[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 101 (Thursday, July 10, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9227-S9231]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[[Page S9227]]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Senate
MILITARY CONSTRUCTION APPROPRIATIONS ACT, FISCAL YEAR 2004
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I now ask unanimous consent that the
Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 177, H.R. 2559, a
bill making appropriations for military construction, family housing,
and base realignment and closure for the Department of Defense for the
fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the bill by title.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
A bill (H.R. 2559) making appropriations for military
construction, family housing, and base realignment and
closure for the Department of Defense for fiscal year ending
September 30, 2004, and for other purposes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the Senate will proceed to
the measure.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that all after
the enacting clause be stricken, the text of Calendar No. 176, S. 1357,
the Senate committee-reported bill, be inserted in lieu thereof, and
the bill, as amended, be considered as original text for the purpose of
further amendment, and that no points of order be waived by reason of
this agreement.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I yield to the Senator from Texas.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Madam President, I am very pleased to join with my
ranking member of the Military Construction Appropriations
Subcommittee, Senator Feinstein of California, in bringing forward for
the Senate's consideration the fiscal year 2004 military construction
appropriations bill. This is a bipartisan bill which received the
unanimous approval of the Committee on Appropriations.
I want to take a moment to say Senator Feinstein is in the Judiciary
markup. She is the best ranking member a chairman could ever have. We
have a great relationship. We work together well. We see things the
same way. And our priorities are the same. So this is very much our
bill together, and it would not have been nearly as easy without her
wonderful cooperation.
This is a bill that does focus on quality of life for our troops
because both Senator Feinstein and I believe it is very important at a
time like this, when we are asking so much from our troops, that we do
right by them. This bill provides $9.196 billion for military
construction, military family housing, and base realignment and closure
costs.
This bill is $79 million above the President's budget request, but
$1.5 billion below the amount appropriated last year. The budget
constraints under which we all are laboring this year did force us to
make difficult choices about our spending priorities, but I believe we
have crafted a bill that attends both to the President's most pressing
requirements and the concerns of Senators.
The bill provides $4.6 billion for military construction, $3.95
billion for military family housing, and $370 million for base
realignment and closure.
Our military forces have been severely strained by the extraordinary
burdens they have been asked to shoulder in the last several years.
They have undertaken nearly 2 years of continuous combat operations in
harsh conditions, endured long deployments and reserve activations.
They have had to deal with severe disruptions to family life resulting
from lengthy separations.
We have asked much of our service personnel and their families; and,
for that reason, we have paid special attention in this bill to
military construction projects that promote our troops' quality of
life.
For example, the bill provides $1.1 billion for 40 new, modern
barracks projects; $166 million for the design and construction of new
hospital and medical facilities; and $16 million for child development
centers to serve our military families.
The intense demands of the past few years have extended well beyond
our Active-Duty forces, and no component has borne a heavier burden in
that time than our Guard and Reserve Forces who have met the call to
duty with a high degree of professionalism.
Unfortunately, military construction for the Guard and Reserve
continues to be severely underfunded. The administration's fiscal year
budget request for Reserve components was $370 million, a little more
than half of what was appropriated last year. This is just inadequate
for the task we are asking these components to perform. As a result,
this bill increases funding for the Guard and Reserve by 87 percent to
$691 million.
This bill differs from the administration's request in only one
significant way, and that is in the area of military construction
overseas. The budget request included over $1 billion for military
construction at U.S. installations outside the United States, much of
it destined for facilities constructed for the cold war. For several
years, Congress has expressed its concern that our overseas basing
structure has not been updated to reflect the realities of the post-
cold-war world. Our Nation is dealing with new threats, new strategies,
new force structure, new deployment concepts, and new geopolitical
realities. Yet a basing structure designed for the cold war endures.
We have questioned the wisdom of continuing to expend taxpayer
dollars on overseas facilities that may not be appropriate to the
Nation's future military needs. The Defense Department continues to
study this issue and has under way an overseas basing and presence
study that will lead to, among
[[Page S9228]]
other things, recommendations for a major overhaul of the U.S. overseas
basing structure. That study is not yet complete. But in testimony
before the Military Construction Subcommittee in April, two of the
combatant commanders, General James Jones, Supreme Allied Commander
Europe, commander of U.S. European Command, and General Leon LaPorte,
commander of U.S. Forces Korea, presented their visions for military
basing in their respective areas of responsibility. General Jones
described a concept for Europe that features fewer large bases, several
smaller, more austere bases in forward locations, and greater use of
rotational forces in and out of these facilities rather than permanent
stationing of large forces with the attendant support infrastructure.
