Hillary Clinton

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. NIEHS has provided $750,000 per center, for a total of $9 million per year to provide for direct and overhead costs that the centers incur. I hope that EPA will also continue to hold up its end of the funding to continue funding 12 centers. I thank Senators Specter and Harkin for their continued support of the centers, which are directly in line with our shared goal of addressing environmental factors that may cause or contribute to childhood illnesses such as asthma, or that can interfere in the proper growth and development of our Nation's children.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I rise in strong support of the Harkin amendment, which would prevent the Department of Labor from implementing its regulation that would deny overtime pay to 8 million Americans, including 450,000 New Yorkers. I am proud to be a co-sponsor of this amendment and hope that my colleagues will join me in supporting it with their vote this afternoon. Many of us celebrated Labor Day with picnics, parades, and fanfare, but for too many American workers, there was not much to celebrate at all. Close to 10 million Americans are about to lose overtime protection because this administration has decided to do the bidding of its corporate donors instead of protecting the rights of overworked and underpaid Americans. The regulation being proposed by the Department of Labor unilaterally removes entire classes of workers from overtime eligibility. Paralegals, engineers, social workers--today rely on overtime. Tomorrow these individuals will be forced to work longer hours for less pay. An let's not forget our police officers, firefighters, and nurses-- individuals who regularly work overtime because they are on the front lines of our homeland defense. Does anyone imagine that these dedicated individuals will stop working overtime after this regulation goes into effect? I can assure you that the New Yorkers who tell me how this will affect them do not think so. They know that when duty calls, they will respond. They simply will not be compensated for their effort. A nurse from Lancaster, NY, wrote to me recently to say, ``I assure you that as a Health Care Professional I work many exhausting though rewarding hours in my position. However, I feel strongly that being forced to work overtime without appropriate compensation is an insult. As a dedicated health professional, I find it impossible to leave my patients untended.'' If the administration wants to help working families as they say they do they can fight to expand access to overtime, to raise the minimum wage, and to ensure that every working American can take a sick day to recover from the common cold without fearing for their jobs. Instead, this regulation would make unpaid overtime a household word and make it easier for bad-faith employers to coerce other workers into accepting time off instead of overtime pay. I do not think the administration is unaware of the impact of what they are proposing. If they were, they would not have proposed this overhaul of the Fair Labor Standards Act under the cloak of secrecy, without a single Congressional hearing, without a single public hearing. As many of my colleagues know, when the Clinton administration tried to issue ergonomics regulations, Republicans in Congress attacked the Labor Department for ``rushing to judgment'' because it held ``only'' 27 days of public hearings. Twenty-seven days. And from this administration, not even one. Those who support the administration's regulation argue that Democrats are overstating our case. They claim that the proposed regulation will not have anywhere near the impact that independent experts say it will. But for the sake of argument, let's assume the Department of Labor's impact analysis is absolutely accurate. The administration's own analysis reveals that 644,000 workers will lose overtime pay. But that is only the number of workers currently earning overtime pay who will lose eligibility. For each worker earning overtime pay, there are another four or five who are protected by the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act but do not currently work more than 40 hours a week. All of them--between 3.2 million and 3.8 million by the Department of Labor's own estimates--will lose their overtime protection under the proposed rule. Their employers will require many of them to work longer hours because they will have no incentive not to. It won't cost them a dime, but it will cost our firefighters, our police officers, our nurses, and so many others in time away from their families and money out of their pocket. The Department of Labor's analysis goes on to state that the changes in the education test alone will result in 44 percent of the ``learned professionals'' losing their right to overtime pay. That is 44 percent of those working in the fields of chemistry, biology, nursing, engineering, accounting, and more. That is 440,000 cooks who would lose their right to overtime pay. That analysis assumes, and I quote, ``that six years of work experience might be considered equivalent to a bachelor's degree''-- even without a day of higher education. But this assumption is not grounded in the rule. In fact, the Department of Labor's rule requires no minimum education standard. If employers decide that their employees have the same skills as employees with college degrees, employers may exempt those employees from overtime. So a cook from Buffalo who has never attended a day of college can be deemed an exempt professional and denied overtime. The administration is taking away the bread and butter earnings American families count on, and leaving them with crumbs. Republicans in my State have crossed party lines to block this regulation--and I applaud them for doing so. They know how many New Yorkers rely on overtime pay--not as a luxury, as a necessity. I recently received a note from John, New York City police officer, who wrote to me to say ``police officers like myself are forced to do overtime whether we like or not because we need the money to stay ahead of our bills.'' John is not alone. Overtime compensation accounts for 25 percent of the total compensation of all workers who receive overtime pay. This issue is not trivial. At its very core, this issue is about our American values of work and family. Workers stripped of their overtime protection would end up working longer hours for less pay. That translates into less time with their children, less time with their parents, their spouses, less time to volunteer and contribute to the fabric of our community. More work hours, for less pay, and less family time--that is not the American way. I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the Harkin amendment.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from New York for addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic on behalf of the millions of people affected by HIV/AIDS in New York and around this country. The profound human tragedy of HIV/AIDS has exacted an incalculable economic and human toll on civilization--the Ryan White CARE Act programs have helped to fill the gaping holes in care and survival we have experienced these last few decades. This amendment will provide essential funding for those programs so that those struggling to survive each day can access necessary, life-saving treatments. We are all familiar with the statistics--800,000 to 900,000 Americans currently live with HIV/AIDS, 77,000 in my State of New York alone. Furthermore there are a devastating 40,000 new infections in the U.S. each year. This is why we need the $401.43 million that this amendment would provide for the Ryan White CARE Act programs, including a $214.8 million increase for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program or ADAP. The Ryan White CARE Act provides invaluable resources to State and community health organizations for primary medical care, drug treatments, supportive services for low-income, and uninsured people living with HIV/AIDS. Ryan White is also crucial to helping people follow complicated drug treatments, to alleviate high medical costs for people with low incomes and to combat HIV/AIDS in communities with a high degree of new HIV/AIDS cases. It is precisely because of Ryan White CARE Act's documented success that we need to help the program survive, so they can help patients survive. Improvements in care and powerful drug therapies are well publicized and indeed many people with HIV/AIDS are living longer, more productive lives. Yet as patients live longer, the cost of their care and treatment places greater demands on community-based organizations and State and local governments. This funding is vital for health facilities and State budgets, which have come under considerable financial strain due to costly new drugs. For example, the AIDS Drug Assistance Program, ADAP under Title II of the CARE Act was created in part to address the enormous need brought on by the advent of new combination drug therapies. However, several States have been forced to cap or restrict access to drug treatments through ADAP, and continually deplete their ADAP budgets long before the fiscal year ends. Turning our backs on patients who have clearly benefited from better access to newer, more effective drugs would be a step backwards. I urge my colleagues, on behalf of patients and states, to support this amendment. We need to keep one step ahead of this disease with education and prevention efforts, focusing on hard hit populations such as women and minorities, or else we risk sliding backwards in our battle. Millions continue to face the daily grind of living with this insidious disease, and it is my sincere hope that funding these programs will bring a measure of help and hope to New Yorkers and Americans who suffer each day.

