[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 154 (Friday, November 18, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13300-S13302]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
UNANIMOUS CONSENT AGREEMENT--CONFERENCE REPORT TO ACCOMPANY H.R. 2528
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be
1 hour of debate equally divided between the two managers in relation
to the conference report to accompany H.R. 2528, the Military Quality
of Life and Veterans Affairs appropriations bill. I further ask consent
that following the use or yielding back of time, and when the Senate
then receives the conference report, it be immediately considered, and
the conference report be adopted, with the motion to reconsider laid
upon the table.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I believe what we bring before the
Senate today is a product worthy of our support. The conference report
has been crafted under two different approaches. What I believe has
emerged is not only a good compromise but also makes strides in both
oversight and policy. What has emerged is a solid recommendation.
I thank my chairman, Senator Cochran, for his leadership. This
subcommittee faced some extreme budgetary shortfalls, and without his
leadership, and basically allocating more resources to this committee,
we would not be able to bring this conference report to the Senate
today.
I also especially thank my ranking member, Senator Feinstein, for her
constant support and willingness to work together. I thank her staff as
well: Christian Evans, B.G. Wright, and Chad Schulken for their hard
work and professionalism, along with my great staff, Tammy Cameron,
Dennis Balkham, and Sean Knowles. It has been a team effort and I
appreciate that so much.
The military construction portion of our bill provides $6.2 billion
for military construction, $5.1 billion of which is for Active
Component construction, and $1.1 billion for Reserve Component
construction. It also includes $4 billion for family housing. There is
$1.75 billion for BRAC implementation and cleanup for both 2005 and
prior rounds. The conference agreement also provides necessary services
for our service men and women and their families, not only enabling
them to effectively do their jobs, but also providing an improved
quality of life in our military communities. This is important for many
reasons. Of course, it is the right thing to do for our military. It is
also the smart thing to do with our tax dollars. In this time of war
and frequent deployments, recruiting and retention, maintaining a ready
and available workforce is very much on the minds of our military
leaders. We often say, in this era of an All Volunteer Force: You
recruit individuals, but you retain families. The quality-of-life
improvements that make our military communities great places to live
are crucial in the retention of military families. Within this
conference report before you, we fund projects that will improve the
lives of those families. We fund 11 family housing privatization
projects, which will provide high-quality, market-standard housing for
nearly 15,000 military families; 39 barracks projects that will get our
single soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines out of substandard living
conditions, or, in some cases, off ships and into first-rate
facilities; and schools, child development centers, and family support
centers that will ensure our servicemembers' children and spouses are
cared for, are included in this bill.
These improvements make it easier for troops to deploy, to focus on
their day-to-day jobs, while giving them the peace of mind that comes
with knowing their families and homes are taken care of, so they can
give their attention to the job we are asking them to do--protecting
America. The conference report provides the first piece to the most
recent BRAC round. With the funds provided, it places priority on those
funds which are critical to carrying out BRAC, while providing the
necessary financial oversight of the resources provided.
For our veterans, we have fully funded the President's request for
veterans benefits and health care. This has not been easy. House and
Senate conferees have provided $22.547 billion for medical services,
which includes $1.225 billion in emergency funding to fully meet the
President's amended request for medical care for the country's
veterans. This conference has strongly responded to the VA's recent
budgetary shortfall by putting in place stringent financial reporting
requirements in an effort to avoid the repeat of budget crises
witnessed this summer in VA health care.
We have fully funded the request for medical facilities and
infrastructure, totaling $3.3 billion for fiscal year 2006. We have
created three Centers of Excellence for mental health care, while at
the same time fully funding health care for post traumatic stress
disorder and other mental health care throughout the VA.
The conference has funded medical and prosthetic research at $412
million, which is $19 million more than the President's request. This
is important because we know many of our troops coming home from Iraq
and Afghanistan are suffering from loss of limbs, to a greater extent
than we have seen before. So we want the research to make sure the
prostheses they have make
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them fully ambulatory and able to function in the rest of their lives.
The conference takes the unprecedented step of providing $15 million
specifically dedicated to Gulf War Illness research for this year and
the next 4 fiscal years, fulfilling the Research Advisory Commission's
recommendations on Gulf War Illness. This is a disease for which we
must determine the cause so we can treat the one in six who returned
from the Gulf War with these symptoms and protect future service men
and women from contracting this disorder.
The conference report before you today establishes a new account
within the VA dedicated to information technology systems. Not only
does this new account provide for increased oversight and consolidated
information technology efforts within the VA, it codifies the new
position of a VA Chief Information Officer and subsequent
reorganization. I believe this is a critical step toward helping the VA
achieve success in medical recordkeeping and medical record
availability. Its HealtheVet-electronic patient records project paid
great dividends during the recent hurricanes.
In fact, the conference report has also responded to the recent
hurricanes by providing the VA authority to establish an Assistant
Secretary for Disaster Preparedness, something which will enable the VA
to better respond to future disaster situations.
Finally, we have provided $1 million over the President's request for
the American Battle Monuments Commission for an environmental study to
save the eroding monument at Normandy Cemetery.
All in all, I believe the conference report before the Senate
provides much-needed resources and does so while maximizing our limited
resources in meeting the greatest needs of our military, their
families, and our veterans.
On a personal note, I want to say I have worked very closely with
Secretary Jim Nicholson of the VA, and I know of his dedication to
doing what is right for our veterans, something we all wish to do. I
appreciate his leadership. We owe our active-duty military, our Guard
and Reserves, who stand ready to serve, and our veterans, who have
served, the care of our country. We have achieved these goals in the
conference report today.
Therefore, I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this conference
report.
