Pete Domenici

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. I say to the Senator, when Senator Bond arrives, upon request, will the Senator from Illinois yield and let him offer his amendment?

Mr. DOMENICI. Can we do that? Under those conditions, rather than suggest the absence of a quorum, I will relinquish the floor. Senator Durbin can start. Senator Bond will be here shortly, and a Senator will be here to replace me in short order. Here is Senator Bond now. I ask the Senator how long he thinks it will be before he is ready?

Mr. DOMENICI. Let's proceed as we had planned and let the distinguished Senator from Missouri proceed next. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the National Drought Preparedness Act of 2003. I want to start by thanking my colleague from Montana, Senator Baucus, for joining me as my lead cosponsor on this important legislation. The National Drought Council will formulate strategies to alleviate the effects of drought by fostering a greater understanding of what triggers wide spread drought conditions. By educating the public in water conservation and proper land stewardship, we can ensure a better preparedness when future drought plagues our country. Drought is a unique emergency situation; it creeps in unlike other abrupt weather disasters. Without a national drought policy we constantly live not knowing what the next year will bring. If we find ourselves facing a drought, towns could be scrambling to drill new water wells, fire could sweep across bone dry forests, and farmers and ranchers could be forced to watch their way of life blow away with the dust. We must be vigilant and prepare ourselves for quick action when the next drought cycle begins. Better planning on our part could limit some of the damage felt by drought. I propose that this bill is the exact tool needed for facilitating better planning. The impacts of drought are also very costly. According to NOAA, there have been 12 different drought events since 1980 that resulted in damages and costs exceeding $1 billion each. In 2000, severe drought in the South-Central and Southeastern States caused losses to agriculture and related industries of over $4 billion. Western wildfires that year totaled over $2 billion in damages. The Eastern drought in 1999 led to $1 billion in losses. These are just a few of the statistics. I am pleased to be following through on what I started in 1997 when I commissioned a taskforce to study the widespread effects of drought. As a result, the taskforce concluded that the development of a national drought council would be an important factor in proactively combating drought. The bill that I am introducing today is the next step in implementing a national, cohesive drought policy. The bill recognizes that drought is a recurring phenomenon that causes serious economic and environmental loss and that a national drought policy is needed to ensure an integrated, coordinated strategy. What the future holds is very uncertain but the continuing apathy in a national drought policy is not. The need for this act is now. We can ill afford to suffer the devastating after-effects of drought knowing that we could have prepared ourselves better. Before I close I would like to give some information about the bill. The National Drought Preparedness Act of 2003 establishes a National Drought Council within the Department of Agriculture to improve national drought preparedness, mitigation, and response efforts. It also develops a cohesive strategy for national drought policy where none previously existed. Addressing these concerns should be of paramount importance as we enter into yet another year with predictions of continued drought. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to make sure that the chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee is aware of an issue of the utmost importance to the security of our Nation's homeland, namely the training of our Federal law enforcement officers who are charged with preventing, mitigating and investigating attacks on America. We have hired a number of federal law enforcement officers since the events of September 11, and we, quite appropriately, continue to hire more. We fail the American people, however, if we don't give these men and women the training necessary to do the job we have asked of them. Our responsibility does not stop there. We must retrain Federal law enforcement officers whose mission has changed since that fateful day. We must also commit to providing advanced training so these officers will have the most current knowledge and abilities as they take on this Herculean challenge. We are fortunate to have state-of-the-art facilities for just these purposes located on Glynco, GA and Artesia, NM. The Federal Law Enforcement Training Center is charged with providing basic and advanced training to the law enforcement officers working for the Federal Government. Unfortunately, these facilities are not always efficiently used because there is no centralized authority responsible for the scheduling of training. I believe this problem is easily solved by placing this authority in the hands of the Director of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. Would the chairman be amenable to this idea and commit to working toward this goal?

Mr. DOMENICI. I thank the distinguished Chairman for her consideration and support for our Federal law enforcement officers. I look forward to working with her to continue to strengthen our homeland security. virginia military institute contribution to homeland security

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, the Senator from New Mexico ought to be doing the thanking. I knew when the people of the Senator's State sent him up here--he thanked us, but we ought to be thanking him; we thank the people of his State for sending him here--we knew when the Senator came that he was going to be a stalwart and someone to whom we could look. We knew we would be getting the ``straight scoop,'' so to speak. Tonight it didn't take the Senator very long to set this record straight. There is no use playing politics with things that do not need any politics added to them. There are already plenty of problems surrounding that big tragedy that came to America. We thank the Senator for telling us the way it is, the way it was, and the way we ought to understand it. This Senator thanks him for that. I wish he had more to say. I hope before it is over, he will have more to say about it. With all of the inferences and implications when things go wrong, there is a political campaign. Just wait, and somebody will find some reason to blame the person running for office. Regardless of how farfetched or how wild, or how irrelevant it is, it will be there. Frankly, we have a Senate with lots of privileges. I like the distinguished Senator from Florida. He had a big job when he had to put that report together. He doesn't have any more to say about it than a lot of other people. He just happens to be running for President. So he has a lot to say. But we thank the Senator very much for his few words which are excellent, as I understand it, and it is something we needed to hear.