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I support the Byrd amendment, which provides $6.15 billion in additional funding for title I grants. Two years ago, we promised school districts that they would have the resources they needed to meet new standards mandated by the Federal No Child Lift Behind Act. As it stands, this bill fails to adequately, fund title I--the cornerstone of No Child Left Behind, NCLB. In fact, it provides $6.15 billion below the amount promised to school districts for fiscal year 04. This funding level in this bill is even $334 million below the increase that was slated for title I in the budget resolution for fiscal year 04. Children are failing in many of our schools in all of our states. These children need extended learning time. They need instruction from high-quality teachers and they need to learn in smaller classrooms. The Byrd amendment gives schools the resources they need so that they can create the best possible condition in which all teachers can teach and all children can learn. Today, 23.3 percent of all children in New York are living in poverty, more than all but six other States. The proposed appropriation in this bill fails to meet the need for more resources for these children. As a result, 458,745 eligible New York children would not be fully served and will consequently be left behind. Funding title I at its NCLB-authorized level of $18.5 billion would provide New York with $682,595,000 more than the current proposal. Title I grants help school districts in all State pay for tutoring instruction, specialized services, class size reduction and other critical support services to help the neediest of all children achieve high standards. With this funding, New York school districts can hire up to 13,379 teachers to reduce class size and provide specialized instruction in math and reading aimed at helping these needy children meet state standards. The impact of the proposed funding level is especially felt in key cities across New York State. Without the resources provided by this amendment, 243,803 eligible children in New York City, 2,902 children in Albany, 15,222 in Buffalo, 7,362 in Syracuse and 5,887 children in Yonkers will not be fully served. These children will be left behind. Securing these additional funds could enable districts to hire an additional 72 teachers in Albany, 385 in Buffalo, 7,862 in New York City, 312 in Rochester, 164 in Syracuse, and 159 teachers in Yonkers. If we expect every single child to succeed there should be no exception to our commitment to turning around struggling schools. This amendment will reaffirm our commitment by giving schools the resources they need so that teachers can teach to the highest standards and all of our children can learn. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I rise today in support of the Reid Hispanic educational opportunities amendment. My Democratic colleagues and I have held roundtables with Hispanic leaders across the Nation and members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus that have allowed us to share ideas and develop an agenda that addresses the issues that matter most to the Hispanic community. We know how important education is to Hispanics and will continue to ensure that it remains a top priority for the Democratic caucus. Two years ago, Congress and this administration worked together to pass the No Child Left Behind Act to improve the quality of education in America's public schools. We had the commitment from President Bush that additional resources would be provided to help schools implement the changes required. Today, this administration has broken its promise and has chosen to cut funding for NCLB next year by $1.2 billion below this year's enacted level of funding. I stand with my colleagues in support of this amendment because we recognize the education of Latino students as a national priority. We are here today to ensure that these resources are restored. Hispanics are now the largest minority group, as well as the youngest fastest-growing minority group, in the country. Hispanic children make up 17 percent of the total school-age population in the country and recent trends indicate that the number of Latino children attending our Nation's schools is increasing. Despite these changing demographics, Hispanic children remain among the most educationally disadvantaged of all students. Hispanic children are more likely to attend schools in predominantly low-income areas, they are more likely to be enrolled in segregated schools, less likely to complete high school, and are less likely to be enrolled in and graduate from college than their non-Latino peers. This amendment will help restore funding for several key programs that have traditionally helped put Hispanic students on par with their more advantaged peers. This administration has chosen to eliminate dropout prevention at a time when the dropout rate among Hispanics is growing and continues to be higher than that of White or Black students. Nationally, the dropout rate among Hispanics in 2000 was 34 percent up from 22 percent in 1990, and in New York State, the percentage rose to 38.4 percent in 2000. In New York City, 38 percent of all children enrolled in elementary and secondary schools are Hispanic, higher than any other group. These children face many barriers to graduation, yet New York City's dropout prevention grant will be zero funded in this appropriation bill. School districts in New York and across the Nation already lack the resources, staffing and programs to help new immigrants adapt to U.S. schools and overcome language barriers. Eliminating this funding will just make matters worse. We know that young adults who do not finish high school are more likely to be unemployed than those who graduate. At a time when our unemployment rate is staggering, we should be doubling the funding for dropout prevention- not eliminating it. I applaud Senator Bingaman for his leadership in making dropout prevention a national priority and look forward to working with him on this issue. This appropriations bill cuts title III of the NCLB by $20 million, severely underfunding bilingual education programs and jeopardizing the academic success of hundreds of thousands of English language learners across the nation. New York's schools serve a large and growing number of Latino students and the rate of enrollment for limited English proficient students has grown by 44.3 percent, since 1990. Resources provided under title III of the NCLB help school districts in my State provide English language instruction to over 300,000 limited English proficient children and nearly 120,000 immigrant children. Since this program was consolidated and turned into a block grant, states like New York have had to reduce their services. This appropriations bill adds insult to injury by forcing cash-strapped schools to serve more students with far fewer resources. Restoring this funding will help States, local schools, and colleges build their capacity to teach limited English proficient students effectively. The children of migrant farm workers, often called ``children of the road,'' face many obstacles in their lives, including extreme poverty, geographic and cultural isolation, discrimination based on race or ethnic status, language minority status, and, most importantly, mobility. I am pleased that this amendment restores and increases funding for key migrant education programs that serve this at-risk population, including Head Start for children of migrant and seasonal farm workers. Currently, only 664 of 1,177 eligible migrant children are enrolled in Migrant and Seasonal Head Start centers across New York. This is especially troubling given the fact that migrant children who are not in head start classrooms are either cared for by other younger siblings or are left in the fields. This amendment will take an additional 150 migrant children in New York out of the fields where they are put at risk of exposure to harmful toxins and pesticides and into quality head start classrooms where they can receive the social, behavioral, and cognitive skills they need to help prepare them for school. This amendment also restores funding to the High School Equivalency Program, HEP, and College Assistance Migrant Program, CAMP. The HEP and CAMP programs are both very important to New York as well as other States in the Northeast. The HEP program helps migrant students who have dropped out of high school get their GED, and CAMP assists migrant students in their first year of college with both counseling and stipends. The children of migrant farm workers face the highest dropout rate among all other Hispanic American ethnic groups. Current estimates place the dropout rate for migrant at between 50 and 60 percent. Before the Federal Government created CAMP programs, there was no record of a migrant child having completed college. With HEP and CAMP these students are making amazing progress. At the State University of New York at Oneonta, both programs serve students from migrant and seasonal farm working families from New York, Maine, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. This year, Luis, a New Yorker and former HEP and CAMP student will be entering as a sophomore at SUNY-Oneonta. Luis' experience as a migrant youth is shared by countless other children of migrant and seasonal farm workers. For many migrant children, moving from state to state can take its toll. For Luis, it resulted in a pattern of repeating grades until he quit school to work with his father in the vineyards in Western New York. A year later, he learned about High School Equivalency Program, HEP. With the assistance of the HEP program, he earned his GED, applied to college, and was accepted to SUNY last year as biology major. As a CAMP student, Luis received vital academic, social, and financial support during his first year of college, the most critical year for most first-generation college students. Luis now mentors other CAMP students, is a member of the Migrant AmeriCorps program and has maintained a cumulative GPA of 3.04. Securing additional resources for HEP and CAMP will help ensure the dreams of students like Luis become reality. I also support increasing funding for Hispanic Serving Institutions, HSIs. For New York this increase will help 12 colleges and universities expand their capacity to serve a large and growing number of Hispanic students. By supporting these institutions we are recognizing the large contribution they make to increasing access to higher education for traditionally underserved communities, and are making the dream of college a reality for many more Hispanics. The condition of America's future will depend upon how well we meet the demand for an educated workforce. Cuts in education programs might help balance the books in the short- term, but it is a bad idea for our economy in the long-term. We need a highly skilled workforce to compete in this global economy and investing in the education and training of our Hispanic population will help our Nation meet this challenge. I therefore urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, first, I commend my colleagues and leaders, the Senators from Iowa and Nevada, for their heartfelt, eloquent statements on behalf of the rights of Americans to be paid for the work they do. I appreciate greatly that our leader on this bill, the Democratic manager, the Senator from Iowa, has really drawn a line in the sand, because we know we are not creating jobs, we know that more people have fallen into poverty, and we know that the incomes of more Americans will be cut dramatically if the provision this administration wants to put into effect is allowed to go forward. So I thank them for their very strong commitment. EPA's Response to the World Trade Center Collapse Mr. President, I wish to talk about another very important issue, one that directly affects the people I represent in New York but which I believe affects our entire country and the credibility of this administration and our Government. I am speaking about the report released on August 21 by the Office of