Tom Davis

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to rise today to pay tribute to 62 distinguished citizens of the Eleventh District of Virginia, the members of the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department's Urban Search and Rescue Team. Called Virginia Task Force One, this brave team of men and women has served as our humanitarian diplomats to cities in crisis. On August 7, 1998, the world was rocked by twin explosions. The American Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania were destroyed in tragic, unconscionably cruel bombings that took the lives of innocent East Africans and Americans. As we stared in numb disbelief at news reports that overflowed with heart-wrenching images and constantly rising death counts, Virginia Task Force One was already alerted and preparing for their daunting mission. Within 12 hours of the bombings, Virginia Task Force One was fully mobilized for deployment to Africa. Less than 24 hours after the explosions, as many of us were still grasping to understand this tragedy, the team was en route from Andrews Air Force Base to Nairobi. Search and rescue technicians, cave-in experts, physicians, paramedics, logisticians, and command and control personnel comprised the 62-member Task Force, led by Battalion Chief Michael Tamillow and retired Deputy Chief James Strickland. Virginia Task Force One worked tirelessly with search and rescue teams from Kenya and Israel, transforming the chaos of Friday into an orderly and systematic search for any survivors, and for key evidence to piece together the cause of the event. For the first several days of the rescue effort, team members ran two twelve-hour shifts to provide round-the-clock operations. The work was especially dangerous during the night, due to the poor light and danger of shifting debris. After they had gone through the entire debris pile, well ahead of schedule, and it was clear that they would find no more survivors, they ceased nighttime operations. Despite the grueling labor, dangerous conditions, and long hours, the members of the Task Force consistently reported that they were ``in good spirits and . . . happy to be contributing to the effort.'' Chief Strickland, co-commander of the mission, reported feeling a sense of deja vu as he surveyed the wreckage in Nairobi. He compared it to the devastation he had observed when the Virginia Task Force assisted rescue efforts in Oklahoma City, after the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building. Nairobi was not the first or even the second scene of mass destruction heroically attended by the Fairfax County Team. As one of only two search and rescue task forces in the U.S. trained and authorized for overseas disaster deployment, Virginia Task Force One has been deployed to Armenia and the Philippines, as well as Oklahoma City and Kenya. The men and women of the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department's Urban Search and Rescue Team answered their nation's call for help. Their work as not glamorous; they quite literally dug in, lifting away thousands of pounds of concrete and steel in the searing African sun. They labored in the face of danger, even switching hotels to evade the bombers, who were still at large. They labored in the face of horrific tragedy, but they never lost faith in their purpose. Mr. Speaker, I know my colleagues join me in honoring the Urban Search and Rescue Team of the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department. The men and women of Virginia Task Force One left their homes and families, traveling thousands of miles to represent the United States in a purely humanitarian mission. Their nobility of purpose and action was an honor to witness. I am proud to represent such heroic citizens.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Is it not also a fact that to actually dispose of this property, the GSA or the Department of Interior or whatever Federal agency would be given that task, that they would need to know what those environmental cleanup costs are before they could dispose of it to anyone?

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, because my experience with waiver provisions has been that it not only creates a huge paperwork backlog, there is the question in the mind of applicants whether they can achieve the waiver, there is a huge time lag, and when it comes to attracting quality people, you need to move very quickly sometimes to get the people who otherwise could take 2 or 3 or 4 different jobs. They just do not work. It sounds great on paper, but operationally, these are just not successful. Finally, let me just say, we want to bring people to the Nation's capital because they want to live there, not because that is the only way they can keep their job. We want people who want to live here because it is a safe city, because they can get their kids an education here, because the garbage is picked up, because the city will be able to attract the best and brightest from throughout the metropolitan region. This legislation does not allow that. This says only 1 in 5 are eligible to come and work in the city, despite these waivers provisions and others that are not administered very well. In fact, the political pressure is not to grant waivers from some of the groups within the city, and it just does not satisfy the requirement. So, despite I think the best intentions of my friend from the District of Columbia, I have to rise to oppose the amendment, and ask my friends to join with me in trying to make the Nation's capital a model city throughout the country. Let us get the best employees we can. Let us not put these artificial restrictions on who can work for the city.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, let me just say, I know in a city where democracy has been stifled and a strong thirst for participation, how deep the feelings run on this, but in my judgment you can have civic involvement, you can have grassroots organizing, without appropriated funds. Out in my County of Fairfax we have hundreds of civic associations. They are the lifeblood of the community, but we do it without government money moving down, and in many instances getting misspent and misappropriated through time. So I think the gentleman from North Carolina (Chairman Taylor) has it right on this particular amendment, and, with all due respect to my friend, the delegate from the District of Columbia, I join the chairman in opposing this amendment.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. The gentleman has read the bill and is familiar with the waiver provision.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. I yield to my good friend, the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Is it not a fact that there have been environmental cleanups and pipes breaking well off the correctional facility property, that have in fact leaked into the Occoquan River that flows through there and has polluted that water and there have been in fact many lawsuits against the city of the District of Columbia for these and these are well off the prison complex reservation itself?