Mr. DOMENICI. I hope so.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the National Drought Preparedness Act of 2003. I want to start by thanking my colleague from Montana, Senator Baucus, for joining me as my lead cosponsor on this important legislation. The National Drought Council will formulate strategies to alleviate the effects of drought by fostering a greater understanding of what triggers wide spread drought conditions. By educating the public in water conservation and proper land stewardship, we can ensure a better preparedness when future drought plagues our country. Drought is a unique emergency situation; it creeps in unlike other abrupt weather disasters. Without a national drought policy we constantly live not knowing what the next year will bring. If we find ourselves facing a drought, towns could be scrambling to drill new water wells, fire could sweep across bone dry forests, and farmers and ranchers could be forced to watch their way of life blow away with the dust. We must be vigilant and prepare ourselves for quick action when the next drought cycle begins. Better planning on our part could limit some of the damage felt by drought. I propose that this bill is the exact tool needed for facilitating better planning. The impacts of drought are also very costly. According to NOAA, there have been 12 different drought events since 1980 that resulted in damages and costs exceeding $1 billion each. In 2000, severe drought in the South-Central and Southeastern States caused losses to agriculture and related industries of over $4 billion. Western wildfires that year totaled over $2 billion in damages. The Eastern drought in 1999 led to $1 billion in losses. These are just a few of the statistics. I am pleased to be following through on what I started in 1997 when I commissioned a taskforce to study the widespread effects of drought. As a result, the taskforce concluded that the development of a national drought council would be an important factor in proactively combating drought. The bill that I am introducing today is the next step in implementing a national, cohesive drought policy. The bill recognizes that drought is a recurring phenomenon that causes serious economic and environmental loss and that a national drought policy is needed to ensure an integrated, coordinated strategy. What the future holds is very uncertain but the continuing apathy in a national drought policy is not. The need for this act is now. We can ill afford to suffer the devastating after-effects of drought knowing that we could have prepared ourselves better. Before I close I would like to give some information about the bill. The National Drought Preparedness Act of 2003 establishes a National Drought Council within the Department of Agriculture to improve national drought preparedness, mitigation, and response efforts. It also develops a cohesive strategy for national drought policy where none previously existed. Addressing these concerns should be of paramount importance as we enter into yet another year with predictions of continued drought. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I wish to discuss a very important homeland security project being developed in New Mexico. Responding to our Nation's need for more sophisticated security, the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, NM Tech, and New Mexico State University, NMSU, are collaborating to create and operate the National Emergency Response Training, Research, and Development Center. This center would be located in Playas, NM. Playas is a small town in Hidalgo County, NM, that was built in the late 1970s by the Phelps Dodge Mining Company to provide housing for 1,000 workers employed at its nearby copper smelting operation. The town includes 259 modern homes and 25 apartment units, a community center, restaurant, bank, gas station, post office, fire station, medical center and airstrip. It also has recreational facilities including a bowling alley, fitness center, rodeo arena, basketball courts, tennis courts, and swimming pool. Smelting operations were suspended in 1999 and currently the town is almost completely uninhabited. NM Tech, a member of the Department of Homeland Security's, DHS, Office for Domestic Preparedness, ODP, National Domestic Preparedness Consortium, is currently in the process of purchasing Playas. If bought using ODP funds and properly developed by New Mexico Tech and then transferred to DHS, Playas could become a critical national facility for securing our Nation against future terrorist attacks. NM Tech and NMSU see it playing two critical roles, as an advanced training facility where our Nation's first responders can practice real world training scenarios and a place where biological, agricultural and environmental terrorism can be studied. First, the center will provide standardized emergency operations training for our Nation's First Responders. Specifically, it will provide advanced training for emergency operations personnel, emergency medical personnel, and physicians. This training would focus on teaching advanced skills that will dramatically increase the technical capacity of emergency response organizations to manage incidents involving chemical, biological, radiological, explosive, and environmental agents. Training participants would also learn how to increase public confidence and foster organizational cooperation among local, State, Federal, and private sector emergency responders. Relationships fostered by this training will help to increase communications among local, regional and national emergency response organizations regarding mutual aid, information sharing, emergency credentialing, equipment interoperability, security clearances, and secure communication systems. Second, the center will focus on ensuring the biological security of our Nation's agricultural assets and natural