Jan Schakowsky

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I am reading to you this. This is not a campaign expenditure: ``The administration is spending another $3.1 million for a newspaper, radio, and Internet effort in both English and Spanish. The 30-second ad addresses some of the major criticism of the law, including assertions that it will force seniors out of traditional Medicare and into managed care plans and that savings will be paltry from drug discount cards and prescription drug insurance starting in 2006.''

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. That is correct.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. It is built into the bill, but it is quite remarkable that before the ink is even dry on this bill, the price has gone up more than 25 percent, from $400 billion to $540 billion, and it has not even started yet. Not one dollar in benefits, so-called, has even gone out. The seniors know that this is a bad deal. The seniors who pay more attention than anybody else already know. In polls that have asked them, they do not think that they are going to benefit sufficiently. But it is important that it be explained. This comes from today, from the Associated Press: ``The Bush administration launched a $9.5 million television advertising campaign Tuesday to rebut criticism of the new Medicare law. Understand, this is not a political commercial paid for by a campaign. You and I and all of our constituents are paying for a $9.5 million television advertising campaign to rebut criticism of the new Medicare law. The ad is to run on network and cable television through March, clustered around soap operas, game shows and news programs. Its theme is, 'Same Medicare, More Benefits.' ''

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. This is not only disgusting, but it is also very costly. We know now that this bill which helps seniors little and pharmaceutical companies and HMOs a lot, is going to cost not $400 billion but about $540 billion. Now is that additional cost meaning that we are going to help seniors more, that we are going to provide a more generous benefit, that they are going to be able to buy their prescription drugs any cheaper? No. The reason that the cost of the Medicare bill has been reassessed is because the cost of prescription drugs are going to go up, so taxpayers are going to have to take more money out of their pocket. The cost to get the HMOs to keep providing the care, because HMO costs go up every year, is going to raise the price of this bill. The other thing that was not talked about that I think a lot of seniors do not get is that the premium can go up every year, the copayment can go up every year. So what may start out as $35 could end up being $85 or even more in a few years.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank both gentlemen for their vivid description on what is wrong with the so-called Medicare bill that passed, the nonprescription drug benefit bill that passed the House, but I want to tell Members my reaction to the chairman talking about now and very seriously looking at going to work for the pharmaceutical companies and how the Medicare administrator is going to benefit. I feel that very personally and very deeply, for this reason. This kind of breach of trust is something that really affects me because it confirms the worst nightmares of the public about what we as Members of Congress do here. I think all too many people have this view that Members of Congress come here and they try and line their own pockets for their own benefit, working with special interests. And then what they find is the smoking gun, a guy like the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, on which the gentleman and I both sit, taking a job and saying he is going to negotiate a job with the pharmaceutical industry, PhRMA, the lobbying organization. He has announced he is going to give up his chairmanship on February 16 and not run again, and that he is looking at this offer. We know he has turned down a million dollar offer already from another organization. We have heard it is between $2 million and $3 million, and go to work for PhRMA, the very industry that stands now to benefit the most from this so-called senior citizen prescription drug benefit. The good news is that the seniors get how bad this bill is. But what I fear that they do not get is that there are Members of Congress who are sincere about trying to provide a real benefit to them and think that all that we are doing here is trying to line our own pockets, trying to rig the system so it helps the pharmaceutical companies, so it helps the HMOs, and that is pretty much what they have seen. This bill is about an estimated $140 billion windfall for the drug companies, $140 billion windfall for the drug companies, because it is prohibited now from trying to negotiate. Like the Veterans Administration, we do not have to look far to see where an agency negotiates for lower prices. The Veterans Administration gets for veterans sometimes half the cost that other Americans pay when they go to the pharmacy, and about half the cost we are going to have to pay for under this bill because there will be no negotiation. The Washington Post had an editorial on January 29 that said for the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) to leave so soon afterward to work for the pharmaceutical association whose companies reaped substantial benefits from that bill provides a particularly pungent example of how quickly the ``revolving door'' between Congress and K Street is now revolving, and how lucrative this game has become for its participants. The only thing I would disagree with, this is not about a revolving door, this is about a locked door. This was happening while the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) is still in the Congress and still chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce. This is about a locked door where he kept out the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the ranking member on his committee, who was here when Medicare was passed in 1965, an expert on the subject, locked out of the conference committee. I hope the public understands how extraordinary that is for the appointed members of a conference committee to be locked out of the process. Also