[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.

                              {time}  1630

  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.

                              {time}  1645

  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.

                          ____________________