the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency entitled ``EPA's Response to the World Trade Center Collapse: Challenges, Successes, and Areas for Improvement.'' As the title suggests, this report is carefully researched, constructively presented, and it outlines how the EPA carried out its charge in the immediate and longer term aftermath of the terrible attack that struck New York on the infamous day of September 11--now almost 2 years ago. No one will ever forget that day. Those who were there in lower Manhattan will never be able to erase the images--not just the visual images but the feelings, the smells, the sounds, the smoke. I remember so well being there the day after and seeing the firefighters emerging from the haze that hung over the site, covered in dust and debris; the rescue workers, whom all of us saw, and many of whom I have met, who guided people to safety without a mask or a bit of concern about their own long-term health. I am sure that Americans remember--and New Yorkers lived with--the apartment buildings, the business buildings that were covered in gray dust. When we turned to our Government in Washington for guidance in the hours, days, and weeks after that tragedy, one of the questions I was asked and I know the EPA was asked, the White House was asked, and the city and the State were asked was: Is the air safe? What did the EPA tell us? The EPA said: Yes, it is safe. Go back to work, get back to your daily lives. Mr. President, it is a very hard thing to stand on this Senate floor and say this, but I believe our Government let us down. It wasn't by accident and it wasn't a mistake during the chaos of those terrible days. Instead, as spelled out in this report by the EPA inspector general, it is clear that the EPA was overruled and directed about what to say. I want to underscore the important fact that this report is not the product of my office, not the product of an advocacy group or an outsider; it was done by the EPA's own career watchdog. Why do we have inspectors general? Because we know our Government needs somebody to keep track of and hold accountable for actions that are taken. It is not a Republican or a Democratic job; it is a nonpartisan job. Sort of like Sergeant Friday, they ``just want the facts.'' They want to be able to know what is actually going on in the bowels and processes of these huge bureaucracies that perform so many important functions. But still, like any human institutions, extra eyes are needed on what they are doing. The inspector general of the EPA looked at the actions EPA took to address the quality of the air affected by the collapse of the World Trade Center and what the EPA told the public about the air we were breathing. The inspector general rightly acknowledges that the EPA, like all of our governmental entities at the Federal, State, and local levels involved with the response to September 11, found themselves dealing with an unprecedented crisis, the scope and nature of which none of us ever imagined. I admit, and I think it is fair to say, that no part of Government was prepared for the enormity of what occurred on September 11, and that is understandable because of what did happen. So in that spirit, and I think realistically so, the inspector general recognized that the particular demands placed on the EPA were considerable. I was there day after day, down at Ground Zero in the city, meeting with EPA officials, and I know how stressed they were because of all they were having to contend with. But still, even taking into account the unprecedented nature of the attacks, the implosion of the buildings, releasing into the air billions and billions of particles of all kinds of compounds and chemicals, the EPA inspector general found and asserted that where the Agency could and should have been more thorough, more proactive, more effective in its responsibility, it did not live up to what we should have rightly expected. We looked to the EPA to give us straight information and help us try to reduce the dangerous emissions in the air from the collapse, from the cleanup and the recovery, and the inspector general looked particularly at the EPA action dealing with monitoring, testing, and cleaning up of indoor air. I want to make this distinction because I think it is very important. When the towers collapsed, clearly, so much was released into the environment. We could see, as we helicoptered over the site on September 12, the burning fires still. The outdoor air was of particular concern to all of the people--the brave men and women who were on the search and recovery teams, who were beginning to work to remove the debris. But there is another separate and equally important issue, and that is about indoor air, because this blizzard of debris and dust went through windows, went through cracks in buildings, settled on roofs, fell into living quarters and businesses. As a Senator from New York, I have been particularly concerned about these air quality issues and the implications for the public's health since September 11. I have worked with other elected officials representing New York and the region. I have worked with our first responders--our firefighters, police officers, and public health professionals. I have worked with residents and workers and businessowners to press for the help and the resources and the information we needed so that the air, both outdoors and indoors, would be clean as fast as possible and that the public's health would be protected as much as possible. With Senator Lieberman, who was then chair of the Clean Air Subcommittee of the Environment and Public Works Committee, on which I serve with him, we held a field hearing in lower Manhattan in February of 2002 to examine what we thought then were troubling and contradictory messages from the EPA about the quality of air in downtown New York City. I especially wanted to be sure of the basis for then-Administrator Christy Todd Whitman's statement on September 18, 1 week after the attack, that the air in New York was ``safe to breathe.'' I pointed out that information from other Government and official sources contradicted that assertion, not to mention the concerns of my constituents who were coming to me asking whether it was safe for them to go back to their apartments, to go back to work, to bring their children home because of what they could feel and smell in the air. Every time I went down there, my eyes burned and my throat burned. It was a palpable feeling that we were in an environment that may not be safe. I do not think either Senator Lieberman or I at that hearing received a straight answer. I am not sure we ever got a straight answer in the time between September 11, 2001, and August 21, 2003. In fact, we know we did not because the inspector general's report confirms that New Yorkers and others affected were, in fact, misled about the most fundamental issue: whether the air they were breathing, the breaths they took were safe. I find this deeply disturbing and very disappointing. Let me quote from the report itself. I have excerpts from the report on these two charts. In the executive summary of the report, the inspector general says in the very first finding: EPA's early public statements following the collapse of the World Trade Center Towers reassured the public regarding the safety of the air outside the Ground Zero area. However, when EPA made a September 18 announcement that the air was ``safe'' to breathe, it did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement. At that time, air monitoring data was lacking for several pollutants of concern, including particulate matter and PCBs. Furthermore, the White House Council on Environmental Quality, influenced, through the collaborative process, the information that the EPA communicated to the public through its early press releases when it convinced the EPA to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones. The inspector general later on in the report states: Based on the documentation we reviewed and our discussions with numerous environmental experts, both within and outside the EPA, we do not agree with the Agency's statement of September 18, 2001, that the air was safe to breathe reflected the Agency's best professional advice. In contrast . . . it appeared that the EPA's best professional advice was overruled when relaying information to the public in the weeks immediately following the disaster. Basically, what the IG is saying is that the EPA did not have the testing data and analyses to make the statements it did, and that the best professional judgment of the EPA experts was influenced by the White House itself. As examples of where White House officials intervened and what the EPA told the public at the time, the inspector general reports that the White House had the EPA remove recommendations that all area residents obtain professional cleaning of their homes and offices and told the EPA to remove any reference to the increased risks from air pollution for sensitive populations, such as young children and the elderly. On these charts, I now want to turn to the actual examples that the inspector general includes in the report of where and how the White House evidently--although we do not know this--evidently, through its Council on Environmental Quality, dictated very specific changes to the EPA on what it could and could not say in its press releases to the public. Here we see in vivid language, to once again use the very words of the inspector general's report, the White House's role in insisting that ``the EPA's overriding message was that the public did not need to be concerned about airborne contaminants caused by the World Trade Center collapse.'' If we look at these charts, we can see very clearly what was told by the White House to be changed. Here is the draft press release from the EPA, and it reads: Recent samples of dust gathered by OSHA-- The Occupational Safety and Health Administration-- on Water Street show higher levels of asbestos in EPA tests. The issued press release after the White House dictated the changes: The new samples confirm previous reports that ambient air quality meets OSHA standards and consequently is not a cause for public concern. New OSHA data also indicates that indoor air quality in downtown buildings will meet standards. Draft press release: Seven debris and dust samples taken Thursday showed levels of asbestos ranging from 2.1 percent to 3.3 percent. EPA views a 1 percent level of asbestos as the definition for asbestos-containing material. Changed press release at the White House direction: Debris samples collected outside buildings, on cars, and other surfaces contained small percentages of asbestos, ranging from 2.1 to 3.3--slightly above the 1 percent trigger for defining asbestos material. These are statements that were added to the press release based on the White House instructions. Here was the instruction from the White House: Add sentence about OSHA monitors walking the streets yesterday and wearing personal monitors and coming up clean. Of course, the EPA did what they were told by the White House. This is what they said: OSHA staff walked through New York's financial district on September 13th, wearing personal air monitors, and collected data on potential asbestos exposure levels. All but two samples contained no asbestos. Two samples contained very low levels of an unknown fiber which is still being analyzed. Of course, what we know now is that they had not done the analysis. They did not have the data. So, basically, the White House decided they better invent some and put it in the press release so they could create more reassurance than what the facts clearly indicated. The White House says: Get a quote in from somebody in charge, somebody with some responsibility; put a quote in so you can get people back to work and back to living downtown. So they came up with a quote by a Mr. John L. Henshaw, Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA. This is the quote they put in: Our tests showed that it is safe for New Yorkers to go back to work in New York's financial district. They just made it up: Might as well