Mary Landrieu

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, would the Senator object to giving me 2 minutes of his time to wrap up?

Ms. LANDRIEU. The program I am attempting to fully fund meets the President's request. This is unlike some other amendments where the President underfunded it and the committee did the same. We just simply have not found the will to fund the program. This is a program the President put in his budget at a $540 million level, and it is being underfunded. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that statements from other individuals who have benefited from this program be printed in the Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for one additional minute.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Let me be very brief before the Senator from California leaves the floor to say I ask her to add me as a cosponsor to the amendment just presented. She made a beautiful presentation, quite compelling about why this Congress should step forward and live up to the commitments we made in a bipartisan fashion with the President of the United States to create and pass a landmark piece of legislation. That only works if the funding is attached. The Senator from California has been so eloquent, saying because the funding has not been attached, it is questionable whether the whole act will work. I commend the Senator and add my name as a cosponsor to her amendment. I move on to describe my amendment, which is complementary but not on the same subject. The amendment I send to the desk is equally as important to Louisiana as the amendment presented by Senator Boxer, which would have provided in Louisiana the opportunity for our Governor, who is Republican--I am a Democrat, he is a Republican--and our board of elementary and secondary education, made up of Democrats and Republicans, her amendment would make it possible for the reformers in our State, made up of members of both parties, to give opportunities for children who find themselves in very difficult situations with no place to go, both parents required to be working or choosing to work, and children needing opportunities after school. This amendment I have sent to the desk funds a similar program that helps stabilize families but in a different way. It actually builds on a bipartisan effort led on this side by the Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Rockefeller, years ago, that recognized a failing in our foster care system. Let me give a minute of background, although the time is very short. We actually have 570,000 children in foster care in the country; about 6,000 are in foster care in Louisiana. It is very unfortunate that children find themselves in foster care at all. We would, of course, like to have a child welfare system in this Nation where, first of all, every child stays in the family to which they are born. We would love for every child to be wanted and nurtured and loved and every family to be strong enough to be able to nurture those children and bring them up in a family environment, of course, educating them and sending them off as we wish for our children whom we raise and for all the children in America. Unfortunately, that situation does not exist in every family for a variety of reasons. Sometimes the parents are simply unable. In some awful situations they are unwilling--drugs, alcohol, very dysfunctional family situations sometimes cause children to be removed from those families, placed into foster care, and then the system is supposed to work. We spend $8 billion a year on that system. And there are serious efforts underway to reform that system. This Senator is convinced we could serve families better, serve the children better, promote adoption, promote family reunification, prevent child abuse actually for less money if we designed this program differently. And those efforts are in the works. Recognizing this program needed so much reform and support, and recognizing the difficulty because it is a very complex, huge Federal program that has been developed over the last 30 years in pretty much of a hit-and-miss kind of fashion, Senator Rockefeller came up with a fabulous, excellent, effective bill several years ago called Promoting Safe and Stable Families. We passed the bill about 7 years ago. The bill basically says we recognize we have this $8 billion Federal program that could work better, and we are going to work on reforming it, but while we are doing that, let's make sure we are doing everything we can to help States and courts prevent children from going into the foster care system--in other words, reducing child abuse; in other words, giving families support at the front end, so that children do not go into foster care, so we do not have almost 600,000 children having to be taken away from their families and moved into a system, sometimes to languish for years. Then Senator Rockefeller and others--this was a bipartisan effort-- said: Let's create a program on the back end so that when these children ``age out''--at that time it was 18; now it is 21--we give them another step so they can become productive adults. Although they have lost their families--many of the parental rights have been terminated--because our system has failed them; they were not adopted-- at least let's give them a college education. That is Promoting Safe and Stable Families. I think the American people, whether they are liberal, conservative, Democrat, or Republican, could most certainly understand the benefit of spending a small portion of money to make sure the $8 billion we are spending is being spent as wisely as possible, to prevent the taxpayers, basically, from picking up the tab for a program that is not working. The fact of the matter is, this bill, even though the President requested the program to be at a level of $504 million, for which he should be commended--he has been criticized, and a great deal of that criticism, actually, I believe, should be leveled