[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 17]
[Senate]
[Pages 23503-23505]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                           PROUD NEW YORKERS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I thank all of my colleagues for their 
understanding for my State and my city of New York over the last 2 
months. I particularly thank the majority leader, the Senator from 
South Dakota; the majority whip, the Senator from Nevada; the Senator 
from Montana, Mr. Baucus, chairman of the Finance Committee; and the 
chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Senator Byrd; as well as all 
of our Senate colleagues for being there for New York in its greatest 
hour of need.
  I spoke with the mayor of New York this morning, and we were 
commenting to one another about what amazing fortitude New Yorkers 
have. The spirits are high. The desire grows to stay the course and 
rebuild our city and make it greater than ever before. The desire of 
New Yorkers to stay in New York, if one looks at the poll numbers, is 
higher than ever before. The number of people when asked if they expect 
to be living in New York 5 years from now increased since September 11.
  We know all about the bravery of the firefighters and the police 
officers and the rescue workers, but maybe we do not know enough about 
the fortitude and the love of the city had by so many in New York City 
and the metropolitan area of New York have. They are brave people.
  As New Yorkers, we come from all over the globe. New York takes us 
and shapes us and makes us into Americans, and we are proud of that. We 
now know more than ever that America is proud of that as well.
  That is the good news. The good news is the fortitude, the strength, 
the courage, and the good grace of the people of New York. The bad news 
is that despite our confidence that our nightmare will soon end, we are 
in trouble. Two months after the attack, the economic damage to our 
city is becoming increasingly apparent and has been documented in 
publication after publication. The damage is enormous.
  Let me give some statistics. Our streets are littered with 37 miles 
of high-voltage electricity lines that are but one prankster away from 
shutting off power to our Nation's financial center. Over 40 percent of 
the lower Manhattan subway infrastructure has been destroyed, adding 
hours to the daily commute of 375,000 people who work in New York City. 
All our major river crossings: The Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queensboro 
Bridges, the Lincoln and Holland Tunnels, have been and continue to be 
subject to nightmarish traffic jams because of security requirements.
  Two weeks ago, they were all shut down again because of the crash of 
flight 587. Twenty-five million square feet of commercial office space 
was destroyed or heavily damaged. The amount destroyed--nearly 20 
million square feet--surpasses the entire office space inventory of 
large, important cities, such as Miami and Atlanta. Over 125,000 jobs 
have at least temporarily vanished from the area and the city estimates 
that 30,000 of those jobs, at a minimum, are gone for good.
  Noxious fumes continue to emanate from the hole at the World Trade 
Center, creating great concern among the workers and residents for 
their personal health. There is even a possibility that the Hudson 
River retaining wall, which is underground and stops the Hudson from 
washing in, will break and flood the area as the debris is removed.
  Insurance companies are another problem--problems come from all 
sides--demanding 100 percent increases from companies doing business in 
New York simply because they are located in a confirmed terrorist 
target zone. Those offers are some of the better ones. There are many 
insurance companies offering no insurance at all.
  Mayor Guiliani has had to cut $1 billion from the city budget just to 
prevent an immediate fiscal meltdown at

