Michael Doyle

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in anticipation of Graduate- Professional Student Appreciation Week, which will be observed this year between April 7th and the 11th. For more than 25 years, Graduate-Professional Student Appreciation Week has been observed as a show of support and appreciation for our nation's graduate and professional students. Its sponsor, the National Association of Graduate- Professional Students, hosts events across the U.S.A. each year in April to educate the public about the importance and impact that graduate and professional students have on their communities and our country. Our nation's graduate and professional students play several important roles in our society. For starters, they teach undergraduate students at many colleges and universities across the country. In addition, they play an often unsung role in our nation's academic research efforts, working away in laboratories and libraries on cutting edge research. Finally, of course, once they graduate and receive their graduate or professional degrees, they go on to careers in science, education, law, medicine, and other fields that are essential to improving our quality of life and promoting economic growth. The National Association of Graduate-Professional Students represents more than 600,000 graduate and professional students at over 90 institutions across the United States, including a number in Pennsylvania's 14th Congressional District. More than 15,000 graduate and professional students are enrolled in the nine institutions of higher education in and around the City of Pittsburgh: Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh, Duquesne University, Chatham University, Robert Morris University, Carlow University, Point Park University, La Roche College, and the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. The graduate programs offered by these institutions and the high caliber of students they attract have a tremendous impact on our local civic life and economy, not only while they are studying, but often because they remain in the region. Graduate students teach undergraduates, lead innovative research projects, and start companies that attract bigger companies to the region like Google, Yahoo, Disney and many others. Pittsburgh owes much of its recent economic growth to the world class research being done at our local colleges and universities. I think it's safe to say that the same is true across the country at institutions of higher learning where graduate and professional students are working in collaboration with talented faculty members to expand the boundaries of human knowledge and improve Americans' quality of life. That's why I think it's particularly important to recognize our nation's graduate and professional students each year. I urge my colleagues to join me in observing Graduate-Professional Student Appreciation Week this year.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to one of my constituents who is truly an American hero. Mr. Robert Harbula of West Mifflin, Pennsylvania, fought bravely as a U.S. Marine in the Korean War--including the Battle of Chosin Reservoir. Private First Class Harbula served in G Company of the Third Battalion of the First Marine Regiment, part of the First Marine Division, in the Korean War. His unit was referred to initially as ``George Company'' and then, later, after Chosin Reservoir, as ``Bloody George.'' Private First Class Bob Harbula was assigned to the Marine unit guarding Camp David, the Presidential retreat, when he served as an usher for the Washington, DC, premiere of ``Sands of Iwo Jima'' in January of 1950. After seeing the movie, he decided that he ought to get a more dangerous posting, so he volunteered for a marine raider unit several months later. Soon thereafter, he ended up in Camp Pendleton as part of the 1st Marine Division--and in August 1950, he found himself on a troopship headed for Japan with the First Marines as one of the early reinforcements for the hard-pressed UN forces in Korea. Mr. Harbula was part of the machine gun squad attached to G Company's First Platoon. Korea had been occupied for 35 years by Japan until the end of World War II, at which point it was partitioned at the 38th Parallel. South Korea was occupied and protected by US forces. North Korea was occupied by the Soviet Union. UN plans to hold elections and unify the country were rejected by the Soviets, and a communist dictatorship was established in the north. On June 25, North Korean troops crossed the boundary separating North and South Korea, taking the ill-prepared South Korean Army by surprise and overwhelming it. Three days later, the North Korean army occupied Seoul, the South Korean capital. US troops from the Eighth Army based in Japan rushed to aid the South Koreans. They were thrown into battle piecemeal in a desperate effort to gain time for more reinforcements to arrive. South Korean troops and the US 24th Infantry Division fought the North Korean troops repeatedly, inflicting substantial casualties, but they were repeatedly defeated by superior numbers and forced to retreat. By August, US and South Korean forces had been pushed back to a fragile perimeter around the port city of Pusan in the southwest corner of the Korean peninsula. Despite repeated North Korean attacks, the Pusan Perimeter held and bled the North Koreans dry. General Douglas MacArthur, commander of US forces in the region, decided to launch a major amphibious landing deep in the North Korean army's rear at the port city of Inchon on Korea's west coast. Mr. Harbula's unit was in the first wave of the assault craft, which landed under heavy fire on September 15th. From that moment on, George Company was in nearly constant combat as US forces captured Inchon and fought their way into Seoul, where the fighting often deteriorated into vicious house-to-house combat. On the night of September 25, George Company--heavily outnumbered--stopped a major North Korean counterattack by tanks, self-propelled artillery, and hundreds of men along Seoul's Ma Po Boulevard. Mr. Harbula and his section did what they could, firing a machine gun non-stop at the lead tank. With artillery support, George Company withstood and repelled the attack-- but at a terrible cost. The Inchon landing and the liberation of Seoul caused the weakened and over-extended North Korean forces in the south to collapse and beat a panicked retreat northward. The US Eighth Army began pressing northward in aggressive pursuit along Korea's west coast. The X Corps, which included the 1st Marine Division, was pulled out of the line and loaded onto amphibious transport ships. They sailed around the Korean Peninsula and disembarked at the end of October in the port of Wonsan on North Korea's southeastern coast, which had already been secured by South Korean units. George Company's first assignment after landing at Wonsan was holding a village called Majon-ni several miles inland at the junction of roads leading to Seoul, Wonsan, and Pyongyang. On November 2nd, PFC Harbula's machine gun squad was helping to escort a re-supply convoy through a treacherous mountain gorge when it was ambushed. Bob Harbula provided cover, firing a .30 caliber machine gun from the hip, while the surviving trucks were carefully turned around on the one-lane, cliff- edged road and driven out of the ambush to Wonsan, where they reported to headquarters and requested a rescue mission for the remaining survivors. George Company garrisoned Majon-ni for several weeks after the ambush. PFC Harbula took command of his 10-man machine gun squad after the sergeant who had been in charge was seriously wounded in the ambush. On November 14, George Company moved north to the Hungnam- Chigyong region. The rugged Taebaek Mountains that ran up the middle of the Korean peninsula divided the Eighth Army from X Corps as each force pushed north. On November 24, MacArthur ordered the ``Home by Christmas'' offensive to conquer all of North Korea up to the Yalu River, which formed the boundary between North Korea and China. The Eighth Army was to push north, while the First Marine Division was to push west from the Chosin Reservoir, cut off a North Korean major supply line, and link up with the Eighth Army. Unbeknownst to General MacArthur and his advisors, hundreds of thousands of Chinese troops had begun infiltrating into North Korea in mid-October. The General and his staff thought that there were only a few small Chinese units fighting in North Korea. In fact, Chinese troops were massing for attacks in both the east and west. In the east, the 9th Army Group of the Chinese ``People's Volunteer Army'' had encircled most of the Chosin Reservoir, a large man-made lake north of Wonsan and 65 miles northwest of the port city of Hungnam. On November 25, nearly two hundred thousand Chinese troops launched a surprise attack on the Eighth Army, defeating it resoundingly in the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River and sending it retreating southward in what came to be called ``the Big Bug-out.'' On November 27, however, the First Marine Division's orders were still to attack northwestward. Most of the Division's combat troops, primarily thousands of Marines from the First Marine Division's 5th and 7th Regiments, were positioned around the village of Yudam-ni west of the reservoir. An understrength regimental combat team from the 7th Infantry Division held territory on the east side of the reservoir up through the village of Hundong-ni to Sinhung-ni. A winding narrow road led through the mountainous terrain from each village to the bottom of the lake, where they met in the village of Hagaru-ri, which was lightly defended by a hodgepodge of units from the First Marine Division, including a number of companies from George Company's First Marine Regiment. Essential supplies had been stockpiled at Hagaru-ri, and engineers were desperately trying to build a small airstrip when they weren't fighting off enemy attacks. It was 14 miles of treacherous terrain from Yudam-ni to Hagaru-ni. From there, the road wound 11 miles through more mountainous terrain to the town of Koto-ri, where the 1st Marine Regiment's headquarters was located--defended by the Regiment's Second Battalion--and then another 10 miles to Chinhung-ni, defended by First Battalion, First Marine Regiment. From there, it was another 37 miles to the port city of Hungnam. That one narrow road was the only way First Marine Division and the other units from X Corps could get out of the mountains and back to the coast. Meanwhile, George Company was stuck somewhere in the rear echelons for lack of transportation. On the night of November 27, all hell broke loose. The 9th Army Group of the People's Volunteer Army attacked the X Corps forces on either side of the Chosin Reservoir and at various points along the road as far south as Koto-ri. Tens of thousands of Chinese soldiers attacked the Marines. The Marines at Yudam-ni were surrounded and cut off, as were the soldiers of the 7th Infantry's Regimental Combat Team 31 on the east side of the reservoir--and the Divisional headquarters and elements of the 1St Marine Regiment at Hagaru-ri. On the morning of November 28, George Company finally got some wheels. They were ordered into trucks and headed north, arriving in Koto-ri at nighfall. That night, the Chinese launched a massive attack on Hagaru-ri. They almost succeeded in overwhelming the outnumbered Marines, who had thrown every able-bodied man who could fire a rifle into the front line--down to, and including, the cooks and truck drivers. Wheu dawn came, the defenses had held, but Chinese forces occupied the strategic high ground--East Hill--and unless reinforcements arrived, it seemed inevitable that Hagaru-ri would fall and the units around