George Miller

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Vento). (Mr. VENTO asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that 15 minutes of the time allocated to me under the rule be allocated to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) at this time.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) has 15 minutes of our 30 minutes because the gentleman from New York (Mr. Solomon) withdrew his objection.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Puerto Rico (Mr. Romero-Barcelo).

Mr. MILLER of California. With 1 hour of total time to all amendments?

Mr. MILLER of California. I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, my understanding is there may be additional amendments. So the person who offers a perfecting amendment or whatever to the gentleman's amendment to the substitute would get time, I assume, to explain their amendment or something.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to do that.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Guam (Mr. Underwood).

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, the Committee on Resources of the House of Representatives had an obligation to report to this floor a fair and accurate plan for the citizens of Puerto Rico to choose their status. I believe that this committee has met that obligation. Mr. Chairman I thank the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young), chairman of the committee, for leading us through what has been a difficult process. I also thank the gentleman from Puerto Rico (Mr. Romero- Barcelo), our friend, for all of his help in this process. Mr. Chairman, the people of Puerto Rico, if this bill is passed, will be given the opportunity by the Congress of the United States under the laws of this Nation to choose their status. They can choose to continue in the commonwealth arrangement, they could choose to become an independent nation, they could choose to become one of the States of the United States of America. Our obligation was to see that when this process went forward to the people of Puerto Rico, that it was a fair process, that it was an accurate process. We had had an earlier plebiscite where the parties wrote their own definitions and the people voted, and the Congress has done nothing because the Congress knew in fact those definitions, whether they were of statehood or of commonwealth, were, in fact, not accurate and would not be supported by the Congress of the United States and did not reflect the laws and the Constitution of this country. In the committee, I was very distraught at beginning of this process because I felt that those who support commonwealth were not able to present their definition to the Congress, to the committee. I worked very hard so that that definition could be offered. I offered that definition. It was turned down overwhelming on a bipartisan basis. It was something called ``enhanced commonwealth.'' It was sort of a make- believe status of commonwealth. The suggestion was that if you voted for commonwealth, you would then be empowered to pick your way through the Constitution of the United States and the laws of the United States and pick and choose which laws you wanted to apply and not have apply, and that you did not have to live under the power of the Congress of the United States or of the Constitution of the United States. That simply was unacceptable to the overwhelming majority of the committee. I believe it is unacceptable to the overwhelming majority of this House. Someone can certainly come forward and offer that amendment this afternoon, should they choose, and I believe it would clearly be unacceptable to the people of this country. So what we put forth is a definition of commonwealth that recognizes their current status today, that they live in a commonwealth arrangement. It says Puerto Rico is joined in relationship under the national sovereignty of the United States. It is the policy of the Congress that this relationship should only be dissolved by mutual consent. That is the situation that we have. We went on to say that in the exercise of the sovereignty, the laws of the commonwealth shall govern Puerto Rico to the extent that they are consistent with the Constitution of the United States. There is no other way to do business, consistent with the Constitution of the United States, treaties and laws of the United States, and the Congress retains its constitutional authority to enact laws that it deems necessary relating to Puerto Rico. That is the burden of commonwealth. That is why some people do not like it. Some people would prefer independence over commonwealth, and some people would prefer statehood. There is a certain burden to commonwealth. We cannot pretend that there is not. But the people of Puerto Rico ought to be able to choose that. They have to be able to choose the status that they want. That is what this legislation does. It enables the people of Puerto Rico to make their choice; not our choice, their choice. And hopefully under this legislation, the Congress would then honor that choice after the President and others have worked out a plan to enable that choice to go forward. That is what this legislation does. Nothing more, nothing less. I think it is an important piece of legislation. I think it is recognized that the people of Puerto Rico are entitled to and must have a free and fair vote on this matter. I would hope that my colleagues would support this legislation to allow that to happen. Mr. Chairman, the House today considers H.R. 856, a complex bill that has, at its core, a very basic concept: the right of a free people to determine the political system under which they live. Puerto Rico has been a part of the United States for a century. Its residents, whether they live in San Juan, Mayaguez, New York or San Francisco, are United States citizens. H.R. 856 gives those 4 million Americans the right to decide their future status relationship to the rest of the United States: to become an independent nation, to become a state, or to remain in commonwealth status. Unlike some of my colleagues who have worked on this issue over the past decade, I do not have a personal preference. I believe status should be determined by the governed. Our obligation is to present fair and accurate status options to the voters of Puerto Rico--options that reflect Constitutional and political reality--and to honor the choice made by a majority of the voters. During much of the consideration of this legislation by the Resources Committee in this Congress and the previous Congress, I could not support the legislation because I did not believe that the very sizeable number of Puerto Rican voters who support the Commonwealth option were treated fairly. Originally, this bill did not even contain any Commonwealth option. But I am pleased to say that Chairman Young worked closely with me and with others to ensure that each of the political parties was heard, and that we ultimately agreed on definitions that are fair and accurate. They are included in Mr. Young's substitute, and I support that substitute strongly. Rarely have we seen more intense lobbying on an issue. It is obvious that opinions are divided on Puerto Rico's