tell them it is OK to go back to work; don't put in any cautionary language about children or the elderly, people with preexisting asthmatic, pulmonary, or respiratory conditions. Tell them it is safe. It is really discouraging, I have to say, to go through this because it is not what any of us expected. It is certainly not what any of us told our constituents and what we were told as we walked these streets and as people asked: Is it OK to go back? I believe this is the kind of interference by Government altering scientific data, putting happy talk in where mature and accurate information would be better suited, and that does our Government a great disservice. I conclude with these two final changes: The draft press release that the experts at EPA put out had this caption: EPA Initiating Emergency Response Activities, Testing Terrorized Sites For Environmental Hazards. That sounds pretty descriptive. That is what they were doing. That was their job. That is what we expect the EPA to do, to go do the emergency response activities and test for environmental hazards. This is what the White House said they had to put as the caption: EPA Initiating Emergency Response Activities, Reassures Public About Environmental Hazards. We went from testing to reassurance because of changes in words dictated by the White House, not based on data, not based on science. Then this final example, the draft press release said: Preliminary results of EPA's sampling activities indicate no or very low levels of asbestos. However, even at low levels, EPA considers asbestos hazardous in this situation and will continue to monitor and sample for elevated levels of asbestos and work with the appropriate officials to ensure awareness and proper handling, transportation and disposal of potentially contaminated debris or materials. I have no problem with that. That is a very thoughtful, informative statement: Thankfully, our testing shows very low levels at this point but we want to caution people because even very low levels can be dangerous, so we want to tell you what you should do to deal with this dust that is everywhere, that is in your house, that covers everything from your drapes and your rugs to your teapot sets, that is filling the streets and the roofs, so we are going to tell you what we need to do. Here is what the White House told them to say instead: EPA is greatly relieved to have learned that there appears to be no significant levels of asbestos dust in the air in New York City, said Administrator Whitman. We are working closely with rescue crews to ensure that all appropriate precautions are taken. We will continue to monitor closely. Public health concerns about asbestos contamination are primarily related to long-term exposure. Short-term, low- level exposure of the type that might have been produced by the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings is unlikely to cause significant health effects. EPA and OSHA will work closely with rescue and cleanup crews to minimize their potential exposure, but the general public should be very reassured by initial sampling. Nothing about proper handling, transportation, or disposal. These are very disturbing revelations. What the EPA wanted to report to the public in their press releases and communication was different from what they did report, and yet all of us relied on those reports. I have talked to a lot of parents with kids who live downtown. I have talked with a lot of business owners. They asked me whether they should send their children back to the schools when they opened, whether they should go to work when the businesses reopened. Based on both the public information and the private information that I had solicited, I said, yes, from all we know, we think it is safe. I understand what tremendous challenges these horrible events caused for everyone, but I just cannot come up with any excuse, justification, or rationale for the White House to interfere with the agency in charge of providing accurate and trustworthy information about whether our air indoors and outdoors is safe to breathe. Dictating what the EPA can generally say is inexcusable, but making them misinform the public on such a critical issue is outrageous. As the inspector general's report clearly points out, the EPA has a clear mandate to communicate honestly and openly with the public about environmental hazards and risks. The reporting even lists the Agency's own seven cardinal rules of risk communication in carrying out these important roles that they have done over the years in dealing with countless situations such as toxic spills and explosions. Those rules were tampered with and the public was misinformed. On Tuesday, August 26, Senator Lieberman and I wrote to President Bush to convey our serious questions and concerns about what we have learned through the IG report. We asked the President to provide Congress and the public with an account of what took place in the White House that resulted in changing the content and the overall message conveyed by EPA through its press releases. We asked for the identities of the White House officials referred to in the report, who played a role in imposing these changes, for an explanation on why the White House felt compelled to insist on the changes, and copies of the actual communications between the White House and the EPA about the air quality in downtown New York. We asked for a response by September 5 with the hope of obtaining a full and frank explanation of the sequence described in the report and be assured that the EPA does indeed have the authority and the liberty to communicate accurately with the public on what it knows. I know the White House did not cooperate with the inspector general report but I hope they would want to get to the bottom of this and learn the lessons that we should not only about the past but going forward. However, I cannot say that I will be surprised if we continue to hear from the administration some of the same excuses that they have been making in response to the IG's report. In one statement reported a few days ago, former EPA Administrator Whitman said: We did not want to scare people. White House representatives have said that the edits and changes imposed on the EPA were necessary for national security reasons. Frankly, this is a canard. The public deserves better. When it comes to our health, the health of our children, the health of our elderly relatives, we need accurate information in a timely manner. Should we have worn a mask? Should we have gotten more sophisticated respiratory protective gear? Should we have gotten a professional cleaner to clean our apartments before we went back? The public needs to know what the risks are so they can appropriately respond. To say that national security somehow justifies telling people the air is safe when it is not is to essentially say that people are going to be told that when they need their Government the most at a time of terrible disaster they cannot trust what they hear. A national crisis does not justify giving people the wrong information and continuing to do so days, weeks, and months after the event. Would any of us have wanted to worry that the Centers for Disease Control had changed what they were telling us about SARS or the West Nile virus or any other public health incident? Would we ever want to question the FDA about what they tell us when it comes to drugs available in our pharmacies? Should we ever fear the EPA's information about a toxic spill in our community or our own backyard? What the inspector general told us in its August 21 report is that we have to raise these questions now. What I hope we can achieve from examining this report and seeking answers is that all New Yorkers and Americans will be assured that in the future the EPA and all parts of our Government responsible for communicating to the public about our health and safety will do so honestly and accurately without any political interference. I have talked about this report and the serious issues it raises with residents who live near Ground Zero. These New Yorkers have been through so much. Many of them were forced into homelessness for months. Many faced devastated neighborhoods when they returned home. For them, who have lost so much, it is tragic if they lose one more precious thing, namely, their trust in their Government, their faith that they would be given accurate, truthful information they could make judgments on. People made life decisions based on what the EPA told them. Families moved back into the area with their children. Parents sent their children to school. Doctors told their patients not to worry because of what the EPA told them. To restore any semblance of that trust, we need to get to the bottom of what happened. I hope the administration, led by the White House, will understand that and will help us do what we need to do which is, number one, to find out what the truth was, unvarnished, without any embroidery or reassuring words, just what it was; second, do an analysis of the quality of the indoor air now. These particles, these contaminants stay in rugs, drapes, and air vents. We need to know whether people are living in places right now that are putting their health at risk. Then our Government needs to show good faith by doing what they said they would do, namely, to make sure the indoor air quality was cleaned up. And, perhaps most importantly, we need to restore that trust which has been breached. I hope the administration will help. These events also require oversight by the Congress. A number of my colleagues have asked we hold hearings in the Environment and Public Works Committee. I hope we will. I cannot imagine anyone representing any State in this country with so many constituents still coughing, who have acquired severe asthma, who have pulmonary dysfunction, not asking for the very same thing I am asking for, congressional hearings and a full, cooperative relationship with the administration. I conclude by responding to one of the constant themes I hear from the administration, that they did not want to cause panic, they did not want people to be upset. If New Yorkers had to prove this one more time, they certainly did on September 11th and they did it again in the blackout. These are terrible times that try people, but New Yorkers rise to the occasion no matter what it is. They would have taken accurate information and acted accordingly. They would have done what they needed to do to take precautions for themselves, their children, their friends, their neighbors. I cannot imagine this idea we did not want to cause people to panic. There are many ways of saying--we saw from the EPA's own language--the truth and then telling people, here are the necessary steps you should take. There is not one firefighter, not one police officer, there is not one construction worker I met who would not have gone out of that pile, would not have tried for days to find survivors, would not have begun to remove the debris, to put the message clearly out to the world and the terrorists that we were not in any way daunted or fearful. Not one. But they might have worn their masks and asked for and demanded better respiratory protection. Instead, the Government says the air is safe. I have not met one family member or business owner who did not want to go back downtown and rebuild and live their lives again. They would have done it. But maybe instead of cleaning with a wet mop and a wet cloth to try to get rid of asbestos and PCBs, they would have done what the EPA said, go out and get a professional cleaner. But the air was safe. This in and of itself is a serious, profoundly important issue that has disturbing consequences, particularly when it comes to the trust we should be able to place in our Government, believing they are looking out for our best interests when it comes to health and safety. I hope the administration will respond to my letter, that the Senate will hold hearings, and we will all make it absolutely clear we will not abide misinformation and political interference in something as important as the air we breathe. I yield the floor.

