Eleanor Norton

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Shows) for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, I recognize the bill is here for the second time only because of technical amendments that occurred in the Senate. I wanted to come to the floor to express my deep appreciation, however, for the bipartisan leadership this bill has received, especially from the chair of our full committee, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Shuster), as well as from our ranking member, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), and from our subcommittee chair, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Franks), and the ranking member, the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Wise). The bill is unique. It is the first time that private development will occur on Federal land. In doing so, of course, we make use of land for which the government was receiving no revenue, and at no cost to the government. The bill represents an extraordinary breakthrough of bipartisan work. Precisely because it is unique, the bill typifies the out-of-the-box, nonstereotypic, nonbureaucratic thinking that is typical of the members of this subcommittee. It took extraordinary collaboration and cooperation for this bill to pass both Houses because we had to think of a way to get some use out of land that had been lying there, very valuable land, for decades, producing no revenue for the Federal Government, even though we are talking about 55 acres of prime land, and some of the most valuable land on the East Coast. I must say I am also grateful for the quality of leadership the bill received in the Senate, especially from Chairman Fred Thompson; from ranking member, Joseph Lieberman; from subcommittee chairman, George Voinovich; and from ranking member, Richard Durbin, the subcommittee chairman of the District Committee and the full committee chairman of the Government Affairs Committee. The magnitude of the waste in not developing these 55 acres for decades is incalculable. Now we have found a way not only to develop it but to develop it at no cost; to get productive use out of it with revenue for the Federal Government and some revenue may even go to District taxpayers for whatever private development occurs. The land had been a terribly large brownfield that had produced slums in everything it touched surrounding it, it is so huge. The reason that it had not been developed is because it turned out not to be, in today's economy, developable as a traditional government-owned site, and we had limited tools to make use of it. It took legislation. This legislation is applicable to this parcel alone. The land was too valuable to sell and indeed we do not sell Federal land. We have so little of it in the District of Columbia, we had to think of something to do with it. Working together, we have thought of something that is unique to do with it but in keeping with public-private partnerships of the type this Congress has long endorsed and with the reinventing government and public-private ideas of the administration. For that reason, I am virtually certain that the President will sign this bill. I wanted to express my profound appreciation, especially since I knew that the chairman and the ranking member, who are so central to this bill, would be on the floor today.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, I regret that when Senate Concurrent Resolution 145, Expressing a Sense of the Congress on the Propriety and Need for Construction of the National World War II Memorial on the National Mall, came to the floor today I was giving the keynote speech to BusinessLINC, a national group that develops mentoring relationships between large and small businesses. Most members are out of town because there are no votes today, and there was apparently no one present who could give the true story of why there has been opposition to the World War II Memorial here in the District an throughout the country. Instead there were some comments that apparently disparaged the opposition and insulted their motives by indicating that they oppose a memorial to World War II veterans or feel less passionately about it than those who support the memorial. There are real differences, but let the record be clear that there are no differences on the belated honor that should have been made to World War II veterans long ago. The ``greatest generation'' of veterans, alone among our veterans, have not been honored, perhaps reflecting the extraordinary selflessness with which they have approached the entirety of their generous lives, from saving our country during the Great Depression to saving the free world itself during World War II, and thereafter the rebuilding of our economy in the post-war years. The controversy surrounding the memorial has nothing to do with the veterans. The controversy has nothing to do with a memorial to the veterans on the Mall. All agree that the memorial to these veterans belongs on the Mall. The controversy arose because of the memorial's placement, obstructing one of the great American vistas. Its placement is largely the work of one man, J. Carter Brown, Chair of the Commission on Fine Arts. The veterans did not choose the particular place on the Mall and had nothing to do with the selection of that site. Another site has been chosen. Brown, however, decided to do what had always been understood to be a violation of virtually sacred national ground, the space between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. This space between the memorials to our greatest presidents is the last expansive space left on the Mall and has been left that way for obvious reasons. This breathtaking space calls to mind the sweep of our extraordinary history and the unique role played by Washington and Lincoln in particular. The view that this pristine space should not be interrupted is not held by a few disgruntled Washingtonians or people who look to bring lawsuits when they do not get their way. Some of the opponents are World War II veterans. Some are historic preservationists and others with a deep appreciation of the McMillan Plan for the Mall and the present Mall legacy of green space created by Charles McKim and Frederick Olmstead, Jr. Many others have voiced opposition, and they are as diverse as editorials from the Wall Street Journal to the Los Angeles Times expressing opposition indicate. Until the end, I had hoped and worked for a compromise, even one that left a memorial at the Rainbow Pool site between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument--a compromise would have avoided many issues. The memorial, as proposed, has not only been criticized for its size and artistry. It also threatens to do irreparable damage to traffic and congestion. It will take huge areas out of other sections of the Mall to make way for buses and crowds that will destroy the ambiance of the Mall as it has been known for decades. World War II veterans deserve a national festival to celebrate a memorial in their honor, not lawsuits that have become inevitable. Perhaps citizens would have been willing to join the celebration and forego their lawsuits had a compromise been reached. However, the memorial was put on a track that avoided the usual safeguards, procedures, and public comment, and the necessary disposition toward compromise never emerged. Although no resolution is necessary for the memorial to proceed, if Congress wishes to go on record supporting the memorial, it should do so without impugning the motives of those who believed that two noble purposes could be served at once: a long overdue memorial on the Mall to the men and women who served our country during the greatest wartime crisis of the 20th century and the preservation of the historic and irreplaceable space between the memorials to our greatest presidents. The failure to serve worthy purposes is a failure for which our generation will have to pay. It is certainly no failure of the veterans of the ``greatest generation.''

