Peter Fitzgerald

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I yield the remainder of my time to the occupant of the chair, Senator Voinovich from Ohio. (Mr. FITZGERALD assumed the chair.) Elections in the Balkans

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I express my appreciation to all the Members of this distinguished body and, in particular, our Senate leaders on both sides of the aisle for the opportunity they have given me over the last couple days to speak to a matter of great importance, in my mind, a matter which, though it concerns only a relatively small portion of the Interior conference committee report that is before the Senate, I think nonetheless is a matter that goes to the heart of the Government's appropriations process. I want to review and describe the filibuster I have conducted since about 2 days ago. It has had four major parts. First, I explained the project about which I was concerned: The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library to be built in Springfield, IL. This is a project I support, and I am working to help make sure the project is adequately funded over the next couple years in the Senate. Second, I explained our insistence on Federal competitive bidding and described the bill the Senate supported which detailed the competitive bid provision. This body, on its own, when focused on the narrow issue of whether the Federal funding the Congress is approving for the Abraham Lincoln Library would require that the project be competitively bid in accordance with Federal bidding guidelines, all Members from all 50 States, agreed that the Federal competitive bid guidelines should be attached. However, the Interior conference committee report that is before us has stripped out that competitive bidding requirement, and since the project now is in the heart of this Appropriations Committee report, which has many other projects and appropriations for programs and Departments of the Federal Government all over the country, it is now in a bill that will no doubt pass the Senate. Third, I compared the State versus the Federal procurement process and procedure. Finally, I gave the context in which these concerns arise. I read a series of articles from publications from throughout the State of Illinois that discussed, first, the various contexts in which the issues of competitive bidding have come up in the State of Illinois and, second, the potential for insider abuse when there are not tight requirements that competitive bidding be applied to a government construction project or a government lease or to practically any kind of project in which the Federal or State government is involved. It has been my effort to make the best possible case that Federal competitive bidding rules should be attached to the Lincoln Library. I began by reviewing the time line of this project. This project was first discussed 2 years ago, or more, under the administration of then Gov. Jim Edgar of the State of Illinois. In the first few months of February 1998, Governor Edgar at that time was proposing a $40 million library. Later, we saw how, by March of 1999 in a new administration, the project had grown to a $60 million project. Then we saw how, by April of 1999, they were discussing $148 million project to construct the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in Springfield, IL. Since then, I think the numbers have fallen back down, and we are really talking about a $115 million to $120 million project: $50 million will come from the Federal Government, $50 million will come from the State, and the rest will come from private sources. I also talked about the specific language in the Interior conference committee report that is before us. I noted that that authorization for $50 million in funding, coupled with an appropriation for $10 million that would be distributed in this fiscal year, does not specify who is to get the $50 million authorization. The authorization language does not require that the money be delivered to the State of Illinois. It says the money will be delivered to an entity that will be selected later by the Department of the Interior in consultation with the Governor of the State of Illinois. I have been concerned by the wide open nature of that language. When you think about wording a bill that money will be funneled to an entity that is going to be selected later, we do not know what that entity is. That raises cause for concern. What happens if that money falls outside of the hands of State or Federal officials altogether and is in private hands? Will there be any controls on it at all? I also mentioned that I was concerned, if this money did go to the State of Illinois--it may well go to the State of Illinois--the State would probably hand it over to its Capital Development Board. I noted that the Illinois Capital Development Board, which builds many of the State's buildings, such as prisons, built the State of Illinois Building in the city of Chicago, IL. They have an unusual provision in the general State procurement code, a highly irregular and unusual provision, that allows the Capital Development Board to establish ``by rule construction purchases that may be made without competitive sealed bidding and the most competitive alternate method of source selection that shall be used.'' I pointed out that with this lack of a hard and fast requirement, if the money were to flow to the State of Illinois, and the Capital Development Board were to construct this library, the Capital Development Board, by their own statute, would have the authority to opt out of competitively bidding this project. I do not think a project of any magnitude, paid for by the taxpayers, should be done without competitive bidding. Obviously, there is too much potential for abuse. We want to make sure we get the best value for the taxpayers. It would be irresponsible for the Congress to not require competitive bidding, in my judgment, and not just on a small project but most particularly for a very large project such as this, a $120 million project. I also want to note--to give some scale to the size of a $120 million building--we have some Illinois structures and cost comparisons. The source for this is the State Journal-Register, the newspaper in Springfield, IL, from a May 1, 2000, article. They said that the estimated cost, adjusted for inflation, of building the Illinois State Capitol in today's dollars would be $70 million. So $120 million is much more expensive. The Lincoln Library would be much more expensive than the State capital. There is another building in Springfield that is worth $70 million. That is the Illinois State Revenue Department building, the Willard Ice Building, built in 1981 to 1984. It would probably cost about $70 million to build. That is a huge building. The Prairie Capital Convention Center: It is estimated to have cost $60 million in today's dollars. The Abraham Lincoln Library will be much more expensive than all of these very major buildings in Springfield, IL. On a project of this magnitude, obviously we need to have the construction contracts competitively bid. In discussing the State procurement code, I noted that the State Capital Development Board had the ability to opt out of competitively bidding projects. It was for that reason, when I saw the language of this measure that originally came over to us from the House, I decided we ought to look at attaching tougher guidelines. We compared the State procurement code to the Federal procurement code, and I determined that in order that we not have to worry about the State opting out of competitive bidding, and in order that we not have to worry about some other flaws in the State procurement code, we would instead attach the Federal guidelines. When I was in Springfield as a State senator for 6 years, back in 1997 I voted for the current State procurement code. It is indeed some improvement over the old State procurement laws. Nonetheless, it does have some problems and it could be better. I regret that I missed the loophole that allows the Capital Development Board to opt out of competitively bidding a project. I also discussed, at length, yesterday how the Capital Development Board was sending around a letter saying they would competitively bid this project, no matter what. They also suggested that their rules require them to competitively bid this project. That contention is conclusively demolished by the language of the State statute, which shows that they do not have to competitively bid. They are sending out a letter saying they would competitively bid. Obviously, that does not create a legal requirement. They sent the letter to me. Maybe it creates a contractual obligation to me, but it does not make them legally accountable in the bidding process. How can you hold someone accountable if the code is optional? That is the problem with the State procurement code. Furthermore, I noted, when I had a discussion with Senator Durbin-- he, of course, along with all other Senators in this body, supported the passage of the Senate provision which required competitive bidding in accordance with the Federal guidelines. However, he did raise the question, How would the State be able to adapt itself so it would apply the Federal competitive bidding guidelines? I pointed out that the State code contemplates, in fact, that from time to time Federal guidelines will be attached on grants from the Federal Government and that the State has statutory authority to adopt all its forms and procedures in order to make sure they can comply with guidelines imposed by the Federal Government, much in the same way the State would have to comply with any guidelines the Federal Government gave along with funding for education, for health care for the indigent, for Medicaid dollars, or the like. Absolutely, there is nothing wrong with that, nor is there anything unusual about that. That is why the State contemplates it in its procurement code. I also reviewed, at length, the context in which this debate has occurred. I read a series of articles from publications throughout the State of Illinois into the Record. Those articles discuss the various contexts in which competitive bidding had come up before in the awarding of construction contracts, of leases for State buildings, of licenses for riverboats. I also discussed loans the State had given out back in the early 1980s to build luxury hotels, loans that never were repaid, and it seemed the borrowers had never really been held fully accountable. I told you that from my experience of several years in the Illinois State legislature, I could not casually dismiss this history. It is seared in my memory from many bruising battles I had when I was a State senator in the Illinois State Senate from 1993 to the end of 1998. Finally, we asked the question whether the Lincoln Library is another one of those insider deals, such as the ones we discussed when we read into the Record stories of leases of State buildings to the State in which it seemed the people who owned the property made out real well but the State seemed to be paying very exorbitant rental rates, and also mishaps that we had with construction projects in the past. We described how, with the very lucrative Illinois riverboat licenses, some of which could be worth in the hundreds of millions of dollars each, the minute you got one of those riverboat licenses, you would have the ability to earn in some cases $100 million a year, and that these licenses could be considered extremely valuable. They would probably sell on the open market for many times the amount of annual earnings that would accrue to one of those licenses. We described how those very valuable licenses were given out in the State of Illinois on a no-bid basis for a total consideration of $85,000 apiece. I described how I thought that was wrong, that those licenses, instead of being handed out as political bonbons to connected political insiders who happen to be longtime, big-dollar contributors to both sides of the aisle, that we should not have just given them away like that. They should have been competitively bid, and the people who wanted those lucrative licenses should not have been going through the legislature or through a gaming board made up of officials handpicked by the Governor to see who would become the next multimillionaire in the State of Illinois. Had we had competitive bidding for those riverboat licenses, then we might not have had all the articles written about how it was that only a handful of politically connected people just happened to wind up being the ones who got these phenomenally lucrative gambling licenses. They were