Dave Obey

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute and 10 seconds to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Wu). (Mr. Wu asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa). (Mr. HINOJOSA asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. There is an executive order which the gentleman from Oklahoma does not like. A Republican President, a Republican White House, is now reviewing that executive order. Let us have the Congress get out of the way and give him time to do it before we jump to conclusions. As the gentleman has indicated, when you are in a doctor's office and you need help, you do not have time for an English lesson.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, the account that the gentleman is asking that we increase has been increased in this bill by 100 percent. The account that the gentleman would cut in order to finance the increase that he is asking for is the account that funds infectious disease control efforts at CDC; it is the account that funds the disease detectives who are right now at this very moment searching for anthrax; it is the account that funds breast and cervical screening; it is the account that funds TB control; it is the account that funds sexually transmitted diseases; and, in addition to that, the gentleman cuts the Child Care Block Grant account. Now, I would point out that with respect to the item that the gentleman seeks to increase, he seeks to increase the funding that we are providing for abstinence programs. I fully support those programs. I voted for them in the past, and I have helped the gentleman get the funding for them. I would point out that the increase that the gentleman has gotten in this bill for those family planning programs is twice as high as the increase that we have provided in this bill for the traditional family planning programs. So the gentleman has already gotten the better part of the deal. Now he is asking us to fund yet another increase. And I have no problem with that increase. I have no problem with it whatsoever. If the gentleman wants to cut back some tax cuts in order to pay for it, or if he wants to find some other reasonable accounts to cut, fine, I am all for it. But I am not for funding a greater than 100 percent increase in this account by reducing the other accounts before us. I find it ironic that the previous amendment is trying to increase the activities that the gentleman is trying to cut with this amendment. This committee is being whipsawed. One minute we are being hit from the northeast, and the next minute we are being hit from the southwest. We are in the center with this bill. We have got a bipartisan compromise, we have got reasonable increases for all of these programs, and I would urge that in the interests of maintaining the balance in this bill, that we oppose the gentleman's amendment. If we can find some other way in conference to increase funding for this in a balanced way, I have no sweats about that. But I am certainly not interested in funding this increase at the expense of the decreases that I have just described.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, what if we will not accept it if the gentleman finishes his speech?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gonzalez).

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

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute and 55 seconds to the gentleman from Guam (Mr. Underwood).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, let me point out that the President will send to this Congress tomorrow a request for $2 billion, not 12 million dollars but $2 billion to combat disease-related potential attacks from any source. I would urge the House not to fall into the trap of using our concern over the incident that happened a month ago to screw up every other program that the government is engaged in. I mean, that is essentially what would happen if this amendment is adopted with respect to our obligation to help finance the mandate that the Federal Government created with respect to digitalization. If the Members want to support a real effort to help CDC prepare this country, they will support that $2 billion request. They will not cut in half what we are trying to do here for digitalization for public television in order to create the appearance that we have done something significant which, in fact, would be a thimbleful in an ocean in terms of its impact.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Wisconsin indicated that he wanted to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and I for what we have done in the bill. I think the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and I would rather have less thanks and more support. I have two things I would like to say, Mr. Chairman. First of all, with respect to the duty that I think individual Members owe the Committee, and vice versa. When the Committee produces a bill, there is a report, a printed report. The bill is printed. The House has several days' notice before the bill comes to the floor. Yet, in contrast, I have seen at least four amendments offered today on which the Committee has essentially been blindsided. Individual Members keep amendments in their pockets until the last possible moment. Then they bring them to the floor with no notice to the Committee, so that we might work with them to fashion an amendment that might be acceptable to both sides. It just seems to me if committees are expected to exhibit certain respect for individual Members, I think individual Members owe that same respect to the Committee. I would urge Members to respond accordingly. Secondly, let me point out that this is one of those amendments that I suspect no matter what we had put in this bill for IDEA, we would have been told, oh, it is not enough. This Committee is one-upped every time we turn around. I want to read to the Members. People have suggested that the Administration is in support of this amendment. That is most definitely not true. I want to read a statement from the Secretary of Education: ``We believe that solutions to these challenges; namely, in IDEA, should be addressed within the context of a thorough review of IDEA and as part of a comprehensive package of reforms.'' In other words, they do not think that we should be providing large amounts of money without reforms to the program. I want to point out what this amendment does. This amendment cuts title I. We hear about how much IDEA is not reaching all the children that it is supposed to reach. I recognize that. It would cost $17 billion to fully fund IDEA. It would cost $27 million to fully fund title I, because title I is only reaching one-third of the children who are eligible for service. Yet, this bill would cut that program to finance a program which is already $375 million above the President. I would point out that on IDEA, since 1996, this Committee has raised the funding for that program from $2.3 billion to $7.7 billion. That is not bad. That is not bad. I would point out that only one-third of eligible kids in title I are now served. Why do we not have an amendment on the floor raising that to $27 billion? It seems to me it would be just as equitable. I want to point out also that there are 8,200 schools in this country who have low-income kids at least 35 percent of their enrollment, low- income kids who do not get a dime in title I money. If we are going to start talking about inadequacies, we ought to raise that program, too. I do not see why we ought to cut vocational education, why we ought to cut title I, why we ought to cut bilingual education when we have 3.6 million kids in this country who need to understand how to read English and speak English. I do not know why we should cut education research when there is still so much debate in this country about how children learn. It would be nice if all of us could get off our biases and get into some facts. The way we do that is with additional education research. So I would say the amendment, in terms of what it wants to increase, is fine. But the source of money for that increase I think is ill- advised, to put it kindly. In my view, the Committee has struck a reasonable balance. There are people in the Senate, there are people in the Senate in my party who want to see IDEA increased far above this level, and who also want to see title I fully funded over the next 4 years so we pay for 100 percent of eligibility. Is anybody here willing to put that $27 billion on the table? This Committee has tried to be responsible. We have held down the gentleman's wish list on that side of the aisle and our wish list on this side of the aisle. I would much prefer that we be able to provide every dollar for IDEA that is suggested in this amendment, but not at the expense of title I, not at the expense of vocational education, not at the expense of educational research, not at the expense of TRIO programs.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. (Mr. OBEY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I would urge Members again to recognize that we have hammered out over a 7-month period a bipartisan bill which does not meet anybody's idea of what is pluperfect, but represents a reasonable compromise between all of us. I urge Members to stick with that judgment.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I appreciate that. That again illustrates what Will Rogers said when he said when two people agree on everything, one of them is unnecessary. The gentleman's opinion may very well be the sound one; ours may very well be the sound one. But in this instance, this bill is the unanimous product of the Committee; and I think we have made the best judgment about where the money ought to go under the circumstances, and I would urge that we not cut this program. This treatment program would be cut below last year's level; and given the problem that we have with this issue, I do not think that we ought to be doing that.

