Corrine Brown

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to have the opportunity to offer legislation designating the post office located at 440 South Orange Blossom Trail in Orlando as the Arthur ``Pappy'' Kennedy Post Office Building. This bill, H.R. 4399, was introduced last Tuesday night. Mr. Kennedy was Orlando's first African American city commissioner. He was a tireless advocate for the dispossessed and the poor. He died on March 28 and is survived by his children, Arthur Kennedy and Shirley Waters, six granddaughters and three grandsons, 21 great grandchildren, and numerous cousins, close relatives and friends. Mr. Kennedy was a public servant who worked with many organizations, including the Meals on Wheels, the United Negro College Fund and the NAACP. He was never one to talk about his accomplishments, so I would like to take the opportunity to do so. As an elected official, his negotiating skills were integral in the building of Hankins Park, and the landscaping of Parramore Street. He organized the Orlando Negro Chamber of Commerce and served on the Jones High School Parent-Teacher Association. In 1992, the Southwest Orlando Jaycees honored Mr. Kennedy with the Lifetime Achievement Award and named the Prayer Breakfast in his honor. He dedicated his life to serving others, as evidenced by the Preserve African American Society honoring him as their Trailblazer Award. Mr. Speaker, Orlando has lost a fine public servant as a result of the passing of Mr. Kennedy. Born in River Junction, Florida, in 1913, Pappy Kennedy moved to Orlando at age 10. He was a graduate of Bethune Cookman College and an impressive public servant whose decency will long be remembered by his friends and family. It is with great pride that I urge my colleagues to help me designate the aforementioned post office in Orlando as the Arthur ``Pappy'' Kennedy Post Office Building. Mr. Speaker, I want to make a special note that the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings) will be making comments and submitting a statement for the Record. I also want to encourage others to join me on Sunday, Mother's Day, to participate in the Mother's Day March. There is no better way to honor mothers than a salute to mothers in support of pending legislation before this body for gun safety and to protect our children. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to have the opportunity to offer legislation designating the Post Office located at 440 South Orange Blossom Trail in Orlando as the ``Arthur `Pappy' Kennedy Post Office Building.'' This bill, H.R. 4399, was introduced last Tuesday night. Mr. Arthur `Pappy' Kennedy was Orlando's first African American City Commissioner and he was a tireless advocate for the dispossessed and the poor. He died on March 28 and is survived by his children Arthur Kennedy and Shirley Waters; six granddaughters and three grandsons; twenty-one great grandchildren and numerous cousins, close relatives, friends and acquaintances. Mr. Kennedy was a public servant who worked with many organizations including Meals on Wheels, the United Negro College Fund, and the NAACP. He was never one to talk about his accomplishments, so I would like to take the opportunity to do so. As an elected official, his negotiating skills were integral in the building of Hankins Park, and the landscaping of Parramore Street. He organized the Orlando Negro Chamber of Commerce and served on the Jones High School Parents- Teachers Association. In 1992, the Southwest Orlando Jaycees honored ``Pappy'' with the Lifetime Achievement Award and named the Prayer Breakfast in his honor. He dedicated his life to serving others as evidenced by the Preserve African American Society (PAST) honoring him with their Trailblazer Award. Mr. Speaker, Orlando has lost a fine public servant as a result of the passing of Arthur `Pappy' Kennedy. Born in River Junction, Florida in 1913, Pappy Kennedy moved to Orlando at age ten. He was a graduate of Bethune Cookman College and an impressive public servant whose decency will long be remembered by his friends and family. It is with a great deal of pride that I urge my colleagues to help me designate the aforementioned Post Office in Orlando as the ``Arthur `Pappy' Kennedy Post Office Building.'' Thank you and with that I would like to yield the remainder of the time to the distinguished gentleman from Florida, Congressman Hastings.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I rise as a proud cosponsor of H.R. 701. This bill will improve funding for conservation programs by purchasing and protecting environmentally sensitive lands as well as other conservation and recreational programs. This bill will provide $141 million annually to the State of Florida and many of the funding initiatives in this bill, such as the park acquisition and maintenance and urban recreation, will have a great impact on Florida and my district. This is extremely important to Florida's environment and is critical for preserving places like the Timucuan Preserve in Jacksonville, which is a legend of the work by my predecessor, Charlie Bennett. Mr. Chairman, I know there are critics out there, but this bill is necessary for places like Florida that have precious ecosystems that need to be preserved in a period of extreme urban growth. Our local and State governments in Florida have made a great effort toward preserving our sensitive land, and this bill will be an enormous benefit for all of us. These monies will also allow us to promote assets such as urban fishing to serve ethnic and minority populations that would not have the resources to reach out in the past. Mr. Chairman, this is an important bill and I urge my colleagues to vote for it.