in his direction. But in this case, it is actually the opposite. The President put $504 million in his budget. I commend him for doing that. Yet this underlying bill is shorting that program by over $100 million. My amendment seeks to fully fund Promoting Safe and Stable Families to the level President Bush requested. Again, that request was made because Democrats and Republicans believe this program is a way, first, to make sure the $8 billion taxpayers are spending right now is spent in the appropriate ways, and making sure we have the flexibility given to our States and local governments to prevent children from coming into foster care. And that is done by supporting community-based programs, time-limited family reunifications, and, in my opinion, most importantly, promoting adoption and the support services that go along with adoption. Then, at the back end, this money would be given to States. It would be very flexible. States can design their own programs. It is given to the States in a very flexible way to make sure that if the system is failing--and right now it is failing thousands and thousands of our children--when the system takes their parents away, and then when the system fails to provide another family for them, the least this Congress could do, I would argue, for the most vulnerable children in America--some of these children are poor, some of them are not, some of them came from homes of middle-income families--the least we could do, though, for this group of children who have no parents to advocate for them, who have no family to advocate for them, is to fully fund the education component this Congress wisely put in place that gives children an opportunity, when they age out of foster care, to go on and try to build a life, despite the difficulties they have, to stay out of prison, to stay out of mental health hospitals. That is what this amendment does. In conclusion, this amendment, which adds about $100 million to the underlying bill, would meet the President's request. It would fund the authorization of Promoting Safe and Stable Families. It would attempt to help the 1 million children last year in the United States who were confirmed as victims of abuse and neglect. It would do it in a way without Federal mandates, without Federal regulations, but would give the money to the States and to our cities and to our local communities to design these programs in the way they see fit. In closing, Mr. President, let me just add some words from children who have actually received the benefit of this program. Let's listen to what they say in their own words about this program. The first is written by Belinda J. from Juniata College in Pennsylvania. She says: There are not enough words to express my gratitude to you for donating money to further my education. When I received the award letter-- which this amendment would fully fund-- I was speechless and almost started to cry. All those years I worked hard in school because I knew I wanted a career in science. I had a dream and people like you-- speaking to the Members of Congress-- helped me fulfill that dream. Things still do not come easy to me and I still face the same challenges that I had in foster care, but your belief in me has helped keep me going towards my goal. At this point in my life, I do not know if I am going to be a doctor, a scientist or a forensic investigator, but I do know whom to thank when I become one of these. This is a young woman who has no parents.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, there are fewer issues that bring consensus to the table than the issue of adoption. We in this Congress have worked in a bipartisan manner to help our families be stronger and safer and to help children in foster care. There are 570,000 children in foster care. This amendment allows us to help them with $118 million to live up to the commitments we have made to these children. Madam President, 100,000 of them are orphans. We promised to help 25,000 who age out of foster care get a chance to go to college. These children have no parents. We are their parents. If we do not help them get to school, they are not going. That is what this amendment does. We agree on adoption. We agree on improvements to foster care. Let us vote to increase the funding. It is minuscule and inconsequential to this budget, but it is of enormous importance to this group of people and to these children.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, we have had a series of very important amendments. The priorities of Members and their States are reflected in each amendment that has been offered, and the amendments of Senator Breaux, one of the cosponsors, Senator Daschle, Senator Johnson, and others, is the same. This is a very important issue to our State and an issue we hope we can find some redress to in this appropriations bill. My amendment seeks to fund a new piece of legislation passed last year with a great deal of fanfare because the situation is so obvious relating to the West Nile virus sweeping the United States. Because of this very frightening situation, the Congress acted appropriately last year. Several Members joined together with States that had been very hard hit to pass a new piece of Federal legislation saying yes, the Federal Government should step to the plate and help our States with treatment, with education for the population, with prevention, and also with methods in place to basically kill the mosquitoes and kill the dangerous larvae that create the situation. There are a lot of serious issues. I don't mean to compare this in any way with the degree of the heartbreak in which we engage in the war in Iraq because that is such an international and extremely important issue. Just to let the taxpayers know, to date we had 286 people die in a war; we have had 246 people die in the United States of West Nile virus. The small, modest amendment I am offering, which is only $100 million, to fully fund this