the Chosin Reservoir would be doomed. George Company's 200 men formed part of the 900-man ``Task Force Drysdale'' that was rapidly thrown together on the morning of November 29th in Koto-ri to reinforce Hagaru-ri. It took the column all day to fight their way up the 11 miles of road between Koto-ri and Hagaru-ri. They had to stop repeatedly to clear enemy roadblocks, and they were under fire the whole time from thousands of Chinese soldiers dug in on either side of the road. The route was subsequently given the name ``Hell Fire Valley.'' Late in the day, the rear of the convoy was stopped by a burning truck and surrounded by Chinese troops. Fighting through the night until their ammunition was nearly all gone, the surviving soldiers finally had no choice but to surrender. The front of the column, consisting of the surviving tanks, George Company, and some of the Royal Marines pushed on and finally broke through to Hagaru-ri. Only a third of the men who set out that morning in Task Force Drysdale made it to Hagaru-ri, but the 300 soldiers and the tanks that made it through Hell Fire Valley at such a terrible cost significantly bolstered the town's defenses. The next morning, November 30, George Company was given the daunting mission of retaking East Hill. They slowly advanced up the hill, slipping and falling repeatedly on the ice and taking heavy rifle and machine gun fire. By the end of the day, they held the south end of the ridge, but the Chinese still held the center. George Company dug in as best they could, but the temperature at night dropped past -20 degrees and the ground was frozen hard. Private Harbula was forced to resort to piling dead Chinese soldiers around his machine gun like sand bags. Once it was dark, Chinese forces counterattacked, charging down the hill several thousand strong. The men of George Company fought bravely--eventually hand-to-hand. Private Harbula's machine gun jammed, and his position was overrun by the enemy. An officer ordered the men to pull back. He remembers hitting one Chinese soldier in the face with his helmet and firing his pistol at several others. As he slipped and slid back down the hill, he fell into a shell crater. In the crater, he found several dead Americans and one of his comrades, Richard Haller, still alive but wounded in both legs. Private Harbula carried Haller down the hill to safety, but he ruptured his Achilles tendon in the process. Private Harbula was out of the fight, but the surviving members of George Company fought on. Finally, near dawn on December 1st, the Chinese attack petered out. December 1st was something of a turning point. That day, the Marines in Yudam-ni began a break-out to the south. By nightfall, they had fought their way to Toktong Pass, halfway to Hagaru-ri. In addition, the engineers who had been working on the airstrip completed enough of the runway that C-47 transport planes could use it. That afternoon, planes started bringing in supplies and reinforcements and flying out the wounded. There was bad news on December 1st as well. With half of the men in Regimental Combat Team 31 dead or wounded, its commander, Lieutenant Colonel Don Faith, ordered his troops to destroy any equipment they couldn't carry and attempt to break through to Hagaru-ri. As the column advanced, it was attacked constantly by thousands of Chinese soldiers on each side of the road to Hagaru-ri. As night fell, Lieutenant Faith was killed trying to take a roadblock and the column disintegrated. Many small groups of soldiers fled through the night and made it to the Hagaru-ri perimeter alive, but everyone who stayed with the convoy was killed. Most of the First Division was now reunited in Hagaru-ri. The remaining able-bodied but exhausted members of George Company continued to defend the perimeter, moving to one end of the runway on December 5th and repulsing another large Chinese attack. On December 6, the First Marine Division began its breakout effort-- or as its commanding officer General O.P. Smith put it, not so much retreating as attacking in a different direction. George Company fought its way back down Hell Fire Valley--but this time as part of a unit powerful enough to defend itself. They reached Koto-ri by the end of the next day. The retreat continued the following day with the 5th and 7th Regiments pushing ahead and the 1st Regiment and George Company acting as a rear guard. Finally, reached the port of Hungnam, where an armada of ships evacuated a quarter of a million soldiers and civilians, as well as a great deal of equipment. The ``advance in a different direction'' by the ``Chosin Few'' has become a legendary example of heroism, sacrifice, endurance, and suffering. Thousands of American soldiers rebuffed surprise attacks by overwhelming numbers of enemy forces and then conducted a 70-mile fighting retreat through treacherous mountain terrain in subfreezing weather. George Company, now ``Bloody George,'' did their part, fighting their way into Hagaru-ri, up East Hill, and then--outnumbered 10 to 1-- holding their perimeter against determined enemy counterattack. Private First Class Bob Harbula served bravely in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir until he was injured. Remarkably, several months later, Bob's brother, John, who was a Marine stationed in Norfolk, saw a Marine on crutches hitchhiking. John picked him up and they got to talking, and the Marine mentioned that he was at the Chosin Reservoir with G-3-1. John told his passenger that he had a brother who had also fought there with G-3-1. The hitchhiker asked John what his brother's name was, and when John told him that it was Bob Harbula, the Marine's face turned white and he said, ``that's the SOB that saved my life!'' John had given a lift to Richard Haller! Chosin Reservoir didn't mark the end of Bloody George's or Bob Harbula's combat action in Korea by any means. Soon after, he was back in combat. On April 15, 1951, he was promoted to Corporal and put in charge of 2 machineguns and 20 men at the start of Operation Ripper. He fought again with G Company in North Korea at the Hwachon Reservoir, where the First Marine Division was awarded its third Presidential Unit Citation for action on Hill 902. He was finally rotated home on 6 June 1951. Mr. Harbula was recently quoted in the McKeesport Daily News as saying, ``I don't consider myself a hero.'' Well, I think it's safe to say that the rest of us do. I am grateful to U.S. Marine Corporal Robert Harbula for his heroic service to our country, and I am very proud to represent him in the House of Representatives. Mr. Harbula may not consider himself a hero, but he believes deeply that his comrades in George Company, especially those who gave their lives for this country, are heroes who never got the recognition they deserved. He has endeavored in recent years to educate the American public about the critical role George Company played in reinforcing and defending Hagaru-ri and holding it until the 5th and 7th Marine Regiments could reach it and the First Marine Division could carry out its legendary fighting withdrawal. That may finally be happening some 60-some years after the fact. In 2010, a writer named Patrick K. O'Donnell published ``Give Me Tomorrow: The Korean War's Greatest Untold Story--the Epic Stand of the Marines of George Company.'' The book is based on extensive interviews with the surviving members of G Company. In addition, earlier this week, the story of George Company's actions in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir was the subject of an episode of ``Against All Odds''--a six-part series about battlefield heroism on the American Heroes Channel--which until recently was known as the Military Channel. Mr. Speaker, all Americans can be proud of the fact that in the course of our nation's history, there have been many inspiring, often heartbreaking stories of heroes who have given their lives for this country. There are many, many more Americans who have served this country who have risked their lives for this country. Many have come home wounded and disabled. We owe them all a debt we can never begin to repay. It's my belief, though, that we should remember them and honor them as best we can for what they've done. That's why, when I learned about Bob Harbula and George Company's service in the Korean War, I felt it was only right that I share their story with you and have it included in the Congressional Record. Mr. Harbula has spent much of his life trying to call attention to his brothers in arms--the Chosin Few--so I urge my colleagues to join me in recognizing the bravery and tremendous sacrifices of Bob Harbula and the men of Company G, Third Battalion, First Marine Regiment for their heroic service in the Korean War. God bless them, and God bless everyone who serves or has served our nation in its armed forces.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, along with my friend and colleague Mr. Walden, in support of H.R. 3675, the FCC Process Reform Act of 2013. The Federal Communications Commission is charged with overseeing industries that make up one-sixth of our national economy. The communications and technology sectors are driving economic growth across the Nation, connecting businesses to markets large and small and delivering innovative, new products and services to consumers. Perhaps more importantly, communications networks are part of the very fabric of our democracy, providing the news and information that makes us informed citizens and voters. With a mission this critical, both Democrats and Republicans believe that the FCC must be efficient, transparent, and accountable. We started this debate in the Energy and Commerce Committee with different perspectives about how to achieve these goals. Last Congress, our work on this issue, unfortunately, devolved into a partisan process and a vote on a bill that was dead on arrival in the Senate. But this Congress, thanks to Chairman Walden's leadership and consultation with Ranking Members Waxman and Eshoo, we were able to come to an agreement on a set of bipartisan reform proposals that were unanimously supported by the committee. I want to highlight several key provisions in this bill that we believe will improve the functioning of the FCC. The first reform is the Sunshine Act, to allow FCC Commissioners to collaborate more closely while preserving the transparency of agency decisionmaking. I introduced this legislation along with Representatives Eshoo and Shimkus, and I am pleased to see it incorporated in the bill we are considering today. The second area that I am particularly pleased with is the incorporation of a provision to provide an exemption to the Antideficiency Act for the Universal Service Fund. Today, the FCC relies on temporary exemptions from the Antideficiency Act to be able to administer the Universal Service program that supports connectivity to schools and libraries, known as E-Rate. The bill we reported out of the Energy and Commerce Committee would have permanently exempted the Universal Service Fund from the Antideficiency Act, but, unfortunately, we were unable to reach agreement with CBO about the impact of this provision. I want to thank my colleagues in the majority for working with us to come up with an alternative that provides a longer--if not permanent-- exemption. I believe it demonstrates our committee's bipartisan support for providing the FCC with the flexibility it needs to administer the E-Rate program. I also want to compliment FCC Chairman Wheeler for his actions to address transparency and efficiency of FCC decisionmaking. From his very first day at the helm of the agency, he has focused on remedying the concerns identified in the bill that we are considering today. I urge the FCC to continue to move forward on reforms they can make under their