Kent Conrad

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. I appreciate the subcommittee's support for the Rural Telemedicine and Distance Learning Services Grant Program, and am pleased to see that the subcommittee has provided $10 million for this important program. In 1993, the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences made a major commitment to the education and training of rural and frontier health care providers. To support this commitment, the school invested considerably in distance education technology in the form of satellite transmission equipment, upgraded telecommunications equipment, and advanced computer networks to develop the North Dakota Health Education Network. This network is an important component of the overall health education communication program that serves the State of North Dakota. However, the system would better serve educators, students, and the citizens of North Dakota if it had access to additional computer technology, two-way video technology, additional satellite downlink sites, and funds for additional medical and medical education programs. I wish to make the subcommittee aware that the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences may submit an application for a rural telemedicine and distance learning grant to accomplish the additional activates I just described. Do the distinguished chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee agree that this grant application, if submitted, would be appropriate for consideration under the Rural Telemedicine and Distance Learning Services Grant Program?

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, this is a bipartisan amendment about feeding hungry people. This has always been a bipartisan priority in this Chamber. The father of the Food Assistance Program is Senator Dole, the former Republican leader, and former Senator George McGovern. Our amendment, a bipartisan amendment, preserves the most important feature of our Food Assistance Program. It maintains the automatic adjustment in funding to respond to economic downturns or natural disasters. A pure block grant would leave States with a fixed amount of money no matter what happens. If we look at the example of Florida, we see very clearly what can happen. They had a flat demand for food assistance. Then we had a national recession, and demand for food assistance increased dramatically. Then there was a natural disaster, Hurricane Andrew, and the demand for food assistance exploded. Under the pure block grant, that State would have had no ability to respond to the demand for food assistance. No block grant could have responded to this increase in need. The block grant would destroy the Food Stamp Program. Mr. President, America is better than that. This Senate is better than that. I hope my colleagues will support the amendment. Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. Reserving the right to object, I ask the able majority leader that I be added, a Conrad amendment with respect to barley, so we have another slot. So, hopefully, we can get this worked out in a way that achieves a result. If we could reach that understanding, I would not object.

Mr. CONRAD. Reserving the right to object.

Mr. CONRAD. Yes.

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I hesitate to extend the discussion of this matter. I would like to rivet the point and confirm what my colleague from North Dakota is saying. Barley farmers in this country were made a clear promise. They were told they were going to get 46 cents a bushel under this farm bill. Somebody made a miscalculation. We do not know yet whether it was USDA or the Agriculture Committee staffs of the Senate and the House. But we know with great precision what promise was made--46 cents a bushel. That is already a significant reduction from what they would have gotten under previous legislation. But now they are told they are not going to get 46 cents. They are going to get 32 cents. Farmers have already planted understanding that they were going to receive a certain level of payment. So they have moved on the promise that was made to them. They have planted the crop. It is there. Nothing can be done about it. But we now cannot go back on the pledge that was made to these people and say, ``Well, you know that is the way Washington works sometimes. You were told you were going to get something, and on that basis you acted, and now we are going to go back on our word and instead of 46 cents you are going to get 32 cents.'' That is an economic disaster to literally thousands of people who plant barley in this country--barley that goes into making beer which is important to our country. You have to have beer. If you do not have beer, what kind of a country have you got? [Laughter.] The next thing you know we will have the Germans over here selling all the beer. We do not want to do that to America--to deny those in our country who enjoy a tall cool one; that they are going to have to buy German barley or Canadian barley. They ought to be able to get American barley. And those barley farmers ought to be getting what they were promised. So I would be very hopeful that our colleagues would recognize this is an extraordinary circumstance that somehow we have to keep our word with respect to what barley farmers were promised.

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I would call up my amendment that is at the desk.