lucrative licenses not only because they were gambling licenses but because they were monopoly licenses. There could be only 10 riverboats in the State of Illinois. If there could only be 10 restaurants or 10 hotels in the State of Illinois, then the license to operate one of those restaurants or hotels would be very valuable as well. We reviewed at length all the problems that happened and all the questions that get raised when a governmental body gives out privileges or contracts or leases without tight procedures to make sure that political favoritism does not enter into the equation and without tight guidelines to make sure there is a fair and equitable competitive bidding process. After this whole discussion, in which some names of prominent political people seemed to be coming up again and again and again in many of the articles, we finally arrived at the question, is this Abraham Lincoln Library to be built in Springfield--the construction has not started yet; it is scheduled to start on Lincoln's birthday next year, 2001; they have awarded some architecture and engineering contracts and some design contracts--just another insider deal? We concluded that it may or may not be. We won't know until it is done, until we see how it is done. But we concluded that, clearly, given the whole history of problems we have seen again and again and again in recent State history with the awarding of construction contracts, leases, privileges, licenses, that we ought to do our very best to prevent this project from becoming just one more insider deal. And we noted what a horrible, ugly irony it would be if a monument to ``Honest Abe'' Lincoln, arguably our country's greatest President, wound up having any taint at all. That is what we are seeking to avoid. We should do our very best to prevent it from becoming an insider deal. Moreover, we have many red flags that have to be taken into account. We have the price increases from $40 to $60 to now $120 million. We have the location of the library. The library site has recently been selected. This is a map of Springfield. This is the State Capitol complex. This is where Abraham Lincoln's home is. It is now run by the National Park Service. There is, in fact, an entire neighborhood that has been renovated and kept up to look as we think it looked in the day and age that Abraham Lincoln and his family lived there. This is where the Capital Convention Center is. This is where the Abraham Lincoln Library is now planned. That was the site selected. Maybe that is the best site. I don't know. One may never know. It is close to the old State Capitol, which Abraham Lincoln actually served in and spoke in when he was a State legislator. It is near the Abraham Lincoln law office. Is it the best site? I don't know. Did political favoritism come into consideration in selecting that site? I don't know. We don't know. One thing is interesting, though. This hotel, the Renaissance Springfield Hotel, is very close to the proposed library. That is the hotel that, as we discussed yesterday, was built with taxpayer money in the form of a State loan given out back in the early 1980s. The loan was never paid back, though some payments were made on the loan. The people who got the loan still own the hotel and still manage it. Presumably if the Lincoln Library results in increased tourism revenue and more people coming to visit the city of Springfield, there will be a lot of tourist dollars. Some projections estimate as much as $140 million in tourist revenue will be added by the construction of the library in Springfield. Certainly some of that would probably accrue to the benefit of those who have the Renaissance Springfield Hotel. The price increases, the location of the library, we note these things. We note the involvement of individuals whose names have come up in the past and were described again and again in many of the articles read into the Record. And we note the general problem that the State has had with projects such as this in the past. Given all these red flags, isn't it appropriate that we be extra careful and that we do everything we can to ensure that the project be appropriately competitively bid? It is for that reason that I attached the Federal competitive bid guidelines when the authorization bill came into the Senate. These guidelines were adopted unanimously in the Senate Energy Committee and, ultimately, the whole Senate unanimously adopted these guidelines and sent the bill back to the House. We are here today because we have to vote on the Interior conference committee report which has appropriations for the project tucked in, but with the Senate requirements for competitive bidding in accordance with Federal guidelines stripped out. It is the fact that those competitive bid guidelines are not contained within the authorization and appropriations for the library in this Interior conference committee report that I am here on the floor of the Senate. Mr. President, this debate, as I have said, goes to the very heart of the appropriations process itself. We need to take great care with the taxpayers' money. The money represents precious hours of hard work, sweat, and time away from their families. The American people are fundamentally generous and they will permit reasonable expenditures for the good of their country and their communities. The people of Springfield, IL, are as generous as any, and they are as fine a people as any. I have heard more from the people of Springfield, IL, than from anywhere else in my State about the importance to them of having an honest and ethical bidding process on this library that they hope will be a credit to their community for ages to come. But while the people are generous and they are willing to permit us to make reasonable expenditures in support of our States and communities, the taxpayers do expect that they not be abused. We need to do our best to make sure there are sufficient safeguards so that the people can know their hard work is not being trampled on, that politically connected individuals are not deriving private profit at the expense of the taxpayers, all under the guise of a public works project. I know that in this Chamber our remarks go out to the entire country. I am well aware of it in this debate because our office is receiving correspondence from people all over the United States who find interesting what has happened in Illinois. But I want to address these remarks now exclusively to the people of my State--the land of Lincoln--Illinois. In a very short time now, the Senate will soon take a vote on the Interior appropriations conference report. This is the vehicle that contains the Lincoln Library provisions we have been talking about in this filibuster. When the Senate votes, we will lose because the Interior bill itself is a bill with considerable support for projects around the country--it is an $18 billion bill that literally has implications for every State in the Nation--my colleagues will vote for it. Even those who, along with me, believe the Lincoln Library should have Federal competitive bidding rules attached to the money that will be appropriated today will do so. As I have noted, all Members of this body, earlier this week, voted in favor of Federal competitive bidding guidelines for this project when we had a vote just on that narrow issue. We cannot have a vote to take out the language that is in the conference committee report that does not require the competitive bidding. These are the rules of the Senate. However, when the vote is called and we lose, I do not want the people of Illinois to be discouraged by the difficulties we have encountered. If nothing else, from the materials we have introduced into the Record, it is clear that the political culture of Illinois is entrenched and formidable--so entrenched and formidable that a simple provision such as competitive bidding could become controversial. Our effort in these last couple of days is just a baby step. Real change can only come as the people of Illinois see more, know more, and gradually come to realize that they do indeed have the power to make it different. Real change comes from the bottom, from the people up. All those of us in this body can do is observe, think, exercise our very best judgment, and then make the case. Today and yesterday, we have made the case. In a little while, the opponents of our simple competitive bid requirement will prevail. But the next time you hear of leases, or loans, or capital projects, or riverboat licenses going to political insiders, you will remember this debate; and together we will rejoin the fight and redouble our efforts for the next time. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. FITZGERALD

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

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, Senator Wyden has requested to speak for 5 to 10 minutes. I ask unanimous consent he be allowed to do that, then I be able to go back and speak as though it were a continuation of the speech I have had ongoing since early this morning.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Yes, for a question.

Mr. FITZGERALD. All I can say at this time--I hope the Senator will appreciate this--I will need an extended period of time, and I cannot give a good timeframe. You may want to go back to your office.

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I am here to speak on the $120 million Abraham Lincoln Library, for which there is authorization language in the Interior Subcommittee appropriations bill. Last night, the Senate passed separate legislation authorizing $50 million of Federal funds for the construction of the Abraham Lincoln Library in Springfield, IL. The library is intended to be built with a mixture of State and Federal funds. The total cost of the project would be about $120 million. The Senate, in adopting its authorizing language, attached an amendment, that I put on, that required this library, this monument for ``Honest Abe'' Lincoln--that all the construction contracts on it be competitively bid in accordance with the Federal competitive bid guidelines. That language cleared the full Senate last night. The Senate went on record in favor of a requirement that this Abraham Lincoln $120 million library carry with it the requirements that all contracts be competitively bid in accordance with Federal procurement law, the purpose of which is to prevent political favoritism in the awarding of construction contracts and also to get the best value for the taxpayer. I rise to speak on the Subcommittee on Interior appropriations bill because there is language in the bill that authorizes $50 million in Federal funding over several years for construction of the Abraham Lincoln Library. However, the language requiring competitive bidding of the construction contract has been stripped out of the conference report. The Governor of Illinois is opposed to the attachment of Federal competitive bidding guidelines and apparently asked for House assistance to go around the Senate, which has spoken on this issue and gone on record in favor of the Federal competitive bid guidelines. I support construction of the Abraham Lincoln Library in Springfield, IL. If it is done properly, it could be a wonderful treasure, not only for the city of Springfield and for the State of Illinois but, indeed, for the entire Nation. Of course, Springfield, IL, is where ``Honest Abe Lincoln'' lived. He lived there for many years. He is responsible for making it the State capital of Illinois. When Abe Lincoln served in the State legislature in the early part of the 1800s, he was successful in leading a drive to move the State capital from Vandalia to Springfield, IL. For several years, he represented Sangamon County in both the Illinois Legislature and later for a period in the U.S. Congress. Of course, his debates for the Senate seat with Stephen Douglas of Illinois in 1858 are legendary. I am very proud to hold the seat in the Senate that Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas vied for in 1858, before, of course, Abraham Lincoln went on, in 1860, to be elected the first Republican President of the United States and one of our greatest Presidents ever. There are several Lincoln attractions in Springfield, IL. I am sure many of my colleagues and many of the people in the gallery have visited Lincoln's home in Springfield, IL, which is run by the National Park Service. It is maintained with a great deal of care. It is a wonderful attraction. I went there as a boy, and I have returned there many times since. Senator Durbin and I both have our Springfield district offices in the Lincoln home neighborhood, which