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today I introduce the United States Commission on Security in an Open Society Act, expressing an idea I have been working on for two years. Before our eyes, parts of our open society are gradually being closed down because of fear of terrorism. This act would begin a systematic response that takes full account of the importance of maintaining our democratic traditions while responding adequately to the real and substantial threat terrorism poses. The bill I introduce today is being simultaneously introduced by the gentleman from New York, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who is retiring this year. His unique career, as the Senate's intellectual leader, and as architect of the revival of Pennsylvania Avenue and a good deal of the rest of the renaissance of the Nation's Capital makes him the perfect partner for this bill. Because the bill embodies much of the breadth of concerns of the man and his career, I believe that the passage of the United States Commission on Security in an Open Society Act during this Congress would be another fitting tribute to Senator Moynihan's service. Recent history has been marked by the rise of terrorism in the world and in this country. As a result, American society faces new and unprecedented challenges. We must provide higher levels of security for our people and public spaces while maintaining a free and open democratic society. As yet, our country has no systematic process or strategy for meeting these challenges. When we have been faced with unprecedented and perplexing issues in the past, we have had the good sense to investigate them deeply and to move to resolve them. Examples include the Warren Commission following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the Kerner Commission following riotous uprisings that swept American cities in the 1960's and 1970's. The problems associated with worldwide terrorism are of similar importance and dimension. The Act requires that a commission be presidentially appointed because to be useful in meeting the multiple problems raised, a careful balance of members representative of a cross section of disciplines will be necessary. To date, questions of security most often have been left to security and military experts. They are indispensable participants, but they cannot alone resolve all the issues raised by terrorism in an open society. In order to strike the balance required by our traditions, constitution and laws, a cross cutting group representing our best and wisest minds needs to be working at the same table. With only existing tools and thinking, we have been left to muddle through, using blunt 19th century approaches, such as crude blockades and other denials of access. The threat of terrorism to our democratic society is too serious to be left to ad hoc problem-solving. Such approaches are often as inadequate as they are menacing. We can do better, but only if we recognize and then come to grips with the complexities associated with maintaining a society with free and open access in a world characterized by unprecedented terrorism. The place to begin is with a high-level presidential commission of wise experts from an array of disciplines who can help chart the new course that will be required to protect both our people and our precious democratic institutions.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time and for his hard work on this bill. This is a great bipartisan moment in the House. The gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn) and the bipartisan Women's Caucus have worked together to make sure that this bill gets done this year. Mr. Speaker, it is harder to get low-income women to take preventive steps. We know resources is one of the reasons; but the fact is we have to fight against advice, for example, on whether or not mammograms are harmful. We have to fight against the lack of education that middle- income women do not suffer from. But there is no greater deterrent than knowing that the information I find may be information I have to not only live with, but ultimately die with, because there is no treatment, no matter what we learn. Mr. Speaker, this really raises moral and ethical issues, because if we detect but do not treat, what are we as a society doing and saying? We have made real progress on early detection in recent years. It is quite amazing progress. For example, the majority of women in the District of Columbia probably now get a mammogram. D.C. offers free screening at 26 different sites, a program called WISH, Women Interested in Staying Healthy, that is pennywise and healthwise, because it saves money and saves lives, but not if there is no treatment. We are then defeating our own purpose. Let me give you a painful example. The incidence of breast cancer among black women is significantly less than among white women, but the mortality rate among black women is much greater: 19.8 per 100,000 for white women, 26.5 for black women. Why? Of course, it is a combination of early diagnosis and no treatment, no early diagnosis and no treatment. It is almost cruel to offer one without the other. If we continue to do this, it will throw us back on early detection, because we would be sending the message, don't come forward and scare yourself to death because we cannot do anything for you afterwards. Mr. Speaker, we have made enormous progress on early diagnosis of cervical cancer and breast cancer. Now we are making great progress on curing them.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Maryland for yielding time to me, and for his very kind and gracious words. May I thank him and our other regional colleague, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), for their leadership on this bill. They have been steadfast until in fact we have come to this moment, when it has gone to the Senate and come back to us with a few changes. I want particularly to thank President Clinton, whose leadership has been at the forefront of this concept. Madam Speaker, I would like to say that this concept represents precisely what we ought to be doing with retirement. We are not taking any money from the social security trust fund to get this done. What we are doing is encouraging people, through incentives we are providing, to save their own money. That is the only way to make sure we secure the social service trust fund at the same time we do what we have not done nearly enough of, and that is to encourage the American people to stop spending so much of their money and save it. They are not doing that. We are at the lowest savings rate virtually in history. This bill encourages savings in two ways. First, it brings Federal employees into equality in rolling over their contributions into 401(k)s now, like their private sector counterparts. There is no reason for there to have been any distinction in that regard. Secondly, it allows newly-hired employees to get into the savings habit from the moment they get their first paycheck by allowing TSP to apply to them immediately, instead of waiting for the next period, which could be as much as a year. Thus, essentially what this very good bill does is to put the government in the ballgame of employee savings plans. It brings us to where many private sector plans have long been. The House, of course, offset this bill through contributions from the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund. The administration opposed that, and I think correctly. After all, the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund is very controversial over here, at least with respect to funding it, and these contributions would not be related to benefits or to retirement. I believe the administration was probably correct in saying that it set a poor precedent for the future to use the trust fund for unrelated purposes. So I appreciate the suggestion of the other body, which is why this bill is back here, that we should offset, as is required, in a way that I must say gives us a double bang. First of all, it gives us the money. We recognize now court orders during a divorce proceedings that otherwise might result in what amounts to fraud. If one is going through a divorce and they say, oh, my God, I might have to give some of this to my wife or husband, and they pull their money out so they cannot be part of the proceeding, that is nothing the Federal government wants to encourage. This body has been trying to go in the other way and secure spouses in what would otherwise be available to them, so I regard it as an antifraud measure. But then I am also pleased to see, when we consider what this means for women in particular, that it would safeguard women for what would otherwise be a fleet of what should be available to them. Madam Speaker, we get the savings, we prevent fraud, and we allow either spouse, in this case, I think it probably benefits women more than men, to perhaps get what would otherwise be available to them but has not been in the past, because the Federal Government did not recognize court orders until the divorce was all done and through, in which case the spouse could have withdrawn the retirement funds that were in the account. May I say, Madam Speaker, that there is another benefit to this bill, and that really has to do with the retention and recruitment of employees. The Federal Government has become almost noncompetitive with the private sector in pay and benefits. With the scarcity of workers, and I am amazed to hear myself say that, we have the kind of full employment that we never had in my lifetime, the private sector is trying everywhere it can to make sure that it recruits and retains employees. Moreover, the sizzle is all there. Youngsters getting out of school think of the Federal Government and State governments as kind of ho hum places. They want to go where the action is, to technology, to the private sector by having benefits that do not equal what the private sector has long done. We certainly do not help ourselves to retain and recruit the employees we need to keep this government running. Benefits used to be the way the government offset lower pay; now benefits have lost ground as well. We are not going to be able to maintain the extraordinary civil service we have had throughout my lifetime in this city as a native Washingtonian, unless we wake up and smell the coffee when it comes to pay and benefits. Obviously, this bill helps employees by equalizing their savings and benefit plan, but it helps the Government to make up for lost ground in recruiting and maintaining what has been historically the best and brightest labor force in the country.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time, and I thank him and his partners on the other side for their hard work in bringing this most important legislation to the floor. This week, the surgeon general was quoted as saying the epidemic has evolved to become increasingly an epidemic of people of color, of women and of the young. We have got to get rid of this epidemic, not let it evolve; and what we are doing here this morning will have a great deal to do with getting rid of it. The disease has moved to a devastating place, Mr. Speaker, to the poorest communities of color. Blacks are only 12 percent of the population. They are 50 percent of the new cases. Almost 80 percent of the new cases among women are black and Latino women. Half of the new cases occur in youth. We are now finding that we have to educate each new cohort perhaps every 4 or 5 years of gay men because the newest cohort needs to learn what those that have passed on in their 20s perhaps had to learn. We are dealing with a preventable disease. But when people get this disease, they need our care and they need our love. I am grateful to the gay and lesbian community of this country for the way in which they brought this issue to the forefront and now have helped us gather a bipartisan majority for the Ryan White bill. If we continue to do what we are doing today, we will show what we all know, that this is a disease, unlike heart disease and unlike cancer, that we can prevent. This is a disease that we can eliminate. I thank all of those who contributed to this moment on the House floor.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, just for the record, I want the gentleman to know that, of the $2 billion that the gentleman has referenced, only $400 million of that is for direct Federal funding, but most of it is for the kind of grants they do not appropriate for anybody else in the first place.

Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, there are two points on which I simply must take exception to the remarks of the Chair of the subcommittee when he talks about the $6 billion budget and says almost $4 billion of it is from the District and about $2 billion of it is from the Federal Government. Most of that $2 billion would never have come here until recently. In all of the years that the District budget came, Federal grants, most of them competitive Federal grants, were never even included in the District budget that came here. In recent years it has been and most of that money are grants. For example, it includes the transportation money that I get for the District out of another appropriation altogether, very large set of money, had nothing to do with this appropriation or with this chairman. It is done pursuant to a formula. And that is included in the $2 billion. That is most of the money he is talking about when he says $2 billion. Let me say what I mean when I say the President put the money in the budget. This gentleman would not have had $35 million to manipulate to other priorities. If there was not $35 million in the budget, if there were only the money funding the functions that the Federal Government took over, we would not even be having this discussion. But the Mayor, the city council Chair, the control board Chair and I went to the White House and said, ``We are funding two-thirds of the Metro stop, can the Federal Government put in one-third?'' What this chairman has done is to take a good part of that money and reallocate it to where he thinks the money should go, or else he would not have had any money to play around with at all. We do not agree with him. It is our city. He is for some of the money, for example, into the arboretum which is in the appropriation of the agriculture committee. We are asking that the money that was added to the D.C. appropriation, funded in the President's budget, be used for the purpose he funded it for and not be used for the purposes the gentleman wants it funded for. He would not have had it to deal with at all if we had not gone to the White House. I ask him to respect the reason the money was put in there, and it was the Metro stop and the other functions that we have mentioned. Finally, I say to my colleagues, it is not fair to you to ask you to vote against the motion to instruct because you will engage in a futile exercise. If you vote against the motion to instruct, you are voting for overtime on the smallest appropriation. You are guaranteed a fight on that appropriation, I promise you that.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I appreciate his comments. First, let me indicate that what I am going to say now has the sign- off of the Mayor and the Chair of the city council, who want us to support the motion to instruct so that D.C. can get its money and we can recede to the Senate bill. D.C. General Hospital has been taken care of in the Senate bill. There is some money that can be moved, if necessary, to assist the transition, with very severe limits on it; and D.C., of course, can no longer fund the hospital above and beyond the appropriated amount. That has been fully taken care of in the House. The Senate budget as to securitization of the tobacco settlement, D.C. would have desired that. But the necessity to get this bill done is overriding, and the mayor and the City Council are asking our colleagues on both sides to support the motion to instruct. The Senate bill is tough on the District, tougher than necessary, but it is a fair bill. It forces me to swallow hard. There are major attachments on that bill reflecting the views of this House as well as the Senate. There is a major violation of home rule right in our face. Congressional review of the Chief Financial Officer before that nomination becomes effective even after hearings and confirmation by the Council, a totally unnecessary, horrible violation of home rule. And if the mayor and the City Council are willing to let that go without a fight and a veto, I think it says a lot about the urgency of passing this bill because I am going to have something to say about what the specific injury is to the District in holding this bill longer. The Senate bill requires the District to pay back in 1 year amounts taken from its emergency reserves for emergencies, and that becomes very difficult for us because it is a city recovering from insolvency. If we take an amount from the reserves, the District asks that we have 3 years to pay it back. We are not able to get that in the Senate bill. That is the kind of tough language the District would have to absorb through the Senate bill. But the Senate bill would, at least, make this small appropriation go away. And then what would we have? Would it be one down and eight to go? I have lost count. But they have got a lot to do before they get out of here. If they want to spend their time in October and November fighting over the D.C. bill, be my guest. Because we are not going to give up without a fight. If in fact we do not adopt the Senate version, what we are headed for is a veto and a protracted fight over the smallest appropriation consisting almost entirely of locally raised revenue. This would be an absurd fight this late in the year because it would be a fight over D.C.'s balanced budget with a surplus. The Senate version, of course, has riders we deplore but it bears us a fight over controversial language that are the pet concerns of this Member and that Member who in the House cannot wait for the D.C. appropriation because it allows them to undemocratically micromanage their views into the appropriation of a local jurisdiction, going against all of the philosophy of devolution that is spouted by the other side daily on this floor. Is it worth the fight to get their little curlicue in their budget and then have it vetoed by the President? I do not think so. Usually funds have not held up the D.C. appropriations since most of the money comes from D.C. and D.C. submits balanced budgets. Not this time. This appropriation is being held up largely because of a $35 million dispute in a $2 trillion budget. That is what this House is all about. Now, understand that this dispute involves priorities that were funded in the President's budget and that the District cannot do without. So that means a fight, too. They have a fight on their hands. Do they want a fight? Do they want to stick around and fight? They are going to get their fight. Because we have got to get that Metro station. D.C. has come up with a third of the money. As far as the Metro station, one of our business people has written an extraordinary piece in the Washington Post saying he simply cannot believe that, with the millions of dollars he is pouring into the District, that the Congress would not let this Metro station go. It is key to the revitalization of the entire northeast quadrant of the city, to the city's economy itself, which is just rebounding from insolvency. We cannot put any more of our money into it. The control board has certified that it does not have more of its money to put into it. That is going to hold this bill up. We are not going to give up without that Metro stop. If my colleagues want to hang around and fight over it, they got themselves a fight. Members have always supported such infrastructure support. They did so when we were building the Convention Center because they knew that we were going to make millions of dollars for ourselves every year. And so the Congress funded an expansion of the Metro stop near the Convention Center when the President put the money in his budget, as he has now. This body, in one of the great moments frankly for bipartisan support for the Nation's capital, passed the College Access Act. There was strong bipartisan support in the Senate and the House because the House understood that we are the only jurisdiction in the United States that does not have a State college system, a State university system. So that now our youngsters can go to State colleges for low in-state college tuition fees. Why underfund in the second year, the upcoming year, when we have received such an outpouring of young people taking advantage, more than 3,000 youngsters going all over the United States? It is mean spirited to underfund that, especially since the money for it is there in the President's budget. It is time to acknowledge the giant steps that the District has taken with its new reform mayor, Tony Williams, and its completely revitalized City Council that does tough oversight all the time. They did their homework. We found no fault with their budget. The delay into the fiscal year has already hurt the City's priorities. As I speak, 175 police cannot be hired. As I speak, we cannot put money into an after-school program to take our kids off the street during the high crime hours between 3 and 6. And the only reason is because this body has decided to hold our budget up, our balanced budget, and we cannot move ahead on anything new until they let our budget go. Is it worth it to put their own signature on somebody else's budget when they have done their homework? Let the District budget go.