locked out, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel), the ranking member on the Committee on Ways and Means. And let us be clear, when the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) got locked out, it meant that the only possible representative of people of color in this country who have a lot at stake in this issue, were also locked out of that conference committee, which is now an all-white committee, I guess. We do not know. Who knows who they invited in from the pharmaceutical industry or the HMOs because the leading Democrats in the House of Representatives were locked out of that process. And coming out of that locked door is, number one, a bill that is just a payoff to the HMOs and the pharmaceutical companies; and what comes out of that committee are job offers, big job offers. So what we have is now the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) we think getting between $2-3 million, which is actually a pretty good deal for the pharmaceutical industry which stands to gain $140 billion. That is not too bad a deal to get a clever man like the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin). They also got a guy named Tom Scully who was the Medicare administrator, the guy behind the scenes, who as a staffer helped write the bill and negotiate the whole bill. Where has Mr. Scully gone? Mr. Scully has gone to be a top health care lobbyist for the Washington firm of Alston & Bird. While serving as President Bush's director of Medicare and helping to craft the Medicare deal, Scully was actively negotiating with the lobbying firm. Recognizing the conflict of interest, the Bush administration granted Scully a special waiver to negotiate with the lobbying firm while serving in the Bush administration. Here he is, he is with Medicare, he is the head man, he wants to look for another job, and Health and Human Services grants him a waiver while he is working on the Medicare bill to start negotiating for his next job. A waiver. Well, there was such an uproar over that, now they have said agencies cannot do that, only the White House can grant those sorts of waivers. So Scully is out the door. Then there is the top aide on the Committee on Ways and Means, John McManus, who was negotiating this bill as well. He left and he is going to have a job outside helping him make some money from the pharmaceutical industry. Here is what he said. ``We accomplished what we set out to do. Helping people figure out how this gets implemented, that is what is interesting to me.'' Who are the people is he talking about that he wants to help figure it out? Is he going to help the seniors? I have not heard that he is going to go work for a senior citizen organization.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, there are some aspects of revolving door that apply here, although I still believe that was about a locked door. These individuals were servants of the public while they are negotiating or figuring out their next move with the pharmaceutical industry. But we have got the door going the other way, too. We have a situation where an HMO lobbyist turns up as a Bush Medicare official. A woman named Julie Goon was just hired by the Bush administration. She is the former vice president of legislative affairs for an HMO trade association in Washington, and she is now the new Director of Medicare Outreach. Congress Daily reported that Goon will be in charge of ``getting the word out to seniors, health care professionals, consumer groups and others about how the program works, HHS' progress in implementing it and what its impact on them will be, and for apprising the department of their reaction.'' Before she got this job, Goon was named one of Washington's top lobbyists in Washington in 2002. Now she is head of explaining this Medicare bill and why it is such a great deal as Director of Medicare Outreach.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes. I rise today with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Loretta Sanchez) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) to offer this motion to recommit on behalf of our brave soldiers and their families and veterans across the country. My motion to recommit would provide basic protections to financially distressed military families and veterans from the harsher aspects of the means test found in the newly added text of S. 1920. This motion would provide safe harbor from the bill's means test for military and veterans' families and safe harbor for the widows of our servicewomen and men. Without changing the bill, military personnel, veterans and their families could be dragged into court by their creditors. They could be harassed because of an arbitrary standard, the means test, that has no true reflection of whether they can pay their debt or not. The men and women who in the past have and do today risk their lives to protect us deserve protection from us in return. We should be offering them relief, not greater hardships. Since 9/11, 350,000 reservists and guardsmen have been called to active duty and almost 40,000 are serving in Iraq. According to the National Guard, four out of 10 members of the Reserves and National Guard lose money when they leave their civilian jobs for active duty. Additionally, many left for the war thinking they would be deployed for 6 months and have ended up staying for a year or even longer. There is almost no way that they could have financially anticipated and prepared for that extension of their service. We want to help people like Mrs. Vicky Wessel. When she appeared on ``60 Minutes'' last year, she expressed the concerns that many families of reservists whose husbands or wives have been called to active duty experience. What she talked about was the financial difficulty. She said, ``It is because a staff sergeant's pay is a 60 percent cut in pay from my husband's regular job.'' There are thousands of families like the Wessels. Make no mistake about it, these families will not be protected under the bill as it stands. These are people who, through no fault of their own, may end up in bankruptcy. They are risking their lives for us. And the veterans who have done so in the past, we should protect them. This is what my motion to recommit does. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Loretta Sanchez).

