[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 16 (Tuesday, January 28, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S495-S505]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 HOMEOWNER FLOOD INSURANCE AFFORDABILITY ACT OF 2014--MOTION TO PROCEED

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 1926, which the 
clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 294, 
     S. 1926, a bill to delay the implementation of certain 
     provisions of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act 
     of 2012 and to reform the National Association of Registered 
     Agents and Brokers, and for other purposes.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I wish to speak for up to 10 minutes. I 
think we are in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate is moving to proceed to consider S. 
1926.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Wonderful. I thank the Presiding Officer. I will then 
speak on the bill that is before us.
  I appreciate the cooperation of so many Members who voted last night 
to move forward on the debate of the fix to Biggert-Waters. We had a 
very strong and very impressive vote. I think 83 Members, Republicans 
and Democrats, came together from all parts of the country, from all 
different areas and districts and backgrounds to vote to move forward 
on the debate on flood insurance. I am grateful.
  We have been working on this for about a year and a half. It has been 
a tough slog because 2 years ago a bill called Biggert-Waters was 
passed, named after the two cosponsors in the House, Congresswoman 
Biggert and Congresswoman Waters. They passed a bill with very good 
intentions. They were thinking they were going to strengthen the flood 
insurance program. The bill had wonderful intentions, but 
unfortunately, the way it was drafted in the conference committee has 
resulted in disastrous results.
  Some of us knew that 2 years ago and started working literally the 
moment the conference bill was passed to begin changing it. So we have 
worked diligently and together and built a great coalition. I thank the 
200 organizations that quickly came together over the last year and a 
half--as quickly as any of these things can happen in a practical 
sense--to understand what went wrong in the first bill and how we could 
fix it so we could accomplish two important goals for the National 
Flood Insurance Program: first, that the program could be self-
sustaining. In other words, it could pay for itself with limited or 
minimal taxpayer burden.
  The other equally important goal--and the Presiding Officer, who 
represents New Jersey, knows, as I do, how important this is--is that 
the program would be affordable to middle-class families. If it is not 
affordable to middle-class families, they will not participate in it 
and the program will go bankrupt due to lack of participation.
  The idea of insurance is to have a large pool to spread the risk, and 
that is how an insurance system works. If we don't fix it, it is going 
to make that pool get smaller and smaller and smaller. Because people 
will not be able to afford it, the program will collapse and the 
taxpayers will be saddled with debt.
  The goal of our coalition--led by Senator Menendez, the senior 
Senator from New Jersey who is on the Banking Committee and has been 
one of the great spokesmen and leaders for this bill, and Senator 
Isakson from Georgia, who is literally the most respected Member in 
this whole body on issues related to real estate because he had one of 
the largest real estate companies in Atlanta and knows the issue well. 
He is very respected on both sides of the aisle. These two gentlemen 
have led this effort and have built a bipartisan coalition.
  So we are now ready this week, of all weeks. It is the State of the 
Union week. We would have probably preferred another week, but that is 
how this worked out. We are ready to debate the bill on the floor of 
the Senate. At last count, when we left, there were about six or seven 
relevant amendments. We are only going to accept relevant amendments to 
this bill. We are not going to accept amendments on other subjects by 
Members who are attempting to derail the Senate, get us off topic, et 
cetera, et cetera. We will only accept relevant amendments to this 
bill.
  The happy thing is we think we only have about seven or eight 
amendments. Some amendments are Republican, some amendments are 
Democratic.
  We just received an amendment from one of the opponents of our bill, 
the good Senator from Pennsylvania, who has not been supportive of our 
bill and

[[Page S496]]

has not worked with the coalition and has not cooperated in any way. We 
got his amendment an hour ago. We have been actually waiting for a year 
and a half.
  Last May he opposed the bill, and we couldn't even get to the debate 
because he wasn't happy with the direction we were going. So that 
happened in May. What is this month? It is January. We are now in the 
month of January, and he opposed the bill in May. It set us back 7 
months. We tried to explain to the Senator from Pennsylvania that 
74,000 people in his State have these policies and they too need help. 
Whether he has been able to reconcile that with his constituents I 
don't know, but we literally asked him to please let us know what we 
could do. We told him we would be happy to meet with him. The 
homebuilders and the realtors were willing to sit down and speak to 
him. We finally got a draft of his amendment in the last hour. We are 
literally reading it for the first time. I don't think that is 
cooperation, but he may have a different definition of it. We are 
reading that amendment now. I don't believe this amendment is going to 
help our cause. I think it is going to undermine what we are trying to 
do.
  I will have more comments about the specifics of it, but the Senator 
from Pennsylvania, for whatever reason, has not been cooperative the 
whole time. We will be happy to vote on his amendment. I think the 
amendment is going to do great harm to the bill, and I think I would 
urge our coalition at this point to vote no, but I am going to look at 
it.
  Senator Isakson has just received a copy of it in the last hour, and 
all I can do is ask our colleagues to be patient while we review his 
13-page amendment. We have 200 organizations that have been working on 
this. We are trying to be fair and get their input, and then we will 
know how to proceed.

  The bottom line is this: This week we are going to pass a flood 
insurance relief bill off the floor of the Senate. I wish to put 
everybody on notice that we have run out of patience. We have been 
working on this for a year and a half. We were told before Christmas we 
could have a vote, and then we were told we could have a vote when we 
got back. Then we were told we could have a vote before we left.
  This is it. There is no more time. We are voting on this legislation 
this week. We are either going to do it the easy way or the hard way. 
We are either going to have a few amendments the Republicans put up, 
the Democrats put up, and we get back to legislating as we should or 
the leader is going to file cloture on this bill and we are going to 
pass it without an amendment. If one single Republican comes to this 
floor and says they did not have time to discuss their amendment, we 
will debate until the cows come home because I am not leaving this 
floor until every single person in America knows the games that can be 
played here.
  I have been more than transparent. I have been more than honest. I 
have come here more than any Senator. I don't know if this is good or 
bad; it is the only way I know how to lead, which is to be forthright 
and honest with myself, with my constituents, and with people who need 
to know what in the heck is going on. I don't know how else to do it. I 
am not going to apologize. I am not going to read about how to do this 
in a book. There are no books on this. This is about leadership from 
the inside, and the only people who taught me this were my parents.
  I am just saying, if anyone in this Chamber thinks they are going to 
get away with trying to give some flimsy-limsy excuse about how they 
didn't get their amendment considered, how they are upset with the 
leader, they will have to go through me, and I am not moving because I 
have people all over this country who are desperate. We passed the 
wrong bill. We should not have passed it. We must fix it, and we are 
going to fix it this week in the Senate.
  What the House does, what Speaker Boehner does--he made some negative 
comments about the bill last week. My comments back were the Speaker 
has his hands full. He has been busy. I understand it. I wouldn't want 
his job. He has a tough job with a lot of issues to juggle. But I said, 
and I will say again, when this bill goes to the House, which it will 
after it passes the Senate this week, he will hear from millions and 
millions of Americans who paid their mortgage every month, who went to 
work every day, who honor their family by building homes in places they 
have been for generations, and they are about ready to take those 
front-door keys and turn them in to the local bank and walk away from 
their house. Speaker Boehner is going to hear that. I hope those words, 
those expressions, those pictures, those letters will hit his heart the 
way they have hit mine and that he will have a softened heart and an 
open mind and he will consider what we are trying to do.
  I realize our way may not be the most perfect way, but it is a good 
way, and if somebody wants to improve it, fine. But don't scuttle it, 
pretending to be helping. Don't scuttle it by pretending to be for some 
kind of better approach. If there was a better approach, we would have 
found it in the last year and a half we have been searching. We are not 
going to find it in the last 3 minutes of this debate.
  We are reviewing the Toomey amendment. He has been the lead opponent 
of our effort. I don't believe his amendment is helpful, but until I 
read it, I will not be able to give a definitive assessment. Senator 
Isakson will have to give his views on it, as will Senator Menendez, 
and we will figure it out. But we are going to bring relief to the 5 
million people who have done nothing wrong--middle-class families, some 
of them very poor families--who have been living in these places for 
generations, and because FEMA can't get its flood maps right, because 
FEMA can't get the affordability study done, they are going to be 
kicked out of their homes.
  Talk about misguided regulation. I hope Mitch McConnell, our 
Republican leader, talking about misguided regulation, will put a 
little muscle into helping us. He has been cooperative, and I thank 
him. Senator Reid has been putting a lot of muscle into this, and I 
thank him.
  I hope people will come to the floor and speak about the importance 
of this bill. We will figure out this amendment process--all germane 
amendments--and get the final vote this week. This is going to get done 
this week, the easy way or the hard way, and we are done. The vote is 
going to happen this week. We are going to move this bill from the 
floor to the President, who put out a statement--and his 
administration--they didn't have many positive things to say about 
this. Let me just say I think their statement is misinformed. It is 
misguided. I am hoping the White House will reconsider. The President 
is coming here tonight to speak about the importance of strengthening 
the middle class. I would think that allowing middle-class people to 
stay in their homes would be a good place to start. So I hope the 
administration will take a second look and join us and help us to let 
middle-class families stay in their homes.
  Let me conclude. Colorado is a beautiful State. I have been there 
many times. However, not everybody can live in the mountains of 
Colorado. There are some of us who have to live along rivers and 
streams and ports to build and to support the infrastructure that helps 
to make this country grow. My people who fish every day, who harvest 
the oysters, who put seafood on the table, who bring those huge and 
magnificent barges up and down the river, can't live in Vail, CO. I am 
sorry. They don't like the snow and they couldn't afford to live there 
anyway. They live in little places such as Burris and Venice and 
Plackman, and the lower ninth ward that got flooded out, every single 
home destroyed. They can go back if we use our science, our 
engineering, our brains, and lead with our hearts and our heads. This 
can work. But if people are playing political games, if they are trying 
to score political points or if they are not working hard enough to 
understand the issue, then I feel sorry for them because the public 
needs our help.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I have come to the floor to talk about 
the