program makes small grants available to the States. This would help save lives, would help the country become more aware of what individuals and communities can do to protect themselves. Hopefully, with just a little bit of help from the Federal Government, our States will step to the plate. In 2002, we had 884 cases reported in Illinois. In that State alone, 64 people have died. In Michigan, we have had 614 positive cases of West Nile and 51 people died as a result. My State has been hard hit. In Louisiana we had 329 cases in 2002 and 25 deaths. Other States that have registered high numbers of cases are Colorado, South Dakota, and Louisiana for 2003. Mosquitos are not a new enemy in Louisiana. As a low-lying swampy place, we have been battling this for literally hundreds of years. However, they are more than a nuisance; they are deadly. This is a very serious public health issue in the United States. The bill last year was passed with great fanfare, authorizing a very simple, modest, but important Federal program to help give moneys to local counties--in our State that would be parishes--to help with mosquito abatement programs. It requires a local government match. Without this money there will be no assistance for the State and local governments to help with the West Nile virus and mosquito control. This funding will make it possible for State and local jurisdictions to develop and implement effective programs. I am proud to say Louisiana has been a leader. Of course, for 300 years we have been fighting mosquitos. We have a lot of experience. Many of the coastal States, including North Carolina, have experienced difficulties, as well as Alaska, I understand. It is interesting to note that it is not limited to just the coastal States. Again, the highest incidence is in Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio. People are dying. This can be a fatal condition. Madam President, my amendment seeks to fund the new but very important program to help local governments deal with the West Nile virus. I hope we find the resources in this budget to do so.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I believe under the unanimous consent I am in line to offer an amendment and I send an amendment to the desk for its immediate consideration.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I appreciate the chairman's comments. I know how hard he and the Senator from Iowa have worked to keep this budget within the limits established. As a member of the Appropriations Committee, I am well aware of the process. It seems as though the Republican leadership has allowed spending for programs using an advance funding mechanism for the priorities they believe are important; yet while saying they think this priority is important, they refuse to accept amendments that basically use the same offset. I want to make clear for the record that the funding for this would come from the exact same provision that the chairman has used for other programs in the health, welfare, and education bill. Yet it seems when it comes to full funding for Leave No Child Behind or full funding for a program the administration says it fully supports, there is all of a sudden no money available. Again, this has been one of the priorities of this administration. Leave No Child Behind is something this administration speaks about on a daily basis. Yet there are billions of dollars of shortage in funding in that program. That is not just another Federal program. It was a very important historic meeting of the minds on how to reform education and how to give cities--whether it is Washington, DC, or New Orleans or rural areas throughout the country--the resources they need to reform public education. Also, upgrading foster care, promoting adoption, making sure that every child has a family, a loving and stable home because that is the fabric and essence of our society, again, we find that the will is simply not there. That is what I wanted to say in response. I understand this amendment will not be accepted. I wanted to say that it seeks the same sort of offset that other programs have in the bill.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, pursuant to section 504(b)(2) of H. Con. Res. 95, I move to waive section 504 of that concurrent resolution for the purposes of the pending amendment. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the list of States and the amounts of money that will be lost be printed in the Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. I ask unanimous consent that Kathleen Strottman be granted the privilege of the floor.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, it is almost like the change of season around the Capitol when young people from all over the country descend on the Capitol to learn about their Government. We all meet with groups of these students from our State. We take photos, we answer questions. But if you take the time to look at the badges the students and teachers are wearing, more likely than not, they will say Close Up. Like thousands of young people around this Nation, I got my first real taste of our Federal Government from a trip sponsored by the Close Up Foundation. Since 1972, more than 26,000 students from my State have learned about their Government through the auspices of this organization. Close Up has awarded some $3.7 million in fellowships for students in need and their teachers to encourage the broadest base of possible participation. Furthermore, this program was started by a legendary member of this body, who also hailed from Louisiana--Allen Ellender. Moreover, there has never been a greater need than now for young people to understand what our Democracy is all about. As we face enormous challenges at home and abroad, the better understanding our young people have about their Government, the brighter our future will be. Sadly, Mr. President, the Close Up Foundation, which has enjoyed the support of the Senate for several decades, did not receive any resources in this bill. They are seeking funding of $1.4 million, an amount equal to last year's level. I would ask my friend, the Senior Senator from Pennsylvania, and chairman of the Labor, Health and Human Services Subcommittee, if he is aware of the precarious situation of this program, and if he would be willing to work with me to find additional resources during the conference process.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, pursuant to section 504(b)(2) of H. Con. Res. 95, I move to waive section 504 of that concurrent resolution for purposes of the pending amendment, and I ask for the yeas and nays.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I ask for my colleagues' support on this amendment.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I am glad to have a quorum. This is a very important amendment. I need my colleagues' help, if they would direct their attention to this chart I have in the Chamber. This amendment is called the MASH amendment. It is a very serious amendment: mosquito abatement, safety, and health. We are fighting multiple wars--one in Iraq, which is very serious, with far-reaching consequences. I know my colleagues are interested in knowing about how many people have lost their lives in their own States in this last year. It has been quite a few from this new and very deadly disease. We have lost 286 men and women in Iraq, which is very serious, and we are spending a great deal of time, energy, money, and treasure, but we have also lost 246 individuals in the United States. The highest instances have been in Louisiana, South Dakota, Michigan, and Ohio. This amendment will provide the only Federal funds available to help our States combat this deadly disease. I ask for your support. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record data on the number of confirmed cases of people who have contracted this deadly disease and the number of people who have died from it.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I come to the floor to support Senator Harkin in his call for additional funding to support the reform underway for education. I would like to speak a minute about the reforms, the importance of living up to our promises and meeting the requirements of the quite historic act of Leave No Child Behind, as well as to support Senator Harkin in his call to scuttle an unneeded, untimely, and in many ways unsettling and disappointing rule that the Labor Department is proposing to strip away overtime pay for 8 million workers. Since the Senator spoke in just the last moment on education, let me start with that. I listened during the last several weeks to so many different speeches about the level of education funding. Let me be the first to say as a Democrat that I am proud to have led the effort to come up with a bipartisan bill that holds out hope and promise to every child in our country for a better education. I tire of the criticism this side of the aisle receives when people say all the Democrats care about is more money and more money. Let me remind people about the fact that many of us on this side of the aisle rejected the call for more funding just being dumped on the same old system. We stood our ground and argued with some Republicans--not all-- whose initial efforts were in many ways to just abandon the public school system, eliminate the Department of Education, remove all Federal involvement in education, walk away from our Governors, walk away from our legislators, and say: Fine. The school system is yours. But luckily there were enough Republicans so we rejected that wrong- headed thinking. We came together and said it is not a straight voucher system that is going to solve public education and we don't need to abandon public schools. Then some Democrats said it is not just more money which we need. It is accountability with added investment and an expectation of results that are going to work. People would ask me: Senator, how do you know this? Why do you feel so strongly about it? How can you be so confident about it? It is not a concept for me and for Senator Breaux who represent the State of Louisiana that it would be 3 years down the road of reform and accountability before we passed the Federal law. We started out--along with about five other States--pioneering this new effort to identify through strong testing the schools that are working and those that aren't; when we identify those that aren't, to give added resources, whether they are urban areas or rural areas, to help them turn around and improve; when they can and when they fail. Then we have the power at the State and Federal levels to close those schools or reconstitute those schools so we can provide better leadership, a better framework, and better opportunity so the children in those schools, along with better qualified teachers, more committed administrators, and more involved parents and communities can learn and get the job done. But all of those new requirements for every child to take a test and pass, for teachers to have certification and not willy-nilly certification--not the old-fashioned certification but the new kind of certification--obviously a college degree but also nontraditional certifications such as teachers and executives who have been successful and perhaps retired and want to come into the classroom--new and innovative ways but still a standard to be met and teachers coming into the classroom with good skills and good requirements. We said if we are going to raise the bar and increase the mandates and require accountability and certification, then we will fund those efforts. The other side of the aisle wants to keep saying that all Democrats want is more money. We don't just want more money. But we do want this administration and we want the President to commit and live up to the promises he made to fund the reforms. Yes, the amount of money for education has increased, but it does not increase because the