Mr. CONRAD. I appreciate that from the able manager of the bill. I will just proceed briefly to outline the rationale for the amendment and then yield back our time as well. Mr. President, everybody here agrees that work is important and that food stamp benefits should be temporary. But the work requirement provision in the pending welfare bill would have the unintended effect of preventing people who want to find work from securing a job. How can my colleagues seriously argue that people can be expected to find a job, to sit through an interview when they have not eaten? It does not work. I understand and support the work ethic in America, but I also believe our society has achieved a level of decency where we will not deny food assistance to people who have been unable to find a job in just 4 months. The reason I felt it was important to offer this amendment is I have dealt with people who are in this exact circumstance. I remember very well a young fellow who worked construction in my State--very frankly, not the smartest guy in the world, and he had a hard time finding work, but he was able to work construction. He was a strong kid and he was able to work in that way. But the construction season in my state is not very long. You are lucky if you can be in construction 6 months out of the year in North Dakota some years. This young fellow would work during the construction season, which usually starts in April in North Dakota, but come winter, November, the construction season ended. He was not able to find additional work. And I tell you, he came from a family that had next to nothing. He had next to nothing, lived in a very modest basement apartment, and that fellow needed some help during the winter to eat. That is just the reality of the circumstance. Under this legislation, after 4 months, that guy would not get any help. Is that really what we want to do in America? Is that really what we want to do? We want to say to somebody, if you cannot find a job in 4 months, you do not get any food assistance? Is that what we have come to in this country? I find that hard to believe. I really must say to my colleagues, if that is where we are, then something is radically wrong in this country. America is better than that. We are a wealthy nation, with a rich and abundant food supply. We should not knowingly adopt a national policy which promotes hunger. Certainly we should promote work, but not cut people off from food if they have not been able to find a job in 4 months. This amendment gives States the option to provide food for people who are unable to find a job within 4 months, at least 20 percent they can exempt as hardship cases, and they can count 2 months of looking for work as part of work. As I already mentioned and as the chart serves to remind us, in addition to the number of people cut off the Food Stamp Program because of the tightened eligibility requirements and work registration requirements, the Congressional Budget Office has estimated the welfare bill before us will cut 600,000 people off of food stamps each month because they cannot find a job within the 4-month time limit. These 600,000 people will then be at risk of going hungry, more worried about finding their next meal than finding a job. I cannot believe that is what we are about here in the U.S. Senate. According to a study done in 1993, 83 percent of the people who would be affected by this draconian provision are below 50 percent of the poverty line. We are talking about folks who do not have anything. Now we are going to say to them, ``If you do not get a job within 4 months, you do not get to eat''? I cannot believe we are going to do that. I am all for strong work requirements. I introduced my own welfare reform bill that had the toughest work requirements of any bill before us. But this is not a work provision. This is a hunger provision. We are talking about food for people who cannot find a job. I think it is entirely reasonable to give States the option to continue food stamp coverage for an additional month of intensive job search, to help make sure that poor people complete the transition from welfare to work. The Senate-passed welfare reform bill that was supported by 87 Senators contained 6 months of food stamp eligibility for people in this category. Bipartisan efforts to reform the welfare system, including the Chafee-Breaux approach and the Specter-Biden proposal, also contained a 6-month food stamp time limit. These are far more humane and realistic provisions. Mr. President, for those who think the majority of people affected by this provision are just scamming the system and are not interested in working, let me put this in perspective by translating it into dollar terms. Under the Food Stamp Program, the maximum level of benefits for a single person is $119 a month. That is about $4 a day. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that every one of the 600,000 who cannot find a job would accept job training or a work slot if one was available through the Food Stamp Employment Training Program. These 600,000 people are, consequently, receiving less than $4 a day in food stamps. I ask my colleagues to think seriously about what this means, less than $4 a day in food stamps. Does it not make sense if there were actually minimum wage jobs available for $4.25 an hour that individuals would work at these jobs? Why would anyone trade a $4.25-an-hour job for $4 a day in food stamps? I do not think the vast majority of people would make that kind of trade. Clearly, we are talking about circumstances in which those jobs are not available. People cannot find those jobs. This is not a case of they are better off taking welfare than taking a job for $4 in food assistance. You would be much better off, clearly, with $4 an hour in a job. Before I close, I want to spend just a minute talking about the hardship exemption. Again, I share the view of those who believe we must set limits and push people from welfare to work. But I think it is important to recognize there are people who just do not have the skills to find a job, or else have some personal hardship that means they will not be employed after 4 months on food stamps. Every one of us know people who, frankly, are marginal in the employment arena. They cannot find work. They are not educated, they are not trained, they may have one or more disabilities. It is important, I think, also, to consider the devastating effects of natural disasters or economic downturn on a particular area, which may make it difficult for people to find employment in 4 months. If you have a natural disaster like a hurricane, tornado, earthquake, or a series of disasters as we have seen in California, all of a sudden an area may not have much in the way of employment. People may not be able to find a job. I think it is also important for us to understand this issue affects urban areas and could cause increased tensions in some of America's biggest cities. A recent study showed that for every McDonald's opening in New York City, there were 14 applicants. They wanted to work, wanted to have a job. For whatever reason, they were not able to find a job. That circumstance has improved because the national economy has improved, but we all know the economy is subjected to cycles. Sometimes it is good and strong and sometimes it is not so good, not so strong. What are we going to say to people who cannot find a job after 4 months? We are going to deny them food stamps? What are we telling them? Telling them to go to the garbage can to find something to eat? I have people right now going through my neighborhood who are looking in garbage cans trying to find something to eat, and my neighborhood in this town is eight blocks from where we are right now, eight blocks due east of the Capitol of the United States. I have people every day going through my neighborhood, going through garbage cans. If we want more of it, I suppose we just stick with what is in the underlying bill. I might say it is not just urban areas, but rural areas as well. There are parts of my State which have very low populations, small communities, and jobs are scarce in some of these areas. An individual who has worked hard for 20 years in a small business in a rural area, and maybe that business fails, now this person may be willing to work all night and all day if given the chance, but the harsh reality is he or she may not be able to find a job. The truth of the matter is, it may take more than 4 months for a new business to come to that community. We need to give States the option to offer food assistance to hard- working people who experience extreme hardship. It is wrong to force States to cut these people off from food assistance. Instead, we should give States the flexibility to continue to provide food stamps to a limited number, up to 20 percent of individuals who face some special hardship, Mr. President, 20 percent of the eligible population, instead of 10 percent that is in the underlying bill. Mr. President, it may not be politically popular to care about adults who are hungry and cannot find a job, but I want my colleagues to think about what it would be like to be without food. We are not talking here about the luxuries. We are talking about food. It strikes me it is bad policy, and bad for the country, to knowingly create a class of desperate people across the country, struggling for the most basic human necessity, food. Fundamentally, it does not make sense to deny food to people who are working hard to find a job and cannot find one. These people are less, not more likely to find a job if they are spending their time trying to find their next meal instead of trying to find their next job. I ask my colleagues to join me in giving States additional flexibility to continue to provide food assistance to people who are unable to find work within the 4 months provided for in this legislation. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. CONRAD. That is correct.

Mr. CONRAD. I would be happy to yield to my colleague if we do not have an interruption.