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me, especially given the very special circumstance in which I find myself. This process has to be as frustrating for my Republican colleagues as for Democrats. After all, we are stuck here with the overwhelming number of our appropriations unresolved this late, and into a new fiscal year. I do believe I have a right to be more frustrated than most because mine is not a case of delay in funding Federal agencies. It is more complicated than that. You are asking me to put an entire city of half a million people on hold, the city that I represent. It is important for the House to be aware of what happens when we put a city on hold. In this high-crime big city, 175 new police officers now cannot be hired; 88 new firefighters, to help fill out the depletion that occurred when the District was in financial crisis in the 1990s, cannot be hired. We have five new charter schools, and that is what this Congress has most wanted. They are now in operation. We have the largest number of charter schools in the United States, but there is no money for these new charter schools, making their start very shaky, because they are already in operation. School has begun. There is $4.5 million for school recreation centers to get our kids off the streets during the busy crime hours between 3 and 6; that is on hold. To the public, this seems like games we play with ourselves. Games or not, it is far more serious for the District of Columbia than for any other place in the United States. The District got its work done on time. We have submitted a balanced budget with a surplus. Because the Congress has not done its work, the District cannot begin to spend its own money, raised in the District of Columbia from its own taxpayers. We cannot continue to treat this city this way. We need a new process, Mr. Speaker. I have just called the Mayor to say to our new Mayor, the mayor who has received so much in lip service compliments for the work that he has done already in the District, to say ``Mr. Mayor, your city is on hold for CR number 2.'' We have a new Mayor. We have a new council exercising excellent oversight. They have done what the Congress said they should do. Everything in the District is new. Painstaking reforms are occurring. There is a new government in the throes of wholesale reform. The very least this body should do is to let that government take care of itself and begin to spend its own money. The only thing that is not new about the District of Columbia is the process that the Congress forces upon it in order for the city to spend its own money. I ask that we look closely at this process, and I ask Members to help me next year to change this process and free D.C.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from American Samoa for yielding me this time and for his work in facilitating this bill to the floor so soon after it was introduced. I also thank the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Hansen), who has worked with me on similar bills and without whom this bill would certainly not be here so promptly. I am particularly indebted to my good friends, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus) and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis), whose leadership has been central to this bill. Mr. Speaker, on any list of the 10 greatest Americans of all time Frederick Douglass' name would probably appear. A man of multiple talents and great principle. Of course, he is known for many on the one hand as the great abolitionist. That is his national-international reputation. Those of us in the District of Columbia call him the Sage of Anacostia, Anacostia and southeast Washington. This much seems clear: Frederick Douglass was the most important black man of the 19th century, just as Martin Luther King is surely the most important black man of the 20th Century. There are two important differences, though. First, a memorial for Martin Luther King, Jr. is about to come forward on the mall. We are very close to that now. A mall site has been approved, the memorial itself has been approved, yet there is none for Douglass anywhere in the Nation's capitol. And, secondly, we do not seek a place for Douglass on the mall. To be sure, Douglass deserves a national memorial wherever the greats are sited, but there has been great sensitivity in thinking through where this memorial should sit. I thank the original cosponsors with whom I have cosponsored this bill, because, in a very real sense, Douglass belongs with us in the District of Columbia. Now, the National Park Service maintains a very interesting, wonderfully educational home, the home he called Cedar Hill in Southeast, in Anacostia. If Members have not been there, it is a place you must not avoid. They have set that home up exactly as Douglass left it. It is a great and wonderful mansion that he purchased in historic Anacostia. It is also in historic Anacostia where the memorial itself belongs, not on the overcrowded mall where with all our hubris we all seek to crowd but in Anacostia, in Southeast, where Douglass lived, where he wrote, and from where he often rode on horseback and even walked to Capitol Hill. He held every conceivable position in the District, U.S. marshal, board of Howard University, recorder of deeds for the District of Columbia. He was a man for all seasons and all nations and he was a man of the District of Columbia. To be sure, a national and international hero and diplomat, but above all, a man of this town. So it stands to reason that it would be a local group in Anacostia who wishes to raise the funds, working with the National Park Service, for this memorial, of course, with no funds to come from the United States Government. One of the most appealing aspects of the notion of this memorial is that it is a memorial and gardens, and the sponsor is the Frederick Douglass Gardens. What a wonderful idea, an idea that did not come from us but from the community which has thought about Douglass and his life, how he lived that life, close to the city, close to nature. Supporters, of course, include not only the Frederick Douglass Institute, Frederick Douglass, IV himself, a man who looks strikingly like his great great grandfather, I might add, but also the Anacostia Historical Society and the Anacostia Garden Club; residents of the District of Columbia who studied his life and try to live by his principles. The preferred site is even more wonderful. Again, it is not some grand site in the middle of the most important part of the memorial, though heaven knows Douglass would deserve such a site were it appropriate in our sight, but it would be, we hope, on Poplar Point. Where is Poplar Point? Poplar Point is a discarded site where the Architect of the Capitol maintained his greenhouse. There is nothing there now. We have moved the greenhouse. We would like to reclaim it and integrate it as a memorial grove to be kept by the Park Service with some appropriate memorial to the great Frederick Douglass in the gardens, gardens so that people can come not just to watch whatever we put there but to think about his life, to think about where he lived, to think about what Douglass stood for. I do believe this is the way to do a memorial, Mr. Speaker, at least for this man. It is, as well, a way to spread out the memorials to other historic parts of the District. We all somehow see ourselves close to the Capitol, waving to history. You cannot do it. You cannot fill it up with ourselves. You cannot fill it up with our favorite heroes. Yet much of the District is historic. Not far from the Capitol is where the great historic figures like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln spent their time, not in this plot of land but in the wonderful plots surrounding the District. That is where Douglass belongs. That is where we want a memorial to him, in another historic part of the District, historic old Anacostia. We hope it will prove a perfect precedent for memorials for other great men and women. This was a perfect idea. I thank the original cosponsors, and I thank my own constituents here in Washington for giving us an idea that I hope will be repeated to honor great men and women like Frederick Douglass.