[[Page S497]]

Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act. This bill is a bill that 
is designed to fix the damage that has been done by the Biggert-Waters 
Act, and this damage is extensive. This bill would freeze dramatic rate 
hikes, and these rate hikes have several impacts.
  We have, of course, the impact on families who currently have flood 
insurance who will be paying much higher levels than they bargained for 
when they bought their home and may not be able to afford those much 
higher levels, raising questions about their ability to stay in those 
homes.
  We have the impact on commercial enterprises and the fact that now 
that they are paying higher rates, they may not feel they can add on to 
their business in that location.
  Then we have the impact, of course, on selling your property, whether 
you are a homeowner or you are a business, because the folks who might 
be buying might have to jump to a full rate that would be many times--
in some cases 10 times--the price the current owner is paying, and when 
that happens the property becomes unaffordable and, therefore, the 
value that one has in their home or business drops dramatically.
  All of this is of great concern, and we need to reverse the features 
of Biggert-Waters that are causing this economic havoc.
  This bill comes out of discussions that were in my Subcommittee on 
Economic Policy several months ago. This discussion is now led by 
Senator Menendez, and he has been ably assisted and partnered with 
Senator Mary Landrieu and Senator Isakson and Senator Vitter and I 
compliment them all for being vocal advocates and instrumental in 
helping to move this bill forward.
  The Biggert-Waters Act, while well intentioned, is creating massive 
burdens for our middle-class homeowners in Oregon and certainly across 
the Nation. Flooding is something of an equal opportunity disaster. For 
some, it is the coastlines. For others, it is broad flood plains along 
major rivers. For others, it is narrow valleys and flash floods. But in 
all of these situations, the common impact is dramatic devastation.
  Something is very wrong though when families are more worried about 
dramatic spikes in their flood insurance premiums than they are worried 
about dramatic floods, and that is where my Oregon families are right 
now. I wish to share a letter from Kelly. She lives in Tigard. She 
says, in her own words, she is ``a middle class, single mother 
currently working to get [her] daughter through college.''
  She bought her home 13 years ago to provide stability for her 
daughter. This is a goal of so many parents, to have a piece of the 
American dream, to have the stability that goes with home ownership, to 
have the equity that you build in your home as a financial reservoir 
with which to assist your children going forward in life.
  She thought about selling a few years ago but decided to stay in that 
house and keep that financial foundation. But now, with Biggert-Waters 
going into effect, she has been caught between two bad choices. If she 
stays in her home, her flood insurance rates will go up precipitously, 
making her home increasingly unaffordable and squeezing an already 
tight budget. But should she try to sell, the new owner will face 
annual flood insurance premiums of $15,000 or more, making her home 
completely unaffordable for middle-class buyers.
  Keep this in mind: For every $1,000 a buyer pays in flood insurance 
per year, the value of a home drops by about $20,000. So if the flood 
insurance is $15,000, we are talking about a value of a home dropping 
$300,000. Many middle-class homes in Oregon are not priced at $300,000. 
They might be valued at $200,000 or $220,000 or $250,000 or, in more 
rural areas, $150,000 or $175,000. So we can wipe out the complete 
value of a home and certainly easily wipe out the equity a homeowner 
has built over a number of years. Essentially, you have to give the 
home away. That makes no sense.
  To read from Kelly's letter, she says:

       Here is where I see a problem. There is an old saying, 
     ``you can't get blood from a stone.''

  She continues:

       I know I am not alone in my predicament of barely getting 
     by financially.
       Middle income folks like me are squeezed from all sides. . 
     . .
       While living expenses rise every year, our income generally 
     does not raise enough to make up for it. . . .
       We tighten our belts and wait for better times. So, the 
     problem here is, we can't afford to pay these, much higher 
     rates. We just don't have the money.

  She continues in her analysis:

       There are options, of course. We can come up with many 10's 
     of thousands of dollars to raise our houses up and make them 
     flood friendly. . . .
       But wait--we don't have 10's of thousands of dollars. And, 
     we can't sell--that's the beauty here. Who will buy a small, 
     middle income type home that has a flood insurance bill 
     annually of 15-30k [a year]?

  She continues:

       So what will we do, the over 1 million homeowners in this 
     situation? To our utter frustration and humiliation, many of 
     us have no choice but to walk away. . . .
       Whatever the attitudes about us are, most of us are good 
     Americans who believe in paying our debts. We have worked 
     hard our entire lives, and asked for little or no help along 
     the way.
       This will crush us, and since we don't have the money to 
     give, there is no benefit to be had.

  That is how she concludes her letter: ``This will crush us. . . . '' 
She is right. It will crush her family. It will crush millions of 
families across this country. It will include foreclosures. It will 
include equity wiped out. It will result in families having to walk 
away from their home and hope they are not pursued by their mortgage 
company that will be unable to sell the home on a secondary market for 
the debt owed and, therefore, could pursue the owners.
  It is wrong and counterproductive to squeeze middle-class homeowners 
such as Kelly when it will only result in more foreclosures or families 
trapped in their homes unable to sell them.
  Making flood insurance more solvent is a laudable goal, but it is one 
we have to approach in a manner that involves fairness over time. 
Achieving solvency by putting a huge burden, a huge financial shock on 
the backs of our middle-class families is not just wrong, it is a 
financial disaster that is unfolding now and will continue to unfold 
across this country.
  We cannot get to solvency by asking families to pay sums they simply 
do not have or, as Kelly said, ``You can't get blood from a stone.''
  We need to immediately stop these dramatic rate hikes for our 
homeowners and our businesses while FEMA goes back to the drawing board 
to figure out how to make this program affordable and effective for our 
middle-class families.
  That is exactly what this bill does. This bill has several important 
provisions that help ensure affordability and fairness for our middle-
class families.
  The first is it delays implementation of flood insurance rate 
increases. It does so on primary residences and on businesses until 
FEMA can complete an affordability study, propose regulations to 
address the problem of affordability, and give Congress time to weigh 
in.
  Second, unlike Biggert-Waters, the bill ensures that FEMA will truly 
have the funding they need to complete a comprehensive affordability 
study.
  Third, this bill takes on a catch-22 in the current system, which is 
that when homeowners face unaffordable rates that they think are 
inaccurate, they have to pay out of their pocket for a flood map appeal 
to prove that their premiums should be lowered. So when someone else 
makes a mistake, they have to pay for that mistake, and that is wrong.
  The studies necessary for an appeal can cost between $500 and $2,000. 
It is a prohibitive cost for many families to undertake. This bill 
ensures that any homeowner who can successfully appeal a flood map 
finding will be reimbursed by FEMA for their expense, making the system 
fairer for the homeowner and giving FEMA an added incentive to get it 
right.
  Finally, this bill does something very important in creating a flood 
insurance rate map advocate within FEMA, someone to educate and 
advocate for homeowners. One of the complaints my office has heard is 
that FEMA has not been responsive to homeowners' concerns or questions 
about changes in their policy.
  It creates this position. An advocate will do several things. The 
advocate will educate policyholders about their flood risks and their 
options in choosing a policy. The advocate will assist

[[Page S498]]

those who believe a flood map is wrong and assist them through the 
appeal process. The advocate will improve outreach and coordination 
with local officials, community leaders, and Congress.
  My colleagues Senators Hoeven and Heitkamp have also done great work 
on this bill to ensure that homeowners in certain communities are not 
hit by unfair rules on how their basements impact a flood policy.
  I would like to address one other issue that is not in this bill that 
hopefully I will be able to offer an amendment on; that is, protection 
for consumers whose policies are purchased by their mortgage servicer 
or their bank rather than by themselves. This is the issue of predatory 
force-placed premiums.
  Let me explain. Let's say, for example, that you are notified by your 
servicer that they have reviewed the records and they now consider you 
to be in a flood plain they had not noticed before and you have to get 
flood insurance. But that flood insurance, unsubsidized, is so 
expensive you cannot afford it. So then the servicer says: Well, we are 
going to put on flood insurance for you. The rate might be 5 to 10 
times the market rate. In other words, the homeowner who already cannot 
afford flood insurance is gouged by predatory premiums on force-placed 
insurance.
  Let's consider that perhaps you had a transition in your family. 
Maybe you have one partner paying the bills and another partner takes 
it over while the first partner is sick and you miss the fact that your 
annual premium was due on your flood insurance. So what happens? That 
lapse can trigger much higher rates that you cannot afford. Then 
suddenly you are in the situation of force-placed insurance.
  How about if new maps are issued. The new maps now put you into a 
100-year flood plain that you were not in previously. It is not that 
the geography changed; it is that a different set of engineers, doing a 
different study, different assumptions about where the rain will fail, 
which creek will swell the quickest, puts you into this 100-year flood 
plain.
  So now what are you going to do? You are going to be in this 
situation. You cannot afford that insurance, that newly placed 
requirement for insurance, so the servicer or bank puts it on for you. 
Well, they should put it in at a fair market rate, not at a rate which 
is 5 to 10 times the fair market rate and which is designed to gouge.
  I have an amendment that addresses this by saying the servicers or 
banks cannot take fees--or, as some would say, ``kickbacks''--for 
placing this insurance and therefore have an incentive to do a 
nonmarket rate policy that is 5 or 10 times higher than the actual 
market rate.
  This is a significant problem in force-placed home insurance. 
Certainly, we do not need to add to this problem by allowing predatory 
premiums on force-placed policies in the realm of flood insurance. I 
encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to take a look at 
this issue, to support banning the anticompetitive features of the 
market that have led to these predatory premiums on force-placed flood 
insurance.
  In closing, I again thank my colleagues who have worked so hard. This 
is an important issue, an incredibly important issue for families 
across Oregon. Let's stop these dramatic rate hikes. Let's work 
together for an affordable flood insurance program that will be 
effective and fair for all Americans.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Schatz). The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in 
morning business for 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Income Inequality