resources. Playas will provide a secure environment where university researchers can work collaboratively with private sector companies to study our homeland security challenges and develop new tools for fighting terrorist activities. The center will allow our researchers to network with other scientists throughout the world to develop and maintain constantly evolving strategies for dealing with biological security threats or breaches. Initially, these research efforts will focus on food supply security including crops and livestock, pipeline security, and transportation system security. New Mexico Tech will be the lead organization for this project and will provide the administrative, maintenance, and operations infrastructure needed to support this project. New Mexico Tech will conduct extensive research and training programs at this location. Its research efforts will be coordinated closely with programs currently offered on its Socorro campus and will include research initiatives regarding dirty bomb detection; suicide bomb detection; and oil and gas infrastructure protection. New Mexico Tech's training efforts will focus on providing advanced skills training for emergency personnel and will build on the first responder training currently offered by the university. New Mexico State University will focus its efforts on conducting research and developing complementary programming that will protect our Nation's natural and agricultural resources from biological security breaches. Though significant natural biological security breaches have occurred in the past decade, current security trends indicate that in the near term even greater risks may be associated with breaches maliciously perpetrated by terrorist organizations. NMSU's research efforts would focus on securing our Nation's agricultural and biological environments that would include developing a state-of-the- art rural border crossing facility with testing and engineering facilities. This would include assessing our Nation's agricultural security infrastructure, preventative activities, training programs, and response protocols. The Playas purchase would add significantly to the DHS infrastructure arsenal by providing a working town for real world training scenarios like those carried out at Hogan's Alley, a mock town used to train agents at the FBI's training academy in Quantico, VA. I believe that this could prove to be a very useful piece of property for the Department of Homeland Security. There are undoubtedly a number of possibilities as to potential uses for this land, including an infrastructure protection and training center. We all recognize that real world training for first responders and anti-terrorist organizations within our government will be of vital importance to accomplishing our mission. Because the entire necessary infrastructure is in place, this town could be used for training personnel charged with protecting our homeland. Furthermore, our Nation must be able to handle agricultural and biological outbreaks that could significantly harm our citizens and crate chaos in our agricultural sector. Playas is the perfect location to study and train against these problems. I suggest that the Department of Homeland Security work with NM Tech to purchase this town. I am certain it could be a great training and research asset for the new Department. first responder training

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I express my concern about the Committee recommendation for the National Domestic Preparedness Consortium, which is provided $140 million in the Senate version of the FY 2004 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations bill. I understand the desire of the Committee to give the Department of Homeland Security the maximum flexibility to identify threats and appropriately respond to them. However, there are ongoing programs that I believe deserve the Committee's support and that need to be put in place to assist with this important responsibility. The National Domestic Preparedness Consortium is one of those programs. I believe the consortium needs about double the amount in the current bill to meet the need to train our first responders--our firefighters, police officers, and emergency medical personnel. The National Domestic Preparedness consortium was created with the able guidance and support of Senator Gregg following the 1998 Oklahoma City bombing tragedy. Senator Gregg has been the leader in the Senate in recognizing the potential threat of terrorism and providing direction and funding to prepare the nation to respond to this threat in his position as Chairman of the Committee, Justice, State, and the Judiciary Appropriations Subcommittee. The consortium, which includes the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology as one of its training partners, has the expertise to train our first responders in conventional explosives. New Mexico Tech alone has trained more than 6,000 first responders at its one-week advanced course, and more than 40,000 first responders in its general course. The other consortium training partners--Texas A&M University, Louisiana State University, and the Nevada Test Site--have unique facilities and expertise to give our first responders the best training, and coordinated training that is so important during an emergency situation. The consortium is led by the National Preparedness Center at Fort McClellan, AL. I firmly believe we need to support the National Domestic Preparedness Consortium with the funding needed to fully utilize its capacity and to train as quickly as possible the additional thousands of first responders who need training in a comprehensive and coordinated fashion. The $20 million provided to each of the four training partners in the consortium is below the $30 million they each received in FY 2001 and FY 2002. It is an artificial level developed with the delay in enacting the FY 2003 appropriations bills that eventually passed as a consolidated bill this past February, nearly five full months into the fiscal year. I hope as this bill moves forward that we will recognize this extremely valuable homeland security asset and will provide significantly more funding for the National Domestic Preparedness Consortium in the final bill so that we can train our first responders without delay.