[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 85 (Wednesday, June 18, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5904-S5918]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 1998--PUBLIC-PRIVATE 
                    COMPETITION OF DEPOT MAINTENANCE

  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I thank the majority leader for 
stating his concerns here. I notice the distinguished committee 
chairman is also here.
  I think it is very important that the rights of Members be upheld 
here because there is a significant issue that is very important to the 
Department of Defense for the readiness of this country that is at 
issue in this bill. Heretofore, our side has not really had any ability 
to have an accommodation or to make sure that what the Department of 
Defense wants to do, what BRAC allowed them to do, in fact they will be 
able to do. Because in the bill that would be brought before us, it 
vitiates any public-private competition for depot maintenance work by 
the Air Force. That is the effect of this bill.
  To think that someone, for parochial interests, would put language in 
a bill that would do away with what BRAC said to the Department of 
Defense was their option, which is to go out and spread the workload to 
other depots from the bases that are closed, or privatize in place, the 
Department of Defense should be able to make the decision based on the 
efficiency of taxpayer dollars and where we need the defense dollars to 
go. The Department of Defense should be able to make that decision. 
That is what BRAC said.
  The Department of Defense made the decision. They said it would be 
more efficient and save more money to privatize in place. They are 
doing public-private competition to make sure that the price is better. 
Yet the bill that would come before us says they cannot do any of that 
work, privatize in place, until the depots get the work and are up to 
75 percent of their capacity. Well, that is impossible, because some of 
those depots may not ever get to 75 percent capacity, nor does that 
have anything to do with efficiency.
  So, Mr. President, yes, we are standing on principle. We are standing 
on the principle that the Department of Defense should be able to have 
a public-private competition, to save taxpayer dollars and to put those 
defense dollars into readiness. We can save millions of dollars for the 
taxpayers and for the Department of Defense. And those millions of 
dollars, rather than being wasted, can be put into equipment that will 
keep our troops safe and secure.
  We are standing for the integrity of the BRAC process. We are 
standing for the integrity of the Department of Defense and for their 
ability to make their decisions without congressional mandates that 
cause the waste of millions of dollars for the taxpayers and for the 
young men and women who are putting their lives on the line to protect 
our freedom. That is what this issue is.
  So, yes, Mr. President, we are objecting. We hope to find an 
accommodation. I will say that the distinguished chairman of the 
committee wants to find an accommodation that will give the Department 
of Defense the flexibility they need, that will do right by the 
taxpayers of this country, that will do right by the people who are in 
our Armed Services, and that will do right by the depots that are still 
left in Oklahoma, Utah, and Georgia.
  We want something that will be fair to everyone. And when we come to 
that fair conclusion, then we will be happy to debate this bill and 
hopefully authorize a good defense bill. But, Mr. President, make no 
mistake, if there is not a defense authorization bill that can be 
worked out that can be fair, I hope that we will not go forward putting 
shackles on the Department of Defense and wasting taxpayer dollars.
  I hope we will have the strength to resist that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I want to associate myself with the 
remarks of my colleague from Texas, Senator Hutchison, who I thought 
really homed in on why this issue is so important. I am very pleased 
the distinguished chairman of the committee is here because it gives us 
an opportunity to speak with him about why we are so frustrated about 
this bill as it now stands.
  Mr. President, it would be a historic moment if this bill were to 
pass because it would, for the first time ever, overturn a BRAC 
decision. Now, we all know that when the four base closure rounds went 
through Washington, DC, many of us were not happy with the process. 
Many of us felt the savings were overstated. Many of us felt this was 
not the right way to go. But not one of us, until today, moved to 
undermine a BRAC decision.
  By objecting to this bill, we are taking a stand, it seems to me, for 
the integrity of the process. After all, this is the law of the land. 
This is just the kind of unraveling we do not want to see happen, 
because if this effort succeeds to overturn BRAC, to stifle competition 
between the private sector and the public sector with respect to depot 
maintenance, where will it end? Tomorrow, someone else will try another 
unraveling, and the day after, someone else will, and we will have 
chaos.
  I want to say, Mr. President, there are two other reasons why this 
bill as drafted is so harmful. Not only does it unravel the Base 
Closure Commission's decisions of the past but it undermines a promise 
made to the people in the Sacramento area and the people in Texas who 
will be so adversely affected. There was an explicit promise by the 
President of the United States that privatization in place could take 
place at McClellan Air Force Base. There was also a promise made by 
Congress that such privatization in place could move forward at 
McClellan. After all, Congress passed the BRAC, so, therefore, we would 
be breaking a deal, a sacred deal, really, made with these people who 
were told that privatization in place could, in fact, occur.
  Lastly, Mr. President, I thought we were all really concerned here 
about

[[Page S5905]]

taxpayer dollars. We are doing everything we can to bring down this 
deficit. I am so proud to be a part of the team that brought down the 
deficit from $290 billion in 1993 to less than $70 billion now. We have 
agreed on a balanced budget deal to finish the job. This is great for 
taxpayers. This is good for our country. It is good for our economy. So 
why would we now reverse course and to say that the private sector's 
ability to compete with the public sector will be cut short?
  It will be a bad deal for the taxpayers if we do not reach some kind 
of agreement here. I hope we do because if the bill as drafted becomes 
the law of the land, it will force the Pentagon to waste money. This 
bill will essentially direct the Pentagon to waste money by preventing 
the fair and open competition that is underway to win contracts for 
depot maintenance work at Kelly and McClellan Air Force Bases.
  So every way you look at it--from standing behind the law of the 
land, the BRAC process, to keeping our word to workers who trusted us 
when we said privatization in place can take place, to taxpayers who 
know that it makes no sense to eliminate competition--if you look at 
all of these factors, Mr. President, I think what the Senators from 
Texas and the Senators from California are doing here is in the best 
interests of the U.S. Senate, of the U.S. Congress, and, frankly, in 
the best interests of the United States of America.
  I am working with the senior Senator from California, Senator 
Feinstein, who you will hear from shortly, my colleagues from Texas, 
and hopefully all others who want to see this bill move forward. We 
have no interest in preventing this bill from moving forward. We want 
to reach an accommodation here. I think there are ways we can do it.
  We are so sure that competition is a good thing, we are so positive 
that privatization in place will reap rewards for taxpayers, that we 
are willing--we are very willing--to agree to language that would 
ensure that this could only occur if the taxpayers save money.

  I am very hopeful that we can reach an agreement. Until then, we will 
fight for our rights as Senators to protect a promise made to the 
people of our communities and a promise made to the taxpayers.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from California.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I thank the Senator 
from California and the two Senators from Texas for joining me in this 
coalition.
  I certainly do object to the motion to proceed to the bill. I want to 
explain why in some detail. These provisions that the Depot Caucus put 
in not only halts the public-private competitions for depot workload 
currently underway at both McClellan and Kelly Air Force Bases, but it 
essentially undermines any effort to do this work in the private sector 
in a more cost-effective way.
  The option to privatize certain depot workloads was explicitly made 
available by the BRAC Commission and was a part of the base closure 
decision. Yes, let their be no doubt, these bases will be closed. We 
know that. But an effort was guaranteed to be put underway to see if an 
amount of this workload could, in fact, be privatized. In its report to 
the President, the BRAC 95 Commission specifically recommended that the 
department ``consolidate the remaining workloads to other DOD depots or 
to private-sector commercial activities as determined by the Defense 
Depot Maintenance Council.''
  The President strongly supported the Commission's decision, 
specifically reinforcing the option of privatization. In his letter to 
the chairman of the BRAC 95 Commission, the President stated, ``I was 
pleased to learn that * * * you confirmed that the Commission's 
recommendations permit the Department of Defense to privatize the work 
loads of the McClellan and Kelly facilities in place or elsewhere in 
their respective communities. * * * In my communication with Congress, 
I have made clear that the Commission's agreement that the Secretary 
enjoys full authority and discretion to transfer workload from these 
two installations to the private sector, in place, locally or 
otherwise, is an integral part of the overall BRAC 95 package it will 
be considering.'' The President goes on to say, without ambiguity, 
``Moreover, should the Congress approve this package but then 
subsequently take action in other legislation to restrict privatization 
options at McClellan or Kelly, I will regard this as a breach of Public 
Law 101-510 (the base closure law) in the same manner as if the 
Congress were to attempt to reverse by legislation any other material 
direction of this or any other BRAC.''
  I think that's pretty clear.
  Let me say that I firmly believe if this bill goes forward with the 
depot language in it, the President of the United States should veto 
the bill. Not to veto the bill is to say that the BRAC decisions and 
the decisions made surrounding the 1995 base closure decision are no 
longer valid. Their integrity is clearly punctuated by this kind of 
special interest drive.
  Let me go on to say that some have alleged that this privatization 
process is an attempt to keep McClellan and Kelly open. Let me disabuse 
my colleagues of that. I want to be very clear. McClellan and Kelly 
will both be closed in the year 2001. That decision has been made. The 
property and buildings at McClellan will be transferred by the Air 
Force to recipients in the local community according to the base reuse 
plan.
  Two private companies, Boeing and a group led by AAI Corp. and one 
Air Force depot, Hill Air Force Depot in Utah, have each been awarded 
$750,000 in Air Force contracts to formulate their bids for the 
workload package at McClellan. Final bids from these competitors for 
this workload are due in September of this year. The contract is 
scheduled to be awarded in January 1998. This aspect of privatization 
is now underway, Mr. President, and essentially what we have in this 
bill is a special provision which would halt the contracts currently 
proceeding. It is to this that we strongly object.

  The workload package, currently under development by the Air Force, 
will be worth approximately $220 million and will affect only 2,300 
McClellan Air Force Base employees. McClellan ALC, Air Logistics 
Center, employed over 8,000 people before the BRAC 1995 round, and 
currently employs less than 7,800 people. So you can see the workload 
package we are talking about affects about one-third of the employees 
that used to work at McClellan Air Logistics Center.
  The Air Force's planned workload package at McClellan will include 
maintenance and repair of the KC-135 refueler aircraft and A-10 close-
air support aircraft. It will also include repair work and maintenance 
on hydraulics systems, instruments and electronic components and 
electronic accessories for numerous aircraft systems. Finally, the 
workload package will include software support activities, parts repair 
and assembly for the KC-135 and A-10, and the packaging and movement of 
parts to military customers.
  The public/private competition for this work can save taxpayer 
dollars. If the competition for this work is won by the private sector, 
hundreds of millions of dollars in savings could be realized by 
avoiding the costs of new military construction, movement of the 
workload, and retraining workers at Hill Air Force Base. Additional 
savings can come from taking advantage of any potential efficiencies in 
private industry.
  Let me make another point. Past Federal investments at McClellan 
should not be ignored. Since 1987, the Department has spent $150 
million on military construction projects at McClellan. Outright 
closure of these facilities before the year 2001 means the U.S. 
taxpayer not only forfeits this expenditure but also must pay for new 
military construction at another Air Force base so this workload can be 
moved. The Defense Department will have to spend hundreds of millions 
of dollars to duplicate the facilities now in operation at McClellan.
  As the Defense Department phases out its operations at McClellan and 
Kelly Air Force Bases, privatization provides a means to reduce 
overhead costs by bringing defense and commercial work together. If 
private industry wins the competition for this workload

[[Page S5906]]

package, they will be able to add commercial products along with their 
Defense Department workload. This innovative approach will expand 
employment opportunities at these closing facilities and increase 
savings to the Department through decreased overhead costs and enhanced 
efficiency.
  The Depot Caucus' language takes none of these potential savings into 
account and violates every proven principle that competition reduces 
costs. The Depot Caucus provision would sole-source billions of dollars 
of depot maintenance work to government facilities regardless of the 
cost or the impact this noncompetitive practice would have on DOD's 
management plans and strategies. In addition, the Depot Caucus' 
unqualified opposition to privatization goes against a clear national 
trend. The language ignores not only the lessons learned by industry, 
but also the guidance of DOD's most respected advisory reports.
  This spring's Quadrennial Defense Review stated that DOD should, 
``Conduct public-private competitions for depot maintenance work that 
does not contribute to core capability when other appropriate 
outsourcing criteria are met. In addition, [DOD] will partner in-house 
facilities with industry to preserve depot-level skills and utilize 
excess capacity. Savings will be achieved as a result of these 
competitions and the reductions in excess capacity.''
  The May 1995 Commission on Roles and Missions [CORM] of the Armed 
Forces strongly urged increasing privatization. CORM recommended ``that 
the Department make the transition to a depot maintenance system 
relying mostly on the private sector.''
  In fact, the 1995 Base Realignment and Closure [BRAC] Commission 
Report strongly supported depot privatization, writing, ``The 
Commission believes reducing infrastructure by expanding privatization 
to * * * DOD industrial and commercial activities will reduce the cost 
of maintaining and operating a ready military force.''

