Gene Green

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, Members, the manager's amendment is a new amendment that, again, this bill came out of committee 2 months ago with the idea that we were going to work on title V of the vocational rehabilitation section of the bill, and we have seen changes in the last 10 days. We really need more than a weekend to deal with this. But what the manager's amendment would do instead of cutting bureaucracy, which all of us want to do, and involve those parents involved in it, they are involved on the State level right now, the State of Texas does not need the Federal Government to tell us to involve parents in their vocational rehabilitation programs for their children. The amendment, the manager's amendment, would layer another bureaucracy because it would allow the Governor to appoint another agency to oversee the Federal funding. Again, in the general debate we heard that might be expanded to the legislative. But, again, that is not what I see in this manager's amendment that I have had a copy of that we got a copy of earlier. We want to reduce the bureaucracy. We do not want to add another layer in. That is why the manager's amendment raises concern. Again, title V of this bill, that substantially changes vocational rehabilitation, needs to be addressed separately in a separate piece of legislation and not in this, because we are going to lose some of the people who need it the most, people who need that vocational rehabilitation effort. I appreciate the concern of my colleague from Florida about parent involvement, and when I was in the legislature in Texas, we required parents to be involved with public schools. We required public schools to get their parents involved. But, again, we do not need the Federal Government here in Washington telling them in Austin, TX, or even in Tallahassee, they have to get involved. That is part of most States' plans already. Parents are involved. They should. But most of this money is State money. It is not Federal dollars. Let us leave those decisions locally. I would be glad to lobby my legislature to make sure they include parents because I know they already do, instead of saying we are going to impose a separate possible layer of bureaucracy on vocational rehabilitation. It is so important because we are dealing with, again, our citizens in this country who are harder to educate and harder to train and they are more expensive. We do not need to lose one dime to a bureaucracy that should be going to direct services for these people. That is why the manager's amendment again has made great strides in some ways but still does not go far enough to deal with the concerns that I have and a lot of my colleagues and a lot of the agencies or agencies and individuals that we have with vocational rehab. Let me read some of the individuals. You will see this yellow sheet today a great deal. American Council of the Blind, the American Foundation for the Blind, the National Federation for the Blind, the National Head Injury Foundation, the National Industries for the Blind, people who are opposing this bill and the manager's amendment because they are worried they are going to lose the basic support services that we have in Houston, TX, with the Lighthouse for the Blind that are serving a lot of my constituents. With that, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the opportunity to oppose the manager's amendment.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I thank my colleague from New York for yielding to me. I am glad he pointed that out. Again, the Governors are not here on the floor of the House. They have their authority in the State legislatures and they can work their will there, but we do have a battle of letters here today from Republican Governors, national Governors. The national Governors do support the flexibility of keeping vocational rehabilitation as a separate revenue source or a separate stream, separate from this CAREERS bill, because it has worked for 70 years. Sure, they have gone through reforms in 1992, and we will reform them again, but we do not need to do it by lumping them all together with everyone else.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I do not know the background to it, but I know it is on National Governors' Association stationery and your Governor is at the top of this. In fact, we heard your Governor a great many times in our committee this year. Again, this letter is dated today, September 19, and it is the best available information I have and the most reliable on the National Governors' Association. If they have problems with their executive director, they may want to talk with him.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I am glad for little things.