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I engage the distinguished Senator from Mississippi and chairman of the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee in a discussion about the National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center--or NISAC--and its importance to the overall mission of the Department of Homeland Security. I understand the desire of the chairman to give the Department of Homeland Security the maximum flexibility to identify potential terrorist threats and to appropriately respond to them. However, there are ongoing programs that I believe deserve the Senate's support and that need to be put in place to assist with this important responsibility. The National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center was established in fiscal year 2000 by Department of Energy national laboratories at Sandia and Los Alamos in New Mexico to model critical infrastructure in the nation to identify vulnerabilities to potential terrorist attacks, prepare for such attacks, and to mitigate and respond to such attacks if necessary. Following the terrible events of September 11, NISAC was specifically authorized in the Patriot Act and received appropriations of $20 million in fiscal year 2002 to continue to implement the program. The Patriot Act established NISAC ``to serve as a source of national competence to address critical infrastructure protection and continuity through support for activities related to counter terrorism, threat assessment, and risk mitigation.'' The Act defines the need for this modeling and simulation to evaluate ``appropriate mechanisms to ensure the stability of these complex and interdependent systems. . . .'' NISAC is being designed to understand the full consequences of disruptions of the nation's infrastructure, including direct consequences, lives lost, property destruction, contamination, secondary consequences, economic disruptions and national defense threats, and cascading consequences, infrastructure interdependencies and regional interdependencies. For the current year, fiscal year 2003, $27.5 million has been approved for NISAC--$20 million in program funding and $7.5 million for a NISAC facility at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico. These funds were provided in the Consolidated Appropriations Act enacted this past February. NISAC has now been transferred to the Department of Homeland Security. First, I call on the Department of Homeland Security to release the fiscal year 2003 funding immediately so the NISAC program is not delayed. The Department is sitting on $15 million in program funding and $7.5 million for the NISAC facility in New Mexico, and Sandia and Los Alamos need these funds to continue to develop NISAC. It is my understanding that the President's fiscal year 2004 budget request includes $23 million in the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate for continued development of NISAC, and that the President's request for NISAC funding is approved in this bill. May I inquire of the chairman if this is indeed the case?

Mr. DOMENICI. I thank the Senator for clarification on this point. Mr. President, NISAC fills a critical need in our work to secure the United States against terrorist attacks. By utilizing the modeling and simulation analysis capabilities at the DOE labs, NISAC is providing the Department of Homeland Security with science-based information and analysis to understand the full consequences of disruptions to the Nation's critical infrastructure. NISAC can assess infrastructure vulnerabilities, interdependencies, and complexities to help the department, industry and other government agencies protect and secure critical infrastructure against terrorist attacks. NISAC is already at work to help protect the critical infrastructure of our Nation against terrorist attack. NISAC has looked at port security with specific demonstrations in the Pacific Northwest in Seattle and Portland. NISAC has supported the TOPOFF II exercise to help evaluate the impact of decisions made during an exercise simulating a biological attack. NISAC is being tasked to model critical industries and critical links in the nation's transportation network. NISAC has developed an initial suite of modeling, simulation and analysis capabilities that address urban, regional, and national interdependent infrastructures that only the Federal Government has the resources to accomplish. This package can be adapted for new issues, new regions, and new infrastructures to help secure the Nation against future terrorist events. Mr. President, I am excited at the work already performed by NISAC, and the development that is underway on NISAC to help the Department of Homeland Security address potential terrorist threats against the Nation's critical infrastructure. I encourage the Department to embrace the NISAC program and to fully utilize the talents and expertise of Sandia and Los Alamos National Laboratories who have developed NISAC. Would the Chairman join me in that message to the Department of Homeland Security?

Mr. DOMENICI. I thank the distinguished Chairman of the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee for his recognition of this important component of the Federal homeland security effort. national center for disaster decision making

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, parliamentary inquiry: Are we currently in morning business?

