[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 28201-28205]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



   PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2389, COUNTY SCHOOLS FUNDING 
                       REVITALIZATION ACT OF 1999

  Ms. PRYCE. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I 
call up House Resolution 352 and ask for its immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

                              H. Res. 352

       Resolved, That at any time after the adoption of this 
     resolution the Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule 
     XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of the 
     Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of 
     the bill (H.R. 2389) to restore stability and predictability 
     to the annual payments made to States and counties containing 
     National Forest System lands and public domain lands managed 
     by the Bureau of Land Management for use by the counties for 
     the benefit of public schools, roads, and other purposes. The 
     first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points 
     of order against consideration of the bill are waived. 
     General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not 
     exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the 
     chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on 
     Agriculture. After general debate the bill shall be 
     considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. In lieu 
     of the amendment recommended by the Committee on Agriculture 
     now printed in the bill, it shall be in order to consider as 
     an original bill for the purpose of amendment under the five-
     minute rule the amendment in the nature of a substitute 
     printed in the Congressional Record and numbered 1 pursuant 
     to clause 8 of rule XVIII, modified by the amendments printed 
     in the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this 
     resolution. That amendment in the nature of a substitute 
     shall be considered as read. All points of order against that 
     amendment in the nature of a substitute are waived. During 
     consideration of the bill for amendment, the Chairman of the 
     Committee of the Whole may accord priority in recognition on 
     the basis of whether the Member offering an amendment has 
     caused it to be printed in the portion of the Congressional 
     Record designated for that purpose in clause 8 of rule XVIII. 
     Amendments so printed shall be considered as read. The 
     Chairman of the Committee of the Whole may: (1) postpone 
     until a time during further consideration in the Committee of 
     the Whole a request for a recorded vote on any amendment; and 
     (2) reduce to five minutes the minimum time for electronic 
     voting on any postponed question that follows another 
     electronic vote without intervening business, provided that 
     the minimum time for electronic voting on the first in any 
     series of questions shall be 15 minutes. At the conclusion of 
     consideration of the bill for amendment the Committee shall 
     rise and report the bill to the House with such amendments as 
     may have been adopted. Any Member may demand a separate vote 
     in the House on any amendment adopted in the Committee of the 
     Whole to the bill or to the amendment in the nature of a 
     substitute made in order as original text. The previous 
     question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and 
     amendments thereto to final passage without intervening 
     motion except one motion to recommit with or without 
     instructions.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) is 
recognized for 1 hour.
  Ms. PRYCE. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the 
customary 30 minutes to my good friend the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. 
Hall), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During 
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose 
of debate only.
  Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 352 is an open rule providing for the 
consideration of H.R. 2389, the County Schools Funding Revitalization 
Act. Under the rule, 1 hour of general debate will be controlled by the 
chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Agriculture. 
For the purpose of amendment, the rule makes in order as base text a 
substitute amendment which is printed and numbered 1 in the 
Congressional Record. This substitute language, which will replace H.R. 
2389, represents a bipartisan compromise brokered by the gentleman from 
Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert), 
and the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) to address the concerns of 
some environmental groups. The rule further amends this compromise 
language to make technical amendments and clarify a budgetary issue.
  As my colleagues know, under an open rule any Member may offer any 
germane amendment to the bill, but under the rule priority recognition 
will be given to Members who have preprinted their amendments in the 
Congressional Record. And, of course, the rule offers the minority an 
additional opportunity to amend the bill through a motion to recommit, 
with or without instructions. During consideration of amendments, the 
Chair will have the flexibility to postpone votes and reduce voting 
time to 5 minutes, as long as the first vote in a series is 15 minutes.
  Mr. Speaker, the goals of the County School Funding Revitalization 
Act are straightforward. The bill seeks to provide a temporary solution 
to a very real problem for counties that include Federal land. Since 
the enactment of two compacts, one in 1908 and the other in 1937, these 
counties have counted on revenue from the Forest Service and the Bureau 
of Land Management to pay for public schools and roads. This revenue 
compensates the counties for the revenue they would have otherwise 
received had the land been sold or transferred into private ownership. 
However, in recent years these Federal revenue payments have plummeted 
as Federal timber sales have declined by 70 percent, leaving 
communities searching for the resources they need to educate their 
children and maintain basic infrastructure. This has been especially 
devastating for students who have seen their classes canceled, teachers 
laid off and extracurricular activities eliminated as budgets shrink.
  Mr. Speaker, education reform has become a top national priority for 
both

