[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 140 (Monday, September 11, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13183-S13199]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE FAMILY SELF-SUFFICIENCY ACT
The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, will the Senator be good enough to yield
5 minutes?
Mr. HATCH. I will be happy to yield 5 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.
Mr. KENNEDY. I thank the Senator.
Mr. President, I just want to put in the Record some of the comments
from some of the leading church and legislative and active groups that
have been focusing on the welfare debate. I will include all of the
statements in the Record. But I would like to refer at this time to
individual sentences and comments that summarize their position.
One was from the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the
USA. It said:
The religious community is a major provider of center-based
child care. Throughout the nation, millions of children are
cared for every day in church-housed child care. Our churches
have long waiting lists of parents seeking quality care for
their children. We are not able to accommodate the demand
because the resources to expand the supply are so scarce. We
know this problem first hand, because the desperate parents
are in our congregations, as are the overworked providers of
child care services. Their facilities are in our buildings,
and our congregations are enriched by the lively presence of
their children.
We believe that it is not responsible public policy to
require parents to work without providing adequately for
their children's safety and nurture while the parents are at
their jobs. If the government is going to insist that mothers
of young children leave them to go into the workplace, then
the government must make it possible for the parents to do so
in the confidence that their children are in a safe,
wholesome environment. To do otherwise puts our children at
risk and almost guarantees that parents, preoccupied with
concern for the well-being of their youngsters, will not
perform to the best of their ability.
That is an excellent statement of the National Council of the
Churches of Christ.
The National Conference of State Legislatures:
NCSL has been concerned about the lack of coordination of
existing child care funding streams. We are interested in
working with you to consolidate these funds. Child care is an
essential component to support welfare recipients moving from
welfare to work and is critical for low-income working
families. Our experience suggests that a renewed commitment
to work by welfare recipients will require additional child
care funds above current levels.
That is the National Conference of State Legislatures; that is,
Republicans and Democrats.
The American Public Welfare Association:
Current proposals in the Senate do not create a separate
state block grant for all child care programs. APWA supports
a separate child care block grant, in the form of an
entitlement to states, not as a discretionary spending
program subject to annual funding reductions. States will not
be able to move clients from welfare to work without adequate
and flexible funding to provide essential child care
services.
Catholic Charities:
We are very concerned that the new work requirements and
time limits for AFDC participation will leave children
without adequate adult supervision while their parents are
working or looking for work. The key to successful work
programs is safe, affordable, quality day care for the
children. The bill before the Senate does not guarantee or
increase funding for day care to meet the increased need
associated with the work requirements and time limits.
Please, support amendments by Senators Hatch and Kennedy to
guarantee adequate funding to keep children safe while their
mothers try to earn enough to support them.
The Governor of Ohio:
I would like to see the child care and family nutrition
block grants converted into capped state entitlements. In the
House bill, funding for these block grants is discretionary.
Key child care programs currently are individual
entitlements. The need for child care only will grow as
welfare recipients move into the workforce.
The National Parent Teacher Association:
The potential for success of welfare reform depends on
former recipients becoming employed an being able to meet
basic needs for shelter, food, health care and child care.
Subsidized child care for low income working parents is
crucial.
Every single organization that has responsibility and which has
studied this is and which are out on the front lines on the issue of
welfare reform has understood the importance of providing child care,
and the Dodd-Kennedy amendment provides it.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that these documents be
printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA--Statement on the
Importance of Child Care in Welfare Reform
(By Mary Anderson Cooper, Associate Director, Washington Office, August
9, 1995)
As the Senate works to overhaul the nation's welfare
system, we urge Senators to make the well-being of those who
are impacted by that system their primary concern. As people
of faith and religious commitment, we are called to stand
with and seek justice for people who are poor. This is
central to our religious traditions, sacred texts, and
teachings. We are convinced, therefore, that welfare reform
must not focus on eliminating programs but on eliminating
poverty and the damage it inflicts on children (who are \2/3\
of all welfare recipients), on their parents, and on the rest
of society.
Further, we support the goal of helping families to leave
welfare through employment, because we believe that those who
are able to work have a right and a responsibility to do so.
However, we also recognize that just finding a job will not
necessarily mean either that a family should leave welfare or
that its poverty will end. Since full-time jobs at minimum
wage yield a family income that is below the poverty line,
and since such jobs often do not provide health care
benefits, employed people trying to leave welfare may still
need some government subsidy in order to become self-
supporting.
Key among the kinds of help such people need is child care.
The Children's Defense Fund tells us that one in four mothers
in their twenties who were out of the labor force in 1986
said they were not working because of child care problems
(high cost, lack of availability, poor quality or location,
lack of transportation, etc.). Among poor women, 34% said
they were not working because of child care problems.
The Government Accounting Office tells us that increasing
the supply of child care would raise the work participation
rates of poor women from 29 to 44 percent. For near-poor
women, the rates would rise from 43 to 57 percent. Thus,
increasing the supply of safe, quality, affordable child care
would help some women escape poverty while helping others
avoid falling into it in the first place.
The religious community is a major provider of center-based
child care. Throughout the nation, millions of children are
care for every day in church-housed child care. Our churches
have long waiting lists of parents seeking quality care for
their children. We
[[Page S 13184]]
are not able to accommodate the demand because the resources to expand
the supply are so scarce. We know this problem first hand,
because the desperate parents are in our congregations, as
are the overworked providers of child care services. Their
facilities are in our buildings, and our congregations are
enriched by the lively presence of their children.
We believe that it is not responsible public policy to
require parents to work without providing adequately for
their children's safety and nurture while the parents are at
their jobs. If the government is going to insist that mothers
of young children leave them to go into the workplace, then
the government must make it possible for the parents to do so
in the confidence that their children are in a safe,
wholesome environment. To do otherwise puts our children at
risk and almost guarantees that parents, preoccupied with
concern for the well-being of their youngsters, will not
perform to the best of their ability.
The issue of child care has been nearly absent from the
congressional debate on welfare reform. Consequently, we are
particularly grateful to Senator Daschle for making child
care a key feature of his legislation. We commend him for
raising the visibility of this issue and look forward to
working with him to assure that adequate provisions for child
care are included in any welfare bill that is approved by the
Congress.
____
National Conference of
State Legislatures,
Washington, DC, May 16, 1995.
Hon. Bob Packwood,
U.S. Senate, Russell Office Building, Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Packwood: We are writing to thank you for your
public commitment to state flexibility as a principle in your
welfare reform legislation. The National Conference of State
Legislatures (NCSL) is especially pleased by your recognition
of the critical role of state legislators in welfare reform
and other programs that serve children and families. We
appreciate your confidence in our ability to design programs
that best serve the needs in our states and urge you to
consider our views as you finalize your welfare reform
legislation.
We are encouraged by your endorsement of providing more
discretion to state decisionmakers and rejecting provisions
that micromanage and limit state authority to determine
eligibility. However, state legislators are concerned about
several provisions under consideration that have the
potential to limit state authority, shift major costs to the
states and violate NCSL's policy on block grants. The balance
of this letter specifies our concerns in six major areas. In
summary, we urge you to reconsider the consolidation of open-
ended entitlements for child protection services, work
requirements in the cash assistance block grant, denial of
benefits to legal immigrants, the absence of real protection
for states to respond to economic change, the consolidation
of child care funding, and timing to successfully implement
revised programs.
I understand that your are still considering a block grant
for child protection funds. State legislators believe that
foster care maintenance and adoption assistance payments and
administrative funding under Title IV-E must be maintained as
an open-ended entitlement. Children in danger cannot be told
that the government ran out of money to protect them. We must
respond to those who turn to us as a last resort. The demand
for these services has not been predicted well at the federal
level. No one predicted the damage that HIV infection, crack
cocaine and homelessness would do to children's security
within their families. No one anticipated the resulting
increase in state and federal costs. Courts will decide to
remove children from unsafe homes and states must respond to
these decisions. We urge you to reject the child protection
block grant.
We are disappointed with the prescriptive work and
participation requirements in H.R. 4. State legislators are
interested in creating our own programs, not running a
uniform program with federally-determined program details and
fewer funds. We oppose federal micromanagement in the
definition or type or work, the role of training, minimum
number of hours a recipient must work, and participation
rates. These are precisely the decisions each state should
make based on local needs. We do support measurement of
outcomes and performance data to ensure that program goals
are being met.
NCSL strongly opposes the denial of benefits to legal
immigrants. The federal government has sole jurisdiction over
immigration policy and must bear the responsibility to serve
the immigrants it allows to enter states and localities. The
denial of benefits will shift the costs to state budgets.
Eliminating benefits to noncitizens or deeming for
unreasonably long periods will not eliminate the need, and
state and local budgets and taxpayers will bear the burden.
Denial of services to legal immigrants by states appears to
violate both state and federal constitutional provisions. We
continue to support making affidavits of support legally
binding.
NCSL supports the development of a contingency funds to
assist states to respond to changes in population and the
economy rather than a loan fund. The absence of adequate
protections for states with population growth, economic
changes and disasters is a barrier to state support of a cash
assistance block grant. We believe that a loan fund is not
sufficient assurance of federal assistance. The federal
government must participate as a partner in a fund that has a
mechanism for budget adjustment so that states are not overly
burdened by increased demand for services.
NCSL has been concerned about the lack of coordination of
existing child care funding streams. We are interested in
working with you to consolidate these funds. Child care is an
essential component to support welfare recipients moving from
welfare to work and is critical for low-income working
families. Our experience suggests that a renewed commitment
to work by welfare recipients will require additional child
care funds above current levels. A consolidated child care
fund should stand alone.
Finally, state legislators will need adequate transition
time to successfully implement revised income security and
related programs. States will have to modify their laws to
comport with new federal legislation, restructure their
administrative bureaucracies and revise their FY96 and FY97
budgets that have been enacted on the basis of current law
and federal spending guarantees. We urge inclusion of a
provision giving states no less than one year of transition
time and consideration for additional time for states that
meet biennially.
We look forward to working with you throughout this
process. Please contact Sheri Steisel or Michael Bird in
NCSL's Washington Office to further discuss our views.
Sincerely,
Jane L. Campbell,
President, NCSL, Assistant House Minority Leader, Ohio.
James J. Lack,
President-elect, NCSL, Senator, New York.
____
American Public Welfare Association
(By Gerald H. Miller, President, and A. Sidney Johnson III, Executive
Director)
Serious Shortfall in Child Care Funding
By increasing the number of participants required to work
and maintaining child care funds at the FY 94 level, current
welfare reform proposals in the Senate would significantly
hinder states' efforts to move welfare recipients into the
workforce. There is clear congressional intent to require
states to meet higher participation rates, which cannot be
met if child care is unavailable. CBO estimates, presented in
testimony before the Senate Finance Committee, indicate that
the child care needed to meet proposed participation rates,
will cost approximately 5 times the current proposed
allocation. Based on those estimates, states will face a
serious child care funding crisis.
Current proposals in the Senate do not create a separate
state block grant for all child care programs. APWA supports
a separate child care block grant, in the form of an
entitlement to states, not as a discretionary spending
program subject to annual funding reductions. States will not
be able to move clients from welfare to work without adequate
and flexible funding to provide essential child care
services.
Analysis
The amount of money allocated for child care is not
adequate given the work participation requirements in the
bill. Welfare reform legislation, in outlining work
provisions and requirements, should recognize and address
both programatically and financially the distinct role of
child care in clients' ability to obtain and retain
employment. Child care is an essential component for
successfully moving people to self-sufficiency. Moreover, no
work program can succeed without a commitment to making
quality child care available for recipients.
____
Catholic Charities, USA,
August 4, 1995.
Dear Senator: As the Senate takes up welfare reform, we
urge you to adopt provisions to strengthen families, protect
children, and preserve the nation's commitment to fighting
child poverty.
Across this country, 1,400 local agencies and institutions
in the Catholic Charities network serve more than 10 million
people annually. Last year alone, Catholic Charities USA
helped more than 138,000 women, teenagers, and their families
with crisis pregnancies. Because Catholic agencies run the
full spectrum of services, from soup kitchens and shelters to
transitional and permanent housing, they see families in all
stages of problems as well as those who have escaped poverty
and dependency.
This broad experience, along with our religious tradition
which defends human life and human dignity, compels us to
share our strong convictions about welfare reform.
The first principle in welfare reform must be, ``Do no
harm.'' Along with the U.S. Catholic Conference, the National
Right-to-Life Committee, and other pro-life organizations, we
have vigorously opposed child-exclusion provisions such as
the ``family cap'' and denial of cash assistance for children
born to teenage mothers or for whom paternity has not yet
been legally established.
We are also convinced that the idea of rewarding states for
reducing out-of-wedlock pregnancies is well-intentioned but
dangerously light of the fact that the only state experiment
in this regard, the New Jersey family cap, already has
increased abortions without any significant reduction in
births. The ``illegitimacy ratio'' may well encourage states
to engage in similar experiments that
[[Page S 13185]]
would result in more abortions and more suffering.
We also support Senator Kent Conrad's amendment, which not
only would require teen mothers to live under adult
supervision and continue their education, but also would
provide resources for ``second-chance homes'' to make that
requirement a reality.