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Chair. I am joined in this amendment by my colleague from Vermont, Senator Leahy, the ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee. This amendment addresses a serious problem with the food stamp provisions of the welfare bill that is before us now. As I describe our amendment, I would like to bring my colleagues' attention to the chart beside me and the number 600,000 because that is the impact of the food stamp provisions before us; 600,000 Americans will lose eligibility each month under the provision that is in the bill before us. The 600,000 estimated by the Congressional Budget Office is to be the number of people who would be terminated from the Food Stamp Program in any given month because they are unable to find a job within the 4- month time limit provided for in this legislation. Our amendment insists on work, and that is as it should be. But it promotes State flexibility by giving States an option to assist people who would otherwise be at risk of going hungry. Our amendment achieves these goals in two ways. First, the amendment would expand the State option to exercise a hardship exemption. The amendment increases the hardship exemption from 10 percent to 20 percent of the eligible population and makes it consistent with the AFDC block grant. Simply stated, we are allowing States, instead of being able to declare 10 percent of their eligible population hardship cases not bound by the 4-month limit, to increase that at State option to 20 percent. Second, the amendment allows States to count job search as work for 2 months instead of the 1 month provided in the bill before us. I want to be clear to my colleagues that the cost of this amendment is fully offset over the 6-year budget period. The Agriculture Committee will still be in full compliance with its budget reconciliation target.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. CONRAD. We are willing to yield back the time on this side.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, they are at it again. The critics of farm programs are suggesting bad policy for agriculture and are trying to break the promise just made to the American farmer. On April 4 this year, the President signed into law the 1996 farm bill. That is April 4 of this year. The proponents of that bill claim they had a 7-year plan for agriculture, one that promised to be reliable, one that promised to provide certainty, one that promised to reduce Government interference. The farm bill passed, and now we see how quickly their promises have been broken. The House Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee proposed additional cuts in addition to those already made in commodity payments under the freedom to farm legislation. They broke their promise to the American farmer--not 7 years later, but 7 weeks later. So much for reliability and certainty. Thankfully, those additional cuts in commodity payments were rejected at the full committee level. But the critics of the farm program did not stop there. They proposed, on the House side, capping raw sugar prices. Imagine, people who advocate market orientation are placing into law a limit on what prices could be in an industry. If that is not Government interference, I do not know what is. Under that amendment, the Republican-led House would be telling the Government to reach into the sugar market and place an arbitrary cap on prices. It is the ultimate irony--Government interference at its worst. Once again, a promise was broken. Now today we are faced with an amendment to interfere even more with what was just agreed to months ago. The Gregg amendment eliminates the safety net U.S. producers have against heavily subsidized foreign competition. The Senator from New Hampshire I think is well-motivated, well- intended, but I think sadly misinformed as to international sugar and about what happens in these markets. And I would say to my colleague from New Hampshire that this is not like Dell Computer, or Apple Computer, or IBM. Oh, no, that is not the way the sugar market works in the world. This is not a free market. That is a nice idea--a textbook idea--but it is not the real world. The sugar industry worldwide works in a much different way. Every major producing country has a program-- every one. We are not talking about a free market. We are talking about heavy Government involvement in every one of these producing countries. What the Senator from New Hampshire wants to do is say to the U.S. industry, ``You go out there and compete against all these other countries, but without the benefit of a program. You go out there, and we are going to engage in unilateral disarmament here in America.'' We are going to say to our folks, ``You go out and compete not only against other countries' farmers, but against the governments of other countries, and good luck. We hope everything will work out.'' Everything will not work out. Anybody who has looked at the sugar industry and what has happened knows better, knows precisely what will happen, if we say to our producers, ``You go out there and compete against heavily subsidized foreign sugar and see what happens.'' We all know what will happen. Our folks will go broke, because the treasuries of these countries with whom we are competing are a lot bigger than the treasuries of the individual producers. That is the reality of what we face here. This notion that the Senator advocates that U.S. sugar policy unfairly inflates U.S. prices over world prices is absolutely untrue--absolutely untrue. All of us know what happens if you take away the sugar program. This chart shows what has happened the two times we eliminated the sugar program. Here is what happened to prices. They skyrocketed in both cases in the early 1970's and in the early 1980's. Prices skyrocketed. Why? Because the market knew we were headed for turbulence, a lack of certainty, that people would dramatically reduce their plantings. And what would happen is you would see shortages, spot shortages. And those who are producers of sugar, refiners, bid up the price in order to assure themselves of a stable supply. That is what has happened repeatedly. Unfortunately, when my colleague says, ``Gee, look at the price. The sugar price is 22 cents a pound, and the world price is 13 cents. Well, there is evidence, there is clear evidence that this sugar program is gouging consumers.'' Nonsense, absolute nonsense. Eighty-five percent of the sugar that is marketed in the world moves under contract. This sugar is not in the world market at all. It is moved under a contract. For this reason, the so-called world market is not a world market. It is a dump market. It is where the sugar sells that is not under contract. That is why you see the prices in the so- called world market, the dump market, selling for 13 cents. Look at what happens if you eliminate the sugar program. We know what happens. Every time it has been tried, prices skyrocket. And who got hurt? I will tell you who got hurt. The consumer got hurt. This is not a free-market model. That is not what is happening in world sugar production. Make no mistake: The Gregg amendment kills the sugar program. If you want to kill the sugar program, there is a way to do it--pass the Gregg amendment. If you want to sock it to consumers, pass the Gregg amendment. Prices will skyrocket. We know, it has happened before whenever somebody actually got a mind to pursue this course. But not only will it hurt consumers, it will hurt American producers, because even though prices will go up, American producers will be hurt. Why? Because we will get a flood of foreign sugar into the U.S. market. We know what will happen. It happened every time in the past when this and the other Chamber has decided that we should eliminate the sugar program, that we were going to be free from the world and act as though there is some free market in world sugar. There is no free market. Let me just say that the Gregg amendment is not a program. It is a recipe for disaster. It will force dozens of millers and processors and thousands of farmers out of business. This is not some insignificant amendment. In my State, there are thousands of farmers that depend on sugar for a substantial part of their income. Kill this program, and you kill them. And they know it. They know exactly what is happening in these world markets. They know exactly what has happened with other countries' programs. They know exactly what we are up against in these world markets. For those less familiar with sugar policy, loans are not made to these producers, because beets and cane are not storable commodities. It is unlike other commodities such as grains, such as corn and wheat. Those are programs that have a payment that goes directly to producers because those are storable commodities. That is not the case in sugar. Sugarcane and sugar beets are not storable. So what we have is a program where the loans are made to the millers and processors who store the raw cane or the processed beet sugar. As a result, producers are intricately tied to the millers and processors. If millers and processors are no longer