[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 2 (Wednesday, January 8, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E38]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                CARE 21

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. NICK J. RAHALL II

                            of west virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, January 8, 2003

  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, today I am reintroducing legislation to 
restore our Nation's historic commitment to insuring lifetime health 
care for retired coal miners. Joining me in introducing this bill is 
the distinguished gentleman from Ohio, Bob Ney. Indeed, last year the 
House of Representatives passed the legislation we are reintroducing 
today. However, the other body did not take action on it prior to 
adjournment of the 107th Congress.
  Enactment this year of CARE 21, the ``Coal Accountability and Retired 
Employee Act for the 21st Century,'' is essential if we are to avoid 
seeing a curtailment in health care coverage for thousands of retired 
coal miners and their widows. This would not be the first time that 
Congress acted in this matter. In 1992, in what is known as the ``Coal 
Act'' enacted as part of the Energy Policy Act, Congress established 
the UMWA Combined Benefit Fund (CBF) combining the union's 1950 and 
1974 benefit plans. This action came in response to changes in the coal 
industry which created a large class of ``orphaned'' miners whose 
benefits were no longer being paid by an active coal company. A key 
feature of the Coal Act was the financing of orphaned miner health care 
costs through an annual transfer of a portion of the interest which 
accrues to the unappropriated balance in the Abandoned Mine Reclamation 
Fund.
  Simply put, in restoring abandoned coal mine lands we must not 
abandon the retired coal miner.
  The Coal Act has worked well with health care for retirees whose 
former employers could be identified financed by premiums paid by those 
companies while providing for a transfer of reclamation fund interest 
to finance orphaned miner care.
  However, a barrage of litigation, adverse court decisions and 
skyrocketing health care costs is now threatening the financial 
integrity of the program. The result: Without a new source of funds, 
the CBF faces a deficit which if it continues could force curtailments 
in health care coverage for some 50,000 retirees and widows whose 
average age is 78.
  CARE 21 takes a relatively simple and straightforward approach to 
addressing this impending crisis: It would lift the restriction in 
current law that reclamation fund interest can only be used for 
orphaned miner health care. Instead, it would allow interest transfers 
to be made for the purpose of offsetting any deficit in net assets in 
the CBF.
  One of the key features of CARE 21 is that the general taxpayer is 
not being called upon to pay for retired coal miner health care, but 
rather, the coal industry itself would provide for this coverage 
through the interest which accrues to the fees it pays into the 
Abandoned Mine Reclamation Fund.
  Mr. Speaker, I noted earlier there is a historical commitment to 
providing health care for retired coal miners. This is a unique 
situation in that what would normally be a matter solely for the 
private sector is not in this instance. The genesis for this situation 
dates back to 1946 in an agreement between then-UMW President John L. 
Lewis and the federal government to resolve a long-running labor 
dispute. At the time, President Truman had ordered the Interior 
Secretary to take possession of all bituminous coal mines in the 
country in an effort to break a United Mine Workers of America strike. 
Eventually, Lewis and Secretary Julius Krug reached an agreement that 
included an industry-wide, miner controlled health plan.
  In fact, the 1992 Coal Act itself was formulated partly on the basis 
of recommendations from the Coal Commission, established by former 
Labor Secretary Libby Dole, which in 1990 recommended a statutory 
obligation to help finance the UMWA's Health Benefit Funds.
  Mr. Speaker, the people covered by this health care program spent 
their careers producing the energy which powered this Nation to 
greatness. We must not forsake them. We must not cast them adrift in 
their later years, robbed of the health care they so desperately need.

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