Floor Statements

Mr. President, I am pleased to join the chairman of the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, Senator Cochran, to introduce the National Veterinary Medical Service Act. This bill will offer veterinarians a valuable opportunity to serve where they are needed most, while receiving help in paying off their often burdensome student loans.

The cost of becoming a veterinarian is tremendous. Unless aspiring veterinarians come from a wealthy background, they will have accumulated substantial debt by the time they leave school. Because of this debt, their postgraduate opportunities for employment are greatly limited to the geographical areas and types of jobs where incomes meet the burden of student loan repayment. By defraying some of this debt, this bill will help veterinarians to take jobs where there are shortages of veterinarians--such as meat and poultry inspectors in the Federal Government, or in rural areas where large animal practitioners are needed.

Many of these unfilled positions are essential to ensuring the health and food security of Americans. We need to keep the Federal Government staffed with skilled veterinarians in order to maintain a safe food supply and the health of our livestock and poultry. We have all seen the devastating effects diseases such as E. coli O157:H7, Salmonella and Foot and Mouth Disease can have on the livestock and poultry industries and the human and economic toll they can take.

I have worked on many initiatives to address the uneven distribution of medical professionals. Although it often can require extra incentives to get these professionals where they are needed, they often transform these shortage areas by providing critically important services. I have been very happy with the ability of past bills to enable medical professionals to go where they are needed, and I am confident the National Veterinary Medical Service Act will be as successful for veterinarians. I am proud to cosponsor this bill, and I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Jason Eaton and Melissa Hall of my staff be granted floor privileges for the duration of the week.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Senators Conrad, Roberts and others in introducing the Voluntary Public Access and Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program Act of 2003. This bill offers an excellent opportunity to help conserve wildlife habitat, increase the amount of land available for outdoor recreational activities, and help farmers and ranchers.

Hunting and other outdoor activities are very popular and are an important part of our country's heritage. Unfortunately, the shortage of public land in some States limits the ability of people to enjoy these activities. Providing incentives to increase public access to private lands can enhance outdoor recreational opportunities and help rural economies.

In many rural areas businesses associated with wildlife recreation, such as sporting goods stores, campgrounds, and motels and hotels, are an important part of the economy. By increasing the lands available for outdoor recreation, not only will more local residents be able to enjoy this activity, but we will also encourage more people to visit rural areas, bringing additional revenue to these rural communities. When hunting, bird watching or hiking on accessible lands, visitors stay in local lodging, purchase goods in stores and eat in restaurants. The money generated from these activities is good for rural economies.

In many States, such as Iowa, many farmers and landowners have traditionally granted hunters and other outdoor recreationists permission to use their land when asked. This bill will help compensate owners and operators of farm and ranch land for their generosity and also encourage more of them to provide such access to their land. And, of course, this bill will benefit wildlife by encouraging landowners and operators to maintain, increase and improve habitat for wildlife.

In States access programs now operating, information listing enrolled private land is often readily available to allow recreationists to access the land without the need to bother the owners to ask for permission. Many existing programs also have the very important benefit of reducing the liability of landowners and operators in case of injury to people using their land. State programs also help ensure enforcement of hunting and other regulations and help landowners and operators posts signs and information.

Currently at least 13 States have public access programs that would be eligible for funds from this bill. While Iowa currently does not have a program, there is great interest in starting a program, and I believe this bill will enable Iowa to start one. This bill provides flexibility to allow States to design programs to meet the particular needs and interests of landowners and recreationists in each State while at the same time ensuring that the goals of increasing wildlife habitat and available lands for public recreation are met.

I am proud to cosponsor this bill and urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Senators Conrad, Roberts and others in introducing the Voluntary Public Access and Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program Act of 2003. This bill offers an excellent opportunity to help conserve wildlife habitat, increase the amount of land available for outdoor recreational activities, and help farmers and ranchers.

Hunting and other outdoor activities are very popular and are an important part of our country's heritage. Unfortunately, the shortage of public land in some States limits the ability of people to enjoy these activities. Providing incentives to increase public access to private lands can enhance outdoor recreational opportunities and help rural economies.

In many rural areas businesses associated with wildlife recreation, such as sporting goods stores, campgrounds, and motels and hotels, are an important part of the economy. By increasing the lands available for outdoor recreation, not only will more local residents be able to enjoy this activity, but we will also encourage more people to visit rural areas, bringing additional revenue to these rural communities. When hunting, bird watching or hiking on accessible lands, visitors stay in local lodging, purchase goods in stores and eat in restaurants. The money generated from these activities is good for rural economies.

In many States, such as Iowa, many farmers and landowners have traditionally granted hunters and other outdoor recreationists permission to use their land when asked. This bill will help compensate owners and operators of farm and ranch land for their generosity and also encourage more of them to provide such access to their land. And, of course, this bill will benefit wildlife by encouraging landowners and operators to maintain, increase and improve habitat for wildlife.

In States access programs now operating, information listing enrolled private land is often readily available to allow recreationists to access the land without the need to bother the owners to ask for permission. Many existing programs also have the very important benefit of reducing the liability of landowners and operators in case of injury to people using their land. State programs also help ensure enforcement of hunting and other regulations and help landowners and operators posts signs and information.

Currently at least 13 States have public access programs that would be eligible for funds from this bill. While Iowa currently does not have a program, there is great interest in starting a program, and I believe this bill will enable Iowa to start one. This bill provides flexibility to allow States to design programs to meet the particular needs and interests of landowners and recreationists in each State while at the same time ensuring that the goals of increasing wildlife habitat and available lands for public recreation are met.

I am proud to cosponsor this bill and urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I was trying to hear that. I ask for at least 10 minutes on the Leahy amendment and 10 minutes on the Daschle amendment. I may not take it all.

I understand I am allowed 10 minutes to speak on the Leahy amendment.

Madam President, first, I commend the Senator from Vermont for raising the issue of funding for technical assistance for farm bill conservation programs. The technical assistance, as provided by the staff of the Natural Resource Conservation Service and other qualified providers such as engineers or agronomists, includes planning, designing, construction and implementation of conservation practices on agricultural land--this assistance is essential to allow farmers, ranchers, and landowners to carry out conservation practices.

This amendment, as I understand it, would cut off funding for technical assistance for the Conservation Reserve Program. For that reason, I cannot support the amendment.

Cutting off technical assistance would effectively preclude new enrollments in the CRP program, including the continuous CRP and the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, otherwise known as CREP, thus hurting the environment, wildlife, and land owners.

I only have 10 minutes. I will have to ask for more time if I can.

I appreciate the explanation of the Senator from Vermont. As I understand it, I ask the Senator from Vermont, does this not prevent the transfer of money from donor programs?

I could be wrong. I want to understand, if I can make a few more comments, and let the Senator from Vermont see if this is a correct interpretation. Prior to the passage of the farm bill in 2002, there was a shortage of technical assistance funding because the 1996 farm bill limited technical assistance funding to that amount available under section 11 of the CCC. That was $56 million a year. This became known as the section 11 cap.

The 2002 farm bill corrected this problem by providing an alternative source for technical assistance funds. What we did was we included a provision in the conservation title of the farm bill that technical assistance funding would come directly from the funds provided for each conservation program.

This approach was not novel or untested. Congress relied on similar language in the 1996 farm bill providing funding for technical assistance for the EQIP program, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, directly from EQIP funds and outside the section 11 cap. We adopted this approach for all environmental programs to ensure there would be adequate funding for technical assistance. We all agreed on that approach. That is in the 2002 farm bill.

Soon after the passage of the farm bill, we got a big shock from the Bush administration because they announced that the section 11 cap still applied, despite the language we had put in the farm bill.

Despite the opinion of Nancy Bryson, General Counsel at USDA, and despite the opinion of the GAO, the General Accounting Office, that the 2002 farm bill provided new authority for funding technical assistance, not subject to the section 11 cap, the White House, through OMB and then the Department of Justice, decided that the farm bill's conservation program funds could not be used for technical assistance because they were limited to the section 11 cap, thereby, largely blocking implementation of the conservation programs.

We attempted to fix this in the fiscal year 2003 omnibus appropriations bill. As a result, funds from the dollar-limited conservation programs are now used to pay for technical assistance for all the conservation programs, including the Conservation Reserve Program and the Wetlands Reserve Program, which are acreage limited programs.

Senator Leahy, I believe, is correct that we now have a situation in which money that the farm bill provided for some conservation programs is being diverted to pay for technical assistance for others. Because of this problem, there is less conservation money going to producers and landowners than was intended or provided in the farm bill.

In fiscal year 2003, almost $91 million in conservation funds were lost because that amount of money was taken from some programs and used to provide technical assistance for other programs. If the White House had implemented the farm bill as intended and as we got the opinion from the general counsel at USDA, this would not have happened.