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I am, Mr. Speaker, in its present form.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, it gives me such great honor and pleasure to join in support of this resolution in memory and to celebrate the life of former Senator Paul Simon who was my friend and my mentor and my Senator and my role model. Paul Simon was unique. He was the real thing, though. When we look at him with his bow tie and his suit, he was an authentic person. And those who might make the mistake of kind of relegating Paul Simon to the kind of politician of the past, that would be wrong. Paul Simon, although he had that kind of almost old-fashioned gentlemanly way about him, was someone who we can learn a lot from today. He had incredible courage. The thing that Paul Simon really understood was that it is not only important for your own personal integrity to stand up for your beliefs, but that it was also really good politics. Paul Simon his whole life was an opponent of the death penalty, not always a popular issue in the State of Illinois; and it is an issue that inspired a lot of hot feelings about that. And yet people who would disagree with him on that or, like me, who disagreed with him on the Balanced Budget Amendment pretty strongly, nonetheless often would come up to Senator Paul Simon and say, you know, Senator, I do not agree with you on this or that, or even, I do not agree with you on most things, but I trust you. I am going to vote for you. I admire the way that you stand up for the State of Illinois and for the things that you believe in. It would be wonderful if more of us would do that. I went to Iowa. We just finished the Iowa primaries. I went to Iowa for a month for Paul Simon in 1988 and, by the end, of course, everybody could say the speech with him. I could just hear that voice saying, the United States is a great country, but we can be an even better country. And he believed that so much. His desire, as he stated it: I wanted to do something where I could continue to contribute. I did not get into office just because I wanted a title; I wanted to get something meaningful done, and he did. He continued to do that. That is so true. He did not just want to be something; he wanted to do something. So when he retired from being in the Senate, he continued in his role at Southern Illinois University and all the while prodding all of us. We heard mention of those personal notes. He wrote a book called ``Tapped Out,'' dealing with the water crisis around the world; and he really wanted me to get involved in that. He would write me letters. Then he sent me the book. He said, now look, your name is in the forward of the book. It said, to someone who is going to be working on this issue. I knew what he was saying to me: you better work on this issue; you are in my book. Paul, I am going to be working on that issue and so many more where you forged the path.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring attention to the hard work of some of our nation's oldest service organizations to improve global health. As described in a December 7, 2003 Washington Post article titled ``Service Clubs Living Up to Mission,'' Rotary International, Lions Club International and Kiwanis International have each conunitted themselves to bettering the quality of life for people around the world. I represent the city of Chicago where Rotary International, our oldest service organization, was founded and Evanston where it is currently headquartered. The organization, in the early 1980s, made a commitment to eradicate polio and immunize children against infectious diseases. Rotarians have exceeded all expectations. Through the years, Rotary International has given $500 million to the polio-eradication effort and has sent thousands of volunteers abroad to work on the campaign. Partly based on the strength and success of Rotary International's campaign, the World Health Organization announced its intent to eradicate polio worldwide. I commend the commitment that Rotary International and its members continue to make to improving world health. Lions Club International, which was also founded in Chicago, has spent the last decade working to reduce blindness worldwide. Over the last decade, this organization has spent $148 million on sight- preservation projects in 79 countries; it has funded more than 550 grants in 78 countries targeting the main causes of blindness. Rotary International and Lions Club International paved the way for Kiwanis International's decision in 1991 to coordinate an organization- wide campaign to reduce the amount of iodine deficiency, which causes developmental delays, worldwide. The organization has pledged to raise $75 million dollars towards the effort, and has already delivered $57 million. Rotary International, Lions Club International and The Kiwanis have demonstrated that we have the ability to make real change in the lives of people around the world. While I look forward to supporting the efforts of these amazing service organizations, I hope that Congress and the Administration will also increase efforts to meet those goals. Mr. Speaker, I would like to commit the article from the Washington Post into the Record, and ask my fellow colleagues to take a moment to read it. [From the Washington Post, Dec. 7, 2003] Service Clubs Living Up to Mission Rotary, Lions and Kiwanis at Front of Global War Against Disease (By David Brown) Lunch is over, and the Rotary Club of Washington, D.C., is taking coffee when Susan O'Neal starts her slide presentation about the trip she and 65 other Rotarians took to India, where they helped hand out oral polio vaccine to ragtag children in a New Delhi slum. She explains that the vaccine, taken in two drops of fluid, grows in the intestine and is excreted by the body for a few weeks while immunity builds up. She then clicks on a slide of an open sewer. ``You can see how it's rather easy for people to get fecal microbes on their hands,'' O'Neal says. ``In fact, even though only 93 percent of children on average get vaccinated in a campaign, the other 7 percent get immunized through the feces in the environment.'' A groan briefly mixes with the tinkling of glassware as the Rotarians settle in for