  The vast majority of private firms are also moving toward increased 
reliance on outsourcing to become more efficient and remain 
competitive. The DOD can learn and benefit from the private sector's 
experience.
  We have an opportunity to save money by allowing the competitions for 
workload at McClellan AFB to go forward. If the bids made by private 
industry are not financially feasible, then the contract will be 
awarded to the public bidder, Hill AFB. But, if a private bidder does 
win, then we will have our first opportunity to reduce the cost of 
depot maintenance activities through careful use of private enterprise.
  The General Accounting Office's study of depot workload privatization 
never considered the question of how much could be saved if this 
workload was privatized. It only considered the costs of maintaining 
that workload at Kelly and McClellan as compared to consolidating it 
into the remaining air logistics centers. The privatization of this 
workload will not be business as usual.
  Finally, many of my colleagues are concerned that readiness will 
suffer at the hands of greater outsourcing and privatization. DOD, 
however, has entrusted our military's readiness to private contractors 
for years. Currently, several weapons systems, including the KC-10 
refueling aircraft, the F-117 stealth fighter, the B-1B bomber, and the 
software maintenance for the B-2 bomber are completed by private 
contractors.
  I believe that the leadership of our armed services will continue to 
ensure that any DOD depot maintenance workload that is outsourced will 
be maintained appropriately, to DOD's own high standard. Allowing 
noncore depot workload to privatize simply permits DOD to award work to 
the most qualified, most reliable contractor, whether that contractor 
is a public facility or a private company.
  In supporting the defense industrial base, DOD's policy calls for 
greater reliance on the private sector for appropriate depot 
maintenance workload. Outsourcing helps preserve private sector 
capabilities and enhances DOD's ability to capture new technologies 
that are constantly being developed in the private sector. By 
introducing greater competition into the mix, outsourcing lowers the 
cost of depot-level maintenance activities.
  I firmly believe that the Nation will always require a public sector 
depot capability for certain mission-essential workloads and skills. 
Unfortunately, the depot language included in the DOD authorization 
bill will squander essential readiness and modernization funds. The 
Defense Department has defined public depot maintenance policy for the 
21st century. It is time that we move beyond the arbitrary laws 
defining the policy of the past, and allow public/private competition 
to move us forward.
  These are the points that I wanted to make today. But, let me 
emphasize, the Depot Caucus' amendment will eventually cost the 
taxpayers much more money by duplicating existing facilities. In 
addition, the contractual process, including the request for proposals 
has already begun and, at McClellan, two companies--Boeing, AAI Corp., 
and one Air Force depot, Hill Air Force Depot--have already been 
awarded $750,000 in Air Force contracts to formulate their bids for 
this workload. Now the Congress is trying to step in and say, ``We are 
going to stop these competitions midstream.'' I think that makes no 
sense for the taxpayers and it makes no sense for the credibility of 
the BRAC process.
  I, for one, am delighted to join with my colleagues both in my own 
State and in Texas to work to see if we cannot come up with some 
compromise. Absent that compromise, I firmly believe the President 
should veto this bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
  Mr. COVERDELL. Mr. President, it is indeed unfortunate that such a 
critical piece of legislation for the authorization of the Department 
of Defense has been encumbered by a disagreement over the last Base 
Closure Commission findings.
  If I might, Mr. President, give a broad overview as one of the 
Senators who was deeply involved in the last round of the BRAC, Base 
Realignment and Closure Commission. BRAC was designed because it is so 
terribly difficult for the issues of base closures and shutdowns to be 
handled in this political environment. So a highly disciplined system 
was envisioned--a commission that would independently review these core 
and critical issues and would come back to the legislature, and the 
legislature would have to vote it up or down. No amendments could be 
made.

  In other words, the traditional legislative actions and prerogatives 
were removed. You could only be for it or against it. In this 
particular case, the Air Force had five bases throughout the country, 
and many experts thought there were too many and some had to be closed. 
Originally, the Air Force wanted to keep all five of them open as the 
process began. But BRAC did not agree with them. BRAC thought that 
would make five Air Force bases inefficient and, therefore, some had to 
be closed and the work moved to the remaining Air Force bases to 
produce an efficiency ratio.
  After extensive discussions by BRAC and their commission, they came 
to the legislature and recommended the closure of Kelly Air Force Base 
in Texas, which is tough. If you ever lived in a community where one of 
those closures occurred, it is tough. I understand and empathize with 
the Senators from California and Texas. That is tough medicine. But 
they called for the closure of Kelly in Texas and McClellan in 
California, leaving three Air Force logistics centers open--one in 
Georgia, one in Oklahoma, one in Utah. The work would be moved to the 
remaining three, making those three efficient operations.
  Mr. President, the administration and the President sullied BRAC, 
because they overrode the commission. In other words, the people had to 
live by it, Congress had to live by it, but the administration didn't. 
We were in an election year. Texas and California are very big and very 
important. So they instituted this concept of privatization. They 
theoretically closed Kelly and McClellan, as has been alluded to by the 
Senator, but they left everything else there under the guise of 
privatization. For example, the total number of employees at Kelly and 
McClellan before the Base Closure Commission called for their closing 
was 33,000 people. Today, the number of

[[Page S5907]]

employees at these two installations is 31,000 employees. That is 
according to the General Accounting Office. The General Accounting 
Office has told us that this override has resulted in the failure to 
save $400 million to $600 million.
  The point that I want to make is that when the administration decided 
to intervene in the findings of the Base Realignment and Closure 
Commission, they reintroduced the very activity that we are engaged in 
on the Senate floor today. They put it back into the political process. 
I can say this, Mr. President. There will never be another BRAC, as we 
knew it, because you can't have a discipline where the people had to 
stand up and fight for their installations, the people that work there. 
The Congress had none of its authority. All of its prerogatives were 
removed except to vote for or against it, and then the administration 
may unilaterally alter it. That voids the discipline. So that process 
will never occur again. It can't. If you are going to have something 
that highly disciplined, it has to apply to the people of our country, 
the citizens that are affected, to the members of the legislative body, 
and to the President of the United States. It can't just apply to two 
parts of the puzzle. With this exercise, you track it directly to the 
White House. When they decided to take the Base Realignment and Closure 
Commission and politicize it, that, if effect, eliminated BRAC as a 
discipline or policy that can ever be used by this Government again to 
deal with these contentious questions. If it ever comes again, it will 
have to be completely redone and redesigned so that it applies to the 
President and the administration as well as to the people in the 
Congress.
  I understand the Senator from Texas. Once that policy was breached, 
she has no choice but to defend the people of Texas and the workers in 
Texas. It is the same with the Senators from California. This was what 
BRAC was to have avoided--and it did, for all practical purposes, until 
the last round.
  Mr. President, it is unfortunate. It means that that system will 
never be used again, from my point of view, until the administration 
and Department of Defense can certify that the recommendations of the 
last round of BRAC have been carried out, that the three remaining 
logistic bases have been shifted to work that was purported to go there 
to make them efficient. There is just not going to be another Base 
Closure Commission. The Department of Defense is going to have to 
demonstrate that they got the job done from the last ones before they 
come back and ask for new ones, and the Department of Defense and the 
administration are going to have to rewrite the rules so that it 
applies to them as well as to the people in Congress.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. INHOFE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma is recognized.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I think we all know certain things are 
true and incontrovertible. One is that a base closing is a very 
difficult thing to do politically and a very difficult thing to endure 
as a Member of the U.S. Senate or a Member of the other body, because 
people look to us and they look to us and say, ``You are responsible 
for saving what we have here.''

  I am not eloquent enough to describe the anguish that people go 
through, that cities go through, that counties and the States go 
through during a BRAC process. They go out and they hire consultant 
after consultant and they spend hundreds of thousands of dollars. They 
go through all of this and, finally, the recommendations come down. We 
have gone through that in 1991, 1993 and 1995, and it was necessary. It 
was, I guess, the Army that came up with the initial idea that we try 
to eliminate excess capacity and infrastructure. But we haven't been 
able to do it because politically it can't be done. There is no better 
evidence of that than what is happening today.
  They established a process that was to be totally free from political 
interference. Seemingly, it worked for a while. I don't have the exact 
number of installations that have been closed down, but we all 
understand that we are going through a difficult time with our defense. 
We all understand that we have a President of the United States who is 
not strong on defense. He would like to have us think there is no 
threat out there, that the cold war is over, so we can start reducing 
down to the point where we cannot begin to defend America on two 
regional fronts. We all know that is true today.
  The bottom line is that we had too much infrastructure. It was up 
here. So we brought it down, in 1991, 1993 and 1995, to a level that is 
down now and still a little bit above our force strength. As far as 
future BRACs are concerned, I contend that I don't want to get this 
infrastructure down so artificially low so that when we rebuild, we 
will not have the infrastructure to accommodate that. I agree with the 
Senator from Georgia, who says that we have to position ourselves so 
that we know if we go through all of this anguish again, we will not 
have political interference.
  Anyway, I am going to tell you a story, Mr. President, and you may 
not believe me. I think you know me well enough to know that I do tell 
the truth. I was in a very tough election when I was in the other body, 
and I ran for the Senate in 1994. I ran against a guy who is young, 
articulate, and a very smart young man. He was a Member of the House of 
Representatives, a member of the other party. He was on the House 
defense committee at that time, which was called the House Armed 
Services Committee, now called the House National Security Committee. 
He said, ``Elect me and I will use political influence to make sure 
that none of the bases are damaged in the BRAC processes.'' We have 
five installations in the State of Oklahoma.
  I made a public statement in the newspaper. I said, ``I will not use 
political influence because I know we have to do something about this 
infrastructure. What I will do is I will stay out of it until the 
recommendations are made, and when they are made, I will walk through 
fire to defend the recommendations of the BRAC committee, because the 
system has to work. We can't allow this to become a politicized 
system.''
  So we did that pretty well. I have a list here of various States and 
Senators that cooperated when they came through in 1991, 1993, and 1995 
and said they wanted to close certain bases. They said, well, it is 
going to hurt at home, hurt me politically, but we are going to have to 
do it. They bit the bullet.
  Now we are asked to make two exceptions. I agree with the Senator 
from Georgia when, certainly, the Senator from Texas is put in a very 
awkward situation by our President because, in August of 1996, right 
before the election, when President Clinton was campaigning out in 
California with a huge number of electoral votes, he said this to them 
and made a commitment that ``I will see to it that no jobs are lost in 
California and no jobs are lost in Texas, and we will privatize.'' He 
grabbed that out of the air. So that commitment had to be--I don't 
think there is anybody in America today that doesn't know that that was 
a highly politically charged commitment and statement he made. He made 
that statement. Then that puts everybody in the position that, wait a 
minute, if you have the President agreeing that we are not going to 
close those installations, McClellan and Kelly, in California and 
Texas, what about you Senators, aren't you going to stand behind the 
President? You have that leverage.
  That is where we are today. So we went through this process. I find 
myself in the situation now that the recommendations have been made 
that we are going to have to stand behind the recommendations.
  I want to suggest to you, Mr. President, we have made some 
compromises. Senator McCain from Arizona had some objections and 
concerns in our committee. I am chairman of the Readiness Subcommittee 
of the Senate Armed Services Committee. We went through this and 
debated these issues for hours and hours on how to protect the 
integrity of the BRAC system because it became a dollar decision. We 
were going through the marking up of an authorization bill where we are 
trying to rebuild our defenses and sustain a level that will adequately 
protect America. We have considerations on modernization programs that 
cost money. We have barracks out there needing replacement. There are 
quality-of-life issues and modernization issues. These things are maybe 
$100,000

[[Page S5908]]

or maybe $1 million a lick. We have had to turn them down.
  Now we have an opportunity to follow the recommendations of the BRAC 
committee and save the defense system approximately $468 million a 
year. Now, if you carry that out to 5 years, you are talking about 
$2.34 billion. If you don't do that, where is the money going to come 
from? If they are successfully able to compete and end up with the jobs 
in Texas or California, or privatize in place, it is the same thing. We 
don't want to confuse people. Those people advocating competition 
realize that they want competition because they want to protect the 
jobs there. I understand this. Just because it is dealing in semantics, 
privatization in place, or competition, where they will be able to 
leave the jobs there, it doesn't make a difference. The bottom line, as 
the Senator from Georgia said, is that we will still have five air 
logistic centers. So it came out with the recommendations. GAO said 
that if we don't do it, it is going to cost $2.34 billion over a 5-year 
period. That is money that has to, realistically, come out of the 
defense system. I don't know where it is going to come from.
  Mr. President, we had several hearings where we had the chiefs of 
services. So I asked each of the four chiefs of services, ``Where are 
you going to come up with this money?'' If we end up having to violate 
the BRAC and it ends up costing us $2 billion, where are you going to 
come up with the money? It can only come from four areas: 
Modernization, quality of life, force strength, and readiness. So I 
asked each one. They said, ``We can't take it out of any of those 
because we are underfunded if all four areas.'' They said at one time 
that it was going to cost another $2 billion in 1 year to bring us up 
to meeting the minimum of the expectations of the American people to 
protect America on two regional fronts.