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure and a mix of sadness that I come to the floor today to speak on the designation of the post office located at 1601-1 Main Street in Jacksonville, Florida, as the Eddie Mae Steward Post Office Building. I am saddened because of the untimely passing of Eddie Mae Steward as a result of heart disease and the sense of emptiness it imposed on her friends in the community and her family. In Jacksonville, Florida, she is best known as a mother, a friend, a leader, a fighter, and an activist. But, most important, she is known as one who would never shy away from a fight against social injustice. Eddie Mae Steward single-handedly led the fight for desegregation of the Duval County school system, initiating the lawsuit that led to the court ordered desegregation of the school system. She was a tireless advocate for most of our citizens and, in particular, our children. Much like Dr. King and other leaders of the Civil Rights era, she too was labeled as a troublemaker and paid dearly for her activities. Eddie Mae Steward spoke out in 1967 about the school board's decision to send 268 African American children to a condemned, run-down building. Mrs. Steward served on the board for the northeast Florida Community Action Agency and was a member of the State Housing Council and State Bi-racial Monitoring Committee for Higher Education. She also served on numerous community-oriented groups. True to Mrs. Steward's character, her neighbors said of her, ``If there were more people like her, we would have a better community.'' She was a woman of unquestionable integrity who believed in equal justice and equal opportunity. Eddie Mae Steward's passing is Jacksonville's loss, which is why I am delighted to honor her memory by designating the post office in her name. Mr. Speaker, I ask that the Florida Delegation support this effort by signing on to my letter, which I will begin circulating early next week.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, this is an important piece of legislation that is long overdue. We must address the critical water resource needs of our expanding communities. I want to especially thank the gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Thurman), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss), and 32 cosponsors for taking the lead in getting the measure to the floor for consideration today. Mr. Chairman, the Water Infrastructure Network released a comprehensive report at the Conference of Mayors' press conference here on Capitol Hill last month on the crisis facing the Nation's wastewater and drinking water system. The report concluded that there is an ``increasing gap in our Nation's water infrastructure needs and the Federal Government's financial commitment to safety and clean water.'' This is unfortunate. In my home State of Florida, Orlando, Jacksonville and other metropolitan areas are faced with a fast-growing population and are very concerned, and rightly so, about their ability to adequately finance the programs needed to meet projected water demands. Water supply is one of the most important issues facing Florida and our Nation, and it is critical to our future. I urge support for H.R. 1106.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, these new Low powered stations will offer a voice to those who deserve to be heard, and will promote greater diversity and allow non-profit organizations, community groups, and churches an opportunity to reach their local constituents without paying huge fees to commercial radio stations. As more and more radio stations are bought up by large companies, it becomes more and more difficult for minorities and women to own or access a station. Its obvious to me why these commercial radio stations are opposing these additional stations, they just don't want any competition. It amazes me that the same people who chastised the FCC for trying to limit religious broadcasting are the same ones that stand on the floor here today trying to prevent churches and community groups access to the media. Its dishonest, and I encourage my colleagues to let the FCC do their job and defeat this bill.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will further yield, that is correct. Also, there has been a shift in the vegetation and wildlife in communities around the lake because of the polluted facility.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Minnesota for yielding to me. Mr. Chairman, I am very interested in working with the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Chairman Shuster) and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), the ranking member, concerning Lake Apopka in Florida. Florida, as my colleagues know, is one of the third largest States, and Lake Apopka is the second most polluted lake in the State of Florida. We have been harmed by many years of agricultural storm water discharges, as well as historical discharges of both domestic and industrial waste water. Because of this, this particular lake has been in the news. Many Federal officials have come down, and there is a lot of concern as to how this relates to the community. I am hoping that the committee will look into Lake Apopka as we move this bill through the process and consider adding this to the list.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Fishing, Mr. Chairman. But, as I said, there has been a shift in the usage because of the contamination of the lake.