Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1562, the ``Katrina Housing Tax Relief Act of 2007,'' a bill to extend and enhanced credit available for building low income housing under the Gulf Opportunity Zone Act of 2005. For far too long the residents of the Gulf Coast have struggled to rebuild their homes, their lives and their communities. They continue to face construction delays that could cost them the Federal assistance promised in the 2005 legislation. I want to encourage my colleagues to support this legislation that will encourage the construction of low-income housing in the areas damaged by Hurricane Katrina while assuring accountability for the tax credits.

The Gulf Opportunity Zone Act of 2005 made the affected areas eligible for larger credits to encourage building low-income housing. ``GO Zone'' benefits are available if the project was built and placed in service before the end of calendar year 2008. H.R. 1562 recognizes the magnitude of the struggle to rebuild the housing stock and it extends the credits for two additional years--2009 and 2010.

As the Member of Congress from North Dakota where 10 years ago the City of Grand Forks was destroyed by a flood and a fire in its aftermath, I know that government can effectively provide Americans help to rebuild our communities when a disaster strikes. The 50,000 residents of Grand Forks were fortunate to have an effective Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA) under the leadership of James Lee Witt there to assist them with the momentous task of starting from the ground up after the flood waters receded. Today Grand Forks is flourishing thanks to a well coordinated effort on the part of FEMA. The rebuilding effort drew upon Federal government resources such as Community Development Block Grants which served as a catalyst to encourage accelerated investments in Grand Forks.

This bill permits Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), available because of prior liberalizations, to be combined with all of these enhanced low-income housing credits for affected areas. Under the Katrina Housing Tax Relief Act, qualified projects will not be treated as having below market Federal loans solely by reason of assistance provided under the CDBG. Since many of the GO Zone communities have lost much, if not all, of their economic base, CDBG assistance is vital and will not restrict an otherwise qualifying building from utilizing the higher 9 percent credit. This will encourage builders to deliver more housing to the Gulf Coast communities in desperate need of homes for those who want to return and help rebuild their lives.

Finally, H.R. 1562 would require that the Government Accountability Office submit a report on the allocation and use of these tax incentives in the GO Zone to the Committee on Ways and Means and no later than one year after the date of enactment. I urge passage of H.R. 1562, a common sense bill that brings much relief to the Gulf Region.

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend my friend, the chairman of the Oversight Subcommittee, the former chairman, now ranking member of the Oversight Subcommittee, for bringing this bipartisan bill to the floor.

There are a couple of features I wish to speak to: one, we prohibit use of misleading Internet names. I want to show you why I think that is important.

This is Departmentofthetreasury .com. You pull it up and it looks like an official Web page of the Federal Government. However, the second page on this same domain name shows Departmentofthetreasury.com is for sale. Basically, departmentofthe treasury.gov is the protected government name, and dot-com is a private name that preys upon the public believing they are communicating with the Federal Government, and they are not.

Now, I think we ought to take some exception to the marketing ``Departmentofthetreasury.com is for sale.'' That is a public name. It is owned by the American people. You can't sell something you don't own, and that is a name appropriately reserved reflecting the Department of Treasury of this country, and nobody should be allowed to make a plug nickel on it.

Here is some body of information showing just how lucrative it might be for those who want to prey upon the public using Federal names. There is a domain site called IRS.com, and inconceivably to me, they rang the bell as some prized business concern in the American Stock Exchange this morning. Well, I think a business that preys upon the public with misleading domain names is no business you want to celebrate in ringing the bell of a great stock exchange.

In fact, public reports, as reported in the New York Times today, show that their revenues jumped from $17.5 in 2005 to $25.6 million after IRS.com paid $12.9 million for that domain name. I have pulled up IRS.com. Some would say there is clear disclosure; this is not a public site. IRS.com has IRS. It has tax information, and in little tiny, flyspeck language it has the disclosure. It is deliberately built to deceive, and in fact one survey showed that 40 percent of those accessing the site thought it was a Federal site. And even after seeing it, one-third thought it was a Federal site. But they use this site to market information to taxpayers.

Just to conclude, the business plan of these enterprises to get people to the site, they then have other services offered on the site. The domain holder, IRS.com, is paid for each link accessed by a member of the public. Some of the things sold on that site represent very low value: refund anticipation loans or expensive tax preparation services. This is a fraud on the public, and we ought to put an end to it.