[[Page 28202]]

parties, and this bill plays a small yet meaningful role in enabling 
local communities to give their children a quality education. 
Specifically, the bill will stabilize payments to forest communities by 
providing for a 7-year safety net of guaranteed funding. The payments 
to States and counties with Federal land will be based on the average 
of the highest three payments received by States and counties between 
1984 and 1999. However, the legislation is not without controversy. 
Because the Federal payments made to forest counties are linked to 
timber sales, some believe there is a perverse incentive to cut down 
more trees. These opponents advocate a decoupling of timber sales from 
the revenues. To address some of these concerns, this rule incorporates 
compromise language into the bill.
  Under the compromise, revenues will still come from timber sales, but 
if this source of funding proves inadequate, dollars from the general 
fund may be used to pay forest communities. This effectively takes the 
pressure off the Forest Service to cut more trees. Further, counties 
that receive more than $100,000 through the Forest Service will be 
required to use 80 percent for schools and roads and the remaining 20 
percent for local projects on Federal lands. These local projects will 
be designed to restore forest health for economic or recreational use 
and will be approved by a local committee representing a broad range of 
community interests. Additionally, the project must comply with all 
Federal laws, environmental and otherwise.
  Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, the payments that this legislation 
guarantees are meant only as a short-term safety net. The bill 
establishes a forest county payments committee that is tasked with 
developing a long-term policy to improve upon the current system of 
revenue sharing between the Federal Government and forest counties. 
Within 18 months, the committee will submit its recommendations to 
Congress for our consideration.
  In summary, this legislation offers a balanced approach to ensure 
that the agreement the Federal Government made with States and counties 
that include Federal land within their borders is honored. By providing 
these safety net payments, we will enable local communities to provide 
better educational opportunities to children, as well as maintain their 
socioeconomic infrastructures. The rule is balanced as well. It 
presents a compromise version of this legislation to the House for open 
debate and amendment.
  I urge my colleagues to support this open rule as well as the 
communities who need our assistance to educate their children.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Ohio for 
yielding me the time, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  This is an open rule. It will allow for full and fair consideration 
of H.R. 2389. As the gentlewoman from Ohio has explained, this rule 
will provide for 1 hour of debate to be equally divided between the 
majority and the minority, especially the members of the Committee on 
Agriculture. The rule permits germane amendments under the 5-minute 
rule, the normal amending process in the House, and all Members will 
have the opportunity to offer amendments.
  Under current law, 25 percent of the revenues generated by timber 
sales, mining and oil and gas development in national forests goes to 
the counties where the national forests are located. The counties use 
the money for public schools and roads. This compensates for the loss 
of taxable property. In recent years, timber sales from national 
forests have fallen by 70 percent. This has caused a hardship on the 
rural public schools near the national forests that depend on the 
money.
  In the State of Ohio, which the gentlewoman and I represent, although 
we do not represent the area where Wayne National Forest is, that 
generates funds for schools in some of the poorest counties in the 
State. This bill attempts to strike a compromise between environmental 
concerns and the needs of the rural public schools that benefit from 
the national forest payments. It will provide a stable source of funds 
for the schools. It also will establish a national advisory committee 
to develop long-term solutions to the funding problems of these 
schools.
  Some environmentalists do have concerns about the bill because rural 
schools will still depend on dwindling timber sales in national 
forests. But this is an open rule, as I said. Members will have a 
chance to offer germane amendments and they will have the opportunity 
to improve the bill on the House floor. For that reason, I urge my 
colleagues to support this rule.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. 
Vento).
  Mr. VENTO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time. I have other responsibilities today so I am not going to be able 
to stay on the floor for general debate but I wanted to voice my 
concerns about the general policy path that this measure puts in place. 
I think what we really need here is sort of a reality check in terms of 
what is going down with this bill.
  I have no objections to the rule, I think it is a fair rule which 
permits amendments, but I do not think that this bill is going to be 
corrected by amendment. The underlying premise of the bill 
fundamentally is sound. I think that many of us could agree with such 
policy as counties and school districts that are dependent upon the 25 
percent of total fund yielded from resource extraction in the national 
forests to support their basic governing structure, to support their 
schools. Such funds have become limited and cut back because of the 
reality of forest science and policies that have curtailed the harvest 
of timber and other activities. Most importantly, I think here, is the 
realization of new forestry and what is sustainable and what is not and 
what the impacts are and how those multiple uses of our national 
forests have come to conflict with one another so obviously in the last 
decade in terms of forest science timber harvest has been limited. So 
the reduction in dollars is significant to these communities.
  I think I would stand with my colleagues to try and maintain some 
stable funding. This bill obviously does maintain stable funding by 
giving them the highest amount, their average for the highest 3-year 
period in terms of funding for their counties and their schools from 
1985. While there are a lot of other programs around in terms of Impact 
Aid for military and other issues, I think we have tried to recognize 
nationally where we have significant lands like through the PILT 
program, payment in lieu of taxes program and other programs, some 
funding for communities where we have significant public ownership, 
Federal ownership of lands, and where that does impact, we have 
provided assistance in trying to stabilize that, in this case is a good 
thing to do. At the same time in terms of extending and authorizing the 
significant amounts of money in this bill Congress should also try and 
delink and reform the system to a greater extent. That means to try and 
establish once and for all that these communities should not be 
receiving the dollars based wholly on timber production, that we should 
delink that as we stabilize and assure stable funding. While there is a 
token attempt to do that in this bill, it totally fails in the final 
analysis to do that--to delink timber receipts from state/local 
funding.