status and on this legislation. But let them address some of the misconceptions and misrepresentations that are being circulated about this bill, because Members should not be confused and should not be deceived into voting on this subject based on inaccuracies. No one in this Chamber is more qualified than I to speak about how we addressed the Commonwealth issue. I so strongly advocated inclusion of a Commonwealth option that I was accused of being pro-Commonwealth. The definition of Commonwealth supplied by that party, which is similar in many respects to the definition on the ballot during the 1993 referendum in Puerto Rico, is not accurate and is not acceptable to the Congress. It is not acceptable that Puerto Rico would be eligible for full participation in all federal programs without paying taxes; it is not acceptable that Puerto Rico would pick and choose which federal laws apply on the island; it is not acceptable that Puerto Rico would be free to make its own foreign treaties. I appreciate that this is what the supporters of ``enhanced Commonwealth'' want. But the Congress is not prepared to give such unprecedented rights to Puerto Rico while denying them to every state in the Union. Nevertheless, I offered that definition in the Resources Committee so that it would be clear what is and is not acceptable to the Congress. It was overwhelmingly, and bipartisanly, defeated. And Congress should not offer an option to the voters of Puerto Rico that we are not prepared to embrace. The definition of Puerto Rico now included in the substitute by Mr. Young may not be utopian, but it is historically and Constitutionally accurate. There are some who argue that this bill is unfair because it fails to recognize that Puerto Rico is a ``nation.'' Puerto Rico, like many other areas of the United States, has a unique history and unique culture; that is in part what makes our country so remarkable and enduring. But Puerto Rico is not a nation in any sense under U.S. law or international law. Our refusal to recognize Puerto Rico as a ``nation'' in H.R. 856 is not a slight; it is accurate. There are some who oppose this bill because they do not want America to ``wake up tomorrow'' and find out Puerto Rico is going to be the 51st state. This bill provides for a plebiscite to choose among three options, only one of which is statehood. Even if that option is chosen, there is a transition period of up to a decade during which a plan for achieving statehood would be developed, and then voted on in the Congress and in Puerto Rico. And Congress also will vote on an admissions act. So no one should be under a misimpression that this legislation railroads statehood. Some have raised concerns that admitting Puerto Rico at some point in the future will cost some states seats in this House. I personally support increasing the size of the House to 441 seats to accommodate the 6 new seats Puerto Rico would occupy. In any event, that is a statutory decision to be made by the Congress, just as Congress increased the size of the House permanently when other multi-Member territories were admitted in the 19th and early 20th century. There are those who argue that Puerto Rico would cost the federal government money were it to become a state. I would hope that the financial status of citizens would not be an issue in determining whether they are accorded the full rights of citizenship. I thought we had resolved that issue by declaring the poll tax and properly ownership unconstitutional. And we should be careful about applying such a standard: as of FY 1996, 29 states--more than half--received more federal expenditures than they paid in taxes. Let's not impose a standard on Puerto Rico that we wouldn't apply to other states. I also have noted some questions as to why the bill calls for periodic referenda should either permanent status--independence or statehood--not be selected. Let us be clear that the bill authorizes additional referenda, it does not mandate them. The purpose of the referenda is to determine a permanent status, and commonwealth is generally recognized not to meet that test. Should the voters of Puerto Rico decide to continue as a commonwealth, they could do so indefinitely. Lastly, let me address what has unfortunately become a centerpiece of this debate: whether we should, in this legislation, mandate English as the official national language. The House voted on that legislation in 1996; the leadership could bring it before the full House again at any time. But this is not the time or place to do it. The Solomon amendment declares English to be the national language, but it imposes a series of additional unconstitutional burdens on the people of Puerto Rico, requiring that ``all communications with the federal government by the government or people of Puerto Rico shall be in English''; requiring that ``English will be the sole official language of all federal government activities in Puerto Rico''; imposing English as the ``language of instruction in public schools.'' We don't need to single out Puerto Rico like this, to inflame this debate and insult the 500-year-old culture of 4 million Americans. We have a reasonable alternative amendment that is going to be introduced by Congressmen Dan Burton, Bill McCollum, Don Young and myself that takes a different, and fairer, approach. The Clinton Administration supports our substitute. Our amendment says Puerto Rico, if it becomes a state, will be treated exactly like every other state. If Congress decides that English is to be the official language and passes a comprehensive law to that effect, then Puerto Rico will be covered Just like every other state. But let's not single out Puerto Rico in a divisive and unconstitutional manner for special treatment. Our amendment also calls for Puerto Rico to promote the teaching of English because that language is clearly the language that allows for the fullest participation in all aspects of American life. And we call for inclusion in any transition plan of proposals and incentives for promoting English proficiency in the schools and elsewhere in Puerto Rico. Surely, we can reasonably address this issue in an equitable manner without passing a confrontational and unfair insult to our fellow countrymen and women. The time has come to tell the people of Puerto Rico that the rest of the nation of which they are a part is prepared to hear their views and respond to their desires. That we will stand by our historic and legal tradition that inclusion in America is not dependent on one's background or ethnicity, but on a common allegiance to this nation and its Constitution. After being a part of the United States for 100 years, after sending its sons to war five times in this century, it is time that this Congress recognized the right of Puerto Rico to determine its future in a democratic fashion. That is the purpose and the policy contained in H.R. 856, and I call on the House today to pass this bill, and defeat the divisive Solomon amendment.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4\1/2\ minutes. (Mr. MILLER of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Puerto Rico (Mr. Romero-Barcelo).

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards).