However, two wrongs don't make a right, and my problem, as I understand it, with the Leahy amendment--and I stand to be corrected by the author of the amendment--is that what would happen under this amendment is it would effectively mean that under the Conservation Reserve Program, we would not be able to enroll any new land. We would not be able to continue the continuous sign-up in the CRP program. We would not be able to continue the agreements we have in the CREP, the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program.

That is why, as I understand the Senator's amendment, it says that the donor programs are not available for technical assistance funds for CRP, but doesn't provide an alternative source.

I ask the Senator from Vermont, does his amendment take away the section 11 cap? If we do away with the section 11 cap unequivocally and we go back to what we provided in the 2002 farm bill, then maybe the Senator's amendment is fine. That is not the way I read it.

I yield to the Senator to correct me if I am wrong.

I agree with the Senator that USDA should have followed the farm bill and the White House simply choose not to do so.

Madam President, I say to the Senator from Vermont that we go back to CCC, but the section 11 cap still applies and there would be no funding technical assistance for CRP. The Senator has to know that under the Senator's amendment, new enrollments for CRP will effectively come to an end.

Madam President, I ask for at least 5 more minutes, after yielding time.

Madam President, I understand what the Senator is doing, but two wrongs do not make a right. Now, if the Senator wants to have an amendment that would lift the section 11 cap, or that would clearly spell out that the farm bill once again in 2002--what we did--bypassed the section 11 cap, that is fine.

As I understand it, as I read his amendment, as my staff has informed me, as I have looked at it, that is not what the amendment does. The amendment simply, as the Senator said, builds firewalls. By building firewalls, that goes against what we did in the 2003 omnibus bill, because in the omnibus bill we provided for a mechanism that said we could then use these funds for technical assistance, and that is exactly what we are doing.

Again, I say that the Senator from Vermont is correct in that we have a

situation in which money that the farm bill provided for some conservation programs is being diverted to pay for technical assistance for others. I am all for changing that but not in the way the Senator wants, because the way the Senator wants effectively cuts off signing up for the CRP program.

I am a big supporter of the EQIP program, and FPP and WHIP and GRP. That is fine, and they should be fully funded, as they were in our farm bill, but we cannot abandon the CRP program. That is exactly what the effect of this amendment would do.

Those of us from those States in which we have the CRP program or the CRP program in which we have continuous signup, this would take money away from this very effective program. Almost all states have land enrolled in CRP and there are 23 states that have CREPs--new enrollments in those and continuous CRP would come to a halt.

We could solve this problem of TA funding for CRP and WRP for, according to estimates from USDA, $100 million a year or for $300 million from fiscal year 2004 to fiscal year 2006. Three hundred million dollars would take care of the whole thing. Yet the administration will not provide this money at all.

The President requested nearly $900 million this year for Iraq to have funds for irrigation equipment and the protection of marshlands in the Supplemental. So we have $900 million to go to Iraq for irrigation equipment and protection of marshlands, and $300 million would take care of our entire country in terms of the Conservation Reserve Program and the Wetlands Reserve Program for three years.

There are ways of fixing this, I say to my friend from Vermont, and ways that we agreed upon in the farm bill. The Senator from Vermont and I were together on the farm bill. We agreed on how to do this, but this is not the way to do it now.

I would join with the Senator in any kind of an amendment to get rid of the section 11 cap. That is the answer right there, get rid of the section 11 cap.

We effectively did that in the farm bill. The administration says no. Well, an amendment to that line would do that.

In closing, the major wildlife groups in this country, from Ducks Unlimited, Izaak Walton League of America, National Audubon Society, Pheasants Forever, the Wildlife Society, and Wildlife Management Institute do not support this amendment. They sent a letter to both Chairman Bennett and Ranking Member Kohl that said they can't support this amendment if it would have a chilling effect on CRP.

Again, I find myself in a strange position because in many ways I agree with the Senator from Vermont. He is right in what he is trying to do in terms of saying that we have to have more funding for technical assistance, but not in this manner because it would effectively stop the CRP program.

I am sorry. I did not realize the parliamentary situation. Are these two votes going to be lumped together?

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, the 2002 farm bill included an important program, known as country-of-origin labeling, that adds value to farm products and gives consumers more information about the origin of foods they buy for their families. Opponents of the law have used scare tactics and false information in an attempt to water down or overturn this important program.

Unfortunately, the opponents of the law persuaded the House Appropriations agricultural subcommittee to cancel funding to carry out this program as it applies to labeling for meat. This is the wrong course. USDA needs the funding to continue the rule making process so the program is workable as it was intended by the farm bill.

A large number of other countries have country-of-origin labeling. The General Accounting Office has found that of the 57 U.S. trading partners, 48 require country-of-origin labeling for one or more of the commodities covered by our country-of-origin labeling law.

In this country, over 135 organizations, from the American Farm Bureau Federation, the National Farmers Union, and the Consumer Federation of America--broad support--support country-of-origin labeling for meat. These organizations represent the will of producers and consumers across our country.

Several academic studies in the last year have examined the benefits of country-of-origin labeling for meat. For example, the International Agricultural Trade and Policy Center at the University of Florida found that the benefits of labeling beef clearly outweighed the costs. Research by Colorado State University found that consumers were willing to pay an 11-percent premium on steak and a 24-percent premium for country-of-origin labeling on hamburger.

This research reflects the desire for country-of-origin labeling of meat. Country-of-origin labeling for meat is law. It is law right now. It became law when President Bush signed the 2002 farm bill. Whether or not the Agriculture appropriations bill funds the program, the law still requires meat to be labeled. Removing funding essentially creates a situation where retailers will still be legally required to label meat but USDA will have no funding to provide oversight and work out in a meaningful manner any problems that exist within the meat-labeling regulations.

Then again next year the same debate will come before Congress, asking us to remove funding, asking us to delay country-of-origin labeling for meat for another year. This is just a 1-year bill. The law is already there on the books. Removing funding as the House Appropriations Committee did does not solve any problems. It only creates more problems down the road for the program that is already in the law and that would provide consumers the information they want.

Madam President, it was interesting that in the House appropriations bill, they cut out funding for country-of-origin labeling for meat but, guess what, they left the money in there for country-of-origin labeling for peanuts. They

left the money in there for country-of-origin labeling for fish. They left the money for country-of-origin labeling in there for vegetables. They left the money for country-of-origin labeling in there for fruit. But not meat.

Right away you have to ask yourself a question: What is this all about? Why would they say consumers ought to have the right to know where their fish comes from, but not their meat? Why would they say consumers ought to have the right to know where their peanuts come from, but not their meat?

The fact is, a few in this country--a few, and I mean a few--are trying to overcome in the appropriations process what they could not succeed in doing when we passed the farm bill. They were there. They testified. They had their proposals. They didn't want country-of-origin labeling. We voted on it and it was passed in the House, it was passed in the Senate, it was kept in conference, and the President signed it. Now they are attempting to undo that through the appropriations process. That is why we have to speak loudly and clearly that we want to make sure the law is carried forward.

As I pointed out, even if you don't fund it, retailers will still have to abide by the law. They will still have to give us country-of- origin labeling on meat. It just means the Department of Agriculture will not be able to help them clear up any confusion that may arise. That is the worst possible position in which we could put our retailers. We ought to give them the assistance, the help, the support, the advice, the consultation the Department of Agriculture should do to implement this law.

Before I close, I want to take a moment to say I am pleased the Senate supported the amendment by Senators Dorgan and Burns, which I cosponsored, to increase the funding level of the Rural Broadband Loan Program. I worked to include the loan program in the 2002 farm bill to help bring high-speed Internet to rural farm communities across the country.

Since its launch, there have been more than $1 billion in loan applications to build the broadband infrastructure. This extra funding will go a long way to ensure this program remains strong and can provide the resources needed to ensure rural America keeps faith with its urban neighbors in the 21st century.

In closing, I don't know if I will have time to speak again on the bill. I think we are coming close to voting. First, let me commend the chairman and ranking member for putting together a great Agriculture appropriations bill. I thank them for accepting the rural broadband provisions, as well as many other very good provisions. If we can past the amendment that was just offered here, I think we will have a tremendous Agriculture appropriations bill.

I commend the chairman and commend the ranking member for the excellent job they have done on this bill.

I yield the floor.

The 2002 farm bill reauthorized and increased funding for the Initiative for Future Agriculture and Food Systems, IFAFS, competitive grants program, a program originally authorized as section 401 of the Agricultural Research, Extension, and Education Reform Act of 1998. The Initiative supports outcome-oriented, integrated research, extension, and education competitive grants to address critical emerging agricultural and rural issues related to four key areas: future food production, environmental quality and natural resource management, farm income, and rural economic and business and community development.

The farm bill provides $140 million in mandatory funds from the Commodity Credit Corporation for IFAFS in fiscal year 2004. The appropriations bill before us contains a provision which prohibits the Department from implementing IFAFS in fiscal year 2004. However, the bill also allows the Department to use 20 percent of funding appropriated for the National Research Initiative, NRI, to carry out a competitive grants program under the same terms and conditions as those provided in the farm bill for IFAFS. The bill as amended also requires the Department,

in implementing this provision, to request grant proposals, among the four critical emerging issues required by law, for which the Department has not issued requests for proposals for grants in fiscal year 2002 or 2003.

I ask the distinguished chairman and ranking member if it is their understanding that in requiring this funding set-aside to be carried out under the same ``terms and conditions'' as the IFAFS program that the Senate bill intends for the Department to ensure that over time, all four statutorily-designated purposes for IFAFS spending are subjects for requests for proposals and reflected in the overall research portfolio of this portion of the NRI?

Is it further the understanding of the Senator that the language added by amendment today requires the Department to request proposals that specifically enhance farm income and rural economic, business, and community development?

I thank the distinguished chairman and ranking member. I would also point out to my colleagues that the 2002 farm bill provided specific direction for the Department to pursue grant making for integrated research, education, and extension in key areas related to rural and agriculturally-based development and farm profitability and rural entrepreneurship. I would inform my colleagues that it is my intent to ensure the Department solicits proposals in at least some of these critical areas during fiscal year 2004.

conservation technical assistance program

Mr. President, it is widely felt that we need to do more to protect field crops, farm animals and food processing and distribution of food from terrorist acts. I understand that is the view of the Departments of Agriculture and Homeland Security. State and local governments and the private sector all play an integral role in detecting, deterring, and responding to acts of agro-terrorism.

We need coordination among the States in regard to subjects like laboratory capacity and testing protocols; training and education protocols; the tracking of animal and food product movements; and post- incident actions such as rapid response teams, common incident command structures, quarantine procedures, public information management strategies, and coordination with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and State and local public health authorities.

I believe that the Department of Agriculture needs to be as supportive as possible of such efforts.

Mr. President, I concur with the remarks made by the Senator from Arkansas and also express my support for increased funding for civil rights and for minority farmers at the Department of Agriculture.

In the most recent farm bill, the Committee on Agriculture once again took up the issue of civil rights at USDA. Dismayed by continued complaints from both clients and employees about the inhospitable atmosphere towards minorities at USDA, the farm bill created, for the first time, the position of Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights. That position has been filled for several months now, and I am hopeful that the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights will be able to create positive movement in this regard. It is past time for USDA to shed the shameful nickname, ``The Last Plantation,'' that many have given it due to its civil rights atmosphere.

The House recognized the necessity of doing more for socially disadvantaged farmers and USDA employees earlier this year when it passed by voice vote an amendment to the Agriculture appropriations bill that increased funding for several important civil rights functions. First, it increased funding for the Office of Civil Rights by several million dollars. These additional funds will enable the Department to clear out its backlog of hundreds of civil rights complaints, many of which stagnate for months and months. We need to wipe the slate clean. As long as USDA is unable to deal with this backlog it will be difficult for it to concentrate on its primary task; preventing such complaints from arising in the first place and making the Department of Agriculture hospitable to all farmers regardless of race, sex, or creed.

The House-passed amendment also increased funding for the section 2501 Program for Socially Disadvantaged Farmers. Despite being the primary program by which to make USDA programs available to minority farmers, the section 2501 program has been flat-funded for several years. The Senate bill before us today provides a little over $3 million for the section 2501 program. This modest increase over last year's funding is a commendable start, but it is not nearly enough. The House bill, on the other hand, increased funding by $5 million to a total of over $8 million. The level provided in the House bill is clearly more consistent with the need to reach out to minority and socially-disadvantaged farmers. I hope that the chairman and ranking member of the committee will agree to the House funding levels for this program in the conference committee.

Mr. President, I say to Senators Akaka and Kohl, I would like to clarify a specific matter related to amendment no. 2088 to S. 1427 concerning the protection of downed animals. First of all, I applaud their efforts to protect this Nation's food supply and minimize the suffering of nonambulatory animals. The clarification I have concerns animals raised by farmers and then custom processed so that all of the meat and meat products from that animal will be for the farmer's personal use. I understand that this amendment does not affect a Federally inspected facility's ability to engage in this type of processing. Am I correct that consistent with 21 U.S.C. 623(a), this section does not affect the ability of establishments at which inspection occurs under the Federal Meat Inspection Act, 21 U.S.C. 601, to slaughter animals or prepare meat or meat food products on a custom basis where the animal is raised by the person and the meat and meat products are for the exclusive use of the person and the person's household, nonpaying guests, and employees?

Thank you for that clarification.

asian long-horned beetle

Mr. President, I comment on the Hatch-Harkin-Durbin amendment No. 2090 adopted by the Senate yesterday. This action taken by the Senate is an important step in our continuing efforts to assure that Americans have access to high quality dietary supplements to maintain and improve their health.

Over 158 million Americans take dietary supplements to maintain and improve their health. From vitamin C to calcium to glucosamine to beta carotene, there is a full range of healthful supplements that are part of the daily lives of people all over this country.

Consumer expenditures on these products reached a reported $17.1 billion in 2000, double the amount spent just 6 years earlier. And, according to a recent report by the Food and Drug Administration, the use of dietary supplements is likely to grow due to factors such as the aging of the baby-boom generation, increased interest in self- sufficiency, and advances in science that are uncovering new relationships between diet and disease.

In response to efforts by the Food and Drug Administration to inappropriately cut off consumers' access to some supplements, in 1994, the House and Senate unanimously approved the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act, DSHEA. I was pleased to have played a role in crafting this important legislation. This law balanced continued consumer access to vitamins, minerals and other dietary supplements, increased scientific research on the benefits and risks of supplements and needed consumer protections.

DSHEA provides a number of important consumer protections. It requires that claims made on supplement labels, packaging and accompanying material be ``truthful, non-misleading and substantiated.'' In addition, the act prohibits manufacturers from making claims that products are intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent a disease.

DSHEA also provides for good manufacturing practice standards setting requirements for potency, cleanliness and stability of products. It requires that manufacturers submit adequate information as to the safety of any new ingredients contained in dietary supplements before those products can be sold.

DSHEA also provided the Federal Government a number of avenues for the removal of unsafe dietary supplements from the marketplace. If the FDA determines that a product poses an unreasonable risk when taken as directed, the product can be removed from the market. If the Secretary determines that a product poses an imminent hazard to the public health, he can remove the product from sale.

Finally, in order to promote expanded scientific research on the benefits and health effects of dietary supplements, DSHEA mandated the establishment of the Office of Dietary Supplements within the National Institutes of Health. This research is crucial to expanding reliable information to the American people.

Unfortunately, despite some recent improvement, the history of implementation of DSHEA by the FDA has been poor. The Food and Drug Administration has failed to use the many tools provided by DSHEA. It has failed to carefully review claims for truthfulness. It has failed to put in place new good manufacturing practice standards. It has failed to aggressively remove from the market illegal street drug knock-offs and other products which are in clear violation of DSHEA requirements.

Part of the problem has been resources. The FDA needs adequate resources to appropriately implement and enforce DSHEA. Congress has responded by regularly providing funds over the last several years beyond those requested in the President's budget, reaching $9.7 million in fiscal year 2003.

The amendment we approved yesterday would increase funding for implementation and enforcement of DSHEA by at least 17.5 percent. It requires FDA to spend no less than $11.4 million for this purpose, $1 million more than requested by the administration. This is a substantial and necessary increase. I would like to see even more devoted to this purpose. In fact, S. 1538, legislation Senator Hatch and I introduced earlier this year would increase FDA funding to $20 million next year, rising to $65 million per year within 5 years. We will continue to work to gain adoption of this more aggressive approach.

I thank the chair and ranking member of the Agriculture Appropriations subcommittee for their willingness to work with us and gain approval of this important consumer protection amendment. I also want to express my support for an amendment Senator Durbin offered to expedite the FDA's action on dietary supplements containing ephedra. The FDA should make a decision promptly on this matter and it should be based on sound science.

I concur in this approach and also assure my colleagues of my support for continued funding for education in the FSM and RMI under this new authorization.

Mr. President, the assistance in this supplemental appropriations bill for victims of Hurricane Isabel and the California wildfires is certainly much needed and justified. Both of these disasters were vividly portrayed in images on television, newspapers, and the Internet. Those images drove home the need for help.

We have a strong history of providing assistance from the Federal Government to help our citizens survive and recover from natural disasters. As nearly all previous disaster aid, the assistance in this supplemental appropriations bill for both Hurricane Isabel and the California wildfires does not require a budget offset.

