John Mica

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition this afternoon to this substitute that has been offered. Basically, I have one reason for opposing this substitute, and that is because it only destroys all the work and effort that I have tried to bring to this Congress in the area of using cost-benefit analysis and risk assessment. I think if we take a minute and look back and reflect on the last election, you had the people of this country making a statement, and that statement that they made was a very clear statement that they did not want business as usual in the House of Representatives; that they did not want regulation as usual in the Congress of the United States or in its agencies. What they wanted was a change, a different approach. You know, last year on the floor of the House of Representatives, and I served in this House and I will tell you it was run under a rather oppressive regime, because I tried to bring up cost-benefit analysis on the floor and it was denied, and it was denied in committee to give cost-benefit analysis and risk assessment an opportunity, it was denied in the Committee on Rules upstairs to give this an opportunity. We brought the issue before the House on February 2, and what happened? The entire House rebelled because we had an opportunity to bring up the question of cost-benefit analysis and risk assessment and applying it to regulations and to the biggest regulatory agency in the Federal Government, the Environmental Protection Agency. And this entire House of Representatives, bucking the Vice President of the United States, bucking the Speaker of the House, bucking the committee chairman, bucking the House leadership, came out there and voted down that rule. That was the beginning of the change. It was the beginning when people started to say, Let us make some common sense out of the way this Congress and this Government imposes regulations on its citizens. This substitute wipes out risk assessment, cost-benefit analysis. So what are we doing here? What progress have we made? Are we prepared to set back the clock on regulatory reform? And then under the Contract With America, the Members came out here, bipartisan, and the vote was, what, 1286 to 141. And if my math is correct, that is a bipartisan vote. They supported the cost-benefit analysis provisions and risk assessment provisions that are in this legislation. So are we prepared this afternoon and in this legislation to wipe out all our progress, to say regulatory reform that the people have demanded and this Congress has demanded and the Members have voted on, is it time to wipe that out? So there is only one problem with this bill. It wipes out everything we have done. It wipes out regulatory reform. It wipes out cost-benefit analysis. you, the other day I went to a grocery store and I met a gentleman. His name, I think, was Chuck. He was working behind the counter and I was buying a few items. And Chuck said, ``You are my Congressman. Mr. Mica, I want to tell you, you all are doing a good job.'' I said, ``Do you have any message? What would you like to see us do?'' He said, ``Mr. Mica, there is just one thing I would like to see the Congress do.'' He says, ``Use common sense.'' That is what this legislation proposes, common sense, that we look at the costs, that we look at the benefit and we use risk assessment. This amendment wipes all that out. It wipes out the hope of that gentleman, hundreds and thousands of Americans who sent to the polls and said, there needs to be a change in the conduct and the way this Government conducts its business. So we have an opportunity. We are not going to throw out regulations. This bill does not throw out any regulations. It does not destroy the environment. It does not harm the environment. It does not do anything bad. What it does is says, let us look at the costs. Let us look at the risks. Let us look at the benefits. Yes, indeed, my colleagues, we have had years to look at this. We have seen every county, every city, every State has said, let us make a change. They support the change that is advocated on a bipartisan basis by our committee. So we can come out here and we can vote to set the clock back. We can return to the time of yesterday when we overregulated, when we put people out of jobs, when we put people out of business, when we lost our competitiveness stance, or we can make some progress and we can pass this legislation as it is proposed, without accepting this substitute, without going back and without destroying the progress that this Congress has made, both in the Contract With America and in every successive vote on the question of cost-benefit analysis and risk assessment. There is only one thing wrong with this amendment and this proposal and this substitute. In fact, it destroys everything that we stand for as far as this Congress, everything we voted for, the 286 Members who supported regulatory reform, the successive votes that we have had in this Congress and the will of the American people. I urge my colleagues to defeat this substitute, to enact the bill without changes, that we have a bipartisan agreement, that we have cities, counties, States, local government, associations and a broad base of support for what we are trying to do. And what we are trying to do is to do one thing, and that is what Chuck asked us to do, bring common sense to this process.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. If the gentleman will yield back, again the gentleman cities an example that needs and demands and requires investigation, and I support the gentleman in that, and now this side of the aisle will support you in that. I brought another matter, it is not a major matter of life and death, but a matter that concerned me. Chairman McIntosh, David McIntosh, who heads the Subcommittee on National Economic Growth, Natural Resources, and Regulatory Affairs, is in the process now of also investigating the use of taxpayer money to lobby the Congress on issues, which is totally illegal. So there are a number of these very pressing examples of misuse of this office that need to be investigated by this Congress. Again, I join you tonight and make a commitment to you tonight that we will pursue these matters. And I will tell you, first of all, we have to get the attention in revising this legislation, and we will have that opportunity to look at clean water and some of the other issues that are before the House. But if we cannot get the agency's attention with these investigations, we will get the agency's attention through the budgetary process and through the appropriations process. Because there are many Members, like the gentleman from Louisiana and other Members of this Congress, who have absolutely had it, right up to here, with this agency. It is out of control, it needs to be brought into control, and we can do a much better job in protecting the environment of this country. I consider myself an environmentalist. I consider myself as someone who is concerned about the future of the environment that we live in. I want to leave to my children and my grandchildren a better world, a better United States, a better environment. But we cannot do it when an agency is out of control, it is misdirected, and the funds that it is getting are expended in ways in which they were not intended by this Congress. So we have to rein that in. We have to investigate what is going on there. And we can do a better job and we are demanded to do a better job because we have limited resources. We have literally run out of the taxpayer dollar in the Congress of the United States, and we have to find a better way to do a better job with less money. So we are demanding that. I join the gentleman in asking my colleagues in the Congress and the House on both sides to look at these matters, to bring this agency into control, and to do a better job in protecting the environment. I am so pleased to join you. Before I conclude, I just want to again quote, and we have had questions raised about EPA and its being brought out under control. During some of the debate you have an opportunity to sit and read different documents, and I had an opportunity to sit here and read during one of our last debates the Declaration of Independence. When you look back at the reasons that this country was formed, they are very enlightening. They were very enlightening 200 years ago, and they should be enlightening to all the Members. But I have to repeat this, and I made this comment from the Declaration. This cites one of the reasons for the founding of this country, and it talks about here the King of England, and you can substitute the king with the Federal bureaucracy and EPA. It says: He has erected a multitude of new offices and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. The same thing that happened 200 years ago is happening today with this agency and other agencies that are out of control. Again, I commend the gentleman from Louisiana for bringing this matter to the attention of the House in such detail. I commend you on documenting every point here and showing how again this agency has misused the position of trust given to this agency by the Congress and by the American people, and it demands our attention and our investigation.

