Ed Markey

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman put his finger right on the problem. I do not think we want people driving around, driving up Rock Creek without an E-911 signal. That is what we have right now. It would be very helpful if down the line we are able to resolve these tensions that exist between environmental concerns and telecommunications technology, but ultimately, we have to harmonize the policies to ensure that Americans are able to get the best of both, which right now I think they are being denied.

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

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Ford), that eloquent forceful advocate.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would correct the gentleman from Houston, it is Massachusetts, rather than Massatusetts. We are very sensitive to that as we head into the Yankee Series. Mr. Speaker, we recommend to the full House that this bill be accepted.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would only point out that in order to have a jump shot, we must be able to get off the ground. I would like to have the gentleman have an opportunity to revise and extend so that he can correct any erroneous impression that he may have left with the listening audience here today with regard to my jumping ability. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Houston, Texas (Mr. Green), the illustrious legislator and another luminary in the firmament of jump-shooting basketball players in Congress. (Mr. GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Missouri (Ms. Danner), who played a critical role in the passage of this legislation.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by commending my good friend, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) for his excellent work on this legislation and to praise the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus) for his work and to congratulate him on the addition to his family. It has been a wonderful day, if we can get all of those things done, plus have the Red Sox beat Cleveland and head on to beat the Yankees and take the curse of the Bambino off of our shoulders. It would be excellent, as well, if we can follow on and beat the Mets and get rid of the Bill Buckner curse as part of this week as well, but it is developing as one of the best weeks I think that this Congress is going to have, at least from this Member's perspective. I would also like to compliment the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Bliley) and thank both of my colleagues for working closely with the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) and myself and the other Democratic colleagues on our side of the aisle; as my colleagues know, the gentlewoman from Missouri (Ms. Danner) has been very much identified with this legislation right from the beginning. Mr. Speaker, the bill before us, S. 800, is the Senate version of legislation that picks up on an effort that the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) spearheaded last year to enhance the emergency 9-1-1 infrastructure of this country for wireless communications. It is the Senate version of House Bill 438 which was approved by the House overwhelmingly earlier this year. This is a very timely endeavor given the explosive growth of wireless communications in our country. Mr. Speaker, as more and more Americans use wireless phones, wireless services become less and less perceived as an ancillary, discretionary service. With over 70 million subscribers and with some carriers dropping prices as much as 30 percent in the last year alone, wireless technology is a great success story, and there is no question that every day more consumers will increasingly be relying on wireless technology for both business and safety. A natural result of the proliferation of these wireless phones is that many consumers will use them to call for help and assistance in time of emergency. Indeed many wireless carriers actively promote their services to consumers as safety devices, and this re-emphasizes the need to make that promise a reality for wireless communications. Both the House and Senate version of this bill seek to enhance public safety by making 9-1-1 the national public safety designated number. This is important because in many jurisdictions the emergency number wireless consumers must call is something other than 9-1-1. The gentleman from Louisiana has already pointed that out. That is confusing as people cross State boundaries, and unless it is changed, could cost lives. Simply put, establishing 911 as the national emergency number for wireless calls is something that we believe will save lives. Secondly, the Senate bill also includes a provision that I added as an amendment to last year's wireless 911 legislation in the House conference committee to protect personal privacy. This is, again, something that I have had an enormous concern about in every aspect of telecommunications. How will these communications technologies impinge upon the privacy of every American? I have tried working with the majority to include a privacy provision in every telecommunications bill that has passed through the House over the last 5 years. This new ever-more sophisticated location technology permits wireless carriers a greater ability to physically pinpoint the geographic location of the caller. This is vital technology for locating people who may be in distress or in an accident, in situations where emergency personnel must quickly locate victims, treat injuries, and get them to respond, so that they can get to a hospital. Yet, the same technology that can save lives also poses privacy issues that must be dealt with simultaneously. There is no question that information-rich location systems that do wonders to help save lives on our Nation's roadways also pose significant risks for compromising personal privacy. This is because the technology also avails wireless companies of the ability to locate and track individual's movements throughout society, where you go for your lunch break; where you drive on the weekends; the places you visit during the course of a week is your business. It is your private business, not information that wireless companies ought to collect, monitor, disclose, or use without one's approval. The privacy amendment that I successfully offered last year and which was contained in H.R. 438 this year, as introduced, and is identical to the provisions subsequently adopted in the Senate is in