General LaPorte described a vision for Korea in which U.S. forces are
consolidated at a greatly reduced number of facilities located further
south on the Korean peninsula than at present.
We have been impressed by the combatant commanders' boldness and
creativity in reassessing basing needs, and we believe their respective
visions hold great promise for a more efficient and effective basing
structure that will enhance the ability of the United States to meet
new threats.
When fully developed, this vision will provide a sound basis on which
Congress and the administration will be able to determine the future of
our overseas basing structure. However, at this point the vision has
not yet been developed into a comprehensive plan on which decisions to
pursue new construction initiatives can prudently be based.
The overseas basing and presence study involves far more
than military facilities. According to public statements of Defense
Department officials, it will result in a dramatic change in the
disposition of U.S. forces abroad, including where they are based, how
they operate, how they move to and from their theaters of operation,
and even the number of forces deployed in specific theaters.
In various press accounts, administration officials have acknowledged
considering new bases in Australia; Navy ships ported in Vietnam;
increased U.S. presence in Malaysia and Singapore; bases in Algeria,
Morocco, and Tunisia, as well as Senegal, Ghana, Mali, and Kenya; bases
on territory of the former Soviet Union; a rotational model for
deploying forces overseas; significant reductions to force levels in
Germany; a major relocation and possible reformation of forces in the
Republic of Korea. Summarizing the extent of the changes under
consideration, the Under Secretary of Defense for policy, Douglas
Feith, stated:
Everything is going to move everywhere.
If the sweeping changes under consideration are to be implemented,
they will require extensive diplomatic efforts both in the nations in
which the United States seeks a new presence and in those where it will
reduce or reshape its presence. Because a comprehensive plan is not yet
developed, we are unwilling to recommend undertaking extensive new
military construction projects that would begin the implementation of a
plan without a thorough and deliberate review by Congress. We have been
particularly concerned about proposed projects in Europe and Korea.
For example, the budget request includes a number of projects in
areas in Germany that, according to public statements of the Army and
other Department of Defense officials, are likely to see significant
force level reductions.
In a June 23 letter updating the status of planning Europe, General
Jones said:
We have made considerable progress in determining the
installations required to support theater goals and the force
structure needed to implement our strategy. It is an arduous
process but a necessary one. While I realize fully the
importance of our progress on these matters, the timeliness,
and the effect these decisions will ultimately have on our
fiscal year 2004 military construction projects, I must tell
you candidly that we have not reached the end point of this
process. The changes we are proposing represent the most
significant undertaking to realign forces and basis in
theater in the past 50 years. The decisions made in the
coming weeks will have broad and far-reaching implications;
therefore, it is imperative that we get it right.
General Jones is absolutely right. I appreciate his candor. His
statements underscore our concern that we are not yet ready to begin
implementing the restructuring of our overseas bases in Europe. We have
similar concerns about proceeding too fast in Korea.
In the budget amendment received May 1, the administration proposed
moving some $213 million in military construction projects to a single
base, Camp Humphreys. However, nearly half of that construction is to
occur on land that the United States does not yet control. Although the
Korean National Defense Minister has pledged to try to buy the land for
our use, he is far from clear that this can occur for these projects to
be fully executed in fiscal year 2004. According to a July 7 article in
the Korea Times, there is fierce local opposition to the expansion of
U.S. presence at Camp Humphreys.
The budget amendment also asked to move a $40 million barracks
project from an airfield to Camp Humphreys, but then that was reversed.
There are other examples, but I think this is making it clear that we
don't really have a fully thought out and reviewed plan from which we
can base the needs in Korea. Evaluated against a backdrop of
uncertainty about fundamental aspects of a revised overseas basing
structure which the department has not yet proposed, the Defense
Department's overseas basing and presence plan is not yet sufficiently
mature to enable the Senate to commit to extensive new construction.
