[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 73 (Monday, June 2, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5158-S5173]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     FAMILY FRIENDLY WORKPLACE ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will now resume consideration of S. 
4, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 4) to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 
     to provide to private sector employees the same opportunities 
     for time-and-a-half compensatory time off, biweekly work 
     programs, and flexible credit hour programs as Federal 
     employees currently enjoy to help balance the demands and 
     needs of work and family, to clarify the provisions relating 
     to exemptions of certain professionals from the minimum wage 
     and overtime requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 
     1938, and for other purposes.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri is recognized.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, I am pleased to have the opportunity to 
stand and speak on behalf of the Family Friendly Workplace Act. It is a 
way of helping people resolve tensions that exist between the home 
place and the workplace. Most American families encounter two basic 
tensions. One is the tension that is financial, that drives both adults 
in the family, if there are two adults in the family, into the 
workplace; certainly if there is only one adult in the family, that one 
adult has tremendous pressure to be in the workplace. The other 
pressure which exists for most American families is the social pressure 
that comes when you have all of the adults in the family in the 
workplace. You have tension between the workplace and the home place.
  How in the world are we going to be able to meet the needs of the 
home, when people are not at home when they are needed the most--
particularly when there are times when their presence is very, very 
important. For example, when someone is getting an award, or when 
someone needs to speak to the counselor or with a teacher at school, or 
when someone needs to go to the doctor. Most families understand that 
when you have this kind of a need you should have the opportunity to be 
away from work. If both adults in the family are involved in the 
workplace it makes it very tough to do.
  There are times when certain conditions will justify the use of what 
is known as family and medical leave. The Family and Medical Leave Act 
was passed by the U.S. Congress and it allows people to take time off 
without pay. But I have found in my family, and I am sure most 
Americans have found as well that when you take your child to the 
doctor, that is not a time when you can go without pay. That is a time 
when you actually need all the resources you can get. To put people in 
the position of having to take a pay cut in order to go see the teacher 
about a problem at school or to watch the student get an award at 
school or to be able to take a child to the doctor--to ask a parent to 
take a pay cut in a setting like that is to make a parent make a choice 
that we should not be asking a parent to make.
  Fortunately, there already exists in this culture a clear model of a 
system that can work, that works effectively and works very well. It is 
in the Federal Government. Legally, all Federal employees have the 
ability to have what is called flexible working arrangements. They can 
take time off with pay later if they have earned that time off by 
working more hours earlier. They can arrange their schedule to work a 
couple hours extra one week and take a couple hours off the next week. 
As a matter of fact, Federal workers have the ability to take advantage 
of the scheduling option which allows them to work 45 hours one week, 
35 hours the next week. That way they have every other Friday off. Of 
course, that is really a tremendous boon to people who need to be able 
to do things during the normal working hours, whether it is to go to 
the motor vehicle registration place to get the

[[Page S5159]]

car plates renewed or to take a child to a doctor or go see a child get 
an award or confer with a teacher at the high school--those kinds of 
days that can be scheduled flexibly for Federal employees have worked 
well to solve problems for Federal employees.
  Unfortunately, what is standard operating procedure for people who 
work for the Federal Government turns out to be outright illegal for 
people in the private setting. Let me give an example. If you work for 
a Federal agency and you want to go see your daughter get an award on 
Monday afternoon next week you can say to the boss this Friday, ``I 
would like to work a couple extra hours and then I can take off early 
next Monday.'' Now, your boss can let you work 2 hours this week and 
you can take the 2 hours off next week, that is fine, you can see your 
daughter get the award. For a private employer to do that is violating 
the law. It is against the law for a private employer to be able to 
cooperate with his or her employee in such a setting.

  Now that really shocks most of us to think it is against the law for 
an employer to help an employee in that respect, but it is the truth. 
Similarly, if the private employer says if you would really like every 
other Friday off we will let you work 5 days at 9 hours a day, that 
would be 45 hours one week, and then the next week you only have to 
work 35 hours and you can do that by working 4 days, take the fifth day 
off the second week, that private employer, to pay a person the 
standard wages for doing that, is in violation of the law. Now you 
might add, ``Gee, this is astounding. That should not be against the 
law.'' It is against the law in the private sector. It is not against 
the law for Federal Government employees.
  What is interesting is when you talk to Federal Government employees, 
they endorse this system overwhelmingly. The General Accounting Office, 
which is the Office which makes assessments about how well Government 
is functioning and what works and what does not work--too often they 
find out what does not work--they made a study of this particular 
proposal and the way this works in the Federal Government. It was 
amazing that at a 10-to-1 ratio, Federal Government employees said this 
is something that really helps, this is something we like. This is 
something we want. This works. Not only did the employees say it was 
something that helped, that they wanted, that worked, the employees 
also were found by the General Accounting Office to be more productive, 
their morale was higher, and, obviously, those are the kinds of things 
we would like to extend all across our economy.
  Now, private, hourly paid workers in America are deprived of these 
benefits. It is just that simple. It is against the law. People say, 
how in the world did we get a law that would make it against the law 
for an employee and an employer to cooperate in this way? Well, back in 
the 1930's on the heel of the Great Depression, when only 2 out of 
every 12 mothers of school-age children were in the work force, a law 
was created that set up the Fair Labor Standards Act. This act gave 
some important protections to American workers. However, it also made 
these kinds of adjustments, this kind of workplace flexibility illegal. 
The world is so different now than it was then, it is almost impossible 
to imagine. Instead of 2 out of 12 mothers of school-age children being 
in the workplace, it is 9 out of 12 mothers of school-age children 
being in the workplace. So we flipped the statistics totally but we are 
still operating with the same approach--not totally operating that way. 
We changed it for Government workers.
  Of course, Government workers are not the only people that have 
flexible schedules. The people in the boardrooms have flexible 
schedules. The boss never seems to have trouble with his salary if he 
takes time off to play golf, let alone to see a child at school. People 
on salary, the managers and the supervisors--as a matter of fact, the 
majority of American citizens--have flexible scheduling. It is 
estimated about 66 million people have flexible scheduling and only 59 
million who are the hourly paid working people of America do not have 
the ability for flexible schedule. It is no wonder that the Pugh 
Foundation said that 81 percent of the working mothers said, ``We need 
flexible working arrangements for the private sector.'' Obviously, that 
would be a great help to them.
  It would be a great help, they believed, because they think that is 
what would help them. When you look at Federal workers who have had 
this plan--now, for well into the 1970's--the 1980's and the 1990's, 
they say at a 10 to 1 ratio, ``This is the best thing since sliced 
bread. This is something that is very important to us.''

  So, we are talking about a proposal which would extend to workers and 
working families the capacity to harmonize these competing demands 
between the workplace on the one hand and the home place on the other 
hand. I might add that I believe we are going to continue to have lots 
of people working outside the home in America. As a matter of fact, I 
do not know that America could be very competitive in the world economy 
if we did not. These two-parent families where both parents are working 
outside the home and the single-parent family where the only parent is 
working outside of the home are part of the muscle and fiber of the 
American economy. We cannot do without them. The truth of the matter is 
we need to find ways to help them harmonize the competing demands. They 
need more time and more flexibility.
  What is interesting about the Federal system is that it allows you to 
earn your time off by earning a little bit at one time and taking it 
off at another time. These flexible working arrangements give workers 
the ability to take time off without having to take a pay cut. Now the 
family and medical leave provisions are good, they are fine, they are 
part of the law right now, but if you take time off under the family 
and medical leave provisions you lose pay, and when you lose pay that 
way it is not only not good for you, it is not good for the country.
  Let me just talk to you about what happens in the family and medical 
leave situations where they have taken time off. Now, the family and 
medical leave Commission stated that the method that hourly employees 
used to recover lost wages when taking family and medical leave is that 
28.1 percent borrowed money. So, families had to go in debt to meet 
their needs. And 10.4 percent, 1 out of every 10 hourly workers who 
took time off under family and medical leave had to go on welfare 
because of the money they lost. 41.9 percent, almost 42 percent, 4 out 
of every 10 people, deferred paying their bills. Now, most Americans do 
not like not paying their bills. People would rather have the 
flexibility of keeping their payments on time and on schedule. It is 
cheaper when it comes to the interest you are paying, finance charges, 
and the like. Yet we put people in a situation where 41 percent put off 
paying their bills, over 10 percent went on welfare, and another nearly 
30 percent had to borrow money. I think it is far preferable to be in a 
situation where we allow people to have the flexibility of taking time 
off with pay instead of taking time off without pay.
  Now, there seems to be some developing consensus about the idea that 
there should be some capacity for comptime. Comptime is one of the 
items in this bill. It merely is the right to say to your employer, ``I 
would rather be given some time off with pay later on than be paid for 
overtime.'' We know that the law requires that you be paid for overtime 
at time and a half. This bill would allow a person to say, ``I would 
like to take time and a half off with pay later on, instead of being 
paid time and a half for the overtime.'' People are shocked to learn it 
is against the law now to say I would like to have some time off later 
on instead of being paid time and a half now--time off with pay later 
on.
  Interestingly enough, the comptime part of this bill only addresses a 
pretty narrow group of American citizens because the number of people 
who get regular overtime in our culture is pretty low. As a matter of 
fact, in the 1996 Current Population Survey, women who work on an 
hourly basis--and there are 28.9 million women who are paid on an 
hourly basis in this country--only 4.5 percent of them said they get 
overtime work in a typical work period. Even if you multiply that by 
five times, say you get up to 20 percent, you are dealing only with one 
out of every five women in the work force who would qualify for using 
comptime as a way of assuaging some of these tensions.

[[Page S5160]]

  Since this system is a voluntary system for both employers and 
employees, it is very easy to say that we will just move ourselves 
beyond comptime--not to say it is not valuable, that it wouldn't be 
important, that it wouldn't be wonderful to have. But if we give 
ourselves the capacity for flexible working arrangements, where 
especially people could schedule over a 2-week period instead of a 1-
week period to average out the 40-hour week, indeed, people do have 
some of these benefits who are not traditionally the recipients of 
overtime.
  Another thing that stuns me is the fact that most of the people who 
get overtime are men. Overtime typically focuses on industries that are 
male dominated. There are about two men getting overtime for every 
woman that is getting overtime. So even if you are talking about the 
fact that overall, on balance, you might be entitled to a third of all 
the hourly workers who get some type of regular overtime, or enough of 
it to make a difference to help compensate meeting the demands of their 
family and the home place and the workplace, one-third really is really 
not addressing the problem of what we ought to address. We need to 
address this problem in a way which is comprehensive.
  So having flexible working arrangements for the entire population, 
and not just focusing the opportunity to assuage attention on those 
individuals who are regularly recipients of the opportunity for 
overtime, is very important. That is why the flextime part of this bill 
is important. If we really want this bill to address the needs of 
women, of which only 4.5 percent get overtime in any typical workweek, 
according to the 1996 Current Population Survey, we really ought to 
make sure that we do more than just have comptime legislation, that we 
have flextime legislation as well.
  President Clinton and many Democrat Senators have voiced support for 
flextime, the central idea within the Family Friendly Workplace Act. 
Polls show that the vast majority of Americans favor flexible work 
schedules. They want legislation that would give them parity with 
Federal Government workers.
  Incidentally, comptime is available to every State local government 
worker. The Federal law makes it available as well.
  People would like to have legislation that would give them the 
opportunity to choose scheduling options that would help their 
families.
  Penn and Schoen, the President's own pollsters, have reported that 75 
percent of America wants the choice of comptime.
  Last month's Money magazine published a poll revealing that 64 
percent of the public overall, and 68 percent of the women, would 
occasionally prefer time off in lieu of overtime if they have a choice.
  Nothing in this bill would make someone forever choose that it had to 
be one way or another. You could maintain the opportunity to have 
overtime pay most of the time when you had overtime, but you could on 
occasion say, ``I would really prefer to take this time and a half off 
later than to have the time and a half in pay.''
  From the remarks we hear from the Democrats, I think they say they 
want the same thing. I believe they do have an appreciation for the 
need of workers in this setting.
  If this is really the case, if everybody wants flextime, some have 
specific difficulties with this bill, I hope that Senators would come 
down and offer amendments. We are at a point where we need to begin to 
work out, fine tune, and develop a bill which will result in the 
workers of this country having the benefits which all of us believe 
they need and want.
  According to all the accounts I have heard, people want this bill on 
both sides of the aisle. The President has been heralding the benefits 
of flextime for the last 2 years. In his State of the Union Address, as 
part of his campaign, and as recently as the last several weeks, he 
spoke very favorably, saying that flexible working arrangements are 
very important. Mrs. Clinton has made statements on national television 
over and over again.
  Now we have a situation where we have gridlock in the 
Nation's Capital. I think it is time for us to break that impasse. I 
think it is time to work out this measure. It is time for individuals 
who say they have objections to the bill to come to the floor and offer 
those kinds of compromises that would adjust the bill so as to make it 
acceptable.