has been renovated and restored to the way it was when Abraham Lincoln and his family lived there prior to his becoming President. We also have in Springfield the Abraham Lincoln law office. One can actually go into the very same building in which Abraham Lincoln practiced law for many years in Springfield. He rode the circuit. He did not just practice law in Sangamon County but practiced law all over central Illinois. In recent years, we have turned up many original legal pleadings and filings drafted by Abraham Lincoln. Many of those documents are now scattered all over the State of Illinois. It would be a wonderful achievement if we could finally have one great Lincoln Library in Springfield to bring all the Lincoln artifacts in the possession of the State of Illinois, as well as whatever members of the public donate for this library, into one tasteful, well thought out monument to the man who is arguably the greatest President of the United States, the one who saved our Union at its hour of maximum peril. I am concerned that if we don't have tight controls over taxpayer money that is going to build this library, we run the risk of winding up not with a $120 million Abraham Lincoln Library but instead a $50 million building that just happens to cost $120 million. I think there could be no worse or uglier irony than to have a monument for ``Honest Abe'' wind up being a gigantic public works project on which a bunch of political insiders wind up lining their pockets at taxpayer expense. Let me share some background on the Abraham Lincoln Library, where the idea first started, and how it has changed over the years. I think my colleagues will see that I have reason to be concerned about the growing cost of the project and certainly the magnitude of it within the city of Springfield. This is a time line: ``The Lincoln Library Project Time Line and Interesting Facts.'' Back in February 1998, then-Governor Jim Edgar proposed construction of the Lincoln Presidential Library in Springfield and committed $4.9 million in State funds for initial planning and design. At that time, the projected cost of the project was not $120 million. The projected cost was $40 million. They said it was going to come from State, local, and private funds. Later on, in May of 1998, the project was no longer a $40 million project. It had grown 50 percent in those few months. It was now a $60 million project. According to the Copely News Service, on May 13, 1998, the estimated cost of the Lincoln Library was raised to $60 million, an increase of 50 percent. Senator Durbin and my predecessor, Carol Moseley-Braun, and Sid Yates, who was at that time the ranking member on the House Interior Committee, were seeking $30 million in Federal commitment for the project. They wrote that the State and the city of Springfield were willing to commit up to $30 million in funds to match Federal support. That was May of 1998. We had gone from $40 million up to $60 million. By April 1999, less than a year later, the project price tag had gone up again, this time a little bit more significantly. ``Illinois Historic Preservation Association authority spokesman says library may cost as much as $148 million.'' We have gone from $40 to $60 million, and now we are at $148 million. I believe, now, today, since April 1999, they are talking about $115 or $120 million. Gratefully, the cost or the projected cost has gone down from April 1999. We are talking today about a $115 or $120 million project. That is a big building for Springfield, IL. These are Illinois structures and cost comparisons. This is taken from a State Journal-Register article of May 1, 2000. The State Journal-Register is the newspaper in Springfield, IL. They apparently did some figuring and estimated the cost, adjusted for inflation, of many of the other prominent buildings in the city of Springfield, IL. Our State capitol in Illinois was built between 1868 and 1888. The estimated cost, adjusted for inflation, of constructing the State capitol in Springfield, IL, is $70 million. The State Historical Library, constructed from 1965 to 1968, would cost $13 million to build today. Keep in mind that with this project--the Lincoln Library--we are talking about a $120 million building. The State Library, redone in 1990, was $6 million; Lincoln's Tomb, done in 1865, $6 million. The Dana-Thomas House, a Frank Lloyd Wright home, which I believe the State owns and manages, built between 1902 and 1904, would cost $9 million. Now, the State has a revenue department. It is one of the largest departments of the State, and it has a fairly new building that goes back to the early eighties, one of the very large State office buildings in Springfield that was built between 1981 and 1984. The estimated cost, adjusted for inflation, of building it today is $70 million. They have a gigantic convention center in Springfield called the Prairie Capitol Convention Center, constructed between 1975 and 1979. The estimated cost, adjusted for inflation, of building that giant Capitol Convention Center today would be $60 million. There are also some very notable private buildings in Springfield, IL, that are quite large and significant. One is the Franklin Life Insurance Company building, built between 1911 and 1913. The estimated cost, adjusted for inflation, of building it today is $44 million. The Horace Mann Insurance Company building, built from 1968 to 1972, would be $34.5 million. So, again, the Abraham Lincoln Library is going to be almost twice as costly as any of these other buildings--almost twice as costly as the State capitol, even though the capitol, I believe, is projected to be about two times the size of the projected Abraham Lincoln Library. We are talking about a very substantial building. It is interesting to note, as well, that the Ronald Reagan Library--a Presidential library which opened in 1991--cost $65 million. I have indicated to you the magnitude of this project as being something that caused me to really focus on the details of the taxpayer money involved. I noted the size and scope of the construction project, how it had grown from $40 million to $60 million to $120 million in projected costs over a very short period of time. But I also want to refer you to the language in the Interior conference report now on the floor of the Senate, which has come over to us from the House. The language in the conference report does not tell the people of this country to whom the $50 million is going to be paid. The language of the conference committee report says the $50 million will go to an entity that will be selected later. We are talking about $50 million. Everybody is acting under the assumption that this money is going to be given to the State of Illinois. I think it should be noted that there is no requirement in the conference committee report that is before the Senate that this money is required to go to a public source, such as the State of Illinois. It is required to go to ``an entity'' that will be selected later. Now, could that be a private entity? It appears to me it could because there is nothing in the conference committee report that would prevent it from being paid to a private entity. It says an entity that will be selected later by the Secretary of the Department of the Interior in consultation with the Governor of Illinois. Now, under the language as it is worded, they could possibly give that $50 million to an individual. I hope that will not happen. I hope the Secretary of the Interior and the Governor of Illinois will not decide to take $50 million of taxpayer money and give it to an individual. But they could under the language before the Senate. There would be no violation of the law if they did. They could also give it to a private corporation. There would be no violation of this conference committee report if the Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the Governor of Illinois, steered this money to a private corporation. If that were to happen, this money would just have gone out of the public's hands and out of the public control into an area where we could no longer really put much in the way of restrictions on what they did with it. Pretty much the only requirement in the conference report is that this entity, to be designated or selected later, will have to show its plans for the construction of the library. There is a private entity out there called the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation. As far as I can tell, this is a private, not-for-profit corporation that has filed with the Illinois secretary of state's office on June 20, 1990. It has an address of 10 South Dearborn Street, Suite 5100, Chicago, IL. The registered agent's name is J. Douglas Donafeld. I recall Mr. Donafeld as a lawyer in Chicago who does lobby work in Springfield. The corporation's name is the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation. This foundation, according to published reports that I have read, has three directors on its board--a Mrs. Julie Cellini, who is head of the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency; Lura Lynn Ryan, the First Lady of the State of Illinois; and Pam Daniels, the wife of Lee Daniels, the Republican leader in the Illinois State House of Representatives. I hope the Governor of Illinois and the Secretary of the Interior will not give these public funds to the private corporation called the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation because, if that were to happen, then no one's competitive bid laws, no one's procurement laws would be attached and the money could really be out of the taxpayers' control. Assume, for the sake of argument, that this $50 million in Federal money would not be given to a private individual or a private corporation and that the Secretary of the Interior and the Governor of Illinois would want it sent to the State of Illinois. I think it is a reasonable assumption that the State of Illinois would turn the money over to the State Capitol Development Board, which usually builds State buildings such as this--builds State prisons and has built the State of Illinois building in downtown Chicago. It is a reasonable assumption that if the entity selected to receive the $50 million is not a private entity, the money would go to the State and the State would turn it over to the Capitol Development Board, which is known as the CDB for short. The State contends that if the money is handled by the CDB, the State's procurement law for its competitive bidding laws that applies to the CDB and to other State agencies, such as Central Management Services, and apparently most of the rest of the State government, that its code would apply to the construction of this library and that its code would require competitive bidding of the project. The Governor of Illinois contends that there is no need for the Federal competitive bidding guidelines to be attached because in his judgment the State procurement code is sufficient. He also points out that I, Peter Fitzgerald, Senator from Illinois, when I was a State senator representing the northwest suburban Chicago area district in the Illinois State Senate, voted for that procurement code. Indeed, I did in 1997. I believed that code appeared to represent an improvement over the prior procurement code in the State of Illinois. But I regret that there was a loophole in that State's procurement code that I missed in 1997. I regret that I missed it, and I want to make doubly sure that we don't repeat another loophole in this particular project. I didn't recognize this loophole until I sat down and compared the State code side by side with the Federal code. In my judgment, there are two main problems with the State's competitive bid code. There are many instances in the State procurement code where there are fairly narrow exceptions to the general requirement for purchases of goods and equipment, building construction contracts, and leases. There are some narrow exceptions sprinkled throughout the code to the general requirement that the project be competitively bid with an overall push towards trying to get the lowest cost bid built into the code. But most of the exceptions built into the code to the competitive bid requirements are fairly narrow. If the State does not use competitive bidding to buy something, they typically will have to give notice and file written reasons for not going forward with competitive bidding. But here is a loophole. And here is why this loophole is relevant to this major gigantic project. Within the part of the State procurement code that deals with the Illinois Capital Development Board, which, as I have explained, is the board or State agency that would be required to construct the Abraham Lincoln Library, provided the Governor of Illinois and the Secretary of Interior don't channel the $50 million in Federal money to a private entity outside the control of anybody but the board of directors of that corporation, the Capital Development Board has a special section in the procurement code. They have a special exemption. Let us read the Capital Development Board special exemption. You don't need to be a lawyer to understand that this is a rather broad loophole in the portion of the Illinois Capital Development Board's procurement code. This is from an Illinois statute. This is binding law in the State of Illinois, passed by the Illinois General Assembly, and signed into law by the Governor of Illinois. 