  Mr. GRASSLEY. I ask unanimous consent that the letters I will be 
speaking about be printed in the Record at the end of my remarks.
  Recently the Obama administration has been talking a lot about income 
inequality and poverty. Yesterday I spoke about the issue, about the 
war on poverty, its successes and its failures. As I said yesterday, 
the United States has spent trillions of dollars in the last 50 years 
fighting the so-called war on poverty. I said yesterday that the 
results have been marginal, in some cases successful, reducing the 
poverty rate from 19 percent down to the 15 percent it is now. But a 
lot more needs to be done.
  Now, in the fight against the war on poverty, this administration, 
like a lot of administrations, wants to spend more money on more 
programs. Some of that may be justified, but that does not seem to fix 
the problems. If you just hand this money out with no strings and no 
oversight, it gets diverted and misused. That is the purpose of my 
speaking today on the subject of public housing.
  Wasted money does not help the poor. There are a lot of people who 
make a nice profit from the poverty of others. This administration has 
been helping a number of these profiteers while the poor suffer. I want 
to be clear as to some of these issues I am talking about--their 
genesis goes back to previous administrations as well. Through my 
oversight work, I have seen this happen over and over, that a few 
people profit from trying to help the poor, but the money does not go 
there. The Department of Housing and Urban Development hands out $4 
billion in Federal money every year to local housing authorities. This 
money is supposed to help provide clean, affordable, safe housing for 
the poor. But, while no one is watching, much of the money gets spent 
on high salaries and perks for the people who run the housing 
authorities. These housing authorities have other sources of money. For 
most of them, up to 90 percent of their total funding comes from the $4 
billion contributed by the Federal taxpayers.
  Housing and Urban Development argues that because housing authorities 
are State and local government entities, there is no reason to 
scrutinize them from here in Washington, DC. As far as I am concerned, 
HUD is missing the point for 4 billion reasons. Those are dollar 
reasons. Taxpayer money should come with Federal oversight. We need to 
make sure that the Federal authorities who disburse it make sure they 
oversee that it is spent in the legal way--to help the people who need 
the help.

  I have been conducting oversight of the wasteful spending at housing 
authorities for almost 4 years. I have been urging the Obama 
administration to look at what is happening and to take action. But 
there is little if any interest in the oversight of these Federal 
dollars by the folks writing the checks here in Washington, DC. They 
just want to send the checks and pat themselves on the back. They do 
not want to talk about what actually happens to the money once it is 
disbursed.
  Federal funds end up feathering the nests of local housing 
bureaucrats instead of housing the poor. I will show you how that is 
done. Here are some of the most egregious examples of how ineffective 
the Department of Housing and Urban Development has been at policing 
local housing authorities.
  Bradenton, FL, is an area of the country which was hit extremely hard 
during the foreclosure crisis, but employees at Bradenton Housing 
Authority only have to work 4 days a week. They get 2 weeks off at 
Christmas, bonuses in June and December, and the option to cash out up 
to a month of sick leave twice per year. They get free use of a car 
purchased by the housing authority. After 15 years of employment, they 
get to keep the car when they leave or take $10,000 instead; it is 
their choice.
  There are generous fringe benefits, but many housing authorities also 
provide very lucrative salaries. These salaries far exceed the salaries 
of Federal employees right here in Washington, DC, who hand out the 
taxpayers' money to the housing authorities. The biggest salary jackpot 
winner I have encountered so far is the Atlanta Housing Authority. At 
least 22 employees there earn between $150,000 and $303,000 per year. 
The Atlanta Housing Authority benefits from a special HUD designation 
called ``moving to work.'' That program exempts designated housing 
authorities from certain requirements, including salary justification. 
This is not just an isolated example. The executive director of the 
Raleigh, NC, housing authority receives about $280,000 in salary and 
benefits, plus up to 30 vacation days. He also accumulates comp time 
for any hours he works over 7\1/2\ hours per day. He has used over 20 
days of comp time per year since 2009. Add that to his regular vacation 
time, and he is out of the office

[[Page S499]]

nearly 3 months per year. Nine months of work for $280,000 is an 
annualized salary of $375,000 per year. Very few taxpayer-funded jobs 
pay anything close to that amount.
  So what is the justification for such high salaries, particularly 
considering the fact that they are supposed to provide safe, affordable 
housing for low-income people? After years of ignoring the issue, HUD 
finally capped Federal funding for executive salaries at $155,500 per 
employee. Of course, this was only after various local media and I 
exposed deep-rooted problems and pushed the Department of Housing and 
Urban Development to act. But now housing authority executives have 
turned to creative accounting tricks to get around that limit of 
$155,500 per employee. Since some of their money comes from other 
sources, the housing authorities simply claim that any salary over the 
Federal limit comes from one of those other sources, whereas the money 
from those other sources ought to be used to help low-income people 
have affordable, clean, and safe housing.
  Because of my oversight letters on this subject, HUD recently 
notified the housing authorities that they must document the original 
source of the funding used to pay salaries over the Federal limit. That 
is good news, but there are still larger problems. The Department is 
still not making this salary data public in a reasonable timeframe. I 
will give an example. This administration refused to release the 2010 
set of data for almost a year. I hope we do not have to wait a year to 
get the most recent data.
  Like many of our Federal agencies, some housing authorities spend 
large amounts of money on travel for conferences and training. Some of 
that may be legitimate, but I am raising questions about the extent to 
which it is done and the amount of money that is consumed. Staff and 
board members often attend the same conferences throughout the United 
States year after year. They often attend multiple conferences in a 
single year. In addition to travel costs, housing authorities must pay 
a conference fee for each attendee they send, often ranging from $400 
at the low end to $1,000 per employee at the higher end.
  That money could easily be used to improve conditions and make needed 
repairs in public housing facilities. Instead, it is frittered away on 
conferences. In other words, forget the low-income people they are 
supposed to be helping and spend the money someplace else.
  The Tampa Housing Authority has spent more than $860,000 since 2009 
for staff and board members to attend various conferences, seminars, 
and training programs--$860,000 that could have been used to provide 
affordable housing for low-income people. Tampa also has been sending 
20 or more employees per year to conferences sponsored by the National 
Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials. That alone costs 
more than $177,000 per year.
  The Atlanta Housing Authority spent more than $480,000 since 2009 for 
the employees to attend conferences and training sessions. In fact, the 
housing authority paid over $68,000 in conference fees to a software 
company after giving them a multimillion-dollar contract for a new 
computer system.
  I wonder--I don't know, but I think it is legitimate to question--if 
the housing authority executive director thought to ask for a discount. 
Many of the housing authorities with questionable spending don't limit 
the abuses to salaries or travel.
  The Tampa Housing Authority purchased a new $7 million administrative 
office that includes nearly $3 million in renovations and upgrades. 
That could have helped hundreds, if not thousands, of poor people 
needing the housing. They are also paying nearly $800,000 in salary and 
benefits for a public relations department while at the same time 
paying an employee another $170,369 as a PR consultant.
  Other housing authorities are also spending exorbitant amounts for 
outside consultants. Some of these consultants are former employees of 
the local housing authority.
  In 2013, the Pittsburgh Housing Authority retained 10 law firms for a 
total of $3.5 million over 3 years. One law firm has been representing 
the housing authority during inquiries by the Department of Housing and 
Urban Development Office of Inspector General and the city controller.
  Think about that. It is bad enough that taxpayers' money meant to 
help the poor is wasted, but when the taxpayer also pays the lawyers to 
defend the very organization from scrutiny about whether the taxpayers' 
money was wasted is even more outrageous. Of course, that adds insult 
to injury.
  In Philadelphia, outside lawyers blocked the inspector general's 
office from assessing spending data for months, and that cost the 
taxpayers millions of dollars.
  The Pittsburgh Housing Authority also paid an outside consulting firm 
$1.25 million in the year 2012. The vice president at the consulting 
company billed the housing authority $404,000 for 2,400 hours of work. 
That is 48 hours a week for a year. It is more than double the $168,000 
salary of the housing authority executive director.
  Harris County, TX, is one of the most egregious examples of out-of-
control spending. In 2013, the HUD inspector general questioned the 
mismanagement of over $27 million in Federal funding for Harris County. 
The IG provided the following examples of fraud and abuse: over $1.7 
million in excessive payroll expenses; $190,000 for statues and 
monuments; $66,000 for employees' shirts embossed with logos; $27,000 
for trophies, plaques, and awards; $14,500 for a helicopter, a 
chartered bus, and golf cart rentals for a grand opening; and $18,000 
for letters written by Abraham Lincoln.
  I continue to send my oversight letters to the Senate appropriators 
and the Senate banking committee. These are the letters I received 
permission to put in the Record at the end of my statement.
  The Senate appropriators and the Senate banking committee members 
have jurisdiction over the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 
They have the authority to do something about these abuses. My 
colleagues need to know the extent of the problems, and that I am ready 
to work with the Members of this body to address these issues.
  Employment at public housing authorities should be about public 
service. That is why we have a program serving the needs of low-income 
people. It is supposed to be providing clean, safe, affordable housing 
for those in need, not helping bureaucrats live high on the hog on the 
taxpayers' dime.
  As I said in my opening, this problem didn't start with this 
administration. There is a culture here that had to start back a long 
time ago. But now, bringing these problems to the attention of this 
administration, I hope it will take them seriously. If this 
administration is truly serious about income inequality--and not only 
using it for political purposes--it would stop shoveling taxpayers' 
money out the door with practically no oversight, no controls, no 
limits, and the waste of money I have just expressed. If President 
Obama is truly serious about income inequality, he would take the money 
high-income public housing authorities waste and give it to the benefit 
of low-income patrons of public housing to provide what the law is 
meant to provide these people: safe, affordable, healthy housing.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                   Committee on the Judiciary,