the bill. It stipulates that location information will not be used by wireless carriers, except for 911 emergency purposes, or with the approval of consumers for any other services. This is an opt-in for consumer privacy. The company has to get one's permission to use this information. They just cannot say well, they did not say we could not use it, so we are going to let everybody in town buy where you go, where you stop, the places you have been. This is opt-in, and that is the way it should be. They should have to come to you and say we want to sell this information to anyone who wants to buy it as to where you are going. Wherever your cell phone goes becomes a monitor of all of your activities. Finally, the bill also extends liability protections to wireless carriers for emergency calls equivalent to the protection accorded to States for wire phone companies. Liability protection for wireless service is to be implemented on a State-by-State basis, mirroring the services protections accorded local telephone companies in such jurisdictions. Again, I want to compliment the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus), the gentlewoman from Missouri (Ms. Danner), and the majority for the way in which they treated us. I think we have a nice, solid compromise package here for all of the Members to support tonight. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker, the American public deserves a full, deliberate, considered, informative debate on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Instead, the Republican Senate is conducting a caricature of a debate structured to obscure understanding and to maximize political gamesmanship by springing the subject on to the Senate calendar and forcing a momentous vote on a moment's notice. The Republican leadership is giving jack-in-the-box treatment to the ultimate black box subject of nuclear annihilation. Where is the statesmanship? Where is the sober and solemn consideration of the special role that the United States must play in the stewardship of the world's nuclear stockpiles? If we rush to judgment, we will crush the confidence of our cosigners and spur the proliferation of nuclear weapons in an unpredictable world. We must not reignite the arms race. We must not let the nuclear bull out of the ring to run wild through the streets of the world. The Cold War is over. This is a time to de-alert and dismantle nuclear weapons. Instead, the Republican leadership is bent on destroying the treaty to control them. This is not brinkmanship; this is not statesmanship. This is irresponsibility on a global scale. We no longer test nuclear weapons in the United States. George Bush stopped the nuclear testing. So if we are not going to test nuclear weapons in the United States, which we have not, why in the world should we not sign a treaty 7 years later that allows us to monitor every other country in the world to guarantee that they are not testing nuclear weapons? Madam Speaker, the reality is that without this treaty there can be clandestine tests that allow other countries in the world to catch up with us. The signing of this treaty ensures that we have hundreds of monitoring devices around the world strategically placed to ensure that there is no testing because, in fact, the treaty mandates on-site inspection. That is right. If we detect, through the seismological equipment or any other means, that there is a suspicious activity taking place in any country in the world, that country must allow us and the world to go in and to look at what they are doing, if they are testing. Then, the United States, which has decided unilaterally during the Bush administration, and has continued right through the Clinton years, not to test, will have the ability to ensure that there has been a technological homeostasis, a technological stay which has been put in place where we keep our lead. Madam Speaker, there is no more important issue which we can debate than whether or not at the end of the millennium, the gift which we can give to the next millennium, is that we have resolved this issue of whether or not the countries of the world will continue to test nuclear weapons. The disease, the famine, the wars of this millennium should be something which we do not pass on to the next millennium. We should be trying to find ways of ensuring that we are going to deal with the AIDS crisis in Africa. We should try to find ways in which we are going to deal with the debt crisis of the Third World, and we should try to find some way in which we end the specter of nuclear weapons which has hung over this planet for the last 50 years of this millennium. There can be no more important issue. So, Madam Speaker, let us hope that today in the Senate that enough Members stand up to be recognized in support of a treaty which will allow us to continue to spread a regime of controls which will limit, if not eliminate, the likelihood that we will face the day when we stand here and face the fact that a nuclear accident or a nuclear weapon was used. The least that the Senate should be able to say, the least that all of us should be able to say when those nuclear weapons are about to be used is that we tried; we really tried to put an end to this nuclear threat which hangs over the world. Let us hope today that the United States Senate does the right thing.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, My colleagues, Messrs. Delahunt, Capuano, Scott and I submit the following proclamation: Whereas, Boston College Law School was officially founded on September 26, 1929, in the Lawyer's Building at 11 Beacon Street with a class of 22 students, one full-time faculty and three part-time faculty members. Whereas, after spending nearly 25 years in downtown Boston, the Law School continued its march toward the Heights by joining the Boston College campus community in 1954 at St. Thomas More Hall, under the leadership of the Rev. William J. Kenealy, S.J., the Dean who was charged with building a law school for a new era. Whereas, it was Rev. Robert F. Drinan, S.J., the sixth dean of the Law School and later member of the United States House of Representatives from Massachusetts, whose foresight and indefatigable spirit brought about the Law School's rise in statute and transformation from a regional to a highly-respected national law school. Whereas, Dean Richard G. Huber built upon these traditions in expanding the law school faculty and program, and in 1975 secured the eventual move of the Law School