I also appreciate what we are doing, turning up the heat on these refund anticipation loans, or RALs. To me, they represent an exceedingly poor value to the American public. In fact, such a poor value that I can't believe people are accessing them if they knew the facts and knew the costs. The commissioner has identified some of the practices as predatory lending in testimony to the committee. I like giving the Treasury Department authority to deal with people engaged in predatory lending practices. I urge passage of the bill.

Madam Chairman, on rollcall No. 210, I was unavoidably detained on an important constituent matter and arrived at the House floor after the time for voting had expired. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

This is a very healthy debate taking place. I so appreciate the budget that has been brought out of the Budget Committee, and I appreciate the ranking member for offering a budget. Because, in offering a budget, now the contrast is clear.

Pay-as-you-go is the fundamental foundation of fiscally disciplined budgeting, because it means you have made a decision the deficit goes no deeper. We have heard about the soaring deficits, the astonishing turnaround from a surplus to nearly $3 trillion of deficit spending during the years of Republican control, now yielding us a national debt approaching $9 trillion.

I was pleased to see a picture of children raised by a Member of the other side, because I think that is exactly what it is about. We cannot continue to raise this debt on the children, and that is why pay-as- you-go budgeting was passed in the first 100 hours of this new Congress included in this budget.

Now, the alternative budget, they take a little different view. They say pay-as-you-go does not apply if you are going to cut taxes; you do not have to pay for cutting taxes. In fact, they cut taxes $470 billion without any pay-fors, just cut taxes.

Can you imagine a family sitting down saying, man, we have got to tighten our budget, we have got to cut this, we have got to cut that, we have got to this, we have got to cut that. This is so depressing that I am going to quit working full time. I am going to work half time.

It would not make any sense. You have got to count the revenue side; you have got to cut the spending side. That is our plan.

But that is not the end of the Ryan budget and what it means in terms of overall budget picture, because they do have cuts. This is an important final point to make. It reminds me a little bit of the budget policies we debated in the 1990s, where they wanted to cut the heck out of Medicare in order to fund tax cuts disproportionately flowing to the wealthiest people of this country.

In this budget you have a directive to the Ways and Means and the Energy and Commerce Committees to cut $250 billion. We know where those cuts are coming from. I am on the Ways and Means Committee. That is the Medicare committee. They are coming right back after Medicare again, taking dollars from the seniors' health care in this country in order to fund these tax cuts for the wealthiest people, to the extent they are funded at all.

Here is a chart illustrating the distribution on their tax cuts. This is for those over $1 million. This has been the most regressive series of tax cuts ever enacted in this country. We know the benefit has gone all to the rich, predominantly to the rich, disproportionately to the rich.

To think that they fund it out of cutting Medicare, while driving the debt deeper, shows the budget choice. Fiscal discipline, balanced budget by 2012; cutting Medicare, deeper deficits. Go for the Spratt budget.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to engage the chairman in a colloquy and thank the gentleman for yielding.

Chairman Oberstar, I rise to discuss an issue that is of critical importance to my district. At 1:39 a.m. on January 18, 2002, a Canadian Pacific Railway freight train derailed in Minot, North Dakota. The freight train derailed 31 freight cars, including 15 cars containing anhydrous ammonia. As a result of this accident, the people of Minot were exposed to the largest catastrophic release of anhydrous ammonia in U.S. history. They were not at fault. They were sitting ducks in their own homes.

After the area cleared, one individual, John Grabinger, had died, and many, many others suffered injuries, including individuals who sustained second degree burns to their skin. And many others are still suffering from long-term permanent physical damage.

Some courts are ignoring congressional intent and denying Americans grievously injured in railroad accidents their rights under State law, even when it is undisputed that the cause of the accident was the railroad's wrongdoing. By preempting State law, these courts are leaving injured North Dakotans and others with no remedy at all, since the Federal Railroad Safety Act itself does not provide a remedy or cause of action for victims.

I just want to clarify with the chairman the intent of the language found in section 3 on the first page of the manager's amendment. Is it correct that this legislation clarifies that the Federal Rail Safety Act of 1970 does not and was never intended to preempt State law claims for damages?

It is my understanding that until 1993, there was no question that State causes of actions were not preempted. The Supreme Court then said they could be, under some circumstances, and some courts since then have been broadening the railroads' immunity from liability under the auspices of preemption. Congress tried before to change the FRSA's preemptive scope, but courts didn't listen. Does this language reflect the fact that Congress never intended preemption of State causes of action?

