Jim Walsh

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Indiana (Mr. McIntosh). (Mr. McINTOSH asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Knollenberg), a member of the subcommittee.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker: Today I am proud to commend one of my constituents and a very good personal friend, Mr. Carmen Cosentino. Last week the Society of American Florists recognized the achievements of outstanding individuals in the floral industry and gave its highest honor, induction into the Floriculture Hall of Fame, to Carm Cosentino. The purpose of the Floriculture Hall of Fame is to honor men and women who have made outstanding and lasting contributions to the advancement of floriculture as an integral part of the American way of life. Carm, who owns Cosentino's Florist in Auburn, New York, is a well- known industry spokesperson who has touched many in the floral industry through his talks, magazine articles and educational seminars. In his 43 years in the floral industry, Carm's passion has redefined how potent a grassroots effort can be. He has dedicated his life to teaching others in his industry about proper care and handling in order to prolong enjoyment and appreciation of the beauty of flowers. Carm has spoken at hundreds of industry gatherings, instructed and acted as a spokesperson for major wire services, and has even translated his witty personal style onto paper as a contributor to many publications. His dedication to the floral industry is evidenced by his service as director of the SAF Board of Directors, vice president and president of the New York State Florists Association, and as director of the Seeley Conference. It is a true accomplishment that Carm also owns and operates his own retail flower shop and wholesale business. Throughout his life in the floral industry, he has demonstrated the highest regard for improving the lives of everyone through flowers. I am proud to call Carm Cosentino my good friend, and I join his lovely wife Anne Marie and his family today in recognizing this professional achievement.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, we have no further requests for time. I accept the motion of the gentleman to instruct conferees, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman for his thoughts and comments on the bill. And I wish to again thank him for his help in moving the bill through the House. As we now prepare for our conference with the Senate, we have made a lot of headway. And I would like to give credit to the staff, because the leadership has asked us to move expeditiously, and we are. And I think staff has us at a point now where we will be able to sit down with the Senate and begin and soon thereafter conclude the conference Wednesday morning. So the instructions that the minority side has offered, I think, are constructive. I think they are helpful. When we had the debate in the House, we were far below the President's request and we were far below last year's enacted level in NASA, National Science Foundation, and in some areas of HUD. So as chairman of the Subcommittee on VA, HUD and Independent Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations, I would see these as constructive. We had a very difficult time in the House, because our allocation was much lower than in the Senate. But leadership, I think wisely, has allowed us to go in to this conference at the Senate's spending level, which still keeps us below last year's enacted level, keeps us within the caps and our overall discretionary spending level. And so if we are wise and we work together, I think we can resolve these issues by meeting the priorities that were discussed. And I think we will probably hear more on NASA, on HUD and National Science Foundation from other Members here. But I quite honestly could not agree more with the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Mollohan). The challenge is obviously getting everyone to agree on how much to increase spending in each of those areas, what the priorities are, without basically telling those Departments where the legislative branch wants to spend money. So I take the motion as constructive. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 2684) making appropriations for the Departments of Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development, and for sundry independent agencies, boards, commissions, corporations, and offices for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2000, and for other purposes, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank my chairman, the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Skeen), for yielding me the time and for the hard work that he has done on this very important bill. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to take the unusual step of opposing my chairman and also opposing this bill, a bill that I have spent a good deal of my time on this year trying to resolve some of the real issues in farm country. I am very disappointed with the way this bill came out. I am disappointed with the process. We had assurances all the way along through subcommittee and full committee and then going into conference that we would be able to address the dairy issue, but that was denied us. In fact, the conference never actually concluded its work. We did not have the opportunity even to offer amendments or to debate these critical issues. That is very disappointing, and it is very unusual. I hope we do not see a lot of this in the future. But more to the point than just the process are the issues. The absence of dairy legislation in this bill is going to hurt farmers all over the country. It may benefit two States, but it will definitely hurt over 40. Dairy farmers who work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, who never get a break, are going to lose money. It is estimated as much as $8,000 a family in my State. And believe me, I do not know a dairy farmer in my State on a regular size farm that is putting $8,000 in their pocket after a year of dairy farming. It just is not a cash-flow business. Disaster relief. My colleagues, I have no envy for what the Midwest has accomplished in this bill. I praise them. I admire them. I wish we could have done the same for farmers in the Northeast. But the fact is Midwestern farmers will receive $7.5 billion in disaster payments because they did not get the price they wanted for the crops. Our farmers in the Northeast had no crops. In fact, they have no topsoil because of drought and now flood. They will get pennies on the dollar, $1.2 billion for all the Northeast for weather-related disaster; and the Midwest gets $7.5 billion. That is not fair. It is not right. Sanctions reform. My colleagues wanted to open up new markets to the farmers so that we could sell our crops and get the price that we need. Would they rather open up and sell food to Iran and Iraq, where people are starving, or would they rather spend all of our taxpayers' dollars to give the farmers the price that they want through an artificial means? Let us open up our markets. But we did not do it. The dairy compact, which provides price stability, supported by consumers and farmers in the Northeast, we cannot have that anymore because this does not allow it to be extended. Mr. Speaker, the pricing option that the Secretary has promulgated is a presidential policy, this is the Clinton policy on dairy, helps two States and it harms 40. I do not get it. I mean, I thought these people were good politically down at the White House. This makes no sense. It hurts 40 States to benefit two. But we do not have to do that. There is another option, Option 1-A, that holds Minnesota and Wisconsin harmless and it helps the other States. But that is not available to us, either. So, Mr. Speaker, in conclusion, I thank the chairman for yielding me the time to speak against our own bill. I respect him highly. I regret that I have to oppose this bill, but I can take no other action. I urge my colleagues to voice their objection to the process and the policy by voting no on this bill.