Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a bill to include macadamia nuts in the mandatory country-of-origin labeling program established in the 2002 Farm Bill. The provisions for macadamia nuts would be similar to those for peanuts whereby roasted and flavored nuts in cans or other packaging would be labeled, but not nuts that are used for candy or as ingredients in other foods.

Hawaii produces the highest quality macadamia nuts in the world. The premium macadamia nut product--and the one where the quality, of the nut is most apparent--is the roasted and flavored nuts in cans or other packaging. Using lower quality nuts for these types of products when the packaging implies a Hawaii origin damages Hawaii macadamia growers in two ways: by decreasing demand for Hawaiian nuts (and therefore prices), and by damaging the reputation of Hawaiian macadamia nuts.

Country-of-origin labeling will give my Hawaii growers a well- deserved competitive advantage based on the quality of their product. Hawaii was the pioneer in developing a national and international market for macadamia nuts and many producers in other countries trade upon Hawaii's reputation to market their nuts.

The long-term viability of Hawaii's agriculture is tied to our ability to distinguish our high-quality products from those produced in other countries. And the cachet of Hawaii origin is also a market advantage. I have no doubt in the superiority of Hawaiian papayas, pineapples, mangoes, bananas, and macadamia nuts. Country-of-origin labeling will make it easier for consumers to distinguish among different origins and will result in a market advantage for Hawaii farmers.

For all of these reasons, my bill is fully supported by the Hawaiian macadamia nut industry.

Currently, the mandatory country-of-origin labeling law applies to farm-raised and wild fish and shellfish; ground and muscle cuts of beef, lamb, and pork; fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables; and peanuts. Country-of-origin labeling for fish and shellfish began on September 30, 2004; labeling for fresh produce, meats, and peanuts is currently mandated to begin on September 30, 2006.

I ask for my colleagues' support for adding macadamia nuts to the country-of-origin labeling law so that my macadamia nut fanners can enjoy the same marketing benefits as growers of American peanuts.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce, together with 29 of my colleagues, a concurrent resolution to formally recognize the 2006 centennial of sustained Filipino immigration to the United States, acknowledge the many achievements of our Filipino-American community, and reflect on the productive and enduring relationship between the United States and the Philippines over the past century.

The Filipino-American experience and the evolving yet always close relationship between the Philippines and the United States began in earnest in 1906, when fifteen Filipino contract laborers arrived in the then-Territory of Hawaii to work on the islands' sugar plantations. This marked the start of an emigration from the Philippines to the United States which, during the subsequent century, has numbered upwards of 60,000 a year, making Filipinos our second-largest immigrant group from the Asia-Pacific region.

The year 1906 was also when the first class of two hundred ``pensionados'' arrived from the Philippines to obtain a United States education with the intent of returning to the Philippines. Many, however, stayed to become American citizens, forming, with the ``sakadas'' who emigrated to my Hawaii, the foundation of today's Filipino-American community.

The story of America's Filipino-American community is little known and rarely told. Yet it is the quintessential immigrant story of early struggle, pain, sacrifice, and broken dreams, leading eventually to success in overcoming ethnic, social, economic, political, and legal barriers to win a well-deserved place in American society.

Today, 2.4 million Americans of Filipino ancestry live throughout our Nation, including the two top states: California, where 1.1 million reside, and Hawaii, my home state, where some 275,000 live (140,000 in my Second Congressional District alone, making it home to the largest number of Filipino Americans of any congressional district).

Members of this community have made great contributions to America, and have achieved success and distinction in, among other things, labor, business, politics, media and the arts, medicine, and the armed forces. Filipino Americans have also served with distinction in the armed forces of the United States throughout the long U.S.-Philippines relationship, from World Wars I and II through the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, and today in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere.

Many Filipino Americans retained their mother country's proud cultural traditions, which continue to enrich the diverse tapestry of today's American experience. Many have also maintained close ties to family and friends in the Philippines, and therefore played an indispensable role in maintaining the strength and vitality of the U.S.-Philippines relationship.

That relationship has evolved over the past century from the 1898- 1946 period of U.S. governance, during which the then-Commonwealth of the Philippines was represented in the U.S. Congress by thirteen resident commissioners, to the post-independence period beginning in 1946, when the Philippines took its place among the community of nations and became one of this country's most reliable allies in the international arena.

In 2006, our Filipino-American community will join all Americans in pausing to recognize a century of achievement in the United States through a series of nationwide celebrations and memorials marking the centennial of sustained immigration from the Philippines. This centennial will provide every American of whatever ethnic heritage an opportunity to not only celebrate a century of Filipino immigration to the United States, but to celebrate, appreciate, and honor the struggles and triumphs common to the immigrant experience, which, of course, is also the American experience.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a bill that exempts my State of Hawaii from the adjusted gross income limitation on participation in Farm Bill conservation programs. These programs assist and incentivize producers and landowners to preserve and conserve the dwindling agricultural lands of our country.

These invaluable programs include the following:

Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), which provides annual rental payments to replace crops on highly erodible and environmentally sensitive lands with long-term plantings that protect the soil. Hawaii is attempting to access this program, the largest of all the conservation programs, by developing a Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, which is awaiting approval by the USDA.

Conservation Security Program (CSP), which provides financial and technical assistance for improvements in conserving environmental resources on farmland that meets certain soil and water quality criteria standards.

Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), which provides cost share payments to producers and landowners to plan and install structural, vegetative, and land management practices on eligible lands to alleviate conservation problems, with 60 percent of funds allocated to livestock producers.

Farmland and Ranchland Protection Program (FRPP), which assists state and local governments to acquire easements to limit conversion of agricultural lands to nonagricultural uses.

Grassland Reserve Program (GRP), which retires acres from grazing under arrangements ranging from 10-year agreements to permanent easements and permits the delegation of easements to certain private organizations and state agencies.

Wetlands Reserve Program (WRP), which uses permanent and temporary easements and long-term agreements to protect farmed wetlands.

Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program (WHIP), which provides cost sharing and technical assistance for conservation practices that primarily benefit wildlife.

These programs have become increasingly important in Hawaii, where funding has risen from around $4.9 million in 2003 to $14.2 million in 2005. Unfortunately, especially in the case of the Conservation Reserve Program, Hawaii's ability to access these programs has been severely limited by the application of the adjusted gross income limitation (AGI) placed on the programs by the 2002 Farm Bill to Hawaii's unique conditions. As a result, many of the lands that would deliver the highest environmental benefits are excluded because of this provision.

In Hawaii's case, there are compelling reasons why an exemption from the AGI limitation is not only fair but necessary for these programs to achieve their desired goals. By way of background, during the writing of the 2002 Farm Bill some groups called attention to the fact that some very wealthy individuals were receiving payments under Farm Bill conservation programs. As a result, a limitation was put in place making individuals and corporations with annual incomes of $2.5 million or more ineligible for participation in Farm Bill conservation programs unless 75 percent of that income comes from farming, ranching, or forestry.

This adjusted gross income (AGI) provision seriously disadvantages Hawaii because the major portion of our agricultural lands are owned by families or corporations with diversified holdings. In many cases, these entities have remained engaged in ranching or farming, despite low profit margins, due to a connection to long traditions in ranching, farming, or other activities.

Large agricultural landholdings in Hawaii typically date back more than 100 years and follow the traditional Hawaiian land division of ahupua'a, where land parcels extend from the mountain to the sea, based on the ancient Hawaiian recognition of the interconnectedness of these environments. As a result, we have properties where the upper lands might be used for ranching, the middle lands for crops or residential development, and the lower, oceanside lands for hotels and business developments. Therefore, we have ranches where income from ranching is supplemented by a shopping center and restaurant. A portion of the ranch land may, and in many cases in Hawaii does, harbor endangered plant and animal species. Taking these marginal lands out of cattle production and assisting with reforestation of native species can have a tremendous impact on the prospects of survival for Hawaii's endangered species. But regrettably, the AGI provision has meant that federal funds to assist in these efforts cannot be used to provide what could be enormous environmental benefits. Thus, as a result of our particular history, we in Hawaii are denied access

to a very valuable tool to encourage conservation on many of these marginal agricultural lands.