  We want a bill. The Democrats have said they want a bill. I think it 
is time to work together and to work out Senators' concerns here on the 
Senate floor in the process in which the Senate is best served to 
undertake, and where the Senate works at its best, it works to the 
benefit of the American people.
  So let's work together and hammer out our concerns on the Senate 
floor. If Senators dislike specific provisions or language in the bill, 
I say come down and offer your suggestions, your amendments. Let's make 
sure that we don't allow this bill to be one which fails to move 
because none of us is willing to consider change. Let's try to say that 
since we all want this, let's move it forward, place it before the 
Senate, and ask the Senate to act in its wisdom on proposals and 
amendments so that the will of the Senate might work out the will of 
the people.
  This particular opportunity we have is a good one. It is one which I 
believe can really benefit the working people of this country and will 
help us as a nation as we move into the next century.
  If the studies of the GAO were correct, and 10-to-1 people think that 
this is a good system when they have had a chance to live under it, and 
the morale goes up and the productivity goes up, this is a policy that 
is a win-win situation and should be extended to all workers. It is a 
policy change which should be considered high on the agenda of the 
Senate, not on one party or the other, but high on the agenda of the 
American people and should, therefore, be high on the agenda of the 
Senate.
  Let's work together. Let's come to the floor. Let's make proposals 
for amendments. Let's work out our differences so that we can respond 
to the President, who said he wants to have a measure that addresses 
this issue, and let's find a way to do it in a way which will benefit 
the people of this country.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas is recognized.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I would like to talk for 5 to 7 
minutes just to augment the remarks of my colleague, the Senator from 
Missouri, who has done yeoman's service on this issue.
  Senator Ashcroft has worked on this issue for probably 6 months now, 
trying to educate people on the importance of allowing this stress 
relief valve to be passed into law in America. I commend him for it. 
What he said was very, very important because, in fact, the question I 
get asked when I am home and talking about this bill is, ``Why is it 
necessary to have a law? Why can't people go in and ask their boss to 
take time off on Friday afternoon to see their children's soccer game 
and make it up on Monday?''
  Most people in this country believe that you can do this already. The 
biggest surprise is that 60 million hourly workers in this country do 
not have this option. They do not have this option because the U.S. 
Congress in 1938 passed a law when only 10 percent of the women, the 
mothers in this country, worked. It said you have a 40-hour workweek, 
and employers and hourly employees cannot violate the 40-hour workweek 
unless you pay time and a half for overtime work. Federal employees 
have the ability to go in and say, ``I would like to work 38 hours this 
week and 42 hours next week.'' Salaried employees have the same option. 
But 60 million hourly employees--the ones who need flexibility the 
most--are not able to do it because of a law passed in 1938 when 10 
percent of the mothers in this country worked. Today, two-thirds of the 
working women in this country have school-age children.
  When I talk to my friends who still have school-age children, they 
say what they need more than anything else is time. They need time more 
than they need money. They need time with their children more than 
anything else. The stress of not being able to go to the football game 
or the soccer game is what hurts them the most.
  So why wouldn't we give them the ability to go in and talk to their 
employer and have the flextime or the comptime that was described so 
ably

[[Page S5161]]

by the Senator from Missouri? Why wouldn't we do that? It is just good, 
old-fashioned, common horse sense. That is what it is. The people out 
in the country know that. They can't even believe we are talking about 
it. Only inside the beltway in Washington, DC, would it be a question 
that two adults would be able to sit down and say, ``I would like to 
work 38 hours this week and 42 hours next week, or I would love the 
ability to work 2 extra hours 4 days a week and take Friday off,'' as 
Federal employees are able to do. People want the ability to manage 
their own time without taking a pay cut.
  You know when the President talks about flextime, he is talking about 
nonpaid time. We don't want a person to have to forego the mortgage 
payment or the car payment. We want people to be able to budget, to 
know, ``This is what I am going to have for spending, this is what I am 
going to have to spend, this is my budget, and I do not want to give up 
the 2 hours of pay. But if I can keep on an even keel with my budget 
and be able to have the flexibility in time, that is what I need most 
in the world right now.''
  Mr. President, the Senator from Missouri and the Senator from Texas 
are going to try to make sure that the 60 million employees in this 
country who are not now able to sit down with their employer and ask 
for their flextime or this comptime do, in fact, have that ability. 
That is what this is about.
  The Senator from Missouri came up with the idea that we should 
finally, once and for all, since 1938, come into the real world. And 
the real world is that two-thirds of the working women in this country 
have children in school. They need relief.
  So the Senator from Missouri and I are going to try to give it to 
them by enacting flextime and comptime so people can work their normal 
hours or have the flexibility to change their hours but keep their 
salaries constant. And it is always at the option of the employee to 
say, ``I would rather have time or I would rather have money.''
  That is something that the Senator from Missouri was very careful to 
make sure in his bill that be protected. That is the right of the 
employee to say, ``No, I do not want time-and-a-half time; I want time-
and-a-half money.'' That should be the right of the employee. But if 
the employee says, ``Oh, thank goodness. What I really want to do is to 
go to my child's soccer game on Friday afternoon, and now I can go and 
ask my employer for that time off and make it up next week and not have 
to worry about the car payment,'' that is what we are trying to do. 
That is the simple fact. It is why this bill is necessary. And I 
commend the Senator from Missouri for working to make this happen.
  Why we are having so much trouble getting this bill on the floor for 
debate is because it is being filibustered on the other side, which I 
don't understand. I don't know why the unions would be against it. This 
doesn't interfere with union contracts. If there is a closed shop, a 
contract shop, a union shop, then this law isn't in effect. The union 
is able to do the negotiating.
  But if there isn't a union, why should Government be in the way of 
allowing people the ability to have that time with their child at their 
soccer game or their football game or their Little League Baseball 
game? Big brother Federal Government should not be in the way, nor 
should big brother unions be in the way, because this does not affect 
union contracts. But there are a lot of people in those 60 million 
hourly employees who do not have a union contract that also are 
precluded by law from this flexibility. And, Mr. President, we don't 
think it is right. We want to do something about it.
  That is what the Ashcroft bill does for the working people of this 
country.
  I hope that our colleagues on the other side of the aisle will allow 
us to get this bill on the floor. Stop filibustering it. Stop 
stonewalling. Let us get this bill on the floor. Let us have the 
debate. Let us have the amendments. Whatever is appropriate we will 
work with if we can just get it on the floor. Right now, for the last 4 
weeks, 5 weeks, we have just been trying to get the Democrats to agree 
to let us bring it up. It is being filibustered. The time has come for 
everybody to stand up and say, OK, I will put my amendments out there. 
We will vote them up or down. But let us let the working people of 
America, the 60 million hourly employees, have the same opportunities 
as Federal employees, State employees, and salaried employees to be 
able to take off 2 hours on Friday afternoon and make it up on Monday.
  That is what this bill is about, and I hope that our colleagues will 
allow us to debate it and pass it and give this stress relief valve to 
the working people of America.
  Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.
  Mr. KENNEDY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, as we start off today on this issue, I 
remind our colleagues and friends, there was really no effort on 
anyone's part to delay the consideration of this legislation. If you go 
back and review the amount of time we have taken on the legislation, 
you will find no more than 4 or 6 hours of debate in total on the 
Senate floor.
  We are being faced now with the bill is being brought up this 
afternoon with a cloture motion. We have already been notified there 
will be no time tomorrow morning as the Senate will pause to pay 
tribute to an outstanding Senator, our good friend and colleague, 
Senator Thurmond, who has had a long record in the Senate. We also know 
that we will be displaced tomorrow afternoon should the budget report 
come back before the Senate.
  So we are in a situation where this legislation is put in the 
Chamber, pulled back, put in, pulled back, put in, and then a cloture 
petition is filed. We had a series of amendments that were offered in 
the Labor Committee. These amendments have been filed on the floor as 
well. I will address the purposes of these amendments later. We voted 
on this bill in the committee, and there was no effort to delay. There 
were only, I believe, six or eight amendments, and I think there have 
been just about that number that Senators on this side of the aisle 
have filed on the legislation. So we should be under no illusion that 
there is any interest in undue delay on the measure.
  Madam President, it is very difficult to disagree with the needs of 
the parents in the situations described by my good friend and colleague 
from Texas, Mrs. Hutchison, or my friend from Missouri, Senator 
Ashcroft. They discuss cases where the parent needs a little extra time 
for the meeting with the schoolteachers or for the dental appointment 
or for other kinds of activities. We are all in agreement on the 
importance of those needs.
  But that is not what this bill is all about. That is what the Federal 
employees protections are all about, which we support, but that is not 
what this legislation is all about. I will just take a few minutes to 
review what this bill provides.
  I would think reasonable people could say that we should not abolish 
the 40-hour workweek, which has been in effect for nearly 60 years to 
protect workers from exploitation--that is why it was put into effect. 
We all understand the need to look at the new global economy and 
consider new programs, but I do not think we ought to get away from old 
values. The old values were that 40 hours of hard work for men and 
women in this country is enough over the course of the week if workers 
are going to have any time at all for their families. If employees need 
to work overtime, they should be compensated at time-and-a-half in 
order to provide additional income for the family, particularly because 
they are going to be denied the opportunity to be with that family.
  So, if we are going to abolish the 40-hour workweek, I think we need 
to understand where we are going. That has been a protection for many, 
many years. If we are going to abolish overtime pay in a 2-week period, 
as this bill does, I think we ought to be able to discuss that. I think 
it is fair to review once again who really has the whip hand in 
deciding whether that worker is going to be able to get time off to 
participate in that teacher conference or see that school play. Is it 
the employee? Or can the employer just say, no, you are not going to be 
able to do that. Then what recourse is available to that employee? You 
would think that two people sitting down would be able to work out an 
accommodation so that one person would be able to go to

[[Page S5162]]

that teacher conference, but if the employer is able to say, no, you 
cannot go, how does that benefit the employee? There is virtually no 
hindrance to that employer simply saying, well, you are just not 
getting off next week or the week after for that basketball game or for 
that teacher conference. There is no remedy. If the employee had the 
decision, then we would be talking about an entirely different bill.

  That is not what is before us in S.4. That is not what is before us. 
That is why I think we ought to be cautious when we talk about ending 
the 40-hour workweek, when we talk about ending any premium pay for 
overtime with the flexible credit hours in this legislation, and when 
we skew the decisionmaking process in favor of the employer rather than 
the employee. It seems to me that we ought to examine this and try to 
address it. That is what I want to speak about this afternoon, about 
the different amendments that have been advanced and which I hope will 
be included in the bill. Then I hope the legislation will move forward. 
I would like just to mention those this afternoon to the Senate.
  Prior to the recess, the sponsors of S. 4 attempted to invoke 
cloture, and they failed badly, not by one or two votes but by seven 
votes. Every Democrat opposed cloture because the provisions of S. 4 
are clearly hostile to working men and women. Two courageous 
Republicans broke with their party and joined with us in opposing 
cloture. That vote should have sent a strong signal to the Republican 
leadership that their bill contains provisions which are unacceptable 
to a great many Senators.
  Those 47 Senators who opposed cloture will not allow the advocates of 
S. 4 to eliminate the 40-hour workweek. Those Senators will not allow 
the sponsors of S. 4 to impose a pay cut on American workers, and that 
is what this legislation is really all about. Those Senators will 
insist upon a comptime bill which is fair to working men and women, one 
which allows employees--employees--to make the real decisions and 
choices.
  Whether we take 1 more cloture vote or 10 more cloture votes, the 
result, I believe, will be the same. It should be clear to all Senators 
that the extreme provisions of S. 4 will never be approved by the 
Senate and they will never become law.
  That is why many of us had hoped by now the advocates of S. 4 would 
have moved away from their extreme position toward a more moderate, 
reasonable comptime proposal.
  The real debate in the Senate has never been about whether workers 
needed more flexible schedules. All 100 Senators could concur in that 
goal. What this debate has been about is how best to provide that 
flexibility, how to design a system which genuinely empowers workers 
rather than enhancing the control of their bosses. It is time to turn 
to the real issues. What are the standards by which we should evaluate 
a comptime proposal? I think it would be useful if we could establish 
fairness as the criterion and then make the decision as to what 
legislation advances that goal. I believe there are certain basic 
questions of fairness which should be asked about each of the pending 
comptime proposals. Does the proposal prevent an employer from 
discriminating in allocating overtime work between those workers who 
choose time off and those who choose overtime pay? Will it reduce the 
pay of employees who are currently working overtime and want to 
continue to receive overtime pay? Is the proposal designed to ensure 
that those workers who choose comptime actually get a net increase in 
time off to spend with their families? Does the plan protect employees 
who use comptime from any reduction in their health or retirement 
benefits? Does the legislation contain strong penalties to deter 
employer misconduct in the operation of the comptime program? Is the 
value of an employee's accrued comptime protected if the employer 
should become insolvent?

