Floor Statements

I thank the gentleman for yielding to me. I was still making changes in what I was intending to say, and usually I do that all the time.

I rise tonight to remember and honor the life and the life's work of a dear friend, Senator Ted Kennedy. There are few Americans alive today whose lives are not affected in some way by Senator Kennedy's vast body of legislative achievements. He's credited with hundreds of laws enacted over his 47-year Senate career, and many of those laws make up fundamental tenets of the social contract that is our modern society.

One of the best examples of Senator Kennedy's impact on society can be seen in his groundbreaking Americans with Disabilities Act, which opened the door to jobs, housing, transportation, communications, and a better life for millions of citizens. It also fundamentally changed the way people viewed others who live with disabilities.

Providing opportunity was a great theme of Senator Kennedy's work, as evidenced by his contributions to strengthening public education. Throughout his career, he fought for better teachers, better schools, more funding, and better methods to enhance learning for America's children.

For wage-earning Americans, Ted Kennedy will perhaps be best remembered for his refusal to accept minimum wage levels as they fell further and further behind in their purchasing power. When others balked or faltered on the issue, Senator Kennedy had a knack for pushing through a deal to get everything he could for workers as soon as it could be achieved.

On the international front, when the great debate over America's waging a preemptive war arose at the outset of this decade, Senator Kennedy used his stature and status as a national newsmaker to oppose the President and the Congress' transgressions, as he saw them, with the use of America's military power.

There are many other important accomplishments one could list, but the issue Senator Kennedy himself labeled as the cause of his life, health care, probably stands out as his greatest area of achievement.

Senator Kennedy extended COBRA coverage for workers in between jobs and eliminated preexisting condition restrictions for workers in group insurance plans. He fought for and won uncommon allies in his crusade to provide health coverage for all children, which he considered a moral obligation. He created the Family and Medical Leave Act and the Ryan White CARE Act for Americans living with HIV and AIDS.

Though his ultimate cause of universal health care was one he did not live to see enacted, we are where we are today because of Kennedy's lifelong commitment to that cause. In a sense, the effort is still his effort. The gains that Congress will eventually pass will also be a part of his legacy.

Back in my part of Massachusetts, Senator Kennedy was always a good friend to the First Congressional District. In recent years he championed the development of the University of Massachusetts' Pioneer Valley Life Sciences Institute and helped to support Holyoke Hospital, a critical health services provider in the Connecticut Valley. He was ever willing to exercise his seniority in the Senate when Massachusetts companies needed it, and when campaign season came around, no one could bring out and motivate as many workers as Senator Kennedy. His stump speeches in remote corners of Massachusetts, for State or local candidates, were always an oratorical treat for those lucky enough to hear them.

To me personally, Senator Kennedy was an inspiring and thoughtful friend. I could always count on an immediate and passionate response to whatever was on his mind and on my mind, and his attentive friendship came with a warm smile, a sense of humor and a caring heart. Senator Kennedy's breadth and depth of leadership was unmatched in the Congress. He was a tireless worker for his constituents and all humanity, and I am honored to have known him and served with him.

Mr. Speaker, economic recovery requires not only solving the employment and housing crises but the health care crisis as well.

In this decade, the premiums charged by private health insurance companies have risen more than 75 percent while workers' wages have risen less than 25 percent. Meanwhile, the profits of the 10 largest health insurers have risen by 400 percent, and the salaries of their CEOs have tripled.

America now has 50 percent higher health care costs than the highest of the next 20 most industrialized nations. Yet Americans suffer shorter life expectancies and higher infant mortalities than any of those nations. Fifty million American citizens who cannot afford basic health insurance receive crisis care in the most expensive way possible: in emergency rooms for which the rest of Americans pay. The uninsured fail to receive the preventative care they need, and the insured shoulder the enormous long-term costs in both lives and dollars of preventable diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.

There is something morally and fiscally wrong with this picture. Wake up, America. We need health care reform now.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to call attention to the continuing importance of family farming in America, well exemplified in my district by J & J Farm of Amherst, which marks its 100th anniversary this year, the same year of the 250th anniversary of the Town of Amherst. Family farming is a long and proud tradition in Massachusetts, and the positive community impact of these farms is as vital as ever. Family farms help maintain economically and socially vibrant rural communities. They serve to conserve and enhance our invaluable soil, water and wildlife habitat for future generations. Most important of all, they provide healthy, high-quality food for American families.

Because of the tremendous importance of family farms and rural communities to our nation and to western Massachusetts in particular, it is fitting that we should recognize the many years of hard work of farm proprietors, like the Waskiewicz family of J & J Farm.

Dimetro and Victoria Waskiewicz immigrated from southern Poland in 1895. Dimetro worked as a farm laborer in the North Amherst area for several years. By 1909 he had saved enough money to purchase a farm on Meadow Street in North Amherst from the Spear family. The original farm consisted of 40 acres with the Mill River running through the east side of the farm. Ten years later another 40 acres were added. Milk, tobacco and onions were the farm's main products.

Dimetro died at the early age of 43. His two eldest sons bought the farm from Victoria in 1930. Joseph and John Waskiewicz began the farm as it is now known, J & J Farm. Joe's son Joseph took over operations following John's retirement in 1970. Cucumbers, potatoes and milk became their main crops. Joseph Sr. retired in 1995 at the age of 86. The farm is now in its fourth generation: Joseph III and Michael now operate the farm with their father.

The past century has brought floods, hurricanes and droughts, but despite hardships and market changes the farm has continued to provide area residents with fresh produce and dairy products. J & J Farm is the last remaining dairy farm in Amherst. The farm operates a seasonal roadside stand that supplements the dairy products with sweet corn, another specialty.

We must sustain our rural communities so that future generations of family farmers, like the Waskiewicz family, will enjoy the dignity of a good day's work and the reward of seeing the tangible yield of their labors with the land and with livestock. It is my hope that future generations will maintain the tradition of family farming that the Waskiewicz family built at J & J Farm, and that America will sustain its family farms through the 21st century and beyond.

Mr. Speaker, there are those in America who claim that we can't fix our broken health care system during an economic crisis. The truth is that we can't afford not to fix it.

Health care premiums have risen every year for more than a decade, at least three times as fast as family incomes have risen. If we doing nothing, those rising health insurance premiums will eat up an ever larger slice of family incomes. Businesses that provide health insurance as a benefit for workers and their families will be ever more competitively disadvantaged. That is a loss of jobs that America cannot afford to lose.

Others in America claim that reform will mean a government takeover of health care decisions. The opposite is true. Every American will be able to choose their insurance plan and their doctor, but dropping a person's coverage because of a preexisting condition will be prohibited from all insurance plans.