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, this year the Congress has an historic opportunity to improve the quality of our Nation's education. Teachers are the foundation of our entire educational system, but right now we have a serious problem with the way we prepare and deploy teachers. One in four high school teachers does not even have a college minor in the subject they teach. In high poverty schools, the figure is one in two. Last week it was reported that U.S. students performed poorly in math and science compared to students in other countries. It is no coincidence that many of these students' teachers have no math or science background. The Committee on Education and the Workforce is about to mark up legislation to upgrade teacher preparation and to attract talented individuals to the profession of teaching. I will offer my own legislation, H.R. 2228, which would provide for the forgiveness of student loans to qualified entry-level teachers, increase professional development of new teachers, strengthen the standards for federally-supported teacher programs, and require schools to inform parents about the qualifications of their child's teacher. I support reducing classroom size by hiring more teachers, but when it comes to teachers, more is not enough. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 2228.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to invite my colleagues to join me in recognizing Doyle Williams, retiring Business Manager and Financial Secretary of the Plumbers and Steamfitters' Local 342. Doyle has long been an active and committed member of Local 342. Being initiated as an apprentice in May 1959, Doyle soon became a leader amongst his union brothers. Understanding the importance of a strong union organization to his community's many working men and women, Doyle undertook to position Local 342 as an integral member of Contra Costa County's labor movement. His personal involvement with the California State Pipe Trades Council, the Central Labor Council of Contra Costa County, the Contra Costa Building & Construction Trades Council and many other such organizations, has benefitted not only the members of his own union, but all of those working in the trades. I would like to personally thank Doyle for his activism in the area of public policy. On the numerous occasions that I have addressed the House on behalf of our country's working men and women--on such critical issues as the minimum wage, occupational safety, national trade policies, to name just a few--Doyle was always there to let me know that I spoke with the support of labor. His thoughts and counsel over the years have been invaluable to me, and it has been my honor to work with him. On behalf of the U.S. House of Representatives I would like to congratulate Doyle Williams and wish him a happy and healthy retirement.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, the Salton Sea is a unique resource in the Southern California desert. It was created by accident of man, and over the years it has become an attractive, if unlikely, home and resting area for migratory birds and many species of fish. Now, nearly one hundred years after the permanent Salton Sea was created, it is a polluted mess, always increasingly salty, often smelly and noxious, and most useful as a sump for agricultural and municipal wastewater, almost none of it treated. The birds and fish that once thrived here are now threatened every day with death and disease as the tons of salts and toxic contaminants that are constantly dumped into the Salton Sea become more and more concentrated and deadly over time. Economic development of the area has been frustrated because of conditions in and around the Salton Sea. Congressman Sonny Bono worked very hard to bring national attention to the plight of the Salton Sea, and he will always and rightly be remembered for that effort. I agree that Congress should act quickly at the Salton Sea. We need to stabilize salinity and contaminant levels to protect the dwindling fishery resources and to reduce the threats to migratory birds, and we need to devise long-term solutions as well. I do not, however, believe that Congress should act in haste to authorize and construct an expensive project at the Salton Sea before we know what we are doing. The legislation introduced today is well- intentioned, but I believe it could force Congress to make decisions and spend taxpayer dollars before the scientists and engineers have supplied us with the information we need to make good decisions. I am particularly concerned that we preserve the integrity of the National Environment Policy Act, and that we do not hastily commit to ``solutions'' at the Salton Sea that may limit our options for addressing other water and resource management problems in Southern California and elsewhere in the Lower Colorado River Basin. The problems at the Salton Sea are closely tied to many controversial water quality and water management issues in southern California and elsewhere in the Lower Colorado River Basin, and our solutions for the Salton Sea should properly be made in that broader context. I sincerely appreciate the efforts that have been made by the Congressional Salton Sea Task Force and by the Salton Sea Authority, and I look forward to consideration of this bill in the Resources Committee.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, if all things go according to plan, in several hours the Republican leadership in the United States Senate will succeed in killing campaign finance reform in that body. This will be a tragedy of enormous proportions. Regardless of what action the Senate takes, however, the House must be allowed to vote on campaign finance reform this spring. This Speaker has pledged that we will. Currently, it is still on the schedule. I hope that defeat in the Senate will not mean that that will lessen the appetite for our leadership to bring this to the floor. The House should be allowed to debate, to offer amendments and to have a free and open discussion of how we reform the system that finances our elections. Campaign finance reform is crucial not only to the democratic process in this House but it is crucial to all Americans. Because it is the lack of campaign finance reform that continues to allow vast amounts of money from industries to come into the Congress, to distort the outcomes of the democratic process and America's consumers to pay at the marketplace. They pay in higher pharmaceutical prices and drug prices because of campaign contributions in the extensions of patents. They pay higher cable rates because of campaign contributions. They see that the effort to reform HMOs, managed care practices in this country that the public finds unacceptable, are now being thwarted by a concerted campaign effort by the National Association of Manufacturers. Time and again we see that public resources are sold cheaply because of campaign contributions by the affected industry, by the oil and gas industry, by the mineral industry, by the grazing industry, by the broadcast industry. Time and again Americans find that their tax rates are increased. They find that the costs they pay in the marketplace are increased because of the influence of these large, large contributions to the politicians in the United States Congress. The time has come to have an open debate and to pass campaign finance reform. If we do not, we will find that the consumers of this country, the taxpayers of this country, will continue to be the losers in this system. But, also important, we will continue to see the erosions and the underpinnings of our very democratic principles and our democratic institutions as the vast waves of soft money overwhelm what the decisions of local voters are in districts, the vast waves of soft money that very often are anonymous and that dictate the outcome of and influence the outcome of these elections. The time has come for the Congress to be square with the American people. Not rig the outcome, as is being done in the Senate, but to have a debate where competing plans can be offered to the House. Two weeks ago, 100 Democrats wrote Speaker Gingrich to demand he honor the pledge to hold a bipartisan vote this spring. Earlier, 30 Republicans wrote to the Speaker calling for him to schedule a vote; 187 Democrats have signed a discharge petition calling for a fair and open vote on competing proposals on the House floor. This should not be a structured debate so we only get one alternative. There are many good ideas on both sides of the aisle, and we ought to spend time. It is not as though this Congress is working hard. The French have been debating whether they should vote and work on a 35-hour workweek. This Congress has been working on a 35-hour month. So there is plenty of time to have this debate, to have it open, to let people participate and let them vote on these competing efforts to bring about campaign finance reform. If we do not, we will go into another election where, at the end of that cycle, we will see a recurrence of the campaign scandals by both parties, by individual campaigns and by organizing committees. The American public deserves better than that. The time has come now to start to set out the parameters of that debate, and I look forward to statements by the Speaker and the majority leader as to how the debate will be handled in the coming months.