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate this opportunity. This amendment is offered not only by myself but also the gentleman from Arkansas [Mr. Dickey], my good friend and colleague. This amendment is an amendment we talked about earlier that would strike title V of the CAREERS bill that I talked about on earlier amendments. Even in my opening comments I have expressed grave concerns about the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 that is included in this bill. The Committee on Economic and Educational Opportunities held no hearings specifically on title V. Now, on Thursday, the majority staff released changes to the marked-up bill, and today our chairman includes even more changes in the manager's amendment. We need to spend a great deal more time on dealing with vocational rehabilitation instead of over a weekend. This bill was out of committee for 2 months and we have seen a number of changes just in the last week. Mr. Chairman, we have tried to work on a compromise amendment, and my colleague from South Carolina and I have talked about and I think we share a lot of the same concerns, but, again, on short notice and without having time to sit down like we would like to, that is why I think we should set aside vocational rehabilitation for more judicious concern by this whole Congress instead of on a short-term basis and include it in this bill. The Green-Dickey amendment strikes title V from the CAREERS bill and assures the current vocational rehabilitation program remains intact. The gentleman from Arkansas [Mr. Dickey] and I bring this to the floor because the vocational rehabilitation program is too important to continue to make arbitrary changes without any real thought about those most affected. For more than 75 years Federal aid for vocational rehabilitation services has been provided in the form of a block grant to the States. National performance and quality standards have been established and States have been given broad discretion to determine how best to meet them. This is the original block grant. It just did not happen this January here in Congress. Mr. Chairman, expanding consumer choice and integrating vocational rehabilitation services in a comprehensive system are worthwhile goals which I fully support. In its current form, title V would not advance these objectives. In fact, it could erode the quality and reduce the availability of rehabilitation services for persons with disabilities. People with disabilities face extreme challenges in the pursuit of meaningful employment, challenges far beyond those faced by the average person who accesses Federal job training programs. We want to ensure that any eligible individual is guaranteed access to the same quality and range of rehabilitation services no matter where they reside in a State or in which State they reside. The many people served by the current State vocational rehabilitation programs are coping with new disabilities, new self-images, new feelings about their competencies, new technologies and new ways to perform old tasks. Rehabilitation professionals are specifically trained to assist people in disabilities in these areas. Employees of more general training services do not have that ability. I like the CAREERS bill when it deals with average employees who are laid off. We need to merge the programs. But when we deal with vocational rehabilitation, we should not lump people who are the recipients or the beneficiaries of vocational rehabilitation in with the general population. Mr. Chairman, there is a great deal of concern, and we have letters from among the supporting organizations for the removal of vocational rehabilitation. The concern from these client agencies, not from the State bureaucrats as we heard, but from the clients, they are worried they will get lost in the shuffle when their provisions are included in this bill. As I said earlier, I voted for the bill as it came out of committee. I tried to amend it in committee and we lost, with the understanding that we would try to work something out. We have not been able to work it out to the support of the client organizations that raise this concern. I can mention some of these groups. We have letters, but we also have, and a lot of Members will see this as they come in the door to vote in a few minutes, a yellow sheet of paper that talks about the number of groups from the client groups who are supporting this amendment to strike title V. Another concern we have had is that we have heard the concern for the last 2 months and during our committee markup, in process, the Governors' Association wanting to be able to have flexibility. The concern I have about the original bill, the substitute I saw last week, and even the manager's amendment today is that it gives a great deal of flexibility to Governors and maybe not dealing with their legislatures in addressing it. I have a letter from the National Governors' Association and it says, and I will paraphrase, we believe that the bill could be improved by adoption of two amendments that would be offered on the floor today and ask that Members support these changes; the amendment by Representative Green of Texas to maintain existing law with respect to vocational rehabilitation programs. If we want to address the Governors' concern, the National Governors' Association supports this amendment.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I will not object to the gentleman's having more time as long as I can respond. I understand we may have a duel of letters here, one dated today, this afternoon, and maybe one later, but the concern I have is to whether the Governors are for or against it. I have just been told that the Governor of Texas, Governor Bush, is supporting the amendment. I know he does not represent the National Governors' Association but he is really concerned about including vocational rehabilitation in this bill. That is why I want vocational rehabilitation to be part of the one-stop center.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. If the gentleman will continue to yield for 30 seconds for my response.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois [Mrs. Collins].