own initiative while we continue to work on this legislation. Finally, I want to close by saying that I think the manner in which the FCC Process Reform Act was developed should be a model for the entire House going forward. Working together, members of the Energy and Commerce Committee crafted legislation that addressed the concerns from both sides of the aisle. I am proud to have been a part of this effort. I want to thank my colleague, Chairman Walden, for his work. I urge all my colleagues to support this important legislation to make the FCC more efficient, transparent, and accountable. I look forward to working with our colleagues in the Senate and continuing to help this bill become law. With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, we have no other speakers, and so I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 357, the GI Bill Tuition Fairness Act. This legislation contains a number of important changes in VA programs that provide our veterans with education, training, rehabilitation, disability benefits, and housing; and it deserves our support. I want to focus my remarks today on the disease reporting provisions in the bill because I have been deeply involved with that issue over the last year or so. In November of 2012, the VA announced that there had been an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease at a VA hospital in Pittsburgh, which I represent. Shortly thereafter, I joined other members of the regional congressional delegation in requesting investigations into the outbreak. In response, the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs and the VA Inspector General's Office examined the outbreak and the events leading up to it at length. The Centers for Disease Control also looked into the outbreak and determined that it had resulted in several deaths and more than two dozen illnesses. I want to personally express my gratitude to my good friend Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Jeff Miller, Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Coffman, and Ranking Member Michaud for being so responsive to our requests for investigations and investigating the outbreak and holding hearings on it last year. In the end, the hearings and investigations identified a number of shortcomings in the way the outbreak was handled and the need to be addressed. One of the concerns raised, as we learned more about the outbreak, was that for some time after the local VA facility knew it had Legionella bacteria in its water supply and that VA patients had been sickened by it, it had not notified State or local health agencies about the outbreak. Under current law, VA is not required to make such reports, which are required of all other hospitals. Chairman Miller, Subcommittee Chairman Coffman, Senator Casey, and Congressmen Murphy, Rothfus, and I all agree that in the future the VA should be required to report outbreaks of potentially deadly diseases to public health authorities, just like other hospitals already do. The language in this bill is the result of our discussions over a number of months. I believe that the need for this reporting requirement is obvious. I urge my colleagues to support this bill which will make this important change.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to former Member of Congress William J. Coyne, who represented Pennsylvania's 14th District from 1981 until 2003. Bill passed away on November 3, 2013. I was honored to work with Bill for eight years as members of Pennsylvania's Congressional delegation from adjacent districts, and I have had the privilege of serving many of his former constituents since he retired in January 2003. I wanted to take this opportunity to remember Bill. Bill was born on August 24, 1936. He grew up in a house on Halket Street in Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood, and he lived in that house for most of his life. Bill graduated from Central Catholic High School in 1954. He served in the U.S. Army in Korea from 1955 through 1957. He returned to Pittsburgh after completing his military service and began working as an accountant for a trucking company. He subsequently attended Robert Morris College, graduating with a B.S. in accounting in 1965. In all, he worked as an accountant for 13 years. Bill became involved in local politics in the 1960s, doing volunteer work on a number of local Democratic campaigns. He ran for office himself in 1970 and was elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, where he served one term. He was elected to Pittsburgh City Council in 1973, and he served as a City Councilman from 1974 until 1980. In 1980, Bill ran for Congress, and was elected to represent Pennsylvania's 14th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. At that time, the 14th District consisted of the City of Pittsburgh and a number of adjacent communities in Allegheny County. He was re-elected 10 times and represented the 14th District in Congress for 22 years from 1981 until 2003. During his first 2 terms in Congress, Bill served on the House Banking Committee and the Committee on House Administration. He also served on the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, known unofficially as the House Ethics Committee. In 1985, he was appointed to serve on the Ways and Means Committee. In addition, from 1993 through 1998, he served on the House Budget Committee. In the 1980s, when Bill started serving in Congress, southwestern Pennsylvania was experiencing high unemployment and economic disruption as a result of the decline of the steel industry, which up until then had been the dominant driver of the region's economy. Consequently, job creation and economic redevelopment were his top priorities when he began serving in Congress and throughout his service there. At that time, due to many young and working-age individuals leaving the region to seek work elsewhere, Pittsburgh had a disproportionately large elderly population--with more senior citizens than any Congressional District outside of Miami. As a result, Bill also focused his efforts on programs which, like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, were essential to the health and well-being of older Americans. He worked on the Ways and Means Committee, for example, to protect Americans' pensions and other retirement benefits, enact a Medicare prescription drug benefit, and oppose efforts to cut federal safety net programs. Bill worked closely with local and state elected leaders to develop a plan for the region's renewal, which consisted of building on the region's greatest assets--its research universities, hospitals, and financial institutions--while attempting to preserve the region's remaining manufacturing base. His efforts to achieve those goals focused on federal investments in scientific and biomedical research, higher education, housing and community development, transportation, and the clean-up and redevelopment of abandoned industrial sites. He also pursued complementary tax and trade policies. He was actively involved in securing federal funding for important projects in southwestern Pennsylvania as well as efforts to preserve and expand federal programs nationwide. With hundreds of acres of shuttered steel mills in the region, Bill worked on the Ways and Means Committee to provide tax incentives for businesses and municipalities to clean up and redevelop vacant, often polluted industrial sites--often referred to as brownfields--including a provision in the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 which allowed businesses to deduct the cost of cleaning up brownfields sites in certain targeted areas. He also worked successfully to expand the brownfields tax incentive and delay its expiration date by several years. In addition, he supported legislation to create federal empowerment zones and enterprise communities, which provided tax breaks for businesses that operated in economically distressed areas. Bill believed that the federal tax code could and should be used to create or preserve American manufacturing jobs, and he worked successfully to make the federal tax-exempt Industrial Development Bond program permanent to keep U.S. manufacturing jobs from moving overseas. Bill also worked successfully to secure hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for local infrastructure projects--including reconstruction of the Drake, Library, and Overbrook trolley lines in Allegheny County and construction of an extension of the MLK Jr. Busway. He worked successfully to get local locks and dams updated-- most notably, Locks and Dams 2, 3, and 4 on the Lower Monongahela River--and a flood control project built along Saw Mill Run. Bill also secured the cost-free transfer of the Hays Ammunition Plant to the City of Pittsburgh for redevelopment. He secured millions of dollars in seed money for the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University and the NASA Robotics Engineering Consortium. In addition, he worked successfully to enact a bill designating the Steel Industry Heritage Project in Homestead as a national heritage area to preserve the region's history and culture and promote local tourism. Bill was also an unabashed liberal--a vocal defender of workers' rights, women's rights, and gay rights as well as all of the New Deal and Great Society programs. He believed in tougher federal gun control laws--voting, for example, in support of the 1994 assault weapons ban. He opposed efforts to roll back American workers' rights to organize and bargain collectively, and he worked to expand protection for workers' rights in international trade agreements. Bill strongly opposed efforts to cut domestic spending programs in the 1980s and 1990s, especially programs to help local governments undertake important redevelopment activities--programs like Community Development Block Grants, Urban Development Action Grants, the Economic Development Administration, and General Revenue Sharing. Bill also worked with many of his colleagues to protect federal programs that served children, senior citizens, the disabled, and working families. On the other side of the ledger, he opposed increased defense spending in the 1980s and supported deep defense cuts in the 1990s after the end of the Cold War and the demise of the Soviet Union. Bill worked on the House Ways and Means Committee to reduce the tax burden on low- and middle-income families. He was also actively involved in developing and enacting legislation to reform the Internal Revenue Service. In 2002, Bill decided to retire at the end of his 11th term. In January of 2003, he wrapped up his career in politics and returned home to Pittsburgh. In the 10 years since then, Bill has enjoyed retirement, dividing his time between his home in Pittsburgh and a home in Ireland. When you take into account his military service, his service in the Pennsylvania State legislature, his service on Pittsburgh City Council, and his 22 years in Congress, you can't help but conclude that Bill Coyne was a dedicated public servant. He was quiet but effective--and he was living proof that nice guys can get ahead. Bill Coyne was a credit to this institution and to his home town. Those of us who had the privilege to know him will miss him. He is survived by his long-time companion Kathy Kozdemba, his brother Philip Coyne, Jr. and many nieces and nephews. I'd like to include this eulogy given by his nephew Daniel Coyne at his funeral in Pittsburgh last week. Billy: A Eulogy for Congressman Bill Coyne Delivered at His Funeral, November 7, 2013 (By Daniel V. Coyne, Managing Editor, Boston Consulting Group) Bill Coyne was my father's older brother, and I have the honor and privilege of saying a few words about who he was and the full life he lived. Bill, or Billy as I called him, was devoted to his