In addition, as one of the most isolated land masses in the world, Hawaii has a wealth of unique animal and plant species; regrettably we are also the endangered species capital of the United States. Our 255 listed plant species represent approximately one-fourth of the total number of endangered species in the United States. They also comprise more than one-fifth of the entire Hawaiian flora. An Hawaii's endemic birds make up one-third of the list of endangered bird species. Our unique and beautiful endangered birds would benefit greatly from restoration and protection of native forests using funding from the Farm Bill programs. These programs would also help to control runoff into streams and coral reefs providing habitat for more unique endemic species.

Finally, Hawaii should receive special consideration out of simple fairness. Hawaii, especially my Second district, is a rural agricultural state. Despite this, in part because of the AGI limitation, Hawaii comes in dead last of all the states in terms of federal assistance received as a percentage of agricultural production. In fact, we receive less than 1 cent per dollar of production value compared with 17 cents for North Dakota and an average of 6 cents nationwide.

As a prime example, Hawaii has only ever had 21 acres enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, which covers some 39.2 million acres nationwide. The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) was enacted in 1985 and has grown to become the biggest USDA conservation program, costing just under $2 billion annually in recent years. Under this program, producers bid to retire highly erodible or environmentally sensitive land from production during national signup periods. The Farm Service Agency ranks bids based on their estimated environmental benefits and cost to the government. (I have no doubt that Hawaii would deliver very high environmental benefits, especially when one considers the impact on coral reefs and endangered species.) Successful bidders receive annual rental payments, as well as cost sharing and technical assistance, to install conservation practices. Almost all the enrolled land is retired for 10 years. Enrollment is limited to 25 percent of the crop land in a county.

In July 2004, Hawaii's Governor Lingle submitted the ``Hawaii Conservation Reserve Enhancement and Coordinated Conservation Plan.'' The proposal is currently under review by the Farm Service Agency.

If approved, the plan will restore 30,000 acres of native forest-- 10,000 acres in riparian buffers along streams and 20,000 acres in large blocks in groundwater recharge and sediment source areas. The plan covers the islands of Maui, Hawaii, Molokai, Lanai, Kauai, and Oahu. The principal goals of the project are to improve water quality in streams, reduce flow of polluted runoff to near shore waters and coral reefs, and restore terrestrial and aquatic wildlife habitat.

Unfortunately, the proposal has been stalled because of concerns that not enough suitable land will be eligible under AGI limitations.

Hawaii's agriculture has many unique characteristics due to our isolated location, land use patterns dating from the days of the Kingdom of Hawaii, tropical climate, and year-round growing season. Few USDA programs address our special needs, and we do not benefit from any of the general commodities programs. Hawaii has traditionally received relatively little assistance from the Farm Bill conservation programs, although they seek to address problems that are central to our islands: protecting water quality, preserving endangered species, and controlling invasive pests.

An AGI exemption for Hawaii would remove a barrier that effectively eliminates roughly 80 percent of Hawaii's agricultural land from participation in conservation programs. I ask my colleagues for their support for this exemption to help to protect Hawaii's special environment and vulnerable endangered wildlife both on the land and in our nearshore waters and to provide Hawaii with equal and fail access to the great benefits of these programs.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a crucial and long- overdue measure to address directly what is far and away the most serious threat to my Hawaii's unique and treasured environment: The escalating introduction and establishment of invasive species.

Non-endemic species have done great damage to Hawaii's exposed and non-resistant plants and animals for a long time now. But the sheer rate at which it is now accelerating presents a true crisis, threatening now to completely overwhelm and permanently preclude our ability to provide any modicum of protection, and demanding that we go in a whole different direction of affirmative prevention.

Hawaii is the most remote populated land mass on our planet. Our islands' native species thus evolved in isolation, which led to the generation of species entirely unique to particular islands and found nowhere else in the world. In fact, such species are still being discovered in Hawaii. For example, the current issue of the journal Science reports on a unique web-spinning caterpillar recently discovered in Hawaii that stalks and eats snails

But more than 5,000 species of non-native plants and animals have become established in the Hawaiian islands in the past 200 years, a rate of successful colonization of a new specie every 18 days. This is in astonishing contrast to the estimated rate of introduction to Hawaii through natural evolution of one specie every 25,000 to 50,000 years.

Not all of these new species become pests, but too many do and the consequences are devastating given Hawaii's globally unique and fragile natural environment. As a result, non-native invasive species and diseases represent the single greatest threat to Hawaii's endangered species and the health and viability of our natural systems. Because of the islands' geographic isolation, many species do not have natural predators, and so defense mechanisms like thorns, odors, or toxins have disappeared through the process of evolution. If an aggressive non- native specie becomes established in Hawaii, it can easily overwhelm native species and be very difficult to eradicate because of our hospitable climate and lack of natural competitors.

Thus, Hawaii is most regrettably the undisputed endangered species capital of the United States, if not the world. Our 255 listed plant species represent approximately one-fourth of the total number of endangered species in the United States. They also comprise

more than one-fifth of the entire Hawaiian flora. And Hawaii's beautiful endemic birds make up one-third of the list of U.S. endangered bird species. Many of these birds only exist on one island. What's more shocking is that this disproportionate situation exists in a state with a land area that represents less than two-tenths of one percent of the entire Nation's land mass.

Just 10 years ago, in 1994, the Federal Office of Technology Assessment declared Hawaii's alien pest species problem as the worst in the Nation. Since then, however, the problem of alien pests--from the Formosan termite to the Oriental fruit fly to marine species brought in with bilge water--has worsened considerably, not only costing Hawaii government and business millions of dollars each year in both prevention and remediation, but assuring that many of the world's most unique and endangered lifeforms will not survive. At this point, the introduction and establishment of even one new pest, such as the brown tree snake, which has eliminated the native birdlife of Guam, would change the character of Hawaii forever.

This is obviously a grim picture, but nothing like the future picture if we don't wake up and change our entire approach. For the escalation of travel, commerce and defense activity across the Asia-Pacific region, combined with Hawaii's position as the crossroads of the Pacific and the gateway between Asia and the Pacific and the United States, makes it critical, from not only an environment/conservation perspective but one of economic and human health, that new pests be stopped before they come to Hawaii. Thus, Hawaii must be far better protected from pests and diseases moving west to east, but also those that have become established on the U.S. mainland, such as the red imported fire ant and the West Nile virus.

Our tropical climate and lack of a cold season mean that introduction of a disease such as West Nile virus would be especially severe, with devastating effects not only on our endangered birds but on our visitor industry, which is essential to our economy. The entry of biting sand flies, for instance, would greatly damage Hawaii's appeal as a visitor destination and forever alter our quality of life. The introduction into Hawaii of Africanized honeybees would not only represent a human health hazard, but would endanger Hawaii's pure, undiseased (though non-native) bees. (Hawaii's honeybees are also free of Varroa mites, which are common throughout the U.S. and much of the world.)

The current poster child for invasive species in Hawaii is an animal that hitchhiked from Puerto Rico in uninspected tropical plants. The coqui frog now threatens the viability of Hawaii's vital nursery export industry as well as threatened and endangered species in our native ecosystems. Its extremely loud mating call (90 decibels, equivalent to a lawnmower) is now seriously impacting our tourist industry and depressing land values in some areas. And the list goes on.

