Jim Greenwood

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 91) recognizing the importance of increasing awareness of the autism spectrum disorder, and supporting programs for greater research and improved treatment of autism and improved training and support for individuals with autism and those who care for them.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on H. Con. Res. 91, and include extraneous materials.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood).

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), the cofounder of the Autism Coalition and a leader in helping to solve the problems of children with this malady.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton), the chairman of the Committee on Government Reform.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from my home State of Pennsylvania (Ms. Hart).

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella).

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. GREENWOOD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks, and include extraneous material.)

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, the other speakers, my colleagues, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Doyle), the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), the cofounders of the coalition, have outlined the agonies that parents go through when they find that their children suffer from autism. It is just that those precious moments in the upbringing of a child, as the child begins to communicate, there is a glimmer of recognition of the child, of his siblings, of the world around him or her, and the joy of beginning to sing with their children and to teach them their ABCs and to read to them and to laugh with them. It is just at that time in the development of a child that this terrifying phenomenon occurs, and that is closing down where suddenly the child begins to just turn away and fall away from the grasps of the parents, not beyond their love but certainly beyond their ability to communicate. It is a heartbreaking event. The parents in my district and in my colleagues' districts around the country, many of them decided to turn their anguish into action. They decided that the thing to do was to see if this process that we are engaged in here in Washington actually works. They came to Washington and they said, we need legislation to try to cure this disease, to find out what causes it, to find out how to treat it, to find out how to diagnosis it, to teach doctors how to recognize this disease. They came and we introduced legislation in the last session and the session before that. It took a lot of perseverance on the part of these parents and these families coming to Washington over and over again, through all of our press conferences, coming to their Members from around the country to persuade them to join forces with us; but they succeeded. For a while it was a little bit frightening because the autism bill became a children's health act as one disease after another was added to the legislation. There was some fear that maybe this thing was growing so big that it would be too expensive and too hard to pass; but as it turned out, it created momentum to parents of children with all kinds of conditions who helped to pass this legislation; and we passed it and it was a wonderful, magnificent example of how our political process can actually work in this country. The problem was, or the problem became, that now we had to go to the next stage, and that is the implementation. This bill calls for the creation of five Centers of Excellence geographically distributed throughout the country where parents can take their children, when they suspect there might be a problem of this kind, for diagnosis; where they can get them involved in the latest clinical trials; where there are the best researchers, the best doctors, the best experts in the country all located to get to the bottom of this disease, and to provide real hope for the parents that their children can progress and hopefully some day be cured of this. It turned out it was going to take years, literally years, to get these Centers of Excellence up and running, and that is not what Congress intended, and that was unacceptable. Just last week during the rally, some parents and I, upset about all of this, called into my office from the Department of Health and Human Services the National Institutes of Health Acting Director Ruth Kirschstein, and we said that it was unacceptable that these Centers of Excellence would be postponed a couple of years. I am pleased to report today that we made magnificent progress in that meeting, and I take my hat off to Dr. Kirschstein for the commitment that she made that day. The commitment that she made is that just 6 weeks from now, by mid- June, June 15 to be precise, the National Institutes of Health will put out the request for applications for the Centers of Excellence. By the end of the year, all of those applications will be in and by next year we will be prepared to the tune of $12 million, which is their commitment to fund these Centers of Excellence. So finally this process that these parents have been so engaged in and so many of my colleagues have been so committed to will actually come to fruition, and around the country hopefully we will be able to stand with these parents and their children and cut the ribbons to these centers and have the children walk in and meet their new doctors and their new therapists so that in future years we will be able to report to our colleagues in the House and to the rest of the country that this has worked; that not only did we get a bill passed, but we got it implemented and we got the money spent and we got the experts working side by side with the parents on behalf of these children and, in fact, we can hopefully see the day where these children will begin to come out of these mental prisons in which they have been held captive so cruelly for so many years. Will that day not be a day for great celebration? Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, May 1, 2001. Hon. James Greenwood, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Mr. Greenwood: Thank you for the opportunity to discuss implementation of the autism title of the Children's Health Act of 2000 with you, members of your staff, and representatives of Cure Autism Now in your office last Friday. I commend you for your legislative leadership and your personal commitment to focusing federal resources on research that will lead to a better understanding of this terrible illness and eventually better treatment for those who bear its burden. I also want you to know that all of us at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) share your commitment. I particularly appreciated your patience and objectivity in listening to NIH's plans for meeting the goals of the Act. As my colleagues and I explained, investigators performing autism research represent a relatively small field of science. We believe the field needs to be broadly developed and also invigorated by new researchers with expertise that may expedite and enhance scientific discoveries. At the same time, NIH wants to facilitate the work of outstanding researchers currently in the field by providing additional resources to them, including the establishment of the Centers of Excellence described in the Act. Toward carrying out the Act's provisions, NIH is in the process of implementing a multi-stage approach to autism research. An important part of our approach is the solicitation, through a recent Request for Applications (RFA), for investigators interested in receiving NIH support to develop research excellence in autism. Separately, NIH will also accept applications from current investigators who believe they have sufficient expertise to coordinate and manage Centers of Excellence, as authorized by the Act. NIH will clarify in a public notice issued within the next ten days that applications will be accepted for this latter endeavor; we intend to issue a separate RFA for Centers of Excellence by June 15, 2001. Of course, applications for both development grants and Centers of Excellence grants must undergo and pass NIH's peer review process. In addition, I assure you that NIH will strive to fully fund the Centers of Excellence within the parameters of the Act. I will keep you informed as we proceed. My colleagues and I will answer any additional questions you might have in the future regarding implementation of the Act, as well as any other queries regarding the state of autism research in general. Again, thank you for inviting us to discuss this matter. Please let me know if I can be of additional assistance. Sincerely, Ruth L. Kirschstein, M.D., Acting Director. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, those in the gallery, those watching this debate on national television around the Nation might assume that the reason that we are spending these hours on the floor pursuing this legislation is because we are trying to solve a problem, that there is somehow a problem that exists, that out in America on Federal property women are being assaulted, and they are losing their fetuses in those assaults, and their perpetrators are going unpunished or going too lightly punished. I do not think there is any evidence at all that that is the problem. If it were, this legislation would be a priority for the police and law enforcement officials of our country. This would be a priority for the district attorneys in our counties. This would be a priority for the attorneys general. This would be a priority for the coalitions against domestic violence. That is really not why we are here. My friend, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), is a good friend of mine. I admire him more than I admire many Members of this Congress. He is a good man. But I think in truth we all know that this bill is here because it is aimed at abortion politics. This bill is strategized, is being pushed. The grass-roots organizations that are pushing for this legislation are pushing it because they are part of the anti-abortion part of this country's population. The reason they do that is because for the last 30 years abortion has been legal in this country and because the courts have said that, particularly in the early stages of a woman's pregnancy, the choice of what to do with that pregnancy is hers. It is well-established law. How do you defeat that? You do not bring an amendment to the floor to change the Constitution in that regard. That is not popular in this country. So we bring bills like this, which are designed to come in the back door, and try to define a fetus as a human being, a full person. This is brought here for the purpose of abortion politics to establish in law under the guise, under the obviously compelling notion that we want to protect women against violence, when its purpose is really quite otherwise. If those Members who are really interested in solving this problem will support the Lofgren amendment, this really does get tough on those who would assault a pregnant woman; it does get tough, and does not have the ulterior motive of trying to play abortion politics with something as critical as a woman's assault. Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I take a moment to recognize one of our former colleagues, Bill Frenzel of Minnesota. Bill recently received the Order of the Rising Sun from the Emperor of Japan. This decision is one of the highest honors that can be bestowed on someone of non-Japanese descent. Such a distinguished honor highlights his dedication and many years of service to the development of Japanese-American relations. Many of these efforts began right here while he was serving on the House Ways and Means Committee. Bill was known as the most active Republican on trade matters and was an instrumental player in the advancement of the trade relationship between America and Japan. During the last six years, Bill has served as the Chairman of the Japan-America Society of Washington, DC, a non-partisan educational and cultural organization. Founded in 1957, it serves as the primary forum in the Mid-Atlantic region for promoting understanding between the two countries. While there, Bill has worked hard to foster the development of an open, U.S.-Japanese dialogue. His efforts helped create an honest discussion regarding cultural differences, unfair trade practices, protectionist measures and the need for increased Japanese participation in multinational corporations. Bill's work has been essential in creating stronger ground for trade relations between our great nations. His commitment to secure a productive working relationship has resulted in a sound base that will further continuing economic and political endeavors. It is an honor to recognize his work today on the floor, and I thank him for his dedication to such an important area of our foreign policy.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and concur in the Senate amendment to the bill (H.R. 2884) to extend energy conservation programs under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act through fiscal year 2003.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 2884.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 2884, a bill to reauthorize portions of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) through September 30, 2003. EPCA authorizes the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and U.S. participation in the International Energy Agency. These programs are a crucial component of our energy security and are our first line of defense in a real energy emergency. The U.S. is now well over 50 percent dependent upon foreign oil. Americans have been reminded again and again this year why energy security is so important. Reauthorizing these programs is an important piece of business we must accomplish before we adjourn this year. H.R. 2884 also contains other important provisions which will enhance our energy security and reduce the vulnerability of the Northeast, where I come from, to heating oil shortages. In addition to reauthorizing the Reserve, it creates a Home Heating Oil Reserve in the Northeast and establishes a trigger for when it can be drawn down. The bill also requires annual home heating readiness reports and encourages education on the benefits of filling heating oil tanks in the summer. H.R. 2884 also contains provisions that will help reduce our dependence on foreign oil. It allows for the Reserve to be filled with domestic oil when oil prices are low. It requires the U.S. Geological Survey to conduct an inventory of oil and gas reserves on Federal lands. The bill also makes important changes to the Federal Energy Management Program, making it easier for Federal managers to enter into energy savings performance contracts. H.R. 2884 also updates the low-income weatherization program. In addition, H.R. 2884 contains provisions allowing small hydroelectric projects in Alaska to be licensed faster. Finally, H.R. 2884 includes a provision that is of particular interest to me because it is based on legislation I introduced in the 105th Congress and the beginning of this Congress, H.R. 380. This bill establishes the National Oilheat Research Alliance Act, allowing for the creation of an organization to do research on increasing heating oil's efficiency. Mr. Speaker, I ask that all Members of the House join with me in support of this legislation. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 3514) to amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for a system of sanctuaries for chimpanzees that have been designated as being no longer needed in research conducted or supported by the Public Health Service, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill now under consideration, H.R. 3514.