The second principle should be to protect children. We are
very concerned that the new work requirements and time limits
for AFDC participation will leave children without adequate
adult supervision while their parents are working or looking
for work. The key to successful work programs is safe,
affordable, quality day care for the children. The bill
before the Senate does not guarantee or increase funding for
day care to meet the
increased need associated with the work requirements and
time limits. Please, support amendments by Senators Hatch
and Kennedy to guarantee adequate funding to keep children
safe while their mothers try to earn enough to support
them.
The third principle should be to maintain the national
safety net for children. We oppose block granting Food
Stamps, even as a state option, because the Food Stamp
program is the only national program available to feed poor
children of all ages with working parents as well as those on
welfare. On the whole, the Food Stamp program works well,
ensuring that children in even the poorest families do not
suffer from malnutrition.
We are encouraged by the fact that Senator Dole's bill does
not seek to cut or erode federal support for child protection
in the child welfare system. Proposals to block grant these
essential protections are ill-advised and dangerous to
children who are already abused, neglected, abandoned, and
totally at the mercy of state child welfare systems. Federal
rules and guarantees are essential to the safety of children.
The fourth principle should be fairness to all citizens.
Certain proposals before the Senate would create a new
category of ``second-class citizenship,'' making immigrants
ineligible for most federal programs, even after they become
naturalized Americans. We urge you to reject this and other
proposals that would leave legal immigrants without the
possibility of assistance when they are in genuine need.
The fifth principle should be to maintain the national
commitment to fighting child poverty. In exchange for federal
dollars and broad flexibility, states should be expected to
maintain at least their current level of support for poor
children and their families. We understand that Senator
Breaux will offer such an amendment on the Senate floor.
Please give it your support.
In our Catholic teaching, all children, but especially poor
and unborn children, have a special claim to the protection
of society and government. Please vote for proposals that
keep the federal government on their side.
Sincerely,
Fred Kammer, SJ,
President.
____
State of Ohio,
Office of the Governor,
March 27, 1995.
Hon. Bob Dole,
Majority Leader,
U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Dole: As you know, the House of
Representatives has completed its consideration of welfare
reform legislation. While I strongly support the decision
made by the House to convert welfare programs into block
grants, I am concerned that the House bill fails to provide
states with the flexibility needed to set our own priorities
and conduct innovative experiments to promote responsibility
and self-sufficiency. Many of my fellow Republican Governors
share a number of my concerns.
I was disappointed with the allocation formula established
through the Temporary Family Assistance Block Grant. It is
the position of the National Governors' Association that any
formula should allow states to use either a three-year
average or 1994 spending levels in determining base year
allocations. While the House formula includes this choice, it
then applies a 2.4-percent reduction factor to each state's
allocation. The reduction factor leaves Ohio with a base year
allocation of $700 million annually, which is lower than what
we would have received using either formula without a
reduction factor. Speaker Gingrich assured states he would
support eliminating the reduction factor. We would like to
work with you in the Senate to make this correction.
Although allowing each state to receive its most favorable
allocation without a reduction factor requires funding for
the block grant to be increased by approximately $200 million
nationally, it is important to remember that states are
making a significant financial sacrifice in supporting capped
block grants. If states are disadvantaged in determining base
year allocations, it becomes even more difficult to make the
increased investments in work programs necessary to move
individuals off welfare.
The House bill also does not include sufficient protections
for states in the event of an economic downturn. If Congress
replaces open-ended individual entitlements with capped state
entitlements, states are placed in an extremely vulnerable
position should the welfare-eligible population increase
significantly. The state and federal governments should be
partners in meeting the needs of expanded caseloads in
recessions. The House bill contains a $1 billion rainy day
fund designed to provide the states with short-term loans,
repayable with interest in three years. A loan fund does not
represent a partnership; instead it is a cost shift.
Ohio would be particularly disadvantaged in a recession due
to aggressive steps already taken to reduce welfare
caseloads. Today, 85,000 fewer Ohioans receive welfare than
in 1992. States that have not been aggressive in reducing
their welfare rolls will be better able to accommodate
increased caseloads. Ohio's streamlined base makes it very
difficult for us to absorb increased recessionary demands.
As part of our efforts to reduce welfare caseloads, Ohio
has developed the strongest JOBS program in the nation. Ohio
leads the nation with 33,911 recipients participating in
JOBS. Only California comes close to matching Ohio's
performance with 32,755 recipients enrolled in JOBS, and
California has three times as many ADC recipients as Ohio.
Our success with the JOBS program reflects a strong
investment in training and education programs. Regardless of
the extent of our investment, however, no work program can
succeed without a commitment to making quality child care
available for recipients. In Ohio, the state provides non-
guaranteed day care to families with incomes up to 133
percent of the federal poverty level. The program currently
has an average daily enrollment of 17,800. The State of Ohio
is doing its part to provide child care to those in need. The
federal government also must meet its responsibility.
I would like to see the child care and family nutrition
block grants converted into capped state entitlements. In the
House bill, funding for these block grants is discretionary.
Key child care programs currently are individual
entitlements. The need for child care only will grow as
welfare recipients move into the workforce. My comfort level
with the House package would increase significantly if states
were guaranteed to receive a specified level of funding for
child care and for child nutrition services for the next five
years. That guarantee can only come through a capped state
entitlement.
Excessive prescriptiveness is a problem throughout the
House legislation. The bill's work requirements are a perfect
example. The federal government mandates how many hours per
week a federally defined percentage of cash assistance
recipients must participate in federally prescribed work
activities. In a true block grant, states would be free to
choose how best to allocate resources to meet goals developed
jointly by the federal and state governments. The
recordkeeping requirements in the House bill also are
extraordinarily prescriptive. States remain concerned that
our computer systems lack the capability to provide the
information required by the House.
A true block grant should also give states the ability to
determine their own program eligibility standards. The House
legislation includes a number of specific eligibility
restrictions. For example, cash benefits will be denied to
unwed minor mothers and their children. Additional children
born to mothers on welfare will be denied benefits. Decisions
like these should be left to the states. By federally
mandating these restrictions, the House is interfering with
successful state reforms. For example, in Ohio we have
developed a program designed to encourage minor mothers to
remain in school. The LEAP (Learning, Earning, and Parenting)
program supplements or reduces a teen mother's ADC cash grant
based on her school attendance to teach her that there is a
real value to completing her education. LEAP has led to a
significant decrease in the drop-out rate for this vulnerable
population. If the House prohibition on cash benefits remains
in place, the LEAP program will have to be discontinued.
As the Senate begins to consider welfare legislation, I
would be grateful for your assistance in addressing my
concerns. Like many other Governors, I strongly support the
broad outline of the House proposal, but it is important that
these issues be resolved successfully. As a Governor, it will
be up to me to implement welfare reforms in my State. I would
like to work with you to ensure that block grants give the
states the flexibility we need to implement innovative
reforms designed to meet the specific needs of our
communities. Without this flexibility, I cannot support this
welfare reform package.
While Ohio watches federal welfare reform developments with
tremendous interest, we have been actively pursuing a
statewide reform agenda. I have enclosed a summary of Ohio's
history of welfare reform innovation for your information.
Thank you for your personal consideration of my concerns.
Sincerely,
George V. Voinovich,
Governor.
____
National Parent Teacher Association, National Association
of Elementary School Principals, National Association
of State Boards of Education, National Association of
State Directors of Special Education, National
Education Association, and the Council of Chief State
School Officers,
March 20, 1995.
Dear Representative: The undersigned organizations,
representing parents, educators, principals, and state
policymakers, support improvements to the welfare system. We
believe such reforms must address the
[[Page S 13186]]
fundamental quality child care needs of working as well as
unemployed parents.
We have several concerns about the impact of H.R. 999 on
the issues of access to and the quality of child care in this
country:
The plan reduces funding even though programs already have
long waiting lists of eligible families.
Welfare reform will increase the need for child care by
requiring participation in training, education, or employment
by mothers who currently take care of their children.
The potential for success of welfare reform depends on
former recipients becoming employed and being able to meet
basic needs for shelter, food, health care and child care.
Subsidized child care for low income working parents is
crucial.
Recent data show that quality in centers and daycare homes
is low, especially for infants. Cutting funding for quality
and eliminating standards would threaten to erode the quality
of care even further.
We know that the quality of child care for all children has
a significant impact on the ability of children to learn in
the first few years of school. When children experience
success in responsive, high quality programs, they learn
essential skills and knowledge, and their parents learn to be
confident partners with teachers and schools.
* * * * *
Mr. KENNEDY. Finally, Mr. President, I would just mention what we are
really talking about in terms of child care. We have talked about
figures. We talked about statistics. We talked about flow lines. We
talked about entitlements. What we are talking about is really the
issue of children being home alone. This is not a joke or a big screen
comedy. It is a real life tragedy for American families pressed to the
wall. Just listen to the horror stories from families that have been
put in this awful position--and paying an unbelievable price.
Think about 6-year-old Jermaine James of Fairfax County and his 6-
year-old friend Amanda, who were being cared for by his 8-year-old
sister Tina. When a fire broke out in their apartment, Tina ran for
help, inadvertently locking the younger children in the burning
apartment. They died before the fire department could get to them.
Sandra James and her husband needed two jobs to support their family
and still could not afford child care. They tried to stagger their
schedules but did not always succeed.
Think about 7-month-old Craig Pinner of San Francisco who drowned in
the bathtub while his 9-year-old brother was trying to bathe him. His
mother was working part time and participating in job training. She
usually left the children with her family, but her car had broken down
and she was no longer able to get them there. She was trying to find
affordable child care but was unsuccessful.
Think about 4-year-old Anthony and 5-year-old Maurice Grant of Dade
County. While home alone, they climbed into the clothes dryer to look
at a magazine in a hiding place, pulled the door closed, and tumbled
and burned to death. Their mother was waiting for child care assistance
and generally left the children with neighbors. But sometimes these
arrangements fell through and she had to leave them home alone for just
a few hours.
This did not happen in Hollywood--but in Virginia and Florida and
California and elsewhere. We must do everything in our power to avoid
putting families in this kind of a situation in the name of reform.
Mr. President, I will include in the Record, if my friend and
colleague, Senator Dodd, has not, the waiting lines that exist in the
States at the present time.
The States face large unmet needs for child assistance, waiting
lists, clothes, and the list goes on all the way--Alabama, 19,000
children; Alaska, 752 children; Arizona, 2,600 children; California,
250,000 children; Delaware, over 1,000 children; Florida, 19,000;
Georgia, 21,000; Hawaii, 900 children are on the waiting list; Idaho,
1,000 children waiting; Illinois, 20,000 children waiting; Indiana,
7,900 on the waiting lists; Kansas, 1,270 on the waiting list,
Kentucky, 10,000 on the waiting list; Louisiana, 4,600; Maine 3,000;
Maryland, 4,000; Massachusetts 4,000 statewide waiting for child care
for working poor families; Michigan, 12,000 last year; Minnesota,
7,000; Missouri, 6,500; Montana, 200 children; Nevada, 7,000; and the
list goes on; New Jersey, 24,000; New Mexico, 6,300; New York, 23,000;
North Carolina, 13,000; Pennsylvania, 7,700; Rhode Island, 972. The
list goes on and on with Wisconsin, 6,800; West Virginia, 13,000.
Mr. President, the fact of the matter is that under this particular
bill, the Dole bill, without the Dodd amendment, we will be requiring
the States to have over 1 million new slots. They are not doing it
today. They do not have the resources today. They do not have the money
under the Dole program today to do it. The Dodd amendment will provide
them with the resources to be able to meet that obligation, that
obligation that is there in the States today and that will be created
by this bill. That is what this amendment is all about and why it
should be supported.
Mr. DODD addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. DODD. Mr. President, let me pick up on the last point that the
Senator from Massachusetts raised. He may have made it before I walked
onto the floor. He pointed out the waiting lists that exist in the
States for child care slots today, before we pass a welfare reform
bill. There is just tremendous demand today. What we are talking
about--this bill, of course--is taking anywhere from 1 to 2 million
people and moving them over the next 5 years from welfare to work.
If we do not provide additional resources, then there will be
increased pressure on existing dollars that go to those who are getting
the child care today. It is worthwhile to point out that the people who
get child care today under the child care development block grant, that
Senator Hatch and I passed in 1990, are working poor. Those are people
at work right now. That child care assistance makes it possible for
them to stay in the work force and not slip into a public assistance
category.
The fear that many of us have here, is that without some additional
resources, as we move people who are on welfare today to work, the
people out working today and staying at work, getting some of that
assistance, those resources are going to have to be shifted in the
State
in order to accommodate the demands of this bill or face the penalties
the bill imposes on the States if the States do not move the 25 to 50
percent of the welfare recipients on their rolls to work.
So you are going to have the almost bizarre effect of taking people
who are doing what we are encouraging people to do, and that is stay at
work, who are marginally making enough to stay off the welfare rolls
and pushing those people back on the rolls as we accommodate the
demands of the legislation to take people on the welfare rolls to work.
So it seems we ought not to be jeopardizing the small amount of funds
we have today out there assisting those families presently at work.
Let me emphasize a couple of points here if I can. What we are
talking about with this proposal is not an entitlement. This is a pool
of resources. It does not entitle anyone to it. It merely makes the
funds available to the States.