to its current site on the Newton campus, providing urgently needed space for the educational component as well as for students and faculty offices and meeting facilities. Whereas, under the leadership of Deans Daniel R. Coquillette and Aviam Soifer, the University embarked on a campaign to build a new physical plant for the Law School on its present site, which facility would reflect the breadth and statute of the law school's programs, and which would allow for the full integration of technology in legal teaching and research. Whereas, we also celebrate a revered member of the Law School faculty, Professor Emil Slizewski, who this year retires from his teaching responsibilities at Boston College Law School after 56 years of distinguished service to the Law School and the legal profession. Whereas, on October 8, 1999, members of the Law School and the Boston College communities join together in celebration of an institution which has launched the careers of illustrious government officials and leaders in the profession, and which has inspired an unwavering commitment to social justice among its esteemed graduates. After 70 years of academic excellence, students, administrators, alumni and faculty join together today to celebrate the opening of a new academic wing at Boston College Law School. Now, therefore, I, Congressman Edward J. Markey, hereby request that my colleagues in the United States House of Representatives join me in saluting Boston College Law School as it celebrates 70 years of excellence in legal education.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to introduce the ``Rest of the Truth in Telephone Billing Act of 1999.'' The title of the bill reflects the fact that some of the ``truth in telephone billing'' has already been proposed in a bill by two of my esteemed Commerce Committee colleagues, Chairman Bliley and Telecommunications Subcommittee Tauzin. I offer the ``rest of the truth'' to point out that a listing of fees and taxes only provides half the story. The other half of the story is the subsidies in the telecommunications marketplace, which I believe need to be made just as explicit on a consumer's bill as the fees and taxes in order to fully inform consumers of what they do and do not pay for when they subscribe to telecommunications services. Mr. Speaker, the telecommunications marketplace is rife with such subsidies. Many of these subsidies are quite noble in intention and help to pay for affordable telecommunications service for the poor and for rural consumers. Yet many of these subsidies reflect a historic monopoly marketplace and should be revisited as the marketplace changes. For instance, some of these subsidies may still be needed and there are some which ought to be adjusted (or even eliminated) to reflect a more competitive marketplace. The ``truth,'' Mr. Speaker, is that many consumers in America today pay too much to support a bloated subsidy system that was designed to support inefficient monopoly-provided service. As efficiencies arrive in the marketplace due to technological changes and the competitive entry of new providers, I believe that many subsidized services could be provided at lower cost, and therefore less subsidy, than previously provided. Providing subsidies sufficient to keep costs low in rural America and for the inner city poor, or to hook up schools and libraries, ought to be done in a manner that reflects the actual costs of providing the service. In order to ensure that we give consumers the rest of the truth in telephone billing, I suggest in the legislative proposal I am offering today, that we insist that both the fees and taxes AND the subsidies be made explicit for consumers and listed on their bills. I suggest that we give consumers the full story. Consumers should know when they're paying $8 in fees or $18 in taxes. They should also know whether they're simultaneously receiving (or paying) a hitherto implicit subsidy to the tune of $2 or $200. I look forward to working with Chairman Bliley and Chairman Tauzin on their legislative proposal and to discussions with our other colleagues--both urban and rural--on how we can better ascertain the true costs, true taxes, true fees, and the true subsidies embedded in the telecommunications bills that consumers pay monthly.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, today I am joined by ten of my colleagues in introducing ``The National Amusement Park Ride Safety Act of 1999.'' They include Representatives Miller (CA), Hoeffel (PA), Wexler (FL), Kucinich (OH), Lipinski (IL), Maloney (NY), Weiner (NY), DeLauro (NY), Neal (MA) and Waxman (CA). This bill will restore the ability of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to investigate serious accidents in amusement parks that offer rides, such as roller coasters, which are permanently fixed to the site. While the CPSC has the authority to investigate accidents that occur on rides that move from site to site, rides that are permanently fixed in theme parks are off limits. This bill would correct this anomaly by closing the ``roller coaster loophole.'' Roller coasters are, in general, quite safe. But in the course of just 6 days at the end of August, an unusual number of tragedies on amusement park rides highlighted the fact that when something goes wrong on these rides, the consequences can be catastrophic. Today's rides are huge metal machines capable of hurling the human body through space at forces that exceed the Space Shuttle and at speeds that exceed 100 miles per hour. They are complex industrial-size mechanisms whose design, maintenance and operation can push the limits of physical tolerance even for patrons in peak condition, let alone members of the broad spectrum of the public who are invited to ride each day. The fatalities at the end of August, which U.S. News & World Report termed ``one of the most calamitous weeks in the history of America's amusement parks,'' included: August 22--a 12-year-old boy fell to his death after slipping through a harness on the Drop Zone ride at Paramount's Great America Theme Park in Santa Clara, California; August 23--a 20-year-old man died on the Shockwave roller coaster at Paramount King's Dominion theme park near Richmond, Virginia; August 28--a 39-year-old woman and her 8-year-old daughter were killed when their car slid backward down a 30-foot ascent and crashed into another car, injuring two others on the Wild Wonder roller coaster at Gillian's Wonderland Pier in Ocean City, New Jersey. The Consumer