Reform will ensure that the doctor and the family make the critical decisions on needed care. Now the insurance company executives make those decisions, and they only care about their profits.

Wake up, America; this is the time for health care reform.

Mr. Speaker, this is our year for health insurance reform. The private health insurance industry has reaped enormous profits over the last 9 years while Americans' wages have barely increased at all. On average, 30 percent of the $1.8 trillion in premiums that Americans pay to health insurance companies pays for overhead costs--salaries, administrative, lobbying, and profits--rather than for health care. Americans cannot afford that waste of scarce dollars. Our health reform legislation will limit such overhead spending to no more than 15 percent.

We have to focus our priorities on the quality of health care itself. For example, the diabetes epidemic demonstrates dramatically how critical preventative medicine is to America's children. One-third of all children born this decade are expected to develop diabetes in their lifetimes. The prevention of diabetes will make America healthier, and we will avoid the enormous future costs of diabetes treatment.

Now is the time to act on health care reform.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

As I think we all know, with the collapse of the subprime market and the steep drop in private mortgages available, 25 percent of mortgages written today are backed by FHA. That's up from just 3 percent 2 years ago; and because Ginnie Mae securitizes FHA loans, their volume has increased threefold. With that increased demand, both FHA and Ginnie Mae will reach their loan ceilings in the next few weeks and will be forced to stop operating unless we act today. With the housing market just starting to show some signs of growth and home sales rising for 3 straight months, a first since the year 2004, cutting out 25 percent of available mortgages would be a disaster, decimating the market and hurting million of prospective homeowners out shopping today. This bill ensures that FHA and Ginnie Mae can continue to play their important roles in the mortgage market.

The bill also transfers funds to the Highway Trust Fund to keep it solvent through the end of the fiscal year. Without that transfer, the Department of Transportation will not be able to continue reimbursing States for their highway projects; and States would likely have to scale back on the work they are now doing and would be doing in August and September. There is no question that we will have to eventually do something to guarantee the long-term solvency of the Highway

Trust Fund; but we made infrastructure development an important part of the Economic Recovery Act; and it would be foolish and unwise for us to leave town without ensuring that States can continue with their highway projects as we are on recess in this next month. This needs to be done as quickly as possible. I would urge my colleagues to support this bill by voting ``yes.''

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include tabular and extraneous material on H.R. 3288.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and hopefully that will be less than 5 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, it is my privilege and pleasure to present the fiscal year 2010 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations bill to the House. This bill is the product of many hours of hearings and briefings, always with bipartisan input and excellent subcommittee member participation. I especially would like to recognize the important contributions of my ranking member, Tom Latham, in putting this bill together. And as with any healthy relationship, we do not always agree, but I greatly appreciate his partnership, and his input has made the bill better.

I also want to take a moment to recognize the hard work of staff, specifically on the minority side, Dena Baron, David Gibbons, Allison Fox and Doug Bobbitt; and on the majority side, Kate Hallahan, Laura Hogshead, Dave Napoliello, Lisa Pena, Alex Gillen, Janine Scianna, Andrew Burton and Blair Anderson. They have spent many late nights putting this bill together, and we would not be here today without their dedication.

There has been close communication and coordination between the minority and the majority staffs throughout this process, and the bill is better for that input.

Recognizing that today may be long, my remarks will be brief. This is a nonpartisan bill, as bills related to transportation and housing should be. It invests in our Nation's infrastructure during a transformational period for both the Department of Transportation and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The bill provides $123.1 billion in total budgetary resources, $48 million below the President's budget request. Within Housing and Urban Development, this bill recognizes that foreclosure rates remain high and the current economic climate and weak job market have increased demand for affordable housing. To that extent, this bill provides $47.1 billion for HUD and targets most of the $1.6 billion increase over the President's budget to programs that the previous administration repeatedly attempted to reduce or zero out and thus have not kept up with the need.

In contrast, Transportation is a budget in flux, largely covering programs that are in transition with major surface and aviation authorizations pending. The authorizing committees of jurisdiction in both the House and Senate have either passed or begun marking up multi- year legislation to reform and extend these important infrastructure programs. In that regard, the bill includes $75.8 billion in transportation infrastructure investments. That is $1.66 billion below the President's request.

Last, I want to note that in supporting the transformations taking place at each Department, this bill has emphasized investments in five key areas: one, building healthy communities with environmentally sustainable solutions; two, maintaining services in rural communities; three, supporting vulnerable populations; four, investing in the national infrastructure; and, five, ensuring transportation safety.

In conclusion, we worked hard to balance many competing needs to produce a bill that reflects the bipartisan needs of transportation and housing. I'm pleased with the product, and I urge Members to support it.

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I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard) for a colloquy.

I thank the Congresswoman from California, and I share her concern about the terrible accident in Los Angeles, as well as her resolve to help prevent further accidents.

It is, in fact, my intention that the funding provided for railroad research and development be available for positive train control research and demonstration projects. I believe PTC is a necessary addition to our national railroad system, and I thank the Congresswoman for her leadership on this issue and keeping it in our attention.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Levin) for a colloquy.

The gentleman is correct. Section 412 will help to ensure compliance with the Buy American Act. Because the intention is not to apply the Buy American Act to new entities, it is consistent with our international obligations.

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

To finish this and to allow him to respond in some kind of way, I would give the gentleman additional time, Mr. Chairman.

I just wanted to say that I can remember--and probably, if you think about it a little bit, you can remember, too, because my memory is probably a lot poorer than yours--times when this bill was brought to the floor, and point of order after point of order to the level of practically stripping half the bill away were made by your committee. Well, maybe you weren't the chairman at that particular time, but a few years ago, that sort of thing did happen.

Furthermore, I would just simply say, of the $47 billion, more than $21 billion has been obligated. Those expenditures are going on. That's more than the amount that was intended to be obligated by the end of the 2009 fiscal year. We're already obligating the money into 2010, so it's getting out there pretty quickly. Though, I do have great sympathy for the position that you're taking in that it takes far too long, and I hope the authorizing will take care of that in a new event.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Rodriguez), who is a member of the subcommittee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) for a colloquy.

I thank the gentlewoman for bringing this matter to my attention. This is a good project. I support it, and I will be glad to work with the gentlewoman from California on this as it moves into the New Starts process.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Boren).

Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Oklahoma is correct. Section 164 of this bill allows that.

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

I appreciate the gentleman's attention to this issue. I understand that the House authorizing committee is examining this in the context of their multiyear surface transportation reauthorization bill. In the meantime, I will be happy to work with the gentleman from Oklahoma to address this issue as we move forward in this process and conference this bill with the Senate.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

I yield 15 seconds to the gentlewoman.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Berman) for a colloquy.

