[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 1]
[House]
[Pages 27-28]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           LEGISLATIVE ISSUES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, happy New Year, and 
congratulations to all of my colleagues for the beginning of the 108th 
Congress.
  I believe that we have an opportunity as we serve in the United 
States Congress to make things better and, therefore, I would like to 
speak this afternoon on the attempt to honor some who I believe have 
made this world a better place. So today I will be filing a resolution 
to express the sense of Congress for a commemorative postage stamp in 
honor of the late George Thomas ``Mickey'' Leland, one of our 
colleagues who fought so valiantly to avoid hunger in this world. As I 
stand here, we are recognizing the emerging famine in Ethiopia, which 
was one of the reasons that Congressman Leland was in Ethiopia in 1989, 
to be able to thwart the enormous hunger that that Nation was facing. 
It will be our challenge in this Congress to honor him, but to as well 
take up the cause that he so valiantly attempted in his work to avoid 
or to stamp out hunger in the world.

                              {time}  1645

  I hope, as we look at the funding and the issues before us, we will 
not forget that we are in fact our brothers' and sisters' keepers.
  In addition, I am filing today a resolution to name the Department of 
Veterans Affairs in Houston Hospital as the Michael E. DeBakey 
Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Michael E. DeBakey, a 
famous and renowned heart surgeon, was also a renowned, valiant fighter 
for America in World War II. So we believe that this would be an 
appropriate honoring of such an outstanding leader.
  I also intend to file today a bill that will emphasize more mental 
health services for children and to provide more support for our 
community mental health centers around the Nation. We lost a valiant 
soldier on behalf of the mental health needs of this Nation last year, 
our dear friend, former Senator Paul Wellstone. In his honor I believe 
that we should continue to fight for the equality of health care as it 
relates to mental health services, and particularly I believe that we 
should advocate for the children of this land to have access to mental 
health services.
  Over the last couple of years, as the co-Chair and Chair of the 
Congressional Children's Caucus, my colleague, the gentlewoman from 
Florida (Ms. Ros-Lehtinen), and myself have tried to focus on the needs 
of children in America. It has been appalling to watch in several 
States the tragedy of lost children by the children's protective 
services.
  I have already filed a bill dealing with infant abandonment in 
hospitals,

[[Page 28]]

and also the question of hospitals attending to the information or 
trying to find family members of abandoned children that may be left, 
or newborn babies that may be left in hospitals. We will be looking to 
file a bill dealing with and addressing the question of children's 
protective services across the Nation.
  Let me first of all say that there are many who do good work as part 
of the system of protecting our children in States across the Nation. 
Let me applaud those individuals. Particularly, I would like to cite 
the Harris County Children's Protective Services that had worked with 
me so valiantly on the issue of baby abandonment and other child 
protection issues.
  But when there is fault and error, when there is a circumstance such 
as that that generated the loss of life of a 7-year-old boy in New 
Jersey, and the starvation of two very young children, we need to 
address the question of accountability by our children's protective 
services across the Nation.
  So I will be filing legislation to require an accounting of the 
children that are under their jurisdiction, an annual reporting, and a 
knowledge of whose possession those children are in. Our children are 
our most precious resource, and therefore we need to include 
legislation to protect them at every opportunity that we have.
  Mr. Speaker, I will also be filing two private bills, and have filed 
them, one dealing with Gao Zhan, an outstanding academic from China, 
who still at this point has not received her citizenship. She was held 
against her will in China just a few months ago. We are delighted that 
she is released, and her husband and son are citizens; and I hope we 
will consider her plight.
  Let me also say, Mr. Speaker, that I am filing a private bill on 
behalf of the Kesbeh family, who have been in this country for almost 
12 years and have made every effort to become citizens, and in fact 
have a 9-year-old daughter. We hope that under the laws of this land 
their case can be considered and that we will treat them fairly under 
our laws.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe we are here to work, and I hope that my 
colleagues will join me in supporting the legislative initiative that I 
have put forward and, as well, that we will find compromise and 
opportunity to work with those who are unemployed and to provide an 
outstanding economic stimulus package.

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