Congressional Record, Volume 142 Issue 28 (Tuesday, March 5, 1996)

[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 28 (Tuesday, March 5, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1506-S1510]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 1996--CONFERENCE REPORT

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the clerk will
report the conference report to accompany H.R. 2546, the District of
Columbia appropriations bill.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The committee of conference on the disagreeing votes of the
two Houses on the amendment of the Senate to the bill (H.R.
2546) making appropriations for the Government of the
District of Columbia and other activities chargeable in whole
or in part against the revenues of said District for the
fiscal year ending September 30, 1996, and for other
purposes, having met, after full and free conference, have
agreed to recommend and do recommend to their respective
Houses this report, signed by a majority of the conferees.

The Senate resumed consideration of the conference report.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there are 15 minutes
allotted to each side.
Who yields time?
Mr. KOHL addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, my remarks will be very brief. This
afternoon--after the vote on the Cuba resolution--the Senate is
scheduled to vote on a third motion to invoke cloture on the D.C.
appropriations bill. The first motion was rejected by a vote of 54 to
44. Last Thursday, the Senate rejected a second cloture motion by a
vote of 52 to 42. Today, I urge my colleagues to reject this motion as
well.
The time has arrived for the Senate to move beyond single issue
politics to address the urgent needs of our Nation's Capital. It is
clear that there is a significant--and unresolvable--difference of
opinion on the scholarship program proposed in the conference report.
Repeated attempts to move this report have failed, and I am certain
that the question of vouchers will not be settled on this particular
legislative

[[Page S1507]]

vehicle. I believe it is time now to move forward with the many other
reforms that will begin to put the District on a sound fiscal and
operational footing. As Chairman Jeffords and others have indicated,
the District is about to experience a serious cash shortage. If the
remainder of the Federal payment is not released within the next 2
weeks, the city will be unable to pay its bills or to provide essential
services. The debate over the scholarship program has been a robust and
informative one but it is time to move on. So I urge my colleagues to
vote against the cloture motion.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I honestly hope this is the last time
that we are called upon to debate the D.C. appropriations conference
report. It is time to get beyond our differences and come to agreement.
This conference agreement represents the best consensus that can now be
achieved. To those who believe that by delaying or defeating this
conference report they can somehow ensure a better deal, I can tell you
that this is highly unlikely. I do not know what the House reaction is
going to be, but I do know that we negotiated long and hard on this
conference report which essentially gave total local control on the
question of vouchers and, to my mind, brought it out of the specter of
being a national test on your feelings on this issue.
Mr. President, the Federal Government still owes the District
government more than $254 million, of which $219 million is the
remaining portion of the Federal payment. There are real human
consequences to this delay. District vendors are carrying the city's
debt. The city owes more than $300 million to its vendors. Partially as
a result of not receiving the Federal payment, the city has taken steps
to conserve cash including delaying payments to vendors. Many of these
individuals are small businessmen who depend upon prompt payment to
meet their own payroll and business expenses. When one of their
customers is late, it causes a hardship. Some have gone out of
business. Some have had to lay off employees, and some, like snowplow
operators, refuse to do further business with the city. And let us hope
we do not get another snowstorm. But it is still too early to be sure
of that.
Mr. President, each year we make an appropriation of $52 million to
the District's retirement fund for police, firefighters, teachers, and
judges, who were formerly Federal employees when the District
government was a Federal agency. As a result of the delay in enacting
this bill, the Federal Government has not paid $35 million of this
amount for those pensioners. These funds are invested for the future
benefit of retirees. Through the end of January, the retirement fund
estimates that it has lost over $2 million in interest proceeds as a
result of not having these funds to invest. That is not fair.
I do not know what more can be said to convince Senators that this is
the best deal possible under the circumstances and that the District
desperately needs the money. Last week, the Chairman of the D.C.
Control Board, Dr. Andrew Brimmer, visited me and gave me a letter
concerning the effect of delay in enacting the D.C. bill. He stated
that without the remainder of the Federal payment, the District could
run out of cash this spring. He also noted that without the bill being
enacted, the District cannot spend $42 million in new Federal grants
identified after the 1996 budget was prepared. That authority is
contained in the conference agreement.
In closing, Dr. Brimmer states:

The Authority has begun to make significant progress toward
the goal of restoring financial stability to the District
without sacrificing core public services or adversely
impacting our disadvantaged citizens. . . All this is
jeopardized by failure to enact the D.C. budget. I plead with
you and your colleagues to adopt the District's FY 1996
appropriation bill without further delay.