President has asked for enough money to meet the new and rigorous demands that he and we are expecting from our school system. We have deadlines in the bill to require States such as Louisiana--and in some parishes 40 percent of the teachers are unqualified and uncertified, not because people do not want to teach but because the salary levels are so low; because of the underfunding and the traditional ways we fund education, which is not at all equitable throughout this Nation--for any number of reasons we are not able to keep those teachers' salaries up. Yet the new law which we all supported requires that we have certified teachers. While we have doubled, tripled, and quadrupled the mandate, or the expectation, or the standards--however you want to define them--we have not quadrupled or tripled funds. Therein lies the problem. As we raise the standards and expect higher accountability and, as Senator Byrd from West Virginia has pointed out a number of times on this floor, refuse to step to the plate and fund that level, we leave our schools and our local communities--whether it is out in the mountains of Montana in big sky country or the bayous, flatlands and lowlands of Louisiana, or whether it is an urban center like New York or Chicago, we leave our schools and our administrators struggling with a mighty task and limited resources. It is wrong. Finally on education funding, several decades ago we said to the States, we will help you identify special-needs children. The deal is if you put up X amount of dollars we will put up X amount of dollars because we believe even if children are visually impaired, hard of hearing, or have some mental incapacities, they still should receive a quality education. We submit to the States, if we identify these special-needs children, we will pick up the tab. Again, that was an empty promise because today we are picking up much less than the 40 percent we promised--I think perhaps 10 percent when we promised 40, 50, or 60 percent. Yes, we do need a higher level of commitment from this President and from the administration, not to throw money at the old system but to help build the new system he and the Republican leadership helped to craft. But it is like putting up the framework of a skyscraper and not providing the rest of the money necessary to make those changes real and to make them stick. I know Governors and administrators are struggling. I want them to know that at least this Senator and many Democrats, some Republicans, are in Washington trying to do what we can to squeeze out additional dollars to live up to the promise we made. A final point. I am tired of the other side saying, we never meet authorization levels. What are you talking about? We authorize X in housing, yet we only fund X. We authorize X in research but we only fund X. I know that is normally what we do. But Leave No Child Behind is not just routine business. It is not just another day at the office. It is not just, we will do it when we get to it, and when we don't, we can't. This is a national priority this Congress resolved to commit to, saying yes, we believe it is an American birthright not just to be able to walk into a school but to be able to walk out with a diploma that means something. It is in the family's interest, the individual's interest, and in the Nation's interest to have that kind of school system. We will fund it. And then the next year we didn't. The President and the administration deserve and should stand up and take the criticism they deserve for not funding it fully as was implied, if not directly promised. It brings me to, interestingly, in this debate over education funding, which the underlying bill helps to focus on, another interesting fight or debate about the District of Columbia. This is a school system of 500,000 people, a school system with about 75,000 children. We have been debating in Washington a proposal by the original sponsors, Republican leaders in the House. Their basic solution to the fact this school system is not quite doing what it should do was not, why don't we fully fund what we promised in Leave No Child Behind? Why don't we fully fund Title I for the District of Columbia? Why don't we fully fund special education? Why don't we really hold these teachers and the school system accountable and make sure these schools that are failing are closed? No. Before the ink was dry on the Leave No Child Behind Act, there was a group that said, Vouchers are the answer. With all due respect to well-meaning colleagues, vouchers are not the answer to education challenges in America. Full funding for Leave No Child Behind, funding teacher certification, smaller classroom size, funding to repair dilapidated school systems, and funding research and innovation, and giving flexibility at the local level is what will help our local school system. If there was an opportunity under Leave No Child Behind, if a school was identified as needing reform and it had to be closed and there are several hundred children or perhaps even 1,000 in some of these schools--it is allowable now, permissible now at the local level, without any action Congress might take with that local school system, to use a voucher proposal; not federally mandated, not federally required, not contingent upon getting any new funds, but it is allowed now for those students in failing schools to opt out to either higher performing public schools or charter schools or to a private school that is accredited with that money. And that maybe if it is designed specifically for children in failing schools, if there is the same accountability requirements--in other words, children in public schools have to take certain tests to make sure the public dollars being spent are being spent well--if those accountability measures are followed by the accountable voucher proposal, then perhaps that is something that should be considered, but in the context of more full funding for Leave No Child Behind and in the