long- time companion Kathy; to his surviving brother Philly; to his nieces, nephews, cousins, and extended family; to his faith; to the city of Pittsburgh, which he served for decades; and to his neighborhood of Oakland, which gave rise to characters, stories, and legends that made me wish I'd grown up in a different time. He was best known, of course, for being a politician. Articles about Bill Coyne always described him as quiet. But that belied his passion and his commitment. He worked incredibly hard for the things he believed in. Economic development and opportunity, equality, measures to help the working class. He was sometimes described as an old-fashioned Democrat. I think he was very proud of that--proud to be called liberal or progressive. Not that he'd ever brag about it. Billy never cared for grandstanding, never sought the limelight. To me, his legacy is not just about what he did, it's about how he did it. Billy was civil, sincere, genuine, and honorable. He epitomized everything that's good and noble about the title ``public servant''. He simply wanted to help people. He got involved in politics in the late 60s, he said, because of the conditions of the country. He wanted to make a difference. And that's what he and his dedicated staff did. In a 1986 profile of Billy in the Pittsburgh Press, Tip O'Neill summed it up nicely: ``You can get a lot done for your constituents when you have the respect and admiration of your colleagues,'' he said. ``And Bill Coyne is one of the best liked guys down here.'' Incidentally, when Billy heard that the Press wanted to do a story on him, he had a one-word response: ``Why?'' Billy was more than a politician. He was a kind and generous uncle. He was thoughtful and warm. He loved being with Kathy and hosting Christmas dinners with her. He loved being with his nieces, nephews, and cousins. He was happy being in Pittsburgh, living a short walk from Halket Street, where he grew up. And he was energized by the visits he and Kathy made to Ireland several times each year. For his brother Philly's 90th birthday, a group of us travelled to Ireland. Billy and Kathy were our guides. Billy's excitement was infectious. He was like a little kid, reveling in the music, the scenery, the streetscapes, the people, being with our relatives. He wanted so much for us to be a part of it. It reminded me of how he'd treat people who visited him in Washington. I lived there for a few years while Billy was in office. He'd sometimes sneak me and a friend onto the floor of the House of Representatives for small occasions, like the State of the Union Address. It was never to show off. Billy wasn't in the habit of trying to impress people. I just think he saw the House floor in the same way he and others who grew up in Oakland saw Forbes Field. It's historic, and it's hallowed ground. But it's sort of public property . . . you don't really need a ticket to get in. The fact that it was there was permission enough. Billy did those sorts of things all the time. He'd go out of his way to do something if he thought it would make you happy. The fact is, Billy would go out of his way for anyone, anytime. Selfless hardly begins to describe his compassion and his sense of service. That's how he worked his job. That's how he lived his life. His passing is a profound loss for Kathy, for Philly, and for our whole family. We were blessed to have had him in our lives, and we will miss him dearly. There's a quote, attributed to an ancient Chinese philosopher, whom Billy was fond of. Kathy gave it to me. She said that Billy carried it around in his wallet. It obviously meant a lot to him, and I'd like to close by reading it: A leader is best when people barely know he exists Not so good when people obey and acclaim him Worse when they despise him But of a good leader who talks little, when his work is done they will say: ``We did it ourselves''

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, let's think about where America was prior to the enactment of the Affordable Care Act. There were 30 to 40 million of our citizens without insurance. People with preexisting conditions either couldn't get insurance or had to pay so much they couldn't afford their insurance. Women were being charged twice as much as men. People that had insurance had annual and lifetime caps. Did you ever wonder why when you would see families holding fundraisers to raise money for their kid's drugs when a kid has cancer? These are people who had insurance and came up against the annual caps or lifetime caps, and the insurance company didn't pay any more. Half the families in America are filing bankruptcy. People with insurance up against caps, no more payments, families losing everything. We put an end to that with the Affordable Care Act. How did we do that? We come up with a private system that required everybody to participate--young and old, rich and poor, healthy and sick. When you put everybody in that risk pool, healthy people help us enable the insurance industry to keep rates at an affordable rate for those people who have preexisting conditions and who have chronic diseases. That is how the system works. What my colleague, Mr. Upton, is proposing today unravels that system. Make no mistake about it. If we continue to allow private insurance companies to sell policies that discriminate against women, that set annual caps and lifetime caps, if we continue to allow all of those practices that 80 percent to 90 percent of Americans say they want in their health care system, then that risk pool goes away, rates go sky high, and you will have raised premiums for every American in this country. I say to my colleagues, there are unforeseen circumstances we knew would come up in this bill. I led the charge in my caucus. I told my caucus if the President doesn't come up with a fix, if our leadership doesn't have an alternative solution to this, many of us would consider voting for the Upton bill, as bad as it is, because it undermines the health care bill. The good news is the President has responded. We will have a motion to recommit today that responds, and I want to make it clear that there is nothing in the Upton bill that mandates insurance companies to do this. This is a shallow bill. In the end, let me just say, my friends, have some credibility. You introduced 102 bills, and you never put one of them on the floor for a vote. So don't pretend you care about the American people's health care here. You are just trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Democrats are not going to let you do that.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, one of my constituents, Jeanne Stoner, is retiring this month from her position as Assistant Vice Chancellor at the University of Pittsburgh, after a long and productive career at this highly respected institution. I want to take this opportunity to recognize all the outstanding work that Jeanne has done to help the University of Pittsburgh and our community throughout her career. Jeanne was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. She earned a number of academic degrees, including a bachelor of arts degree, summa cum laude from Clarke College in Dubuque, Iowa, a master of arts degree in English Language and Literature from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. After law school, Jeanne went to work as an associate attorney for the Pittsburgh law firm of Thomson, Rhodes and Cowie, and she's lived there ever since. For the last 25 years, Jeanne has worked for the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. Her first position was as the Director of Federal Government Relations for the UPMC Health System from 1989-1998. In 1999, she was appointed to be the Corporate Secretary for UPMC. In January 2000, Jeanne moved from UPMC to Pitt to become the University's Director of Federal Government Relations, and she was subsequently named Assistant Vice Chancellor and Associate General Counsel. In each of these positions, Jeanne worked diligently on the University's behalf, addressing whatever issues came across her desk with dedication and professionalism. Jeanne also served on many committees for various higher education professional organizations including the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities and the Association of American Universities. In 2009, in recognition of her many contributions to higher education, Jeanne was awarded the Carolyn Cross Distinguished Service Award from the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities' Council on Government Affairs. Jeanne and her husband Bill have 4 children and 7 grandchildren, and she is an active member of the St. Thomas More Parish in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. I have known and worked with Jeanne for most of her time at Pitt and UPMC on a number of public policy and community-related issues. Consequently, I can say from personal experience what a warm, gracious, intelligent, and skilled professional she is. She always had Pittsburgh's best interests at heart. It's been a great pleasure to work with her over the years, and her retirement will put a big dent in the University's institutional memory. I have been privileged to know Jeanne and work with her over the many years that I've served in Congress. She has applied great intelligence, energy, and dedication on behalf of both Pitt and Pittsburgh. I want to thank her for her many contributions to our community, congratulate her on the occasion of her retirement, and wish her the best as she begins the next phase of her life.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. I thank my colleague from California and my colleagues from New York and Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, many of us that you will see on the floor tonight, we are not regulars, we are not people that come to the floor often to speak. But I think many of us feel it is important for the American people to understand the nature of this task, this battle, that we face on their behalf. We hear a lot from Republicans about the President not wanting to negotiate, not wanting to talk. The Democrats don't want to negotiate. They have been pretty good at saying that over and over and over again, Mr. Speaker. But what they are not telling the American people is the nature of the negotiation that they want to have. I think it is important that that be revealed. What makes me so angry--and the reason I am here tonight--is what we face in the country right now is completely a manufactured crisis. There is no structural economic reason that our country should be facing default come the 17th of this month. There is no reason that 800,000 Federal employees aren't working. There is no reason for this to happen. This is being manufactured by a party because they are trying to get something that they have not been able to get at the ballot box. We have divided government. The Republicans control the House of Representatives, the Senate is controlled by the Democratic party, we have a Democratic President. The Republicans had two goals going into this manufactured crisis. One was to destroy the health care bill. Now, this is a bill that passed the House of Representatives, it passed the Senate, it was signed by the President, it was upheld by the Supreme Court. We had a Presidential election and their candidate said on day one of his new administration the first thing he would do if elected was to repeal the Affordable Care Act. That gentleman lost by 5 million votes. What they can't accomplish at the ballot box they now were looking for a way to accomplish here. But it couldn't be done through the regular process, Mr. Speaker. It couldn't be done through the regular order. So now comes this ingenious idea, hatched by the Tea Party wing of the Republican Party, to say: Here