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, first of all the Northern Virginia Regional Park Authority right now has 150 acres of leased land from the Lorton complex. It is not city property, it is Federal property; I think we need to understand that. If and when the property is sold, I think at that point it would be appropriate to determine if the city should receive any of those proceeds, and I think hopefully the whole body would be involved with that at this time. But it is noted that I am not going to elaborate on this except to say the Chairman has said he will accept this amendment. I think that is in good faith, and we can deal with some of these other authorizing issues later. But I want to note that the White House, the Department of Interior and GSA all agree that the Department of Interior, who this land is conveyed to at this point, is not the appropriate agency at this point to make the environmental assessment and later to decide how that land should be sold, divided, developed, discarded or whatever, and it is only for that reason that we have asked ultimately that GSA make those determinations. They are the appropriate Federal agencies that would do that. I do not know of any other conspiracy or news letters except to say on a personal basis I do not favor massive development at that site. Anyone who has driven down that I-395 corridor during rush hour knows that the infusion of thousands and thousands and thousands of more cars is not an appropriate use. But I think at this point that is not the purpose of this amendment. The purpose of this amendment is simply to get the environmental costs so that the GSA can go about their job, make the appropriate environmental evaluation, and we can move ahead and work with the chairman and others to decide what should happen from there.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, this may be selfish and special interest legislation but it is not on the part of suburban Members. This is an election year in the city and every election year people are coming up, whipping up the electorate, and now it is trying to promise city residents that they are going to get jobs that they may or may not otherwise be qualified for, and it is a sham, and it is a shame. The District Government does not operate well. I do not think anyone can sit here and say we would not have had legislation that imposes a Control Board on the city and taken some of the other stringent actions that the authorizing and appropriations committees have taken if the city were functioning well. The potholes are unfilled, applications and permits are routinely lost, garbage not picked up. To solve these problems, the city needs the very best workers they can find to make the government operational once again. If the city restricts its hiring to the 20 percent of the metropolitan region that resides within the confines of the Nation's Capital, their chances for hiring and retaining the best and the brightest, the people they need to man their fire department, their police department, to operate permits, to run their computers, to work in the hospitals, are greatly diminished, because their applicant pool is diminished from 100 percent of the eligible employees and trained and qualified employees in the metropolitan region to only 20 percent of those individuals. My friend from Virginia is absolutely correct, this amendment does not help the suburbs. Our unemployment rate is less than 2 percent. It does, however, open up some unneeded regional wounds, where we have tried as a region to work together, where we in the suburbs have voted for tax breaks for the city that we do not get in the suburbs that in some way give the city some advantages we would not have. We have worked to try to build a convention center downtown, instead of taking it out to the suburbs, because we recognize that bringing this city back is critical, not just for our Nation's capital, but critical for the metropolitan region as well. We have 19,000 jobs today in Northern Virginia that we cannot find qualified employees to fill. These are high-tech jobs, average salary over $40,000 a year. This amendment does not hurt the suburbs, but this amendment does hurt the District of Columbia. Ultimately, to make this a livable city, the city solves its population exodus problems by being an attractive city, where people want to live; not coming to the city because they have to to get a job, or to relocate here to keep their job because they cannot find one somewhere else. Because what you will find is people working for the city, or who otherwise may be attracted to come to the city, will find preferable jobs where they live, where they can get a good education for their children, where they can live in safe neighborhoods that they are not getting in the city. But to make the city school system better, you need to attract the best teachers. To make the neighborhood safe, you need to attract the best police officers, and to do that by diminishing the pool of applicants to one-fifth of the eligible people in the metropolitan region greatly hinders that effort.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Pursuant to clause 2 of rule XXI, I make a point of order against Section 131 of the bill on the ground that it legislates on an appropriation bill.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I rise to make a point of order.