able to use the loan program, they will simply go out of business and they will take farmers with them, make no mistake. Let us just look at how many beet processors and cane mills have already gone out of business. This chart clearly shows that this industry is already facing hard times. This shows what has happened to beet and cane processing mills that have gone out of business since 1990. If anybody thinks there is some big windfall out here, somebody is getting rich on this program, let us look at the record. Why did all these folks go out of business if it is so good? Let us look at beet and cane processing mills. This is just since 1990. The record since 1980 is a whole lot darker. Let us just look since 1990. Delta Sugar Co., beet plant, California, went under in 1993; Holly Sugar, California, beet plant, 1993; Columbia Sugar, cane plant, went out of business, Louisiana, 1994; Hamakua Sugar, cane plant, Hawaii, 1994; Hilo Coast Processing, again, cane sugar, went out of business in 1994; Oahu Sugar, cane plant, Hawaii, 1994; Spreckels Sugar, again, a California plant--this is a beet plant--went out of business in 1996; Holly Sugar, Hamilton City, CA, beet plant, went out of business in 1996; Ka'u Agribusiness Co., cane plant, Hawaii, 1996, went out of business; Kaialua Sugar Co., cane plant, Hawaii, 1996, went out of business; McBryde Sugar, cane plant, Hawaii, went out of business in 1996; Western Sugar, Mitchell, NE, beet plant, went out of business in 1996. One after another, right out of business, and you pass the Gregg amendment and we will be able to provide next year chart after chart after chart just like this one of companies that have gone out of business. That is what we are talking about. The stakes are high. Let me be clear. The Gregg amendment benefits the sugar refiners. That is who is the beneficiary if this amendment passes, not consumers. They will not benefit. In fact, they will be hurt. Not farmers, not beet processors, not cane mills, but refiners, they will be the beneficiaries. Let us look at charts that show the efforts made to increase the supply of raw sugar in the U.S. market and the activity it caused in the market. This chart shows what we have seen with respect to raw sugar prices and the import quota increases over the past year and a half as USDA allowed quota increases four consecutive times, all to the benefit of refiners. This chart shows raw sugar prices from 1995 to 1996. On November 9, 1995, USDA allowed another 330,000 tons to come in over quota--that is, foreign sugar to come into the United States--and look what happened to prices. Prices went down markedly. Then they came back up. January 17 of this year they socked it to the domestic producer again bringing in more foreign sugar and predictably prices plunged again. Then we saw price recovery. All of this is moving in the 22\1/2\ to 23 cents a pound range. On April 1, they did it again, brought in another 220,000 tons from abroad. Prices plunged. And again, June 12, just a month ago, another 165,000 tons. Look what happened to prices; a steep decline as more foreign sugar was brought in, that benefited whom? Benefited the refiners because they were getting more sugar to process through their plants, more throughput, more activity, more profit. I do not begrudge them and their profit. But let us look at what is happening with respect to the throughput of the refiners, because the Gregg amendment is misnamed. It ought to be called the ``refiners benefit bill.'' That is really what we are talking about. You are picking sides in an economic fight and you are saying we want to give the refiners more than they are getting now. Let us look at what the throughput has been through cane refiners' plants in the last 10 years--1985-86 to 1995-96. Back in 1986-87, we were looking at 5.3 million short tons. Had a bad year in 1987-88. Then we went to 5.4 million short tons. Went up to 5.9 million--that is the peak--in 1990-91. Then we saw some pulling back. But in 1995-96 we see a record for the refiners in terms of throughput, 6.4 million short tons--6.4 million short tons. And yet what do we have before us? The refiners benefit bill. They have just had record throughput. That is the amount of product going through their plants. They just had a record year. Well, throughput alone does not tell you what the refiners are experiencing. You have to look at the difference between the raw sugar price and the refined sugar price. That will tell you, combined with throughput, how well our refiner friends are doing. What do we find when we look at that? Well, it is very, very interesting--very interesting, indeed. This chart shows from 1990 to 1996 raw sugar prices. That is in red. I hope there is nothing in the way of their seeing exactly what has happened to raw sugar prices. They have been stable for 10 years. This awful program that is gouging consumers has provided them with stable prices for 10 years. Name anything else that people buy in this country that has been stable for 10 years. Tell me one thing that has been stable for 10 years. But sugar prices, raw sugar prices have been stable. I wish I could say the same thing for refined sugar because refined sugar, you can see, starting in 1995, took off like a scalded cat. Refined sugar prices jumped, and jumped dramatically at the same time raw sugar prices were falling. Raw sugar prices were falling; refined sugar prices were skyrocketing. I have already shown you the record throughput for refiners in 1995-96. And yet what we have before us is a refiners benefit bill. That is the Gregg amendment. Why should we be passing a refiners benefit bill when they have just had the biggest throughput in their history and, No. 2, the best margins--the best margins--that you can find in the last 10 years? Mr. President, what has happened, I believe, is very clear. This is a transparent argument. The refiners want to continue to make more money by refining cheap sugar from the world market. This amendment not only breaks the promises of reliability, certainty, and reduced Government interference in agriculture that was made to American farmers only 4 months ago, but it is bad policy that would send shock waves through a domestic industry, a domestic industry that produces tens of thousands of jobs in this country. I hope my colleagues will join me in soundly rejecting the Gregg amendment. Let me just conclude by saying this is, again, not like the typical industry. Senator Gregg refers to the computer industry, and says there is no Government involvement there. He is right. That is a whole different ball game than the worldwide sugar industry, where every single major producing country has a program. Every single one of them aggressively supports their producers. If we are to abandon ours, the results will be very, very clear. No. 1, we have seen what has happened in the past in terms of prices. Prices will skyrocket. That is undeniable. The world price the Senator refers to as 15 percent of the market is a dump market. It has no relationship to supply/demand relations in the world. The vast majority of sugar moves under contract in the world. So that dump market and its so-called world price is not a world price at all, it is a dump price. That is what people get for sugar produced above and beyond their contractual requirements. If you take away the program you are going to get exactly what we saw the last two times: Prices skyrocket. So consumers are not going to be helped, they are going to be hurt. No. 2, the processors in this country, beet processors and cane processors, are going to be hurt. I have already shown all the plants that have closed in 1994, 1995, and 1996. A lot of plants have closed. Only one refiner but a lot of processing plants have closed. So those folks would be hurt. When they are hurt the farmers are hurt because the farmers are directly tied with those processing facilities. All of a sudden, if you yank out from U.S. producers any support, what you have done is changed the balance of power in these world markets. Who have you helped? You have helped our foreign competitors. The Gregg amendment is great if you represent a foreign country and you produce sugar. They would look forward to the day the United States pulls the plug on its producers and its processors. They are just waiting for the opportunity to come in and take over this industry, take the jobs, take the economic growth, and take the economic opportunity. American farmers who produce sugar are the most efficient in the world. We are ready to compete head to head with anybody at any time. But what our producers are not prepared to do is to take on not only the farmers of another country but the governments of other countries. That is not a fair fight. And our Government should not abandon our producers and our processors, helping foreign governments, foreign producers, foreign processors against the refiners of this country. That is what this amendment is really about. I hope this Chamber will do as it has done before and reject the Gregg amendment and reject it in a resounding way. I yield the floor. Mr. KENNEDY addressed the Chair.