the latest dispatch from their organization's 15-year campaign to eradicate polio, the leading cause of childhood paralysis. This scene at the Hotel Washington recently is not one that George F. Babbitt, the title character of Sinclair Lewis's 1922 novel, would easily recognize. A small-minded resident of a fictional American city, Babbitt belonged to a Rotary- like organization called the Boosters Club. Lewis lampooned it as little more than institutionalized selfishness, and his unflattering picture still lingers in the American psyche. That may be the reason so few people know that the heirs of Babbitt's Boosters--not only in Rotary but also in two other large clubs like it--are now major players in the global fight against disease. They are engaged in arduous and thankless campaigns against ailments that have largely disappeared from the places where their members live. Since 1988, Rotary International has contributed $500 million and sent thousands of volunteers to work on the polio campaign. The club is second only to the U.S. government in the amount of money it has poured into the effort to eradicate a human disease for only the second time in history. In 1994, Kiwanis International adopted as its cause the elimination of iodine deficiency, the biggest cause of preventable mental retardation in the world. Since then, the club has provided more than $50 million to help ensure that all salt used in food contains iodine. Lions Clubs International, once famous for collecting and recycling used eyeglasses, spent $148 million over the past decade on sight-preservation projects in 79 countries. It plays an important role in a river-blindness campaign in Africa, has trained 14,000 ophthalmic workers in India and helped pay for 2.1 million cataract operations in 104 rural counties in China, where last year it became the only Western ``service club'' allowed to establish chapters. The contributions of these clubs, however, go well beyond money. Over the past decade they have essentially created a new species of nongovernmental organization. Unlike many medical charities in the developing world, these are not small cadres of overworked, self-sacrificing idealists. Instead, they are vast, permanent networks of well connected people willing to put in small amounts of time-- often in the form of lobbying and consciousness-raising-- against a few targeted diseases. ``Their contribution goes way beyond pretty important. I believe that eradication of polio would not have been feasible without the participation of Rotary International,'' said R. Bruce Aylward, a Canadian physician who is the World Health Organization's coordinator for the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. ``Kiwanis is signed up indefinitely, not for donating money but for raising their voice if they see any backsliding,'' said Frits van der Haar, a Dutch nutritionist who heads the Network for Sustained Elimination of Iodine Deficiency. ``Outsiders like Kiwanis are the watchdogs. They see that the work is done well and continues to get done.'' In the river-blindness campaign, Merck & Co. provides the drug ivermectin and Lions Clubs International pays to train African villagers to dispense it. The ``barefoot doctor'' strategy that has evolved from the program may become a model for other medical programs in places with few health professionals, said Moses Katabarwa, a Ugandan epidemiologist and anthropologist. ``The Lions, they have triggered off a process in which there is no reverse,'' said Katabarwa, who recently moved to the United States to work on river blindness with the Carter Center in Atlanta. The three clubs came to their work independently, tracing similar paths from their origins as social organizations for midwestern businessmen. Rotary, the oldest, was founded in Chicago in 1905. Kiwanis (whose name is a shortened form of an Indian phrase meaning ``we trade'') began in Detroit in 1915. The first Lions Club formed in Chicago two years later. All made charitable works in their communities part of their mission. The Lions chose blindness prevention as a theme in 1925 when 45-year-old Helen Keller challenged them to become ``knights of the blind in this crusade against darkness.'' All eventually opened clubs on other continents. In the early 1980s, several Rotary leaders proposed beginning an organization-wide project separate from local efforts. ``This was contrary to the beginnings of Rotary and was also contrary to the feelings of a lot of senior Rotarians,'' recalled William T. Sergeant, who at age 84 heads Rotary's polio activities. But the idea took hold. At the suggestion of Albert Sabin, inventor of the oral polio vaccine, Rotary chose as its goal universal immunization of children against polio and several other infectious diseases. In 1986, it decided to support the effort through 2005, the club's centennial year. It did not envisage eradicating polio. A two-year campaign brought in more than twice as much money as expected--$247 million, not $120 million. Partly on the strength of that support, the World Health Organization in 1988 announced its intent to rid the world of polio. A WHO-led effort had previously eradicated smallpox in a campaign lasting from 1966 to 1980. ``A lot of people have very ambitious ideas, but almost nobody has the funding to kickstart a global initiative,'' Aylward said. ``Rotary was the Gates Foundation of 1988.'' But eradication has proved more difficult than anyone anticipated. The target date was originally 2000; it is now 2005. The extra time required more money. Earlier this year, Rotary completed a second fundraising campaign, which raised $111 million--again more than the target, which was $80 million. The club's contributions. including interest, now total more than $500 million. Lions Clubs International, the world's largest service club, decided to reorient much of its sight-saving efforts after it held a symposium with experts in blindness prevention in Singapore in 1989. ``We were astounded to hear that blindness was increasing, particularly in the developing world,'' said Brian Stevenson, a provincial judge in Alberta who had just finished a term as Lions president. ``They told us there were 40 million blind people in the world, and 32 million