The failure to fund these projects at this time does not indicate
dissatisfaction with the general direction in which the Department is
headed. We support the direction. But we do believe that Congress
should know the extent of the restructuring and the price tag before we
determine our Nation's priorities. It would be premature to begin new
construction at this time in these areas. We look forward to receiving
and evaluating the Department's full recommendations once they become
available and taking the time to consider these changes.
Reflecting our continuing concern about this issue, our bill includes
a provision establishing an independent commission to thoroughly study
the structure of our overseas military facilities and advise Congress
on its conclusions. This commission, proposed by Senator Feinstein and
myself, would provide Congress with an independent view of the Nation's
overseas basing requirements to help inform our decisions about the
restructuring of our facilities.
The report accompanying this bill also directs the Defense Department
to submit several reports that will aid Congress in its oversight role,
including a report on the feasibility of privatization and the use of
commercial building practices in barracks construction, a study of the
impact of privatized housing on local school districts, and a report on
the Department's activities related to perchlorate, a chemical used in
solid rocket propellant that has been found in drinking water supplies
in 29 States. Senator Feinstein has more to say on perchlorate, but I
want to say, this is a concern of mine as well.
While a national standard for perchlorate levels has not yet been
established, it is important that the Department of Defense be prepared
to deal with this containment at defense installations once a standard
is agreed upon.
All of the projects added to the bill have been carefully vetted by
the military services. All are top priority for installation
commanders, and all are included in the services' future years defense
plan.
Madam President, the bill before the Senate is a bipartisan product
that was approved by the Appropriations Committee on a vote of 29 to 0.
I am pleased to offer it for the Senate's consideration.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I am pleased to join my chairman,
Senator Hutchison, in recommending the 2004 military construction bill
to the Senate.
This has been a very challenging year. The President's budget request
for military construction was $1.5 billion below last year's enacted
level, a nearly 15 percent reduction in a program that is chronically
underfunded. And this year, because of across-the-board constraints on
appropriation allocations, we had little room to maneuver beyond the
ceiling imposed by the President's budget submission.
[[Page S9229]]
The bill that we bring to the Senate provides $9.2 billion for
military construction and family housing programs for fiscal year 2004.
Within that allocation, we had to shoehorn funding for a large number
of critical programs and projects that were not adequately funded in
the President's budget request.
In addition to tight budget constraints, we were faced with another
challenge this year in determining how to deal with overseas military
construction programs at a time when the Defense Department is
proposing what has been described as the most sweeping change in
America's military presence overseas since World War II.
The President's budget request included more than $1 billion for
overseas military construction. Less than 3 months after the budget was
submitted, the Defense Department unveiled preliminary plans for a
major restructuring of forces in Europe and Korea, and sent Congress a
budget amendment to rescind or delete more than half a billion dollars
in overseas military construction programs from fiscal year 2003 and
the Fiscal Year 2004 request.
It became clear to Senator Hutchison and me that the Department was
far from finalizing its global realignment plans, and indeed, we
continue to read almost daily about different proposals for moving U.S.
forces here and there overseas. For this reason, we are recommending a
pause in funding a number of proposed construction projects in Europe
and Korea until the Defense Department completes its overseas basing
review and presents a comprehensive plan to Congress. The overseas
basing commission that Senator Hutchison and I are proposing in this
bill will provide another important layer of oversight to this process.
In Europe, central questions include how many troops will remain
permanently stationed there, what basing structure will be needed to
support them, and where and what type of forward operating bases and
forward operating locations will be needed to support rotational and
transitory forces.
In Korea, the issue of where the forces will be realigned has
apparently been settled--the U.S. is planning to withdraw troops from
Seoul and the Demilitarized Zone and move them to south central South
Korea. However, the details of that realignment have yet to be
presented to Congress, nor has the Korean government provided the land
needed for the realignment.
I am aware that the administration would prefer to bank all of the
proposed funding for the realignment of forces in Korea to keep
pressure on the South Korean government to transfer the required land
to the U.S. military. However, I believe that withholding this funding
until the U.S. has actually secured the land is an equally effective
incentive for the Korean government if, in fact, it is serious about
wanting United States military forces to move out of Seoul.