  So we have the recommendations. They said, ``All right. If you have 
five ALC's located in Georgia, Oklahoma, Utah, Texas, and California, 
we will select two of those to close.'' And they used the criteria to 
operate more efficiently. And we could get into 2 or 3 hours of 
discussion on how this process works, and how they used the criteria in 
evaluating the effectiveness of various installations. They came up 
with the conclusion that we are going to have to close two, and those 
two should be McClellan and Kelly in California and in Texas.
  When you do that, you redistribute that so that workload goes on to 
the remaining ALC's. Of course, that will increase the number of jobs 
in other States. I understand that. But, if you do not do that, you 
will still be operating five ALC's at 50 percent capacity. The only 
difference is they will be owned--two of them--by the private sector. 
You still have the same problem that existed.
  So, if you look at what the alternatives are and look at what we have 
gone through in the committee process, you will see that we have really 
given in a lot. I suggested to the Senator from Texas that it was the 
QDR--Quadrennial Review Defense--review that we went through, and the 
Secretary of Defense came in, and said, ``We think that we should 
change 60-40 to 50-50.'' He made some other recommendations. He said, 
``We also need to have two more BRAC.'' It so happens that the Senator 
from Arizona, Senator McCain, said, ``I think we ought to change it to 
50-50.''
  So we sat down, and worked it out. And we agreed to do that. So there 
have been compromises during this process. We debated this. We went 
through the whole committee system. We came out, and finally said that 
even though as individuals it is going to be politically very difficult 
as it is, and every time you shut down a military installation--we have 
done over 100 of them so far--it is always difficult to do. It is 
difficult for the local House and Senate Members. But it has to be 
done. So the committee voted unanimously to do that.
  Some people have suggested that the GAO report is not accurate. We 
actually had the committee meeting where we had the GAO people there.
  We said, ``We want you to be sure that we understand you correctly. 
You are saying this is going to cost $468 million. Do you still stand 
by that today?''
  They said, ``The data, as near as we can determine, indicates that 
that is what the cost will be.''
  I said, ``Have you considered everything; privatization in place?''
  They said, ``Yes, we have considered that. That is part of the 
report.''
  So we have an extensive report right here by the GAO that comes up 
with these conclusions. Some people have suggested that perhaps it was 
not a part of that report. I will quote something from the report. 
According to GAO, ``The cost to operate the other depots at 50-percent 
capacity will far exceed any projected savings through public-private 
competition, $468 million. This fact begs the question: What is the 
real objective of public-private competition? The only feasible answer 
is to save jobs, and Texas and California are to appease the private 
sector appetite for new business. Neither is an acceptable answer.''
  So we did this. We went through this thing. We looked at what the GAO 
was recommending, and decided that we were going to have to do that.
  This hearing that we had lasted about 3 hours. They said there is no 
question about the fact that we are going to have to do something to 
build the others up to a reasonable respectable capacity.
  So that gets into the next issue. ``What is the respectable capacity 
of the remaining ALC's in order to have this logistics system function 
in a prudent manner in the United States?'' GAO said somewhere between 
75 and 85 percent.
  You might ask. Why not get them up to 95 or 100 percent? The reason 
is very clear. If something should happen that we should have to go to 
war, we are going to have to have that excess capacity to take care of 
the needs to meet the new threat that is out there.
  That sounds very reasonable. So we have left it there. It is not 
exactly the same in the House bill as the Senate bill. In the House 
bill it was 80 percent, and in the Senate bill it was 75 percent--75 
percent because Senator McCain thought that 75 percent would be a 
better number.
  So again, we caved in a little bit on that. So we are now talking 
about what to do with this and whether or not we should allow this 
process to be violated for the first time.

  I would just suggest to you that almost every State has had to 
undergo the closure of some type of installation. It would be very 
difficult.
  I saw Senator Sessions walking through here just a minute ago. For 
him to go back to the State of Alabama and say that we now are going to 
go ahead and make an exception, and they would say, ``Wait a minute. 
Why wasn't the exception made in Alabama, in fact, where we really 
wanted to keep our bases open?''
  So it is difficult when you lose jobs. We have had to bite the bullet 
and go through this. A majority of the Members of this U.S. Senate have 
had to go through with that.
  Mr. President, there has also been some discussion that perhaps they 
left an option open. I know several people who for political reasons 
would like to believe that there is another option that is out there, 
and they clearly said they had been closed out.
  Let me read a couple of the things that I think are necessary for us 
to understand. If it had been the intent of the BRAC Commission to 
leave an option to privatize in place, they would have said there is an 
option to privatize in place. In the case of 1993 BRAC round in Newark, 
the Newark Air Force Base, they said, ``The workload can either be 
contracted out to one or more of several existing manufacturers, or 
privatize in place.''
  They said in the 1995 Naval Service Warfare Center in Louisville, 
``Transfer workload equipment and facilities to the private sector for 
local jurisdiction, as appropriate, if the private sector can 
accommodate the workload on-site.'' That is privatization in place on-
site. But what they clearly intended in this case was not to have 
privatization in place--not to leave the jobs on site because they want 
to consolidate them.
  Last, I want to mention that this should not be a jobs issue. This is 
a national security issue. The whole reason, Mr. President, that we 
came up initially on this 60-40, which was a ratio--it was arbitrary, 
and I am the first one to say that it is arbitrary and needs to be 
changed at a date when we can correct the national security 
ramifications of this issue. But until then

[[Page S5909]]

we are trying to keep some type of a ratio in place that would allow 
the public sector to be able to know that in case of war we are not 
going to be held hostage by one supplier.
  That is the big issue. Should that be 60 percent? I was willing to go 
50 percent. But I think a better solution is to do what we did in this 
bill. We have a good bill. In this bill for the first time we have 
defined what core is. Core is for those functions that are performed 
that are necessary for us to defend America. That is a fairly simple 
definition. But that is it.
  So, if we define core, then we say that we are going to have to do 
the core work on site. That would solve the problem. We wouldn't be 
talking about 60-40 or 50-50.
  So I made a commitment to Senator McCain that, if we can go ahead and 
drop the 50-50, let's give it a couple of years. Let's allow them to 
see how this works with our new definition of core, and see if we can't 
solve it that way and get away from this somewhat arbitrary type of a 
formula.
  So the real issue here is twofold, I would say. One is we have 
involved a lot of money, and, if we do not do this, we are going to 
have to come up with it somewhere. It is going to be a very costly 
process if we agree that we are going to violate the intent and the 
letter of the BRAC.
  No. 2, this is even more important than just the money; that is, we 
are talking about defending America. We are talking about having a 
capability in the public sector to be able to have air logistics 
centers. That will keep our airplanes in the air, and will keep our 
soldiers fighting in the event that war comes up.
  People would like to say there is not that threat out there. I am not 
going to go into my normal speech that I make when we talk about this. 
I have to tell you. I look wistfully back to the days of the cold war 
when we had one other superpower, and our intelligence knew pretty well 
where they were. We knew what threat was out there, and we defined that 
threat. We could predict how the Soviets were going to act. That is not 
true anymore. We have some 25 nations that have weapons of mass 
destruction. We have a country that was just written about in 
yesterday's newspaper in the Washington Times that the Chinese now are 
selling more and more technology in systems to deliver those weapons of 
mass destruction to countries like Iran.
  So we are faced not with just one single predictable superpower who 
poses a threat to us but also to many, many powers out there.
  So as a member of the Armed Services Committee, as chairman of the 
Readiness Committee, I can say that the big issue here is we have a 
country to defend and as difficult as the process is, as difficult as 
it is to go through, as upset as I am with the President for 
politicizing this in August 1996, nonetheless, we are going to have to 
try to stay as close to the recommendations as possible. Because, if we 
violate it just one time, I can tell you right now it is not only going 
to be the Senator from Georgia who said, ``If we do not go ahead and 
carry out the recommendations of the 1995 round, I am going to oppose 
any future BRAC recommendations.'' I can assure you that I will do the 
same thing. I imagine the majority of the Members of this Senate are 
going to come up with the position that if we do not carry out the 
recommendations that were clearly identified in the 1995 round that we 
are not going to have any more base closure rounds.
  So for the time being, I yield the floor, and will stay engaged here.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I want to talk about some of the 
issues that have been raised by my colleagues, because it seems that 
there are some very important issues that need to be clarified. A lot 
has been said about the integrity of the Base Closure Commission 
process. In fact, it is so important that everyone understand we are 
protecting the integrity of the base closing process.
  I want to read the language that comes straight out of the commission 
recommendation:

       The Commission finds the Secretary of Defense deviated 
     substantially from the force-structure plan and final 
     criteria 1, 4, and 5. Therefore, the Commission recommends 
     the following: realign Kelly Air Force Base including the Air 
     Logistics Center. Disestablish the Defense Distribution 
     Depot, San Antonio.

  This is the important language:

       Consolidate the workloads to other DoD depots or to private 
     sector commercial activities as determined by the Defense 
     Depot Maintenance Council.

  Mr. INHOFE. Will the Senator yield on that point.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. That is the BRAC recommendation.
  Mr. INHOFE. Will the Senator yield on that point.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I would be happy to yield.
  Mr. INHOFE. I would ask the Senator from Texas to read the next 
sentence in that report. If she does not have it, I have it. If she 
does, I would appreciate it.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I think it is important we look at 
this language. I have it right here:

       Consolidate the workloads to other DoD depots or to private 
     sector commercial activities as determined by the Defense 
     Depot Maintenance Council.

  The rest of it:

       Move the required equipment and any required personnel to 
     the receiving locations. The airfield and all associated 
     support activities and facilities will be attached to 
     Lackland Air Force Base.

  Mr. INHOFE. I thank the Senator.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. It is right there. The important part of this 
recommendation from the BRAC Commission report is that the option is 
given to the Department of Defense through the Defense Depot Maintenace 
Council to move the workload to other depots, yes, or to privatize. The 
option is given because the Base Closure Commission understood that it 
was important for the Defense Department to have the flexibility.
  In fact, to augment that argument, I want to read a letter from the 
Chairman of the Base Closure Commission. The letter says:

       The Commission believes reducing infrastructure by 
     expanding privatization to other DoD industrial and 
     commercial activities will reduce the cost of maintaining and 
     operating a ready military force. Privatization of these 
     functions would reduce operating costs, eliminate excess 
     infrastructure and allow uniformed personnel to focus on 
     skills and activities directly related to their military 
     missions.

  He goes on further to say:

       It is my view and the view of the Commission's general 
     counsel that the commission's recommendation in the case of 
     both McClellan Air Force Base and Kelly Air Force Base 
     authorizes the transfer of any workload other than the common 
     use ground communication electronic workload to any other DOD 
     depot or to any private sector commercial activity, local or 
     otherwise, including privatization in place.

  Signed Alan Dixon, Chairman, Base Closure Commission.
  A letter signed by four other members of the Base Closure Commission, 
which would make a majority with the Chairman:

       It was our clear intention to provide the Department of 
     Defense with sufficient flexibility to maintain readiness, 
     make optimum use of scarce resources and to exploit the 
     strength of the United States commercial sector where 
     possible, where doing so would provide the best economic 
     value to the Government. The department has access to all of 
     the relevant information and is in the best position to 
     decide which option best fits its needs.