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute, and would the gentleman yield?

I appreciate the remarks of the two gentlemen about the effects of airport noise on local communities and agree that the FAA has a responsibility to adequately and objectively weigh the concerns of those adversely impacted by nighttime takeoff and landings.

While I can't comment as to the specifics of the Burbank and Van Nuys curfew studies, I agree that the Part 161 process must serve as a credible and objective avenue for evaluating the merits of noise and access restrictions.

Could I inquire how much time there is available?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Braley) for the purposes of a colloquy.

I yield myself 1 minute. I assure the gentleman from Iowa that we will work together with the Federal Rail Administration to implement the 2008 Authorization Act.

I thank the gentleman from Iowa for his kindness and for his hard work and I certainly, again, join him in thanking the very fine staff who worked together very well in crafting this legislation.

It is a good bill. I believe it is a bill that deserves the support of the vast majority of the Members of the Congress.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, this is a good amendment that makes a handful of modest changes to the bill. It adds $250,000 for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to develop safety standards for the incorporation of alternative fuel technologies in vehicles.

It increases the Federal Rail Administration's Railroad Research and Development account by $3 million, which will allow the FRA to perform multiple studies that were authorized in last year's rail safety bill. It provides $1 million for the Federal Aviation Administration to support commercial space activities.

This amendment includes two provisions championed by Representative Cuellar from Texas and included in previous appropriations bills, one that requires the use of energy-efficient bulbs in Federal buildings; and the second, which precludes Federal employees from flying first class.

Last, we have included a technical change to a provision that my ranking member, Mr. Latham, has championed in order to ensure that the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage program can be implemented without Federal subsidy.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Could I inquire how much time there is remaining.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cohen).

Mr. Chairman, I believe this is a good amendment, and I would ask for its passage, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I rise to claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

I rise in opposition to the amendment. The HOPE VI program was launched in 1992 to allow the replacement of affordable housing that had deteriorated and was determined to be uninhabitable. The annual appropriations for about 10 years after that point were $500 million per year or thereabouts.

During that time, 25 to 30 applications were awarded each year, and some of those programs went forward very expeditiously and some of them did not move forward as expeditiously. But in at least the last 5 years, under the previous administration, each year the administration attempted to rescind the appropriation that had been made the previous year and then zero out the program for the year that we were appropriating for, attempting not just to cripple but to terminate the program.

Congress refused, because many communities still had projects for the program, so we still had five or six projects per year, because the appropriation was for several years, at least 5 years, was frozen around $100 million or thereabouts per year. Now, it is my understanding, at least, that what are--typically programs and projects that had been afforded money under the program of HOPE VI took from 3 to 7 years and that would be used to complete. Some took longer.

During the past year, we have been able to get the Department of Housing and Urban Development to spend special time, special effort, through technical assistance and working with the organizations that had the applications in, to go back and make certain that those that had been awarded in 2002 and 2003 were moving forward. They made some serious progress on that, but there is still need for this program.

At this point I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), who is the chairman of the Authorizing Committee, because so great is the need that the Authorizing Committee has been working on that.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, just last fall this House passed reauthorization legislation for HOPE VI and authorized for the first year of that $750 million. The work of HOPE VI simply is not done. That represents how much the demand is on the part of the membership of the House.

Basically, what I would say here is that this work needs to continue. There is much need for affordable housing in this country. The HOPE VI program is not duplicated by anything else that I know of, and I would urge that the amendment be defeated.

I rise to claim the time in opposition.

First of all, I want to say that this high-speed rail, the program for combined high-speed and intercity passenger rail, that is the most important transportation initiative since the Eisenhower Interstate Highway System, the National Defense Highway System of 50 years ago, which took a generation, basically, to build. It's not going to happen quickly. It's going to take a period of time, there is no question, but it is the most important initiative. There is pent-up demand. There is a huge demand.

The first preapplication period for this bill brought in $100 billion of applications for $8 billion that was in place there. If we do not add significantly to that, as this bill does do, by adding $4 billion to the $8 billion that is already there, then people will lose faith or wonder, Are we in this seriously? Are we going to do high-speed and intercity passenger rail, as had been proposed and put forward in the recovery bill earlier or aren't we intending to do that?

I think we must keep this momentum going, for if we lose it, then that would be a very bad thing to have happen. There are applications for more than 40 States in the union totaling a hundred billion dollars. Some of those are going to be in construction later this year or early next year. The actual final applications are due for the smaller projects within a month. And within 2 months after that, they are supposed to be in awards. So they are expected to be providing jobs next year.

So I think that that is a very appropriate way to keep our public momentum going toward passenger and intercity rail, high speed and intercity passenger rail.

I reserve the balance of my time.

How much time is left now?

I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Corrine Brown).

I yield 1\1/4\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

As the gentleman understands, the $4 billion is available in this fiscal year for which we're appropriating only for high-speed rail. And I hope that it will remain there.

I urge the defeat of the amendment so that we will keep the momentum up and keep the building, the development of high-speed rail moving forward as fast as possible.

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I think the gentleman has found a very appropriate amendment. It takes a small amount of money from a very large program to put into a program that we have supported and I have supported strongly. I am perfectly willing to accept the gentleman's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition, but I am not opposed.

In fact, I am willing to accept the gentleman's amendment.

I'm happy to yield.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, the amendment that has been offered prohibits the implementation of the New York airspace design which FAA has worked on now for about 10 years, and it would appear from the gentleman's language that it is on the basis of airport noise, not the overhead noise, but rather the ground noise. Well, with airplanes nowadays, each new sequence of airplanes is quieter than they were in the past, at all levels and more efficient at all levels, whether they're flying high or low or on the ground than had been previously the case. But that is only one point here.

Many parts of this country have completed the redesign of the airspace in their regions over the last several years. And why is that important? Well, it is important because the national airspace is now carrying 750 million passengers per year and is expected to be increasing by 50 percent between now and 2025. Today, already, 40 percent of all flight delays in the national airspace system are part of the New York area flights, both incoming and outgoing, which then causes backups all over the country.

We know we are approaching gridlock in our air traffic control system, which is based on a ground-based sight by radar system which is technologically a half century old. It is really old technology. We know we need to switch to a network satellite-based system for traffic control much more quickly than the present estimate of the year 2025.

To do that, we must finish airspace redesign all over the Nation, but particularly because of the congestion, the extensive congestion in the New York area, particularly in the New York area. So the space design and modern satellite-based traffic control allows planes to fly closer together, higher up, on a direct path, save energy in the process, run quieter because they can stay higher longer and be on the ground less than previously was the case.