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, normally bills to study serious problems are like apple pie and motherhood, but I will tell the Members, this one deserves the serious reservations of Members of this body in light of mounting concerns among the public about medical privacy and Internet privacy. When I chaired the Women's Caucus last term, one of the bills at that time Democratic and the Republican women were able to get some kind of consensus on was a bill involving genetic privacy. The notion that we are here talking about studying privacy at the end of yet another term pains me to even hear. This issue is at the top of the agenda of the American public. The concern of the public is so loud and so real, and has been there for so long after so many hearings about various aspects of this problem, that the expectation has been that we would do something about it at least by now. Let us take medical privacy. That one is so long overdue, particularly with respect to genetic information. We now know the genetic code. That thing is traveling against us at such a speed. We are here talking about studying it with no time limit? People are thinking, will I lose my job if I go to the company doctor or to any doctor to talk about my condition? And all doctors use the Internet now. Do we know where the public is on this? They are clamoring on the doors of this Congress, saying, ``Protect me.'' My own recent experience makes me come to the floor. I needed something, a fancy new telephone. Somebody found out that I could order it and get it in 24 hours over the Internet. I said, over my dead body. I have a recognizable name. I am not going to put the name of Eleanor Holmes Norton on the Internet, because at least in this region somebody might decide that that is the name to use. Do Members know how many people have lost their identity fooling with the Internet? I am not going to lose what little identity I have left. That is one of the things people write again more and more. Yet, we say, here is our answer, we will study that for you. We are making people think we are doing something about something they have clamored for us to do something about for almost 10 years now. This bill says that this commission is going to make recommendations on whether additional legislation is necessary? Give me a break. Tell that to the public, that we are trying to find out if it is necessary. Or listen to what the FCC has just said: ``Legislation is now needed to ensure consumers online privacy is adequately protected.'' It is necessary. This bill does nothing about that necessity. It is very hard for me to advocate support of this bill. I do not do so.

Ms. NORTON

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

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 5284 as a fitting tribute to Owen Pickett. His service to the citizens not only of the second district of Virginia, but also to the citizens of this Nation, is exemplary. We owe a debt of gratitude to Congressman Pickett for his diligence in pursuing military matters in particular. Since he was first elected to Congress in 1986, Owen Pickett has devoted himself to ensuring that the United States military is technologically ready and superior to any other military force. He supported veterans programs, and a strong U.S. flag merchant fleet. In addition to being a dedicated public servant, Owen Pickett is a lawyer and a certified public accountant. He is a devoted husband, father and grandfather to seven grandchildren. Mr. Pickett is known as tenacious, but also as a gentleman, a willing listener and a consensus builder. Mr. Speaker, this bill has broad bipartisan support, and every member of the Virginia delegation supports the bill. It is a most fitting to honor Mr. Pickett with this designation.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I strongly support H.R. 5267, a bill to designate the United States Courthouse in Central Islip, New York, in honor of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States. When Mr. Roosevelt became President, at not quite the age of 43, he became the youngest President in our Nation's history. With his youth and vigor he brought new excitement and vision to the Presidency as he led the country and the Congress and the executive branch toward progressive reforms and a strong foreign policy. His civic career began as a 23-year-old person, when he was elected to the New York Assembly. He served also as the Police Commissioner for his birthplace, the City of New York, as Assistant Secretary for the U.S. Navy, and as Governor of New York. During the Spanish-American War, he was a lieutenant colonel in the Rough Rider Regiment and became one of the war's most conspicuous heroes. As President, Roosevelt viewed his role as ``steward'' for the American public. He believed he should take any necessary action for the public welfare, unless expressly forbidden by the Constitution or by law. He strongly believed and endorsed a central role for the government, especially in arbitrating conflict between capital and labor. He was a ``trust buster'' par excellence. He ensured the construction of the Panama Canal to strengthen America's strategic position. He was a leader in conservation, and many of his accomplishments are with us today, for example, the Grand Canyon, Muirs Woods and Devils Tower. We are thankful to him for establishing the Park Service and the National Park System. He was a champion of reserving open land for public use, and fostered irrigation projects as well as preserving land for game and bird sanctuaries. He received the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating peace in the Russo-Japanese War. An inspiring speaker, he advocated a strenuous outdoor life. Roosevelt holds a revered place in American history, and this designation is a fitting honor to the extraordinary life of this great President. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. NORTON

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

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, S. 1794 is a bill to designate the Federal Courthouse in Jackson, Wyoming, after one of Wyoming's most illustrious native sons, Clifford Hansen. Cliff Hansen was the Senator from Wyoming from 1967 until 1978. Prior to coming to the Senate, he served as the State's Governor from 1963 to 1966. His public career spans four decades of service to the citizens of Wyoming. Beginning in the mid-1940s, Cliff Hansen worked to preserve the State's role in determining grazing issues, as well as tax issues associated with the creation of public lands. He was an advocate of mine safety and became a leader in determining the national energy policy. Senator Hansen was vigilant in protecting Wyoming's fair share of royalties from oil and gas exploration. During his tenure in the Senate he worked with Senator Ribicoff to redefine the Tax Code to provide for equitable treatment of estate taxes for family-owned businesses. It is fitting and proper to honor the former Governor and Senator, Cliff Hansen, by designating the Federal Courthouse in Jackson, Wyoming, in his honor, and I am pleased to join in doing so. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, if my colleagues have been in Congress for no more than 5 years, they have never seen Pennsylvania Avenue as a normal city street. It was closed in 1995 in the wake of the tragic Oklahoma City bombing. This body has had no mechanism for reviewing what was done, whether it was appropriate or whether it should continue ad infinitum. The Secret Service has, of course, wanted to close Pennsylvania Avenue for decades now; and after the tragic Oklahoma bombing, it is understandable that the Service succeeded. But what about now? The Subcommittee on the District of Columbia, to its credit, under the leadership of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Davis) had three hearings. But there was nothing concrete that the committee could come forward with at that time in 1995 to respond to the closing. For all intents and purposes, there is no way for the Congress of the United States to review a closing, and it could happen anywhere in the United States on the say so, the unreviewable say so, as it turns out, of the Secret Service, unreviewable because it is clear to me after a meeting that I had with Secretary of the Treasury Lawrence Summers yesterday that the Secret Service has captured and easily continues to capture the government bureaucrats. The Congress must establish a way to review and decide the appropriateness of a closing when it goes on for