of the cases were or had been treatable. So it gave us a lot of focus.'' Lions set a goal of $130 million but raised $147 million for its SightFirst program. The organization has funded more than 550 grants in 78 countries targeting the main causes of blindness. Kiwanis's entry into the global health arena was due in part to the example of the two other clubs. In 1991, William Foege, former head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, asked the Kiwanis president, a physician named Wil Blechman, what the club was doing for the world's children. Foege cited Rotary's polio work and Lions' just-created SightFirst. While Kiwanis had urged local clubs to have a charitable activity aimed at children younger than 5, there was no organization-wide project. ``I will bring this to the attention of our board, because I don't know at the moment,'' Blechman recalled answering sheepishly. The board discussed the idea and ultimately surveyed its membership, which favored a global project 2 to 1. UNICEF suggested a focus on iodine deficiency. Iodine is an essential part of thyroid hormone, which in turn is essential to brain development. In places where diets contain insufficient iodine, generally because the soil contains little and there is no seafood, the intelligence of the entire population is shifted downward. In 1990, only 20 percent of the world's households consumed salt treated with enough iodine to prevent deficiency. UNICEF estimated the problem could be eliminated worldwide in five years for $50 million to $75 million. Kiwanis took the challenge because it was important, concrete and ``something we thought we could handle,'' Blechman said. The organization pledged to raise $75 million and has already contributed $57 million. The money pays for iodization equipment for salt manufacturers and campaigns on the importance of iodized salt. Occasionally, members of service clubs do the work themselves. Thousands of Rotarians, both local and foreign volunteers, have participated in national immunization days when vaccine is given to millions of children over a few days. Dave Groner, a 60-year-old funeral director in Dowagiac, Mich., has led four groups of Rotarians to India and one to Nigeria. Next month, he will take 14 people, 10 of them nurses, to Niger. They will all pay their own way--about $3,000 each. ``We've never been asked to not work or to get lost,'' he said. Occasionally, club members play a role nobody else can. Angola has a single Rotary Club, 32 people who meet in the capital, Luanda. They are led by Sylvia Nagy, who with her husband owns a foundry. In 1997, a 25-year civil war, which ended last year with the death of rebel leader Jonas Savimbi, was underway. There had not been a vaccination campaign in the rebel-held half of the country in years. Nagy, along with representatives of WHO and UNICEF, negotiated a truce so immunization days could be held in June that year. Rotary rented planes, boats and four-wheel-drive vehicles to deliver vaccine, and disbursed $4 million to far- flung vaccinators. About 2.5 million children were vaccinated. On Sept. 2, Angola marked its second year without a single case of polio.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the dangers posed to the public health by arsenic-treated wood. Most of the lumber sold for outdoor use in our schools' playgrounds and in our own private backyard decks is pressure-treated and injected with toxins to preserve the wood and prevent insect infestation. The most common wood preservative and pesticide used is chromated copper arsenate (CCA), which is 22 percent pure arsenic. The inorganic arsenic used in CCA-treated wood is a known carcinogen and has been linked to skin, bladder, liver and lung cancers. The arsenic in CCA-treated wood has been shown to leach out, ending up in the soil in our back yards and playgrounds, rubbing off onto our clothing, and wiping off onto our hands. Today, I am re-introducing a bill to begin to remove this threat, the Arsenic-Treated Wood Prohibition Act. This bill will prohibit the use of CCA treated lumber once and for all. This legislation will protect children and families by mandating the phase out of arsenic in pressure treated lumber and will ensure that arsenic treated lumber is disposed of safely. Specifically, my bill will: phase-out the use of arsenic- treated wood in residential settings; require the disposal of arsenic- treated wood in lined landfills to prevent contamination of groundwater; require the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to finally complete its risk assessment regarding arsenic-treated wood; provide monetary assistance to schools and local communities to remove arsenic-treated wood from their playgrounds; and direct the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to complete its mitigation studies to determine the effect of sealants in preventing exposure to residues of CCA on treated wood. This bill would save lives and protect our environment. Recent actions by the CPSC and preliminary findings released by the EPA make it even more important that we in Congress pass this legislation. Despite their own findings found that of every 1 million children exposed to the treated wood three times every week for five years, two to 100 of them might develop lung or bladder cancer later in life, the CPSC recently decided to deny a petition to ban the use of arsenic-treated wood in playground equipment and to recall existing playground structures using CCA-treated wood (HP-01-3). In their statements denying the petition, the CPSC Commissioners cited that a voluntary agreement between the EPA and CCA-treated wood manufacturer's to voluntarily phase-out the production of the product. The Commissioners reasoned that rulemaking on the subject would be both unnecessary and redundant. They further cited that the CPSC did not have the authority to initiate a recall before the risk assumptions made in the Commission's staff study could be verified. On November 13, a draft probabilistic exposure assessment released by the EPA confirmed the CPSC's earlier findings. The study concluded that the cancer risk for children who repeatedly come in contact with commonly found playground equipment and decks made of arsenic-treated