of financing is that under WIFIA, projects would be selected by a competitive process rather than by State-by-State allocations, so we get funds to the greatest need across this Nation. We have communities all across Oregon, in every corner of our State, that are facing these infrastructure challenges. I know from talking with my colleagues that the same is true in States across our Nation. And communities that are in good shape now in 5 or 10 years may see the challenge of meeting new standards or meeting the growth in their communities.

I would like to talk about another key aspect of our recovery; that is, manufacturing. If we don't make things in America, we will not have a middle class in America. Our manufacturing sector lost 5 million jobs over the last 14 to 15 years. It is starting to make a comeback, but we should do more to help create good manufacturing jobs.

One very simple thing we can do is support ``Buy American'' provisions in legislation such as this. We recognize the principle. We are using taxpayer dollars to complete a public infrastructure project in America, so it only makes sense for American businesses and workers to do as much of the work as possible. For that reason I will be filing an amendment to this bill to expand the ``Buy American'' provisions for our water infrastructure. These two are very much connected. Yes, we need to be building infrastructure, but we need to make sure those tax dollars build our American economy when the work is being done.

In closing, let's pass this bill, which has a tremendous amount of good in it, and one of those very good points is this water infrastructure act--WIFIA--which does support good jobs and good infrastructure across America.

I also wish to mention the great work my science associate Mirvat Abdelhaq has done on this bill. We are fortunate as Senators to have folks come to work for us for a year or so, bringing their tremendous expertise in trying to develop a very important piece of legislation. She has been very involved, and I thank her, and I thank the program for making this kind of expertise available to our offices.

Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.