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I am proud to be joined by my colleague, Senator Jeffords, the distinguished occupant of the Chair, Senators Kerrey, Leahy, Murray, and Reid in offering an amendment to preserve our Nation's Food Stamp Program by eliminating the food stamp block grant. This is one of the most important issues in the pending welfare reform legislation. Members in this Chamber and people around the country often talk of the need for a real bipartisan effort to reform our welfare system. Our amendment is a true bipartisan undertaking. I am hopeful that my colleagues will consider the amendment and the benefits it will provide for our Nation's children and elderly, our cities and our rural areas. Block granting the Food Stamp Program is a mistake for this country. I am confident that if my colleagues give careful consideration to the Food Stamp Program, how it works, who it serves, and how it was developed, that they will vote for our amendment. I want to make clear to my colleagues and others who are watching what this amendment is about. It is about providing food to hungry people. That is what is at issue. This amendment is about making certain that hungry people are fed. That is the most basic test of the fundamental decency of any society. Are hungry people fed? This amendment provides the answer. It says that in America hungry people will not go without food. Mr. President, I want to make clear at the outset that the cost of our amendment is fully offset over the 6-year budget period. This amendment reduces the standard deduction in order to provide the revenue necessary to pay for the amendment. With our amendment, the Agriculture Committee will still be in full compliance with its budget reconciliation target. Mr. President, the Food Stamp Program is the anchor for our Nation's nutritional safety net. The program developed from a decision by Congress that no child, indeed no person, in our wealthy country with its abundant food supply should go hungry. My colleagues will remember that former Senator Dole, the apparent Republican Presidential nominee, was a leader in this effort. So, too, was former Senator George McGovern, a former Democratic Presidential nominee. In fact, we ought to wish former Senator McGovern a happy birthday because this is Senator McGovern's birthday today. So we had a fully bipartisan effort that formed the Food Stamp Program. It remains a valid goal for our country and for those of us in this Chamber who share with our colleagues in the House of Representatives and the President of the United States the responsibility for making these decisions. My colleagues should know that fully 51 percent of food stamp recipients are children, 7 percent are elderly, and 9 percent are disabled. To further illustrate, I have brought with me this chart indicating the distribution of food stamp benefits to households. And 82 percent of food stamp households are households with children. This chart shows that. Now, 82 percent of the food stamp eligible households in this country are households with children. Only 18 percent are without children. Mr. President, I want to make clear, we are defending the basic notion of a Food Stamp Program. That does not mean that we are not supportive of changes to reform the Food Stamp Program, to improve its implementation and to save money, because this bill has substantial savings out of the Food Stamp Program, over $20 billion. We are not affecting those savings. But we are saying, do not block grant the Food Stamp Program. Do not do that. That is a mistake for this country. And it will fundamentally undermine the Food Stamp Program and the nutritional safety net that it provides. Mr. President, currently every child who needs food is eligible for food stamps. Under a block grant, a State would have no obligation to provide benefits to children--none, no obligation to provide for children. There are no standards whatsoever regarding who should receive benefits or how much in benefits they should receive under the bill we have before us. Mr. President, block granting the Food Stamp Program would tear a hole in the safety net that makes certain 14 million children do not go to bed hungry at night or do not go to school with hunger pains. This is what preserving our Nation's Food Stamp Program is about. And these are the people we place at risk by block granting the Food Stamp Program and eliminating the food safety net. The Food Stamp Program, as my colleagues know well, is a carefully crafted program that has a tremendously impressive history of responding to economic fluctuations in our country and changes in child and adult poverty levels. The Food Stamp Program has been successful in fighting hunger because it automatically covers more people when economic downturns or natural disasters push more Americans below the poverty line. Block granting the Food Stamp Program would eliminate this automatic response to increases in poverty that the current program provides. I have brought two charts which illustrate the Food Stamp Program's responsiveness to fluctuations in poverty. The first is a chart that shows from 1979 to 1993 how the Food Stamp Program responded directly to changes in the overall poverty rate. My colleagues can see the red line shows the poverty population in this country. The blue line shows food stamp participation. As poverty rates have changed, as the incidence of poverty has changed, one can see that the food stamp participation rate has moved in tandem with it. In other words, responding directly to increases in poverty. The second chart is perhaps more compelling to those who think the Federal Government should protect kids but are less sympathetic to their parents. This chart illustrates how the Food Stamp Program responds to changes in the child poverty rate. Again, the red line shows increases in the child poverty rate from 1979 through 1993. Again, the food stamp participation rate tracks closely with it. Make no mistake, the Food Stamp Program is the most important part of our arsenal to fight the battle against poverty in America. This responsiveness, the responsiveness of the Food Stamp Program to economic fluctuations, led the National Governors' Association and the drafters of this welfare bill to improve the AFDC block grant contingency fund trigger by basing it on an increase in food stamp participation. Mr. President, it does not make sense to turn around and block grant the program and eliminate the program's ability to respond to dramatic changes caused by economic downturns or natural disasters. It makes no sense to take away that automatic stabilizer that is a central feature of the Food Stamp Program. Again, this does not mean we cannot make changes in the Food Stamp Program. We can. We should. We should achieve additional savings, and we will. This amendment does not affect those changes and those savings. A block grant with limited funding cannot respond to changes in poverty levels, nor can it respond to a severe economic downturn or to a natural disaster. The need for a State to help its children, elderly, and working families, would come precisely at a time when the State's economy is least able to support increased food assistance expenditures. Let me just share with my colleagues the example from the State of Florida, because I think it is most instructive. I want to make clear this is not a question of Governors or States being mean-spirited or wanting to limit food stamps in a time of need. We are not questioning here the good faith of our Nation's Governors. We are not questioning the good faith of our Nation's State legislators. This is a question of economic reality. There simply is no way for any State to accurately plan in advance for dramatic increases in food aid required by severe economic downturns or natural disasters. Governor Chiles of Florida gave testimony at the Senate agriculture hearing on nutrition in May of last year that illustrated this point. He included a chart with his testimony which outlined Florida's food stamp participation benefits from October 1987 to January 1995. I have brought the chart of Governor Chiles because I think it can help Members understand why block granting the Food Stamp Program could have unintended consequences we would all regret. The way the food stamp block grant is structured in the bill before the Senate, a State is required to decide several months before the beginning of the next fiscal year if it wants to exercise the block grant option. A State would then be bound to its decision for the remainder of the fiscal year. Therein lies the problem, Mr. President. We will look at the chart from Florida that Governor Chiles presented. From October 1987 to October 1989, we can see the demand for food stamps in Florida was level. No block grant demands were increasing. They were basically stable. So a Governor could have felt confident that his or her State would have been better off with the block grant and would not put anyone at risk of going hungry if they were basing that on the experience of 1987 to 1989. However, from October 1989 to mid-1992, there was a national recession, and Florida's food stamp caseload exploded. One can see how the food stamp caseload just went up on almost a straight line in the State of Florida. No block grant could have responded to the increase in families that needed food stamps in Florida during this time. No State would be able to predict or prepare for this dramatic growth in demand for food assistance. That was not the end of the story in Florida because we will recall the testimony of Governor Chiles. Then the big one hit, a natural disaster. The natural disaster was Hurricane Andrew, and its devastating blow was felt all across Florida. The sharp increase in demand for food aid help in September 1992 shows the impact of Hurricane Andrew. A block grant could not have responded to the immediate and massive need for food created by this natural disaster. Mr. President, this is a central point with respect to this amendment. If we adopt a circumstance in which a State must commit to a flat amount of funding, a flat block grant amount for food stamps, and then that State is hit by either an economic downturn, impossible to predict, or a natural disaster, again, impossible to predict, and the demand for food aid skyrockets as it did in Florida, the need for food for that State's children and for other people could not and would not be met. Mr. President, Florida is not alone. Natural disasters hit nearly every State in the last year, from a drought in Texas to flooding in Missouri, to earthquakes in California. We all know the litany of natural disasters over the last several years. Are we really going to abandon the children in those States to a flat amount of funding for food stamps with no ability to adjust for an economic downturn or a natural disaster? I think not. I think America is better than that. The National Food Stamp Program should respond to the needs of families that temporarily need food during these times of crisis. As a matter of fact, using almost exactly the same formula as is in the current welfare proposal, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimated if a block grant proposal had been enacted in 1990, in 1994 every State would have fallen short of the funding needed to provide food aid for their children. Choose any State and children would have suffered. Mr. President, the case for this amendment does not end there. The obligation that is in the bill before the Senate could destroy the Food Stamp Program. I believe we have a strong national interest in ensuring that children and other vulnerable members of our society do not go hungry. Others may argue this is a State option, that the decision to take the risk that children go hungry should be left to each State. It is not that simple, Mr. President. The block grant option contains within it the potential to destroy the National Food Stamp Program. That is because if States opt for the block grant, their representatives no longer have a stake in the Federal program. They could vote for deep cuts in the Food Stamp Program without any adverse impact on their States or districts. Mr. President, I believe the underlying bill has in it the seeds of the destruction of the Food Stamp Program. Too many of us have labored for too long on a bipartisan basis to make certain that if people are hungry in this country, they have a chance of being fed, to allow that to happen. I also want to emphasize there is a different rationale for block granting the AFDC Program than the Food Stamp Program. We have heard many calls for block granting the AFDC Program. That has a certain logic to it. Many States have indicated their desire to block grant the AFDC Program in order to make better use of the significant number of State dollars that are spent on the AFDC Program. States may also want block grants for AFDC, in the hope of eventually achieving savings at the State level. These arguments do not apply to the Food Stamp Program because it is a Federal program. Food stamp benefits are fully funded by the Federal Government. There is no State match. There is no State maintenance of effort requirement. Mr. President, I also want to address the issue of State flexibility. I firmly believe that real welfare reform requires greatly increased State flexibility. I introduced an entire welfare reform package of my own, which provided for a dramatic increase in tax flexibility. That made sense. I have already explained why a block grant approach to food stamps is bad policy and completely undermines the benefits and integrity of the Food Stamp Program. I know, however, that there are those in this Chamber who support the block grants solely on the basis of supporting anything that increases State flexibility. I will address this issue because it is important. Without the block grant, the welfare bill before us makes the biggest steps to expand State flexibility in operating the Food Stamp Program that the program has experienced in two decades. States will have broad, new authority to simplify food stamp rules and develop their own policies to promote work and responsibility. That is as it should be. States will have broad, new flexibility to streamline food stamp benefits to coordinate with their application of benefits under the AFDC block grant. They have the option to convert food stamp benefits to wage subsidies, and the option to determine if they want to provide benefits to people who are delinquent in child support payments. States also have almost complete flexibility to structure programs to promote employment and self-sufficiency and to impose strict work requirements. Federal rules impeding implementation of State electronic benefit transfer systems would be eliminated under the current bill, as would a large number of provisions which micromanage food stamp administration. We do not change any of that, Mr. President. That dramatically increased State flexibility is completely preserved under the amendment we are offering. I understand and support the need for State flexibility. But, as I have already pointed out, this is a Federal program, part of a national commitment to ensure that children and vulnerable Americans do not go hungry. And it works. We here in the Senate have a responsibility to ensure that Federal tax dollars applied to the Food Stamp Program succeed in fulfilling this commitment. We should not use the doctrine of State flexibility to put millions of American children and seniors at risk of going to bed hungry at night. We are a better nation than that. We are a better people than that. We are a better Senate than that. I hope my colleagues will join me in saying that, in America, the hungry will be fed. Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, our colleague from Pennsylvania has not only misplaced me by putting me in South Dakota--I represent North Dakota----