Moreover, in a year when the administration has slashed the military
construction budget by nearly 15 percent, it is unrealistic for the
Defense Department to turn around and ask Congress to wager hundreds of
millions of dollars that are urgently needed elsewhere on the Korean
Government's uncertain timetable.
We have given this matter a great deal of consideration, and I
commend Senator Hutchison for laying out the position of the
subcommittee so clearly and completely in the report accompanying our
bill. This explanation should leave no doubt in anyone's mind that the
Military Construction Subcommittee understands the importance of
maintaining strong military ties to our allies overseas and supports
the Defense Department's efforts to ensure that our overseas basing
structure reflects the international realities of the post-cold-war
environment. We look forward to helping implement the construction
elements of the new overseas basing structure once the Defense
Department completes its review.
There is another item in the Military Construction bill that is
extremely important to me, and that is the environmental clean up of
military installations. The fiscal year 2004 bill includes just $370
million for Base Realignment and Closure, BRAC, environmental cleanup.
This is a significant drop from last year's funding, and it is a level
of funding that I accept only reluctantly, and only because the Defense
Department is embarking on a new and ambitious program to raise revenue
for environmental cleanup at BRAC sites through land sales. The Navy's
BRAC budget, for example, includes $68 million above the appropriated
amount in anticipated revenue from land sales, and the Navy anticipates
that additional land sales revenue could significantly increase the
amount of money available in fiscal year 2004 for environmental
cleanup.
I believe that the Defense Department has the responsibility to
complete, to the maximum extent possible, the cleanup of military
installations closed or realigned through previous BRAC rounds before
embarking on a new BRAC round in 2005. I am hopeful that self-financing
through land sales will be sufficient to supplement appropriated
amounts, but I intend to keep a close watch on this program to ensure
that we do not sacrifice momentum by relying too heavily on land sale
revenue.
Madam President, I also want to comment on an issue that I have been
fighting since this last winter. It is the problem of perchlorate
contamination in our country's drinking water. This topic is relevant
to the Department of Defense and Military Construction Appropriations
as Defense, along with the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, uses 90 percent of the perchlorate produced in the
United States.
Perchlorate, a chemical used in solid rocket propellant, explosives
and munitions has been identified by the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) as an unregulated toxin. No national standard exists for
perchlorate. Perchlorate contamination has been found in drinking water
supplies in 29 States, including Arizona, California, Texas, Colorado,
Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, and New Mexico. More than 300
groundwater wells in California alone are contaminated with
perchlorate, as is the Colorado River, which supplies drinking water to
more than 15 million people in the Southwest.
I am alarmed about the potential impact of perchlorate contamination
at installations that have been closed through the BRAC process as well
as at active and inactive Defense sites or where perchlorate has
migrated off of current and former Defense or contractor properties to
threaten public water supplies.
I am also very disappointed that the Department of Defense has been
unresponsive to requests to take a positive leadership role in
addressing the concerns of the public and the immediate needs of water
agencies large and small as perchlorate is detected in more and more
locations. It is also distressing that the Department is resisting the
obvious need to test for the presence of perchlorate at BRAC properties
or other Defense sites.
The Department of Defense has a moral obligation to the public to
address the problem now as the water agencies that have to close wells,
or treat their water supplies, are faced with a real problem today.
This problem is a result of the activities of the Department or its
contractors.
The language I worked to include in the Military Construction
Subcommittee report moves the Department of Defense toward addressing
the perchlorate problem. This language directs the Department to submit
to the Congressional Defense Appropriation Committees the following:
A report on the activities of the Interagency Perchlorate Steering
Committee and the activities of the Department on perchlorate as
described in the Memo of January 24, 2001 from the Under Secretary of
Defense for Environmental Security to the Secretaries of the military
departments and the Defense Logistics Agency.
Identification of sources of perchlorate contamination at BRAC
properties and to develop a plan to remediate perchlorate contamination
on BRAC sites that can be implemented rapidly once state or Federal
perchlorate standards are set.
Finally, I want to address an issue covered in the report where I
believe the report language was not wholly accurate, and which I intend
to attempt to clarify in conference.
The existing language says, ``The Committee recognizes that, absent a
state or Federal standard for perchlorate, the Department of Defense is
[[Page S9230]]
under no obligation to remediate perchlorate contamination at defense
sites.''