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment which would do even further damage to farmers across the Nation than the Option 1-B does. It ignores one of the most important benefits of the milk marketing order program, and that is to ensure a stable supply of locally produced milk. This is an important aspect of dairy policy since milk is very difficult to preserve over long periods of time, to ship over long distances, so the idea is to incent farmers in areas throughout the country where there is a need for Class I fresh fluid milk. Milk is very bulky, very expensive to ship long distances. Shipping milk over 1,000 miles would add approximately 30 cents a gallon to the cost, 25 percent of the average raw milk cost. Also, it is important to note that regions of the country with the lowest Class I milk differentials like the upper Midwest have the highest farm milk prices, so that while, when we look at the price that the farmer receives throughout the country, on paper, it looks like the Northeast, Southeast receive higher differentials, and they do. The actual mailbox price that the farmer receives is highest in the Midwest. So this would further skew the payment to the farmer and to the detriment of farmers throughout the country. So I would urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment, to stay with the base bill. It is a good approach to this issue. It has been demonstrated with the other amendments and the other votes we have had earlier today, there is strong support for H.R. 1402, and I would urge my colleagues to reject this amendment, stay with the main bill. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm), a member of the Committee on Agriculture.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I listened closely to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm), who I had the pleasure of serving with on the Committee on Agriculture when he chaired the Subcommittee on Livestock and Horticulture. He understands this issue as well as anyone does. He is right, the underlying bill does not benefit the rest of the country at the expense of the upper Midwest. This is basically a status quo bill that allows each section of the country to continue to garner the price for milk that they are receiving. I do not understand how we got to this point, quite frankly. Regionalism has always been an aspect of dairy policy, because the cost of making milk in one part of the country is different from the other, so we try to overlay a Federal policy, and the same policy affects everyone differently, so this regionalism has always been there. But what we have been reduced to this time around is that we have 48 States or at least 40 States being harmed to the benefit of two, if we do not accept the underlying bill. It makes no sense. It makes no sense at all. We have been interested in perhaps allowing compacts to be created. Thus far we have the Northeast compact, and no States have been allowed to join. The Southeast would like to form a compact, but that is not law. We hear this cry of cartels, that they are collaborating to fix prices and harm the consumer. That is not true. The idea is to keep the price down in those areas with the consumers involved making the decisions, as opposed to two or three or four large processing companies setting the price of milk in a region. The idea is to provide that there is a fresh supply of fluid milk so that all areas of the country can grow their own, produce their own, and have it available on a fresh basis. For years, for years the Northeast and the Southeast and West and Southwest suffered under a policy that allowed a small group, I refer to them as the Green Bay cabal, a small group of cheesemakers, to set the price. Every year we would get or every month we would get our farm report, and we would have to look to see what the MW price is to determine what the price of milk was going to be. I asked somebody, this MW price, how is it created? Well, it was created when a group of five or six cheese manufacturers got together for coffee and doughnuts in Green Bay, Wisconsin, once a month, and set the price. How fair is that? So the idea here is to make sure that each area of the country has their own supply of milk. I do not think this amendment helps it. I would urge my colleagues to support the underlying bill and reject this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York for yielding me the time and for the good work that he has done on this bill. This is a good bill, and it is a good rule. I have been listening to the debate; and with several few exceptions, all of the opponents to this rule and this bill has been from Minnesota and Wisconsin, the home of some of the finest dairy farmers in America and some of the best legislators in America. They are so good, they are trying to convince the rest of the country that we should lose at what they say is to the benefit of their farmers. Why would anyone pass a Federal dairy policy that hurts the rest of the country to try to prop up two States? As I understand it, this option 1(b) takes $200 million out of the pockets of dairy farmers all across the country and does not really help Minnesota or Wisconsin. Whereas, the option 1(a) that I support holds everyone harmless. Now, what is the sense of passing a reform that hurts 90 percent of the country when we could pass a reform that keeps everybody whole and in fact helps stabilize prices and ensures that there is a fresh supply of milk all across the country? It does not make sense.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I want to share with my colleagues today a significant honor for many of my Central New York neighbors and constituents who are parishioners at the Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church in Syracuse. My wife and I attend mass at Sacred Heart quite often and so we were happy and proud, as are so many others who worship in this neighborhood church on the west side of the city, to hear the recent news from the Vatican that the church will be designated, by order of Pope John Paul II, a Minor Basilica during a mass to be celebrated on October 3. To many in the parish, this important designation represents years of prayers and hard work by Father Peter W. Gleba, the rector and pastor, who put together the papers of application (all in Latin, I might add), and the long-time leadership of Monsignor Adolph Kantor, Msgr. Kantor is now retired, but he will be on hand at the Oct. 3 mass to present the homily. This designation, aside from the magnificent honor paid to the church and the parish, has a practical effect. A Basilica Chair will sit in the vicinity of the altar and should the Holy Father ever come to Central New York, he would say mass at Sacred Heart and use this very special chair. The designation also means that our Bishop from the Diocese of Syracuse will say mass at Sacred Heart at least once a year, in addition to regular liturgical events such as administering the sacrament of Confirmation. Significantly, there are only two other Basilicas in New York State, one in Tonawanda near Buffalo, and one in Brooklyn. This is the first such designation in the history of the Syracuse diocese. We who are so proud of and thankful for this designation also give thanks to Bishop James Moynihan and former Bishop O'Keefe for their encouragement and support. In closing, I would like to pay tribute also to former pastors, Father Rusin and Monsignor Piejda, both of whom formed a very close bond with the parishioners, many of whom over the years have been of Polish and Eastern European descent. This is a tremendous honor for Sacred Heart Church, and I would ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing their great joy and thanksgiving.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his comments and his cooperation and help on this matter and so many others as we proceeded through this bill.