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Yes, sir. Mr. Chairman, in fact, I have been in touch with the Water Management District, and they will forward that information. In reviewing the bill, I was very concerned that Florida was not represented in the bill. Of course this lake is crucial to the State of Florida.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will yield, I do not have it, but I will have that information for the gentleman from Minnesota.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this bill, and I urge my colleagues to stay out of the doctor's office and leave the medical decisions to the medical profession. This is a bad bill because it is anti-family. This bill ignores the health of the mother, and instead it jeopardizes a woman's chance to have a healthy baby in the future. Let me be clear, a third trimester abortion is an extremely rare procedure. In the State of Florida, we had 25 of these procedures performed last year. Let me give an example of why. A 31-year-old pregnant woman discovered at 31 weeks of pregnancy that her fetus' brain had grown outside of his head. The baby would not live outside of the womb, and the enlarged head made a regular delivery a dangerous procedure for the woman. This is a woman who wanted a child and a woman who wanted a family. I ask my colleagues to allow these women to protect their bodies so they can have healthy babies in the future. Let us leave the medical decisions to the medical professionals. This is a bad bill, and I urge Members to vote against it.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, can my colleagues imagine Florida saying, courses that one has to take, they are going to put them on the Internet? Even though they are wired, they are not hooked up. My colleagues can go to schools in my district, and half of the schools we do not have computers in the classrooms. My colleagues go to another side of the track, there is computers in all of the classrooms. There are refrigerators and air conditioners. No matter where a kid attends school in this great country, we should have ``A'' schools all over. We do not destroy our system by doing away with the schools. We work to bring all of the standards up.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. That is correct, Mr. Speaker. I want to tell my colleagues that one of the problems is that these proposals is top down, not bottom up. I talked with the deans, for example, from the school of nursing. What she indicated to me was that all of their applicants have over 3.0 average. But it is important when they decide or develop the class, there should be some reflection as to the communities that they are going to be going back working in. There is a shortage of African Americans and Hispanics in the allied health. It is important that it includes it. One cannot come here and talk about affirmative action and not talk about the history of this country. That is part of the problem. We have had years of slavery, years of Jim Crow, and 35 years of half hearted trying to do the right thing or not even pretending to do the right thing. So now this is supposed to be some magical day and that it is over and we are not going to consider race. Race is a factor, and we must consider the historical fact. The gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Meek), when she was in Florida, bright, young lady, could not go to the institutions in Florida. She had to go out of State for education. Many, many of my colleagues, that was the situation. In certain programs, one could not go to our flagships. One could not go to the University of Florida. One could not go to Florida State. Now, when we are just beginning to make a difference, we are talking about, well, we are going to do away with all of these programs. Let me tell my colleagues about women, I mean, because that is an area where, even though we have been able to get women into various colleges, we have not gotten into certain programs, like engineering programs or the high-paying technical programs. So in that agreement that we signed with the Federal Government, we indicated that we would make sure that we would recruit women, not only recruit them, but have programs there for the retention of women in higher education, in various fields. So we are not going to go back, as I said, not in Florida. We are going to move forward.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Texas for really holding this special order. It is interesting that George Bush, like his brother Jeb Bush in the State of Florida, has promised to improve the educational gap between minorities and white students by trying to do away with affirmative action. I was not at all surprised to learn from my Texas colleagues that under the governorship of George W. Bush in 1996 and 1997, Texas ranked 38 in the Nation for financial aid given to needy students, and that Governor Bush did not include any additional Head Start funds in his 1999 Federal education proposal, despite the fact that it is currently serving only two in five eligible children. Today I want to talk about the Bush brothers' attack on affirmative action and what has gone on in my State of Florida. In Florida, Governor Jeb Bush is attempting to ram an education plan through the State of Florida called ``One Florida.'' In reality, this plan should be called ``Florida School for the Elite.'' This plan does away with affirmative action in Florida's university admissions. I am here today as a Member of Congress because of a tool called the Voting Rights Act. It took Florida 127 years to send an African American to Congress, and that was just 8 years ago. So we really still have problems in