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 20 minutes.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, I commend and thank my colleague from Ohio who is always looking out for the children. This has been a mission of his, year in and year out. I thank him for the amendments he has just discussed because every one of them concerns the well-being of our children. I look forward to supporting these amendments. I particularly thank the Senator for amendment 1561 to restore the money for pediatric graduate medical education. Amendment No. 1565 To Amendment No. 1542

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, will the Senator from Pennsylvania yield?

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, I wish to express my appreciation to the chairman for that offer. Perhaps even before the bill is totally wrapped up we could take a look at some of those categories of funding because what I am concerned about, as the Senator rightly referenced, is in all of the funding categories, these requests I have put in this amendment are coming from constituent agencies, such as CDC, that at least believe at this point in time that the money available for bioterrorism has not been sufficiently targeted to this personnel issue. I appreciate not only the kind offer of a hearing, because I think this is an issue that is going to go on for quite some time--it is not going to be resolved one way or another even if this amendment were successful--but also perhaps in the next several days if our staffs can look to see if there is a better opportunity to better target some of this funding to deal with this pipeline professional problem that is not only at the Federal Government level, but State and local as well.

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, this amendment is intended to provide the money that is needed to ensure that at the Federal, State, and local levels, we have an adequate bioterrorism workforce. In order to do that, we have to fund the pipeline. This summer the Partnership for Public Service issued a report stating that 50 percent of our experts trained to respond to a biological or chemical attack will retire over the next 5 years. That puts our country and our public health at risk. Obviously, every one of us in this body is committed to making our country safer and providing the bioterrorism funding we have fought for since 9/11. And I appreciate the great support the Senate has given to increasing dollars to combat the threat of bioterrorism. But, unfortunately, our frontline defenders, who are our health professionals, are decreasing in number when we need them more than ever. According to the Office of Personnel Management, more than 2,600 public health professionals in the Federal Government are eligible to retire in 2008, and that number could soar to more than 8,000 in just the next few years. Unfortunately, the shortage in personnel is not just Federal. It is already being felt at the State and county levels. In county after county in the public health departments, I have been given reports that so many of the staff members are being stretched thin and they are unable to do the work that is required. If we don't find ways to provide the resources to attract and pay for these professionals, we are going to be in a terrible dilemma not only if a horrible event or some kind of biological or chemical attack were to occur, but even with the outbreak of something like SARS, or something unpredictable that we may have never encountered before. The Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act that we passed in 2002 does help with workforce training, recruitment and development. But with respect to what has occurred since 2002, we already know we have had increased demands on our public health system, and we have insufficient resources to expand personnel or, as these recent reports I have referenced indicate, keep pace at current levels. The CDC and other agencies need to do strategic planning. My amendment includes $5 million to fund an annual needs assessment, with a report to Congress, of Federal, State, and local bioterrorism personnel, conducted by the Institute of Medicine or another competent and independent authority. But even while we are looking longer term, we have immediate public health needs right now. I know that, for example, in New York, two Centers for Public Health Preparedness are located at SUNY Albany and Columbia University. They have already trained 10,000 people each year in bioterrorism preparedness. Many regions don't have these centers of excellence, and we have to figure out how we can get the resources and personnel to every part of our country. According to the Association of Schools of Public Health Preparedness and Prevention, the 19 nationwide Centers of Public Health Preparedness have asked the administration for $50 million--nearly double what the President's budget proposes. I think we should meet those requests, and my amendment would provide the funds to do that. My amendment also provides funds, in accordance with the recommendation of CDC's own National Advisory Committee on Children and Terrorism, to double the number of outbreak specialists in the Epidemic Intelligence Service. These EIS specialists are dispatched to respond to epidemics and bioterrorism. The resident expertise that we need in State and local public health departments is also crucial. My amendment would provide $25 million to the Epidemiology Program Office, the National Center for Infectious Diseases, and the Public Health Practice Program Office of the CDC to recruit and train 1,600 epidemiologists, 800 laboratory personnel, 800 public health nurses, and 800 other public health professionals to work in State and local public health departments nationwide. The Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists estimates that State and local public health departments need to hire 1,600 epidemiologists over the next 10 years to prevent worsening shortages of State and local epidemiologists. It costs about $60,000 to train a public health professional. This proposal would spread that investment over 10 years. Finally, the amendment also provides $20 million for carrying out sections 765 through 769 of the Public Health Service Act to title VII to encourage personnel to enter epidemiology and bioterrorism detection careers. Title VII has been decimated each of the last 3 years. It has been a struggle to keep it even flat-funded from year to year. Unfortunately, the pipeline for epidemiologists and bioterrorism experts has suffered as a result. I hope to be able to work this out without the manager of the bill. I understand completely the many competing considerations he has to balance, but it is imperative that we start to meet these needs. If we pass this amendment today and get the money in the pipeline, we can begin to train and hire the doctors, nurses, and other public health professionals who are going to be necessary for us to deal with whatever we face in the future. Unfortunately, terrorists or epidemics like SARS don't wait while the retirement notices are stacking up. I don't think we should either. This $93 million would be money well spent that would make us better prepared to deal with the incredible challenges that we confront as we try to ensure that our vigilance and our concern is matched by the expertise we need to actually deal with any problem that we may confront. Madam President, I ask that this amendment be supported, but I ask, too, that we look for a way to deal with this pipeline problem that is so critical to actually putting teeth into the preparedness that we have passed in this body and funded since September 11. I yield the floor.