Mr. WALSH. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

Mr. WALSH. I am, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, I will be brief. The Committee on the Budget has supported our 302(b) allocation and the provisions in the bill which kept us within that allocation. We do not believe, nor is there anything that would lead us to think, that there will be any sequestration of funds. Mr. Speaker, this is a good bill. There is no good reason to recommit it to the committee. The committee has worked its will. The House is prepared to vote. This bill contains the largest-ever increase in veterans medical care. It has the support of the American Legion, the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Military Order of the Purple Heart. Mr. Speaker, this bill strikes a delicate balance that keeps us within our allocation and it keeps us on track to produce a surplus that will benefit our country, helping us to save Social Security and Medicare, to reduce our debt, and to provide all American taxpayers with a well-deserved tax cut.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I would just like to conclude by suggesting that there are no further amendments. There is no further business before the body on this bill, other than the final amendment and the final passage vote. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the chairman for the way the Chair has conducted the debate today, and to all the staff who have worked so hard and put in all the hours to help us to get to this point, and to all the Members who participated in the debate. This is the tip of the iceberg, what we see here today. With all the work that has gone into this on the part of our constituents and our staffs and the Members, I think it is a good product. I am proud of the fact that we have gotten this far. I thank especially my colleague, the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Mollohan), the ranking member. I have learned a great deal from him through this process, not the least of which is about friendship, honor, and respect. I treasure that relationship and I thank him for his support along the way.

Mr. WALSH. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, this amendment, obviously, is a fairly important development in this bill and it takes the form of what most people would refer to as a rider, legislative rider. The consequences of the amendment are not clear, intended or unintended consequences. There just does not seem to be enough information available right now, at least for this Member, to make a determination as to whether or not this is a good idea or a bad idea, whether it helps or hurts the bill. I know some other Members have expressed some concerns about this; not any clear opposition to it but just concerns about what this will eventuate for EPA and for our communities. The gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kleczka) has shown some real sincere concern for his communities. I have been addressed by some of my communities about the fact that some of these regulations the EPA lays on the communities are expensive; it puts a huge burden on them and I understand those concerns. What I would ask, and I would be happy to yield time to the gentleman for debate purposes, to ask if he would consider withdrawing this amendment with the thought that as we go into conference there might be a way to address this issue in a less restrictive way, possibly some report language, something to that effect.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman would yield further, let me be brief because I know the gentleman is waiting to reclaim his time and it is precious. We have requested that report as soon as it may be available to us. We will share it with the gentlewoman and work through those issues with her.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I would pledge to the gentlewoman that we would make it a priority to work with her to make sure that the facts and figures on services and properties and everything within each individual VISN were provided for review to make sure that these assets are being dealt with and used wisely and in a proper way and, as I said earlier, providing staff to help to resolve some of the issues in VISN 3. I pledge that support to the gentlewoman.

Mr. WALSH

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?