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 3514 is the Chimpanzee Health Improvement, Maintenance, and Protection Act. It has 139 bipartisan supporters. Mr. Speaker, I am a member of the Committee on Commerce, and the Committee on Commerce has jurisdiction over the National Institutes of Health. The NIH is the world's premier biomedical research facility in the world. Because the chimpanzee is the closest genetic relative to humans, it has long been used as a model for physiological, biomedical, and behavioral research. We all remember in the early days of the space program the chimpanzee, Ham, pioneering space travel before we dared to allow humans to do that. We would not have a space program if it had not been for the contributions of the chimpanzees in the program. When the AIDS epidemic became apparent to researchers, since we had stopped the practice of importing chimpanzees, the NIH went on a crash program to breed chimpanzees, on the assumption that the chimpanzee, being so closely related to humans genetically, would be the perfect model to study AIDS and HIV and could be used as a means to do research to find cures. It turns out that the chimpanzee was not a good model for HIV and AIDS. It did not contract the disease so readily. And as a result, we now have on our hands 1,700 surplus chimpanzees, 1,700 chimpanzees living in six research centers throughout the country. Often these chimpanzees, which are intelligent animals with emotions and social groupings, live in cramped cages without any social contact at all. It is expensive to do this, Mr. Speaker. It costs the taxpayers about $7.5 million a year to keep these animals in these conditions. The legislation that is before us will create a new public-private partnership to create sanctuaries where these chimpanzees, who are no longer needed for research, can spend the remainder of their lives, and they often live to be 60 years of age, in humane sanctuaries where they can live in social groupings and in humane and healthy conditions. I first became aware of this issue from the work of Dr. Jane Goodall. We all remember Dr. Jane Goodall from the National Geographic special. She was the pioneer researcher living in the field amongst the chimpanzees and learning to understand them and all of the nuances of their behavior. Dr. Jane Goodall is practically a saint, as far as I am concerned. She is a wonderful, gentle, thoughtful person who recognized that these creatures deserve far better from us than they are receiving, and so she suggested this notion that we create these sanctuaries and she has offered to help to raise the funds to meet the private sector side of this. As she said, when she testified before our committee in May, ``Instead of expending research dollars to warehouse chimpanzees, sometimes for decades, retiring chimpanzees to a sanctuary will be a humane alternative that also frees financial resources that can better be used to find cures for human ailments.'' Mr. Speaker, this legislation will save the taxpayers, it is estimated, about $3 million per year. So it is not only the humane thing to do, it is also the cost-effective thing to do. I would like to thank some folks who worked very hard to get this legislation before us today. Tina Nelson is my constituent from Bucks County, Pennsylvania. She is the Executive Director of the American Anti-Vivisection Society. I would also like to thank the National Chimpanzee Sanctuary Task Force, the ASPCA, the NAVS, the SAPL, and the Humane Society of the United States, whose collective membership represents 8 million members. I would also like to thank their staff, Joyce Cowan, Adam Roberts, Chris Heyde, Mimi Brody and Marianne Radziewicz, and Nandan Kenkeremath of the Committee on Commerce staff, as well as my former staff member, Mara Garducci, who started work on this, and Joel White, who completed the task. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall) for his kind remarks and for his help in this legislation. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to both celebrate and mourn the loss of life of those who carried our freedom and beliefs across the seas aboard the U.S.S. Cole. One of the 17 who died was 35-year-old Richard Costelow who grew up in my county of Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Richard attended Morrisville High School, and he graduated in 1983. As one of his teachers remembered him, Richard ``gave 100 percent every day. That kind of kid doesn't come along too often.'' Richard joined the Navy in 1988 and worked his way up to the ranks to electronic technician, first class. As the President mentioned at this morning's memorial service, he spent 5 years in the White House Communications Office and received the prestigious National Defense Service Medal. My heart goes out to the Costelow family, his wife Sharla, and their three boys as well as to his parents and extended family. Today we mourn this tragic loss, but we will never forget those who served to protect the ideals we as a Nation hold dear. Mr. Speaker, it is particularly grotesque that these young men and women killed and injured in this event were in service of the greatest beacon of freedom ever in the history of the world, and that so often those who commit these acts of terrorism are individuals who themselves are victimized by brutal leaders who, while keeping their boot on the faces of the people of their countries, use the United States as a scapegoat for the frustration and the agony that their own people feel. Someday we will conquer this ignorance, and someday all of the peoples of the world will be free. Until that day comes, we will rely on the Richard Costelows of the world to protect us from those who live in ignorance.