The White House has issued a statement which threatens that the
President's senior advisers would recommend he veto this bill in its
present form. The Mayor has written a letter to the President in which
he appeals to the President's good sense and judgment as he weighs the
advice of those senior advisers. The Mayor makes the case very well
when he states, ``This appropriations bill is not a vouchers bill. It
is a bill that only gives local officials the option to do so if they
choose.''
Mr. President, we have come to another vote on this conference
report. I hope my colleagues will heed the words of the mayor and the
chairman of the control board and invoke cloture so that we do not have
to wait for some other legislation to enact this bill. Time and the
District's need for cash are of urgent concern. I ask my colleagues to
support the conference agreement so that we may discharge our
obligations to the city.
Mr. President, I yield the floor and yield 4 minutes to the Senator
from Iowa.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, the issue before us is not just the city
government of Washington, DC, because that general issue is not what is
holding up this legislation. The issue is whether or not the children
of the District of Columbia ought to have a better education and a
better educational system. And if that educational system does not
evolve, then that the poor of the District of Columbia would have the
same opportunity as the rich of the District of Columbia to make sure
their children have an equal educational opportunity. And that revolves
around whether or not school vouchers ought to be available to the poor
of Washington, DC, so that they can have then the same educational
opportunities as the rich of this city who choose to send their
children to private schools.
Now, I have not historically promoted the wholesale move to school
vouchers because I have in the past only supported a limited
demonstration program that would provide school vouchers to poor
families that reside in troubled school districts.
Obviously, the District of Columbia falls into that category. But it
is certainly an idea, the idea of school vouchers, that deserves a
chance. And more importantly, it may give many poor children in the
District of Columbia a chance for a better education.
How ironic. We have been told that the President's advisers may
suggest a veto. How ironic that this very same President, when he was
Governor of Arkansas, supported a voucher program. Thank goodness for a
candid story in the Post explaining why the President of the United
States now has a different view. The Washington Post last Sunday showed
why President Clinton flip-flopped on school vouchers and why the other
side of the aisle is in lockstep behind him in opposition to this bill.
You see, it is the special interests. Now, in Iowa, special interest
when it comes to education means children or, if it is not education,
it means the elderly or the disabled veterans, but here in Washington
the special interests are fellows waving big checkbooks. The special
interest in this case is the National Education Association which
provided $4.4 million to Federal office seekers, virtually all of them
Democrats, according to the Washington Post story.
So I do not want to hear from the other side of the aisle how they
are voting to save education when they vote against cloture. They are
not voting for the children's interest of the District. They are voting
for the special interests of the District.
Incredibly, many people in the White House and in Congress who oppose
this small effort to give children of working families a chance send
their own children to the most expensive private schools in the city. I
hope as they drive their sons and daughters to their elite academies
that they can roll up the tinted windows of their cars and, thus, will
not have to look at the children who have no chance, and they can shut
out the noises of those children asking for a chance.
The Post story recounts that President Clinton told the NEA after he
was elected that he would not ``forget who brought me to the White
House.''
No, President Clinton has not forgotten his big special interest
friends. Unfortunately, it is the children of the poor struggling to
get a good education who have been forgotten by this White House if
they, in fact, veto this bill.
I hope my colleagues will do the right thing for the children of the
District and vote for this bill and give

