Maxine Waters

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone).

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I respectfully offer this statement against the amendment offered by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran). Mr. Chairman, this amendment seeks to prohibit a taking of private property only when the taking's primary purpose is economic development, maybe for the parking lots he described. I am fearful that such an amendment would create a loophole for States and cities, allowing them to take property in a manner that is inconsistent with this Act, by arguing that the economic benefits of the taking were incidental rather than primary. Also, this amendment seeks to confine property owners to a 7-year period in which they must bring a suit under this Act. This means that an owner who has had his or her property taken better hope that the State or the city puts the property to use in 7 years. If a State or city takes property for a public purpose, sits on it for 8 years and then puts it to use for economic development, the owner has no recourse. Mr. Chairman, I do not think that you can argue that the statute of limitations is too long. These people, citizens buy their homes, and they expect to live in them for life. They do not expect someone to come along and say that we have decided that we are going to give it to someone else, a developer to develop for private purposes to make money on. So I would ask my colleagues to reject this amendment.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I support this amendment also. I am tired of poor people and working people having to go and find lawyers and pay them. Who can afford $250 and $300 an hour? The average poor person certainly cannot. So you are right, let us put it on the entity that is trying to pull these tricks in the first place to take these properties away from these citizens. So I support the amendment.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I respectfully offer this statement against the amendment offered by the gentleman from New York. Essentially, this amendment eliminates the teeth of this bill: the denial of Federal funds for 2 fiscal years to those States and cities that have violated this act. The denial of Federal economic development funds should serve as a real deterrent for those States and cities that want to exercise eminent domain for development, that is, the taking of private property for private use. Without this provision, this bill will not be taken seriously, and the eminent domain abuses that many in this country are complaining about will continue. I just waved before my colleagues a list of over 125 cases of the taking of private land for private use, or attempts to do that; and I think the bill that we have before us today will stop this kind of abuse of eminent domain.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. I respect the gentleman's request for yet another exception, but I oppose it. I think that the chairman and the framers of this legislation have been very responsible in the way that we have tried to advance a piece of legislation to protect the citizens of this Nation from a bad Supreme Court decision. A lot of people may be inconvenienced by our bill, people who want to acquire property, people who want to take private property for a development, people who want to make money, people who will use any means necessary by which to gain property that they think will help to bring them additional profits. There are a lot of reasons why people will be inconvenienced by this bill. The bottom line is we do not wish to continue to abuse and inconvenience, marginalize and deny property owners of this country. We feel that our number one responsibility is to the property owners. We are elected to represent our citizens in the best way possible. There is no better way to represent citizens than to say we stand with you in the ownership of the land that you have bought, that you have inherited, that you have invested in. We know a lot of people may not like it. It may inconvenience some people. You may not be able to build that parking lot, you may not be able to develop that shopping center, but we stand with the people against those kind of inconveniences. We ask for a ``no'' on the gentleman's amendment.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I would first like to thank Chairman Sensenbrenner for accepting the gentlewoman's amendment, and I would like to thank her for this very timely amendment. While we began to work on this simply because of the Supreme Court decision and the danger that American citizens' homes and lands were placed in with this decision, the gentlewoman is absolutely right: We have to take another step to protect those victims of Katrina. There has been a lot of discussion from homeowners and others who are observing what is going on and what could possibly happen, wondering if there are not schemes already going on that would deny these homeowners who have lost their homes the ability to hold on to that land, whether or not the speculators are cooking up schemes with those in local government even. So this amendment would protect the victims of Katrina, and they will be very grateful for this, and they will be very, very thankful that the gentlewoman provided the leadership in thinking about them as this legislation was winding its way through the government of the United States of America.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I claim time in opposition to the amendment.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I claimed this time to raise some concerns about the amendment offered by the gentleman from California. I believe the gentleman from California and the gentlewoman from Texas have a sincere interest in furthering this Nation's development of brownfields, land that is difficult to expand because of environmental contamination. However, I believe that such development is already protected under the bill. First, this bill will provide an exception for removing harmful uses of land provided such uses constitute an immediate threat to health and safety. If land truly constitutes a brownfield, then it meets this exception. Second, brownfields are often acquired by clearing title on, for example, old industrial property where ownership exchanged numerous times without proper recording. The bill creates an exception for clearing defective claims of title; and, again, brownfields would be protected. Brownfields are also protected under the abandoned property exception that is in the bill. Owners often abandon these properties to escape liability. I am confident that there are sufficient protections in this bill for brownfields in question if an additional exception needs to be created. We do not want cities to now use the brownfields label as an excuse to take private property and turn it over to a private business or developer. Worse yet, we do not want brownfields to become the modern- day blight exception. You can see that we have heard requests for any number of exceptions, and if we stayed on this floor for 24 hours or 48 hours, more Members, perhaps, could think of reasons why you should take private land for private use. I maintain that if you want to package land or you want to acquire land, you have to work within the marketplace to do it. You have to go out, you have to find the owners, you have to negotiate market rates, you ``have'' to convince people it is for good uses. You have to work. And you have to engage in order to acquire land. You cannot simply come up with every excuse that is convenient to mayors and city council members and to developers to take people's private land. If it is private, if it is owned, whether it is residence or business or ``vacant'' land, whatever, it belongs to somebody, somebody paid for it. They have a right to it. The government does not have the right to take it. And so I would simply be opposed to yet another request for an exception to this very good bill that is put forth to protect the citizens of the States. I commend the chairman and those of us on both sides of the aisle for stepping forward in the manner that we have in a timely fashion to say no. I have often criticized my friends on the opposite side of the aisle for accusing courts and the Supreme Court of creating law, of creating legislation. They did it on this one. They absolutely did. The Constitution simply says that you must compensate for the taking of land for public use. We are not opposed to eminent domain for public use. I question it from time to time, but that is not what this is all about. This is about the taking of private land for private use. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern) for his eloquent and very thorough evaluation and assessment of what is happening in Iraq. He has been an absolute stalwart in trying to help bring this Congress to its senses and this administration. And I am so pleased that he was here this evening to further share with the American public our very, very deep concerns and our very deep feelings. The gentleman's call for an end to this war, I think, is right on target. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) to further discuss not only her long-time involvement with trying to help frame a direction for this Nation, her long-time commitment to challenging this administration, about the way that it went into this war, and what has been happening since we have been in this war, all the work that she has done, the many nights that she has been on the floor, the resolution that she did so well on with this Congress.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I think the gentlewoman is absolutely correct. As a matter of fact, they do not even talk about Osama bin Laden anymore. I am absolutely outraged that we put money into Pakistan. We think we have a friend there, Musharraf; but we know that that border between Afghanistan and Pakistan is where we have al Qaeda, is where we have terrorists. We believe that is where Osama bin Laden is. I believe that he is being protected by those who we are trusting in Pakistan. I believe that we are not putting enough time and effort on that border where we have not only the terrorists and al Qaeda, but increasingly, the Taliban is rising again from the Afghanistan side of all of this. So we just have a misdirected administration who has messed up everything. They have created a crisis. Our young men and women are dying. We are spending American taxpayers' dollars. This money is going out of the window. We are not accomplishing anything. We are getting ripped off in more ways than one. Halliburton is making all of its money. They have been cheating us, and we have slapped them on the wrist, and we have let them go. We are sick and tired. Enough is enough, and I would like to say to the gentlewoman from California, if you have one last word in this 1 minute or so, please.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I come before the House this evening as one of the organizers of the Out of Iraq Caucus to talk about what we have done in that caucus, what we are attempting to continue to do, and where we feel we are at this point. We now have 69 Members who have signed up as part of the Out of Iraq Caucus. We have been meeting on a regular basis. We have had invited speakers and experts come to our caucus to talk about the war in Iraq, to talk about our image in the world as it relates to the war in Iraq, to talk about any number of subjects to help us try and guide this House and this Nation on this war. We think it is extremely important for the Members of Congress to be involved in this way because there are so many questions that are being raised by the American public about the war in Iraq. When we organized this caucus, we did not organize the caucus with the conclusion that we had to get out right now. We did not organize the caucus with the strategy to adopt an exit strategy or to try and force the administration to adopt an exit strategy. We did not organize the caucus around the idea that we should stay there for as long as it takes to train Iraqi soldiers and then exit. We simply organized the Out of Iraq Caucus because we all felt that we must get out of Iraq, and we did not try to say when. We did not even try to say how. We wanted to bring together the kind of discussion that would lead us to adopting the right kind of strategy, to provide some leadership to the Congress of the United States and to this administration. While we have been doing that, over 2,032 U.S. soldiers died while serving in Iraq as of November 2. In the month of October, 93 United States soldiers died in Iraq. October was the fourth deadliest month for U.S. soldiers since the war began on March 29, 2003, and the deadliest since January when 106 U.S. soldiers died. The second most violent month was November 2004, when Americans battled Sunni Arab rebels in Fallujah. The third most violent month was in April 2004, when U.S. soldiers fought militiamen loyal to the Shiite cleric in Najaf. More than 15,353 U.S. soldiers have been injured while serving in Iraq, and we are told there are over 404 amputees. The administration has allocated about $357 billion for military operations, reconstruction, embassy costs, and various foreign aid programs in Iraq and Afghanistan since the September 11 attacks. Of that $357 billion, $251 billion of that total has been for Iraq and about $82 billion for Afghanistan. Mr. Speaker, we are told, despite these casualties, despite these amputees, despite what appears to be our inability to get a handle on the insurgents and all of these roadside bombings, we are told that we are winning this war. As a matter of fact, the President rolled out May 1, 2003, on an aircraft carrier all decked out in the proper dress to accompany his speech and said ``mission accomplished.'' The American public has trusted that this administration knew what it was doing. They gave the administration the benefit of the doubt, even when Mr. Rumsfeld was being urged by people much more expert than he that we did not have enough troops on the ground in order to win the war. He insisted that he knew better what he was doing. He did not increase those numbers. The American public sees now that he did not know what he was talking about. The American public has stayed with this administration despite the fact that the President said that we were going to get enough money from the oil wells in Iraq to take care of rebuilding the infrastructure. That has not happened. The insurgents continue to blow up the oil wells. We have gotten no money from the oil in Iraq. The American people continue to try and trust the President of the United States, but the lack of getting a handle on these insurgents and the killing of our soldiers, the lack of getting any profits from the oil wells, the lack of being in control and getting a handle on what is going on in Iraq is causing the American people to move away from support for the President of the United States and this war. At first, the American public was saying, no, we do not like the way this administration has handled this war, but we think perhaps the President may be right. Perhaps we need to stay there until we have trained enough Iraqi soldiers to wind out of the war. But that does not appear to be happening. As a matter of fact, we keep getting muddled information about how many Iraqi soldiers have been trained. We have been told numbers that we cannot confirm. We have been told that it is just a matter of time before we will have trained enough of these soldiers to whom we can turn over the operations. We have had all of these different military operations. We started out with Operation Iraqi Freedom, which was the name of the entire Iraqi effort that began in March of 2003. At its height, we had over 300,000 troops in the region. Currently, we have about 139,000 U.S. soldiers in Iraq. We had Strike and Awe, which described the initial military action in the opening hours and days of the war. We have had Operation River Gate, which took place in the al Anbar Province near the Syrian border. American forces were trying to retake three towns from al Qaeda insurgents. Some 2,500 U.S. troops along with Iraqi forces participated in Operation River Gate. Then we had Operation Iron Fist, similar to Operation River Gate, which occurred shortly before Operation River Gate. Then we had Operation Lightning launched in early May 2005, to break the insurgency. Approximately 40,000 Iraqi troops and 10,000 U.S. soldiers were deployed in and around Baghdad. Then we had Operation Matador. Operation Matador was launched in the first weeks of May 2005, after U.S. intelligence showed insurgents had moved into the northern Jazirah Desert after the losses in the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi. Operation Spear began on June 17, 2005, with 1,000 Marines and Iraqi soldiers in western Iraq to hunt for insurgents and foreign fighters. Operation Spear took place in the Anbar province. The operation came one day after Air Force Brigadier General Don Alston called the Syrian border the worst problem in stemming the influx of foreign fighters to Iraq. Syria is under intense pressure from Washington and Baghdad to tighten control of its porous 380-mile border with Iraq. Yet we do not know whether or not the insurgents are really the Sunnis and al Qaeda inside Baghdad, inside Iraq, or really all of the insurgents coming from Syria. Operation Dagger. About 1,000 U.S. Marines and Iraqi troops, backed by fighter jets and tanks, launched a second offensive Saturday against insurgents operating in restive Anbar province. That was called Operation Dagger. Operation Dagger aims to uncover insurgent training camps and weapons caches in the southern part of the Lake Tharthar area in central Iraq, 85 kilometers northwest of Baghdad. And now, Operation Sword. Operation Sword included about 1,000 U.S. Marine soldiers and sailors from Regimental Combat Team-2, as well as about 100 Iraqi soldiers. It was the fifth operation launched in late spring, early summer 2005, designed to pressure insurgents in the country's expansive and restive Anbar province west of Baghdad. We are not in control of what is happening with this war that we launched because there were supposedly weapons of mass destruction. We are losing our soldiers. We are not getting Iraqi soldiers trained. The President of the United States said we may be there for the next 10 years. The American people have had enough. I believe that those of us who are working in the Out of Iraq Caucus have had enough. It is time for us to review what we are doing. It is time for us to call on this President to tell the American people when and how we are going to get out, and we cannot accept that we will be there until hell freezes over if that is what it takes. We cannot accept that all of these operations have not worked. We cannot accept that we cannot find a way to stop these roadside bombings. We cannot accept that we are bleeding the American taxpayer dollars with over $1 billion a week being spent in Iraq and over $1 billion a month being spent in Afghanistan. So we come here tonight to challenge the President and this administration. Mr. Speaker, I am going to yield to my colleagues who have come here to discuss this very, very serious matter with us. First, my good friend and colleague, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) for her commitment, for her hard work, and for her sincere desire to provide leadership for this Congress to bring our troops home. Mr. Speaker, you have heard from two of our hardest workers this evening about the war in Iraq. You have heard their assessments. You have listened to their advice. I think it is important for us all to understand that not only have we gone into this war under false pretenses, having the American people believe that there were weapons of mass destruction when, in fact, there are no weapons of mass destruction. We have gone into this war with this administration making the American people believe that somehow Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 9/11 attacks when that certainly is not true. And al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden who have been determined to be responsible are still not contained, have not been apprehended. The idea that somehow we must stay in Iraq because it is going to make us safer is the kind of argument that the American people just will not accept any more. As a matter of fact, I think the American people understand we are less safe because we are in Iraq. We are less safe because we have created a breeding ground for the training and development of these insurgents. We are less safe. While the President talks about homeland security, it takes but a natural disaster to help Americans know that really we do not have a handle on homeland security at all. If, in fact, we can witness what happened to us as a result of Katrina, if we understand that not only were we not able to handle a disaster despite the fact we have this huge bureaucracy of homeland security under FEMA, and with all of that people were left stranded without food, without water, still we do not have a handle on how to get those people into temporary housing, let alone permanent housing. So people have to be suspicious about what would happen to us in the event of a terrorist attack, and people have to wonder why are we putting all of this money and all of this effort into Iraq when the folks who were responsible for 9/11 still have not been apprehended. People have to wonder what is it about this relationship with Saudi Arabia, when we know that the perpetrators of 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia, trained in the madrassas of our so-called friends, trained by the royal family's money that helped them to learn to hate the United States of America, yet we wrap our arms around them, we call them our friends. And after the 9/11 attack we went to their aid, and the members of that royal family that was in the United States of America, we picked them up one by one. We had airplanes dispatched across this country. We put them on those airplanes when Americans could not get on airplanes. When airplanes were grounded, when the Vice President of the United States could not get an airplane, we picked up the Saudis, we put them on the airplanes. We protected them, and we got them out of here. We did not know whether or not they were tied to those that were responsible to 9/11. We did not understand how the funding of some of the so-called nonprofit operations were really funds that were going into terrorist operations. We did not do an investigation. We did nothing but pick them up, protect them, and send them on their way. And we talk about homeland security. Give me a break. We cannot trust that this administration can secure the homeland and certainly we are spending the taxpayers dollars, billions of dollars, billions of dollars in Iraq when perhaps we do need that money in our ports. We need those monies in our airports. We need those monies with helping to fund the first responders. I have been holding emergency preparedness town halls all over my district. What do the first responders tell us? They do not have enough money. They do not have enough resources. They do not have the communication systems by which in the event of an attack that the various first responders can communicate with each other just as they did not have it in New Orleans. So this effort that has been put forth by this administration is not a good one. Not only did they not plan well for the war, they never had an exit strategy going in. They never knew how they were going to get out. The headiness of Mr. Rumsfeld with his shock and awe campaign that led people to believe that somehow we were going to bomb people into submission, make people think that somehow we were protecting them from terrorism, that we were making this country safer, somehow because of the might of the bombs and the sophisticated artillery that somehow we were going to make Americans believe everything was all right. At the moment the President declared ``mission accomplished,'' the insurgents said, now let the war begin. And, guess what? They do not have the sophisticated technology that we have. They do not have the resources that we have. But you know what? They are wreaking havoc on us and our soldiers. They are killing our young people. As it was said by some of my colleagues, it is all right to say we will be there for as long as it takes. But whose children are we talking about? Whose young people are we sending into war, a timeless war, when we cannot tell the American people how we are going to get out of it, where we never had a plan to get out of it? Whose children are dying? The American people are fed up with this war. They have trusted this President and this administration long enough. Mr. President, it is time to bring our soldiers home. It is time to get out of Iraq. The President consistently tells the American people that we will stand down when the Iraqis are ready to stand up. However, there is little evidence that the Iraqis are ready to take over their security responsibilities. In July, the House Armed Services Committee ranking member, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), told us that he believed there were only about 5,000 trained Iraqis, even though the Bush administration claims to have trained 170,000. General John P. Abizaid, who leads the U.S. Central Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in September that a single Iraqi battalion was at level one combat readiness, meaning it was capable of taking the lead in combat without support from coalition forces. During the same testimony, General George W. Casey, Jr., who oversees U.S. forces in Iraq, said the number of level one battalions had dropped from three to one since June. We cannot even get the right information, and that is why the Senate Democrats will take the action that they took. They had to go into closed session. They had to confront the Republicans in the Senate about the so-called investigations, about going on to phase two, to try and get information about what happened with our intelligence community. What did we know and when did we know it and what did we do about it? You cannot hide this information forever. The tactics of this administration, misleading, not giving out all of the information, distorting information, will come to an end; and the retaliation against those who speak out is being unveiled now in a way that is causing the indictments and more to come. The fact of the matter is this administration attempted to punish Ambassador Wilson by outing his wife, Valerie Plame. These tactics of distortion, intimidation, misleading information, rolling out Republican relations campaigns, all of this must come to an end. Americans cannot stand to be misdirected. Americans can stand no longer to be told mistruths. Americans can no longer take from their President and this administration that kind of treatment. So we stand here tonight to say again and again, enough is enough. We have got to bring an end to this war. We have got to redirect our resources back to the people of this Nation. The war in Iraq has cost us almost $3 billion so far. The funding would provide much-needed resources for Americans here at home for the money that we are sending in Iraq. Let me just give you some idea what could have been provided: Health care for 46,458,000,805 people. Health care could have been provided for the amount of money that we are spending. 3,545,016,000 elementary schoolteachers could have been paid for. 27,93,000,473 Head Start places for children. 120,351,991,000 children's health care could have been paid for. We could have built 1,841,000,833 affordable housing units. We could have built another 24,000,072 new elementary schools. On and on. 39,000,665,748 scholarships for university students. 4,000,000,699 public safety officers or 3,204,000, 265 port container inspectors. I could go on and on. The American people deserve to have their tax dollars spent not only to protect and secure us but to provide universal comprehensive health care. It is unconscionable to talk about we are going to be confronted with a pandemic but we do not have enough medicine. We do not have enough resources. We do not have enough hospitals. We do not know how we are going to take care of people in the event of a pandemic. It is unconscionable to talk about how in the event of a pandemic so many people are going to be at risk, to anticipate that so many people are going to die. It is unconscionable to talk about you cannot pay for Katrina or Rita or any of these disasters that are confronting us unless we go back into the budget and reconcile and cut the budget deeper and deeper and deeper and do all of this while we continue to give a tax break to the richest people in America. We are sick and tired of these policies that do not make good sense. We are sick and tired of the direction that is keeping us at war while we are hurting and undermining the people of this Nation. We are sick and tired of public policy that does not make good sense. I am pleased that my colleague said this evening at the beginning of their discussions, we support our soldiers. Do not forget it was really this side of the aisle who forced the issue of protective gear for our soldiers when we discovered that, with all of the talk from Mr. Rumsfeld about we had enough soldiers and they had everything they needed, and we discovered that they were over there with spit and glue, literally trying to build protection, literally trying to figure out ways by which to stop the bullets. It was this side of the aisle that forced getting more money. And we will continue to do that because we do respect, we do support our soldiers. We love them. That is why we want them home. We want them out of harm's way. We cannot tell them why they are there. We cannot tell them why they are losing their lives. Many of those young men and women went there because they are patriotic. They believed their President. They went there because they thought they were doing something good for their country, only to discover that they were misled, that there are no answers. Many of them went there because they were looking for a way out. They were looking for ways by which to provide for their families. They were jobless in America, in the rural communities, in the inner cities. We have not done right by our young men and women. We have not done right by them. We have neither provided them with the security and the protection that they need to serve in this war, nor have we respected their right to have the answers to the questions that they are raising. I would like to at this time have a colloquy with my dear friend from California who has worked so hard on this issue. Do you believe that if we bring our soldiers home that we will be taking the kind of action that will not only bring resources back to this country that could be spent domestically, but in the final analysis, we are taking them out of harm's way because if they stay there there will be more and more deaths, and we still will not be able to contain what perhaps is going to be a civil war anyway between the Shiites, the Sunnis and the Kurds?

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) for yielding me the time and for the job he has done to shape this legislation. I would like to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Oxley) for the tremendous cooperation and the leadership that has been shown that helped to get bipartisan support for this legislation. When it left our committee, it was a good bill. It was a bill that even some people who had not wanted to support it went along with, because in the final analysis, it was going to bring about reform of the GSEs. Now, some of us know that there is a need for reform with the GSEs. We are concerned. We do not want them carrying debt that is not shown, that we do not understand, because we do not want these humongous general services enterprises to somehow get in trouble and we have to bail them out the way we did with the S&Ls. So despite the fact that we think there was an effort by some on the opposite side of the aisle to basically deal with the some of the arguments of the banks and savings and loans about the GSEs being too big, getting too retail, basically taking over their markets, we support reform; and we voted for the bill because we support reform. Because of the vision of the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), we were able to do something for working people and for poor people by creating this very, very special arrangement that could be used for the production and preservation of low-income affordable housing, this kind of set aside. It would be the after-tax profit from these GSEs that will be used to produce low-income housing. And so despite the fact that for years there has been kind of a confrontation between the GSEs and the banks and S&Ls about market share and all of that, we thought it made good sense to make sure that the GSEs were not too big, carrying too much debt. So this reform is good. But what is absolutely mind-boggling about what has happened, from the time the bill left committee until the time it has reached the floor today, is this politicizing of the fund by some of those on the opposite side of the aisle who never supported this fund for low- and moderate-income housing to begin with. What did they do? After the bill left committee, they decided that they were going to try to put some unconstitutional boundaries on nonprofits, and I guess profit-making organizations alike, that would not allow them to participate in the production of low- and moderate- income housing no matter what the need, no matter what the crisis, if, in fact, they exercised their constitutional rights to assist people and lead people in doing voter registration. That is so unbelievable because, number one, it is unconstitutional. It is absolutely unconstitutional. This government has shown that it indeed supports reaching out to the citizens of this country to encourage them to be involved in voting and participating in this democracy. We have the Motor Voter Act, which says motor vehicle departments all over the country, when people register their vehicles, encourage them to vote; give them voter regulation slips; do whatever you can to get them involved in the political process. We are on record with doing that. And now to have those Members from the opposite side of the aisle say that you cannot produce low-income housing if you exercise your constitutional right by helping people to get registered to vote is absolutely mind-boggling. And let me tell you what is even more mind- boggling about this. We know that we have gone through some terrible, terrible times recently here in this country, down in Florida, where there were databases that were developed of people supposedly who had been incarcerated and committed felonies that were supposedly not allowed to vote. But it turned out to be fraudulent databases. We have had attempts to stop people and discourage them from voting by having uniformed officers question them when they come into the polling place. I would think that they would not want to continue with that kind of reputation. I will not vote for this bill no matter how much it is needed, as long as the constitutional rights are violated.

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, yesterday we reached a tragic milestone. Staff Sergeant George T. Alexander, Jr., of Texas, died from wounds he sustained while serving in Iraq. His death brought the U.S. death toll in Iraq to 2,000 soldiers. In addition to that, over 15,000 soldiers have been wounded, and over 400 are now amputees. My thoughts and prayers are with Staff Sergeant Alexander's family, and with all the families that have lost a loved one in Iraq. However, I hope the administration will use this milestone as an opportunity to be honest, to square with the American people about why we are fighting in Iraq, and to develop a stronger plan that will secure Iraq and conclude our involvement the war. Mr. Speaker, it is often said that to govern is to make choices. When it comes to the Iraq War, President Bush has made the wrong choices. Instead of putting the entire resources of the United States behind the efforts to find those responsible for the September 11th terrorist attacks, the President chose to use those tragic events as an excuse to go to war in Iraq. Where is Osama bin Laden? Have we stopped looking for him? We have invaded Iraq. We have the shock and awe campaign. Thousands of Iraqis are dead, and now 2,000 of our soldiers are dead. We have left Iraq, and Baghdad in particular, in shambles. We have appropriated money for the reconstruction of Iraq, and we told the American people that we would basically pay for the major reconstruction with the proceeds from the oil that we would pump in Iraq. None of this is true; no weapons of mass destruction, no money coming from the oil fields in Iraq, no rehabilitation having been done. The insurgents not only are bombing all of the different sites in Iraq, they are killing schoolteachers. We have created a breeding ground for terrorists. Oh, we claim they are coming from Syria. We claim that Iran has a hand in it. What is interesting now is Condoleezza Rice is telling us that we are going to get Iran to help us with Iraq. At the same time, Iran is developing and making more sophisticated its nuclear ability, but now we are going to try and join in with them to help us with Iraq? With this business of trying to make the American people believe that all of the insurgents are coming from Syria, we have created a new bogeyman for the people to focus on. But that is not all about this terrorism, in this fight against terrorism. It seems to me that the President of the United States finds occasions by which he comes to the American public and he tells us that we have to be worried about a new terrorist threat. Every now and then he reminds us that the terrorists are still out there, and somehow we have to stay in Iraq. If we do not, we are going to be vulnerable to all of these terrorists. But if we stay the course, not only is he going to help keep us safe, no matter how many sacrifices we have to make, the right thing to do is to stay the course. Mr. Speaker, that is easy to talk about and say when you are talking about somebody else's children. The President chose to go to war based on false and misleading intelligence. Look where it has gotten us. Look at the scandals surrounding the White House today because we tried to make the intelligence fit the decision that had already been made to go to war. We are finding, and I guess we will know soon, once the indictments come down, who leaked the information about Valerie Plame and outed her because they were so mad at her husband, who had been sent to Niger to help put the story together that somehow Saddam Hussein had been seeking yellowcake in Niger. When Mr. Wilson came back and said it was not true, then they went after Mr. Wilson. Somehow the Vice President's office knows all about this. Mr. Speaker, it is time to bring our soldiers home. It is time for Republicans and Democrats alike to understand that we do not need to lose another American soldier in Iraq. He chose to go to war without international support or heed the warnings of those in Congress that urged him to slow the march to war. The President chose to send our soldiers to war without the body armor and armored vehicles necessary to keep our soldiers safe. And, he chose to go to war without an adequate number of troops or a clear plan for how to succeed in Iraq. For those decisions, American soldiers are paying the price--and for 2,000 soldiers they have paid the ultimate price. It is time that the President recognizes the dangers of ``staying the course'' and develops a plan that accomplishes our mission in Iraq and allows all our soldiers to return to their families. Madam Speaker, over the past several weeks, members of the Republican Caucus have been trying to cut the Federal budget by $50 billion. They claim that it is to help pay for the rebuilding efforts in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and Rita. Perhaps most shocking, the Republicans are trying to cut hundreds of millions of dollars from the Department of Veterans Affairs. If the Republicans are successful in their efforts to cut discretionary funding by 2 percent, the VA's budget will be cut by more than $600 million which translates to nearly 100,000 fewer veterans receiving health care this year. It is heartless and cruel to cut the VA's budget in order to make room for more tax cuts for the wealthiest of Americans, while 159,000 U.S. soldiers are fighting in Iraq and tens of thousands more are deployed throughout the world. I urge my colleagues to oppose these cuts and urge the American people to call their representatives and tell them to oppose these cuts. Our soldiers and their families have sacrificed too much for us to turn our backs on them when they return home. Madam Speaker, I close by thanking our soldiers for their service and pray for their safe return.

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I find it rather embarrassing to have to come to the floor of the Congress of the United States to protect the constitutional rights of the citizens of this country when, in fact, that is what we were all elected for, to make sure that this democracy works. I am opposed to this rule, and I cannot believe that my colleagues on the opposite side of the aisle would jeopardize the opportunity for us to provide housing for people who are victims of these hurricanes that have hit this country because they have interjected politics into this bill. This is absolutely outrageous. There is nothing in this bill that would allow any nonprofit or profit-making organization who wished to produce housing for low- and moderate-income people to use this money for any political activity. It is not fair. My colleagues are making it up, and it is absolutely outrageous. As a matter of fact, we were so concerned about making sure that everybody had an opportunity to provide housing, to produce housing, we put in an amendment that would make sure that this money would not go to one or two big organizations; that it would be available in rural communities; it would be available to the faith-based communities; it would be available all over this country to small- and medium-sized organizations, not just a few large ones. So we have been very democratic. We know that there are some people on the opposite side of the aisle that did not like the idea of providing funds for low- and moderate-income housing; but we also know, because of the leadership of some people on the other side of the aisle who understood the homelessness and the crisis that we have in America, lack of housing, the low-income people, that they were able to prevail, and we came out with a good bill. Do not get up here and fuss and talk about closed rule, modified rule, manager's amendment. It has nothing to do with that. My colleagues either want to provide low-income housing and not put politics in it and prevent people from exercising their constitutional rights or they do not want anything for anybody.

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, a little over a month ago, the gulf coast region was struck with one of the worst natural disasters ever to fall upon this country, Hurricane Katrina followed by Hurricane Rita. In its wake, Katrina left hundreds of thousands of homes destroyed, over 1 million citizens displaced, and countless families separated. Madam Speaker, after the hurricane, hundreds of thousands of people were forced into churches, armories, hotels, community centers, Red Cross-managed shelters, the Cajun Dome, the Superdome, the Astrodome and on and on and on. Almost 5 weeks after Katrina, more than 100,000 people are still living in shelters, over 442,000 more in hotels, 4,600 on cruise ships, and untold others are camping out. Now, certainly shelters are a short-term solution. None of us can be satisfied with what we have accomplished to date. We are failing to manage a credible program to house these hurricane victims. We can do better than that. We in the Congress of the United States as public policy-makers have a responsibility to these victims to provide swift and targeted resources in order to assist in the reconstruction of homes, communities, and cities. Today, we have three Katrina-related housing bills on the suspension calendar. None of them are adequate to do what needs to be done to get people out of shelters, to get people into viable temporary housing, or to rebuild the housing that has been lost in the gulf region. H.R. 3894 provides temporary waivers for several bureaucratic provisions within the section 8 housing program, but it does nothing in the way of adding new vouchers or addressing the immediate need for housing construction in the affected areas; nor does this bill attempt to address the existing affordable housing crisis in other parts of the country, especially those cities providing shelter for the evacuees. Madam Speaker, instead of providing additional resources to programs which we know work and which we know have the infrastructure to provide immediate relief and assistance to those most in need, we have again left the door open for another blank check to be written by FEMA. This bill is a bill that would allow for an expedited process within the section 8 housing program. It will waive several requirements for what have been described as cumbersome roadblocks to housing section 8 voucher holders, such as income verification, tenant contributions, and initial inspections. These things are helping, and of course, I am going to support the bill; but what I am really concerned about is all of those persons who were on the waiting list for vouchers, who are already eligible, even if they are given some temporary assistance from FEMA, even if they got it for 18 months, what happens then. They still need housing. They still are, what, on the waiting list? It is all right to waive some of these bureaucratic rules, but this is the time that we should be thinking about what we can do about homelessness. That is not even addressed here. This simply says, if you had a section 8 voucher, we will replace it and we will make it a little bit easier for you. It does not talk about the homeless people who were not even in the system, nor does it talk about those who are on the waiting list. There is an article that I would like to just read verbatim because I think it describes the mess that we are in; and while I do this, I am not placing blame on my friends on the opposite side of the aisle. Even though I am very concerned that we were so slow in getting to the floor with even this legislation that does not do a lot, I am really concerned that we did not take this as an opportunity to really deal with the housing crisis in the gulf as it is a housing crisis all over the country. This is an article that I am just going to read because I think it sums it up very well: ``Housing Promises to Evacuees Have Fallen Short.'' It is a Washington Post article that was written just a few days ago, 10/2/2005, by Spencer S. Hsu and Elizabeth Williamson: ``Red Cross to Halt Hotel Stipends in 2 weeks, and Hundreds of Shelters Have Closed.'' Well, what is important about this is the President of the United States said he wanted everybody out of the shelters by October 15. That deadline is not going to be met. ``Two weeks before President Bush's mid-October goal for moving Hurricane Katrina victims out of shelters, more than 100,000 people still reside in such makeshift housing, and 400,000 more are in hotel rooms costing up to $100 a night. Housing options promised by the Federal Government a month ago have largely failed to materialize. Cruise ships and trailer parks have so far proved in large part to be unworkable, while an American Red Cross program, paid for by the Federal Government that allows storm victims to stay in motels or hotels is scheduled to expire October 15. ``It is projected to cost the Federal Emergency Management Agency as much as $168 million. Federal officials are struggling to launch an alternative interim housing program that would give families whose homes are destroyed or uninhabitable a lump sum of $2,358 in rental assistance, or $786 a month for 3 months, with the possibility of a 15- month extension. ``So far, 330,000 families have signed up for the housing assistance. But if evacuees have to use those stipends to pay for hotel rooms when FEMA stops covering such lodging, the funds will not last long. Last week, the number of evacuees in hotels increased from 220,000 to more than 400,000 people in 140,000 rooms. Many have no idea what they will do when the program ends in 2 weeks.'' No idea. And they talk about this one man, whose case I am just going to read from this article: ``Ronnie Ashworth, a truck driver from Chalmette, Louisiana, east of New Orleans, currently lives at the Baton Rouge Marriott. If no other housing is forthcoming after October 15, `I'll be sleeping in the back of my truck,' Ashworth, 60, said. `I have no funds right now.' ``Red Cross spokeswoman Carrie Martin said, `We're administering the hotel program with the expectation that it ends on October 15. After that, we'll still have shelters open, but we definitely don't want to move backwards.' Meanwhile, more than 100,000 people remain in about 1,000 shelters operated by the Red Cross, smaller charities and churches, scattered across two dozen States as far flung as New York and Washington.'' I am going to discontinue reading this article because I think my colleagues get the picture, and I think we are all desirous of doing something substantial. But how long has it taken us to get to the floor with this minimal response to the housing problems of the victims of Hurricane Katrina and now Rita? Madam Speaker, I think we can do better than this, and we should be on this floor today not only talking about vouchers simply for those who held vouchers before; but we should be talking about those people who were waiting for vouchers. We should be talking about how we are going to build permanent low- and moderate-income housing. Right now we are failing. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, I, too, join with my colleague and the ranking member of our Financial Services Committee in commending those on the opposite side of the aisle who really do have the providing of housing for low- and moderate-income persons on the top of their priorities. And while I commend them because they have always shown an interest in doing this, I think we are all to be criticized for how slow this process is in dealing with the victims of Katrina and Rita. We have just got to be able to move faster than we are moving. And while, again, today what we do in replacing those vouchers is a good thing, I am still worried about the fact that there are so many people who needed housing even before Katrina and who are going to be left out there to receive whatever resources are available from FEMA, but they will be back in the same situation they were in before, still without adequate housing, still, I suppose, on some kind of a waiting list and still among those in the United States of America without decent and adequate housing for themselves and their families. Let me just say, as I raise the question about us being slow and not doing enough, one may ask what could have been done in this period of time. Well, by now we should have an assessment of all of those buildings, all of those apartment buildings, all of those homes, many of which are considered dilapidated, sitting everywhere from Baton Rouge to Alexandria to New Iberia, on into Texas and other places where we could have created a program by which to provide resources to bring these houses and units up to code in order to create more housing. There are a lot of such homes, a lot of such units. Do not forget, many of the areas that we are dealing with were in deep housing crisis before Hurricane Katrina. While I am very respectful of the fact that FEMA moved people to Utah, California and New Jersey, what I am hearing is people do not want to be in New Jersey and in California and other places. They want to be near their homes; they want to be near their home cities and their home towns. I think that we could by now have done an assessment of all of those properties that could be rehabilitated, some of which are owned by individuals, others owned by corporations, and put together a program for rehabbing and rehabilitation and bringing them back online in order to make them available. We should also be about the business of converting warehouses into lofts and moderate-income housing. And even in some of the factory areas that are closed down, dilapidated, boarded up throughout the South, there are opportunities for the creation of housing. And there are many nonprofit, low-income and moderate-income developers who are waiting for an opportunity to be of help. I think we could have done more. While I am going to vote for this bill, I do not pat myself on the back, nor do I pat the Members from the other side of the aisle on the back. I know they may be confronted with an administration that says it does not want to spend any money, but I must say that our citizens do not want to hear that the President or this administration does not want to spend money to deal with this housing crisis created by a natural disaster at a time when we are dumping billions of dollars into war, into Iraq, into Afghanistan. Our citizens are disappointed that we are not doing better than we are doing. Madam Speaker, I include for the Record the complete article that I read a portion of titled, ``Housing Promises Made to Evacuees Have Fallen Short.'' [From the Washington Post, Oct. 2, 2005] Housing Promises Made to Evacuees Have Fallen Short (by Spencer S. Hsu and Elizabeth Williamson) Red Cross to Halt Hotel Stipends in 2 Weeks, and Hundreds of Shelters Have Closed Two weeks before President Bush's mid-October goal for moving Hurricane Katrina victims out of shelters, more than 100,000 people still reside in such makeshift housing, and 400,000 more are in hotel rooms costing up to $100 a night. Housing options promised by the federal government a month ago have largely failed to materialize. Cruise ships and trailer parks have so far proved in large part to be unworkable, while an American Red Cross program--paid for by the federal government--that allows storm victims to stay in motels or hotels is scheduled to expire Oct. 15. It is projected to cost the Federal Emergency Management Agency as much as $168 million. Federal officials are struggling to launch an alternative interim housing program that would give families whose homes are destroyed or uninhabitable a lump sum of $2,358 in rental assistance, or $786 a month for three months, with the possibility of a 15-month extension. So far, 330,000 families have signed up for the housing assistance. But if evacuees have to use those stipends to pay for hotel rooms when FEMA stops covering such lodging, the funds will not last long. Last week, the number of evacuees in hotels increased from 220,000 to more than 400,000 people, in 140,000 rooms. Many have no idea what they--will do when the program ends in two weeks. Ronnie Ashworth, a truck driver from Chalmette, La., east of New Orleans, currently lives at the Baton Rouge Marriott. If no other housing is forthcoming after Oct. 15, ``I'll be sleeping in the back of my truck,'' Ashworth, 60, said. ``I have no funds right now.'' Red Cross spokeswoman Carrie Martin said, ``We're administering the hotel program with the expectation that it ends on October 15th. . . . After that, we'll still have shelters open, but we definitely don't want to move backwards.'' Meanwhile, more than 100,000 people remain in about 1,000 shelters operated by the Red Cross, smaller charities and churches, scattered across two dozen states as far-flung as New York and Washington. The Red Cross has said it will keep its shelters open for as long as necessary, but many are in churches and public buildings that are needed for their primary functions. Hundreds of shelters have closed over the past two weeks, and many of their occupants, the Red Cross said, appear to be moving into hotels, in hopes of benefiting from the hotel program in its final days. In search of temporary housing immediately after the hurricane, FEMA officials went on a $1.5 billion spending spree, buying out entire dealerships of recreational vehicles and signing contracts for more than $500 million with one manufacturer of mobile homes. But the plan to create ``cities'' of 500 to 600 RVs across the South has run into major logistical and political problems. In FEMA lots in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas, several thousand trailers stand empty, waiting for the agency to navigate land leases, zoning laws, local opposition and policy questions. ``We have 12,000 mobile homes with no place to put them,'' said Rosemarie Hunter, a FEMA spokeswoman in Baton Rouge. To date, only 1,396 trailers in Louisiana house displaced people. About 1,100 are occupied by workers engaged in New Orleans's recovery effort, and 173 house families left homeless by the storm. Policymakers say that warehousing tens of thousands of people in trailer park communities until New Orleans and other cities are rebuilt could lead to the creation of dysfunctional ``FEMAvilles,'' as residents of past encampments have called them. Democrats go further, warning that they may become known as ``Bushvilles,'' just as Depression-era shantytowns were called ``Hoovervilles.'' Refugee Council USA, which includes nine U.S. resettlement agencies that have integrated 2.5 million global refugees into the United States since 1975, said storm victims would be better off getting on with their lives--finding housing, jobs and counseling services in new communities rather than waiting indefinitely for homes to be rebuilt. FEMA officials agree. Evacuees, said FEMA spokesman Eugene Kinerney, ``need to consider long- term housing in areas where there is available rental stock and prospects for employment to take care of other needs, such as food.'' But some civic and political leaders worry that the alternative--resettling storm victims--will lead many to stay permanently in their host communities, fundamentally changing the nature and politics of Louisiana and possibly beyond. FEMA initially estimated that the homes of 300,000 families were destroyed by Katrina and that 200,000 of them will need government help with housing but said only time would reveal the true scope of need. The lack of an effective strategy to manage the largest displaced population of Americans in at least 60 years has touched off a furious policy debate. ``The big picture is . . . everyone who has some scheme for how people should live is now living vicariously through the opportunity New Orleans offers'' of a blank slate, said Ronald D. Utt, senior researcher at the Heritage Foundation. ``All this push and pull is happening, and all of which can be lumped in with some notion of social engineering.'' Policy think tanks from the Brookings Institution on the left to Heritage on the right have criticized FEMA for relying on trailers as it traditionally does for hurricane victims, saying Katrina's scale overwhelms that solution. By contrast, they say vouchers provide more choices to individuals, reduce the need for building public housing and take advantage of existing housing stock. In a joint statement last week, Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) criticized how long it took the Bush administration to implement its voucher program. ``It wasn't until nearly one month after the disaster struck that the Bush Administration finally announced it would begin to provide rent payments to families displaced by the storm,'' as Democrats urged, they said. Under the FEMA housing assistance plan, families that remain eligible can get as much as 18 months of cash assistance for a maximum of $14,148, but the money would count against a cap of $26,200 per family that Congress has set for FEMA to give in cash, rental assistance and home repairs. Even before FEMA announced the program, Sen. Paul S. Sarbanes (D-Md.) pushed a plan through the Senate last month to provide $3.5 billion in housing vouchers to 350,000 Katrina-displaced families. On Friday, Sarbanes called on Bush to transfer control of housing assistance from FEMA to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. ``The scope of this disaster calls for changes in how we think about disaster assistance,'' Sarbanes wrote the White House. ``Hundreds of thousands of people may need housing assistance for 18 months or even longer. We cannot rely on FEMA, an emergency response agency, to provide on-going housing assistance to this large number of families,'' he said, citing HUD's ``experience, staff and infrastructure.''

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. WATERS

Ms. WATERS. Madam Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, today we stand here in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, considering uses for the community development block grant to address the housing and infrastructure crisis wrought upon us by Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita. Madam Speaker, it is ironic because it was not more than a few months ago that I stood with my colleagues, opposed to the administration's attempt to block grant CDBG to the States and to move CDBG and 17 other programs to the Commerce Department. I am so pleased that did not happen. Today, based upon the proven merits of this program, based on the effectiveness and consistency of a statutory mission, based on the need to quickly and effectively provide relief, the administration is now looking to CDBG, and I support that. H.R. 3896 attempts to make two major temporary changes to the community development block grant. H.R. 3896 seeks to weigh the public services cap, which is currently set at 15 percent, and which I support, that is, with a caveat, and H.R. 3896 seeks to waive the requirement for public hearings concerning the use of CDBG funds, and I am concerned about that. Madam Speaker, at the core of CDBG is its original statutory goal to develop viable urban communities by providing decent housing and suitable living environments and the expansion of economic opportunities, principally for persons of low and moderate income. When I traveled to Baton Rouge and New Orleans, I toured the devastation, the homelessness and the desperation that had been created by this disaster. This hurricane certainly exacerbated the poverty and lack of education, lack of economic opportunity that has plagued New Orleans and surrounding areas throughout the gulf, specifically the African-American population. This hurricane has shown a virtual spotlight on problems that are emblematic of inner cities all across this country. I spoke to people about their needs and their hopes for their immediate future. The one thing that was consistent, the one thing that was unchanging, was the determination of people to return home. Madam Speaker, community development block grant is a proven program that provides critical infrastructure resources, and it is a program that can help Katrina victims in their stated goal of returning home. CDBG is one of the best mechanisms that we can employ to help in the reconstruction of the gulf region, because it puts money in the hands of the community and the city government, and they know what to do with it. Furthermore, it is directed to rebuild critical infrastructure, which is a step or step one in reestablishing community. But, again, that amounts at best to flexibility and at worse a little more than a legislative process, exercise. H.R. 3896 provides no additional resources to the directly affected areas. Rather, this bill simply creates programmatic waivers which will allow flexibility but not expansion. Let me just say this: We all agree at this critical moment that CDBG is a great program. Many of us have thought to expand CDBG, because it is such a great program. This program helps large cities, small towns, communities, not only to repair its infrastructure but to provide services that cannot be provided in any other way because there are no other resources to provide these services. My colleague from Louisiana just identified a number of those services, helping people with down payment, helping with child care, helping with other programs. I would have hoped that we could have expanded this program. We could deal with the identified needs, not only of New Orleans but the other parishes and the surrounding communities and with Mississippi, Gulfport, and Alabama, but because CDBG is proven to be able to help move whole cities and communities from communities and cities where they have disproportionate poverty that they have no resources to deal with. I am pleased that we have it here today so that we can lift the cap, and they will have a little bit more flexibility. Ladies and gentlemen, I want this to be a lesson for us, a lesson for us all, that we should not only fight to maintain CDBG in HUD and not transfer it out to Department of Commerce, where we would get people who do not know what to do with it, do not know how to administer it and would only mess it up; but that we would expand it so that we would have the resources to deal with housing crises, because this is a great program to deal with housing needs in every city and every town across this country that is eligible for it. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), our ranking member, to further support CDBG.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.