While the bill accurately clarifies that State causes of action are not preempted, will you continue to work with us to take the steps necessary to ensure that courts construe this amendment only as a clarification of Congress' original intent?

Is it also your understanding that the same Federal court that dismissed those claims urged the Congress to remedy this situation and the language in section 3 does precisely what the court said needed to be done?

I thank the chairman.

Madam Speaker, our Nation lost a great American and this House lost a most distinguished former Member with the passing of Thomas Kleppe at age 87 on March 2, 2007. Tom Kleppe was elected from the 2nd district of North Dakota in 1966 and 1968.

Tom was probably best known to the Nation for his service as Secretary of the Interior under President Ford, however he was best known to his home State of North Dakota for his service in Congress from 1966 to 1970. Tom was a trailblazer in North Dakota, being elected as the youngest-ever mayor of Bismarck at the age of 30 and the first native of North Dakota to ever serve in a Presidential cabinet when he was appointed Interior Secretary in 1975.

Tom exemplified the definition of the ``Greatest Generation,'' having served his country as a warrant officer in the U.S. Army for 4 years during World War II. Shortly before being honorably discharged in 1946, Tom turned down an offer from the St. Louis Cardinals to return to his native North Dakota, and our State is the better for it.

As the son of homesteaders in Kintyre, ND, Tom was instilled with the enterprising spirit and work ethic that have made North Dakota prosper. By the time he was a teenager, Tom was working for his father's grain elevator business. He went on to work in bookkeeping and banking before entering public service, where he served as the mayor of Bismarck and later served two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. There Tom was known as a strong advocate for North Dakota's farmers and ranchers on the Agriculture Committee.

Kleppe was appointed to head the Small Business Administration by President Nixon, a post he held from 1971-1975, when President Ford appointed him Interior Secretary. Tom served in this position for the remainder of Ford's term. During his tenure, Kleppe proved an able steward of the Nation's land and wildlife. Even long after moving to Washington, DC, Tom never lost touch with his prairie roots, and continued to ride horses well into his 80s.

Tom is survived by his wife of 48 years, Glendora Kleppe, and his 4 children, 11 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren. The State of North Dakota mourns the loss of a great public servant.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday morning I had an experience I will never forget. In the snow, in the slush and the ice, I joined the family of Major Alan Johnson as his body was laid to rest at Arlington Cemetery. He had lost his life in an IED explosion in Iraq just 2 weeks before.

On behalf of the people of North Dakota, I expressed to the extent I could our profound condolences for the family's loss. The major's grieving widow stared into my eyes and said, ``Do what you can for our troops over there.''

This is not just a plea and a prayer of the families of our soldiers, it is the demand of the American people. I believe each and every one of us here shares an intense commitment to our soldiers that comes right from the bottom of

our heart. This debate is revealing a sharp difference between us in how to proceed in Iraq.

But there are no differences when it comes to all we share about the valor our soldiers have displayed in service to our country. I have seen it personally in the four trips I have been to Iraq. I have seen soldiers in full battle gear, in 133 degree heat, doing their absolute best to perform their mission. I have seen North Dakota National Guard soldiers charged with training up Iraqi soldiers through an impossible, absolute, language barrier.

I have seen other soldiers just back from the life-threatening business of finding and detonating these explosive devices, saving American lives while keeping essential roads open. Like most of you, I have mourned and prayed with shattered families whose sons and daughters have lost their lives in selfless service to our country and all we care about.

So I cannot get Tori Johnson's fervent request out of my mind, take care of our soldiers over there. Honestly, there is nothing I care more about as a Member of this House.

So, how do we respond? We take care of our soldiers over there by making certain they have the equipment they need as they undertake this most difficult and dangerous mission. We take care of our soldiers over there by making certain their deployments are only for acceptable periods and at acceptable intervals, with enough time at home in between to heal, to rest and to train. But beyond these things, we take care of our soldiers over there when we as a Congress make certain the mission they have been sent to perform has a reasonable chance of success.

In a war where so many tragic mistakes have been made, this Congress must not sit quietly by while additional plans are cooked up in Washington, whose only certainty is to accelerate the loss of American lives, compound the already severe strain on our military capability and accelerate the burn rack of taxpayer dollars spent in Iraq.

For these reasons, this resolution is a very important opening statement for this Congress to make in Iraq in 97 words. It states our support for our soldiers, while opposing the President's plan to escalate the number of troops we send into the middle of the Shia-Sunni violence taking place in Baghdad.