We did not tell the victims of the hurricane or the wildfires that in their time of need they had to go find money elsewhere in the Federal budget. We did not tell these victims of disaster they had to give up something that they had coming to them in order to get the help they critically need.

Last year, many States across the middle of the United States were suffering from a terrible drought, and there were additional agricultural disasters in other parts of our country.

Now, drought is not as spectacular as a hurricane or a fire; that is true. The damage occurs over several months, even years, not days or weeks. But the financial and human losses are still acutely real--lost farms and ranches as they are driven out of business. Farmers and ranchers have to sell off cattle and other livestock. They have dramatically reduced crop yields or no crops at all, just as if a fire had gone through. There are huge financial losses to farmers and ranchers all over our country. There are the loss of homes, loss of businesses, impacts on local communities that may never come back. There is heavy damage to the economy in the drought areas. Without help, many lives would be dramatically changed for the worse in these drought-stricken areas.

Last year, we were told by the White House the only way we could get this disaster aid for agriculture was to cut back on the farm bill we had passed just several months before. For years, agricultural disaster aid has been treated as emergency spending--because it is--and not needing an offset in the budget. That is what we did for the wildfires in California and Hurricane Isabel that hit our Nation's Capital and communities on the east coast. We treated it as emergency spending.

In other words, in effect the White House said the victims of drought over the last couple years on farms and ranches, the victims of other natural kinds of disasters in agriculture, had to finance their own help by cutting the agricultural programs so important to their livelihood.

So in the omnibus appropriations bill last February, agricultural disaster assistance was financed by cutting the farm bill. Disaster assistance last year was estimated at $3.1 billion. To generate an offset of that amount, the conservation title of the farm bill was cut back. The Conservation Security Program was capped and its funding sharply reduced to pay for that $3.1 billion.

It is ironic and shortsighted that the funds for agricultural natural disasters would be taken from the conservation title of the farm bill. Drought is, of course, devastating to soil, plants, and animals. But it is conservation practices that help farmers and ranchers conserve and enhance natural resources and, in fact, lessen the potential impacts of future drought and natural disasters.

This support for conservation is much like the mitigation money the Federal Emergency Management Agency provides. When FEMA responds to a natural disaster, the Agency also provides additional dollars for measures to avoid losses in future similar disasters in that State. The farm bill's conservation programs likewise guard against future disaster losses.

Taking money from the farm bill's conservation title to pay for disaster assistance in the omnibus bill set a very bad precedent, one that will haunt us in the future when we seek to respond to natural disasters affecting agriculture. That action in the omnibus bill ignored the way previous agricultural disaster aid had been funded as emergency spending. It is also exactly the opposite of the policy we follow for nonagricultural disasters.

Fortunately, this precedent was not followed in funding relief for Hurricane Isabel and the California wildfire victims, and it should not have been. Those disasters were emergencies, and we should pay for the assistance by treating it as emergency spending, which we are doing in this supplemental appropriations bill.

By the same token, farmers and ranchers should not have been forced to pay for their own disaster assistance earlier this year. That was an emergency, and it should have been funded just as disaster aid in this bill was funded as an emergency.

So, Mr. President, I did not seek in any way to hold up this supplemental appropriations bill. There are many parts of it I was opposed to in terms of the way we are writing a blank check for some of the Iraq rebuilding. And I do not mean to impede emergency funding for California or Maryland or Virginia or any other States that were hit by these natural disasters. These are emergencies. We should respond as a nation to these emergencies.

The terrible precedent of taking money from the farm bill earlier this year should be reversed, and the conservation funds that were taken away from farmers and ranchers should be replaced. The damage to the Conservation Security Program should be repaired so the program is made whole, as it was enacted in the farm bill, passed by the Senate, passed by the House, and signed by the President. The President had loudly proclaimed as one of the reasons he was signing it the strong conservation measures in that farm bill.

Because of the way the money was taken out in the omnibus appropriations bill, as it came back to us as a conference report, there was no ability for any of us to amend it or to have an up-or-down vote on whether or not we wanted to have emergency funding taken out of the farm bill for disaster aid. But that is how it was done.

So, I take this time to point out the difference between how we are paying for the assistance for the wildfires in California and Hurricane Isabel here on

the east coast and how farmers and ranchers were treated earlier this year when they critically needed disaster assistance. Their disasters were perhaps not as visually dramatic as the wildfires or the hurricane but they nonetheless had devastating losses from disaster that had taken place over months, sometimes over years.

Our nation's farmers and ranchers should have been treated the same way as the victims of the wildfires in California or the victims here on the east coast of Hurricane Isabel. It is up to us to restore the funding that was taken away, to make farmers and ranchers whole, to make our conservation programs whole, and to recognize that when we have emergencies, when we have disasters, regardless of whether it is in California or New York or Iowa or Florida, or wherever it might be, regardless of whether it is homeowners or businesses or communities, yacht basins or beach homes or whatever, farmers and ranchers ought to be treated the same way with emergency funding.

So again, I will not do anything to hold up the bill or anything like that, but I just wanted to make my point that we have to treat everyone the same in this country when it comes to disasters.

(At the request of Mr. Daschle, the following statement was ordered to be printed in the Record.)

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Dennis O'Connor of my staff be granted floor privileges for the duration of today's session.

Mr. President, 50 years ago, James Watson and Francis Crick were identifying the double-helix molecule of DNA. The first embryo transfers from donor cows to recipients were made. The Korean War ended. And the Agricultural Research Service was created.

The creation of ARS was not the beginning of the Department of Agriculture's efforts in agricultural research. President Abraham Lincoln signed the act creating the department, which included the charge to ``acquire and diffuse among the people of the United States useful information . . . and to procure, propagate, and distribute among the people new and valuable seeds and plants.'' The Department's commitment to agricultural research reaches back nearly 150 years. The ARS itself was created by Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson through a reorganization of the former Agricultural Research Administration, on November 2, 1953.

In its 50 years of service, the ARS has discovered dozens of ways to protect crops and livestock from pests and disease. It has improved the quality and safety of agricultural products. It has played a critical role in developing nutrition standards and carrying out nutrition research. It has also developed techniques to maintain the quality of our soil, perhaps our greatest renewable natural resource. Its research has helped farmers work more efficiently and profitably. And it has worked to develop ways to keep food affordable for consumers.

My State has been one of the greatest beneficiaries of ARS research, and the National Animal Disease Center at Ames, Iowa has played a vital role over the years in carrying out the mission of ARS.

Hog cholera was one of the greatest problems faced by hog farmers in this country for more than 130 years, since it was first reported in Ohio in 1833. Outbreaks occurred frequently over the years, some resulting in the loss of more than one in 10 hogs in the U.S. In the early 1960's, hog cholera was still costing farmers $50 million per year.

Agricultural research at USDA on hog cholera, much of it carried out in Ames, IA, dates back to the 1903 discovery of the hog cholera virus. ARS large scale studies starting in 1961 developed and tested a program to immunize hogs against cholera using killed virus. On the advice of ARS, USDA regulatory officials banned interstate shipment of live virus or animals vaccinated with live virus. In January 1978, Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland announced that, as a result of an aggressive campaign that employed the treatment techniques developed by ARS, that hog cholera had been entirely eradicated.

ARS has had many similar successes. The eradication of screwworm in cattle and Marek's disease in chickens has saved an untold amount of money by preventing livestock losses. It is estimated that the savings from the Marek's disease program is 44.3 times it's cost for every dollar spent on immunization, $44.30 is saved. For those who suggest that domestic government spending does not help the economy, the work of ARS stands as a great example of a program that works and helps American farmers be the best in the world.

So I salute the scientists of ARS for their 50 years of service to agriculture, and wish them 50 more. There are still many challenges to agriculture, and ARS will be there working to solve them.

Mr. President, I would like to take a few moments to discuss S. 139, the Climate Stewardship Act and lay out the reasons I am supporting this bill.

The chief reason I support this bill is that I believe, as do the majority of scientists, that global climate change is occurring, and is due in part to human activities. I also believe that the U.S. has a responsibility to provide international and domestic leadership on this issue, and to begin to take action. This body, the U.S. Senate, has now passed three separate Sense of Congress Resolutions, this year and last year, urging U.S. leadership and reengagement in the international process to address global warming, and meaningful U.S. domestic action to begin to reduce our emissions of greenhouse gases that cause climate change. Two of these resolutions were included in the comprehensive energy bills passed by this body this year and last. Despite these resolutions, the United States remains inactive on these issues. We are not displaying enough leadership on combating global warming, either domestically or abroad. And we are beginning to see some early warning signals about the consequences if we persist in our inaction.

