[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 82 (Thursday, June 12, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5555-S5557]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       DISASTER RELIEF IS URGENT

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to follow my colleague, 
Senator Conrad, who has spent an enormous amount of time and effort 
dealing with the flooding issues that have afflicted our region of the 
country. It seems to me that there is some good news on the horizon, 
and it appears that finally the logjam may be broken. It appears 
finally, perhaps today, the Congress will pass a bill that contains 
much-needed disaster relief that the President will sign and that hope 
and help will be offered and restored to the people of Minnesota, North 
Dakota, and South Dakota who are victims of this disaster. Even as it 
appears there are these signs this may happen today, I want to, once 
again, describe a bit about why we have maintained that it is so urgent 
that disaster relief be provided for disaster victims.
  Senator Conrad and I represent the State of North Dakota in the U.S. 
Senate. We are a small State, in many ways. We are 10 times the size of 
the State of Massachusetts in landmass. It is a pretty big State 
geographically, but about 640,000 people live in our State. It is a 
wonderful place to live, and we have a lot of wonderful things to talk 
about with respect to North Dakota.
  Regrettably, the only thing people from the outside who don't come to 
North Dakota regularly see about our State is to tune in on the morning 
shows perhaps on a February morning or January morning, and they see 
that someone says that there is a blizzard or it is cold in our part of 
the country. It gets that way sometimes. Other times in January or 
February, it is quite nice. I don't suppose that we could really, in 
good faith, tell people that in January and February in North Dakota it 
is balmy and sunny and warm and an equivalent vacation spot to 
California or Florida. I don't suppose we could do that with great 
credibility. It does get a little cold sometimes.
  In fact, we had a fellow who was in jail in North Dakota, and from 
his jail cell, he petitioned a judge to extend his jail sentence for 90 
days because he alleged that his rights would be violated if he were 
released from jail in December in North Dakota. He said it was too 
cold, didn't have clothing, so on and so forth. He asked the judge if 
the judge would extend his jail sentence for 90 days. The judge 
promptly told him, no, that he won't extend his jail sentence.

[[Page S5556]]

  I don't want the actions of one prisoner to allow people to think 
that it is so cold, you can't exist in our State. It is a wonderful 
State. But it is true that sometimes in the winter we have some snow, 
some cold weather, and some wind, and this winter particularly.
  Those who have watched what has happened in our State know that we 
were hit with a devastating winter. In North Dakota, we had the 
equivalent of 3 year's worth of snow dumped on our State in nearly 3 
months. Nearly 10 feet of snow fell in the State of North Dakota. We 
suffered, as a result of that, a real disaster--blizzards, roads 
closed, lives lost because of white-out blizzards where no one could 
move, ambulances couldn't get through. And then we had, in addition to 
the blizzards, finally, a 50-year blizzard, the worst in 50 years, and 
then the melting of all of that snow and the flooding.

  While people in North Dakota are patient and tough and resilient and 
have a wonderful spirit, this winter has been tough for them. Most of 
what they can do for each other they have done for each other. But 
sometimes you cannot do it all by yourself.
  I have told my colleagues before of the kinds of individual acts of 
heroism that occurred every day this winter in North Dakota. I told of 
Don Halvorson, who is a hero of mine. I have not met him. I only talked 
to him by telephone. But he symbolizes the spirit of the people in 
North Dakota, saying to others who are in trouble, ``Let me help you. 
You are a neighbor. Let me help.''
  Don Halvorson was at home one night sleeping at around 3 in the 
morning near Grafton, ND, out in the country in a farmhouse. Jan Novak 
was working in town in Grafton, ND. At about 10:30 at night, driving 
out to her home in the country, it was blizzarding, and the blizzard 
got worse, and it became a whiteout blizzard. You cannot see in a 
whiteout blizzard; you cannot see the hand in front of your face with 
heavy snowfall and winds of 40 miles per hour, temperatures with 60 and 
80 degrees below zero windchills.
  Well, Jan Novak, on the way home, could not see and ran off the road 
and became stuck. Her husband became worried, in the middle of this 
blizzard, and could not find her and called the sheriff up in Grafton, 
ND. The sheriff sent out some people to look for her. They could not 
see to drive on the roads.
  Finally, they had to call off the search. So they began calling all 
of the homes along the roads where they thought Jan Novak might have 
driven. One of the homes they called at 3 in the morning was Don 
Halvorson's. They said, ``A woman is missing. Have you seen a woman 
driving on your country road past your place?'' Of course, he could not 
see the road anyway because of the whiteout blizzard, but Don said, 
``No,'' and then he went back to bed.
  But then he said he could not sleep. So at 3:30 in the morning he got 
back up, got out of bed, in the middle of the blizzard, and put on his 
winter clothes and trudged out to his tractor. He had a cab on his 
tractor. He got in that tractor cab, started up the tractor, and with 
his tractor lights started driving.
  About 3 hours later Jan Novak--when I called her she said she had 
been in the car all of that night, starting the engine to try to keep 
warm, and finally it was not starting very well. And the temperature 
and the blizzard was such that she would freeze to death. She began to 
worry she might not survive through this.
  She prayed all night long, she said. At about 6:30 in the morning she 
had almost given up hope. Her head was bowed in her car, and she was 
saying a prayer, thinking she would not survive, when a tractor drove 
up to her car. The tractor lights, in the middle of that blizzard, were 
about 5 feet away when they became apparent to Jan Novak. It was Don 
Halvorson, 3 hours in the middle of a blizzard, not being able to see 
beyond the front fender of his tractor. He drove all around his part of 
the country looking for this woman who was lost and whose life was in 
danger.
  When I read about what Don had done, I called Don and said, ``Tell me 
how you happened to do this.'' He said, ``When they called my home at 3 
in the morning and said that this woman was missing--I didn't know her 
and obviously had not seen her--I went back to bed, but I couldn't go 
to sleep.'' He said, ``I just couldn't go to sleep knowing there was a 
woman out there missing, and I went to search for her.'' Three hours 
later he found her.
  You talk about a hero. Don Halvorson likely saved Jan Novak's life. 
That is one story of hundreds and hundreds of stories across our State 
this winter--the ambulance drivers in Mandan and Flasher, ND, who 
punched through a huge blizzard-related snowbank that had blocked a 
road and made all traffic impassable. They, along with the road crews 
from both sides of this snowbank, punched through in whiteout 
conditions and no visibility to go out and save a young boy and get him 
to a hospital. They risked their lives, all of them, and that young boy 
survived because of them.

