[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 88 (Thursday, May 25, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7405-S7407]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     SECOND SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS AND RESCISSIONS ACT, 1995--
                           CONFERENCE REPORT

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
now proceed to vote on the conference report to accompany H.R. 1158, 
which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The conference report to accompany H.R. 1158, an act making 
     emergency supplemental appropriations for additional disaster 
     assistance, and making rescissions for the fiscal year ending 
     September 30, 1995, and for other purposes.

  The Senate resumed consideration of the conference report.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the 
conference report. On this question, the yeas and nays have been 
ordered, and the clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. FORD. I announce that the Senator from Maryland [Ms. Mikulski] is 
necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coverdell). Are there any other Senators 
in the Chamber who desire to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 61, nays 38, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 203 Leg.]

                                YEAS--61

     Abraham
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Coats
     Cochran
     Cohen
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     DeWine
     Dole
     Domenici
     Faircloth
     Feinstein
     Frist
     Gorton
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hatch
     Hatfield
     Helms
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnston
     Kassebaum
     Kempthorne
     Kerrey
     Kohl
     Kyl
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Packwood
     Pressler
     Reid
     Roth
     Santorum
     Shelby
     Simpson
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Warner

                                NAYS--38

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bradley
     Breaux
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Chafee
     Conrad
     Daschle
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Exon
     Feingold
     Ford
     Glenn
     Graham
     Harkin
     Heflin
     Hollings
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Moseley-Braun
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Nunn
     Pell
     Pryor
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Sarbanes
     Simon
     Wellstone