So there are those who have said they do not believe in an
entitlement for child care. We might otherwise disagree about that, but
this amendment does not create an entitlement. It merely says to Ohio,
Connecticut, Massachusetts, divide it up based on the block grant and
what it takes to make it work. Here are some additional resources to
make it possible for you to meet the demand, the mandate, of the
Federal law.
The mandate of the bill we are about to pass says to Ohio and
Connecticut, you must move the following percentages of your welfare
rolls to work. And what we are saying is rather than ask Ohio and
Connecticut to pay a penalty because they did not meet that criteria
because they could not come up with the resources to pay for the child
care, here as a result of our mandate are some resources on the most
critical issue facing any State with its welfare recipients: How do you
take a parent that has infant children and no place to put them and get
them to go to work?
Sixty percent of all welfare recipients have children age 5 and
under, Mr. President. So it is unrealistic to assume those children are
going to find some setting in the neighborhood or with a grandparent.
Ideally that would be the best case, but realistically that
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is not going to happen in enough instances. So it is finding and
affording child care that's the issue. The child care settings may
vary--church-based programs, community-based programs. There is a wide
variety of things the States have done creatively in the child-care
setting area. I do not have any difficulty with that kind of
flexibility at all. But here are resources.
In the absence of that, we are told that we are looking at an
additional cost, above the amount set aside from the block grant, which
is the $5 billion over 5 years. In fiscal year 2000, in the State of
Ohio, the additional amount is $190 million, in the State of
Pennsylvania--I see my colleague and friend from Pennsylvania here--
$171 million; for Connecticut, $48 million; Massachusetts, $89 million.
These are the numbers the States, it is estimated, will have to come up
with. They can cut spending. It does not mean necessarily a mandate to
raise taxes. But that is the pool they will have to come up with to
provide for the child-care needs of the population that moves to work.
If we are mandating that--and we are; we are mandating work--why not
provide the States with some help to do it? That is all we are saying
here, a pool of money over 5 years, $6 billion.
Now, it is a lot of money. I know that. But if we all appreciate
keeping our mind on the goal of getting people to work, then we ought
to be trying to do this in a bipartisan way.
Mr. President, I am not exaggerating. If we get this amendment
adopted or something like it--and I think on the issue of the formulas,
which is, I think, a minor point--and a few other areas, you could pass
this bill 95 to 5. We could have overwhelming, strong support coming
out of here for a welfare reform bill, because I think all of us share
the common goal of getting people from welfare to work.
Whether that is cost savings or an investment, the value of it, I
think all of us appreciate, to the family, the neighborhood, the
community, is tremendously enhanced. And if child care is one of the
major obstacles to moving an individual to work, because they do not
know where to put that child, then trying to find the way for them to
do it, assist the States in that process ought not to be an ideological
battle here. We have enough battles on that stuff. This ought not be
one.
So I am urging in these next 40 minutes or so that are remaining that
people take a good look at what this is. Understand, it is no
entitlement, not a guarantee to anybody, merely assistance to these
States to be able to achieve the goal as laid out in the majority
leader's bill, and that is to get people to work.
People will tell you even with adequate child care, it is going to be
hard. You talk about some pretty heavy numbers to move from welfare to
work, and given the economy and downsizing and a lot of other things
happening, good jobs, and so forth, are not expanding in our economy.
We ought to be talking about that, I hope, one of these days, but
nonetheless under the best of circumstances, it is going to be hard.
It seems to me we ought to be trying at least to make it possible to
move those people to work and not have the kind of burden on the States
that is laid out here with the particular costs associated with child
care. And as I said in response to the point that was being made by the
Senator from Massachusetts, we have already got people really trying
hard to stay off the welfare rolls and stay at work. It would be a
tragedy, in a way, to then have some of these people taking some of the
resources they get, plowing them into this area and moving some of
these people at work and trying to stay off welfare back on those
rolls.
Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Utah, who was here, who
allocated me about 5 or 10 minutes of his time to make this point. I am
grateful to him for that.
At this point, I will yield the floor. We may have some additional
Members who show up on this issue. But I urge my colleagues in these
next remaining minutes here, this is a chance for us, Mr. President, to
really put together a bipartisan bill on welfare reform. I honestly
believe that if we could adopt this amendment, and a few other things,
we would be looking at an overwhelming vote in favor of this welfare
reform package.
That is how this body and this Congress ought to be functioning.
People want us to come together. They do not want to see bickering and
partisan battling. They would like us to find common ground. Here is a
way for us to do it on an issue that most people really want to see us
focus our attention on. Here is a chance to achieve that goal in the
next 45 or 50 minutes. It means doing the right thing. It is truly
doing the right thing in terms of welfare reform and eliminating a
major obstacle that people face here of moving from the rolls of public
assistance to the independence and self-reliance of work and helping
them out with their kids. And those children's needs, as I said a
moment ago, Mr. President, ought not to be the subject of a partisan
debate here. We ought to be able to find the means by which we can
assist the families to eliminate at least that question in their mind,
assist the States as they move into this process in a way in which we
can do it. Resource allocation is simple enough to accommodate.
I again urge my colleagues to take a good look at this and come to
this floor, hopefully in the next 50 minutes, and cast a vote in favor
of what I think would build a strong, strong vote of support in favor
of the majority leader's welfare reform bill.
I yield the floor.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, may I inquire of the Chair of the time
remaining on this side?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania has 50 minutes
remaining. The Senator from Connecticut has 1 minute 42 seconds.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
I wanted to congratulate the Senator from Connecticut for his very
persuasive case on behalf of the need for child care and making
workfare or welfare to work.
I do not think anyone on this side of the aisle disagrees with the
basic premise of his amendment, which is if we are going to have people
go to work, then we are going to be in some need of child care for
working women, single mothers. The question is, How much money are you
willing to put up? What will be the impact?
Again, we go back to the start of a lot of these programs, the
welfare programs back in the 1960's when they really mushroomed, and a
lot of these programs were very well intentioned, but what happened?
What were the consequences of these--I am careful not to use the word
entitlement because I know the Senator from Connecticut says this is
not an entitlement. I agree. It is not an entitlement.
But there is enough money in his bill to fill all the day-care slots
that are anticipated to be needed.
Well, it is not an entitlement, but it takes care of everyone who
needs the service. So while you know it is sort of taking away with one
hand, saying it is not an entitlement, it is giving with the other by
giving all the money necessary anticipated to have the need. You can
say it is not an entitlement, but it is, in fact, almost a guarantee of
child care.
So, what are the consequences of this guarantee? And we talked about
this in some dialog on Friday. And you know, I have some concerns about
people on welfare getting a guarantee of sorts of child care where if
someone who is a working mother gets no guarantee at all of having any
kind of child-care support. In fact, as the Senator from Connecticut
pointed out on numerous occasions, accurately, there is a shortage of
day-care slots available for working mothers in this country.
So to suggest we should provide some sort of quasi-guarantee for
those on welfare and not for those who are working mothers, I think,
sets up a bad precedent, No. 1; and with the law of unintended
consequence you may encourage welfare dependency, at least initially,
in some cases.
There are several other points I want to make. One is the money. I
know we sort of gloss over that around here. Mr. President, $6 billion
is not a whole lot of money, at least if you sit on the Senate floor
most days you would think $6 billion is not a lot of money. But it is a
lot of money, and it is given the fact that if you look at what is
being proposed in the Republican bill that we are now amending.
The Republican bill over the next 7 years will allow welfare to grow
at 70 percent over the next 7 years--70 percent. Welfare programs will
grow from
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the year 1995 to the year 2002, 70 percent. There will be an increase
of 70 percent in these programs. And what we are saying now is that is
not enough. We need another $6 billion more. Just so you understand,
you say, well, how much was it going to grow if we did not cut it back,
because this bill does have some reduction? Well, it would have grown
at 77 percent. So we are taking a program that was supposed to grow
over the next 7 years and grow by 77 percent; cut it back to 70
percent. There are those on the other side saying, that is too tough.
We need to add another $6 billion more back to this fund of money.
If you are serious about day care, if you really think child care is
that important, well then, I would suggest that you confine it to the
70-percent growth that is going to be experienced over the next 7
years, $6 billion to offset the money you want to spend, not another
quasi-guarantee or almost entitlement for child care.
I just think you have to pass the straight-face test around here. If
you really are serious about solving problems--I think we all are. We
want to solve the problem of child care in this bill. And I think we
have done some things with the Snowe amendment that goes a long way in
doing so. So it is now in the Dole modified bill. I think we made a
major step forward.
If you are serious about providing and funding more dollars, do not
say we need to spend more. That is how we got to where we are today.
This bill has to fit into a reconciliation package which, by the way,
it does not right now. It does not right now. It is over what, I think,
the Budget Committee wants to see in reductions in welfare. We are
going to have to get more.
When we go to conference this bill is going to come back with less
money, I suspect. The House bill was substantially under this bill. So
it will be under this. The House bill had a 5-year year timeframe when
they passed the bill. And on their 5-year timeframe they had welfare
expenditures growing at 42 percent.
Now, that is at a slower rate than our 70 percent over 7 years. So
you are going to see we are already going to have to pull back funds.
And to suggest that we should come to the floor and we can get a
compromise spending more money, that is how we got there and how we got
to what the welfare system is. We have always done that, come to the
floor and said, ``OK. We will compromise and spend more.'' And
everybody will be happy and pass a bill 96 to 1, passing a bill 96 to 1
that perpetuates the same thing--maybe makes everybody feel good, but
it does not solve the problem. It does not solve the problem.
So what we are suggesting here is that you know, we are, and I think,
continuing in a dialog. I know Senator Hatch has an amendment on day
care that I think is a serious amendment. And we are trying to find
some ground to make all of our Members, not just on the Democratic
side, but I know myself and others, I know Senator Jeffords is going to
speak here. We are concerned about the child care aspects of this.
I know Senator Jeffords supported the Snowe amendment which is now in
the leader's bill. I know he would like to go further. And I know there
are other Members who would like to go further. But we have to
understand we have budget constraints.
This is not a stingy bill that we are dealing with. Welfare spending
will grow by 70 percent over the next 7 years. That is not stingy. That
is not uncaring. And to suggest that we can solve the problem and get
everybody happy by spending another $6 billion--I suggest if we got
that in there there would be another $6 billion to spend in another
program.
I would also add that Republican Governors, almost every one of
them--I know the majority leader has come here and said I think 29 of
the 30 Republican Governors in the country have come out and supported
the Dole substitute. They comprise roughly 80 percent of the welfare
recipients. The Governors of those States have within those States 80
percent of the Nation's welfare recipients. And what they have almost
unanimously said to us is ``You give us the money you allocated under
this bill and we can do the job. We can, in fact, put people to work.''
You would think from the comments of some on the other side that we
are going to require every mother who has a child under 5 to go to
work. I would remind the Senators who are debating this amendment that
when this bill goes into effect, the initial participation rates are
only 30 percent. That means only 30 percent of all the welfare caseload
has to be in a work program. It only goes up to a maximum of 50
percent. So the State always has discretion to take mothers with young
children and not require them to work. In fact, many Governors have
already told me that is exactly what they would do in most cases
because of the cost, and because of the difficulty with day care.
But we provide that flexibility in the law. We already provide that.
We already say they can adjust. And the Governors say they can do it.
And if you look at some of the plans that have been tried under the
1988 act--I mentioned on several occasions the Riverside, CA, example,
where what we have seen is a 14-percent reduction in food stamps, a 20-
some reduction--I do not have numbers in front of me--20-some percent
reduction that goes out on AFDC, aid to families with dependent
children, and a 25-percent reduction in caseload.
Now, that saves money. Why? Why do they save money? They require
people to go to work. So you can save money to provide some of that
work. And it was a successful program at a time when Riverside, CA, was
experiencing a 9 percent-unemployment rate. So it is not that there are
no jobs. There are no jobs. Well, there are jobs, if we do some things
like the Dole bill does which allow you to fill some vacancies in
cities and counties and local governments, State governments which you
cannot under current law. If there is a vacancy in the State government
or local government, you want to fill it with a welfare recipient, you
can do it. You are not allowed to hire somebody who is a welfare
recipient for an open position. Why? That is to protect the union
membership at the State and local level. They do not want people on
welfare to get some of those jobs. I think that is a crime. That would
change under the Dole bill.
So I mean we are doing a lot of things that will encourage--will
create more job opportunities which will cause savings as we have seen
in examples in the past, where if you have a work requirement, the
welfare rolls will go down. Ask Governor Thompson, Governor Engler, and
ask others who have tried it. The caseload will go down. People will
get to work because of the requirement that is there. And they will
save money. And that money can be used to provide for support services
for those who have to remain in the program and go to the work program.
That is the whole basis behind what we are suggesting here.
I would suggest that what we have provided for again with the
Governors, Republican Governors lining up behind this bill, is adequate
to fund this program, to fund the child-care programs that are
necessary. We have the flexibility of the States with the 50-percent
work participation requirement to exempt certain difficult-to-place
mothers with young children. I mean there is a lot of flexibility in
this program to be able to deal with the problems. I think what we now
have to do is make the fiscally responsible vote. Welfare has gotten
itself in the problem it has because we have been reluctant in the face
of harming children or these horrible things that are going to occur,
if we do not provide all the money for everything, all these
entitlements. If we do not provide all these entitlements children are
going to suffer.
All I would suggest is we provided entitlements for 25 and 30 years.