Product Safety Act charges the CPSC with the responsibility to protect the public against unreasonable risks of injuries and deaths associated with consumer products. However, rides in ``fixed locations'' such as theme parks are currently entirely exempt from safety regulation by the CPSC. State oversight is good in some places, bad in others, and in some states, the state has also exempted ``fixed locations'' so that there is no federal or state regulatory body overseeing ride safety. The number of serious injuries on ``fixed location'' rides has risen dramatically from 1994 through 1998. Why do we bar the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) from investigating accidents on roller coasters and from sharing that information with the rest of the country? It makes no sense. When a child is killed or injured on an amusement park ride, should the decision to investigate depend on whether the amusement park ride is ``fixed'' versus ``mobile''? Emergency-room injuries more than doubled in the last five years, yet the CPSC is prohibited from investigating any--not one--of those accidents, even when it involves a ride that may be in heavy use by mobile carnivals or fairs. According to the CPSC Chair, Ann Brown, ``The current regulatory structure as it applies to fixed-site amusement park rides is not sufficient to protect against unreasonable risks of injuries or deaths caused by these rides.'' She is right. The accident statistics highlight the folly of granting an exemption from federal safety regulation to amusement park rides. Injuries are rising rapidly on the one category of amusement park rides that the CPSC is barred from overseeing. The manufacturer or owner of every other consumer product in America is required by law to inform the CPSC whenever it becomes aware that the product may pose a substantial risk of harm--but not the owners or operators of ``fixed-site'' rides in amusement parks. Some in the industry argue that this legislation is unnecessary because the states or the industry itself can provide sufficient protection. This argument fails on two counts. First, many states have simply failed to step in where the federal safety agency has been excluded. The CPSC reports that there is still no state-level inspection program in Alabama, Arizona, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Vermont. In addition, Florida exempts the big theme parks from state inspection, Virginia relies on private inspections, and New York exempts New York City (which includes Coney Island.) California had no state program until last month. Second, states are not equipped and not inclined to act as a national clearinghouse of safety problems associated with particular rides or with operator or patron errors. That is a federal function. Yet the federal agency charged with the protection of the public against unreasonable risk of injury or death is currently, by law, forbidden from carrying out this important task. I urge my colleagues to support this measured effort to close the loopholes and to ensure patrons of amusement parks that the level of protection afforded by law will no longer hinge on the question of whether the ride itself is ``mobile'' or ``fixed.''

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, back 4 years ago the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Ganske) and I introduced a gag bill, a bill that said that physicians should not be gagged in telling a patient that they might need some additional help, some additional services outside of the scope of what the HMO might want to provide. We had 169 cosponsors on our bill in the 104th Congress. We had 302 cosponsors on that bill in the last Congress, but the Speaker of the House would not allow us to debate it out here on the floor of Congress. We have come a long way since that point, not that long ago, when that was controversial in the minds of the majority, of the Speaker, a gag rule. The gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Ganske) and I are looking back at that as though it is ancient history, because this debate has moved far beyond that now. The majority wishes they could just work on the gag rule now, ``How do we go just on that?'' But that issue is passed by, and as each issue goes to the public and they understand it more, the Republicans get educated more. Now we are down to the question of whether or not, if an HMO engages in practices which are really wrong, that an injured family should be able to sue, to say something went wrong; my family member got hurt. The public understands this issue. It is 75-25. ``Give me and my family the right to be able to protect ourselves. Allow me to be able to sue someone who harmed my family member.'' They are debating on this final issue now, but it is going to go in. If it does not go in this Congress, it is going in the next Congress. And you should view that gag rule as past being prologue. Vote for this substitute today, and give the American people what they need, protections for their families today across our country.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my colleagues to support H.R. 2956, the Children's Protection and Community Cleanup Act, which challenges the whole premise of Superfund reform. Too many bills have been written on the premise that we have been doing too much to clean up our environment. Today, we make clear that we think we're doing too little. Are people worried that their water is too clean, or too dirty? Are they worried that there is too little E coli in hamburgers, or too much? And do you think people sit around and wish there was more pfisteria in the water killing more fish? The answers are self-evident. People want to clean up their water, clean up their food, and clean up toxic waste dumps in their community that are threatening their health. Last year, the movie, A Civil Action, told the story of a group of parents in the city of Woburn in my District. These parents discovered that far too many of their children were dying of leukemia, and linked it to the water they used, which smelled and corroded the water pipes. But for years they could not get anyone to listen to them, to do a rigorous public health assessment to find out whether they were at risk. The Children's Protection and Community Cleanup Act will require a public health assessment to be conducted at every Superfund site, and will allow communities to get Federal grants to conduct their own health assessments and take their own soil and water samples. It