                                    Washington, DC, July 16, 2013.
     Hon. Shaun Donovan,
     Secretary, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Donovan: The Department of Housing and Urban 
     Development (HUD) awarded high performer status to the Harris 
     County Housing Authority (HCHA) ``for eight consecutive 
     years'' between 2004 and 2011. In the 2009 Consolidated On-
     Site Review, the HUD field office director, Dan Rodriguez, 
     even stated that, HCHA ``practices are some of the best 
     throughout our region.'' Following revelations of possible 
     mismanagement in 2012, Mr. Rodriguez then told the Houston 
     Chronicle, ``We didn't expect that anything was actually 
     going on here of concern.'' He further stated, ``We in the 
     field office here have always had the privilege of having one 
     of the highest-performing housing authorities in the 
     country.''
       On June 19, 2013, the HUD Office of Inspector General (OIG) 
     released an audit report raising concerns about HCHA 
     mismanagement of over $27 million in federal funding. In 
     addition to over $7 million spent on an unauthorized disaster 
     assessment and over $8 million for the now-defunct Patriots 
     on the Lake development, the OIG provided numerous examples 
     of fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars. These include:

[[Page S500]]

       Over $1.7 million in excessive payroll expenses;
       $190,000 for statues and monuments;
       $66,000 for employee shirts embossed with HCHA logos;
       $54,000 for apartment rental for housing consultants;
       $24,000 for a book writing project about disaster housing;
       $27,000 for trophies, plaques and awards;
       $14,500 for helicopter, chartered bus and golf cart rentals 
     for a grand opening;
       $18,000 for letters written by Abraham Lincoln; and
       Over $150,000 in missing electronic equipment including 
     computers and electronic tablets.
       The OIG found that both HCHA management and the Board 
     failed to fulfill their oversight responsibilities. 
     Specifically, ``the Authority expended funds for many items 
     that were not reasonable or necessary and did not support the 
     Authority's mission.'' Moreover, ``they neglected their 
     management and oversight responsibilities; wasted Authority 
     funds, at times for personal gain; circumvented existing 
     internal controls; and manipulated accounting records. These 
     conditions occurred because the Authority's management and 
     Board failed to exercise their fiduciary responsibilities and 
     did not act in the best interest of the Authority.''
       HUD also failed to ensure that millions in Disaster Housing 
     Assistance Program (DHAP) funding, awarded following 
     Hurricane Ike, were used properly or as intended. Instead, 
     HCHA awarded a lucrative consulting contract to the former 
     HCHA Board chairman Odysseus Lanier's firm just two months 
     after he resigned from the Board. The conflict-of-interest 
     waiting period is one year. Mr. Lanier's consulting firm 
     received ``$11.3 million from HCHA, according to agency 
     director Tom McCasland, most of it for work on some sort of 
     multi-state disaster response survey that nobody wanted. 
     Harris County tried to get $7 million in reimbursement for it 
     from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, but was denied, 
     according to the audit.'' Additionally, in 2008 the housing 
     authority purchased at least five high-end SUVs which were 
     subsequently donated to the Harris County Office of Emergency 
     Management and earmarked for five specific employees.
       Purchasing $18,000 historic documents, spending $190,000 on 
     statues and monuments, and paying for chartered helicopter 
     flights is not a hallmark of ``one of the highest performing 
     housing authorities in the country.'' This is money that 
     should have been used to provide clean, safe, and affordable 
     housing for those in need. HUD must take greater steps to 
     safeguard taxpayer dollars, especially during this time of 
     budget cuts due to sequestration. Please provide the 
     following information:
       1. What steps are being taken by HUD to recoup as much of 
     the $27 million in questionable spending outlined in the OIG 
     audit report?
       Given the efforts that Mr. Rankin and other officials at 
     HCHA took to hide their questionable spending, have criminal 
     referrals been made to the Department of Justice? If so, for 
     what offenses? Who has been referred?
       2. I have raised concerns about unreported conflicts-of-
     interest at HCHA and other housing authorities that have cost 
     taxpayers millions. What steps are being taken by HUD to 
     tighten up conflict-of-interest reporting requirements and 
     increased oversight to reduce the questionable payments in 
     the future?
       3. It is my understanding that HUD has conducted no 
     oversight of the billions in Disaster Housing Assistance 
     Program (DHAP) funding granted to HCHA and other housing 
     authorities along the Gulf Coast impacted by Hurricanes 
     Katrina, Rita and Ike. Please explain why this has not been 
     done and, given the recent financial problems at HCHA and 
     billions provided for Hurricane Sandy efforts, when we might 
     expect an audit to be conducted?
       4. It is my understanding that neither the former HCHA 
     executive director, Guy Rankin IV, nor his new company, 
     International Housing Solutions, has been suspended or 
     disbarred from receiving federal funding through HUD. In 
     fact, Mr. Rankin may be trying to obtain or has already 
     received Hurricane Sandy funding even after allegedly wasting 
     millions in Hurricane Ike funding.
       Please state whether HUD has suspended or disbarred Mr. 
     Rankin and/or International Housing Solutions, as well as 
     other bad housing authority actors, from receiving federal 
     funding.
       Please also explain what steps HUD is taking to ensure that 
     Hurricane Sandy funding is used as Congress intended and not 
     lost to waste, fraud and abuse.
       5. What specific changes have been and will be made to the 
     housing authority assessment program that will address the 
     many deficiencies in the current self-assessment program? 
     When will these changes be fully implemented?
       6. Currently, the housing authorities' financial and 
     management audits are paid for by the housing authorities 
     themselves, which may result in conflicts of interest. What 
     alternatives to auditor contracting awards and payments are 
     being considered by in order to ensure that the auditors are 
     serving the taxpayers instead of housing authority 
     management?
       Thank you in advance for your prompt attention to this 
     matter. I would appreciate receiving your response to this 
     matter by July 31, 2013. Should you have any questions 
     regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact 
     Janet Drew of my staff.
           Sincerely,

                                          Charles E. Grassley,

                                                   Ranking Member,
     Committee on the Judiciary.
                                  ____

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                   Committee on the Judiciary,

                                 Washington, DC, November 20, 2013
     Hon. Shaun Donovan,
     Secretary, Department of Housing and Urban Development, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Donovan: I have been raising concerns about 
     questionable spending at public housing authorities (PHA) 
     across the United States. I have questioned excessive travel 
     spending at public housing authorities in the past, but the 
     Tampa Housing Authority (THA), a HUD high performer, appears 
     to have far surpassed those housing authorities in travel and 
     conference spending.
       Recent investigative reports by Channel 10 News in Tampa 
     found that THA has spent in excess of $860,000 since 2009 for 
     staff and Board members to attend various conferences, 
     seminars and training programs. According to travel documents 
     provided by THA (see attached), staff and board members often 
     attend the same conferences throughout the United States, 
     some for the same organizations year after year, and often 
     attend multiple conferences in a single year. In addition to 
     travel costs, THA pays a conference fee for each attendee, 
     ranging between $400 and $1000. Every dollar that goes to 
     airfare, meals, lodging and conference fees, is another 
     dollar that cannot be used to help house homeless Tampa Bay 
     residents.
       Additionally, these trips amount to thousands of man hours 
     spent away from the office and not serving the citizens of 
     Tampa. According to the travel documents, THA staff and board 
     members annually spend more than 500 work days outside the 
     office. While THA may argue the necessity for the conference 
     and training attendance, a vast majority of these trips 
     appear to be non-critical to housing authority business and 
     give the impression of being an excuse to take expensive 
     vacations paid for with taxpayer dollars.
       Like other housing authorities I have been investigating, 
     THA has been spending limited federal funding for other 
     questionable expenses. The executive director, Jerome Ryans, 
     receives an annual salary of $214,000 plus a compensation 
     package which puts him well over the $155,500 salary cap. 
     Additional examples include: a new $7 million administrative 
     office with nearly $3 million in renovations and upgrades, 
     nearly $800,000 on salary and benefits for the public 
     relations department while paying $170,369 for a PR 
     consultant, $2.8 million in outside legal fees since 2009 
     while one outside lawyer is also married to a housing 
     authority employee.
       In August, Executive Director Ryans complained that ``the 
     agency will also lose approximately 1 million dollars in 
     administrative fees that cover operational costs due to 
     sequestration.'' He also stated that ``it is our goal to 
     continually find ways or opportunities to reduce overall 
     departmental costs.'' I strongly suggest that Mr. Ryans and 
     HUD start by curtailing attendance at conferences and 
     training seminars, excessive salaries, consulting and legal 
     fees.
       Please provide the following:
       1. Please describe the steps being taken by HUD to rein in 
     excessive spending on travel, conferences and training at THA 
     and other housing authorities across the country and explain 
     why those steps have been ineffective in preventing the 
     abuses described above.
       2. The complete annual compensation packages of all THA 
     employees, including salaries, bonuses and any other 
     compensation (health care, retirement, etc).
       3. A copy of most recent employment contracts for the 
     executive director and all THA financial statements filed 
     with HUD, including any statements made about executive 
     director salary and all benefits.
       4. Complete documentation of the remodeling expenditures 
     for the new headquarters building.
       5. The total number of credit cards issued to THA, 
     including any provided to THA board members.
       6. All legal bills and professional service and consulting 
     fees paid by the PHAs. Please also document all conflict of 
     interest waivers.
       7. A list of all take-home vehicles provided by the housing 
     authorities and the names of the employees who drive them.
       Thank you in advance for your prompt attention to this 
     matter. I would appreciate your response by December 6, 2013. 
     Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to 
     contact Janet Drew of my staff.
           Sincerely,
                                              Charles E. Grassley,
     Ranking Member.
                                  ____