wood is considerably greater than EPA officials indicated last year. The agency's preliminary findings show that 90 percent of children repeatedly exposed to arsenic-treated wood face a greater than one-in-1 million risk of cancer. The risk associated with exposure to arsenic- treated wood appears to be up to 100 times greater in the warmer climates of southern States than in the general population since children tend to spend more time playing outdoors. This risk passes the EPA's historic threshold of concern about the effects of toxic chemicals. In light of these facts, I believe that we must take immediate action. I believe that a voluntary phase-out of this potentially harmful product is not adequate. Initiating a ban on CCA-treated wood would greatly increase public awareness of the dangers that existing arsenic-treated wood presents. By failing to ban CCA-treated wood, we are ignoring the responsibility to protect and promote the best interests of consumers. I strongly believe that a legislative mandate permanently banning its use and providing for its safe removal is critical to ensuring the safety of children and their families. The effect of arsenic in our environment is undeniable: it kills. Arsenic-treated wood is a danger to the future health of America's families. I encourage my colleagues to join me in this very important effort to remove this threat.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, a little history lesson. August 17, 1989, front page of the Chicago Tribune, outside the Copernicus Senior Center in Chicago. These are the constituents of Congressman Dan Rostenkowski who is in this car. They are not happy with their Congressman, and they are not happy with the catastrophic health care bill. When the Congressman escaped from his car, a reporter asked him if he sympathized with the seniors who were mad about this bill, and he said, ``No, they do not understand.'' But, unfortunately, it was not the seniors who did not get it. It was the Congressman. Three months later that bill was repealed. A big mistake was made. This Congress overwhelmingly passed the catastrophic. Everyone on Capitol Hill liked it including the AARP. They did not check with the seniors, and we are about to make the same mistake tonight. A thousand pages and more, 40 years of Medicare, but 40 hours to read this bill. I tell you, if you vote for this, you better get your running shoes. The senior citizens will be after you.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing a bill, the Business Links Act of 2003, that would provide needed resources to parents facing serious barriers to employment. The bill would provide grants for transitional jobs programs in order to support State efforts to help TANF recipients find work. Transitional jobs can provide the right combination of support, work, and vocational training and have the potential to turn many job seekers into permanent wage earners. I would like to thank my colleagues who have joined me as original cosponsors on this bill. I would also like to commend Senator Jeff Bingaman who has already introduced companion legislation, S. 786, in the Senate. This legislation would replace the TANF bonus grants currently provided to States and instead provide $200 million for each of fiscal years 2005 through 2009 for grants to be awarded to nonprofit organizations, local workforce investment boards, States, localities, and Indian tribes. The grant funds could be used either to promote business links by improving employee wages and job skills in partnership with employers or to provide fully subsidized wage-paying jobs to individuals who have been unemployed because of limited skills or other barriers. The legislation also includes worker protection provisions that, among other things, prohibit transitional job participants from displacing or replacing existing workers or positions and provide participants the same worker protections that all other workers receive. Parents who are currently receiving or have recently received Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), parents who are at risk of needing TANF, individuals with disabilities, and unemployed, noncustodial parents who are having difficulty meeting their child support obligations would be eligible to participate in transitional jobs programs. Transitional jobs programs would provide intensive case management and access to needed support services such as vocational skills training, basic education, job placement services, and child care to all participants. Transitional jobs programs, which are aimed at helping those who have limited English proficiency and other barriers to employment, can be particularly effective for the hardest to serve welfare recipients. Program participants must work 30 to 40 hours a week, unless they have a child under the age of six, and participation is time limited to between six and 24 months. The goal of transitional jobs programs is to prepare and help participants find unsubsidized, permanent jobs. Because of the individual attention given to each transitional job holder, various programs across the country have proven very successful in achieving that goal. From January 2000 to July 2001, a Chicago program known as Transitional Community Service Jobs placed over 75 percent of its participants in unsubsidized jobs, more than one-third of which paid over $8.00 an hour. Many cities and communities across the country have implemented transitional jobs programs because they understand the importance of helping those facing serious barriers to employment, and they recognize the long-term benefits of investing in a future workforce that is well- trained and able to contribute to the economy. However, because the Welfare-to-Work funds that help support transitional jobs programs are nearly exhausted and because of tight State budgets, many of those successful programs are at risk. This bill would provide a more stable funding source to allow many of these programs to survive, enable the development of new programs, and require a rigorous evaluation of funded programs. I am proud that this bill would help those who are having a difficult time supporting their children by providing them with resources and skills that will help them immediately, as well as sustain them in the future. I urge my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring the Business Links Act of 2003.