[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 112 (Monday, September 9, 2002)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1529-E1530]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     SPEECH BY DR. LESLIE LENKOWSKY

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. CONSTANCE A. MORELLA

                              of maryland

                    in the house of representatives

                       Monday, September 9, 2002

  Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Speaker, on August 27, 2002, Dr. Leslie Lenkowsky, 
the CEO of the Corporation for National Community Service, and a 
constituent of mine, addressed the National Press Club on the subject 
of ``Protecting the Homeland: What Volunteers Can Do.'' His words are 
particularly meaningful in light of the fact that he was appointed by 
President Bush and confirmed by the Senate in October of 2001, at a 
time when many thousands of Americans were volunteering in the recovery 
from the September 11th attacks. I commend the speech to my colleagues.

            Protecting the Homeland: What Volunteers Can Do

       On September 11, as smoke poured from the ruins of the 
     World Trade Center, along with New Yorkers, hundreds, if not 
     thousands, of New Jerseyites headed toward Ground Zero to 
     help. Many went right to work, assisting the hard-pressed 
     ``first responders'': police, firefighters, emergency medical 
     personnel, among others. But many also found themselves 
     without clear guidance about what was needed or where they 
     could best serve. Of New Jersey's 21 counties, only three had 
     networks called ``VOADS''--Voluntary Organizations Active in 
     Disasters--which are the principal channel through which 
     public agencies responsible for dealing with emergencies can 
     call on the resources of the nation's nonprofit groups. As a 
     result, many people who wanted to be helpful had difficulty 
     finding ways of doing so.
       What happened in New Jersey occurred elsewhere in the 
     United States as well. Americans stepped forward in record 
     numbers to give blood, make donations, even travel long 
     distances to help the searchers and console the survivors. No 
     one who knows our country's history should have been 
     surprised; we have long been unique among the nations in our 
     willingness to give and volunteer, especially in the face of 
     local and national emergencies. But this outpouring of 
     generosity stretched the abilities of our charities. Blood 
     banks wound up with more supplies than they could keep; for 
     all the exceptionally great work they did, the Red Cross and 
     other groups encountered big challenges in distributing the 
     contributions they received; so many people showed up to 
     search the rubble of the World Trade Center, William 
     Langewiesche's extraordinary series in The Atlantic Monthly 
     reports, that the site became even more dangerous than it 
     already was.
       Moreover, this particular national emergency is not one 
     which is likely to end soon. As the cache of videos uncovered 
     recently by CNN so clearly illustrates, these perpetrators of 
     evil are determined to strike again, and to strike in ways 
     that heretofore had been considered unthinkable. To prevent 
     what we can prevent, and to prepare ourselves for what we 
     cannot, will take a concerted effort that involves not just 
     our intelligence and security agencies, and our trained 
     ``first responders,'' whose efforts were critical in helping 
     New York deal with the terrorist attacks, but also an 
     unprecedented level of commitment by everyday people--by 
     volunteers--to support those first responders and ensure that 
     homes and families, schools and places of business, houses of 
     worship and other public spaces are prepared to face any 
     crisis.