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
     Mikulski
       
  So the conference report was agreed to.
  Mr. HATFIELD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed for 2 
minutes on this rescissions package.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. HATFIELD. Mr. President, I merely wanted to say, in conclusion of 
this process on the rescissions package, I am very hopeful that the 
President will sign this bill. If he does not sign this bill, of 
course, there are problems relating particularly to the supplemental 
appropriations that are included in this bill.
  We have worked long and hard on this. I want to take this occasion to 
thank my colleague from the Democratic side of the aisle, Senator Byrd, 
the ranking member of the full committee; each of subcommittee chairs 
and each of the subcommittee ranking members, and the extraordinary 
staff that we have on both sides that have worked together very 
carefully.
  Mr. President, I cannot predict what will happen. There have been 
discussions between the Republican leadership of the House and the 
Senate with the White House wondering if there might be a better way to 
achieve a [[Page S7406]] common goal that the President has and we 
have. I make no predictions.
  I must say, I am terribly disappointed we had so few Democrats 
support this measure today, because I can say one thing: If there is a 
revision or if there is a new package that comes down the track, we 
will not have enough votes on this side to pass it. I, therefore, would 
urge that the White House take a very careful view of the politics of 
getting any other package passed, even one that we might be able to 
agree to.
  I thank my colleagues on the committee, both the Republicans and 
Democrats, for having brought us to a conclusion at this point on the 
rescissions conference report.
  Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I voted against the bill before the 
Senate today because of its misplaced priorities: cuts in education, 
cuts in training, cuts in housing, but no cuts in programs which do not 
address critical needs or waste tax dollars.
  Mr. President, President Clinton has shown real leadership by drawing 
a line in the sand and standing up for important investments in our 
future. The President has repeatedly made it clear that he wants to 
work with the Congress to reduce spending, but that it is his 
responsibility to protect important investments in our future. The 
President does not want to pile up a stack of veto messages. He wants 
to work with the Congress to move legislation that will help the 
American people. He saw gridlock in the last Congress and does not want 
to repeat the experience.
  Despite his efforts to cooperate, the House of Representatives 
crafted a bill to cut programs which the President found unacceptable. 
The Senate, after a great deal of effort, came up with a deficit 
reduction bill which every Member voted for and which the President 
said he could sign. In conference with the House of Representatives, 
however, it changed again. Almost 85 percent of the funding for 
priorities important to the President was eliminated. That was done, in 
many cases, without Democratic members of the Appropriations Committee 
having access to the decisionmaking process. I support the President's 
decision to veto this bill, and have voted against it.
  Mr. President, rather than force a useless confrontation, we can and 
should have revised this legislation and passed it. Everyone agrees 
that the disaster relief in this bill is important. Everyone agrees 
that the aid to Oklahoma in this bill is critical. Everyone agrees that 
the aid to Jordan in this bill protects our national self-interest. And 
everyone agrees that we can and should cut some of the funding 
appropriated for certain programs last year.
  It was irresponsible for the Republican majority, in a fit of 
partisan political pique, to simply refuse to revise this legislation 
and get it passed. Yet the most ardent budget cutters claimed they were 
too busy to save the American taxpayers a mere $10 billion or so in 
what they see as unnecessary and wasteful spending. That, Mr. 
President, is ridiculous. If we had worked with the administration, we 
could have quickly adopted legislation to give people the aid they need 
and the reductions in overall spending they want.
  Mr. President, I voted for the initial Senate version of this bill, a 
bill which more closely met my own priorities, especially when compared 
to the House measure. I was not entirely satisfied with the Senate 
bill. We cut billions from housing programs, but we did not touch a 
penny of military spending. We cut billions from education and training 
programs, but we did not touch wasteful subsidies which go to wealthy 
and corporate agricultural interests. We cut millions for dozens of 
important, productive, and efficient programs, but we did not look for 
the waste and mismanagement which permeates too many of our programs. 
That situation did not get better in conference. We cut $1.4 billion in 
job training funds and another $831 million in education. Look at the 
specifics: $65 million for adult job training, gone; $67 million for 
displaced workers, gone; $12.5 million for school to work programs, 
gone; $236 million for the Safe and Drug Free Schools Program, gone; 
$91 million for vocational and adult education, gone. Those programs 
represent an investment in our future, and those cuts make that future 
a little darker.
  So, Mr. President, I oppose this conference report. I still believe 
the Government can play a role in improving the lives of the American 
people. I accept and embrace the need to reduce the deficit and get 
control over spending, but I believe we can do that while still 
addressing the needs we face as a nation.
  Given that, Mr. President, I voted against this bill and will support 
the President's veto. I hope our colleagues will quickly move to put 
together a bill which meets our obligations to reduce overall Federal 
spending while preserving programs that help people.