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Earlier the gentleman from Louisiana (Chairman Tauzin) waxed poetic about the deep meaning of a movie, of all things, and about the centrality of choice in our democracy. And I agree about choice. But I have to tell the Members in all the years that I have worked for and with seniors, never, not once, did a senior citizen come up to me and say ``What I really want is a choice of insurance plans. I want more salesmen to call me, send me those brochures, include all those charts and graphs and fine print. I cannot wait to sit down each year and choose among HMOs.'' Never, not once. Seniors want a choice all right. They want to choose their doctor. They want to choose the drug that their doctor prescribes for them. They want the choice of their pharmacy if they want to go to their neighborhood pharmacy. They want the kind of real choice they get under Medicare, the Medicare that they know and love. And that is the kind of choice they will lose under this bill and under a pile of brochures that they are going to be burdened with. But do the Members know what? That is okay. I want to tell the Members it is okay because the seniors know the difference between real choices and phony choices. And we can put all kinds of fancy pictures on it, but senior citizens will know, and I want to tell the Members that it is to their peril that they vote for this legislation and give seniors a phony choice.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), who worked hard on this legislation and over a long period of time. (Mr. STARK asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes. I rise in strong support and as an original cosponsor of H.R. 3140, the Fairness to Contact Lens Consumers Act. I am pleased that the House is taking action on this important measure before the end of the legislative session. This is an important consumer rights issue. Thirty-six million Americans use contact lenses, and Congress must address the regulatory issues that impact the rights of those consumers and their ability to purchase contact lenses from their preferred vendors. We have a duty to make sure that consumers' interests are being met; that they have access to affordable and safe contact lenses; and that uniform standards regulate this process nationwide. Several of my colleagues have spent a great deal of time studying the subject, including, of course, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the gentleman from New York (Mr. Towns), the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), and the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark); and I want to commend and thank them for their leadership. As a contact lens user myself, I am glad to have the opportunity to take part in the debate and passage of this legislation and appreciate the opportunity to work with those who have crafted this legislation, as well as the distinguished chairman of the Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Stearns). We appreciate the support also of the American Optometric Association for supporting this proconsumer legislation. This bill will change current law to provide what we all agree to be needed changes, so that consumers are explicitly entitled to a copy of their contact lens prescription from their doctor. That way, they will have the freedom to shop around to get the best deal possible for filling their contact lens needs. There have been reports of eye care providers unnecessarily preventing or delaying consumer access to their own prescriptions. There is some suggestion patients may not even know they are entitled to ask for their prescription. Clearly, we need to address those problems, and the legislation we are discussing today includes strong language guaranteeing those rights. The bill requires eye doctors and optometrists to provide parents with a copy of their contact lens prescription, regardless of whether or not the patient asks for a copy. Under this measure, eye doctors and other prescribers are prohibited from requiring that consumers buy contact lenses from them as a condition of performing an eye exam or providing the prescription. While consumers have a right to shop for the best deal when purchasing contact lenses, Congress, doctors, and industry all have a duty and an interest in making sure that patient safety is not compromised in the process. The Food and Drug Administration mandates that contact lens sales require a valid prescription from an eye care professional. With the increasing prevalence of mail order contact lens providers, whether through the Internet or 1-800 numbers, I believe it is important we give consumers expanded access while adhering to the FDA requirements. In the interest of fairness to consumers and doctors, this legislation establishes clear uniform rules that will guarantee fairness and safety to contact lens consumers in every State, regardless of existing laws. The bill creates a verification system that will ensure prompt filling of contact lens prescriptions. Under the legislation, when consumers place orders with third-party contact lens vendors, those vendors must verify the prescription with their doctors. Their doctors will then have 8 hours to respond. If they do not, the prescription will be deemed valid by the vendor and the order filled. These safeguards, coupled with time requirements, will ensure prompt and safe access to contact lenses at affordable prices for consumers. This legislation requires the FTC to issue rules implementing the bill's requirements and empowers the FTC to enforce these rules. The new rules will become effective within 60 days of enactment. I want to again commend those who worked to bring this proconsumer legislation to the floor, and I urge all of my colleagues to support it. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson).

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Towns), the lead Democratic cosponsor of the bill.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall no. 570, Basic Pilot Extension Act of 2003, had I been present, I would have voted ``nay.''