  The answers to these questions will tell us whether a particular 
version of comptime will truly empower workers. The Republican bill 
flunks this simple test. S. 4 does not give the workers real choices. 
It gives the employer the final say on when employees can use their 
accrued comptime. It will result in a pay cut, and it jeopardizes the 
health and retirement benefits of many workers. It will not even 
guarantee that those who use comptime get a net increase in the amount 
of time off they have to spend with their families. And the Ashcroft 
bill would abolish the 40-hour workweek, one of the most fundamental 
principles of American labor law for nearly 60 years.
  Fortunately for American working men and women, there is a comptime 
proposal which passes this fairness test. The Democratic comptime 
proposal offered by Senator Baucus, Senator Kerrey, and Senator 
Landrieu guarantees the genuine employee choice, which the Republican 
bill fails to provide.
  The substitute corrects the most serious defects in the Ashcroft 
bill. It incorporates many of the ideas proposed by the Democratic 
members of the Labor Committee as amendments during the markup. 
Unfortunately, each was rejected on a party line vote. Let me highlight 
the key improvements.
  First, the 40-hour week is preserved. This bedrock principle would be 
eliminated by the Republican bill. The Democratic alternative preserves 
the 40-hour workweek and ensures that every hourly employee who works 
more than 40 hours will receive time-and-a-half in either pay or 
comptime. If the real purpose of comptime legislation is to provide 
employees with the option of additional time off in lieu of extra pay, 
it should not reduce the historic standard of compensation for overtime 
worked. The Republican bill would result in both lower pay and less 
time off for workers than the Democratic alternative. It is easy to see 
which piece of legislation is truly family friendly.
  Second, the Democratic proposal makes it illegal for employers to 
discriminate in allocating overtime work. Employers would have to make 
overtime work equally available to those employees who want to receive 
overtime pay and those who want to receive comptime. This is an 
essential protection for workers who have been receiving overtime pay 
and need the money. Nearly half of the hourly workers earn $16,000 a 
year or less; 80 percent of them earn less than $28,000. Overtime pay 
on average constitutes 10 or 15 percent of their annual income. Their 
families need those dollars to make ends meet. The Republican bill 
would allow an employer to offer all the overtime work to those 
employees who choose comptime and none to those who choose extra pay. 
In many businesses, S. 4 would mean the end of overtime pay. Such 
discrimination is terribly wrong, yet the Ashcroft bill would allow it. 
The Democratic alternative makes this discrimination illegal, and it is 
easy to see which legislation is truly family friendly.
  On that point, we offered an amendment in the committee to try to 
address that issue and it was rejected on a straight party line vote.
  (Mrs. HUTCHISON assumed the Chair.)
  Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, thirdly, any creditable proposal to 
deal with employees' desire for more time off to spend with their 
families must ensure the employee can take the time when he or she 
needs it most. A working mother needs a particular day off so she can 
accompany her child to a school event or doctor's appointment, not a 
day when it is convenient for her boss. Nothing in the Republican 
proposal requires the employer to give her the day she requests. He can 
deny her request and she has no effective recourse. The Democratic 
alternative provides for real employee choice in using accrued 
comptime.
  If the time off is needed to care for a sick child or other family 
member, the employee has an absolute right to take the time. When the 
time is being used for other reasons, the employee can take the time if 
he or she has given 2 weeks notice and the absence will not cause 
substantial and grievous injury to the business. The difference between 
the Democratic and the Republican positions on this crucial issue is 
dramatic. Under the Democratic plan, employees can take the time when 
they need the time, and it is easy to see which proposal is truly 
family friendly.
  We saw the resistance of our Republican friends to the very modest 
amendment of our friend and colleague, Senator Murray from the State of 
Washington, that said let's just have a 24-hour guarantee that a

[[Page S5163]]

mother or father who is working would be able to take up to 24 hours to 
go to a parent-teacher conference or go to a school event--just 24 
hours. That was rejected. And why? The reason it was rejected, I 
believe, is because it provided for the employees' protection.
  You can say all you want that this legislation leaves it up to the 
employee, but the fact is, it does not. If those who support S. 4 say 
that it does, we have the clarifying language to make sure it does do 
that. But they resisted that in the markup; they resisted the very 
reasonable proposal of the Senator from Washington for a 24-hour period 
over the course of a year. That would have given the discretion to the 
employee. Republicans resisted it because, under their proposal, the 
employer is going to be the one who makes that decision. That, I 
believe, is a very important and significant difference.
  Fourth, if employees are really going to be able to increase the 
amount of time spent with their families, comptime hours must count as 
hours worked. The way the Ashcroft bill is drafted, if an employee uses 
earned comptime to take Monday off, she can still be required to work 
40 hours during that week. The boss can require her to work on Saturday 
and not even have it count as overtime.
  I want my colleagues to understand that the boss can say, ``OK, you 
can take comptime off on Monday,'' and then can say, ``Well, you will 
work on Saturday,'' and not even have it count as overtime pay. That 
can be 48 hours during that one week. Of course, the bill eliminates 
the 40-hour workweek in any event, so there are any number of hours 
that employees can be forced to work. Or, the employer can require the 
employee to work 10 hours a day Tuesday through Friday and not have it 
count as overtime. Thus, under the Republican comptime scheme, she 
would not even gain extra time to be with her child. The hours gained 
on Monday would be lost by Saturday. There would be no net benefit in 
time off to the employee. This absurd result is due to the fact that 
the authors of S. 4 have refused to count hours of comptime as hours 
worked. That little change, comptime as hours worked, would avoid that. 
We offered that as an amendment. It was rejected. My Republican 
colleagues rejected an amendment to give the employees the ability to 
make the decision about the time off. My colleagues on the other side 
of the aisle rejected our amendment to count comptime hours when used 
as hours worked, which would provide that protection from exploitation. 
That was rejected by the supporters of S. 4. Thus, the employees using 
the comptime will enjoy no increase in their free time. Our Democratic 
alternative provides that protection. Again, it is easy to see which 
proposal is truly family friendly.
  The Baucus-Kerrey-Landrieu legislation corrects a number of other 
flaws in S. 4 as well. It shows how hollow the promise of the Ashcroft 
bill really is. This debate has never been about whether employees 
needed the option of more time off. We all agree, as I mentioned 
earlier, that they deserve more time to spend with their families. The 
debate has always been about how to make that opportunity real. It is 
about how to truly empower workers, not how to give increased control 
to their bosses. The Democratic alternative achieves the goal of 
empowering workers; the Republican bill falls dramatically short.
  Madam President, with those kinds of alterations or changes, we would 
have legislation that would be out of here in very short order. It 
seems to me that if we are going to do what is the stated purpose of 
this legislation--to give the employees the power to be able to make 
those decisions, to make sure they are protected in terms of hourly 
pay--then we need to provide those protections. We need to prevent 
discrimination against workers where the employer says, ``I'm always 
going to give overtime work to Jimmy here because he always takes the 
comptime, and I'm not going to give any to Sally because she always 
takes the overtime and I don't want to pay that out.'' We just need to 
provide some protection so we don't have that kind of discrimination.
  These are basic elements of protection for employees. Every one of 
these proposals that I have mentioned provides additional power to the 
employee. As I understand it, having listened to the debate, giving 
employees some power is the primary reason at least some say they 
support this legislation.
  I think it is important to emphasize the extent of flexibility in the 
40-hour workweek at the present time. If employers--and this is today--
genuinely want to provide family friendly arrangements, they can do so 
under current law. The key is the 40-hour week. Normally, employees 
work five 8-hour days a week, but more flexible arrangements are 
possible. Employers can schedule workers for four 10-hour days a week 
with the 5th day off and pay them the regular hourly rate for each 
hour. No time-and-a-half is required. They can arrange a work schedule 
of four 9-hour days plus a 4-hour day on the 5th day so they can have 
Friday afternoons off, again without paying a dime of overtime. That 
can be worked out today without a dime of overtime.
  Under the current law, some employees can even vary their hours 
enough to have a 3-day weekend every other week. Once again, the 
employer does not have to pay a dime of overtime. That flexibility is 
totally legal under current law.
  Employers can also offer genuine flextime. This allows employers to 
schedule an 8-hour day around core hours of, say, from 10 to 3. Let 
employees decide whether they want to work from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. or 
from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. This is a very popular option for Federal 
employees. This, too, costs employers not a penny more. But only a tiny 
fraction of employers use these or many other flexible arrangements 
available under the current law. The Bureau of Labor Statistics found 
that only 10 percent of hourly employees are allowed to use these or 
other flexible schedules. Only 10 percent. We hear S. 4's proponents 
say, ``Let's give them half the day off on Friday, let's give them more 
flexibility during the course of the week, let's let them have an extra 
day off every other week''--all that is possible today, without a dime 
of overtime. You know something? Only 10 percent of employees are 
permitted to do that at the present time. Current law offers a host of 
family friendly flexible schedules, yet virtually no employers provide 
them.
  Madam President, this bill has a different purpose, and that, I 
suggest, is to cut workers' wages. Employer groups unanimously support 
it. Obviously, it is not just the small businesses which wish to cut 
pay and substitute some less expensive benefit instead. I have here, 
which I will have printed in the Record, a letter signed by 9 to 5, 
National Association of Working Women; American Nurses Association; 
Business and Professional Women; National Council of Jewish Women; 
National Women's Law Center; and the Women's Legal Defense Fund. These 
have been the organizations, during the time I have been in the Senate, 
that have fought for gender equity, gender fairness, pay equity, 
nondiscrimination against women. They have been the ones who have 
fought for the increase in the minimum wage, day care programs, 
expansion of Head Start--the whole range of different family friendly 
programs. They are on record in each and every one of them. This is 
their conclusion in reviewing this legislation:

       We believe that passage of S. 4, the Family Friendly 
     Workplace Act, fails to offer real flexibility to the working 
     women it purports to help while offering a substantial 
     windfall to employers * * *
       Nearly half of the workforce is women and the number of 
     women working multiple jobs has increased more than four fold 
     in the last 20 years. S. 4 would affect hourly workers and 
     most hourly workers are women. The majority of minimum wage 
     workers are women. Many of these women depend on overtime 
     pay. Many of them want more control of their schedules, not 
     less. Without strong protections for workers, the comp time 
     bill will cut women's options and women's pay. For example:
       Someone pressured into taking comp time when she really 
     wants or needs overtime pay is taking an involuntary pay cut.

  That is the example I used earlier.

       Supporters argue S. 4 is voluntary and the employees have a 
     ``choice,'' yet working women, who for decades faced subtle 
     (and not-so-subtle) forms of discrimination, are all too 
     familiar with the potential consequences of not going along 
     with the employers' wishes: isolation, intimidation and even 
     retaliation;

  As I mentioned in our earlier debate on this bill, in 1996 more than 
170,000

[[Page S5164]]

workers received backpay because their employers failed to pay 
overtime--in violation of Federal law. Those employees received over 
$100 million for those violations, in the last year alone. That is what 
is really happening in the workplace.

       Because employees do not control when and if they use their 
     comp time, they are essentially being asked to gamble on the 
     chance that they will be able to take time when it is as 
     valuable to them as overtime pay * * *
       Women want flexibility in the workplace, but not at the 
     risk of jeopardizing their overtime pay or the well-
     established 40-hour work week.

