Bart Stupak

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Happy St. Valentine's Day, America, and happy St. Valentine's Day to my wife, Laurie, in Michigan. On this St. Valentine's Day we debated a crime bill, but justice was not done on the crime bill we debated today. In fact, what happened today is We had 10 hours, 10 hours over 2 days to debate a $30 billion crime bill. The majority called that debate an open rule. An open rule in this body means Members come to the well of this institution, offer an amendment. It is freely debated and it is voted on, not at the end of 10 hours we cap it off and say that is it, we are going home, we are going home on the crime bill. Crime is the No. 1 issue across this Nation. People feel insecure in their homes. They are insecure when they walk the streets. They want Congress to provide some leadership. So what leadership did we provide them tonight? Ten hours worth of debate; 10 hours worth of debate. In that 10 hours, you had to get your amendment accepted. I was one of the fortunate ones. I had an amendment that was accepted by both sides of the aisle, because it made a lot of sense. But I also had amendments for the Byrne grants. I was given 1 minute and 15 seconds to debate a Byrne grants amendment. Byrne grants, a program that has been around for a long time, we wanted to fight crime for more than 1 year. We wanted to provide steady funding for Byrne grants over 5 years. That funds our DARE programs, multijurisdictional undercover drug teams, and even Alabama used Byrne grants to run the prisons. One minute and 15 seconds. I had another one, another amendment, for rural communities to share in some of this $30 billion. We wanted 30 percent, and other Members had good amendments that were never offered. They were denied the opportunity to offer their amendments. They were denied the opportunity to debate, because we had 10 hours of debate. Members come from all walks of life, like myself, having been a police officer for 12 years. I have some ideas on how I think crime should be fought in this country. You know, when I was a police officer, I went to work knowing that I had to put in my 8-hour shift, but many times that shift would go 10 hours, 12 hours, 16 hours. I could not stop at the end of 10 hours when I was fighting crime or doing a investigation. At times there were major incidents that occurred in my State of Michigan; I was mobilized. I was gone for days from my home. I could not say it is 10 hours, I want to go home. Crime knows no time limit. Crime does not stop for Valentine's Day. You do not fight crime for 10 hours and then you go home because of St. Valentine's Day. Crime occurs on Valentine's Day. Remember back in the thirties, the St. Valentine's Day massacre? Well, the old saying is history repeats itself. That is what we had here again today, Saint Valentine's Day massacre. Let me ask the majority party who pushed through this rule on a party-line vote, when you have a missing child, are you going to stop missing that child after 10 hours? When you have a bank robbery or breaking and entering, do you stop that investigation at the end of 10 hours? If you have a kidnaping, do you stop at the end of 10 hours? If you are getting close to the end of your shift, do you stop because you cannot go past 10 hours? You cannot apprehend a criminal because you are at that time limit? Well, that is what happened here today. We should have stayed on the job, debated each and every amendment, and there were some of my friends on the Republican side of the aisle that never had an opportunity to offer their amendments or have them debated. We stopped at 10 hours because the majority said, ``We have a Contract on America. We have to get it done.'' You heard tonight they are going to start the national security debate. And guess what, we have 10 hours to debate national security. That is the kind of Contract on America they have, and they want for this country. I want to move forward, and I want to debate these issues in an open and free rule where there are not time caps. So remember, when crime strikes your family, when crime strikes in your community, you can thank the other party, because instead of doing something about crime tonight, we ended up going out to dinner because it is Valentine's Day. We have more important things to do. We have plenty of amendments. Let us not run out on America. Let us not run with a contract that cannot be debated, a contract that cannot be amended, and the only value that we place on crime and national security is 10 hours. Ladies and gentlemen, unfortunately the Contract on America has turned into another St. Valentine's Day massacre.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, in this motion to recommit, we are asking that $450 million each year for the life of this crime bill be made available for the Byrne grants. The Byrne grants, for those of you who were not here last year, is very popular. It is 22 programs that States use to do crime prevention, crime enforcement, projects throughout their States. In the bill we currently have, the current crime bill, there is $580 million; fiscal year next year, fiscal year 1996, that goes to $130 million, a 300 percent decrease in 1 year. Every major law enforcement group tells you you cannot fight crime in 1 year. It takes more than 1 year. We will unstabilize funding over 5 years. You wanted flexibility so the locals can do what they want. It is right here, $450 million grant in the Byrne grants that gives you the flexibility you sought for the last few days. Last year when there was some question whether or not Byrne grants would continue, we put together a letter in a bipartisan spirit, 153 Members signed that letter, 47 on that side of the aisle, including the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum], who said, ``Keep the Byrne grants, keep them authorized at $450 million.'' That is what we are asking to do in this motion to recommit.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, today we will begin debating H.R. 728, the law enforcement block grant proposal. With violent crime still the No. 1 concern of most Americans, the voters should know why this proposal will do nothing to decrease instances of violent crime. In fact, having been a police officer for 12 years, as a police officer, we get angry when we hear these proposals about new crime bills, angry because crime is an emotional issue. But unfortunately it is always being used for political purposes. Crime is not political. Crime is not Democrat nor Republican. It is not independent. It is personal. Crime violates the self-respect of every individual touched by crime, and elected officials who play politics with crime, or try to seize upon the fear of crime for political gain do a disservice to this country, to their constituency, and to the civility of our own country. For the past 7 years, there had not been a crime bill. In August 1994 we passed a crime bill. In the past, crime bills were always defeated because this group or that group or a President would veto a crime bill. While they were busy playing politics with crime, crime has tripled. Violent crime has gone up 300 percent. It has tripled in the last 10 years. Yet the number of police officers on the street helping to combat violent crime has only gone up just a mere 10 percent. So why are we here today on H.R. 728 after 4 months of passing a crime bill? Pure and simple, we are here because of politics. We are here because one group is trying to capitalize and repeal the work we did in 1994 merely for political purposes. H.R. 728 will repeal the promise, the provisions to put 100,000 more police officers on the street. They want to take that money for 100,000 more police officers on the street and replace it with a massive block grant program that allows money to be spent with no restrictions, a massive block grant program like we did in the late sixties and early seventies called the Law Enforcement Administrative Agency. The LEAA, Mr. Speaker, was a failure and a very costly one for this country. For instance, the block grants that were granted in 1968 and 1970 went like this. In Louisiana, a sheriff purchased a tank saying it would be necessary for crowd control. In Indiana, $84,000 in LEAA funds were block-granted so they could purchase an aircraft that could be used to fly the Governor around the State. Well, in fact, it did come to Washington once to pick up some Moon rocks and went back to Indiana, really a swell crime-fighting program there. In Alabama, the LEAA funded a police cadet program. Over $117,000 was put out for costs of this program that went to the payment to the sons, the friends, and relatives of other high State ranking officials. One State used the money to make a manual, and you know what, the manual turned out to be nothing more than a copy of an existing Federal publication. Another city used the LEAA block grant funds to buy a police car, a Chevrolet Impala. It had no police markings, it had no sirens, it had no flashers. It was used as a private vehicle for the mayor. The city of New Orleans spent $200,000 in block grants to buy land. Other law enforcement officials did LEAA block grant funds for financial investments. In fact, 33 cents on every dollar spent in LEAA funds went for outside consultants, for administrative costs. So we are here today with H.R. 728 to redo the pork of Christmases past, to bring back these block grants. The Republicans are going to dismantle the police on the street, the cops on the street program, to go back to block grants. Since the 1994 crime bill was passed on October 1, it became effective, we have placed 17,000, authorized 17,000 new police officers to be placed in our communities to do community policing. In a letter dated February 6, the President of the Fraternal Order of Police stated, ``We strongly support your resolve to fight any repeal of the funding earmarked for the hiring of 100,000 police officers.'' February 7, a letter of Police Officers writes, ``Representing over 3,500 police unions and associations and 175,000 sworn law enforcement officers, we ask it not be devastated.'' Mr. Speaker, as we begin this debate, I ask that Members look seriously upon the fallacies of H.R. 728. Let us not play politics with crime, and let us put forth and keep the 100,000 police on the street program.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. The reason why we are here tonight is because probably on Monday we will have a very critical vote, and it is a vote not just which side is going to win or prevail but whether America wins in keeping police officers on the street, where we need them, to keep community policing viable and working throughout this great Nation. It is not who wins the most votes at the end of that vote on Monday, whether Democrats carry the day or Republicans carry the day; we want this country to carry the day by being safe in our homes, having more police officers available to them, and a crime bill that the taxpayers, really, are paying for, and then not going back to what happened in 1968. The whole issue here and the reason why we have been here throughout this week is not to allow the current crime bill that is proceeding on this floor, to be debated again tomorrow and again on Monday, to take the money we have available for community policing with 17,000 police officers authorized and we have 83,000 more, and we found a way to pay for it by cutting Federal employees. So it is paid for in the crime trust fund, not to devastate that program, not to replace it with a program that has block grant after block grant with no guidelines and all the waste we saw in 1968 and in the 1970's. Let us keep the program alive. We need the American people to help us get the message to their Representatives, whoever he or she may be, whether Democrat or Republican. I hope they call them tonight, tomorrow, and over the weekend and tell them to keep the cops program where it does the most good, on the streets, in our communities, whether you are a town of 17,000 or you are the size of Detroit or Houston or Lowell, whatever it is, that you have police officers. We have responded, the need is there. As the cops fast program proceeded, half of the towns in this great Nation under 150,000 applied for police officers and were helped out. Mr. Speaker, in summary, we are here because we need the help of the American people to keep cops on the street and not allow it to be devastated by the proposal that our friends on the other side of the aisle will bring to this body either tomorrow or Monday morning--Monday is when I believe the vote will take place. I believe the vote will take place on Monday.