  They are saying clearly they do not expect the U.S. Congress to make 
that decision. They think the Department of Defense is in the best 
position to decide which option fits best. They go on to say:

       The Commission felt that privatization was a key tool the 
     Department of Defense could employ to achieve significant 
     savings. As members of the 1995 Base Realignment and Closure 
     Commission, we support the department's efforts to remove 
     legislative restrictions which are arbitrary and undermine 
     effective depot maintenance management.

  Signed Rebecca Cox, Benjamin Montoya, J.B. Davis, and Josue Robles. 
That is in addition to the Chairman, Alan Dixon. It is very clear the 
intent of the Base Closure Commission, along with the actual wording, 
that privatization must be an option for the Department of Defense to 
be able to use the precious defense dollars for readiness of our 
country rather than wasting taxpayer dollars by artificially having 
mandates that 60 percent of all maintenance must be done in a public 
depot. That is what we are arguing about today.

  Now, the Senators have said that we have gone down to 50 percent from 
60 percent, and they say that is an accommodation. At 50 percent, you 
are still

[[Page S5910]]

mandating that there not be competition, that the Department of Defense 
not have the flexibility to do the job it needs to do in the most 
efficient and best way, and to save those defense dollars for 
readiness.
  In fact, I will quote to you from the people who are responsible for 
our readiness and their view of this issue. Admiral William S. Owens, 
the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, retired, is talking 
about the importance of the fixed-costs versus the variable costs:

       The world's largest business--

  The defense business, the Defense Department--

     is 65 percent fixed costs and 35 percent variable costs.

  The variable costs, the 35 percent, translate to the war-fighting 
capability, but the money is in fixed costs.
  So what they are trying to do, according to Admiral Owens, is reduce 
those fixed costs.
  So he says, in order to reduce fixed costs, he believes they must 
have privatization. He says he would eliminate a particular percentage 
split and let the core work be decided by the services according to 
their needs.
  Dr. John White, Deputy Secretary of Defense:

       Privatization provides substantial savings. As we go 
     forward, we have a situation where we have to emphasize 
     modernization.

  Dr. White is saying we need flexibility to run this Department so 
that we can fight wars, and we need to save it where we can, and 
privatization provides savings.
  General Shalikashvili, our sitting Chief of the Joint Chiefs:

       I believe we must get on with privatization outsourcing.

  This is from March 6, 1996, testimony to the Defense Appropriations 
Committee:

       We need your support to make the hard choices and the 
     changes to make these initiatives work. I particularly ask 
     for your support where changes in law are required.

  The changes in law he is asking for is to do away with 60-40 or 50-50 
so that they can have the full ability to decide what is core workload, 
what can be done in the private sector and how they can save money so 
that our money will go to, be able to go into the equipment that 
protects those young men and women who are out in the field who have 
given their lives to protect our freedom.
  In response to a question, General Fogleman, on March 14, 1996, said 
in answer to the question, how can the services close the $20 billion 
procurement gap that they face in trying to cut costs, one word: 
``Privatization.''
  General Viccellio, who was in charge of the depots, testified May 7, 
1997, he needs the flexibility to privatize. DOD, he says, doesn't want 
to privatize everything, but they want the flexibility where they know 
they can do better.
  So, Mr. President, not only are we keeping the integrity of BRAC, 
which states in their recommendations they are leaving the option to 
the Department of Defense to move the workload to depots or to 
privatize, not only is it in the writing of BRAC, but it is augmented 
by letters signed by a majority of the members of the Base Closure 
Commission, who very specifically say to restrict privatization options 
would be wrong.
  That is further augmented by the Vice Chief of the Joint Chiefs, by 
the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and by the Deputy Secretary of 
Defense. I did not read to you the testimony from the Secretary of 
Defense, both William Perry and Bill Cohen. They all say if we are 
going to do the job you are giving us to do, which is cut costs yet 
remain ready and do the best for our troops, we need the flexibility to 
privatize. And yet the authorization bill that is tried to be brought 
up, which we are objecting to being brought up, continues to keep Kelly 
and McClellan from being able to bid in a public-private competition, 
to have the most efficient use of taxpayer dollars. They would prevent 
the ability to have the competition, and instead say it does not matter 
if we waste taxpayer dollars; it does not matter if the Department of 
Defense has testified they do not want to do it; we are going to force 
them to do this work in one of the depots.
  Mr. President, it does not make sense. It does not make common sense. 
It does not make money sense. And we are going to try to come to an 
accommodation so that the depots feel that they will not be threatened. 
I do not want them to be threatened. But I do want what is best for the 
taxpayers. I do want the Department of Defense to make this decision 
based on the facts and based on what is best for the Department of 
Defense, and I think they are in the best position to make this 
decision. And that is what I am fighting for today.
  It has been stated that the GAO report says you cannot have savings 
by doing the privatization in place, and I think it is most important 
that we say for the record that the GAO has never taken into account 
bids in competition. They have told me that, and we must have the 
ability for the Department of Defense to take the bids so that we will 
know if we are going to be able to have the savings.
  So, Mr. President, I am trying to stand today for the integrity of 
the BRAC process. BRAC recommended privatization as an option. That has 
been thoroughly augmented by the majority of the members of the BRAC in 
letters since the closing of the BRAC. It has been augmented by every 
important military leader who has testified before the Armed Services 
Committee or the Defense Appropriations Committee. There is unanimity 
in the Department of Defense that they need this flexibility in order 
to use the millions of dollars that they can save by doing this work 
privately and put it in the readiness area.
  I have to say I am somewhat amused to hear privatization used as if 
this is un-American. Who makes the aircraft? Who makes the engines? I 
believe private companies make those. Why would we be against the same 
private companies that manufacture the engines, that manufacture the 
aircraft, repairing them? I really do not understand that argument very 
well.
  I think the Department of Defense is in the best position to know if 
they are, in fact, the best people to repair the engines that they 
built or repair the aircraft that they built, and I think we should let 
the experts make that decision. That is what we are fighting for today. 
We are fighting for public-private competition, we are fighting for 
integrity of the BRAC process. We are fighting for the experts to be 
able to make the decision of where those precious defense dollars would 
go.
  We are on the side of the right, and I hope we can work with those 
who are trying to protect three depots--which I want to be protected as 
well. But they don't have to be protected against competition. They 
don't have to be protected in the name of artificial constraints on the 
Department of Defense to be able to make decisions. They should be 
protected because the Department of Defense wants them to be there. I 
am ready to pass a law saying protect them. But I am not willing to 
pass a law saying you cannot have public-private competition by the 
Department of Defense even if that is the decision that the Department 
of Defense makes, because they know best, they are the experts that we 
have trusted to make these decisions, and we are trying to uphold the 
integrity of that process.
  Mr. INHOFE addressed the chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coats). The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I have some comments to make in response 
to the very eloquent comments of the Senator from Texas, but first I 
ask if she would answer one question that I have. I think it is 
probably the most important question that could be asked, in these 
terms. We all understand. Although the Senator is not on the Armed 
Services Committee now as she was last year, she knows the significance 
of an authorization bill. I think we all agree that this, the defense 
authorization bill, which the Senator presiding right now was a very 
important part of, is a very significant bill.
  While she gives a compelling case--and I know it comes from the 
heart--on privatization, on changing what our interpretation of what 
the BRAC recommendations are, would she be willing, in order to protect 
the authorization bill, to go ahead, let's take the bill up in the form 
that it is and offer an amendment to strike that provision that she 
finds objectionable so we can then isolate that one problem and still 
have an authorization bill, not hold the

[[Page S5911]]

entire authorization bill hostage, which I am sure she would agree 
would not be in the best interests of the country? Would the Senator be 
willing to do that?
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, let me say this is the first time in 
this entire process that anyone has tried to get a fair solution to 
this issue. We were not able to do that last year in the armed services 
authorization bill, and we certainly do not have a bill that would 
allow for good public policy before us today. It is not as if the 
Department of Defense would go without appropriation if there was not 
an authorization bill because, in fact, many departments of Government 
go forward if there is no authorization as long as there is an 
appropriation. So there is no ongoing issue of the Department of 
Defense not having the ability to do its job and the money being there 
for them to do it.
  We are talking about a budget that starts on October 1 of this year, 
so we have time, and I think we need to take the time. I think we need 
to solve this problem in the best interests of the people of America, 
our armed services, our Department of Defense and all of the depots 
that we would like to protect. I think we have time to do that and do 
it right. I do not think it is in the best interests of our country to 
go forward with a bill that has such a flawed policy that will have 
such far-reaching implications and one in which I am not sure, because 
of parochial interests, we will be able to amend unless we are able to 
make an agreement before we take the bill up for consideration.
  What I am hoping is that before October 1 of this year, the members 
of the depot caucus will work with us in sincerity for something that 
they think is fair, that we think is fair, that is fair to the 
taxpayers, that is fair to the Department of Defense, and that we can 
go and negotiate and stand for together. Because, if we can stand 
together on something that is right, we will win and it will be better 
for America.
  So, we have time. Let's do it right. I thank the Senator for the 
question.
  Mr. INHOFE. I thank the Senator from Texas for that answer, but it is 
really a shorter answer I was looking for. That is, would the Senator 
be willing to take up her issue, that which she finds objectionable 
about the defense authorization bill, and debate that thoroughly on the 
floor--and if she is more persuasive or has a better case, then, of 
course, she would prevail on that--instead of blocking the entire 
authorization bill? This is my concern. The Senate is different than 
the other body that I served in for 8 years. Over there, you cannot do 
that. But in the Senate I guess one person can just block a bill from 
being passed. I hope the Senator from Texas would consider offering her 
position as an amendment to strike the language that was put in by the 
committee.

  I will not ask for a response now, but I hope she would consider 
doing that.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I would like to respond, if the 
Senator from Oklahoma would allow me to?
  Mr. INHOFE. Of course.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. This bill goes into effect on October 1, 1997. I 
would like to see sincerity on the part of the Senator from Oklahoma to 
work on this. Let's get a fair agreement so all of us can be together 
on this floor fighting for what is right for America, what is right for 
the Department of Defense, what is right for our young men and women 
who are defending this country. We have time to do it right. Let us do 
it right. Because he is correct, in the Senate we do not treat people 
the way they treat people in the House sometimes. In the House, they 
run over people. Normally, we have not done that in the Senate. That is 
why the rights of the minority in the Senate are protected.
  I think it is very important that we work together on this issue. I 
think we have an incentive to do it. We have plenty of time, and when 
we can come to a fair accommodation, I hope we can all work together on 
a bill that is good policy for America and allows us to use the 
precious defense dollars that we have for the readiness of our country 
and for the quality of life for our troops.
  Mr. INHOFE. I thank the Senator from Texas. She brings up a very good 
point, and that is we are in the middle of a process now that is very 
complicated. First of all, we have our defense authorization bill. It 
is very, very significant that we get this passed because we have pay 
raises for those people who are serving right now in Bosnia and other 
places. We have military construction projects that, if we do not pass 
this authorization bill, can be in jeopardy. This goes far beyond depot 
maintenance. I just hope, instead of holding up the entire 
authorization bill, that we could address this in a way where an 
amendment could be crafted by the Senator from Texas that would take 
out the offensive language and then debate it openly, for hours and 
hours. Because these are critical decisions.
  I have to respond to a few things that were said. First of all, the 
idea of privatization in place--no one is going to exceed my efforts 
for the past 30 years for privatization in place. I can remember when I 
was mayor of the city of Tulsa, I was privatizing everything that would 
not move. I remember our trash system--we privatized it in place. Of 
course, people do not like change. I can remember they ended up dumping 
in my front yard. However, now it is the greatest system we could have 
had--privatization in place.
  There is a big difference between privatizing a trash system and 
privatizing a core responsibility of the military. So here we are 
trying to defend America and putting ourselves in a posture where, if 
we follow all the way through with the privatization argument and 
privatize everything in the military, then we would not have a core 
capability within the public sector to defend America. That is clearly 
what this issue is all about.
  I would also like to talk a little bit about the committee process 
that we have gone through. The Senator from Texas talks about the 
committee perhaps not coming out with the right conclusions. We have 
been going through this every year. Certainly I, when I was in the 
other body, sat through this process. Am I happy with it? No. I would 
like to have a better process. The committee process is a very 
difficult one and it is one of compromise. We have compromised.
  In this process our committee--first of all, in the Subcommittee on 
Readiness we discussed this issue, we aired it. It was not partisan. It 
was not Republicans versus Democrats. It was how can we address the 
issue of having enough of the critical workload, core workload in the 
public sector so we know if a war comes up we will not be in a hostage 
situation by one supplier or one contractor who might be in a position 
to undercut the public sector a little bit at the present time. That is 
really what it is about.
  So we discussed this and we aired this in committee. I see now that 
Senator Thurmond, the chairman of the committee, is here in the 
Chamber. I am just reminded that, back when it was very difficult for 
the Senator from South Carolina to comply with it, they came along and 
closed, in the 1993 BRAC round, the Charleston naval shipyard. He does 
not have to answer this question, but I can tell you right now he was 
not very happy about that. But he bit the bullet and said we have to 
eliminate excess capacity.
  I can say the Senator who is presiding right now, Senator Coats--Mr. 
President, you can remember when you had to close Fort Benjamin 
Harrison in Indiana. Was that fun? No, it was not fun. But you were 
very strong at that point and said we have to protect the integrity of 
this nonpoliticized process and close excess capacity. There is hardly 
a Senator in here who did not have to bite the bullet. All of a sudden, 
we are saying the system is not good and we are going to have to ignore 
the BRAC process for facilities in two States. There are 50 States. 
There are still 50 States. This is just two States we are talking 
about. So we went from the subcommittee into the committee, and Senator 
Thurmond will remember that we debated this hour after hour. We had 
amendments that were offered that would strike the language that we put 
in, saying in order to protect the integrity of the BRAC system, we 
have to close two of the ALC's and move that workload so others are 
going to have at least 75 percent capacity. The House said 80 percent, 
the Senate said 75 percent, and we debated that. We had some votes that 
were really close votes.