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                    Committe on the Judiciary,

                                  Washington, DC, January 8, 2014.
     Hon. Shaun Donovan,
     Secretary, Department of Housing and Urban Development, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Donovan: The Dayton Daily News recently 
     reported questionable management decisions at the Dayton 
     (Ohio) Housing Authority, renamed Greater Dayton Premier 
     Management (GDPM). I want to ensure that HUD taxpayer dollars 
     are used for safe, affordable housing instead of questionable 
     compensation packages.

[[Page S501]]

       According to the article, the GDPM Board of Commissioners 
     recently fired the interim CEO, Al Prude. Mr. Prude was 
     removed by a Board resolution which stated that the housing 
     authority ``is going to a `new business model' that consists 
     of four agency directors acting as a team that will meet 
     twice a day to run the agency.'' Instead of hiring a new CEO 
     immediately, the housing authority is paying the four 
     department heads each an additional $1,000 per week to cover 
     the CEO duties. At that rate, the housing authority is 
     spending $16,000 per month or $192,000 per year for the 
     department directors to cover the CEO duties, with no time 
     frame for naming a replacement. The former CEO was paid just 
     over $123,000 per year which now looks like a bargain.
       It also appears that prior to his removal, Mr. Prude 
     received two very lucrative pay raises on one day last year. 
     The first bumped his salary ``from $98,542 to $123,157 on 
     Aug. 30, 2012, along with a check for back pay through June 
     1, when he was appointed interim CEO.'' The second was an 
     increase ``from $81,000 to $98,542, retroactive to the date 
     of his hire on Jan. 31, 2011.'' He also received a lump-sum 
     payment for back pay back to his hire date. The raises were 
     signed by himself, the board chairman and the chief financial 
     officer.
       Although the GDPM Board decided to terminate Mr. Prude, the 
     decision to pay the department heads to cover his duties 
     indefinitely appears to be even more expensive than the 
     previous CEO. Therefore, I am requesting the following 
     information for the period of 2008 to the present:
       1. Please provide an explanation for why a housing 
     authority is allowed to pay an additional $16,000 per month 
     for four individuals to act as CEO. Please also document how 
     HUD intends to enforce the $155,000 salary limit when the 
     duties are split among several individuals.
       2. The complete annual compensation packages of all GDPM 
     employees, including salaries, bonuses, retroactive pay, 
     separation pay and any other compensation (health care, 
     retirement, etc.).
       3. Provide a list of all legal bills and professional 
     service and consulting fees paid by GDPM.
       4. Please document any Conflict of Interest waivers filed 
     by the GDPM and Board of Commissioners with HUD.
       5. What additional oversight is being conducted by HUD 
     regarding payments to outside consultants and law firms by 
     all housing authorities across the country to ensure that all 
     federal funds, including stimulus and disaster funds, are 
     protected against waste, fraud and abuse? Please be specific.
       6. Provide all travel records for all employees at GDPM as 
     well as the GDPM Board members.
       7. Please provide the names of all nonprofit affiliates 
     with ties to GDPM. Please include the names of all officers 
     and their salary/benefit packages.
       Accordingly, please provide responses by no later than 
     January 24, 2014. If you have any questions regarding this 
     letter, please have your respective staff members contact 
     Janet Drew.
           Sincerely,
                                              Charles E. Grassley,
     Ranking Member.
                                  ____



                                Congress of the United States,

                                  Washington, DC, January 9, 2014.
     Hon. Shaun Donovan,
     Secretary, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Donovan: Recent reports in the Raleigh News 
     & Observer, which we have attached to this letter, have shone 
     a light on the situation surrounding the executive director 
     of the Raleigh, North Carolina Housing Authority (RHA) and 
     his extremely generous salary and fringe benefits. 
     Specifically, we are concerned that the RHA--a HUD ``high 
     performer''--allows its executive director, Steve Beam, to be 
     on paid vacation from the housing authority for nearly three 
     months a year to pursue his outside hobbies and interests.
       According to the article, Mr. Beam is one of the most 
     highly paid housing authority executive directors in the 
     country. His compensation package, which includes ``salary, 
     bonuses, longevity payments and car allowance,'' totals 
     approximately $280,000 per year. This year, the RHA board 
     also increased his annual vacation time from 24 days to 30 
     days per year. In return for the high salary, Mr. Beam is 
     only required to work 7.5 hours per day.
       In addition to the generous salary and vacation days he 
     receives through his contract, Mr. Beam also accumulates 
     comp-time for any hours he works over 7.5 hours. This benefit 
     is extremely unusual for such a highly paid manager and Mr. 
     Beam has used it to rack up over four months of paid vacation 
     from 2010 to the present. In fact, because of Mr. Beam's 
     unique 7.5 hour work day, over the course of one year he 
     accrues an additional two weeks of comp-time simply by 
     working a traditional eight hour day. All told, he used 22.5 
     comp days in 2009, 23.5 in 2010, 20 in 2011, 20.5 in 2012, 
     and only 14 through October 2013.
       It appears however, that despite these extremely generous 
     benefits, Mr. Beam still uses government funded time to 
     indulge his interest in magic tricks, which he referred to as 
     his ``business/hobby'' in a statement to the News & Observer. 
     The newspaper spotlighted several examples of Mr. Beam's 
     using work time to pursue his hobby including posting to a 
     website called ``The Magic Cafee.'' Given that the RHA board 
     specifically gives Mr. Beam months of vacation unavailable to 
     other housing authority executives in order to pursue his 
     interest in magic, it is extremely concerning that Mr. Beam 
     was unable to confine his ``business/hobby'' to his multiple 
     months of vacation which suggests the RHA does not have 
     sufficient oversight controls over Mr. Beam's activities.
       The RHA executive director and board believe that RHA 
     functions well while the executive director is away from the 
     office for nearly three months a year mainly because RHA has 
     a ``capable'' deputy executive director to pick up the slack. 
     As the RHA receives the vast majority of its funds from HUD, 
     it is important for HUD to hold Mr. Beam and the RHA board 
     accountable for their actions. To examine the extent of HUD's 
     oversight over Mr. Beam in the RHA, please answer the 
     following questions and provide the requested documents:
       1. An explanation for why Mr. Beam is allowed to accumulate 
     up to three weeks of comp time while working less than the 
     standard 40 hour work week.
       2. An explanation for how RHA is deemed a ``high 
     performer'' when the executive director is away from the 
     office for nearly three months per year.
       3. The complete list of annual compensation packages of all 
     RHA employees, including salaries, bonuses, longevity pay, 
     car allowance and/or take-home vehicle, vacation and comp 
     time and any other compensation (health care, retirement, 
     etc).
       4. Please review and document the executive director's use 
     of RHA office equipment to conduct non-RHA business.
       5. Provide a list of all legal bills and professional 
     service and consulting fees paid by RHA.
       6. Please provide copies of all employee financial 
     disclosure forms and document any Conflict of Interest 
     waivers filed by the RHA and RHA board with HUD.
       7. Provide all travel records for all employees at RHA as 
     well as the RHA board members.
       8. Please provide the names of all nonprofit affiliates 
     with ties to RHA. Please include the names of all officers 
     and their salary/benefit packages.
       Accordingly, please provide responses by no later than 
     January 24, 2014. If you have any questions regarding this 
     letter, please have your respective staff members contact 
     Janet Drew with Senator Grassley or Kris Denzel with 
     Congressman Holding.
           Sincerely,
     Charles E. Grassley,
       U.S. Senator.
     George Holding,
       U.S. Congressman.
                                  ____

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                   Committee on the Judiciary,

