[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 53 (Wednesday, March 22, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H3539-H3540]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                             WELFARE REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I want to pick up on the comments of the 
last speaker. I think it is important to note that the gentleman from 
Tennessee thanked the majority party for getting the unfunded mandates 
legislation to the floor of the House as has the majority party brought 
welfare reform finally to the floor of the House. And I will say this 
to my moderate Democrat friends over there, that we are glad you have a 
plan.
  I was real disappointed when the President decided to end the welfare 
debate as we know it by not offering a plan. I thought he was going to 
end welfare, but it was just end the welfare debate. So I am glad you 
all have stepped in and filled what is obviously a leadership vacuum 
and tremendous void over there both from the White House and I would 
say the party leadership. I am glad to see the Deal plan is on the 
floor. A lot of a good aspects on the Deal plan, a lot of good aspects 
in it and I am looking at it.
  Favor H.R. 4 though. It is a bill that offers hope and independence 
and opportunity for people. I think it is important.
  Today I had an opportunity to meet a lady named Felicia Patterson 
from Savannah, GA. She had been on welfare. She is right now living in 
public housing and she has now got a job. She is 
[[Page H3540]] independent, she is raising three children. She is 
asking for a little help on something that to my knowledge the Deal 
plan does not address, H.R. 4 I hope will address in the future. It is 
something I think both parties ought to come back and work on and that 
is the subject of rent reform.
  You know in a public housing unit when somebody is making money, as 
Ms. Patterson is, and their income goes up, their rent goes up, so what 
they find themselves doing is running faster just to stay in place; and 
in a situation where they get married or the father decides to live at 
home, they get thrown out completely. Or if, as in Ms. Patterson's 
case, you have a 16-year-old child who wants to go to work but knows 
that all of the money is just going to go to additional rent, it is 
kind of hard on them. We have to make it so that the transition to 
getting off of public assistance in its entirety is a little bit 
smoother.
  Now the Republican plan has a lot of flexibility. It allows States to 
work with people like Ms. Patterson and it grants some waivers, and I 
think stuff like that is important. I will not say it is totally 
complete. But all of these bills we are going to have to come back. 
After all, the current welfare system is one of despondency and 
dependence probably as a result of 40 years of negligence and political 
payoffs and so forth. We did not get here overnight. We got here 
slowly. And we are probably going to pull out of this thing slowly.
  The thing I do like about the Republican plan is it consolidates 45 
different welfare programs into 4 flexible block grants. Anytime I her 
the idea of eliminating duplication of consolidating Federal programs I 
get excited, because as a member of the Committee on Appropriations, I 
cannot tell you, Mr. Speaker, the number of government agencies that 
come in day after day, doing the exact same thing, but have a little 
bit different title, and of course it is a tad bit different turf and 
they are all saying please keep us alive, we are the only agency that 
can deliver
 such service. That is not true. The Republican plan consolidates 
services, it consolidates a number of different things that will free 
up money by eliminating bureaucrats' jobs and free up money to help 
create more flexibility to States, and lowers the tax burden for 
taxpayers so that the private sector can go out and create jobs.

  One of the aspects I like about the Republican plan is the idea of 
requiring work. I think that that is important because we have got to 
give people the opportunity to end the cycle and become independent, 
and have that hope that you and I have when we get our paycheck and buy 
our own car and buy our own food and put a down payment on a House and 
so forth. I think all of that is very important.
  The other thing that I like about it, I am not sure if the moderate 
Democrat plan addresses it or not, but illegal aliens, one of the 
problems particularly in California, Texas, and even in Georgia, we 
have 28,000 illegal aliens. This restricts benefits to illegal aliens. 
I am sick and tired, as I know my constituents in Georgia are, of going 
out and earning a living and then seeing a percentage of your paycheck 
go to people who are illegal aliens who have never paid American taxes 
and do not even have proper citizenship cards. I am glad to see the 
Republican Party addressing that.
  Stopping the welfare payment and the new benefit for having a baby, 
we have interviewed people who have said listen, there is in fact to 
some women out that and some people a motivation to have an additional 
child if they are going to get paid for it.
  These things, Mr. Speaker, are addressed in the Republican plan. I 
think it is a good plan. We will look at the Deal plan; I think it has 
some good aspects, but I hope you all will look at ours.

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