It's not as if we can't all see the problem, and we have had some nominal measures in place for decades aimed at controlling the introduction of unwanted alien species (at least under some entry conditions). Obviously, however, what amounts largely to an honor system, combined with inadequate resources devoted to inspection and enforcement, is not sufficient to do what must be done.

We have two things going for us. First, our location in the middle of the ocean, provides us with far better control over movement of invasives across our borders than, say, a landlocked midwest state. Second, we have a solution, which has proven effective, staring us in the face.

For more than 40 years, a Federal quarantine has been imposed in Hawaii on the movement of all passengers and cargo from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland to protect the U.S. mainland from identified insect pests in Hawaii, such as the Mediterranean fruit fly. Ironically, these pests are themselves invasive to Hawaii, causing millions in agricultural losses and added treatment costs for our export crops. Under this system, passenger baggage and cargo is physically inspected by USDA inspectors using advanced inspection equipment; most passengers don't give the process a second thought.

A similar, more comprehensive, system is already in place for a whole country--New Zealand--which as a remote island nation with disproportionately high and exposed endemic species bears striking similarities to Hawaii. New Zealand ``white lists'' designate permissible import species, say no to everything else, and then inspect on arrival for enforcement.

But ironically Hawaii, which has a much more acute overall problem than either the U.S. mainland or New Zealand, has found it very difficult to fashion and implement a similar prevention regime. Part of the problem has been general denial and naysaying. But a more tangible obstacle has been federal laws that arguably preempt State of Hawaii efforts to control the movement of goods. These arise under the Commerce Clause, which requires a state to consider the burdens its regulations may impose on interstate commerce, and the Supremacy Clause, which may preempt state regulation in an area where Congress has already legislated.

My bill--the Hawaii Invasive Species Prevention Act--may be condensed into this simple statement: what is good for the U.S. mainland should be good for Hawaii. The bill basically establishes certain federal findings and authority under which Hawaii may institute an incoming quarantine and inspection regime comparable to that existing for the movement of people and cargo from Hawaii to the mainland.

Specifically, the bill starts by expressing the clear sense of Congress that there exists a pressing need for improved and better coordinated control, interdiction, and eradication of invasive species and diseases to prevent their introduction into Hawaii. The bill states that it is the policy of the United States to fund and support coordinated and concerted programs and activities to control, interdict, and prevent the introduction and spread of invasive species into Hawaii, and that no federal agency may authorize, fund, or carry out actions that would cause or promote the introduction or spread of invasive species and disease into Hawaii.

The bill goes on to direct the Secretaries of Agriculture and Interior to impose a quarantine on the State of Hawaii in order to prevent the introduction of invasive species and diseases in Hawaii. The Secretaries are directed to establish a system of post-arrival protocols for all persons, baggage, cargo, containers, packing materials, and other items traveling or being shipped to Hawaii from domestic or foreign locations. The Secretaries are further directed to establish an expedited process for the State of Hawaii to seek approval to impose general or specific prohibitions on the introduction or movement of invasive species or diseases that are in addition to any prohibitions or restrictions imposed by the Secretaries, which may encompass at white list approach. And in cases of imminent threat, the State of Hawaii is authorized to impose, for not longer than 2 years pending approval by the Secretaries, general or specific prohibitions or restrictions upon the introduction or movement of a specific invasive specie or disease.

Actual implementation of the Federal quarantine would be subject to funds being specifically appropriated, or designation of a means to finance the system (for example, a means of financing similar to that now utilized by the USDA for its outgoing quarantine). However, the design of the system and the expedited process under which the State of Hawaii can seek approval for additional protections would not be subject to appropriations. Finally, the bill authorizes Federal quarantine, natural resource, conservation, and law enforcement officers and inspectors to enforce Hawaii state and local laws regarding the importation, possession, or introduction of invasive species or diseases.

Mr. Speaker, I end my remarks where I started: this bill is not only light years overdue, but crucial, if not indispensable, to the preservation and enhancement of my Hawaii as we know it. I ask for my colleagues' expedited support.

Mr. Speaker, in introducing an earlier version of this bill into the 108th Congress (2003-2004), I remarked that I was grateful for being able to take an action both long overdue and truly needed. I still feel that way as I reintroduce the Coral Reef Conservation and Protection Act of 2005, except that this proposal is now far longer overdue and far more needed.

As I said last Congress, my childhood was spent among the rich diversity of the coral reef ecosystems of my native Island of Hawaii. It was a time of budding wonder at what nature had wrought, the living corals and other reef life existing in mutual dependency and sustainability. But just weeks ago, when I returned, as I often do, now with my children, to those same reefs, they're not what they were. Still beautiful, yes; still wondrous. But there is not the same diversity of coral nor the same luster; the fish and other marine life not as plentiful nor diverse; the presence of new, alien species is apparent.

Of course, there are simply more of us in those marine environments than there were, and so our cumulative impact over my fifty years in those waters has become apparent, even at the level of recreational and subsistence use. But it's more, for these reefs have become a significant business, their coral exoskeletons, their living creators, and the shells and fish that live in and among them valuable collectors' items for the aquariums and curio shops of the world. And the purposeful and accidental introduction of marine invasives in isolated instances over the last decades have magnified into a critical mass of statewide presence and threat.

In relevant terms, though, we in Hawaii are among the lucky ones, for at least we still have living, albeit threatened, coral reefs, with declining but at least remaining marine life. At least we have marginally protective state laws, and a culture of arguable sustainability.

But in much of the rest of the marine world, especially throughout the temperate zones of the Pacific and beyond, the world of the coral reef is past endangered and into destroyed, wiped out by a wave of commercial overfishing, overcollecting, dynamiting, cyanide poisoning, and other forms of ecological pillage. In these worlds, laws do not exist to provide even minimum protections or, if they do, they are spurned.

Some say that that's their business; what do we care if they wreck their marine ecosystems? First, of course, in today's interdependent world, our global environment is everyone's business. But beyond that, we can't turn our backs because we are the chief facilitator; ours is the largest market for the products of this stripping of the world's coral reefs.

None of this is new: we've known all of this for decades. We've even set out to do something about it. In 1973, we became a party to the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which sought to clamp down on endangered species trafficking. But although some of our world's coral reef life has been designated as covered under it, the enforcement mechanisms are frankly ineffective.

More recently, in 1998 President Clinton issued the Coral Reef Protection Executive Order (No. 13098) establishing the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force. That entity was directed to strengthen our stewardship and conservation of our country's reef ecosystems, and to assess our role in the international coral reef products trade with the goal of taking actions to promote conservation and sustainable use of coral reefs worldwide.

The Task Force conducted its evaluations, made its reports, and outlined what was needed. That was in large part comprehensive legislation to institute common protective standards for our nation's coral reefs, but, equally important, rules to discourage international coral reef abuse and encourage sustainable practices by allowing imports only of non-endangered products collected by sustainable practices and pursuant to integrated management plans.

The Coral Reef Conservation and Protection Act of 2005 I gratefully reintroduce today embodies the principal directions of the Task Force and more. It establishes a comprehensive scheme for the domestic and international protection of our world's coral reef ecosystems. The regime's key ingredients are the disallowal of any domestic taking, transport in interstate commerce, or import of the endangered marine life of our coral reefs, unless that life is collected in non- destructive ways or subject to sustainable management plans or otherwise exempted from coverage by administrative actions.

Mr. Speaker, we have to start somewhere; our world's coral reefs are crying out for our help. This bill is that start, and I urge its prompt deliberation and passage.

Mahalo, and aloha!

Mr. Speaker, I rise to introduce crucial legislation with my colleague from Hawaii, Congressman Neil Abercrombie, reauthorizing the Hawaiian Home Lands Homeownership Act of 2000. Our bill simply reauthorizes the program for FY 2006 through FY 2009.