The added capacity is absolutely necessary and will finally reduce delays in this most congested area by allowing the redesign benefits to accrue from environmental purposes, reducing emissions. Benefits are provided to the controllers because the new technology increases the flexibility in routing and helps balance their workload, and this amendment would delay the removal of congestion. It would prolong the use of outdated, inefficient technology. It would put noise reduction that is in the design process at bay, and it would delay the safe expansion of our air traffic travel capacity.

We have to move on in this 21st century and develop the fully new technology. This amendment should be defeated.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Costello) who is the chairman of the Aviation Subcommittee of Transportation and Infrastructure.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, the gentlewoman from Tennessee is quite correct. I will claim that an across-the-board cut of the sort that has been proposed in this amendment is the worst possible way that one can do this sort of thing.

In my opening remarks, I pointed out that this legislation has some $47 billion of appropriation for housing programs and that it's above the President's request in that area because we are trying to fill the gap for what has happened over the last 8 years of cuts in so many of the housing investment programs. And let me just give you an example of this.

One of the points I made in the opening was that one of the things we were particularly trying to do in the very good housing parts of this legislation was to support vulnerable populations. And so in replacement of several years, 5 years in a row of cuts in elder housing and in disabled housing, in tenant- and project-based assistance in our PHA's major programs, we didn't always allow the cuts that the administration had applied and had requested, and we usually, in fact, didn't do that because people in here are concerned about what's going on in the matter of people's lives. However, the cuts were made.

And I would like to just point out that if you go back to the year 2001 and use a 1 percent, a 1 percent per year inflationary factor to each of those housing program investments that we would make, that would bring you to a point $1.5 billion above where the present legislation proposes in this bill.

So what I'm saying there is that an across-the-board cut of the sort that has been suggested by the gentlewoman from Tennessee simply cuts those places that we particularly wanted to put money into in order to fill the gap that has been growing over a period of years, and it's the wrong thing to do.

It would hurt our elders. It would hurt our people who are in affordable housing in either the tenant- or the project-based systems. It would cut Hope VI. It would cut the program for housing for people with AIDS, the elder and disabled housing and CDBG. All of those were programs that were deliberately reduced year after year or recommendations made for a reduction, and, in fact, over time had been reduced substantially compared with the '01 appropriation.

So this has particularly bad effects on those programs, particularly the housing programs that have been well-funded in the bill that we have before us.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I would just reiterate that while I'm not in favor of cutting the bill that we have put forward, I think it is a good bill, that this is by far the worst way that you could possibly do that, and I would urge the defeat of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I claim the time in opposition, though I am not opposed to it and I will not oppose it.

I will yield.

I yield back.

Mr. Chairman, I claim time in opposition.

Well, it sounds so simple, only 9\1/2\ months ago, but in fact, of course, the funding level that has been proposed here would take this bill back to the appropriated level for the fiscal year 2008. We're talking about the year 2010. We're talking about a year starting several months from now and going forward a year, and he's talking about 9\1/2\ months ago being the end of that fiscal year, the end of the 2008 fiscal year, and that was funding the year prior to that. So it is really taking a step backward 2 years in the funding level.

As everybody knows, while we have had a bad economy, the inflation level has stayed relatively low--that's true--but this kind of a funding level, taking $20 billion out of this appropriation, then has the effect of cutting a huge number of programs by an average of 16 percent for the next fiscal year. It is an unsustainable number for the kinds of efforts that one needs to have in housing. As I've indicated, for housing, there is growth in this. I agree there is growth in this bill.

On the transportation side, the major point of growth is in the high- speed rail program. The high-speed rail program is putting forward money that actually will extend out over a series of years. It doesn't all happen in the first year by any means at all. We all know that. It creates jobs over a period of time in the building of that infrastructure.

In the case of housing, again, if one tries to cut the housing programs, it will be particularly bad for vulnerable populations, and we should not do that.

I oppose the amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

There is no direction in the amendment, itself. It merely says cut the total expenditure by $20 billion, which is one-sixth of the sum total of the legislation. All I can do is say, if one were to do that by one-sixth of the appropriation for affordable housing, for our tenant- and project-based systems, we would be putting out 400,000 families. Yes, it's bad, but it's those low-income families who are probably in the worst shape and in the most needy shape of all. I'm not sure that we want to do that. I certainly don't want to see that happen, and I hope the majority will not want to see that happen.

Let me just close by urging a ``no'' vote on this amendment. It is a slash-and-burn kind of an amendment.

I claim time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, this amendment is $13 billion. Therefore, compared with what I call ``slash and burn,'' this is slash and burn a little bit less than the previous one. Generally, there is no direction as to how one might do it, and I'm left with the question of what kinds of impacts this one might have.

I would point out that it would have an impact of now, not the 16 percent but only an 11 or 12 percent cut--roughly 11, I guess it would be--on all of our transit programs, on the public transportation programs that we fund and that move people around in as efficient a way as they possibly can. It would have a similar effect on all of our air traffic safety programs, on all of the efforts that we have to make in order to have our airports and our air traffic controller systems function appropriately. All of those things come from this kind of an amendment. This would take us back to a freeze of the '09 levels, not the '08 levels, which was the previous one, but it would be a freeze at the '09 levels.

I oppose the amendment. I urge defeat of the amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, the gentleman has just made an argument and continues to make an argument about the level of debt.

In 1980, when President Carter left office, the national debt of the country was about $1 trillion. Twelve years later, the debt of the country had reached $4 trillion. It had quadrupled. It had quadrupled in those 12 years. In the following 8 years, the debt went up again by another $1.4 trillion, so that at the end of President Clinton's term, the debt had gone up about one-third more, just slightly more than one- third more. Then during the Presidency of the previous President, we saw the debt go from $5.4 trillion to $10.5 trillion as he left office. Then it went up almost double in just an 8-year period.

Now there is concern since we have been in a recession for more than a year now, the first five quarters of which were clearly in the previous administration with the housing crisis, a deep recession with severe losses of jobs throughout the last year. They're continuing. This is a deep recession, but this is not a time to be cutting our most vulnerable people through this sort of action. This action is the wrong action to take. We will grow out of this over time. I urge defeat of the amendment.

I yield back my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I thank the gentleman for his amendment. The gentleman's amendment is actually slash-and-burn sort of squared, essentially, because it puts the whole pressure of the reduction--it's not as large a dollar reduction--but it is all focused deliberately and directly upon discretionary expenditure.