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from Virginia.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. I yield to the gentlewoman from New York.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Collins amendment that would open competition for small business, and I think it is appropriate that our chairman of the Committee on Small Business is also supporting it. The Collins amendment retains the current practice allowing all business to compete for government procurement contracts under full and open competition. The bill would restrict competition by allowing agency employees, those so-called terrible bureaucrats, to limit the companies allowed to compete. The Collins amendment was previously adopted in this House on the DOD Authorization Act on June 14 allowing for consideration of procurement reform, and the Collins amendment was supported by a great many different groups, including the Small Business Working Group, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Small Business Administration, and of course the chair of the Committee on Small Business, the gentlewoman from Kansas [Mrs. Meyers]. There are also other groups, the Latin American Management Association, the National Association of Minority Businesses. It is very important that they have an ability to compete for Government contracts on equal footing if they can do the job. [[Page H 8877]] I think that is what this whole effort is about, to bring more competition to help to lower the cost to the taxpayers in this bill. That is why I voted for the bill coming out of committee, and I hope we can improve it a great deal tonight with the Collins amendment.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. (Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, it is refreshing to hear the Republican majority quote the Washington Post. I am more concerned about the Houston Chronicle than I am the Washington Post. Republican Medicare cuts in growth $270 billion to pay for a $245 billion tax cut over the same 7 years. The new Republican majority will double the monthly premium for Medicare recipients and eliminate their choice of doctors under their plan. It is a secret plan, because we do not know about it. It has been secret for the 8 months we have been here, almost 9. They want to cram that plan down our throats this coming week. Mr. Speaker, let us have at least 30 days of public hearings. Let us listen to what our constituents want us to hear about their plan and let us make sure that we do not take away from seniors their choice of doctors and providers, because I know that is what that secret Republican plan will do.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. It reminds us why we are actually here working for the students that are actually working. As we talk this evening, they are working to make sure they do better. They are the ones going to be standing on this floor 10 to 15 years from now.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Connecticut for requesting this hour this evening for us and to share her time with us. Yesterday I had the opportunity in Houston, because I am proud to serve on what is now called the Economic and Educational Opportunities Committee, Education and Labor Committee last session, because, no matter what problems we deal with in our country, education is the answer, and yesterday I had the opportunity to visit an elementary school in Houston, Franklin Elementary, and the sixth-grade class provided me appropriately the front page in green, a booklet, and I will go into that in a few minutes, but yesterday the kids are back in school around the country. After Labor Day they go back, but in Texas we had our children back in school for about 3 weeks, and every year young people across the country venture out to buy new notebooks, pencils, backpacks and the same excitement about going back to school mounts inside of them again. But, Mr. Speaker, this year is a little different. Yes, school has started again, but Congress is welcoming students back with less funding for this year than they did last year. Programs hit hardest include basic math and reading services, efforts to promote safe and drug-free schools, resources for State and local officials to implement higher standards, and education technology. Cuts in these vital programs will cause irreparable harm to students in my community and particularly across the country. It may shock some of you that the lion's share of cuts in Federal aid to education are in elementary and secondary education, but it is true. We will be spending $4.5 billion less in 1996--almost 20 percent of the total Federal aid to schools--than we did in 1995! At the very same time, local, State, and nationwide enrollment trends are up. In fact, the Houston Independent School District, where Franklin Elementary is reports a 2.2-percent enrollment increase or 4,462 more students in 1995 than in 1994. And, the Aldine Independent School District where my wife teaches reports a 3.2-percent enrollment increase or 1,375 more student in 1995 than in 1994. We are having more students, but they are having less money in each of these school districts. On top of these steep cuts, my home State of Texas stands to lose all the money we won last year under the Elementary and Secondary Education Reauthorization Act. I supported the package last year through Congress largely because we changed the funding formula, and I know Connecticut was kind of caught in the middle on that, but for high-growth States like Texas, and Arizona, and New Mexico, and Florida, the reauthorization of chapter 1 funding actually provided additional funds for our students. In the updated formula, it took into account these population increases in Texas and high growth States. But in order to gain the support of the Northeastern States, what we did was in conference committee we agreed and said the new funding formula would go into effect for new money, and the spending levels, only the amount above the 1995 spending level, would go in under the new formula. Unfortunately, for every child in these United States, the 1996 appropriation is not increasing. In fact, it is decreasing. In Texas we are going to lose in chapter I alone $97 million. Texas has about 10.5 percent of the Nation's poor children, but about we receive only 4.5 percent of the chapter I money. This inequity for Texas children can only worsen in the future unless we change it and the U.S. Senate changes it. These education cuts are not what we are hearing as shared sacrifice. Education will suffer a staggering 18 percent cut. By comparison, agriculture spending is cut by 9 percent, transportation by 7 percent, and the Department of Defense by .3 percent. Cuts in Federal Aid to Education will adversely affect every working family and further diminish the quality of life of thousands of American communities. State and local governments will not be able to make up that difference without raising taxes or shortchanging our children's future. I