[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 9019-9022]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           SUPPORTING THE GOALS AND IDEALS OF WORLD WATER DAY

  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to 
the resolution (H. Res. 196) supporting the goals and ideals of World 
Water Day.

[[Page 9020]]

  The Clerk read the title of the resolution.
  The text of the resolution is as follows:

                              H. Res. 196

       Whereas the global celebration of World Water Day is an 
     initiative that grew out of the 1992 United Nations 
     Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro;
       Whereas the United Nations General Assembly, via 
     resolution, designated March 22 of each year as World Water 
     Day;
       Whereas although water is the most widely occurring 
     substance on earth, only 2.53 percent of all water is 
     freshwater and the remainder is salt water;
       Whereas freshwater resources are further impaired by 
     various forms of industrial, chemical, human, and 
     agricultural pollution;
       Whereas climate change will increasingly pose a challenge 
     for ensuring the availability of sufficient water supplies at 
     the appropriate times;
       Whereas approximately one in six people in the world lack 
     access to safe drinking water and approximately two in every 
     five people lack access to basic sanitation services;
       Whereas water-related diseases are among the most common 
     causes of illness and death, afflicting primarily the poor 
     and very poor in developing countries;
       Whereas up to five million people die each year from 
     preventable water and sanitation related diseases, including 
     one out of every five children in the poorest countries;
       Whereas every $1 invested in safe drinking water and 
     sanitation yields an economic return of between $3 and $34, 
     depending on the region;
       Whereas increasing access to safe drinking water and 
     sanitation advances efforts towards other United States 
     development objectives including fighting poverty and hunger, 
     promoting primary education and gender equality, reducing 
     child mortality, promoting environmental stability, improving 
     the lives of slum dwellers, and strengthening national 
     security;
       Whereas the participants in the 2002 World Summit on 
     Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, including the United 
     States, agreed to the Plan of Implementation which included 
     an agreement to work to reduce by one-half from the baseline 
     year 1990 ``the proportion of people who are unable to reach 
     or to afford safe drinking water,'' and ``the proportion of 
     people without access to basic sanitation'' by 2015; and
       Whereas Congress passed and the President signed into law 
     the ``Senator Paul Simon Water for the Poor Act of 2005'' 
     (Public Law 109-121) which was intended to ``elevate the role 
     of water and sanitation policy in the development of U.S. 
     foreign policy and improve the effectiveness of U.S. official 
     programs'': Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved,  That the House of Representatives--
       (1) supports the goals and ideals of World Water Day;
       (2) recognizes the importance of increasing access to safe 
     drinking water and sanitation, as well as the conservation 
     and sustainable management of water resources, to human 
     health and quality of life across the globe;
       (3) urges an increased effort and the investment of greater 
     resources by the Department of State, the United States 
     Agency for International Development, and all relevant 
     Federal departments and agencies towards providing 
     sustainable and equitable access to safe drinking water and 
     sanitation for the poor and very poor; and
       (4) encourages the people of the United States to observe 
     World Water Day with appropriate recognition, ceremonies, 
     activities, and programs to demonstrate the importance of 
     water to humanity.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Lantos) and the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Ros-
Lehtinen) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California.