                                 Washington, DC, January 16, 2014.
     Hon. Shaun Donovan,
     Secretary, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Donovan: A recent series of articles in the 
     Bradenton Herald describe very serious financial 
     mismanagement issues at the Bradenton (Florida) Housing 
     Authority (BHA). Specifically BHA--a HUD ``high performer''--
     has provided lucrative employee compensation packages that 
     helped put the housing authority $400,000 in debt. HUD has 
     already removed both employees for attendance and vacation 
     time infractions, but there appear to be other financial and 
     management problems as well.
       The BHA employee manual contains very questionable 
     provisions for take-home vehicles, lucrative bonus and leave 
     policies, and retirement benefits. According to an October 6, 
     2013 Bradenton Herald article, at least half of the ten 
     person staff have take-home vehicles. According to page 49 of 
     the BHA employee handbook, the take-home vehicles are 
     ``available for both business and personal use,'' and ``BHA 
     issues a fuel credit card for each vehicle user.'' 
     Additionally, the employee is required to ``arrange for 
     routine vehicle servicing . . . through the Development 
     Director'' and the vehicle must be ``cleaned every other week 
     inside and out at a designated car wash.''
       If employees with fifteen or more years of service like 
     their take-home vehicles, they have the option of keeping 
     them when they retire or voluntarily leave. According to the 
     employee handbook, the employee ``will be entitled to either 
     the vehicle that they are driving at the time of the 
     separation or $10,000.'' Moreover, the policy provides that 
     ``if said vehicle is leased, the Housing Authority will 
     immediately pay the lease in full.'' Interestingly, the 
     policy places no limit on the value of the vehicle or the 
     lease to be paid off.
       Most BHA employees are given two bonuses every year, one in 
     June and one in December. According to the employee handbook, 
     employees who have been with BHA for at least a year are 
     eligible for a bonus of up to ten percent which is determined 
     by the executive director. The bonus is paid in June and even 
     employees who retire or voluntarily leave during the year 
     receive a prorated bonus. According to an October 20, 2013, 
     Bradenton Herald article, BHA instituted a new bonus policy 
     in February 2013, without Board approval, that gave every 
     employee a ten percent raise in March 2013. The second bonus, 
     a longevity award, is paid in December of each year (see 
     Table below). Even employees who voluntarily left BHA after 
     five or more years of employment are paid a prorated amount.

[[Page S502]]



------------------------------------------------------------------------
    For service of at least:        But less than:      The Amount is:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 years.........................  3 years...........  $100
3 years.........................  4 years...........  $200
4 years.........................  5 years...........  $300
5 years.........................  10 years..........  1 Weeks Pay
10 years........................  15 years..........  Two Weeks Pay
15 years........................  20 years..........  Three Weeks Pay
20 years........................  ..................  4 Weeks Pay
------------------------------------------------------------------------

       The BHA has very liberal leave policies including 15 hours 
     of vacation and 15 hours of sick leave per month and bonus 
     vacation hours after five years of service. Although the 
     employee handbook allows for two days off for Christmas and 
     one for New Year's Day, BHA had been closing between December 
     20th and January 2nd for the Christmas and New Year's 
     holidays. Plus, an employee can, according to the employee 
     handbook, cash out between 40 and 160 sick leave hours twice 
     per year and may convert vacation hours to sick leave hours 
     in order to cash them out. In fact, the Bradenton Herald 
     estimates that the former executive could cash out ``between 
     $7127.50 and $28,510 at a time'' so he could have pocketed an 
     extra $14,225 to $57,020 per year.
       Meanwhile, BHA board members failed due diligence and 
     oversight responsibilities. The board consistently passed 
     ``resolutions without seeing the language'' and the chairman 
     now wants to review employee policies only after the 
     executive director was fired. Another board member stated 
     ``HUD is the official agency.'' And, ``They didn't call me 
     and say, `Did you know your budget is in deficit.' ''
       To examine the extent of HUD's oversight over BHA 
     management, please answer the following questions and provide 
     the requested documents from years 2008 to present:
       1. A copy of the former BHA executive director's most 
     recent employment contract.
       2. The total amount of salary and compensation paid to the 
     former executive director.
       3. The complete annual compensation payments to all BHA 
     employees, including salaries, bonuses, longevity awards and 
     cashed out sick time any other compensation (health care, 
     retirement, take-home vehicle).
       4. The total number and description of BHA take-home 
     vehicles. The number of BHA vehicles or $10,000 payments 
     given as a retirement/separation benefit, as well as whether 
     or not the housing authority paid off the vehicle lease.
       5. The total number of fuel and other credit cards 
     authorized by BHA. Please include the names of each employee 
     provided with a fuel or other credit card, and the monthly 
     fuel charges paid by BHA.
       6. In addition to every Friday, please document every week 
     day (both full and half) per year that the BHA has been 
     closed and for what reason.
       7. A list of all legal bills and professional service and 
     consulting fees paid by BHA, including all vehicle service 
     bills.
       8. Please provide all financial disclosure forms completed 
     by BHA employees and document any Conflict of Interest 
     waivers filed by the BHA and Board of Commissioners with HUD.
       9. Provide all travel records for employees at BHA as well 
     as the BHA Board members.
       Accordingly, please provide responses by no later than 
     January 31, 2014. If you have any questions regarding this 
     letter, please have your respective staff members contact 
     Janet Drew.
           Sincerely,
                                              Charles E. Grassley,
                                                   Ranking Member.

  Mr. GRASSLEY. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Heitkamp). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                     Women's Health Protection Act

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, this month we recognize the 41st 
anniversary of the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, a ruling that 
assured every woman her constitutional right to make her own decision 
about whether and when to have a child based on her fundamental right 
to have her privacy protected.
  I had the honor to clerk for the author of Roe v. Wade, Justice Harry 
Blackmun, shortly after that decision in 1974. Few of us expected we 
would be here 41 years later facing the kind of attacks--in fact, the 
onslaught on women's health care and on their right to privacy--that we 
see again and again and again on the part of States, and even in this 
Congress.
  Today the House of Representatives will debate and probably vote on a 
bill that would severely restrict--very practically constrict--a 
women's right to choose. H.R. 7 is a threat to that right of privacy. 
Instead of moving forward in protecting women's health, all too often 
we have seen ongoing attacks. After four decades, this judgment is 
threatened by onerous and ongoing limitations repeatedly passed by 
State legislators and this body.
  I am very proud to be joined today by two of my most distinguished 
colleagues, Senator Murray of the State of Washington and Senator 
Baldwin of Wisconsin, who have been tireless champions for women's 
rights--for our constitutional rights--and for women's health care. I 
am humbled and admiring of the work they have already done and the work 
we have ahead of us.
  With their support, I have introduced--particularly with the active 
work of Senator Baldwin--a measure that will proactively and 
preventively protect women's rights against this onslaught at the State 
level.
  The Women's Health Protection Act is designed to stop restrictions 
that purportedly protect women's health but really use that cause as a 
ruse and a ploy to impose physical layouts on clinics, admitting 
privileges on doctors, and other kinds of severely burdensome 
restrictions--such as ultrasound requirements when there is no real 
medical reason for them--and basically apply to abortion health care 
the same kinds of restrictions with no more limitations than are 
required for medically comparable procedures. That is the basic 
principle.
  The goal is to push back the offensive onslaught on women's health 
care. We want to be on the offense rather than the defense because 
undoubtedly most of these restrictions, if not all, will eventually be 
struck down by the courts. The resources which are required are 
burdensome on the organizations and groups and individuals who are 
forced to carry on that fight.
  I know about that fight because I helped to wage it as an attorney 
general in the State of Connecticut for 20 years. I am very proud that 
I enforced many of the laws that are designed to protect a woman's 
right to choose, including the FACE statute. I was the first attorney 
general to enforce the FACE statute.
  We have many issues that are now before the Supreme Court, such as 
the McCullen v. Coakley case--which I hope will be decided--to uphold 
the buffer zone that makes women's rights real against the intimidation 
and deterrents that anti-choice groups try to bring.
  Making these rights real--the right of privacy, the right to be left 
alone--is the fundamental reason that we have introduced the Women's 
Health Protection Act.
  The President tonight will talk about many of the most important 
issues that matter to this country, including economic opportunity, job 
creation, recovery from the deepest recession in recent history; giving 
people a greater sense of confidence and trust in their ability to gain 
the skills they need to move forward in their lives. Economic mobility 
in this country is one of the greatest challenges we face for our 
children and our grandchildren. Those issues of job creation and 
economic growth are what we should be debating, not H.R. 7, not the 
restrictions at the State level that seek to inhibit and impede the 
ability of a woman to exercise her fundamental right to privacy. Let's 
keep in mind what is important to the American people who sense deeply, 
because it is part of our cultural DNA, part of our fundamental reason 
for being as a nation, that we have a right to privacy over a personal 
decision that should be made by a woman in consultation with her 
doctor, her health care provider, and her family, without interference 
from government bureaucrats or politicians. That is what is important. 
Ending the chilling effect of those State restrictions is also one of 
the goals--the chilling effect that deters women from exercising those 
rights, making those rights real, protecting a woman's right to decide 
whether and when to have a child. Every pregnant woman faces her own 
unique circumstances and challenges, and she has a right to make her 
own decision based on her own values, guidance from a physician she 
trusts, a family member she loves and her personal goals and what is 
right for her family.
  In the 40 years since Roe v. Wade, the attacks on this right have not 
been slowed; they have merely evolved, and they have taken new forms. I 
stand with my colleagues today and ask that we recognize together these 
pervasive threats, that we counter them and stand together in fighting 
back.
  I am very proud to stand with Senator Baldwin and Senator Murray,