will require a cleanup that protects drinking water for future generations, instead of just building a fence around the toxic waste and hoping it won't leak out. In addition, people don't want to pay tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to corporate polluters who are responsible for dumping tons of chemicals into our environment. They want to see the responsible parties pay for the damage they cause. The Children's Protection and Community Cleanup Act would ensure that the polluters responsible for the messes they made have to pay for them. In addition, it will place all nuclear facilities under the same Superfund laws that control chemicals, and it will ensure that when the responsible polluter was the Federal Government, that the same high cleanup and liability standards are applied as to the civilian sites. For more than a decade under Republican administrations, EPA stood for nothing more than ``Every Polluter's Ally''. Superfund sites languished with no cleanups. But today more than half of non-Federal Superfund sites have completed construction activities. Where cleanups are not complete, two-thirds of the required work is underway or finished. The Children's Protection and Community Cleanup Act will ensure that the EPA can build on that record of achievement.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 202 and urge its adoption. Mr. Speaker, over the past year, I have been inundated with calls and letters from seniors living in Section 8 housing units where owners were prepaying their mortgages or opting out of their contract renewals thereby terminating their relationship with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and leaving their senior tenants without any housing security. Following a meeting in my district office with the Mayor of Waltham, Massachusetts, representatives of the Boston HUD office, and other local officials, I wrote the following letter to Secretary Cuomo, and a similar letter to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget Jack Lew, to explain the serious problems facing seniors in Waltham and elsewhere in my district and throughout the nation: January 21, 1999. Hon. Andrew M. Cuomo, Secretary, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Washington, DC. Dear Secretary Cuomo: I am writing to ask that you give full attention and high priority to the issue of Section 8 Contract Renewals as you review and consult with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) regarding the Administration's Fiscal Year 2000 Budget Proposal. While I would like to bring to your attention the specific situation confronting 258 seniors in my Congressional district currently housed at the Francis Cabot Lowell Mill (the ``Mill'') apartment complex in Waltham, Massachusetts, where a 20-year lease negotiated with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is due to expire at the end of this year, I believe that the problems facing residents at the Mill will confront thousands of seniors across America as more of these long-term contracts expire. My office has already received dozens of letters and phone calls from Mill seniors who are frightened at the prospect of losing their housing. I recently met in my district office with Mr. William F. Stanley, Mayor of Waltham, Massachusetts, Ms. Mary Lou Crane, HUD's Secretary's Representative for the Boston Region, Mr. Bob Kargman, representing the Mill owners, their various associates, and telephonically with Mr. Bill Apgar, Assistant Secretary for Policy Development and Research. The focus of the meeting was Public Law 105-65, Section 524(a)(1) which states in part ``. . . the Secretary may use amounts available for the renewal of assistance under section 8 of the United States Housing Act of 1937, upon termination or expiration of a contract for assistance under section 8 . . . to provide assistance under section 8 of such Act at rent levels that do not exceed comparable market rents for the market area. The assistance shall be provided in accordance with terms and conditions prescribed by the Secretary.'' Mr. Kargman informed the group that negotiations for a new lease contract had hit a snag over the issue of meeting fair market rent levels, and that residents were being informed that the Mill lease may not be renewed. Mayor Stanley expressed his concern that given the current housing stock in Waltham, it would be virtually impossible to keep all of the seniors currently living at the Mill in Waltham, thus doing tremendous damage to the spirit and continuity of the senior population in the city. Mr. Apgar indicated that HUD was empowered by law to more closely approximate comparable market rent levels in Waltham, but the money was not available and that discussions were under way between representatives from HUD and OMB. As I understand it, the federal government has reaped the financial benefit of housing reform in renegotiating HUD leases in areas where market rents are below the national average--roughly in eighty percent of markets. But for the remaining twenty percent of markets, primarily markets on the coasts, market rents are higher than the national average. I believe that we have an obligation as policymakers to the seniors living in these higher rent areas, such as those in Waltham, as well as to the owners of the developments, who have kept faith with their tenants and the government, to renew their contract under the terms and conditions of Public Law 105-65. I am hopeful that you will carefully examine this matter, and consult with the OMB Director Lew, in an effort to develop a plan to fully fund those contract renewals where comparable market rents exceed the national average. I look forward to your response, Sincerely, Edward J. Markey. Mr. Speaker, I want to commend my colleagues in both parties for bringing the House's attention to these important issues, and for compiling a bill that encompasses many important reforms to give seniors housing security. I am pleased that the bill will specifically address the problems created by the booming rental economy in the greater Boston area--seniors in subsidized housing are getting squeezed. Mr. Speaker, I am hopeful that the House will pass H.R. 202 today to bring much-needed reassurance to the seniors in my district and every Congressional District in the United States. Our seniors deserve no less.