The World Meteorological Organization, WMO, in July of this year issued an unprecedented alert, saying: ``Record extremes in weather and climate events continue to occur around the world. Recent scientific assessments indicate that, as the global temperatures continue to warm due to climate change, the number and intensity of extreme events might increase.'' They go on to say that: ``New record extreme events occur every year somewhere in the globe, but in recent years the number of such extremes has been increasing.'' And, ``(w)hile the trend towards warmer globally averaged surface temperatures has been uneven over the course of the last century, the trend for the period since 1976 is roughly three times that for the past 100 years as a whole.''

In the United States, the WMO cited record-breaking statistics in a particularly dangerous category of extreme weather events: nationwide, 562 tornadoes occurred in May, 2003, resulting in 41 deaths--a record for the number of tornadoes in any month, far surpassing the June, 1992 U.S. record of 399 tornadoes.

In Iowa, as in much of the midwest, we have been experiencing a drought--a drought that is hurting my states' farmers, and farmers across the midwest and west. These dramatic weather events that we are experiencing--the tornadoes, the drought, the warming--these are exactly what scientists have been predicting would occur with unmitigated global warming. These events should not come as a surprise to any of us, they have been predicted for some years now.

The bill we are debating, the Climate Stewardship Act, will take the first, modest steps to put into place a U.S. system to begin to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, to begin to take action. It will respond to the science, and it will do it in a manner that this administration has failed to do--with meaningful policies that will not harm the U.S. economy, but will at least put us on the right path.

Now I know some Members of this body and of some organizations and industries have expressed concerns that taking action will harm the U.S. economy, and will impact energy supplies. While their concerns are legitimate, they are misplaced, because scientists, economists and analysts in this administration and in the private sector agree that this bill that we are debating will not be onerous for the overall economy or for the various industries it impacts. The Energy Information Agency in the Department of Energy and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in separate assessments of the bill, indicate it will have minimal impacts on fuel prices and will even lower fuel prices in the case of natural gas, for instance, by generating efficiencies and providing market signals to drive efficiency. Furthermore, the bill has specific provisions to encourage clean, renewable fuel production from the agricultural sector and other sectors, which would not only reduce our reliance on imports of oil, but would also benefit the agricultural economy and the environment by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. I support those provisions.

Some critics have said that this bill would prevent the burning of coal, and would force coal-burning utilities to switch to using only natural gas. That is simply not true. Under this bill, coal use will actually increase, and financial incentives for clean coal technologies are also provided.

According to the MIT analysis of the bill, coal use will continue to expand 12 percent over current usage levels, out to 2025, which is the time frame that MIT looked at. Additionally, coal prices per metric ton are expected to drop 4 percent by 2015, and 5 percent by 2020.

A portion of the proceeds from the auctioning or sale of allowances in the bill will go to technology deployment programs. Specifically, integrated coal gasification systems will receive significant financial incentives. Such clean coal technologies are not only beneficial to the environment, but will ensure continued usage of this valuable fuel source well into the future, in an environmentally benign manner.

The agricultural sector and rural areas will continue to bear the brunt of severe weather events that can devastate farmers and rural economies as long as our inaction continues. However, U.S. agriculture can also make important, cost-effective contributions to offset a portion of U.S. emissions of greenhouse gasses in the near- and medium- term. With the proper incentives, agriculture can provide a low-cost bridge to a less fossil-fuel and greenhouse gas intensive future, while improving the sustainability and perhaps the profitability of this vital economic sector. The Climate Stewardship Act,

provides some of these incentives. A provision in the bill that I particularly support is financial incentives, through the auctioning of permits to capped sectors, to agricultural practices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including clean, renewable energy sources, such as wind power.

Agriculture can play an important role in mitigating global warming, and can provide valuable benefits to society. Carbon is a commodity already being traded and sold in this country and others, and farmers can not only ``farm'' for carbon, they can reap the rewards under this bill, and help keep costs of action down.

To make sure farmers can take advantage of this opportunity, I have negotiated with Senators McCain and Lieberman to guarantee that a specific portion of the credits that can be sold into this cap-and- trade system in the bill will be set aside for soil carbon sequestration. Soil carbon sequestration reduces U.S. net emissions of greenhouse gasses but also improves air and water quality by reducing run-off, and improves soil moisture retention. Soil carbon sequestration occurs through improved management practices such as no- till or reduced-till farming, the use of shelterbelts, grass waterways, wetland restoration, and improved irrigation systems, to name but a few. But most importantly for the farm sector, soil carbon enhances agricultural sustainability and profitability. We know this because agricultural and soil scientists have studied this issue for years--not because of global warming, but because of the associated environmental improvements and the improved crop productivity associated with greater soil carbon. These are complementary objectives with nice overlap. As a key benefit soil carbon sequestration has the potential to offset fully 10 percent of U.S. annual carbon emissions.

To help ensure that farmers and others in the agricultural sector thoroughly understand the issue of climate change, and that they can benefit from an emerging carbon market, we have negotiated additional language to institute an education and outreach initiative within USDA. The program would provide detailed information as well as technical assistance to these individuals and groups, as well as allow for the creation or utilization of existing centers on climate change.

This is a win-win policy for agriculture, for our citizens, and of course for our environment. That is why I support this bill.

I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I permitted the reading of the amendment to show how simple it is, one sentence. Basically, this amendment provides for a 5-year authorization to title I of the bill. Currently, this bill is drafted as permanent law, which means these provisions continue in perpetuity. I don't believe that should be the case.

This amendment is very reasonable and should not be controversial. It is consistent with past policy on authorizations. For example, the Wyden-Feinstein bill and others introduced in the past several months have always wisely provided for a 5-year timeline. Why this bill does not have a 5-year timeline eludes me.

Most of our major authorizing bills include a specified term of years; for example, the 2002 farm bill, the Agriculture Committee child nutrition bill, which expires every 5 years, the Transportation bill, and on and on with many others. This is particularly true of legislation that attempts to legislate a different approach than what is historical practice or that is controversial in some way. Again, those both apply here.

We are legislating a different approach than what has been historical practice. It is, obviously, somewhat controversial. In doing so, this 5-year timeframe provides a structured mechanism for Congress to review the effectiveness of this new approach. I believe it is the prudent thing to do.

The bill we are debating today would significantly change how we manage millions of acres of public land. It alters the National Environmental Public Act, NEPA, as we have discussed. As we all know, the bill changes the judicial review process in addressing hazardous fuel cases. It changes the Forest Service appeals process as well. It provides well-intended protections for old growth. But these may be lacking in some key respects. And the bill involves actions that will affect public safety and protecting communities throughout the country from wildfire risk.

These are significant changes. It makes perfect sense that Congress will want to review the impact and effectiveness of the legislation after an initial period of 5 years. Indeed, I believe it is our responsibility to do so.

Currently, the legislation's authorities can be used on 20 million acres. That is a cap, and I assume some may argue that is an effective limitation on the bill. Yet this could take much longer than 5 years at the current rate of hazardous fuels reduction.

In fiscal year 2002, the Forest Service reduced fuels on 2.2 million acres of land. If we just keep that process up, you can see that the 20 million acres would not be reached for, well, a minimum of 10 years.

Now, some would argue that simply because we have a cap, that is why we should not include a 5-year authorization. Yet if all is going well, and the agencies have not yet treated the full 20 million acres, certainly the Congress can extend the authorization beyond its initial 5-year period.

We do that all the time. We come here all the time to extend authorizing bills. But it does give the relevant committees a chance to take a look at it and to see whether tweaking needs to be done or whether it needs to be reauthorized for that period of time. It sort of forces us to do our responsibility; that is, to review legislation periodically. Moreover, we can make improvements when the time comes.

Now, again, some will argue that this acreage cap is an effective authorization or a sunset, but it is not. It is simply a cap on acreage, nothing more. So I think adding the 5-year authorization to this bill is a fairly conservative, reasonable, appropriate step to take in line with much of what we do around here in terms of the length of time of legislation.

I know many of us, even those who will ultimately vote for the bill's passage, would be comforted to know in several years' time there will be an opportunity to review its impact, discuss it, and perhaps make improvements.

So, again, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment and kind of keep it in line with most other types of legislation of this nature that we pass around here.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to close out my amendment. There were a lot of speeches, but not too many on my amendment.

I would like to bring it back a little bit, anyway. I again point out that the pending amendment is one that basically says we are going to authorize it, but we are going to authorize it for a period of time.

I say to my good friend from Oregon--and he is my good friend--I know he and others worked so hard on this bill and got a good compromise. I understand that, but I don't think that putting a time on this bill violates any compromise. As I pointed out, earlier bills have had a 5- year time limit.

I know my friend from Idaho talked about monitoring, the fact we monitor bills. Of course, we monitor bills. There is that old saying: Nothing focuses one's attention like the hangman's noose. When you find that something is expiring, that is when a committee starts to act, review, and get into it, perform its responsibilities.