Mr. MICA. First of all I want to take just a moment to express my appreciation to the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin] for bringing this matter to the attention of the House. For too long the Agency, EPA, has really reigned out of control, and I come here tonight, I know the hour is late, before the House, but I want to commend you again on bringing this matter to the attention of both the House and the Congress, another example of misdeed, of malfeasance, of misfeasance in office, which has been conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency. I come here also to commend you in a bipartisan effort. I am on the other side of the aisle and thank you for your leadership in questions relating to wetlands, to revision of some of the laws such as the Clean Water legislation which the House will be taking up tomorrow, and again for bringing before the Congress and the American people the question of how this agency is functioning out of control. Mr. Speaker and gentleman from Louisiana, I had the opportunity to sit as a member of the subcommittee in the House Committee on Government Operations during the last session of Congress. I came as a new member. I came as someone from business with a business background. Quite frankly I sat in absolute stunned fashion to listen day after day in hearing after hearing of how an agency which is so well- intended--in fact it is a Republican initiative that created the Environmental Protection Agency. Everyone wants to protect the environment. Everyone wants to look out for the environment. Everyone wants to preserve wetlands and our natural areas for this generation and future generations. But to sit as a member of that committee and consistently hear the abuse, the misuse, the misdirection of billions of taxpayer dollars, I was just stunned and appalled, and that is why I got involved in this issue. That is why during the last Congress, as a new Member of this Congress, I was able to get support from both sides of the aisle when the question of elevating EPA from a department to a Cabinet level position came before the House, and we defeated that measure, not because people do not want to protect the environment, not because people are not concerned about the environment, not because people have any interests in lowering the standards for environmental protection in this country, but because of exactly the reason the gentleman from Louisiana is on the floor tonight, because this agency is out of control, and you have brought to the House again another example that should be investigated, and I, too, demand an investigation and will do everything in my power to see that the majority acts on your request because again this agency is out of control. This agency is so inept, so out of control, again I brought this matter before the attention of the House, and let me cite to you what they did to me. Here, just several months ago, they sent a fax to my office inviting me to a briefing on wetlands. They sent the fax, and the cover sheet is addressed to two individuals. Both were my opponents in the election. In fact their list predated the qualifying date for election in the State of Florida. So they used a list that was even out of date and then they gave me this lame excuse as a response. But here they have the time to send me a fax addressed to my opponents with my name on it, to my congressional office, months after the election. If this is not an example of abuse of office, and, if nothing else, ineptness in office. Now, you bring tonight an example to the floor of what this agency is doing in your instance. Here is a little example of what they are doing in my particular situation. I called for an investigation back in the spring of this year, in February, I believe it was, of this year, and this is the lame excuse that I got. This is an agency that is out of control. And when they have time to intimidate people, to act in a manner in which the gentleman has brought before the House tonight, they deserve investigation. And I intend as a Member of the majority side of the House to see that in fact this agency investigates the matter you brought before the House. Let me also point out that I, too, had great hopes. Carol Browner, Administrator Browner, came from my State, the State of Florida. It was my hope she had seen some of the problems with this agency from serving in a capacity at the State level that protected the environment in the State of Florida, and would come here and try to make changes in this agency, make some sense out of it. But it is the situation where the inmates are running the asylum.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 1271, the bill just considered and passed.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Again, I do want to thank again particularly the new Members, and also my colleague, the gentleman from New Hampshire [Mr. Zeliff], for their leadership on this issue; for coming forward, for taking time to address this. This is not kind of the fun thing, it is not the fancy thing that will make the headlines, it is not the exciting issue, but it is the responsible issue. We came here, I think I came here--I have only been here 27 months, from the business community, to try to apply some business principles to what I saw here in Congress. I think you have also set a standard for doing that in particularly the freshman class. Again, acting in a responsible manner to try to bring our fiscal house in order, we are not here to impose any penalty, any tax on our Federal employees, but we want to work with them in a cooperative effort to bring their house, their house into order, and the fiscal house of this Nation into order, because we can't continue to spend the way we are spending. We can't continue to sweep these problems aside and ignore these problems. We've got to address these problems, face up to these problems, and look for sound solutions to resolve these problems. I will tell you, I have sat on corporate boards, and in a corporate board, if these facts were brought before us it would not take us more than 15 minutes to make a decision on how private sector would be, again, you would go to jail, because you would violate the ERISA laws and standards set up by this Congress. The only difference is this is a public entity, so we are not here to impose any harm, we are not here to impose any tax, we are here to say that, you know, the piper must be paid; that we can't continue robbing Peter to pay Paul in this fashion, that we must act in a sensible, responsible fashion. With that, Mr. Speaker, again, I thank you for bringing this to the attention of this Congress, and for the Record, that we, and I as the chairman, and you as members of this Government Reform and Oversight