Children are suffering at historic levels. So if it was just money and
entitlements there would be no suffering today. There are plenty of
entitlements and plenty of suffering to go with it. So let me suggest
that maybe what we need is instead of guaranteeing everybody child
care, why do we not require work and say that we have to look to
families and to other kinds of networks of support to look for child
care, just like we have done in this country historically?
One of my real concerns--and this gets to be more of a philosophical
concern, if we--as I know the Senator from Connecticut will say we are
not guaranteeing, but we darn near are guaranteeing it--if you provide
all the money for all the slots, if you do that, you run
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into the problem where the Government day-care option is the first
resort;
that getting Government support for that day care slot is now the
first choice, not the last resort. The system as it works today works
well. I know there are shortages of day care, but it works well in
targeting the mothers who need day care the most. It works well in that
you have to go through a very rigorous qualification procedure to be
able to qualify for Government-assisted day care. That would probably
not be the case if we fully funded all these day care slots.
Mr. DODD. Will my colleague yield?
Mr. SANTORUM. Yes, I will yield.
Mr. DODD. I note the point about the entitlement issue. I think my
colleague from Pennsylvania mentioned over the next 7 years there would
be a 70-percent increase. I believe it is flat. I do not think there is
a penny more. This is $48 billion. It is for 7 years. There is no
inflation factor built in. I think I am correct on that, but I stand
corrected if I am wrong.
Mr. SANTORUM. The Senator is right, the AFDC dollars remain flat.
When I talk about the 70-percent increase, I talk about all the means-
tested entitlement programs included in this bill.
Mr. DODD. As far as the AFDC----
Mr. SANTORUM. The AFDC program is block granted at a flat level, the
Senator is right. But, obviously, there are a lot of other support
services and means-tested programs that will continue to grow.
The point I tried to make is that with respect to AFDC, you have the
flexibility within that program the Governors desire, saying, in fact,
they can save money and have money, because of the savings, available
to support the work program.
In addition, you have a 50-percent work participation requirement
which would give the States the flexibility to exclude a lot of the
people that you mentioned who have young children or maybe multiple
young children, from having to go to work and the work requirement. We
do provide a lot of flexibility there. We think that flexibility goes a
long way in solving the problem.
I am hopeful we can look at the past to see what the future holds.
Looking at the past and seeing all the entitlements we put in place and
seeing all the money that we spent trying to make sure nobody is
harmed, what we have done is make sure that nobody has been helped.
What we have not done is challenge people to do more, to move forward.
I believe this program, with the work requirement and the
participation standards we have and the flexibility given to States,
will do just that: challenge people to go out and work and find ways to
provide for themselves and their families. I think, in the long run,
that will be the best for everyone concerned.
At this time, I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Vermont.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, we all are having a hard time with this
amendment and with this bill. We all want to see welfare reform. We all
want to see child care provided, and, thus, I rise in support of this
amendment because I think it will help us move in that direction.
We all agree that we want to see more welfare recipients in the work
force. We all agree that the welfare cycle must be broken. I believe
giving kids a good start through safe and healthy surroundings is
essential to breaking the welfare cycle.
In order to become productive, self-sufficient members of society,
kids need quality care from the very beginning of their lives, either
from their parents, in the child care setting or elsewhere. And a
quality education must be provided from the beginning of their lives.
What we are talking about, though, are the resources that will be
available and should be available.
We are all tied up with the problems of the deficit and the need to
reduce the deficit. But there are things we must consider when we go
about providing resources, that if we do not make resources available
for those things that will break the cycle, for those things which will
allow our young children to have the possibility of breaking out of the
cycle, sort of give the parents of the children the ability to provide
the child care necessary, then one important segment of breaking that
cycle will not come about.
Let us take a look at the macro picture that we must have and what we
have to deal with so that we can recognize what the savings are from
improving the education of our society and, most importantly, from the
beginning of life, in child care to be sure these young children have
the opportunity to have the surroundings that will allow them to learn.
This chart gives us an idea of what we are losing now because we have
serious educational problems in our country. One-half of a trillion
dollars in GDP is lost per year because we fail to educate our people.
The cost to our economy is more than $125 billion, in addition to lost
revenues; $208 billion is lost from the result of the problems of
welfare. So when we are talking about $1 billion a year or more to try
and get enough money available for child care, to give to the children,
weigh that against what is lost.
In addition to that, I will have an amendment that says, hey, we have
a demand here, an important demand that says every person in training
must have a GED, must have a high school equivalent education. There is
not money for that either. So what we are going to be doing is either
creating a huge mandate upon the States that is unfunded or going
forward with expectations which will not be fulfilled.
Let us take a look at the relationship of education to productivity,
what is happening to those who do not have a good education.
The only people who have increased their income over the past few
years are professionals. This is over the last 20 years. In the last 20
years, the only people who have increased their standard of living is
at the level of master's, doctorates, and professionals. Others have
either stayed at the bachelor level or gone down. Then take a look at
the comparison of what is earned by those who do not finish high
school: $12,800 per family. That is incredibly low and is going down in
the sense of percentage of income.
How do we break out of this? How do we provide those resources? It is
stupid to cut back on those things which is going to increase your
deficit. If we do not provide the amount of money that is necessary for
child care, there is no chance that we are going to raise this level
up, until you get to the area where you have a high enough standard of
living to survive.
So what this amendment tries to do is to say, ``Look, we are going to
make sure that our children will have an opportunity to have the kind
of income that will bring them out of the welfare cycle, to place them
in a position where they can earn what is necessary, to get us out of
the position of losing all this money we do with the welfare
situation.''
So when we talk in terms of $1 billion a year over the term of this,
as compared to the $208 billion we are losing by the problems we have
with welfare, it means we are just being, really, penny wise and pound
foolish, and we must not do that.
I recognize that my time has expired. May I have an additional 2
minutes?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized for an additional 2
minutes.
Mr. JEFFORDS. So as we go forward with this welfare reform, let us
keep in mind some things. I do not think there is a person here or the
House who does not want welfare reform, including the White House. The
question is, how do we reach a consensus?
That is not going to be easy, there is no question about it. We have
some people at the extremes of the process from no welfare to all
welfare. But what we have to do is to try and reach that middle ground.
We have to make some areas where we can have a consensus, and certainly
one of those ought to be the provision of child care.
There is not anyone in this body who does not believe there ought to
be adequate child care. This amendment is the only thing which will
bring us close to that. So, if we are going to have consensus on the
issue of child care and if we really want to do what we are supposed to
do here, and that is to break through the cycle of welfare, if we are
going to give the children of those in the most desperate economic
situations in this country the ability for them to have the education
which is necessary, all the studies show if they
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do not get the early preschool education, they start out at a big
disadvantage.
Let me just end up by saying one of my most unusual experiences when
I came to the Senate was I had a group of CEO's come into my office
when I was first elected to the Senate. John Akers was the head of the
group, the Business Roundtable. I expected them all to say, ``We need
to get capital gains tax relief,'' blah, blah, blah. What happened? The
first thing they said was, ``We need to fully fund Head Start. We need
to make sure there is preschool education for every one of our kids if
we are ever going to get our society in a position where we can be
economically sound.''
Just recently, this IBM president said at the NGA, ``This Nation is in
a crisis, and if we do not start the educational process we need, this
Nation is not going to be the Nation it is today in the next century.''
I leave those words with you.
Here is an opportunity to make sure the young kids will have the
opportunity to get out of the welfare cycle.
I yield the floor.
Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I am proud to be one of the co-sponsors
of the Kennedy-Dodd child-care amendment to the Republican welfare
reform bill. No issue more clearly defines the differences in this
welfare debate than child care. Both sides have said that the goal of
welfare must be to move people to work, but Democrats have maintained
that it is not just about moving them to work, it is is about keeping
them on the job.
We want to provide welfare recipients with the tools to stay on the
job. What the facts prove time and time again is that the most
necessary tool is child care for children. Child care is the No. 1
barrier keeping mothers out of the work force, and one in four mothers
between the ages of 21 and 29 are not working today because of child
care. Among welfare mothers, 34 percent are not working because of
either inability to find reliable child care or inability to afford
child care.
No single parent can look for or keep a job without child care, and
single parents make up 88 percent of the AFDC caseload. Without child
care, we will have no success in moving people to work and keeping them
there.
But child care is costly, and the average middle-class family spends
9 percent of its income on child care. However, the average poor family
spends almost 25 percent of its income on child care.
The Republican plan will leave four million children under the age of
six home alone. Today, almost 650,000 of them receive child care with
assistance that would be eliminated under the Dole plan. In fact, the
plan would repeal the child care guarantee passed by the Senate in
1988.
If the States implement the proposed welfare reform plan, the need
for child care will increase by more than 200 percent by the year 2000.
States will need over $4 billion more a year. In Maryland, the unfunded
mandate will amount to more than $1 million a week that Maryland
taxpayers will pay to cover child care costs.
This child care policy proves that the Republican bill does not look
at the day-to-day lives of real people. Welfare recipients who we send
to work will not have high-paying jobs, and will not be able to afford
child care.
Suppose a mother lives in suburban Maryland and decides to do the
right thing. She gets an entry-level, minimum-wage job in the food
service industry. With this job, she is making almost $9,000 a year,
but gets no benefits. After taxes and Social Security, this mother
takes home $175 a week, but her child care costs her $125 a week. How
is she going to pay for rent, food, clothing, and transportation costs
with only $50 left over a week?
Our Democratic Work First plan recognizes that child care is the
vital link between leaving welfare and going to work. Our plan
consolidates four current programs into one expanded child care block
grant, eliminating duplicate paperwork and reporting requirements, and
reducing bureaucratic structure.
This block grant will help provide child care for welfare recipients,
those transitioning from welfare to work, and the working poor. Under
our plan, a family of four making less than $15,000 a year will be
eligible for child care.
On the other hand, the Republican plan forces States into an
impossible position. Either the State does not provide child care and
welfare reform fails, or they do provide child care by raising taxes
and cutting other State programs.
States also can divert aid from the working poor to pay for welfare,
but in doing so send a perverse incentive--if you go on welfare, you
get help; if you go to work every day and barely make ends meet, you
never get a break.
Welfare reform is about ending the cycle and the culture of poverty.
Ending the cycle of poverty is an economic challenge, but Democrats are
providing the tools to overcome this challenge. The Republicans have no
plan.
Ending the culture of poverty is about personal responsibility.
Democrats have proposed a tough plan based on tough love. It is a hand
up, not a hand out. But Republicans have proposed a punitive plan based
on tough luck. It aims for the mother, but hits the child.
This debate should be about ending welfare as a way of life, and
making it a step to a better life. That means real work requirements,
with the tools to get the job done. If we are to have a bipartisan
framework for welfare reform, we must address the work challenge in a
way that is real, and deals with people's day-to-day needs.
We must adopt the Kennedy-Dodd amendment and fix the Dole home alone
child care policy.
the need for child care in welfare reform
Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I think we can all agree on the
fundamental goal of welfare reform. We must create a program that moves
recipients from welfare to work to economic self-sufficiency as quickly
as possible. We must help replace their welfare checks with paychecks.
One obvious way to transform a system which encourages dependency is
to eliminate its inherent disincentives. How? Fundamentally, you must
make support services--the cornerstone of long-term success in the
workplace--more available to low-income people who want to work. The
linchpin of successfully transitioning people from welfare to work is
child care. And the bill before us today is woefully deficient in
providing funding for child care services. In fact, the Dole bill does
not guarantee that one cent of the block grant will be spent on child
care.
That is why I strongly support the Dodd-Kennedy amendment. It
recognizes that no welfare reform proposal can be successful without
providing child-care services. And it is willing to invest in those
services to ensure a successful outcome.
Most working families feel the pinch of child-care costs. Low-income
families, which are often headed by single parents, feel the greatest
pinch, spending a quarter of their income for child care. In North
Dakota, it costs a family about $3,400 a year for child care. If a
family is just scraping by at poverty level wages--$14,763 for a family
of four--that's an awfully big chunk of your income going to pay for
child care.
This situation is all too prevalent in our society. There are too
many working poor families, and too many mothers trying to move from
welfare to work who are forced back onto the welfare rolls because
their child care is too expensive or unreliable.
While the Dole bill does contain child-care provisions, it falls far
short of what is needed to help these families achieve true self-
sufficiency and economic independence. It fails to guarantee child-care
assistance to recipients who are moving to work, and most importantly,
it fails to provide additional funding to meet the work requirements
contained in the bill--it provides less than half of current child-care
spending and doesn't even begin to address the increased need for child
care created by the bill's work requirements. In short, it just doesn't
put its money where its mouth is, and it is a recipe for disaster.
The ability to secure affordable child care is a decisive factor in
determining whether low-income mothers can get off and stay off
welfare. If we want to move parents with children off of the welfare
rolls and into work, we must pass a welfare reform bill that will
ensure that the 10 million children on AFDC will be cared for while
their parents look for jobs and begin employment.
[[Page S 13191]]
The Dodd-Kennedy amendment achieves that goal. To help welfare
recipients get and keep a job, this amendment creates a direct spending
grant to States with the funding levels set at HHS cost estimates of
$11 billion over 5 years so that the child-care needs created by the
Dole work requirements are met. This grant is fully paid for--by
earmarking $5 billion from the title 1 block grant and by cuts in
corporate welfare.
