John Boccieri

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. Let's revisit the three pillars of this legislation. Number one, create jobs in our country that cannot be outsourced; number two, that it's about national security, moving away from our dependence on foreign oil and other energy sources; making sure that we have those homegrown energy jobs right here in our country. Those are the three pillars of this legislation. When we think about the two largest countries that market natural gas, it is Iran and Russia, when if we invested in the technology that we recently just talked about, anaerobic digesters and the like, we talk about these different opportunities, we can actually create natural gas and harvest natural gas from our part of the country. This is important that we understand that moving away from dependence on imported sources of energy is going to make our country stronger. So national security, creating jobs, moving away from our dependence on foreign oil, that's what this legislation is about. That's what this opportunity is about. And I believe in the innovation and entrepreneurship of Americans. I believe in our success as a country when we challenge each other to think outside of the box, to move ahead. And if we just allow ourselves to be bogged down by the fear of the past and bogged down by those detractors who are now saying, this is not the right time--well, when is the right time? When is the right time, when we have 80 percent of our oil coming from overseas? When is the right time, when energy costs are through the roof? Now is the time because our country can make these investments and create jobs here.

Mr. BOCCIERI. I agree with you, Congressman Ryan, and this is the time to do it. We have about 6 minutes remaining. I would like to yield each of the gentlemen at least a minute or two. Happy birthday, Congressman Ryan.

Mr. BOCCIERI. So let me get this straight. This is about jobs that can't be outsourced, about our national security and moving away from our dependence on foreign oil. John McCain said it. He said it. He was introduced to a cap-and-trade bill three times. Three times, he said it is a free-market approach that will stimulate green technologies, a free-market approach. And he said that this is a matter of our national security. That is what this legislation is about. It is so important that we enact this very soon so that we can move away from our dependence on these foreign sources of energy. I will yield to the gentleman from Ohio.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Well, let me just wrap by saying this: this is about jobs in our country that can't be outsourced. It is about our national security. And it is about moving away from our dependence on foreign oil. We have set up a free-market approach, one that is supported by both, or was supported by both, Democrats and Republicans before we introduced it and passed it, but one that is a free-market approach with no taxes that invests in regional opportunities for States like Ohio and Virginia to make certain that we have an energy policy that works for this country. I flew wounded and fallen soldiers out of Baghdad. And it is very clear that we have two fronts over in the Middle East, in Afghanistan and Iraq and a much broader region because of the oil that that area produces. This is about making our Nation stronger. We have to do this now. The Department of Defense realizes this, and that is why they are testing alternative fuels. We can make that innovation. We believe in the American people. That is what this bill is about.

Mr. BOCCIERI. You're exactly right, Congressman Ryan. We are going to be judged by two measures in this Congress, two measures, by action or inaction. And I am so happy that we had this opportunity to speak tonight on clean energy and our national security.

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. Mr. Speaker, there are difference makers among us. I rise today to honor a man who committed his life to public service and put his life on the line working to save people in our community. Just a few short weeks ago, James Martin ``Marty'' Hall, City of Canton, Ohio Fire Captain of 15 years, made the ultimate sacrifice and died in the line of duty after suffering a fatal heart attack just hours after serving a volunteer fire shift at the Greentown Fire Department. Captain Hall was a member of the City of Canton's fire force for more than 20 years. Captain Hall clearly moved our community. Joining the thousands of friends and neighbors and loved ones who lined the streets of Canton for his funeral procession deeply moved me. This man was a respected member of our city who touched and saved many lives, including a child he performed CPR on after rescuing him from a burning home in Canton. Captain Hall's peers called and said to him as they bid him farewell, ``If you needed to be rescued, Captain Hall and his crew would be the crew you wanted coming for you.'' Captain Hall was a hero in our community and in his home. Being a father of four small children, it was exceptionally emotional to witness his three daughters stand up at his funeral and say, ``We're going to miss you, Daddy.'' Their words should remind each of us that our time on Earth is limited and we must live fully each day. Captain Hall's passing shocked our community, and he will forever remain one of our community heroes. My prayers and deepest condolences go out to his family as they grieve this tragic loss. Captain Hall's family and our community reflect on his service both in the military and as a firefighter. Today, I take this moment to honor his life and his service to our country. We thank you, Marty, for your service.