  Mr. PELL. Mr. President, I voted for the original rescissions bill 
because the reductions were reasonable and because we had restored 80 
percent of the education cuts that were contained in the House bill. I 
fervently hoped that the Senate position on education would prevail in 
the House-Senate conference. Unfortunately, it did not. As a result 
there are drastic cuts in several important Federal education programs, 
such as safe and drug free schools, dropout prevention, and education 
reform. Because of this, I cannot support the conference report.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today in support of this 
emergency disaster supplemental conference report. We are faced with a 
difficult decision: Parts of the Nation, including California, 
desperately need the emergency disaster funds contained in this bill, 
yet many of the cuts in this legislation, such as the Safe and Drug 
Free Schools Program and the Summer Youth Employment Program, will harm 
many of those very people we are intending to help the most.
  However, emergency spending is just that, and American families 
affected by natural disasters cannot wait for us in Washington to get 
our acts together to begin providing relief. Since the beginning of 
this year, there have been seven new disaster declarations, including 
two floods in California, flooding in South Dakota, tornadoes in 
Alabama, the great tragedy of Oklahoma City, and flooding in Louisiana 
and Mississippi. FEMA has also undertaken preliminary damage 
assessments in Tennessee and Kentucky as a result of the tremendous 
rain and hail storms that recently swept through that area, and in 
South Dakota as a result of flooding.
  Also, and more recently, the specter of the Mississippi River's 
recent cresting and the snowpacks melting in California reinforces the 
urgency for this timely assistance. I note with trepidation and concern 
that tornado season in the South and Midwest, and hurricane season in 
the Gulf and East Coast States will both soon be here.
  In addition to this year's disasters, this funding will also go to 
continue or closeout the disaster assistance accounts in 40 other 
States for over 280 separate Federal disaster assistance obligations.
  I understand President Clinton has said he will veto this bill. I 
welcome the recent comments by Chairman Hatfield and Chairman 
Livingston which would indicate at the very least a willingness to work 
toward providing this needed relief. I urge the administration and the 
leadership of both parties to work together toward a speedy resolution 
of the impasse we will soon face.
  I fully support efforts to cut spending and reduce the deficit and 
look forward to working with my colleagues in the future toward that 
end. However, there are other vehicles for deficit reduction; we spent 
most of this week on the fiscal year 1996 budget resolution. Very soon 
we will also begin considering the fiscal year 1996 appropriations 
bills. I respectfully submit to my colleagues that these are the proper 
vehicles for controlling spending and deficit reduction and I pledge to 
work with them at the appropriate time to make those difficult 
decisions.
  Let me reiterate that this is a national disaster relief bill. Now is 
the time for the Congress to come through for Americans who have been 
affected by national disasters. Let us not allow this obligation to get 
mired down in partisan bickering over which programs to cut and when to 
cut them. We will have the opportunity to make these cuts later; this 
emergency assistance, however, cannot wait.
  I urge my colleagues to pass this conference report and to work with 
the administration toward formulating a disaster assistance bill that 
can both pass [[Page S7407]] the Congress and be signed by the 
President.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, today the Senate passed the conference 
report on the emergency supplemental and rescission bill. Some of the 
cuts in the report were well deserved. The emergency relief for 
California and Oklahoma is certainly much needed. But you do not buy a 
horse because it has two good legs, and I will not vote for a 
rescission bill whose cuts have such a lopsided affect on low- and 
middle-income Americans. There is a better way to cut spending.
  Last month I supported the Senate in overwhelmingly passing a 
rescission bill that, while far from perfect, put the emphasis of cuts 
where it should be, on pork not the poor. The Senate bill included cuts 
to earmarked courthouse construction, American subsidized broadcasting 
to Europe--a hard program to support when public broadcasting at home 
is being cut, and unused funding for transportation projects.
  The House cuts had a much difference focus, a focus that 
unfortunately the conference report has adopted. The conference package 
cuts $319 million from low-income fuel assistance programs, $113 
million--five times the Senate level of cuts--to low-income education 
programs, and $1.5 billion more than the Senate proposed in cuts to 
assisted housing programs. Affordable housing took the biggest cut, 
with the conference report rescinding $7 billion from Department of 
Housing and Urban Development--30 percent of this year's budget.
  These cuts are not equitable, they are not fair to working American 
families, they are not the cuts the Senate voted for on April 6. I hope 
that there will be an opportunity to return the focus of this 
rescission bill to the programs that the Senate bill targeted. The 
disaster victims need the assistance the supplemental will provide. Let 
us get it to them without making victims of middle-class American 
families.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, regrettably, I do not support the 
conference agreement before us today. While it cuts this year's funding 
by $16.4 billion, and adds new spending for the California earthquake, 
other disasters and the Oklahoma City catastrophe, it misses the target 
on some very fundamental issues. I support cutting spending and 
reducing the deficit. But the cuts in this bill are in the wrong 
