[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 51 (Thursday, April 30, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H2673-H2675]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CONFERENCE REPORT ON HR. 3579, 1998 SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS AND
RESCISSIONS ACT
Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 416 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 416
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider the conference report to accompany the
bill (H.R. 3579) making emergency supplemental appropriations
for the fiscal year ending September 30, 1998, and for other
purposes. All points of order against the conference report
and against its consideration are waived. The conference
report shall be considered as read.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from New York (Mr. Solomon) is
recognized for 1 hour.
Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, for the purposes of debate only, I yield
the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall), my good
friend, pending which I yield myself such time as I might consume.
During the consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for
the purposes of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, this resolution is a customary rule for the
consideration of conference reports. The rule waives all points of
order against the conference report to accompany H.R. 3579, which makes
emergency supplemental appropriations for fiscal year 1998, and against
its consideration. The rule also provides that the conference report
would be considered as read.
Mr. Speaker, passage of this rule would provide much-needed funding
to thousands of disaster areas around this Nation as well as crucial
funding for our Nation's defense. The conference report responsibly
provides resources for our military operations in Southwest Asia and in
Bosnia to ensure that our men and women in uniform have the best
equipment and resources that money can buy.
Furthermore, the conference report also provides for $179 million for
the Ballistic Missile Defense Program.
The conference report also includes crucial paid-for funds for the
disaster areas in the northeast who were burdened by heavy ice storms
earlier this year, for the Southeast and Plains States devastated by
tornados, floods, and other natural disasters, and also for the
Southwestern and Western States that were hit by El Nino weather
disasters.
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Mr. Speaker, in my part of the country, up in upper State New York,
we were hit hard by an ice storm that literally wiped out power and
energy to residents for as long as 2 and even 3 weeks. Passage of this
bill today will ensure that all of these areas will receive this much-
needed relief.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, this conference report provides much-needed
increases for veterans' compensation and pensions to prevent any
expected shortfalls in this important account.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that the gentleman from Louisiana
(Mr. Livingston), the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, and
the members of the Committee on Appropriations certainly are to be
commended for their vigorous defense of the House's position that this
supplemental not include funding for the IMF or the United Nations and
that the nondefense disaster-related funding be offset. These Members
also did yeomen work in protecting our Defense Department from any
further cuts.
Our Nation has endured 14 straight years of inflation-adjusted cuts
in defense spending. That is a 40 percent real decline in defense
dollars, and it is beginning to hurt everywhere in our military.
Mr. Speaker, this is a fiscally responsible and much-needed measure
before the House this afternoon; and I would urge all my colleagues to
support the conference report and support this rule.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume, and I want to thank the chairman of the Committee on Rules
(Mr. Solomon) for yielding me this time.
As the gentleman from New York has described, this is a rule that
waives all points of order against the conference report on H.R. 3579.
The report makes emergency appropriations for U.S. military operations
in Bosnia, peacekeeping operations in Iraq, and domestic disaster
relief. It also makes nonemergency appropriations.
The conference agreement contains many improvements from the House
bill. In particular, I am pleased that the conferees dropped a
provision which would have shut down the AmeriCorps program.
However, the bill actually deepens the cuts in the reserves for the
Section 8 program, which helps make housing affordable to low-income
people and the elderly. Once again, we are reducing aid to the people
who can least protect themselves from these cuts.
The bill fails to include funding for the International Monetary
Fund. I believe that we should fund the IMF for humanitarian reasons
because it will help bolster the economies of nations not as well off
as we are. It is also in our Nation's self-interest to support the IMF
to maintain international economic stability.
The emergency funding in this bill is desperately needed by our
troops abroad. The emergency disaster assistance is also important.
However, we do not have to make these cuts in programs to help the poor
and needy.
The Committee on Rules reported this bill on a recorded vote with all
Democrats opposed.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Rohrabacher).
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this
supplemental.
Thanks to the diligent efforts of the appropriators, this bill now
includes a provision that continues to throw money at one of this
administration's better-known foreign policy fiascoes, our partnership
with Russia to build the International Space Station.
I am chairman of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics that
oversees this effort, and that provision that we are talking about was
not in either House or Senate bill but was inserted over the strong
objection of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics and the
Committee on Science chairman, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr.
Sensenbrenner).
This bill contains and continues to give money to pay for Russia's
failures; and by covering up those failures, the President and the Vice
President can continue to pretend that everything is fine in this grand
partnership with Boris Yeltsin. In other words, this bill spends tens
of millions of dollars to hide the administration's mistakes.