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Agriculture Appropriations bill, but want to specifically address the provisions regarding reimportation of prescription drugs, section 745 and 746. As a Member of the Commerce Committee, which has jurisdiction over this issue, I am glad two provisions were included to ensure the safety of consumers, and that savings are passed along to customers. First, we must be sure that nothing in these provisions compromises the health or safety or the American public in any way. Section 745 requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services to demonstrate in a written report to Congress that implementation of the amendment will pose no risk to the public, before the legislation can become effective. This demonstration requirement is no paper tiger. We expect the Secretary to make detailed factual findings and to submit a report supporting the demonstration, if indeed the Secretary can make it at all. The demonstration must be based on a detailed explanation that the Food and Drug Administration has the resources to enforce all of the requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act against each and every one of these drug products as they arrive at our borders. If FDA cannot do this, the demonstration cannot be made, and these provisions cannot be implemented. Through the hard work of the House Commerce Committee in previous Congresses, we have established a precedent for ensuring that Americans have access to safe and effective prescription drugs. Any attempt to under-mine this system by lowering these standards is not acceptable. Second, this legislation sets a condition that before it is implemented, the Secretary must demonstrate that it will result in a cost reduction to American consumers. If the result of reimportation profits only middlemen, and not individual consumers, we will have done little to extend affordable prescriptions to our constituents. In my view, these two determinations are bare minimum essentials that must be in place before this legislation is implemented. We must be vigilant in ensuring that American consumers are not threatened or put at risk in any way by the prescription drugs that come into this country under these provisions.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. I also thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis) for his leadership on this issue; as well as the minority chair of the Subcommittee on Health, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown); and the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn) and the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) for their collaboration. Anytime the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn) and the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) agree on something, it has got to be pretty close to right on. Mr. Speaker, I also want to thank Dorothy Mann from the Philadelphia area, a friend of mine, who helped negotiate one of the toughest aspects of this bill; and that has to do with the testing of newborns. AIDS is clearly the worst epidemic in modern history. It is a tragedy, and it has struck down so many millions of people around the world. But of all of its victims, certainly the children, the newborns, are the most innocent and the ones who tug most heavily on our hearts. Four million women become pregnant in this country every year and 7,000 of those 4 million women are HIV positive. Several hundred of the babies that they bear will be born HIV positive. Of those little children, fully half of them will die before they reach the age of 3; and by the age of 5, 90 percent of them have perished. So obviously anything that can be done to rescue these children from that horrible fate needs to be done. When a woman's HIV status is known during her pregnancy, in two-thirds of the cases the child can be prevented from becoming HIV positive with AZT treatments that are given during pregnancy, during labor and several weeks afterwards, and Cesarian deliveries seem to very dramatically reduce the likelihood that the child will become HIV positive. What we have done in this bill to try to solve the logjam between those who do and those who do not believe in mandatory testing is we have put $30 million in here to go to those States that either have mandatory testing laws or do the most through a variety of programs to reduce the incidence of HIV being passed on to newborns. In New York, they have had a law on the books for 3 years; and they have been able to identify every child who could potentially become exposed to HIV through delivery. They have been able to prevent all of that. In 98 percent of the cases, the mother has been able to get treatment. It has been wildly successful. This bill goes a long way to making sure that that track record will apply to every State in the Union.

Mr. GREENWOOD

Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, my mother once said to me that no matter how important you think you are, remember that the number of people who come to your funeral will be primarily determined by the weather. It must be a good day today because Mr. Goodling is blessed with too many speakers, and we will all have to be brief. Mr. Speaker, I will miss Mr. Goodling as a member of the Committee on Education and the Workforce and a fellow Pennsylvanian. The children and the teachers and the parents and the school board administrators will miss Bill Goodling, because he is someone that has become a rarity in this town. He believes that politics belongs on the campaign trail, and here in Washington in the Nation's capital, because we are supposed to do the people's business, we are supposed to compromise. We are supposed to put politics second to people. Bill Goodling has done that every day for his 26-year career. It is an honor to serve with him and join in this tribute today. Mr. Speaker, because time is limited, I will cut my remarks brief and I yield to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt).