[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 115 (Tuesday, July 28, 2009)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2050-E2051]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EARMARK DECLARATION
______
HON. BILL SHUSTER
of pennsylvania
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Mr. SHUSTER. Madam Speaker, consistent with the Republican
Leadership's policy on earmarks, I am submitting this statement.
Requesting Member: Congressman Bill Shuster (PA-9)
Bill Number: H.R. 3326--Department of Defense Appropriations Act, FY
2010
Defense Appropriations Projects
Project Name: Cadmium Emissions Reduction--Letterkenny Army Depot
Account: RDTE, A
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Mountain Research, LLC
Address of Requesting Entity: 825 25th Street, Altoona, PA 16601
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding: $1,000,000
for Cadmium Emissions Reduction--Letterkenny Army Depot
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because this work
will help Letterkenny Army Depot conduct environmental management
activities in an environmentally and fiscally sound, sustainable
manner.
Letterkenny's unique mission, which includes manufacturing, depot
level maintenance, and demilitarization, presents significant
challenges to maintaining operations while achieving aggressive
sustainability targets and goals. Specifically, this project will
assist in addressing federal and state regulatory issues associated
with the reduction of cadmium levels in waste water affluent outflows.
This technology implementation will also serve as a demonstration site
to facilitate horizontal technology transfer to surrounding
Pennsylvania military installations, other Army depots, and
installations across the Department of Defense.
Project Name: Defense Support for Civil Authorities for Key Resource
Protection
Account: RDTE, A
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: L. Robert Kimball & Associates
Address of Requesting Entity: 615 West Highland Avenue, Ebensburg, PA
15931
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding: $1,000,000
for Defense Support for Civil Authorities for Key Resource Protection
The Defense Support for Civil Authorities (DSCA) for Key Resource
Protection--South Central, PA project is part of efforts led by U.S.
Army ARDEC at Picatinny, New Jersey combing and harmonizing a number of
Homeland Defense and Homeland Security programs under the umbrella of
Project National Shield (PNS). The National Infrastructure Protection
Plan (NIPP) mandates a coordinated approach to Critical Infrastructure
and Key Resources (CIKR) protection roles and responsibilities for
federal, state, local, tribal, and private sector security partners.
The ability to sense, detect and respond to threats to CIKR will
require regional communication and information sharing capabilities.
The fundamental geospatial data needed to manage CIKR risk and
establish the framework for assessing consequences, vulnerability, and
threat information is available in jurisdictions across the country.
Not available, however, are Enterprise Geographic Information Systems
(EGIS) that span political jurisdictions, regions or states and can
produce the comprehensive, systematic, and rational assessment of
national or sector risk.
South Central Pennsylvania houses a major freight transportation hub
(CSX railway) and Army weapons depot (Letterkenny) within miles of each
other. This proposal will establish EGIS in South Central PA to advance
NIPP objectives. Response-specific intelligence will provide emergency
responders and homeland defense personnel with essential situational
awareness information required to protect critical infrastructure.
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because it meets a
critical Army need to improve Homeland Defense and Civil Support
missions while also providing enhanced capabilities to local
constituencies in the communications and networking side of emergency
response. Specifically, the program represents the actual full
deployment of a critical network that will allow local Emergency
Management personnel and first responders to communicate as well as
provide for a tie in to the Army's Emergency Operations Center at
Picatinny Arsenal.
Project Name: Nurse Education Center of Excellent for Remote and
Medically Underserved Populations
Account: RDTE, A
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Saint Francis University
Address of Requesting Entity: 117 Evergreen Drive, Loretto, PA 15940
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding:
$2,000,000 for Nurse Education Center of Excellence for Remote and
Medically Underserved Populations (CERMUSA)
This project will allow CERMUSA to collaborate with clinical partners
and other key Army stakeholders to develop and implement a multi-
pronged strategy to address the core issues impacting the military's
ability to maintain the supply of active duty registered nurses.
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because these
strategies will serve to address the shortages of registered nurses as
well as nurse educators and will, as a final outcome, function as a
core strategy for recruitment and retention.
Currently, the Army has approximately 59,000 enlisted personnel
serving as medics in a variety of theatres, including Iraq and
Afghanistan. These medics are promising nursing students because of
their affinity for treating and managing injured warriors. Despite the
formal training supplied by the Army and the vast life support skills
they acquire, they possess no diploma or certification to practice
healthcare in civilian institutions. Many medics pursue a career in
healthcare once leaving active duty. On the sheer basis of volume
alone,
[[Page E2051]]
this group of active duty personnel presents a very clear opportunity
upon which to build a source of bachelors prepared registered nurses to
meet the ongoing recruitment needs of the Army. In addition, this group
has already had some preparation and has demonstrated affinity for the
type of work which Army nurses are prepared to address. In light of
this opportunity, an online Bachelor of Science curriculum will be
developed with the intent of allowing progression of the Army medic
toward degree completion. The ultimate goal of this project will be
qualification for, and entry into, the Army Nurse Corps. Following
development of the initial program, additional educational tracks could
be developed. Areas for consideration would include a nurse
practitioner program with a concentration in neurology/mental health or
a Clinical Nurse Specialist program with an emphasis in TBI/PTSD. Both
options would result in the preparation of advanced practice nurses who
would help meet the needs of returning warriors.
Project Name: Rural Health Center of Excellence for Remote and
Medically Underserved Populations
Account: RDTE, A
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Saint Francis University
Address of Requesting Entity: 117 Evergreen Drive, Loretto, PA 15940
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding:
$2,000,000 for Rural Health Center of Excellence for Remote and
Medically Underserved Populations (CERMUSA)
CERMUSA performs applied military research in telehealth, distance
learning, and telerehabilitation to benefit individuals, healthcare
facilities, and educational entities in rural and remote regions. This
research is carried out at minimal cost via strategic partnerships with
military, healthcare, business, and other governmental areas. All of
CERMUSA's research efforts are conducted using commercial off-the-shelf
(COTS) technologies, making these projects both sustainable and
replicable in a cost-effective manner. CERMUSA disseminates the results
of this research via publication, presentation, and live demonstrations
of technology solutions in action. CERMUSA, under the direction of the
U.S. Army, serves as a technology test bed readily available to the
Armed Forces for test and evaluation of both military-spec and
commercially available hardware and software.
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer dollars because, as an
asset of the United States Army Medical Research and Materiel Command,
CERMUSA provides direct service to DOD by performing constant analysis
of current trends in computing and communications. CERMUSA's main area
of operations, central Pennsylvania, strongly approximates many of the
same communications and technology difficulties experienced by
America's Armed Services throughout the world, including difficult
terrain, extreme weather conditions, and a lack of reliable
communications architectures. By overcoming these difficulties with
readily-available commodity technologies, often combined in unique or
novel ways, CERMUSA provides viable alternatives to often costly (and
proprietary) military-spec hardware and software.
Project Name: Voice Recognition and Cross Platform Speech Interface
System
Account: RDTE, A
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Szanca Solutions, Inc.
Address of Requesting Entity: 100 East Pitt Street, Bedford, PA 15522
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding:
$2,500,000 for Voice Recognition and Cross Platform Speech Interface
System
It is my understanding that this project will provide voice
activation to legacy command and control systems to improve the ease of
use, accuracy, and timeliness of the systems. The project will continue
the work done to bring speech controlled operations and in addition
provide a cross-platform solution that can be integrated to a wide
variety of military systems. Doing so will dramatically increase the
functionality and useful life of legacy systems while decreasing
training costs and increasing operational speed.
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because many of the
Army's current command and control systems require a series of
complicated keyboard entries to operate, making the systems slower to
operate and prone to errors in stressful environments. This can result
in delays providing commanders with critical information and in
executing mission critical fire missions. This program will focus on
solutions to those issues, allow quicker access to tactical
information, and increase the speed in which targets can be fired.
Project Name: ALC Logistics Integration Environment
Account: RDTE, AF
Legal Name of Requesting Entity: IS2 Technologies, Inc.
Address of Requesting Entity: 3018 Pleasant Valley Blvd., Altoona, PA
16602
Description of Request/Justification of Federal Funding:
$1,000,000 for ALC Logistics Integration Environment
It is my understanding that this project will develop a Logistics
Integration Environment using COTS software that facilitates pulling
together teams of people to optimize battlefield readiness and improve
the availability of aircraft and associated subsystems.
This project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because the Air
Force Logistics Centers lack an integrated data environment for
service, repair, and overall logistics.
Development and deployment of the Logistics Information Environment
would:
Develop and implement a collaborative logistics management solution
that would provide a single source of data for the maintainers, supply
and battlefield environments
Provide optimized predictive logistics modeling for critical
supportability factors such as spare parts, maintenance schedules, and
survivability under fire
Capture aircraft performance information that may be used to drive
further improvements in survivability
Allow for real-time collaboration across the R&D, acquisition,
logistics, and warfighter communities
Reduce costs by reducing the time required to research and collect
the engineering and logistics data necessary to support unplanned/
unscheduled depot-level maintenance requirements
Benefits to our warfighting capability would be:
Mission readiness: Improve the readiness of rapidly deployed aircraft
Cost Avoidance: Minimize the cost and complexity of the aircraft
logistics footprint
Innovation: Allow for accelerated innovation to aircraft and
subsystems, continuously improving their operational performance and
survivability
Additional benefits would include composite data that can be used to
formalize and distribute Interactive Electric Technical Manuals (IETM)
and dynamic work cards for maintenance planning and instructions.
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