Mr. OBEY. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, my understanding is that the point in the bill at which this amendment would be in order has already been passed and so clearly, under the House rules, the gentleman's amendment is not in order at this time. However, as a courtesy to him and in an effort to save time, I will not insist on the point of order. I would simply move to strike the last word.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans), the ranking minority member on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, let me simply say that I oppose the amendment of the gentleman from Florida for one very simple reason: it is very easy for any individual Member to second guess what this Committee has done and come to the floor and say we should have put $10 million here rather than having put $10 million there. I have seen many a Member come to the floor; and no matter how high we have had an individual account, some have said to me, frankly, no matter what the committee puts in, I will offer an amendment to add $10 million or $20 million because that way they get their day in court. Mr. Chairman, I suggest in this instance we should not do that. The gentleman is trying to take $60 million out of an account that has received a $15 million increase. He is trying to put the money into an account that has received a $60 million increase. This account has already been increased four times as much as the account that the gentleman is trying to take money out of. Secondly, the treatment grants that the gentleman seeks to cut in fact under this amendment are being cut below last year's level. I do not believe that we ought to do that. I would urge Members of the House to respect the many hours of hearings that we have held on these subjects. These are all judgment calls. I respect the gentleman's right to offer the amendment, but I would urge that Members stick with the committee. There will be amendments today that I am very much in favor of personally, but which I will oppose because we have an understanding that we are going to try to resist all amendments from either side of the aisle in order to keep the delicately balanced bipartisan bill, which it is at this point; and I would not want to begin to unravel that. Besides, substantively I believe the gentleman is in error in seeking to make the reduction that he is in this account. I would urge defeat of the amendment.