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to invite my colleagues to join me in wishing a very happy birthday to Mr. Al Zampa of Crockett, California, who will be 93 years old on March 12. Al Zampa is a truly remarkable man who has left his mark on his community in more ways than one. As an ironworker from 1927 through 1970, Al personally contributed to one of the San Francisco Bay Area's most distinctive characteristics, its bridges. Starting with construction of the Carquinez Bridge in Crockett, Al's career included work on the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge, the San Mateo Bridge, the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, the Benicia Bridge and, of course, the Golden Gate. In the autumn of 1936, Al became a member of the ``Half- Way-to Hell Club'' when he fell from the Golden Gate Bridge and lived to tell about it. Many of his friends and colleagues believed that that fall would end his career as an ironworker and a builder of bridges, but the day he was released from the hospital he returned to the Gate to climb the bridge that had nearly killed him. But Al Zampa contributed to more than just our community's infrastructure, he also helped to shape a generation of its residents. Al was a major force in the creation of the Tri-City Baseball League, making positive recreational opportunities available to hundreds of youth. As the League's Vice President and a team coach for six years, Al helped shape the lives of many of our young people, and this is perhaps his most lasting tribute. Again, I invite my colleagues to join me in recognizing the life of an incredible citizen, and wishing Al Zampa a happy and healthy 93rd birthday.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, today I introduce legislation to address the most important source of water pollution facing our country--polluted runoff. A major component of polluted runoff in many watersheds is surface and ground water pollution from concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), such as large dairies, cattle feedlots, and hog and poultry farms. Under current Clean Water Act regulations, CAFOs are supposed to have no discharge of pollutants, but as a result of regulatory loopholes and lax enforcement at the state and federal levels, CAFOs are in reality major polluters in many watersheds. My bill, the Farm Sustainability and Animal Feedlot Enforcement (Farm SAFE) Act addresses these deficiencies. I hope my colleagues will join me in trying to address this significant threat to water quality and human health. Included for the Record is an article from the San Francisco Chronicle describing water quality problems caused by dairies in the San Joaquin Valley of California. Contaminants associated with animal waste have also been linked to this summer's outbreak of Pfiesteria in Maryland and the death of more than 100 people from infection by cryptosoridium in Milwaukee. Although considered point sources of pollution under the Clean Water Act, little has been done at the federal or state levels to control water pollution from CAFOs. In recent years, many family farms have been squeezed out by large, well capitalized factory farms. Even though there are far fewer livestock and poultry farms today than there were twenty years ago, animal production and the wastes that accompany it have increased dramatically during this period. And although farm animals annually produce 130 times more waste than human beings, its disposal goes virtually unregulated. Farm SAFE will require large livestock operations to do their part to reduce water pollution. The bill will lower the size threshold for CAFOs, substantially increasing the number of facilities that will have to contain animal wastes. It will require all CAFOs to obtain and abide by a National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit. The bill improves water quality monitoring, recordkeeping and reporting so that the public knows which CAFOs are polluting. Farm SAFE addresses loopholes in the current regulatory program by requiring CAFOs to adopt procedures to eliminate both surface and ground water pollution resulting from the storage and disposal of animal waste. The bill also directs EPA, working with USDA, to develop binding limits on the amount of animal waste that can be applied to land as fertilizer based on crop nutrient requirements. This legislation will restore confidence that we can swim and fish in our streams and rivers without getting sick. It will do much to address our number one remaining water pollution problem--polluted runoff. I hope the House will join me in the effort to clean up factory farm pollution. [From the San Francisco Chronicle, July 7, 1997] Page One--In Central Valley, Defiant Dairies Foul the Water (By Elliot Diringer, Chronicle Staff Writer) Central Valley dairies routinely defy pollution laws-- fouling rivers and groundwater with waste from their cows-- and state regulators say there is little they can do about it. California is now the nation's leading dairy state, and most of the cows are in the Central Valley, creating as much natural waste as a city of 21 million. Yet the state agency that is supposed to make sure they don't pollute the water has just one man on the job. There is no telling how many miles of creek are being ruined, or how much drinking water could be lost to contaminants spreading silently underground. Regulators themselves are the first to admit that the situation is going from bad to worse. While dairy herds keep growing, officials at the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board say that most of the valley's 1,600 dairies have never been inspected and that probably fewer than half follow the law. ``Individually and cumulatively, (dairies) pose a significant threat to surface and groundwater,'' concluded a 1995 report to the board urging a sixfold increase in regulatory staff. ``We were barely scratching the surface,'' said Larry Glandon, a dairy inspector who has since retired, leaving just one. ``We knew it. Everybody knew it.'' The unchecked pollution attests to the considerable muscle of California's leading agribusiness. Statewide, a million-plus cows churn out $3 billion worth of milk and cream a year, nearly twice the earnings of the state's No. 2 crop, grapes. In the past six years, dairy groups have contributed more than $700,000 to state election campaigns, most of it to incumbents in the Legislature. ``Dairies have been rather untouchable,'' said Glandon, who was with the board for 16 years. ``They have a lot of political significance in Sacramento. It's kind of understood.'' Some dairies do their best to contain their wastewater--a rich brine of manure, urine and water that is supposed to be stored in a leak-resistant lagoon, then used to irrigate crops. The idea is to recycle the wastes right on the farm. As long as there is enough cropland, and not too many cows, potentially harmfull nutrients in the wastewater can be captured by the plants. In the right quantities, the nutrients don't harm the crops, but help them grow. But all too often, regulators say, there are too many cows or not enough crops. Then, dairies simply let their wastes overflow--onto neighbors' fields, into roadside ditches, into creeks that feed rivers already degraded by other pollutants. Perhaps a greater worry, they say, are findings not yet released suggesting a steady but invisible poisoning of water underground. Industry spokesmen deny that violations are widespread. ``If they're saying they don't have the staff to go out and monitor, how can they make the statement that half are not in compliance? I question the accuracy of that statement,'' said Gary Conover of Western United Dairymen, the state's biggest dairy lobby. ``Over the last 20 years, the industry has come a long way to meeting its obligations under the law,'' Conover said. ``I think all in all, the dairy has done a very good job of controlling their wastes.'' Yet some dairy owners readily concede that in the grueling seven-day-a-week business of raising and milking