years. I intend to introduce legislation to that effect so that it does not again happen here and so it cannot happen in my colleagues' jurisdictions either. A public-spirited group of business people, the Federal City Council and the D.C. Building and Industry Association, have secured an independent effort by world-class experts to see whether there is any way to meet the Secret Service's concerns and open the avenue. They have a plan that meets each and every concern the Secret Service had raised--narrowing the avenue, putting grass over large parts of it so that cars would be well beyond the distance that a bomb could do damage to the White House complex, bridges on either side of the avenue that would allow only cars and not trucks to enter the avenue, and so forth. Without this kind of sensitivity to this living, breathing city, of course, essentially we close down much of its commerce in the middle of the town. We do great damage to the environment, and we make congestion far more awful than it is. We are second already in traffic congestion in this country. There are many other details, including technology, that there is not time to offer here today. I soon am to receive a Secret Service briefing so that I can learn what it is that concerns them now. But there is every indication that they simply intend to move the goal post. First it was trucks. I am sure that now it will be cars. Then it will be motorcycles. We have briefed White House officials. The President seems quite open to opening the avenue, but he says he wants to make sure that others are not harmed. The fact is that no single person wants to take the responsibility. This is the body that should take the responsibility. What the Secret Service wants is essentially zero risk. It is time to factor into the equation of decisionmaking the more than half a million people who live in this city, the more than 4 million who live in the region, and the millions of Americans 25 million each year, who come to visit and see America's main street closed down. Only the independent counsel has had as much nonreviewable authority as the Secret Service effectively has. Nobody wants to harm the President or the White House complex. But in a free society there must be a way to balance the risk of harm versus the risk to our democratic institutions. We cannot accept a bar that automatically rises when the Secret Service alone, unreviewable for all intents and purposes, simply raises that bar. We cannot let the police ever be the last word on our democratic institutions. In America, the notion of a zero risk standard in order to protect any of us is unacceptable when what we lose are our democratic rights and our democratic institutions. Zero risk or anything close to it is a standard that no American who believes in an open and democratic society should ever have to meet. That is the power we have effectively given the Secret Service. I am going to introduce a bill to make sure that it does not happen again.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time, and I especially thank her and the manager on the other side for the hard work that succeeded in bringing this bill that we have waited so long to get to the floor. Mr. Speaker, I must say we had no right to subject such an important bill to the constitutional attack it is going to get in the courts almost immediately. We have marred this bill by incorporating two provisions that involve deliberate discrimination. At least one of them puts the bill at constitutional peril. That is the constitutional choice provision. I am a former Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Title VII gives the broadest deference to religious institutions. They can discriminate in employment involving religion, and even in secular activities that they carry out, and even if conduct as they see it is against their religion. But once you give a religious organization the right to administer Federal funds, our law and our Constitution require equal treatment. Title VI and title VII both make that clear, and certainly the Constitution does. We are funding churches, synagogues, other religious entities, as if they were Federal agencies. That in itself raises the most serious constitutional questions, because these are pervasively religious institutions, and that is exactly what the Supreme Court says you cannot fund. Then we go one unconstitutional step further. We allow these religious institutions to discriminate as to whom they hire to administer Federal funds. That is where the line surely must be drawn. We go further in discriminating in this bill. We carry into this bill discredited, discriminatory, mandatory sentencing minimums, and we carry it to new legislation, turning a deaf ear to the Federal courts and to all our experience. Worse, we effectively exempt white defendants from mandatory minimums, while assuring black and Hispanic defendants will get them. That is deliberate discrimination. That is the very definition of racism.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, by failing to do our baseline work, the minimum work we have to do, we are doing great harm to our country moving forward now with the CR. We see that in the content, or lack thereof, of this appropriation and certainly by the delay in getting this basic work done. This House deliberately underfunded each and every appropriation in order to fund a tax cut as they went to their convention. But the quintessential example of the harm done by Government by CR is what they are doing to the capital of the United States. They require the local budget of a city to come here so that those of them who have nothing to do with raising the funds while they deny me the right to vote on my own budget, pick over that budget's local funds, own funds, budget surplus, balanced budget here in this House where it does not belong and then they say to the City, to a living, breathing city, they cannot spend their money because they are not through with Federal business that has nothing to do with them. They say to a living, breathing city, spend on a daily basis 1/365 of their money. Try doing that, I say to my colleagues, in their city and their State. How does a city with dozens of vital finances parse out the amount they require it to spend when we are talking about dozens of vital functions, some of them life-and-death functions? How do we pick up garbage that way. How do we run a school system that way? They have said to the District of Columbia, streamline your functions, get your act together. The District of Columbia has done that. The District says to Congress, streamline your functions, let the District run itself. It got its business done on time. Let the City go forward and do its business. Free us from your convoluted processes.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, last Friday a man named Edward Gay marched into a gay bar, killed a man, and wounded six others. He said he was tired of people making fun of his last name: Gay. No joke. He said he wanted to get rid of faggots. What happened in that gay bar last Friday was the exact equivalent of lynchings, common in the South in the first half of this century. This House never passed an anti-lynching law. And there was no hate crimes in Texas when James Byrd, a black man, was dragged behind a truck to his death. George W. Bush opposed a hate crimes law in Texas. James Byrd gave us all the reasons we ever needed for a Federal hate crimes law. Edward Gay's act of murder against gays is a mandate to pass the hate crimes act now. Bring it to the floor, Mr. Speaker.