Mrs. CLINTON. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that amendment 1565 be called up.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I want to echo and support the eloquent comments of my colleague from Michigan about the values and priorities of our Nation at this point in our history. I particularly wish to reinforce her strong statement of support for the Kennedy-Collins amendment concerning higher education and its affordability. This amendment that will increase access to higher education would invest $2.2 billion in Pell grants and other critical programs. I think all of us know that investing in higher education pays off, but we also know we have put our students into a difficult dilemma. They understand the importance of going to college. That is why in the last week they have packed up; they have moved to campuses; they have enrolled in courses; they are prepared to do their part to acquire the skills and credentials they need to make a contribution to our country. Yet at the very time they are doing their part, accepting their responsibility, the costs of higher education are dramatically increasing. States are reducing their support, increasing tuition, and other related costs. As a result, many qualified students from middle-income and low-income families, sometimes the first in their families to even dream of going to college, the first to apply, the first to believe they could put together the financial resources to attend and graduate from college, are coming up against the reality of not being able to fund their education. We know that on average each year a postsecondary education increases earnings by 6 to 12 percent. Research also points out what many of us know from personal experience; that postsecondary education leads low-income citizens to become more self-sufficient, to lead productive lives. Clearly, this is a time when we cannot ignore the importance of preparing our workforce, making it as productive as possible, and providing programs such as GEAR UP and TRIO which have helped change the expectations and raise the vision of many children from families for whom college was not a reality. I recently heard from Melissa Santos, a tenth grade GEAR UP student at Hempstead High School in my State of New York. She wrote to tell me something that sometimes young people do not realize until it is too late. She writes: Life can take you many places. It all depends on the choices you make. I feel that life could be good, but it all depends on how you live it. For instance, if you decide to go to college and get your education, you will most likely live a good life. GEAR UP has a lot of benefits like helping students get into college, which is essential to making it in today's world. My philosophy is that education can break many boundaries. Well, Melissa Santos is a young woman who is wise beyond her years, but she is taking advantage of a program that is giving her the structure, the incentive, and the motivation to dream about going to college. She is preparing herself to take advantage of that. The Kennedy-Collins amendment will increase access to college for eligible students in all States, and it will be particularly important to students in New York where tuition at the State University of New York at our various campuses jumped by 28 percent. Students attending the city University of New York are now faced with a 25-percent tuition increase. Last year, 404,181 students received Pell grants in New York. This amendment will expand grant aid to additional students, but it will also make sure the grant amount is sufficient to keep students in school. So I am hopeful, along with my friend and colleague from Michigan, that we will do something to invest in our own students, make it possible for these bright young men and women from all corners of our country to have an educational opportunity, not feel that they have to postpone it or drop out because of financial pressures. Amendment No. 1575 Similarly, I join with my colleague, Senator Harkin from Iowa, in working to amend the appropriations to provide critical relief to schools that are overcrowded and worn down and, as a side benefit, create much needed jobs in the economy. The Harkin-Clinton amendment would provide $1 billion to help needy schools make those critical repairs and renovations and relieve overcrowding. For New York alone, this amendment would mean more than $100 million which, believe me, is money that is sorely needed. It is particularly needed because of the requirements of No Child Left Behind. We promised that we would put a qualified teacher in every classroom. We led teachers, parents, and students to believe that a qualified teacher would be able to teach because the number of students sitting before him or her would be low enough that you could actually do the hard work of helping these students meet the new accountability standards. Unfortunately, because of the deterioration in our public school stock, because at least one-third of our schools need extensive repair, we know that we have all kinds of learning and educational problems that we could help alleviate. It is impossible for most of our communities to even think about raising property taxes to fix these schools. On the other hand, because of the State, county, city, and school district budget crunches, we have schools that were contracted for and built a few years ago and we cannot even fill the classrooms with teachers because they do not have the money. We are creating a recipe for failure. For many who voted for No Child Left Behind, we did so with the understanding there would be the resources, that the Government would do its part so our students, teachers, and parents would do their part. The net result would be better outcomes on learning measurements for our kids. This amendment, the Harkin-Clinton amendment, is sponsored by a number of our colleagues. Senator Bob Graham asked to be added as a cosponsor. I appreciate the support it has received. Clearly, we have to do more than just introduce amendments and talk about them. We need action. We estimate 14 million American children are attending these deteriorating schools. Think if it were your child, your grandchild, your niece, or your nephew. Think what that would mean to you and what kind of confidence you would be able to instill in the future of that young boy or girl. According to the General Accounting Office, one-fifth of all children attend schools with unhealthy air quality. I know a little bit about this now because of our work in lower Manhattan after 9/11. It is absolutely clear that air quality is associated with absenteeism. In fact, American children miss 10 million schooldays a year because of asthma exacerbated by indoor air quality. Poor indoor air quality has a disproportionate impact on racial minorities and students from low- income families. Black and Hispanic students have a much higher likelihood of living in neighborhoods with toxic waste facilities. Eighty percent of Hispanic children live in neighborhoods where quality does not meet EPA standards. According to the GAO, schools with at least 40 percent of students eligible to receive free or reduced-price lunch are more likely to have unsatisfactory air quality. We are putting our children who need help and encouragement the most into the environments that are least likely to produce the kind of positive results we all hoped for from the unprecedented Federal mandate under No Child Left Behind. These Federal requirements which we have imposed on our school districts are really a two-edged sword. On the one hand, we hope these requirements will inspire school districts to do things that maybe they should have done on their own but have not in the past; on the other hand, they may set up impossible barriers to any school district being able to achieve what is expected because we have not funded the resources that were called for in the authorization of No Child Left Behind. I know many of my colleagues argue there is no Federal role for building and repairing schools. The reality is that we made an explicit Federal priority to close the achievement gap, to say my daughter and the sons and daughters and grandchildren of my colleagues would not have an unfair advantage by dint of birth and genetics and environment; they would be given all the opportunities we could give as their parents and grandparents, but we would do more to help those children who, through no fault of their own, might not have been provided all of the benefits we take for granted. When we think about how we are going to achieve the standards put forth in No Child Left Behind and what our dearest hopes and dreams are for all children, I don't think we can ignore the compelling body of evidence that unhealthy school buildings are a detriment to performance. If our goal is to leave no child behind, we must first start by leaving no school behind. The Harkin-Clinton amendment would help States and schools comply with the requirements of No Child Left Behind. I hope we will look seriously at this amendment that gives us the opportunity to put our money where our mouths have been about higher education standards. We were ahead of the curve in New York. The New York regents already established standards for science, but many of our districts did not have the financial wherewithal to make sure their facilities were adequate. New York City lacks science labs in its junior high schools and has insufficient funds to construct then. We are still recovering from 9/11. We still have higher than 8 percent unemployment. Is it fair to say to the million children in the New York school district: You are not meeting the standards because we have not given you the basic equipment to be able to do that? I don't think so. The city also lacks the funding to build or modernize science labs and high schools. Chancellor Joel Klein wrote in a letter to me in support of this amendment: [W]ithout the necessary resources to meet our acute needs in this area, our students are in danger of falling short of meeting these requirements. The Harkin-Clinton amendment will also help alleviate overcrowding. Today, school enrollments are at their highest level in history, even more than the baby boomers. We filled up the classrooms, but the children of the baby boomers are even in greater numbers. A record 47.7 million children are enrolled in elementary and secondary schools today. The number will climb to 53.7 million by 2008. Between 1990 and 2000, school enrollments increased by 14 percent. Anyone who has driven by a school recently often sees trailers parked on the grounds because that is the only way the children can be accommodated. The temporary facilities sometimes last years because there are not sufficient resources to do what needs to be done in terms of facilities. We have a very big overcrowding problem in New York City. We have 30,000 more children than we have seats. We know we have to figure out what to do for those children, especially with the new standards and the testing requirements. But it is very hard to figure out how we are going to build the classrooms we need to seat those 30,000 children without some help. Where does the help, such as it is, come from? We know it comes from local tax bases, local taxpayers, and we know that in the last several years, according to a survey conducted by the National League of Cities, virtually every State that provides aid to local communities is cutting back on that aid because of the current fiscal problems. Local taxpayers cannot be expected to bear the brunt of every education cut occurring at the local level. There is no way it can be done. What administrators do is postpone costs, postpone repairs, postpone renovations, and even routine maintenance. Deferring the costs does not make them go away. Oftentimes it just leads to increased costs because something fails and then there is a bigger problem that is more expensive. There were $12 gaskets that failed at a school in New York costing $186,000 and forcing a gym to be closed for 5 weeks. Those are the things that happen as a matter of course through the country. There are many educationally compelling reasons to vote for this Harkin-Clinton amendment. There are many benefits that would flow to our children, our teachers, to the enterprise we have committed ourselves to as a nation to improve educational outcomes among all children, leaving no child behind. But there is another benefit, an ancillary benefit, and that is this would create jobs. We are in the worst, heightening slump since the Great Depression. More than 3.2 million private sector jobs have been lost since February of 2001; 1.4 million people have fallen back into poverty in the last 2 years. We have an unemployment problem. It is not going away. Some people say the economy is recovering, but even the most optimistic call it a jobless recovery. We know many people have even given up looking for work. This is a way to stimulate the economy. I don't think it is the primary reason. The primary reasons are the reasons to which I have alluded. It would not hurt to put some people to work. Spending $1 billion on school construction would generate 23,765 jobs. In New York alone, it is estimated it would put 2,434 people back to work. So this commonsense amendment, the Harkin-Clinton amendment, is really central to our achieving the purposes we claim to be supporting. I hope my colleagues will recognize the merit in this amendment and support it because I believe it has a tremendous amount of positive impact across the board. I further believe it would be affordable and, in comparison to the other challenges we are facing in Iraq and elsewhere, it would be a demonstration of real commitment to our goals. I hope on the Kennedy-Collins amendment concerning Pell grants and other related support for higher education, and on the Harkin-Clinton amendment with respect to school construction, modernization, repair, and renovation, that this body will cast a vote that really puts our children first--not just in rhetoric but in resources.

Mrs. CLINTON. Certainly.

Mrs. CLINTON. The Senator is absolutely correct. If one looks throughout our history, one sees the commitment to education is a constant. In the midst of the Civil War--hardly a moment one would think where any attention would be focused on any matter other than winning the war--President Lincoln forged ahead on land grant colleges because he understood that the war itself was not the only goal he had to keep in mind. He had to be constantly focused on what kind of country he was trying to save, what sort of union we would have. He understood that a citizenry committed to education, just as Thomas Jefferson understood and his successors after President Lincoln understood, was the kind of country he wanted to help create and make sure continued. If we go into the 20th century, at the turn of the 19th to the 20th century when we had so many immigrants coming to our shores, looking for hope and work and opportunity, we invested in schools. In fact, New York State still has some of those schools. I have been in schools built in 1894 and 1910. I have been to schools that are so old, they can't figure out how to get through that thick brick exterior to wire the schools. But all the way through the period, whether it was the Progressive period under President Roosevelt, the World War I era under President Wilson, and on to President Roosevelt and others, going forward, investing in schools was always key. I would make identity with my good friend from Connecticut that certainly, given our, sort of, age at this time in our lives, we know the generation of our parents invested in education. The veterans who went off and saved freedom in World War II came home and made it clear they wanted to build schools for the children they wanted to see grow up in peace. I know the father of the Senator from Connecticut was a great champion of that. I find it hard to understand how, here we are, a generation later, turning our back on the kind of facilities that are needed to demonstrate the public commitment we should be making to our children. I thank the Senator from Connecticut for a very timely and historically important inquiry.

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, will the Senator from Pennsylvania yield for a question?

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, the Senator from Pennsylvania is correct in his statement of his own record and the record with respect to increasing the Federal commitment to education. The Senator from Pennsylvania knows very well because of the complex State he represents the importance of supporting education and also supporting construction for the kind of old school stock we have in cities in New York and Pennsylvania. But would the Senator agree that with the No Child Left Behind Act the consequences for students and school districts under federally mandated accountability standards are considerably greater than they have ever been at any point in our history where for the first time the Federal Government has assumed a leadership role and accountability role with respect to public education?

Mrs. CLINTON. Certainly.