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to first say to the distinguished majority leader that I was privileged to be here for part of the comments on the floor. As usual, today he brings to the floor of the Senate a tremendously difficult issue confronting the American people. What he spoke of in terms of spam and our kids is a tough one. We have to solve it. I believe his response to his own question about whether it can be solved is that it can be solved. It is going to be tough. I hope we can get some good Senators to put their shoulders to it and see what we can do about getting it stopped. (The remarks of Mr. Domenici pertaining to the introduction of S. 1432 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to talk about two things: One is strictly domestic and another is international. First, I am introducing a bill today in behalf of myself, Senator Hagel, and Senator Bingaman. I will start this discussion with a chart. The dark brown on this map are counties in these United States--you will note that they are predominantly in the West--with arsenic concentrations exceeding 10 parts per billion or more in the water sampling. The little bit lighter ones are counties with 5 parts per billion. The little bit lighter ones are counties with 3 parts per billion. And, the very light ones are counties with fewer than 10 parts per billion. Arsenic is a very prevalent compound or chemical in the United States. Communities in the State of New Mexico and throughout the country are going to face, very soon, a very costly situation not of their own making. Beginning in the year 2000, Federal drinking water regulations established by the Environmental Protection Agency will require substantial reductions in the amount of arsenic present in water. Today, the limit is 50 parts per billion. In 2006, it will become 10 parts per billion. When I was referring a while ago to these colorations, this dark brown is parts per billion. Today the limit is 50. In 2006, it will become 10 parts per billion. Arsenic is indeed poisonous if used in large amounts. It is naturally occurring, however, in much of the ground water throughout the Nation. That means there have been people living for as long as they have lived in areas that have naturally occurring arsenic in the ground water. Believe it or not, fellow citizens, they have been drinking that water. What is so strange about it is that we don't have any evidence it has been killing them. We don't have any evidence it has been hurting them. But actually there are scientific tests on which the Environmental Protection Agency relied, I regret to tell you, that, in this Senator's opinion, are very meager in terms of their strength, and they predominate in foreign countries. However, the law has been interpreted to say that, in 2006, drinking water systems will be down to 10 parts per billion or they will be in violation of this Federal law. In my home city of Albuquerque, which is shown on this second map I have put up--there is Albuquerque; you see there is the very dark brown--there are around 13 parts per billion. This illustrates the problem the new standard will create. This bill recognizes that in some parts of the United States, and of my State, the burden will become so great that some communities just will not be able to bear it. They have to go through-- at least today--a whole new cleanup system for their domestic water. Whatever they have been doing, they must do it all another way. Although our scientists are busy at work, No. 1, trying to figure an easier way to clean it up, we are also having some of them busy at work trying to offer us more evidence that it is not dangerous to have Albuquerquians drink the water that must be cleaned up and water in water systems in many other parts of my State and in other parts of America. But this bill goes on to say that small communities may not have the resources to meet these standards and may need help, and it creates a grant program for the small communities to help them upgrade these systems and ensures them that not less than 20 percent of the grant moneys go to communities with fewer than 50,000 residents. And the bill authorizes appropriations of $1.9 billion for fiscal year 2004 and for each year through 2009. In New Mexico, the geology, the make up of the rocks and dirt, results in relatively high levels of arsenic in the groundwater. However, over time, New Mexico residents have not experienced higher levels of diseases associated with arsenic. Be that as it may, many small communities throughout New Mexico and the west will not be able to meet the financial burden. Because of this, I believe it is important to aid communities in meeting the coming standards. The financial burden facing many communities and individuals is great. The new standards could cost New Mexico communities between $370 to $440 million to improve treatment systems, plus $18 million a year in operating costs. Albuquerque, alone, is looking at having to spend $150 million to come into compliance. Its sister city, right across the river, Rio Rancho--our second largest city--is facing $60 million in improvements. And many individuals in small communities throughout the West are facing increases in their water bills of $50 to $90 a month just to pay for the cleanup. Most people cannot afford such an increase. This legislation will help these communities in upgrading their systems and training their people. We are forcing communities to comply with drinking water standards that many believe will not increase public health. The least we can do is help them meet the burden. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to talk about two things: One is strictly domestic and another is international. First, I am introducing a bill today in behalf of myself, Senator Hagel, and Senator Bingaman. I will start this discussion with a chart. The dark brown on this map are counties in these United States--you will note that they are predominantly in the West--with arsenic concentrations exceeding 10 parts per billion or more in the water sampling. The little bit lighter ones are counties with 5 parts per billion. The little bit lighter ones are counties with 3 parts per billion. And, the very light ones are counties with fewer than 10 parts per billion. Arsenic is a very prevalent compound or chemical in the United States. Communities in the State of New Mexico and throughout the country are going to face, very soon, a very costly situation not of their own making. Beginning in the year 2000, Federal drinking water regulations established by the Environmental Protection Agency will require substantial reductions in the amount of arsenic present in water. Today, the limit is 50 parts per billion. In 2006, it will become 10 parts per billion. When I was referring a while ago to these colorations, this dark brown is parts per billion. Today the limit is 50. In 2006, it will become 10 parts per billion. Arsenic is indeed poisonous if used in large amounts. It is naturally occurring, however, in much of the ground water throughout the Nation. That means there have been people living for as long as they have lived in areas that have naturally occurring arsenic in the ground water. Believe it or not, fellow citizens, they have been drinking that water. What is so strange about it is that we don't have any evidence it has been killing them. We don't have any evidence it has been hurting them. But actually there are scientific tests on which the Environmental Protection Agency relied, I regret to tell you, that, in this Senator's opinion, are very meager in terms of their strength, and they predominate in foreign countries. However, the law has been interpreted to say that, in 2006, drinking water systems will be down to 10 parts per billion or they will be in violation of this Federal law. In my home city of Albuquerque, which is shown on this second map I have put up--there is Albuquerque; you see there is the very dark brown--there are around 13 parts per billion. This illustrates the problem the new standard