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 569, rule to recommit the Conference Report on H.R. 2215, rollcall No. 571, Markey motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. 6, rollcall No. 572, Woolsey Motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. 1308, rollcall No. 5731, Brown (OH) Motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. 1, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for gathering us here tonight to talk about an issue that is very much in the minds of the American people. Where is our $87 billion going? And I do not know if the gentleman has seen Newsweek this week. The cover story is ``Bush's $87 Billion Mess. Special Investigation. Waste, Chaos and Cronyism: The Real Cost of Rebuilding Iraq.'' And I thought I would just refer to some of this. Now, I know that the President has cautioned us not to believe what we read and that we should not emphasize the negative, but we should look for the positive and that you cannot believe all these negative news reports. And I do not know if he is necessarily questioning this Newsweek investigative report, but I thought, in any case, that because it is a reputable magazine that I might refer to some of the findings here. The headline of the story is ``The $87 Billion Money Pit. It is the boldest reconstruction project since the Marshall Plan. And we cannot afford to fail. But where are the billions really going,'' is the question that it asks. So let me just read a little bit of this. This says, ``No doubt, reconstructing postwar Iraq is a brutally hard and hazardous task. Sabotage has already destroyed some 700 power transmission towers. But George W. Bush, who has staked his Nation's credibility and perhaps his Presidency on success in Iraq, has no choice but to set things right. ``Iraqis like to point out that after the 1991 war, Saddam restored the badly destroyed electricity grid in only 3 months. Some 6 months after Bush declared an end to major hostilities, a much more ambitious and costly American effort has yet to get to that point. It is only in recent weeks that the coalition amped up the power generation level that Saddam achieved last March; 4400 megawatts for the country, though it has since dropped back.'' I just wanted to emphasize that point because we are told now that electricity is at the level that Saddam had but, in fact, it has dropped back. ``True, Saddam did not have a guerilla war to contend with, and his power infrastructure was in much better shape than the Americans found it, but he also had fewer resources. ``Six months ago the administration decided to cut corners on normal bidding procedures and hand over large contracts to defense contractors like Bechtel and Halliburton on a limited bid or no-bid basis. It bypassed the Iraqis and didn't worry much about accountability to Congress. The plan was for `blitzkrieg' reconstruction. But by sacrificing accountability for speed,'' Newsweek says, ``America is not achieving either very well right now. For months no one has seemed to be fully in charge of postwar planning. There has been so little transparency that even at the White House, `it was almost impossible to get a sense of what was happening,' on the power problems, says one official privy to the discussions. ``Numerous allegations of overspending, favoritism and corruption have surfaced. Halliburton, a major defense contractor once run by Vice President Dick Cheney,'' as earlier statements indicated, he still is benefiting from his relationship to Halliburton, ``Halliburton has been accused of gouging prices on imported fuel, charging $1.59 a gallon while the Iraqis `get up to speed,' when the Iraqi national oil company says it can now buy it at no more than 98 cents a gallon. The difference is about $300 million. Cronies of Iraqi exile leader Ahmad Chalabi, Newsweek has learned, were recently awarded a large chunk of a major contract for mobile telecommunications networks.'' So it is a really interesting article. There is a lot in here. But one of the other things that it has is some charts. ``What critics say. Waste not.'' This is in a chart. It says, ``Congressional Democrats are raising eyebrows at price tags.'' Some examples: Repair. U.S. engineers estimated $15 million for repairs on a cement plant in northern Iraq. The project was given to local Iraqis instead. Remember it was $15 million was the estimate from the U.S. contractors. It was done by local Iraqis for $80,000. $15 million; $80,000. Rebuild. Big business contractors refurbished 20 police stations in Basra for $25 million. An Iraqi official contends locals could have done it for $5 million. Also talks about Iraqis versus U.S. jobs, local labor. It is cheaper to hire Iraqis for reconstruction projects. Unequal pay. Non-Iraqi security guards make $1,200 a day working for U.S. companies in Iraq, 144 times that of Iraqi guards who make $250 a month. So for a British or U.S. security guard $1,200 per day, an Iraqi security guard, $8.33 a day. Then it talks about the Iraq's luxury items. These are some of the expenditures. I think we actually may have cut some of them out, but these were the proposals. They are talking about a kind of feeding frenzy going on for contractors in Iraq. At the same time, and I am glad that the gentleman from Ohio pointed out a number of things that are being shortchanged, like body armor for our soldiers, but a proposal that we may be still going through in our $87 billion, I am not sure, $33,000 per pickup truck, or $2.64 million for 80 vehicles, $9 million to create zip codes, a numbered postal system throughout the country. $6,000 per radio or phone. That added up to $3.6 million. $50,000 per prison bed, way more than we spend here in the United States. $400 million for two new 4,000-bed prisons. And it goes on and on. A couple more things I just wanted to point out, if I could, there is a section called waste, fraud, and abuse. It says American companies are barred by law from paying bribes or taking kickbacks abroad, but Iraq is still largely a lawless place. And one company director for a British firm doing business in Baghdad said that makes all the difference. Quote, ``I have never seen corruption like this by expatriate businessmen. It is like a feeding frenzy,'' he says. One prominent Iraqi businessman said he was told he had to raise his bid by $750,000 to get a major contract so long as he kicked back that amount to the contractors rep. The businessman refused to identify the contractor, but did say, quote, ``No Iraqi would ask for a bribe that big,'' unquote. At the very least, Americans have a right to know exactly what is going on, how is our money being spent, a completely transparent process. Because if we are going to send our young men and women over there who put their lives at risk every day without the proper equipment that could save their lives, and all of these billions and billions of dollars are going to private contractors who are responsible for taking care of them and providing what is needed in Iraq in some cases, that is part of what we hire some contractors for, then for heaven's sakes, we want accounting of that. If it is too much, then we have got to cut that price. I mean, $87 billion, no wonder the American people had sticker shock and no wonder when they read stories like this they are saying why should we be handing this check to this administration when they cannot even be trusted to take care of our young men and women in uniform but they are more than taking care of and padding the pockets of their good friends at Halliburton and Bechtel and still not getting the job done and still not providing the electricity and still not making Iraq more safe for the Iraqi people yet. Now that may be happening but at what cost to the American people. We just want to know. And I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for letting us ask that question.