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. I thank the gentlelady from Maine not only for her extraordinary work on the House floor here but also on the Rules Committee. We appreciate your efforts to help move the country forward. There is no question, perhaps, the biggest issue that we will address in our freshmen tenure and perhaps for the time that we serve here in the United States Congress is health care. And there is perhaps arguably no more important issue that we could tackle as a Nation than to get our health care costs under control. And I know the gentlelady from Maine is hearing what I am hearing back in my district, and that is that people, working families in our district, are one accident, one medical emergency, one diagnosis away from complete bankruptcy. And, in fact, in 2007, 60 percent of all bankruptcies were due to medical costs, some accident that a family had sustained or some unsustainable costs that had arisen because they had contracted a disease or some sort of cancer. And we need to do our part here in Congress to make sure that we are working on this issue and getting these costs under control. They predict right now that 16 percent of our gross national product is for paying health care. And that in a few decades that cost could grow as high as half of our gross national product. That is absolutely unsustainable for our future. And we have an obligation to make sure that our country can be competitive, that we can have a workforce that is not only well educated and trained but has access to the basic fundamentals of prevention and healthy lifestyles and access to seeing the doctor that they choose. And when I speak to my constituents back in Ohio, in northeast Ohio, I talk about the five Ps of health care, the five Ps, the fact that we need to cover all people. Now, when we talk about covering all people, we need to understand that by not doing so it's actually costing all of us paying into the system more money. Those 46 million uninsured or underinsured people who can't seek access to their doctor because their health care effectively ended when they got their pink slip at the job, because they can't afford a COBRA payment, they are uninsured or underinsured. And when they use the hospital emergency room as their primary care physician, they are costing all of us paying into the system four if not five times more by using the hospital room, the emergency room as their primary care physician. We need to cover all people. And to those Americans who might be listening tonight, we need to understand that the American taxpayer right now is paying to make sure that every man, woman and child in Iraq has access to universal health care coverage. Now, it's inconsistent that we would pay for Iraqis to see the doctor they want to but yet not Americans. The second P is that we have portability, that our workers, when they get that pink slip, God forbid, that they can take their health care from job to job to job. Portability, covering all people. The third P that we have in our five Ps is making sure that we provide incentives for prevention, because prevention should be tied into all of this with respect to healthy lifestyles ending the chronic diseases that plague so many. And we have to end preexisting conditions--insurance companies using as a notion of disqualifying people from seeing their primary care physician the notion of preexisting conditions. And when that worker in a factory in Canton, Ohio, loses their job and they get hired by another factory with another set of health care principles and another set of health care opportunities, and they were a diabetic, God forbid, it becomes a preexisting condition now that they are seeking treatment from their physician for routine coverage that would have been covered previously. We need to end preexisting condition. Portability, covering all people, adding prevention, and making sure that physicians and doctors are making and prescribing the types of health care that our patients should seek. Those are the five Ps that I hope we have in this great and robust dialog here on Capitol Hill. So I thank the gentlelady from Maine for bringing this issue, and I hope that we have a very spirited discussion about how we can move this issue down the field.

Mr. BOCCIERI. The gentlelady from Maine is absolutely correct about how this dilemma that is facing our country has impacted many families not only across our districts but across the country. We have a responsibility and an obligation to fix this issue so that we can remain competitive as a country and help our citizens. Now, I want to tell you about a personal story myself. As an Air Force pilot who was deployed all over the world, I had to get shots so that I wouldn't get sick when I went overseas. I received a couple of anthrax shots as part of our mobility deployment, and I was having these terrible reactions. My knees were swelling up. They were getting red. So the flight surgeon suggested that I should go see a rheumatoid specialist. I waited nearly 3 months to get in to see this rheumatoid specialist, and then I waited 2\1/2\ hours in the doctor's office when I finally got there. When the nurse ushered me into the doctor's waiting room there, I sat on the table for about 20 minutes. The doctor came in. He did some movements with my knee and he said, Son, you're getting older. I said, Doctor, I could have made that diagnosis. But, I said, These are recurring as a coincidence to these shots that I have been getting. So he went in the corner, wrote a prescription, and said, Call me in a month after taking these pills to see if this works. I said, Doctor, I'm 30-something years old. I'm in good shape. I want to figure out why this is happening. We went back and forth for a couple of minutes and he said, Son, I have got to get down the room to see 15 other patients so that I can keep the lights on in this building. And I thought to myself, Is that what we have reduced health care to? Is that what we have enabled our system to give and administer to our citizens? They deserve better. And that's why our choices for the bills that we are introducing are going to add some significant improvements. One, we're going to make sure that Americans have more choices to see the doctor that they want, to develop and sign onto the plans that they want and to make sure, number two, the number two guidepost we have is that bureaucrats and bean counters are not deciding the type of health care that our citizens should get. And, lastly, we want to make sure that families understand that there's enough money in the system. We hear from the other side about how are we going to pay for this. This is going to be more resources coming down here to Capitol Hill and being disbursed out. We know this much, that one-third of the $2.5 trillion that we spend every year on health care, one-third of that never reaches the doctors, never reaches the patients. It's lost somewhere out in the administration of the system. We know one-third of that money could be given and could be used to cover the 46 million uninsured and underinsured. So conceivably there is enough money in the system to pay for those people who are uninsured and underinsured. In fact, we hear that families have found that nearly 7 percent, in 1987, 7 percent of their median household income was being used and devoted for health care. And now it has grown to nearly 20 percent. In fact, Americans spend more than any industrialized country on health care, nearly $7,000 over the aggregate for a year, for a family, for a working family. And yet our health care and our life expectancy is on par with Cuba. It is on par with Cuba. So we have got to make systematic and fundamental changes, as the gentlewoman said, to focus on prevention. Four cents of every dollar is only focused on prevention. Yet we have some of the worst chronic diseases that continue over this period. So we want to stress that folks will have more choices, that bureaucrats and bean counters won't decide, but doctors and physicians will decide the type of health care that they get, and there is enough money in the system to pay for itself. Those are the three guideposts; those are the three beacons that we are using as we drafting the legislation here in the House. I yield back.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Well, I applaud the gentlelady's perspective because there is no question that getting costs under control are the most important facet of any health care reform package. And we talk about the health care delivery system. Really, we have sickness delivery system where we are actually doing a fee for service where folks are paid with the number of patients that they see in their hospital or their doctor's office. Well, how about providing incentives to say that, well, we didn't see any patients today because they are all healthy? What a novel idea that would be to provide incentives for prevention. This is the type of plan we are embracing here. Our plan talks about prevention. It talks about rewarding citizens who are living healthy life styles, doctors who are able to have this relationship, as the gentlelady from Illinois suggested that we have to have a relationship with our doctor not necessarily one where you come in, you bounce in for 5 minutes, and he writes you a prescription, and you are out the door. That is not health care. That is not health care. That is not even health care delivery. To me that is something so far disconnected. So our plan is going to make sure that we have more choices, better time with our doctors, more choices in the types of who we get to see and who we are able to see and to make sure that doctors and physicians are describing and predicting giving and subscribing the type of health care that we should have. We should not have a bean counter at an insurance company deciding whether we should have an MRI, or a bureaucrat in Washington deciding if we should get this procedure or prescription drug. It should be left to physicians and doctors and our health care professionals. And our plan will address the amount of money that we spend on health care. By getting costs under control, covering all people and making sure all people have access to health care, we actually will reduce the cost of health care because that diabetic that lost their job in Canton, Ohio, now can't get the syringes that they need to give themselves insulin, and they can't buy their prescriptions, and all of a sudden they need to go to the emergency room because of an ulcer on their foot, and they are using the emergency room as their primary care physicians. And that is costing all of us in the system four if not five times more. By getting those costs under control, we will save money in the long run, more choices, better accessibility to the doctors we want to see, and making sure that we have the opportunity to contain these costs, keep them under control and making sure that doctors and health care professionals are prescribing health care and not bean counters. This is what our plan addresses, and this is a matter of our competitiveness of the country and having citizens that are healthy. And the well-being of our Nation is at stake here.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Let me add something to the gentlelady's remarks. We talk about this notion of 46 million uninsured and underinsured folks. Let's explain for a minute what uninsured and underinsured means. Uninsured means you have absolutely no health care coverage. If you were injured or had to seek routine medical care, you couldn't go to a physician unless you paid out of our pocket. Underinsured are people who don't have quite enough insurance because they got caught in that preexisting net, that factory worker who lost their job and their health insurance with that pink slip, got rehired down the line but because they were a diabetic, that condition was preexisting, so they can't seek treatment. They are underinsured because they don't have enough insurance to cover all of their medical needs. We found in a medical study that was published last year that health care insurance companies spend $84 billion every year to block, deny, and screen patients from seeing their physicians; $84 billion. In that same study it showed that only $77 billion would be required to cover all of those 46 million uninsured or underinsured. It actually would be cheaper to cover all of the folks who are actually costing us more by not seeing their primary care physician. So we have an opportunity now with the bill that we have rolled out to end preexisting conditions, which have been one of the biggest albatrosses in health care in my opinion for such a long time; not being able to see the doctor because you have a condition that existed prior to your employment at some factory. So this is something that affects middle class Americans all over the United States. I think if we address this, preexisting conditions, portability from job to job, covering all people so they are not using their primary care physician in the emergency room versus seeing the doctor that they want to see, and making sure that we provide incentives for prevention so that people are living healthy lifestyles and we are able to provide prevention and allowing physicians to make those medical diagnoses, that is what is going to be the cure for our health care dilemma here.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Will the gentlelady yield? I know that there might be some apprehension out there from our seniors about health care reform. And let me stress to you that our plan allows you to keep the doctor that you want to keep. If you like the doctor that you're seeing, you can continue seeing that doctor. If you don't like the doctor that you're seeing and you would like to get into a different plan, it will allow you to go into a different plan. There will be more freedom under this bill. There will be more freedom under these proposals. And we're going to make sure that physicians are telling our seniors, health care professionals are telling our seniors the type of health care that they need, whether this MRI was authorized, whether this cancer treatment was necessary and prudent. We want health care professionals to do that. We do not want bean counters making decisions based upon what the bottom line and dollars are going to be. Now, the gentlelady was talking about what she did in the State legislature. In Ohio, we had a very similar situation where insurance companies were delaying payments to doctors who ultimately run a business. When you see your primary care physician, they have staff. They have a payroll. They have to keep the lights on. They have to pay utility bills just like any small business. But when you do look-backs and you suggest whether this MRI was really necessary or authorized, whether this x-ray was necessary or authorized and you delay those payments over a time period, the physician can't keep the lights on in the building, and that should end. We passed a bill in the State legislature called Prompt Pay to make sure that insurance companies were making best efforts to pay those bills on time so doctors could keep the lights on. Additionally, we were doing health care simplification so that we could involve a little bit of health care IT, medical IT, so that when you roll into a hospital, God forbid, after an accident that's in your region, when they pull up your name, when they pull up your identification, they're able to identify who you are and your health care records. The military has been doing this for years. In fact, on our military identification card, we have the medical technology to pull up all my medical records. If I rolled into a hospital or to a VA facility or to a military hospital, on my card, they would scan it in and my complete medical history would come up. And on that, you would be able to tell whether you were diabetic, what type of treatments you've had. And that ultimately is going to cost hospitals less because they're not going to run these battery of tests to see if this person is a diabetic because they know that John Doe, when they came in, has a medical history and it's on their card. Perhaps this is something we should do. We're doing it in the military. It's something that we ought to explore for Americans so that they can have quick access to their medical records. I yield to the gentlelady.

Mr. BOCCIERI. I thank the gentlelady for assembling this dialogue on health care. This is very important. And we know those Americans who might be listening in, those folks who are still awake after perhaps punching the time clock and working long hours, we want you to know that we are working on this issue. But we have studied it long enough. We've talked about it long enough. Now it's time to take action. Leadership is defined by action, not position, but by action. And what I applaud this President for is his bold efforts to step forward and take action on an issue that remains a dilemma for America. This is about us, as a Nation, being competitive with our foreign competitors. This is about how much we spend on delivery of health care and making sure that all Americans have access to the quality of care that we want, not just because you can afford it but because you're American. And let me just say these things: Number one, if you like your doctor, you will keep your doctor. If you don't like the plan that you're in, you can move to another. There is going to be freedom of choice, and there will be broad choices in the plan that has been unveiled in this Chamber. Number two, we want to make sure that health care professionals and physicians and doctors and nurses are prescribing health care and administering health care and not necessarily the bean counters or bureaucrats that we find too often who are making health care decisions for too many Americans. And the third issue that we need to emphasize is that there is enough money in the system already to pay for health care. The 46 million uninsured and underinsured folks who are out there, we know that there is enough money in the delivery of health care--$2.5 trillion we spend every year, 16 percent of our gross national product. We spend more than any other industrialized nation in the world, but yet have a life expectancy on par with Cuba. There is enough money in the system that is out there that we can make sure that 46 million uninsured or underinsured people have access to health care. How are we going to do that? With the five P's. Making sure that all people have access to health care. If they don't, it is going to end up costing all of us more because when they use the hospital room as their primary care physician, they will actually cost all of us more. Making sure they have a portable plan that allows them to take it from job to job to job. End this notion of preexisting conditions, that if you're working at one place and you go to another job that somehow being pregnant or being a diabetic or having a chronic disease somehow eliminates you from seeking health care from this new provider. End preexisting conditions. Making sure that we provide incentives for physicians to not only enter the field but also that physicians are making the health care decisions. And, lastly, prevention, prevention, prevention. Four cents of every dollar that we spend on health care is for prevention. We can do a better job. We have to do a better job. The President has called us to action. The Nation has suffered for too long under a system that has excluded a few and allowed others to seek access. And this delivery system that we have should be about health care and not a health sickness plan that we have that's a fee for service but that encompasses all the things that we talked about here tonight. I thank the gentlewoman from Maine for allowing me to be a part of this.