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. I am going to try to be brief and speak in support of the Norton amendment on this. The amount of money involved here is minuscule. There is no savings to the taxpayer. We are talking about the Corporation Counsel or some other District entity having the right to coordinate a lawsuit, to touch it up, to go through briefs that is being done by a pro bono law firm. So the money involved here is nothing. Let us get this straight. We go to Hong Kong, we go to China, we stand in the face of Jiang Zemin and we look at him and say you are diminishing Democratic rights in Hong Kong because you are not letting all of the participants participate and we do not like the way they have structured the electorate. But here in Washington, we do not give our Nation's capital the right to vote in the Senate or in the House of Representatives. Now, the Congress treats the District of Columbia differently than other entities. There are long, historical reasons for this. I think reasonable people can disagree over what that voting representation ought to be, what it is today, what it was in the 103rd Congress when there was a semblance of a vote for the delegate along with other delegates and what it was when Republicans took control, but even then it was not a full vote and there were constitutional prohibitions or perceived constitutional prohibitions that would have not allowed the delegate from D.C. to have full voting rights. But what are we afraid of, allowing the city to go to court to try to find out and define what their constitutional rights are for voting representation in the House? If the Constitution gives the citizens a right to a Member of Congress, so be it. What are we afraid of? That is a constitutional guarantee they should not be denied. If it simply defines a mechanism whereby Congress can grant that voting right without having to go through the constitutional process, perhaps by statute or House rule, so be it. Then we can act accordingly. What are we afraid of? It is one thing to be able to go and say to them they cannot have a vote on the House floor. We have had many debates here, and reasonable people can agree or disagree. But it is another thing to not allow the city to petition, to in any way participate in a lawsuit that would help define a mechanism where they may be going about achieving these rights. I support the Norton amendment. I hope it is successful, and I think it would just give the city basic guarantees that every other citizen and noncitizen in this country enjoy under the Constitution.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend for yielding me the time. This is generally one of the most controversial and contentious appropriation bills that hits the House floor, mainly because of the riders and the interference in local government and the strong passions that some of the amendments evoke among Members with strong feelings on both sides. This year's bill is no exception. I support this bill on the theory that the longer it hangs around the House floor, the more amendments get added, and it tends to get worse. Traditionally, we have moved it off the House floor into conference, worked in a collegial way, and gotten back something that works in the interest of the District of Columbia and the entire region. I am hopeful that that will happen in this case. I think I have assurances that is going to happen. Let me address some of the items in this bill that I think are beneficial to the city and beneficial to the region. Both of my colleagues have spoken about the $25 million for the metro improvements at Mount Vernon Square metro. This is critical. We passed a bill out of this House last week on unanimous consent that will allow a new Washington Convention Center to be built downtown. This is critical for the City of Washington for this reason: They need a tax base. This will help revitalize the downtown and, working in concert with the MCI Center down there, this will, I think, enliven and revitalize the downtown area, increase taxes and job opportunities for District residents. There are parts of the convention authority legislation that guarantee jobs and give incentives for jobs for District residents, many of them unskilled, who will no longer have to be on welfare. It will help the welfare to work, help some of them from having to commute to the suburbs to work downtown. When it is established, I think we will see the long-term establishment of tens of thousands of jobs downtown, particularly in the hospitality interests. The District of Columbia residents and the tax base and charitable organizations that are going to benefit from that need this to happen. Without the $25 million in this particular bill, the dollars fall short. It is very difficult for the city to come up with it. I thank the chairman for including that in this mark of the legislation. Seven million for environmental assessment at the Lorton complex where the city has housed for over 75 years a correctional facility. We know now there are severe environmental problems at the site. But we also know that if we can get the EPA in, do the environmental assessment, we can start the cleanup there and deal with the site. Over the long-term that is in the best interest of the taxpayers, not just in the District of Columbia but of the entire Nation. This is the time to do it. This is the starting place. I thank the chairman for including this money in the bill as well. There are some controversial amendments in this. I want to note early, and I will speak at the appropriate time, the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) has an amendment to allow the city to expend its own dollars for a lawsuit to help a pro bono firm that is trying to establish what the city's voting rights are. For this Congress, which took what little voting authority the city had away from the city, I think we should not deprive them of the money to at least confer with pro bono counseling to find out what their rights are, and then this Congress can deal with it up or down. I intend to support that. The residency requirement is one that evokes some controversy, but I think the city needs the best employees it can find, wherever they can find them, and I think that the protection that is offered by the Committee on Rules on this is important. I will speak against that at the appropriate time. I urge approval of this bill.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Absolutely, with great pride. They either raise the money locally, or they do it just the old-fashioned way, with volunteer time.