Mr. President, I yield to my ranking member, Senator Feinstein.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I am very pleased to join my chairman,
Senator Hutchison, in recommending this 2006 Military Construction,
Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies appropriations conference report
to the Senate. This is the first year that MILCON has added
dramatically to its portfolio, and I want to compliment the chairman of
our committee, and I want to compliment her staff for what has been, I
think--on what could have been a very difficult bill--a very
bipartisan, constructive, team-like, problem-solving effort. I only
wish we had more of it in the Senate. But I want the chairman to know
how much I am grateful to her for her leadership, and I want her staff
to know that as well.
I also thank Chairman Cochran--what Senator Hutchison said was right
about the amount of money--and also Senator Byrd for their leadership
and diligence in getting this bill through conference and to the Senate
floor.
As the chairman said, the conference report before us today is a
first. It provides for the infrastructure needs of our military and the
health care and other needs of our veterans.
The bill is a big one. It is an $82.57 billion bill. It includes
$12.167 billion for MILCON, family housing, environmental cleanup;
$70.25 billion for veterans' benefits and health care--that is the big
addition--and $157.6 million for several related agencies.
Of the many vital programs the Senator elucidated as funded in this
conference report, none is more important than the funding we provide
to meet the medical needs of our Nation's veterans. As a Senator from a
State with the largest population of veterans in the Nation, I cannot
overstate the importance of this issue. We have to support our veterans
to the fullest extent possible.
The conference report before us today provides $22.547 billion for
veterans medical services. Included in that level is $1.225 billion in
contingent emergency funding to make up the projected shortfall in the
President's original budget request. The Senate had sought a higher
level of funding, and it was my sincere hope that the House, which had
zero emergency funding for veterans in its version of the bill, would
have agreed to our position and accepted the full amount provided in
the Senate bill. That did not happen. But given the huge disparity
between the House and Senate funding proposals, the level of funding
provided in the conference report is a good start. I commend, again,
the chairman for her hard work--for the cooperation of Senator Cochran,
chairman of the Appropriations Committee--in bridging the enormous gap
between the two bills and ensuring that the conference report did not
shortchange our veterans. I do not believe it does shortchange our
veterans.
The proposed funding for VA medical services is equal to the level of
funding the administration has said it needs for fiscal year 2006. That
is clearly a good start. But it offers--and it has to be pointed out--
no safety net to our veterans, should the VA's budget once again prove
to be wrong. This is a worrisome prospect. Hopefully, the
administration got it right this time and the funding will be
sufficient, but everyone should know that we will be watching.
Additionally, there is much talk floating around the Capitol of an
across-the-board cut to discretionary programs. I would like to be
clear to everyone, any across-the-board cut to VA medical services will
mean cuts in health care for veterans. There is no other way around it.
We can't allow it to happen.
As I noted earlier, the medical services proposal includes the $1.225
billion in contingent emergency funding. This means the administration
will have to designate the funding as an emergency before it is
apportioned to the VA. I want to send this message loud and clear to
the administration: Do not sit on this funding and force the VA to have
to begin rationing health care. We will not stand for that.
The MILCON portion of the report provides $12.17 billion to fund
state-of-the-art facilities. The Senator has mentioned some of them--
barracks, housing for military families, and other vital infrastructure
for servicemembers around the world.
Army projects were increased by 19 percent; Air Force, by 18 percent;
and the Navy, by nearly 8 percent. When enacted, this bill will fund
Active-component MILCON at $5.1 billion. We were also able to provide
significant increases in funding for Reserve-component MILCON. This is
important at a time when our Reserve Forces are being asked to do more
than ever before and, in many cases, are being deployed to combat zones
overseas multiple times. Ensuring that these troops have adequate
facilities in which to train and maintain their equipment is crucial to
the success of their mission. To that end, the conferees agreed to
increase funding for Army Guard projects by 60 percent, a substantial
amount; for Air Guard projects by 83 percent over the President's
budget request. In fact, overall funding for Reserve components was
increased by 52 percent over the President's budget request, dedicating
$1.1 billion for new facilities for our Reserve bases. That is
important, and it means that this committee has done an excellent job
in recognizing the need.
In summary, I once again thank my chairman, Senator Hutchison. I not
only enjoy her collegiality but her friendship as well. I want her to
know that that means a great deal to me. I thank Chairman Cochran and
Senator Byrd for their leadership. And I would like to thank our staffs
who really worked in what I like to believe is a hallmark, sometimes,
of this great body, which is bipartisanship. They have shown an
unfailing spirit of cooperation. So thank you, Tammy Cameron, Sean
Knowles, and Dennis Balkham for Senator Hutchison, and Christine Evans,
B. G. Wright, Chad Schulken, and Chris Thompson of my staff.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Chambliss). The Senator from Texas.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, collegiality and bipartisanship is a
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two-way street. You can't do it if only one person wants to do the
right thing. I have worked with Senator Feinstein. She has been
chairman of our committee, and I have been ranking member. I have been
chairman, and she has been ranking member. We have always come together
to do what is right for the military personnel who are defending our
country as we speak today. We both believe in quality of life, good
housing, good health care facilities, good childcare facilities, and
all the things that we can provide in the purview of our bill. And now
we have the veterans, which has been added to our bill this year, which
is a great opportunity for us to continue to say thank you to those who
have preserved the freedom for our generation.
We have come together on the goals, and I could not ask for a better
partner.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Texas.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. I so appreciate that we can do this in the Senate,
which is what we ought to be doing in every committee. I hope by our
ability to do this--frankly, the Appropriations Committee, in general,
does so--we will be able to create a better America for all of our
constituents.
I thank the Chair and yield back all of my time.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I do, as well, Mr. President.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, we have already passed the resolution.
When it comes from the House, we have deemed that it would be passed
here.
With that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
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