cows, what's coming off the back end of the dairy is often little more than an afterthought. ``There's no way with the price of milk we get that we can afford to meet these rules,'' said one. ``If they made all dairymen in California do that, I think milk prices would skyrocket.'' The real problem, insist regulators, is power and money. In 1988, when the Legislature set annual waste fees for factories, sewage plants and other dischargers, dairies were granted an exemption. Instead, they pay a one-time fee of no more than $2,000. As a result, there is little in the budget for regulating them. In the years since, the volume of waste has kept growing as dairies relocate from fast urbanizing Southern California or try to boost profits with bigger herds. Last year, there were 891,000 milk cows and heifers in the valley, up 42 percent from a decade before. A cow typically produces as much waste as 24 people. Pollution authorities have concerns about other ``confined animal facilities'' raising beef, poultry and swine, but in the Central Valley they are far outnumbered by dairies. Bill Crooks, former executive officer of the regional water board, said the agency has appealed regularly to its parent agency, the State Water Resources Control Board, for more money to monitor dairies. ``We've continually raised the issue on a number of fronts,'' Crooks said. ``But at the same time, we could see the handwriting on the wall. We could see it wasn't very popular, so we didn't push it very hard.'' A bill before the Legislature would authorize 18 new enforcement positions statewide, and the three or four going to the Central Valley could be assigned to dairies, said Craig Wilson, assistant chief counsel at the state board. But, he said, there are many other pressing needs. ``The dairy industry prevailed upon the Legislature to give them an exemption where they pay this one-shot deal,'' Wilson said. ``I don't think it's equitable. But we're stuck with the hand we're dealt.'' Day in and day out, the man trying to play that hand is Louis Pratt. All too often, he says, it's a loser. Since Glandon's retirement, Pratt has been the one man in the field. He is a pollution detective, tracking dairy wastes, in some cases many miles, to their source. Sometimes, particularly when winter rains overfill lagoons, he finds huge quantities have been deliberately released. Usually, it's just a small, steady overflow from a dairy that doesn't seem to care. Pratt's is an exasperating routine. The violation notices he writes up are frequently ignored. Even in cases where he manages to win stiff fines, some dairies go on polluting. One dairy he has hounded for 10 years was finally hauled into court by the San Joaquin County district attorney's office--the only one in the valley that seems inclined to prosecute dairies. The owners admitted illegal releases, paid nearly $10,000 in penalties and costs, and were ordered by the court to clean up. Last winter, their waste ponds were overflowing again. Deputy District Attorney David Irey said that this time he will insist on tougher measures. ``But this case is the tip of the iceberg,'' said Irey. ``We think there could be hundreds of violations each winter.'' Cruising two-lane roads on the valley's east side one spring day, Pratt pointed to one dairy after another, casually noting violations and reciting his history of run- ins. At one dairy near Elk Grove, a few dozen Holstein lazed in puddles of watery waste, which seeped from the muddy corral. ``They just arrogantly let it go, flood the neighbors, and tell the neighbors to go to hell,'' said Pratt. At the next, the waste lagoon was too small for the number of cows. To keep it from spilling, the dairy had over-applied wastewater to a field, which in turn drained to a roadside ditch. ``Eventually, it ends up in the Cosumnes River,'' he said. ``I've talked to them, and they've done nothing.'' Farther south, near Escalon, Pratt pulled to the side of the road. With a long-handled scoop, he plucked a sample of a brownish liquid from a shallow canal, part of the vast grid of drainage ditches dug all across the valley floor to carry off used irrigation water. Pratt poured the solution into a small meter that measures electrical conductivity, a crude indication of salts and solids. The needle jumped to 520, twice what it should be. ``I can come out here just about any day of the year and find dairy wastes going into that drain,'' he said dejectedly. ``All these little creeks and drains would support fish if there was no dairy waste going into them. But there's no fish, because they can't survive.'' Pratt used to get more help from the state Department of Fish and Game, which has suffered cuts of its own. Dennis DeAnda, a patrol lieutenant in Merced, said that as a field warden, he investigated several big dairy spills that left fish floating dead. But the subtler efforts of smaller, chronic releases, he said, are harder to gauge. ``We're dealing with probably several hundred dairies on the San Joaquin River alone,'' DeAnda said. ``Those impacts certainly are going to affect fish farther downstream.'' In the long run, the bigger worry may be what is happening underground, where no one can see. When stored in a leaky lagoon, over-applied to crops or simply piled too deep in a corral, dairy wastes stand a good chance of seeping down into the ground. Eventually, the groundwater below can load up with nitrates, a form of nitrogen that in sufficient quantities can sicken or kill an infant. Wells used by public water systems are periodically checked, and from 1984 to 1996, the number in the Central Valley with nitrates above the drinking water standard jumped fourfold. Private wells serving individual homes tend to be shallower--and more vulnerable to contamination--but there is no requirement they be routinely tested. There are other obvious sources of nitrates--leaking septic systems and overuse of chemical fertilizers. Without sophisticated testing, it is usually impossible to trace contamination to any single source. ``Is it dairy X or is it dairy Y? Or is it the farmer who's using ammonia fertilizer between the two?'' said Cindy Forbes, Central Valley drinking water chief for the state Department of Health Services. ``That's the problem. There's no smoking gun.'' There is evidence suggesting that collectively, dairies pose a long-term threat to Central Valley groundwater--but the regional board has yet to release it. In 1993, the agency dug 44 shallow monitoring wells at five dairies thought to be doing a reasonable job controlling their wastes. Groundwater samples taken over the next two years showed average nitrate levels five times the drinking water limit. ``The five dairies . . . share site characteristics and follow management practices common to hundreds of Central Valley dairies,'' notes a draft of the study, still under review three years later. The ``standard approach,'' the report says, would be to stop the pollution and order cleanups. ``Despite the fact that significant pollution is apparently occurring, the standard response is not feasible . . . Current staffing levels are not adequate.'' No one can predict when the contaminants might reach the deeper aquifers that supply much of the valley with its tap water. But with farmers perennially crying for more water, and some underground supplies already lost to pesticides, any drinkable reserves are certain to become more precious if the Central Valley keeps growing as projected. ``I expect there are plumes of high-salt, high-nitrate water under dozens, if not hundreds, of these sites . . . The nitrate is eventually going to get into the deeper stuff. It is just a matter of time,'' said Rudy Schnagl, who oversaw dairy regulation for 10 years as chief of the regional board's agricultural unit. ``What concerns me is there are a lot of rural residences that still have old wells that don't go down so deep.'' Schnagl said, ``I suspect a lot of those people are drinking water exceeding the nitrate standard.'' Some experts say the Central Valley need only look south, to the Chino basin east of Los Angeles, to see what it ultimately risks. With the highest concentration of dairies in the world, the Chino basin years ago was forced to write off vast quantities of tainted groundwater. But with subdivisions now displacing the dairies, water is in high demand. There is talk of building exorbitant desalination plants so cities can tap the dirty underground cache. ``It's so heavily loaded now with nitrates from dairy cows, it's just useless,'' said Bill Fairbank, an agricultural waste engineer who spent 30 years at the University of California. ``The Central Valley's headed in that direction, too, if they don't get their act together.''