Committee, we saw the problem, we identified the problem, we proposed a solution, and we are committed to work with all the Members of this Congress to try to bring, again, this important responsibility that we have, that we are cast with, into some order, into some fashion, and so that people look back and they say, ``You know, what did they do in 1995? Did they ignore this, or did they find a solution?'' We propose that solution, we offer it to the Congress. We hope they won't play politics, that they will be out there with public employees and others stirring up the pot, and saying, ``No, no, no, this will go away,'' because I tell you, Mr. Speaker, this will not go away. It must be addressed. We must have responsible leaders and responsible actions, just as you have outlined here, and just as you present in the fashion that you have in this special order tonight. I personally thank you. I thank you on behalf of our subcommittee and committee, and I thank you on behalf of a future generation of Federal retirees and people that are in the system now and counting on us to act in a responsible fashion.

Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MICA. Well, you know, again, I think that we need to approach this on a bipartisan basis, that we need a resolution to this, that I do not like the other side or anyone going and telling employees that we are going to do things that we are not going to do to them. Instead, they should be transmitting information that we have a problem and we need to deal with it. I am willing, as chairman of this subcommittee, and with this responsibility, an I know the gentleman from New Hampshire, [Mr. Bass] extends the same invitation to meet with any groups at any time if they have a better solution, if they have a better way of working this out. However, we cannot be in a state of denial. We cannot say this does not exist. We cannot ignore this and say it will go away. We have to act responsibly. I might add also that I saw something from one of the Postal Supervisors group that spoke in opposition to what we are doing. We do not even affect the postal system. They are taken out, and they do have, since they have changed their status, they have created a responsible system, a responsible contribution. They are not affected. Their 800,000, 900,000 postal employees are not affected. We are not proposing any change there. This is only current Federal employees. Mr. Speaker, again, this has not been changed since 1972. It is not like they have been hit every year on this. I know they have taken some other reductions, and it may not be fair, but the alternatives, I submit, are not very tasteful.

Mr. MICA. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Gutknecht] for yielding, and I just want to make one comment to the Speaker and also to my colleagues in the House. You know the regular order of business of the House of Representatives has concluded, and we are involved in special orders this afternoon. Some of the Members are already on their way to their families or back to their districts for the weekend. We concluded the normal business, but, you know, sometimes you get dismayed about the process here in Congress. But I have to say that I want to commend the gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Gutknecht], the gentleman from Arizona [Mr. Shadegg], and the gentleman from New Hampshire [Mr. Bass], who serves as vice chairman of the Subcommittee on Civil Service which I chair. These are three new Members of Congress, and my colleagues, Mr. Speaker, and the American people can take heart that we have representatives like this that will stay to discuss this issue. Now, this is not the juiciest issue to come before the Congress, and it does not have people clamoring in the rafters, but this shows you the caliber, the dedication that we have now serving and level of responsibility we have serving in the House of Representatives. I, as chairman of the Subcommittee on Civil Service, did not initiate this. These new Members initiated this because they wanted to bring to the attention of the House and the American people one of the things that we uncovered. You know, we have a new majority here, and we found many things in the past month, 2 months that have been swept under the table. This clearly is something that needs the attention of this Congress and that needs action on a bipartisan basis to resolve. I have been told that the good news is I am in the majority and I was named chairman of the Subcommittee on Civil Service. The bad news is I am responsible for the retirement system for Federal employees. And the further bad news is that we have a $540 billion Federal unfunded liability to that fund. Now, we really have two problems in addition to what I just described, and again I have described a half a trillion dollar unfunded liability. We have an annual outflow, and I think these charts show it. Right now, it is $19.8, between $19.7 and $19.8 billion a year from the General Treasury to support not the unfunded liability but to make this solvent on a month-to-month and year-to-year basis. It would be bad enough if this $19.8 billion was just for this year, but the projections you have seen and they have shown you from these charts are absolutely startling. In fact, the system, the old system, and I will describe that in a second, runs out of money in the year 2008 by the projections of this administration. Now let me back up, if I may, and tell you a little bit about the retirement system from a historical perspective. First of all, we had a Civil Service Retirement System, and that is known as CSRS, and that existed until about 1985. Most of the employees who are in retirement, about 1\1/2\ million Federal retirees are in the old CSRS system. I will say that the Congress recognized in 1984, 1985 that there was a growing problem and an unfunded liability and the program was out of control, just as they have recognized from time to time we have the same problem with Social Security. So what they did is they created a new program, and most of the Federal employees from 1987 forward, about the last 8 years, all belong to part of that new program. It is called FERS or Federal Employee Retirement System. So we have two systems. However, they combined all of the retirement funds into one fund, one retirement trust fund. What they did not do in 1985 and what we have a difficult time sobering up to do and this Congress will not face up to the responsibility right now of is making certain that we meet the financial responsibility on a year-to-basis and then also do something about this potential unfunded liability. I proposed, and, you know, we have heard many things commented on by public employee groups and others that Chairman Mica has proposed this bad thing or this cut or that cut and he is going to cut COLAs. Let me tell you what I came up with as a solution and recommended to our Subcommittee on Civil Service. I said, well, we have this $19.8 billion annual outflow from the Treasury, about $20 billion. Why do we not have the employees increase their contribution? And we do not do it all at once. We propose to do it, I propose to do it, I propose to do it 1 percent, a half a percent, then another percent so we get up to, from 7 percent, the current contribution, to 9\1/2\ percent in a period of 3 years. I would like to have projected it out even further, but be thought that was a reasonable approach. We did not touch COLAs. We did not touch potential 2 percent pay increases. We did not touch locality pay. We did not change the terms of retirement. Now, what we did was we adjusted this $19.8 billion annual outflow from the Treasury. Now, that did not do anything really do adjust the unfunded liability. The only thing that we did that affects benefits or any calculations in any way is we changed calculating what is now the high 3 years of service, the amount that an individual earns, to the high 5 years. That does make a small dent in the unfunded liability. so we addressed the annual outflow again of the $20 billion. We did it fairly. We increased it gradually. We put part of the burden, about half of it, on the Federal employer. We put about half of it on the Federal employee. That is all we did. We did not propose, again, any cuts in COLAs or any other benefits, and I am really irritated by some of the employee groups that have sent out a message to the contrary. We tried to act as a new majority in this Congress in a responsible fashion to get this House in order. Now, let me say that I recently saw the opposition circulate, the opposition to my proposal circulate a letter from CRS [Congressional Research Service], that tried to justify that there was no need to take any action, that all this will work out. I am taking here, and this is not as fancy as the new Members of Congress have proposed, a page from the Office of Personnel Management Annual Report. This is 1993, produced by the administration. Now, they say here $540 billion unfunded liability. Now, we could call this a rose, and by any other name it is still a rose. This is $540 billion unfunded liability, no matter how you cut it. Now, you want to hear the really bad news? They say that there is plenty of money coming in and that there is money in reserve. Guess what I found out when I checked into where the reserves are? Ninety- seven percent of the reserves of the employee retirement fund are really in nonnegotiable instruments, really instruments of indebtedness of the U.S. Treasury. So if the public employees look in there or retirees look in there, there is no real solid basis for this. And this Congressional Research Service report said that there is no problem. That was produced by the opposition to our plan, says, well, we do not have to worry because it is funded by the taxpayers. Well, that is the problem, and this situation is a microcosm of the bigger situation. We do not have to worry about it. We do not have to worry about waking up tomorrow and having our dollar, like the peso was worth 60 cents on a dollar, because it is funded by the taxpayers. But this bait and switch, this failure to face up to reality, will catch up with us. Now, I could ignore this. I do not like being politically unpopular with Federal employees or retirees. I do not like the marching on my office or saying that Mr. Mica is a heartless individual. But the responsible thing for us to do and the responsible thing that these new Members have done at this hour, this late hour, is come forward on their own and said, we have a problem, we need to face up to this problem, we need to resolve this problem. So this is what we have done. This the Administration's proposal. Even the Administration in its budget submission, and I just got through testifying to the Committee on the Budget on this, has stated that we need to do something to better reflect this. Now, what they do is play a game, and they propose that we shift the $19.7 billion back to each agency's budget. Well, we do that, but the $19.7 billion still comes out of the taxpayer pockets. Now, I said, let us be fair. Let us make sure that we do not make the same mistake that was made by our predecessors. Let us put this money into a retirement fund and have some actual assets in the retirement fund and not play games with it. So we set our house in order from this point forward. So that was my proposal. That is what we have said. We have not, again, proposed any damaging cuts. We felt that there might be an opportunity in this Congress, even with the constraints that we are under, to keep our commitments on COLAs. And no one has advocated stronger than I have in this House that if we do anything with COLAs we do it across the board and we limit increases. We do not cut COLAs. We do not cut our commitment to people who have served this Nation well or who have worked as civil servants and deserve to see us keep our commitment. We do not do anything that will harm these people or the prior commitments of prior Congresses or commitments that we should keep. So that is what we have done. I proposes the plan that you heard, again, that would help solve a little bit of the unfunded liability and the outflow on a reasonable basis, it is now in the hands of the Committee on the Budget. They are adopting, I hope, most of our proposal, but it is not an easy thing. Politically, it is easy to ignore. No one wants to be disliked because they are going to increase employee contributions. But I will tell you what it is. It is the right thing. It is the responsible thing. It is the type of action that has been ignored too long by this Congress, whether it is in its entire budget or in this little microcosm, the retirement system. So I urge my colleagues to act responsibly, to work in a bipartisan fashion. And the thing about this is, let me tell you that this is not the end of the story. There is more to this story, because we are going to still have to come back and address this unfunded liability. It is my determination as Chairman of this Subcommittee on Civil Service to bring the fiscal house of this retirement fund in order. We will bring in actuarials. We will bring in other individuals. We will calculate in now the downsizing of the Federal Government which we ask OPM that they calculate it in that the President is recommending 272,000 cuts. In fact, we took some of the funds out of the crime bill to fund the crime bill out of the budget, and we must cut those positions. We have not calculated in what the other body is saying, cutting half a million positions. We have not calculated in what the White House is saying as far as further reductions in the scope or other Members of Congress or even the freshmen Republican class has come up to abolish four or five agencies. They have not calculated in the equation of these additional cuts. So this is where we are, and this is where we are going, and this is what we failed to do. But, again, I want to commend each and every one of these new Members for coming forward, for organizing this special order, for setting in the record of the Congress what the situation is, what our commitment is, what we have proposed and what needs to be done. So, with that, I commend the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Gutknecht, and the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Civil Service, Mr. Bass, for their action, for their commitment to getting the fiscal house of this Congress and this retirement fund in order.