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, some of my colleagues may not be aware of this, but for over 30 years, we had a special supersecret bureaucracy that ran our Nation's nuclear weapons programs. It was not subject to effective external oversight or accountability. It was called the Atomic Energy Agency. For years, the old AEC pursued a philosophy of production first, and public health and safety and environment be damned. What was the AEC's legacy? It funded hundreds of unethical experiments on human beings using radioactive materials. It allowed workers to be exposed to radioactive substances in Paducah, Kentucky, and Fernald, Ohio. It allowed for the venting of gases from Hanford, Washington, to the Nevada test site, to Fernald, Ohio. It wantonly and repeatedly dumped toxic wastes into the soil at its weapons production sites, buried radioactive materials in shallow, unlined pits: Rocky Flats; Savanna River; Los Alamos; Paducah, Kentucky. We disbanded the Atomic Energy Agency and put it over into the Department of Energy so we could have some accountability. What are we doing here today? What we are doing here today is we are going back to the bad old days where we are going to have an agency focused on making bombs hidden from public site, causing environmental havoc, public health catastrophes, and then the very same kind of a formula that allowed for the lying and concealment of actions from the public. We should not be going back to those bad old days where this report barely even mentions the contractors that were responsible for much of what went wrong.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I have no additional requests for time either, so I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I begin by complimenting, praising the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman), who is the principal author of this resolution. I thank him for asking me to be his coauthor. This is without question an important statement for the Congress to make. After all, we do spend a considerable amount of time here in Congress criticizing the impact which the media have upon the culture of our country, especially as it impacts the children in our society, so I think that as the Family Friendly Programming Forum begins a process of trying to encourage positive, family-friendly television, that we should praise them. This resolution does four things: First, it recognizes and it honors the efforts of the Family Friendly Programming Forum and other entities supporting family-friendly programming. Secondly, it supports efforts to encourage television networks, studios and production communities to produce more quality family-friendly programs. Third, it supports the proposed Family Friendly Programming Awards, development fund, and scholarships, all of which are designed to encourage, recognize and celebrate creative excellence in, and commitment to, family-friendly programming. And, fourth, it encourages the media and American advertisers to further a family-friendly television environment within which an appropriate advertisement campaign can accompany the appropriate programming. Now, this Family Friendly Programming Forum is a project of the National Association of Advertisers, which includes some of our Nation's largest companies: General Motors, Procter & Gamble, Wendy's, Coca-Cola, Bell Atlantic, Gillette and others. These companies are the life's blood of free, over-the-air television, because, of course, without advertising from these large companies, there can be no television because there would be no advertising that the networks would use in order to fund the production of programs that are run on every single community in our country. These network ads are critically important to the cable industry and to the satellite industry as well, and as a result they have tremendous leverage over the television industry in general, whether it be broadcast, cable or satellite. And so we should all applaud this effort. The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) has, I think, done an enormous favor to each of us in bringing this resolution out because it will give us a chance to go on record in support of the kinds of initiatives that we would like to see large American corporations undertake to use their leverage in order to stem the trend towards more sex, more violence, lowering of standards, increasing the tsunami of words and images that assault the minds of young children in our country. Now, this is a huge breakthrough. Back in 1993, I attempted to have a hearing on this issue, inviting the largest advertisers to come to Congress to discuss it. At the time, only AT&T was willing to come forward to discuss a strategy by which these largest corporations would advance this kind of a cause. So it is heartening indeed to see this broad coalition today come together. I think that the more that we come to realize that these advertisers have this clout as the broadcasters attempt to attract large audiences in influencing the kind of programming that is played on the air, that we are going to have the kind of influence that we would like to see, and, as the gentleman from Ohio said, private sector initiated, advertisers pressuring, encouraging broadcasters to do the right thing, because they, that is, those advertisers, want to be associated with the right thing, with that kind of programming. As the Family Friendly Forum states in their mission statement: we support a wide range of programming options, and we will continue to advertise on shows that appeal to different target audiences, but we want to ensure the existence of a family-friendly television environment, particularly in the early evening time period. And most importantly, they are establishing a development fund to finance TV scripts, underwriting scholarships for students interested in exploring family-friendly programming, and granting awards for excellence in this area. They held their first awards ceremony just last Thursday, as the gentleman from Ohio pointed out. It is something that should be applauded and encouraged. The WB Network has already taken up the challenge. In August, WB CEO Jamie Kellner and Andrea Alstrup, vice president of advertising for Johnson & Johnson, on behalf of the Forum agreed to identify writers to produce new scripts that will entertain and engage family audiences. As my colleagues know, the V-Chip is an important device to have built into TV sets, and by the beginning of next year, that is, January of the year 2000, every television set that is sold in the United States will have a V-chip built into it. We sell 25 million TV sets a year in