Mr. STUPAK. Not just city halls all the way across the United States, but the other day at the press conference when we announced the Cops Fast Program, you know, we were joined by representatives of the FOP, the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Association of Police Organizations, there was a member there from the International Association of Chiefs of Police, and they said this program works. Do not go back to what we did in 1968 and the early 1970's with the law enforcement assistance agency, or administration. Let us not go back. Let us not go back. As Chief Vibrette said the other day when she was making an announcement, she said for too long from Washington, the Federal Government, in helping us fight crime was always one way, here is the way you do it, here is the way you do it, here is the way we do it; we always were told, we were always lectured, always preached. Underneath the crime bill that currently exists, it is a two-way street. It is a partnership. You are giving us what we need, police officers to help fight crimes in our community. We have formed partnership for once, just like community policing is a partnership with the community in which it serves, and let us not go back to those days. You have provided us with the financial incentive on a one-page form. You do not even have to put down the criteria of your community policing, but just have a police officer there. The purest form of prevention of crime is a police officer open and visible in that community.

Mr. STUPAK. That is right; eight questions, one sheet. You did not have to hire a consultant or an expert in grants to write a grant. All you had to do was to fill out the form, and they want to repeal it. Back in the 1970's with the LEAA Program, 33 cents of every dollar went for administrative costs, for the experts and the people to write the grants, and we do it on one page, and it is effective and it is efficient, it is fast and it does the job. It puts the money to do away with it. Why?