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, this bill is about putting America first. We heard this all throughout the last campaign about how we need to invest in America and we need to protect American jobs. And Congresswoman Betty Sutton has stood up for American jobs, and she is putting new meaning to ``putting old Betty back in the garage and putting new cars on our streets.'' That's why it's imperative that the auto industry, especially in Ohio, be preserved under this bill. Twenty-five percent of Ohio's economy is based on how well or how poorly the automotive industry performs. There were 560,000 new vehicle registrations alone last year in Ohio. That averages to more than $24 million per dealership in Ohio. This bill is about putting America first and putting Americans back in American-built cars. I will be proud to support this bill today on the House floor.

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 472) congratulating and saluting the seventieth anniversary of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) and their dedication to general aviation, safety and the important contribution general aviation provides to the United States.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on House Resolution 472.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise today in support of House Resolution 472, congratulating and saluting the 70th anniversary of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association and their dedication to the general aviation, safety, and the important contribution that general aviation provides to the United States of America. AOPA was incorporated on May 15, 1939, as a nonprofit organization dedicated to general aviation. AOPA represents more than 414,000 members, which is about 70 percent of all United States pilots. In 1950, AOPA created the Air Safety Foundation, which provides general aviation pilots with training, education, and research on information and safety that are important to all pilots. AOPA was a leading advocate in the General Aviation Revitalization Act of 1994 which led to the recovery of the U.S. general aviation and light aircraft manufacturing industry. In recent years, AOPA has been active on many general aviation issues such as global positioning navigation, flight service station modernization, FAA reauthorization, and the Next Generation Air Transportation System, known as NextGen. House Resolution 472 congratulates and salutes the 70th anniversary of AOPA and its dedication to general aviation, safety, and the important contribution made by all aviators to the United States. In addition, the resolution commends AOPA for creating the Air Safety Foundation, leading the recovery of general aviation of light aircraft in the manufacturing industry and setting the stage for the development of NextGen. For these reasons and others, I urge my colleagues to support House Resolution 472. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I would like to commend the gentleman from Pennsylvania for his efforts to promote general aviation. It's very clear, having, myself, several classifications as a multiengine commercial instrument single engineer, that general aviation needs to do all it can to promote and respond to the needs of its pilots--in particular, training of the pilots. It is very important that we recognize the significance of this organization and what it means to general aviation. I concur with the remarks of the ranking member and also concur with the gentleman and his remarks with respect to the importance of this bill. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, the swift passage of this bill is very important. I yield back my time as well.