Established in 2000 through Title VIII of the Native American Housing Assistance and Self-Determination Act of 1996 (NAHASDA), the Hawaiian Home Lands Homeownership Act provides affordable housing opportunities to Native Hawaiian families living on the Hawaiian Home Lands of Hawaii.

The Hawaiian Home Lands program, authorized by the federal government under the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920, is currently being administered by the State of Hawaii's Department of Hawaiian Home Lands. The Department receives over $9 million annually from Title VIII of NAHASDA. The rest of its funds come from the State of Hawaii as well as revenues derived from its own assets and commercial activities.

Funds provided through the Hawaiian Home Lands Homeownership Act, which is the first significant infusion of federal housing for Native Hawaiians assistance since the Hawaiian Home Lands program began in 1921, have been well-utilized and administered through the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands to service our under-served Native Hawaiian communities across the state. Funds have been used for: Infrastructure construction of approximately 200 residential lots; Technical assistance for 110 families constructing their homes using the selfhelp method or with the assistance of Habitat for Humanity; Homeownership counseling for over 300 families; Assistance to community associations to construct or renovate community facilities; and Downpayment assistance and low interest loans to families.

As the housing needs of all of our Hawaii grow more and more critical, particularly given our small land base, any improvement to Native Hawaiian housing needs helps not only our Hawaiian community but all communities in our state.

I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House and Senate, where a companion bill was introduced by Senator Daniel Inouye, on passage of this important legislation. Mahalo!

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support for H. Res. 169, which recognizes the importance of sun safety and encourages all of us to protect ourselves and our children from the dangers of excessive sun exposure.

As kids growing up in Hawaii, many of our best memories are tied to our world-renowned oceans and beaches and other outdoor environments: from catching waves to having pot-luck dinners or enjoying concerts or hiking. Given what we now know about the dangers of overexposure to ultraviolet radiation and its link to skin cancer, I believe that it is imperative that we stress sun safety as we continue to enjoy these outdoor activities with our families and friends.

I have included an op-ed from the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, written by my wife, Audrey, also a Hawaii native, which details the importance of early detection of preventable skin cancers--specifically skin cancers. Her thoughts say what we all need to know.

Mahalo (thank you) for this opportunity to express support for H. Res. 169.

[From the Honolulu Star Bulletin, May 23, 2005]

Protect Your Skin Early and Often With Sunscreen

(By Audrey Case)

Hawaii is a special place, where we spend time with family

and friends or just by ourselves enjoying wonderful outdoor

activities so much a part of our islands and culture.

My earliest childhood memories are of Sundays after my dad,

an Episcopal minister, and my mom were pau with their duties

and would take all five of us kids to the beach for a swim

and a picnic dinner. We'd all come home sunburned and happily

tired. And my teen years with my friends were beach years as

well.

We know so much more now about the sun's power than we did

even a decade ago. We know, for example, that the sunburns of

our childhood can lead to the skin cancer of

our adulthood. We also know that all ethnicities can be

affected by skin cancer, not just fair-skinned people like my

husband Ed! Our family has seen some brushes with skin cancer

and gets checked by a doctor regularly, including Ed and me.

May is Melanoma/Skin Cancer Detection and Prevention Month.

As a member of Congressional Families Action for Cancer

Awareness, I have joined with the spouses of other members of

the U.S. House of Representatives to spread the message of

early detection of preventable cancers--specifically skin

cancers.

Today, skin cancer is the most common and fastest-growing

form of cancer in the United States, affecting more than 1

million people each year. One person dies every hour from

melanoma, the deadliest form of the disease. The American

Cancer Society estimates that in Hawaii there will be 150 new

cases of melanoma of the skin this year. And, the fact is,

many of these cancers could be prevented.

Of course, we know now that we should protect our skin by

using sunscreen--SPF 15 or higher--and wearing protective

clothing. Don't forget your hat, lip protection and

sunglasses! And, we need to protect our skin in all weather--

not just the summer.

Perhaps our greatest opportunity for changing skin cancer

statistics rests with our children. Although most skin

cancers are diagnosed when people are older than 50, the

damage that causes skin cancer is done at an early age. Just

one blistering sunburn can double a child's lifetime risk of

developing skin cancer. If you are a parent, grandparent,

aunt, uncle, caregiver or friend, make sure the kids in your

life are protected.

Help your teenagers understand the dangers of tanning beds,

which are at least as dangerous as the sun, and some studies

suggest they are more damaging. There are safer

alternatives--such as sunless tanning products and bronzers--

if your teen insists on being tanned for prom night.

Encourage your children's schools, health teachers and

school nurses to allow students to apply sunscreen before

recess. Encourage sports programs and coaches to have kids

apply sunscreen before practice and games.

Examine your skin and your loved ones' skin monthly. Look

for: brown or black irregularly pigmented spots with uneven

margins; a slow-growing, raised, translucent, pearly nodule

that may crust, ulcerate or bleed; a change in sensation,

itchiness, tenderness or pain from a mole; a small, smooth,

shiny, pale or waxy lump on the skin; and any new mole.

And remember the ABCD rule: Asymmetry, Border irregularly,

Color that is not uniform and Diameter greater than 6

millimeters--about the size of a pencil eraser.

If you discover a suspicious growth while conducting your

monthly self-examination, have it checked by your doctor.

Because your risk of developing skin cancer increases as you

age, annual clinical exams are even more important after you

reach age 50.

So by all means enjoy the sun and outdoors, but have a

healthy regard for the sun's strength and protect yourself

and those you love. Sun safety should not be neglected by

anyone. If we all take responsibility for ourselves and our

children, we can change skin cancer from being the fastest-

growing cancer to one that is rare in future generations.

Mr. Chairman, on June 22, 2004, I came to the floor of this house in support of the gentleman from Oregon's (Mr. Blumenauer) amendment to the Fiscal Year 2005 Defense Appropriations bill relative to unexploded ordnance (UXO). I rise again today in support of my colleague's UXO amendment.

My home state of Hawaii is the perfect example of how and why funds for the cleanup of UXO are very much needed. Several years ago, the Department of Defense (DOD) identified over fifty DOD-registered locations in my state that have not been cleaned up. These sites continue to present significant and ongoing public safety risks.

One of these locations is the Waikoloa/Waimea Formerly Used Defense Site (FUDS) on my Island of Hawaii. The site includes over 137,000 acres and all or parts of the communities of Waikoloa and Waimea (Kamuela). The U.S. Navy acquired the area in 1943 through licensing agreements for use as a military training camp and artillery range. U.S. Marine Corps maneuvers and intensive live-fire training included hand grenades, 4.2-inch mortar, and 37 millimeter (mm), 75mm, 105mm, and 155mm high explosive shells.

The first ordnance cleanup activity occurred in 1946. In 1954, military ordnance disposal units began to identify and dispose of thousands of munitions. The United States Army Corps of Engineers determined the site was eligible for the Defense Environmental Restoration Program Formerly Used Defense Site in 1992.

An engineering evaluation/cost analysis, completed in January 2002, designated the entire property as a potential ordnance health and safety risk. Eleven areas within property (48,000 acres) were determined to have the highest risk, including all of the Waikoloa Village and the developing urban area from Kawaihae to Waimea. In that analysis, the United States Army Corps of Engineers estimated that the cost to complete the cleanup for the entire site is $653 million.

Mr. Chairman, our military plays a vital role in our society and throughout the world. My state of Hawaii is the location for the regional headquarters of each of the service branches as well as the Pacific Command. Hawaii proudly continues to play a vital role in America's military, commercial, and diplomatic relations with countries in the Pacific Rim and beyond.

However, I strongly believe that the military must also follow practices espoused by parents, teachers, and camp counselors alike: Leave any place you have visited cleaner than when you arrived. Along these lines, the United States Army Corps of Engineers is ready and willing to be better engaged in the cleanup process. Congress must now take the first step of appropriating sufficient funds for this important action.