       No one should doubt that Americans are prepared to make 
     this commitment. But what we must strengthen is our capacity 
     to make this commitment effectively. We often think of 
     volunteering as something we do spontaneously, as when we are 
     moved by an appeal to help or the images of a needy group of 
     people on our televisions. As we saw on September 11, there 
     is a lot of truth to this, but as we also saw on that day, 
     volunteering requires more to be useful in dealing with the 
     threats we now face. It requires not just the will (of which 
     Americans have always had plenty), but also careful and 
     creative thought about the ways.
       That is part of what President Bush is trying to do with 
     the USA Freedom Corps. Last November, in a speech in Atlanta, 
     the President responded to those asking what they could do to 
     help by calling on Americans to ``get directly involved in 
     this war effort, by making our homes and neighborhoods and 
     schools and workplaces safer.'' A few weeks later, in his 
     State of the Union address, he created the USA Freedom Corps, 
     a major Presidential initiative aimed at fostering a new 
     culture of ``citizenship, service, and responsibility'' and 
     helping the nation's voluntary groups build the kind of 
     capacity they need to better assist not only in the war 
     effort, but also in the many other vital tasks they perform 
     in our communities.
       As part of that sweeping initiative, the President called 
     for the creation of a new set of Citizen Corps programs to 
     deal specifically with the issue of homeland security. Today, 
     FEMA and the Departments of Justice and Health and Human 
     Services are working together to create and expand these 
     programs.
       At the Corporation for National and Community Service, we 
     have long utilized Senior Corps volunteers and AmeriCorps 
     members in public health, public safety, and disaster relief 
     and preparedness. These programs were not designed 
     specifically to deal with terror attacks, of course, but our 
     members were well trained and fully able to take on the task. 
     And like other Americans, they were glad to have the 
     opportunity. Many, for example, have long worked with the 
     American Red Cross and FEMA, responding to disasters and 
     ensuring public safety. Currently, twenty American Red Cross 
     Chapters sponsor National Readiness and Response Corps teams 
     staffed by AmeriCorps members. These teams have assisted more 
     than 430,000 victims of natural disasters since 1994.
       Members of our National Civilian Community Corps, an 
     AmeriCorps program, responded to the September 11 attacks, 
     helping to process requests for aid, distributing relief 
     checks to victims' families, and assisting them with 
     paperwork and other kinds of support, both in New York and 
     Washington. While the rescue workers combed through the site, 
     our Corps members were helping out with the little things 
     that truly made a difference in people's lives. They worked 
     at Pier 94 in New York, at a Red Cross phone bank in Northern 
     Virginia, and elsewhere. As one AmeriCorps member put it in 
     an e-mail: ``The hours are long, the cases are stressful, the 
     food is fattening, but all in all we wouldn't want to be 
     anywhere else right now.''
       AmeriCorps and Senior Corps participants are also working 
     around the nation to free up police and other ``first 
     responders'' by taking on basic tasks that divert them from 
     focusing on public safety. Volunteers with special skills, 
     such as our veterans, provide backup assistance to fire and 
     medical personnel, while ordinary citizens can and do provide 
     basic administrative assistance to police stations, 
     hospitals, and fire stations