30 I.L.C.S. 500/30-15: (b) says: Other methods. The Capital Development Board shall establish by rule construction purchases that may be made without competitive sealed bidding and the most competitive alternate method of source selection that shall be used. The code clearly contemplates that the Capital Development Board shall not have to use competitive bidding; that they can opt out of competitively bidding for this construction contract. That language is plain as day. The Capital Development Board, in seeking to oppose my amendment which requires the application of Federal competitive bid laws, has circulated a letter that says they have to competitively bid the project under State law. However, their letter makes no reference or attempts to abut this provision of State law. Here is what their letter says: Dear Senator Fitzgerald: Competitive bidding has long been the requirement for State of Illinois construction contracts and was most recently reaffirmed with the passage of the stricter Illinois procurement code of 1998. Only six exemptions to that provision, which are defined by rule and must be approved by the director, exist. And then they name the exemptions: No. 1, emergency repairs; No. 2, construction projects of less than $30,000 total; No. 3, limited projects such as asbestos removal for which CDB may contract with correctional industries; No. 4, an architecture program which follows a separate procurement process; No. 5, construction management services which are competitively procured under a separate law; and, No. 6, sole source items. I am not sure what the sole source items are. But, in any case, they don't refer to this section of the law which seems to me is plain as day. I am a lawyer, so I didn't find it confusing. I have run it by nonlawyers, and none of them have been unable to understand this. It doesn't seem as if there is any ambiguity here. It says, ``The Capital Development Board shall establish by rule construction purchases that may be made without competitive sealed bidding.'' So they can establish a rule that they can do this without competitive bidding. What does it mean when they establish a rule, when they say ``rule"? The Capital Development Board can just write its own rule. It has that authority from the Illinois General Assembly to write its own rule. And in this authority to them to write its own rule, we have an unchecked level of discretion on the part of the State that, in my judgment, leaves too much room for abuse by political insiders in the State of Illinois. When I saw that was in the bill originally authorizing this appropriations, which as I said, the Senate passed last night with my amendment requiring Federal competitive bid guidelines, and my staff showed it to me, we said this is a giant loophole. As one paper in Illinois has editorialized it, it is a giant loophole for which you could drive a whole convoy of Illinois Department of Transportation trucks. I regret that I missed that when I voted for this procurement code of which I was a part back in 1997. I asked the Congressional Research Service if there was a comparable loophole in the Federal law. In a memorandum to me from an attorney in the Congressional Research Service at the Library of Congress, it says: The exception found in 30 I.L.C.S. 500/30-15, which permits the Capital Development Board to establish by rule construction purchases which may be made without competitive sealed bidding, does not have a comparable provision in Federal procurement law. On its face it appears to be a rather broad exception to the requirement for competition in awarding State construction contracts. I think it is very clear that is a giant loophole that should not be allowed in a project of this magnitude. Mr. President, $50 million of taxpayer money from the Federal Government is a lot of money. How many Americans are working day in and day out, some families with parents working 2, 2\1/2\, sometimes 3 jobs just to pay the taxes, just to pay the cut extracted by Uncle Sam. The American people are fundamentally very generous with their money. They will permit reasonable expenditures for their community, for their State, for worthy projects, but we owe it to all Americans--not just those Americans in my State of Illinois but Americans all over the country--to take great care with their money and to treat it no less carefully than we would treat our own money. I sometimes wonder whether those who oppose closing this loophole by substituting them with the Federal competitive bid guidelines--which are much more comprehensive, much more thoroughly defined, and which a lot of thought has gone into--if they were building a house, wouldn't they competitively bid or insist that their house be competitively bid if they had to pay for it out of their own pocket? I think they would. I think they would do what they could to secure the best possible value for themselves. And I think we in government ought to try and treat the taxpayers' money with the same respect we treat our own. As to another point on the State of Illinois code with respect to competitive bidding, this is a very subtle omission. This is a problem not just in the portion of that code which deals with the Illinois Capital Development Board; it is a problem that permeates the whole code. This is the one loophole that I didn't fully appreciate until I sat down and read the Federal procurement guidelines, side by side, with the State guidelines. The Illinois rules where sealed competitive bids are required--as we have shown, it is not required; the Capital Development Board can opt out of competitive sealed bidding, but where the code does require competitive sealed bidding--and maybe in this project the State would not opt out of competitive sealed bidding, but say it applied its own competitive sealed bidding guidelines. It is interesting there is a lot of language in the procurement code that gives the State the appearance of a regulator. On its face, there are a lot of fairly ordinary provisions one would expect in a State procurement code. One thing is interesting. The State code, when it requires the State to go out and solicit bids--say, for a construction contract--they are required under the State code to tell the bidders in advance what criteria the State is going to evaluate in selecting bids. In other words, the State would have to tell prospective bidders how they are going to select the contractor and presumably they would tell prospective construction contractors that they are going to look at cost, workmanship, experience, quality, management. There could be all sorts of factors at which they are going to look. And they have to tell the bidders, in advance, what factors they will look for. It is interesting; the State code doesn't require the State officials to tell the bidders the relative weight or importance of each of those criteria. The Federal code does. Federal law requires that sealed bid solicitations disclose in advance all significant bid evaluation factors and the relative importance of each factor and whether nonprice factors when combined, will be accorded more, equal, or less weight than price. The citation for that Federal requirement is at 41 U.S.C. section 253(a). The State code, by not requiring that the State tell you in advance what weight they are going to assign the different criteria, allows a purchasing officer for the State to pick any bid he or she wants and explain his decision by saying that the one factor for which that bid was better or the combination of factors for which that bid was better was the most important factor. That subtle omission in the State law allows practically any decision the State makes to be rationalized after the fact. So, conceivably, somebody could come in, and say we have a $1.5 million construction project. Somebody bids $1.4 million; the other bidder bids $1.6 million. The State can give the award after the fact to the high bidder, the $1.6 million, and say they decided the management experience and the quality of the higher bidder was more important than the cost that you, the low bidder, offered. They could move the goalpost after the fact and there would be nothing the losing bidder could do. There would be no challenge. There is no State procurement law because no State procurement law was violated. In fact, it would be very difficult to violate the State rules. When I reflected on this, it occurred to me that after almost a lifetime of living in Illinois and reading about procurement scandals and reading investigative report after investigative report by the Chicago Sun Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Associated Press, on leases that ripped off the State, on construction projects that ripped off the State, on contracts of many sorts on which the taxpayers appeared to not have made out well, we rarely, if ever, heard of any legal challenge or of any prosecution. It is very hard to violate the State code. It is that subtle omission. I believe that needs to be tightened up. The Federal code is much better at buttoning down the procurement officials, and under the Federal law we hear of challenges to Federal officials awarding bids to somebody. If there is a basis for challenging it because the bidder whose bid was rejected can say, hey, these procurement officers told me that cost was 75 percent of it and workmanship was the other portion, but they violated those guidelines. The Federal law does a better job of pinnning down the State officials so they cannot keep moving the goalposts and award the projects to their political friends. In my judgment, the Federal code does a much better job of lowering the potential for political favoritism in the award of contracts using taxpayer money. If I may, for a moment, I would like to now turn to the context, the overall general context in which I come to the Senate floor to argue against language in this conference committee report that comes to us from the House with the requirement of competitive Federal bidding of the $120 million Abraham Lincoln Federal Library in Springfield, IL-- the requirement of competitive bidding according to Federal laws-- stripped out of it. I reviewed early on in my discussion how the cost of this project had gone from $40 million to $60 million to $120 million; that we are talking about a lot of money. This would be a monstrous building within the city of Springfield, one of the biggest buildings, in fact, save for the Springfield Memorial Hospital. But I also want to give the rest of the picture, the other parts of the puzzle that cause me to have great concern and to feel as strongly as I do that there ought to be tighter controls on the spending. Illinois has a long history of having had problems in State procurement. There have been questions before about capital construction projects involving the Capital Development Board. In fact, I would like to read an editorial from the Peoria Journal Star, dated Wednesday, March 16, 1994: To the Illinois Capital Development Board for giving River City's construction companies an unfair advantage--thumbs up. Giving an unfair advantage in bidding to manage construction of a southern Illinois prison, River City submitted the low bid and the board's staff recommended its acceptance. But the board rebid the project and awarded it to a Chicago firm, knowing what River City had bid, which, knowing what River City had bid, lowered its own offer. The process is doubly tainted because the Chicago firm, together with its subcontractor, had donated $10,000 to a previous Governor's campaign. The perception, rightly or wrongly, is that River City lost the contract because it didn't ante up. There is another article about a more recent capital construction project. This is an article from the Chicago Tribune, dated January 6, 2000. The headline is: New Prison Benefits Ryan Pal: $33,000 payday seen in land