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I think this is an issue that is complicated. It is emotional. It is one where people of good will I think can reasonably disagree. We have not too bad objectives, but we have competing public policy objectives. On the one hand we have groups who say the best way is to stop drug use in its entirety, to just say no, and that ought to be the overriding public policy concern. On the other hand, we have some data that I find is persuasive in many cases saying that exchanging needles, giving people clean needles that are using illegal drugs, can stop the spread of AIDS and hepatitis and can bring down those areas. Those are both good objectives, but they are competing objectives. We cannot have it both ways. The question comes down to, are we better off giving drug users free, taxpayer-funded needles to use illegal drugs in the hope cleaner needles will stop the spread of disease, or are we better off sending a strong just-say-no message to preventing more drug users from starting illegal drug use in the first place, so they will never start using illegal drugs and will not need needles in the first place? It is complicated. I think the criteria are different. Here is where I come down, when I look at it. It seems most inconsistent to me that we have veterans, we have patients in HMOs, we have Medicaid patients who are charged, in many cases, for having needles, using legal drugs, while at the same time we are giving free needles to people to use a product in a usage that is illegal. So I think the amendment of the gentleman from Kansas is one that, on a public policy basis, I support. I realize I have friends on the other side with strong and persuasive feelings, but I think the message here ought to be that we are not going to use taxpayer dollars to fund free needles for people to do illegal acts.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, let me just address a few issues raised by my friends from the other side. First of all, this bill is already fully loaded. This has given a new meaning to that term, it will pass here and it will be whittled down in conference, but the President has already offered, I think, to veto 7 appropriation bills as they have come through this year. I do not think that means that we stop under the threat every time that he raises it. My friend has raised the issue of fairness because this only applies to 3,000 scholarship students who can use the money, I might add, not just to go to private school but for tutors, for computers, for other items they may not be able to receive through the District of Columbia public school system. But what is fairness? No member of Congress, the President's kids, the Vice President's kids will attend the public schools in the District of Columbia. Fairness is giving to the poorest of the poor the same opportunities that our kids have. That is what fairness is. Not trying to equate 78,000 people and treat them all equally in a system right now that has the highest dropout rate in the country. Finally, I just add, the schools have not opened on time for the last four years. We are putting more money in the public school system. It is our hope that it will help. My friend also raised the issue of consistency in the ESEA Act. But consistency there is, what we said is, Federal dollars would not go in, but we encouraged State and local governments to be able to put dollars in for vouchers, if they felt it was effective. In our case, it is only 6 percent of Federal money is in the State and local school systems nationally. In this case, we are the State for the District of Columbia. We have a unique leadership role in one of the poorest school systems in the United States. This is a visionary plan. I am sorry it cannot have wider breadth. I am sure the majority leader would like to do that. But that only subjects it to more criticism from the other side of the aisle. What we would like to do is to give the same kind of opportunities to the poorest of the poor in this city, the President and the Vice President and Members of Congress.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding time. I have very mixed feelings about a rule like this. This is always one of the more difficult appropriation bills to come before the House. I would just add a few things to what has been said. If we take a look at what has happened over the last four years in the District of Columbia, it has been a great success story. We took a city four years ago that had no bond rating, could not sell their bonds on the marketplace, they were running hundreds of millions of dollars in debt, they had no way to try to control their expenditures, they had a rising crime rate, schools that had not opened on time in several years and we take a look at where they are today, they are running surpluses in the hundreds of millions of dollars, not just last year but this year and into the future. So they are financially stable. They are out in the bond markets once again. In enacting the D.C. Control Board bill, I think it was our vision that we would try to get a discussion between the Control Board, the Mayor and the Council to learn financial restraint, to learn to control expenditures and to come forward after discussions to Congress with a united budget. I am happy to say that with a few exceptions but for the most part this appropriation bill does that. This rule allows some extraneous things to enter into it but it allows the House a free vote on it, so I have very mixed feelings about the rule. I sympathize with my friends in the Committee on Rules who get torn from different constituency groups within the Congress in terms of how they are going to deal with it, but I look forward to a wide open debate on a number of issues and would just say to my friends, I think we can take pride in what we have accomplished in working with the city, with the Control Board, with the Council together over the last four years in hopes that whatever the outcome of this debate today, we can continue to look forward and work together in the years to come to make this the greatest city in the country.