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

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

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I simply want to thank the gentleman for his interest in this program. I know he has been most interested in seeing that we appropriate as much money as possible for the inspection of nursing homes and I appreciate his leadership on this issue.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 11 minutes. Mr. Chairman, Jim Dyer, Craig Higgins, Carol Murphy, Meg Synder, Susan Firth, Nicole Wheeler, Francine Mack-Salvador, Lori Rowley, David Reich, Cheryl Smith, Linda Pagelson, Lin Liu, David Pomerantz, Scott Lilly, Bob Bonner, Melody Clark, Christina Hamilton, Norm Suchar, Dayle Lewis, Scott Boule, Kristin Holman, Charles Dujon, Matt Braunstein, Chris Kukla and the associate staff on the majority side: What do all of those names have in common? They are the people who really put together this bill. Every Member of the House will have an opportunity to vote on this bill, and I think we can do that proudly, because I think it is a good bill. But the people who worked just as hard and, in fact, probably harder and the people who worked out many of the compromises that were needed to produce a bill which is truly a bipartisan bill were the people whom I just named. I want to express my appreciation to each and every one of them, because without them, we would not be able to deliver what we are delivering to the American people here today. In my view, Mr. Chairman, this bill ought to be named the Family Opportunity and Health Security Act of 2001, because this bill, more than any other bill that we deal with, provides opportunity for average working families to share in the goodness that this society provides. And it also provides for the improvement of the health of every single American and, in fact, probably every single person in the world who is within the reach of any kind of civilized medicine. I think we ought to be very proud of that. This is the second bipartisan bill that we have had on labor, health and education and social services in the last 7 years, and I hope that it is going to be the first of a long series of bipartisan bills in the future. This bill is the place that you go to measure congressional commitment to equal opportunity in education, to worker protection, worker fairness at the bargaining table. It is the place you go to see what our society will do to help those who are unlucky enough to be without health care or who have special problems in the health care area and need special help. It is the place where virtually every family goes to obtain advances in medical care. And it is the place where many people in this society go who live life on the underside to find some help and some relief from the pain and pressure of their daily problems. And I would say it is also the place where we go if we want to have some measure of the determination that is being applied, the human ingenuity that is being applied, in order to unlock the scientific mysteries of disease and its treatment and to protect public health. And each and every Member of this House can be proud to vote for this bill. The bill is $12 billion over last year and I make an apology for absolutely not one dollar. I wish it had been more, because the families in this country who are serviced by this bill need more help than this bill will provide. The bill is $7 billion above the President, and I am pleased about that. In the area of education, for the past 5 years this Congress has produced an education bill which provides about a 13 percent increase on average. The President's budget this year initially recommended that that increase be cut to 5.8 percent. This bill provides a 17 percent increase in funding for education. There is no more important long-term investment that we can make than that one. In the area of education, special education, Mr. Chairman, is the third largest item in this bill. It is funded at $375 million above the President's recommendation. We have $7.7 billion in the bill. In 2 years we will have increased the Federal share of the cost of providing special education by 50 percent, and I hope we can increase it by 50 percent again in the next 2 years. Title I is the main program that we use to try to provide extra educational help to the children who need it most, disadvantaged children who are at risk of dropping out and never making it, either in school or in society. This bill provides $10.5 billion, $1.4 billion over the President's request, $1.7 billion over last year. This is the largest increase in that program in the history of the program. Pell Grants. That is the main program by which we assist average working-class families in this country to send their kids to college. It is a real door-opener to higher education opportunity. We provide in this bill a $4,000 maximum grant for those who qualify, $150 over the President's request, $250 over last year. Every dollar is well spent and will be well received by the American people. The block grant for teacher training and class size reduction, $1 billion over last year and $575 million over the budget recommendation. After-school centers, $154 million above the request. That program is in demand more than almost any I know in this bill, because as families' life-styles have changed, so have their needs to see to it that their children at all times will be in healthy, wholesome places. There is no more treacherous time for children from the age of 12 to 15 than the after-school hours. That is when most of the juvenile crime is committed in this country and that is when we need the most supervision of kids, and this program, I hope, will be an ever-expanding program to help provide that supervision. In the area of health care, we are $1.3 billion above the President, $3.4 billion above last year. Community health centers, we are $26 million above the President. That has also been a high priority item for the President himself. For Healthy Start, we are $102 million in this bill, $12 million again above the budget request. Centers for Disease Control, crucial in these times when we are concerned about public health, when we see the anthrax concerns in Florida, we are $265 million above last year, $430 million above the President's request. For bioterrorism, we have a 28 percent increase above last year and the President's budget and in a follow-on appropriation bill we will have substantially more money than we have in this bill for that same item. Mental health, $68 million above the President. There ought to be more. We have serious problems that are not being met in that area. Human services. The Low-Income Heating Assistance Program that helps keep low-income senior citizens warm in the wintertime so they do not have to choose between heating and eating, $300 million above the President's request. I wish it could be more. Head Start, $276 million above last year. In the area of the Labor Department, all of the personnel cuts in OSHA and Mine Safety have been eliminated. And we have added what I consider to be all too modest increases in other worker protection accounts. The international labor program that helps defend our workers and our country from the production of goods and services by slave labor and child labor abroad, we have restored fully the cuts that were recommended in the White House budget. Title VI, foreign language studies. As I said in Committee, when the Russians invaded Afghanistan a number of years ago, we did not have enough language specialists to respond in the correct language. So our information services responded in Farsi. That did not help anybody in Afghanistan. They may have understood it in Iran, but they did not understand it in Afghanistan. We missed the target a little bit. Since then, what has happened in that area? Almost nothing. That is why we have a 19 percent increase in this bill. As you know, we also had an increase in another bill for the same item that passed this House last week. All in all, this bill is far from perfect. I think given the needs of our society, we need more in education, in health care and in worker protection, but this is a very good bill given the circumstances in which we found ourselves in January. I very much appreciate the efforts made by the majority to make this a bipartisan bill. I very much appreciate the professionalism with which this bill has been approached by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula), the distinguished subcommittee chairman, and also the distinguished gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young). He and I have many, many political differences. We do not have very many personal differences. We have disagreed many times but we have dealt with each other, I think, in a straight-shooting way. And I appreciate the fact that after some concern on this bill, we have brought a bill to this floor today under the rules of the House which treats everyone fairly and respectfully. And I think because of that, we are going to see a very large vote for this bill on both sides of the aisle. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 6 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, under my reservation, I would simply say I agree with the gentleman on the need to pass this. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.