[Congressional Bills 110th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 1709 Introduced in Senate (IS)]







110th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                S. 1709

 To amend the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Act of 
 1998 to provide additional staff and oversight of funds to carry out 
                    the Act, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             June 27, 2007

  Mr. Biden (for himself, Mr. Specter, Mr. Alexander, Mr. Carper, Mr. 
Cardin, Mr. Cochran, Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Kerry, Mr. Levin, and Mr. Obama) 
introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the 
               Committee on Energy and Natural Resources

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To amend the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Act of 
 1998 to provide additional staff and oversight of funds to carry out 
                    the Act, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``National Underground Railroad 
Network to Freedom Reauthorization Act of 2007''.

SEC. 2. HIRING STAFF FOR THE NATIONAL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD NETWORK.

    Section 3 of the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom 
Act of 1998 (16 U.S.C. 469l-1) is amended by striking subsection (d) 
and inserting the following:
    ``(d) Staff.--The Secretary shall appoint at least 8 full-time 
equivalent staff to assist the Secretary in carrying out duties under 
this Act, including providing oversight of the grant program 
established under section 4.''.

SEC. 3. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.

    The National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Act of 1998 
(16 U.S.C. 469l et seq.) is amended--
            (1) in section 4 (16 U.S.C. 469l-2), by striking subsection 
        (d); and
            (2) by adding at the end the following:

``SEC. 5. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.

    ``(a) In General.--There is authorized to be appropriated for each 
fiscal year to carry out this Act $2,500,000.
    ``(b) Allocation.--Of the amounts made available under subsection 
(a)--
            ``(1) $2,000,000 shall be allocated to carry out section 3; 
        and
            ``(2) $500,000 shall be allocated to carry out section 4.
    ``(c) Limitation.--Any amounts made available under this section 
shall be made available only to the Secretary to carry out the 
responsibilities of the Secretary under this Act.
    ``(d) Availability.--Amounts made available under this section 
shall remain available until expended.''.

SEC. 4. EFFECTIVE DATE.

    The amendments made by sections 2 and 3 shall take effect at the 
beginning of the next fiscal year after the date of enactment of this 
Act.
                                 <all>