The space station is now estimated to be $7 billion over budget and
another 2 to 4 years late. NASA's own independent analysts suggest that
Russia's defaults are the biggest problem. The Committee on Science has
worked on a bipartisan basis to get the administration to focus on this
problem. Instead, the administration keeps dancing away from the tough
decisions, and now the appropriators are letting them off the hook by
giving them this extra money.
Specifically, this supplemental provides $63 million in directed
transfer, totaling $90 million in Band-aids for a patient that needs
surgery. We need to focus on these problems with Russia or they will
continue to drain money and continue to bring the space station down.
That is not what this supplemental does.
[[Page H2674]]
Secondly, I oppose the supplemental because it again represents the
shoveling of money at an enduring quagmire that drains our resources
and makes us weaker and does not face the decisions that are necessary
to get our country unstuck from this situation. I am, of course,
referring to almost a half billion dollars in this bill to keep our
troops in Bosnia.
I had strong reservations about the Bosnian mission to begin with. We
were told it would last 1 year and cost $2 billion. Now our troops have
been there almost 3 years, and it has already cost between $8 and $10
billion. The mission has escalated from a 1-year mission to now what
appears to be an open-ended commitment with no end in sight.
The huge financial drain that this represents is coming right out of
our taxpayers' hide but also the hides of our defenders who are finding
they cannot even maintain their airplanes and ships and ground weaponry
because money is being drained away from them for these foolish
missions that have nothing to do with our national security, like
Bosnia.
By passing supplementals like this, what we are doing is permitting
the government and this administration to ignore these fundamental
problems and not make the decisions that are necessary to do things
like ending the Bosnian situation that goes on and on, or correcting
the problem with Russia that is putting us behind the eight ball when
it comes to the International Space Station. That is why this
supplemental should be defeated.
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman
from New York (Mrs. Maloney).
(Mrs. MALONEY of New York asked and was given permission to revise
and extend her remarks.)
Mrs. MALONEY of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the
supplemental appropriations rule for a number of reasons, but for the
moment I would like to talk about one special interest rider that was
added in conference at the last minute that its supporters should be
ashamed of. It is an amendment that allows big oil companies to pay
lower royalties for oil extracted from federally-owned, taxpayer-owned
land at the expense of our Nation's schoolchildren.
Oil companies should pay royalties to the Federal Government based on
the market price, but they are not doing that. They have been paying to
the Federal Government based on what they call posted price. Of course,
that is a lower price than what they pay each other for this same oil.
What they are doing is keeping two sets of books, one to record their
profits for what they pay each other and one to profit off the American
people and the American taxpayer by paying a lower price for oil
extracted from taxpayer-owned land.
Oil royalties help pay for our children's education. Each year, big
oil is taking $100 million out of our classrooms and putting it into
their own pockets. The Washington Post and Rollcall both report that
the companies are putting plenty of money into certain congressional
campaigns. I guess it is paying off.
This is poor policy. We should vote against the supplemental. The
President should veto it on just this rip-off that was added at the
last minute alone.
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman
from Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy).
Mr. KENNEDY of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong
opposition to this bill for the simple reason that it cuts over $2.3
billion from the housing budget.
It is remarkable that the leadership would bring forth a bill which
slashes housing funding just 2 days after the HUD issued a major study
documenting a record number of low-income households with severe
housing problems. HUD's worst-case housing report concludes that there
are 12.5 million Americans living in low-income households; including
4.5 million children, 1.5 million elderly people, and 1.1 million
disabled people who are without affordable housing. They have been
untouched by the economic boom.
When the Republicans took over the Congress in 1995, they slashed the
housing budget by 25 percent without a hearing. They then took it upon
themselves to cut the homeless budget by 26 percent. What this budget
does, and I think many people, including many people on the Republican
side, will give great credit to some of the reforms that have taken
place at HUD over the course of these last couple of years.
I was very delighted to see that the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr.
Livingston) mentioned in his press release today the fact that the
money, this $2.3 billion that is being cut, is going to be vitally
necessary to fund housing problems that we face in the future. The way
the government accounts for housing money requires us every once in a
while to put a lump sum figure in the budget authority requirements of
the government's budget. That lump sum figure is coming up this coming
year. We are cutting this money within the very year that we are going
to need the dollars.
The chairman, I hope, will commit himself to making certain that the
funding will continue next year, despite the fact that he has had to
grab this money this year.
I see the chairman has just walked on to the House floor, and I would
very much appreciate it if he would consider making a commitment to
funding that housing need into the future.
Mr. LIVINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. KENNEDY of Massachusetts. I yield to the gentleman from
Louisiana.