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, the following article appeared in the February 9, 1998 Philadelphia Inquirer and describes the living and working conditions in the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). This article, ``Your Pricey Clothing is Their Low-Pay'' offers additional examples of the alarming conditions under which many workers in this U.S. territory toil. Every independent reporter who has traveled to the CNMI to investigate the working and living conditions of the tens of thousands of imported foreign workers there--whose population outnumbers that of the U.S. citizens--has reached the same alarming conclusion: U.S. laws designed to protect workers on U.S. soil are not being adequately applied or enforced. Instead, this part of America has become an outpost for foreign investors, the construction, tourism and garment industries being the major suppliers of foreign workers. In the CNMI, Chinese labor bosses are able to ``run their factories just as they would in China--as virtual sweatshops.'' Because this is a U.S. territory, $810 million worth of garments manufactured under these conditions in 1997 entered the U.S. duty-- and quota-free and allowed to bear the ``Made in USA'' label. One Chinese woman describes restrictive labor practices that include being forbidden from attending church. Another tells of working seven days a week and only occasionally getting a half-day off on Sundays. Human rights advocates say ``many guest workers endure unpaid work, forced overtime, withheld wages and unsafe workplaces.'' Many foreign workers live in ``squalid shacks without running water, sufficient toilets or proper ventilation'' but ``are too deep in debt back home to risk getting fired'' by speaking out about unfair treatment, poor working conditions, or improper wages. Indeed, many of these workers have sold their family's land, their homes, and have borrowed the money from loan sharks to pay recruiters who have promised them good, high-paying jobs in America. The workers must repay these loans or risk harm to themselves and their families. As the article attests, the CNMI is hardly a good example of a situation we in Congress would want to emulate in our hoe States. Rather, it is an example of what can go horribly wrong when a U.S. territory government develops an economy based heavily on the importation of cheap, alien, indentured workers, who are granted no stake in society, and who are denied adequate labor protections by the local government. Congress can, and should, take action to correct this situation. I have introduced legislation, HR 1450--the ``Insular Fair Wage and Human Rights Act'' that would place the CNMI immigration system under federal law, bringing the CNMI into conformity with every other U.S. territory. Further, this legislation will incrementally increase the local minimum wage until it reaches the federal level, and provide that garments only be allowed to bear the ``Made in USA'' label if all federal laws were adhered to in the manufacture of the garment. [From the Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 8, 1998] Your Pricey Clothing is Their Low-Pay Work (By Jennifer Lin) Saipan, Northern Mariana Island.-- The rest of America may worry about losing jobs to Asia, but this lush island in the far western Pacific has created an outpost of Asia right on American soil. Pacific Rim investors--primarily overseas Chinese and Koreans--have flocked to this U.S. territory, building a profitable world-class garment industry. They hire workers from China. They import fabric, buttons and zippers from China. And in many cases, they run their factories just as they would in China--as virtual sweatshops--ignoring U.S. laws designed to protect workers. Even so, the factories can sew ``Made in the U.S.A.'' onto clothing, skirt U.S. duties and quotas, and pay their workers far less than the U.S. minimum wage. Attempts to rescind those privileges have been opposed by several American lawmakers, some of whom have taken trips to Saipan paid for by the island government. The coveted ``Made in the U.S.A.'' label is like a seal of approval for clothing-makers, implying that products are untainted by labor abuses the American buying public associates with garments made in Asian sweatshops. But it has lost much of its meaning in Saipan. Such companies as J.C. Penney, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger and Jones New York have paid factories here to make their clothing under contract. The suppliers pay less than U.S. minimum wage and ship duty-free to the U.S.--giving them a decided advantage over competitors who make garments in the

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, today we are being offered a resolution in support of parents who stay at home with their children who are young. There is no dispute about the benefits a parent staying at home with his or her children can bring to that family, and on that basis alone this resolution should, and will, pass with a bipartisan majority. What is most notable and most troubling, however, are the issues not addressed in this resolution. First and foremost is the issue of wages. Too many Americans are not earning enough to support their families with just one income. Half of America's families with young children earn less than $35,000 per year. This includes families in which both parents work full time at the minimum wage and earn only $21,400. These are the families who have been left behind in the boom economy, families whose salaries have been flat-lined and benefits have been cut back while the stock market and the CEOs' salaries have skyrocketed. These are the families who are forced to send both parents into the work force, the many single parents who are forced to work more than one job. Temporary employment agencies report that most of our employees are second breadwinners in the family and that 75 percent of the people they employ are working because they have to. Families are in a bind over child care because they simply cannot earn enough despite working so hard. It is true that where the second family income is marginally helpful to the family, then a small boost in a tax credit or some other form of assistance may help. But since the reality for most families is that a second income is essential, it is essential for buying basic needs like food, rent, and health care, than a small payment to stay-at-home parents will not resolve the problem of most working families, that both parents must work, and that child care is either too expensive, too far away, or too low quality, there are only two places that workers can go to get assistance and basic family needs, either from the wages their employers pay to them or from the government. But with this resolution, the Republicans once again are opposing the requirement that wages be sufficient to provide for the essentials of a family. This resolution is also further puzzling because in recent actions of the Congress to eliminate Federal welfare assistance, Congress voted last year to stop paying poor mothers to stay at home with their children, instead to go out and get a job, because we believe that the mothers of the children of our country would be better off. But now the Republican majority wants to use another tax-based subsidy to pay mothers or fathers to stay at home, and these are parents that are much better off than the working poor or those mothers that are on welfare. Somehow there is a consistency gap here. Focusing on stay-at-home parents is part of an effort to deceive the public into thinking that providing a small taxpayer subsidy to parents to stay at home is the equivalent of providing a small taxpayer subsidy to working parents that need that money to provide for child care so they can stay in the work force. In the first solution, the additional income is not enough to keep parents from having to work. But in the second instance, the additional support is crucial if these parents are going to be able to hold on to the jobs that provide the wherewithal for their families. So while I welcome this opportunity to work together on child care, I wonder why it is that the majority cannot grasp the larger picture of the child-care needs of America's families.