[[Page S503]]

and I am proud to yield for Senator Baldwin.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
  Ms. BALDWIN. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Connecticut.
  Last week marked the 41st anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court 
decision in Roe v. Wade, which affirmed that women have the right to 
make their own personal health care decisions and to have access to 
safe and legal reproductive care.
  The anniversary of Roe should commemorate how far our country has 
progressed in the last 40 years in safeguarding women's reproductive 
freedoms and access to quality health care. But today I rise to 
recognize that history has been made in another way; that is, turning 
back the clock.
  Americans across the country expect to have access to high-quality, 
dependable health care when they and their families need it. 
Unfortunately, for women across this country, this access has come 
under attack.
  As my colleagues and I have worked to reform our health care system, 
to expand access to quality, affordable health care, too many States 
have enacted record numbers of laws that restrict a woman's access to 
comprehensive reproductive health services and the freedom to make her 
own health care decisions. In the past 3 years, States across the 
country have enacted a total of 205 provisions that restrict women's 
access to safe abortion services. In 2013 alone, States enacted 70 of 
these measures.
  In my home State of Wisconsin, we are now ranked as one of the worst 
States when it comes to a woman's reproductive rights, thanks to our 
Republican Governor and legislature. Wisconsin women, families, and 
their doctors are facing a slew of new and radical restrictions to 
health services mandated by one-party--Republican--rule in my State.
  Most recently, our Governor has enacted four new restrictions on 
women's access to safe and legal abortion care in our State. For one, 
he signed a law that not only forces women to undergo unnecessary 
medical procedures but also imposes unreasonable requirements on 
doctors who deliver care to women.
  I recently heard from a mother in Middleton, WI. She found out her 
baby had severe fetal anomalies and would not survive delivery. She had 
to undergo an emergency termination, and a clinic in Milwaukee was the 
only place that would do the procedure. But because the Governor was 
set to sign this law imposing unreasonable requirements on providers, 
the clinic was preparing to close its doors and wouldn't schedule her 
for an appointment. She and her husband were forced to find childcare 
for their two sons and leave the State and travel to Minnesota just to 
get the medical care she needed. If not for a Federal court order 
blocking the law shortly after the Governor signed it, the admitting 
privileges provision would have reduced women's access to safe and 
legal abortions in Wisconsin by 66 percent, closing several health care 
clinics and leaving women out in the cold. But unfortunately for this 
woman in Middleton, the court order did not come fast enough and the 
Governor's law disrupted her family during a deeply personal and trying 
time.
  The threat in Wisconsin and in States across the country is clear. 
Politicians are doing this because they think they know better than 
women and their doctors. The fact is they don't. It is not the job of 
politicians to play doctor and to dictate how these professionals 
practice medicine, nor is it their job to intrude in the private lives 
and important health decisions of American families.
  That is why I am proud to stand with my colleagues, including my good 
friend from Connecticut and my good friend from Washington State, and 
challenge these attacks on women's freedoms. I am proud to have 
introduced the Women's Health Protection Act because every American 
woman deserves the freedom to exercise her constitutional rights by 
making personal health decisions for herself and for her family with a 
trusted doctor and without political interference.
  Our bill makes it clear that States can no longer enact laws that 
unduly limit access to reproductive health care and that do nothing to 
further women's health or safety. The Women's Health Protection Act 
creates Federal protections against State restrictions that fail to 
ensure women's health and intrude upon personal decisionmaking. It 
promotes and protects a woman's individual constitutional rights and 
guarantees that she can make her own responsible health care decisions 
no matter where she lives.
  Elected officials should not put politics before women's health and 
women's safety. Women are more than capable of making their own 
personal medical decisions without consulting their legislator. Every 
woman in America deserves the freedom to plan her own family, to make 
her own health care decisions, and to have access to essential and 
quality women's health care services. We need to act now to guarantee 
that women will continue to have that freedom.
  Today I stand with 33 of my Senate colleagues and 99 Members of the 
House of Representatives to move our country forward with the Women's 
Health Protection Act and to safeguard women's constitutional rights 
under Roe. We need to act now to protect a woman's access to care and 
her constitutional rights, no matter where she lives, by enacting the 
Women's Health Protection Act.
  Again, I thank my colleagues, in particular my good friend from 
Connecticut, in leading us in this discussion on the Senate floor but 
also with the introduction of the bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I thank my colleagues from Connecticut 
and Wisconsin for their strong voices in support of a woman's right to 
make her own health care decisions in this country. I appreciate them 
being here today to talk about that and to stand with me to remind our 
colleagues that 41 years ago last week, just about 400 yards from where 
we are standing today, the course of history for women in the United 
States was changed forever.
  After over one century of struggle, a new generation of American 
women had access to safe and legal abortion. With one case, American 
women gained the ability to make their own decisions about their own 
health care and their own bodies. At a time when some Members of this 
body were far too young to remember, women stood up to the restrictive 
laws of States and the Federal Government and to the men who at that 
time wrote them.
  I would like to think that after four decades, many of those who want 
to make women's health care decisions for them have come to grips with 
the fact that Roe v. Wade is settled law. But unfortunately that notion 
is quickly shattered with one look at our legislatures across the 
country and efforts right here in Congress. In fact, tomorrow the House 
of Representatives is slated to vote on their misleadingly named ``No 
Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act.'' That bill severely undermines a 
woman's access to insurance coverage of comprehensive health care and 
fails to allow her to get the care she needs, even when her own health 
is at risk. It is nothing more than an attempt to eliminate access to 
abortion services while restricting a woman's ability to make personal 
decisions about her own care. I guess we shouldn't be surprised.
  The truth is that the tide of these politically driven, extreme, and 
unconstitutional laws continues to rise. In 2013, our Nation saw yet 
another recordbreaking year of State legislatures passing restrictive 
legislation barring women's access to abortion services. In fact, in 
the past 3 years, the United States has enacted more of these 
restrictions than in the previous 10 years combined. That means that 
now, more than ever, it is our job to protect this decision for women, 
to fight for women's health, and to ensure that women's health does not 
become a political football.
  For that reason today I will, along with 18 other Members of my 
caucus, file a brief with the Supreme Court of the United States in the 
case of Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., v. Sebelius. Just as in the many 
attempts before this case, there are those out there who would like the 
American public to believe that this conversation is anything but an 
attack on women's health care. To

[[Page S504]]

them, it is a debate about freedom--except, of course, for the freedom 
of women to access their own care.
  It is no different than when we are told that attacks on abortion 
rights aren't an infringement on a woman's right to choose, they are 
about religion or States' rights, or when we are told that restricting 
emergency contraception isn't about limiting women's ability to make 
their own family planning decisions, it is about protecting 
pharmacists, or when last week we were told that a certain former 
Republican Governor's comments about women's libido was a ``tone'' 
issue rather than a direct reflection of the Republican Party's 
misguided and arcane policies.
  The truth is this is about contraception. This is an attempt to limit 
a woman's ability to access care. This is about women.
  Allowing a woman's boss to call the shots about her access to birth 
control should be inconceivable to all Americans in this day and age 
and takes us back to a place in history when women had no voice or no 
choice.
  In fact, contraception was included as a required preventive service 
in the Affordable Care Act on the recommendation of the independent, 
nonprofit Institute of Medicine and other medical experts because it is 
essential to the health of women and their families. After many years 
of research, we know ensuring access for effective birth control has a 
direct impact on improving the lives of women and families in America. 
We have been able to directly link it to declines in maternal and 
infant mortality, reduced risk of ovarian cancer, better overall health 
care outcomes for women, and far fewer unintended pregnancies and 
abortions, which is a goal we should all share.
  But what is at stake in this case before the Supreme Court is whether 
a CEO's personal belief trumps a woman's right to access free or low-
cost contraception under the Affordable Care Act. Every American 
deserves to have access to high-quality health care coverage, 
regardless of where they work, and each of us should have the right to 
make our own medical and religious decisions without being dictated to 
or limited by our employer. Contraceptive coverage is supported by the 
vast majority of Americans who understand how important it is for women 
and families.
  In weighing this case, my hope is the Court realizes that women 
working for private companies should be afforded the same access to 
medical care regardless of who signs their paycheck.
  We cannot allow for-profit, secular corporations or their 
shareholders to deny female employees' access to comprehensive women's 
health care under the guise of a religious exemption. It is as if we 
are saying that because you are a CEO or a shareholder in a 
corporation, your rights are more important than your employees who 
happen to be women. That is a very slippery slope that could lead to 
employers cutting off coverage for childhood immunizations, if they 
object to it, or prenatal care for children born to unmarried parents, 
if they thought that was wrong, or an employee's ability to access HIV 
treatment.
  I am proud to be joined in this effort by 18 other Senators who were 
here when Congress enacted the religious protections through the 
Religious Freedom Restoration Act in 1993 and who also were here when 
Congress made access to women's health available through the Affordable 
Care Act in 2010. They are Senators who know that Congress never 
intended for a corporation--or furthermore, its shareholders--to 
restrict a woman's access to preventive health care, because we all 
know that improving access to birth control is good health policy and 
good economic policy. We know it will mean healthier women, healthier 
children, and healthier families. And we know it will save money for 
businesses and consumers.
  So today we are taking another step forward to uphold the promise we 
made to women and provide this access broadly, and I believe our Nation 
will be better for it.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for no 
longer than 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                       State of the Union Address