On one of my trips to Iraq, a soldier said to me, ``We can stand up an Iraqi Army, but we cannot create a country for this army to defend.'' This simple truth goes right to the heart of the issue and exposes the flaw of the President's plan.

Without the commitment between the warring parties in Iraq to stop the killing and create a political agreement upon which a national government can exist, 20,000 more U.S. soldiers are not likely to bring about a lasting peace. Our soldiers are disciplined and determined. They have superbly performed everything that has been asked of them.

However, the United States alone cannot create a democracy in Iraq. Only the Iraqi people can achieve that.

A broad group of experts, including the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the former senior military commander in the region, General John Abizaid, have all rejected the strategy of escalating U.S. troop numbers as a means of bringing the factions of Iraq together.

The bottom line is that this troop escalation will increase the terrible cost of this endeavor, more lives lost, more young men and women maimed forever, more tens of billions spent, all without improving our prospects for an acceptable outcome.

Under these circumstances, I will vote to oppose this escalation of troops. It is part of what I believe we must do. Under these circumstances, I will oppose this escalation of troops. It is part of what I believe we must do to support our soldiers over there and the American interests they have put their lives on the line to defend.

Madam Speaker, on January 22, 2007, due to flight delays, I missed rollcall votes Nos. 43, 44, 45, and 46. Had I been present, I would have voted in the following manner: Rollcall No. 43, yea; rollcall No. 44, yea; rollcall No. 45, yea; rollcall No. 46, yea.

Madam Speaker, on January 16, I joined the Happy Hooligans and the North Dakota Air National Guard in celebrating their 60th Anniversary. This unit--the 119th Fighting Wing, now rechristened the 119th Wing--has served our nation for the better part of the last century, and their dedicated commitment to our Nation's defense will only continue in the coming years.

I can remember being at the Capitol on September 11th and one year later, being at

the Pentagon to recognize those pilots from the 119th Fighter Wing, who were flying vigil that day and in fact, did the first fly-over of the Pentagon after the attack. These moments will forever be part of the Hooligans' history.

This unit demonstrated time and again a commitment to excellence in flying fighter aircraft. The William Tell competition, which pits the top fighter units from across the country, was won by the 119th three times. The unit won the Hughes Achievement Award for air defense twice. It only makes sense to provide such a skilled and decorated unit a mission for the new century consistent with the evolution of the United States Air Force.

We know about our two new missions--the C-21s and the Predators--but what we don't yet know is how exactly the Hooligans will make their next entry into the history books with those aircraft. Ultimately, the 119th is about the people that make it up and those people have a record of accomplishment and great service to our Nation.

The 119th changes its mission, but brings with it an enviable record for flying safety. The unit was awarded the Flight Safety Trophy four times in the past seven years. Since 1990, the ``Happy Hooligans'' have flown more than 70,000 hours in F-16 aircraft without an accident from dozens of locations around the world, in a variety of weather conditions, during daylight and nighttime hours. That achievement coupled with hours of accident free flying in F-4 fighters and flight hours in F-101 fighter aircraft is one of the best safety records in U.S. Air Force history.

The pilots and other personnel in Fargo today who have stood up to terrorists and stood for freedom to protect the United States are remarkable heroes and their stories will ring true for many years in our hearts and our history books.

Mr. Speaker, I am a Democrat representing an energy- producing State, and I will be proudly supporting this bill.

This bill creates a very important reserve, a reserve that will serve as a funding base for our efforts to significantly expand critical research in order to develop greater energy independence for our country while continuing those tax credits that have been absolutely essential to the growth of renewable fuels in our country.

We face the promise of not looking to the Middle East, but looking to the Middle West for our energy future, and we are seeing across the plains of this country wonderful developments. A 10-fold increase of ethanol production alone in my State is under construction at the present time due essentially to these tax credits that continue to fuel this revolution.

What about the issues of a new tax, something that will crack people right at the pump. The reality is we are addressing something that was slipped into a massive bill dealing with the tax needs of manufacturers.

As we restructured the tax base on the Nation's manufacturers, in light of international trade pressures, we constructed a bill, moved the bill forward, and at no point in the debate in the Ways and Means Committee or on the floor of the House was there notice provided that a similar tax treatment was slipped in for the oil companies. This is something they did not have before; it is something that has not been long critical to their operations. This was an ill-gotten windfall amounting to $700 million a year, and it is time it be withdrawn.