It is more accurate to say that absent a State or Federal standard
for perchlorate, there is uncertainty as to the level of perchlorate
cleanup that would be required at each site, but there still is a legal
obligation to remediate perchlorate contamination under Federal and
State statutes including the Comprehensive Environmental Response,
Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) and California's Carpenter-
Presley-Tanner Hazardous Substance Account Act. Remediation would then
proceed on the basis of a site-specific risk assessment or other
criteria such as an Applicable, Relevant and Appropriate Requirement.
Madam President, as I stated earlier, this has been a challenging
year. Senator Hutchison and I were faced with a difficult set of
circumstances and a series of hard choices. We were able to develop a
military construction program that comes within the constraints of the
budget resolution, but I hope that the administration understands the
importance of infrastructure as a key element of readiness and quality
of life, and will present Congress with a more realistic budget request
next year.
I thank the members of my Appropriations Committee staff, Christina
Evans, and B.G. Wright, and to Chris Thompson of my personal staff for
their hard work on this bill. Also, I wish to express my appreciation
to Dennis Ward, of Senator Hutchison's staff for his cooperative and
bipartisan effort throughout this process.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada is recognized.
Mr. REID. As I said earlier today, the work Senator Durbin has done
on the legislative appropriations bill is, of course, exemplary, as was
Senator Feinstein's, the ranking member of the subcommittee.
As the Senator from Texas knows, last year I made a statement on the
floor about the great work these two fine Senators had done on the
military construction appropriations bill. My feelings have not
changed. I think they have done an excellent job.
I had the honor of also chairing the subcommittee in years past. It
is an extremely interesting subcommittee. It does so many important
things for the men and women representing this country.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona is recognized.
Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I rise briefly to make a few remarks
about the military construction appropriations bill, and,
uncharacteristically, I commend the Appropriations Committee--
especially Chairman Stevens and Chairperson Hutchison, as well as the
other members of the committee--for reporting out a bill with the
lowest number of earmarks I have seen in a long time.
The military construction appropriations bill for fiscal year 2004
has $80 million of unrequested and unauthorized military construction
projects. Obviously, that is a lot of money. But I point out, to the
great credit of the sponsors of this legislation on both sides of the
aisle, it is far less than what was added last year, which was $900
billion.
What is egregious and objectionable in this year's military
construction appropriations bill that I have not seen to this degree in
previous years is the extent to which the appropriators earmarked
projects in the unspecified minor construction accounts--totaling $80
million. The authorization committee, once again, was circumvented and
the President's budget was not requested. But the fact is that this is
a much smaller number than before.
In an effort to contain the wasteful spending inherent in member-
requested construction projects, I sponsored, and the Senate adopted,
merit-based criteria for evaluating member adds as a part of the fiscal
year 1995 Defense Authorization Act. The criteria are:
One, the project is in service's future years defense plan.
Two, the project is mission essential.
Three, the project can be put under contract in the current fiscal
year.
Four, the project doesn't conflict with base realignment proposals.
Five, the service can offset the proposed expenditure within that
year's budget request.
These criteria have been useful in our efforts to determine programs
of merit or nonmerit.
Regarding the reduction in the amount of member adds in this
legislation, there are, of course, a couple we have found that I found
at least somewhat entertaining. While some of our soldiers and sailors
have been on food stamps, we have found a way to provide $1.4 million
to replace a working dog kennel. It is good to see that Fido has not
been left out of this year's military construction appropriations.
Having said that, I am grateful to my friends on both sides of the
aisle, including the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and the
chairperson of the Military Construction Subcommittee, for their
arduous work on the bill and their continued unequaled support for our
men and women in the military. Their attention and commitment to
supporting only necessary projects that are high priorities of the
services is exemplary this year, in my view.