The amendment guarantees that no child will be left home alone while
their parents are working, looking for work, or participating in an
education or training program. And it ensures that families aren't
punished for failing to participate in job training or work programs if
child care is unavailable.
It also requires States to maintain current spending on child care--
without requiring them to match additional child-care spending.
Perhaps most importantly, the Dodd-Kennedy amendment means that
critical child-care services for low-income families will continue to
be provided under the child care and development block grant.
Parents who are able to work must be given the tools to do so. A
critical component of getting families off welfare--and keeping them
off--is ensuring safe, adequate and affordable care for their children.
The Dodd-Kennedy amendment does just that, and I hope that my
colleagues will support it.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I am proud to be a co-sponsor of the Dodd-
Kennedy child-care amendment to the Republican leader's welfare bill.
This amendment backs up the work requirements in this bill with the
child care assistance necessary to meet them.
Caring for our children is not an issue that affects only the poor--
all working parents need child care. As we debate the issue of how we
are going to change the dynamic of the welfare system, it is absolutely
crucial that we do all we can to protect children.
We are trying to agree on the best way to get welfare parents,
generally single mothers, into jobs and how to keep them there. A
single mother should not be forced to choose between properly caring
for her children and going to work. And if parents are not working,
they cannot support their families. If my wife and I wanted to see a
movie, but were unable to find a babysitter for our three children when
they were young, then we did not see the movie. How can we expect
parents to work when there is no one to care for their children? We
need to be realistic in our effort to reform the welfare system.
Welfare reform is not only about adults--it is about children who
live in poor families. These children are poor at no fault of their own
and the U.S. Congress is punishing them by forcing their mothers out
the door, leaving them home without a parent or babysitter.
If we are going to break the cycle of poverty and change the future
of poor people in this country, children need to be at the top of our
list of priorities. We need to guarantee that children will be cared
for in healthy, safe, supportive environments that help them to develop
and build their self-confidence. If we do this, if we help children get
good child care, we can help parents keep their jobs, and then and only
then, will their children learn the importance of working.
Watching their parents come home from work at night will allow
children to see the self-confidence that results from bringing home a
pay check and being self-supportive. If Congress denies low-income
families the child care assistance they need to work, then kids will be
left home alone. Do we want television to take over as the caregiver
while parents are at work?
If we can give children some structure, a place where they can learn
the skills and values they need to stay interested in school, perhaps
they will work their way out of poverty and we can start breaking the
demoralizing cycle of poverty that has affected millions of Americans.
Anyone who has ever sought child care knows that it can be difficult,
stressful, and time consuming. For many families, child care is
unavailable and unaffordable and those that lack the economic
resources, the time, and information, have fewer options. In many small
towns in Vermont, neighbors, friends, and family rely on each other to
help out with each other's children. There is usually someone around
who can watch the children for a few hours. But not every family lives
in that kind of supportive environment. We all need to share the
responsibility in meeting the needs of the children of this country.
Children growing up in secure, supportive environments benefits us all.
The Republican leader's bill will make child care even more
unaffordable for low-income families. As it is, working poor families
spend 33 percent of their income on child care. In sharp contrast,
middle-class families spend only 6 percent of their income on child
care. A single mother of two living on welfare can probably expect to
earn about $5 an hour once she is able to find a job. Child care will
cost about $3 an hour or more for her two children which leaves her $2
an hour, at most, to live on and support her family--$2 an hour is not
even enough to support one person.
In addition to child care, a single mother must then pay for
transportation to work, clothes for herself and her children, rent,
food, and medical costs depending on how much assistance she receives
from food stamps and Medicaid. Nobody could cover those expenses on $2
an hour. Nobody. Welfare is the price our country pays to keep
families, single mothers and their children, together. If this Congress
fails to require States to guarantee child care, the consequences for
many of these families, women and their children, will be tragic.
We must also remember that single mother's did not have their
children alone. I certainly hope that strong child support enforcement
will decrease the need for Federal assistance, and move single mothers
and their families toward self-sufficiency. These efforts alone,
however, may not be enough for some families.
Child-care assistance for low-income working parents and those
working their way off of welfare is essential. I urge adoption of this
amendment.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I rise in strong support of the pending
amendment and commend Senators Dodd and Kennedy for addressing one of
the most critical issues related to welfare reform.
Child care is the linchpin for achieving comprehensive welfare reform
because parents must know that their children are supervised and safe
in order to go to work. That is just common sense.
But the Dole amendment falls short here. First, it repeals the
guarantee that child care must be provided in order for States to take
welfare recipients out of the home and put them into the workplace.
Second, the Dole proposal mandates that parents work, but does not
provide any additional support for child care. In fact, the plan
repeals all existing child-care funding specifically for this purpose.
Mr. President, we all agree that welfare recipients must be required
to work. However, if quality, affordable child care is not available
parents will be faced with the unacceptable alternative of leaving
children at home alone or in unsafe situations. That is really no
choice at all.
I have often spoken about the success of the Iowa Family Investment
Program. After 22 months, the Iowa welfare reform program is showing
good results. More people are working, the caseload is declining and
the cost of cash assistance is going down.
These results happened because the State has been investing in
education, training, transportation, and, of course, child care.
I often meet with welfare recipients, caseworkers, and other in Iowa
regarding welfare reform. The most common concern I hear is the need
for child care and the need to provide more resources for this purpose.
We must make sure that resources are available for child care or
welfare reform will fail. This is a most fundamental issue.
The average annual cost per participant in Iowa's PROMISE JOBS
program is $1,920, including $987 for child care. It is clear that
child care is a critical part of moving welfare recipients into the
work force.
Mr. President, I commend Senators Dodd and Kennedy for addressing the
important issue of child care and welfare reform and urge adoption of
the amendment.
[[Page S 13192]]
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator
Hollings be added as a cosponsor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. KENNEDY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair advises Senators that the Senator
from Massachusetts has only 1 minute and 42 seconds, and the Senator
from Pennsylvania has 14 minutes and 52 seconds. Therefore, there is
insufficient time for the elapse of a quorum call.
Does the Senator from Pennsylvania yield time?
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I yield such time as I may consume. I
want to go over this amendment again and discuss it specifically for
Members who may be torn, as I think many are, in wanting to support
work and see the potential need for day care.
Focusing on what the amendment does, we have heard a lot of
discussion from the Senator from Connecticut and the Senator from
Massachusetts of the concern for mothers with preschool children, that
we cannot allow mothers who have children 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 years of age--
and I have three children all under the age of 5 and I am keenly aware
of the need for care for young children.
However, this amendment does not just pertain to young children. This
provides funding so that every welfare parent with children under 12
years of age--12 and under, under 13--you can have an 11-year-old or
12-year-old and you still get a funded day care slot. That is what the
amendment says. This is not just focused on children under 5.
We talk about being concerned for them. This is a much more expansive
program. It is not just part-time child care, it is a full-time child
care program. It is 12 and under, full time, not just for single moms,
not just for single moms or dads who have children, but for married
mothers and fathers who may be on welfare and have children. This is
for two-parent households as well as single-parent households. That is
what the amendment says.
You could have a situation where you have a 12-year-old child at home
with two parents, and under this bill, you would get a full-time day
care slot paid for by the Federal Government. Would that not be nice if
every American who was working, the Government would pay your full-time
child care, and you could not even have to work under this bill.
So you do not have to work. You can be married, have a 12-year-old at
home, do not work, and the Government will pay your child care full
time. That is what this amendment does.
Now, you hear a lot of compassion on the other side about the single
mom with the 2-year-old, but you do not hear that this is another well-
intended bill that focuses on the hard problem. And then when you
realize this is a brandnew big-time expansive program, day care for
everybody on welfare, whether you are married or not, whether you are
working or not.
I do not think that is what is being sold here on the Senate floor. I
think we have to look very carefully at what is in this amendment and
how much money it costs--$6 billion, fully funded day care slots for
all children of married and unmarried parents, single and married
parents, up to 12 years of age. Not the preschool kids, but up to 12
years of age.
I think this is a real Pandora's box we have opened. This is not the
amendment that is being talked about. This is a very broad, expansive
program.
Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. SANTORUM. I am happy to yield to the Senator.
Mr. KENNEDY. Is the Senator familiar with how many parents are
waiting for child care in the State of Pennsylvania?
Mr. SANTORUM. I think the number is around 9,000.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, 7,779 children now are on the child care
waiting list in Pennsylvania, many are single parents, waiting to get
off welfare or stay off welfare.
I am wondering, does the Senator believe that for those who want to
work and can work, that there ought to at least be some help and
assistance, either full or part time, as was included in the bill
passed in 1988 and providing at help and assistance for hundreds of
thousands of families?
Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, I say the answer is yes. I
think we do that in this bill. In the Dole modified bill, we believe
there are ample dollars available. Within the AFDC block grant, there
will be money available for child care.
You have the additional child care block grant, which is appropriated
at $1 billion for this year and as necessary for future years. We will
have this debate every year, Senator.
We are going to have a debate on the floor of the Senate over how
much money we will provide in the appropriations process for people on
welfare who need day care assistance. I may be back here with you,
joining with you in having started this program in place and having
seen the needs and heard from the Governors that we may need to
appropriate more money in the years ahead. There is nothing that
prohibits us from doing that.
But to lock in--you do not call it an entitlement, but it might as
well be one--to lock in a program of $6 billion right now, not just
again for young kids, for children under the age of 5, but for children
up to the age of 12, for parents who are single and married, I think
that just goes too far.
I hope that my colleagues will look at the expansiveness of this
amendment, the cost of this amendment, and I think the unfairness of
this amendment when juxtaposed to the working family in America.
We are telling the working family in America that, if you want to
raise children, fine. But you are on your own. But if you go on
welfare, even if you are married, we are going to provide a full-time
government day-care slot for you. I think that goes too far.
I hope we will reject this amendment, that we will continue to work--
as I know the Senator from Utah [Mr. Hatch] has talked about, and I
know the Senator from Vermont and others who are looking at this issue
will--we will continue to work to see what we can do to make sure that
people are not disqualified from working because of the unavailability
of day care. That is what the Snowe amendment----
Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield further?
Mr. SANTORUM. If I can finish--that is what the Senator's amendment
does. It focuses in on the problem areas. It says, if you cannot find
day care, and if you can show that day care is unavailable, whether it
is just too costly, given the amount of money you receive on welfare,
or it is not proximate to where you live, or whatever the case may be--
and there is a laundry list of things that you can use to show the
unavailability of day care--under the Snowe amendment that is included
in the Dole package now, if you can show that day care is unavailable,
you are exempted from the work requirements.
That is a very important measure. Because what that does is it says
to the State--which, I remind you, has to have, when this program is
finally phased in, half of the people in the program in the work
program. Those people who cannot find day care remain in the
denominator but not in the numerator. So they are part of the base of
100 percent, but they do not go toward the 50 percent you need for work
participation. If you have a sufficient lack of day care, that is going
to have a big effect on your ability to meet your 50 percent work
participation standards.
We believe that will be adequate impetus, in fact more than adequate
impetus, to get the States to provide day-care services that are
necessary to get younger mothers, in particular, into the workplace. We
think that kind of flexibility and dynamics are better than creating
out of the box a fully funded entitlement--or guarantee, it is not an
entitlement--guarantee that you are going to have day care if you are
on welfare: You get day care if you have children under age 13 whether
you are married or not, whether you are working or not. I just think
that is too big of a loophole, too big of a grant.
[[Page S 13193]]
And I think it is an unwise move by the U.S. Senate.
Mr. KENNEDY. Is that what the Senator understands the Dodd amendment
will do, provide day care for all children? The Senator just said that.
Is that what the Senator understands it to do? You said it. Of course--
--
Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, I will be happy to answer the
question. It says on page 4 of the amendment, eligible children are--
For purposes of this section, the term ``eligible child''
means an individual, who is less than 13 years of age and
resides with a parent or parents who are working pursuant to
a work requirement contained in section 404 of the Act.
So I think it is clear that those who are eligible are under 13 years
of age, can be with a single parent or parents, which I assume means
married.
Mr. KENNEDY. And what percent in the Dole proposal would be included
under that requirement? What percent in the Dole proposal will not be
so included?
As the Senator knows, half of those will be required to work in order
for the States not to be penalized. They are going to have to find
their child care outside of these requirements.
The Senator understands that?
Mr. SANTORUM. Right.
Mr. KENNEDY. When the Senator says this amendment is effectively
saying to every parent that all children will receive child care, that
is not a fair characterization of the amendment. I mean, I think that
is what we ought to do--but that is one fact that the Senator is wrong
on. And second, how does the Senator understand the discretionary block
grant? Who is eligible for that?
Mr. SANTORUM. My understanding, if I can respond to the first point,
is that the Senator from Connecticut has repeatedly said the formula
was calculated based on fully funding every welfare parent who is
required to work with children under 12. That includes single parents
and married parents. So there will be parents who will not have to work
because only one of them will be required to work that will, in fact,
get day care. I think that is a little much.
Mr. KENNEDY. As the Senator knows, the Dole proposal requires that
half of all families on welfare participate in the work program. HHS
estimates that half of these families will find their own child care.
The Dodd amendment is focused on those families that will need child
care assistance in order to move from welfare to work.
So it is not all of those. It is those that they believe--50 percent
of the adults that otherwise would need the child care under this
proposal.