Mr. CONRAD. But also misplacing his argument as well. The simple reality is Florida did not get advance notice of Hurricane Andrew. Nobody called up the Governor and said, when he would have had to make the decision under this bill to opt in and take the block grant that, ``Hey, Governor, 9 months from now you are going to be hit by a hurricane.'' You know, if the Governor would have looked back to the pattern back in 1987 to 1989, any Governor might have concluded it is a safe bet to go with a block grant. The problem is people do not have advance notice of an economic downturn. That is what happened here. They do not have advance notice of an actual disaster. That is what happened here. All the opt in and opt out would not have done them a bit of good in Florida. When these hungry people showed up, these were not people who have been on the welfare rolls for 10 years, these were not people who did not work. These are people who were hit by a natural disaster and needed food. The State of Florida would not have been able to provide it under a block grant. Is that what we want to do in this country? I think not.

Mr. CONRAD. Let me conclude. We want a plan and a program that is going to assure us, as the Food Stamp Program does now, that if people are hungry, if they have been hit by a sharp economic downturn and a natural disaster, that they are going to have a chance to be fed. Let me just say, with respect to the notion of opt in and opt out, that you have a one-time opt out here; one time. Does that mean Florida is never going to be hit by another natural disaster? Does that mean that Florida is never going to be hit again by an economic downturn? Mr. President, this is not well-crafted. This is not well thought through. It goes right to the heart of the Food Stamp Program. More importantly, it goes right to the heart of the question in America: Are we going to make sure that hungry people are fed? I am happy to yield.