I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of the
projects that were add-ons--not leaving out the replacement of the
working dog kennel.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
Alaska:
Army:
Fort Wainwright:
Chapel Expansion................................................1.5
Gymnasium Addition..............................................1.5
Fort Richardson Replace Ship Creek Bridge.......................1.5
Donnelly Training Area Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Maintenance Facil1.5
Air Force:
Elmendorf AFB:
Repair Alaska Command Headquarters..............................3.0
Replace Working Dog Kennel......................................1.4
Army National Guard:
Angoon, White Mountain Federal Scout Readiness Center...........1.0
Manokotak, Toksook Bay Napaskiak Federal Scout Storage Facilitie0.2
Air National Guard:
Kulis Mobility Storage Warehouse Addition.......................1.0
California:
Air Force:
Travis AFB Air Mobility Operations Group [AMOG] Global Reach
Deployment Center.............................................1.4
Army National Guard:
Sacramento Readiness Center.....................................0.3
Air Force Reserve:
March Air Reserve Base Upgrade Utilities........................1.4
Colorado:
Defense Wide:
Denver DoD Hospital [Tricare]...................................4.0
Florida:
Navy:
Pensacola NAS Blue Angels Hanger................................1.4
Hawaii:
Navy:
Pacific Missile Range Facility Range Operations Complex.........1.3
Defense Wide:
Honolulu Tripler Army Hospital, Biomedical Center...............4.6
Idaho:
Army National Guard:
Gowen Field TASS Barracks.......................................1.1
Illinois:
Army National Guard:
Marseilles Pistol Range Replacement.............................1.1
Iowa:
Army National Guard:
Camp Dodge Readiness Center.....................................1.5
Iowa City Readiness Center/Maintenance Shop.....................0.8
Kentucky:
Army
Fort Knox Dining Facilities Renovation..........................0.2
Fort Campbell
Urban Assault Course............................................0.2
Conversion of Former Officer's Club.............................1.5
Louisiana:
Air Force Reserve:
Barksdale AFB Squadron Operations Center........................0.4
Maryland:
Navy:
Craderock Naval Special Warfare Center Engineering Management and
Logistics Facility............................................1.5
Indian Head Naval Special Warfare Center Joint Explosive Ordnance
Disposal Technology Support Facility..........................1.2
Mississippi:
Army National Guard:
Monticello Readiness Center.....................................0.5
Pascagoula Readiness Center.....................................0.4
Missouri:
Army National Guard
Whiteman AFB Aviation Support Facility..........................1.8
Montana:
Air Force:
Malstrom AFB
Addition/Alteration to Fitness Center...........................0.7
Corrosion Control Facility......................................0.5
[[Page S9231]]
Nebraska:
Army National Guard
Grand Island Aviation Support Facility..........................1.6
New Hampshire:
Navy:
Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Structural Shop Consolidation.........1.5
Norfolk Naval Shipyard Suspect Cargo Handling Facility..........1.4
New Jersey:
Army:
Fort Monmouth Battery Test Facility.............................0.2
Air Force:
Lakehurst Combat Offload Ramp...................................0.4
New Mexico:
Air Force:
Holloman AFB War Reserve Material Storage Facility..............1.0
New York:
Army National Guard
Rochester Aviation Support Facility.............................1.6
Nevada:
Army:
Hawthorne Army Depot Water Treatment Facility...................3.0
North Dakota:
Air National Guard:
Fargo Repair Maintenance Shop...................................1.4
Ohio:
Army National Guard:
Hamilton Organizational Maintenance Shops.......................1.5
Air Force:
Wright-Patterson AFB Fire Crash Rescue Station..................1.0
Oregon:
Air National Guard:
Klamath Falls Munitions Administration Facility.................1.4
Pennsylvania:
Air Force Reserve:
Pittsburgh Air Reserve Station Headquarters Building, 911th Airlift
Wing..........................................................0.7
Rhode Island:
Army National Guard:
Kingston, Aviation Support Facility.............................2.0
South Carolina:
Air Force:
Charleston AFB Child Development Center.........................0.5
South Dakota:
Army National Guard:
Watertown Readiness Center......................................1.2
Sioux Falls Unit Training Equipment Site........................0.8
Texas:
Army:
Fort Bliss:
Chaffee (Main) Gate.............................................0.9
Robert E. Lee (Main) Gate.......................................1.2
Tactical Equipment Shop.........................................0.6
Red River Army Depot Wheeled Vehicle Rebuild Facility...........2.9
Air Force:
Lackland AFB Addition/Alteration to Training Annex Fire Station.1.0
Elevated Basic Military Training [BMT] Troop Walk at Carswell
Avenue........................................................0.8
Laughlin AFB:
Fire Department Addition........................................0.5
Squadron Operations Facility....................................0.2
Goodfellow AFB Fitness Center...................................1.5
Utah:
Air Force:
Hill Air Force Base Consolidated Software Support Facility......1.7
Washington:
Air Force:
Fairchild AFB Mission Support Complex...........................1.2
Vermont:
Army National Guard:
Colchester, Camp Johnson Information Systems Facility...........0.5
Air National Guard:
Burlington Air Mobilization Facility............................0.4
West Virginia:
Defense Wide:
Birdgeport Biometrics Training Center...........................1.4
Air National Guard:
Martinsburg C-5 Upgrades........................................5.0
Wisconsin:
Army Reserve:
Eau Claire Reserve Center.......................................0.6
BUY AMERICA
Sec. 108. Prohibits the procurement of steel unless American producers,
fabricators, and manufacturers have been allowed to compete.