And of course, when the gentleman points out that he is strongly in favor of a lot of the programs here, I'm sure that there are a few of those programs that are discretionary programs, perhaps not all of them, though I suspect that there are a fair number of programs that he doesn't particularly like and that are mandatory programs as well.

So, again, we have here a very large cut in the budget that is proposed by taking 25 percent out of the discretionary programs, and the arguments would only be repetitious, and I don't mean to take people's time.

I reserve the balance of my time.

We have in this legislation and in the Recovery Act earlier this year, we have added enormous additional responsibilities to both the Secretary of Transportation, our good former colleague, very popular former colleague, now-Secretary Ray LaHood, in order to administer those properly and do what they are told to do under the Recovery Act, to get all of those moneys out and moving. For instance, they have gotten some 300 applications thereabouts for the high-speed rail moneys, the high-speed rail and inner city passenger rail programs. You've got to have people to look at those programs, to assess them, to decide which ones are the better ones, to move the paperwork so that we will be able to actually have those projects out where they're going to get people to work as quickly as it's possible to do.

And the same thing is true for the Federal Rail Administration. The Secretary's office has certain key responsibilities added to his. It is not nearly as much as the increase of responsibilities that has been given to the Federal Rail Administration, which is really where the first monitoring and the first assessment and grading of all of the projects that have come in is. It's an enormous program that is there, but it is part of what was expected to have to happen in order to make the high-speed rail and inner city passenger rail programs work.

So I have no apology whatsoever for additional administrative assistance for making those things happen. If we

hadn't done that, we would have been killing the programs before they even could even get started, and that was not the purpose of the American Recovery Act in the first place.

And again, I reserve the balance of my time.

How much time do I have?

Well, I will simply say on that one that the President actually proposed a totally new program which had not been authorized at the $250 million level. We, instead, decided because it was not authorized that we would leave it to authorization, and it was somewhat similar. It was in some ways an expansion of the HOPE VI program and alteration of the HOPE VI program, he would say quite significant alteration of that program, for a $250 million program.

Instead, we put that money that he had requested into the HOPE VI, which we had in this Chamber, perhaps without the gentleman's vote, we had reauthorized last fall but hadn't been acted upon by the Senate. It will be, again, acted upon by the House later this year, and there will be a reauthorization, I would guess, within this year for the HOPE VI program, and that's where the money has been placed.

I yield back my time.

Mr. Chairman, I claim time in opposition, though I am not opposed.

I would yield to the gentleman.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I thank you for your careful defense of the job that you do as a Representative there for New Castle, Pennsylvania.

I asked for the time because just a few minutes ago the gentleman from Arizona had spoken about the distribution of earmarks and how it seems to favor certain Members or committees, and I wandered over to see, and I suspect that I and my ranking member are in trouble for the nature of that chart.

But, as a part of your argument, the gentleman's argument, the gentleman mentioned that maybe the Federal agencies can do a better job of distributing funding more equitably. However, one really ought to look a little bit at what has been the historical record and some fairly recent historical record.

In fiscal 2007, we included no earmarks in this bill.

I thank the gentleman. That was very kind of you.

In fiscal 2007, we included no earmarks in this bill and gave complete discretion to the Secretary of Transportation. Remember, that was the year that the majority tipped, but we still had the previous President in place. The result of that was that the Secretary of Transportation distributed over $1 billion of discretionary money to five cities, to five places, five single places.

Would the gentleman yield another 30 seconds?

Well, if the gentleman would place all the earmarks funded in this bill in '08 or '09 on a map and show where those had actually gone, you'd find that the earmarks have been spread much more widely, much more evenly among all 50 States and the territories than you would find by the bureaucrats.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. Let me make a few remarks about the general process and then about this amendment, and then maybe I will even have a little bit more time.

As indicated in the report to this bill, the funding for earmarks on the Transportation and HUD appropriations bill in 2010 has been cut to 50 percent of the 2006 levels. I would remind the gentleman that in the 2006 budget there was both a Republican majority in both branches and the President of the United States as well.

Also, this year, Chairman Obey introduced new requirements to continue our effort to ensure that the appropriations process is open, transparent and worthy of the public's trust. As part of that, the committee vetted each request with the agency under whose jurisdiction an earmark would fall. Also, each request has been publicly disclosed on Members' Web sites so everyone can know exactly what has been asked by every Member and what ones are being funded.

I oppose the particular amendment here because the funds here, the $2 million of funds, are being used to replace Doyle Drive with a new parkway connecting the Golden Gate Bridge and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Federal funds would be used for project design work and the right-of-way acquisition. Doyle Drive is the only link between the San Francisco peninsula and Northern California counties, and is, therefore, designated as a postdisaster recovery route.

Doyle Drive was built the year I was born and is reaching the end of its useful life. The lack of shoulders and the absence of a dividing median create dangerous operating conditions and often result in serious accidents. The drive is ranked as the fifth-worst bridge in the Nation and the worst in California on the measure of structural insufficiency. 100,000 drivers, 18,000 transit riders use that Doyle Drive every day. So for those reasons I think this is a very important earmark.

Then I would like to comment, and I oppose, again, the amendment. I would like then to use the rest of my time to point out something that I did a little bit earlier, which was to point out that at the end of the Carter administration there was $1 trillion of national debt. That took us from the Presidency of President Washington all the way 190 years to 1980 to get $1 trillion of national debt. Twelve years later, the national debt was over $4 trillion, more than four times, more than quadrupled in that 12 years. That's the 12 years of the greatest debt increase in the history of the country by any percentage-wise.

In the Presidency of President Clinton, the debt went up another one- third, 33 percent, in that 8 years which is quite modest compared to what it then went up during the previous administration, the years from 2001 through 2009. The debt during that period went up from $5.3 trillion--I think maybe I said 5.4 the last time I made this, hadn't quite gone down that much--but in any case, it's gone up over $10 trillion by the end of the Bush administration. So that's another doubling, the largest actual number of dollars of debt increase in trillions of any kind but not the largest percentage. This was only a doubling there.

And where the gentleman gets the idea that the debt will be a tripling under the present President, I cannot imagine. It will take at least seven more years for us to have any idea what the level of the debt will be at the end of that time. He might be surprised, we might all be surprised that it will be a good deal more modest than the kinds of numbers that the gentleman is using today.

I would be happy to yield.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve a point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve a point of order on the motion.

I do not. I withdraw my point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion.

Mr. Speaker, I think it's quite ironic that the amendment that's being offered is one to reduce the funding and conform the funding to the President's request, but it's exactly what the now minority has done year after year in rubber-stamping the President's position. That's what's so ironic about it.