Florida. Thurgood Marshall, who was the only Supreme Court Justice, in my opinion, African American, but he said a snake is a snake. It does not matter whether that snake is a black snake or a white snake. If he bites you, the result is the same. Now, Governor Bush, Jeb, has tried to mislead the people of Florida by telling them that the Clinton administration and the Department of Education support his initiative. That is not true. The policy of the Clinton administration on affirmative action is mend it; do not end it. Mend it; do not end it. Florida has never been a color-blind or gender-neutral State. In fact, race is a factor and is a factor that is very important. Recently upheld in the Supreme Court, a decision as recently as in 1995, is the Adarand decision. The law of the land still affirms that affirmative action is lawful in the United States of America. It is in the Government's interest to address this limited minority participation in the social and economic structure of this country. Now, I want my colleagues to know that my governor had a special session on how we are going to kill people in Florida, how we are going to execute them in Florida, but would not have one on how are we going to save our kids. Florida ranks 47th with the number of our graduates that attend higher education, ranks 47th. But yet we want to come up with a plan that would exclude another group from attending our universities. The real sad thing about it is the courses, he talks about the top 20, half of the courses that they are talking about are not even offered in the public school system in Florida. Half of the courses are not even offered. So when we were discussing this matter, they say, do not worry about it, do not worry about it. We will put these classes on the Internet. What a joke. Have they not heard of the digital divide? The computers are not in the community. They are not in the schools. I have been a representative in Florida for over 18 years, and I know what happened as far as the funding of the educational system. The schools that I represent are the ones on the other side of the track, on the other side of the bridge, on the other side of the railroad track. They are the ones that have not been funded. So we have this A Plus plan and the F plan, and we are going to give money to the A plus schools. Those are the schools that have been given the money all along. The D-F schools, as opposed to try to improve those schools, well, we are going to give them a voucher. So what we are trying to do in Florida is destroy public education. Give them a piece of paper that does not cover the costs. In fact, 90 percent of the kids in Florida and in this country go to public schools. So rather than addressing the problem, what we are doing, we are coming up with gimmicks and slogans. People need to understand that it is not who comes to your barbecue, it is how they stand on the issues that is important to you. This has really been a wake-up call in Florida. Our late governor, Lawton Chiles, as recently as 1998, signed an agreement with the Federal Government to improve minority participation and female participation in higher education in Florida. Not only recruitment, but recruitment and retention because of the historical problems that we have experienced in Florida. Let me give my colleagues another statistic in Florida. In school districts that are 40 percent black and 60 percent white, 95 percent of the special education students are black boys. Special ed is not a way to go to college. We need to work on that. As I said before, Florida ranks 47th with the number of our graduates that go on to college. We in Florida need to be working to try to improve that program. I also said almost 50 percent of the African Americans in Florida go to schools that do not even offer the courses that they are requiring. They say, well, in the top 20 percent, what we will do is we will admit you to a school, a school; but we are not including the schools like the University of Florida, Florida State, or the University of Central Florida. Do not sit here and tell me tonight that the only students that should be able to go to University of Florida are our fine basketball players and football players. No, we want kids in law school and medical school. We want to have others. There is a provision to exclude basketball and football. But I have to be concerned today as I speak where we have one student graduating at the University of Texas and the University of California, one African American in law. They have the same number as the University of Mississippi. We are not going to let that happen in Florida. I am committed that our State will remain one of inclusion, that we will consider all of our kids. I can really thank the Bush boys, because this has really been a wake-up call for us in Florida. We have been kind of brain dead and not involved. But that is over. We are going to be involved in the education of our kids and the future of all of our kids. Lyndon Johnson says it is not enough to open the gates of opportunity. All of our citizens must have the ability to walk through those gates. Let us remember what President Clinton remarked in his latest visit to Selma. He said, ``We have come a long way, but our journey is not over.'' I mean, because of all of the great things that has gone on in this country, we have to make sure that all of our kids, black and white, get an opportunity to cross the bridge.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 95, on March 30, I was detained and unable to make this vote. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yes.''