Mr. STUPAK. And what do they want to do?

Mr. STUPAK. I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

Mr. STUPAK. If the gentleman will yield on that point, in the Cops Fast Program which was announced yesterday, where you mentioned you had six police officers and they said there was no need for extra police in this country, the statistics that stuck with us yesterday when we reviewed and announced these grants was Cops Fast, which for communities under 150,000, they could apply for one or two police officers or whatever their needs were on a one-page form, eight questions. They filled it out. It had to be in by January 1. They would make announcements in February. The forms were sent out in November. Half, one-half of all cities under 150,000 people in this country applied to receive a police officer. One-half of all towns, cities, villages, townships under 150,000 applied for these police officers. As of yesterday the announcement was made that the President and the Attorney General authorize 7,000 more police officers to go and spread out across this great Nation to help fight crime. In my district, which is a very rural district in northern Michigan, and my largest city is 17,000, which I spoke of earlier, Marquette, they received a police officer. But in my communities throughout my massive district of 23,000 people we had 49 agencies apply and awarded police officers. So in the northern Michigan area we have 49 more police officers, thanks to this program. And whether it is a big city, and Detroit earlier with the Cops More got 96 police officers to do community policing. So it works and the need is there. Fifty percent of all of the cities under 150,000 in this great Nation applied from Alaska, Florida, Michigan, Connecticut.

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, it is certainly very helpful, because it humanizes police officers. It is not just whether it is a police athletic league or teaching about DARE, DARE to keep the kids off drugs, a program that was developed in L.A., and it is taught nationwide, or whether it is seeing the police officer in the school. When you put a human being--and it ges back to the community policing concept of building trust, confidence, and respect for law enforcement. What are we doing here, as we were talking earlier tonight? In the bills that are pending before this floor right now, the Republican crime bill of taking back the streets, there is not one program earmarked to humanize the police, to even provide us one police. instead, they want this massive block grant program. What happened when we had it back in 1968? Did they form PAL? Did they put police officers in the schools? Here is an example of some of the things they did. The local people said, ``We know what is best. Let us do it. We can do it better. We know what works in Houston, Marquette, Michigan, or Lowell MA.'' Here is what they did. In 1968 a sheriff in Louisiana purchased a tank--a tank to combat crime. In another State, they used $84,000 to buy an airplane--an airplane. The only value they got out of the airplane, other than to buzz the Governor around the State, was it had a very secret mission. That airplane came to Washington, DC, picked up some Moon rocks, and went back to the State from whence it had come. That was the only law enforcement function of that airplane you could consider, because that must have been top security, picking up some Moon rocks, but $84,000 went there. Or how about one of the Southern States, which started a cadet program, a law enforcement cadet program to help out young people, as the gentlewoman suggests? Do you know what the cadet program was? Some $117,000 was spent for that sheriff's family members and friends of his to have a job at the expense of taxpayers. Or another city, they used $200,000 in LEAA grants to buy property-- to buy property. Another city used money to buy an unmarked car, so the mayor could drive around. This is the same type of program that they are telling us: ``Take about $10 billion, we will give it to the local communities. They know what is best in fighting crime.'' Not one police officer. Thirty-three percent, we have seen, back from the 1968 and seventies program, went to administrative costs, and what for? We did this before, for all of us who were here, but it happened before in 1968 and what was it used for? Tanks, airplanes, limousines, land. It goes on and on and on.