context of supporting other admirable reform efforts in the schools like charter schools and the transformation of some of the public schools that are going on today. I was recently criticized by the Wall Street Journal for my position in this particular debate. Although it is not worth putting it into the Congressional Record, the article was factually incorrect on so many different points, including criticizing me for changing my position. My position on this has been constant over the last several years. Again, I don't believe a mandate in public schools of going to a system of vouchers helps to strengthen the public school system. However, I believe when failing schools are identified, children from families with limited resources should be allowed but not required, if the vouchers meet the same accountability standards as Leave No Child Behind allowed, to be able to move to a higher performing school. My position has been consistent. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a beautiful letter written by the head of the Georgetown Day School, Peter M. Branch, where my children attend. This letter is in response to the Wall Street Journal editorial.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, today I rise to introduce the Environmental Health Research Act. Science has long since shown that the environment plays an important role in an individual's health. We have made the correlation between clean drinking water and a person's well being. We know that there is a link between childhood asthma and unclean air. Through scientific research we have been able to shed light on these findings, and as a society we are healthier form knowing how our environment affects our physical condition, as we are now able to take steps to ameliorate our environment so we can improve our health. With all of the advancements we have made in recent decades, we must still research further, especially in the area of how the environment affects women's health. There is evidence that shows that environmental factors contribute to numerous diseases in women. For example, there are synthetic chemicals in numerous regularly used pesticides and natural compounds in many plant products in our regular diet that produce compounds that mimic the female hormone estrogen. Many scientists believe that these `environmental estrogens'' may block the natural hormone. If this is true, then environmental estrogens may play a role in diseases such as cancers of the breast, uterus, and ovaries, endometriosis, uterine fibroids, and osteoporosis. As we come into contact with environmental estrogens everyday through eating, drinking, and breathing, it is very important that we have research dedicated to discovering how they may affect women's health. In addition, 12 million American kids suffer from developmental, learning, or behavioral disabilities. Attention deficit disorder affects three to six percent of our schoolchildren. Research shows that exposure to certain environmental factors during pregnancy may increase the risk of disabilities after birth. The research called for by this bill would help us to answer the many questions raised by the incidence of birth defects in certain environments. One in three women will be diagnosed with cancer at some point in their lives. Uterine fibroids are present in between 20 and 30 percent of women over the age of 30. Endometriosis affects an estimated 10 to 15 percent of pre-menopausal women. Millions of women are affected every year with diseases that are more than likely linked to the environment. We must further our scientific knowledge in this area. For this reason I ask for your support for the Environmental Health Research Act. Thank you. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, today I rise to introduce the Environmental Health Research Act. Science has long since shown that the environment plays an important role in an individual's health. We have made the correlation between clean drinking water and a person's well being. We know that there is a link between childhood asthma and unclean air. Through scientific research we have been able to shed light on these findings, and as a society we are healthier form knowing how our environment affects our physical condition, as we are now able to take steps to ameliorate our environment so we can improve our health. With all of the advancements we have made in recent decades, we must still research further, especially in the area of how the environment affects women's health. There is evidence that shows that environmental factors contribute to numerous diseases in women. For example, there are synthetic chemicals in numerous regularly used pesticides and natural compounds in many plant products in our regular diet that produce compounds that mimic the female hormone estrogen. Many scientists believe that these `environmental estrogens'' may block the natural hormone. If this is true, then environmental estrogens may play a role in diseases such as cancers of the breast, uterus, and ovaries, endometriosis, uterine fibroids, and osteoporosis. As we come into contact with environmental estrogens everyday through eating, drinking, and breathing, it is very important that we have research dedicated to discovering how they may affect women's health. In addition, 12 million American kids suffer from developmental, learning, or behavioral disabilities. Attention deficit disorder affects three to six percent of our schoolchildren. Research shows that exposure to certain environmental factors during pregnancy may increase the risk of disabilities after birth. The research called for by this bill would help us to answer the many questions raised by the incidence of birth defects in certain environments. One in three women will be diagnosed with cancer at some point in their lives. Uterine fibroids are present in between 20 and 30 percent of women over the age of 30. Endometriosis affects an estimated 10 to 15 percent of pre-menopausal women. Millions of women are affected every year with diseases that are more than likely linked to the environment. We must further our scientific knowledge in this area. For this reason I ask for your support for the Environmental Health Research Act. Thank you. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I associate myself with the remarks of my colleague from Arkansas who, along with our colleague from Texas, has organized and continues to organize a very appropriate tribute to our troops to let them know that while we work, while we try to fashion an Energy bill, while we pass trade legislation, while we attempt to pass the 13 appropriations bills that fund this Government, including the Department which funds their operations, we keep them in our minds. They are on our minds in the morning, at noontime, the early afternoon, and early evening, as it is today. I thank my colleague for her remarks, and I know she wishes the troops from Arkansas well and that they return home safely, as I do those from Louisiana, as does our whole Nation. So I thank her. I will spend a few minutes speaking about the major issue at hand, and that is our Energy bill and our attempts to fashion an energy policy for our Nation. For a great part of the time since last Friday, the Senate has been engaged in a very important debate on this very complicated and far-reaching subject. That debate has followed along several weeks of intense debate and hard work done on the part of Democrats and Republicans on the Energy Committee to try to fashion a bill a majority of the Senators could support. I have been in meetings myself all day on and off the floor about that very subject, and hopefully those meetings are proceeding well, trying to come up with some compromises to move us forward, to proceed so we do not get stalled on this energy legislation. I remain very hopeful at this hour that those negotiations will be fruitful so we can continue our push, our bipartisan effort, to fashion a bill that increases supply, reduces demand, puts new measures in place that require conservation and that also will protect consumers in a new, more deregulated way. Those are high goals, but they are important goals because if we do it right, consumers can save a great deal of money. If we do it right, we can save jobs. If we do it right, we can help this economy to get a strong foothold toward recovery. If we do it right, we can help our industries be more competitive and, in doing so, save and preserve jobs in the United States and increase prosperity. I wanted to take a moment, while we had this time, to focus on one of the most important aspects of an energy policy, and, first, to recognize that most of the debate this week has rightly been Senators expressing their outrage at what went wrong in the last 12 or 15 months: The description brought again so vividly to the Senate floor by the Senator from Washington, Ms. Cantwell; the comments made by Senator Feinstein; the comments made by other Senators on the travesty that occurred in California and the outrage of the constituents there because of the doubling and tripling and quadrupling of energy prices. I most certainly understand. We, ourselves, in Louisiana have been experiencing higher prices for different reasons. I understand that frustration. As much as I support some--not all but some--of their efforts to remedy that situation, I will spend a few minutes talking about one of the real causes of that problem. While there was deception, there was manipulation, there was wrongdoing--and people like Ken Lay and others need to be on their way to jail, and we hope the prosecution will be vigorous for that wrongdoing--we would not be giving our constituents the whole picture if we did not talk for a minute about the underlying cause of that debacle. It is simply a lack of supply. We have for the last 20 years implemented policies in this Congress that have mandated a dramatic increase in natural gas. Yet we have also mandated the same policies or allowed policies to develop that decreased our chances of producing natural gas. As my chart shows, our main energy problem--what has happened and the reason we are spending weeks, and if we have to spend months, so be it--is we have to close this gap between natural gas demand and natural gas availability. That is what is causing the price of natural gas to be at historic highs and, quite frankly, at dangerous levels because it undercuts this economy. Let me give a few specifics. Natural gas provides nearly 25 percent of the energy that powers our $10.5 trillion economy. I repeat: 25 percent of our entire economy rests on our natural gas policy. It is out of whack. When it is out of whack, it causes serious problems and serious consequences. That is what we are experiencing. More than 55 percent of residential customers use natural gas. Visualize walking along any neighborhood in the country. In New Orleans, along Napoleon Avenue where I grew up; think about walking down Grand Isle, little Main Street on an island. I was just there a few weeks ago. Maybe you are in a suburb right close to Washington or maybe right on East Capitol Street. Every other house--50 percent of residential consumers--has natural gas access. We have a shortage. When there is a shortage, prices go up. This country will see an increase, it is estimated, from $534 in 1999 to $900 in 2003. That means consumers--every other house, basically--will pay $70 billion more for gas in 2003 than they did in 2002. We gave a tax cut of $340 billion. Average it over 10 years, it is $34 billion. We are giving a tax cut of $34 billion. Yet because of our energy policy, we are taking $70 billion out of the pockets of residential customers. It makes no sense. That is why people can say: Thanks for the tax cut, but I am not really feeling it because you are giving it on the one hand and taking it away on the other. We have a solution. Natural gas is not only a fuel but