In the withdrawing, however, it is not going to the General Treasury. We are dedicating it, dedicating it to the energy picture. So as we try to move from big oil into renewables, we will have the wherewithal to do it. I urge passage.

This bill is an important step for our growing renewable energy industry. H.R. 6 will set up a Strategic Energy Efficiency and Renewables Reserve, which will allow this Congress to begin to get serious about developing America's renewable energy industries.

Through enhanced investment in renewable energy we will not only build a sustainable industry for our State but we will also be helping make America more energy independent and more secure.

There will be many new proposals made in the coming months regarding how we should use this reserve, but we must make sure that while we place significant funds into research and development we also continue to place importance on policies and tax credits that have an immediate impact on the creation of renewable energy. These tax credits include those for ethanol, biodiesel and the production tax credit for wind and other renewables.

The tax credits for biodiesel and ethanol are set to expire in the next few years. These credits must be extended to ensure that the biofuels industry is able to continue its expansion and meet more and more of our transportation fuel needs. These credits helped spur the development of 350 million gallons of ethanol and over 100 million gallons of biodiesel in my State, North Dakota, over the last 2 years alone.

In 2006 over 1 billion gallons of ethanol production capacity came online with another 5.4 billion expected to become operational in the next 18 months easily surpassing the 7.5 billion gallon Renewable Fuels Standard set for 2012. Meanwhile the biodiesel industry has tripled its production capacity each year since 2004. Expansion of these credits will have a direct effect on the volume of biofuels produced, encouraging the development that we need to lower our dependence on foreign oil.

In addition to the biofuels incentives, the production tax credit, which expires at the end of next year, must be extended for 5 years to allow industries such as the wind industry to operate under stabile conditions. Without stabilizing the tax credit, companies like DMI Industries in West Fargo and LM Glassfiber in Grand Forks are in constant limbo. DMI manufactures wind turbine towers and had furloughed over 100 employees in late 2003 after the expiration of the wind production tax credit. LM Glassfiber, which manufactures wind turbine blades, had previously idled all production due to the delay in extending the wind tax credit and was forced to furlough 60 to 70 employees.

America has great potential for meeting our energy needs domestically. In order to achieve energy independence we must enact policies that will take full advantage of our renewable fuel potential but at the same time we must also continue to invest in traditional sources of energy such as clean coal and domestic oil production. Technologies such as coal-to-liquids, enhanced oil recovery through carbon sequestration and clean coal technologies hold great potential for increasing the efficiency of these industries while at the same time making them more environmentally friendly.

Reliance on foreign sources for our energy supply and the volatility of the Middle East create a national security risk that cannot be ignored. We must work to harness our own Nation's energy resources while also bolstering new and inventive methods of meeting our growing energy needs. We are taking an important first step today and I look forward to the debate on renewable energy that will occur in the coming months.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1. This bill takes an important long-overdue step to implement recommendations put forth by the 9/11 Commission. This bill improves interoperability, enhances cargo and overall port security, and strengthens U.S. efforts to reduce the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

I do recommend that implementation of this bill be undertaken in such a way as to ensure that our rural first responders do not receive less funding as a result of the redistribution of the homeland security grants in the legislation. First responders across the Nation must be equipped to readily deal with and react to security concerns in the United States. Therefore, I think it is critical that North Dakota's first responders continue to receive the funding that they need and deserve to do their job.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and would amplify just for a moment on his point. You can't get your amendment set until you know what the underlying bill is. And with all the moving parts in the underlying bill, that simply was not possible.

But I believe that this election was about restoring more of a bipartisan tone to the functions of this Chamber. And in that context, I want to tell the departing chairman I wish him well as his service in this body comes to a conclusion. I wish all my Ways and Means colleagues, Republicans and Democrats alike, a very happy holiday season.

There are several portions of this bill that are important, and I applaud those who constructed this legislation for including these components. I am not speaking about the amendment which will be brought; that will be dealt with by other speakers. But there is a lot of good in this bill, and I don't want it lost in the discussion here.

I chair, along with Greg Walden, a bipartisan group, the Rural Health Care Coalition. We have advanced legislation to try to improve the unfairness of the Medicare system relative to rural hospitals. I am pleased that the bill includes provisions, including a continuation of the geographic classification issue, section 508, that was in the Medicare Modernization Act and addresses reasonable cost payment for lab tests in small rural hospitals and a number of other provisions found their way into this bill. They are important to us, and I speak in favor of them.