  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the 
Record this letter I just referred to.
  There being no objection, the letter was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

                                  American Nurses Association,

                                     Washington, DC, May 30, 1997.
     Hon. Trent Lott,
     Hon. Tom Daschle,
     U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Lott and Senator Daschle: The undersigned 
     national organizations represent many of the working women of 
     today. We believe passage of S. 4, the Family Friendly 
     Workplace Act, fails to offer real flexibility to the working 
     women it purports to help while offering a substantial 
     windfall to employees. We urge you to delay consideration 
     until a real solution can be found which truly meets the 
     needs of working women and families.
       Nearly half of the workforce is women and the number of 
     women working multiple jobs has increased more than four fold 
     in the last 20 years. S. 4 would affect hourly workers, and 
     most hourly workers are women. The majority of minimum wage 
     workers are women. Many of these women depend on overtime 
     pay. Many of them want more control of their schedules, not 
     less. Without strong protections for workers, the comp time 
     bill will cut women's options and women's pay. For example: 
     someone pressured into taking comp time when she really wants 
     or needs overtime pay is taking an involuntary pay cut; 
     supporters argue that S. 4 is voluntary and the employees 
     have a ``choice,'' yet working women, who have for decades 
     faced subtle (and not-so-subtle) forms of discrimination, are 
     all too familiar with the potential consequences of not going 
     along with the employers' wishes: isolation, intimidation and 
     even retaliation; and because employees do not control when 
     or if they can use their comp time, they are essentially 
     being asked to gamble on the chance that they will be able to 
     take time when it is as valuable to them as overtime pay.
       S. 4 must be defeated. Women want flexibility in the 
     workplace, but not at the risk of jeopardizing their overtime 
     pay or the well-established 40 hour work week.
           Sincerely,
     9 to 5, National Association of Working Women,
     American Nurses Association,
     Business and Professional Women,
     National Council of Jewish Women,
     National Women's Law Center,
     Women's Legal Defense Fund.

  Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, this isn't just my own conclusion. The 
observations made today reflect a wide range of different groups, those 
groups primarily that have been fighting for the working men and women 
of this country. The groups opposing this bill include not only the 
League of Women Voters, but the National Women's Political Caucus, the 
National Council of Senior Citizens, the National Council of Churches, 
and the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund. The list goes on 
and on, for these reasons: this bill, S. 4, gives the ultimate decision 
to the employer rather than the employee.
  This isn't Federal employees where the employee has the right to take 
the time off. This is a different arrangement which, under any fair 
reading, would give the employer the control. Without the protections 
that I have mentioned, this would be the result.
  We have to ask today whether we want to risk abolishing the 40-hour 
workweek, effectively abolishing overtime pay for workers who are on 
the lower rungs of the economic ladder. Some 60 percent of those 
workers earn $16,000 a year; 65 percent of them have no college 
education. In so many instances, they are working not just one job but 
two or three jobs in order to make ends meet. Those are people who are 
struggling at the bottom rung of the ladder and depend upon the 
overtime just to get those resources to be able to try to bring up a 
family. Sure, they would like to spend more time with their family and, 
sure, they ought to have some opportunity to do that. We support that. 
But we are going to make sure that when that judgment is made, that 
that employee is the one who is going to make the judgment, not the 
employer because they want to see a pay cut for hard-working Americans.
  That is basically what the issue is before us in the U.S. Senate. 
Without these kinds of protections that we have talked about today, 
that would be the result, a significant pay cut for those that are 
working on the bottom economic rungs of the ladder. That is wrong. That 
is unfair.
  The measure that has been introduced by the Democrats as a substitute 
provides protections to deal with those issues. But we have been unable 
to be able to get acceptance of that proposal. Therefore, we stand in 
opposition to S. 4.
  Mr. HUTCHINSON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.
  Mr. HUTCHINSON. Madam President, it is with a great deal of 
enthusiasm that I rise to voice support for S. 4, I think the aptly 
named ``Family Friendly Workplace Act.'' I think that is exactly what 
this bill does. It provides some friendliness in the Fair Labor 
Standards Act for the employees, for the workers in this Nation.
  I want to compliment and commend the Senator from Missouri for his 
leadership on this issue. I know of no one in this body more committed 
and more dedicated to the American family than the Senator from 
Missouri. And he demonstrated that I believe in his sponsorship and his 
championing of this cause and this bill.
  This bill will give American workers the flexibility to take paid 
time off for any reason by simply working those hours in advance, paid 
time off. I know there are many in this body who have worked hard for 
family and medical leave. That is unpaid family medical leave. Most in 
the U.S. Senate voted for the Family and Medical Leave Act, the unpaid 
Family and Medical Leave Act. Therefore, it puzzles me that so many of 
those who championed family and medical leave on a voluntary and unpaid 
basis will now oppose this legislation which will provide workers paid 
time off for any reason by simply working those hours in advance.
  It would make it possible, this bill, for modern families to 
harmonize the ever-increasing demands of family life and the workplace. 
Many employers have done their best to try to build some flexibility 
under the current law. And they have found themselves repeatedly in a 
virtual straitjacket.
  This legislation will provide them that much-needed flexibility to 
work with and on behalf of those whom it is their best interest to 
help, their employees, their own workers. This is an issue which has 
been recognized by those on both sides of the aisle as being crucial to 
the future of the American family in this country. Mothers need to be 
able to leave work early to attend parent-teacher conferences or 
whatever else may be important to the welfare of their families. 
Fathers need to be able to take off work early to go coach their 
children's Little League team or some other worthy activity that will 
benefit their families.
  S. 4 amends the Fair Labor Standards Act that applies to private-
sector employees. That is those employees currently not eligible for 
comptime or flexible work programs. The individuals that I am referring 
to hold hourly positions such as clerical workers, mechanics, other 
low- or mid-level jobs that provide the backbone of our work force. The 
very individuals who need flexibility the most are those who currently 
are denied it under the current law.
  The Labor Department recently concluded a report to the Nation and to 
President Clinton entitled ``Working Women Count.'' Hundreds of 
thousands of working women were surveyed and the results speak volumes 
about the priorities of these women in the work force today. The No. 1 
issue for these women was how difficult it is to balance work and 
family obligations.
  Their concerns are exactly what S. 4 is designed to address, how to 
continue meeting their responsibilities at work while also meeting 
their responsibilities at home to their families.

[[Page S5165]]

  Why do we need a bill like the Family Friendly Workplace Act? The 
current laws dealing with the workplace were developed in the 1930's. 
There are some who feel content. They feel that those 1930 laws, as 
well-intended as they were, should be set in concrete forever, never 
amended, never changed except to make periodic changes in the minimum 
wage.

  But the fact is, life in America has changed dramatically in the last 
60 years. The structure and the composition of the typical American 
family has changed dramatically in the last 60 years. And it is time 
that we reflected those changes in the Fair Labor Standards Act.
  In 1940, just 2 years after the passage of the Fair Labor Standards 
Act, 67 percent of all American families were comprised of a husband 
that worked outside the home and a wife that did not. More than two-
thirds of American families fit that basic model in 1940, just 2 years 
after the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act, and only 9 percent 
of families had two working spouses. Today that is no longer the case. 
Not only is it no longer the case it is just about the reverse, it is 
just about the opposite of that.
  By 1995, only 17 percent of families had husbands that worked while 
the wife stayed at home. In 1995, only 17 percent had that kind of 
classic Ozzie and Harriet household. Only 17 percent fit that model 2 
years ago. In addition, almost 70 percent of single women headed 
families with children.
  So again, I point out, Madam President, the Department of Labor's own 
study revealed that the No. 1 issue women wanted to bring to the 
President's attention is the difficulty of balancing work and family 
obligations.
  Recent polling data reflects that 81 percent of women support 
flextime proposals, and 31 percent of women who work full time say the 
ability to work flexible hours is the single most important policy 
reform that could be instituted in the workplace to ease this dilemma, 
this struggle of balancing a family and work pressures, to reduce 
stress, and to increase productivity.
  So, 8 out of 10 women support the concept of this bill championed by 
Senator Ashcroft of Missouri. Nearly one out of three put flextime at 
the very top of the list of workplace reforms that will provide help to 
the family.
  I know I have been talking mostly about how this bill will benefit 
women in the work force. But it is not just women who feel so strongly 
about this issue. A poll conducted by Penn & Schoen Associates showed 
that most Americans prefer options in compensation for working 
overtime. They want options, they want more flexibility.
  In fact, 75 percent favor allowing employees the choice of getting 
time and a half either in wages or as time off, 75 percent favor that. 
Madam President, 57 percent would take time off instead of being paid 
if that option were made available to them. Not by coercion. I heard 
that word. Not by pressure. I heard that word. But they voluntarily 
desire that option and would take it were it made available to them.
  Then Money magazine recently conducted a poll which concluded that 64 
percent of Americans and 68 percent of women would rather have their 
overtime in the form of time off rather than cash wages. Madam 
President, the evidence is overwhelming, the American people want more 
flexibility in their work schedules.
  This bill provides it. The Family Friendly Workplace Act guarantees 
all Americans the right to have this flexibility. Unfortunately, many 
misconceptions have been perpetrated about what this bill actually 
does.
  Let me just set the record straight on what I believe are some gross 
mischaracterizations of this legislation. The single most important 
thing that the American worker needs to know about the Family Friendly 
Workplace Act is that its provisions are completely--completely--
voluntary.
  As I was listening to debate here on the Senate floor I was turning 
through the bill. It is always helpful to read the bill. I believe the 
language is very plain and unequivocal:

       An employer that provides compensatory time off under 
     paragraph 2 to an employee shall not directly or indirectly 
     intimidate, threaten, or coerce or attempt to intimidate, 
     threaten or coerce any employee.
  So the most important thing to remember is that the provisions of 
this bill are entirely completely voluntary. No employer can force a 
worker to take time off rather than overtime pay. In fact, S. 4 imposes 
criminal and civil penalties on employers who attempt to coerce or 
intimidate their employees into taking time off in lieu of overtime 
pay. Those penalties are increased. Flexible time can only be initiated 
at the employee's request. So worker protections would really be 
greater under this legislation than under current law. And it is, I say 
again, totally--totally--voluntary.
  Another misconception is that workers would only be able to take the 
time off at the discretion of their employers. S. 4 allows an employee 
to take time off within a reasonable period after making the request as 
long as their absence would not unduly disrupt the employer's 
operations.
  This standard has been used since 1985 for Government employees. It 
has resulted in very few disputes, and most notably has won rave 
reviews from these Federal workers who have had this option made 
available to them. They have not seen themselves as the pawns of 
management. They have not seen themselves abused, but rather they have 
seen this as an option that they wanted to take advantage of. They have 
approved of it. It has worked admirably. It has won rave reviews.
  It is interesting to note that Federal employees have enjoyed a 
compensatory time-off option since 1945, and flexible work schedules 
since 1978, while private-sector employees must still operate under the 
rules established almost 60 years ago.
  Furthermore, the comptime and flextime provisions of the bill are 
completely voluntary and do not affect collective bargaining 
agreements.
  Some would like to portray this bill as a coercive attempt to 
undermine the unions. Nothing could be further from the truth. S. 4 is 
a bill that recognizes the importance of one particular union, and that 
is the union of family, a mother, a father, children, and the 
relationship that they have to their employer. And this bill will 
enhance that contractual agreement. It will enhance that union that 
exists within family. It will put a modicum of flexibility and 
reasonableness into labor law and into workplace management.
  So let me just say, in concluding my remarks, there are two things I 
think are absolutely essential to remember. No. 1, it is voluntary. I 
am so tired of hearing the words ``pressure'' and ``intimidation'' and 
``coercion'' because the language of this bill is absolutely plain and 
clear that that is not only not tolerated, it is illegal, whether it is 
implied or otherwise, and the sanctions and the penalties are actually 
enhanced over current law.
  The second thing that I urge my colleagues to remember is not only is 
it voluntary, but it is tried and it is proved and has been successful. 
Federal employees have enjoyed this, and it is high time that we gave 
the workers of America the same benefits that Federal employees have 
enjoyed for years. And it is voluntary. You cannot coerce it. It is 
absolutely and totally voluntary and it has been proven it works. It is 
time we extend those benefits to others.
  This bill takes a giant step in altering the all-too-obvious dilemma 
American workers presently face in trying to balance family and work 
responsibilities. I urge my colleagues to put families first and 
support S. 4.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. KENNEDY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, I was very interested in the comments 
that the good Senator was making, saying this is a completely voluntary 
provision. Let me point this out. If an individual worker says, ``Well, 
if I'm going to work overtime, I want my time and a half. And, 
therefore, since the system is completely voluntary, I'm not going to 
sign up for the comptime. I'm not going to sign up for flextime. I'm 
going to maintain the 40-hour week, and anybody who thinks that this is 
going to allow discrimination just doesn't understand it because I'm 
going to be able to maintain my rights.''