will create. This bill recognizes that in some parts of the United States, and of my State, the burden will become so great that some communities just will not be able to bear it. They have to go through-- at least today--a whole new cleanup system for their domestic water. Whatever they have been doing, they must do it all another way. Although our scientists are busy at work, No. 1, trying to figure an easier way to clean it up, we are also having some of them busy at work trying to offer us more evidence that it is not dangerous to have Albuquerquians drink the water that must be cleaned up and water in water systems in many other parts of my State and in other parts of America. But this bill goes on to say that small communities may not have the resources to meet these standards and may need help, and it creates a grant program for the small communities to help them upgrade these systems and ensures them that not less than 20 percent of the grant moneys go to communities with fewer than 50,000 residents. And the bill authorizes appropriations of $1.9 billion for fiscal year 2004 and for each year through 2009. In New Mexico, the geology, the make up of the rocks and dirt, results in relatively high levels of arsenic in the groundwater. However, over time, New Mexico residents have not experienced higher levels of diseases associated with arsenic. Be that as it may, many small communities throughout New Mexico and the west will not be able to meet the financial burden. Because of this, I believe it is important to aid communities in meeting the coming standards. The financial burden facing many communities and individuals is great. The new standards could cost New Mexico communities between $370 to $440 million to improve treatment systems, plus $18 million a year in operating costs. Albuquerque, alone, is looking at having to spend $150 million to come into compliance. Its sister city, right across the river, Rio Rancho--our second largest city--is facing $60 million in improvements. And many individuals in small communities throughout the West are facing increases in their water bills of $50 to $90 a month just to pay for the cleanup. Most people cannot afford such an increase. This legislation will help these communities in upgrading their systems and training their people. We are forcing communities to comply with drinking water standards that many believe will not increase public health. The least we can do is help them meet the burden. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, on behalf of myself and Senators Bingaman, Craig and Akaka--colleagues from the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources--I am pleased to introduce legislation recently transmitted by the Administration that would strengthen our Nation's relationship with two Pacific Island nations with which we have a special bond--the Federated States of Micronesia, FSM, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands, RMI. The United States has a long history of involvement in the islands of Micronesia in the Western Pacific--from 19th century voyages of Nantucket whaling ships, that inspired the literature of Herman Melville, to the development of nuclear weapons and missile defense systems that are cornerstones of our Nation's military strength. In 1947, following the bloody battles of World War II on the beaches of Kwajalein and Saipan, our nation's role changed fundamentally when the United States became Administrator of the region under the United Nation's Trusteeship system. As Administrator of the U.N. Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, the United States governed the islands for over forty years; not as an occupation force or as sovereign, but with the obligation to promote the political, economic, and social development of the inhabitants. In 1986, the United States fulfilled its obligation to the U.N. with respect to the islands of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands following implementation of the Compact of Free Association. The Compact formally ended U.S. Administration and allowed these countries to achieve self- government and recognition as full members of the community of nations. However, and most significantly, the Compact also allowed the United States and these new nations to maintain the special relationship forged during the Trusteeship. For seventeen years now, the Compact has continued to provide for mutual defense as well as political and economic stability in a region of vital interest to the United States. The legislation being introduced today is necessary to update and extend various provisions of the Compact, particularly the economic assistance provisions that are due to expire on September 30 of this year. Representatives of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and the United States have invested tremendous effort over the past four years in negotiating these amendments. We commend Al Short, Peter Christian, and Gerald Zackios, the U.S., FSM, and RMI negotiators, respectively, for their years of work to strengthen the Compact and the special relationship between our nations. The agreements reached by the negotiators, as reflected by this legislation, would provide the resources needed to assure continued economic development and mutual security in the islands. Pursuant to those agreements, trust funds will be established to provide a mechanism for the eventual phase-out of annual financial assistance from the United States. The parties have also agreed to changes that will assure greater accountability and effectiveness in the use of U.S. financial and program assistance. Continued access to the vitally important Ronald Reagan Missile Test Site at Kwajalein Atoll is provided. The Compact's immigration provisions have been updated to reduce threats to our country's homeland security and to reduce the impact of migration on the neighboring islands of Hawaii, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands. These changes are made while continuing to allow citizens of the FSM and RMI the opportunity to migrate to the United States as non-immigrants for education, employment, and residence. Congressional consideration of this legislation comes at a time when the issue of nation-building is receiving increased attention. Our 60 years of experience of nation-building in Micronesia and the Marshall Islands underscores the importance of partnership, planning, adequate resources, and sustained commitment. The task in the former Trust Territory has turned out to be neither easy nor quick. However, virtually all who have examined the Compact agree that it has successfully met its objectives of promoting self-government, mutual defense and economic stability. There is also agreement that there is much more to be done. The FSM and RMI still have tremendous challenges in improving health and education and in further developing their economies so that they can provide health and education and in further developing their economies so that they can provide more resources to meet the basic needs of the people. This is a particularly daunting task given that each nation is dispersed over a vast area of the remote western Pacific Ocean. We too face a considerable challenge given how little time we have to consider this package. The assistance provisions of the current Compact expire in just 11 weeks. While the negotiators have done an excellent job, it is our understanding that they, and the General Accounting Office, will present several issues to Congress for further consideration and we expect that there will be a need for fine-tuning the package. We look forward to working with our colleagues in the Senate, House, and the Administration in trying to meet the demanding deadline, to consider these remaining issues, and to assure the continued success of the special relationship between the United States, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order that I speak for 1 minute with reference to the nomination of Robert C. Brack, which is currently going to be accepted by the Senate.