Mr STUPAK

Mr STUPAK. For those who are watching us either in their office or at home, the reason why we are here, this program, community policing, was just started October 1, just over 4 months ago. And on February 7, the Republicans, our friends on the other side of the aisle, brought forth six pieces of crime legislation on February 7. We have been debating it for the last few days. We talk about 100,000 police officers we made a commitment to put on America's streets in the next 5 years. The program is 4 months old. There is overwhelming support throughout this Nation for it from the police officers. The gentlewoman from Texas mentioned the Cops on the Beat Program, the Cops More Program, the Cops Fast Program, three of the programs that have just started will have 17,000 police officers on the street in the last 4 months. But why are we here talking about it? Because even though the slogan is, our friends on the other side of the aisle say the slogan is taking back the streets, what they are doing is giving back the streets to the criminals, to the violent perpetrators because they want to scrap this program, this 100,000 cops on the street. I still have not heard a good reason why it should be scrapped, but they want to scrap it for nothing more than political reasons. The would replace these 100,000 cops on the street and replace them with a massive block grant program. When you look at that massive block grant program, billions of dollars are going to be put into a block grant program. They way that is to help fight crime at is best for them. There is not one police officer earmarked in their plan. There is not any program earmarked in their plan to put police officers on the street. And we have been seen in late 1968, with the Law Enforcement and Administration Agency, LEAA, how the money was squandered, was squandered or as someone said the other day, it reminds you of the pork of Christmas past, what they did with all that money. For every dollar that was spent in the late 1960's and early 1070's, 33 cents on every dollar went for administrative costs, overhead, bureaucrats. We did not see more police officers on the street. What we are here trying to inform the American people is this unrestrained giving of money back without any conditions will repeat the problems we had in the late 1960's and the early 1970's, the abuses that went into the LEAA Program.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. I would be pleased to. Back before I came to Congress, I was in the State legislature back in 1989 and 1990. We wrote the community policing law for Michigan. Community policing is really a concept where the police officer works and lives in the community in which he is policing. It is usually a small geographic area where the police officer basically befriends the people in which he is serving. Many people refer to community policing probably in the larger cities as walking the beat. While you are walking that beat, you are learning to communicate with the people you are serving. You have built a friendship. You have built a trust. You actually have trying to serve. Once that partnership is cemented, then the faith, the trust and the confidence in law enforcement comes back. So when there is a crime, when you go to one of the five murders that you went to in Lowell, MA, when you go there, you go there a complete stranger and you try to do an investigation. But if you are a community police officer and a murder or a crime happens in that community, you go there, you have contact. You have seen these people. You are not strangers trying to resolve a heinous crime that may have concern, but rather, you are a community that has come together to focus on this crime, with the faith, confidence, and trust in your police. They are more open. They will assist him in solving this crime. And once you have built that trust, that relationship, community policing can and will work. You work together as a community. It is a partnership that is formed between the geographic area. In Michigan, one of the ways we defined the areas in which a community police officer would work would be the density of population in a given area, the crime rate and the juvenile population, since juveniles seem to be the focus of most, a lot of the crime that happens nowadays. So when you take those three factors, you put a police officer in there. That police officer lives there. He works there. So when that police officer investigates this crime, whatever it might be, whether it is murder in Lowell, MA, or breaking and entering in northern Michigan, the police officer that took the original complaint, started the investigation, is the same police officer that stays through the whole investigation. It is the same police officer that brings the request to the district attorney or the prosecutor for the warrant. It is the same police officer that goes to court with the witnesses or the victim's family, whatever it might be. Throughout this whole investigation, there is a trust that is being built. There is confidence in the department. Because the way it is right now, without community policing, one police officer takes the initial report. He turns it over to the investigator who goes and sees the family or victim, wherever he does his investigation. Someone else goes to the prosecutor to get the warrant. And when you go to the day of trial, the person who took the initial complaint, you do not remember anymore. You might know the investigator. You never met the prosecutor. There is not that teamwork, that partnership, that relationship, that trust that is needed. When it is put together, it works, whether it is a rural area or in an urban area. I know the gentlewoman from Houston, TX [Ms. Jackson-Lee] wants to jump in here because they have a tremendous community policing program.

Mr. STUPAK. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. STUPAK. I thank the gentleman. I thank the gentleman for once again taking the lead in putting together another special order on crime. But you were commenting a little bit there on statistics in Lowell, MA and what you found with community policing. But through all this rhetoric, I think one part that has been lost is that if you take the last decade, take the last 10 years, crime has tripled. It has gone up, violent crime, part I crime, has tripled in this country. It has gone up 300 percent. In that same 10-year period, do you realize how many police officers were added to help combat crime, which went up 300 percent in 10 years? A mere 10-percent increase in police officers throughout this country. So the point that you are making about violent crime and how police officers under a community policing program can have impact, our resources are scarce, crime is soaring out of sight. Like I said, it tripled in the last decade. Yet here we have a program that works, that works, as is shown in your area, and I am from northern Michigan, in Marquette, a city in my State of 17,000 people. But yet we put a community police officer in 1990, and in the last 2 years the crime has dropped 23 percent. The first 2 years it has been in existence it dropped 23 percent. We were just awarded another police officer because the community policing grant ran out in Marquette, but under the COPS Fast Program which was announced yesterday, they have now received money to fund this program for another 3 years to keep the solid work that is being done in community policing in a small rural community like Marquette. It works.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, today, Congressman Jim Lightfoot and I are introducing the Law Enforcement Officers' Bill of Rights. It will surprise some to find that the same law enforcement officials who lay their lives on the line every day in protecting the rights of American citizens are denied many of these same rights in their workplace. Further, the absence of a standard for investigating police officers for non-criminal activities has, in some cases, subjected law enforcement officials to threats and coercion by superiors or internal affairs divisions, and to arbitrary and unfair remedies to any charges. Mr. Lightfoot's and my bill is very simple: it would set the time and location for interviews regarding violations; it would require the appointment of counsel to represent the officer under investigation; it would mandate that only one interrogator be allowed to question the suspect during any single session--to avoid the questioning method known as Good Cop/Bad Cop; it would mandate that no questions be asked about an officer's family or financial status; it would put forth a system for reviews; and it would require that the officer being investigated be made aware of the charges he or she is facing, among other fundamental due process rights. Again, this legislation would only apply to officers being investigation for noncriminal offenses. As noncriminal disciplinary procedures vary widely from State to State, I believe that this important piece of legislation will go a long way to ending these ad hoc approaches to such proceedings and the often arbitrary and misplaced remedies that officers face. Under this legislation, States will have a guide path for such investigations and the rights of an officer, guilty or innocent, will be insured. Mr. Speaker, this bill could not have been introduced today without the hard work of the Fraternal Order of Police and the National Association of Police Organizations, our country's two largest organizations representing law enforcement officials. Their hard work in this effort reiterates the need and widespread support for such an initiative. Furthermore, President Clinton, as Governor of the State of Arkansas, signed similar legislation into law to apply to officers in Arkansas; and Attorney General Janet Reno testified in the Senate in 1993 that such a bill is working effectively in her home State of Florida and that she has seen no disadvantages to it at all. In a bipartisan effort, Senators McConnell, from Kentucky, and Biden, from Delaware, have introduced this proposal in the Senate. Congressman Lightfoot and I are continuing this bipartisan support in the House of Representatives. This is not a partisan issue. This is a constitutional issue. Law enforcement officials facing disciplinary actions deserve the same fundamental protections granted to every American and I believe that the Law Enforcement Officers' Bill of Rights of 1995 will go a long way to ensuring that these rights are protected.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Weller-Hastert amendment, as amended by the Doggett-Cramer-Stupak amendment. Mr. Chairman, it is refreshing to see that ideas from both parties can be melded together here on the House floor to make a stronger amendment to achieve the purposes of what we all want to achieve, and that is to provide prisons for youthful offenders. When I was a police officer, all too often most of the people I would arrest for crime, whether it be breaking and entering to murder, was usually young people. What would we do in today's society is take these young people and put them in prisons with many members of our society who are there for heinous crimes, and they are 20 and 30 years their senior, and they are treated the same in a judicial system which is insensitive to the needs of young people. Juveniles go into these prisons, young people; a few years later I would see them out on the street. They may be a little bit older chronologically, but they were much, much wiser in the ways of the crime. If we are ever going to help young people overcome their responsibilities to society, if we are going to help them be rehabilitated, we should try to isolate them in youthful offender prisons and not imprison them with hardened criminals. So I am pleased to stand today to say that both sides of the aisle have been able to work together. I thank the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Weller] and the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hastert] and the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde] for their cooperation and guidance in putting together these two amendments, and my congratulations to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Doggett] in his first amendment on this House floor, and hope there will be many more, and the same to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Weller].