[[Page S1508]]

them a chance for a better education tomorrow and a better future as a
result thereof.
Mr. JEFFORDS addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I want to thank the Senator from Iowa
for some very explicit and appropriate comments on the situation that
we are in. I hope that my colleagues will heed his words.
I yield the floor, seeing there are speakers on the other side, I
believe, ready to go.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, how much time remains?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts has 13 minutes,
6 seconds remaining.
Mr. KENNEDY. I yield myself 6 minutes.
Mr. President, just to sum up where we are in the U.S. Senate, and
really speaking to the people who live in the District, we are seeing a
third vote on an issue in which I believe our good Republican friends
are basically playing politics with the children of the District of
Columbia.
It is an interesting fact that 2 years ago, the majority cut $28
million out of funding for education in the District. This last year,
they cut some $14 million out, and then $8.5 million out of title I.
So that is the background, and now what they are doing is asking $42
million over the period of the next 5 years for a very narrow program,
which has been rejected 8 to 1 by the District of Columbia, and that is
the voucher system that is not going to give the choice to the
individual, it is going to give the choice to the school.
That is something that our Republican friends do not seem to
understand. Only 2 percent of the children in the District would be
able to qualify for this particular program. Who is going to make the
judgment? Do you think the parents are? Of course, they are not. It is
going to be the schools that are making the judgment about which
children they are going to take.
So, on the one hand, we have seen the commitment to try and enhance
the academic achievement and accomplishment for all of the children 2
years ago, and that was cut back, and then you see the commitment to
enhance opportunities for all of the children, and that is cut back.
Now we are faced with a conference proposal that effectively
undermines the first elected school board for the District of Columbia
by not funding them. Do you hear that, Mr. President? I hope all of our
Republican colleagues understand, local control. How often we hear,
``Let's have local control over school planning, local control over the
allocations of resources.'' That is not this bill.
The officials elected by the District of Columbia selected their
school board, and that program is defunded. We have basically a Federal
oversight that is going to say to the District of Columbia, ``Use this
money our way or you're not going to get it.'' That is real choice.
That is real choice. That is real choice for the citizens here.
So we ought to understand, this is the third time that we are being
asked to vote on this, Mr. President, along with the other provisions
of the legislation that provide an assault on the incomes of working
families here, unlike any other part of the country, where the changes
in the worker protection under Davis-Bacon have been included, and the
position of the Congress on the issues of funding for abortions. We are
making a judgment which the Supreme Court has recognized ought to be a
State or a local judgment, but, oh, no, we are saying we know best, we
know what is really best for the education of the students, and we know
what is in the best interest of the poor and needy women in the
District, and we know what is in the best interest of workers in the
District.
We will hear, as we have over the period of these past months, that
we in this body do not always know what is best for the people around
this country. How often we have heard that speech. Now you have the
chance to say no to that judgment by rejecting this conference report
and saying yes to workers, yes to needy women, yes to the parents and
to the enhanced quality of education for the people of the District.
So, Mr. President, I hope for these reasons and the excellent reasons
that have been outlined by Senator Kohl earlier today and during the
last debates and my friend and colleague from Illinois, Senator Simon,
that this conference report will not be considered; that we will send a
very clear message.
As Senator Kohl has pointed out, and it has not been controverted, if
you eliminated these kinds of restrictions that have no business
whatsoever being on this bill, this funding would be available this
afternoon. But, no, we have voted on it. People understand where those
votes are, and we are being asked to go through this routine and what I
think is basically blackmailing the children and families of the
District of Columbia to achieve some purpose for the majority that the
majority might be able to explain to us. But we are asked to do that,
Mr. President.
I want to make it very, very clear to all the members of the District
of Columbia, we stand strong to make sure that the District of Columbia
is going to get its funding. It could get it this afternoon if they
drop these three proposals off the conference report. They could work
that conference report. All of us have been around this institution to
know the conferees would be able to get back together. Drop those
three, and they could get it this afternoon.
We have had the two votes, and still they want to have the third one.
But we will do everything we possibly can to work with our friend and
colleague, the Senator from Vermont, who we admire both his commitment
to the quality of education nationwide and also in the District of
Columbia. We will work with him and the other Members of the House to
make sure the District of Columbia gets its payment, but on this
proposal we should say no.
Mr. President, I see my friend and colleague. I yield 4 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I simply want to underscore what Senator
Kennedy has had to say. The Presiding Officer, as a new Member of this
body, may not be aware of this, but in addition to everything that
Senator Kennedy had to say, one of the things that is happening in our
world that is really dramatic is the spread of democracy. It is in
Russia, it is in Poland, it is in many countries of Africa now.
It is interesting, Mr. President, that in all of the democracies of
the world, there is only one democracy where we deny the people in the
capital city the right to be represented in a democracy, in their
parliament. That democracy, I regret to say, is the United States of
America.
The District of Columbia has their own elected school board, and we
make all these speeches about local control, but we say to only one
school board--and it is not insignificant, it is a school board that
does not have a vote in terms of having a U.S. Senator--we say to one
school board, ``You have to do this or you don't get this money.'' That
just does not make sense. I add one other point, Mr. President. I have
been around here now 22 years and, generally, we try and work out
compromises between the House and the Senate. These are provisions that
were not favored by a single Member of the Senate side. Democrats and
Republicans capitulated to the House. I understand capitulating because
you have to do that sometimes. But the body does not need to do that.
The precedent is simply wrong.