[[Page S5912]]

  If you remember, Mr. President, we debated these and had the votes, 
and then there were amendments that were offered, and in the final 
analysis, we came out and said this bill is a good bill. This bill does 
things we have been trying to do for a long time. We have been trying 
to define what is core. Always before we have had a very loose 
definition that the DOD has used, and that has been acceptable, and we 
took their definition and put it into this bill so we will have a 
definition of what is core, what is necessary to be performed by the 
public sector in order to protect us in times of war so we do not 
become dependent upon some outside contractor.
  So we have that definition in there. We also have another compromise 
that I made, and that is, one of the reasons--in a minute I am going to 
talk about the bidding process--we can't have any kind of bidding on 
this thing that is fair to the public sector is because they cannot do 
the same things the private sector can do. So we put in a teaming 
provision. That is to say that the public sector can do what the 
private sector can do. Let's take Tinker Air Force base in Oklahoma 
City. If Tinker Air Force base wants to compete for some of the 
workload that private contractors in Texas are currently trying to 
hold, they cannot subcontract out or have teaming arrangements with 
other subcontractors on work that they would like. In this bill, when 
we pass this authorization bill, we put a provision in here that says, 
yes, they can go ahead and contract out. So, if they find the private 
sector can do one particular function or one product more efficiently 
than the public sector can, then they can go ahead and do that and that 
work will be counted as public work in any formula.
  That is a great concession, and it is one I don't mind making, 
because in that situation, the private sector could do the work, but we 
could not be held hostage because the public sector would control the 
contracting out of that work. They want to do it. There is not an ALC 
in America that doesn't want to have the capability of contracting out 
small parcels that might be better done while they can still protect 
the core condition or concern that is there.
  We have things such as bundling in a package. I can tell you right 
now that if they continue the way they are doing it right now in trying 
to induce competition for these core responsibilities, that they are 
going to win. You cannot compete when you are operating on a playing 
field that isn't level.
  Right now they can bundle it, and they have bundled these projects, 
for example, in Texas, so that only those in Texas could come out 
realistically and win this thing.
  In our statutes, we have depreciation schedules, where the private 
sector can use a different schedule than the public sector. We have 
another provision, which I don't disapprove of, which is one that I, as 
mayor of Tulsa, actually had the opportunity at one time to participate 
in, and that is when they decided that Air Force Plant No. 3 in Tulsa, 
OK, was no longer inventory that the Air Force wanted and wanted to 
have to keep up, we went through this process, the process of divesting 
ourselves of inventory we do not want: First, we let the Federal 
agencies look at it to see if they want it. If they want it, it is 
taken up there. If not, it goes to the State, and if not there, it goes 
to the local communities and counties.
  In the case of Air Force Plant No. 3, the city of Tulsa ended up with 
it. What can we do now? We can take that and, at no cost, offer it to a 
contractor to go out there and compete. This is, I suggest, exactly 
what can happen and will happen if they are successful in what they 
call competition down at Kelly for some of the ALC work. They would be 
able to pick up that base that is closed, that resource worth many, 
many, many millions of dollars, give it, for all practical purposes, to 
a contractor. That contractor can submit a bid and bid against any of 
the remaining ALCs at no cost for overhead.
  So here we are in Utah or Georgia or in Oklahoma saying we are going 
to have to pay for all of this overhead in our bid, we have to account 
for that some way, and they get something free. No, we can't bid. I 
don't care if we gave them a 20-percent advantage, there is no way we 
could do that, and we shouldn't be talking about that anyway because 
the issue here is national defense. Are we going to be capable, Mr. 
President, of defending America, of handling those core issues and 
concerns within the public sector?
  I have to share something, because the very eloquent Senator from 
Texas quoted a number of people, and I would like to suggest to you, 
Mr. President, that of the eight members of the BRAC committee, only 
one who came out for privatization in place as something that is 
reasonable. I would like to read to you what some of the other 
Commissioners said. This comes from Commissioner Steele. She said:

       The Commission was, in general, supportive of privatization 
     of DOD industrial activities where appropriate. However, 
     privatization as a concept and forced privatization in place 
     of what is clearly excess depot capacity are two very 
     different issues.
       In the specific case of Sacramento and San Antonio ALCs, 
     the Commission was very aware that we were recommending the 
     closure of two very large industrial activities. The 
     Commission's recommendation to consolidate these workloads, 
     other than common-use ground-communication and electronics 
     work, ``to other DOD depots or to private sector commercial 
     activities as determined by the Defense Depot Maintenance 
     Council. Move the required equipment * * * to the receiving 
     locations''--
       ``To the receiving locations,'' that means a location other 
     than Kelly Air Force Base and other than McClellan out in 
     California, because you still don't resolve the problem, if 
     you merely privatize in place and end up with five, so to 
     say, ALCs all operating at 50-percent capacity.
       Forced privatization in place of all of the workload is 
     contrary to the intent of Report language.

  She says, further reading toward the end of the letter:

       The Commission clearly did not intend to privatize in place 
     all of the workload from the 2 ALCs we voted to close, as 
     noted in our Findings, ``closure * * * permits significantly 
     improved utilization of the remaining depots and reduces DOD 
     operating costs.'' Where the Commission encourages 
     privatization in place, our Report addresses it directly * * 
     *

  And she cites the page numbers.

       Such was not the case with the ALCs.

  Finally:

       If any Commissioner had offered a motion--

  Listen, Mr. President--

       If any Commissioner had offered a motion to privatize in 
     place, as the President proposes, I am 100-percent certain 
     that such a motion would have been defeated handily.

  This is Wendi Steele, a Commissioner who went through all the 
processes. I won't go through the whole letter from Commissioner Lee 
Kling, but I will read the last paragraph of his letter. Now keep in 
mind, these are two of the eight Commissioners. We have letters from 
all but former Senator Dixon.
  He says:

       The Commission's review clearly documented significant 
     excess capacity in the five Air Force Air Logistic Centers. 
     Privatization in place of all of the workload of Sacramento 
     and San Antonio Air Logistic Centers could result in little 
     or no savings to the Air Force by the closures. Further, it 
     might result in privatizing excess capacity rather than 
     eliminating it and could also miss the opportunity to improve 
     the efficiency of other DOD depots by increasing their 
     utilization.

  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have these letters from 
Commissioner Wendi Steele and Commissioner Kling printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the letters were ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                          The Defense Base Closure


                                   and Realignment Commission,

                                Arlington, VA, September 21, 1995.
     Hon. J.C. Watts, Jr.
     U.S. House of Representatives,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Representative Watts: Thank you for your letter of 
     September 15 and questions regarding the issue of 
     privatization in place for the workload of the Sacramento and 
     San Antonio Air Logistics Centers.
       The Commission was, in general, supportive of privatization 
     of DoD industrial activities where appropriate. However, 
     privatization as a concept and forced privatization in place 
     of what is clearly excess depot capacity are two very 
     different issues.
       In the specific cases of the Sacramento and San Antonio 
     ALCs, the Commission was very aware that we were recommending 
     the closure of two very large industrial activities. The 
     Commission's recommendation to consolidate these workloads, 
     other than common-use ground-communication and electronics 
     work, ``to other DoD depots or to private sector commercial 
     activities as determined by the Defense Depot Maintenance 
     Council. Move the required equipment . . . to the receiving 
     locations'' was intended to move that workload to the most 
     cost-effective and operationally sound location after

[[Page S5913]]

     closure of the ALCs and elimination of that capacity.
       We felt that the Depot Maintenance Council, rather than the 
     Air Force. Would be in the best position to proceed in good 
     faith to maximize efficiencies by determining what portions 
     of that workload should be interserviced, moved to another 
     ALC or transferred to the private sector (not necessarily 
     ``in place''). Forced privatization in place of all of the 
     workload is contrary to the intent of our Report language.
       The only instance I am aware of the Commission specifically 
     discussing the possibility of significant ALC privatization 
     in place, or a government owned/contractor operated facility 
     (GO/CO), was the C-5 work at Kellly (excluding engines). That 
     would assume it could be accomplished by a private contractor 
     at that location for less than the savings and efficiencies 
     which would be realized by moving it. By all of our measures, 
     it appeared that the long-term savings to DoD would be 
     substantial by moving that workload to another ALC, but we 
     did not want to pre-determine the outcome of a complete and 
     fair analysis by the Depot Maintenance Council, which the 
     President's proposal disallows.
       Though the Commission did not direct the engine work to 
     move to another ALC, our Findings state, ``The Commission 
     urges the Air Force to consolidate engine maintenance 
     activity at Tinker to reduce excess capacity. The Commission 
     firmly believes that consolidation of engine activities will 
     result in lower costs and increased efficiencies.''
       Privatization in place of all the workload of the 2 closing 
     ALCs would enhance our national security posture only when: 
     Moving the work to another DoD depot or to a private activity 
     would have unmanageable operational/readiness risk; the costs 
     to move the work would outweigh the long-term efficiencies 
     and savings which would be realized (capacity utilization, 
     reduction in overhead, etc.); or a truly unique capability or 
     strategically important redundancy would be lost or unable to 
     be cost-effectively replicated elsewhere in the public or 
     private sector.
       It's important to remember that both DoD and the 
     Commission's review clearly documented significant excess 
     capacity in the 5 ALCs. Privatization in place of all of the 
     workload of Sacramento and San Antonio would result in 
     shifting excess capacity to what appears would be a 
     competitively protected segment of the private sector rather 
     than eliminating it, and further, would miss the opportunity 
     to improve the efficiency of the other DoD depots.
       The Commission clearly did not intend to privatize in place 
     all of the workload from the 2 ALCs we voted to close, as 
     noted in our Findings, ``closure * * * permits significantly 
     improved utilization of the remaining depots and reduces DoD 
     operating costs.'' Where the Commission encouraged 
     privatization in place, our Report addresses it directly (see 
     pgs. 1-58 to 1-61). Such was not the case with the ALCs.
       Moreover, not allowing the remaining ALCs--all of which 
     ranked higher in military value--to compete for the 
     additional workload, will cause them to become increasingly 
     less cost-competitive in the future. Even beyond common sense 
     issues of most effectively utilizing our limited defense 
     resources, I am at a loss to understand why it would be in 
     the Air Force's best interest to protect its lowest ranking 
     depots at the expense of its 3 superior installations.
       As difficult as it was to vote for the closure of 2 
     facilities of this size and quality, the Commission voted 6-2 
     to do so because we felt that it was in the best interest of 
     the Air Force, DoD, and the American taxpayers. If any 
     Commissioner had offered a motion to privatize in place, as 
     the President proposes, I am 100% certain that such a motion 
     would have been defeated handily.
       Representative Watts, I hope I have answered your 
     questions. Please feel free to contact me if I might be of 
     further service on this or any other matter.
           Highest regards,
                                                  Wendi L. Steele,
     Commissioner.
                                                                    ____