  Well, that is a wonderful rhetorical statement, but it just does not 
take into account what is happening out in the workplace. Because you 
have Johnny over here who says, ``I'm going to

[[Page S5166]]

maintain my rights, I'm not going to let the employer decide when I can 
take comptime or flextime. I'm going to take the overtime pay after 40 
hours a week.'' The employer says, ``OK, if you do that, I'm going to 
give the work to Bill and Harry over here. So you, Johnny, you're not 
going to get any overtime work because Bill and Harry are going to take 
comptime and they're going to take flextime. So you'll never get 
overtime work as you get today.''
  That is the reality of the workplace. You can stand up here all day 
long--and I have heard Senators say, ``This is completely voluntary, 
because if I don't want to participate I don't have to. I'll be 
protected by the 40-hour week. I'll be able to get my overtime.'' But 
that does not reflect what is happening out there in the workplace 
today.
  You have the three workers. He says, ``I'm going to stick with the 
40-hour week. And I want my overtime pay.'' The others say, ``I'll do 
the flextime. I will not take the overtime,'' The flexible credit hour 
provision provides what they call straight time, which means they will 
work overtime but they will still get paid the same amount they got for 
the first 40 hours. That is in the bill. Or the next one says, ``I will 
take that in comptime and I will take that time off next week.''

  Now, who is the employer going to choose when it comes to awarding 
overtime work? What the Democrats said is, ``OK, if you are going for 
these programs, we want a provision in there that you will not 
discriminate against that person who needs the overtime pay.'' Were the 
Republicans willing to take that? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. The 
Republicans claim that workers are going to be able to make a decision 
on their own, without coercion. But the fact is that they are going to 
be discriminated against in the workplace because they are not going 
along. When we tried to remedy that situation with an amendment, the 
Republicans said no.
  Now, I find it difficult to believe that this is really voluntary and 
it really will not affect those workers who do not want to participate. 
Of course it will affect those workers. They will have their pay cut 
because they will never get the overtime work. Those who need the 
overtime pay the most will never be assigned overtime work again. They 
will be hurt the worst.
  That is why we are trying to bring in that provision, so we will not 
discriminate. This bill allows that. I think it demonstrates what the 
bill's real purpose is.
  This is, basically, Madam President, about reducing overtime pay. 
That is the testimony we had before the committee. The National 
Federation of Independent Business, one of the prime organizations that 
supports this told our committee that ``Small businesses can't afford 
to pay overtime.'' That was the National Federation of Independent 
Businesses's explanation of why they support this bill.
  Who are the people affected by this legislation? To understand the 
real-world impact of the bill, you have to look at the workers 
currently depending on overtime pay to make ends meet. Forty-four 
percent of those who depend on overtime earn $16,000 a year or less. 
More than 80 percent have annual earnings of less than $28,000 a year. 
That is, 80 percent of them earn less than $28,000 a year. A single mom 
with two children, $28,000 a year. That is at the top level of those 
who are working overtime. These are people who need every dollar they 
can earn just to make ends meet, men and women supporting families.
  If this bill passes, many will lose the overtime dollars they need so 
badly. Employers will give all the work to the employees who agree to 
take the comptime. There will not be overtime work for those who insist 
on being paid.
  Under the Ashcroft bill, discrimination in awarding overtime work 
will be perfectly legal. Does anyone honestly believe it will not 
happen? Does anyone honestly believe if the employer has the choice 
between paying someone 1\1/2\ times or paying someone in flexible 
credit hours, which is straight time, does anybody believe the employer 
will not choose the less expensive option?
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I am happy to yield to the Senator.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. If you mean for the question to be totally rhetorical, 
I would not. But I believe there are reasons in the bill which indicate 
that such coercion would not exist. First, I do not think it is 
automatic that it costs an employer less to have an employee to accept 
comptime and have to maintain books for the compensatory time and also 
have the cash available for an employee to be paid the compensatory 
time at the worker's option.
  If you look at the bill on page 15, it says, ``Prohibition of 
Coercion,'' and it says, ``shall not directly or indirectly intimidate, 
threaten, coerce or attempt to do so,'' and again on page 39, ``an 
employer shall not directly or indirectly intimidate, threaten, coerce 
or attempt to do so.''
  Mr. KENNEDY. If I could, please tell me where coercion is defined in 
the bill. I would be interested.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Page 40--thank you for asking--definition: ``The terms 
intimidate, threaten or coercion include promising to confer or 
conferring any benefit, such as an appointment, promotion, or 
compensation, or affecting or threatening to affect any reprisal such 
as deprivation of appointment, promotion, or compensation.'' It seems 
to me that is exactly what you are talking about.
  Mr. KENNEDY. No, it is not. Are you are saying that the definition of 
coercion includes discrimination in the award of overtime work, or are 
you saying that the issue of coercion is different from the issue of 
discrimination?
  Mr. ASHCROFT. No, what I am saying----
  Mr. KENNEDY. Do you agree that you can have discrimination without 
coercion?
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Not under the bill.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Then why do you not add the word ``discrimination''? If 
you added that this afternoon, that would be real progress. I think 
there is a difference between coercion and discrimination. Without 
coercing somebody, I can say I will not give overtime work to that 
person. That is not coercing that person, as I interpret it. That is 
discriminating against that person because they will not take comptime 
or they will not go along with the flexible credit hours, which is 
straight time. I call that discrimination, not coercion.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. KENNEDY. Sure.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. This defines intimidation, and it says it includes 
``promising to confer or conferring any benefit such as appointment,'' 
which means to appoint the person to do the overtime, or promotion, or 
compensation, to give a person a benefit, which the overtime is clearly 
a benefit. That is the whole thrust of your argument.
  If you do that, your discrimination qualifies as intimidation under 
the definition on page 40. But maybe we can clarify this with an 
amendment. That is one of the reasons I have said I would welcome 
Members to come to the floor.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I would be more than glad to offer that amendment this 
afternoon to make that clear, and we could accept that this afternoon 
and move ahead. I would consider that very important.
  With all respect to the Senator, I find an important difference in 
the definitions of coercion and discrimination. If the Senator believes 
that other parts of the bill's definition of coercion somehow prohibit 
discrimination, and therefore employers cannot discriminate, perhaps we 
could clarify that issue by using those words, discrimination. If we 
could achieve that, we would have made very important progress. I 
offered an amendment to accomplish precisely this. My amendment made it 
unlawful for an employer ``to qualify the availability of work for 
which monetary overtime compensation is required upon the request of an 
employee for acceptance of compensatory time off in lieu of monetary 
overtime pay.'' So if you are willing to include those words, I think 
we would have made some very important progress. That is one of the 
important improvements that we are trying to achieve.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. I am happy to try to work together with our staffs to 
see if we can meet a mutual understanding of language. It is not my 
intent to draft a measure that would allow the employer to withhold the 
benefit of additional

[[Page S5167]]

overtime or opportunities from an individual based upon their 
commitment to take either comptime as opposed to paid time or paid time 
as opposed to comptime. The decision should be neutral.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I appreciate the Senator's position on that. I do feel 
that has to be spelled out in the legislation because of the types of 
industries that we have been talking about here, for those individuals 
working in those industries have been subject to a great deal of 
exploitation, as the Senator knows--I will not take the time now, 
because I mentioned it earlier--both in terms of meeting minimum wage 
standards and also in terms of overtime standards. We are talking about 
hundreds of thousands of workers every single year.

  I certainly appreciate what the Senator says about his desire to make 
sure that the legislation is not going to lend itself to exploitation. 
It is my own experience, and I think the experience of many others, 
particularly those people who are working in those working conditions, 
that there would be, in too many instances, a contrary result. I am 
sure there will be many employers who would not abuse this system, but 
I think we need to provide those kinds of protections. We will welcome 
the chance to work on this.
  I was addressing, Madam President, the overtime provisions. I will 
not be long. It does reflect the vulnerability of these individuals in 
the work force. We are talking about these individuals who do not have 
the protection of any of the unions and are subject to, in too many 
instances, harsh working conditions.
  As I mentioned, the people who will be hurt the most are the most 
vulnerable workers. Fifty-six percent have only a high school diploma 
or less. You know how hard it is to get ahead, no matter how hard you 
work, without more education. Millions who rely on overtime earn only 
the minimum wage. Sixty percent of them are women. One-third of them 
are the sole breadwinner in their families, and 2.3 million children 
rely on parents who earn the minimum wage, parents who hope their 
children will not get sick because they cannot afford a doctor and 
cannot afford the health insurance.
  Interviews conducted by the Women's Legal Defense Fund demonstrate 
the sacrifice American women make in support of corporate flexibility, 
such as a waitress who is involuntarily changed to a night shift 
despite the fact she has no child care for evening hours. One working 
mom says, ``My life feels I am wearing shoes two sizes too small.'' 
Thousands of these workers already work two jobs to make ends meet, and 
they need to work every hour they can.
  Let me give a few examples of these people: 400,000, half of them 
women, work two jobs in the food service industry; 200,000 are cleaning 
and building maintenance workers. These are classic low-wage jobs. 
These employees really need the money they earn from overtime.
  We discussed in our committee how the new economy, Madam President, 
was creating two categories of workers. The highly educated people are 
doing well, but those with limited education are struggling, and it is 
increasingly difficult for them to earn a good living. They depend on 
overtime. Their jobs are hard, but they perform them with dignity and 
commitment. They are doing their best to provide for their families. We 
cannot pass a bill to allow employers to cut the pay those workers 
receive now.
  Madam President, I think if we were to go across the face of this 
country, we would find that most workers feel they are working longer 
hours. They are working longer hours than they were 20 years ago, about 
200 hours a year more than they were working 20 years ago. Most of them 
feel they are working longer, they are working harder, and they are not 
making much progress toward reaching the American dream.
  I saw the National Association of Business Economists was talking 
about poll results that for the first time found that more than half of 
the American people believe that the future for their children is not 
going to be as good as their own standard of living. We have always, as 
a country and a society, believed that future generations were going to 
have better opportunities for success, and there are a variety of 
measures that impact the well-being of those workers. Obviously, there 
are wages, the key element; the education of their children; decent 
health care; whether they will have any kind of pension system down the 
road. Of course, very, very few of these workers, ever have any kind of 
pension. That does not exist for the kind of workers we are talking 
about here today. The challenges they are facing in terms of inner 
cities, of rural communities, in terms of safety and security, 
wondering about the air they breathe, the water they drink, all of 
those issues are out there. They are facing an extraordinarily 
challenging time for themselves and for their families, working harder 
and not getting very far ahead.
  Now we are asking them to roll the dice on legislation. Will we offer 
them legislation that will abolish what protection those workers have 
under the 40-hour week, and allow employers to tell them they will work 
60 hours 1 week and 20 hours the next? Or will we give workers the 
right to decide whether they want to work longer and maybe get that 
additional money, maybe not see their children as much, but at the 
least offer their children a better quality of life? Sixty hours of 
work in one week--where are workers going to get the day care under 
such a schedule? Where are they going to be during that week if their 
child gets sick? How does it help them to work 20 hours the next week?

  The key to this legislation is very clear. What is the power of the 
employee? Is the employee going to be making the judgment, as provided 
in the Democratic alternative bill, as to when that time can be taken 
off? Or is it going to be the employer who will choose, as S. 4 
provides? The Ashcroft bill says that, when an employee has accrued the 
comp time and wants to use it, the employee ``shall be permitted by the 
employer of the employee to use it within a reasonable period of 
time.''
  Does that mean workers are going to be guaranteed the ability to go 
to that school meeting next Monday afternoon, or go to the dentist a 
week from Wednesday, or go to that school play, or go to that athletic 
event in the middle of next week? It says, ``shall be permitted by the 
employer of the employee to use such time within a reasonable period 
after making the request, if the use of the time does not unduly 
disrupt.'' What is unduly disrupt? The employer says, ``I have to get 
those products out to the market. We can't have you leaving in the 
middle of next week.'' That is the end of the story. Is there any 
opportunity for this employee to say, ``Wait a minute; let someone 
else, a neutral person, make a decision on this?'' Absolutely not. The 
employer makes that judgment. It is stated here.
  If the employer makes that judgment that the employee's use of 
comptime will unduly disrupt, he will give the time off 3 weeks from 
now rather than the time when that individual wants and needs it. Those 
are the provisions of the legislation. It does not give the choice to 
the employee.
  That is the dramatic difference between this bill and the bill that 
has been proposed by the Democrats. The Democratic alternative would 
provide for the employee to be able to take that time. It would 
guarantee that workers could take that time if they needed it to take 
care of a sick child or a family member. That is an absolute right. And 
when the time is being used for the other reasons; that is, the ball 
game, the parent-teacher conference, the employee can take the time off 
if she has given at least 2 weeks notice and the use of the time will 
not cause grievous injury to the business. That is the difference.
  Are we going to risk abolishing the 40-hour week, or are we willing 
to give the employee greater flexibility to be able to do the kinds of 
things that have been identified which parents want to do and need to 
do for their children's upbringing? That is the basic question.
  I think we ought to at least be able to consider the Democratic 
alternative before we obtain cloture. I understand that we would not be 
able to consider the Democratic alternative prior to cloture.
  It is my understanding that we will be having a cloture motion filed 
this afternoon.
  Mr. ASHCROFT addressed the Chair.