know the value of good education. I as a youngster growing up in Northside Houston, in the district I am honored to represent, our hope for a better life was better education. That is even more important today in 1995 than it was in 1965 when I was a student in Jeff Davis High School in Houston and we received our first Federal funding. Yesterday I participated in a press conference with the Department of Education in which Franklin Elementary was recognized by the Department of Education for their vast improvement in our Texas achievement scores, the test that is required around the country. Different States have different achievement tests. Franklin Elementary moved from the 35 to the 59 percentile to the 75 to the 89 percentile, and that is in a school that 98 percent of those children are qualified for school reduced or free lunch. The reason Franklin Elementary improved was because of renewed commitment by the students, by the teachers, and by the faculty. A representative from the Department of Education and I had the opportunity to tour an innovative fourth grade team teaching classroom, and we actually sat down and read to a classroom. I do that often times. I have already done it three times this year. We sit down and read a great book and talk with the children in the lunchroom about their school and their pride in their school that a year or two years ago they did not have. Federal funding is used in that school for computers, for additional counselors, for chapter I, and yet they are not going to have that because of the cuts. The students and teachers were willing to make that commitment by staying late during the week and coming in on Saturdays. Teachers came in [[Page H 8786]] without extra pay on Saturday because they knew the commitment from the community. They participated in workshops that would not be there if the Federal Government did not continue that commitment. Let me share with you some of the letters that I received yesterday from some of the students. Let me share a letter from a young man, Michael Gonzalez. His statement is: Thank you for the free and reduced lunch program. It helped us a lot because my mom has a lot of bills to pay. Again, this is a school that 90 percent of those children qualify for it. Another letter, from Mario Silva. Mario says: Thank you for giving us free lunches and for making the school look better every year. You have done a good job on fixing the school. You have brought our school from bad to good. We hope to do even better this year. They hope to do even better than the 89 percentile, yet we are cutting the funding for Franklin Elementary. Mr. Speaker, I hope we can find common ground on education, because I am committed that education is a key to the stronger future for America. I hope our colleagues on both sides of the aisle will stop balancing the budget on the backs of these children, particularly the ones that I was with at Franklin Elementary School in Houston yesterday.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. To my colleague from Hawaii, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. The issue just came up, and I am glad it was brought up, concerning the [[Page H 8762]] amount of investment in our country as compared to the amount of outflow in investment. I share the concern. The United States is the greatest country in the world to invest in, and that is why people will come here. But why should we discourage our own investment managers or pension managers to go overseas? We might want to consider, it was announced today or yesterday, the investment in the Rockefeller Center by some foreign nationals who are now deciding it was not such a great investment, but I agree, we have a great investment climate here. Why should we not have American workers creating their own American jobs instead of encouraging, by not adopting this amendment, what may be happening in this bill? Again, I urge an ``aye'' vote on the Green amendment.

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I thank my colleague, the gentleman from California, not only for his leadership on this bill, but also for yielding to me, and again for the benefit of the Members, let me again read the amendment for the Members who have not had a chance to look at it: ``Nothing in this act shall be construed as prohibiting the investment by employee benefit plans within the meaning of paragraph 3 of section 3 of the ERISA in domestic investments as distinguished from foreign investments.'' Let me also go to read the infamous, I guess, 94.1 interpretive bulletin: The fiduciary standards applicable to ETI's are no different than the applicable to plan investments generally. ``Therefore, if the above requirements are met, the selection of the ETI or the engaging in an investment course of action intended to result in the selection of an ETI will not violate it.'' We are talking about the same investment standards, and again, for the people, who are trying to pass this bill, Mr. Chairman, to say that they are not encouraging overseas investments, again, why should they not accept the amendment if they are more concerned about investing again in Lebanon, PA, than in Lebanon, the country?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. We are not changing that by this amendment. I am concerned the whole bill may cause pension fund managers to say, ``We do not want to invest in riskier investment in inner-city Cleveland or inner-city Houston, but we can invest in inner-city Lebanon. Maybe we ought to build housing in Lebanon, not inner-city Houston, because we can get a greater return over there.'' I do not want to scare those pension fund managers off from U.S. investments by this bill. I am concerned by seeing some of the letters that raise concerns about this bill. Again, the article was in the National Journal saying just what the gentleman's argument was. We have workers here who pay into a pension. We do not want any mandates on ETI's, and I would be up here like a lot of Members opposing it if they said, ``No, we want you to put it back into the inner-city investments that are shaky.'' If those investments pay a decent rate of return for their risk, then why should they not?

Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman, we talked about the concern about investing overseas and the opposition to the amendment. I have a hard time figuring out why they will not just accept it. But granted, investment overseas would cause, in this amendment, if we do not take this amendment, it may increase it. Let me talk about, in the National Journal in June of this year, they [[Page H 8761]] talked about the challenge to pension fund trustees, and let me just quote, ``The congressional Republicans, by turning ETI's into an ideological issue, are casting a chill over pension fund investments that could strengthen the homegrown economies of the States, cities and towns the pensioners grew up in and, indeed, that they continue to depend on for their broader, long-term security''.