Let me just ask the Senator----
Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, the 50 percent participation
standard means that 50 percent of the people in the welfare program are
going to be required to be in a work program. The other 50 percent are
not required to be in a work program and therefore the need for day
care, I would assume--there would be no need for day care because they
would not be in a work program.
So, what the Dodd amendment does is provide funding for those who
have to work. That is my understanding.
Mr. KENNEDY. First of all, I am a strong supporter of the need for
child care to move people off of welfare into work. But second, how
does the Senator understand the block grant program? Who is eligible
for the discretionary block grant program?
Mr. SANTORUM. Under the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut?
Mr. KENNEDY. No, just under the existing program, the $1 billion that
is existing under the discretionary program. Who is eligible for that?
Mr. SANTORUM. Before I answer that question, how much time is there
remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania has 2 minutes 20
seconds. The Senator from Massachusetts has 1 minute 24 seconds.
Mr. KENNEDY. I think we have another 15 minutes.
Mr. SANTORUM. I will put a unanimous consent in, and then I will be
happy to respond.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the vote on or in relation to
the Dodd amendment occur at 5:15 p.m. today, notwithstanding the
previous order, with the time between now and 5:15 equally divided.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SANTORUM. My understanding is, under the current proposal, that
money is a block grant to the States with the States' discretion to
provide those funds.
Mr. KENNEDY. The existing discretionary block grant program, who is
participating in that program today? The program originally created by
Senators Dodd and Hatch.
Mr. SANTORUM. I do not know the answer to that.
Mr. KENNEDY. See, this is part of the problem, Mr. President, using
these characterizations loosely. That program is targeted to low-income
working families. It provides $1 billion and 700,000 families
struggling to make ends meet and stay off welfare. It has been
supported by Republicans and Democrats alike. The idea, under these
proposals, is to assist those who are making the minimum wage, who
still receive the $13,000 for the family and still cannot afford the
child care they need to get by.
The Senator mentioned earlier that he is concerned about trying to
provide some help and assistance to working poor families. I hope then
he opposes diverting these essential resources away from working poor
families as is encouraged by the Dole bill.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, if I can reclaim my time, I just think,
within the existing AFDC block grant, there are funds available, that
are currently available under the AFDC program, for child care. Those
funds would continue to be available if the State should so desire to
create a program to provide assistance for people on welfare in
addition to the block grant funding. So what we do is provide State
flexibility to be able to use those funds as the State sees fit, which
is in keeping with what this side of the aisle was trying to do, which
is for the States to be able to design, we believe, better programs
than a Washington-based program.
Again, I think throughout this dialog we found that, in fact, this
program is an expansive, new--I will not use the term ``entitlement''
because there is not an entitlement in the law --but it fully funds
every slot that is necessary. I know that is not an entitlement because
you cannot go in there and go to court and say I am entitled to this
money. But the money is there. Anyone who has a child under the age of
13, one or two parents, will be able to get fully funded government day
care, a full-time day-care slot.
Again, it is the option of first resort, not last resort. If you look
at the money the Senator from Massachusetts was just talking about, the
block grant funding, and he talks about how many working families are
waiting for this assistance, it is not the option of first resort. You
have to look at family and neighbors and friends. That, I would think,
would still be--it is harder. But I think we have done enough to say
that families are not important in this country or that fathers are not
important in this country, to continue to provide money to replace
existing social networks and just say the Government will do it. You do
not need the father's money.
You do not need a father around anymore. We will pay the father's
money. That is what AFDC is for and all these other programs. You do
not need grandparents or cousins. We will have a fully funded
Government day care slot for you. We do not need family support. What
does that mean? That is not necessary. We will continue to isolate you
from your surroundings. I think that is harmful. I think guaranteeing
something up front is harmful in the long run. It may sound good, but
it will continue to destroy the fabric and culture of our society where
we used to be interdependent. And because the Government is now coming
in and doing everything for you, you have become this island unto
yourself.
I think it is a very sad state in our communities. And we will only
add to that with this program.
I hope we do not accept this amendment.
Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, how much time remains? I see the leader
on the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Grams). The Senator from Massachusetts has
9 minutes remaining.
Mr. KENNEDY. May I have 3 minutes?
[[Page S 13194]]
Mr. President, I have listened to my friend and colleague from
Pennsylvania. I listened to him describe the Dodd amendment. I have
difficulty understanding his interpretation. There are 60 percent of
welfare mothers today who have children 5 years of age or younger.
Under the most recent modification, they would not be sanctioned for
failure to participate in the work program. It is clearly better for
parents to stay home than to leave their children home alone, but what
about the great number of those individuals who want to work, would
like to work, could work, will work, and are just looking for the
opportunity and the child care they need to enable them to work. The
Senator from Pennsylvania says, ``Well, we are not going to be punitive
to them.'' Well he is right, the most recent modification is better
than the original bill, but it is not enough.
The final point that I want to mention again is what the National
Council of Churches says with regard to this. I have read it. They
believe we need increased access to child care. The National Conference
of State Legislatures, bipartisan, believes that we need additional
child care. The American Public Welfare Association thinks we need
additional child care. The Catholic Charities talk about it. They think
we need additional child care, and the list goes on. The National
Parent-Teachers Association agrees.
These are groups that are operating programs for children every
single day, talking with parents and listening to their concerns. They
are on the frontlines, and this is what their conclusion is.
Our amendment will promote work and protect children. It will improve
the lives and the livelihoods of millions of American families. That is
why I think the amendment is needed.
I yield the remainder of my time.
Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I will use my leadership time for
whatever time I may consume to speak in behalf of the Dodd amendment.
Mr. President, let me begin by thanking the distinguished Senator
from Massachusetts for his excellent comments and for the leadership
that he has shown on this issue throughout this debate, and certainly
the Senator from Connecticut, the senior Senator, Senator Dodd, for his
work in bringing us to this point this afternoon. His leadership and
the effort that he has invested in this issue for many years is
illustrative of the contribution that he has made on a number of issues
relating to children. And this is perhaps the most important
contribution of all.
As the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts has indicated, you
simply cannot have welfare reform if you do not address the issue of
child care adequately. There can be no doubt that it is the linchpin
between welfare and work. Why? Because 60 percent of AFDC families have
children under 6. Why? Because, in many cases, those same families
cannot find adequate day care, cannot afford day care even if they can
find it, and have great anxiety about leaving their children
unattended.
I do not care whether it is one parent or two parents. If we want
them to go out and work, if we want them to go out and get the skills
necessary so they can work--time after time they have told us, and time
after time virtually every social organization has indicated--you have
to find a way to take care of their children. That is what this
amendment does. It says in a meaningful way we are going to create a
partnership. We are not going to tell you who to take your children to.
We are not going to create some new governmental system to do it. We
are simply going to give you the means by which you can find the best
way to take care of your children.
This will affect every single welfare family. You have to have a
child to be on welfare, period. You do not meet the definition if you
do not have a child.
Child care enables mothers to go to work, to have the confidence to
leave their home. Parents cannot accept their responsibilities as
parents if they leave their children at home alone without any
supervision, without any care, without any knowledge of what is going
to happen to their children, especially at those early ages.
Let me address another point that was raised in this most recent
colloquy. It is not just the child who is under the age of 4 or 5 and
not yet ready to go to school that we ought to be concerned about. What
happens to those children who are going to school, who come back in the
mid to late afternoon to a home without a parent, without anybody to
take care of them through the end of the day? What happens to them?
What kind of supervision, what kind of care, what kind of nutrition,
what kind of attention are they going to get? This amendment addresses
that concern. It is not just a concern for those who are under the age
of 6 and not able to go to school. We have to be equally as concerned
with those children who come home in the afternoon and have no
supervision, especially in those early ages.
Families below poverty spend almost 30 percent of their income on
child care, Mr. President. Nonpoor families only spend about 7 percent
of their income on child care. There is no secret why low-income
families are not capable of addressing the need for child care in their
own families.
Child care costs in the District of Columbia can run as high as $150
to $175 per week. The average monthly benefit for an AFDC recipient is
less than $400. So we are asking many parents today to spend more in 1
month on child care alone than they receive in AFDC. Obviously, Mr.
President, it is an incredible impediment for many people.
So what happens is that most people today are relegated to finding
other ways of ensuring that their children are cared for. They depend
on relatives who may or may not be reliable or informal arrangements
that may or may not work on a daily basis. A job requires reliable
child care, and often that is very hard to find.
So in many cases, Mr. President, parents are simply forced to make
do. And all too often, unfortunately, they do not make do. All too
often they are forced to rely on low-quality care.
We believe that quality child care is too important to child
development to leave those children home alone or to make a way somehow
on a day-to-day basis with relatives or families or people in the
neighborhood to care for their children. Studies show that the first 3
years of life in some ways are the most critical of all. Quality care
can clearly change the lives of children today. Quality care can truly
give kids a head start. Quality care can relieve parental stress and
give people the confidence they need to walk out of that door and go to
their job, go on and achieve meaningful job skills, and do so with the
knowledge that they can be a productive, cohesive, and successful
family when the work is done.
Mr. President, that is all we are asking. Let us give families an
opportunity to be families. Let us give them the opportunity to be
strong families. Strength is defined in part by how strong the children
are, by how nourished, how educated, how guided, how attended, and how
cared for they are.
The Republican plan, frankly, is nonexistent in this regard. It is
nice to have all the nice sounding rhetoric, but the fact is you have
nothing if you do not put resources next to it. There are no resources
in the Dole bill. It is estimated that the Dole bill in its current
form is underfunded by almost $11 billion in the area of child care.
So there is no assurance that the children of single mothers will be
adequately cared for. As the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts
has said over and over, the Home Alone bill is not what this piece of
legislation ought to be.
The modification made by the majority leader last week does not
address this concern. In fact, it only exacerbates the problem. As the
Senator from Pennsylvania has alluded to, the bill prohibits States
from sanctioning mothers with children under 6. That may be good in
some cases. But that is not the real issue. That does not help mothers
become self-sufficient. It is a de facto exemption from the work
requirement.
We do not want to exempt mothers, and we do not want to exempt States
that do not provide the resources. We want States to provide the
resources so that mothers will have the tools and the opportunities
they are going to need.
Mr. President, the Dole bill in its current form will exempt 60
percent of those who are eligible for welfare today. Why? Because 60
percent of AFDC mothers have children under 6.
[[Page S 13195]]
As the Dole bill is written, it will exempt any mother among that 60
percent that cannot find or afford child care.
States already had to pay for day care. It was an unfunded mandate,
but they were required to pay it or exempt mothers and take a 5-percent
cut in the block grant. The likelihood now is even greater that the
bill has virtually no value in terms of putting people to work or
providing child care.
So that is why this amendment is so important. This amendment says a
number of things. First of all, it says we cannot expect parents to
walk out that door, achieve the desired goals of this bill--that people
either acquire skills or acquire a job--if they have to leave their
children at home alone.
Second, it provides the resources necessary to make this happen. We
ensure, not only that States are going to establish the mechanisms by
which to provide those services, but that States are going to have the
resources to see that that happens.
Third, the Dodd-Kennedy amendment is tough on work but not on kids.
We require able-bodied adults to work or to prepare for work. We ensure
that when they do, we are going to enter into a partnership with them
to see that their children are cared for. We guarantee that child care
assistance is provided, and we do so not by exempting the mothers with
children who cannot find day care, but by helping them find the child
care they need to allow them to work in the first place.
It is very clear. The adoption of this amendment is the linchpin to
welfare reform. We are not going to get it without child care. We are
not going to get it without the level of resources required to provide
meaningful child care. We are not going to get it simply by exempting
mothers who have no other recourse but to stay at home because child
care is not available.
There has been a lot of rhetoric in this debate. The most important
thing we can do to change rhetoric to real action is to pass this
amendment, to provide the resources, to provide the mechanisms, and,
most importantly, to provide mothers the confidence that they can be a
family when they come home from work at night. This investment in
children is as important to kids as it is to mothers, as it is to the
system itself. It deserves our support, and I hope Republicans will
join us in the passage of it as we take up the vote momentarily.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is all time yielded back?
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, what time is remaining on both sides?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania controls 5
minutes, 45 seconds.
Mr. SANTORUM. Their time has expired?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Seven minutes and seven seconds on the
minority side.
Does the Senator from Massachusetts yield back all of his time? Is
that correct?
Mr. DODD. The Democratic leader just spoke. Does anybody on that side
wish to be heard on this?
Mr. SANTORUM. I would like to recognize the Senator from Washington
for 2 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I just want to say that the abstractions
with which we deal with issues like this here are very different from
the reality on the streets.
On my way back here from Seattle today, I read a long and fascinating
article in the New York Times about the cultural differences among
various kinds of gangs in the city of Los Angeles. The reporter reports
on the particular ethos of black gangs, of Asian gangs, and of Hispanic
gangs. In Los Angeles, the Spanish gangs account for most of the street
murders, in the number of hundreds every year, but they do have a
strong sense of family. And the principal part of the story is about a
15-year-old gang member with a 17-year-old girlfriend who has a 1-year-
old child by this gang member.
If I may, I will share the last two paragraphs of that story with
you, Mr. President.
``He's always staying home now,'' Tanya said hopefully.