Mr. BOCCIERI

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1687) to designate the Federal building and United States courthouse located at McKinley Avenue and Third Street, SW., Canton, Ohio, as the ``Ralph Regula Federal Building and United States Courthouse,'' as amended.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on H.R. 1687.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Madam Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of the bill I introduced, H.R. 1687, as amended, and urge its quick passage. This bill designates the building located at McKinley and Third Streets, S.W., Canton, Ohio, as the Ralph Regula Federal Building and United States Courthouse. The bill has strong, bipartisan support. While I know Congressman Regula as my predecessor, many of you on both sides of the aisle were also fortunate enough to call him a colleague, a mentor, and a friend. He was a true steward of his district and earned every accolade from his constituents, who knew him only as Ralph. He combined a unique blend of procedural acumen, hard work, and collegial personality in rising to a position of leadership on the House Appropriations Committee. All the while, he never forgot where he came from, consistently setting the standard and making sure that his constituents received the assistance they needed with their problems. As a former teacher and principal, Ralph was a leader in pushing to improve our students' reading skills, develop teacher training, and increase Pell Grant funding. He also increased by millions of dollars the amount of Federal money committed to research in fighting cancer, heart disease, and birth defects. Ralph was a leader in alternative energy. And he was an early champion of fuel cell technology, helping my district earn a reputation as a national leader in fuel cell research and development. Congressman Ralph Regula served with distinction and represented the 16th District of Ohio for over 30 years--in fact, it was 36 years. He is a native Ohioan, born in Beach City, Ohio, on December 3, 1924. After high school, Congressman Ralph Regula served in the United States Navy with distinction and honor in World War II. He later graduated from college and earned his law degree in Canton, Ohio, at William McKinley School of Law. He went on to become a lawyer and later a State legislator. He was first elected to Congress in 1972 and served 18 consecutive terms, retiring last year to spend more time with his lovely, lovely wife, Mary, and college sweetheart, as well as their three children and four grandchildren. As much as I wish to claim this as an original idea, I have to give thanks and credit to Senator Sherrod Brown, who first introduced this legislation last December before I was sworn in. It is appropriate that we honor Congressman Ralph Regula with this bill because in many ways this building would not exist without his efforts, having laid the groundwork for it many, many years ago. The Ralph Regula Federal Building and United States Courthouse will continue Ralph's legacy, serving Stark County for many years to come. It is most fitting and proper to honor Congressman Regula with this designation. I support this bill, as amended, and urge its immediate passage. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano). (Mr. SERRANO asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. BOCCIERI. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. I wish to thank the gentleman from Ohio. His remarks were not only appropriate, they were well-guided in terms of what Mr. Regula meant not only to our part of Ohio, but what he meant to America. Campaigning through the district and having the occasion to work with Congressman Regula while I was in the State legislature, people knew him not as a conservative, not as a liberal, not as a Democrat or Republican, but just as Ralph. And that type of leadership, that type of portrayal of American politics is what we should all rise to emulate. He was a man of his word, a man of integrity, and a man who believed in the Constitution. And he told me, he said, When you go to Congress, John, make sure that you protect the Constitution and, in particular, the fact that we own the checkbook, we write the checks, we appropriate the money, we here in Congress are responsible for the taxpayers' dollars. He was responsible for millions and millions of dollars coming back to the State of Ohio, whether it was research in fuel-cell technology or whether it was the First Ladies' Library that his wife had such a brilliant idea to anchor in our part of Ohio and the Midwest, or just funding for all the medical research that we're doing in our State, he was a leader. And he believed in the innovation and creativity of the American people, and in particular of all Ohioans. He was a man of great integrity, and someone who obviously I, as Congressman LaTourette said, would not be able to replace, but certainly respect as his successor. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield to the gentlelady from California, our Speaker of the House of Representatives, Speaker Pelosi.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Thank you, Madam Speaker. I concur with the Speaker's eloquent remarks, especially about Mary, who champions women in their role in politics. And for my two daughters who are sitting behind me and the ones I have at home, she has been a shepherd for all in the 16th District as well as our country. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOCCIERI. Mr. Speaker, just a few more comments and I think we will be wrapping this up very soon. To piggyback on what the gentleman was suggesting, as I said earlier, Ralph was not known as a Democrat or a Republican, a conservative or a liberal; he was just known as ``Ralph.'' I remember, in some closing remarks at a recent banquet that we were at, I was telling folks, and I feel at liberty to say this, I'm a freshman Member here, that this collegiality that we are sharing right now becomes few and far between at times and we need to return this Chamber, this body, our dialogue to that kind of respect for each other, where we may disagree on ideas, as Democrats and Republicans, we both believe in the end goal. And like a married couple, we may argue about how we get to the end destination, taking this exit ramp, that road, but at the end of the day, like a married couple, we always end up where we need to go. And we need to respect that. And I think that this bill respects the service of Ralph Regula and his contributions to northeast Ohio, and in particular what it will mean to the people of Stark County who go there to find relief and find help from their government. And every day they walk into that building, that building that's being built right now, they will see his designation, his name, and it will be a remembrance of what he meant. Just one last comment, Mr. Speaker. This district that I am currently representing and serving in is, by all measures, arguably a swing district. It has Democrat and Republican registrations, even Independents inside the race. But yet he held this district for 36 years, and the Congressman before him held this district for 18 years, and the other Federal building in the city is named after him, Frank T. Bow. And so what this says is that the people of northeast Ohio, in particular the 16th District, they respect legislators, they respect Congressmen like Ralph Regula and his predecessor because they believe in our greatest asset, which is our people. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.