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the Mollohan amendment. We have heard a great deal about the National Academy of Sciences and their endorsement of the population polling scheme for Census 2000. Let me let you in on a little secret: The distinguished members of the National Academy of Sciences have not endorsed the plan. Indeed, the entire membership of the National Academy never endorses anything. So what then are these three blue ribbon panels at the National Academy? The NAS regularly convenes these panels to study important problems facing the country or government, but members of the committees need not be members of the National Academy of Sciences. Indeed, most of the time there are very few National Academy of Sciences members on the committee at all. Let me give an example. One of the three panels endorsing the use of polling to adjust the census was called the Panel on Census Requirements for the Year 2000 and Beyond. There were 20 people working on that committee. How many actual members of the National Academy of Sciences? One. That is right, just one. The other 19 members were handpicked so that the panel would know what the answer was before they even asked the question. We are dealing with a stacked deck, Mr. Chairman. I, for one, am not buying it. After the panel finished its work and delivered the inevitable report, did the entire National Academy of Sciences address the report? Of course not. There are members of the National Academy of Sciences who oppose the projected polling scheme. There are other panels you can say the same kind of thing for. The American Statistical Association created a handpicked blue ribbon panel to inform the public about sampling. While all the members of this panel may have been members of the American Statistical Association, again, the horse was put before the cart. The answer the panel would have delivered was known ahead of time. These phony panels are akin to asking Popeye if spinach should be the national vegetable. Do we ask the Seven Dwarfs to be objective about Snow White? Of course not. Do not believe the hype. If you have no objective scientific evidence for the reliability of the population polling scheme, then we have to reject it. The GAO has already expressed their doubts about this scheme. There is too much at stake here. We think that this amendment should be defeated. During the dress rehearsal, the GAO discovered that the Master Address File did not include between 3 and 6 percent of the households. It is fatally flawed. Reject the Mollohan amendment.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, due to the time at which the House considered H.R. 4237 under unanimous consent procedures, the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight was unable to file the committee report on the bill. I am therefore entering the committee report as prepared into the Record at this time: The Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, to whom was referred the bill (H.R. 4237) to amend the District of Columbia convention center and sports arena authorization act of 1995 to revise the revenues and activities covered under such act, and for other purposes, having considered the same, reports favorably thereon without amendment and recommends that the bill do pass. I. Background and Need for the Legislation A. Background As noted by the Committee in the 104th Congress, the current Convention Center was completed in 1982, at 9th and H Streets, N.W., and is widely considered too small to accommodate the largest and most financially attractive conventions. Over time, it is estimated that the situation will only become worse. The District of Columbia's existing Washington Convention Center is now only the 30th largest in the country and can accommodate 55% of national conventions and exhibition shows. The inability of the Washington Convention Center to host so many events is unfortunate not only for the local economy, but also for the organizations and exhibitors who can no longer have the Nation's Capital on their regular schedule of meeting sites. In 1993, the Washington Convention Center generated $656 million in spending from its activities. In 1995, that spending dipped to approximately $558 million. The serious blow to the District's economy caused by the slowdown in activity at the Convention Center is obvious and needs to be reversed. A new, state-of-the-art Washington Convention Center of the appropriate size and technology to host 90% of the national level conventions and shows will generate up to $1.5 billion of spending in the District of Columbia. Obviously, such increased economic activity will generate considerable additional revenues that cannot otherwise be used by the District. In order to gain these economic benefits, the City needed to find a way to finance a new convention facility. It was clear to everyone that the City's general fund could not afford to continue to pay the operating subsidy for the current convention center or the up-front costs for a new one. As part of an effort to address this problem, the City Council enacted the Washington Convention Center Authority Act of 1994 (DC Law 10-188). This act established a special convention center tax. It took effect on October 13, 1994. This tax was composed of a fixed percentage of several pre- existing taxes. The convention center tax is a dedicated tax which the City places in a ``lock-box'' escrow account. It can be used only to pay the operating subsidy for the current convention center and for expenses associated with the development and construction of a new facility. In the same Act, the City Council created the Washington Convention Center Authority (WCCA). The WCCA is a corporate body with a legal existence separate from the City government. Because of the independent status of the WCCA, its self supporting revenue stream, and legal accountability, its spending is not subject to an annual appropriation. Although it has the power to issue bonds, the debt thereby created is not general obligation debt. The WCCA is governed by a nine member Board of Directors. The District's Chief Financial Officer and the Director of Tourism are ex-officio, voting members of the board. The remaining seven members, one from the tourism industry and another from organized labor, are appointed by the Mayor with the advice and consent of the Council. The Directors are responsible for managing the current convention center; developing plans for a new convention center; managing the new facility; and appointing a general manager for the convention center. The Board is empowered to develop a personnel system for convention center employees. On July 12, 1995, the Subcommittee on the District of Columbia held a hearing on H.R. 1862, the District of Columbia Convention Center Preconstruction Act of 1995. At