[[Page S5168]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Allard). The Senator from Missouri.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, we may or may not be able to have the 
cloture motion filed this afternoon. But to make a difference in terms 
of working out some of these measures, I would be pleased to see the 
cloture motion held over until Tuesday so that the cloture vote could 
be held until Thursday.
  I think it is important for us to get together and work on this 
measure. It is important for us to understand that we agree that 
families need more time. I believe we have an agreement that we want 
workers to have a real choice and a choice that is meaningful to 
workers.
  That is one of the reasons we put the second level of choice into the 
bill. We allow a worker to choose to say, ``I would like to have this 
as comptime instead of overtime pay.'' But we put a second choice into 
the bill that says any time after the worker has said that they want it 
as comptime and not as pay later, the worker can say, ``I change my 
mind. I will take that as pay.'' That is to avoid any potential 
coercion or abuse.

  But the idea that an employer might say we are only going to let 
overtime go to people who will choose compensatory time, or even to say 
we are only going to let overtime go to employees who are going to 
choose to be paid because they don't want to mess with the hassle of 
keeping the overtime--if the employer wants to participate at all, the 
employer shouldn't be able to intimidate the employee's choice in this 
matter.
  One of the things that I think I would like to point out that the 
Senator from Massachusetts has raised is that he wants this to be 
something that helps families. He talks about the need to help 
families. But the kinds of items that they are proposing that deal only 
with comp time and don't deal with flexible working arrangements like 
the Federal employees have or don't deal with anything like the Federal 
employees have, maybe we will address the needs of at best maybe a 
third of the employees. I think we are forgetting the data from the 
1996 current population survey, which indicated that only 4.5 percent--
that is one out of every 25 women--who work by the hour have overtime 
in a typical workweek. That means, yes, in a typical work period and in 
a week's time. But say you get four times or five times that 4.5 
percent that get it over the course of time so that they would be able 
to build up some comptime, they are still talking about 20 percent of 
the women in the culture who are working in those hourly jobs.
  If you have 28.8 million women working in hourly jobs and you are 
only going to help 5 to 6 million of them, we have not done much in 
this bill. We need to address the problems that inure to the families 
of all of the workers, not just the ones that get regular overtime. The 
men are in a little bit better shape in our culture. They get more of 
the overtime than the women do. There are about two men getting 
overtime for every woman getting overtime.
  But if we do nothing more than pass the comptime part of this bill, 
we are going to leave behind too many men and too many women. We need 
to have flexible working arrangements on a broader level to meet the 
needs of the families, the families with children, that do not have 
regular overtime. They get sick. Children in families that do not have 
regular overtime get awards--they have parent-teacher conferences.
  Of course, in one respect it is important to say that, if you have 
comptime or flextime under this bill, you don't even have to have 
children to benefit. If you want to go fishing and your boss can agree 
that it does not unduly disrupt the business' purposes, you can swap 
the time off, and especially if you schedule to take every other Friday 
off.
  The Senator from Massachusetts talked about the fact that there are 
certain ways in which flexible benefits can inure under the current 
situation. He says that only a tiny fraction of the employers provide 
flexible work schedules. That is because they are unworkable. It is a 
simple matter of fact.
  The flexibility outside of S. 4 is limited to arranging 40 hours of 
work in a 7-day period. Exchanging hours from week to week is not 
permitted, even if the employee requests such an arrangement. For 
example, an employee who wants to work 45 hours in one week in exchange 
for only working 35 in another in order to attend a child's soccer game 
or to take the child to a doctor or to go fishing makes the employer 
agree to pay 5 hours of overtime for the longer workweek. Most 
employers can't do that.
  Sally Larson, a human resource professional at TRW, tesified before 
the Employment and Job Training Subcommittee that her company 
instituted a program where hourly workers would take every other Friday 
off. She also stated it took a team of lawyers a year to change over 
their payroll systems and to make sure that the program complied with 
Federal law.
  Most hourly workers aren't working in settings like that where they 
work for an employer who can have a team of lawyers that go through 
that kind of enterprise. Small businesses--or any business, for that 
matter--should not have to hire a team of lawyers in order to 
cooperate.

  The point is that current law is unworkable. It is obviously not in 
broad utilization. It doesn't happen. We need something better.
  The fact is that the system which we are promoting, the system which 
we are offering to the American public, is not an untried system. It is 
a system that has been place in the Federal Government since 1978. 
Through the last years of the 1970's, all through the decade of the 
1980's, now well through the 1990's, we have had the system in place.
  I have been in the Senate now going on 3 years. I have yet to have a 
single Federal employee come and complain to me about this system. 
There is no bill pending in the U.S. Congress that would change this 
system. This is a benefit. It is a clear, unmistakable benefit. It is 
something that workers use. They subscribed to the flexible working 
arrangements benefits so aggressively early on that it has provided 
some difficulty in getting people to work on Friday. It has taken 
cooperation and some scheduling. But that has happened.
  There is much talk about the fact of the suggestion that we are 
without protections in this bill. But the bill which I have proposed 
for private industry has many protections which are not included in the 
bill which relates to the public. What I find amusing is that many of 
the people who are most aggressive in their opposition to this bill for 
private industry were sponsors of the bill which does not have the 
protections for people who work for the Government.
  Look at this.
  ``Workers can be required to participate in compensatory time as a 
condition of employment.'' This goes to the comptime bill for State and 
local workers. ``Can be required to participate.'' Under my bill it is 
strictly voluntary, and cannot be required.
  The very sponsors of the bill which are complaining, saying there is 
not enough volunteer choice here, cosponsored the bill for State and 
local employees which allows them to be required to participate as a 
condition of employment. Under the State and local law, which was 
sponsored by the same opponents of the bill currently, ``management can 
decide whether a worker must use comp time.'' Not so. ``Workers cannot 
be coerced into using their comp time. Penalties are doubled for direct 
or indirect coercion'' under our bill.
  It is important that people have choice. If someone were to try to 
coerce a worker into using comptime, the worker would have to do but 
one thing: Say, ``I want the money,'' because we allow for that second 
choice. Until you actually use comptime under S. 4, you have the right 
to cash that time in at any time.
  So you want the money? Just say you want the money. This is a 
structural opportunity. This structural capacity to take the money 
mitigates against coercion.
  ``Comptime is paid in cash only when a worker leaves the job.'' Under 
Senate 1570, Public Law 99-150, you have to quit if you are a State 
government employee in order to get your pay in cash. We didn't think 
that was enough protection. We thought that workers ought to have a 
different protection than that. ``Comptime must be cashed out on the 
request of the employee,'' and ``must be cashed out at the end of the 
year.''

[[Page S5169]]

  I just raise these issues as a means of saying that our effort is to 
make this measure one which will provide a basis upon which people can 
spend time with their families, can arrange their work schedules, can 
meet these competing demands of the workplace and the home place. And 
we have sought to place not only legal inhibitors to coercion in the 
bill, we have also sought to put structural things in the bill--the 
right of the worker to cash out, just to say I want the money; I am 
entitled to it; give me the time-and-a-half, I want to take my money 
instead of leaving the hours in the bank. That right is there all the 
time. It never is extinguished.
  The only way the right of the worker--there are two ways the right of 
the worker to get that money out is extinguished. Two ways. The first 
is if the worker takes time off with pay. You would not expect to take 
time off with pay and get paid time and a half for overtime. You cannot 
have your cake and eat it.
  The second way you do not have a right to cash out your employment is 
if you are going to get cashed out at the end of every year. At the end 
of every year the employer must give out the money. He cannot carry it 
over as comptime. So if the worker cannot be forced to take it as 
comptime and at the end of the year the employer must give it out as 
cash, then the employer does not have any real incentive to try to get 
people to work without, by saying they will take comptime instead of 
paying them overtime. A business is going to have to hold the cash 
ready to pay it out at the end of the year, hold it ready to pay it out 
at the employee's request, at any time the worker says I have decided I 
want the money instead of cash.
  As I said to the Senator from Massachusetts, Mr. President, I hope we 
will be able to work to provide further assurance that we do not intend 
for employers to be able to coerce or intimidate. This is a measure 
which I think would really affect people where they live. I have been 
getting lots of letters from people around the country. This one says:

       I'm writing this letter in regard to S. 4, the Family 
     Friendly Workplace Act. I ask that you support the bill as I 
     think it would be of great benefit to all the citizens of 
     this country. Time and again parents relate to me--

  And this comes from a public school principal--

     parents relate to me that they cannot come to school for 
     conferences or other meetings because they have to work. This 
     bill would seem to allow some flexibility in the workplace.

  The principal knows the value of parents being able to come and 
participate in the child's education.
  She also goes on to say:

       I'm also the child of an elderly parent who needs constant 
     care. Many of my baby boomer friends are in the same 
     situation of caring for parents. A family friendly workplace 
     would relieve some of the worry and frustration of this 
     situation. Thank you for your time.

  Here is a letter from a 25-year-old single mother of twin 2-year-old 
daughters--A 25-year-old single mother of twin 2-year-old daughters. 
Now, this is the definition of having your hands full.

       Recently I heard of your Family Friendly Workplace Act. My 
     employer, located in Carthage, MO, does not allow a flexible 
     work schedule or overtime. My understanding of this act is 
     that I would be able to have flexibility in my work schedule, 
     giving me the opportunity to make up work hours lost because 
     of illness in the family and doctor appointments.

  She is right there. The employer would have the option of doing that.

       As a 25-year-old single mother of twin 2-year-old 
     daughters, the Family Friendly Workplace Act would be 
     extremely beneficial to my situation.

  Listen to her situation.

       My children were born with a congenital heart disease and 
     they need to attend checkup appointments on a 3-month basis 
     with a cardiologist. These appointments have to allow a full 
     day since our specialist is in Springfield, MO, and 
     especially because both of my children attend the 
     appointments. Also, since my children have a heart 
     disease, they need special attention if they are ill. As a 
     single mother, it's very difficult to lose any days 
     financially.

  Let me read that again.

       As a single mother, it is very difficult to lose any days 
     financially.

  Let me interrupt this letter for a moment. Now, you might say, well, 
this woman can take time from Family and Medical Leave. I think she 
could qualify for the serious medical problems that Family and Medical 
Leave may cover. But Family and Medical Leave makes you take the time 
off without pay. So here is this single mother, with twin 2-year-old 
daughters with congenital heart disease, having to make regular doctor 
appointments and having to take a pay cut in order to take her kids to 
the doctor, and she says:

       My understanding of this act is that I will be able to have 
     the flexibility in my work schedule giving me the opportunity 
     to make up work hours lost because of illness in the family 
     and doctor appointments.

  I can understand her desire to make those things up.

       As a single mother--

  She goes on to say--

     it's very difficult to lose any days financially. The 
     opportunity to make up lost workdays would be incredibly 
     helpful. The Family Friendly Workplace Act would give me the 
     opportunity to take time off from work without the loss of 
     pay because of those days my children are ill or need to 
     attend a doctor's appointment.
       Thank you for taking time to read my letter and your 
     consideration of the many working parents who would 
     appreciate such an act. Please go forward with the Family 
     Friendly Workplace Act.