programs and in the wrong amounts.
   Mr. President, I voted for this bill when it originally passed the 
Senate. I did so because immediately before final passage a carefully 
crafted bipartisan amendment by Senators Dole and Daschle was adopted 
to restore some money for certain critical health, education, and 
training programs that had been deeply cut in the bill.
  Unfortunately, Mr. President, the Dole-Daschle amendment was gutted 
by the conferees. This bill now rescinds $813 million in education 
funding, almost three times the amount that was included in the 
original Senate bill. It cuts education reform programs, it cuts 
student loan programs, and it cuts money to keep schools safe and kids 
off of drugs. That is simply unacceptable. What could be a higher 
national priority than investing in our kids? How can we say on the one 
hand that drugs in our schools have reached epidemic proportions, and 
on the other hand cut funding for the Safe and Drug Free Schools 
Program? These cuts just do not meet the commonsense test, and I think 
most Americans will agree.
  Equally disturbing to me is the amount of funding that was cut from 
training programs. These cuts total $1.4 billion. The bill makes deep 
cuts in the Youth Job Training Program, the Youth Unemployment Program, 
and the School-to-Work Program. These are programs that help 
disadvantaged kids obtain the skills they will need to move into the 
work force and become productive citizens.
  How can we in good conscience support big cuts in programs for 
children from struggling families in order to pay for tax cuts for the 
wealthy? I do not think average Americans support these reductions. I 
think they would prefer that we close corporate tax loopholes rather 
than eliminate the helping hand low-income youth might need to have a 
brighter future. I think they would rather have us spend $1 billion on 
youth training programs than $50 billion on star wars. I think the 
average American family would rather have us spend money to keep poor 
seniors from freezing in the winter than paying for some Member's pork 
project.
  There also appears to be a hidden agenda in this bill. Rather than 
earmarking all the spending cuts in the bill for deficit reduction, 
there are $50 billion in long-term savings that are not set aside for 
that purpose. The motive of Republican tax cut proponents is clear. 
They want that money to finance a big tax cut package for the affluent.
  Because I think this conference agreement establishes the wrong set 
of spending priorities and does not use all the savings for deficit 
reduction, I am pleased that the President has threatened to veto it. 
We start over, we can produce a better product.
  The President has sent us his guidelines for a package of cuts he 
will support. His proposal has deeper spending cuts than are contained 
in this bill. But his priorities are different. He would restore money 
for education, training, health, veterans and poor pregnant women. And 
he would pay for spending on these programs by cutting funding for 
Federal buildings, government travel, and highway projects.
  The President wants us to continue to invest in people, not pork. I 
happen to share that view. Investing in our people, especially in kids 
who are at risk of falling through the cracks of the social safety net, 
is the value system I want to represent, and those are the values I 
believe most Americans support.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the Conference 
Report on H.R. 1158. While I am a strong supporter of deficit 
reduction, I am opposed to the precedent of requiring large budget cuts 
in order to pay for emergency disaster relief. In addition, I believe 
this bill undermines programs which make the investments in our 
Nation's future. In addition, my own State of Maryland suffers a 
disproportionate share of the rescissions which will have a negative 
impact on Maryland's economy. For these reasons, I am opposed to this 
bill.
  The conference report made a very deep cut in funding for the 
consolidation of the Food and Drug Administration facilities in 
Montgomery County, MD. The conferees' decision to rescind $228 million 
will delay the consolidation of FDA facilities which are in desperate 
need of modernization. I believe that modernizing the FDA is a national 
priority that is vital to protecting public health and safety and 
improving the regulatory capability of this agency.
  This conference report also makes significant cuts in the VA/HUD 
Subcommittee budget in order to pay for disaster funding for 
Northridge, CA and Oklahoma City. It is wrong to require programs 
within the jurisdiction of single appropriations subcommittee to bear 
the costs of funding national disasters. Funding assistance for 
national disasters is a national responsibility requiring everyone to 
contribute.
  During the Senate's consideration of H.R. 1158, I offered an 
amendment to that would have made an across-the-board cut in 
discretionary spending to pay for disaster relief in a more equitable 
manner. Unfortunately, this amendment was defeated.
  As the flood waters once again rise throughout the Midwest, we are 
reminded of the need to establish a rainy day fund to prepay the costs 
of disaster relief. Our failure to establish such a fund is costing VA-
HUD programs $8.5 billion--over 10 percent of all the funds 
appropriated for VA-HUD programs in FY 1995.
  The conference agreement also nearly triples the Senate-passed 
rescissions for education programs and doubles the amount of funding 
rescinded for national service. These programs represent the kind of 
strategic investments that I believe the we have to make if we are to 
prepare future generations for the 21st century.
  While the conferees did recognize the value and need of moving 
forward with this project in the future, I will continue to fight for 
FDA consolidation despite the rescission contained in this bill.
  For these reasons, Mr. President, I am opposed to the conference 
report to H.R. 1158.


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