is what we will do. We will wait until the end of the fiscal year to come, and we will say we are going to shut the government down unless you repeal ObamaCare. I was on this floor a couple of days ago and read something on the floor that I saw on the Internet by a young man by the name of Judd Legum. I hope I have said his last name correctly. He put an analogy about what we were actually facing. He said it is sort of like if someone comes up to you and says, I want to burn down your house, and you look at the guy and you say, no. And he says, well, I just want to burn down the second floor, and you tell him, no. And he goes, well, what about your garage, can I burn your garage down? And you say, no. And the guy says, well, let's just sit down and talk about what part of your house I can burn down, and you look at the guy and you say, no. And he goes, you see, you're not compromising. This is what we are facing in this so-called ``rigged'' negotiation. What Republicans are saying is, defund ObamaCare, we will open up the government. We said, no. Then they said, we will delay ObamaCare for a year and we will open up the government, and we said, no. Then they said, well, just get rid of that individual mandate--which effectively kills the health care bill--and we said, no. Then they said, well, will you just sit down and negotiate with us and tell us what part of the Affordable Care Act we can get rid of, and we said, there are 20 million Americans that are counting on this bill, it is the law of the land, the answer is no. And they look at us and say, the Democrats don't want to negotiate; the President doesn't want to negotiate. Well, I got news for my friends over there: we are not going to negotiate the rights of 20 million uninsured Americans because they can't get this done at the ballot box. So now, Mr. Speaker, what is the new strategy? They have shifted off of the health care bill now because the American public, by margins of over 70 percent, have said we don't want you to shut the government down to try to get rid of the Affordable Care Act. So now where have they moved? To the Ryan budget. What is the Ryan budget? It is a budget that keeps us in sequester, it is a budget that does not invest in our infrastructure, it is a budget that does not invest in the education of our children, it is a budget that makes it impossible for this economy to grow, and it is a budget that threatens the social safety net that many of our senior citizens depend on. They couldn't get it passed in the regular order. They couldn't get it passed in their own House of Representatives for a long time. They were afraid to put the bill on the floor. They certainly couldn't get it passed in the Senate, and they knew the President wouldn't sign it. So what is the strategy now? This new rigged negotiation that we are being asked to have with our friends is: Give us pieces of the Ryan budget, and in return we will open up the government and we will raise the debt ceiling, but only if you give us what we want in the Ryan budget. Mr. Speaker, we want to have a budget negotiation with our friends on the Republican side. The House has passed a budget, the Senate has passed a budget. The numbers--there is a great disparity in the numbers. Democrats believe in investing in America. We want to rebuild our roads and bridges and sewer systems. We want to invest in the education of our children. We want to protect our seniors and our veterans. It costs money to do that, Mr. Speaker, so there is a difference. But we are ready and we are willing to appoint conferees tomorrow to sit down and have a negotiation. I want the American public to understand that we have asked 18 times to appoint conferees to negotiate the differences in the Senate budget and the House budget, and all 18 times the Republicans in the House have said no. So, Mr. Speaker, I would just say if there's someone in this House that's not willing to negotiate, it's our friends on the Republican side of the aisle. The American people deserve a budget negotiation where we sit down and settle our differences. We're not going to get everything we want, Mr. Speaker; it's divided government. The Republicans are going to get something in this budget negotiation, the Democrats are going to get something in the budget negotiation. But the country moves forward, we pay our bills, and we live to pay another day. In closing, let me say to the American people, we will not be part of a rigged negotiation where Democratic priorities and principles aren't allowed to be discussed, only that which the Republicans couldn't get in the ballot box that they're trying to get now by holding a gun to our head. That's not how you do business in the United States of America. That kind of behavior has to be stopped. Mr. Speaker, for the good of the American people, I hope Republicans will come to their senses, pass a clean CR, and let's sit down and negotiate a budget agreement for the American people and move this country forward. I thank you for yielding me this time.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, we've heard from our Republican colleagues that Democrats don't want to compromise, that the President doesn't want to negotiate. I read something on the Internet this morning that sort of describes the type of negotiation the Republicans want to have with us. It goes something like this: Can I burn down your house? No. How about just the second floor? No. How about the garage? No. Well, let's talk about what I can burn down. No. You're not compromising. Mr. Speaker, this is what we've been going through. You want a budget for 6 weeks? Defund ObamaCare. Delay ObamaCare. Take away the individual mandate from ObamaCare. Or please, just sit down with us and tell us what we can take away from 20 million Americans who need health care, and then we'll reopen the government. Let me say to my colleagues, if you would just stop trying to burn down the house, we can talk.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to remove my name as a cosponsor of H.R. 693.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commend the long service of Mr. Bernard M. Luketich as National President of the Croatian Fraternal Union, which is headquartered in Pittsburgh. Since its founding in 1894, the Croatian Fraternal Union has grown with the Croatian community in the United States. It is estimated that 30,000 Croatian Americans currently live in the Greater Pittsburgh area, and I am very happy to represent many of our local Croatian Americans in the U.S. Congress. The Croatian Fraternal Union has provided much-needed insurance, investment, and social services for its members since its inception and has helped many Croatian Americans establish successful families and communities over the past 100+ years. The Croatian Fraternal Union also ardently supported the Republic of Croatia's establishment as a stable democratic and free market-oriented nation-state as a result of the devolution of the Soviet Union and the Balkan Wars in the 1990s. The CFU was instrumental in developing American support as a founding member of and in steady concert with the National Federation of Croatian Americans for the new Republic's full accession into western multilateral organizations. This includes full membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO, in early 2009 and the European Union on July 1, 2013. This year, Mr. Luketich was re-elected to serve his 35th year as President of the CFU, the largest and oldest Croatian American organization in the United States. I would like to congratulate Bernie for his 35 years of strong leadership as President of the Croatian Fraternal Union. As we all know, the president of any organization cannot do it alone. It is important to also to note the contributions of his long-time senior staff at the Pittsburgh headquarters--Executive Assistant/Editor Lorraine Turkall, Secretary/Treasurer Ed Pazo, VP Franjo Bertovic, VP George Pavlecic, Editor Ivan Begg, and CFU Board of Trustees President Bernadette Luketich Sikaras. Mr. Speaker, I submit a June 5th article on Bernie Luketich's career that appeared in the Croatian American community's premier ethnic newspaper, the ``Zajednicar.'' Mr. Speaker, congratulations again to Bernie for his steady leadership and service to his diaspora community and to our United States. [From the Zajednicar, June 5, 2013] Bernard M. Luketich--Celebrating 35 Years as National President of the Croatian Fraternal Union of America A record-setting milestone was achieved on June 1, 2013 as CFU National President Bernard M. Luketich began his 35th anniversary year serving as National President at the helm of the Croatian Fraternal Union of America. Consecutively elected as National President since the 1979 CFU National Convention, President Luketich is currently serving his ninth full term as president of the Society. Prior to becoming National President on June 1, 1978, Luketich had served as a Member of the Society's National Administration in various capacities, beginning with his election to the National Board of Trustees at the 1959 CFU National Convention held at Detroit, Michigan. The son of Emma and Ivan Luketic, Bernard Luketich was born and raised in Cokeburg, Pennsylvania. His father, Ivan, emigrated from the village of Zagorje, Ogulin, Croatia and settled in Cokeburg where he found work in the Pennsylvania coal mines. A coal miner himself in his youth, Bernard Luketich carried his family values and love for his Croatian ancestry to become a leader of the largest Croatian fraternal organization outside of the old homeland. Recognized as the ``Founding Father'' of the CFU Junior Cultural Federation, President Luketich counts this youth cultural program among his proudest achievements since it perpetuates Croatian identity and heritage among CFU children and young adults. In addition to the annual Junior Tamburitza Festivals, President Luketich was further instrumental in initiating the annual CFU Adult Tamburitza Festivals, both cultural events which have flourished over the years to promote Croatian tamburitza music throughout the United States and Canada. Interested in Croatian activities at a young age, Bernard Luketich became a member of the Croatian Fraternal Union in 1932. He was elected President of his local CFU Lodge 354 at Cokeburg, Pennsylvania at the age of 16 and has served in that capacity since that time. Luketich established the St. George Junior Tamburitzans of Lodge 354 in 1950 and later organized the St. George Adult Tamburitzans of Lodge 354 in which he currently participates as an active tamburitzan. President Luketich has been the recipient of numerous prestigious awards, including the Redom Hrvatskog Pletera in 1996, the Redom Danice Hrvatske s Likom Katarine Zrinske in 1998, both bestowed upon him by the late Croatian President Dr. Franjo Tudjman, and the Red Kneza Trpimira s Ogrlicom i Danicom in 2003, presented to him by former Croatian President Stjepan Mesic. Without question, Bernard Luketich has been the driving force in promoting Fraternal Unity among the CFU Membership and is the identifiable face of the Croatian Fraternal Union who has been instrumental in making our Fraternal Organization what it is today. Bernard Luketich, along with his wife, Martha, and their family, continue to make their home in the small mining town of Cokeburg, PA. The full legacy of National President Luketich is yet to be written but we can continue to expect great things from Bernard M. Luketich as he greets his 35th Presidential Year with the same pride that he has espoused since first becoming a member of our Fraternal Society. His lifelong passion remains the principles, programs and benefits of the CFU and the preservation of Croatian heritage, culture and identity. ``Zivio!'', President Luketich!