the July 12, 1995 hearing the Subcommittee also reviewed legislation authorizing the City to finance and pay its part of the costs associated with the construction of a new sports arena. That facility, now known as the MCI Center at Gallery Place, opened on time and has been a spectacular success. Following the July 12, 1995 hearing, the legislation involving the sports arena and the legislation involving the Convention Center were combined into a new single piece of legislation, H.R. 2108 (P.L. 104-28), which authorized the WCCA to expend revenues for the operation and maintenance of the existing Washington Convention Center and for preconstruction activities relating to a new convention center in the District of Columbia. The linkage of the legislation for the MCI Center and the Convention Center was more than a matter of convenience. It reflected the Committee's belief that together they were two of the most important economic generators in the entire region. The legislation was strongly supported by the entire Washington Metropolitan regional congressional delegation. In 1995, a new convention center was still in its initial planning stages. It needed and received congressional authority to permit already collected taxes dedicated to this project to be used in order to proceed to the planning and development stage. In 1996, a newly-formed Washington Convention Center Authority began actively to investigate construction of a new facility. The WCCA has worked over the past four years to develop a project that will meet the economic development needs of the District of Columbia, the requirements of the community and the needs of the hospitality industry. The regulatory process for approval of the new convention center has been key to the development of the project. WCCA has proceeded in accord with the statutory requirements for Federal and public involvement, notification of activities via the Federal Register and community newspapers, and in coordination with Federal and local agencies. In addition, over an eighteen month period, WCCA conducted over 100 public hearings with DC Advisory Neighborhood Commissions, community leaders, organizations and churches to discuss the progress and to provide the community an opportunity to express their views. The National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) conducted six public hearings and the DC City Council conducted five public hearings. This process involved participation from the NCPC, the State Historic Preservation Office, Commission on Fine Arts, the National Environmental Protection Agency, the Historic Preservation Review Board, the Redevelopment Land Agency, and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. This process included the design, location, physical program, neighborhood mitigation, environmental, historical, and transportation issues. The Environmental Impact Statement process alone, was approximately an eighteen month activity which involved written public comments, public hearings and meetings, reviewing agency in-put and comments that resulted in a final document with mitigation measures for the environmental impacts from the construction of the new convention center. The development of the new convention center process was initiated by the private sector in partnership with the District of Columbia. The private sector financed the original feasibility study, assisted in the drafting of the financing legislation, and requested that taxes be imposed upon hotels and restaurants which provided the financing framework of the plan. B. Need for Legislation The Committee has followed efforts to build a new Convention Center in downtown Washington with great interest. At this time additional congressional approval is necessary before construction on the new facility may begin. H.R. 2108 (P.L. 104-28) expressly did not authorize the financing or the construction of a new convention center. In order for the City to proceed beyond the planning and design phase, explicit, affirmative congressional action is necessary. The Federal role in this project is very narrow. Here, Congressional action is necessary for the convention center project to move beyond the pre-construction stage. This legislation, H.R. 4237, authorizes the WCCA to begin financing (the issuance of bonds up to $650 million) and construction of a new Washington Convention Center and waives the 30-day waiting period for DC Council Act 12-402 to go into effect.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the American GI Forum of the United States, a truly outstanding organization that has served our Nation's veterans for fifty years. They are dedicated to addressing critical issues affecting veterans, with special emphasis on Hispanic American veterans and their families. Hispanic Americans have always been willing to fight for America's freedom and to defend our peace. They know what it means to wear the uniform of our country and to be willing to bear any sacrifice to keep America free. The American GI Forum has helped to resolve problems of discrimination or inequality endured by Hispanic American veterans. The American GI Forum is a national veterans family organization and was founded on March 26, 1948, in Corpus Christi, Texas by the late Dr. Hector P. Garcia, a medical doctor who was a veteran of World War II, and other Hispanic American veterans. The American GI Forum has more than 500 chapters in the United States and Puerto Rico. Although the Forum is predominantly Hispanic, it is a fully interracial organization. The American GI Forum is made up of three separate groups--the Veterans Forum, the Women's Forum, and the Youth Forum. The American GI Forum is the founding organization of the American GI Forum Hispanic Educational Foundation (HEF), a national educational and scholarship program. It was also the founding organization of the American GI Forum National Veterans Outreach Program, Inc. (NVOP), which is the Nation's premier nonprofit community based service provider of employment and training, economic development, housing, and social service programs. Mr. Speaker, I know my colleagues join me in saluting the members of the American GI Forum. Their hard work and dedication for America's veterans have set an example for all of us, I congratulate the American GI Forum on their fiftieth anniversary and I wish them continued success in all their future endeavors.