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Progressive Caucus Budget. I want to talk about one of the most important pieces of this budget, housing. As we all know, home is where the heart is, but if we leave America's current housing crisis in the hands of our Republican counterparts, a lot of hearts and families will be broken. Do not ever forget that in 1994 the Republicans wanted to abolish the Department of Housing in their Contract on America. At a time when we have seen economic expansions throughout the Nation, the Republican budget makes significant decreases in critical housing programs. Our housing and development programs are some of the most important things that we do to help communities and working people help themselves. The progressive budget increases funding for community development, grants empowerment zones, and economic development. This budget would help our cities develop sewer systems and help our local government rebuild schools and water treatment plants. This budget would make a real difference for the Americans who need it the most. I want to make it clear that I will be voting for the progressive budget and against the Republican continual reverse Robin Hood, robbing from the poor and working people to give a tax break to their rich friends.

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Chairman, America's veterans are not just Function 700 of the budget. They are the men and women who put their lives on the line protecting our freedom, and they need to be made a priority now, when they need our help the most. I will never understand how Republicans can offer billions of dollars of tax cuts while our veterans are struggling for the services in health care that we promised them. The CBC budget offers our veterans the service that they have earned. It provides additional funds for medical research, nursing home construction, and the Montgomery GI bill, and the VA Center for Minority Veterans. Mr. Chairman, we talk about a surplus; but we cannot have a surplus when we have not paid our bills. We owe the veterans. We should make them a priority, and I urge the support of the CBC budget substitute.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of an increase in the minimum wage. Last year in my state of Florida, more than half a million people earned the minimum wage, a full 10% of the state's employees. Many of these workers are women, and most are adults who are trying to support a family. Don't be fooled by the claims that these workers are all teenagers. In fact, seventy-two percent of our nation's minimum wage workers are adults, and their family incomes are well below the national average. For a family of four to live above the poverty threshold, which is $17,000 a year, the minimum wage would have to be increased to $8.19 an hour! Since the 1980s, real earnings for our nation's workers have declined by 12 percent, while the wealthiest 20 percent swallowed up almost all of the increases. It's ironic that productivity, profits, executive pay and the stock market are rising, but the incomes of the poorest working families in our nation are not. The last time we raised the minimum wage, 10 million American workers benefitted and no jobs were lost. The 1996 minimum wage increase provided a pay raise to 10 million workers, and since then the economy has continued to speed ahead, creating thousands of new jobs. H.R. 3846 shortchanges minimum wage workers by stretching out a $1 an hour increase over 3 years, making low wage workers wait as long as possible before receiving the full increase. In addition, this bill is loaded down with tax breaks for big business, and by doing so it threatens Social Security and other invaluable programs! Not surprisingly, 73% of the beneficiaries of these tax breaks are the wealthiest 1% of our citizens! This is another case of Reverse Robin Hood--stealing from the poor and working people, and giving tax breaks to the wealthy. The Joint Committee on Taxation reports that this will cost our country $123 billion over the next ten years! I urge my colleagues to vote for a fair minimum wage bill and support the Democratic substitute. Stand up for our country's hard working minimum wage earners and vote ``no'' on the Republican measures.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that the conferees were able to finish their work so we now have the opportunity to vote on this conference report. I know that this negotiation was complex and frustrating. I want to commend my colleagues for working so hard on behalf of the American people. My State of Florida is keenly aware of the importance of getting AIR 21 passed and signed by the President. This comes at a critical time for our Nation's travelers as aviation forecasts continue to show a rise in the number of passengers taking advantage of air travel. In particular, I would like to take this opportunity to express my thanks for the inclusion of the Military Airport Program provisions in this bill. This program benefits communities like Jacksonville that suffered during BRAC. Florida's Cecil Field is a Naval Air Station closed during BRAC and selected for the MAP program last month. MAP helps turn former military airports over for civilian use. This is critical