[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 133 (Tuesday, September 29, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11108-S11109]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   ENERGY AND WATER CONFERENCE REPORT

  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, first all, I thank my friend and colleague 
from Rhode Island for letting me jump in front of him. I will only take 
a couple minutes.
  The chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Domenici, was in the 
Chamber earlier talking about the fact that I had not permitted the 
energy and water conference report to proceed under a unanimous consent 
agreement. I objected to that. And the reason I did so not objection to 
the energy bill; I have none. Rather I objected because I wanted to 
once again bring the attention of the Senate to the fact that we have a 
very unfair situation presented to us in terms of the allocation of 
money for the defense portion of fiscal year 1999 Appropriations and 
for the nondefense portion.
  I again ask Senators to look at the July 30 Congressional Record, 
page S9404, when I spoke, and there was a short colloquy with Senator 
Specter, myself, Senator Lautenberg, and Senator Domenici at that time.
  Basically, it goes back to a letter that was written on April 2, 
1998, by Senator Domenici to Senator Stevens which basically said that 
by using OMB scoring figures and policy decisions, they had identified 
$2.2 billion more in outlays for defense by using the OMB policy 
assumptions rather than CBO policy assumptions.
  At the end of the letter Senator Domenici writes, ``Pursuant to your 
amendment, we are also looking at the issue of nondefense outlay 
scoring and will report back to you shortly.''
  That was April 27, and we still don't have a report.
  Right now, based on informal preliminary meetings being held with the 
House, it is clear that a considerable increase over the funding in the 
Senate bill will be required to meet all of the demands and get this 
bill signed into law.
  Now, earlier today I spoke to Senator Domenici about this, and 
Senator Domenici mentioned something to me about $300 million that he 
had already given. That unfortunately is not my understanding of where 
we officially stand. We still haven't seen it, and I do not know where 
it is. If it is $215 million or even $300 million, that still means we 
are going to have to trim over half a billion dollars from what the 
preliminary discussions with the House have led us to.
  So where are we going to trim? Head Start? Are we going to cut IDEA, 
the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act? Are we going to cut 
community health centers? Are we going to cut the Ryan White AIDS 
Program? Drug

[[Page S11109]]

treatment? How about our vitally important medical research at NIH? Are 
we going to cut all those? A half a billion dollars we are going to 
have to cut.
  Well, I and others have said what is fair is fair, and if you use OMB 
policy statements for defense scoring, you ought to use them for 
nondefense also. If that were the case, the Labor, Health, and Human 
Services Subcommittee would not be getting $215 million; it would, in 
fact, get $770 million--not $215 million.
  So the reason I have said that we need this time--and I will not take 
a lot of time now because I know that Senator Reed has prepared a 
speech here, and I don't want to interrupt his time. He was kind enough 
to give me a couple minutes here just to lay this out. But right now we 
need fair treatment for these domestic programs, and $215 million 
doesn't do it. But if we have the same kind of scoring as we got for 
defense, we should get about $770 million.
  So I just wanted to alert Senators as to why I was taking this course 
of action. We have been waiting since April 22. We talked about it on 
July 30. Here we are in the final closing days of the Congress and 
programs vital to the health, to the education, and the security of the 
people of this country are going underfunded.
  I don't know what kind of games are being played. I don't know what 
all is going on behind the scenes. But we are going to continue to 
demand fairness until we get it. I am sorry that Senator Specter can't 
be here. Of course, he is home because of the Jewish holy day. I would 
just again refer to Senator Specter's comments on July 30 of this year 
in which he basically echoed what I was saying, and that is that we 
need to get this correct scoring. I would not want to put words in 
Senator Specter's mouth without him being here, but I believe he feels 
the same way I do.
  I thank the Senator from Rhode Island for letting me get ahead of 
him. I yield the floor.
  Mr. REED addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. REED. I thank the Chair.

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