[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 25 (Wednesday, March 9, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: March 9, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
LEGISLATION TO ELIMINATE THE ``PORKIEST OF PORK'' FROM DISASTER RELIEF 
                                 FUNDS

                                 ______


                         HON. HARRIS W. FAWELL

                              of illinois

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, March 9, 1994

  Mr. FAWELL. Mr. Speaker, while the recent Los Angeles earthquake 
reached 6.6 on the Richter scale, the emergency supplemental earthquake 
assistance bill that followed hit over $33 million on the pork scale. 
The San Andreas Fault appears to have spread as far east as New York 
City, and as far west as Hawaii. Today, I am introducing legislation, 
along with 33 of my colleagues, to eliminate the following projects 
which we found tucked away in the appropriations bill after it was 
rushed through Congress.
  The aftershocks include: $20 million to add 500 employees at the FBI 
fingerprint facility in West Virginia. This appropriation was never 
authorized and was not requested by the President in his budget; $1.5 
million for the first commercial nuclear powered ship, the Savannah. 
The Savannah has developed hull problems, and the tax money will be 
used to secure the vessel at a Maritime Museum in South Carolina; $10 
million to design the James A. Farley Post Office in New York City for 
use as a train station and commercial center. A 1992 law specifies that 
no federal funds are to be used for this project; this new law may 
override the original prohibition; and $1.3 million redesignating a 
Housing and Urban Development special purpose grant to go to Hawaiian 
sugar cane mill communities.
  When the earthquake bill came up for a vote, we were assured that the 
bill was clean and that the funding in the bill was strictly of an 
emergency nature. Many who voted for the legislation did so out of 
compassion for helping those who lost so much in the tragedy of the 
earthquake; not to appropriate millions of dollars on a legislative 
Christmas tree.
  These disaster relief bills are to be for emergencies that could not 
have been anticipated in the regular appropriation bills. The only lid 
we have on Federal expenditures are spending caps that limit how much 
can be spent each year.
  But Congress' purveyors of pork have found a way around these caps. 
Emergency supplemental appropriation bills are not subject to these 
caps. These bills fly through Congress like greased lightning, creating 
the perfect conditions for pork barrel projects. The projects thrive in 
bills that are put together in the back rooms of Congress by a few 
powerful appropriators. This bill was not even printed until after the 
final vote. Even if it had been printed, it moved through Congress so 
fast, no member had time to read every provision.
  Pork barrel projects' worst enemy is the light of publicity. And, 
with the help of our porkbusters coalition, and my colleagues and I 
plan to bathe these projects in that light. Some commentators lament 
that these projects are only a few drops in an ocean of red ink and, 
therefore, insignificant. I could not disagree more. In fact, it is 
these pieces of pork, doled out by powerful appropriators, that grease 
the Federal Government's massive spending machine.
  Some members of Congress are afraid to vote for cutting any programs, 
or voting for a balanced budget amendment, for fear of offending 
powerful appropriators and losing their piece of pork. So while these 
projects may look small relative to all Federal spending, they loom 
very large indeed in terms of creating an unbreakable culture of 
overspending. I urge my colleagues to cosponsor the bill I am 
introducing today, so that we can eliminate the porkiest of pork 
projects, and send a message that business as usual will not be 
accepted.
  Mr. Speaker, we must break the cycle of ``you fund my project and I 
won't cut yours.'' And, I'm confident we will. But, if we do not, the 
aftershock will not be just taxpayer outrage, but a different type of 
disaster: an economy so strapped with debt it cannot grow.

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