I again wish to commend the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for his continued diligent work on this important issue. I look forward to working with him in the future and urge my colleagues to support this important, vital amendment for communities throughout our country.

Mr. Speaker, I take this opportunity to recognize and congratulate a remarkable organization, Alu Like, Inc., as it marks its 30th anniversary of service to my Hawai`i's Native Hawaiian community.

Alu Like, which means ``striving (working) together,'' was established in 1975 to promote social and economic self-sufficiency among Native Hawaiians. The organization was given its name by kupuna Mary Kawena Pukui, and its motto, ``E alu like mai kakou, e na `oiwi o Hawai`i'' (Let us work together natives of Hawai`i), by kupuna Edith Kanaka`ole.

Now with 238 employees located throughout the State of Hawai`i (Hawai`i, Kaua`i, Lana`i, Maui, Moloka`i, and O`ahu), it has grown into one of Hawai`i's most successful service agencies and has been instrumental in improving the quality of life for our Native Hawaiian community from early childhood to kupuna (elderly) programs. These include a range of services and activities such as economic development, business assistance, employment preparation, training, library services, and educational and childcare services for families with young children, all tailored to the specific often unique, needs of Hawai`i's indigenous people. Current services include: Ho`okahua-- Early Childhood; Ho`olokahi--High Risk Reduction; Ho`omanea `Oiwi-- Education and Employment; Ka Ipu Ka`eo--Education and Training; Kulia Like--Financial Literacy and Kumu Kahi--Elderly Services.

Throughout its thirty years, Alu Like has served more than 100,000 people, and continues to form strong partnerships with other service providers. To increase its outreach to our community, Alu Like has also worked closely and collaboratively to expand its commitment to education and language preservation through its Native Hawaiian Library and to community service through its AmeriCorps Project.

As always, the success of any organization requires strong and sustained leadership from its staff and board of directors, and Alu Like has benefited greatly from a whole generation of such leaders. These include its visionaries--Myron ``Pinky'' Thompson, Alvin Shim, James Bacon, Yukio Naito, David Peters, and Winona Ellis Rubin--and directors over the years, as well as its Presidents/CEOs, who have included: Winona Ellis Rubin, Myron ``Pinky'' Thompson, David Helela, Masaru Oshiro, S. Haunani Apoliona, and Tara Lulani Arquette.

Under the current leadership of Mervina K.M. Cash-Kaeo, President/ CEO, I have every

confidence that Alu Like will continue to be a leading service organization in its promotion of social and economic self-sufficiency for all Native Hawaiians. But today is a time for us simply to reflect on the great success of our Alu Like `ohana (family), all of whom deserve our praise and commendation for a job truly well done.

Mahalo, and aloha!

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a truly novel and revolutionary proposal to create the largest marine protected area in our world. I offer for this Congress' consideration and prompt action the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Marine Refuge Act of 2005, which would provide the maximum level of permanent protection for a magnificent marine system and international treasure, larger even than Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Protected Area. In so doing, my proposal would do for our country's, and world's, oceans what another then-novel and revolutionary action--our 1872 set-aside of what later became the foundation of our National Park System, Yellowstone National Park--did for permanent protection of our treasured and endangered terrestrial ecosystems.

This ``Ocean Yellowstone'' lives and breathes in the waters of our country surrounding the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI), an equally magnificent chain of islands starting at Nihoa Island lying just northwest of the main Hawaiian Islands and stretching fully 1,200 miles northwest across the Pacific to Kure Atoll. In these waters and among their reefs, banks, and seamounts, and existing as an integrated ecosystem with their terrestrial neighbors, lie some 70 percent of our nation's coral reefs.

This remote and incredibly diverse ecosystem is also home to some 7,000 species, at least one-quarter of which (some scientists say as much as half) are endemic to this area and found nowhere else on earth. It also serves as a pu`uhonua (place of refuge) to many species of coral, fish, birds, and marine mammals, including the highly endangered Hawaiian monk seal, threatened green sea turtle, and the endangered leatherback, loggerhead, and hawksbill sea turtles. An estimated 14 million seabirds thrive in these islands and their waters, including 99 percent of the world's Laysan albatrosses and 98 percent of the black- footed albatross population. This also may be the last predator- dominated marine ecosystem left on the planet--some 55 percent of the total fish biomass is made up of predator species, the natural way of our oceans.

Yet this incredible remnant of a purer world will not survive absent affirmative protective action, for by its isolation it is a fragile world, one where the most seemingly insignificant and benign human interaction can have the most magnified effect. As a prime example, the islands and waters of the NWHI have developed a unique ecosystem whose isolation at one time provided protection ttom invasive species. Yet today some invasives have become established due not only to marine debris from the Northern Pacific but from fishing, transiting, and other vessels. And commercial fishing and other human interaction is itself inherently invasive, as is evident in the introduction of rats (now eliminated) and the consequences of overfishing, leading the near- extinction of the black-lipped pearl oyster and other species and, more recently, the crash of the lobster fishery. Just last February, as another example, our Marine Mammal Commission reported that the world's dwindling Hawaiian monk seal population of an estimated 1,400, based in the NWHI, has ``no tolerance for additional mortality associated with fisheries or other human activities.''

Jurisdiction of the NWHI and waters has been shared by our federal and Hawai`i state governments. As an overall template, the islands themselves (with the exception of Midway Island, an unassociated federal possession) are part of the State of Hawai`i (and my Second Congressional District) along with the waters around those islands out to the three-mile limit. Beyond three miles and out to the fifty-mile boundary is the current Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve (Reserve), established by President Clinton and under the jurisdiction of the National Ocean Service (NOS) within the Department of Commerce's National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration. The waters beyond the Reserve out to the extent of our country's 200-mile exclusive economic zone are also administered by the Department of Commerce in non-reserve status. Midway and its waters out twelve miles constitute the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, established in 1988 and administered by the Department of the Interior's U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS). With the exception of Midway, the islands of the NWHI and certain offshore waters, including some Hawai`i waters and some Reserve waters (except for waters off Kure Atoll), also constitute the Hawaiian Islands National Wildlife Refuge, originally established as a bird reservation by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1909 and now under joint FWS-Hawai`i management.

On the face of it, if one's end-goal is, as is mine, to provide the highest level of permanent protection to the total ecosystem of the NWHI and waters, this structure can work and is, in most cases, working. The FWS is managing its jurisdiction within the Midway Atoll and the Hawaiian Islands National Wildlife Refuges toward the goal of full protection and preservation under longstanding and well- established federal mandates and mechanisms.

And just last Friday, May 13th, the State of Hawai`i's Board of Land and Natural Resources, responsible for the administration of all state lands and waters, voted to establish throughout Hawai`i's NWHI waters the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine Refuge, together with rules prohibiting commercial or recreational fishing within refuge waters. The Board's action followed a public input process which yielded some 110,000 comments supporting the most stringent protections. As Peter Young, Chair of the Board, said at the time: ``We are dealing with a special place, and it's different.'' For this action, Chair Young and the Board deserve our lasting gratitude.

To complete now this penumbra of protection and truly discharge our responsibility of stewardship, we must turn our attention primarily to the Reserve. Following its establishment, subsequent legislation mandated that the Reserve be converted to a National Marine Sanctuary. Public scoping meetings began in 2002, and the National Marine Sanctuary Program published ``Advice and Recommendations on Development of Draft Fishing Regulations'' in September 2004.

Essentially, in an effort to forge compromise between the interests of fishermen who operate in the Reserve, the desire of the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council (WESPAC) to retain control over the Reserve, the opinion of scientists and conservationists that the area remains vulnerable, and the overwhelming sentiment of the people of Hawai`i for protection, the Program proposed a management plan that would allow current fishing to continue and keep WESPAC involved in Reserve fishery management. WESPAC, however, subsequently proposed alternative Reserve regulations that would expand current fishing, open a fishery for precious corals, and provide only a temporary closing of the lobster fishery. Final Program Reserve regulations are pending.