deal. The article is by Ray Gibson, a Tribune staff writer. I would like to read this article because I think it shows the problems that can occur. I would like to set forth the context, why one could, on a large construction project in Illinois, reasonably be concerned about whether the money is all channeled into the project and that none of it is frittered away in rewarding political pals. When Gov. George Ryan announced last month that his home county of Kankakee was the winner in the latest Illinois prison derby, he talked about how the new $80 million women's facility would create jobs and other opportunities for economic development. What he didn't say was that one of the first to benefit would be one of his top supporters and fundraisers, real estate developer Tony Perry, who was among the dignitaries on the date for Ryan's announcement. Perry, acting at Ryan's behest as the point man for Hopkins Park and Pembroke Township's bid for the new prison, personally acquired options on the 120 acres the state will buy to construct the new women's facility. By Perry's own account, the current owners will pay him about a 5 percent real estate commission, which would amount to about $33,000, when he exercises his options to acquire the land. Then he will sell the land to the state. Right now, he says, he plans to sell the acreage for the same price he will pay--about $5,500 an acre. But state officials say that price is still open to negotiation and his profit could be higher. And Perry also acquired options on two other tracts of land near the prison site that are almost certain to be developed. A Tribune examination of how Perry, the governor's longtime friend, came to act as the middleman for the proposed prison construction illustrates anew the financial advantages political insiders reap under Ryan, already under fire for questionable leases of state facilities during his tenure as secretary of state. Perry's role in the selection of Hopkins Park and Pembroke Township for the prison site began last summer, as the sweepstakes among Illinois communities vying for the new penal facility got under way. At a luncheon, Perry said--he doesn't recall where--the governor asked him to help the impoverished Kankakee County communities complete the required paperwork to finalize their bid for the new facility. Perry went to work, first meeting with local officials. ``Tony Perry told us the governor sent him. . . . The governor sent him to make sure the paperwork got done correctly,'' said Hopkins Park Village Clerk Pam Basu, who opposes the prison project. Then Perry set about meeting with landowners to persuade them to sell the farmland, and he personally obtained options to acquire 480 acres, representing three proposed sites in the area. Although the state now needs only 120 acres for the site, Perry originally obtained options for three 160-acre parcels of land. He researched the cost of supplying utilities to the site and rounded up vital statistics about one of the state's poorest communities. For all that work, Perry was not paid, according to local officials. But now that the state is set to acquire 120 acres of land where the new women's prison will be constructed, Perry says he stands to make a 5 percent commission--or about $33,000-- from the sale of the land to the state. Perry's role in the development now has touched off a local controversy. According to Basu, the decision to allow Perry to act as the communities' representative was never discussed at any township or municipal board meeting. Nor was his agreement with the sellers to act as a real estate agent and collect a fee ever disclosed, she said. Nonetheless, other local officials said Perry's help was vital to the communities securing the prison. ``He was the key component. He was very instrumental in helping,'' said Hopkins Park Mayor David Legett. But others say Perry's commission, and Ryan's decision to tap him for the job, is just another example of insider politics. ``To me, it sounds like more ways to take care of his close friends,'' said Jim Howard, executive director of Common Cause, a taxpayers lobbying group. ``It just reinforces the public attitude how bad and dirty politics is in Illinois.'' Perry's role in the Hopkins Park prison is unusual on several counts. This will be the first time in two decades that the state will pay the entire cost to buy private property to construct a new prison. During 26 previous construction projects, the local communities vying for the prison sites have either supplied the land free or paid a portion of the state's purchase price. If the state only reimburses Perry for his cost per acre, it stands to pay $660,000 to acquire the land, the first time the state has paid so much to acquire a prison site in at least 20 years. A spokesman for the governor would not comment on why Ryan asked Perry to step in and help with the application other than to say that Perry was a real estate professional who has a long history in economic development in Kankakee County. While many of the communities participating in the prison derby hired lobbyists, Perry's role was unique in that he, and not local public officials, acted as the point man for the project. ``He was pretty much spearheading the communities effort,'' said Nic Howell, a spokesman for the Illinois Department of Corrections. ``He was the contact.'' Howell said the agency did not know if Perry was being paid. ``I have no idea. None whatsoever. I don't know that he's not doing this out of the goodness of his heart,'' said Howell, adding that he was unaware that Perry would receive a commission on the sale from the seller. Howell said the state wouldn't make any offer to buy the property from Perry until after it does appraisals. Perry said that he is now trying to spur development around the new prison, but he insisted he is not going to act as a developer. He has been meeting with builders and developers and trying to woo them to bring everything from housing to industrial development to the area. ``I am not the developer. I am the orchestrator,'' he said. State officials will spend millions of dollars to bring utilities such as sewers, gas, and water to the prison site from as far as two miles away, improvements that will increase the value of nearby properties as well. If the prison's construction fulfills the communities' dream of development, the land near the prison could be filled with gas stations, restaurants, housing and other development. Perry also has options to purchase two adjoining 160-acre parcels of land that were also proposed for the prison site. He said in a recent interview that he will not execute the options to buy those 320 acres, saying it would be improper to benefit as a developer. ``I can't work on somebody's behalf'' and turn around and develop the property, he said. Perry is a longtime friend of Ryan's and a fundraiser. Just four weeks after Ryan announced in September 1997 his intention to run for the governor's office, Perry chaired one of the first major fundraisers for Ryan's campaign in Chicago. Since 1994, Perry and the firms that he operates have donated nearly $19,000 to Ryan's campaign fund. One of Perry's ventures, a nonprofit corporation that was formed to help economic development in Kankake County, donated $2,250 to Ryan's campaign, despite federal tax laws that prohibit it from making political donations. State officials and Ryan have contended that there were plenty of good reasons why the site was selected over bids from the two other finalists, Freeport and Wenona. Pembroke Township is statistically one of the poorest areas in the state and nation. Fifty-two percent of its 3,657 residents live below the poverty level, and its unemployment rate is four times higher than the state's rate. The site also is close to the Chicago area, where many of the prisoners' families reside. Even Ryan joked at the Dec. 9 press conference when the site selection was announced that his roots in the county may have influenced the decision. ``This is one of the advantages in supporting a local guy for public office,'' he said. ``I can't imagine this would've happened if I hadn't been elected governor.'' Despite the potential for enormous economic assistance from the project, not all Pembroke Township residents are throwing out the welcome mat for the prison. A group of about 200 residents called Pembroke Advocates for Truth sprang up in the last several months to try to stop construction, saying they don't believe the economic benefits will trickle down to the community. They point to Perry, who lives in nearby Bourbonnais, as an example of how outsiders are more likely than locals to reap the benefits. ``There are a lot of angry people out here,'' said Beau, who is a member of the group. Perry said Ryan approached him and asked him to help because the two communities needed assistance with the paperwork. Perry said he contacted local officials and offered his services. A Ryan spokesman said the governor ``doesn't recall the conversation quite that way,'' but he declined to elaborate. Records show that Perry paid little, if anything, for the options on the property. Because no cash was needed for the transactions, either Pembroke Township or Hopkins Park could have entered into the option agreements with the local landowners, as did another finalist, the City of Freeport, records show. Perry told the state in September that it could expect to pay $6,100 an acre for the 160 acres it would purchase. The state recently has said it will purchase only about 120 acres. Now, Perry said he will sell the land to the state at $5,500 an acre, the price he is paying the owners. (Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire assumed the chair.)

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, there have also been a number of problems involving Illinois leases that go back a number of years. I turn my attention to an examination of State leasing practices. We have, thus far, been dealing with the State procurement code, how it bids out projects for construction, but also part of that code governs how the State handles its leases and whether it competitively bids leases for office space or other space that the State of Illinois may give. In an examination of this overall context of insider deals that have happened and swirled around and been going on in Springfield for a very long time, I want to focus on a couple of articles that go back a little bit further to December 29, 1992. There was at that time a series that was run in the Chicago Tribune that was called ``Between Friends. In the new era of patronage, the politically connected get something better than jobs--lucrative government leases.'' This article I am going to read is the third in a series. The headline is ``Helping Their Cronies Is The Lease Politicians Can Do.'' The byline is by Ray Gibson and Hanke Gratteau: Before Paul Butera decided to shut down and sell his grocery at 3518 W. Division St., his telephone started ringing. The interest in his property, an enormous parking lot backstopped by a single-story brick structure of 30,000 square feet, astonished him. Located in a working-class area, the grocery had served Butera's family well for four years. But business had waned since a large grocery complex opened nearby. Although he had yet to list the property with a real estate broker, Butera began getting calls about whether the Humboldt Park property was for sale. ``The property got very hot very fast,'' he recalled. Several weeks before Butera closed the deal in July 1991, he learned the buyer planned to convert the grocery into office space and rent it to the state for the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. Unbeknownst to Butera, the state and the buyer, Victor J. Cacciatore, Sr., had hammered out the details of the lease four months before Butera sold the property. The lease was signed in apparent violation of state purchasing laws that require disclosure of building and land owners. State officials signed the lease relying on Cacciatori's representation that he was the owner of the building, said Helen Adorjan, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Central Management Service, or CMS. The state has done business with Cacciatore for decades, and, for just as long, Cacciatore had been a faithful campaign contributor. Patronage, the process of rewarding political cronies at taxpayers' expense, has been big business in Illinois. Even though court decisions and taxpayers' outrage largely have stopped the practice of putting supporters on the public payroll, elected officials still find ways to divide the spoils. Contracts are the mother lode for