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, as I sat on the floor here for the last half hour, I have listened to the gentleman from Florida say that we are going to get the Truth in Sentencing Act, and I hear the gentleman from my neighbor State of Wisconsin say we have to put a human face on this bill in what we are trying to do here today. Let us put it in people terms, as they have said: ``If you take a look at the example that the gentleman from Wisconsin brought up, that the individual from Oklahoma got 30,000 years, let's put that in human terms. Who is going to live 30,000 years, serve 85 percent of that time, as the bill requires, as the GOP bill requires? Eighty-five percent of 30,000 years is 25,000 years. It's not realistic. It's not going to happen. The bill, as written right now, says, `When you get 85 percent of the actual prison time, 85 percent of the actual prison time, you qualify for money underneath this bill.''' The Schumer amendment, in which I am proud to support, says on page 8--go to page 8. The bill is right there. Each State shall receive 25 percent, 0.25 percent, for the most violent criminals, and we define what the most violent criminals are. Go to page 10. The most violent criminals are murderers, nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, aggravated assault. Those are the people we have to get off the street. So the Schumer amendment allows every State to receive money not just to build prisons, but to operate and maintain prisons. My State of Michigan, this past year we had four prisons that were built, correction officers, no one to prepare the food, no one to provide the services in those prisons. They sat empty, and the latest Department of Justice report shows Michigan, Georgia, Connecticut, with the most heinous criminals. We need space; there is nothing there. We have places to hold them, but we cannot operate them. So the Schumer amendment not only allows us to build them, the Schumer amendment allows them to operate, it allows them to maintain their prison population. There are no prevention programs in here. This is not a social welfare. This is exactly what they say they want to do. They want to get tough on criminals, they want to lock them up, and we have to have the means to provide for correction officers and for the maintenance of those prisons. That is what the Schumer amendment does. Mr. Chairman, I say to my colleagues, ``When you take a look at it, the State of Georgia alone on the Department of Justice facilities, they have over 3,200 criminals that they cannot lock up, over 3,200. This bill would help alleviate that by building the prisons and by also allowing the operation and maintenance.'' This is no social welfare program. We take the money, make it available right now. Underneath the Republican plan, only when your prison population actually serves 85 percent will you then get the money. Is that going to be 3 years from now, 8 years from now? We do not know. The Schumer amendment makes the money available right now to build prisons for the operation and maintenance of the prisons. I urge my colleagues to support the Schumer amendment.

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. As we begin this debate here on the prison and how we are going to fund it, I wish we would take into account a number of things that are going on. Having been a police officer for many years, it frustrated me to no end to find that after you do a thorough investigation, you get a conviction, you send them to prison, and there is no prison space and there are early release programs, we need more prisons. This is true. But every State, every geographic location in this country should be allowed to participate in such a program. It does us who are police officers no good to do our work, get them ready to go to prison, and there is nothing there. The Republican alternative that we are dealing with here today simply says 3 States will get half of the money; the other 47 States, they will receive their money when their prison population serves 85 percent of its time, when the actual prison population serves it. Michigan just passed a truth-in-sentencing law in the last few years. It is going to take probably 8 to 10 years for our current prison population to reach that 85 percent level. What do we do for 8 to 10 years? What do we do that it is going to take 2 or 3 years to build those prisons? What we are doing, in the Taking Back the Streets Program, is giving the streets back to the criminals. The money is not allocated appropriately. In the crime bill last year, every State received money. In the proposal before us today, three States will receive money. The other 47 States will have to wait their turn after their prison population actually serves their time to meet the magic numbers. Mr. Chairman, this is nothing new. The Committee on the Judiciary pointed that out, but because Members are so focused on moving this bill forward, they are not giving us the flexibility that States and local governments need.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I come down here today. I had no intention of coming down here until I started listening to the debate, and the more I listened to it, the more concerned I have become and the more convinced I am that we need the amendment proposed by the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers]. in the amendments in our Bill of Rights that are more sacred than protecting people and their homes from unreasonable search and seizures. As I was in my office discussing matters with some constituents, the gentleman from North Carolina, who had a very long and distinguished career in law enforcement, came up and spoke in favor of H.R. 666, but what the gentleman said are words to this effect, that the fourth amendment applies only to law-abiding citizens, as he was 2 months ago. I say to my colleague, ``The fourth amendment applies to everyone in this country, whether you're a law-abiding citizen, whether you are driving down the road and being stopped by the police, or whether you are walking home at night and being stopped by the police. We are all citizens, and we all have the protection of the fourth amendment against unreasonable search and seizures.'' Having been a police officer for 12 years, 12 years of having worked the road while I was a police officer, I also went back and got my law degree and was assigned to special investigations. I also taught constitutional law, search and seizure and criminal law at the Michigan State police academies, and I continued to work the road and to do special investigations. No matter who you are, the fourth amendment applies to you. We do not know when the resources of the State or local or Federal Government will turn their resources on you, and you then become a suspect. You do not suddenly lose your fourth amendment rights. You cannot lose these rights. The gentleman from Florida mentioned the Arizona versus Evans case, and he said in his comment ``We all know he was guilty.'' That is the reason why we need the fourth amendment, because we do not know people are guilty until they are tried by a jury of their peers. It is not a subjective standard. It is reasonable search and seizure. The Leon standard as articulated by the Supreme Court in 1984, that was a Reagan Supreme Court that decided Leon. Last night we were handling President Reagan as a hero of the line item veto. Today we are saying his Court did not know what they were doing? It cannot be both ways. It cannot be both ways.