                                                 S. Lee Kling,

                                St. Louis, MO, September 29, 1995.
     Hon. J.C. Watts, Jr.
     Congress of the United States, House of Representatives, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Congressman Watts: Thank you for your recent letter 
     concerning the issue of privatization in place for the 
     workload of the Sacramento and San Antonio Air Logistics 
     Centers. I certainly understand your interest in this 
     question.
       As Chairman Dixon noted in his July 8 letter to Deputy 
     Secretary of Defense John White, the Commission was generally 
     very supportive of the concept of privatization of DoD 
     industrial and commercial activities. This is consistent with 
     the May, 1995 Report of the Commission on Roles and Missions 
     of the Armed Forces, which concluded that ``with proper 
     oversight, private contractors could provide essentially all 
     of the depot-level maintenance services now conducted in 
     government facilities within the United States.'' 
     Privatization is very beneficial in certain situations but 
     not all.
       In specific cases of Sacramento and San Antonio Air 
     Logistics Centers, the Commission was very aware that we were 
     recommending the closure of two very large industrial 
     activities. The Commission's recommendation to consolidate 
     the workloads of these two Air Logistics Centers ``to other 
     DoD depots or to private sector commercial activities as 
     determined by the Defense Depot Maintenance Council'' was 
     intended to give the Air Force and the Secretary of Defense 
     the maximum flexibility to implement the closure of these two 
     Air Logistics Centers in a way that would eliminate excess 
     capacity without harming ongoing Air Force operations and 
     provide the greatest savings. With the exception of the 
     direction to move the common-use ground-communication 
     electronics workload currently performed at Sacramento Air 
     Logistics Center to Tobyhanna Army Depot, the Commission did 
     not direct any of the workload of McClellan or San Antonio 
     Air Force Bases to any specific DoD depot or to the private 
     sector. We felt that the Defense Department was in the best 
     position to make these judgments.
       The Commission's review clearly documented significant 
     excess capacity in the five Air Force Air Logistics Centers. 
     Privatization in place of all of the workload of Sacramento 
     and San Antonio Logistics Centers could result in little or 
     no savings to the Air Force by the closures. Further, it 
     might result in privatizing excess capacity rather than 
     eliminating it and could also miss the opportunity to improve 
     the efficiency of other DoD depots by increasing their 
     utilization.
       Thank you for your continuing interest in the base closure 
     process.
           Kindest regards,
                                                     S. Lee Kling.

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, this is taken directly out of the BRAC 
language. It is critical that we find ourselves in a situation where we 
are going to be able to actively interpret the intent of the BRAC 
Commissioners. Eight Commissioners, and they used the same criteria 
everywhere they went. They visited all the installations. They were in 
Oklahoma. It was very tense. We have five installations in Oklahoma. 
They went to all of them. These people worked for years to try to come 
up with conclusions, so I am going to read some of the conclusions they 
have, and then I would like to yield to the Senator from Georgia, if it 
is his desire to be heard on this subject.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for one 
question?
  Mr. INHOFE. Yes, I will yield for a question, and then I do want to 
hold the floor so I can conclude my remarks.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Yes, I understand, and since I was willing to answer 
any questions you had, I think that is fair.
  Mr. President, I understand that the Senator has read a letter from 
one of the Base Closing Commissioners, Wendi Steele. And I just ask if 
the Senator from Oklahoma will tell us where Wendi Steele worked just 
before she went on the Base Closing Commission?
  Mr. INHOFE. Where did she work?
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Yes.
  Mr. INHOFE. Maybe you can tell me. I know she lived in Texas.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Yes, Wendi Steele was actually the defense 
legislative assistant for Don Nickles. She is from Oklahoma. I don't 
know if she lived in Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. I think she is from Houston.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. But she worked for Don Nickles before becoming a 
member of the Base Closing Commission.
  Mr. INHOFE. Can I ask a question of the Senator from Texas? During 
the time that we approved the appointments by the President of the 
eight Commissioners, we went through long hearings. You, at the time, 
were a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I believe, and I 
was there, too. I ask, did you have any objection to the appointment of 
Wendi Steele as one of the Commissioners during those hearings?
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. As a matter of fact, I was very concerned about the 
appointment of a former staff member of a Senator from a State that was 
going to be in competition with our State on several bases. I was 
concerned about it. I asked Ms. Steele at the time if she would be 
willing to recuse herself, since she was on Senator Nickles' staff, 
from any of the decisions that would bear on a base that was in 
competition with Oklahoma, and she said no. I thought of objecting to 
her at the time. I decided that I would not object because I hoped that 
she would be fair and open and honest.
  I was concerned when, as a member of the Commission, she was doing 
the routine tour that Commissioners do of Kelly Air Force Base and she, 
at the time, said to the commander of the base, ``This is a really nice 
facility. I wonder what we will be able to do here when all of this is 
moved to Tinker?''
  Now, this was when she was just in the research phase taking the 
routine

[[Page S5914]]

trips that everyone takes, and she had made up her mind that this was 
going to be moved to Tinker.
  So I just think when I read the letters from the five members of the 
Base Closing Commission that stated clearly that privatization is an 
option that they meant to leave open in these base decisions, I just 
wanted the Senator to know what the background was on the letter from 
Wendi Steele.
  Mr. INHOFE. Let me reclaim my time. Thank you very much, I say to 
Senator Hutchison.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. INHOFE. I appreciate you calling that to our attention. I also, 
Mr. President, call to your attention the Commissioner in question is a 
resident--was a resident, I assume is still a resident--of Houston, TX, 
and she had not been on the staff of Senator Nickles for some time.
  I think when we went through this process of determining whether or 
not anyone was prejudiced on that Commission, I asked every 
Commissioner questions. I asked them: ``Are you going to use the 
criteria in an unprejudiced manner?'' And they all responded yes. There 
is not one person who objected to Wendi Steele.
  I will also say, I also quoted extensively Lee Kling. I don't believe 
Lee Kling was ever on Senator Nickles' staff.
  I want to yield to the Senator from Georgia, but since it is so 
critical we know what the intent was, not just by reading the reports 
from the Commissioners, let me just go ahead and read a few things that 
actually came from the BRAC commission report. These are quotes, Mr. 
President, if you will bear with me for just a moment.

       . . . significant excess capacity and infrastructure in the 
     Air Force depot system requires closure of the San Antonio 
     ALC.

  They addressed separately the question in California. But the point 
here is, I keep hearing, don't worry about it, they are already closed. 
No one is going to be naive enough to say by closing it, they didn't 
fully intend to stop the excess capacity from taking place in Texas and 
in California. It was assumed that that would take place.

  Second:

       . . . closure of the San Antonio ALC and related activities 
     in Kelly AFB, including the defense distribution depot and 
     information processing megacenter, permits significantly 
     improved utilization of the remaining depots and reduces DOD 
     operating costs.

  Third, another direct quote from the BRAC committee:

       The Commission found the cost to realign Kelly AFB to be 
     less than that estimated by the DOD and the annual savings to 
     be significantly greater than DOD's estimate.

  I heard someone, I believe it was the Senator from California, just a 
short while ago make a statement--maybe I am not attributing that to 
the right person--saying that the GAO study did not take into 
consideration relocation. The GAO study clearly did take into 
consideration relocation.
  Quoting further:

       The Commission assumed that a depot closure and 
     consolidation of work would permit a personnel reduction--

  Listen, Mr. President--

     of 15 percent of selected ALC personnel and a 50 percent 
     reduction in management overhead personnel.

  Further quoting:

       The decision to close the San Antonio ALC is a difficult 
     one, but given the significant amount of excess depot 
     capacity and limited defense resources, closure is a 
     necessity . . . The San Antonio ALC closure will permit 
     improved utilization of the remaining ALCs and substantially 
     reduce DOD operating costs.

  I could go on all day with these things. There is a lot of redundancy 
here. But it clearly expresses to us what their decision was and what 
they meant.

  The Commission staff presented data indicating large annual savings 
could be realized by consolidating engine maintenance activities at 
Tinker Air Force Base, OK. Both Kelly and Tinker are operating at less 
than 50 percent of their engine maintenance capacity. * * * The 
Commission urges the Air Force to consolidate engine maintenance 
activity at Tinker to reduce excess capacity. The Commission firmly 
believes that consolidation of engine activities will result in lower 
costs and increased efficiencies.
  Again, Mr. President, there can be no doubt that even if you tried to 
isolate certain things that were said or maybe a rumor that was heard 
down in Kelly Air Force Base, I do not think we should be talking about 
statements that cannot be documented and rumors that someone said this 
or someone said something else.
  If you just stop and realize, if you have five ALC's operating at 50-
percent capacity, and you close two, and, as the bill calls for, you do 
not privatize anything in place there until the remaining, more 
efficient--according to the BRAC process--certification of ALC's 
located in Oklahoma and Utah and in Georgia are operating at a minimum 
of 75-percent capacity, I do not care if it is 65 percent, but the 
bottom line is anyone who has any business background knows that you 
cannot operate at 50-percent capacity and do so efficiently.
  I do not think we need to attack the integrity of the independent 
commissioners. I feel that people like Wendie Steele and Lee Kling and 
the rest of them have spent time, their valuable time--sure there is 
compensation, but there are very few people who would be willing to 
take 2 years out of their lives to do nothing but evaluate the 
operation of literally hundreds of military installations.
  Now, I have a lot more things to talk about. I would like to yield to 
the Senator from Georgia. You know, I commented several times, as he 
sat in there with us in the Senate Armed Services Committee, that this 
not a partisan thing. This is about defending America.
  So I yield the floor.
  Mr. CLELAND addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
  Mr. CLELAND. Will the Senator from Oklahoma yield?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma yielded the floor.
  Mr. CLELAND. Mr. President, I missed some of the discussion of the 
Senator from Oklahoma. I would like to just highlight some points that 
I will mention about this discussion.
  I say to the Senator, I am a newcomer to this basic issue here, but 
you have been involved from the beginning of the BRAC process, all the 
way through.
  Was it your understanding when this process was set up to close 
bases, that that was exactly the intent of the entire process, to 
indeed close bases, and that this issue of privatization in place came 
along some time afterward as possibly something that was new to the 
process and has actually thrown that process off track? Is that your 
understanding?
  Mr. INHOFE. That is my understanding.
  Before the Senator from Georgia got in here, I commented on several 
of the States. For example, Indiana, where the presiding office is 
from, he lost, and did so with grace, as much grace as he could, a 
major installation in Indiana.
  Our own chairman, Senator Thurmond, I mean, no one, no one can have 
more political influence to stop the closing of a base in his home 
State than the chairman of the Armed Services Committee. And Senator 
Thurmond was willing to say, all right we have to bite the bullet.
  The big issue here is, we need to use the money that is used on 
excess capacity to be spent on such things as modernization, quality of 
life, on readiness, on force strength. These are the things that we 
need to be talking about.
  So, yes, the whole thing on privatization in place, it was 
anticipated someone might bring it up. So the GAO in their report, when 
they came to the conclusion that if you privatize that excess capacity 
in place in Sacramento and in San Antonio, it is going to cost the 
taxpayers, and I say cost the defense system, because that is what it 
is going to come out of--$468 million a year. Over the 5 years, they 
said that is $2.34 billion.
  In further responding to the Senator's question, I would say, you sat 
there in those committee meetings when we had the service chiefs in 
there and said, ``Where are we going to come up with the money if we 
don't carry out the recommendations of the BRAC system?'' We have to 
come up with several hundred million dollars. Is it going to kill the 
force stream and quality of life and come out of modernization. ``Where 
is it going to come from?'' What did they say? They said, ``We don't 
have anything for it to come out of.''

[[Page S5915]]

  Mr. CLELAND. I ask the Senator, is it your understanding, if this 
privatization in place policy stands--of course, the bill reported out 
of the Senate Armed Services Committee does not prohibit privatization. 
It just prohibits this policy which has thrown the BRAC process off 
track in terms of their logistics centers.