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. First off, I want to thank my good friend Joe Barton--he is my good friend--for a good game last night. I can't really single out individuals. This was a team effort on the Democratic side. Our team had 24 hits and no errors in the field. Cedric Richmond normally strikes out a lot of batters, and, last year, Cedric had 16 strikeouts. For the first five innings, Cedric didn't strike out a single batter. We had 15 putouts in the field. When you hit the ball, we fielded it, and we made the throws to first, and we made the plays. It was the best team effort that I've seen out of the Democratic side in the 19 years I've been associated with the game, and I want to congratulate my team. As my good friend Joe Barton knows, the real winners of this game are three charities. We broke a record this year. We raised $300,000 for our charities--the Washington Boys & Girls Club, the Washington Literacy Council, and the Dream Foundation, which is going to help children in the Seventh Ward in Washington, D.C. This is going to be a great program for the kids--for boys and girls to learn baseball, but also to learn more important things in after-school learning centers and the like. So, to the charities--the real winners of this game--congratulations. This is a great tradition that helps bring us together. I can tell you that the members of the Republican baseball team are friends of ours, and we enjoy the camaraderie and the game every year, and we look forward to it again next year.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Builders Association of Metropolitan Pittsburgh, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary of serving the region's housing needs tonight. The Builders Association of Metropolitan Pittsburgh--``BAMP''--is one of the oldest builders associations in the country. Founded in 1938 by a group of South Hills builders as the Home Builders Association of Allegheny County, it has grown to serve the home building and related industries in all the counties of southwestern Pennsylvania. BAMP was a founding member of a group of local associations that established the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) in 1942, and the Pennsylvania Builders Association (PBA) in 1952. BAMP members, past and present, have a long history of service to the home building industry and its trade association at the local, state and national levels. It boasts the only member from Pennsylvania to have ever served as President of NAHB--J. Roger Glunt in 1993--who was also inducted as a member of the National Housing Hall of Fame. Several of its others members have served as president of the state association as well as on state and national governmental agencies of importance to housing. Even more are leaders in the communities in which they build and live, in my district in Southwestern Pennsylvania. Many of today's members are second, third and, in some instances, fourth generation home builders and tradesmen. In service to their community, members of BAMP give individually and collectively in an effort to improving our community and helping our neighbors in need. BAMP has organized countless community service projects throughout its 75 years of existence, lending its members' expertise to building or repairing community assets as well as helping to improve homes for citizens in need of assistance. I wish to congratulate them on their 75th anniversary.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate the Girls of Steel robotics team on winning the Engineering Inspiration Award at the 2013 Pittsburgh Regional F.I.R.S.T. Robotics Competition. This is the second year in a row in which they have won the Engineering Inspiration Award. This prestigious award, which recognizes the team's outstanding efforts to advance respect for the engineering profession, also qualified the team to compete at the F.I.R.S.T. Championship in St. Louis for the third year in a row. The championship is the final and largest competition of the robotics season and features teams from across the world. F.I.R.S.T., which stands for ``For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology,'' is an organization dedicated to introducing our youth to the world of science and technology. This year alone, hundreds of thousands of students are gaining practical, team-based engineering experiences by participating in F.I.R.S.T. As a founder and co-chair of the Congressional Robotics Caucus, I think competitions such as these are outstanding tools for getting students interested in careers in science, technology, engineering, and math. I believe our nation's future economic growth and prosperity depends upon getting young people interested and engaged in scientific pursuits, and I want to commend organizations like F.I.R.S.T. for the important work they do in that regard. The F.I.R.S.T Robotics Competition instills a sense of pride in the individuals who participate in it and allows them to apply their natural creativity in the demanding and competitive field of robotics. The Girls of Steel team is made up of 40 young women from high schools in and around the Pittsburgh area. In recognition of their hard work, intelligence, and teamwork, I want to mention each of these inspiring young ladies by name. They are Sonia Appasamy, Katie Ashwood, Tammy Bevilacqua, Elizabeth Bianchini, Britt Bovbjerg, Aaminah Bray, Grace Brueggman, Dakota Calvert, Abby Ceraso, Tristan Close-Abuyen, Claudia Contreras, Laurel Donatelli, Samantha Eppinger, Clarisa Espinoza-Delgado, Mackenzie Ferris, Naoka Gunawardena, Heather Harrington, Rosanne Harrison, Kathryn Hendrickson, Imani Horton, Campbell Konrad, Elizabeth Kysel, Sylvie Lee, Sophia Lee, Shana Leshko, Pragna Mannam, Genevieve Nieson, Raina Oravec, Simran Parwani, Korryn Resetar, Kaylyn Rocher, Alex Roth, Rachel Round, Katie Shreve, Lynn Urbina, Molly Urbina, Bryce Volk, Becca Volk, Giulia Watkins, and Natalie Young. I also want to mention that one of the Girls of Steel--Naoka Gunawardena from The Ellis School--was one of two students at the Pittsburgh Regional who won the prestigious F.I.R.S.T. Dean's List Award, which recognizes student leaders who are outstanding at pursuing and achieving F.I.R.S.T.'s ideals. I also want to express my appreciation to the staff of the Carnegie Mellon University Field Robotics Center, which has mentored the Girls of Steel. As a result of their efforts, more young women are gaining real-world technological experiences which will certainly aid them in the future. I congratulate the Girls of Steel and wish them continued success in their academic and professional pursuits.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the Patients' Rights Repeal Act. Today is actually an embarrassment. Today, for the 37th time, we vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act--a messaging vote that is surely dead on arrival when it reaches the Senate. I would say to my good friend from Texas, you can repeal it in this House 37 more times, and it's going to be just as dead when it gets over to the Senate. This is a waste of our time. A CBS analysis last year said that Congress spent 80 hours--2 full weeks of work--on repeal votes that cost the taxpayers $48 million. Bryce Covert and Adam Peck of Think Progress estimated that, since then, we've spent an additional $6 million, bringing the total to $55 million on 37 symbolic votes to repeal the Affordable Care Act and waste our time here on the floor of the Congress. Just think what we could have done with $55 million. We could make sure college students have access to Federal work study grants. We could keep low-income kids in preschool. Quit wasting the taxpayers' money and this Congress' time. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, May 14 marks the first annual Childhood Apraxia of Speech Day, a day to raise national awareness about Childhood Apraxia of Speech, a particularly difficult, persistent, and severe speech disorder in youngsters. Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) causes children to have extreme difficulty planning and producing the precise, highly refined and specific series of movements of the tongue, lips, jaw, and palate that are necessary for the production of proper speech. It is among the most severe of speech and communication problems in children. While the act of learning to speak comes effortlessly to most children, those with apraxia endure an incredible and lengthy struggle. Although not life threatening it is life altering as families are left to cope with the emotional, physical, and financial challenges of having a child diagnosed with CAS. Every child should be afforded their best opportunity to develop speech. With early intervention and appropriate therapy, most children with CAS will learn to communicate with their very own voices. These children, as well as their families, deserve our highest respect for their effort, determination and resilience in the face of such obstacles. The Childhood Apraxia of Speech Association of North America (CASANA) offers information and support related to CAS on its website, www.apraxia-kids.org. Let's use Childhood Apraxia Day to raise awareness about CAS and support the goals of Better Hearing and Speech Month.