I also believe that it was absolutely essential we address this physician payment issue in this legislation. It should be underscored, I suppose, that this is just a very stop-gap fix and more will need to be done. There is some very important features in here on renewable energy as well. The plus-up of the clean renewable energy bonds with an additional $400 million to fund renewable energy projects, extremely important. A 1-year continuation of the wind production tax credit is, no question, going to allow more wind farms to be brought online, bringing this renewable energy source, clean renewable energy source, more into our power mix. And the extension of the ethanol tariff is also important, something to keep in mind as we consider it this afternoon.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 6111, the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006 as it provides for much needed relief for those physicians, hospitals and laboratories who serve North Dakota's 103,000 Medicare patients.

As you know, the Medicare Modernization Act made long overdue corrections to significant flaws in Medicare payment schemes that have made a tremendous difference to the hospitals, doctors and other providers in my State and throughout the rural America. Several of these provisions, which help to level the playing and simply keep hospitals and doctors offices open, have or are about to expire. However, access to health care services in rural areas continues to be in jeopardy due to physician shortages, low patient volume and geographic isolation. In my own State of North Dakota, over two-thirds of our counties are designated as Physician Scarcity Areas.

That is why Representative Greg Walden, myself and over 50 other bipartisan members of the Rural Health Care Coalition introduced H.R. 6030, the Health Care Access and Rural Equity Act, otherwise known as H-CARE. This commonsense legislation significantly improves health care quality and access in North Dakota and rural America while also increasing the viability of rural providers.

I am pleased to see that a number of the provisions Representative Walden and I authored for H-CARE are included in today's bill. From extending the Medicare Modernization Act, MMA, floor on the Medicare work geographic adjustment for physician services to continuing to provide reasonable cost payment for lab tests in small rural hospitals, H.R. 6111 helps to maintain important corrections in our current Medicare payment system. In addition, this bill extends a critical provision of the MMA that created greater wage parity between hospitals in my State of North Dakota.

These MMA rural health provisions have already made a tremendous difference in our State. For example, one hospital was able to use the funding to recruit four new physicians. Other hospitals used the funding to invest in capital infrastructure including much needed and costly ultrasound equipment and electronic health record systems. In addition, these hospitals were able to increase salaries anywhere from 4 to 8 percent.

While H.R. 6111 extends many critical rural health care provisions from the MMA and brings temporary relief for our Nations physician's, our work is not done. I think we would all agree that the physician payment system under Medicare is a flawed system that penalizes efficient care and rewards excessive care. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the 110th Congress in a bipartisan manner to improve our Medicare physician payment system and further advance the remaining components of H-CARE in order to improve access to quality, affordable health care in North Dakota and rural America.

This bill also contains important provisions for our growing renewable energy industry. Included in H.R. 6111, the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006, are an extension and expansion of the Clean Renewable Energy Bond program, a 1-year extension of the Wind Production Tax Credit and over a year extension of the ethanol tariff that protects American ethanol producers from subsidized foreign ethanol.

Through this continued investment in renewable energy we not only build a sustainable industry for our State but we are helping make America more energy independent and more secure.

Clean Renewable Energy Bonds, which I helped develop as part of the 2005 Energy Bill, can now be offered for an additional year and have been authorized to release an additional $400 million of clean energy bonds. In North Dakota we have already seen the effects that Clean Renewable Energy Bonds can have. The city of Fargo will be using Clean Renewable Energy Bonds to finance a wind tower and a methane gas facility that will be used to reduce the city's energy costs. Great River Energy will also be using these energy bonds to finance the construction of a coal drying facility which will not only increase the efficiency of North Dakota lignite coal but also reduce emissions.

Clean Renewable Energy Bonds work by allowing a Federal tax credit to holders of bonds issued by public utilities and cooperatives to finance clean energy projects. Not-for-profit utilities can sell clean energy bonds to stakeholders, but instead of the utility or cooperative paying out interest to the bondholder, the Federal Government would give the bondholder a tax credit. These bonds provide what amounts to interest free loans for co-ops and public power systems to finance renewable energy projects.

This bill also extends the wind production tax credit to 2009. In 2015, wind energy generation is expected to reach 63 gigawatts with the tax credit in place compared to an estimated 9.3 gigawatts without. This represents a 650 percent increase in wind generation.