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. Indeed so. We invite Members to join us. I will be riding in my skirt because I have a hearing right afterwards. I thank the gentleman for helping us show off our waterfront which we are trying to get in better shape. I thought I would come to the floor, and I appreciate the opportunity that the gentleman from Oregon has given me, to give a status report to Members on important developments in the District of Columbia. I try to give a status report every so often. This is an important time to do so because it is the appropriation period. There are new Members here who perhaps think they have been having an out-of-body experience because they have had to vote on the floor on a local city's budget, on a budget raised in the District of Columbia. No, that is the way they do it here. They should not do it anywhere. Some of you have been local legislators. You would never abide that in your district. If I could get out of it, I would. I think that there is going to come a time very soon when there will be ways to modify the present system. I wanted, though, to begin by thanking the chairman of the District subcommittee, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Davis), and the vice chair, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), for going with me to the Committee on Rules last week to ask for the return of the vote to the District of Columbia that was retracted along with the votes of the other delegates when the Republicans took the majority. As a constitutional lawyer, I had written a memorandum that showed that even as I had the full vote in committees, I could have it in the Committee of the Whole, the creation of the rules of the House, the Democrats were in power then, by a vote I had won it. The Republicans sued us and both the District Court and the Court of Appeals indicated that this was constitutional. When the vote was retracted through the rules, there were a considerable number of Republicans who came up to me and said that at least for the District of Columbia, which is third per capita in Federal income taxes, if we had been severed, they would have voted to retain the vote of the District. The fact that Chairman Davis and Vice Chair Morella went with me to plead for the return of the vote for the District I think indicates that we are dealing here with a matter above political considerations, not bipartisan but nonpartisan; but because we are talking about the vote, my single vote cannot make a difference, particularly since the rules require a revote if the delegate's vote makes the difference. Of course no one vote makes the difference very often. There cannot be half a dozen times in the session when that occurs. Nothing is lost by the Republican majority should they retain the majority. Everything is gained for my residents who still are smarting under the notion that anybody would take the vote while accepting their Federal income taxes. There are other reasons as well. Uniquely, this body assumes the privilege of voting on my local budget; yet I have to stand there with no vote on the amendments as I had when I had the vote in the Committee of the Whole, and of course there is the unique requirement that every law passed by the local city council come here to lay over and perhaps to be overturned. So in the name of the half million tax-paying Americans I represent, I ask that my vote be retained, and I appreciate the bipartisan support I have for that proposition. Let me say just a word about the District itself. Its basic health needs to be reported to this body because this body saw the District go down in 1995. Since then, there have been 4 years of balanced budgets plus surpluses. The District came into balance 2 years ahead of the congressional mandate. The control board is sunsetting. Next year's CAFR will report a balanced budget. That signals the end of the control board. At the same time the city council has revived its oversight functions so that it is now a full functioning city council with all of the vigilance that this body, for example, has over Federal agencies, keeping the new reform mayor on the reform path. Finally, the school board, which is perhaps where the Congress has had its greatest concern, has itself also been reformed by vote of the residents of the District. We have a new superintendent that was superintendent in Montgomery County, one of the leading school districts in the country, who is now our superintendent. The former superintendent, Arlene Ackerman, did so well in the District that she was recruited away by San Francisco. She took our scores up 2 years running, instituted all manner of reforms including a summer program not only for remediation but to help students get ahead. Our police department is doing extraordinarily well in what has been a particularly high crime city. We have had double-digit drops in crime for 2 years now. Most of my colleagues know and have enormous respect for our management-oriented mayor, the new mayor of the District of Columbia, Anthony Williams. You have perhaps read of the management plans he has in place which holds managers to goals which are publicized to the entire city so that people can see whether or not these managers are meeting their goals. One agency has been in the paper recently, the foster care agency. I am pleased that the majority whip, Tom DeLay, a national advocate for children, himself a foster parent, was concerned about the fact that the foster care agency is in disarray. Note, though, that that agency is in receivership. Mr. DeLay has joined Chairman Tom Davis and me in calling for the return of that agency from the Federal courts to the mayor of the District of Columbia because he has shown that he knows how to reform an agency and the receivership has not done the job. Finally, I want to thank the Congress for the tax credits and incentives that it voted in 1997, which are already having an enormous effect in reviving the economy of the District of Columbia. Just today, Senator Connie Mack and I have an op-ed piece in the Washington Post where we call upon the Senate and the House to make citywide these D.C.-only tax credits and incentives which are reviving the private economy of the District of Columbia and have contributed invaluably to the revival of the District itself. Because the District has no State to fall back on, it needs special incentives of some kind; and we prefer private sector incentives, because we are trying to develop a stable economy that depends upon no one but ourselves and our own businesses. The D.C. residential and business credits have had phenomenal success in the many communities in which they are found. But not every community has had the benefit of these tax incentives. The result is that there are businesses that have the incentives on one side of the street and on the other side of the street they do not, or competitors have them and their competitors do not. That is because this is a small, compact city, and you cannot divide it up the way you can Chicago or New York or L.A. into districts with some getting it and some not getting it without having terrifically adverse effects. The effect here has been to unintentionally discriminate against some communities. What Senator Mack, who has been extraordinarily helpful to this city, wonderfully attentive to our economy, and I ask is that the proven success of these tax credits and benefits make the Congress decide to make them citywide. They are a tax-exempt bonding authority, for example, which means that we have what most cities have had for a long time, and that is tax bonding authority for profit-making businesses. We only had it for tax-exempt institutions before. Now there is $100 million of private investment in the city because of the tax-exempt bonding. It is paying for itself over and over again. The best example is the $5,000 homebuyer credit. It is the only one of the tax incentives Congress passed in 1997 that was citywide, and look what has happened. We have turned around the extraordinary exit of middle-class homeowners from the city. Seventy percent of those who bought in the city said they bought because of the $5,000 homebuyer credit which allows you to get $5,000 off of your Federal income taxes if you buy a home in the District. We want that to be the case for the tax-exempt incentives as well. Finally, let me thank the Congress once again for the 1997 tax credits and incentives that have boosted the city's private economy. In one or another of the tax measures coming out of the House, we expect these tax credits to perhaps become citywide, and I ask for Members' support for that measure. Let me thank, once again, those who have supported me to get the vote back for the tax-paying residents of the District. I ask whoever becomes the majority to at that time give the District back the vote it lost when the Republican majority assumed power here in the Congress. I think that it would be a most fitting way for the Congress to say to the District, which has blossomed back from the depths of insolvency into now a thriving city, ``Job well done.'' I thank the gentleman for yielding to me so that I might give the Members of the House this progress report on the Nation's capital.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for yielding to me. That is a most generous gesture and in keeping with the special attention he has devoted to the capital of the United States. He joins us in so many activities that we share in common with his own constituents. I want to particularly thank him for joining our bike ride just the other day where we are trying to work with his livability caucus to make the Nation's capital more livable for people who walk and ride and run.