Mrs. CLINTON. I share my colleague's bewilderment. It does appear to me that the offsets are certainly adequate for the money we believe should go into school construction. The Senator's reference to Iraq raises an additional question. I, too, am aware of the statement by the administration, by Mr. Bremer and others that we--the American taxpayers--were committed to rebuilding schools, hospitals, health clinics, roads, and powerplants. I don't think one would argue with that. It is our responsibility. Once we make the decision to pursue military action and change the regime, we inherit those responsibilities. But not only does it seem fair and equitable to do the same for our own citizenry--particularly our students in rural areas and in underserved urban areas which both of us represent in our respective States--I would note a cautionary comment: that if we expect to have the broad population of this country support the long-term commitment we have taken upon ourselves, which is costing at least $1 billion a week--and we know the President is going to come and ask for between $60 billion and $70 billion more to support both the military mission and the reconstruction costs of Iraq--I think if we are serious about sustaining public support for what is a costly endeavor in terms of life and, much more important than money, the soldiers we are losing, the casualties, the injuries that are being incurred, it is important we support things here in our own country. It will be impossible to go to this Nation and say keep spending money in Iraq when you do not have jobs, when your schools are crumbling, when your bridges, your wastewater treatment centers, and your electricity grid is crumbling. Who are we kidding? How do you sustain the broad American public support for this kind of endeavor that costs us blood and fortune without doing things here at home? This is a tangible way to demonstrate we care about what happens in America as well. Amendment No. 1568

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I am pleased to support the amendment of Senators Mikulski and Collins that would bring the total funding in the bill for these programs to $175 million, the amount requested by over 30 bipartisan Senators and groups ranging from AARP to cancer patient groups to nursing and provider groups. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that more than one million new nurses will be needed by the year 2010. Yet in my State of New York, the number of undergraduate nursing program graduates has dropped each academic year since 1996. Even as the workforce shrinks, the patient population is projected to grow. Baby boomers across the Nation are aging, and their healthcare needs will put an extra burden on the system. In New York State, the population over 80 will double by the year 2020. As I travel across New York State, every type of community--urban, suburban, rural--and every type of provider--hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies, hospices is affected by this shortage. All around the State, nurses are facing an emergency of their own. That is why last Congress I worked so hard to pass the Nurse Reinvestment Act which will provide scholarships, public service announcements, and other provisions to encourage people to enter the profession. But the current nursing shortage exists not only because fewer individuals are entering the nursing profession, but also because the healthcare industry is having trouble retaining the nurses already on staff. This amendment will help fund important nurse retention programs that we authorized last year in the Nurse Reinvestment Act, based on proven workplace principles, such as promotion of patient-centered care and nurse leadership, that are shown to improve retention. The amendment does not take any funding from other programs in the bill. As so many studies have shown, our nursing care can often be the difference in medical outcomes. For all the new technologies, talented surgeons, and breakthrough drugs, I want people to remember that nursing care is essential in keeping our healthcare system the best in the world. Study after study has cited a direct link between the type and quality of nursing care that is delivered and patient outcomes. We trust nurses. In fact in a CNN/USA Gallop poll our Nation's nurses rank second for their honesty and integrity, with 84 percent of Americans rating them ``high'' or ``very high.'' If you are interested in who was ranked first--it was firefighters, for their selfless acts of bravery after the September 11 attacks. We too admire nurses for their self-sacrifice, as individuals who embark on a caregiving profession and found themselves on September 11 on the front lines of the battle against terrorism and bioterrorism. Nurses were on the frontlines when anthrax first appeared, when SARS hit, and nurses rose to the challenge and continue to rise to the challenge. This is why I am so concerned about the nursing shortage. Nurses are more vital than ever, and that is why we must fund these programs and make good on the promise of the Nurse Reinvestment Act.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, last Friday, on July 25, just as it was preparing to leave town and recess, the House of Representatives sent to the Senate an emergency supplemental appropriations bill that fails to meet the needs that have been outlined by the President and by the majority of Members of the House and the Senate. I rise to express my profound disappointment with the House leadership for their action. It put the Senate in the objectionable position of having to adopt or reject the House version because any effort to amend that bill would delay urgently needed disaster aid. The House-passed bill includes only $984 million for disaster emergency spending, even though the President requested $1.55 billion for disaster relief and emergency assistance. These funds are needed to cover the unexpected costs of the winter storms, as well as tornadoes and hurricanes which are affecting Texas and other southern States. Just last week we saw the streets of Denver flooded so high, cars were floating in the streets. The House bill also leaves out $289 million to fight fires in the West even though this is proving to be one of the driest seasons on record. At this time there are 45 large fires burning in the West, a total of almost 400,000 acres of active wildfires. If they continue to rage, these fires will take more lives--five were lost in the last week alone--and ruin homes and even communities. How are these communities, which are experiencing the worst fiscal crisis in a generation, to cover these costs without any Federal assistance? The House bill also neglects to provide $50 million for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to cover unanticipated costs associated with the Shuttle Columbia accident and to allow NASA to begin to implement measures recommended by the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. The President requested these funds and I agree that we should provide them. When the Columbia space shuttle accident occurred, it devastated our Nation, reminding us that we cannot become complacent about space travel. Let us at least learn from this accident and ensure that it never happens again by implementing the recommendations of the accident board. Of most concern to me and to the New Yorkers I represent, the House bill fails to include $100 million for AmeriCorps--emergency spending that the Senate passed overwhelmingly by a vote of 71 to 21 July 11. This funding is not only supported by the vast majority of Senators, it is also strongly supported by the majority of House Members. Two hundred and thirty four Representatives from both sides of the aisle signed letters to the President requesting additional funds for AmeriCorps. In addition to Members of Congress, the Governors have weighed in to support AmeriCorps. Forty-four Governors including Governor Bush from Florida, Governor Taft from Ohio, and Governor Pataki from my home State of New York sent a letter to the President and Congress asking us to provide additional funding for AmeriCorps. Over 145 U.S. mayors, including the mayors of Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, San Diego, and New York, have sent letters in support of additional funding for AmeriCorps. One hundred and ninety college and university presidents have signed a letter in support of additional funding for AmeriCorps. Two hundred and fifty business and philanthropic leaders took out full-page ads in the New York Times and the Financial Times asking the President to request $200 million in additional AmeriCorps funding. One thousand eleven hundred and eight community-based programs that relay on AmeriCorps to meet their community's vital needs have also sent a letter to Congress about their support for this funding and I ask unanimous consent to print that letter into the Record now as well. Seventy-one editorials have appeared in newspapers from coast to coast endorsing the additional funds for AmeriCorps and calling on Congress to act to prevent programs from being forced to close and prevent thousands of young people from being denied the opportunity to serve. So how do we account for this outpouring of support? Mr. President, I submit that it is for the simple reason that AmeriCorps works. For the price of a small grant towards higher education and a small living stipend, AmeriCorps volunteers transform communities. They fill vital gaps that otherwise would go unfilled and in the process, they make the future brighter for themselves and so many others in our society. Sister Mary Johnice, who runs a shelter in Buffalo, described the impact AmeriCorps has had on her organization at a recent event, ``AmeriCorps forms a team of workers, hard workers, who make a difference in other people's lives. They are selfless, outstanding and sacrificial, never counting the cost of what they do and whom they serve.'' She went on to describe how Buffalo has come to count on AmeriCorps members during difficult times. ``Everyone knows when snow hits the City of Buffalo, although it's a beautiful sight, the city can be paralyzed,'' said Sister Johnice. ``I worked with AmeriCorps to pack thousands of food bags, and deliver heavy packages of food to the homebound. I saw AmeriCorps workers walk miles for a prescription a new mother needed after having a baby. I looked at workers shoveling snow for hours so emergency vehicles could move. And I witnessed faith and love in action . . . lives touching lives! Isn't that what life is all about?'' she asked. Quincy Calimese, a young man from the Bronx said that AmeriCorps has changed his life. ``I was waking up at two o'clock every day,'' he said. ``I had nothing to do but run the streets and be the baddest person on the block, meanwhile getting others to do the same. Now I'm asleep by ten o'clock and up every morning at seven o'clock. I'm not running the streets and I try to motivate others to do the right thing, especially the younger kids. Mostly now I'm focused on my future as an architect and staying out of trouble. I spend a lot of time in the house, and now I'm reading, something I used to think was boring. I like how simple my life has become. No more worries, no more watching my back everywhere I go.'' If the $100 million are not approved, programs like the ones Sister Johnice runs and the one Quincy Calimese participates in will be devastated. National programs with proven records of success like CityYear, Teach for America, and Jumpstart will lose more than half of their sites. Jumpstart, which today serves 3,500 children, including 900 in New York, will probably have to close every one of its New York sites. This poster shows the progress of a shy little boy who, through the help of Jumpstart members, is now about to write his name. He is on the path to a successful future thanks to AmeriCorps. President Bush himself said of this program, ``I want you to know, America can be saved one person at a time. You see, this great society of ours can be changed one heart, one soul, one conscience at a time. And these six heroic students, people who have said, listen, serving something greater than myself in life is an important part of being a citizen, have been a part of what's called Jumpstart.'' I believe that he meant those words when he spoke them. And I agree with him. So, how can we stand by and watch as Jumpstart loses 60 percent of its Corps members? AmeriCorps is also integral to reducing the achievement gap between students living in high-poverty communities and their better off peers. Teach for America is an AmeriCorps program that recruits extremely talented and bright college graduates to teach in America's neediest schools. Last year 16,000 college seniors with average GPAs of 3.5 and average SATs of 1,300 applied to teach. Only 1,700 of them were selected. The majority of these students stay in education, devoting their careers to improving educational outcomes for low-income students. I am proud that the largest Teach for America corps in the country is in New York City. But I am deeply concerned about the number who will choose not to join the program after they learn that their education awards will not be forthcoming. Mr. President, this is not a partisan issue. When I organized a letter in support of providing $3 million for Teach for America in April, 9 Republicans and 10 Democrats signed on. This program has strong bipartisan support. So, why will only 16 percent of Teach for America members receive education awards this year? How did all of these programs, which have such overwhelming support, get to the point where they need an additional $100 million or they will go out of business? Well, we have to look at the history. Yes, there was mismanagement by Corporation officials. The inspector general's report revealed that for a long time the Corporation was enrolling more volunteers than it had the resources in the trust to support. But Congress has not helped the situation. In 2000 and 2001, believing that the Corporation was being overly prudent in the way it was managing the trust, Congress rescinded a total of $111.2 million. And in 2002, Congress appropriated nothing for the trust, leaving it to rely on the interest it was accruing from previously appropriated funds. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. And an independent analysis from KPMG LLP confirmed that the National Service Trust was solvent. How could Congress have foreseen the tragic events of September 11 and the President's Call to Service for every American? Nevertheless, they occurred. And the response to the President's call was overwhelming. Twenty-five percent more volunteers enrolled in AmeriCorps in the year after he made his announcement. Should we not have rescinded the funds from the trust? Probably. Should we have appropriated more for the trust in 2002? Yes. Should the President have acted sooner to ensure that the Corporation was allocating the correct number of volunteers, based on the resources it had at its disposal? Yes, I believe so. Should Corporation officials have been less accommodating to Americans who rose to meet the President's call to service? I suppose so. But here we are today. And we have to act in the best interest of our Nation. I believe we should reward the thousands of young people who signed up to serve their communities. They are not at fault for the misjudgment of the Corporation officials. Yet they are the ones who will be punished if we take the House's lead here today. President Bush proposed to increase AmeriCorps by 50 percent. Instead it is about to be cut by 60 percent. This is not what the President claims to want. It is not what the majority of the Senate wants. It is not what the majority of the House wants. It is not what most Governors want. It is not what most mayors want. It is not what most community leaders want. And it is not what most business leaders want. I know we can do better for AmeriCorps, which has been such a lifesaver for so many communities across New York and America. Today is a tragic day for AmeriCorps. It is a day when we are giving pink slips to 20,000 dedicated Americans who want to serve their communities. We are telling them that their service is no longer needed. I hope that we can find a way to do better by AmeriCorps when we return in September.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I rise to announce that today I am introducing The Access to Employment and English Acquisition Act with Senator Ensign and Senator Bingaman. I am grateful to both Senators for working with me to develop this legislation. I consider them partners in the important effort to expand opportunities for job training for Limited English Proficient individuals. I also want to thank the dedicated individuals at the New York Immigration Coalition, the National Immigration Law Center, the National Council at La Raza and the Immigration Forum for their significant contributions to this proposal. It is vitally important that our workforce investment system be responsive to the needs of those who do not speak English. Immigrants and Limited English Proficient individuals play a crucial role in the New York State and U.S. economy. Immigrants account for nearly half of the growth in the civilian labor force between 1990 and 2000 and immigrants are projected to account for all of the growth in the prime-age labor force between 2000 and 2020. Immigrants fill critical jobs, are the backbone of many industries, and are net contributors to the Nation's tax base. Without current and future immigrants in the workforce, our aging society will be short of workers; short of savings and investment to support national economic growth; and short of tax revenues to finance government services and Social Security outlays. The Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on which I serve, is in the process of reauthorizing the Workforce Investment (WIA). WIA reauthorization provides a valuable opportunity for Congress to improve our Nation's workforce development system to effectively serve immigrants and persons who are Limited English proficient. And I look forward to working with my colleagues on the HELP Committee to incorporate this legislation into the reauthorization bill. The Access to Employment and English Acquisition Act will reduce barriers to job training for English language learners by creating incentives for training providers to serve these individuals. It will also make programs that integrate job training and language acquisition more accessible. Employees have found that integrated programs offer a significant return on their investment because they improve productivity, reduce attendance problems, increase job retention rates, and promote overall quality control. Limited English Proficient persons also benefit from integrated training through improved job security, increased job advancement, and a greater ability to participate in society. There is no question that English proficiency is critical to economic advancement and improved quality of life for LEP workers and their families. Workers who are fluent in oral and written English earn about 24 percent more than those who lack fluency, regardless of their qualifications. These individuals are better able to participate in the civic life of their community, which so many LEP individuals in New York tell me they want to do. I look forward to continuing the work with Senator Ensign and Senator Bingaman to improve job training services for immigrants and LEP individuals.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I rise to announce that today I am introducing The Access to Employment and English Acquisition Act with Senator Ensign and Senator Bingaman. I am grateful to both Senators for working with me to develop this legislation. I consider them partners in the important effort to expand opportunities for job training for Limited English Proficient individuals. I also want to thank the dedicated individuals at the New York Immigration Coalition, the National Immigration Law Center, the National Council at La Raza and the Immigration Forum for their significant contributions to this proposal. It is vitally important that our workforce investment system be responsive to the needs of those who do not speak English. Immigrants and Limited English Proficient individuals play a crucial role in the New York State and U.S. economy. Immigrants account for nearly half of the growth in the civilian labor force between 1990 and 2000 and immigrants are projected to account for all of the growth in the prime-age labor force between 2000 and 2020. Immigrants fill critical jobs, are the backbone of many industries, and are net contributors to the Nation's tax base. Without current and future immigrants in the workforce, our aging society will be short of workers; short of savings and investment to support national economic growth; and short of tax revenues to finance government services and Social Security outlays. The Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on which I serve, is in the process of reauthorizing the Workforce Investment (WIA). WIA reauthorization provides a valuable opportunity for Congress to improve our Nation's workforce development system to effectively serve immigrants and persons who are Limited English proficient. And I look forward to working with my colleagues on the HELP Committee to incorporate this legislation into the reauthorization bill. The Access to Employment and English Acquisition Act will reduce barriers to job training for English language learners by creating incentives for training providers to serve these individuals. It will also make programs that integrate job training and language acquisition more accessible. Employees have found that integrated programs offer a significant return on their investment because they improve productivity, reduce attendance problems, increase job retention rates, and promote overall quality control. Limited English Proficient persons also benefit from integrated training through improved job security, increased job advancement, and a greater ability to participate in society. There is no question that English proficiency is critical to economic advancement and improved quality of life for LEP workers and their families. Workers who are fluent in oral and written English earn about 24 percent more than those who lack fluency, regardless of their qualifications. These individuals are better able to participate in the civic life of their community, which so many LEP individuals in New York tell me they want to do. I look forward to continuing the work with Senator Ensign and Senator Bingaman to improve job training services for immigrants and LEP individuals.