  Absent the Family Friendly Workplace Act, people like that have to 
take family and medical leave, which is time off without pay.
  Now, before the current occupant of the Chair came in, I went to the 
Report of the Commission on Family and Medical Leave. The Commission 
report stated in order to make up for the pay cuts that people have to 
endure because they are not allowed to make up their salaries, they are 
not allowed to bank flextime and they are not allowed to have banked 
comptime--here is how they make up for those losses--28 percent have to 
borrow money; over 10 percent went on welfare when they took family and 
medical leave; 42 percent put off paying bills.
  Do you know what putting off paying your bills does for you? It 
increases your payments. The interest goes up. You are paying for a 
longer period of time. And it just occurs to me that we should not put 
people in the position of having to take a pay cut in order to be a 
good mom or dad in America. We should have a situation where we can 
give people the option of working some time in advance and then using 
that time, or when they have overtime required of them, putting that 
time in a bank so they can take time and a half off at some later date. 
It seems to me that makes a lot of sense.
  Now, I do not understand how it is that those who oppose this bill 
say this is a bill for a pay cut. This is not a pay cut. This is a way 
for you to work time in advance so that when you need to take time off 
later, you do not have to have a pay cut. You do not have to take 
Family and Medical Leave time, which is unpaid leave. You can take 
flextime off or comptime off, or you could just cash in your flextime 
or comptime and have the money that you had earned earlier there to 
sustain you when you would be gone.
  So the suggestion that this is a bill which provides for pay cuts I 
think ignores the real facts of life. The real fact of life is that 
when you have your 25-year-old mother, single mother of twins going to 
the doctor under Family and Medical Leave, she takes a pay cut. And 
that pay cut is never restored. But if she had the ability to have 
flexible working arrangements, that would be a pay cut which she would 
not have to endure.

  I believe we do have a lot of agreement here. We agree that American 
families need the opportunity for flexible working arrangements. S. 4 
provides the potential of flexible working arrangements to all the 
workers in the culture.
  Because the suggestions from the other side only address people who 
traditionally work overtime, you are only talking about a third of the 
people in the culture there. I think we ought to find a way to help all 
Americans balance the needs that they have between their families and 
the workplace, and we ought to look very carefully at the data from the 
1996 Current Population Survey which indicates that only 4.5 percent, 
4.5 percent of the private sector working working women report getting 
regular overtime. Even if you multiply it 4 or 5 times, get it up to 20 
percent, get it up to 25 percent, multiply it by seven times or eight 
times,

[[Page S5170]]

get it up to 32 percent, you are still ignoring two-thirds of the 
individuals in that population.
  I think it is time for us to provide a way to accommodate the needs 
of families that respects all of the families in the United States of 
America and does so without requiring them to take a pay cut, because, 
in my judgment, we should not be asking people to take pay cuts. We 
should be providing people with ways that they can sustain their income 
and sustain their families in the same situation.
  Mr. KENNEDY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I listened with great interest to my friend and 
colleague. I will be glad over the evening to examine further that 4 
percent of the workers, if I quote the Senator right, who regularly get 
overtime and are women. We debated the increase in the minimum wage 
last year going from $4.25 an hour up to $5.15 an hour, and we found 
out that two-thirds of them were women. I cannot believe that these are 
not individuals who are working the overtime. Maybe we have a semantic 
disagreement, but it is difficult for me to believe at this time that 
only 4 percent of the overtime is being made by women in this country.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I yield for that.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. The data which I cite was that only 4.5 percent of the 
working women reported that they get overtime in a regular work period. 
That is the data in the Current Population Survey.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I have heard that and I will try to review over the 
evening what we have in terms of those regularly working overtime, how 
those matters are defined, because it is virtually impossible for me to 
believe that the majority of the hourly workers are not women in our 
society. It is just very, very difficult. And that the majority of 
overtime hours worked is not worked by women.
  Now, Mr. President, I am someone who was here strongly in support of 
the Family and Medical Leave Act. I supported the leadership that was 
provided by my friend and colleague from Connecticut, Senator Dodd, who 
is the real leader on this issue. When we proposed that legislation, we 
tried to start out with a limited program that provided pay for people 
who used family and medical leave. Every other industrialized country 
in the world provides paid leave. We were absolutely stopped in our 
tracks by Republican opposition. Now we hear on the floor this 
afternoon, can you imagine, that someone who uses family and medical 
leave is going to have to go on welfare to use it. I wish we did 
provide some financial help when workers use leave for the type of 
family emergency that the Senator has pointed out. Every other 
industrialized society provides that kind of reimbursement. But we met 
total Republican opposition to that proposal. And American workers do 
not get paid family and medical leave.
  It is difficult for me to understand, with all respect to my 
colleague, why it is worth more to that worker to work for compensatory 
time so that they will be able to take the time off, should they be 
given the chance to use it, in looking after a sick child rather than 
getting time and a half and putting the money in their pocket and 
having it in their pocket when that medical emergency happens. It seems 
to me that ought to be the choice that people would want to have. The 
Senator is saying, well, we are giving them a new opportunity. They can 
work and not even put that money in their pocket. I don't find that 
very convincing.

  Mr. President, as the Senator has pointed out, we have mentioned 
Federal employees a number of times. I will just read the statute 
governing Federal employees. In this instance, the statute refers to 
flexible credit hours. In the Federal program, ``Credit hours means 
flexible schedule which are in excess of the employee's basic . . . and 
which the employee elects to work.'' The employee elects to work.
  In the Senator's bill, it is the employer and the employee who 
jointly designate hours. That is a big difference. I am all for Federal 
employees making the decision, but I am not for S. 4, which provides 
that the time off shall be permitted by the employer instead of the 
employee. That is what it says. Time off shall be permitted by the 
employer instead of the employee, for the employee to use within a 
reasonable period of time after making the request. The example that 
was given by Senator Ashcroft is actually protected by the Democratic 
substitute bill.
  In the substitute bill, it provides that if the time off is needed to 
care for a sick child or other family member, the employee has an 
absolute right to take the time. Put that in your bill, I say to the 
Senator; put that in your bill. Put it in this afternoon; put it in 
right now. We just heard that story. Put it in right now. Put in the 
other provision on nondiscrimination that you mentioned. 
Discrimination, is it the same as coercion? Yes, it is; no, it isn't. 
Put in those words. Put in now just what I read here from my amendment; 
put that right in. If the time off is needed to care for a sick child 
or other family member, the employee has an absolute right to take the 
time. That is not in the Ashcroft bill. That is not in the Ashcroft 
bill, and he cannot stand up on the floor of the U.S. Senate this 
afternoon and say it is.
  So that parent out there who may be listening to this debate, read 
what is in the bill. You don't have the guarantee under his bill to use 
the time for your desperately ill children. You do under the Democratic 
alternative. It is written right in there. If the time off is needed to 
care for a sick child or other family member, the employee has an 
absolute right to take the time. When the time is being used for other 
reasons, the employee can take the time if he or she has given 2 weeks 
advance notice and the absence will not cause grievous injury to the 
business. The presumption is in favor of the employee. That is not in 
the Ashcroft bill.
  That is the essence of this, after all is said and done, Mr. 
President. Those are really essential parts: whether we are going to 
risk abolishing the 40-hour week, and the dangers that will take place 
without specifying that the employer cannot discriminate against those 
workers who refuse to play ball with the employer, and that makes the 
decision primarily a decision to be made by the employer. I think that 
is really the essence of the difference in our approaches.
  I commend my colleagues on our side for studying this issue, for 
providing the protection for all employees, giving the employee the 
kind of protections that they need to assure that comp time hours when 
used will be considered hours worked so they are not going to be 
shortchanged at the end of the week. These are the kind of protections 
that exist for Federal employees. That protection was in our amendment. 
That was rejected. That was rejected by our Republican friends in the 
markup. We have offered it. We will offer it again. We will have a 
chance to do that.
  Mr. President, I appreciate the chance for this debate and 
discussion. The conditions affecting working families in this country 
are enormously important. We have seen the assaults that have been made 
on the earned-income tax credit.
  We have seen the assaults that have been made with regard to 
increasing the minimum wage.
  We have seen assaults made in terms of some of the education programs 
in the last Congress.
  And we have seen the assaults made in terms of the pay that goes to 
those who work in the construction trades, who average $28,000 a year, 
protections in terms of the prevailing wage not being undermined.

  These are all working families in this country. It doesn't seem they 
have too much protection. They have, in many instances, too little. I 
believe that this proposal will substantially reduce the amount of 
overtime that is paid to workers who are willing to work hard, play by 
the rules, and try to make that little extra money to be able to 
provide for their families.
  Mr. ASHCROFT addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, first of all, I thank my colleague from 
Massachusetts for engaging in this debate. I think it is important to 
do that, to refine what we are talking about, to learn what works and 
what won't work and learn where we might need to modify what we are 
doing. I am eager to

[[Page S5171]]

have amendments offered by those individuals who want to change this 
proposal, and I think we will be getting to that very shortly, and I am 
grateful.
  I just point out that he indicated that the situation with the mother 
of twin 2-year-old daughters would be covered under the Democratic 
proposal. Her company doesn't provide for overtime. Her company just 
doesn't ask people to work overtime, and the Democratic proposal simply 
doesn't address the needs of the vast majority of individuals in the 
country who don't get overtime. I think we need to do that. There are 
lots of companies who just don't do it. They can't afford for their 
labor costs to go up by 50 percent by having overtime, so they hire 
enough workers, schedule enough people, pay enough benefits.
  But this young mother says, ``My company doesn't schedule overtime.'' 
So the only way for her to have the capacity to develop the ability to 
serve her daughters without taking a pay cut would be if we had some 
kind of flextime proposal similar to the one offered in the U.S. 
Government to Federal employees. It has worked well here. As a matter 
of fact, 10 to 1 the workers say it is very, very good. The General 
Accounting Office, which assesses whether things work or don't work in 
the Federal Government, indicate because people have the kind of 
flexibility they need, these workers in the Federal Government are more 
productive and their morale is better. I think that would be the same 
kind of thing in which private employers would want to engage. They 
would want to help their workers be more productive, have better 
morale, and extend to them the same kind of benefits that are available 
to Federal employees.
  You may just say all the various things you want to say about this, 
but there are a couple key facts. It is totally voluntary, and not only 
do you have your first choice, but you have your second choice. If you 
choose to bank some hours and then you choose to cash them in later, 
you can cash them in. So your first choice is whether or not to put 
hours in the bank instead of taking the pay. But any time later, before 
you take the hours off, you can cash them in. That is choice No. 2. 
This isn't a plan that is just characterized by choice, this is a plan 
characterized by choice squared. This is two choices, and I believe in 
this case two choices are better than one because they provide 
insurance.
  Second, it is a plan which would give people an opportunity to take 
time off without taking a pay cut, and that is something that we need. 
It is a plan that would deal with all the work force in the country, 
not just the few who regularly get, or with some frequency get, 
overtime pay. In my judgment, those are very important components, and 
I think given the fact there is substantial agreement about the needs--
and I don't think anybody will come to us and really say the needs are 
focused only on people who get overtime in their work--it is pretty 
clear that people who don't get overtime, their kids have problems, 
they have the needs for the parent-teacher conferences, just like other 
folks, and I think it is time now to work together.
  I hope the amendments will begin to be brought to the floor, and we 
will vote on these amendments. I am not in favor of curtailing the 
amount of time available to this bill. I think we ought to run this 
through the series of proposals, and the Senator has been kind enough 
to mention a number of them, that apparently will be coming forth. 
Frankly, we are going to be working this evening and into the day 
tomorrow to try and make sure if there are misunderstandings or 
clarifications that can be the basis for agreements, that we will 
provide those. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, before yielding the floor, I thank my 
colleague for a very positive and constructive approach on this 
legislation. We certainly want to try and find out what possibilities 
there are, but he certainly has indicated a willingness to consider 
different alternatives, and I thank him very much for the interesting 
debate and for his willingness to try and find common ground. I yield 
the floor.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I rise in support of S. 4, the Family 
Friendly Workplace Act. I was proud to be an original cosponsor of this 
bill when it was introduced. I commend Senator Ashcroft, for his 
leadership as the principal author of the bill, and Chairman Jeffords, 
for guiding it through the Labor and Human Resources Committee.
  In a word, this bill is about freedom. Mothers, and fathers and their 
families, need more freedom in the workplace--more flexibility in 
balancing the demands of work and family.
  What has the Federal Government all too often given them instead?
  Rules and regulations that are rigid, arbitrary, and one-size-fits 
all.
  Increasingly over the last 60 years, Federal employment law has 
reflected the paternalistic attitude of a government that thinks it 
knows more about work-and-family needs than do the families and workers 
themselves.
  The apologists of the failed regulatory state will argue that freedom 
is something granted to the people by the Government; and that freedom 
is a zero-sum game. For instance, you can't give employees more 
flexibility without creating an entitlement at the expense of the 
employer.
  They will offer amendments to this bill next week, asking us to 
impose more legal straitjackets on workers and employers. We should 
reject those amendments and opt, instead, for freedom for our workers 
and their families.
  This bill shows how Government, in its zeal to regulate, has failed 
our families; and how maintaining basic labor standards, while adding a 
little dose of freedom and flexibility, will create a win-win situation 
for employees and employers.
  This bill does not create a right or grant an entitlement. It does 
not take away from a single worker or employer. It simply removes an 
obvious example of overkill--of the Government acting as the national 
nanny. It gives back to workers and their families some of the freedom 
that was taken away when an earlier Congress went too far in regulating 
the workplace.
  This bill restores employee choice in an area where, for most private 
sector workers, the Government had taken it away from them. It allows 
the employee to arrange flexible work schedules to meet important 
family needs. It allows the employee the choice between one kind of 
overtime compensation or another. The employee will still receive time-
and-a-half compensation for overtime. Only now the employee will have 
the freedom to negotiate when and how.
  The apologists of the regulatory state want to expand Federal control 
over the lives of workers and their families:
  They want the Federal Government, increasingly, to become the 
personnel manager for every workplace, and the collective bargaining 
agent for every worker.
  They want the Federal Government to decide a family's priorities for 
taking time off. But what qualifies Washington, DC, to choose a parent-
teacher conference, yes; but the school science fair, no? Dentist 
appointment, yes; but going to the DMV, no? Some kinds of elder care, 
yes; versus other kinds, no?
  And you have to take a pay cut if you take their Government-approved 
leave, because the entitlement mandated under the Family and Medical 
Leave Act is unpaid leave.
  They want Congress to say to employers with 25 to 49 workers: In 1993 
we thought you were a small business. In 1993 we said you didn't have 
the economies for scale to afford federally mandated leave. Now we 
think you're a big business and we want to run your employees' benefit 
package.
  Public employees have the freedom and flexibility that this bill 
would extend to private sector workers. Flextime and comptime have 
worked for public employees. These arrangements are overwhelmingly 
popular with the workers who have been eligible for them.
  Now is the time to pull back a little on the long arm of big brother. 
Now is the time to give back some of the workplace freedom that 
previous Congresses took away.
  Mr. DORGAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 15 
minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S5172]]