``He doesn't want to miss nothing. He's saying, `Can't you
just leave the baby with me. I'll watch the baby and you go
to school.''
Dreamer is still only school age--
He is 15.
Tanya acknowledged, but the young family expects to be
financially secure. Her mother receives Federal assistance to
care for her through Aid to Families with Dependent Children.
And now, Tanya said, she will also receive AFDC assistance to
care for her own daughter, who is named Josefina.
So here we are subsidizing gangs and gang warfare in Los Angeles.
That is why we need to pass this bill. That is why we need to deal with
reality.
Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
Mr. SANTORUM. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
In closing, I just want to remind Members what this amendment does.
This is not an amendment targeted at preschool children, to provide
single mothers support for preschool children. Children aged 12 and
under are eligible for a full-time guaranteed day care slot under this
proposal, under the Dodd amendment including two-parent families. Not
just single mothers but two-parent families also qualify for a full-
time day care slot. It also has a 100-percent maintenance-of-effort
provision in this bill on the States.
This is a throwback to some of the ideas that we were debating for
the past 2 decades. This is not in a new direction. This is not the
direction we should take if we are going to reform the welfare system
and get people back to work and get back to self-sufficiency.
I urge my colleagues to defeat the Dodd amendment.
I yield back the remainder of my time.
Mr. DODD addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. DODD. Mr. President, very briefly, first of all, just in response
to my friend from Pennsylvania, we say with regard to children that
they should not be penalized if there are two parents. In fact, we
ought to be encouraging that. And second, for after-school programs, it
does not mean all-day child care, people in school. Obviously, it does
not apply in those cases.
However, let me get back to the central point, Mr. President, if I
can, in conclusion. We all want to see people move from welfare to
work, and assist in that process. Every survey that has been done over
the last decade has indicated that one of the major obstacles of people
moving from welfare to work is the absence of child care.
Sixty percent of all AFDC recipients have children age 5 and under.
If we are truly committed to moving people from welfare to work and we
want to assist States in that process, we must provide adequate funds
for child care. Because this bill mandates a 25-percent work
requirement in 2 years, and 50 percent by the year 2000--we set that as
a mandate in this bill--we should assist States in making that happen.
All this amendment does is provide the assistance in a pool of money.
It is not an entitlement. It does not guarantee anybody anything.
Merely on a proportional basis based on the block grant, it says to the
States, ``Here is a pool of money to assist you in providing those
families that you are moving from welfare to work with child care.''
Everyone knows that any effort to go from welfare to work, with
infant children, that does not provide for child care will fail. And
all of us do not want to see that happen.
So, Mr. President, I urge that we come together. This is an
authorization--authorization. Money will have to be appropriated. If
the numbers are less, then appropriate to less. But let us not try to
divide over this issue that has united us in the past. Let us see if we
cannot here find some common ground.
I happen to believe, Mr. President, we would pass welfare reform 95-5
if we would adopt the Dodd amendment on child care. We could end the
acrimony. We could have a good welfare reform bill. We could assist our
States. And we could move people from welfare to work. Let us not miss
this opportunity, for once, to come together in this Congress on an
issue this critical and this important to the American public.
Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time, and I urge a
``yes'' vote on the amendment.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I move to table the Dodd amendment and
ask for the yeas and nays.
[[Page S 13196]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is now on the motion to table.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
Mr. LOTT. I announce that the Senator from Texas [Mr. Gramm] and the
Senator from Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] are necessarily absent.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] would vote ``yea.''
The VICE PRESIDENT. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 50, nays 48, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 406 Leg.]
YEAS--50
Abraham
Ashcroft
Bennett
Bond
Brown
Burns
Chafee
Coats
Cochran
Cohen
Coverdell
Craig
D'Amato
DeWine
Dole
Domenici
Faircloth
Frist
Gorton
Grams
Grassley
Gregg
Hatch
Hatfield
Helms
Hutchison
Inhofe
Kassebaum
Kempthorne
Kyl
Lott
Lugar
Mack
McCain
McConnell
Murkowski
Nickles
Packwood
Pressler
Roth
Santorum
Shelby
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stevens
Thomas
Thompson
Thurmond
Warner
NAYS--48
Akaka
Baucus
Biden
Bingaman
Boxer
Bradley
Breaux
Bryan
Bumpers
Byrd
Campbell
Conrad
Daschle
Dodd
Dorgan
Exon
Feingold
Feinstein
Ford
Glenn
Graham
Harkin
Heflin
Hollings
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnston
Kennedy
Kerrey
Kerry
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Mikulski
Moseley-Braun
Moynihan
Murray
Nunn
Pell
Pryor
Reid
Robb
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Simon
Wellstone
NOT VOTING--2
Gramm
Simpson
So the motion to lay on the table the amendment (No. 2560) was agreed
to.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. SANTORUM. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
The VICE PRESIDENT. The question recurs on the amendment of the
Senator from Kansas, Mrs. Kassebaum.
There are 4 minutes of debate, evenly divided.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, may we have order.
The VICE PRESIDENT. The Senate will be in order.
The Senator from Kansas, [Mrs. Kassebaum], is recognized.
Amendment No. 2522
Mrs. KASSEBAUM. Mr. President, first, I would like to ask for the
yeas and nays on my amendment.
The VICE PRESIDENT. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Mrs. KASSEBAUM. Mr. President, I will reiterate why I believe this
amendment is important.
Mr. President, I, too, feel strongly about the importance of child
care. In order to make our welfare reform effort successful, I could
not support the measure that we just voted on because I felt it was an
amount of money that could not be sustained and was not offset in a way
that I felt would be successful.
The rationale for my amendment is briefly three parts. It creates a
unified system of child care at the State level, with one State plan.
It is not an effort to, in any way, intrude on the infringement of one
committee over another. It is my idea that a consolidation of these
efforts is important, and it provides one set of regulations, rather
than a two-track system. So it does not transfer jurisdiction of the
Senate Finance Committee child care program to the Senate Labor and
Human Resources Committee. But it does set up a single system through
which child care is handled. It prevents families from experiencing
disruptions in their child care since their eligibility is no longer
tied to specific program requirements, that is, AFDC. Instead,
eligibility is based on a family's income, through a sliding fee scale
that the State determines. As parents earn more, they make a greater
contribution for child care assistance.
I feel it is very important that low-income families can be able to
move off of welfare rolls and yet still be able to maintain some
support for child care. It preserves the limited funding for child care
for low-income working families, many of whom rely on this assistance
to stay off of the welfare rolls. For example, for a family of two
earning minimum wage, average yearly child care costs consume 47
percent of the household gross income. That is a significant amount,
Mr. President. I believe families do need some support because it is
the children that we do have to protect in this process.
I yield the floor.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Grams). The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The question is on agreeing to the amendment. The yeas and nays have
been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. LOTT. I announce that the Senator from Texas [Mr. Gramm] and the
Senator from Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] are necessarily absent.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] would vote ``nay.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Faircloth). Are there any other Senators
in the Chamber desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 76, nays 22, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 407 Leg.]
YEAS--76
Abraham
Akaka
Baucus
Bennett
Biden
Bingaman
Bond
Boxer
Bradley
Breaux
Bryan
Bumpers
Burns
Byrd
Campbell
Chafee
Coats
Cochran
Cohen
Conrad
Craig
Daschle
DeWine
Dodd
Domenici
Dorgan
Exon
Feingold
Feinstein
Ford
Frist
Glenn
Gorton
Graham
Grams
Harkin
Hatch
Hatfield
Heflin
Helms
Hollings
Hutchison
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnston
Kassebaum
Kempthorne
Kennedy
Kerrey
Kerry
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lugar
Mikulski
Moseley-Braun
Murkowski
Murray
Nunn
Pell
Pressler
Pryor
Reid
Robb
Rockefeller
Santorum
Sarbanes
Shelby
Simon
Snowe
Specter
Stevens
Warner
Wellstone
NAYS--22
Ashcroft
Brown
Coverdell
D'Amato
Dole
Faircloth
Grassley
Gregg
Inhofe
Kyl
Lott
Mack
McCain
McConnell
Moynihan
Nickles
Packwood
Roth
Smith
Thomas
Thompson
Thurmond
NOT VOTING--2
Gramm
Simpson
So the amendment (No. 2522) was agreed to.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
Amendment No. 2523
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question--the Senate will please be in
order.
The question is on the amendment No. 2523, offered by Senator Helms.
There are 4 minutes evenly divided. Who yields the time?
The distinguished Senator from North Carolina.
Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I do not believe I can talk over the
various discussions going on.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, the Senate is not in order. The Senator is
right. He is entitled to be heard.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will please be in order.
Mr. FORD. The Chair can call names.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from North
Carolina.
Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, instead of making remarks, I have prepared
a sheet that is on every Senator's desk that explains, or refutes in
one or two cases, suggestions about what this amendment does or does
not do.
Let me go down the list. First, the question and then the answer.
How much of the taxpayers' money will this amendment save?
[[Page S 13197]]
CBO says it will save $5.68 billion over 7 years.
What are the work requirements under the Helms amendment? And by the
way it is cosponsored by the distinguished occupant of the chair, Mr.
Faircloth, and Mr. Smith of New Hampshire, Mr. Grams of Minnesota, and
Mr. Shelby of Alabama. What are the work requirements under the Helms
amendment?
Food stamp recipients must work a total of 40 hours over a 4-week
period before receiving benefits.
Question. Are temporarily unemployed people denied food stamps?
No, community service will count as work.
Are work requirements in the Helms amendment stronger than in the
Dole amendment? And, incidentally Senator Dole supports the Helms
amendment.
Yes. The Dole amendment allows recipients to receive food stamps for
a full year and requires only 6 months of work to qualify.
Will pregnant women be denied food stamps?
No, there are millions of pregnant women who went to work this
morning. But if and when they are unable to work they can and will get
food stamps when qualified.
Will retired people be denied food stamps?
Of course not. Citizens over 55 are exempt from the work
requirements.
How many individuals does the Helms amendment target?
It targets the 2.5 million able-bodied individuals who refuse to
work.
Exempted by this amendment are children under 18, parents with
children, parents with disabled dependents, mentally or physically
unfit, and all who are over 55.
Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time of the Senator has expired.
Who yields time?
Mr. LUGAR. Mr. President, I would like to speak in opposition.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from Indiana.
Mr. LUGAR. Mr. President, the dilemma with the Helms amendment is
very simple. That is in many communities throughout the country there
are not volunteer programs. There are not work programs that people
could take up. In some cases, there are not jobs.
Frankly, the problem is the amendment affects able-bodied people who
are temporarily laid off, as people sometimes are in this country,
during recessions or during closing of factories or economic change. It
does not really give a very good opportunity for those people to
qualify for food stamps.
USDA estimates 700,000 people would be affected. By and large, these
are people, often with long work records, who temporarily have bad
luck.
In my judgment, the amendment has the merit of trying to tighten up
the food stamp situation but it does so at the expense of able-bodied
Americans who should not be penalized.
I encourage the Senate to defeat the amendment.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, it is true that this amendment by itself
would save money. But you could also say that if we had an amendment
that totally did away with the food stamp program that would save even
more money.
Basically what this says is you could be somebody who has worked in
the plant for 15 years, you paid your taxes, you are an upright citizen
who paid for the programs and everything else, and if that factory, the
largest employer in the area, should suddenly close, and you cannot
find a job within 30 or 31 days later and if you are looking for food
stamps you are not going to get them because you have not worked in the
last 30 days. This is far too punitive. It is going to make it
extremely difficult, as the senior Senator from Indiana said, for those
who have been employed who because of a disaster or a plant closing or
something else are out of a job. It goes much too far.
food stamp work amendment
Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, I am pleased to join with Senators Helms
and Faircloth to offer this amendment to the welfare reform bill. This
amendment is based on the simple notion that recipients of public
assistance should give something in return for their benefits. To not
require work for welfare, is to promote irresponsibility, which is
ultimately harmful to the recipient.
This amendment is straightforward. It states that those recipients of
food assistance, who are able-bodied, do not have any dependents, and
are between the ages of 18 and 55, must work for an average of 40 hours
per month in order to receive their food assistance.
Some critics might point out that the Dole amendment already has work
requirements for Food Stamp recipients. However, those work
requirements do not begin until 6 months after the person begins
receiving food assistance. Workfare programs should resemble the
private sector to the greatest extent possible, and I do not know of
any business which pays its employees for 6 months before the employee
ever begins working. Our work requirement is structured identically to
private sector employment: wages--or benefits in this case--are paid
after the service is rendered. This will promote personal
responsibility and self-sufficiency.
Finally, one of the main benefits of work requirements is that they
are a humane way of screening people off of welfare who do not belong
on the rolls. Many people receiving benefits which are now free, will
opt to pursue other options they currently have in the private sector
if they are faced with even a minimal work requirement. If they have no
such options, they will be able to continue to receive benefits in
exchange for community service. However, CBO has estimated that this
work requirement will save taxpayers $5.5 billion over 7 years, due to
a decrease in the food stamp rolls of more than 1 million individuals.
This will free up money to be used on people who are in genuine need,
who have small children, and who have no employment options in the
private sector.
Again, this amendment does not affect anyone with small children, or
anyone who is disabled or elderly. It is carefully targeted at those
who are the most likely to be able to move into the private sector.
Mr. President, this is a responsible amendment, and one I hope my
colleagues will support.
Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I rise today to speak out against the
amendment offered by the senior Senator from North Carolina.
Let me be clear. I am for reform of the Food Stamp Program. I am
willing to toughen up work requirements. I am for elimination of fraud.
That is why Democrats included reforms in our welfare reform.
We include increased civil and criminal forfeiture for grocers who
violate the Food Stamp Act. We require stores to reapply for the Food
Stamp Program so that we make sure that fraud is not taking place. We
disqualify grocers who have already been disqualified from the WIC
Program. We encourage States to use the electronic benefits transfer
program and we allow them to require a picture ID. We require able-
bodied people who are between 18 to 50 to work after a period.
The fight here is over food, not fraud. This amendment would say to
workers in my State and States across this country that if you are a
victim of a plant closing, you won't get any food stamps unless you go
out and work. This amendment is tough on new mothers. Under this
amendment, if you are about to have your first child and for some
reason you lose your job, you are cut off from food stamps unless you
work. Cut off at the most critical time in life for good nutrition.
This amendment doesn't recognize that some areas are hit by high
unemployment. This proposal fails to realize that we do have
recessions.
In a time when we denounce mandates to the States, this is exactly
what the proposal does--it mandates further costs. This amendment
offers no funding to help these workers find work or create jobs. It is
assumed that State and local governments can do this on their own.
State and local governments will have to enforce these new Food Stamp
requirements at the very time they are reinventing their welfare
program.
Mr. President, I am for welfare reform including the Food Stamp
Program. I am not for denying help to those who truly need it and that
is what this amendment does. I urge my
[[Page S 13198]]
colleagues to vote this amendment down so we can get on to real reform.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time on the amendment has expired. The
question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from North
Carolina. On this question, the yeas and nays have been ordered and the
clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. LOTT. I announce that the Senator from Texas [Mr. Gramm] and the
Senator from Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] are necessarily absent.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Wyoming [Mr. Simpson] would vote ``yea.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
who desire to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 32, nays 66, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 408 Leg.]
YEAS--32
Abraham
Brown
Coats
Coverdell
Craig
Dole
Faircloth
Frist
Gorton
Grams
Grassley
Gregg
Helms
Hutchison
Inhofe
Kempthorne
Kyl
Lott
Mack
McCain
McConnell
Murkowski
Nickles
Pressler
Roth
Santorum
Shelby
Smith
Stevens
Thompson
Thurmond
Warner
NAYS--66
Akaka
Ashcroft
Baucus
Bennett
Biden
Bingaman
Bond
Boxer
Bradley
Breaux
Bryan
Bumpers
Burns
Byrd
Campbell
Chafee
Cochran
Cohen
Conrad
D'Amato
Daschle
DeWine
Dodd
Domenici
Dorgan
Exon
Feingold
Feinstein
Ford
Glenn
Graham
Harkin
Hatch
Hatfield
Heflin
Hollings
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnston
Kassebaum
Kennedy
Kerrey
Kerry
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lugar
Mikulski
Moseley-Braun
Moynihan
Murray
Nunn
Packwood
Pell
Pryor
Reid
Robb
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Simon
Snowe
Specter
Thomas
Wellstone
NOT VOTING--2
Gramm
Simpson
So the amendment (No. 2523) was rejected.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I will ask unanimous consent as to how we
may proceed. It has been worked out and cleared by the Democrats. There
will be no more votes tonight.
Unfortunately, we could not get anybody to offer an amendment, but we
do have an agreement the Senator from California and the Senator from
North Dakota will offer amendments and votes will occur tomorrow.
Orders for Tuesday, September 12, 1995
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate
completes its business today, it stand in recess until 9 a.m. Tuesday,
September 12, 1995, and the Senate immediately resume consideration of
H.R. 4, the welfare bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. DOLE. I ask unanimous consent that at 9 a.m. there be 10 minutes
for debate on the pending Conrad amendment No. 2529, to be followed
immediately by a vote on or in relation to the Conrad amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. DOLE. I further ask that following disposition of the Conrad
amendment, there be 4 minutes equally divided in the usual form on the
Feinstein amendment No. 2469, to be followed immediately by a vote on
or in relation to the Feinstein amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. DOLE. I further ask that following disposition of the Feinstein
amendment, Senator Breaux be recognized to offer his amendment
concerning maintenance of effort; that the time prior to 12:30 p.m. be
equally divided in the usual form and a vote occur on or in relation to
the Breaux amendment at 2:15 p.m. on Tuesday.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, let me indicate to my colleagues on both
sides, I think there are a couple hundred amendments pending. We did
not dispose of very many today. It is my understanding there are about
19 cleared on this side. And we hope we might be able to dispose of
those this evening if they can be cleared on the other side. They are
both Democratic and Republican amendments, and not controversial, as I
understand it.
I have not seen the amendments myself. But I think we have
indicated--at least I have indicated, and I think the Democratic
leader, the distinguished Senator from South Dakota, Senator Daschle,
agrees--we ought to complete action on this bill Thursday, that on
Friday take up the State, Commerce, Justice appropriations bill, and
either complete action on that Friday--the chairman would like it
Friday or Saturday, that bill, because we do need to complete action on
the remaining appropriations bills and go to conference and send them
down to the President before October 1.
And so there is a lot of pressure on us to get the work done. We
still have the six appropriations bills to do. Two or three will take
some time. A couple of them may go rather quickly. So I would suggest
that we have got a lot of work to do in a rather short time.
I know that some of my colleagues will have problems in the first
week in October because of religious holidays. And we want to
accommodate everybody, try to accommodate everybody, as we should. But
hopefully we will have the appropriations bills done, so it will be
easier to accommodate those who have particular concerns in that area.
So I would urge my colleagues to cooperate with the managers on each
side so we can complete action on this bill on Thursday evening.
I will be sending a cloture motion to the desk. In fact, I will do it
right now.
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Will the majority leader yield?
Mr. DOLE. I will be happy to yield to the Senator from Illinois.
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. I have three pending amendments that I would be
prepared to take up after the Breaux amendment has been disposed of,
and if it is appropriate, if you would amend your unanimous-consent
request to take up the three 4Moseley-Braun amendments thereafter.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. Did you want 1 hour?
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. An hour would be sufficient.
Mr. DOLE. For each one?
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. One hour for all three.
Mr. DOLE. I think now that we have two Democratic amendments pending,
our hope would be that we take up the Ashcroft amendment, the Shelby
amendment, and then the amendments of the Senator from Illinois, if
that is satisfactory.
I do not know how much time they are going to take. So we would be on
your amendments by about 4:30.
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Is there time on the Aschroft amendment?
Mr. DOLE. One hour on Ashcroft; 1 hour on Shelby; and 1 hour on
yours, if that is satisfactory.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. Why do we not ask for that now?
Mr. GRAHAM addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from Florida.
Mr. GRAHAM. I would request, immediately after disposition of the
amendments from the Senator from Illinois, an amendment offered by
Senator Bumpers and myself be the next Democratic amendment. And we
have agreed to a time agreement of 2 hours equally divided.
Mr. DOLE. I want to first make certain we satisfy the Senator from
Illinois.
Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. If I may, I would like an hour on my side on my
three amendments. And if that would mean an hour--that would be 2 hours
total on the three amendments that I have.
Mr. DOLE. OK. Let me just make this consent request, that following
the disposition of the Breaux amendment--the vote will occur at 2:15--
then we consider the Ashcroft amendment, 1 hour equally divided in
reference to food stamps; followed by a Shelby amendment in reference
to food stamps, 1 hour equally divided; followed by three amendments by
the distinguished Senator from Illinois, Senator Moseley-Braun, 2 hours
equally divided; followed by----
Mr. MOYNIHAN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
[[Page S 13199]]
Mr. MOYNIHAN. If the Senator from Florida would be understanding, I
do not know that we could get a time agreement at this point. But in
the sequence, he would come after the Senator from Illinois.
Mr. GRAHAM. I would modify my request for unanimous consent just to
be in sequence after the Senator from Illinois and settle at a later
date the question of time.
Mr. DOLE. I think the only point I would make--I am not certain we
could do that. We do not want to get to one amendment at 5 o'clock
tomorrow and be on it for the rest of the day.
If I could get consent, before I move to the Graham amendment, on the
previous three amendments, Ashcroft, Shelby--no time agreements.
Mr. FORD. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President. And I say to
my friend, the majority leader, there are some that are very involved,
and the floor manager here understands that very well. We have not been
able to check about the time limits on food stamps.
If we could do sequence, then work out the time agreements after
that, I think that would be best. But as far as agreeing to a time as
it relates to these amendments, it would be very difficult for us to do
it at this time unless we could get all of those Senators that are
involved and interested in the particular amendments that are going to
be brought forward.
We are talking about basically six amendments here, and one of them
you cannot give a time agreement on; one you have the time agreement
for an hour on the three; but then that does not include time in
opposition, so 2 hours. I would be put in a very untenable position to
having to object.
I see the minority leader is here, the Democratic leader is here now.
I yield the floor.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
Mr. DOLE. That is OK.
Mr. President, I will just modify my request.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. I withdraw my request.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. DOLE. Again, I must say we still have a couple hundred amendments
pending. I do not want to get carried away that we are making progress
if we take up four amendments, five.
Mr. FORD. They are major, though.
Mr. DOLE. I would ask the following sequence: Following disposition
of the Breaux amendment, Senator Ashcroft be recognized to offer an
amendment on food stamps; following disposition of that amendment, we
hope to get a time agreement, and that the Senator from Alabama,
Senator Shelby, be recognized to offer an amendment on food stamps;
following disposition of that amendment, the distinguished Senator from
Illinois, Senator Moseley-Braun, be recognized to offer three
amendments with a 2-hour time agreement, 1 hour on each side; followed
by the Graham-Bumpers amendment on formulas, as I understand it.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. That is right.
Mr. DOLE. Yes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. DOMENICI. Reserving the right to object. Might I ask the majority
leader a question?
Mr. Majority Leader, there is no time agreement yet as to when this
bill has to be disposed of, is there?
Mr. DOLE. No. But it is my hope, and I hope the hope of the
Democratic leader, that we finish it Thursday. Otherwise, I think we
will go the reconciliation route. We could be here on this for the next
3 weeks, and we have six appropriations bills to pass. We have got some
people pressing for a recess in October. And we want to try to
accommodate people, but sometimes we have to accommodate the work at
hand. And there is a lot of work at hand.
For 49 hours we have been on this bill. It is a very important bill.
But this will take us into tomorrow evening, even this agreement--one,
two, five, six, seven, eight, nine amendments, which will get us to
sometime tomorrow evening. That would still only leave 200 left. That
may be progress; not in my book.
I will send a cloture motion to the desk.
First, I will yield the floor.
Mr. DASCHLE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the minority leader.
Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I share the view just expressed by the
majority leader. I think we have made some progress. We have a long way
to go. I know that some of the amendments that have been offered are
duplicative amendments, so there is probably a much shorter list than
200.
I think we can make a real good-faith effort tomorrow and see if we
cannot accommodate both sides in not having votes on all of these. I
think if we can work with the managers and accept some of these
amendments, it would be very helpful as well.
There are two other amendments, at least I will just put our
colleagues on notice, on the Democratic side. I would like the
Lieberman amendment and the Kennedy amendment having to do with work as
our next two amendments, regardless of whether they are part of the
unanimous-consent agreement or not. I think it would be helpful for
Democrats on our side at least to know what the sequencing will be.
Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. DASCHLE. Yes.
Mr. KENNEDY. This is the amendment to strike the training aspects of
the welfare proposal; basically, the Kassebaum training programs that
deal with dislocated workers, the workers that would be covered under
NAFTA, GATT, defense downsizing, corporate restructuring, environmental
considerations, an amendment that would be used to strike those
provisions from the Dole bill.
Mr. DOLE. Any time agreements?
Mr. KENNEDY. We would be glad to work out a reasonable time, and I
will be glad to talk with others who are the cosponsors and Senator
Kassebaum and make a recommendation to the leaders tomorrow and try to
get that in prior to the time of the cloture vote.
Mr. DOLE. I will just say for my colleagues, we have two Republican
amendments, and then we have three amendments from Senator Carol
Moseley-Braun and then the amendment of Senators Graham and Bumpers. I
assume following that there would be a Republican amendment, and then
we can accommodate.
Mr. DASCHLE. The next two Democratic amendments following those would
be the two I just mentioned.
Mr. DOLE. I also want to say, as I indicated earlier, since the
leader is on the floor, there are a number of amendments that have been
cleared on this side, and if they can be cleared on the other side--I
think there are a total of 19--that would be a sign of progress, too.
As I understand, they are amendments from Republicans and Democrats.
They are not controversial. They probably would not have been cleared.
That would be a sign we are making progress, too.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the majority leader's
request?
Mr. DOMENICI. I wonder if the Senator will add Senator Domenici's
amendment on family cap to the sequencing when he is finished.
Mr. DOLE. Following the Graham-Bumpers amendment, how much time?
Mr. DOMENICI. At least an hour on my side; maybe an hour on the other
side.
Mr. DOLE. They may want to check that. I can seek agreement but not
give a time agreement. I ask unanimous consent that Senator Domenici be
sequenced in after Graham-Bumpers, but we cannot get an agreement on
time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request? Without
objection, it is so ordered.
____________________