a new age of patronage. Deals to lease properties, perform services and produce goods for the state are now a $4.6 billion-a-year industry, a business that has more than doubled in the last decade. The state's need to house its burgeoning bureaucracy has been a gold mine for those seeking to lease land and offices to the state. From 1981 to 1991, the state's rental costs climbed to $104 million annually, a 177 percent increase. Those with connections, such as Cacciatore, are cashing in. The state's landlords include major donors to the gubernatorial campaigns of James Thompson and Jim Edgar. In the last four years, Edgar's campaign fund has received more than $178,000 from people who lease offices to the state, disclosure forms show. Those people include Cacciatore, who has contributed at least $9,000 to Edgar's campaign fund and has received two state leases since Edgar took office. During the final seven years of the Thompson administration, Cacciatore donated more than $27,000 to Thompson's campaign. During that time, he was awarded five state leases. The DCFS deal marked the second time Cacciatore had offered to rent to the state the building he did not own. Records show he first proposed the Division Street grocery as an office building in March 1990, more than 15 months before he bought it. Other large states have specific procedures to secure property, but Illinois' methods are much more fluid, said Michael Bartletti, manager of the Bureau of Property Management for CMS, the leasing agent for most state departments. Requirements vary according to geographic and agency needs, he said. For example, sometimes the state publishes an advertisement seeking potential sites. Sometimes it does not. Sometimes state leasing agents search specific communities for appropriate buildings, Bartletti said. Sometimes they do not. Bartletti said CMS rules ``encourage'' the obtaining of price quotes on ``two or three sites'' that would meet state needs. The rule, he said, ``encourages competition. It doesn't require it.'' In the Cacciatore deal, the state did not advertise its need for DCFS office space, records show. Instead, CMS officials relied on responses to a year-old advertisement published when the Illinois Department of Public Aid sought similar office space, Adorjan said. Cacciatore had proposed the Division Street grocery as a potential public aid office, Adorjan said, so the site was suggested to DCFS. CMS records on the DCFS office hunt reflect that the agency obtained price quotes on two other locations. But an owner of a building the state said it surveyed told the Tribune that he never was contacted. Records state that officials with CMS contacted an individual named ``Boris Amen,'' who was trying to sell a 28,000-square-foot building at 2950 N. Western Ave. But officials at Advanced Transformer, the owner of the 130,000-square-foot factory at that address, said that they never offered their property to the state and that they did not know Boris Amen. ``I have never had any discussions with the state,'' said Sol Hassom, a vice president for the company. Records also state that CMS obtained a price quote on a lease from owners of a building at 3011 N. Western Ave. No such address or building exists. An owner of a nearby 9,000- square-foot building said he never has offered it for rent. Adorjan acknowledged the records were filled with inaccuracies, but she maintained that the agency obtained other competing prices that are not reflected in the records. ``It is obvious that they are just sloppy records,'' she said. ``They obviously did a sloppy job.'' Records show the state will pay $2.3 million over the next five years to rent the grocery, which Cacciatore bought for $775,000. With his partners, Cacciatore holds seven state leases worth more than $1 million a year. The state is paying $17.05 a square foot for space, utilities and janitorial service for the Humboldt Park building. That rate, according to Realtors, is comparable with rates in fancy Loop high-rise buildings. ``You can do better than that in the Loop,'' said George Martin, a real estate broker. ``You can get $13 (a square foot). What you are talking about out there doesn't even make sense.'' Adorjan said the rent the state is paying was fair and comparable with others in the area. Cacciatore, in a written response to questions, argued that the high rental rate partly reflects remodeling costs needed to meet the state's requirements. Cook County records show Cacciatore's company spent $450,000 on remodeling. According to the lease, Cacciatore will recoup his initial investment and renovation costs within the first three years. Cacciatore's company and appraisers successfully argued earlier this year to lower the property's tax assessment. Their plea was based partly on data showing that the state was paying rent that was $5 a square foot to $6 a square foot above market rates and that, therefore, the rent did not accurately reflect the building's value, county records show. ``Confronted with the pressing need to service the area with a field office and the lack of such appropriate office space, (the state) was willing to pay a rental premium,'' the company's written appeal stated. Cacciatore also has sold property to the state. The state's 1990 purchase of $1.9 million of Cacciatore's property in Lake County for a proposed state highway provoked public outcry there. At his request, the property was rezoned for development, forcing the state to pay 20 times the price it normally pays for vacant land. One south suburban landlord who leases property to the state said renting office space to the state is an insider's game fraught with politics. The landlord, who asked not to be identified, told the Tribune that when he was notified that a state agency was leaving his building in the midst of a long-term contract, state officials told him to see William Cellini, a top Republican fundraiser. ``I was told, `If you want to get a state lease, go see Mr. Cellini,' '' he said. He did not, and the state canceled his lease. Cellini headed the state Transportation Department under Republican Gov. Richard Ogilvie. He has not been a state official in nearly two decades but remains one of Springfield's most influential insiders. His sister Janis is Edgar's patronage chief, and the transportation agency still seeks his counsel, according to former and current officials. ``I chuckle sometimes when I hear some of the stories in Springfield about what all (Cellini) controls. That's not true,'' Edgar said in an interview. Cellini and Cacciatore, along with another former state official, Gayle Franzen, were business partners in 1991 on the purchase of a 140-acre parcel in south suburban Hazel Crest, records show. Franzen said Cacciatore invited him to become a partner on the Division Street grocery, even though Cacciatore told the state he was the sole owner. Franzen said that he declined. Cellini, through an aide, said he had no current interests in any state leases. In addition to holding leases with the state, Cacciatore is a director of Elgin Sweeping Services Inc., which has reaped nearly $40 million in contracts with the state's highway department since 1970, when Cellini headed the department. The contract is based on competitive bidding, but no company has submitted a competing bid in 10 years, state records show. Let me read that sentence again. The State, of course, on this $120 million library, is assuring us that there will be the application of what they call their competitive bid rules. But in this article, it says: The contract is based on competitive bidding, but no company has submitted a competing bid in 10 years, state records show. Some state landlords scoff at the notion that political favoritism influences the way the state shops for land and space. Anthony Antoniou, a Du Page County real estate developer, is among them. His firm holds a lease that is among the state's most expensive, with $5.2 million in annual payments for an unemployment office on Chicago's State Street. Antoniou, a contributor to Thompson and Edgar, said his firm found that politics played virtually no role in the decision to lease his building. Nevertheless, when Antoniou began discussions with the state about possible purchase of the State Street building, he turned to state Sen. Howard Carroll for help. Carroll, a Chicago Democrat, heads the appropriations committee that approves the budget for CMS, the agency trying to buy the building. ``Harold Carroll is a friend,'' Antoniou said. ``He may have given some peripheral help. I met with him through my wife who lobbies (in Springfield).'' Carroll said that Antoniou asked him to find out the status of possible state funds to buy the building. ``We did some checking and we didn't see any funds in the budget,'' Carroll said. Illinois' lease costs are comparable to what officials in New York, Florida and Texas spend on land rights and office space. California, which has nearly twice as many state employees as Illinois and whose real estate costs are notoriously exorbitant, spends more than $270 million a year on leases. But the manner in which leases are let in Illinois differs greatly from methods used in Florida, Texas and California. In those states, landlords must submit sealed bids to state officials who are required by law to award leases to the lowest and best competitive bidder. Illinois officials reject the notion of competitive bidding on leases. Let me read that line again: Illinois officials reject the notion of competitive bidding on leases. Competitive bidding has never been popular in Illinois with public officials, and that is what is at stake here on this $120 million Lincoln Library, where objections were made to the U.S. Senate's requirement that Federal competitive bid guidelines be attached to this $50 million authorization for a $120 million building in Springfield, IL. Quoting again: The Tribune found that state rental procedures are so casual that state files on negotiations for some properties are little more than handwritten scrawls of price quotes from building owners. Officials have maintained for more than a decade that state law does not require competitive bidding on leases, despite admonishments from the state auditor general. The absence of competitive bidding, the auditor general has warned, has deprived taxpayers of the ``assurance that its best interests were served.'' Let me interject at this point, since this article was written, the State's procurement law has been updated and presumably improved to some extent. But in our discussion and our examination today, we are trying to emphasize that not all loopholes have been closed and that the State rules still allow a high degree of discretion and leave a high amount of decisionmaking authority up to subjective preferences of State officials and that leaving that kind of unchecked discretion in State officials' hands opens the potential for insider abuse of Illinois procurement, whether it is leasing a building, building a building, or buying goods and services from the State. Continuing from the article: The Tribune investigation of state purchasing found that CMS sometimes has disregarded its own internal rules established to ensure fair pricing and competition. In some cases, state agencies seeking to lease space compose written requirements that virtually rule out competition. Specifications also have been tailored to steer state agencies to sites owned by the connected, as in the case of a $9.3 million deal in Peoria. Let's back up on that. In some cases, you have the State claiming it has competitive bidding, but what they do is, State agencies seeking to lease space compose written requirements that virtually rule out competition. They put restrictions on who is eligible to apply. The State did that with how they awarded river boat licenses in Illinois, and we are going to get to that later this afternoon when we examine how the State awarded the phenomenally lucrative 10 river boat licenses that somehow just happened to--I guess it was coincidence--all wind up in the hands of long-time contributors, in many cases, for many of those river boat licenses. Continuing from the article: Twelve days after the Illinois Department of Transportation informed CMS that it had outgrown its district headquarters in Peoria, officials with CMS asked the governor's office if G. Raymond Becker, a multimillionaire real estate developer, was eligible to become a state landlord. The written query, dated March 19, 1990, was necessary because Becker was a Thompson-appointed member of the Illinois Capital Development Board, whose executive director is required by state