Sec. 112. Establishes preference for American contractors for military
construction in the United States territories and possessions in
the Pacific and on Kwajalein Atoll, or in the Arabian Sea.
TOTAL MEMBER ADDS--$80.1 million
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas is recognized.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Madam President, I thank the kinder and gentler
Senator from Arizona. I am very pleased that he looked at our bill and
found that we did meet the criteria because that is exactly what we
intended to do.
The kennel is for dogs at an Air Force base. The dogs are security
dogs, and they do need a place to stay.
Mr. McCAIN. Might I ask where that is located?
Mrs. HUTCHISON. At Elmendorf Air Force Base. I think the Senator
knows that is in Alaska. Dogs in Alaska need a place to stay, too.
Maybe it is cold up there and they need shelter. I think it is
certainly legitimate.
With that, we did work hard to make the priorities that we thought
were right for our military personnel. No one deserves better treatment
right now than the military personnel of our country. I thank the
Senator from Arizona for his continuing interest in assuring that our
military personnel have a quality of life. That has been his hallmark
here.
I thank, once again, the chairman of the committee, Senator Stevens,
and Senator Inouye, the ranking member, Senator Byrd, Senator
Feinstein, my ranking member, and our respective staffs. I am very
proud of the work we did on the bill, and I do hope our military
personnel do see better health care facilities, better barracks, better
living quarters, and from this legislation I think they will.
Mr. REID. Madam President, I wonder if the Senator from Arizona has
looked over the managers' package on this bill including 15 different
items.
I am only kidding.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Madam President, to clarify the record, and before
the Senator from Arizona turns into the ``Incredible Hulk,'' there was
no managers' amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska is recognized.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, when the Senators brought this bill to
the full committee--Senators Hutchison and Feinstein--I was totally
astounded at the consensus on this bill. This is a fairly difficult
bill and there are difficult decisions in which the House may not
concur. But the two Senators managing the bill proposed decisions for
the Senate to which not one Senator has objected. I think that is
really a milestone in dealing with this bill.
I congratulate the Senator from Texas and the Senator from California
not only for their work product but for their work ethic, working
together as a bipartisan team on a very difficult subject. I hope we
can bring the bill back from the conference as it stands. I am not sure
we can, but it certainly is an extremely good work product dealing with
a whole myriad of subjects that affect our bases at home and abroad,
and I congratulate the Senators for a marvelous job.
Madam President, we are close to wrap-up. I ask unanimous consent we
temporarily set aside the pending business, and Senator Dayton be
allowed to make a statement about Iraq for 15 minutes while we prepare
the wrap-up for this evening.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Madam President, before we move off this bill, I so
appreciate the chairman's remarks. We could not have done it without
our excellent staff work. On the majority staff, Dennis Ward has done
an incredible job of research. He is the most thorough person we could
have on the committee. I appreciate him very much.
Also, Christina Evans and B.G. Wright on Senator Feinstein's staff,
without their working relationship being so good, we could not have
done so well. I wanted to add that to the record before we moved away
from the bill.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, for the information of the Senate, I am
informed we will open the Senate tomorrow at 9:15 a.m. We will have 15
minutes of debate and then proceed to the three votes that will be
stacked at that time.
I renew my request to permit the Senator to speak as in morning
business for 15 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Minnesota.
____________________