                             General Leave

  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and 
include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from California?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this 
resolution, and I yield myself such time as I might consume.
  I would first like to commend my distinguished colleague and a former 
member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, 
for introducing this important resolution.
  Nearly 5 years ago, representatives of governments around the globe, 
including the United States, stood together and agreed to reduce by 
one-half the number of people who lack access to safe drinking water 
and basic sanitation by the year 2015. We now stand at the midpoint of 
that target, and we are no closer to reaching it than we were at the 
outset.
  Today over 900 million people lack access to safe water, and over 1.3 
billion people do not have access to basic sanitation. Climate change 
is rapidly depleting the world's already badly stretched water 
resources.
  Each year more than 3 billion of our fellow human beings suffer from 
preventable water-related diseases. As a result of these diseases, 5 
million people die. Most of these victims are children under the age of 
5. Clearly, more must be done to address this humanitarian catastrophe.
  Our legislation, H. Res. 196, demonstrates the commitment of the 
Congress to achieve the goals and ideals of World Water Day to increase 
the availability of clean water.
  Collectively, we have the means to address this global crisis. What 
we need is political will for action. Congress swiftly acted with the 
passage of the Senator Paul Simon Water for the Poor Act in 2005, a 
critically important piece of legislation spearheaded by the 
distinguished gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) with the support 
of my former colleague, Chairman Henry Hyde, and myself.
  This resolution is another step in improving our commitment to 
bringing clean water and basic sanitation to the poorest of the poor. 
H. Res. 196 urges our own government to utilize every resource at our 
disposal to improve access to clean water and sanitation for those most 
in need. It recognizes the importance of conservation and sustainable 
management of water resources to both human health and the quality of 
life.
  We must do all we can to provide clean water and basic sanitation for 
all people across the globe.
  Madam Speaker, I strongly support this resolution and urge all of my 
colleagues to do so.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  I rise in support of House Resolution 196, which expresses the 
support of this House for the goals and ideals associated with World 
Water Day.
  The lack of access to safe drinking water and the lack of adequate 
sanitation systems continue to be major problems for poor people around 
the world despite our strong efforts over many decades to help address 
those challenges. The lack of clean water and sanitation systems in 
many parts of the world lead to the spread of disease and to the deaths 
that might otherwise have been avoided and undermines the efforts we 
take to assist poor people around the world as they seek a better life.
  Madam Speaker, I just got back last week from a heart-wrenching trip 
to Darfur, and we saw firsthand how important a resource water is to so 
many people. We saw, by visiting the clinics, how many people are 
afflicted with the diseases that are borne because of the water that is 
not pure, that is not sanitized and that is, in fact, full of bacteria. 
I understand how important it is to support the goals and ideals of 
this resolution before us commemorating World Water Day.
  In addition to sanitation and access to clean water, the conservation 
of water resources is, itself, an increasing challenge around the 
world. Conservation of drinking water will, in fact, remain even a 
greater challenge in the near future as mankind's population continues 
to expand and the demand for fresh, clean water increases.
  In calling for the appropriate Departments and agencies of the United 
States Government to increase our efforts to support access to clean 
water, availability of sanitation systems and conservation of water, 
this resolution properly cites the Senator Paul Simon Water for the 
Poor Act of 2005 enacted in the last Congress, which called for a 
greater focus on the objectives that are associated with World Water 
Day.
  This resolution rightfully seeks to highlight this global problem 
encouraging all of us to observe World Water

[[Page 9021]]

Day every year on March 22. I support the intent of this resolution and 
its adoption by this House.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of our time.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 7 minutes to the 
author of this resolution, my good friend from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. I appreciate the chairman's courtesy. I appreciate 
his leadership in working with me on this bill.
  Madam Speaker, as we stagger under the implications of what we have 
just witnessed at Virginia Tech, I think part of what we ought to do is 
to rededicate ourselves to simple steps that will help make the world a 
better place. I can think of no better or direct way for us to act 
today than what this legislation means for us.
  I would begin by thanking the gentlewoman from Texas, Ms. Johnson, 
who can't be here right now because she is actually chairing a 
committee dealing with water pollution as we speak, as Chair of the 
Water Resources Subcommittee. She has been really a terrific champion. 
I see here today my friend from Tennessee, the former Chair of the 
subcommittee, who likewise has been focusing on the central need for us 
to be respectful of water supply.
  As the old joke goes, God gives us water for free, but he doesn't 
give us the pipes, the distribution system and purification.
  Across the world, as my good friends from the Foreign Affairs 
Committee have just enumerated, every day millions and millions of poor 
people are paying the price for nature's failure to provide water 
exactly where they live, and a failure of stewardship on the part of 
governments and individuals to take care of the water that they have.