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, I come to the floor this afternoon to talk about President Clinton and his upcoming trip to Haiti. President Clinton is going to Haiti to celebrate what I consider a policy of failure. What really concerns me, and I am now a member of the Subcommittee on National Security, International Affairs and Criminal Justice of the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, is the disastrous course this administration has taken in Haiti and the President plans to go to Haiti to celebrate. Let me tell you that just within the last few weeks, I had the opportunity, with Mr. Burton, to go to Haiti and to review what is going on there and meet with President Aristide. And let me say to my colleagues in the House that what I saw is frightening. It is the result, really, of a policy that has been out of sync from the very beginning. Let me review for you just a moment where we have been and how we got to this situation. First of all, that we failed to enforce and this administration failed to enforce international law. One of the sorriest days in the history of this Nation was when the SS Harlem sailed out of the Port- au-Prince harbor and failed to have Haiti comply with international law. Another failure of this administration. Then what did we do? We imposed sanctions that killed more than 60,000 jobs in that nation that fed hundreds of thousands of people and destroyed permanently those jobs and drove that country and that poorest nation in our Western Hemisphere into the ground. What is worse than killing the economy, we also allowed during that period of time for the opposition in Haiti to be killed. They murdered and tortured and destroyed any potential future leadership for this Nation. Next, we sent our troops there. And what has happened now is a cost to the U.S. taxpayer of billions of dollars. And, in the meantime, actually even before we sent our troops there, we had incredible costs to my State, the State of Florida, in a wave of refuges that landed there. But then we sent our troops, and we have had to pay twice for our troops, both for our troops and in a few more days for the U.N. peacekeeping troops when part of our troops are removed. So we have paid for a policy of failure. Now, that is only the beginning of it. My concern is, what do we do from here as the President marches down there and we leave 2,000 of our troops? What is going to happen? You know, I had a chance to talk to our commanders. I had a chance to talk to our leaders, our Ambassador and our AID officials about what is going on. Even the young men and women who served, and I met with those individuals from Florida, said, ``Congressman Mica, there is no plan for economic development. Our biggest plan that the United States offers is picking up trash in Haiti. That is the job opportunity plan that we have in place there. That is the biggest job opportunity, and when the money runs out for that program, the program runs out.'' This is what we have. This is the document that was presented to me by AID and the Ambassador, and it is pitiful. It talks about spending millions of dollars on feeding stations. They are so proud of 2,500 feeding stations. It talks about spending millions of dollars on elections and local governments. And do you know what there is in here? At the bottom of the page, there are a few paragraphs about economic development. Well, heaven forbid we should spend billions of dollars there and leave this Nation without some ability to create jobs and opportunities for the future. are making the same mistake in this country, that we have created a system of dependence and reliance on social and welfare programs that leave people dependent, just like we have done in Haiti and we are doing in this Nation. And now we have a President going there to celebrate a victory. I tell you that he is going there to celebrate a policy of disaster and potential economic disaster. So I ask my colleagues to join with me to express concern to the administration and other Members of Congress that we do something to create jobs and real opportunities not only in Haiti but also this country.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, it is fitting that President Clinton has proposed the bulk of his new cuts in NASA and the Small Business Administration. I say that it is fitting because President Clinton wants to be consistent. He wants to ensure that we continue to produce low-paying and part-time jobs, the cornerstone of this administration's approach to economic development. This week President Clinton tells Congress to cut NASA. He wants to kill thousands of high paying research and development jobs, destroy America's lead in the next frontier and cripple our chances for future high tech employment. This week our President recommends to this Congress to gut the Small Business Administration, another great choice to kill even more jobs. Small business is the greatest creator of jobs in our country and the largest employer in our Nation. Then he goes to Atlanta--read here in today's newspaper, where he says we need to create more jobs and talks about job creation. This is after he has made two bad choices this week in his consistent policy to kill jobs, darken our children's future and promote a welfare state.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, under the Articles of Confederation, there were term limits. If we look back in history when the Constitutional Convention met in Philadelphia in 1787, they did not consider any term limits. In fact, they wanted to preserve the experience and knowledge of Members who had provided prior service. This book which I recommend to each and every one of you is entitled ``The Miracle at Philadelphia.'' It chronicles the proceedings of the Constitutional Convention, and it is really one of my favorite books, and again I recommend it for reading by every Member of Congress and every citizen. In 1787 the Founding Fathers set 2-year terms for House Members. However, 1787 is not 1995. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, when reflecting upon the Constitution, said, experiment,'' he said. We have had an opportunity for the past 200 years to reflect on this experiment provided by our Constitution. In 1787 they came, they served, and they left. Today we have PACs, unlimited campaign spending, and media expenditures that distort the entire process. I do not support 6-year term limits or 8-year term limits--they leave the bureaucrats & lobbyists in charge. Because of that I believe the experiment and the experience we have says that 12 years can do it best. We have a different situation, we have experience and experiment to draw upon, and it is now our duty and responsibility to enact that provision into this document and into the laws of our land. I support the 12-year terms in Mr. McCollum's amendment and ask my colleagues to do the same.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, I represent Florida where we have many lakes and natural reserves. If you visit these areas, you may see a sign like this that reads, ``do not feed the alligators.'' We post these signs for several reasons. First, because if left in a natural state, alligators can fend for themselves. They work, gather food and care for their young. Second, we post these warnings because unnatural feeding and artificial care creates dependency. When dependency sets in, these otherwise able-bodied alligators can no longer survive on their own. Now, I know people are not alligators, but I submit to you that with our current handout, nonwork welfare system, we have upset the natural order. We have failed to understand the simple warning signs. We have created a system of dependency. The author of our Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, said it best in three words: ``Dependence begets servitude.'' Let us heed these warnings. Today we have a chance to restore that natural order, to break the change of dependency and stop the enslavement of another generation of Americans.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, during the debate on regulatory reform, I spent a great deal of time on the floor. I had a chance to re-read the Constitution, in this little pocket edition of the Constitution. In the back of this booklet is the Declaration of Independence. If Members have not read it in a while, I recommend it. It states forth the reasons why this country sought its independence from the King, the oppressive King. Let me read one line here in the Declaration of Independence. It says ``He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.'' This is exactly what Washington, DC, has done, and what this agency has done. OSHA has driven our employees out of business, it has harassed our businesses, and operates in conflict with the principles of the Constitution. In fact, our employers and our business men and women in this country are guilty until proven innocent. Here is another regulation that will send swarms of new officers into our workplaces, harass our people who are trying to create jobs, keep jobs in this country, and make sense out of an agency that is totally out of control. Pass this amendment and send OSHA a message that this rule and OSHA's oppressive actions must stop.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, something is really wrong when we as a Congress have provided better benefits to illegal immigrants than we have to people who have served this country, people who have fought and sacrificed for this country. Something is wrong when benefits for a volunteer program are more important than medical assistance for our veterans. We have cut our programs across this country and we need to direct our priorities at this time to those veterans who have served this country. I speak in strong support of this amendment. Mr. Chairman, something is wrong when we as a Congress have provided better benefits to illegal immigrants than to people who have served, fought and sacrificed for this country. Something is wrong when benefits for a volunteer program are more important than medical assistance for our veterans. Today, we propose a cut in a volunteer program that has pay and perks. Today, we have tough choices. Today, in central Florida we have over 150,000 veteran patient visits to a veterans outpatient clinic that was designed for 50,000. Now the VA Administrator is threatening to abandon plans to continue the conversion of our former Naval Training Center Hospital to a veterans outpatient clinic. Now we have a choice: benefits to our veterans or benefits to volunteers. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, make tough choices today and support our veterans and their well-deserved medical services.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MICA. Under the previous administration, the drug czar, Mr. Martinez from Florida, and Mr. William Bennett, there were no less than two dozen subcommittee hearings and at least two full committee hearings on the policies, and these drug leaders from the administration were hauled before the Congress and asked to comment on specifies of the policy. We have not had that opportunity, but we will have that opportunity. We will find out what the policy is, what the direction of this administration is going to be, and if necessary I will work with the gentleman and with both sides of the aisle to craft a policy that makes some sense so that we bring enforcement, so that we bring real education forward, and that we list this as a national priority, that our children and young people are dying on our streets, that it is the number one cause behind crime in this country, and it has been swept under the table and now something needs to be done about it. So this is your priority and it is my priority, and it will be the priority of other Members in this 104th Congress.

Mr. MICA. If I may respond to the gentleman, there never was a central theme. There were hit and miss embarrassments, and the only one that I recall that there was any change or attempted change in policy was relating to the Andean policy and the exchange of information. I remember when the President came to the Summit of the Americas in Miami and we spent about an hour together, almost every Member of Congress who joined our delegation stood up and said, ``Mr. President, what is your policy relating to narcotics control? Mr. President, what is the situation relating to enforcement?'' Each time we got different answers from the President and from his advisers, and finally they have begun to respond, only because there is a new majority in the Congress.