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a time when the need for city services is at an all-time high, and 
Mayor-elect Bloomberg will have to cut much more than that and begin 
thinking about it the day he enters office because the city is staring 
at a $3 billion deficit next year as a direct result of this crisis.
  Governor Pataki has it even worse. The State's revenue loss is 
projected at $9 to $12 billion. The comptroller of the city of New York 
places the economic loss to the city and its businesses at $105 billion 
over the next couple of years.
  We were so proud as our city grew and grew and grew and added over 
800,000 people in the last decade. It was a record. But now we have had 
the first decline in the city gross product in over 9 years.
  In short, we have taken a hit for the Nation. None of the problems I 
describe was of the making of New Yorkers. None of these problems was 
the result of a single thing New York did or didn't do. And so we find 
ourselves in extremely difficult times.
  Now, with Chairman Byrd and Senator Daschle at the helm and broad 
support of Senate colleagues, I believe we will ultimately get the 
disaster aid needed to rebuild our damaged and destroyed 
infrastructure. That is coming through. Some Members would like it to 
come through more quickly, but it is coming. We don't have much of a 
dispute about that.
  We thank everybody. Senator Clinton and I are extremely grateful to 
all of our colleagues for the support they have shown New Yorkers.
  What we are here to talk about today is the need for tax provisions 
for New York to deal with the kind of economic damage I have mentioned. 
As we all know, the FEMA dollars go to the Governor, as they have for 
disaster after disaster. They go to replace the subway lines and 
streets that were destroyed. They go to pay for the cleaning up of the 
refuse. They deal with the firefighters and the police officers and 
their overtime. But none of that will give one iota of help to keep the 
businesses in New York or get the jobs growing to where they were.
  Senator Clinton and I put together an economic stimulus package. We 
had great help from the Finance Committee, Chairman Baucus and members 
of the Finance Committee, and help from the staff, led by Russ 
Sullivan. We were extremely grateful when it was included in our 
stimulus package that we presented.
  The reason I take the floor today, it appears there is a good chance 
we will have a stimulus package. I remind my colleagues how much we 
need that part of the package that went for New York to remain in the 
package. The provisions in it are designed to counter the uncertainty 
and fear we believe may lead many companies to walk away from us. We 
believe if we do not do it now, it will be too late.
  Company after company, the large ones, the small ones, are making 
their decisions over the next few months as to whether they stay in 
lower Manhattan and in New York City or whether they leave. Once they 
decide to leave, we can be as generous as we want, but come next spring 
it won't do any good. Their leases will have been signed, their 
decisions will have been made.
  There is urgency to do this now. It is not related to the FEMA 
spending or even the extra help in some of the appropriations measures 
that we have asked of the Appropriations Committee. Senator Byrd has 
been extremely generous to Senator Clinton and myself. We have been in 
constant conversation with him. But this relates to tax cuts. This 
relates to keeping the businesses in New York lest the financial 
center--not just of New York but of America--dissipates. That would be 
a real blow to our country--not just our city but our country--because 
so much of the capital to build the factories and the homes and so much 
of the capital to start new businesses comes from the financial center 
located in downtown New York. It is the greatest capital market in the 
world.
  Whether you live in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Albany, or even if 
you live in Omaha, Seattle or Wilmington, you have a real interest in 
seeing that financial center remain as strong as it has been. It has 
helped create the unprecedented prosperity we have seen.
  The need to act is now. The amount of money we are asking for in a 
huge budget is modest. We hear, as we talk about the stimulus package, 
of many other needs. We are aware of them and want to be helpful, too. 
Maybe I am a bit parochial, but I can't think of a better need than 
this one--a need for New York, a need for America.
  Let me outline to my colleagues--and I know many are familiar with 
this--the three complimentary provisions included in the stimulus 
package. There is $4,800 for an employee tax credit to companies that 
retain jobs and to not abandon New York in the area immediately around 
ground zero.
  There is the creation of special private activity bonds to lower the 
cost of redevelopment projects.
  There is a provision that would permit companies that replace 
equipment destroyed in the World Trade Center bombing to take a special 
deduction if they replace that property in New York, minus the 
insurance costs they will get back. We all know an insurance company 
will give $500 for a 2-year-old computer and you have to replace the 
computer with $1,000 in costs; the difference would be deductible.
  There is a one-time residential tax credit designed to encourage 
residents in Lower Manhattan to continue to live there. They are all 
afraid. Many visited Senator Clinton and myself here yesterday. They 
are scared. They are worried. These are their homes. They don't know if 
they should stay. This will be an incentive for them to stay and 
overcome the fear and disruption that has been visited upon their 
lives.
  And there will be permission for New York municipal bond issuers and 
hospitals to issue advance additional refunding to help enable them to 
refinance their debt service.
  Not a single aspect of the provision is designed to take business 
from another part of the country. We want to just keep what we had, 
what bin Laden and al-Qaida tried to take away from us.
  The provisions are designed very carefully. We worked closely with 
both the business and labor communities. They are designed very 
carefully to do just enough--not more, not overly generous but just 
enough--to keep the businesses in New York.
  I am making a humble plea. There are many, many needs and many, many 
conflicts embodied in the stimulus package. We need your help. I have 
tried in my few years as Senator to be generous.
  I have tried in my years here to respond when other areas of the 
country needed help. I did not do it thinking New York would. We do not 
have the kinds of natural disasters we are accustomed to seeing in many 
other parts of the country. But when I heard about and read about the 
earthquake in California, the hurricane in Florida, the floods in North 
Dakota and North Carolina, I knew they needed help. Now, unexpectedly 
but in a devastating way, we were hit by, not a natural disaster but 
one very real. We need your help.
  I thank Chairman Baucus. These provisions for New York he championed, 
not because of politics but because it was the right thing. He has done 
the right thing. I believe the Nation, with his stimulus bill which 
will also extend unemployment and COBRA to hard-working Americans, is 
the right thing to do. I thank Senator Daschle who has stood with us 
through thick and thin. Among all my colleagues I have hardly heard a 
word of dissent. There was tremendous sympathy.
  At our Thanksgiving table this year, we closed our eyes and had some 
moments of silence as we thought of the thousands and thousands of New 
York families who, that same day, were having their Thanksgiving 
dinners--their turkeys and stuffing and corn bread--but at whose tables 
there was an empty seat. Someone wasn't there who had been there for 
all the previous Thanksgivings. That person will never come back. Those 
families' hearts will remain broken for the rest of their lives.
  We remember them. We think of them. But when we talk to the families

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who have survived, they tell us: Rebuild New York. Don't let those 
deaths be in vain. Don't let Mr. bin Laden and his evil band succeed in 
permanently hurting our country and our city. This is a mission. It is 
a mission to rebuild New York. It is a mission to rededicate ourselves, 
in the name of so many in the New York metropolitan area who lost their 
lives. We hope and we pray that all of you will join us in this effort.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska.

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