                              {time}  1300

  Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, one of the problems with this bill is that 
it provides for communities that do receive over $100,000, and in many 
other instances where they receive significant aid under this measure, 
to in fact establish dozens of different advisory committees which 
would then sit down and decide how in a local area and make 
recommendations to the Secretary of Agriculture or Interior on how to 
expend 20 percent of the resources that they are provided under this 
bill's authority. I know the counties and school districts would just 
as well receive the money themselves, this sets up a big problem--in 
fact a grant program under cover of this measure.

[[Page 28203]]

  First of all, it creates a lot more government than probably anyone 
need. We already have county boards and school boards that could make 
decisions on how to expend this money. Frankly, I think these advisory 
groups set up the potential and set up the Secretary of Agriculture and 
the Chief of the Forest Service for a lot more controversy and 
conflict. Frankly, it is going to be up to the Secretary of Agriculture 
and the Chief of the Forest Service to make decisions to say no to a 
lot of local advisory groups in a very unpleasant way, delivering the 
bad news, that some of these proposals are not worthy.
  It is up to the Secretary with such little details as requiring 
whether or not an environmental impact statement or environmental 
assessment is needed; and if it is needed, then the cost will go back 
to the local group to pay for writing. That's another unpopular 
decision, to say the least.
  I just think it is going to create a lot more conflict. I do not see 
this as being helpful. I think that it is a step in the wrong 
direction, creating all this governing structure is not an improvement. 
It is not what America is demanding with regards to deal with this 
problem, quite the contrary. I think it expands the original problem, 
creating controversy and confusing the topic.
  I have questions about whether all Federal laws are going to be 
complied with, such as enforcing the prevailing wage law. I have 
questions about the use of individuals in this that are put into a 
situation where they are forced to work in the county because they are 
under mandatory work-type requirements, both adults and juveniles. That 
provision is in the bill.
  There are a lot of concerns that I have. But fundamentally I think 
the bill fails on the basis of not delinking the roller coaster ride of 
up-and-down timber revenues sharing that occur as the local receipts 
from our national forests to these local communities. In other words, 
it keeps that link in place; it creates all this governing structure, 
and I think it is going to create more conflict.
  This is not an interim bill. It lasts for 7 or 8 years. The 
description of this as an interim bill is flawed on its surface and 
misleading. I urge the defeat of this measure.
  Ms. PRYCE of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield 6 minutes 
to the distinguished gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula), the dean of the 
Ohio delegation and the distinguished chairman of the Committee on 
Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior.
  Mr. REGULA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for the time.
  Mr. Speaker, I just want to explain my vote on this because I am pro-
education, but I think there are a couple of things I would bring to 
the attention of my colleagues here. It is temporary for 7 years. That 
is not exactly ``temporary'' as I would define it. But the real 
fundamental concern that I have is that the policy involved, we are 
establishing a policy that when Federal receipts are diminished, we, 
therefore, step in and fill the breach.
  Now, in the case that is outlined in this bill, that may have some 
validity. But as a matter of precedent, what happens if offshore oil 
production goes down, because a portion of offshore oil revenues go to 
the States? Do we then make up the difference to the highest years for 
the States that are receiving offshore oil receipts? Or how about the 
States that are receiving revenues from on-shore oil, and you have in 
this case timber; but we produce a lot of other things on Federal 
lands. In most cases, 50 percent of those revenues are shared with the 
States.
  Now, you can see that as these revenues diminish, and they may well, 
because our resources are not finite, that then we would be called on 
