[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 100 (Tuesday, July 15, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H5290]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2245
                     A GOOD PRIORITY FOR THE NATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gilchrest). Under a previous order of 
the House, the gentleman from Kansas [Mr. Tiahrt] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. TIAHRT. Mr. Speaker, I want to talk a little bit about the 
amendment that just passed the House before we closed business for this 
day because it does establish a very good priority for this Nation and 
for this Congress.
  We, for once, for the first time, I think, since the gulf war at 
least, we have established that gulf war illness is going to be a 
priority when it comes to solving or finding a cure for this illness 
that has been plaguing so many of our gulf war veterans.
  We did so by making a good compromise to what we had before in the 
bill. What this amendment did basically is it took half the funding 
from the National Service Corporation and it transferred it to the 
veterans research account so that we can focus on the gulf war 
illnesses.
  Let me tell my colleagues a little bit about it. In Kansas, we have 
got several people, quite a few people that are currently suffering 
from this. I want to thank first of all Dan Thimesch from the 93d 
District of Kansas. Representative Thimesch brought this very important 
issue to my attention and provided me with a lot of information on what 
is going on in Kansas.
  He told me about Sgt. David Janda, a 35-year-old father of three from 
Hutchinson, KS, suffering from blinding headaches and a blistering 
rash. He has had this problem for 6 years. It includes chronic diarrhea 
and joint pain.
  He talked to me about Kenny Schwartz of Great Bend who endures a 
stabbing pain in his left eye and stiffness in his joints. He has 
memory loss and scarring rashes.
  Now we find out in that in Kansas that some insurance companies have 
decided that this is a war-related illness and they are going to be 
denying coverage based on a clause in their health insurance contract 
that says any health-related problems as a result of war will not be 
covered by health insurance, so it leaves these people without 
coverage. But now we have a way of finding out a cure for these 
illnesses because of the research money that we are putting in place.
  We are, in exchange, we are cutting back on a program that is largely 
inefficient and ineffective, AmeriCorps. It is a troubled organization 
and it does need to improve. And I hope through the course of this 
debate that we have had tonight, that Members are aware that there need 
to be advances in the way AmeriCorps conducts business.
  Right now they are suffering a 39-percent dropout rate across the 
United States. They have unauditable books. They only expend 11 percent 
of the money that they are allocated by the Federal Government. Since 
its conception, we have allocated $1.6 billion to AmeriCorps. Out of 
that $1.6 billion, only approximately $300 million has been spent or 
set aside for their trust fund for education that they have promised to 
the people that have participated in the program, the paid volunteers.
  That leaves about $1 billion, over $1 billion that has yet to be 
expended. So if AmeriCorps was actually cut off today and no funds were 
allocated by this Congress, the 105th Congress, AmeriCorps could 
continue for 5 to 10 years just on the money that they have been 
already budgeted but not yet spent because of their inefficiency.
  So it is an organization that needs to look at itself. I think they 
need to evaluate the trends they are using, the direction they are 
headed. Perhaps they need to rewrite their vision statement and come up 
with a more effective way of addressing the idea, the concept that they 
had in mind when it first came into service. It is this inefficiency, 
and in comparison to the great need of this illness that gulf war 
veterans are suffering from, that brought on this decision that we have 
made tonight of balancing the two.
  The President is strongly in support of AmeriCorps. It has kind of 
been his pet program. And the amendment that was put in place tonight 
does satisfy the need that he has to have paid volunteers in government 
service, and it also provides a solution to the need that we have for 
more research on gulf war illness.
  I think it was a good compromise that was reached tonight. It was not 
the original intent that I had when I put the amendment forward, but in 
this business it seems like sometimes we have to come up with the best 
solution to the problem, the best solution available that we have to 
the problem, and I think that we have accomplished that tonight.
  I hope that this bill will pass when we get done with the amendment 
process at the end of the week, and that we can have not only a 
solution for our gulf war illnesses but also have a more effective 
AmeriCorps.

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