[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 96 (Wednesday, June 26, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H6852]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            VOTE TODAY TO HELP THE DISABLED AND THE ELDERLY

  (Mr. LAZIO of New York asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. LAZIO of New York. Madam Speaker, this morning we are going to 
have an opportunity to stand up for the most vulnerable members of 
society, the disabled and the elderly. There will be an amendment that 
was debated on the floor yesterday that will be up for a vote. We will 
have a chance to step forward and to do something important in terms of 
providing shelter and housing to give people the ability to have a 
meaningful life who have disabilities and who are elderly.
  Now, when we talk about the word ``disabled,'' it is almost a 
sanitized word, but let us think about it in terms of the veteran who 
has returned from the war and who is in a wheelchair and lost his legs, 
or the 90-year-old grandmother who is in a wheelchair and wants her own 
home, not a nursing home, or the young girl who has lost her sight, and 
the young man who was born so mentally challenged that he needs the 
help that only a community house can provide to him.
  In 1996, we were spending about $387 million out of a $30 billion 
budget for housing for the disabled. We are now talking about reducing 
funding down to $174 million. Please vote for the Lazio amendment that 
will restore about $40 million of that.

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