We, on the other hand, have taken an independent view with a very good subcommittee, with some Members on the minority side who have joined us on some of this and, in fact, have taken a position substantially in support of the idea which is at the core of this legislation that we are doing something more for vulnerable populations.

Virtually everything that has been removed in reductions from this bill is in those things, but not all of them, virtually all, in the area of assistance for vulnerable populations. Let me just go down the list.

We have section 8, tenant-based housing and section 8 project-based housing, a total of a $798 million reduction, all of them back to the President's requests. But the needs got greater from when the requests were made because of what is happening, because there are more homeless, because there are more people out of work than there were at the time the request was made, in all good faith.

The Native American Block Grant for the poorest of the poor is reduced by $105 million.

Elder housing, which we had raised by $235 million, and the housing for the disabled people, which we had raised by $100 million, which, by the way, all of this was taken through the full Appropriations Committee and approved by the Appropriations Committee and sent to the floor.

Homeless assistance has been reduced by $56 million.

The public housing operating fund has been reduced by $200 million.

The public housing authority's capital fund, reduced by $256 million.

The housing for people with AIDS, reduced by $40 million.

The HOME Program for affordable housing, rental housing, as well as first-time homeownership is reduced by $175 million. All of these to conform with the President's number.

Our committee and our Members feel very strongly that those vulnerable populations need a little bit more under the circumstances that we are dealing with at the present time, so we put it in, and that's the way we voted today.

Now, beyond that, we have had a strong vote on the issue of high- speed rail and the items related to it, a vote which was earlier today, 136 for an amendment to strike the very thing that is backing this motion to 284 against, including 40 Members from the minority side who voted with the majority on that issue.

Beyond that, we have the amendment which reduces the FAA's safety positions in two different areas; one by removing 150 aviation inspectors, which we went above the President's request, I think quite legitimately, for aviation safety, and also 35 additional people that we put in for rail safety. We've had some rail problems. We believe that there are problems that needed to be dealt with.

So all of those things have been done. I think we should keep exactly what we have done, the vote before, and reject this motion to recommit.

I yield time to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

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

Mr. Chairman, I urge rejection of the amendment before us. In 2006, Congress created the Upper Housatonic National Heritage Area in southwestern Massachusetts and in northwestern Connecticut based on legislation that was cosponsored by our distinguished former colleague Representative Nancy Johnson of Connecticut and myself in the House and by all the Senators from Massachusetts and Connecticut in the other body.

The Housatonic River Museum is being created by a group of local citizens and environmentalists, all residents of that national heritage area, as a venue to highlight the rich cultural history and explore the hopes for the future of that area. The 13,000-square-foot museum is being designed to achieve two sustainable goals: zero carbon footprint and zero net energy usage.

Ninety percent of the money for this project is being raised privately, but the money provided in this bill will allow the museum to maximize energy conservation and efficiency using passive strategies such as natural lighting, natural ventilation, water conservation, high-performance building materials, and, in addition, to generate enough power for its own needs, all from renewable sources utilizing photovoltaic panels, recycled wood pellet boilers and a geothermal well system. The museum will return excess power to the public electricity grid when available and possible.

All of these techniques and processes for energy conservation and efficiency will be made available for explanation and demonstration to thousands of visitors of all ages, but especially to school-age children from near and far.

The museum itself will be lead certified, and will serve as a flagship demonstration project and an example of sustainable construction. It will be the first public building on the East Coast to be listed by the Department of Energy as a zero energy, and will join only seven others of similar designation in the Nation.

This is a good project with high goals and deserves to be funded, and I urge a ``no'' vote on the gentleman's amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

It is under design.

It is under design, and the money is being raised as we speak.

I am not familiar with the day-to-day progress of the collection of those construction funds.

I continue to reserve.

I think I have the right to close, do I not?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Pastor).

I would just reiterate in this instance that all of this money goes to achieve those specific goals for providing zero carbon footprint and net zero energy usage in this to-be-constructed museum. All of the techniques, an array of techniques, I mentioned five or six, but the array of techniques, all of those will be available as demonstrations for all of the visitors all of the years of the future of this museum.

And he worries that it may never be constructed. Well, if they don't raise the money, which I expect them to do, and to be able to be in construction quite as fast as a good many of our recovery projects might get into construction, but certainly within this and the next fiscal year, that none of that money gets expended. So there is no harm at all in that. And otherwise, we have a very fine museum and a very fine demonstration project which hundreds of thousands of people will see over the next decade.

So I would hope that the amendment will be rejected. I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment.

I yield back.

Madam Speaker, I rise to honor the life of Corrine Louise Conte, a beloved neighbor and community member in western Massachusetts and Washington, DC.

Corrine was a woman of many talents. A native of Pittsfield, she was a star swimmer at Pittsfield High School, and she later became an accomplished pilot. Once, while flying near her home, her plane's engine failed, but she steered the descending plane into an open field and escaped with only a fractured rib, an injury she dismissed as trifling.

During World War II, Corrine served as a nurse in the Navy, where she met her future husband, the late, great Congressman Silvio O. Conte. The couple married after the war, and Corrine continued to serve as a nurse while raising their four children. When Silvio was elected to the House of Representatives, she moved their family to Bethesda, Maryland, where she became a successful real estate agent.

Ever-welcoming, Corrine opened her family's home in Bethesda to ambassadors and politicians, regardless of political party. Her gatherings were known for being intimate and down-to-earth. When a Russian delegation once came to dinner, they were surprised to find that Corrine had done all the cooking herself

She was a friend to several Presidents, meeting each Chief Executive from Dwight Eisenhower to George H.W. Bush, and even dancing with Lyndon Johnson at his inaugural ball. True to form, she made all of her White House gowns herself, working from a sewing table in her basement. In the late 1980s, she served on President Bush's Special Committee on Mental Health.

Despite remarkable talents and powerful friends, Corrine never lost touch with her community or shrank from the rigors of public service. The phone number to her family's Pittsfield home was listed publicly, and, during the three decades her husband served in Congress, she fielded calls from constituents and often followed up on requests herself. She was an active campaigner, regularly putting in long days on the campaign trail, and a favorite with voters, who appreciated her practicality and command of the issues. After her husband's death in 1991, she dedicated herself to preserving his extensive and important legacy.

Away from the public eye, Corrine was known to be a loving mother and a woman of great faith. She was also a life-long Boston Red Sox fan and reportedly was elated to see her team finally reverse the ``Curse of Bambino'' by sweeping the World Series in 2004.

Corrine Conte's strength, warmth and charm were legendary. The friends she made and the people she touched throughout her remarkable life will miss her dearly.