This is an opportune, in fact optimum, time, before the Program acts any further, for us all to first stop, look, and listen, and second move to a whole different beat. And in doing so we must first ask this basic question: shouldn't there be some special places in our marine world which are in fact true reserves--truly off-limits, where our marine species can live and thrive in their natural state, without the invasive, extractive hand of humankind? I know in my heart that the answer is yes, and that the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands and their waters are where we should just do it.

The challenge, however, is that we simply do not have an existing federal marine statutory and regulatory regime that encompasses this goal. We do have a National Marine Sanctuary Program run by good people with good intentions, administering a number of national marine sanctuaries. But the basic statutory and regulatory authority under which the Program operates and the sanctuaries are administered requires a balancing of sometimes-competing uses, including extractive uses, which is why some form of extractive use, fostered by fisheries management councils such as WESPAC, is allowed in all of our nation's national marine sanctuaries. There is simply not the regime in place to create what truly would be a sanctuary in the literal sense of the word, to forge a world such as my State of Hawai`i just proudly did in creation in its waters of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine Refuge.

My Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Marine Refuge Act of 2005 would do just that: establish the public policy of this country that there should exist in the waters of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands one place that is

truly a refuge for our marine world. This refuge would extend seaward from the boundary of the federal national wildlife refuges-with concurrent jurisdiction over those portions also within Hawaii's Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine Refuge--out fifty miles to the boundaries of the current federal Reserve, except that the boundary would be further out past Kure Atoll to encompass newly-identified precious coral beds and monk seal foraging areas. The total area of this precious refuge would be approximately 137,000 square miles, eclipsing Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Protected Area of 135,000 square miles.

Under my bill, the Refuge would continue to be managed by NOS through a new Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and Refuges. This is consistent with NOAA's longstanding desire to elevate the current National Marine Sanctuary Program to full office level, and it provides NOS with a management option for marine resources in need of a higher level of protection than that currently provided under the Program. And that office, in managing the Refuge (in consultation with an advisory council including representatives from the State of Hawai`i and the Native Hawaiian, scientific, and marine conservation communities), would be statutorily charged with implementing Congress's purpose ``that the preservation of biodiversity and the protection and conservation of the natural resources and cultural heritage of [the Refuge] shall be the exclusive basis for all associated decisions by Federal agencies.''

Passage through and activities in the Refuge would be by permit only. Permitted activities would include scientific research and other uses consistent with the purpose of the Refuge. These uses would not include commercial fishing or other extractive practices except in very narrow circumstances. As there are some existing commercial fishing permitholders, my bill provides a mechanism to buy out these permits at fair value.

It is vital to note that this bill is grounded solidly in the cultural heritage and traditions of the indigenous peoples of Hawai`i, our Native Hawaiians. Their respect for the `aina--our natural world in all its manifestations--in their practice of environmental protection and sustainability, was not just a profoundly spiritual belief but a basic survival strategy. So it is no surprise that one of the principal groups working toward just such a Refuge is Kahea: the Hawaiian Environmental Alliance, dedicated to bringing to our modern world this pu`uhonua for the rare and precious species of the NWHI. And in that same spirit my bill provides, as does Hawai`i's newly-proposed Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine Refuge, for continued traditional use of the Refuge by Native Hawaiians for religious, cultural, and sustenance purposes.

Here is a quick overview of my proposed Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Marine Refuge Act of 2005:

Section 1: Entitles the act.

Section 2: Outlines Congress's findings, including the finding that the ``waters of the NWHI must be set aside as a fully protected national marine refuge to preserve in perpetuity their unique and fragile ecosystems, habitats, and communities of flora and fauna, as well as areas of traditional Hawaiian cultural significance. ``

Section 3: Sets forth the purposes and policies of the Act, including the provision that ``all human activities in the [Refuge] shall be limited to those entirely consistent with preservation and protections in the true nature of a full protected refuge, and that all commercial use of such refuge shall be prohibited.''

Section 4: Provides Act definitions, including Refuge boundaries and cooperative management between federal and Hawai`i agencies.

Section 5: Designates the Refuge.

Section 6: Provides for management of the Refuge by NOS through the new Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and Refuges in cooperation with the State of Hawai`i through memoranda of agreement and in consultation with an advisory council.

Section 7: Provides for vessel presence in the Refuge by permit only; outlines prohibited activities; provides compensation for current permitholders.

Section 8: Provides for enforcement and penalties.

Section 9: Provides for liability and other legal consequences.

Section 10: Repeals prior inconsistent laws.

Section 11: Requires issuance of implementing regulations within six months of enactment.

Mr. Speaker, I confess to speaking on this floor today with a mix of excitement and awe. Excitement at continuing a journey to a next, higher level that is not only novel and revolutionary, but so right. And awe at the responsibility and opportunity we all have to truly preserve and protect one of the most incredible places on this world. I hope and believe that we can all come together to harness the collective aloha of so many for this place, and promptly pass the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Marine Refuge Act of 2005.

Mahalo, and aloha!

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 2317, the Credit Union Regulatory Improvements Act, commonly known as CURIA, of which I am a proud original cosponsor.

As I have noted many times in many ways, our Nation's credit unions provide a truly invaluable service to their approximately 84 million members throughout our country, including over 742,000 members in my Hawai`i alone. Where other financial institutions are unable or unwilling to do business as and when desired by consumers, credit unions have prospered by offering fair, convenient and relevant financing. In doing so, they are one of the key linchpins binding together the economic and social life of so many of our communities, including those of non-urban and rural America.

Let me provide you with just one example from my own district: the southern portion of my home Island of Hawai`i. Small rural and agricultural-based communities are dispersed throughout this low population density region, which thus does not lend itself to traditional urban-focused banking.

Instead, the main branch of Ka`u Federal Credit Union, known as the southernmost credit union in the United States, is located in the small town of Na`alehu and provides its residents with highly personal and tailored services. But Ka`u FCU has taken its service a step further and added two additional branches in nearby communities--one in Ocean View and the other in Pahala--each located in a local grocery store and no bigger than the size of a small car.

Of course, credit unions are prospering in urban and suburban areas of our country and my Hawai`i as well. This is because they all share the characteristics of highly personal, member-invested services. They are thus clearly a great success story throughout our entire country.

Support for our credit unions should thus be one of our key goals. Here in Congress, one of the best ways to do so is to support this bipartisan legislation.

H.R. 2317 contains three major sections, which, as outlined below, will modernize credit union net worth standards, advance credit union efforts to promote economic growth, and make several needed modifications to credit union activities, governance, and oversight.

According to the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA), the independent federal agency that charters and supervises federal credit unions, modifications to the Prompt Correction Action (PCA) system are needed to ensure that the standards are ``aptly robust'' and ``not unduly burdensome or constraining.'' This legislation would revise thresholds for PCA net worth categories for credit unions to new net worth ratio thresholds that are comparable to those used by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) for the leverage requirement.

H.R. 2317 would also provide a much-needed update to the definition of net worth in the Federal Credit Union Act for purposes of credit union mergers. The Financial Accounting Standards Board has proposed eliminating the pooling accounting method for mergers and requiring all credit union mergers to apply the purchase method after 2006. Under the purchase method of accounting, only the surviving credit union's retained earnings count as net worth for PCA purposes. This legislation codifies that recommendation.

Finally, CURIA will update and modernize a number of specific outdated regulatory burdens and make other necessary changes to the credit union regulatory system, including improving credit union leasing arrangements on federal land, permitting limited investments in securities, reforming credit union governance, and altering credit union conversion voting requirements.