So I hope that our vote on cloture will be the same. There is no
reason for anyone to change his or her mind. This is not good policy,
and I hope we will continue to resist the cloture motion.
I yield the remainder of my time back to Senator Kennedy.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, first, I thank my colleagues for their
kind words about our relationship, which I cherish. I thank them for
very eloquently making my arguments, because they have pinned it all on
the fact that we are shoving something at a city that has no
opportunity with their elected officials to say no.
That is not the case. I wish they would read the bill. What it says
is simply that we set up the operation, and there is a nonprofit
corporation set up to handle private funds and public funds. Then there
will be two voucher plans. One voucher plan nobody disagrees with. One
is that every child that has problems with their education will have an
opportunity to seek a

[[Page S1509]]

voucher to go after school--or to go someplace to get the kind of
remedial attention they need. Nobody disagrees with that. The bill
further states that, however, the corporation can recommend that money
would go for tuition vouchers. However, there must be agreement upon
how much to spend on tuition vouchers, down to zero, and that is up to
the elected city officials, the District Council. They can say no
money.
When we reached this agreement, I was fully aware there had been a
referendum that said, 8 to 1, ``We do not want any vouchers.'' That
simply means that I knew, and I am sure others that have agreed to this
know, that many people in the District are against it. To make the
presumption that the city council does not remember this vote, that was
on the ballot, which said that the city voters do not want vouchers, 8
to 1, and they are going to say forget about that, forget about how you
feel now--of course, they are not. So I appreciate Senators on the
other side making the argument strongly that we should not have
anything that is locally controlled. This conference agreement gives
the city local control.
So how can you say you are against it because it does not have local
control when the whole thing is based upon local control?
The other issues, we have argued before, with respect to Davis-Bacon
may not be a problem. If it is, we will correct it. The abortion issue
is a compromise between the language adopted in 1995, and which was
adopted by the Senate this year and the more restrictive language of
the House bill. The conference agreement states that no funds, either
from the local government or the Federal Government, can be used to
perform an abortion unless it is to save the life of the mother or in
cases of rape or incest. That was the best we could do.
Let us concentrate on the educational provisions now. Mr. President,
we have done everything in this agreement we can to protect the people
of this city from a mandatory Federal program which would violate local
control. That is the case in this agreement.
In addition, we must remember that there are many other important
education reforms in this bill besides that one provision. We run the
risk, as I mentioned earlier, of ending up with nothing here, and all
the catastrophes that can come from that, including losing the funding
for the reforms.
I want to say briefly that I know there are several Members--enough
to pass this bill--that are tortured by this vote right now, who want
to support the cloture motion, but they know that the problem has been
an agreement by the unions to hold the line. The White House is putting
pressure on and saying they will veto it if it is presented in its
present form. I urge those Members to look at the facts and get the
grit to be able to do what you know you should do to help the city and
to, most of all, help the kids get the education they need in this
city.
I reserve the remainder of my time.
Mr. KENNEDY. How much time do I have?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 4 minutes.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I yield myself 3 minutes.
Mr. President, I appreciate the explanation of the Senator from
Vermont. But I do not think that that ought to be very satisfying to
the parents of the school district in the District of Columbia.
Effectively, what the Republican Congress has done is this: They have
cut $52 million in the last 2 years on the one hand, and they are
giving $42 million back on the other, if it is used as explained by the
Senator from Vermont, and that is whether it is vouchers or after-
school vouchers. But if they do not spend it for the vouchers, they
lose it. They lose it. They do not get the money.
You have had these draconian cuts that we have seen in the last 2