I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I want to thank the gentleman from Connecticut and my friends from Florida and Wisconsin for being here tonight to help to enlighten people about what has become a very, very critical issue for America.

The only agreement that I can see about the debate that we are beginning to have on reform of the health care system is that virtually every American family, all across the board, knows that health insurance is too expensive. For the 50 million or so Americans who don't have any health insurance, it is obviously too expensive or they otherwise would already have it. For the next 50 million who have too little insurance or are underinsured, as it is called, they know it is too expensive when their insurance company refuses to pay for coverage that they thought they had or the insurance company makes a claim that there was a previous condition involved and that may have been why they are now are claiming that they shouldn't pay the money. Or there are a certain number of people who have lost jobs in this economy and thereby have lost their coverage for health insurance, and for them, obviously, the whole situation has gotten out of hand.

Yes, our American health insurance is too expensive. Let me use this first chart and show you what the situation is here.

This is a chart which shows the health care cost as a percentage of gross domestic product in the G-7 countries. The G-7 countries are America and the next six largest economies in the world, except for China. These data, it indicates that the Japanese data are for the year 2005, whereas the other data are for the year 2008.

You can see on the chart that the percentage of health care cost as a percent of their domestic product ranges from 8.2 to 11.1 percent in the other six next largest economies in this world, and here we are up over 15. And, by the way, these data, if you look at 09, fiscal 09, you would probably find that that number 15.3 percent is probably up to 16 percent or a little higher because of the problems with the economy. Health care continues to go up, and people are struggling for that reason.

So we have by far the highest. We are 40 percent roughly higher than the next-highest one of the largest economies, which is the industrial economies with which we compete all the time. And the average of the other six members, our partners in the G-7, their average number is only two-thirds. We are more than 50 percent higher than the average of those other six countries.

So, yes, American health insurance is too expensive, and this huge gap between our health care costs, the burden that that puts on our industries, between that burden in this country versus the others of our major competitors, hurts American businesses and costs us jobs.

You only need to look at the auto industry, where our old icons of Chrysler and General Motors now are struggling, and in large measure because the cost of their health care in this country is so much greater than it is for other countries producing automobiles.

Well, that might be okay, or it might be acceptable, that kind of a cost difference, if we got the best health care. Everyone watching has probably heard a politician tell them that we have the best health care in the world.

Well, we do have the most expensive health care in the world. That chart

very clearly illustrates that we do have the most expensive health care in the world. But I would like to examine that question of whether we have the best health care a little bit more deeply with this chart, which shows what the life expectancy is among the very same heavily industrialized countries, which are our major partners in industry and in commerce and trade around the world. Again, I leave out China, but I am using the G-7 countries. All seven of them are listed there.

What you see on this chart is that life expectancy in the United States is less than each and every one of the other members of the G-7 group, each of the other six partner members in the G-7 largest economies in the world. And if I average the life expectancies in those other six countries, it is 3 years longer than American citizens live. Now, that does not suggest that we have the very best health care in the world or the very best health care that we could have.

Then on this last chart let me just illustrate one more measure of what our health care quality is, and this measure is one that directly affects a huge number of families at the very beginning of life. This is the question of infant mortality in the G-7 countries, where you see the listed number of deaths for children under the age of one. So it is deaths among new infants lower be than the age of one.

Going from Japan, you see 2.7 per 1,000 births, on to 5.5 for Italy per 1,000 births, and the U.S., the highest number of infant deaths that are occurring before the age of 1 year. Again, if you average the six, you find that the infant mortality in the United States is more than 50 percent higher than the average of these six other nations.

So, I think one has to ask the question, after going through all of that, and I have to look and see where the question is on my papers, one has to ask the question, is the assertion that the U.S. has the best health care in the world, basically is it true, is it not true, is it simply a lie?

We ought really to think very carefully while we're doing the reform of our health care system, as we're going to do later this year. We ought to think very carefully about figures like this and a whole bunch of other measures. I could go through a series of other measures that show similar kinds of data, and show that we are not doing as well as we ought to be doing as the richest country in the world. There are reasons for that. We'll have other times to perhaps explore some of those other reasons.

But I'm very pleased that the gentlemen, my friends from Connecticut and Florida and Wisconsin, are taking this up tonight, and that I have been able to bring some little bit of thought to how this is going forward in America. Thank you.

It really would. I must say, it's daunting to be taking part in a discussion with an M.D. who has been through this so intimately and has so many examples that he can put forward. We have two or three other medical doctors here in the Congress, and I'm glad we're not having this discussion among just them and me because I would feel completely out of place.

But I did want to comment to something that my friend from Connecticut had said after I finished my chart talk essentially, and that was, yeah, we should be willing to accept a higher cost in this country. True. I said that it would be perfectly acceptable if we were getting outcomes that correspond to the cost that is going in.

We do have a very productive workforce, and the total value of our economy is so high that I think you would find, per person, per member of the workforce, that the value of our economy, the gross product per member is substantially greater than most, if not all of these. I don't have the data on that, but I think I have seen them. And so you would expect that you should be able to spend more in real dollars than others and still maybe not be hurting the economy. But when it gets so out of range, then you really have to look at what are the outcomes.

One other outcome that I would just like to mention, because I used first the life expectancy of our people at large, from the time that they are born until they join their Maker, and then the infant mortality, but then look at the other question, the question of maternal mortality, which very closely mirrors the data on infant mortality, though that goes from the birth until 1 year of age, whereas maternal mortality would refer only to women who die in childbirth. And there, again, our value is, in this country, with supposedly the best health care in the country in the world, our number, again, is about twice, almost twice as high as it is in the other major industrial partners of ours in this whole world economic system. So that's just one more--I did not bring that chart along, but that's just one more of those measures of the many kinds of measures that you could look at.

I would be happy to yield.

Madam Speaker, the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Subcommittee bid farewell earlier this week to Amy Schick who has served as the Subcommittee's Congressional Fellow over the past year. Ms. Schick returned to the Office of Occupant Protection and Impaired Driving at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, where she will have her next assignment as part of the Presidential Management Fellow program.

The Transportation Subcommittee was fortunate to have Amy as a part of the Subcommittee team. She did a superb job researching a variety of transportation issues; preparing hearing and briefing materials; and, managing the thousands of project requests that were submitted to the Subcommittee during the fiscal year 2009 appropriations process. In addition, Amy had lead staff responsibility for oversight of the budgets of the Surface Transportation Board and the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board.

Amy's organizational skills and unwavering positive attitude set a high standard for the Subcommittee. Her outstanding commitment to public service was evident not only in how she performed her duties on the Subcommittee but also through her dedication and brave service in the United States Army Reserves.