However, without stabilizing the tax credit, companies like DMI Industries in West Fargo and LM Glassfiber in Grand Forks are in constant limbo. DMI manufactures wind turbine towers and had furloughed over 100 employees in late 2003 after the expiration of the wind production tax credit. LM Glassfiber, which manufactures wind turbine blades, had previously idled all production due to the delay in extending the wind tax credit and was forced to furlough 60 to 70 employees.

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the gentlewoman from Texas, Sheila Jackson-Lee, for the remarks she just made, particularly in respect to the cooperation with Chairman Hostettler.

You know, this bill is before us at this critical hour for this program because of the work of the chairman and the persistent advocacy of the gentlewoman. What impresses me in particular is the gentlewoman's agreement to advance this bill forward, even though it was not reformed in ways that she had sought.

For rural areas, this was just so urgent. And we are really pleased that we can get this done, even as the session comes to conclusion. You see, we have trouble in rural areas. We have trouble getting doctors that we need to practice there. And this Conrad 30 program has played an incredibly important role in getting doctors into areas who need them in rural America. In fact, the physician practice vacancies in North Dakota have been cut roughly in half out in the rural areas as a result of this program. If this program were to expire, we would literally have hospitals without doctors. We would have people without the care they need. Frankly, we would have lives lost, because when you are getting into areas of western Kansas or North Dakota, you are talking about vast reaches of territory that take considerable time to cross before you can get someone, who may have an emergency medical condition, to an urban center where they might be treated.

So this program which is tried, true, tested and part of the landscape, is about to expire. Again, to sum up, continuation of it continues what we have got. We have agreed, I have agreed with the gentlewoman to take a look at how we reform it in ways that respond to her concerns. But I am just so pleased that she has agreed to move this forward, and also pleased with the working relationship she has with Chairman Hostettler.

So, at this point in his congressional career, he instilled a sense that this come to the floor for a conclusion. Good for you, madam, gentlewoman, Sheila Jackson Lee, and good for you, Chairman Hostettler. This is one rule America sorely needs. We thank you for it.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 4997, the Physicians for Underserved Areas Act, which helps to address the physician shortage in rural areas across America.

H.R. 4997 reauthorizes for two years the Conrad 30 program. This program, which was established by fellow North Dakotan, Senator Kent Conrad, allows graduates of foreign medical schools who complete their training in the United States on a J-l cultural exchange visa to remain in the U.S. for three years if they agree to serve in a medically underserved community.

Many of these medically underserved communities are in rural areas. In fact, only about ten percent of physicians practice in rural America despite the fact that nearly one- fourth of the population lives in rural areas. In my own state of North Dakota, eighty-one percent of North Dakota's counties are designated as health professional shortage areas, or HPSAs.

In communities like Crosby and Tioga, North Dakota, the J-l visa waiver physicians pool serves as the primary resource to meet rural clinics and hospitals physician needs. For example, Dr. Ivan Tsutskiridze, serves Crosby, North Dakota, under the Conrad 30 program and is the communities' sole physician. Prior to the creation of the program, Crosby and other communities were chasing physicians. In fact, since 1994, this program has cut in half the number of family practice physician vacancies in North Dakota.

The importance of this program is evident. Last year alone, over 6,000 physicians participated in the J-l waiver program and it is heavily relied upon by a majority of the states. However, its need for reauthorization remains as the physician shortage in this country is projected to reach 200,000 by 2020. That is why I am pleased to see this bill before the House today to reauthorize this important program that has provided many rural areas with capable, much-needed physicians.

I would like to thank the people who have worked to bring this bill to the floor today, especially Representative John Hostettler, Representative Sheila Jackson-Lee and Representative Jerry Moran. This bill makes a real difference for medically underserved areas across the United States and in North Dakota. I urge a ``yes'' vote on H.R. 4997.

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to reflect upon the life of a strong and good man, Dean Lenaburg from Valley City, North Dakota.

Dean was my mentor and my friend. Without his role in my life, I would never have been a Member of Congress. Dean passed away earlier this year after a long battle with kidney and liver disease, but his memory will continue to guide and inspire his family and friends in the years ahead.

Dean was easy to look up to--he towered over most of us with a height of 6' 4" and the athletic build of someone who excelled in sports. He easily transitioned from the small town competition of Portland, North Dakota to stand-out on the University of North Dakota football team.