Ms. NORTON

Ms. NORTON. I very much thank the gentleman for yielding. Moreover, I am very appreciative of the initiative that his involvement brings to this special order this evening. He is a member of our leadership. I think a special order led by him indicates, among other things, the attention and the importance of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities to our own minority leadership here in the House. I recognize that the majority has also given some considerable attention to Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and I want to thank them for that this evening as well. I am pleased that the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), the minority leader, has taken a lead in drawing in the Historically Black Colleges and Universities here this week when the President has declared this to be National Black Colleges and Universities Week, so that we could hear directly from them. If I may say so, my own sister, a fourth generation Washingtonian like me, is president of a Historically Black College and University, Albany State University; so I suppose my own interest in this is also a family interest. She is a graduate of Miners Teachers College, now the University of the District of Columbia. My mother is a graduate of Howard University. I suppose it is very difficult for any African American who has gotten anywhere in life not to have in her family some indication that the HBCUs have touched their lives. I believe that this special order this evening is important for the way in which it illustrates the gentleman from Maryland's understanding of the continuing importance of these universities in the life and times of black America, the 23 States and the District of Columbia where they are located, almost half our States, 105 of them who bear a disproportionate share of the responsibility for higher education for African Americans. Because of that fact alone, these colleges and universities are deserving of all the attention we can give them. If they were to drop out of the higher education business tomorrow, black higher education in the United States of America would collapse. They give us, just at the bachelor's level, 28 percent of the bachelor's degree. They are only 3 percent of the colleges and universities in the United States of America. They are as vital as any network of institutions in our country. Madam Speaker, I do want to speak about some new developments in the District of Columbia involving HBCUs. Of course, Howard University, in many ways the flagship university of black America, is located here. The gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) has indicated its special relationship to this Congress. When the slaves were freed, what they wanted most of all was access to education, and higher education. The Congress has had responsibility for Howard University in a very special way almost since the end of the Civil War. Actually, we had two Historically Black Colleges and Universities here, the University of the District of Columbia as well as Howard University, the University of the District of Columbia being an amalgam of three Historically Black Colleges and Universities. But because of a wrinkle and mishap, the University of the District of Columbia was never funded as a Historically Black College and University. I want to thank this body here this evening that when the D.C. College Tuition Act was passed, the University of the District of Columbia received its rightful status as a fully funded HBCU beginning in 1999. This was very important because this is the only publicly supported university in the District of Columbia, for its lack of vital funding, especially given the hard times the District has since gone through, was a matter of some considerable disadvantage to the District. It is also, however, an open-admissions university. That means that, by definition, it is not the university for some of our youngsters. One size does not fit all. And so this body passed the D.C. College Tuition Access Act. This was a historic act, because for the first time it means that residents of the District of Columbia have what Maryland and Virginia, to point to our two neighbors, have had historically. Virginia has 58 public colleges and universities, I think Maryland has almost 30, and so you can choose which one fits you. The District had one. It was an open-admissions university. This gave us access to any public college or university anywhere in the United States of America, and in this its first year just begun in September, college attendance in the District of Columbia has been raised enormously. Already in the first year they have come. What it means is that the youngster and her family pays in-state tuition and the Federal Government picks up the rest. What does that have to do with what we are celebrating here today? We have the preliminary figures about where these students are going. And I am here to report today that of the 10 universities most favored by D.C. students, and they could choose any universities that are publicly funded anywhere in the United States, six are Historically Black Colleges and Universities, the six most favored. And they are Howard, Norfolk State, Morgan, Hampton, Bowie State. There are a host of others. Delaware State. There are many in North Carolina. Now I am focusing only on the Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Private universities in the District and the region receive a stipend of $2,500 if the student chooses the private university. We have 150 students at Hampton, a private university, of course, one of the great Historically Black Colleges and Universities in Virginia. Mr. Speaker, the fact that so many District youngsters, who finally have the gates open for them, choose any one they want have chosen HBCUs speaks for itself about the importance of these universities to African Americans. Mr. Speaker, we are a microcosm of where black America is in their choices of higher education. They feel welcome. They feel these schools will help them get a degree, rather than simply attend a university. The dropout rates for whites and blacks who go to college in the United States is enormous. Many of our students come from very disadvantaged backgrounds. They need special attention. They get that attention in the historically black colleges and universities. These universities have proven themselves to the students, to their families and to our country for generations. More students than ever now in the District of Columbia know the value since the way it has been opened to allow them to go to these universities. We are grateful for this opportunity. We are grateful for this body, for the leadership on this side of the aisle and the other side of the aisle that has opened the gates all over America to make up for the fact that we do not have the same access that other colleges and universities have. We are grateful that we now have a funded HBCU here in the District of Columbia, the University of the District of Columbia, and above all we are grateful that the HBCUs are there for D.C. as they have been there for African Americans and for people of all backgrounds throughout their glorious history. Mr. Speaker, I very much thank the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) for yielding to me and I thank him once again for leadership on this issue as he has always shown leadership on this issue and on other issues facing black America.