                              {time}  1415

  They are paying the price for pollution from inadequate or 
nonexistent sanitation, and far too many poor people are paying a huge 
amount of their scarce income because they can't otherwise get water. 
They are paying in time and in money. There are some poor people that 
are slowly going blind because of arsenic poisoning in their water 
system in Bangladesh.
  I used to think that the pictures in the National Geographic articles 
with the water jug on the head was sort of exotic, but now I recognize 
this as the face of poverty. Indeed it is a travesty as young women 
particularly spend 1, 2, or 3 hours with that jug of water balanced on 
their head to meet the needs of their family. That is time that they 
are not spending in school, that is time that they are not spending 
economically to support that family. As has been mentioned, every 15 
seconds a child dies from lack of access to safe drinking water and 
sanitation, and each is an unnecessary death because we know exactly 
what to do to stop it. Indeed, there are people from churches and 
synagogues and Boy Scout troops and Kiwanis Clubs that are acting on 
their own to help provide water around the world.
  Lack of access to drinking water and sanitation is the number one 
preventable killer in the world. And I won't repeat the statistics, 
mind numbing as they are, of over 2 billion people without access to 
sanitation, and the fact that half the people who are sick today around 
the globe are sick needlessly from waterborne diseases.
  As my friend from Florida said, this is tied to other health 
problems, HIV/AIDS, and poverty reduction. The tragedy is compounded 
because we are not doing enough to stop it. By recognizing the goals 
and ideals of World Water Day, we commit again on this floor to spread 
the word about this grave issue and build the momentum to address it.
  As the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee pointed out, in 2002 
the world did take a stand. I was privileged to be at that conference 
in Johannesburg, where the United States and 185 other countries agreed 
to that ambitious goal. The frustration is that this goal can be met, 
if done correctly, for less than the cost of a takeout pizza a year for 
an American family.
  In 2005, the Congress passed and the President signed into law the 
Paul Simon Water for the Poor Act, which I thought was important 
because not only were we for the first time taking a stand, but the way 
that we did it, with the leadership of Mr. Lantos and Mr. Hyde; and on 
the Senate side we had the minority leader and the majority leader 
coming together in broad bipartisan legislation. We were for the first 
time providing a plan to implement the commitment that the United 
States and 185 other countries made.
  I am saddened as we come to the floor today, however, that the Bush 
administration has failed to implement this legislation. Instead, as I 
read the budget, the President has proposed major cuts to the already 
inadequate commitment from the United States to water and sanitation.
  The centerpiece of this bill was to create a strategy for meeting our 
international commitments, to bring together some 15 agencies and 
departments, to have a plan. Sadly, the deadline has passed, and as 
yet, we don't have yet that comprehensive plan. We continue to use 
gimmicks and numbers games to claim that the administration is meeting 
Congress' requirements, but they are not. This resolution ought to be a 
point of emphasis that Congress demands a greater effort, not lesser, 
from the administration, and indeed from ourselves, as we come forward 
with the budgets this year. We should insist that the United States 
stand by its word and actually do something about this crisis. We are 
saying that we have to partner with poor people wherever they are, not 
in a few allied countries in the Middle East, but especially in sub-
Saharan Africa, in South Asia, and around the world.
  I would hope that with the help of the Foreign Affairs Committee and 
the distinguished leadership on the floor here that when the State 
Department comes back to Congress this June with its second report on 
the implementation of the bipartisan ``Water for the Poor Act,'' I 
would hope that it will match our legislation in scope, ambition, and 
focus. If not, let us return to the drawing board to find ways to help 
the State Department meet its obligation under the Act.
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. I am now pleased to yield such time as he may 
consume to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan), who is the former 
chairman of the Subcommittee on Water Resources and the Environment, 
and representing a district that surrounds Knoxville and includes 
Knoxville, who passed a resolution supporting the ideals of the issue 
before us.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Madam Speaker, I thank, first of all, the gentlelady from 
Florida, the new ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, for 
yielding me this time and for her kind words and her strong support of 
this legislation. I also commend Chairman Lantos for bringing this 
resolution to the floor. But I especially want to commend my good 
friend and colleague, the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for 
his work in bringing this matter to the floor today and also calling 
attention to what is a very, very serious problem.
  I had the privilege of chairing the Aviation Subcommittee for 6 
years, and that subcommittee seemed to generate a lot of attention and 
publicity. Then I chaired for 6 years the Water Resources and 
Environment Subcommittee, and unfortunately I think people did not pay 
as much attention to that subcommittee; and I thought it was just as 
important, perhaps more important, than the Aviation Subcommittee. And 
yet I said many times there probably is nothing that the people in this 
country take for granted as much as they do our clean water and 
wastewater infrastructure in this Nation.
  Madam Speaker, much work needs to be done in this country in regard 
to our water to keep it to the standards that the people of this 
country want. And so the day after tomorrow we will hopefully pass a 
long overdue bill, the Water Resources Development Act, a bill that we 
passed two or three times here in the House, that has been held up in 
the Senate, but that is very, very important for our water 
infrastructure in this Nation.
  You have heard some of the statistics already. My statistics vary 
just a little