  Mr. INHOFE. That is a very good point.
  In fact, several people, who would like to have us believe that--
referring to the privatization in place--very conveniently leave out 
one sentence when they talk about realigning Kelly Air Force Base, 
including the air logistics center. The last sentence says, ``Move the 
required equipment * * * [and any required personnel] to the receiving 
locations * * *.''
  That means not there. Do not privatize excess capacity where you 
maintain the problem of having five locations, each operating at 50-
percent capacity. It is very, very clear.
  Mr. CLELAND. I ask the Senator, isn't it true that if the action 
follows, that is, the privatization-in-place policy, that we have heard 
testimony--you and I were in the subcommittee listening to the 
testimony from the Air Force--that if you followed the privatization-
in-place policy, rather than just sheer privatization, it begins to 
thwart not only the BRAC decision, but it begins to obscure the whole 
concept of privatizing to begin with, and that when the Air Force talks 
about competition, say, competing for the C-5-A workload, they put 
qualifications on it in order to adjust to the privatization-in-place 
requirement and require that work to be done for the C-5-A workload at 
Kelly, and that absolutely compromises, I think, the whole sense of 
competition between an air base, say, like in Warner Robins--it is 
going after that workload--and a private contractor?
  Isn't it your opinion that if we do not get rid of this 
privatization-in-place policy, we will end up with five air logistics 
centers, which is not the desire of the BRAC Commission, but three will 
be publicly run by the Air Force and two will be private, costing the 
taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars? Is that not right?
  Mr. INHOFE. You know, that is one of the three bottom lines here. It 
is just so logical that if you have five operating at 50-percent 
capacity--as they said in this overdraft quoted out of their report; 
they said it over and over again--you have to close two and transfer 
the workload.
  Now, the whole idea of privatization came up--and I hate to say it, 
but it was highly political. We all get political right before an 
election. This is what happened right before the election. And it 
happened out in California. There are a lot of electoral votes in 
California. The administration said: ``We want to privatize in place.''
  But clearly you are right. The Senator from Georgia is exactly right. 
That does not resolve the problems.
  A minute ago I said there are three bottom lines. That is one bottom 
line. Another bottom line is the fact that this is a national defense 
issue. How can we be sure that if there is a war, if Iran decides they 
are going to use some of that technology and the systems they are 
getting out of China or Russia and go to war with us, that we are going 
to be in a position to fight that war? It is a national security issue 
so that if we do get in a war, we will not become dependent, for those 
core activities, on a private contractor.
  You know, I am all for privatization in place. But that is the other 
issue.
  The third, of course, is cost. Those who say that GAO did not 
consider privatization in place, they did. The GAO was before our 
committee. You were there with me. We sat there for several hours. We 
cross-examined this gentleman. He said, and repeated over and over 
again, ``Yes, the costs. It is going to be to the taxpayers or to the 
defense system. We proximate $468 million a year.'' Then I said, ``Is 
that old information? Is that new?'' ``No; we brought it up to date.''
  So that is their current position. That is their past position. The 
GAO was set up to be an independent agency to evaluate these things 
free of political interference. They came out with this, that third-
cost thing. The Senator from Georgia knows the problems that we are 
suffering from right now in our defense system. He knows that we cannot 
come up with $2 or $3 billion and take it out of something that is 
existing. So the Senator from Georgia is exactly right.
  Mr. CLELAND. I say to the Senator, you and I both sit on the 
subcommittee. That point is well-taken, that regardless of some of the 
aspects of this issue, which can be kind of arcane, when you start 
talking about air logistics centers, the bottom line is, are we going 
to fulfill the goal of the BRAC Commission, and that is have three air 
logistics centers, lean and mean and working at full capacity and ready 
to go in terms of the readiness of our forces? That is the bottom line. 
If we compromise the BRAC decision, then we will not have three air 
logistics centers lean and mean operating at full capacity really ready 
to do their job in a time of conflict and combat. That is one of the 
things that really concerns me about this whole issue.
  Mr. INHOFE. I respond to the suggestion of the Senator from Georgia 
that in capacity, there is potentially enough capacity so there will be 
a public depot in the event of war and have some capacity to grow into 
it. That is the reason that, again, it is somewhat arbitrary as to 
whether it is 75, 80, or 85 percent. The GAO again said that you should 
operate the three remaining air logistics centers somewhere between 75 
and 85 percent capacity to leave enough capacity so that, as the 
Senator suggests, in time of war we would have that capacity and then 
we would be at full capacity. Clearly this is a national defense issue.

  Mr. CLELAND. I appreciate the Senator from Oklahoma and his 
leadership on this point and his concern for readiness of our forces, 
readiness of our air logistics centers to do the job, the ability of 
those centers to do the job economically and effectively, which in my 
reading of the BRAC process was part of the reason for the process even 
occurring, and that he marshaled great facts and arguments for the 
committee bill here, which I support, which does not eliminate 
privatization, it just eliminates an absurd policy that is costing the 
taxpayers of this country hundreds of millions of dollars and is 
inefficient, ineffective, and ultimately weighs down and compromises 
three outstanding air logistics centers.
  I just want to thank the Senator for his leadership and his 
scholarship on this issue. I will be supporting him on a vote.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. INHOFE. Before the Senator yields the floor, I would like to 
respond, in a way. We are talking about this as being a major national 
defense issue. That is what it is really all about.
  I am deeply concerned because I understand, certainly not as well as 
some of the others around here, that the Senate rules do provide that 
any one Senator can stop the train, can stop and can kill a bill.
  I see Senator Thurmond down there, the chairman of our committee, the 
hours that we put into this thing. I just hope that those who disagree 
with one small part--this is a tiny part of this bill. We have pay 
raises for our guys in Bosnia. We have modernization programs in there. 
We have barracks that are starting construction right now that we have 
to continue. We have literally hundreds of things that are totally out 
of this realm, not associated with the depot maintenance, that are in 
this bill.
  So I just hope that those who are opposed to this part or any part of 
the bill would not use the Senate prerogative that each Senator has to 
stop the bill altogether so that we will not have the defense 
authorization bill, but merely offer amendments to take out those parts 
that they find offensive. I am prepared to debate against such 
amendments that might cause this to come out.
  So, I just respond by saying, I hope that you share my concern that 
we do not want to hold up the defense authorization bill. Let us go 
ahead, as Senator Thurmond had suggested in a meeting yesterday and 
said we have a good bill here. A lot of good things are in it. If 
somebody does not like some provision, they have every right to stand 
here on the floor and argue that case and be as persuasive as they can 
to take that out. I think that is the process, for the sake of 
America's defense, that should be used.
  I assume the Senator from Georgia would agree with that.

[[Page S5916]]

  Mr. CLELAND. The Senator from Oklahoma is absolutely correct. I 
support him 100 percent on that point. And the great chairman of our 
committee is absolutely correct; if there is anyone who disagrees with 
portions of this authorization bill, offer an amendment to delete it. 
But to hold up the whole bill is wrong.
  Second, I am the ranking Democrat on the committee that deals with 
personnel in the military, particularly with quality-of-life issues. 
There are many things in this piece of legislation that we are about to 
discuss, like the 2.8 percent pay rate increase in barracks housing and 
housing for families on many bases and an increase in aviator pay, to 
recruit and retain the best pilots and service men and women.
  There are many things in this bill that our soldiers and sailors, 
airmen, marines, coastguardsmen out there really need. I hate to see 
this bill run aground on this particular point that we have been 
debating.
  So the Senator is absolutely correct. I support him 100 percent on 
that point.
  Mr. INHOFE. Of course, the Senator from Georgia being the ranking 
member of the Personnel Subcommittee, and Senator Kempthorne, being the 
chairman, as I go around and make the base visits, it is very 
distressing. You mentioned flight pay.
  We are losing our quality pilots to the private sector because there 
is a great demand out there. How can we compete, when these guys are 
willing to do it? They want to fly the F-16's, the F-14's and the F-
18's, and the equipment we have, the heavy equipment, the B-1's and B-
2's, and so forth, but they also have families and they have children 
and we have to provide them with the pay that is somewhat competitive. 
We are way below that. However, you are able to get in some provisions 
that will, I think, retain some of these pilots.
  Right now we are in the middle of an incredible housing shortage and 
we have troops on food stamps, we have housing that they would not let 
prisoners live in.
  We have a lot of improvements here due to your hard work and that of 
Senator Kempthorne. To jeopardize all of that work just because of one 
small provision--I suggest there are some things I do not like in this 
bill. If I do not like them I will offer an amendment to take it out. 
That is the process. I just hope we can follow that process.
  Mr. BENNETT. Mr. President, do I have the floor?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah has the floor.
  Mr. BENNETT. I will not prolong this particular debate about depots, 
but I was passing through and heard it going on and could not resist 
the opportunity to make some comments about it. The issue clearly will 
be debated at greater length and I will have more statistics and 
information at that time.
  The point I want to make in this context has to do with the issues 
raised by the Senator from Georgia and the Senator from Oklahoma 
regarding readiness and capability in the depots. It is the corrosive 
effect of a depot operating at less than full capacity or even 
approaching full capacity.
  If I may, I will share with the Senate my experience at Hill Air 
Force Base where we have the air logistics depot that was rated No. 1 
during the last BRAC process. Let it be understood there were five 
depots that BRAC looked at, and according to the ratings that were 
given these depots, Hill Air Force Base was rated No. 1, McClellan Air 
Force Base which BRAC said should be closed was rated No. 5, and Kelly 
Air Force Base, which BRAC said should be closed was rated No. 4.
  However, the expected shift of workload from Kelly and McClellan to 
the surviving three has not taken place. At the Hill Air Force Base 
they are now down to about 52 percent of capacity. There has been a lot 
of conversation here about how inefficient and expensive that is. I 
agree with all that conversation. It is ineffecient and expensive. But 
it is more corrosive than that in terms of what it is doing to the 
personnel on whom we will depend at some point for support if there is 
a war.
  The work force at Hill is aging. As people leave, they are not 
replaced. Why should they be--the capacity of the base is not being 
used, so as attrition comes along and people leave, they are not 
replaced. The people who are looking toward retirement in the next 5 to 
10 years recognize they will not be replaced if this capacity problem 
is not solved. Their morale is down. When they speak to the people in 
the surrounding community who might want to apply for jobs, be trained 
and acquire the expertise that we will need, the present folk tell 
them, quite understandably and logically, ``Don't bother. Don't come to 
work here. The Air Force has no loyalty to its personnel. The Air Force 
has no loyalty to this depot. They have done everything they can to 
close the depot by keeping work spread out at other depots around the 
country.''
  The time will come, and it will come relatively soon in terms of 
international defense issues, that is, within the next 5 to 10 years, 
when we will not have a work force at all. These people will have 
retired, they will have left, no one will have come in to be trained, 
and the Air Force will suddenly sit there and say, who can we get to do 
this work at virtually any price, at any place? Depots do not manage 
themselves. It takes people. Problems do not get solved by facilities, 
it takes people.
  The process the Air Force is following in this privatization in place 
procedure is corrosive and destructive of not only the morale but the 
skills of the people at each one of these depots. We would not have 
this problem at Hill Air Force Base if Hill Air Force Base were 
operating at 75, 80 or 85 percent of capacity. People would be busy 
doing productive, worthwhile things.