law to review all state leases. CMS officials wanted to know if Thompson would waive a state conflict-of-interest law prohibiting state officials such as Becker from doing business with the state. Such waivers are somewhat routine in Illinois, but the request was unusual because CMS officials had not yet advertised the state's desire to rent office space in Peoria, records show. But Becker, a member of Thompson's Governor's Club, a circle of campaign contributors whose donations totaled at least $1,000, already was being considered for a state contract for space in the 16-story office building he was constructing in downtown Peoria. Months later, the state published an advertisement from new Peoria space, specifying narrow geographic boundaries that essentially reduced the competition to Becker's building. Another developer, Dianne Cullinan, who had a downtown site under construction next to the state's targeted area, expressed interest but later halted talks after much of her building was leased. Negotiations with Becker, the lone landlord under consideration, lagged for several months. But in January 1991, the deal was completed within a week--the final one of Thompson's tenure. Thompson waived the conflict of interest law for Becker, noting that his proposal--the only one that had been on the table for four months--was the best of two submitted. Yet, records show that neither Cullinan nor anyone other than Becker had submitted a formal proposal. The Becker deal stands to be worth more than $9.3 million over the next 10 years if the state renews the lease after the first five years. IDOT offices fill about one-third of the building, which Becker built with a $3.2 million Peoria city bond and private loans of $8 million. ``It was a very good deal because I am doing much better with the rest of the leases,'' Becker said. The IDOT lease, he said, helped him charge higher rates for the lower floors. By August, shortly before IDOT moved in, two-thirds of the complex had been rented, Becker said. The lease also carried the promise of revitalizing Becker's adjacent properties: a twin-story condominium and a small office complex that have been suffering from high vacancy rates. Whether the deal was as good for taxpayers as it was for Becker is another question. Of course, that line in this article--``Whether the deal was as good for taxpayers as it was for Becker is another question''--kind of goes to the heart of our debate today because we want construction of the Presidential library for Abraham Lincoln in Springfield, IL, to be as great a treasure for and as good a deal for the taxpayers of Illinois and this Nation as it is for everybody who winds up actually building the building or owning other buildings right next to it, which will benefit from the tourism that comes in. State officials maintain the Becker lease is less costly than building a Peoria headquarters. They point to a January 1991 study conducted by an outside consulting firm that concluded that over a 10-year period, the state would pay about $11.4 million for construction, operating costs and debt service on a new building, compared with slightly less than $10 million in lease costs in the same period. But the study was based in part on the consultants' assumption that the state would have to acquire land for the project, records indicate. ``We are not aware of other state-owned space in the Peoria area that would be suitable for the (IDOT) space needs,'' the study stated. ``Also, we did not examine the cost of buying and renovating an existing facility. . . . Additionally, we did not address the availability of bond funds to finance the construction of a potential facility.'' Three years earlier, IDOT had proposed building a Peoria regional headquarters and materials-testing labs on a 34-acre site owned by the state on the city's west side. The price tag at the time was $7.16 million, said Richard Adorjan, an IDOT spokesman. The General Assembly refused to appropriate funds for the project, so the state decided to lease. Adorjan said IDOT was never told about the 1991 study comparing the costs of leasing with the costs of a new building. CMS officials say they never considered the 34-acre site for building because it was ``too rural,'' Bartletti said. The site is 9.3 miles from Peoria's downtown, said a CMS spokesman. IDOT's main headquarters in Springfield is about four miles from downtown. IDOT's former Peoria headquarters, a sprawling brick structure with 36,000 square feet on the city's north end, will continue to house materials-testing labs, but the site soon will be largely abandoned. The IDOT lease was not Becker's only deal with the state. Soon after signing the IDOT lease in Peoria, Thompson aides signed a $1.1 million lease for the Illinois Department of Employment Security to move into a building owned by Becker's business partner, Russell Waldschmidt. Less than a year later, Waldschmidt sold the building to Becker's son, George Raymond Becker, Jr. Later in 1991, the General Assembly restored funding for leased office space for the Illinois Industrial Commission in another Becker-owned building. The five-year lease is worth about $41,000 annually. Becker's construction company also has been a successful competitor for state road building jobs. In 1987 and 1989, his company was the low bidder on two contracts worth nearly $2 million for paving and resurfacing state highways near Peoria, an IDOT spokesman said. Becker and his partner, Waldschmidt, said Becker's status as a confidant to the Thompson administration played no role in landing the leases. But administration sources said Thompson's aides demanded that the transportation agency lease be signed before Thompson left office. Some top administrators had favored putting the lease on hold, a common practice during transitions, since it would bind Edgar's administration to the pact. Their concerns, however, were overruled by Thompson's key aides, according to interviews. Even after Thompson left office, he continued to turn to his old friend for favors. Several months after Thompson left the Executive Mansion, the developer lent his private airplane to the former Governor to fly to Jackson, Miss., for a Republican Party function, according to a Thompson spokeswoman. CMS officials have been at loggerheads with the state Auditor General's office for more than a decade because of their insistence that state law does not require leases to be competitively bid. Again, what we are talking about here is competitively bidding a construction contract. The House has taken a position in opposition to the Senate's requirement on an appropriation of $50 million to the State of Illinois that that money be competitively bid, that the construction contracts be competitively bid in accordance with the Federal law. The House position on this, to date, is that the project not carry that restriction and that States' so-called competitive bid guidelines are adequate. We are here examining some of the problems that have occurred in recent memory in the State of Illinois regarding leases, construction projects, and the like, which really weren't what we would think should be a proper competitive bidding and where there has been some slippage. State purchasing laws, a hodgepodge of more than 100 provisions adopted over the years, make no mention of leases. And a 1981 report by state auditors found that 96 percent of the state's leases were awarded without bid. That is why there are so many articles inches thick and investigative reports, over many different administrations and many Governors in the State of Illinois, of deals that appeared to involve, or may have involved, or the writers thought involved, political favoritism. CMS has argued that because leases are not specifically included among the goods and services required to be competitively bid, they are exempt from bidding. State auditors have argued that because leases are not listed among the exemptions, they must be bid. There is no way to competitively bid real estate, said the CMS' Bartletti. Simply put, there are no two real estate parcels in the world that are alike. Real estate is exclusive by definition. There is only one parcel at a certain intersection. Location is everything in real estate, he said. Among the State purchasing reforms to be proposed in the general assembly's spring session will be a requirement to bid leases competitively, said State Senator Judy Barr Topinka (R-Riverside). The proposed reform, Topinka said, is prompted largely by ``the scandal'' created by a lease state officials signed in 1989 to rent the shuttered St. Anne's Hospital on Chicago's West Side. State officials needed the building to house patients from the Illinois State Psychiatric Hospital, which had to be closed for extensive renovations. Taxpayers will end up paying $16.1 million for a four-year lease of the hospital, including costs of transferring patients, mainly because the lease failed to shield the state from huge repair bills. The state could have bought the building for $3 million. Let's review that again. State officials needed the building to house patients from the Illinois State Psychiatric Hospital, which had to be closed for extensive renovations. Taxpayers will end up paying $16.1 million for a four-year lease of the hospital, including costs of transferring patients, mainly because the lease failed to shield the state from huge repair bills. The State could have bought the building for $3 million. The State could have bought it for $3 million. But they will end up paying $16 million for a 4-year lease of the hospital. In that difference between $16.1 million and $3 million, look at the money that was lost for the taxpayers. How many taxpayers had to work how many hours? How many couples had to struggle working 2, or 2\1/2\, or 3 jobs to pay their taxes to the State of Illinois and to the Federal Government just to see that money go to State officials? Some might conclude from such articles that in many cases when there are not proper controls, what the State officials wind up doing with that taxpayer money is really tantamount to lighting a match to it. I now move on to another issue that has been talked about in Illinois for a very long time. It actually goes back to the early 1980s, and it is still a problem for the taxpayers in the State of Illinois. That is the subject of hotel loans given out by the State that were never fully repaid. There are some of these issues that we could highlight on which I am seeking to narrow the focus and ultimately tie all of this back into what is going on down in Springfield. I am going to turn to a discussion of State loans that were made back in the early 1980s for the construction of several buildings around the State, including two hotels: One in Springfield, IL, and the other, as I recall, at Collinsville, IL, which is down in the southern part of the State in the metro East St. Louis area. I am very familiar with both of these hotels. Of course, I see them often on my trips to Springfield and Collinsville. These hotels are actually pretty famous in the minds of many taxpayers because the taxpayers gave loans for the prominent people to develop these hotels and the loans were never fully paid. This article, which comes from the Chicago Sun Times, dated April 26, 1995, is by Tim Novak, who at that time was in Springfield. He wrote this article. The headline is, ``Taxpayers Stuck With $30 Million Hotel Tab.'' Illinois taxpayers will lose $30 million today when state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka closes the books on two hotel loans that former Gov. Jim Thompson and former Treasurer Jerry Cosentino made to political cronies. The hotels owe the state $40.3 million under low-interest loans they got in 1982, but Topinka has agreed to settle their debts for $10 million, the Sun-Times has learned. She plans to announce the deal today. Under the deal, the Springfield Renaissance Hotel headed by Republican power broker William F. Cellini will pay the state $3.75 million of the $19.8 million it owes. The state will also collect $6.3 million from the Collinsville Holiday Inn, partly owned by Gary Fears, who raised money for Democrats and Republicans. The Collinsville hotel owes the state $20.6 million. Topinka said it's the ``best deal'' she could get from the hotels, which have often skipped loan payments while their value has fallen. The deal will save the state at least $6,000 a month it spends to manage the loans. ``The taxpayers are going to take a bath, no question,'' Topinka said. ``But the property is so depressed, we will never get back what we spent. Our little escapade into the hotel