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, tonight the President of the United 
States will come before the Congress and make his State of the Union 
Address. That is an annual ritual we go through around here every year, 
and I have been through State of the Union speeches through multiple 
administrations. I sort of liken them to somebody making New Year's 
resolutions at the beginning of the new year, filled with lots of 
rhetoric and promises, most of which get left on the cutting-room floor 
when the speech concludes. But that being said, it is something that 
gives the President an opportunity to lay out his agenda for the coming 
year.
  Rumor has it that this year the President's speech is going to focus 
on income inequality and economic opportunity. Well, that is good to 
hear because these last 5 years of the Obama administration have been 
devastating to Americans who are trying to advance economically.
  Nobody can deny that the President inherited a difficult economic 
situation. I think we would all concede that at the very outset. But he 
has had now 5 years, going on 6, to make things better. Unfortunately, 
he has not made much progress.
  For the majority of Americans, things do not look much better today 
than they did 5 years ago. The economy still is not working; 
unemployment remains at historic recession-level highs; income 
inequality is at the highest point literally in 86 years; household 
income has dropped by nearly $4,000 since the President took office.
  I would like to quote from a piece that was published on Sunday. It 
said this:

       The last five years have been cataclysmic. . . . The 
     average income of the top 1 percent of earners increased 
     about 31.4 percent from 2009 to 2012, while wages for the 
     other 99 percent essentially stood still. The proportion of 
     economic gains going to the very wealthy under the Obama 
     administration is greater than it was under Mr. Bush.

  Those are not Republican talking points. That is from a column 
published in the New York Times. The column goes on to state:

       The rich-poor gap in the United States is now greater than 
     in any other industrialized country. Upward mobility, a 
     staple of the American Dream, is eroding compared with more 
     than a few nations.

  That again is from the New York Times.
  Whether the author intended it that way, it is a pretty damning 
indictment of the economic policies of the past 5 years.
  So I am glad to hear that the President is planning to focus on 
income inequality and economic opportunity tonight. These statistics 
make it very clear just how important it is we have that discussion 
right now. And they also make it clear we cannot continue the economic 
policies of the past 5 years because these policies have clearly 
failed.
  The President has tried throwing taxpayer money at the problem--
witness the failed trillion-dollar stimulus bill. He has tried economic 
bandaids that attempt to alleviate some of the symptoms of economic 
stagnation without doing anything to address the cause. Neither of 
those strategies has been successful in doing the one thing that will 
turn our economy around; that is, creating full-time, well-paying jobs 
for the American people.
  Extending unemployment benefits or offering food stamps may provide 
short-term relief, but no government assistance is going to provide a 
stable, secure, prosperous future like a good job will. Real long-term 
economic security and prosperity comes when families have access to 
stable well-paying jobs, with the potential for advancement.
  If we really want to help Americans, if we really want to get our 
economy growing, that is where our focus needs to be: creating the kind 
of environment where job creation can flourish. That means making it 
easier and less expensive for businesses--particularly small 
businesses, which create a majority of the jobs in this country--to 
expand and hire new workers.
  Unfortunately, the President has spent much of his Presidency making 
it more difficult. ObamaCare, for example, saddled businesses with a 
host of new taxes and regulations that have

[[Page S505]]

made it difficult or in some cases impossible for businesses to hire 
new employees.
  CBS reported in December that--and I quote--``Nearly half of U.S. 
companies said they are reluctant to hire full-time employees because 
of the [ObamaCare] law.'' That is not how you want businesses to feel 
if you are looking to encourage them to grow and create jobs.
  So I am hoping that this evening the President will turn away from 
the policies that have made nearly half of U.S. companies too worried 
to hire new full-time employees and turn toward policies that will 
enable real job creation in our economy.
  According to his advisors, the President wants 2014 to be a year of 
action. Republicans could not agree more, and there are a number of 
actions we think the President can take, and I hope he will announce 
them tonight.
  One thing Republicans and Democrats agree on, and would like the 
President to do, is grant immediate approval of the Keystone pipeline. 
According to the President's own State Department, the Keystone 
pipeline would support 42,000 jobs that would provide $2 billion--$2 
billion--in wages and earnings without taxpayers having to spend a 
dime. All that is required for the creation of these jobs is the 
President's approval, which he has inexplicably delayed now for 5 
years, despite numerous reports testifying to the benefits of the 
project and its low environmental impact.
  The President's staff has spent a lot of time over the last week 
talking about the President's intention of acting without Congress when 
Congress disagrees with him. Well, here is something the President can 
legitimately do unilaterally. He has the authority to open the door to 
these 42,000 jobs, and I hope this evening he will announce his 
intention of acting on approval of the Keystone pipeline.
  Another thing I hope the President will do tonight is encourage the 
majority leader to take up dozens of jobs bills that have been passed 
by the House of Representatives. Many of these bills passed the House 
with bipartisan support and could pass the Senate the same way. There 
is no good reason why the majority leader has decided to let them 
languish. Surely we could take up a few of those bills. The President 
ought to call on his party to pass these bills to get Americans back to 
work.
  In the same spirit, I hope the President will call on his party in 
the Senate to approve trade promotion authority legislation, which 
would help create U.S. jobs by giving farmers, ranchers, entrepreneurs, 
and job creators in this country access to 1 billion new consumers 
around the globe.
  Republicans hope the President will use that phone of his that he 
keeps talking about to call the majority leader here in the Senate and 
encourage him to pass trade promotion authority as soon as possible.
  Of course, no discussion of relief for middle-class Americans and job 
creators is complete without discussing ObamaCare, which is putting an 
intolerable burden on middle-class families and small businesses.
  I am not very hopeful that the President is going to announce his 
intention tonight of working with Congress to repair some of the worst 
parts of his signature law, but for all Americans' sake, I hope he 
does.
  Around the country, families are reeling under the impact of 
ObamaCare: higher insurance premiums, higher out-of-pocket costs, 
reduced access to doctors and hospitals. Meanwhile, businesses are 
cutting workers' hours, eliminating health care plans, or declining to 
expand their businesses to protect themselves from ObamaCare's 
burdensome taxes and regulations.
  There is bipartisan support for more than one change to ObamaCare, 
and there is particularly strong support for repealing the job-killing 
medical device tax, which is forcing medical device companies to send 
American jobs overseas.
  In March of last year, the Senate voted 79 to 20--79 to 20--against 
the tax. More than 30 Democrats voted for repeal. If the President is 
really serious about putting Americans back to work, he will announce 
his intention of working with Congress to repeal this job-destroying 
portion of his legislation.
  Last month almost 350,000 Americans gave up looking for jobs and 
dropped out of the labor force altogether. That is 350,000 Americans in 
1 month--1 month--who gave up looking for a job.
  The labor force participation rate is at its lowest level in 36 
years. More than 10 million Americans are looking for work, and nearly 
4 million of them have been unemployed for more than 6 months. In fact, 
if you had the labor participation rate today that we had when the 
President took office, the unemployment rate today would be about 11 
percent.
  It is definitely--it is definitely--time for a year of action. It is 
time to leave behind the economic bandaids of the past 5 years and 
focus on policies that will not address just the symptoms but the cause 
of our weak economic growth.
  We need to remove the obstacles facing our Nation's job creators so 
that struggling Americans can finally get back to work. We need to help 
create a future where every American has the opportunity for a well-
paying, full-time job, with the possibility of advancement. You are not 
going to see that as long as the policies coming out of Washington, DC, 
and this administration make it more expensive and more difficult to 
create jobs for the American people.
  And you are not going to do anything about income inequality if you 
drive people's cost of living higher, which is what ObamaCare's premium 
increases, higher out-of-pocket increases, energy-cost increases--there 
are new regulations coming out today that are going to put new 
requirements and regulations on existing coal-fired powerplants that 
are going to drive electricity costs through the roof for people whom I 
represent in South Dakota.
  Fifty percent of the electricity in South Dakota comes from coal-
fired power. We are told the administration is coming out with 
regulations that are going to apply those same things that apply to new 
plants to existing coal-fired power. So you are going to have not only 
new plants that are going to be prevented from being constructed but 
those that are existing that are going to have to modify their plants 
at enormous cost, in many cases with technologies that do not exist. 
All that does is put people out of work and makes it more expensive for 
middle-class Americans to make ends meet.
  If you want to do something about income inequality, provide good-
paying jobs for middle-class families in this country. Put policies in 
place that make it less expensive, less difficult to create those jobs, 
and then drive down the cost for middle-class Americans rather than 
raising them--rather than having higher energy costs, higher health 
care costs, higher this, higher that, all because of policies coming 
out of Washington.
  We can do better. The President has not always shown his eagerness to 
work with Congress in the past. I am told that tonight he is going to 
talk about all the things he can do unilaterally. I hope that tonight's 
State of the Union Address will mark a new start. Republicans are ready 
to get to work. I hope the President is too. I yield the floor.


                                 Recess

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate stands in 
recess until 2:15 p.m.
  There upon, the Senate, at 12:45 p.m., recessed until 2:15 p.m. and 
reassembled when called to order by the Presiding Officer (Ms. 
Baldwin).

                          ____________________