  Now they are painting rocks--not literally, but figuratively. I have 
been in the Army. I know what happens when the drill sergeant has you 
for the afternoon and has nothing for you to do. He requires that you 
go out in front of the barracks and pick up all the rocks and paint 
them and then put them back. That is not a really good morale 
experience to go through. I have gone through that. I think just about 
anybody who has gone through training in the American military has had 
that kind of experience from time to time. You want to spend your time 
in worthwhile activities, in real training, but they have you for the 
afternoon, they do not have anything for you to do, and military life 
being what it is, they will not let you go, so the top sergeant has you 
out there painting rocks. Well, figuratively, many of the people at 
Hill Air Force Base are drawing their full salary, charging the 
taxpayer the full cost, but they are painting rocks. Why? Because the 
work they should be doing is still being done on the bases that the 
BRAC ordered to be closed.
  We can talk about the price, we can talk about the money that is 
being wasted, we can talk about the inefficiency, but we should not 
lose sight of the corrosive impact on the morale, the expertise and the 
ultimate future of the work force that will be necessary to keep this 
country alive and strong in the defense in the future.
  I hope the members of the Armed Services Committee who address this 
issue keep this in mind, along with all of the other issues. We are 
arguing about jobs and where they will be. We are arguing about dollars 
and where they will be spent. However, we are in an exercise created by 
the Air Force's refusal to abide by the requirements of BRAC, that is 
terribly corrosive of the work force, and ultimately the readiness 
capacity of this Nation.
  It is very difficult to measure but that does not mean it is not 
real. It is very difficult to pin down in specifics, but that does not 
mean it is not serious. It is real. It is serious. It is going on, and 
the BRAC process must be implemented as quickly as possible in order to 
stop it.
  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, the Senate has a very able majority 
leader. It is his business to take matters up after the committees have 
acted and to get action one way or the other. The Senate Armed Services 
Committee has brought forth a bill here. It is ready to be acted on. 
Why is this delayed? Some Senators are not pleased with what it 
contains.
  Now, any Senator who is not pleased with any portion of this bill and 
wishes to amend it or repeal it has an opportunity to offer an 
amendment to do that. But to say to the Senate, we are going to object 
to even taking up the bill, even considering the bill, and holding up 
the work of the Senate--isn't it reasonable to go forward with

[[Page S5917]]

this bill, let amendments be offered, let them be acted on? That is the 
democratic way.
  Now, the Senate Armed Services Committee passed this bill out 
unanimously. Every member of the Senate Armed Services Committee voted 
for it. Every Republican and every Democrat voted for it. It cannot be 
too bad a bill in view of the unanimous support it has received.
  Again, I repeat, any Member who is dissatisfied with any portion of 
this bill has an opportunity to offer an amendment to the bill to their 
liking. I hope the objections to going forward with the bill and 
considering it will be discontinued and we can proceed with the welfare 
of the Senate which is to take up this bill and act on it.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I came down at noon with my colleague from 
Texas, Senator Hutchison, and objected to bringing the Defense 
authorization bill to the floor of the Senate under unanimous consent. 
I then rushed back to the Finance Committee where we were finishing our 
markup on Medicare, Medicaid, and welfare reform. I did not have an 
opportunity when I raised the objection to explain exactly what all of 
this is about. I wanted to come over very briefly and do that now.
  Let me say I once had the great privilege of serving on the Armed 
Services Committee. I have always been a strong supporter of national 
defense. My dad was a career soldier, a sergeant in the Army. I was 
born at Fort Benning and I have always had a special place in my heart 
for people who wear the uniform of the country. So it produces no great 
happiness in my heart being in a position of holding up this bill.
  Let me also say that I never like to do anything that brings distress 
to the chairman of this committee, Strom Thurmond, who is the greatest 
man that I have ever served with in public life.
  However, let me explain to my colleagues why this issue is so 
important, although I do not want to get into a debate today about the 
issue. I am hoping we can work something out. I am hoping that reason 
and fairness will prevail, and like everything else in life, if you 
look at something from a different perspective, you see it differently. 
I do not have any doubt that our dear colleague from Oklahoma in his 
heart sees this thing differently than I do. I think one of the things 
that has helped me in public life is what an old Virginian, Thomas 
Jefferson, once said, ``Good men with the same facts are going to often 
disagree.'' So I never try to get personalities involved with issues.
  This is about what we want to achieve, in some cases for our States, 
in some cases for the country. Let me tell you how I see the issue. 
This is an old issue, in the sense that it has been building for 
several years. It started in the House with a group called the Depot 
Caucus. This is a group of Members of Congress who have depots in their 
district. For those who know more about trains than they do about 
military maintenance, a depot is a Government-owned facility where 
Government employees do work for the Defense Department--primarily work 
in maintaining defense systems.

  Now, we have had a longstanding debate about whether maintenance work 
ought to be done in depots, or whether it should be done by the private 
sector. You will hear people argue on both sides of the issue. Some 
people will say only these depots can be relied upon to maintain 
weapons systems that were built by the private sector, not the private 
sector. We have gone through three base closings, and we have now 
closed five bases in Texas.
  I was an original cosponsor of the base closing commission. I voted 
for the commission reports that closed all of those bases. I hated it. 
It seemed to me that we were penalizing the very people who won the 
cold war, but I understood it had to be done. Let me say to my 
colleagues that I am for another round of base closings. We have cut 
defense by a third; we have reduced the number of military bases by 18 
percent. We have more Army nurses in Europe than we have combat 
infantry officers in Europe. Tell me that makes sense. We have a huge 
bureaucracy that was built in another era, for another time, for 
another conflict. And we all love parts of that bureaucracy. Part of it 
is in our State. But it is profoundly wrong for the country, and we 
have to have a bureaucracy that fits the military we have now.
  So I am not here trying to defend a base in Texas, Kelly Air Force 
Base. That is closed. It is closed. The case is over. I voted to set up 
the commission that closed it and voted for the report that closed it, 
even though I wish we had closed a base in someone's State who doesn't 
support defense as much as I do. So the issue we are debating here is 
not trying to keep a base open. It is going to be closed. I don't want 
to reverse the decision. It is done. I wish it had been decided 
differently, but it wasn't.
  Now, the issue before us is a very simple issue. The Defense 
Department, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of the Air Force, 
and those involved in procurement believe that we can save tremendous 
amounts of money through price competition. Surely, in America, that is 
not a revolutionary concept. What the Defense Department wants to do is 
to have competitive bidding between the three depots in the Air Force 
that are doing maintenance work and private contractors. I should also 
point out to my colleagues that my State, when Kelly is closed, will 
lose a minimum of 7,000 jobs that will go to the other three depots--
7,000 jobs.
  Now, what Senator Hutchison and I want is simply to allow private 
contractors in our State or anywhere else to have the right to compete 
for this work and, if they can do it better, if they can do it cheaper, 
they would have an opportunity to do it. Quite frankly, the Air Force 
believes that we could have savings in the range of 20 to 25 to 30 
percent by having price competition and by choosing the depots through 
Government employees to do the work when they are cheaper and choosing 
private companies to do the work when they are cheaper.
  I remind my colleagues, given that defense has been cut by a third 
since 1985, it ought to be welcome news that we can save that kind of 
money. We currently have a proposal out to privatize the maintenance of 
the C-5, the great big transport plane that is operated by the Air 
Force. We have all seen it or seen pictures of it; it is big. Now, that 
was a function at Kelly. So what the Air Force wants to do is to put it 
out for bids, and if one of the depots can do it cheaper, to move it 
there, or if a private contractor can do it cheaper, take the facility 
that has been turned over to the City of San Antonio and lease it to a 
private contractor, or even let a private contractor in any other city 
in the country do it, if they can do it cheaper.
  Now, the bill before us says that that contract would have to be 
stopped, that you could not have competitive bidding until the depots 
were operating at 75 percent of capacity, which would be most of all 
the work that exists in the Air Force today, so in effect there would 
never be another competitive bid. And it says, even if you had a 
competitive bid, nobody using facilities that used to be Kelly Air 
Force Base, or used to be McClellan Air Force base in California, could 
compete.

  Now, I understand give and take. I understand compromise. But I don't 
understand knocking people down and stepping in their faces. That is 
basically what we are talking about here. Now, if we were simply 
talking about Texas' interest, I am for Texas' interest. I get paid to 
represent it, and I try to do a good job at it. But the reason that I 
am adamant about this subject is this is not just Texas, this is 
America. Why should we not have price competition?
  I would like to remind my colleagues, when I was on the Senate Armed 
Services Committee--and two of my colleagues here sat with me every day 
I was on that committee--I always supported competition, I always 
supported privatization, and I always supported it, even though my 
State might have benefited if we had stopped competition, because it is 
something I believe

[[Page S5918]]

in. It is fundamentally important to America. I know we have people who 
stand up and say, well, we can't contract out maintenance for the F-l6. 
You could not trust somebody who didn't work for the Federal Government 
to maintain the F-l6. Our freedom depends on it. Well, who built the F-
l6? Private contractors. The plain truth is, if Government defense 
without the involvement of the private sector really worked, we would 
have lost the cold war.
  My point is this: We ought to have it as a matter of policy, and 
since I am standing on our side of the aisle, let me speak as a 
Republican. If Republicans believe in anything, it is competition. If 
Republicans stand for anything, it is that when we are spending the 
taxpayers' money, we ought to do it as efficiently as possible. We 
ought not to be concerned about where somebody lives that can do the 
work cheaper. We ought not to be concerned about what their gender is 
or their ethnicity. We ought to be concerned about the work they can 
do, the quality they can provide, and what they are willing to charge.
  I have tried to break this impasse. Let me explain what I have 
proposed and why I think it is more than reasonable, bending over 
backward, and then I will yield the floor. Obviously, if you wanted to 
be reasonable on this issue, you would simply say to the Defense 
Department, look, here are a set of criteria for looking at a fair 
competition with a level playing surface. Let me say, with all due 
respect, to the depot caucus in the House, the only fair competition to 
them is no competition. The last thing on Earth they want is 
competition. But we could set out simple criteria for a level playing 
surface to have competition between the public sector and the private 
sector to do this work. What we ought to do is to do that scrupulously 
and choose the low bidder for the highest quality and get the most 
defense we can for the money we have. That is logic.
  To try to break this impasse, I have made the following proposal. 
Have competitive bidding after you first set out the criteria for 
competitive bidding. If you want to look at the cost of the facilities 
they are using, to make adjustments for it, then look at everything--
look at retirement costs, look at every single cost, come up with a way 
of measuring it, and have a competition. And then, even if the depots 
lose the competition by less than 10 percent, give it to them anyway. 
In other words, let's say that we can maintain the C-5 through a 
Government depot for $109 million, and let's say that a private 
contractor can do it for $100 million. What I have said is, to try to 
break this impasse, cheat the taxpayer out of $9 million. Give it to 
the depot. But if the private sector can do it for more than 10 percent 
less, give it to them.
  Now, what that is saying is that the depots will win any close 
competition. If they are no more than 9.99 percent higher, they win. 
But if the private sector can do it for 10 percent or more less, can it 
be prudent public policy, can it make any sense to deny them the right 
to do that work? I think the answer is no. That has been a proposal 
that I have made.
  Some people have answered, well, you won't have a fair competition. 
The Air Force will cheat us. I am willing to try to set out criteria. I 
personally don't believe any of us are so important that the Air Force 
is out to cheat us. I have never believed in conspiracies. But the 
point is, all I am trying to do here is not keep a Texas base open. It 
is going to be closed. But what I want the workers there to have a 
chance to do is to go to work for private companies that might have a 
chance to compete for work. So I am not asking for anybody to give 
anything to San Antonio, TX. But I am demanding that we have an 
opportunity to compete. A problem we have here is we have a bill that 
bans that competition. And then we are going to conference with the 
House, which basically has the approach that whatever money there is 
belongs to us and we are not worried about how efficiently it is spent, 
and this is really defense welfare anyway.
  So what I am trying to do, and what I would very much like to do to 
move ahead, is to try to work out an agreement on the principle of 
competition, something we believe in, something that clearly works, and 
I am willing to give an edge to the Government. But I think a 10-
percent edge is more than generous. I don't think most Americans would 
agree with that, especially when many of the people competing are 
small, independent businesses. But, again, I mention this not because I 
think it is what we ought to do, but what I am willing to do to try to 
break this logjam. So I thought it was important, having run over here 
from the Finance Committee and objected and then run back without 
having a chance to say anything, to get an opportunity to explain why 
this is important.
  This is a critically important issue. I feel like Senator Hutchison 
and I have not been treated fairly on this issue. I believe there is a 
fundamental national objective here, and I see it as the competition 
between special interests and the public interest and, in this case, 
the public interest is also the Texas interest. When you combine the 
two, I am getting paid twice to do the same work. So I want to be sure 
that I do it well. That is what this whole thing is about.
  Again, I want to apologize to my colleagues for inconveniencing the 
process. I know they want to move ahead with their bill. But I know 
that each of them, from time to time, have found themselves in a 
similar position.
  Thank God the Founding Fathers set up the Senate where one Member 
does have power; where one person can stand in the face of large 
numbers of others and say, ``no.'' Ultimately, they can be run over, 
but they can't be run over for a long time. I think we all benefit from 
that.
  So I am simply taking advantage of the rights I have as an individual 
Member, as any Member here would, I believe, under the circumstances.
  I thank my colleagues for listening. I yield the floor.
  Mr. LAUTENBERG addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, are we at the moment in morning 
business?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. We are on S. 4.
  Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that S. 4 be 
set aside and that I be permitted to speak for up to 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________