Mr. Speaker, I commend both the gentleman from California (Mr. Royce) and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kanjorski) for once again spearheading CURIA. I look forward to working with them and my other cosponsors in supporting this vital initiative.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge the continued efforts of my colleagues, our federal administration, and all Americans toward long-overdue and essential reconstruction of the USS Arizona Memorial Visitors Center at Pearl Harbor, Hawai`i.

Nobody can dispute that one of the seminal moments in American history occurred on December 7, 1941, when the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked our country's Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. It was a dark and tragic day for all Americans. Yet, in the unity, determination and fortitude of our response, we saw the rekindling of a devout patriotism, and we came together to overcome one of our greatest challenges with simple integrity and willing sacrifice.

The events at Pearl Harbor on that day and in early WWII in the Pacific have been viewed through many lenses. ``Remember Pearl Harbor'' has become a rallying cry each time our nation ventures forth in furtherance of liberty throughout the world. We have remembered of that day and subsequent events that our brave service men and women and our civilian population proudly accepted whatever burden was asked of them to ensure that our way of life would survive, endure, and finally succeed. We have recalled our demonstration that no other nation, no matter how menacing, could withstand our determination to fight for human betterment and humane values. We have reaffirmed our demonstration of the power of a nation governed by the will of its people, based on the rule of law, and extolling the value of equality and endowed rights.

Yet what a high price was paid for all this, for the results of December 7th were nothing short of carnage. Six military sites on Oahu were attacked, killing over 2,400 Americans. Over 320 aircraft were destroyed or damaged; over 21 vessels were sunk or damaged. Leaking fuel ablaze hampered rescue operations and threatened undamaged ships. Extraordinary and heroic efforts enabled many to survive the onslaught, but of those fortunate to survive many bore their scars for life.

The Pearl Harbor attack acted as a catalyst in bringing us fully and actively into World War II and served as a rallying cry to unify our country. And because the USS Arizona accounted for almost half of those casualties, it has become the central symbol of our commemoration. In the words of one writer, ``because of her significance . . . the Arizona is much more than a sunken ship; she is a national icon.''

In the 1950s, the Territory of Hawai`i (which in 1959 proudly became the 50th state of our union) along with our federal government and others spearheaded an effort to create a monument to the USS Arizona and to the many events and individuals related to the attack on Pearl Harbor. The result, through the combined efforts of public funds and private enterprise, was the building of the USS Arizona Memorial in the early 1960s. This graceful and moving tribute, seemingly afloat over the Arizona and the remains contained within of most of her crew, has come to memorialize perfectly the lessons of Pearl Harbor.

The Memorial has therefore been indispensable to our nation's ability to learn and benefit from the events of December 7, 1941. The memorial itself enhanced and extended the impact of the Pearl Harbor attack into the collective American consciousness. As one newspaper reported, ``. . . its tenth anniversary in 1951 barely rated a mention in the newspaper of the day. But in 1961 came the dedication of the USS Arizona Memorial . . . and the observances of the U.S. entry into WWII became significant.''

In the 1960s and 1970s, the appeal of visits to the USS Arizona Memorial continued to increase. More and more visitors arrived on the shores of Pearl Harbor to ferry the short distance to the Memorial. The numbers rose rapidly and it was soon apparent that a shoreside facility and an organizational responsibility were needed for the safety, security, guidance, and accommodation of the thousands of people lining up to view and pay homage to the Memorial and what it stood for. Branch 46 of the Fleet Reserve Association in Honolulu, a group that had been active in establishing the Memorial itself, once again moved to the forefront of making the visitor experience what it should be by making capital improvements on the shore side as well as at the Memorial. Plans were designed for the construction of the USS Arizona Memorial Visitor Center at Pearl Harbor.

An Arizona Memorial Foundation was founded to raise consciousness and funds for the new facilities. It became the Arizona Memorial Museum Association, a non-profit entity, in 1979. Once again, the State of Hawai`i, federal government, U.S. Navy, Fleet Reserve Association and Arizona Memorial Museum Association provided the funds necessary to complete the building. I want to make special mention of my esteemed colleague, the senior U.S. Senator from Hawai`i, Daniel K. Inouye, who was instrumental in getting this project of the ground.

By any measure, the Visitor Center at the USS Arizona Memorial, today administered by the National Park Service, has been a remarkable success. Over 1.5 million people visit the Memorial annually, twice that projected by the original designers and builders.

So significant is the desire to visit the USS Arizona Memorial and visitors center that visitors often begin to line up as early as 5:00 AM. In some cases, visitors must wait 2-3 hours just to board the U.S. Navy launch that takes them to the Memorial.

The Arizona Memorial Museum Association and the National Park Service have worked together to provide special and general educational and interpretive programs for everyone. Such programs include Witness to History, which matches events and firsthand observers of the events such as Pearl Harbor survivors with students, historians, and schoolchildren in interactive learning sessions on site and through videoconferencing. Pearl Harbor survivors, National Park Service personnel, and others are available to travel to schools and community associations to participate in interactive educational sessions.

To provide additional space for programs and people, the Arizona Memorial Museum Association and the National Park Service started, in 2001, to plan an extension to the present building. Structural engineers and designers were consulted as to what building options were available. Much to the disappointment of the planners, the engineers advised that the current building was settling at a high rate and that its useful life was only an additional 5-9 years.

This knowledge, while initially disappointing, led to the inevitable conclusion that a new structure must be built. This new facility would better accommodate the thousands of visitors and provide for the proper display of many more artifacts and items currently being sent to storage, as well as meet a National Park Service engineering specification requirement that associated structures have a projected life of at least 50 years.

A detailed plan has therefore been completed for the replacement of the Museum and Visitor Center through the joint efforts of the U.S. Navy and the National Park Service. The primary components of the planned Museum and Visitor Center plan are:

An enlarged and enclosed state-of-the-art museum; An outdoor amphitheater; Updated Memorial orientation theaters; An education center with a library and a videoconferencing facility; Expanded and improved visitor comfort areas including suitable rest rooms; A larger bookstore.

For its part, the Arizona Memorial Museum Association has stepped forward still again to undertake a national public/private program to raise the funds necessary to pay for the construction, endowment, and interpretive requirements of the replacement facility.

Mr. Speaker, the USS Arizona Memorial is a place of the spirit. It exudes solemnity and dignity. People assume prayerful postures and hushed tones as they embark on its landing dock.

The depth of their experience is heightened by the interpretive and educational shoreside activities at the Museum and Visitor Center. It is there that the facts and artifacts, the audiovisual aids and the human interaction, the films and the charts, prepare them with knowledge and perspective for the moments that they will spend searching among the heroes' names, the ship's image, the oily surface, and the haunting environs of the Memorial. The Museum and Visitor Center have themselves become intertwined in the full meaning of a visit to the USS Arizona Memorial. Neither stands alone; together, they are a mighty symbol of the strength, unity, and hope of our nation.

I look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and in both chambers to support the construction of this new visitors center. And, in doing so, I hope and pray that the USS Arizona Memorial, a national icon, becomes even more imbedded in our national consciousness as a source of inspiration, understanding, and honor for current and future generations.

Mahalo (thank you), and aloha.

Mr. Speaker, $6,198 trillion, $6,198,000,000,000, a lot of money. An almost inconceivable amount of money. So many zeros that it is easy to pretend that it is paper money which, of course it is not, but that is how much our gross national debt was, how much our government owed, how much we owed in real money to our Social Security trust fund, to our bondholders and to many foreign countries,

including China, when I was first elected to this Congress in late 2002, a lot of debt to have built up since the founding of our country.

But how about this number, $7.775 trillion, our total debt today? Yes. In just the 28 months since I was first elected to this Congress, we have seen a 25 percent increase in national debt.

