[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 145 (Friday, October 7, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 7, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                               DISASTERS

  Mr. DURENBERGER. Mr. President, in my 16 years of representing the 
people of Minnesota in the U.S. Senate, I have been a first-hand 
witness to a number of catastrophic disasters that Minnesota farm 
families have endured. I have seen the disasters from the air and from 
the ground. And, I have visited with farmers who have suffered the 
effects of these natural disasters.
  Everyone remembers the horror of the Midwest floods of 1993, even as 
we have seen floods occur in other parts of the country this year. But 
the call for crop insurance reform stemmed from years before that 
fateful summer.
  In 1991, thousands of prime corn and soybean acres could not be 
planted because of extraordinary rainfalls in southern Minnesota. It 
was then that we came to the plain realization that crop insurance did 
not pay up when Minnesota farmers needed it. It was then that Minnesota 
farmers told me that reform was absolutely essential to their economic 
survival. And, it was then that we asked the Secretary of Agriculture 
to lend a hand in bringing about reform.
  One year later--in the spring of 1992--three tornadoes devastated a 
portion of southwestern Minnesota. The tornadoes destroyed crops that, 
just moments before, looked as promising as anything we had seen. And, 
a few months later, an unusually early frost killed all of the crops in 
one northern county. But, unreformed and seriously flawed, crop 
insurance again fell short. In fact, a Jackson County corn farmer, 
Richard Peterson, had paid $21,000 in crop insurance premiums over 6 
years but--while he endured extensive crop losses over the same 
period--the total payment he received was just $2,100. With crop 
insurance floundering, I decided it was time to put together a bill to 
give our farmers the kind of crop protection they deserve. And, in the 
fall of that year, I introduced the bill Minnesota farmers like Richard 
Peterson, Andy Quinn, and Grant Annexstad helped write. Unfortunately, 
the urgency of reform was not so apparent on Capitol Hill--and the bill 
never became law.
  So, on March 9, 1993, I reintroduced the Federal Crop Insurance 
Fairness Act hoping that the need for reform would by that time be 
evident. But, it met with little fanfare. And, tragically, it was only 
a few months later that floods and rains of Biblical proportions caused 
57 of Minnesota's 87 counties to be declared Federal disaster areas. 
Thousands of Minnesota farmers were not able to turn a wheel in their 
fields all season due to the floods and torrential downpours. Water 
stood in the fields all year--even into the winter. It was the worst 
natural disaster in Minnesota history. That summer, Congress approved 
millions of dollars in disaster assistance. And, a number of us fought 
for crop insurance reform during consideration of the disaster bill on 
the Senate floor. But, beyond the quick fix of disaster aid, there was 
little enthusiasm for taking on the real problem and fixing a tired 
crop insurance program that just did not work. We lost that battle but 
not without a fight and a promise--a promise of reform this year.

  Early this spring, the reform legislation I originally introduced in 
1992 and 1993 was embraced by the President and the Department of 
Agriculture. As a leading cosponsor of the Federal Crop Insurance 
Reform Act, I worked hard to give our farmers real security in crop 
insurance. The bill Minnesota farmers and I helped write would provide 
our farmers with a catastrophic yield adjustment to protect his or her 
actual production history from the effects or disaster. It would make 
65 percent and 75 percent coverage more affordable. It would cut in 
half late planting penalties and allow our farmers to prove their 
yields in 4 years instead of 10. It would provide prevented planting as 
part of the standard coverage. And, last, it would provide catastrophic 
coverage for all our farmers at a nominal cost of $50 per crop per 
county with a maximum of $100 per farmer per county.
  Now--months after we introduced the Federal Crop Insurance Reform Act 
of 1994 and nearly 4 years after we first began our fight for reform--
this reform will finally be law. After all we've been through in 
Minnesota, the victory is bittersweet. Had Congress listened to 
Minnesota farmers and passed reform earlier, farmers nationwide could 
have been spared some of the pain and hardship the disasters of recent 
years brought. But, there is some consolation in the proof this process 
reveals: Minnesotans persevere when times get tough and they commit to 
solving problems with solutions far ahead of their time.
  Mr. President, I would like to pay tribute to a group of people who 
have been tenacious in passing this critical legislation that they, in 
part, wrote. These friends include farmers and agricultural leaders 
including Richard Peterson, Andy Quinn, Grant Annexstad, Glenn 
Annexstad, Gerald Lacey, Noel Kjesbo, Mark Moenning, Paul and Alan 
Brutlag, Sharon Clark, Craig Weir, Doug Magnus, Kent Thiesse, and Gary 
Hachfeld. And my thanks to the farm organizations and commodity groups 
who persisted to see this reform through.
  And, finally, I want to recognize members of my staff, including my 
former agriculture aide, Hank Snyder who sailed in to uncharted 
territory as he put together the original bill in 1992. I thank Jeff 
Harrison, who ably took his place and tenaciously hammered out this 
legislation with staff members of the Agriculture Committee. And, I am 
grateful to Karen Humphrey of my Minnesota staff who met with farmers 
throughout all of the disasters they suffered and brought his problem 
to our attention.
  Mr. President, I am proud to have been a leading cosponsor of this 
important legislation. But, I am most proud of the Minnesota farmers 
who made it possible.

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