Mr. MICA. First I want to take just a moment and thank you as chairman of our subcommittee, I have the honor of serving with you. I know the hour is late, I know that my colleagues are late, the staff is tired, and we have been working very diligently the past weeks to bring issues before the Congress and the American people of utmost importance, but I really cannot think of any subject that is more important to this Congress or to American society than the question of drug and substance abuse. I want to compliment you, too, taking over as chairman of this subcommittee and immediately dealing with the issue and bringing this issue to the forefront not only of our subcommittee but of the Congress and this administration and the American people. If I might just comment a few minutes. As a Member, a new Member of Congress during the 103d session, I had over 130 members of both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democrat, sign a letter asking the former chairman of the House Committee on Government Operations to hold a hearing, a full hearing on the administration's drug policy. Do you know that we never held a true full hearing on the administration's drug policy? The worse the situation got, the more that this was ignored. In fact, it was totally ignored. Again over 130 Members, both sides, Republicans and Democrats, asked for a hearing and never got a hearing. On the very last day, a hearing was held in one of the subcommittees and it was a sham of a hearing. So I salute you on taking charge of this subcommittee, on bringing this subject forward. Let me say that this is a real, real problem that this country has, and that is drug and substance abuse and that our subcommittee and this Congress must address some of these fundamental issues. For too long, the other side sent mixed messages. They sent messages as far as the Congress was concerned in the way that drug abuse would be tolerated in this country. We had a Surgeon General of this Nation who did not give the proper emphasis to the problems with casual abuse and drug use that we have heard mentioned here today. It has not been a priority of this administration. I again commend you on making it a priority. When this Congress can send thousands of American troops into Haiti and we can help solve the problems in Somalia and around the world and when just a few miles from here, Washington, DC, we have in the alleys, in the backyards, in the streets almost every weekend and every night people, their lives being destroyed, young people being destroyed. You know, I have been coming to our Nation's capital for almost 15 years now and every Monday I pick up the paper and it practically brings tears to my eyes and sadness to my heart to read about the young black American, Afro-American males that are being wiped out in our Nation's capital, again just a few blocks from here. Each year since I have been coming here, it has been between 350 and 450 people whose lives are snuffed out in this fashion. And somewhere this has to be a priority. Somewhere there has to be a time for this Congress and this Nation to wake up and see that the real problem facing this country, that the biggest social and crime problem is drugs and drug abuse and drug use. If you come to Florida in my district and you talk to the sheriffs and talk to the enforcement people and you ask them how many people in your prison abuse or substance abuse, they will tell you 60 percent, 70 percent of the people in prison have been victimized or involved in drug use and abuse. We have ignored this problem, and we must bring this problem and this administration and this Congress' approach, a new approach, a sound approach. This administration ignored helping our Andean nations with information, with exchange radar information. I will say that two of the chairs and former ranking member of the Committee on Foreign Relations sat in hearings and saw the mess that was created with our Andean nations, and now we accuse Columbia of not paying attention to drug abuse and interdiction and assistance and enforcement. Yet this Nation has not made it a priority. So we have got to get our house and our policy and our agenda and our priorities in order, and we have got to make drugs and substance abuse enforcement, interdiction, telling our young people this is not an acceptable behavior, telling our young people how it will destroy their lives and make enforcement a real tool rather than an imaginary or illusory tool as has been done under this administration. So I do want to commend again the gentleman in the well, the chairman for holding these hearings and for coming out late tonight and for giving us an opportunity to tell the Congress and the American people that this is high on our priority agenda. We do not have a Contract With America for the next 100 days, but this is part of the Contract With America now and for this new majority in Congress, and it will be for the days remaining in our tenure in this Congress and now the 104th Congress.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, I really did not plan to speak on this, but I have to address my colleagues and say, ``You might just as well take a gun and go and rob people of their life savings under the pretenses of the amendment that's being offered here.'' Mr. Chairman, we have to really look at what is being done here. People who have worked their entire life for home, or for property, or for business, and they are saying that we can come in, the government can come in, and take 20 percent of it before they are due any compensation. that is just not right. That is just not right. The way this bill is structured with its current language does give the citizens some recourse, and if my colleagues are going to say that government can come in and regulate our lives, can steal from us in this fashion, then they support this amendment, but again I say to my colleagues, ``You go back and explain to your constituents, your moms and your pops who have worked all their lives, people who have acquired a piece of property--most people today don't even have 20 percent equity in their home, or their business or their property--but you're going to say that the U.S. Government can come in and take that property from you without compensation.'' Until we get to the 20-percent level, Mr. Chairman, is that fair, is that just, is that the way we want to treat the men, and women and wage earners of this country? I can give my colleagues good examples of businesses that I have worked in and property that I have been involved in in which I do not even have 10-percent profit after working 20 years, but it is okay for the Federal Government to come in, pass regulations to deprive me of the use of that property, the use of it, the property that I have worked and slaved for or that my mom and dad have worked for, to protect their property. Again I think that we have got to look at this just like any other situation where the government comes in and ruins property, takes property and fails to compensate us for that property, and that is why I strongly support the 10 percent provision. I do not support the amendment that is being offered by my colleague today.