to make up the difference. I think that is a precedent that we ought to 
give serious consideration to today in establishing this as a policy of 
the Government.
  I know it is temporary, if you define that by 7 years, but it seems 
to me if we are going to get into this kind of a policy change, we 
ought to have a long-term set of conditions that address this in the 
case of other types of revenues.
  Also the question of where is it funded arises. The way it is 
established, it comes out of the Interior budget. I have, along with my 
colleagues on the subcommittee and all of us essentially, 
responsibility for the funding of parks and forests and fish and 
wildlife and Bureau of Land Management, about 30 percent of America's 
land; and if I would read this correctly, the money to fund it, which 
could grow as forest receipts are diminished, would have to come out of 
the Interior budget. That means, of course, there would be less for 
parks in the U.S. or less for other forms of responsibilities that we 
have in the committee, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the land agencies 
I mentioned, the cultural institutions here in the city.
  While I understand the objective here, it seems to me that we may be 
getting into something that has greater ramifications than we think.
  I also would point out that the national forests, while the amount of 
cut has been diminished, do provide revenues to communities through the 
recreation uses. People come in to hunt, fish, camp, and do a lot of 
other types of activities. Interestingly, and this is a little known 
fact, the forests of this Nation generate triple the visitor days of 
the Park Service, and the Bureau of Land Management lands generate 
double the visitor days of the Park Service.
  We think of the parks as our recreation dimension, when in reality 
the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service collectively 
probably produce five to six times as many visitor days as the Park 
Service. I say this because as people visit these forests, as they 
visit BLM lands, they are spending money, for housing, for food, for 
fishing gear, you name it; and this in turn helps to support the local 
economy.
  So for these reasons I think it is maybe premature to try to band-aid 
a problem that has a greater potential policy impact down the road. If 
we were to make legislation like this permanent, if we were to make it 
part of our responsibility, then I think there ought to be a separate 
source of funding, because I do not believe we should be penalizing the 
revenues that we have available to the appropriate committees for the 
parks and the recreation and the ecosystem of this Nation and the many 
responsibilities that go with the Department of Interior.
  I understand this and I commend the Members that are supporting this. 
They are trying to help their school districts. But with the exception 
of about three big States in terms of forests, it primarily affects 
about three or four States, about 150 counties, out of the total in the 
United States. So I believe that we ought to move cautiously in 
establishing the precedent that is embodied in this legislation, and I 
hope my colleagues will give some thought to that as we make a judgment 
in voting for or against this bill.
  Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman 
from Colorado (Mr. Udall).
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding me time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule. I support the rule 
because it appropriately allows the House to consider amendments, 
including one that I will offer and I will describe in a moment. But I 
believe the bill is another story. I cannot support the bill in its 
present form because it is not addressing the real problem with the 
current law that links Federal assistance for schools and roads to the 
size of the annual timber harvest on Federal lands.
  The real problem, if you look at it, is the link itself. This link 
needs to be broken, but this bill does not do that.
  I strongly support Federal assistance to education. The need for this 
assistance is particularly important in areas that are undergoing 
economic or other stress. In Colorado, for example, the stress that we 
feel at this point is because of our rapid growth and urban sprawl. In 
other areas it has other causes, including changes in local economies 
that have depended on timber harvests.
  But I think the Congress should provide assistance in ways that are 
most efficient and will have the fewest of side effects. In other 
words, if we are

