[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 101 (Thursday, July 28, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 28, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
               FEDERAL RIP-OFF PROGRAMS HURTING THE POOR

  (Mr. DUNCAN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, almost every day we hear or read horror 
stories about the waste and inefficiency of our Federal Government.
  It seems that the Federal bureaucracy cannot do anything in an 
economical way.
  The General Accounting Office has now released a report detailing 
terrible conditions in all the Housing and Urban Development apartment 
buildings they studied across the country.
  These buildings had received Federal subsidies from HUD averaging 
$700,000 each.
  A front-page story in the Washington Post reported that one apartment 
development received $638,000 for rat-infested apartments for which the 
rent was 43 percent higher than that at nearby private developments.
  Another development received $558,000 while every apartment fell 
below even minimum standards, only 40 percent were occupied, and some 
of those were declared unfit for human habitation.
  This is a program that spends hundreds of millions across the 
country.
  Once again we see that Federal programs benefit the bureaucrats and 
enrich Federal contractors, but they really do almost nothing for poor 
people except to help insure continued poverty.
  These millions would do much more for the economy and for low-income 
people if the funds were left in the private sector.

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