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the artistic ability of a young woman from my Congressional District, Stephanie Taylor from South Allegheny High School. Ms. Taylor is the winner of the 2013 14th Congressional District of Pennsylvania's High School Art Competition, ``An Artistic Discovery.'' Ms. Taylor's artwork, an acrylic painting entitled ``My Artistic Discovery: Mona and Me'' was selected from a number of outstanding entries to this year's competition. In fact, 58 works from twelve different schools in Pennsylvania's 14th Congressional District were submitted to our panel of respected local artists. It's a real tribute to her skill and vision that her work was chosen as the winner of this year's competition. I am certain that Ms. Taylor's family is proud of her artistic talents and this impressive accomplishment, but perhaps her selection as the winner won't surprise them. Stephanie has received one of the top five awards for 4 years in a row! Last year, she received fifth place for her oil painting ``Shades of Green''. Two years ago, she took Second Place, and in 2010 her painting was the winner. Stephanie has a tremendous amount of artistic talent, and I hope that she'll continue painting after she graduates from high school. Ms. Taylor's artwork will represent the 14th Congressional District of Pennsylvania in the national exhibit of high school students' artwork that will be displayed in the United States Capitol over the coming year. I encourage my colleagues as well as any visitor to Capitol Hill to view Ms. Taylor's artwork, along with the winning entries from the high school art contests held in other Congressional Districts, which will be on display in the Capitol tunnel. It is amazing to walk through this corridor and see the interpretation of life through the eyes of these young artists from all across our country. Miranda McCully from Springdale High School was awarded second place for her graphite drawing ``Breaking Free.'' Reanna Buzza from Springdale High School received third place for her graphite drawing entitled ``Koala in Tree.'' Candice Kubican from Highlands High School was awarded fourth place for her marker composition ``Frederick the Frog,'' and Ashley Guillary, also from Highlands High School, received the fifth place award for her silk painting ``Pittsburgh.'' In addition, Honorable Mention Awards were presented to works by Cassandra Finnegan of Springdale High School, Sarah Welsh of Baldwin High School, Elif Kizilkaya of the Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts School, Elizabeth Schaap of Brentwood High School, Dakotah Yaworski of Highlands High School, John Karp of Penn Hills High School, Roomel Reese of Penn Hills, Stephanie Taylor of South Allegheny High School, Kattie Jones of Brentwood High School, Emily Cotter of Springdale High School, Perri Murray of the Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts School, and Samantha Reiss of Sto-Rox High School. I would like to recognize all of the participants in this year's 14th Congressional District High School Art Competition, ``An Artistic Discovery:'' from Highlands High School, Meagan Ekas, Ashley Guillary, Candice Kubican, Katherine McDonough, Cassie Olszewski, and Dakotah Yaworski; from East Allegheny High School, Adam Jacko, Shannon Nelis, and Thomas Randall; from Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, Evalynn Farkas, Alexia Janikowski, Pheobe Kristek, Rebecca Rodgers, Rachael Sarnowski, and Heidi Langhorst; from the Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts School, Lauren Brown, Maeve Gannon, Elif Kizilkaya, Adam Linn, Ethan Michaels, Perri Murray, and Arianna Williams; From Baldwin High School, Joseph Esposito, Alicia Mastroianni, Kayla Munizza, and Sarah Welsh; from Springdale High School, Reanna Buzza, Emily Cotter, Cassandra Finnegan, Sam Hieber, Miranda McCully, and Skylar Siciliano; from Penn Hills High School, John Karp, Witney Larko, Tyler Madden, Nevia Orsini, Roomel Reese, and Hamilton Rodkey; from Brentwood High School, Sydney Bauer, Kattie Jones, Samanta Sauro, Elizabeth Schaap, Shelby Stockline, and Taiyu Wang; from Riverview High School, Chandler Fescemyer and Jake Morgan; from Sto-Rox High School, Keirstin Bopp, Adam Gilchrist, Alanna Molter, Katelyn Parker, Samantha Reiss, and Cheyenne Simmons; from Woodland Hills High School, Brandywine Dugan, Miranda Miller, and La'tosha DeMaris Milton, and from South Allegheny High School, Amy Underwood and Stephanie Taylor. I would like to thank these impressive young artists for allowing us to share and celebrate their talents, imagination, and creativity. The efforts of these students in expressing themselves in a powerful and positive manner are no less than spectacular. I hope that all of these individuals continue to utilize their artistic talents, and I wish them all the best of luck in their future endeavors.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask my colleagues to join me in congratulating the Clairton Bears on another perfect high school football season and their fourth consecutive PIAA Class A state championship victory. The Bears now have 63 straight wins after their victory in Hershey, PA, giving them the longest winning streak in all of high school, collegiate, and professional football. It is also the longest such streak in Pennsylvania history. Both the players and the coaches put in years of hard work that led to this sustained success on the field, and in their success they have brought hope to the town and the region. Tom Nola has now served as the team's head coach for 11 years, and he is assisted by coaches Tim Bukowski, Jim Dumm, Eric Fusco, Marc Gambino, Wayne Wade, Jr., and Remondo Williams, Sr. The team was led by sixteen seniors--Tyus Booker, Santeaun Sims, Bryon Clifford, Terrish Webb, Titus Howard, Nick Boswell, Vinny Moody, Robert Boatwright, Armani Ford, Tyler Boyd, Sedrick Nash, Devonte Harvey, Damond Flowers, Jordan Gressem, Kyuss Jeter, and Garret Santoline. In addition, the team included a number of underclassmen--JoJuan Bray, Ryan Williams, Tyreike Hammonds, Khalil Berry, Aaron Matthews, Vance Allen, Esaias Hammons, Brandon Murphy, James Hines, Deven Fritz, Demar Bell, Jjuan Jackson, Brian Brown, Raymone Clifford, Josh Wilson, Dryan Davenport, Vance Gibson, Israel Melvin, Will Hampton, Jhsia Miles, Devondre Brown, Jayll Hall, Carlito Spence, and Allen Norris. The Clairton Bears continue to make Pittsburgh proud through the high standard of athletic excellence they have brought to the gridiron. Clairton has a rich history of perseverance and hard work, and the Bears continue to build on that legacy. I give them my hearty congratulations, and I wish them all the best as they look to dive deeper into the record books next season.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate and recognize the Pittsburghers who competed in the 2012 London Olympic Games. We are proud in Pittsburgh to be a city of champions with deep-rooted team spirit and winning traditions. These Olympians have reached the pinnacle of accomplishment in their sports, and today I would like to salute their unyielding pursuit of excellence. These hometown heroes embody the ambition, resilience, courage, and dogged work ethic that the people of Western Pennsylvania deeply admire. I would like to individually recognize each of these outstanding athletes. Cassidy Krug attended Montour High School and Stanford University, where she was unbeaten in diving dual meet competitions. The NCAA champion, three time All-American, and 10-time national champion was coached by both of her parents--her father, the head diving coach at the University of Pittsburgh and her mother, a coach at the Pitt Aquatic Club team. She briefly retired before making a comeback to compete in diving in London, coming in 7th in the women's 3m springboard. She now plans to pursue a career in writing. Trevor Barron of Bethel Park, a race-walking prodigy, studies computer science at Colorado College. He started suffering seizures from epilepsy at age 8 and underwent multiple brain surgeries to overcome them. Thankfully, he is now seizure-free, and throughout the trying episodes, Barron exhibited an extraordinary zeal to achieve greatness. Barron won the U.S. National Junior Olympics every year from 2003 to 2006. He set the American record in the men's 20,000 meter race-walk at the 2012 Olympic trials. He finished 26th in London setting an American record in the event. Allison Schmitt, two-time Olympian and six-time Olympic medalist hails from the city of Pittsburgh. She took bronze in the 4x200 meter freestyle relay at her Olympic debut in Beijing. This time around she swam the anchor leg in two relays bringing home the bronze in the 4x100 meter freestyle relay and the gold in the 4x100 meter medley relay. She also won silver in the 400 meter freestyle and gold in the 200 meter freestyle. Schmitt, known for her fun-loving nature and infectious positive attitude, is headed back to the University of Georgia for her senior year. Swin Cash of McKeesport helped the U.S. basketball team to its fifth straight gold medal at the Olympics. The team is on a 41-game winning streak in the Olympics, usually winning by nearly 30 point margins. Cash played basketball for UConn, leading the Huskies to National Championships in 2000 and 2002, when she was named the Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four. The second pick in the 2002 WNBA draft, she was selected by the Detroit Shock, and led the team to its first WNBA Championship the following year. This is her second gold at the Olympics, as she also played on the 2004 U.S. team in Athens. Cash has graciously given back to the community in McKeesport through her charity ``Cash for Kids'' which uses sports and cultural activities to encourage kids to ``get in the game'' on and off the court. Jake Herbert graduated from North Allegheny High School in Pittsburgh. The two-time NCAA Champion studied communications at Northwestern University, where he was the best wrestler in the school's history. Herbert posted a perfect 34-0 record in his final season and a 149-4 career record, the fifth best percentage in NCAA history. He was a recipient of college wrestling's top honor, the Hodge Trophy. Herbert went on to win silver at the 2009 World Championships and to compete at the London Olympics, where he just missed out in the repechage on a shot at the bronze medal match. This fierce competitor sported a hefty fan club of about 65 friends and family members waving terrible towels in the crowd. Amanda Polk grew up in Pittsburgh and graduated from Oakland Catholic High School, where she first began rowing. She studied biochemistry at the University of Notre Dame where she was part of the first NCAA team bid in the team's history and was a four time All-American. Polk took silver in the four at the 2009 World Championhips, then won gold in the eight in 2010 and 2011. She recently