I am profoundly grateful for Amy's service to the Subcommittee over the past twelve months and I am confident that she will go on to achieve great things at the Department of Transportation. I, along with my Subcommittee staff, wish Amy all the best in her future endeavors.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I think I heard the immediate previous speaker say that we should freeze all expenditure at the 08 level. Well, speaker after speaker from the other side of the aisle have said--from what they've said it would seem to me they are in complete denial, utter denial, of where we are and why we got here.

The fact that we have had a recession. We've been in a recession for at least, now, into the fifth quarter. All of that being in the budget year of 08, fiscal 08, and then part of 09 when we did part of our budget under the previous President.

We, in that period of time, have ended up losing more than 3 million jobs in the 08 calendar year. We're still going to lose more jobs. We're still in recession, clearly in recession. And we have also been suffering from a foreclosure crisis where we've lost more than 3 million homes to foreclosure.

What that totals to is of course there is more expenditure when you are talking about trying to get out of a recession and a foreclosure crisis--which every economist, reputable economist, at least, that we've heard from on either side of the aisle says that the kind of recovery package that we have passed only 2 weeks ago was important to be able to put a bottom under this recession, under the foreclosure crisis, and such. The foreclosure crisis caused by total lack of any kind of regulation of the financial industry has occurred under their watch.

So here we are, we have a recovery package which actually does increase the expenditure over what would be the normal expenditure in a given year. Our regular budget that we're passing is only the regular budget. The stimulus package is above that, and it needs to be above that. And they've got to stop being in denial of how we got there and why we're having to do this.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to celebrate the founding of Amherst, Massachusetts 250 years ago on February 13, 1759. The following history provided by the Amherst Historical Society paints a fascinating picture of a town I have been honored to represent my entire legislative career.

Two hundred fifty years ago, a section of Hadley, Massachusetts became the district of Amherst when local men petitioned the government of Massachusetts Bay to incorporate Hadley's Second Precinct (as Amherst was officially called) as a district which could hold town meetings and govern itself. On February 13, 1759, a bill was passed and the royal governor, Thomas Pownall, named the new district ``Amherst'' to honor his friend General Jeffery Amherst, who had recently led a successful military expedition against the French in Canada.

Hadley famers, who had been grazing their cattle on Amherst lands since the late 1600s,

called this land by many names--Hadley Farms, East Farms, Hadley Outer Commons, East Hadley, New Swamp, and event Foote's Folly Swamp. Hadley farmers didn't think much of Amherst's soil as compared with the richer soils closer to the Connecticut River, but the Amherst land was fertile enough and, during a brief peaceful period in the late 1720s, a few farmers ventured to establish Amherst homesteads.

In the 1750s, more farms sprang up and the population of ``East Hadley'' topped that of the original settlement, but inhabitants were still required to travel to Hadley to conduct town business and pay taxes, for which they received little in return. This led, naturally, to the locals desire to govern themselves.

But Amherst's history goes back much farther. About 1,000 years ago, native peoples who lived and fanned all over Southern New England, including the area that became Amherst, met regularly at sites along the Connecticut River for fishing, feasting, and socializing. The Norwottucks, one of those groups, traveled through Amherst and probably set up temporary campsites along the Fort and Mill Rivers. They used two major trails, a path that later became Bay Road and one in the area of Pulpit Hill and East Leverett Roads.

The beginnings of the town we know today were not only built by those original farmers from Hadley and surrounding communities but by Africans who were brought here as slaves, torn from their homelands and families. Up through the 1770s, slaves were bought, sold, leased, and traded in Amherst. They worked on their owners' houses and farms and were always subject to being sold away from their families. During this same period, several free blacks also lived in Amherst.

Today, descendants from every group representing Amherst's ``First Comers'' can be found living in town and throughout the Connecticut River Valley.

What distinguished Amherst from other Connecticut Valley farming towns was an early interest in education. Between 1814 and 1821, Amherst citizens established both Amherst Academy and Amherst College. As early as 1847, Massachusetts citizens began thinking about the need for agricultural education, which paved the way for the founding of the Massachusetts Agricultural College in Amherst in 1863. In this same period, Amherst boasted small-scale manufacturing (and later large- scale hat factories) but without a large, powerful river, manufacturing never blossomed as it did in other Massachusetts communities. Amherst remained an agricultural and educational community.

It was the establishment of the University of Massachusetts in 1947 and its post-World War II expansion, the opening of Hampshire College in 1970, and the attendant population increase and development boom that threatened Amherst's small town character and natural beauty. Citizens responded with local laws to preserve agricultural land and to limit development. By the late 1960s, the town was noted for being progressive and socially conscious, with outspoken citizens bringing national and international issues to the local level. This independent spirit, combined with good schools, open spaces, and a vibrant intellectual life, has made Amherst a magnet for newcomers.

There are also other Amhersts: a home to immigrants from all over the world; a place where machinists and shop owners work and goods are made and sold; a place where people struggle to make ends meet amid social services spread then; and a town caught between residents' high expectations for schools and services and a tax base largely funded by property tax on private residences. Slightly more than half of Amherst's land is in use by the colleges and university or remains under conservation or agricultural restriction. Townspeople watch and wait as the resolutions to these economic issues evolve and define Amherst's future.

Once again, I am proud and honored to represent this town rich in history and community. Please join me in congratulating the Town of Amherst as it celebrates its 250th Founders Day.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this Economic Recovery bill that will put America back to work and throw a life-line to the millions of people that are struggling to support their families.

In the last four months alone, the economy has lost over 2 million jobs. By the end of 2009, an additional 3-5 million Americans could lose their jobs and without this package, the unemployment rate is likely to rise to 12 percent.

Mr. Speaker, the transportation and housing investments in this bill will create jobs, generate economic growth, and significantly improve our transportation and housing infrastructure.

The bill appropriates over $48 billion for surface transportation and aviation and over $13 billion for housing investment.

Within the $48 billion for transportation over 75 percent of that money will quickly go to the states through existing authorized formula programs for ready to go highway and transit projects. This funding will create over 1 million new jobs.

Among discretionary transportation initiatives, $8 billion is provided for high-speed and intercity passenger rail which is an historic investment in America's future.

The bill invests in the nation's public housing, provides funding to communities hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis to purchase and rehabilitate foreclosed housing, and includes money to fill financing gaps in the Low Income Housing Tax Credit caused by the collapse of the credit market. Together these housing appropriations will yield about 250,000 jobs.

While I believe more must still be done to adequately invest in public transit and to help communities with the growing number of foreclosures, we must not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

This is a good bill Mr. Speaker and I urge a yes vote.