  All across our State those stories abound--individuals helping others 
because it is the spirit and the culture of what we do. We say, ``Let's 
help each other.''
  Our country does that in a larger way. Sometimes one person cannot do 
enough to help another. Sometimes even a city or a State cannot do 
enough. Sometimes a flood or earthquake or fire or tornado it 
overwhelms the ability of one person to make the difference, so our 
country then makes the difference.
  What happened when all of this snow melted in North Dakota, was the 
Red River Valley suffered a 500-year flood. When the dikes broke in 
Grand Forks, ND, and East Grand Forks, MN, and that water became a 
gusher running down the streets to inundate two entire cities and they 
evacuated two complete communities, it was not a case where one person 
could solve the problem for another person. It then became a case of us 
having to say, as people now tried to recover from this calamitous 
flood, ``We want to help you. The rest of the people of the country 
want to help you.''
  That is what this fight has been about on this disaster bill. I know 
I have worn out my welcome for a number of Members of the Senate in 
recent weeks. They are flat out tired of seeing me on the floor. They 
think I put too much pressure on them. Some are angry at my 
presentations on the floor.
  But I have no choice. Thousands of people this morning in Grand Forks 
and East Grand Forks, thousands and thousands of them this morning woke 
up not in their own homes, because their homes are destroyed. Their 
lives are on hold until we pass a disaster relief bill.
  That bill has been delayed. And now it appears that that bill may 
today finally be on the road to the President in a manner that will 
result in a signature, and in the bill becoming law, and in the 
disaster aid being available to those who so desperately need it.
  I want again to just read some of the messages of North Dakotans who 
describe why I am here on the floor and why I have been here for some 
weeks.
  First, simply a drawing by a grade schooler that came in a large 
packet of drawings. It is pretty simple. Someone in a canoe says, 
``Save our town.'' Pretty simple expression that does not need much 
elaboration. ``Save our town.'' We have the capability to help do that.
  Mr. President, here is a Grand Forks resident who says:

       I'm calling on behalf of my grandmother. She's 99 years 
     old. She lost her home and everything in it. She's in 
     Bemidji, MN, now staying in a house with four children. She 
     doesn't know if she's going to get home again. She's in good 
     shape, but I'm really concerned about the trauma at her age, 
     and I don't know what I'd be like in that circumstance. She's 
     pretty strong and she talked about how she was married in 
     World War I, and she went through the Depression and the Dust 
     Bowl and World War II. She lost two out of her three kids. 
     She lost her husband. She's been through it, and all of these 
     milestones in her life, and now she is going through 
     uncertainty of not knowing whether she's going to have a 
     home. Her husband left her well set with a home she could 
     live in for the rest of her life and she's done well until 
     now. And now at age 99 she's homeless.

  Kari and Paul Kolstoe, who are from Grand Forks, ND, said:

       Our daughter's 12th birthday was April 18. That was the day 
     the Red River destroyed our home. We lost most of our 
     possessions, but more importantly, we lost the place and our 
     ability to live together as a family. The last 5 weeks we've 
     lived in four different places. Our home has too much damage 
     to be restored. And we now live in limbo waiting for a 
     decision and the money to go on with our lives. * * *
       We can deal somehow with the disaster that's happened to us 
     in our town and we're trying to put our lives back together. 
     * * *

[[Page S5557]]

       But we lost everything. And don't prolong this disaster 
     bill. Allow us to go on with our lives.
  That is Kari and Paul Kolstoe from Grand Forks, ND.
  There are so many letters.
  Rodney and Judy Krause. I talked to Rodney and Judy a couple days 
ago, as a matter of fact. They are also from Grand Forks, ND.