Mr. LIVINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I heard the gentleman's statement, and I
would be happy to tell the gentleman that in fiscal year 1999 we are
certainly going to address this. Matter of fact, I have made the
commitment to the gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis) that many of
these funds are going to have to be replenished. But for the balance of
fiscal year 1998, these are excess funds and will not be needed.
Mr. KENNEDY of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I very
much appreciate the Chairman's commitment, and I hope he means he was
not going to be cutting those funds from other parts of the HUD budget.
And I very much appreciate his clarification.
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman
from Minnesota (Mr. Vento).
Mr. VENTO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule and
opposition to this supplemental appropriation.
This concern is that certainly we need to deal with disaster
assistance and the other funds requested here. Of course, we are not
dealing with the important money for the International Monetary Fund
because of the, I think, the misrepresentations and the lack of
responsibility that was demonstrated last week on the floor in
discussing or addressing that particular topic.
But with regards to the main issue in terms of what we are voting
here for, what we are voting for is to take money with one hand and
distribute it to those with the disaster assistance and the other
domestic needs, and with the other hand we are taking it away from the
communities with regard to the housing assistance that is necessary.
This bill, in and of itself, does not provide the type of help. This
action is the wrong action. We ought to be addressing this problem
right now. The fact is that commitments had been made, good intentions
before, which in fact took $3.6 billion out of this particular fund,
this permanent fund for assisted housing in 1997, with commitments that
they were going to place that entire money back into the budget. It is
still not there. And the fact is that putting this off until tomorrow,
with the assurances, does not, in fact, put the money in place.
It is very likely, based on the type of performance that has gone on
with regards to assisted housing, is that we have continually rolled
these contracts over for 1 year, not making the commitment in the
budget process to assure the type of stability that is necessary for
low-income persons that live in this housing.
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This is nothing more than a pea and shell game that is going on with
regards to assisted housing, and the end result is going to be that
many elderly, disabled, and low-income persons, families with children,
are going to be denied the type of assistance and supports that they
need.
The fact is that that $2.3 billion translates into taking support
away
[[Page H2675]]
from 440,000 to 450,000 families that receive assisted housing support
with this particular vote. That is what this vote will do. Yes, it will
do some good in terms of the disaster assistance that we need in the
Northwest and in the Pacific and with regards to the Northeast types of
problems, but it, nevertheless, takes that money away from many
communities across this country that need the money in terms of
housing.
We are not facing up to it. No budget resolution this year, no issue,
no blueprint is in place. And the fact is good intentions are fine to
have, but they are not going to meet the tangible needs that we have
with regards to housing. The fact is that we should not take this vote
on a supplemental appropriation denying the types of funds that are
necessary for the permanent assisted housing fund. I urge my colleagues
to vote ``no.''
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman
from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich).
Mr. KUCINICH. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and in
opposition to the bill, H.R. 3579, the emergency supplemental bill.
I, in particular, want to speak to my concerns about the $2.3 billion
in offsets for emergency funding for section 8 housing. There are
people across this country who depend on section 8 housing for the roof
over their heads; and when they learn that Congress would take action
to take money away from that program next year, this will have a
destabilizing effect on many households, because people rely on our
good sense and our goodwill and our humanity to sustain them.
I also want to express my concern that we would have on one hand the
offsets put in there and at the same time put in there the money for
Bosnia. It is really giving people a cruel choice. We know the
suffering and the inhumanity that has been expressed in Bosnia and how
people have heroically tried to come back from it, and at the same time
we are being told to make a choice between that, helping them and
people who live in section 8 housing in this country.
I, regretfully, am going to have to vote against this bill, but I
think that when similar bills come to this House, we ought not use it
as a moment to prey on the disadvantaged, to destabilize their
household, and to tell them even for a minute that America does not
care about their concerns.
Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I have no request for time, and I
yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, let me just say that I mentioned early on where I heaped
praise on the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Livingston) chairman of the
Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).
And, incidentally, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Livingston) is
sitting next to me here; and for all my colleagues who may not know,
today is his birthday. And I told him earlier that when I grow up, I
want to be just like him.
But seriously, this measure before us has disaster in it. I have been
here for 20 years, and we in the north country of New York State do not
have to ask for aid like this very often. We do not have tornadoes. We
do not have hurricanes. We do not have earthquakes. Sometimes we have
some floods, we have terrible snowstorms, but we are geared up to
handle those.
We have always welcomed the opportunity to help people in other parts
of the country. So today they are helping us in the north country; and
believe me, our people really appreciate it.
I hope everybody votes on the rule and the bill.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the
previous question on the resolution.
The previous question was ordered.
The resolution was agreed to.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
____________________