won gold and set a world best time in the women's eight at the 2012 World Rowing Cup in Lucerne. Polk has consistently been a strong part of the eight that is dominating women's rowing and she was an alternate in London. Unbeaten since 2006, the women were golden again in London, successfully defending their title from Beijing and solidifying what Polk's teammate, Susan Francia, has rightfully dubbed an ``American Dynasty.'' Lauren Crandall grew up in Doylestown, PA and went to school in North Allegheny. She was first named to the U.S. National field hockey team when she was a sophomore at Wake Forest. In 2006, Crandall was named the ACC Tournament Most Valuable Player. A veteran of the international field hockey scene, she has 173 international caps, or tournament appearances, which is the second most on the team. Now a two-time Olympian, she helped the team to an 8th place finish in Beijing and captained Team USA in London to come in 12th place. Crandall is going to DeVry University to pursue a master's degree in public administration with a concentration on non-profit organizations. Christa Harmotto was originally recruited to play volleyball from a 6th grade gym glass. She went on to play at Hopewell High School and then at Penn State where she studied education. She and her team won national titles in 2007 and 2008 and she ended her career with a .433 career hitting percentage, the second best in NCAA history. Harmotto played basketball abroad professionally, where she sharpened her skills gearing up for the Games and now she has a silver medal from the London Olympics indoor volleyball competition to show for it. She plans to continue playing and training for Rio in 2016. Lauryn Williams, a track and field star, was born in Pittsburgh. Williams studied finance at the University of Miami, where she was the 2004 NCAA Champion at the 100 meter. A three-time World Champion, Williams took home the silver medal in the 100 meter at the 2004 Games and came in fourth in the event in 2008. She competed in the 4x100 meter relay in Beijing but an incomplete pass of the baton put the team out of medal contention. In London, Williams ran the anchor leg of the women's 4x100 meter in the qualification round, and the team went on to win gold in event. Williams aims to finish 100 meter races in under 11 seconds. Every time she goes ``sub 11,'' she has pledged to give out a $1000 scholarship to a female athlete in her senior year of high school. The 2006 Visa Humanitarian of the Year, she is deeply invested in her community as part of USA Track and Field's ``Be a Champion'' community outreach, through volunteering with hearing impaired elementary school students, and through her female athlete scholarship fund. I applaud all of these extraordinary athletes for their unbreakable spirits, their indomitable will to win, and their thrilling achievements. Training involves serious sacrifices. These athletes put in the work day in and day out, then they put it all on the line on the world stage with gutsy performances full of heart. I want to commend their family and friends who have supported their Olympic dreams and helped them keep striving to be stronger, get faster, and reach farther. And to these Olympians, I want to wish you a hearty congratulations and I want you to know that we in Pittsburgh are proud of yinz!

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. The bill before us today is the result of efforts from both sides of the aisle to find a solution that really works for industry, government, and our environment. Currently, the Department of Energy has the authority to issue a ``must-run'' order to a power provider in emergency cases to protect grid reliability. At the same time, environmental laws and regulations could prohibit a company from complying with a DOE must-run order. So a company is left in the position of choosing which law it violates-- environmental rules or an emergency order from the Department of Energy. In fact, Mr. Speaker, this has happened in the past. During the California energy crisis, and as recently as 2005 in Virginia, a company was issued emergency orders by the Department of Energy. To comply with those orders, the company was temporarily in noncompliance with environmental law. Therefore, after complying with an emergency must-run order, the company was both fined and forced to settle a citizen lawsuit. If it happens once, twice, or 50 times, it will never be proper for the Federal Government to put a company in the position of choosing which law to violate. Reliability concerns for our electric grid are real, and power plant retirements are being announced nearly every week. In June, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation issued their summer reliability assessment. They told us that reserves in Texas are coming up short to meet peak demand and that the California reserve margin will be extremely tight. So this bill will fix a clear conflict in Federal laws with a narrow, targeted approach. This bill will ensure that the Department of Energy will have the ability to keep the lights on while still protecting the environment. The bill before us simply clarifies that if an emergency order issued pursuant to section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act may result in such a conflict with an environmental law or regulation, it shall expire not later than 90 days after issuance. This is to ensure that DOE continues to have the necessary authority to ``keep the lights on'' in true emergencies. It then gives DOE the opportunity to renew or reissue such an order for an additional 90-day period after consulting with the appropriate Federal agencies and including conditions submitted by such agencies to mitigate adverse environmental impacts. DOE may exclude a recommended condition from the order if it determines the condition would prevent the order from adequately addressing the emergency. Mr. Speaker, this bill is the result of many months of work with members on both sides of the Energy and Commerce Committee. It is supported by both the chairman and the ranking member of the committee. And I ask my colleagues to support it also. I want to thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Olson). It has been a pleasure to work with him on this piece of legislation. It is my hope that all our colleagues also support this legislation. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to now yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene Green), a valuable member of our Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, we have no further speakers, and at this time I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Speaker, I want to add my support for this important resolution to safeguard the Internet from government control. I'd like to thank my friend and colleague, Mary Bono Mack, and my other colleagues from the Energy and Commerce Committee for introducing this measure, and I was delighted to become an original cosponsor. This bipartisan resolution sends a clear message to the United Nations. It tells the International Telecommunication Union, which is the U.N. arm handling telecommunications issues, not to adopt regulations that would make it easier for governments to exercise tracking, surveillance, or censorship online. The Internet has developed into the revolutionary medium it is today because decisions over the structure of the Internet have been made by nongovernmental, expert organizations. These groups invite the participation of a number of stakeholders from academia, the private sector, public interests, and other experts, and they've done a good job of avoiding a lot of the political interference. At a time when some governments have actively been blocking users from accessing certain Web sites online, I am glad to see my colleagues unite against such repressive actions and in support of Internet freedom. Opposition to Internet censorship has always been a very bipartisan issue. I want to make that clear because sometimes this issue gets confused with other policy issues like net neutrality. Some of my colleagues have argued that net neutrality supporters somehow favor Internet censorship. I believe that users should be able to surf the Internet however they want to without being blocked from certain Web sites or services, which is what net neutrality is all about as well, so I think opposing censorship and favoring net neutrality go hand in hand. Mr. Speaker, I am glad to see this resolution move forward in a bipartisan fashion. I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. DOYLE

Mr. DOYLE. Mr. Chairman, you all know that last night was the 51st annual Congressional Quarterly-Roll Call baseball game for charity, and I'm pleased to inform the House this morning that the Democratic team won 18-5 last night. Mr. Chairman, there are 21 outs in the game we play because we only play seven innings. Cedric Richmond struck out 16 batters, so he didn't leave much work for our infield. It's my understanding that if the Republicans should win the Presidency, that Cedric is going to be offered a Cabinet position just to get him out of here. Other notables, Cedric also came within about 3 feet of hitting one out of the park at National Field, too. Ben Chandler also had a fantastic game for our team as co-MVP. But, Mr. Chairman, the real winner last night was the Boys and Girls Club of Washington, D.C. and the Washington Literacy Council. This was a record year for the congressional baseball game. We came close to raising, for the first time ever, almost a quarter of a million dollars for the charities. I want to congratulate my good friend and Republican manager, Joe Barton, on a hard-fought game. I can tell you, as someone who has played in the game for 18 years now, I've been part of the highs and part of the lows. I know what it's like to be on both ends of a winning and losing ball game. But the Republicans were game opponents. They came out there, and they did their best last night; but we were just a little bit better than them. And now I yield to my good friend, Joe Barton.