[[Page E1530]]

     so that those with highly technical skills can focus their 
     time and energies on the tasks they are trained to perform.
       In Daytona Beach, for example, nearly two hundred members 
     of our Senior Corps participate in the local Citizens on 
     Patrol program, helping police with traffic management and 
     neighborhood watch. They wear uniforms, look for suspicious 
     activity, remove disabled vehicles, watch vacant homes, and 
     search for missing persons. They have fingerprinted thousands 
     of children in an effort to keep them safe in the community. 
     Last year alone, they served more than 51,000 hours and 
     logged more than 360,000 miles in their patrol cars, allowing 
     trained law enforcement officials in the county to focus on 
     crime prevention and real emergencies.
       And there's more to come. Just a few weeks ago, we became 
     one of the first federal agencies to direct grant money to 
     community groups working in homeland security. The $10.3 
     million in grants we gave to 43 private groups and public 
     agencies in 26 states and the District of Columbia will 
     support more than 37,000 homeland security volunteers across 
     the nation. The grantees included: the venerable American 
     Radio Relay League, based in Connecticut, which will create a 
     national communications network of amateur radio enthusiasts 
     prepared to respond in disasters when those new-fangled cell 
     phones and pda's become inoperative; Mercy Medical Airlift, a 
     charitable organization based in Virginia that usually flies 
     critically ill patients to receive treatment around the 
     country, but will also now prepare its network of pilots to 
     fly at a moment's notice, transporting emergency blood 
     shipments to hospitals, key relief agency officials to 
     disaster sites, and needed materials to rescue and response 
     crews; and the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee, 
     which will train an intergenerational group of 2000 public 
     housing residents in emergency preparedness, crime 
     prevention, basic responder skills, and the use of two-way 
     radios. In several communities, the American Red Cross will 
     be working with local organizations to develop response plans 
     and in New York City, the AmeriCorps Public Safety Program 
     will place members in firehouses to relieve some of the 
     administrative burdens on the ``bravest of the brave,'' who 
     sacrificed so much for all of us on September 11. Last, but 
     not least, one of our grants will establish the New Jersey 
     Secure Corps, whose main objective will be to ensure that 
     every county in that state has a fully functioning VOAD.
       These programs, I believe, represent some of the most 
     appropriate and effective ways that citizens can help prepare 
     for or respond to any future attack. They build on our 
     strengths--the vast array of voluntary groups that are spread 
     throughout our nation and the credibility they enjoy with so 
     many Americans--to create an organized network that is ready, 
     willing, and able to tackle emergencies whenever and wherever 
     they arise. They do not ask ordinary citizens to take on the 
     often difficult and dangerous tasks that the ``first 
     responders'' and other specialists are qualified to do. But 
     by coordinating their efforts with those trained 
     professionals, these programs enable ordinary Americans--such 
     as Senior Corps member Roseann Schneider, who is here today, 
     but would otherwise be helping the Montgomery County police--
     to make extraordinary contributions to our nation's safety 
     and security when the occasion requires them to do so.
       Most importantly, by enlisting Americans in serving their 
     country, these programs--and the broader efforts of the USA 
     Freedom Corps--help to perpetuate our country's greatest 
     source of strength, both in war and in peace: a citizenry 
     that is actively engaged in public life.
       When he announced the creation of USA Freedom Corps, the 
     President also asked Americans to devote at least two years 
     of their lives--or 4,000 hours--in service to their
       Congress also needs to pass the Citizen Service Act, the 
     legislation pending in the House right now would bring much 
     needed improvements and reforms to our programs--as well as 
     more resources. It has been almost a decade since the laws 
     that authorize our programs were last debated and 
     authorized--and while we have done much to expand and improve 
     our programs with lapsed authorization, we think that debate 
     and discussion will take us much further--and will ultimately 
     help enhance the availability of quality volunteer 
     opportunities for individuals and improve the quality of 
     service that volunteers provide in response to many of our 
     greatest national needs, including homeland security. A clear 
     Congressional endorsement of this work would be a fitting way 
     to recognize the efforts volunteers made on September 11--and 
     are still making--to guard against the evils of terrorism.
       Here with us today is one of those people: AmeriCorps 
     member Mark Lindquist, who is a team leader at the DC campus 
     of our National Civilian Community Corps. Right after 
     September 11, he helped run shuttles between the Pentagon and 
     Red Cross headquarters in Arlington, set up Red Cross centers 
     for rescue and relief workers, as well as for survivors and 
     their families, and a phone bank which people could call for 
     more information. And during the rest of his AmeriCorps year, 
     he took the training he received in helping victims of 
     catastrophes to La Plata, Maryland, as well as states that 
     had been ravaged by floods and forest fires.
       All of us at the Corporation for National and Community 
     Service, including our chairman, former Mayor Stephen 
     Goldsmith and distinguished board of directors, are 
     privileged to work with people like Mark and on issues such 
     as volunteerism, philanthropy, and national service for many 
     years now. For the first time in a long time, the values that 
     we seek to inculcate and perpetuate through programs such as 
     AmeriCorps, Senior Corps, and Learn and Serve America--
     patriotism, democratic citizenship, a concern for the 
     national purpose, the desire to give back--are on the front 
     burner of our nation's politics.
       But they won't stay there forever. Dr. Robert Putnam, 
     author of the book Bowling Alone, recently noted that: ``in 
     the aftermath of [last] September's tragedy, a window of 
     opportunity has opened for a sort of civic renewal that 
     occurs only once or twice a century. But though the crisis 
     revealed and replenished the wells of solidarity in American 
     communities, so far those wells remain untapped.''
       We should not lose the momentum toward civic connectedness 
     and service to others that came out of the terrible event 
     whose anniversary we will mark in just two weeks. Our Nation 
     still has a great need for volunteers, in homeland security 
     and in many other areas. And public service itself is a 
     responsibility that attends the privilege of life in a free 
     society. Among all that we will be called upon to remember in 
     the next two weeks, let us not forget that the ideals 
     embodied by our country are not only worth defending. They 
     are also worth serving.

     

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