Dean's parents obviously instilled in him an intellectual curiosity and love of learning--that would be an important feature of his character throughout his life.

Dean quickly completed his university years earning his undergraduate and law degrees in just 5 years. He married Mary Trom from Lisbon, North Dakota, and upon graduation they began the adventure of Dean's service in the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Dean would have been the very picture of an FBI agent in those days-- tall, strong, smart, and absolutely committed to advancing justice and public safety. Dean was never one to talk about himself, so most of his experiences as an FBI agent were never shared--even with those closest to him. I know, however, he served with honor and that the FBI has never had an agent more trustworthy than Dean Lenaburg.

After several years Dean, Mary and their four young daughters, Kristin, Kathryn, Andrea, and Susan, came back to North Dakota where Dean began his career as a practicing attorney--briefly in Oakes and later in Valley City where he was a fixture in the area's legal community for more than 30 years.

In the course of these years, Dean made many positive contributions to his community, his clients and friends. He profoundly influenced my own life during this time, as revealed in three examples.

In 1971, my father died unexpectedly at the age of 57. Dean handled the estate. To this day, I vividly remember the competent and sensitive representation he provided to our grief stricken family. His example of service furthered my own thinking with regards to pursuit of a law career.

In 1974, Dean supported my application for the Rotary Foundation Award. With his help, I won the scholarship and was able to pursue graduate studies in England.

Finally, Dean and his law partner R. Jon Fitzner allowed me to fulfill my first career

goal--joining them in the practice of law back in my hometown.

Fortunately for me, both Dean and R. Jon had a broad and selfless view of my participation in the law firm. When I became interested in pursuing elected office--first for the legislature and then as a statewide candidate--they were completely supportive.

I believe the value of junior members in many law firms is found solely in the billable hours they generate for the benefit of the firm. Dean Lenaburg and R. Jon Fitzner thought I had something to offer in the area of public leadership. Without their understanding and support, I would never have been able to participate in the political process.

I only hope Dean knew the dimensions of gratitude I will always have for his allowing me to take my shot at elective office. As long as I may remain in public service, I hope and pray my efforts are worthy of the trusting support he provided.

One final aspect of Dean needs noting. He had a first rate intellect and insatiable appetite for learning. He was a lifelong student of history and read extensively. He would positively delight in uncovering a new insight or perspective on the historical development of our State and Nation.

His interest in scholarship led him to extended service on the Valley City Library Building. Our beautiful Andrew Carnegie building and its contents reflect his conscientious contribution to the preservation and enhancement of our community library.

Dean's spirit--including his active mind, his concern for others, and his good humor--lives on in his daughters and grandchildren.

Dean Lenaburg had a life well lived. All of us whose lives he touched feel grateful for having known him and will carry him in our thoughts and memories always.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the tremendous role that our cooperative businesses play in our nation's economy and in the state of North Dakota. October is National Co-op Month, so it is fitting that we take a few moments today to recognize the value of cooperatives.

Cooperatives are businesses owned and democratically governed by their members--

those who buy their products or use their services--rather than by outside investors. This business structure provides valuable benefits to the co-op's member/owners.

North Dakota alone has over 250 farmer cooperatives and over 300 cooperatives total (including utilities and credit union cooperatives). These cooperatives contribute over $1.6 billion to the state's economy, and personal income attributed to cooperatives is over 15 percent of North Dakota's total.

North Dakota's cooperatives directly employ over 9,000 people full- time and an additional 3,000 people part-time. Add in secondary jobs associated with these cooperative businesses, and over 50,000 jobs in North Dakota result from cooperatives.

The effects of cooperatives are not just felt in North Dakota, of course. Nationwide, cooperatives operating in every state in the nation pump more than $200 billion into the economy and serve an estimated 130 million Americans. These cooperatives operate in virtually every industry, including agriculture, energy, financial services, food retailing and distribution, housing, healthcare, and telecommunications. They range in size from small storefronts to large Fortune 500 companies, employing more than 500,000 Americans with an aggregate payroll in excess of $15 billion.

Cooperatives dedicate substantial resources to serving their communities beyond their core business functions. This includes charitable giving that assists the underserved and community development activities that generate jobs and income.

The theme for Cooperative Month 2006 is ``Cooperatives, Owned by Our Members, Committed to Our Communities.'' I urge my colleagues to join with cooperatives in their districts next month in celebrating the role of cooperatives in our economy and their value to their communities.