[[Page 28204]]

going to assist schools or provide help to local governments with funds 
for schools or fire fighting or whatever needs they may have, we should 
do so directly in a way as simple as possible to administer and in 
proportion to the needs.
  The current law that links payments to timber harvests does not meet 
those tests of directness, simplicity, and proportionality. So we need 
to break the link, in other words, to decouple payments as some have 
described it. We should also break the link because it would free the 
captives, those captives at the local areas.
  Local schools, roads or other vital functions of government should no 
longer be held financial hostage to the very contentious issues that 
surround the management of our forests. School boards and county 
commissioners should not be forced to argue that it is necessary to cut 
more trees in order to repair roofs or keep the roads plowed.
  I do not mean to say that local officials do not have a legitimate 
interest in the management of our forests or that they should not speak 
out about them. I do mean that they and everyone else should be free to 
debate those issues on the basis of what is best for the lands 
themselves and for our society as a whole and not in terms of the 
financial needs of our schools or other institutions.
  But this bill does not only break the link; it not only does not free 
the captives. I believe it would make things worse for these local 
people. The bill would impose a new Federal mandate on the very 
communities for whom this Federal assistance is most important. It 
says, for example, that if the local government gets more than $100,000 
under the bill, 20 percent of the total payment must be set aside and 
used for projects on the Federal lands. To put it another way, the bill 
says that the hostages will have to help pay for things that otherwise 
would be funded from the budgets of the Forest Service or the Bureau of 
Land Management.
  Some of those things could be good things, like repairing trails or 
removing old logging roads that cause erosion. But suppose the local 
government has other priorities? What if they would rather spend all 
their Federal payment on schools or roads, rather than helping the 
Forest Service or BLM. Then what? Under current law it is their choice. 
They have that option. Under the bill, the way it is written, they 
would not.
  I think that is just flat wrong. So at an appropriate time I will 
offer an amendment that will return discretion to the local 
governments. My amendment would allow any local government to spend 20 
percent of its Federal payment on Federal land projects, but it would 
not require that those monies are spent on Federal land projects.
  Under my amendment, a local government could decide to use all this 
year's payment for schools and roads and then, next year, perhaps apply 
some of those monies to these Federal land projects. But in the end it 
would remove this potential Federal mandate and restore local 
discretion.
  My amendment would not cure all the problems with the bill. I think 
the bill is fundamentally flawed because it does not break this link 
between Federal assistance and timber receipts. So, to be straight with 
this body, even if my amendment is adopted, I cannot support the bill. 
At least my amendment would mean that this bill, which is entitled the 
Community Self-Determination Act, would come a little closer to living 
up to its name.
  Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman 
from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
  Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.
  Mr. Speaker, I wish that every day on the floor we had rules like 
this. This is an open rule. It will allow any Member of the House to 
offer an amendment, and I believe that is something that we should do 
much more often around here. So this will be a rare moment where I can 
support a rule for a bill. Too many times we are muzzled and not 
allowed to offer amendments that would improve or alter bills before 
us.
  The bill that is before us is very different and did not go through a 
regular committee process; and for that reason, some Members may be 
puzzled as to exactly what the bill does, as are advocacy groups on 
both sides of the issue among the public; and I would like to take a 
couple of minutes to explain that.
  I had a very different approach in mind when I introduced my 
legislation, which would be 100 percent guaranteed, very clean, 
complete decoupled. That bill garnered very, very little support; and a 
different bill passed in the Committee on Agriculture, the Boyd-Deal 
bill; and then, of course, we had a bill recommended on the Senate side 
by Senators who I do not think the rules of the House allow me to name. 
But, anyway, there were some Senators that introduced a bill over.
  This bill is different than all of those bills, but it combines some 
of the most important aspects of all. First and foremost, this bill 
requires that anything and everything done under this legislation 
follow and absolutely comply with every environmental law, every 
environmental rule, every forest plan, every resource management plan 
that is currently on the books in the United States, that it fully 
follow the Endangered Species Act, and allow appeals.