for my State. Florida has an incredible aviation demands, and Cecil Field will be used to handle some of this growth. Jacksonville is the second fastest growing airport in the country and Orlando International Airport handles more than 30 million passengers a year. Overall, I think this is a good bill, and I urge my colleagues to please vote for it. I rise in support of this conference report. I am very pleased the conferees were able to finish their work so we now have an opportunity to vote on this conference report. I know that the negotiations were complex and frustrating, and I want to commend my colleagues for working so hard on behalf of the American people. My state of Florida is keenly aware of the importance of getting AIR 21 passed and signed by the President. This comes at a critical time for our nation's travelers, as aviation forecasts continue to show a rising number of passengers taking advantage of air travel. In particular, I would like to take this opportunity to express my thanks for the inclusion of the Military Airport Program provision in this bill. This program benefits communities like Jacksonville that suffered during BRAC. Florida's Cecil Field is a Naval Air Station that was closed during BRAC and selected for the MAP program last month. MAP helps turn former military airports over to civilian use, and this is critical for my state. Florida has incredible aviation demands, and Cecil Field will be used to handle some of this growth. Jacksonville is the 2nd fastest growing airport in the country and Orlando International Airport handles more than 30 million passengers a year. Overall, AIR 21 provides the vital transportation infrastructure investment that is needed to shore up safety and security, as well as providing the economic engine that will aid development not only in Florida, but across the nation as well. I urge my colleagues to support the conference report.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, most people do not realize that African Americans were central contributors to the allied victory in World War II and served in numeric proportion to their presence in the population. Over 1.2 million African American men and women served in the Armed Forces during the war. Unfortunately, over the decades, the popular culture of major films and books fail to acknowledge. A few efforts have been made to tell the story of a small number of the participants such as the HBO film on the Tuskeegee Airman. However, in the mainstream of Americana African American World War II veterans are ignored and bypassed. To make sure these brave men and women don't pass before their sacrifices are recognized, I am asking for your support of the ``Day of Honor 2000'' project. The ``Day of Honor 2000'' project is an organized effort to provide a national city by city special event honoring African American World War II veterans. It is undertaken to provide some measure of clear public acknowledgment and appreciation of the sacrifices of a generation who served America under some of the most trying conditions experienced by any group of Americans in World War II. Day of Honor activities includes an appreciation reception with local African American World War II veterans who will make remarks on behalf of their comrades present and fallen. These veterans will be presented with Oral History Collection Kits which will be used to record their individual stories for future generations. These oral histories will be transcribed and forwarded to major museums focusing on World War II history. The reception also includes a premier screening of the critically acclaimed documentary film ``The Invisible Soldier: Unheard Voices.'' The ``Day of Honor 2000'' project will culminate with a major event in Washington, DC on May 25th. If you have any questions or would like to sign on to the bill, please contact Nick Martinelli in my office at 225-0123.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to come to the floor today to support the conference report for the Veterans Millenium Health Care Act. This was the first conference involving Members in many years, in fact, 25. We have only had three conferences in 25 years, so I wanted to thank my colleagues and the committee staff for all of their hard work in putting this compromise bill together. The Veterans Millenium Health Care Act will positively serve veterans in my State of Florida and throughout the Nation. This bill, although not perfect, will offer additional medical and long-term care options for a rapidly aging veterans population, extend vital programs like VA's sexual trauma program, the health evaluation programs for Gulf War veterans, and VA homeless veterans assistance programs; in addition, education benefits and housing loan guarantees, and requiring the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to obligate funds for the establishment of six additional national cemeteries for veterans, and to conduct an independent study on burial benefits. I have personally worked very hard in support of additional cemetery spaces for our veterans. My State of Florida, which has the oldest veteran population in the Nation, is in desperate need of additional burial space. Today, of the four national cemeteries in Florida, only two remain fully open to the veterans population. For those who served this country with pride and dignity, VA will now be obligated to provide an opportunity to be buried in a national cemetery near their home, an opportunity that is not available to many of our veterans. Standing on the threshold of a new century, it is our obligation as Members of Congress to again affirm America's solid commitment to her veterans, past, present, and future, and to their families, and to provide the appropriate health care and service promised them. The Department of Veterans Affairs will fully carry out its responsibility to that end.