business has not been remarkably fruitful. ``I may open myself up to criticism on one hand, but on the other hand, I have got to settle this because the longer this goes on, the more we lose because the property value (of the hotels) keeps going down.'' Former Treasurer Patrick Quinn, a Democrat, said Topinka is giving another sweetheart deal to political insiders. ``These particular individuals . . . are getting off very lightly,'' Quinn said of Cellini and Fears. ``The taxpayers are being fleeced again. They were fleeced when the loans were made. They were fleeced when the loans were refinanced. ``If you foreclosed, you would have assets that you can sell for a greater price than they're getting now,'' Quinn said. He claimed that the hotels are worth far more than the $10 million the owners will pay under Topinka's deal. Local assessors say the hotels are worth a total of $13.2 million--$7.9 million for the Springfield hotel and $5.3 million for the one in Collinsville. Topinka said the hotels are worth only a total of $6.5 million, much less than the $10 million the state will receive. Topinka said the Springfield hotel is worth $3 million and the one in Collinsville is worth $3.5 million. ``I didn't make the (original) deal,'' she said. ``I'm the garbage man trying to clean up.'' The loans were to expire in 2010. The state cannot foreclose on the hotels until 1999, and then only if the debts exceed $18 million on the Springfield hotel and $19.9 million on the Collinsville one. Quinn spent four years trying to get money out of the hotel owners, particularly Cellini, who made millions as the lead investor of the state's first riverboat casino, the Alton Belle. Quinn urged the Illinois Gaming Board to revoke the casino license last year unless Cellini pays off the hotel loan. The board refused, saying the hotel and casino were separate, state-sanctioned deals. Cellini is among 80 investors in the Springfield hotel. He could not be reached for comment. B.C. Gitcho, managing partner of the Collinsville hotel, referred questions to attorney Dan K. Webb, a law partner of Thompson's. Webb, who represents both hotels, could not be reached for comment. Thompson, a Republican, and Cosentino, a Democrat, made the hotel loans in 1982 under the governor's Build Illinois program, designed to create economic development and jobs. Cellini's group, President Lincoln Hotel Ventures, used the money to build a luxurious hotel about six blocks from the state Capitol. Fears' group, Collinsville Hotel. Venture, built a hotel about 20 miles east of St. Louis. The loans originally had a 12.25 percent interest rate. The owners were required to make mortgage payments only in those quarters in which the hotels made profits. The owners often skipped payments, claiming they made no money in those quarters. Before Thompson and Cosentino left office in 1991, the loans were restructured with a new interest rate of 6 percent. The interest was deferred until the principal was paid off. Since 1982, the state has collected $1.3 million from the Springfield hotel and $1.4 million from the Collinsville hotel. Mr. President, there is another article on that hotel loan. I point out at this time the hotel for which that loan was given, that was built in Springfield, IL--one of them was for a hotel in Springfield, the other for a hotel in Collinsville, IL. This is a map of downtown Springfield. This is the State capitol where I used to go when I was a State senator in Springfield for 6 years. This is the Abraham Lincoln neighborhood. Mr. Lincoln's neighborhood is run by the National Park Service. Abraham Lincoln's home is here. Senator Durbin and I have our Springfield district offices in that neighborhood. It is beautifully maintained to look as it did in Mr. Lincoln's era. Here is the Springfield Convention Center, and next to the Springfield Convention Center we see the Renaissance Springfield Hotel. As we saw that investor deal, headed by Mr. William Cellini from Springfield, they got that $15 million--I believe was the loan--back in the early 1980s. There was an attempt to settle the loan after not much of that money had been paid back. In fact, that settlement that was just described, to my knowledge, never went through. I will continue reading some articles and examining this hotel issue because since it is so close to where the proposed Lincoln Library site is, I think this will give a picture of how this connects together and why in my mind--being familiar with this whole history--red flags were raised. I believed we were on notice that we needed to do everything we could to protect taxpayers' money in the construction of that proposed Lincoln Library, which is a $120 million project.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I yield.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I will speak as long as I need to make the point on this project. I imagine it will be for quite some time.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I will do that. Turning to a June 5, 1995, Chicago Tribune article, by Rick Pearson, a Tribune staff writer, the headline is: ``Taxpayers Face a Big Loss on Hotel Loans; GOP Insider Denies Political Deal.'' He has achieved a unique and almost mystical aura as a clout-heavy Republican power broker, fundraiser and riverboat gambling captain. But William Cellini says he doubts he will ever be a hotel developer again. Cellini is at the center of a controversy involving a proposal by state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka to settle $40 million owed to taxpayers on two hotel loans for $10 million. He said he and other investors in the Springfield Renaissance never made a dime and will never see any return. Cellini also maintained that the state has probably recouped the original $120 million lent to developers of the Renaissance, the Collinsville Holiday Inn and 16 other projects because the developers paid 17 percent interest during the construction in the high-interest period of the early 1980s. ``Would I do it again? Never,'' Cellini said in his first public comments on the hotel deal. ``Well, never is a long time. Let's put it this way: I'll never do another one with the government. You're too high-profile, and then everybody comes to these (political) conclusions.' Not that anyone is suggesting any tag days for the 60-year- old Cellini. He has parlayed his position during the 1960s as state transportation secretary under Gov. Richard Ogilvie into influential leases and contracts, a role as head of the road- building Illinois Asphalt Pavement Association, and chairmanship of Argosy Gaming Co., which operates the Alton Belle riverboat casino. Cellini's stake in the riverboat is worth more than $20 million. Yet Cellini disputed the perception that the hotel settlement reached in April with Topinka is a sweetheart deal for himself, the Renaissance's 84 other investors, bipartisan fundraiser Gary Fears and investors in the Collinsville Holiday Inn. Instead, he said, taxpayers will get about $2 million more than the highest bid offered to former state Treasurer Patrick Quinn when he attempted to shop the two hotel loans last year to other investors. In addition, Cellini said, investors in the Springfield hotel put $10.1 million of their money into launching the project, along with the state's $15.5 million loan and a $3.1 million federal urban-development grant. Boy, that is interesting. On that loan for that Springfield Renaissance Hotel, the investors put in $10 billion of their money, the State loaned $15 million of State taxpayers' money, and the Federal Government gave $3.1 million in an urban development grant for that hotel. ``People are saying, `This hotel was built with all state money. Cellini didn't put in anything, and now he's walking away with the marbles.' That isn't true. We put in almost as much as the state, for sure $10 million in cash. And we will never get it back,'' Cellini said. The proposed settlement with Topinka has been put on hold pending review by Atty. Gen. Jim Ryan, another Republican. But under the agreement, Cellini and Renaissance investors would pay the state $3.75 million of the $19.8 million they owe. Meanwhile, the Collinsville Holiday Inn would pay $6.3 million of $20.6 million owed to the state. Topinka, a Republican who took office in January, has said the loans were a ``bad investment'' for the state. She also said the settlement is the ``best deal'' she could get for taxpayers because the properties' values are depressed. The loans, first made in 1982 by then-Gov. James Thompson, a Republican, and then-Treasurer Jerome Cosentino, a Democrat, originally carried a 12.25 percent interest rate. But Thompson and Cosentino revised the loans in 1988 to require mortgage payments only when the hotels were profitable. Few payments were made. That is interesting. The loan was not being fully repaid. Yet in 1998 they revised the loan documents so that mortgage payments only had to be made when the hotel was profitable. And then few payments were made. Shortly before Thompson and Cosentino left officein 1991, the loans again were restructured to call for 6 percent interest, with all payments first applied to principal on the debt. Cellini, who is a general partner of the Renaissance and owns 1.01 percent of the stock, said the original loan, the subsequent restructuring and the settlement plan were normal business deals and didn't involve politics. The projects initially were meant to improve economic development, but they were written down because of market conditions, he said. The lavish Renaissance, five blocks from the Capitol, pays $100,000 a year to help retire bonds used to build an adjacent city convention center. The hotel has a payroll of $2.8 million and pays $1.3 million a year in taxes, he said. ``It isn't that this was different or it was something that just because of political contact there was this discounting,'' Cellini said. ``There isn't a first-class, full-service hotel that was built in Chicago from '85 to today that is not only not paying their mortgage loans but I bet you some of them aren't paying for their operations.'' Cellini also disputed reports from Topinka's office that personal guarantees he signed on the loan were waived by Thompson and Cosentino. Such a waiver would have helpted Cellini when Argosy appeared before the Illinois Gaming Board seeking a license for the Alton Belle casino. But aides to Topinka confirmed Friday that when the hotel was opened, Cellini satisfied the terms of a construction loan and was released from his personal guarantee. Cellini also said that while the hotel had an assessed value of $7 million two years ago, the value of the real estate now is only slightly more than the $3.7 million value of the loan that investors have agreed to pay. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Louisiana be recognized at this time, and that I be rerecognized upon the completion of her remarks and that my rerecognition count as a continuation of my current speech.

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I am going to continue speaking about this $120 million proposed Abraham Lincoln Library in Illinois. I realize my colleague from Idaho wishes to be recognized. What I am going to ask is unanimous consent that the Senator from Idaho be recognized for 10 minutes at this time and that I then be re- recognized.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. I ask unanimous consent the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate now proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 848, H.R. 4806.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I ask unanimous consent the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H.R. 5284, which is at the desk.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I ask unanimous consent the bill be read three times, passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 909, H.R. 4318.

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the committee substitute amendment, as amended, be agreed to, the bill be read a third time and passed, as amended, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 846, H.R. 1162.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I ask unanimous consent the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. FITZGERALD

Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, the Senator from Washington has requested that he be allowed to speak before me beginning at about 11:10. I would like to go after Senator Gorton because he is only going to speak for about 10 minutes. I will speak for an extended period following Senator Gorton's remarks.

Mr. FITZGERALD. I have no objection.