the United States. But the V-chip is really only a way by which parents, in programming it, can block out the programming they do not want their children to be exposed to. In no way can the V-Chip put good programming on the air. What is happening here, what is being encouraged by the advertisers of the United States, is encouragement given to the networks, to the cable industry, to the satellite industry to put good programming on that parents can sit their children down in front of with the parent sitting there with them and watch as a family. It is something that should be encouraged. It is something that this resolution, I think, correctly identifies as just the kind of trend that we should be encouraging here in the Congress. I want to again congratulate my friend from Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in opposition to H.R. 2684, the VA-HUD, and independent agencies fiscal year 2000 appropriations bill. I do so because the bill would drastically cut our efforts to provide the best care to our nation's veterans and the best protection for our environment. But I would like to focus today on the devastation this bill would cause in public housing and urban development programs in our country, and in my congressional district. We are in the midst of an unprecedented economic boom in our country which is largely the result of the fiscal discipline exerted in Congress when the 1990 and 1993 budget deals were passed. That discipline has produced an era where we now have surplus projections for the next decade and beyond. In this time of unparalleled growth and opportunity, we have a special duty to protect those vulnerable citizens who depend on the federal government for housing assistance. Worst case housing needs are at an all time high of 5.3 million households today. In my district, a number of owners are considering opting out of the Section 8 program to cash in on the hot real estate market in eastern Massachusetts. Hundreds of seniors living in the communities that I represent are frightened because they have received notices that their landlords are contemplating the termination of their contracts with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Without the money to make fair and reasonable offers to these owners, and to increase the number of elderly assistance housing vouchers, HUD is unable--though not unwilling--to protect these seniors in my district and throughout the country. In the face of these challenges, what does the Republican majority propose to do for these seniors: nothing. Instead, the majority has proposed a HUD budget that falls $1.6 billion short of last year's level. The bill will not fund a single Administration request for new housing and economic development assistance, which includes the funding of 100,000 new Section 8 vouchers. And the cuts will have a very deep and negative impact in my district--this bill will cut nearly $4 million, 250 fewer jobs, and 440 fewer housing units for low-income families. At the same time, the cuts will cripple the ability of HUD to assist worthy community development projects in cities and towns in every district. In my district, HUD is an active participant in the redevelopment efforts of the cities of Everett, Malden, and Medford-- three older, industrial cities that have joined forces to transform themselves from industrial-age communities to information-age communities with the creation of a telecommunications research and development technology park called TelCom City. HUD recently announced a grant and loan guarantee package for the TeleCom City project to assist these 3 cities to reclaim some of the land at the site that is considered ``brownfields.'' This type of assistance is playing a critical role in the revitalization of these communities. Mr. Chairman, these cuts are too deep. The Republican leadership should be ashamed to be proposing to dole out huge tax breaks to the wealthy financed on the backs of the most vulnerable citizens in our country--those who depend on housing assistance to keep a roof over their heads, and those living in cities and towns that need a helping hand to achieve their redevelopment goals. I urge a no vote on this bill.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, 54 years ago tomorrow a single bomb in a single city changed our world. The atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima leveled the city, engulfed the rubble in a fireball, and killed 100,000 people. Three days later another 70,000 people died at Nagasaki, and people are still dying today from leukemia and other remnants of those explosions. The victims of Hiroshima cast shadows from the explosion's blinding light that were permanently etched not only in the remaining buildings but also in our souls. Since August 6th, 1945 we have lived in fear that such nuclear destruction would happen again, perhaps in the United States. Today, the accidental launch of a single missile with multiple warheads could kill 600,000 people in Boston, or 3,000,000 people in New York, or 700,000 people in San Francisco or right here in Washington, DC. If that missile sparked a nuclear exchange, the result would be worldwide devastation. For 40 years of Cold War we played a game of nuclear chicken with the Soviet Union, racing to make ever more nuclear bombs, praying that the other side would turn aside. During the Cuban missile crisis and many other times we came perilously close to going over the cliff. Then in 1991 the Cold War and the Soviet Union ended. Yet today we not only keep hundreds of nuclear missiles with nowhere to point them, we keep many of them ready to fire at a moment's notice. This threat from this ''launch-on-warning`` policy is real. On January 25, 1995, when Russia radar detected a launch off the coast of Norway, Boris Yeltsin was notified and the ''nuclear briefcase`` activated. It took eight minutes--just a few minutes before the deadline to respond to the apparent attack--before the Russian military determined there was no threat from what turned out to be a U.S. scientific rocket. The U.S. is not immune: on November 9, 1979 displays at four U.S. command centers all showed an incoming full-scale Soviet missile attack. After Air Force planes were launched it was discovered that the signals were from a simulation tape. And the danger of an accidental nuclear war is growing. The Russian command and control system is decaying. Power has repeatedly been shut off in Russian nuclear weapons facilities because they couldn't