But wait a minute, if that is not bad enough try this one, $8.184 trillion, the current maximum permissible debt of our country. The debt ceiling has increased for a third time in as many years, voted on by this Congress or at least by a majority, and a majority that did not include me, just a few months ago, currently estimated to be reached and breached in January 2006. An increase in our total national debt of 32 percent in just the 3 years since I joined this Congress.

But wait. In the budget resolution for 2006, just passed on this floor 6 days ago, over the objection of every Member of the minority party and 15 Members of the majority, hidden in that resolution, glossed over, buried, shunned, avoided, turned away from, concealed, an automatic authority to increase our debt ceiling a fourth time in as many years to $8.965 trillion.

When might we reach that total debt, bump up against that debt ceiling at the rate we are going and why is it so crucial to pass another debt ceiling bump way before we are even close to the ceiling we just bumped up against? When? Late 2006, most likely December 2006, after the 2006 election. Coincidence? I surely doubt it. Can it be that our colleagues cannot stomach another ceiling increase in mid-election?

When we reach that level of debt, there will have been added to the debt load we all face $2.767 trillion, a 45 percent increase in just 4 years since I joined this House.

This administration and its supporters in Congress would have us believe this is normal, that this debt is in balance with our gross domestic product, with our collective ability to pay it, or that this debt is because of our commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan. Well, let us strip both of those arguments down.

First, total debt increase over the past 4 years, almost $3 trillion total. Cost of Iraq in the same time period, almost $300 billion, 10 percent of total debt increase. So clearly that is not the reason.

What about this gross domestic product argument? This is from the President's own budget, and it shows total Federal debt as a percentage of gross domestic product, in other words, the ability of our economy to carry the load, and that total Federal debt percentage of our gross domestic product will hit 68 percent in 2008 under the President's own budget. Guess when the last time that percentage was that high? Couple of years ago? No. Couple of decades ago? 1955, after a full 10 years, 15 years, of war and Cold War and war again. So, clearly, that is not the reason.

This debt is completely unusual. This debt is completely out of control. Something is wrong. Something is terribly wrong, and do not let anyone lie to you about it.

The first step towards addressing any crisis, and this is the crisis of our time, is to know you have one, to look yourself in the mirror and say, yes, I have a problem. Then you can get to work. So let us quit letting ourselves be fooled and get to work.

The House Blue Dog Coalition is way past being fooled, way, way past being fooled. We are at work and we welcome the participation of anybody who realizes that this is the crisis of our time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to extend my deepest congratulations to the incredible students of Kahuku High and Intermediate School for their great achievement in winning 4th place at the national finals of the We the People: The Citizen and the Constitution program, held in Washington, DC from April 30 to May 2, 2005. These outstanding students from my Oahu's North Shore underwent months of intensive study and hard-won victories to earn the right to represent Hawaii in the finals, where they competed against a class from every state in the country and demonstrated a remarkable understanding of the fundamental ideas and values of American constitutional government.

This is the second consecutive year in Hawaii's 9-year history at this rigorous competition that Kahuku has competed in the final 10. This is truly a wonderful accomplishment that our whole state is deeply proud of!

I want to again commend Kahuku's great teacher, Sandra Cashman, for her unending commitment to her students and for producing new generations of responsible citizens. Commendations are also in order for State Coordinator (and State Representative) Lyla Berg and District Coordinator Carolina Kaanehe for fostering development of what will surely be our leaders of tomorrow.

However, ultimately this competition is by and about our outstanding students. So I would like to extend my heartiest congratulations to each and all of them by entering their names for posterity into our Congressional Record: Genevieve Allen, Yesenia Arevalo, Amanda Baize, Bonnie Cameron, Meri Ching, Dannah Christensen, Krystle Corpuz, Oliver Howells, Lorna Kekua, Jokke Kokkonen, Jacquelyn Lautaha, William Law, Catalina

Markowitz, Ajri McArthur, Sara Mirels, Brad Rasmussen, Ashley Rillamas, Lizette Sauque, Noelle Spring, Shirly Tagayuna, Joseph Trisolini, and Morgan Wright. You have all done your Hawaii proud, and we wish you only best wishes and aloha in all of your future endeavors.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a proud member of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus so ably led by the gentleman from California (Mr. Honda) to join my colleagues in commemorating our Asian Pacific American community at the outset of APA Heritage Month.

And I do so with deep respect, great pride, humble appreciation and eager anticipation. Respect, for the great challenges generations of Asians and Pacific Americans have faced in our country and overcome and still face and will overcome. Pride, for the profound role my own Hawaii, has played in the nurturance and maturation of our APA communities throughout our country. Appreciation, for the rich tapestry APAs have woven in the fabric of our national identity. And anticipation, for what certainly lies ahead for our APA communities in writing the next great chapters in the ongoing narrative of this great country.

Mr. Speaker, nowhere in our country is the story of Americans of Asian and Pacific Island descent better illustrated than my own Hawaii, where well over 50 percent of our population is Asian and Pacific American, where our Asian and Pacific American community has achieved the pinnacle of success in all facets of local, statewide, national and international life, and where a majority of all marriages and a majority of all children share more now than one ethnicity, more likely than not an ethnicity of the Asian and Pacific Americans.

And the story of APAs in Hawaii is a rich and compelling story which acts as a microcosm of the story of our very country. Of course, it started millennia ago when the ancestors of our indigenous peoples, the native Hawaiians, came to Hawaii from their ancestral homelands to the south, joining other indigenous peoples in the U.S. mainland and Alaska in the original settlement of our country. And it continued in the last 200 years with the great migrations from Japan and China. And in the last 100-plus years, with still further great migrations from Korea and the Philippines. And then in the last half century from the Pacific islands such as Samoa, Tonga, Fiji and Guam. And amazingly it continues since to this day, in the last quarter century, from Vietnam and Cambodia and Laos and the other nations of Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia. And throughout, of course, many, many other immigrants from other Asian and Pacific countries, India and Pakistan and Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, Thailand and Indonesia and Malaysia and much more.

So when we pause to honor the rich and diverse heritage of our APA communities, we honor the capital of the APA world, my Hawaii, a beacon to the world of what can be.

Yet what is throughout our country is not where it can and should be, for there remain challenges aplenty. There is always the specter of racism and discrimination. Yes, less than there was, less overt, less on the surface than it has been, but insidious enough and there enough to flare up with very little warning, a specter against which constant vigilance is required.

And there are still unique challenges in economic and social advancement for the APA community and unique conditions to be addressed in health care and education and other areas. And there are still goals of fundamental fairness to be accomplished with many of our APA communities, most notably, in my case, Federal recognition for our native Hawaiians.

But while we must remember tonight these challenges and what we must do, we also remember all that is good and great in our APA community. Let me give you just one great example, because we remember tonight that hard

on us is the centennial of sustained immigration from the Philippines to our country, the 1906 exodus from the mother country to the sugar plantations of Hawaii, an exodus that accelerated in 1946 and on and now has yielded fully 2.4 million citizens of our country of Philippine descent.

Yes, it will be a great year for the Filipino community of celebration, with barrio fiestas and song and dance and remembrances of the pioneers and those who succeeded on their broad shoulders. But in many ways, what we celebrate tonight is the recognition that for the Filipino-American community, the celebration of their centennial will be a celebration in miniature of the Asian and Pacific American experience in our country, for the story of our APA community is the story of our America, from its earliest beginnings to its latest arrivals, a story still unfolding as, for example, is happening right on the floor of this U.S. House of Representatives, with my congressional page appointment, Awapuhi Dancil of Makawa, Maui, a junior at Kamehameha Schools and undoubtedly, no doubt about it, a leader in the making for the APA community and for our country in the future.

And so this is a story worth telling over and over again as we do here again tonight.

Mahalo and aloha.