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, the following article is the second of two that appeared in the February 9, 1998 Philadelphia Inquirer and describes the plights of tens of thousands of foreign workers who live and labor in one of our U.S. territories, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). This article, ``For Workers, Island Jobs can be a Losing Proposition,'' describes the desperate situations of these workers once they arrive in the CNMI deeply in debt and prone to exploitation. Every independent reporter who has traveled to the CNMI to investigate the working and living conditions of the tens of thousands of imported foreign workers there has found that the principles behind the labor and immigration situation in the CNMI are contrary to those defined by established ideals of American democracy. The CNMI economy is based on the exploitation of a large, disenfranchised, foreign population, and laws to protect these workers on U.S. soil are neither being adequately applied, nor enforced, and perpetrators of justice are not being punished. The article describes fifty-five men from China who each paid $7,000 to a Chinese recruiter for ``transportation, passports, and the promise of construction jobs. Most had to borrow money from friends, family members or loan sharks.'' Once they arrived in the CNMI, these men found no jobs waiting. Although the men marched in protest to the offices of the U.S. Department of Labor, the federal government could not help them because the CNMI has sole authority over immigration policy and controlling recruiters. A similar story is repeated for 134 men from Bangladesh who paid $5,000 to recruiters for jobs that did not exist. In both cases, the recruiters responsible for bringing these men from China and Bangladesh to the CNMI have fled, while the men remain disenchanted, hungry and desperate for employment. The article also details the story of one 22 year old Chinese worker who tells of being summoned four times by her garment factory supervisor in his attempts to pressure her into returning to China to have an abortion after she became pregnant. The worker refused to have an abortion and, after losing several days of work because of a pregnancy related illness, was fired. She is now jobless and fears deportation back to China, where she would likely be subjected to a late-term abortion because she is unmarried. Nowhere else in America would these practices be allowed to continue. Congress must act to change this situation. I have introduced legislation, HR 1450--the ``Insular Fair Wage and Human Rights Act'' that would place the CNMI immigration system under federal law, bringing the CNMI into conformity with every other U.S. territory. Further, this legislation will incrementally increase the local minimum wage until it reaches the federal level, and provide that garments only be allowed to bear the ``Made in USA'' label if all federal laws were adhered to in the manufacture of the garment. Passage of this legislation would bring additional federal oversight to the policies practiced in this remote corner of America. [From the Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 8, 1998] For Workers, Island Jobs Can Be a Losing Proposition (By Jennifer Lin) Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands.--They arrive on the red- eye flight from Hong Kong pulling little suitcases on wheels into the humid, predawn blackness. Poor, tired and hungry for work, these young men and women from China are hoping for a slice of the American Dream. They have paid thousands of dollars to agents at home for jobs in clothing factories on this faraway island that few can find on a map. At the airport, they stand out from the Japanese tourists heading off to luxury hotels on blossom- scented beaches. They are whisked away by waiting van's to spartan barracks. For many desperate Asians, dreams of working in America have turned into living nightmares in Saipan. Men from Bangladesh and China have turned over their life savings to middlemen for jobs that never materialize. Young women from the Philippines have come to work in bars and been forced into prostitution. Garment workers from China have found themselves toiling in sweatshops for employers who cheat them out of their wages or limit their freedom. Chinese garment worker Tu Xiaomei, 22 and pregnant, is one of the many unlucky ones. She is broke, jobless, and fearful of being deported. Tu arrived in Saipan in the summer of 1996 and planned to work in a garment factory for two years. At a $3.05-an-hour sewing job here, she could earn more in one year than in four back home. She fell in love with a Chinese laborer and became pregnant. When her factory found out, Tu said, it pressured her to return to China to have an abortion. She said a supervisor summoned her four times to deliver the same message. ``She didn't say, `You must go back to China for an abortion.' '' Tu said, ``but she always said, `Think about it.' '' It is difficult to get an abortion on this predominantly Catholic island. But in China, abortion is widely used as a form of birth control for women limited by the government to one child. In Tu's home province of Jiangxi, women, by law, are not allowed to marry until they are 23 and may not legally bear a child until they are 24. Tu refused to have the abortion. She wanted to work until the baby was born (she is due in May) and return to China only after her two-year contract with the factory had expired in July. But in December, she missed several days of work because of a pregnancy-related illness. Her boss at the factory, owned by mainland Chinese and Hong Kong investors, told her not to come back, she said. Steve Yim, a Hong Kong-based management adviser for the factory, Micronesian Garment Manufacturing Inc., denied that anyone pressured Tu to return to China for an abortion and said she ``deliberately'' stopped going to work. Six months pregnant, Tu now rents a room near a busy road. Her bed consists of two wood planks on blocks. She has little food on her shelves and no money to see a doctor. Her biggest fear, she said, is being forced to return to China, where she would risk being pressured to undergo a late-term abortion. ``I don't want to have an abortion,'' Tu said. ``It's a small life; it's six months old. I'm afraid.'' The tens of thousands of foreigners brought to Saipan as ``guest workers'' are recruited by middlemen who operate in a murky business that is loosely regulated and open to abuse. Local recruiters who promise to find jobs for foreigners work in tandem with agents in such places as China, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and the Philippines. Fifty-five Chinese men from northeast China said they arrived here in September, only to find there were no jobs waiting. The men, recruited from a down-and-out industrial region of China with high unemployment, each paid $7,000 to a Chinese agent for transportation, passports, and the promise of construction jobs. Most had to borrow money from friends, family members or loan sharks, they said. For weeks, the men were holed up in a dirty, hot, crowded, metal barracks near a golf course with an ocean view. They had little to eat and limited fresh water, they said. J&J International, the employer who had promised them work, had only been able to place a few of them. On Oct. 21, the rest of the men marched in protest to the offices of the U.S. Department of Labor, carrying a banner that read, in English and Chinese: ``We need live. We need work.'' The U.S. federal government could not help them. One of the unique things about the Northern Mariana Islands is that the local government has full authority over immigration. It also is responsible for policing recruiters. Kim Long, an employee for J&J International, said in December that the company had found work for 10 men and that the others were seeking too much money, demanding wages of $5 an hour instead of the island's minimum wage of $3.05 an hour. The men told a different story. They said they would work for any wage at all. In a letter to U.S. labor officials in October, they wrote, in Chinese: ``Many Chinese regard the United States as heaven on earth. But there are swindlers out there who dare to bring shame to the American government.'' The jobless laborers protested again in December. This time, having been kicked out of their barracks, they carried bedrolls under their arms. Embarrassed local officials went on television to seek jobs for the men and leaned on garment factories to find them work. Some of the men got work building a casino on a neighboring island. About a dozen became so frustrated that they returned to China. Another batch of workers from Bangladesh, meanwhile, has not been as fortunate. In early 1997, 134 men from Bangladesh paid $5,000 apiece to recruiters for jobs that, as it turned out, did not exist. The local go-between, responsible for arranging the work in Saipan, fled to the Philippines. Today, many of the men are still without work, left to scrounge for food and shelter, fearful of being deported and knowing that angry loan sharks would be on their tails back home. Naive and unschooled, many of these workers believed the tall tales they heard from unscrupulous recruiters. One was promised a U.S. passport as soon as he got here. Another said he was told he could take a bus from Saipan to California. He is still looking for work.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, today the corporate special interests are responding to the call of the Republican leadership to get off their wallets. Today they start spending millions of dollars, with the National Association of Manufacturers fly-in, to kill the bipartisan effort to pass a patients' bill of rights to protect people against the excesses of managed care, to make sure that people know that doctors are making the medical decisions and not insurance companies, to make sure that patients have a right to appeal the denial of services, to make sure that people understand that these medical decisions are theirs and between them and their doctors. But, no, the Republican leadership in the House and the Senate have told the special interests lobby to come to Washington to spend millions of dollars to deny us the right to have a bill that has over 220 cosponsors, Republicans and Democrats, who know that their constituents need these protections against managed care. We have got to respond to the need of our people, not to the corporate interests and their million-dollar campaign.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, it is with great admiration and heavy sadness that I rise tonight to pay tribute to one of the greatest Members of Congress this Country has known. This Friday, our colleague, Ronald V. Dellums, will officially resign the seat he has held since 1970. My colleagues and many in the public that watch Congress are familiar with Ron--with his style, his passion, his eloquence, his issues, and his brilliant mind. He's always been known as the best dressed Member of Congress. He's always been known as one of Congress's great orators, colorfully and articulately dancing in the well of the House to draw support for his positions. And he's always been known as one of the greatest advocates for peace and human rights. It will not be easy for me or my colleagues to adjust to a Congress without Ron Dellums. Many a good team has gone on to win without one their star players. But it isn't easy. Ron Dellums changed Congress and he helped to change America. I have enjoyed every year we have spent together fighting for peace, justice, and dignity. It has been said that Ron Dellums is the conscience of Congress. We will miss him for that. But we will also expect him to let his conscience be felt from wherever he may be. And knowing Ron, he will not shy away from that responsibility. Ron has been our modern day ``drum major for peace.'' He saved us from many weapons systems that we didn't need, couldn't afford, and probably couldn't control. He stopped the MX missile years ago. And he should be credited with helping to drive the final nail into the coffin of the senseless B-2 bomber. Ron Dellums brought the titans of apartheid to their knees, dragging a reluctant American government along the way. He fought for civil rights for all Americans. More than nearly any other Member of Congress he helped to clearly draw the connection between a bloated military budget and the many starving communities throughout our country. Whether it was the war in Vietnam or the Cold War against the Russians, Ron Dellums brought the facts and the passion to the table every time to argue against further gorging the giant while ignoring the children. He has been here to serve the people of America and to fight for human rights around the world. He was never here to fight for the monied special interests that only seek to use Congress to further their already privileged positions in society. And Ron Dellums always helped his friends. When it came time to close down the military establishment in the Bay Area and other communities, Ron fought to ensure that the base closure process was fair and expeditious. We all owe him a huge debt of gratitude. Like many of you here, I will miss him in the Halls of Congress. And like you, I will be calling out his name when we need a helping hand. We have a job to do in America. Ron Dellums did not fight in Congress all these years so we could go on vacation. Wages are too low, defense budgets are too high, and wars are still to frequent. So the challenge remains for us all. Maybe if we all learn to dress as well as Ron does, to dance on the House floor as he does, and to carry the convictions of a more just society with us to work every day as he does, just maybe we will be able to make America even better and the world a little bit safer. Ron, if it is not too late to ask, please, don't go. But if you must go, go in peace, and go with the satisfaction of a man who did all he could to achieve his goals on behalf of this great Nation.