years, and they are dangling the money in front of the District now and
saying the only way you can use this money is if you use it for the
programs of after-school vouchers and the other vouchers.
What do you say to the school that says they would like just a few
more hundred thousand dollars for the literacy program, or they would
like to have an in-school after-school program? It would not be just
the kids that get the vouchers, but all the children. You are saying no
to that group of parents that want to have an after-school program and
use some of the money. We otherwise would have gotten another $42
million for the after-school program. What if the teachers and parents
say we would like to have more technology, computers? Oh, no, we have
to permit 2 percent of the school children to go to some other schools.
We cannot say that in your school you might be able to get some
additional resources for technology.
Those are the things that are out there, parents, and under this
proposal, you are denying it. You have had significant cuts in the last
2 years. You are offering them a lot of money this way, but it has to
be used not the way the District of Columbia wants to use it, which has
rejected vouchers in recent years by 8 to 1--if they had wanted
vouchers, they would have had it before this year. They never have. So
you are saying we know best, and you are going to use the money this
way, or you are going to lose it.
That is unacceptable. We say that the schools know best and the
parents, who may want to be able to develop after-school programs.
Schools and parents want to have literacy and technology, and schools
and parents want to have enhancement of math and science. But we are
saying, no, you cannot do that. You have to use it our way, or you lose
the money. That is the issue.
That is unacceptable, Mr. President. I hope that we will defeat the
cloture motion and move toward providing the funding to the District of
Columbia.
Mr. JEFFORDS. How much time remains?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. There are 30 seconds remaining.
Mr. JEFFORDS. I point out that we have never cut the school budgets
of the city. The city has recommended reductions, some of which were
accepted. We have never imposed cuts. So, again, let us get the facts
straight.
In addition to that, this $5 million is the only thing at risk here.
All of that can be used if the city council and the scholarship
corporation agree. It can all be used for the kind of vouchers that no
one opposes, for remedial instruction. Local control is total here.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, as the Senate today again attempts to
limit debate on H.R. 2546, the fiscal year 1996 District of Columbia
appropriations bill, I would like to address what seems to be the
principal roadblock to Senate approval. That issue is the proposed
discretionary educational voucher program.
The conference report on H.R. 2546 would authorize school vouchers
for as many as 1,500 low-income children at up to $3,000 each. These
vouchers could be used for one of two purposes: Either for supplemental
educational services such as remedial training after school, or as
tuition scholarships to assist with the costs of private education.
As proposed, the voucher demonstration is not mandated. It is
authorized first as a choice for the District of Columbia Council. No
voucher program could go forward until it was approved by the District
government.
Furthermore, should the District decide to implement the voucher
demonstration, the D.C. Council could specify the type of vouchers
which would be available. For instance, all of the demonstration funds
could be targeted to supplemental educational services with no tuition
assistance alternative.
Mr. President, this legislation respects home rule by giving the D.C.
government the discretion to choose the type of program it may wish to
provide, or reject the program outright. It would also give up to 1,500
D.C. families the ability to make important choices to improve their
children's education.
I strongly support the bill, and I strongly support the discretionary
school voucher demonstration. This is consistent with my support of a
similar voucher demonstration proposal during the 1994 debate on the
Goals 2000 legislation.
The American education system should provide an environment which
fosters innovation and experimentation. Here is an opportunity to test
that environment in the Nation's Capital. I urge my colleagues to join
in voting in favor of educational choice for the District of Columbia.

[[Page S1510]]

Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time.

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