Mrs. CLINTON

Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, today the Senate will vote on the Singapore and Chile free-trade agreements. Because I believe that these agreements will benefit New York and will lead to greater economic opportunities for New York companies, I will vote in support of these agreements. Both the Singapore and Chile free-trade agreements promise to offer new opportunities for United States banks, insurance, securities and related services. These sectors are a critical part of New York's economy. These agreements also include provisions that improve intellectual property protections and open the telecommunications markets in both of these nations. I share the concerns raised by some of my colleagues regarding the immigration provisions in these agreements. As my colleagues have pointed out, trade agreements are not the place to rewrite our immigration laws. I will be supporting Senator Leahy's legislation to deny fast-track procedures to trade agreements that include immigration provisions. As you know, I voted against granting Trade Promotion Authority to the President and I believe the inclusion of these immigration provisions provides an example of my concerns about providing the President with Trade Promotion Authority. Despite bipartisan concerns about these provisions, Trade Promotion Authority means that we are unable to fix it. As for the labor provisions in each agreement, the Chile and Singapore free trade agreements include obligations for each nation to enforce their own domestic labor laws. I believe that a better model for labor provisions is the United States-Jordan Free Trade agreement which included enforceable provisions to uphold International Labor Organizations, ILO, core labor standards. I am concerned that we appear to be backing away from the United States-Jordan FTA model. The labor provisions in the Chile and Singapore agreements should not be used as a model for future trade agreements. Despite my concerns over the immigration and labor provisions, I believe that, in the aggregate, New York will benefit more from having these agreements pass than if they failed. This vote should not be interpreted as a signal as to how I will vote on future trade agreements. Rather I will look at each agreement in its totality and measure the impact of each agreement on the New Yorkers that I am privileged to represent. Because I believe that passage of the Singapore and Chile free trade agreements will lead to more jobs and greater economic growth in industries that are an important part of New York's economy, I will vote in support of these agreements.