Mr. DOMENICI. I didn't know you wanted to speak. I saw the calendar said that he was going to be accepted.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, in a couple moments the Senate will approve Robert C. Brack for district court judge of New Mexico. It is not always easy to find somebody, when you recommend them and they have finished this process and received, as in this case, full approval of the Democratic Senator--the committee approved them rather quickly--it is not always easy to find that kind of person. And then secondly, it is not always easy to know that you have really got the right individual, that they are going to do justice to that terrific responsibility which is theirs for such a long period of time under our Constitution. But in this man's case, I am certain of both. I am certain he is as good as there is. Far be it for me to say he is the very best in New Mexico. Who knows that? But he is very good at the law. Secondly, after being good at law, he had a shot at being a judge, and he was a very good judge at the district court level where you have general jurisdiction. When you add all that together, you just feel good about it. And you can end up telling the Senate, thank you this evening in advance and the President, thank you for sending this man to New Mexico to become a district judge in our State. I yield the floor. If I offended or sought precedence over the distinguished Senator, I did not intend to. I apologize.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will be held on Tuesday, July 15, at 2:30 p.m., in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. The purpose of this hearing is to receive testimony regarding the Compact of Free Association with the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands. Because of the limited time available for the hearing, witnesses may testify by invitation only. However, those wishing to submit written testimony for the hearing record should send two copies of their testimony to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC 20510-6150. For further information, please contact Meghan Beal at 202.224.7556 or Meghan_Beal@energy.senate.gov. Committee on Energy and Natural Resources

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise to pay tribute to a friend and public servant of New Mexico, Dick Knipfing of Albuquerque. A few years ago, a New Mexico research company conducted a statewide poll on the popularity of certain well-known people. My name was one of the most recognized, but I wasn't No. 1. The person best known and best liked by New Mexicans was Dick Knipfing. He is not a politician. He has never been Governor, Senator, mayor, or on any city council. Dick is something more special to everyday citizens--he has been a nightly guest in their living rooms for 40 years. In July 1963, Dick started as a reporter for the CBS affiliate in Albuquerque. He did it all. He shot and edited his own film, wrote his own scripts, and got to know some of the most influential people in New Mexico. Eventually, Dick became an anchor. Over the course of his career, he moved to the ABC affiliate, then to the NBC station, and back to ABC. This month, he celebrates his 40th anniversary in broadcast journalism at channel 13, the CBS station where it all started. Since Dick returned to Channel 13, a station whose news had been in the ratings cellar, the station rapidly shot into head-to-head competition with other New Mexico news channels. There is one big reason--Dick Knipfing. New Mexicans trust Dick as a veteran newsman. He is respected by his colleagues. He has been inducted into the Silver Circle Society by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, one of the organization's highest honors for a television journalist. Dick Knipfing is revered by viewers because they easily discern that he is devoted to bringing them a comprehensive and accurate look at the day's major news events. Viewers have welcomed him into their homes, either as a reporter or anchor, because he has shown them that he cares very deeply for New Mexico and its people. Dick, and his wonderful wife, Charlene, have made Albuquerque and New Mexico their home, and integrated themselves into activities to make it a better place to live. Like tens of thousands of New Mexicans, my wife Nancy and I have grown accustomed to Dick's face and his voice. As he marks his 40th anniversary in broadcast journalism, we hope there will be 40 more years of Dick Knipfing to represent the best in broadcasting.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise to congratulate the Office of Naval Research for the successful design review to begin development of the next great astronomical telescope. The Navy is the preeminent authority in the areas of Precise Time and Astrometry, and distributes Earth Orientation parameters and other Astronomical Data required for accurate navigation and fundamental astronomy. Now they are managing an international team to build the Magdalena Ridge Observatory, MRO, on a 10,000 foot mountain in central New Mexico. The Navy, along with the Air Force, Army, and a consortium of universities from the United States and the United Kingdom, will break ground on October 20 this year. This month, the prestigious scientific journal, Physics Today, published a superbly written article that explains the MRO. The project will create a unique array of mirrors that can take pictures of bright celestial objects with a resolution equivalent to a huge telescope measuring 400 meters in diameter. I ask that a copy of the article be printed in the Record. The article follows. New Mexico