Mr. CONRAD. If I may say to my colleague, the opt out is not just a bad idea. What is a bad idea is the opt in because once you have opted in you are stuck for that year. You are stuck. Florida would have been stuck. They would not have been able to feed these people who are hungry. The problem is the opt in. That is what this amendment seeks to say. It says, ``Look, we are not going to have a program that endangers children. We are not going to have a program that endangers people who are vulnerable.'' Mr. President, it seems to me that this is a circumstance in which we should all understand that half of the States are eligible immediately, I am told under this bill, to go under the Block Grant Program; 40 would be eligible within 2 years. This is not some narrow, finely crafted amendment. This is a wholesale assault on the Food Stamp Program. That is what this is. I do not think that is what this Senate ought to be doing. I do not think that is what this Congress ought to be doing. Further, there is no guarantee under this legislation that protects children who are now eligible. There is no individual guarantee to children in this legislation. And most serious of all, there is absolutely no protection for a State that is hit by a natural disaster or a sharp economic downturn. That is the reality of the underlying legislation. I do not think we want to take that risk with America's kids. I do not think we want to take that risk with the States that may face something they are wholly unprepared for. What is going to happen in California? What if California opted in and decided in July of a year that the next year they were going to be block granted? They are going to take a set amount of money for food stamps. And then California has the big one, has a huge earthquake, and millions of people are displaced and hungry, and they show up at Federal centers looking for food assistance. Are we really going to have a system that says that we are sorry, California is out of money; you just are going to have to go hungry, and maybe you can go over to Nevada and find some food over there? This is not well thought through, this provision of block granting food stamps. We ought to make this change, the change that is contained in this amendment. I say to my friend that he has established a new standard. The standard here is it is good because it passed the Senate sometime in the past, or that it is acceptable because it passed the Senate sometime in the past. That is a new standard. I do not think that is the standard we want to apply in judging whether or not legislation is well-crafted. I am afraid all too often things that have passed this Chamber, perhaps even things that passed the other Chamber, are things that need a lot more work. And that is why we have offered this amendment on a bipartisan basis. Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.

