[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 41 (Monday, March 29, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3297-S3298]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mrs. FEINSTEIN (for herself, Mr. Domenici, Mrs. Boxer, and Mr. 
        Dayton):
  S. 2253. A bill to permit young adults to perform projects to prevent 
fire and suppress fires, and provide disaster relief, on public land 
through a Healthy Forest Youth Conservation Corps; to the Committee on 
Energy and Natural Resources.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce a bill with 
Senators Domenici, Boxer, and Dayton to allow youth service and 
conservation corps to partner with public land management agencies to 
restore and protect public lands threatened by severe fire. I have 
dubbed this public-private partnership the Healthy Forests Youth 
Conservation Corps.
  Last year, I authored a similar provision that was included in the 
Senate version of the Healthy Forest legislation. Unfortunately, this 
provision was stripped out of the bill before it was signed into law.
  First, this bill aims to help Federal, State, and local governments 
implement priority projects using the cost-saving resources of youth 
corps.
  It is estimated that youth corps generate $1.60 in immediate benefits 
for every dollar in costs. This figure is important given the great 
need and cost associated with fighting fires.
  Every year, land management agencies are charged with conserving, 
protecting, and maintaining millions of acres of public land. This is a 
daunting task that requires an incredible amount of human and material 
resources.
  For instance, the Federal Government, alone, is responsible for 
overseeing 689 million acres of this land. Last year, five Federal 
agencies reported spending $1.6 billion in 2002 on fire fighting 
suppression efforts--a whopping $300 million more than the previous 
record. To fight those fires, 28,000 fire and support personnel were 
activated--the maximum civilian resources available in the Forest 
Service on top of the 600 Army troops, and 950 foreign firefighters who 
joined in the effort.
  As an example of what can happen in one State, consider last year's 
catastrophic wildfires in southern California. Before they were 
contained, the deadly fires of last fall scorched a total of 738,158 
acres, killed 23 people, and destroyed approximately 3,626 homes and 
thousands of other structures--amounting to the most costly and 
devastating fire ever to hit California. The insurance payouts alone 
will cost more than $3 billion, with public expenditures to fight the 
fires and recover from them running into the hundreds of millions of 
dollars.
  And those statistics make no mention of the resources expended to 
fight fires in other States.
  I want to prevent this type of catastrophe in the future. That is why 
I was an ardent supporter of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act that 
was signed into law last year.
  I also believe that we must use every resource at our disposal to 
meet this challenge. In my opinion, youth service and conversation 
corps can play a significant role in reducing the physical and 
financial strain that public land management agencies bear and help 
protect our Nation's public lands from wildfires.
  Secondly, this bill allows young people, particularly those youth who 
are people of color, low income, or are at high risk of dropping out of 
school, to integrate themselves into their communities and to learn 
skills that could lead to jobs or a greater interest in higher 
education in the future.
  I have seen firsthand the benefits that youth corps bring to their 
communities and the difference that the work can make in the lives of 
at-risk youth.
  In 1983, I founded the first urban youth corps as mayor of San 
Francisco, and during that time I saw a great improvement in the 
quality of life of the corps members and of the city itself.
  When we first began the program, we ran it on a million-dollar budget 
employing 36 disadvantaged young people ranging in age between 18 and 
23 years old who needed some direction, wanted a challenge, and wanted 
to make themselves socially useful.
  That first year, we paid corps members $3.35 an hour to repair 
bathrooms in affordable housing for senior citizens and ex-offenders, 
build a park in Hunter's Point, clear scotch broom from the Twin Peaks 
hillside, and fix up Alcatraz Island. And in the 21 years since the 
program began, it has grown into a multisite, multifaceted agency that 
engages more than 500 young adults annually who have completed over 3.5 
million hours of community service.
  It has given thousands of corps members a sense of personal pride, 
helped to connect them with their community and see for themselves that 
hard work pays off.
  I started the San Francisco Conservation Corps to help young people 
break out of the cycle of poverty and crime and improve their job 
skills by giving them guidance and support through labor-intensive 
activities.
  For this same reason, I am introducing this bill with the hope that 
the success of the San Francisco Conservation Corps can be duplicated 
nationwide.
  Specifically, this bill does the following: It authorizes the 
Agriculture and Interior Secretaries to enter into contracts or 
cooperative agreements with existing State, local, and nonprofit youth 
conservation corps to carry out land management initiatives on public 
lands.
  It directs the Secretaries to give priority for projects that will 
reduce hazardous fuels on public land, restore land located in near 
municipal watersheds and municipal waters supplies, rehabilitate land 
affected or altered by fire, assess lands afflicted or imminently 
threatened by disease or insect infestation, work to address windthrown 
land or at high risk of reburn, provide emergency assistance and 
disaster relief to communities.
  It allows the Secretaries to grant, at their discretion, 
noncompetitive hiring status for corps alumni for future Federal 
hiring.
  It authorizes $25 million for the alliance for fiscal year 2005-
fiscal year 2009.
  I know this program will not take all of the burden off public land 
management agencies as they work to protect and restore public lands, 
and I know this program will not reach every disadvantaged young person 
in need of guidance and support. But it is a start and I urge my 
colleagues to join me in my efforts.

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