Plans Optical Interferometer and Fast-Slewing Telescope How does a minor university land a major observatory? In New Mexico Tech's case, it helped that the university has access to a high, dark site, that the Magdalena Ridge Observatory (MRO) will have national security applications, and that the project has allies in Congress. ``We had a coalition of universities looking for an observatory,'' says Van Romero, vice president for research at New Mexico Tech (officially the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology), which has around 1800 students and 110 faculty members. New Mexico Tech and its partners--New Mexico State University, New Mexico Highlands University, and the University of Puerto Rico--learned that the US Army's neighboring White Sands Missile Range wanted better missile tracking capability and the Air Force Research Laboratory in Albuquerque was interested in developing adaptive optics. ``We seemed to have a critical mass--universities, along with more than one military user,'' says Romero. Representative Joe Skeen and Senator Pete Domenici, both New Mexico Republicans, supported creating the MRO because the potential for education outreach, adaptive optics research, and world- class astronomy ``all came together in a happy confluence of ideas,'' says Stephen Traver, a legislative fellow in Domenici's office who used to work for the now retired Skeen. Domenici led the way in winning a congressional markup for the $48 million observatory. The observatory's future home is on a ridge in the Magdalena mountains near Socorro, about 130 kilometers south of Albuquerque. Besides the clear skies and roughly 3200- meter-high perch, the site's advantages include that it is near both White Sands and New Mexico Tech, it has room for the observatory to expand, and it has a road and other infrastructure already serving ecological and atmospheric studies and the university's lightning lab (see box). The MRO will consist of an optical-infrared interferometer with eight to ten 1.4-meter telescopes in a reconfigurable Y- shaped array up to 400 meters long plus a single 2.4-meter telescope. Groundbreaking is scheduled for 20 October. stars and scuds The MRO array will have a large number of bigger elements distributed over a wider range of baselines than any other optical interferometer in the works, says Chris Haniff, whose University of Cambridge group is involved in the project. MRO's angular resolution, he adds, ``will be a factor of a hundred higher than the Hubble Space Telescope. That means that for any class of astronomical object, you can see more detail.'' ``One of the exciting things we think we will be able to do is to look at the central engines of active galactic nuclei,'' says David Westpfahl, project scientist for the MRO interferometer. ``All the models have a massive object at the center, such as a black hole, and an accretion disk and polar outflow, but the detailed shape and arrangement of these things are still being worked on. We hope to be able to resolve several of these objects and decide among the models.'' The MRO interferometer will also be used to deduce the relative rotational axes of stars in clusters, which could shed light on the importance of turbulence in star formation, and to study other aspects of star birth, as well as star aging and planet formation. Fast slewing is the special feature of MRO's single telescope. It will be able to zip to a particular part of the sky at 10 deg. per second. The slewing was initially incorporated to accommodate the US Army. The MRO offers a good look at target missiles fired from Fort Wingate in western New Mexico, says Tomas C. Chavez, chief of test technology at White Sands. ``We could collect phenomenology data during the target's boost and coast phases to help home in on the target with an interceptor.'' Adds Romero, ``This is a match made in heaven. The army wants to use [the telescope] during the day and early morning, we want to use it at night.'' The 2.4-meter mirror was donated by the air force. Originally intended for classified space-based research, it has hardware added to keep it from sagging in Earth's gravitational field. Astronomers will take advantage of the fast slewing, too. ``One big use of the telescope will be `alert response to transient astrophysical phenomema,' '' says project scientist Eileen Ryan. ``An example would be to find the optical counterpart of gamma-ray bursts.'' For that, the telescope would automatically interrupt other observations when it receives signals from Swift, a satellite NASA is supposed to launch in December. The MRO telescope, Ryan adds, will be bigger and will slew faster than other ground-based telescopes currently hunting for GRBs (see Physics Today, July 2002, pages 24 and 25). Mostly, though, the 2.4-meter telescope will be devoted to studying ``small Solar system bodies--asteriods, comets, and Kuiper Belt objects,'' says Ryan. ``We want to use the telescope to ask how fast asteroids are spinning. How big are they? What are their shapes? possible with pork What with the MRO being funded directly by Congress, the project often gets labeled as pork. Says Romero, ``Without this type of funding, we would not be able to build it. But we think this is a facility that funding agencies like NASA and NSF will take the opportunity to fund research at.'' And, unusual for a federally funded project, New Mexico Tech and its partners will foot the running costs, estimated at $2 million a year. If all goes as planned, the single telescope would see first light in 2005, and the interferometer could be up and running a couple years laters.