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, the requirement I always felt was proper, having spent 12 years there. If I may expand, warrants are not needed in exigent circumstances like hot pursuit. Consent searches, you do not need a warrant. Stop and frisk, you do not need a warrant. Before you place someone in your squad car to transport them, you do not need a warrant. Inventory searches upon arrest, you do not need a warrant. Automobile searches, you do not need a warrant. Independent sources, and I can go on and on.

Mr. STUPAK

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, the other point that should be made in community policing, nowhere in the bill that was passed last fall do they tell you how to do community policing. What may work in Marquette, MI, in our 116-unit public housing unit, may not work in Lowell, MA. But what we have said is, this concept of community policing is flexible. It transcends party lines, it transcends neighborhoods, and what it must do is, you must tell us what works in your community, put forth your proposal, and we promise you that we have 100,000 new police officers that we would be willing to put forth and assist you in that concept. So the creativity that we need to fight crime is there. The only thing we ask is to develop a program where the community can work with the police and build on friendship, trust, and confidence in each other to fight crime. As we said earlier, I know you have alluded to it and I stated earlier, in order to fight crime it is everyone's responsibility, everyone in this Chamber, everyone who is listening to us tonight. It is our responsibility to help the police officers. When I went to a crime scene as a State trooper, whether it was an automobile accident, a breaking-and-entering, or a murder case, whatever it might have been, I knew nothing when I got there until I stepped out of my car. I could rely on my sight, my five senses, but I had to rely on the community, witnesses, possible witnesses, to fill in the blanks for me or to create that puzzle, and when the puzzle is complete, hopefully then we could apprehend a perpetrator. So we always had community policing in a sort of effort. The difference about this program is that being the police officer working a small community, hopefully I will know them on a communications in a more friendlier, relaxed atmosphere, as opposed to a conversation during the height of a crime or a criminal investigation. Because when I pull up in my squad car they would not know who I was, and I did not know who they were, so two strangers or three or four strangers were supposed to solve a crime. But if we have three or four friends trying to solve a crime, the results are much greater. Mr. Speaker, that is why community policing is such a valuable tool. It has been around for a few years. What has always kept policing down is the cost. It is expensive to assign a police officer to a couple of townships, and he takes his car home with him every night. It is not parked at the station. He has certain needs which require a little bit more than probably a police officer who switches cars at every shift, and trades off with equipment, because each individual is a police officer and almost a police station in and of himself. His office is his home or his office is his car or her car. It requires a degree of help. What this program offers them is, we will make a 3-year commitment if they will commit to a community policing program that will work in their communities.

Mr. STUPAK. In the first round of the Clinton cops program, we did receive four sheriffs in one of my larger growing areas, two in Grand Traverse County, one in the city of Escanaba, and another in the California Kalkaska sheriff's department. All these individuals related to me once we submitted our application, there was some phone calls and verifications, and that was it. They sent in a voucher periodically, certifying the individual is working for that department. They sent in an invoice based upon their cost to the local department. The Federal Government then pays 75 percent. It was one of these programs that was so simple, they were so surprised at the reduction in paperwork, that the Federal Government not only did it right but did it extremely efficiently, quickly, and responded to their needs.