       April 19 [Rod writes] we were evacuated from our home, and 
     it sat under water for a period of 10 to 12 days, with 56 
     inches of sewage and floodwater on the main floor. Currently, 
     the house is sitting empty and we're waiting for a bill to be 
     passed in Congress dealing with flood relief.

  Rod Krause says:

       I'm a staff sergeant in the Air Force, and my wife and 
     myself also happen to be from Grand Forks. We're proud of 
     this community, and we hate to see it as wasted as it is from 
     this flood. Right now, as a member of the Air Force, even 
     through all this mess, I have my bags packed and ready to go 
     at a moment's notice to fight, possibly die, for this 
     country, basically at your calling. But what Congress is 
     doing now really hurts. I still need to make a house payment 
     for a home that sits empty. And it keeps getting worse as the 
     days pass. I can't do anything but wait. All we want is an 
     answer. Why is this taking so long?

  Arthur Bakken, who is a councilman in Grand Forks, says:

       People here have no homes, no jobs, no other homes to go 
     to. They have no toys, no bikes, no clothes, or anything else 
     for their children.

  Mr. President, I ask for 5 additional minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. I mentioned yesterday a call from a man named Mark whose 
family has been separated, children living with the grandparents, his 
home damaged by the flood. His wife is in the hospital with a terminal 
illness, telling us that his wife has only a couple months to live 
perhaps, asking us to make the decisions that allow them to get on with 
their lives.
  Here is another little drawing from a schoolchild who sent it to me. 
It probably says it is as well as any can. It is two different scenes. 
One is a scene of flooding and devastation and trees down; and it says, 
``If you do nothing.'' And the other side is a page with a scene with a 
park bench and grass and trees and sun and flowers; and underneath it 
says, ``If you do something.''
  These are people who have voiced to say to us today, through my 
reading their letters, that they really need help. That is what this 
disaster legislation is about, reaching out and helping those who, 
through no fault of their own, have had to bear the burden of a natural 
disaster of enormous proportions.
  I came to Congress some many years ago, and I have on behalf of the 
constituents in North Dakota on every occasion--on every single 
occasion--said, when there was an earthquake in California, ``Count me 
in, and count my constituents in, because on behalf of North Dakotans I 
want so vote yes to provide disaster aid for you.''
  For flood victims on the Mississippi, I have said, yes, because I 
think it is important to provide disaster aid for you.
  In every circumstance, every day and every way that we have been 
requested to provide disaster assistance, I have indicated that I felt 
North Dakotans would want to do that.
  North Dakotans now feel that people in the rest of this country will 
want to do that for us as well--North Dakotans, Minnesotans and South 
Dakotans--who have suffered through the disaster.
  Isn't every disaster unique and isn't every disaster difficult and 
traumatic? Yes, it is. There is no question about that. We have seen 
now through the new technology of television in the modern age the 
gripping scenes of devastation from disasters--death, and destruction. 
It breaks your heart to see that anywhere in our country.
  This disaster was unusual in a couple of respects. First, we were 
enormously fortunate that we did not suffer a major or massive loss of 
life. Some lost their lives, but we did not suffer the loss of life of 
hundreds of citizens.
  This combination of blizzards and floods and then fires in the middle 
of the flood that ripped the guts from a significant city in our State, 
this combination is a very unusual circumstance because a large city 
was completely abandoned and evacuated and completely inundated with 
water. The water came and stayed for a very long period of time.
  Now we have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of homes that will 
never again be lived in. We have families from every single one of 
those homes whose possessions are now out on the berm, somewhere out on 
the boulevard, on the driveway being hauled away in dump trucks--the 
dolls, the baby carriages, the pictures, all of the belongings of those 
families. They do not know what will come next for them, what their 
lives will be like, where they will live, how they will make a house 
payment on a house that is destroyed. That is why this legislation is 
so critically important.

  Now, I have been very upset that we have not gotten this done. We are 
about 3 weeks late. I have said repeatedly that I appreciate enormously 
the cooperation on a bipartisan basis to put a disaster package in this 
bill that is very substantial and will be enormously helpful to these 
victims of this disaster. Most every Member of this institution 
deserves credit for what is in this bill, and I thank them for it.
  I am upset that it was delayed. But if today this gets dislodged, and 
if today this bill gets passed by the House and the Senate and goes to 
the President for his signature, then we will finally be able to 
provide the answers that are necessary for these people to understand 
what the rest of their lives will be like, what will happen to their 
home, will their job be restored, will their community be rebuilt, will 
their region recover? Those are the questions that will be answered by 
the hundreds of millions of dollars in the many categories in this 
piece of legislation. In fact, the disaster portion is something over 
$5 billion in this legislation dealing with many, many States.
  If and when this happens, and I hope it does today, it will be an 
enormous benefit to our region, and I will be forever grateful to the 
Members of the Senate who made it happen.
  Mr. President, as I finish, I say to my colleagues, while I have worn 
out my welcome in recent weeks on this subject, I do not apologize for 
it. I speak on behalf of people who need a voice in this debate. Let us 
hope, at the end of this day, we will have some wonderful news for 
people who have been victims of this disaster.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

                          ____________________