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I just say to my friend who just spoke, this is not about staying engaged with the Vietnamese. We are fully engaged. We have normalized relations. We have full trade with Vietnam. Those policies are not in question. What is in question, though, is about, and we are not refighting the Vietnam war. We are fully engaged in this. Although the Vietnamese are showing some improvement in the area of emigration with the Rover program and others, I think they are woefully short of meeting the threshold that would allow us to use American tax dollars to subsidize American businesses doing business in Vietnam. I have from my own district Dr. Nguyen Dan Que and Doan Viet Hoat, who are still languishing in Vietnamese prisons, on trumped up charges, for 15 years. Their families are not allowed to visit. When I was there last January, I was not allowed to visit. They are not allowed to get correspondence. They are not allowed to emigrate and come back to Northern Virginia, where they would like to join their families. We are in a sense, by ignoring existing prisoners there who are there on trumped up charges, rewarding behavior that is woefully short of the kinds of gains that we have seen in China and other places. I do not think this behavior should be rewarded, their human rights abuses being rewarded with tax subsidies from U.S. taxpayers. I think we need to send Vietnam a message that more freedom of emigration has to be accomplished, and I would urge my colleagues to support this resolution. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of House Joint Resolution 120, which would disapprove the President's renewal of his waiver of the Jackson-Vanik amendment for the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. As many of you know, I have been a fervent supporter of U.S. engagement with countries who have had a history of committing human rights violations. My positions rests on my belief that it is only through the gradual building of trust between nations that arises when commerce and cultural ideas flow freely, that democracy and freedom will prevail in such societies. To my deep regret, the Vietnamese government has demonstrated that no amount of economic engagement will compel improvements in its human rights record, especially when it comes to its emigration policies. The President's waiver of the Jackson-Vanik amendment this year is clearly without any basis. Indeed, it is contrary to the overwhelming evidence that the Vietnamese government does not permit free emigration as the Jackson-Vanik amendment requires before normal trading status can be conferred on Vietnam. Having visited Vietnam this past January, I can attest to the fact that Vietnam has done little to improve its human rights violations or loosened its restrictions on free emigration. Unlike China, which has made slow but measured progress in the area of human rights as witnesses by the many Chinese religious leaders and citizens that I spoke with during my visit to China last year, the same unfortunately cannot be said for Vietnam. Two Vietnamese-American families in my district intimately understand the agony of having a family member thrown into a Vietnamese prison simply because they promoted human and political rights. Both Dr. Nguyen Dan Que, a 53-year-old endocrinologist, and Professor Doan Viet Hoat each received 20 year sentences for conducting ``activities aimed at overthrowing the people's government.'' Professor Hoat's sentence was later reduced to 15 years of imprisonment and 5 years of house arrest and deprivation of his civil liberties. Worried about their health and safety, their families asked me to do all I could to learn about their medical conditions. We had understood that both men were suffering from serious kidney problems. However, my request was denied. I was not permitted to visit with any political prisoners and the medical information I did receive was unclear. The Jackson-Vanik waiver exists for the express purpose of improving emigration between nations by using the promise of economic relations as leverage. With this in mind, I do not dispute the fact that it has an unquestionably important role in normalizing U.S.-Vietnam relations. However, so much work has yet to be done in the way of individual liberty in Vietnam. I cannot help but feel that the waiver is being improperly implemented this year. Make no mistake, I consider productive relations with Vietnam's Government to be very important. But a relationship must stand on mutual understanding and clear expectations. It is time that we make a statement to the Government of Vietnam on the state of human rights in that country. I would hope that our support for the resolution would also carry the message that we will not stand for continued human rights abuses in Vietnam. I would like to note that trade between nations implies a degree of mutual respect and acceptance. We as a nation have demonstrated goodwill in this endeavor and still have yet to see these efforts reciprocated in accord with the waiver's provisions. Vietnam's government has had adequate time to demonstrate its commitment towards improving its emigration policies since the President ended the U.S. trade embargo on Vietnam in 1994. Given the continued restrictions on emigration and political freedoms in Vietnam, I feel that we must voice our disapproval. I am encouraged by the fact that many of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle have found the proposed waiver renewal to be ill- considered. Once we see concrete progress by the Vietnamese government--that real improvements are being made so far as human liberties are concerned--then I will be one of the first to say that waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment and normalizing U.S.-Vietnamese trade relations would further the interests of civil liberty and freedoms. Until that time, however, we must send a clear message and vote in favor of this disapproval resolution. Doing otherwise will reflect poorly on this nation and on the principles for which it stands.

