[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Page 17482]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                  THE RURAL SATELLITE TELEVISION BILL

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I understand that my friend from 
Mississippi, the distinguished majority leader, may propose a unanimous 
consent request regarding the rural television loan guarantee bill 
which I have been working to get passed for many months. If the consent 
request actually offered is the one I have seen, I will have to object 
when that happens. I will explain why now so I don't hold up the 
distinguished leader when he comes to the floor.
  As a conferee last year on a major satellite television bill--the 
Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act--I worked hard to include, along 
with other Senators, a provision that would have assured that rural 
Americans were not left out of the benefits of that Act. I teamed up 
with other Senators to include a title that would have allowed USDA to 
provide loan guarantees to companies that wished to offer local-into-
local television to rural Americans. We wanted to do this so that rural 
families would be able to receive their local network television 
stations over satellite, or other service, along with the full range of 
other programming. We wanted rural families to be able to get local 
news, local weather warnings and local programming but recognized that 
without a loan guarantee program that might never happen.
  In other words, we wanted to share the benefits of that bill that 
would go to urban areas to rural Americans also through a loan 
guarantee program. I know many parts of rural America would not have 
the benefits of it without a loan guarantee program. It is similar to 
what we did in my grandparents' time to bring telephone service and 
electricity to rural areas.
  As a Conferee, I originated the rural satellite guarantee program to 
be administered by USDA when I was a conferee on the satellite TV bill. 
Unfortunately, one of the Senate committee chairmen objected to that 
provision and insisted that it be pulled from the Conference Report. To 
date, we have been unable to resolve this matter and regain the ground 
we lost last year. I know the distinguished junior Senator from 
Montana, Senator Burns, took an early leadership role in this matter. 
His colleague, the distinguished senior Senator from Montana, Senator 
Baucus, introduced legislation with me last year also on this issue. We 
did this to show bipartisan support.
  I want to work with all Members on this. The reason I would make such 
an objection, if it were done the way I have been told, is that to do 
otherwise I would have to abandon rural America, and I don't intend to 
do that. As a product of rural America, I feel my roots there very 
deeply. Ironically enough, this could have already been law by today. 
There is a simple solution. A lot of Republicans and Democrats agree on 
this. We can send a great rural satellite loan guarantee bill to the 
House by working together. I think that could be passed by unanimous 
consent. Or, we could enact a final bill by a Senate amendment to the 
House-passed bill. We could do that in the time it would take to get 
the conferees together to meet.
  I am concerned that a conference would delay this process until the 
end of the year and result in denying rural Americans local-into-local 
television--the same kind of satellite local-into-local television 
urban residents now enjoy. I use as an example the electronic signature 
conference. That showed how difficult a conference can be and it shows 
how long a conference can take. That conference took way more time to 
finish than we have left to devote to any rural satellite conference. 
In addition, the Congress has to pass at least ten major appropriations 
bills or else there could be another government shutdown. In this case, 
the proposal would leave two key committees off the conference.
  Regarding the e-signature conference, when we finally got the right 
mix of conferees and followed proper procedures, we still had many 
struggles before we finished a strong e-signature bill that has been 
applauded by both businesses and consumers. However, this time around 
we do not have time because the Congress is going out of session soon.
  But we clearly have time to enact this rural satellite bill. My staff 
provided draft language to many of the Republican and Democratic 
offices months ago in order to help resolve this matter. I urge the 
majority leader and the Democratic leader to call a meeting so we can 
resolve this important issue and send a clean bill over to the House 
without wasting time. I suspect it would be passed very quickly, with 
very strong support from the rural areas of our country.
  Mr. President, 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. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sessions). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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