It is in that nature I have offered this amendment. I don't think it does anything to hurt the bill or change it. It doesn't change one thing in the bill. All it says is at some point down the track, 5 years--I picked 5 years because that was in earlier bills--the appropriate committee--in this case the Agriculture Committee--will reauthorize it.

Sometimes a reauthorization goes through by unanimous consent. That may be the case with this bill. I don't know. Maybe if this bill works as everyone says it will, it might go by unanimous consent or maybe we will want to change something. At least it will force the committee to do something at that time, and that is in the nature of why I offered this amendment.

Madam President, I will talk about the bill pending and share some thoughts and concerns I have about the bill.

This is not a matter of light substance that is before the Senate. This is not a bill that we can take a wink and a nod and let it go because everyone agrees this is a unanimous consent bill. It is true that it did come out of our committee, the Agriculture Committee, on a voice vote. We reached agreements to go ahead and get it to the floor.

There are a lot of things in the bill I can agree with, that I think are good and necessary; there are some other things about which I have concerns and a lot of Senators have concerns. This is a bill that is open for amendment. There will be a number of amendments offered to this bill to try to strengthen it and to answer some concerns people have.

I am somewhat amazed when we come out with legislation and it deals with sensitive environmental issues and we are told certain environmental groups have concerns and we will hear about the environmental issues so that somehow, if you are a member of an environmental organization, you are opposed to progress, you are opposed to jobs, you are opposed to doing things that might make life better for some people in certain areas. It is almost as if ``environmentalist'' is a bad word. I don't think it is. I think being pro-environment and being an environmentalist is a positive attribute.

I compliment those in our country, many of whom work for nonprofit organizations. I have a number of letters from them that I will have printed in the Record. They toil endlessly, tirelessly, sometimes for no pay, sometimes for little pay, to ensure that future generations of Americans have a good, healthy environment, that those who like to hunt have areas in which we can hunt, where we have healthy wildlife areas.

I am proud of the fact that in our last farm bill we had the biggest increase ever in conservation, an 80 percent increase. To me, this is not only pro-environment; it is pro-economy; it is pro-jobs; it is pro- growth but growth in a way that is sustainable, not just for our time and our place but for future generations.

That is why the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003 is not something that can be lightly passed through. We have to look at it and talk about it. I compliment those who have worked hard to reach agreements and tried to reach compromises on this legislation. That is all well and good. I compliment Members on both sides of the aisle. They have worked very hard to get to a point where we have a bill that has broad support. I don't deny the bill has broad support. That does not mean those who have some concerns about certain aspects of the bill could be stopped from talking about it and offering amendments. That is what the legislative process is all about.

We will proceed in that regard deliberately, not in a way to stop anything. This is not a method of slowing down the bill or taking an undue amount of time, but it is ensuring that we do look at the bill carefully; that the public is generally aware of what is in the bill; that those who perhaps do not spend a lot of time looking at these things--and I am the first to admit this is not an area of my expertise, but as the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee, charged with the responsibility of legislation that impinges upon our national forests that comes under our jurisdiction, I make sure I have good staff who understand the impact of forest legislation. And I have taken the time to study it myself to the extent I have had the time to do so.

I do not pretend to know all the ins and outs of forest legislation as much as my friend from Oregon, for example, who has spent his adult life working on this, or the Senator from Idaho and others who I know have put a great deal of time in this. But that does not lessen my concern about certain aspects of the bill and its impact on our environment. So we will have a discussion and we will have amendments.

Preventing damage and injury to communities is of paramount concern to all of us, especially now with the tragic wildfires in California that show clearly the dangers these communities face. Of course, our hearts and our thoughts go out to all those families in those communities that are affected by these wildfires.

Now, again I point out that this bill passed by a voice vote to allow us more

time in order to reach a consensus on this agreement, and that is the substitute amendment offered by Chairman Cochran. The vote out of the committee was not--and I wish to state this very clearly--any kind of unanimous endorsement of the bill as a whole. It was merely our agreement to move the process forward.

The legislation before us purports to focus the Federal Government's efforts to reduce the dangers of wildfire and improve forest health. Now, of course, all of us want to achieve this goal so that our communities out west can be better protected from catastrophic wildfires, so that forest areas around the country can better cope with the onset of disease and insect infestation, and so that we can improve the overall health of our national forests and public lands.

I am heartened that several Senators from both sides of the aisle have endorsed a legislative compromise to title I of the bill. This, of course, is the title that has drawn the most focus because it covers hazardous fuel reductions on Federal lands, and, as such, it is also the most controversial portion of the legislation. I believe it is a step in the right direction. I believe it comes up a little short, and that is why we will have some amendments in that area.

Again, I will say that much of the bill is worthy of support. In addition to title I, there are seven other titles, ranging from watershed forestry assistance to rural community forest enterprise programs, with others, and again the bulk of these provisions are non-- I will not say not debatable, but they raise no really contentious issues. But I would like to take this time to talk a little more about title I.

Simply put, I still continue to have some serious concerns about this section. For one, the bill lacks sufficient targeting to conduct hazardous fuel work in the areas that need it the most, which likely might waste limited Government dollars. The Forest Service's own research has concluded that the areas immediately surrounding homes and structures are where the fuel cleanup should be done, as it is the most effective and cost-efficient method for reducing fire risk.

The language in the bill requires that only 50 percent of the hazardous fuel dollars be spent in what is known as the wildland/urban interface. Again, because of the bill's loose definition of the interface or of the community protection zone, land miles away from homes and other structures could qualify. Ensuring that a higher percentage of this work would be done in the areas at risk to human life and property would vastly enhance our community protection efforts.

Again, there is no definition of the size of a community. So one has to ask: Just what kind of communities are we talking about? Well, I happen to come from a town of 150 people. I live there. To me, that is a community. Two or three houses out someplace, to me, is not.

As I was saying to my friend from Oregon earlier, if someone wants to build a house out in an area that is on the ocean, that is subject to hurricanes and tidal waves and weather such as that, they take their own risk. If they want to do that, they are at risk. If they want to go where the floods happen and a hurricane comes up and wipes a house away, well, it is not primarily the Federal Government's responsibility, it is not primarily the taxpayers' responsibility to go out and build seawalls to protect that house. If someone wants to build a house in an area where there are mud slides all the time, it is not our responsibility to come in and build up structures to protect that house from a mud slide. If they want to build it on the side of a cliff, God love them. If they can get the insurance for it, fine, but it should not be the taxpayers' responsibility.

So if someone wants to build a house out in a wilderness area, fine, I have no problem with that. They can do that. But I do not know that we then have the responsibility as taxpayers to come in and say we are going to spend millions of dollars to protect your house from a wildfire. Now, where that cutoff is, I do not know. I am not here to say the cutoff is 150 people or 200, but there has to be some better definition of structure for communities.

The way the bill is right now, we could spend a lot of money going out and cleaning out the brush. And, by the way, I will have something to say about that. We are not talking about brush. We are talking about trees. It could be miles, tens of hundreds of miles, away from any community. So again I question whether that is where we want to put our resources.

I understand there may be an amendment, or there will be an amendment offered to raise that 50 percent threshold to something more akin to 70 or 75 percent, which I think is maybe more where we ought to focus our resources, with the very few dollars that we have.

Secondly, the bill could also be interpreted to allow logging on virtually all Federal lands other than wilderness or wilderness study areas. This means national monuments and other areas could be logged in the name of wildfire prevention. The old growth language contains numerous exceptions so large that even ancient trees, trees that were around before our country was a country, could be logged.

The President traveled around the West this summer arguing that we need to remove small trees and brush from damaged forests. The scientific community agrees with him. But these same scientists tell us that cutting bigger and older trees can actually make fire risks worse. Logging, after all, is a part of what created the fire conditions that this bill is supposed to address.

Now, you might say: Well, how can that be? If you cut down trees, how can you have forest fires? Well, by logging, by taking out certain trees, you leave a lot of brush, you leave a lot of stuff on the ground; plus, you take out some of the overhang of the ancient trees that tend to keep the risk of brushfires down; plus the fact, when you do logging, of course, you put in roads. Whenever you have a road, then you have people coming in. When you have people coming in, they are building campfires and doing things such as that, and that also increases the risk of fire.

Another problem I have with this legislation is the lack of protection for roadless areas, those areas of our national forests that have wisely been left free from most logging and roadbuilding to ensure their protection. In fact, this bill does not restrict roadbuilding at all--at all. So you could have permanent roads built anywhere under this bill.

If we did restrict some of this roadbuilding, we would have less fire risk, and greater ecosystem benefits. This is because the forests in these undeveloped areas have experienced less damage by past management practices. They are much less in need of remedial work themselves. And they tend to be the furthest away from homes and communities. Moreover, scientists tell us that fires are more common and larger in developed forests. As I said earlier, roads bring people. People bring accidents that start fires.