Mr. DAVIS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my colleagues to join the Congressional Dialogue on Vietnam. This group facilitates an open exchange among Members of Congress, the Administration, and the public on issues that affect those who have personal interests tied to Vietnam. In particular, I wish to call attention to the grassroots campaign, ``Adopt a Religious Prisoner in Vietnam.'' This group notifies its members on the current state of religious persecution in Vietnam as well as the plight of people who have been imprisoned for their religious beliefs. The current Vietnamese government detains individuals for a variety of ideological reasons, including those who openly discuss religious ideas. These prisoners of conscience are writers, philosophers, and artists who have never served in combat and yet some have been incarcerated since the Vietnam War. This past January I had the unique opportunity to visit Vietnam. Despite the advancements our countries have made in diplomatic relations, we still differ on issues concerning religious prisoners. On my visit I was denied the opportunity to visit with prisoners of conscience, and what medical information I did receive was ambiguous. In my opinion, this underscores the value of the ``Adopt a Religious Prisoner in Vietnam'' campaign and its ties to overseas religious institutions. I want to take a moment to tell you about my own adoptee. The Venerable Thich Tue Sy has been a Buddhist monk from the age of seven years. He taught himself several languages including Classical Chinese, English, and Sanskrit. A noted scholar and founder of the Free Vietnam Force, he was arrested by Vietnamese government authorities on April 2nd, 1984. Four years later he was prosecuted on national security charges and sentenced to death, but protests from the international community helped to commute his sentence to 20 years in a government ``re-education'' camp. He has been jailed for the past 14 years in a camp where nutrition and health conditions are typically poor. The ``Adopt a Religious Prisoner in Vietnam'' campaign affords Members of Congress the opportunity to address two very important audiences. One is the world community, and the message is that as concerned legislators we decry the blatant oppression of individuals worldwide, especially when it is based solely on differing ideology. We also send a message to the adoptee, telling that person there is an advocate who is appealing for his or her release, and encouraging that individual to continue pursue the goals of free speech and religious liberty. Mr. Speaker, I again encourage my colleagues to join the Congressional Dialogue on Vietnam as well as the ``Adopt a Religious Prisoner in Vietnam'' program. The Congressional Dialogue was founded by the gentlewomen from California, Ms. Loretta Sanchez and Ms. Zoe Lofgren and represents a committed bipartisan endeavor to support the progress of US-Vietnam relations. In defense of fundamental human rights and in the interests of our many Vietnamese-Americans who have ties to Vietnam, I hope that all of my colleagues will participate in these efforts. Mr, UNDERWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.J. Res. 120 and in support of waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment for Vietnam. Last August, I visited Vietnam as part of a Congressional delegation, although there was a certain level of economic and political interaction between the United States and Vietnam, there was still the need to increase this interaction. The Jackson-Vanik waiver, enacted for the first time on March of this year, is a tool for this interaction, for this engagement. Not only has the Jackson-Vanik increased the freedom of emigration in Vietnam, our American businesses investing and exporting to Vietnam are benefitting from federal economic programs, such as those administered by the Export-Import Bank. Removing the waiver could mean job losses for workers in the United States. It will be a great setback not to grant the waiver. Let us not use this issue to act as a referendum on our total relationship with Vietnam. I understand that we still have many issues with Vietnam which we are not satisfied, such as human rights and POW/MIA concerns. In fact there are separate vehicles for these other concerns. By waiving the Jackson-Vanik, we continue to increase our engagement with Vietnam and we will have even greater opportunities to discuss other issues such as human rights, issues which I agree are just as important to the American people. We are linked to Vietnam economically, politically and even culturally. We should not move backwards by passing this resolution. I urge my colleagues to vote against H.J. Res. 120.