an essential raw material for feedstock. Each year, the U.S. chemical industry converts 20 percent or $20 billion of natural gas-based fuel and feedstock into more than $200 billion of essential consumer products. When people say to me, Senator, your State is a natural gas State, you are concerned about natural gas, I am concerned about natural gas because, of course, it fuels every other house in the country, but also because it fuels so many of the plants that create all of the products we use for a variety of our entities, a variety of goods in our economy that we use every day, from plastics to chemicals to fertilizers. More than a million people work daily in the U.S. chemical industry, and 5 million people work in dependent jobs; that is 6 million jobs. If I have to stay on the Senate floor all day today, all day tomorrow, if I don't leave for the August recess, it is fine with me because we need to get people back to work. I know that even if we passed the most well-crafted tax policy, no matter if we pass the most well-crafted trade laws, no matter what we pass, if we do not pass an Energy bill that gives some vision for the future, confidence to the market and an increased supply and conservation, we are not going to be able to do anything else here that will save these jobs or create jobs for Louisiana or for the Nation as a whole. This is not just an Energy bill; it is a jobs bill. At a time when our economy is weak, this Senate needs to be about jobs. That is why I hope these negotiations will be fruitful. We need a good bill. In my State of Louisiana, ammonia plants in particular are feeling the effects. For these plants, the cost of natural gas represents 70 to 90 percent of the total cost of manufacturing. If I cannot get them relief on their price of natural gas, if I cannot help get this bill through, and we do not have some relief in sight, these plants will close, thousands of jobs will be lost, they will move overseas, and they are not coming back. It is not like closing an office temporarily until conditions improve and then everyone shows up a few months later. These plants are huge. There is a tremendous amount of steel and processing equipment. When they close, they are not going to reopen. We have gone from nine companies employing more than 3,500 people to three companies employing less than 100. There is a solution: Improving our drilling opportunities in appropriate places for natural gas--out West, in the gulf coast, and importing liquefied natural gas is a start. In my last 3 minutes I will explain one basic issue that gets to the heart of what I am trying to communicate. Again, let me say so that no one can say that Senator Landrieu is not concerned about deception and manipulation and scams that went on, I promise, the manipulation, deception, and scams were not the primary cause of our dilemma today. It was a cause, it was a significant cause, and it was criminal in many cases, but it was not the primary cause. The primary cause is some States, in the last 20 or 30 years, consumed a lot of energy, but do not produce energy. I have a chart illustrating statistics from our Energy Department, including all types of fuels and energy: Nuclear, hydrogen, geothermal, wood, wind, waste, solar, oil, natural gas, and coal. This is from the U.S. Department of Energy, the Energy Information Agency. This includes all types of energy minus consumption. The States in dark red on the chart are the States that consume much more energy than they produce. And they are rated from the top, which is California; the second is New York; third is Ohio; and fourth is Florida. And it goes down to the States that produce more than they consume. They become net exporters of energy, the best State being Wyoming, then Louisiana, then West Virginia, Alaska, and it goes up. Let me be quick to point out, because this is a very important chart, the country can never be energy independent until these States, and the regions they are in, become energy independent. One of the things the chairman, the Senator from New Mexico, has been trying to help this Congress understand is that you cannot even begin to be energy independent until these States and these regions come to terms with the fact that they are consuming huge amounts of energy and they are not producing. They have two choices: They can either cut their consumption, they can cut their consumption and can conserve anything they want, or they can produce more energy. So that is part of what our chairman and ranking member, both from New Mexico, have been trying to explain to us. I am going to submit this for the Record. We have an energy deficit in this Nation. No matter how you look at it, no matter how many people you put in jail, no matter how much consumer regulation you put in place, we have a serious energy deficit. Until this is corrected, no matter what we do, we are still not going to have the kind of energy policy in this Nation that will help us keep jobs in America and strengthen our economy. In conclusion, I want to say how proud I am that Louisiana is a producing State and we not only consume what we produce but we export energy. We are proud to do that, and we will continue to do that in appropriate, environmentally sensitive ways. I yield the floor.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Ms. LANDRIEU. I wanted to ask my distinguished colleague if I had heard the Senator from New Mexico correctly when he suggested that one way to proceed to move us past this very difficult hurdle would be to take up the electricity section and try to finish that before we left? If that is what I heard, was that a suggestion made by the chairman of the committee, who has worked so hard to try to put a bill together, thinking we could perhaps resolve some of those difficult issues on the electricity section? Is that what the Senator understood the chairman of the committee to say?

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.