While I am a strong believer in access to public lands, it depends on what kind of access we are talking about. We have to realize building roads to reduce fire risks can be very self-defeating. So I am concerned about a lack of protection from the building of roads in currently roadless areas.

Some people say this is a contentious issue. It is an important issue. It is one that concerns a number of environmentalists and other people around the country, especially those who have tried to protect our natural forests that have been left free from logging.

The bill also limits the reach of what may have been called the heart of NEPA, the National Environmental Policy Act. I know there are some who would like to get rid of NEPA completely, just get it off the books. There are some who would like to see that happen. But NEPA is the heart of our environmental policy. Simply put, it requires the Federal Government to look at a reasonable range of alternatives to any proposed course of action. Yet the language in this bill arbitrarily restricts a full and robust environmental analysis to only the agency's preferred alternative, a no-action alternative--which is really not an alternative because a no-action alternative means you don't do anything--and possibly one additional alternative.

It boils down to the fact that NEPA would be required to look at two alternatives, not a reasonable range of alternatives but two. The one alternative doesn't even have to be environmentally preferable. It could be a proposal for more and heavier logging of

big trees. Again, this effectively undermines what has been called the heart of NEPA; that is, to look at a reasonable range of alternatives to a proposed agency course of action.

What this bill basically could leave us with is one alternative. That is not what NEPA was intended to do. It calls for a reasonable range of alternatives. This effectively undermines a landmark law of immense value--a landmark law that has been in existence for about 30 years.

We will hear from some who say that the NEPA analysis takes time; it costs money. What we won't hear is how important this time and money is for realizing better outcomes.

NEPA analysis is designed to ensure that more effective or more efficient approaches are considered before an agency reaches a final decision on how to proceed with a project. Too little attention has been paid to date to the fact that thinning may or may not be effective in reducing fire risk. The scientists tell us that it needs to be designed carefully and in light of many site-specific factors, if it is likely to succeed.

There is the general perception that if we just go out and clear out all that underbrush and take out trees, certain trees, it is going to protect us from forest fires. That may or may not be true, depending upon the site and the specificity of what they are doing. That is exactly why we need good, solid NEPA--National Environmental Policy Act--analysis for this work, particularly the larger the projects and trees involved and the more sensitive the places. Otherwise, if we don't consider alternatives, we will be wasting time and taxpayers' money that we can't spare on projects that don't help and may even hurt in terms of protecting against wildfire.

We ought to look more closely at the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management inefficiencies in carrying out their NEPA obligations rather than attacking what has been referred to as the Magna Carta of environmental law. Routine forest health projects can confidently proceed without lengthy environmental review, as long as they stick to small trees and brush, developed forests, and no new roads. Once you get into that, that is when we need the environmental review.

I also want to make clear from the beginning that you will hear a lot of talk about small trees and brush. It is my understanding that these small trees can go up to 12 inches or greater in diameter and that these are the trees that loggers want now. These seem to be what is in demand. I am not a contractor. I don't build houses and stuff like that. But I am to understand that these are the ones most in demand right now, trees up to 12 inches and greater in diameter. That is a pretty good size tree. That is not brush. But that is what we are talking about here, going out and clearing those trees. That is why we need a good, healthy NEPA analysis of what we are talking about, what the alternatives could be.

The bill before us also exempts hazardous fuel projects from the normal administrative appeals process for what we are told will be something similar to the BLM's appeals process. This predecisional process, it is argued, will help expedite projects toward their completion by making projects more collaborative and less confrontational.

But this new, undefined process threatens to cut out or unfairly limit citizen participation in agency decisions. The bill currently does not have meaningful standards for the new process to ensure that all the talk we hear about preserving public participation is fulfilled.

Let me repeat that. The bill before us does not have meaningful standards to ensure that we preserve public participation to the fullest. This is not good public policy. These national forests belong to us all. They belong to you and they belong to me. They belong to you and they belong to our kids and our grandkids and future generations. The public ought to be participating and should be heard and should have meaningful participation in agency decisions regarding forest policy. The bill should spell out the Forest Service appeals process. It does not do that. So we don't really know how the public is going to be involved. The language may provide too much discretion and too little accountability to the public. This needs to be cleared up.

Let me say a few words about the judicial review provisions of the legislation. I do not believe they represent a major response to the situation. Among other things, the bill limits preliminary injunctions to 60 days. You do have the right to renew, but it limits it to 60 days and stipulates that courts balance the short- and long-term effects of undertaking and not undertaking a hazardous fuels reduction project.

The limit on injunctions will make additional work for judges that could actually slow them down in reaching a final decision. The balance-of-harms language in the bill is unnecessary and intrusive, as courts have always done this. Moreover, the presence in this bill of that language could be read as implying direction to change the current process in some way. This could tilt the scales to one side or another regardless of the facts in a particular case.

Again, let me point out something else we hear about: the flood of lawsuits. There is no flood of lawsuits clogging up the courts and preventing us from moving ahead in hazardous rules reduction projects. The GAO study of hazardous fuel reduction projects found that only 3 percent of all fuels cases were litigated in 2000 and 2001, covering only 100,000 acres.

I will repeat that. Our GAO--our investigator--found only 3 percent of the hazardous fuels cases were litigated in 2000 and 2001, and plaintiffs were often not environmental groups but local communities, outdoor enthusiasts, and timber interests. Of the 762 cases, only 4 were delayed by court order during the litigation. Again, out of 762 cases, only 4 were delayed by court order during the litigation, and that is about five-tenths of a percent of all the cases.

Yet we are told we have to do something here to clean up the plugging up of our courts by all these environmentalists, that litigate and come to court to stop the agency from proceeding. Nonsense.

With regard to appeals of agency decisions, the argument that there is some sort of crisis holding up these projects simply doesn't hold water. The Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management's own database lists about 3,500 fuels reduction projects they conducted between 1998 and 2002. About 250 were appealed. Out of 3,500 projects, 250 were appealed. This is about 7 percent. There is a 7-percent appeals rate for all of their fuels reduction projects nationwide. In other words, by the agencies' own count, 93 percent of their projects went through with no appeal whatsoever. Yet we are told there is some sort of ``appeal crisis.'' Well, the facts just don't support that.

The GAO and similar studies have found the main reasons that projects could not proceed were weather related and the diversion of funds to fight wildfires. Now we are getting to the crux of it. Roughly a third of the delays were due to a shift in money from preventative projects to firefighting, which last year cost more than $1 billion. That is why we need more resources out there--not to shift the resources we have now but to have more resources out there for preventative projects.

Again, the main reason the projects could not proceed, according to the GAO, is weather related and the diversion of funds for wildfires. Other reasons include public resistance, regulatory demands, unpredictable funding, and inadequate staffing within the agencies.

Yet the administration and some of my colleagues would have us believe the agencies cannot get the work done due to appeals and litigation by environmentalists and environmental organizations. This simply is not true.

Well, are there some problems getting the work done? Yes, there are. Does this bill have provisions, including new programs, that are worthwhile? Yes, I have already stated that to be the case. There are a lot of good aspects to this bill. Is this bill the best way to protect our at-risk communities and the environment from wildfire, disease, and pest infestation? Well, I don't think so. I think there could be some changes made to this bill that would make it even better.

What is even more troubling about the legislation is that it comes on the heels of some very harmful actions recently taken by the administration and

the Forest Service to weaken environmental protections, weaken public participation or public scrutiny of agency action--the cumulative effect of which could be to seriously degrade the health of our national forests and public lands that the bill's proponents seek to protect.

The Administration, through regulation, has ``categorically excluded timber'' sales up to 1,000 acres from NEPA analysis as long as trees are cut in the name of fire prevention. So you can go in--a thousand acres would be pretty substantial in some areas. You can go in and cut down 12-inch or greater diameter trees in the name of fire prevention. No NEPA analysis is needed. They are shelving administrative appeals for these projects under NEPA; they are curtailing environmental analysis for entire forest management plans and ending public appeals of the plans. Proponents of this bill are even cutting out endangered or threatened species consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service, and preparing to jettison protections for roadless areas.

In other words, the administration has taken a largely one-sided view of Federal forest management. That is, thin or cut first and minimize environmental protections and public input through the regulatory and legislative process.

The upshot is that, combined with this bill as it now stands, we could see widespread, heavy logging of mature trees, even in pristine roadless areas, without the benefit of public environmental review, pursuant to overarching plans that also lack NEPA compliance, bereft of interagency consultation or meaningful public appeals, and subject only to modified judicial review. In this scenario, there could be a major increase in Federal timber sales with little public understanding or input and even less agency accountability. I believe this is bad governing, bad policy, pure and simple.

Now, while I recognize the legislation probably has the votes to pass, I believe we can and should do better. There will be amendments to attempt to do this. We have seen several alternative bills offered in the past several months. We should better target funds to have work done in this wildland/urban interface, as it is called, or the community protection zones. We should vastly increase funding for hazardous fuels work on Federal and non-Federal lands. That is the crux of it. We should have more comprehensive protection of old-growth and large fire-resistance trees. We should avoid unnecessary and largely unprecedented attacks to our independent judiciary. And we must maintain full and vigorous public participation in the care of our national forests and public lands, while expediting projects to reduce wildfire risks to at-risk communities.

As I have said before, these public lands and these national forests belong to us all, not to a timber company, not to someone who builds a beautiful home out in the middle of a wilderness area and wants us to spend taxpayer dollars to protect them from a wildfire. These national forests belong to all of us, and public participation and agency decisions dealing with public lands and public forests ought to be in the forefront, not in the background.

Otherwise, if we move ahead in this manner, we are inviting the waste of limited time and resources that it is our responsibility to ensure are directed at stated priorities of community protection and removal of small trees and brush. As drafted, I am concerned that this bill will not accomplish that urgent goal, will not ensure adequate public participation, and will not help to end the controversy and gridlock that has plagued this issue for some years.

I hope we will have a reasonable debate on this bill. Certainly, there will be amendments to it; I don't know how many and who will offer them. Some have come to me saying they had amendments to offer. I think they will take some time to dispense with, which is appropriate given the significance of the policy changes proposed in H.R. 1904. We must carefully scrutinize what is in the bill and see if there are ways to improve it.

I ask my colleagues on both sides to wait and see how these amendments proceed before judging the ultimate merit of this legislation.

Madam President, in closing, I wish to have printed in the Record some material. First is an editorial that appeared this morning in the Washington Post called ``Fire Damage.'' I ask unanimous consent that the editorial be printed in the Record.

Madam President, the editorial basically states that what is happening in California is a genuine national tragedy and one that shouldn't be misused for political purposes. But, unfortunately, that is a distinct possibility, the editorial says. It says the fires happened to arrive just as the Senate is wrestling with a bill supposedly designed to help prevent catastrophic fires.

The editorial goes on to question whether or not the bill before us really does accomplish that goal.

Also, I have a series of letters from different environmental groups. When I say ``environmental groups,'' I do not use it in a pejorative sense. I use it in a very supportive sense. First is a letter from about 200 different environmental groups alphabetically from the Alaska Wilderness League to the Yosemite Area Audubon, California--from A to Z--that basically are opposed to this version of the bill.

I ask unanimous consent that letter be printed in the Record.

Madam President, I have a letter from the Forest Stewards Guild urging a vote against the Senate version of the bill, H.R. 1904. I ask unanimous consent this letter be printed in the Record.

Madam President, I have a letter from the League of Conservation Voters urging opposition to H.R. 1904. I ask unanimous consent that this letter be printed in the Record.

Madam President, I have another letter from the American Sportfishing Association, the American Fisheries Society, the Izaak Walton League of America, Orion: The Hunter's Institute, Trout Unlimited, Wildlife Forever, and the Wildlife Society. The letter is dated July 16, 2003. I will be clear to point out they did not say they were opposed to the bill, but they have serious concerns about some areas of the bill. I ask unanimous consent this letter be printed in the Record.

Madam President, I have another letter from a number of individuals who basically represent firefighters, smokejumpers--12 individuals who have written urging opposition to H.R. 1904 which they say is misnamed the Healthy Forests Restoration Act and instead support S. 1453, the Forestry and Community Assistance Act. I ask unanimous consent this letter be printed in the Record.

Lastly, the Forest Roads Working Group, which includes Wildlife Forever, Trout Unlimited, Wildlife Management Institute, Izaak Walton League of America, Outdoor Industry Association, the Wildlife Society, and International Paper, also wrote a letter dated October 28, 2003. It is not in total opposition, but it expresses their concerns about certain parts of the bill saying the ``fire legislation should endorse the prohibition of new roads into inventoried roadless areas.'' I ask unanimous consent that their letter be printed in the Record.

Madam President, these are the concerns that I and many others have with the legislation before us, and I hope those who have amendments will come to the floor and offer them. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, in the middle of the last decade, a group of business and education leaders in Cedar Rapids, IA convened a stakeholder group to discuss community concerns. This group identified the need for a highly skilled and well-educated workforce as a top priority.

The fact that this group identified the need to improve workforce development is not news. Nor is the problem they identified unique or isolated to eastern Iowa. What is news and what is unique is the response.

In 1998, area employers, educational institutions and community organizations partnered with Kirkwood Community College and Grant Wood Area Education Agency to create the Workplace Learning Connection to facilitate work-based learning for area students. This project is a winner for everyone involved. Teachers and students get more information about local career opportunities and the skills needed for those careers. Students get experience in relevant, work-based learning activities. Employers get workers with the skills that match the jobs they have.

The Workplace Learning Connection has been recognized as one of the 11 best Tech Prep programs in the Nation, is one of the top 25 school- to-work programs in the country and has been cited in national publications as an exemplary program. Over the past 5 years, TWLC has worked with over 700 employers to organize over 8,000 job shadow experiences and 750 internships; provided professional development activities for teachers impacting thousands of students in 35 area school districts in 7 counties; and facilitated hundreds of business tours and classroom speakers.

The Workplace Learning Connection has been an unqualified success and the community is celebrating the fifth anniversary of this project on October 30, 2003. In commemoration of this event, I wanted to bring this organization to the attention of the Senate and the Nation.

Mr. President, I ask consent that Darcy Zotler on my staff and Evan Notman on my staff be permitted floor privileges for the duration of the debate on the healthy forests.

Mr. President, I will vote to confirm Michael Leavitt to be Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, but I want to emphasize that I am hoping that Governor Leavitt will bring change to the sorry record that this administration has had on the environment.

I am concerned by the direction that our Nation's environmental policy is headed. We need an active Environmental Protection Agency, working to protect the health of our people. This administration has been active, all right--actively rolling back the environmental progress our country has made, actively working to narrow the reach of Federal environmental policy, actively working to promote oil drilling in environmentally sensitive areas and actively cutting funding for conservation and anti-pollution enforcement efforts.

Under this administration, we've seen cuts in funding for the EPA. We've seen an increased focus on cutting sweetheart deals with polluters. And we've seen a failure to move forward on new, innovative programs that will help our environment. While environmental regulation requires action and distributes responsibility among Federal, State and local authorities, Governor Leavitt needs to recognize that the Federal EPA is the backstop. The environmental buck will stop on Governor Leavitt's desk. If a State is not acting responsibly and protecting the health and safety of its citizens, Governor Leavitt must step in. I hope that Governor Leavitt will fight for the environment, rather than fighting for the priorities of the White House.

I have concerns with this nominee. A number of environmental watchdog groups have expressed their disappointment about Governor Leavitt's record on environmental protection during his tenure as Governor of Utah. He has a record of supporting a number of projects that were environmentally questionable, such as the Legacy Highway Project in Davis County, UT. It is my understanding that this highway project as originally conceived would harm a significant migratory bird habitat.

But in the end, I decided that Governor Leavitt has the background and qualifications necessary to do this job. As a governor who has a distinguished background not only leading his own State, but also the National Governors Association and the Western Governors Association, he will bring an experienced hand to the leadership of the agency. Further, as the Vice-Chair of the National Governors Association, he pushed through a bipartisan policy supporting working out environmental issues through a collaborative process.

In the area of agriculture, the Administration has delayed the implementation of the Conservation Security Program, a fresh farmer- friendly approach to farm policy that uses incentives to help farmers do what's best for their land and for the air and water they and their neighbors breathe and drink. This bipartisan, bicameral program was a key part of the 6 year farm bill passed last year. Yet, it is still not implemented.

We've also seen a serious pullback from the Clean Water Act. In the face of the SWANCC decision limiting federal jurisdiction on certain isolated wetlands, the EPA has released an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and policy guidance that pulls back even further. The intent of Congress for the CWA is clear--to protect the waters of the United States, and to reach all waters within Federal constitutional jurisdiction.

The court's decision in SWANCC has removed jurisdiction from intrastate, non-navigable waters where jurisdiction was based solely on the so-called ``migratory bird rule.'' The contemplated changes to the rules pull back much further and would relinquish jurisdiction that the Federal Government clearly has and needs to protect waters of the United States.

One of Governor Leavitt's achievements at the National Governors Assocation was the adoption of a set of environmental principles he calls ``enlibra.'' The term means ``balance,'' and refers to a process of bringing in all the stakeholders in environmental issues together to try to work issues out. I hope that, as EPA Administrator, Governor Leavitt will truly strive for balance--because, unfortunately, there has been very little balance in the environmental policies of the administration he is joining.