                            DISASTER RELIEF

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I was interested in listening to the 
debate of my colleagues, and this is, indeed, an important issue and it 
is very important to understand what are the facts, what precisely is 
being proposed and how exactly will it affect workers in our country. I 
expect in the coming days that we will hear a great deal more about 
this, see amendments and have votes. We already had one cloture vote on 
this issue as the Presiding Officer knows. I came to the floor, 
however, just to visit a few moments about the disaster relief bill, 
the supplemental appropriations bill that we will be dealing with this 
week in Congress.
  As my colleagues know, the Congress left for a Memorial Day recess, 
which was all of last week, without having passed the supplemental 
appropriations bill or the disaster bill, as we refer to it, because 
the legislation contains a substantial amount of money to respond to 
the disasters that occurred in our part of the country; namely, the 
blizzards and the flooding and the fires that occurred in North and 
South Dakota and Minnesota.
  Mr. President, I spent all of last week in North Dakota. Most 
Americans, having watched for a couple of weeks the disaster that 
occurred, especially along the Red River Valley and most especially in 
Grand Forks, ND, and East Grand Forks, MN, remember the images of the 
massive flooding that occurred that caused the evacuation of a city of 
50,000 people on the North Dakota side of the border and the evacuation 
of 9,000 people from East Grand Forks on the Minnesota side of the 
border.
  The American people saw this flood that consumed the Red River 
Valley, a small red river which flows north became a lake 150 miles 
long by nearly 20 and 30 miles wide in parts of it. Of course, 
channeling it through the communities of Wahpeton, Fargo, and 
eventually Grand Forks was successful until it got to Grand Forks, and 
then the dikes breached and the town of Grand Forks and East Grand 
Forks became almost totally flooded and both communities were totally 
evacuated.
  In the middle of that evacuation, a fire broke out in downtown Grand 
Forks and destroyed 11 of the larger buildings in downtown Grand Forks, 
ND. Firefighters were fighting fire in water that was terribly cold, 
water up to their chest, standing in the streets, trying to fight fires 
in nearly three city blocks in downtown Grand Forks, ND.
  The story is well known that the folks in Grand Forks and East Grand 
Forks left town, many of them with only the shirts on their backs. They 
were housed in aircraft hangars at the Grand Forks Air Force Base, 
4,000 people originally sleeping on cots and hangars at the Air Force 
base, and people all around the region taking families in, living with 
relatives, doing all the things necessary because they have lost their 
homes and had to find somewhere to go.
  That occurred weeks ago, and the Congress began working on a disaster 
relief bill. President Clinton went to Grand Forks and East Grand Forks 
in the middle of the flooding. I went with President Clinton on that 
visit. He proposed $100 million in community development block grants 
and other substantial aid through FEMA and other Federal agencies. We 
added to that.

  And my colleagues here in the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, 
constructed a disaster relief bill that was very significant and very 
important for the recovery of that region. Regrettably, the Congress 
was not able to agree on the bill and left for the Memorial Day recess.
  Among the areas in this legislation that caused some difficulty is an 
amendment dealing with a Government shutdown issue that has nothing to 
do with this bill but nonetheless will engender a Presidential veto. 
The President has already indicated he could not sign a bill even a 
disaster bill if it included a controversial amendment like this. So, 
that is where we left it as we left town about a week and a half ago.
  I was in Grand Forks, ND, last week. And here is an editorial from 
the Minot Daily News that describes what I saw as well. It talks about 
the biggest mess in history in North Dakota.
  Garbage is almost everywhere--talking about Grand Forks--thousands of 
piles several feet high--crumbled drywall and brickwork, water-damaged 
appliances and furniture and anything else that could be hauled out to 
the curb and beyond. Streets that were once wide enough to accommodate 
two-way traffic and a row of parked cars are now so narrow as to permit 
only one vehicle at a time.
  What I saw in Grand Forks, which is a very pretty city, was every 
single street of that community lined with garbage, having been pulled 
out of all of these homes that were inundated, basements, first floors, 
and in some cases the entire homes inundated by flood water. And now it 
is all taken out to the curb as they are starting to try to clean up.
  I was down in one part of Grand Forks where I had previously traveled 
by Coast Guard boat where the homes were totally submerged in water. 
And our boat was going at the top of the home level on water. I was 
back there last week, and the water is gone and these homes are totally 
destroyed--600 of them in this area, 600 homes totally destroyed having 
been totally under water and the homes were picked up off their 
foundation and set back. I saw a home sitting on top of a car, a home 
taken completely off its foundation by the flood water, and then put 
back down on top of an old Ford car.
  But you go up and down the street, and what you saw was carnage, 
homes completely destroyed. And the folks who lived there are folks 
who, in many cases, have lived there many years and are now wondering 
what to do.
  There was a man and his wife in their seventies standing in the front 
yard surveying this home they lived in. And I walked across the street 
and visited with them a bit and asked, ``How long had you lived in this 
home?'' ``Forty-three years,'' they told me. And the woman said, ``In 
43 years we never even had a drop of water in our basement.'' And now 
of course the home is totally destroyed. ``What will you do?'' I asked 
her. ``We are living in a little recreation vehicle, one of these 
little travel trailers that has been provided, but we have no idea what 
we will do next--no idea. No idea where we will live.''
  They have no idea when their house will be bought out to be part of 
the flood line, the new floodway that is being created in Grand Forks; 
they have no idea what will be paid for this house in order to create 
the floodway. ``We don't know what our future is going to be.'' But 
interestingly enough, these folks still had that spirit I guess that 
exists up in the Scandinavian areas of North Dakota.
  I put my arm around the shoulders of this wonderful woman and finally 
said at the end, ``How are you doing?'' She said, ``Oh, pretty good, 
pretty good.'' They lost their home of 43 years, but she said she's 
doing ``pretty good''. Well, I know they are going through a lot of 
difficulty, as are most families, thousands and thousands of families 
in Grand Forks and East Grand Forks.
  Alice Hoglo owned a home on Dike Street in East Grand Forks for 56 
years. She is now living with relatives waiting to see what is going to 
happen to her home. And her home is nearly completely destroyed.
  And 90-year-old Ann Sticklemyer, she has said she is now going to be 
a renter. She has not rented for decades, but of course now she has 
lost her home and is going to have to find a place to rent. But there 
is nowhere to rent. There are no homes available to rent, no apartments 
to rent, nothing available for housing in Grand Forks.
  The list goes on, and it is endless of the families and the people 
who are struggling now to try to figure out: What do you do after the 
flood has come and gone? Where do we live? What do we do? I mean, when 
I was there on a boat in downtown Grand Forks surveying the damage in 
Grand Forks, that was one thing because the water then was so high that 
you could not possibly walk in it, but now the water is gone and all 
you have is this wreckage--hundreds and hundreds of homes totally and 
completely destroyed and families who previously lived in those homes 
now have nowhere to live. Oh, some are living with relatives, some are 
100 miles or 200 miles away living in a motel. Some are living with 
strangers who invited them in. But they have nowhere to live.
  And so the city of Grand Forks and the city of East Grand Forks 
struggle now to try to figure out, how do you put all this back 
together? How do you restart a business community that is

[[Page S5173]]

shut down? How do you build a new downtown when the new floodway will 
probably take several critical blocks of your downtown area? How do you 
do all of that?
  Well, you do it with the resources that were in this disaster bill, 
the hundreds of millions of dollars of community development block 
grants and other things that will allow people to get back on their 
feet and allow cities to begin planning to buy out homes in the 
floodway, to help provide some grants, yes, to homeowners to fix up 
their homes and to restart their business.
  When Congress left without passing the disaster bill, some said it 
did not matter. But the folks in Grand Forks were very upset. And here 
is a Grand Forks editorial. Every day the top of their editorial page 
has this: ``8 Days Since Congress Let Us Down.'' How much longer will 
it be before Congress gets to work and passes a disaster bill? The next 
day: ``9 Days Since Congress Let Us Down.''
  Congress is not going to let Grand Forks and East Grand Forks down. 
These resources are going to be made available. But it is urgent they 
be made available now. It is urgent that Wednesday, when we go to 
conference, that we strip out the controversial provisions of this 
legislation and that we pass the legislation, pass the emergency 
portion of the legislation, at least, clean and get it to the President 
for signature so the help can be flowing to people who need it.
  Another headline in the Grand Forks Herald, ``Along the Dikes Lives 
are Still on Hold.'' And it talks about these folks who have no idea 
what their tomorrow is going to be because the resources that are 
needed in order to make the buyouts and to develop the new floodways 
and so on are not available at this point because the legislation has 
not yet been passed.
  I just hope that on Wednesday when the conference committee convenes, 
that the conference committee and all of the conferees will decide that 
we ought not in any way impede, delay, or derail the disaster bill. We 
have not in the past, and we should not now.
  I wish the disaster bill had been enacted by Congress before Congress 
broke for the Memorial Day weekend and the week that we took off. That 
was not possible regrettably. I think the decision to go home without 
passing the disaster portion of that bill was a mistake. But those who 
made that decision apparently felt comfortable with it. I do hope now 
that this Wednesday when the conference committee reconvenes that it 
will decide to enact this legislation, do it cleanly, do it without 
adding additional burdens to it that would engender a Presidential 
veto, and then make that critically needed relief available to the 
people who so desperately need it.
  While I am on this subject, let me end with one other point. In the 
Senate, on a bipartisan basis, we have had enormously helpful support 
from Senator Stevens, Senator Byrd, Senator Lott, Senator Daschle, on a 
bipartisan basis. We have had strong support and unwavering support 
from virtually all of the subcommittee chairs and the ranking members 
of the Appropriations Committee. And for that we are most appreciative. 
We know that we cannot do in alone.

  North Dakotans, who were dealt a very severe blow by having nearly 3 
years worth of snow fall in 3 months on North Dakota, causing a massive 
amount of flooding, a 500-year flood on the Red River, and causing the 
complete evacuation of very large cities, we know that we cannot solve 
these problems alone. And we are very thankful for the bipartisan 
support we have had in the Senate to address these issues.
  I again urge all of those who come to conference in the middle of 
this week to join us in and pass this bill and do it cleanly and 
quickly so that the people of Grand Forks are able to rely on the 
resources in this legislation.

                          ____________________