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate Professor Marilyn Repsher, a mathematics teacher at the University of Jacksonville, who was awarded the Professor of the year award for 1999. Out of 400 competing professorial nominees representing institutions of higher learning across the nation, and on behalf of the city of Jacksonville, I am proud to commend Professor Repsher of her receipt of this award. Professor Repsher had been teaching for over a decade when she was honored as one of the four national professors of the Year. This award, the most prestigious national recognition in college teaching, is granted annually by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, and the Council of Advancement and Support of Education. Marilyn Repsher began her 30 year teaching career at Jacksonville University in 1969. The daughter of a high school math teacher, Professor Repsher was honored and indeed, elated, upon the award announcement. Presently, even though Professor Repsher serves as the Head of the mathematics department, she still manages to devote 75% of her time to teaching, and interacting directly with students. A few years ago Professor Repsher decided to change the way she taught math courses. Originating from a desire to teach students in a more down-to-earth fashion after listening to student complaints about their professors' teaching methods, and the lack of practicality of the material being taught, she realized that students were being forced to study theoretical concepts in math before studying math's every day life applications. With her colleagues and this new way of teaching, Dr. Repsher completely revolutionized the way in which mathematics is taught at Jacksonville University. She now focuses on practical equations in her classes first, and then moves on to theory afterwards, but only after the students already have a grasp of the practical ways in which this material can be applied in concrete situations. As an example of her new teaching methods can be seen in her introductory Algebra course. In this course, she begins the semester by teaching basic algebraic concepts, while at the same time plotting the growth of a puppy on a computer screen. In more advanced math classes such as calculus, the students use the same technology to create visual displays on the data. It is for this reason that Dr. Repsher is given credit for being a true innovator in utilizing technology in the classrooms of Jacksonville University, an idea that is quickly catching on in other university departments. In fact, she won two teaching awards at the university, both for projects involving the use of computer technology. Some of Dr. Repsher's former and current students have described her lectures as ``anything but long and arduous,'' while another said: ``she keeps the class involved and is very focused.'' I congratulate you, Dr. Repsher, on the receipt of this award, and am proud to have such outstanding role models like yourself in my district in the great state of Florida.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor today to share my support for the Day of Honor 2000 Project, which will give long overdue recognition to the 1.2 million invisible African American World War II veterans. During the Second World War, these valiant African American soldiers were waging a war on two fronts. They fought gallantly beside their comrades, saving the world from the evils of fascism while battling the bigotry and racism that was still prevalent in the United States military. These same African American war veterans continued their fight against racism at home by forming the grassroots of the civil rights movement. In my State of Florida, we have the oldest veteran population in the Nation. Unfortunately for these veterans and veterans all across the country, the VA budget continues to be underfunded, causing them to be denied the health care and services they need and deserve. As our aging veterans population declines, we need programs like the Day of Honor 2000 to remind us of the sacrifices African Americans made to protect their freedom they now enjoy. I wish Dr. Smith and the other leaders of the Day of Honor 2000 Project the greatest success in portraying the honor and dignity displayed by our African American World War II veterans. These efforts and accomplishments have been ignored for far too long, and I look forward to sharing their achievement for the people today and for the generations to come.

Ms. BROWN of Florida

Ms. BROWN of Florida. I yield to the gentlewoman from Florida. (Mrs. MEEK of Florida asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)