Mr. STUPAK. It is not just what works; there has to be a commitment, a commitment so the resources will be there. Back in 1978, 1979, when I was in the Michigan State Police, one of the first community policing pilot programs in the Nation was in northern Michigan. If I can go back up to Marquette County, it is a very large county. There it is very sparsely populated at some point and other points it has, like I said, my largest city of 17,000. But there are these three townships. We call them the tri-townships, which was sort of struck away from the center of population, sort of extreme end of the county. They had a rampant crime rate going on, based upon the number of people there. The factors we looked at, back in 1978 and 1979, is population density, the number of crimes committed, and the number of juveniles who live in that area. Then when we went in there, we identified these three townships. We asked the township boards, one of the most local forms of government, if they would be willing to share in a community policing program and would they put up a police officer and some resources and the Federal Government would provide them with a State trooper to go in and to coordinate it and work out of homes and live in the communities. Well, in less than 2 years, they reduced the crime rate by 70 percent. They were solving burglaries and safe jobs 5, 6, 7 years old already. But once the community realized that it was their police officer and it was them that were involved in this fight against crime, they knew that when they called that police officer and if their house was broken into, the police officer who responded would be the same police officer that followed up the investigation, who would be the same police officer that went to the prosecutor's office. It would be the same police officer would be there in court with them, that trust relationship developed and we were able to solve crime in this very sparsely populated, tri-township area of Marquette County. That was back in 1978-79. When they left, when the trooper left in 2 years, tri-township still has a police department. They are still involved in community policing. And they still have been able to keep the crime rate at a very low rate, even up in northern Michigan. So community policing does work. You mentioned Lowell and your Team Lowell. In Detroit, with the 96 police officers they received underneath the Clinton Cops Program, they called their team or the program CLEAN, which is the initials for Community Law Enforcement And Neighborhood Teams. So CLEAN in Detroit really symbolizes what we want. We want the community working with law enforcement who are in neighborhoods working together to help solve the crime problems. If it can work in Detroit, MI, or tri-township in northern Michigan, it can work anywhere in this country. And it is one program that, yes, we need police and, yes, we need the public working with us, but we need some leadership and some financial resources from the Federal Government. And that should be our role. Not to tell them what squad car to buy or to buy this radio, but you set up your community policing program. We will give you the incentives. We will provide you, and it is up front, it says right on our application, 75 percent the first year, 50/50 the second year. The 75/25 match with Federal paying 25 the third year and the fourth year hopefully you are financially able to then provide the program itself.And as you pointed out, correctly pointed out, here we are 3 months later, just over 3 months, arguing for the life of a program which everyone has said works. How do Members go back to their local communities and say, that cop that was walking the beat, that was providing you that extra bit of security, that person you trusted, the person you had confidence in is going to program. Because remember, we are talking about the same pot of money here. When the crime bill was passed last year, I did not support all the aspects of the crime bill. In fact, I, even in the House, I voted for it. And in the final conference committee, because of what happened to the Byrne grants and some other crime labs, I was not pleased with it. I did not support it. But the point is, there was $30 billion that was what we always centered around, $30 billion over 5 years which is going to be paid for by reducing the number of Federal employees that would go into the crime trust fund so the money would be there. And the Republican proposal right now is $30 billion. But instead of having police officers on the street, what they want to do, they want to go to these block grants and they want to shift it to prisons. We will never fight crime if we merely throw everyone in prisons. We do not have enough prisons. And the fallacy with the argument further is, you can provide money for the brick and mortar, but what about the costs for the security officers, the corrections officers, the administration of those prisons. In northern Michigan, we had two prisons, one in Baraga, a maximum security prison, which Michigan went on a prison building spree in the 1980's, and we built these prisons. For 2 years, Baraga maximum security prison sat empty because the State did not have the money for the correction officers or for the administrative cost, operational costs of that prison. We had a juvenile detention center. We built a juvenile detention facility so young people that had to be incarcerated could still stay closer to their families. The closest one for northern Michigan was some 400 miles away, and it was built in Escanaba, my hometown. Again, when I was back in the State legislature, we got that program put in. That was 1989. It just opened this year, excuse me, July 1994. So it has been built, it has been sitting empty because we did not have the money to maintain it. And now Michigan is on another prison building spree, Newberry regional site is going to be built, again up in my district. But how long will that last? They are going to use some Federal money to clean it up, build it up but, again, nowhere in either bill, the Republican proposal, is there any money for the administration, for the correction officers of these prisons.

Mr. STUPAK. I thank the gentleman for not only joining me tonight, but also last night, along with the gentleman from California [Mr. Filner], the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Chapman], and others who came out. The purpose for doing these special orders or 5 minutes, as you can see, the Chamber is practically empty, is for the benefit of our viewing audience. It is our hope that they will call their Members and urge them to support the community policing program. This debate will probably start, I think, Thursday, and then go into Friday and possibly Monday. So time is of the essence. We are on this fast track legislation. Many people throughout my district, and as I speak out more and more on community policing and 1,000 police officers, the cops on the street program, most people are not aware that the proposal that will be presented later this week is to kill this program, so we need help from the public to call their Representative and tell them to keep this program, keep the police officers on the street. We need police. We need prevention and not just the prisons and pork that are going to be offered by the other side.

Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, I am here tonight and I will be joined by some of my colleagues on the Democratic side to talk about the community policing program and the proposal that will be before us later this week to do away with the community policing program and the 100,000 cops as the President has outlined in the past, in last year's crime bill. So the special order tonight will deal with community policing commonly called cops on the beat or Clinton cops. Today at a press conference there were representatives from police organizations all over the country, mostly the FOP and the National Association of Police Organizations which represent most of the rank- and-file police officers in the country. They spoke articulately of the need to get police officers on the street. The program has been a win-win situation not just for the police officers, not just for fighting crime but especially for the communities in which they serve. Last night in this Chamber we spoke, a number of us, about community policing, how you need to restore the trust, confidence and faith in the police with the specific area they serve in order to form a working partnership, working in concert to help with community policing, to combat the crime elements that they face in their communities. The gentleman from California [Mr. Filner] was here, and he represents San Diego, and they had one of the first programs ever on community policing and the dramatic impact it had on crime in San Diego, and then there was the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Meehan], Middlesex County, Lowell, MA, where he talked about his role as a district attorney to help to reduce crime. Mr. Speaker and those folks who are listening to us, there is no one program that is going to solve crime. There is no one police agency in and of itself that can solve crime. We will never solve crime until the citizens we serve work hand in hand with the police officers who are there to help them. Fighting crime is more than just prisons, fighting crime is more than just putting a new law on the book, and it is even more than just police officers. There must be a partnership between the police, the citizens they represent, but most of all it is a responsibility for each and every one of us in this great country. I would like to speak, if I may, about two programs tonight in my home State of Michigan; the COPS program, as it is called, in Marquette, MI, which is in northern Michigan and is a town of only 17,000 people. But the community policing program works in rural areas as well as in urban areas, but the COPS program was started back in 1990. In its first 2 years of operation, Mr. Speaker, overall crime in my city dropped 23 percent. As the community police officers get progressively closer to the community in which he lives and serves, more and more citizens are coming forward to report incidents of crime. This is because a community and a community police officer have developed a special relationship that relates to more trust, more confidence, a greater willingness to become involved in the system. I would like to share with my colleagues some other stories regarding the COPS program in Marquette, MI, because the program is often referred to as just Cops on the Beat. Well, more than just cops on the beat, they must interact with the communities. A major problem area in Marquette centered around a 116-unit family public housing development the COPS program in Marquette County and Marquette city had developed in coordination with the city police and the public housing authority in an attempt to decrease the crime rates there at the public housing. A police officer, a public housing authority and residents there formed a partnership which was developed to reduce crime and maintain order. The program has lowered crime and has restored a sense of pride in that housing project. A good example was back in 1991 and 1992, Halloween or Devil's Night, as it is called, with the first 2 years in which there were at least 26 fires, arson fires, per night in and around this housing project. But with the working with the local police departments, volunteers on patrol and CB radios, Mr. Speaker, we have gone on to deter this program, and last year not one arson complaint was answered during Halloween or Devil's Night. Another one they did in Marquette was the adopt-a-park program, and it was to eliminate the drinking and drugs in a wooded area by the community, and again the COPS program opened up this community, identified the problem and patrolled the area. Other achievements that COPS programs have helped out is bike registration, bicycle safety, child identification fingerprinting, bike patrols, court-referred workers to do community service work, anti- trespass programs, say no to drug crimes, community child watch program and others. Again the first year the COPS program, and there has been much criticism of the President's program, and you only have so much money. How are you going to pay for 100,000 cops?Well, as you all know, it is a sharing program--75 percent of the costs of the police office for the first year is paid by the Federal Government, 25 percent is paid by locals. Second year it is a 50-50 match. That is how we can provide 100,000 police officers underneath the crime bill that was passed last year and that took effect as of October 1 this year. There are 17 police departments in Michigan with COPS programs. The COPS programs throughout the State, the one in Marquette, was rated No. 1, but from a small city like Marquette of 17,000 people you can go on to city like Detroit, our largest city in Michigan. The recently passed crime bill has awarded the Detroit Police Department 96 new police officers. These officers are currently attending the Detroit Metropolitan Police Academy and are being trained in community policing. Why community policing? Because we know that when police officers work with the folks in which they must serve, it is the greatest positive effect on reducing crime. The community policing program in Detroit has conducted over 130 residential surveys, has installed security hardware for citizens, has organized over 50 blocks in the city streets into neighborhood watch programs and has increased and provided aggressive patrolling in high drug activity areas. It has created and maintained child safety and substance abuse programs and continues the youth programs to combat violent crime and drug related offenses. I want to ask in the survey what was the most positive change in these areas just during the last 3 months. The ``It was community policing and a police keep-the-cops-on the-streets program.'' Now our friends on the other side of the aisle are going to tell us in the next few days, and probably on to Monday, that Members, that mayors and local elected officials, support this family and the Clinton COPS program, that they want to wider discretion, and let the locals determine what it is. But we believe, those of us on this side of the aisle, that what we will do is just buy more pork barrel projects that we saw in LEAA in the late 1960's and early 1970's, but as my mayor in Detroit, Mayor Dennis Archer, said, the time has come for us to stop throwing money at crime, but put it into law enforcement officials, and what they want is cops and not programs. Mayor Archer believes that the President and the Congress got it right last year when we funded the police on the street program. People in Dennis archer's city of Detroit, or whether it is up in my district in Marquette, want protection and the ability to walk their streets at night, and we know that the only way to do it is to continue funding for the 100,000 cops that currently exist with the cops on the beat program. One of the most effective tools for law enforcement committees is about to become a casualty underneath the GOP crime bill. Those of us are here tonight, and many others who cannot be with us, intend to keep fighting to keep the 100,000 police officers on the street. Underneath the GOP plan of block grants there is no guarantee that any police officers will be hired. There is no guarantee that the cops on the street program will be maintained. There is no program specifically earmarked for community policing. Tomorrow I know the President will announce underneath a fast cops program that 49 more police officers have been awarded in my district alone, 250 in the State of Michigan. Marquette, with their program ready to run out, will be awarded another police officer. In the President's program, in the one that we are fighting to try to save, there is very little bureaucracy. In fact, in order to do a fast cop application, it is a one-page form. It is a program that began November 1, and here we are on February 7, 1995, just over 3 months, and they are already just in my State alone providing 250 police officers underneath the cops fast program. It is a good program. It works. There is very little pork--there is no pork in it. There is very little administrative cost. My police agencies are very pleased with us and implore us to continue keeping this program. One more word before I turn over to my good friend from Massachusetts [Mr. Meehan]: Community policing and the cop on the street or cop on the beat, whatever handle you want to put on it, is a program I strongly believe in, having been a police officer for many years myself. When I was in the Michigan legislature, I helped to write the community policing program in Michigan. It is a winner. It works. But it only works when we put police officers in touch with their local communities, and they work together to provide secure residents, secure neighborhoods, by getting the trust, the faith and confidence back in law enforcement. With that I yield to my good friend from Massachusetts who comes from maybe a little different perspective, not being a police officer, but a district attorney in Lowell, MA.