                              {time}  1315

  All that is within the scope of this bill. Any projects which might 
occur under this bill, which are a small part of the bill, are subject 
to Secretarial discretion, in addition to having to follow all rules, 
laws, and regulations.
  There will be much controversy over the projects. The projects were 
not my preferred alternative, but they have been altered in a way that 
makes them environmentally neutral, and potentially they could be 
projects that would be beneficial to local communities and areas.
  They could be spent for road obliteration for problem roads, for 
watershed restoration, they could be spent for other revenue-generating 
activities on the forests that do not go to timber production. They 
could be spent on recreation.
  The gentleman from Minnesota objected to a provision I had added 
which would allow them to be used for work camps; that is, to be 
allowed for a correctional facility for nonviolent offenders to work on 
the forest lands. I do not find that to be objectionable. I think that 
is very desirable, better than having them sit in jail and watch 
television. So I do not understand why the gentleman would object to 
that.
  It could also be used at their initiative for reimbursing counties 
for the huge unmet costs of search and rescue on Federal lands. The 
bottom line is, my State is more than half owned by the Federal 
government. The Federal government has dramatically changed the laws 
and rules that pertain to timber harvests, as I believe many of those 
changes were necessary, because we were overharvesting.
  The question is, since no other productive use that generates 
revenues for those counties, we cannot levy taxes in those lands can go 
forward, should the government pay something to those counties for 
their ongoing obligations to provide a road network through those 
lands, and to provide law enforcement services and the other things? I 
believe the answer is yes. I hope that a majority of the body here 
today decides that the answer is yes.
  The gentleman before me, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) said 
this creates a bad precedent. He talked about offshore oil drilling. 
That is not analogous. The analogy would be base closings. When the 
Federal government closes a military base, it admits there are huge 
impacts on the communities, it dumps a whole bunch of money into that 
community, it does retraining, does a whole host of other things, and 
ultimately it turns the lands over to those communities for future 
purposes.
  I am not advocating these lands be turned back over to the States. I 
am absolutely and adamantly opposed to that. But in lieu of that, we 
are asking for a modest replacement of revenues that were formerly 
created off these lands, while there will be ongoing and perpetual 
obligations to the counties for law enforcement and infrastructure, 
roads and other activities on those lands.

[[Page 28205]]

  These are vital payments that go to schools, that go to vital county 
services; as I already mentioned, law enforcement, road construction, 
reconstruction, and maintenance. Those funds will not exist if this 
legislation does not pass.
  In the case of my counties, we have 3 more years of a guarantee under 
law, but after that, we fall off the cliff. For many other counties, 
they have already fallen off the cliff. They need this help to rebuild 
the social infrastructure of their communities and maintain vital 
county services.
  I would urge people to keep an open mind in the debate today and 
realize, unfortunately, having not followed a regular process, my 
committee having decided not to take jurisdiction, the Committee on 
Resources, that this has not been before Members in its final form for 
very long. It is very different than what was proposed. I urge the 
Members to read the bill and ask questions of any of us who were 
involved in the writing.
  Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, there could be some problems with this bill, I am not 
sure. The most important thing as far as what we have right now is that 
the rule is open. It gives Members a chance to change this bill if they 
do not like it. For that reason we support the rule.
  Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back 
the balance of my time.
  Ms. PRYCE of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, let me remind my colleagues, as my 
colleague, the gentleman from Ohio, just did, that this is an open 
rule. Not only does it provide for a completely open amendment process, 
it provides balance for the process by inserting compromise language 
into H.R. 2389 as well.
  This bipartisan compromise has the support of the National 
Association of Counties, the National Education Association, the U.S. 
Chamber of Commerce, and some 800 rural education, government, 
business, and labor organizations from 37 States.
  For any Member who still has concerns about the legislation, the rule 
allows any germane amendment to be debated and voted upon. I hope my 
colleagues will support this very fair, balanced, open rule.
  More importantly, I urge my colleagues to support the children and 
the schools who will benefit from the needed assistance this bill will 
provide. This is a great opportunity to shore up public education in 
rural forest communities through a balanced, equitable approach. I hope 
Members can support this effort.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the 
previous question on the resolution.
  The previous question was ordered.
  The resolution was agreed to.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________