afford to pay their electricity bills. Communications at their nuclear weapons centers have been disrupted because thieves stole the cables for their copper. And at New Year's the ''Y2K`` bug in computers that are not programmed to recognize the year 2000 could cause monitoring screens to go blank or even cause false signals. There is no reason to run the terrible risk of an accidental nuclear war. It is hard today to imagine a ''bolt out of the blue`` sudden nuclear attack. And even if the U.S. was devastated by an attack, the thousands of nuclear warheads we have on submarines would survive unscathed. Keeping weapons on high alert is an intemperate response to an implausible event. Mr. Speaker, it is time to take a large step away from the brink of nuclear war, to take our nuclear weapons off of hair-trigger alert. Today I an introducing a resolution that expresses the sense of Congress that we should do four things: We should immediately remove some nuclear weapons from high alert. We should study methods to further slow the firing of all nuclear weapons. We should use these unilateral measures to jump-start an eventual agreement with Russia and other nuclear powers to take all weapons off of alert. And we should quickly establish a joint U.S.-Russian early warning center before the Year 2000 turnover. These are not new or radical ideas. President George Bush in 1991 ordered an immediate standdown of nuclear bombers and took many missiles off of alert. President Gorbachev reciprocated a week later by deactivating bombers, submarines, and land-based missiles. Leading security experts including former Senator Sam Nunn, former Strategic Air Command chief Gen. Lee Butler, and a National Academy of Sciences panel have endorsed further measures to take weapons off of high alert. Two-third of Americans in a 1998 poll support taking all nuclear forces off alert, and this week I received a petition signed by 270 of my constituents from Lexington, MA calling on the President to de-alert nuclear missiles. I urge my colleagues to join together to cosponsor this resolution. The best way we can commemorate the anniversary of the nuclear explosion at Hiroshima is to make sure we will never blunder into an accidental nuclear holocaust.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. I will reclaim my time requesting one more time if the gentleman would grant us a hearing.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise in opposition to this amendment. Mr. Chairman, we are in a telecommunications crisis out here on the floor. We are legislating on an appropriations bill. An emergency. A telecommunications emergency. And who is declaring the emergency? The chairman of the authorizing subcommittee. It is an emergency. We do not have time to introduce a bill, we do not have time to have any hearings, we do not have time to give any consumer groups an audience so they can complain about this bill. By the way, the Consumer Federation of America opposes the bill, as does the Consumer Union, as does the National Retail Federation. Every business in America opposes it, as do the States, by the way, my colleagues. This is quite a coalition. But we do not have time because we are in a telecommunications emergency. And I can tell my colleagues why. Because Senator Enzi from Wyoming attached this amendment over on the floor of the Senate. He is not a member of the Committee on Appropriations over there, he is not a member of the telecommunications committee over there. He attached this to a Senate appropriations bill, so we have to debate it with no time and no hearings. Thank God Senator Enzi has not gotten his own tax proposal. He would wrap this chamber in knots for weeks. We would have to consider what Senator Enzi did on the Senate floor as an emergency. I can tell my colleagues what the emergency is. Under the existing accounting standards the FCC found that the telephone companies, the monopolies in America, were hiding $5 billion worth of assets that they could not find, that they had on their books and were telling regulators were there for purposes of billing consumers across the country. That is their emergency. And this accounting standard that we are going to take off the books found that $5 billion. We are concerned about tax breaks out here? Multiply that out by 10 years, my colleagues. We are talking chump change compared to most of the things we are talking about here. So that is the emergency, my colleagues. I look forward to the rest of the debate. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, can you tell me how much time is remaining?

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and hope they are consumed at the same rate of duration as the gentleman from Michigan's minutes. Mr. Chairman, let me say that there has been no process here. There has been no opportunity to be heard. If I could, I would like to request from the subcommittee chairman that he engage in a colloquy with me, and I would request that the gentleman from Louisiana, the chairman of the subcommittee, over the next 6 weeks, call a subcommittee hearing on this issue so that witnesses of all sides could be heard on this subject.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to how much time is remaining in the debate?

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the Republican Tax Bill. As I read through the Republicans' Tax Bill, I am reminded of the prayer in Saint Augustine's Confessions, in which he asked God to ``Give me chastity and continence, but not just now.'' The Republican Leaders in Washington want to genuflect on the alter of fiscal responsibility. But when it comes down to using the surplus to strengthen education, preserve Medicare and give seniors a prescription drug benefit, and pay down the debt, they say: ``Give us chastity and continence, but not just now.'' And with this bill, we are seeing the GOP embarking on a budget- busting bender. The top 10 percent of the taxpayers will get 48 percent of the total benefits. The middle class tax breaks are phased in slowly, and may not happen at all depending on the strength of the economy. In contrast, the special-interest corporate tax breaks and estate tax repeal are automatic. This isn't tax relief. It's deficit debauchery. This bill will squander the surplus on tax breaks for the rich, do nothing for Social Security, nothing for Medicare, and nothing on a prescription drug benefit. And at the same time, it will threaten to send us back to the days of deficits.