[[Page 9022]]

bit. I was given the information that 1.2 billion don't have access to 
clean water; Chairman Lantos said a lower figure, I think Mr. 
Blumenauer said a higher figure, but it is an astounding number of 
people, whatever the exact number is, that don't have access to a good, 
clean water source.
  Water-related diseases, as Chairman Lantos said, kill over 5 million 
people each year. Six million are blind today because of trachoma, an 
eye infection spread through poor hygiene caused by dirty water and 
unsanitary conditions. I could give all kinds of statistics.
  As the gentlelady from Florida (Ms. Ros-Lehtinen) said, I was proud 
that in my hometown of Knoxville recently, the city council, at the 
urging of our great Mayor Bill Haslam, passed a proclamation in support 
of World Water Day. This was done without my knowledge, and so I am 
pleased that other people are helping to call attention to what is one 
of the most serious problems that this world faces today.
  And so I think that it is very appropriate that the Congress take up 
a resolution at this time, and I think that this will help lead to 
progress in this area, much, much needed progress; and I urge support 
for this resolution.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to my good 
friend from Ohio, the distinguished chairman of the Oversight and 
Government Reform Subcommittee on Domestic Policy, Mr. Kucinich.
  Mr. KUCINICH. I thank my friend, Mr. Lantos.
  I rise as a proud cosponsor of this bill emphasizing the importance 
of water. Despite the availability of advanced and inexpensive water 
treatment technologies and despite an aggregate level of wealth that 
should preclude injustice, one in six people in the world still lack 
access to safe drinking water. Global warming is expected to worsen the 
situation.
  At the same time, privatization of our scarce water supplies is also 
proliferating. It drives up the price of a life-giving resource under 
the guise of making it cheaper. In its most egregious form, bottled 
water companies overpump a valuable water supply, restricting access to 
only those who can afford to pay more for water than for gas.
  I represent an area of Cleveland that, like many nearby cities, 
relies on Lake Erie for drinking water. During negotiations by Great 
Lakes States over the conditions under which water could be withdrawn 
from Lake Erie and the surrounding Great Lakes, the bottled water 
industry slipped in their own language; it allowed exclusive, unlimited 
access to Great Lakes water by their industry. By weakening the 
agreement in this way, it also paved the way for any corporation to 
have full access to the lakes, even at the expense of the public water 
supply. This is happening at a time when both water quality and 
quantity are expected to decline as a result of global warming.
  In Nottingham and Barrington, two small New Hampshire towns, a 
company called USA Springs is attempting to pump 310,000 gallons a day 
in an area populated with homes that get their water from small, 
private, household wells. The community is concerned about loss of 
their water supply, loss of water quality, degradation of nearby 
wetlands, but USA Springs is using their substantial resources to 
overwhelm the community. The result is that this company, USA Springs, 
is now dangerously close to winning this battle it started in 2001. 
Similar battles are being fought in communities all over the country.
  The basic building blocks of life, like water, must be accessible by 
people before corporations and must be managed as a public trust, not 
reduced to a commodity.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to my 
friend and neighbor from California, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey, 
chairwoman of the Education and Labor Subcommittee on Workforce 
Protections.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Madam Speaker, today I rise in support of the World 
Water Day resolution, H.R. 196, and I am proud to be a cosponsor of 
Congressman Blumenauer's resolution.
  The district I represent includes Marin and Sonoma Counties just 
north of San Francisco. My district is very ecologically diverse. In 
fact, we are putting new life into our wetlands, we are expanding our 
wetlands. We have wastewater treatment plants that make it possible for 
us to send our wastewater and use our wastewater to water our grapes, 
and we have one of the best grape growing counties in the country.
  In fact, in my very own backyard, my drip system that waters my yard 
is controlled by satellite because my town of Petaluma is 
experimenting. They picked 100 houses and asked us, would we let them 
use our drip systems as an experimental project; and it will indeed 
save me money and save water, I am sure. Along with that, many of our 
commercial and recreation activities in my district are focused around 
water.
  So even with programs like this throughout our country, throughout 
the world, we are squandering. We still squander this precious resource 
called water.
  World Water Day raises the profile of the issue. It means that we 
must keep on working, we must keep on paying attention to safe and 
sustainable water supplies, and we must make safe and sustainable water 
available without regard to any economic or any political boundaries.
  Recently, there has been an entirely renewed attention to global 
warming, and with that, we are paying more attention to our water 
resources and what we need to do to keep a safe and liveable world, not 
just for Americans, not just for Petalumans, but for everyone.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos) that the House suspend the rules 
and agree to the resolution, H. Res. 196.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. LANTOS. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this question will 
be postponed.

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