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, I am really pleased to join one of the leaders in regulatory reform, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Chapman], to offer this amendment today. I think what we need to do is stop and look and see where we have been and what we have done over the past couple of days. Actually it is quite monumental in the area of regulatory reform. Only a matter of months ago, a year ago, it was almost impossible to discuss some of the issues, let alone vote and pass some of the measures we have passed in the past few days here on the floor of the House. But we have passed here a moratorium, a temporary moratorium on regulations until we get other measures in place. We passed risk assessment regulation, which is long overdue, setting some general guidelines and parameters, which will provide a tool for assessing risk and then using cost and benefit to see how we can do a better job in the regulatory process. Then today we have been discussing regulatory flexibility and regulatory impact analysis. Some of that gets a little bit heavy, but all we have been trying to do is make some common sense out of the regulatory process. The amendment my colleague is offering and I am offering with him today says let us have a periodic review of regulations. None of the measures that we have looked at in the past few days dealing with regulatory reform have really addressed that issue. We think it is critical that we look forward and periodically review all of the mass of regulations that are pending. For example, right now there are over 4,300 regulations pending or being considered by the various Federal agencies. I do not want to get back into the look-back, which I think we need to address, but do you know in the last 20 years we have adopted 1,055,000 in the Federal Register of regulations? That is what we need to do, is go back and look at what we have done. What we are offering today is prospective, but even the President of the United States has recognized the need, and I hope we prompted his action. Let me quote from the February 22 Washington Post: ``Clinton said he was ordering Federal regulators to examine each rule they administer to see what has become obsolete and to produce by June 1st rules that can be discarded.'' What we are saying here is we would like to do that for the future. Of think it needs to be done, and we should really have a hearing, have an opportunity to do just that. But again, what we are asking for here in this amendment is a return of common sense, a periodic review of outdated regulations, a periodic review of regulations that should be terminated, and a periodic review of regulations that make us less competitive, that put people out of business, that send jobs overseas. So that is the basis for our request today. It is my understanding, too, that my colleague and I have agreed that we will agree in a few moments here to withdraw our amendment, but I do want to compliment, first of all, the chairman for his agreeing with us today to conduct full hearings on this issue and that we can go back and look at what needs to be done retroactively, and we need to look at what goes forward as far as review of these regulations. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his leadership, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Walker], the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Bliley], the gentleman from Texas [Mr. DeLay], the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin], the gentleman from California [Mr. Condit], the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Hayes], and again the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Gekas], and our Speaker, the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Gingrich], for their leadership on these regulatory reform issues, and on what we have accomplished and hope to accomplish by offering this amendment, and also withdrawing this amendment today, but with the opportunity to address this as the next stop in the regulatory reform process.

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. (Mr. MICA asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, I have been slightly involved in this issue during the past year, and again we hear the whines and complaints from the other side. We had an opportunity last year. We begged, we pleaded, we requested politely to bring this issue before the Congress, and at every juncture our pleas were not heard, and here tonight we have an opportunity to make some of these changes. They did not hear us on the other side, but the Amercian people heard us, and they said they are tired of being tied up in regulations that make no sense, that put our people out of jobs, that do not address the risks to life, health, safety, and welfare of our people. We want to protect the environment, and we can do a better job protecting the environment, and the money we spend can be spent wisely if we adopt this bill. I urge you, let us try something new around here. Try something new. Take a minute and read the bill. The bill is a good, well-thought-out measure, and it will protect us. It will do a better job in protecting the environment, and I urge the defeat of the Brown substitute. to that. No one gave us that opportunity.

Mr. MICA

Mr. MICA. Mr. Chairman, my colleagues in the House of Representatives, regardless of what you have heard in the debate today, this is really a well-crafted bill. It is incredible to hear the opponents whine against this bill, because this bill does not do any of the things to any of the regulations they are talking about. This bill does not go back. This bill is not retroactive. This bill is prospective. This bill gives the President a say in this risk assessment process. This bill gives the agencies a say in this risk assessment process. This is a well-crafted, sound piece of legislation. Let me tell you something else this bill does for the future. Current law in many instances prohibits the use of cost as a criteria in assessing risks and benefits. This bill says for the first time that we will use a cost-benefit and risk assessment based on a set of criteria that makes sense in an orderly procedure. Let me give you some examples, if I may, of ridiculous approaches to requirements to assess risk right now. In 1992, OSHA cited a two-person company for not having material safety data sheets for Windex and Joy cleaning solutions. Here is a material safety data sheet that they are required to fill out. Is that a good use of our resources? EPA rules force dentists to keep logs for possession an disposal of White-Out. Here is White-Out correction fluid. It is classified as a hazardous waste. Is that a good use of our resources? Mr. Chairman, let me give you one more example--strawberries. Strawberries, EPA limits benzene to 5 parts per billion in drinking water. Strawberries naturally have 50 parts per billion. Does this make sense? Is this how we are protecting public health, safety and welfare? I say not. GAO cited in a study to this Congress that politics is the main criteria for choosing cleanup sites. What does that say to our children in inner cities? What does that say to the real risk to human life and human limb? Limited resources require that we do a better job. Let me quote John Graham, a Harvard professor, who said, ``Sound science means saving the most lives and achieving the most ecological protection with our scarce budgets. Without sound science, we are engaging in a form of `statistical murder,' where we squander our resources on phantom risks when our families continue to be endangered by real risks.'' So this legislation today for the first time gives some direction to an agency like EPA, like OSHA, and says these are the risks. This is the way we will address these risks, and we will use cost-benefit analysis in the process. It is a good piece of legislation, and I urge Members to support it.