Mr. CONRAD. The problem with the argument of the Senator from Pennsylvania is that it is wholly focused on what is in the interest of the State government. What he forgets about is who we are trying to serve here. We are talking about hungry people. He is worried about what happens to the structure of the State government. I am worried about what happens to the people who are hungry in that State if the State officials make this mistake. Let us go back to the example of Florida. From 1987 to 1989, their caseload was flat. Then they had economic downturn and the caseload started to explode. They did not have advance warning of an economic downturn. More clearly, they did not have warning of what happened here where we see the spike in demand for food aid for people caused by a natural disaster. They would have had to make the decision to go to the block grant under this proposal back here in July of the previous year. Now, unless they were prophetic, they might have thought if they had a pattern like they saw back in 1987 to 1989, it was safe to take a block grant. But then if they would have had a natural disaster like Andrew, what would have happened to the people who were hungry that lined up for help? The Senator says, well, the State could have put in their money. That is at the very time the State is having to put their money into every other part of this disaster. You go find out about the budget of the State of Florida during this period. They were under enormous stress because of the combination of economic downturn and natural disaster. That is the very time this underlying bill would say: State, come up with some more money. That is a dream. That is not connected to reality. That is a wish. That is a hope. People cannot eat wishes and hopes. People need food when they are hungry. This, to me, is one of those circumstances where we have before us a proposal that does not meet the needs of the people. I am not so worried about the State government. I am worried about the people who in my State or any other State would be denied food because of an economic downturn or a natural disaster that was unforeseen, unpredicted, and the State bet the farm that nothing bad was going to happen. How much time remains?

Mr. CONRAD. I yield whatever time the Senator from Vermont desires.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, just a couple of quick additional points so we can, hopefully, persuade the occupant of the chair of the wisdom of this amendment. I think he is perhaps right on the brink, now, of coming over to our side. If we can just provide him some additional information, he will come to our side on this argument. The Senator from Pennsylvania was indicating that just a handful of States would be eligible. That strikes me as an indication of the weakness of their argument. If the argument is this underlying bill is not so bad because only a handful of States can qualify, that does not speak very well of the position in the legislation. The fact is, not a handful of States qualify; every State can qualify. Every State can qualify. Every State could be in a position of not meeting the needs of hungry people at the time of economic recession or natural disaster. The facts I have suggest that about half the States now could take block grant with no cost. Others could come in by paying a small cost. But within 2 or 3 years, nearly 40 States would be in a position to be in the block grant at no cost. In addition to that, with respect to what happens to participation rates during a recession, I have a chart that shows what has happened in various States during an economic downturn, during the period of 1989 to 1992, when the country was in a recession. Nevada's participation rate went up over 90 percent; Florida's rate went up over 100 percent; Delaware's rate went up over 70 percent; Vermont's rate went up nearly 60 percent. These are not things that a State does a very good job of forecasting. They even do less well at forecasting natural disasters. In my own State of North Dakota, we had a natural disaster back in 1988 and 1989. It was a drought. Nobody forecasted the drought was coming. Out of the blue we have a drought. All of a sudden our participation rates jumped, and not just in food stamps, but other programs as well. Food stamps are different because we are talking about hungry people. We are talking about preventing people who cannot get food from having some alternative that is humane. The Florida example is just as clear as it can be. You have to opt in the year before. If they had opted in, they would have been stuck with the level of funding provided for in this block grant. If you look at it, in 1994, Florida, their actual money, because of the flexibility of the National Food Stamp Program--they got $1.4 billion. Under the block grant they would have gotten $440 million. That is a $1 billion hole that would have had to be filled in somewhere. The Senator from Pennsylvania suggests they just take it out of other State money. What other State money? Every State I know budgets their money right up to the full ability of the State revenue sources to cover those expenditures. They may have a bit of a rainy day fund, but it is not enough to cover a natural disaster when the State is faced with expenditures for all manner of other requirements. They have to deal with roads. They have to deal with bridges. They have to deal with all kinds of other extraordinary expenses at the time of a natural disaster. The last thing we should have people worrying about is whether, in the midst of a natural disaster, hungry people are going to get fed. That is what this amendment addresses. I hope my colleagues will support it.

Mr. CONRAD. Will the Senator yield on that point?