C. Young

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, I make the following announcement: that it is our intention if this unanimous consent request is agreed to that the Committee will reconvene and will continue working on this bill until 1 o'clock in the morning. However, any votes will be rolled until tomorrow. We would convene at 9 o'clock tomorrow morning and, hopefully, be able to finish this bill by 4 or 5 o'clock in the afternoon and be able to adjourn for the weekend. So I just use the time to make that announcement. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I would like to announce to the membership that the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan) will make a motion to rise. The Committee will not be rising for the evening, it will be for the purpose of appointing conferees on the defense appropriations bill. Then we will go back into the committee and go back to the consideration of the foreign operations bill. The intent is to work as late as we can this evening. The gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and I have been working diligently to come to an agreement that we will be able to get the House adjourned at least no later than 5 o'clock tomorrow, having completed the foreign operations bill. So we will tend to this business, then come back to the foreign operations bill, get through as much of it as we can this evening, and try to finish it tomorrow before 5 o'clock so Members can make their plans for the weekend.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 4576) making appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2001, and for other purposes, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time I may consume. Mr. Speaker, an earlier speaker had mentioned that this bill was $2 billion over the original House bill. I think there was a mistake in addition or subtraction. Because the House bill that we passed on March 30 was $12.7 billion. This conference report is $11.2 billion. So that is less than the House-passed bill. Now, that is unusual because normally when we come back from conference we have a bill that is much larger than either the House or the Senate. Now, there is one reason that this bill might appear to be higher is because of a provision that sets aside $4 billion to be used exclusively to pay down on the national debt. If we add that $4 billion, then, of course, the number gets higher. But that $4 billion is not spent. It is reserved and it is set aside to pay down the debt.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time for closing.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico (Mrs. Wilson).

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, this conference report deals with the military construction appropriations bill. The conference report contains two parts, one is the conference report on the military construction appropriation bill, as I said, and the other part is the conference report on the supplemental for the Defense Department and other items that were passed on March 30 in the House of Representatives. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hobson), the very distinguished chairman of the Subcommittee on Military Construction, to explain what is in that part of the bill. (Mr. HOBSON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Foreign Operations, Export Financing and Related Programs.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the previous order of the House, I call up the conference report on the bill (H.R. 4425) making appropriations for military construction, family housing, and base realignment and closure for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2001, and for other purposes.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute. (Mr. YOUNG of Florida asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, the gentleman is correct. There was some adjustment on that issue, yes. Mr. Speaker, I ask our Members to support this conference report and move it on to the other body. Before I yield back my time, I want to thank the principals who worked so hard in making this bill as good a bill as it is today. It is a good bill. There are some things that Members want that did not get in there. There were some things that I had in the original bill that were of importance to my State that are not in the bill tonight. And quite a few of us have had that experience. But it is a good bill, and it is a clean bill. I want to compliment the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hobson), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Military Construction, and the ranking member, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Olver), who worked diligently to get the military construction section of this bill concluded in a very expeditious manner; and the gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis), the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula), the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan), the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers), the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha); and then my colleague, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), who is the ranking member on the full committee. I must tell my colleagues that it has been a difficult procedure. But we have worked together. We have had some strong differences of opinion, and we have worked them out. There are still some areas where the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) is not satisfied and where I am not satisfied, but this is as good a bill as we could produce for this supplemental. I want to pay tribute, also, to the many members of our staff, subcommittee staff and the full committee staff, who worked many, many long and hard hours to help us put together the mechanical parts of this bill. To do the adding and subtracting has been a tremendous effort. Mr. Speaker, I ask for a yes vote on the conference report. At this point in the Record I would like to insert a table providing the details of the conference agreement. [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.043 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.044 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.045 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.046 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.047 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.048 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH29JN00.049

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from Oklahoma.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on the conference report to accompany H.R. 4425 and that I may include tabular and extraneous material.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me. The purpose of the unanimous consent is to expedite the business of this House. We passed in this body the supplemental on the 30th day of March, and it has been hanging out there now until today. It has been a work in progress. We have been working diligently to cover every possible issue that we could with a limitation on the amount of money available. Now, here is the problem, and here is why we need to expedite this. We are recessing for the 4th of July recess. The Army, as well as the other services, has the biggest problem because its money for the fourth quarter has been spent in Kosovo and other deployments. It is essential that this money be replaced before the Army has to stop driving its trucks or the Navy has to tie up its ships or the Air Force and the Marine Corps have to stop flying their airplanes. It is essential that we move this conference report through the House tonight in order for the Senate to take it up tomorrow before we all get home for our 4th of July activities. That is the reason that we are trying to expedite this through a unanimous consent request. Now, there probably will be some parts of this bill that someone does not like, but that is always the case. We need to move this conference agreement. I hope that no one will object to us taking it up so we can debate it and move it on to the Senate.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order at any time on or before the legislative day of Friday, June 30, 2000, to consider the conference report to accompany H.R. 4425; that all points of order against the conference report and against its consideration be waived; that the conference report be considered as read when called up; and that H. Res. 540 be laid on the table.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for yielding to me. I thank the gentleman for his question. As he knows, the House did pass this bill with the agricultural interests included in March, and it has taken us this long to reach some kind of a conclusion with the other body. We are prepared with a bill, a supplemental bill that has been scaled down somewhat. But I would say to the gentleman from Wisconsin, he is exactly correct. We have to move the supplemental as early as possible. The money has already been spent for the Defense Department in Kosovo and other parts of the world. So it is essential that we move the supplemental quickly. I would say to the gentleman, in response to his question, that I agree with his interpretation. I agree with his intent. There are agricultural matters of interest that were in the supplemental that are of great interest to the State of Florida. We do intend to make sure that we meet those obligations as we go through the further process.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, on tomorrow, the House will consider the Energy and Water Development appropriations bill. As was done for prior appropriations bills, we will be trying to develop a unanimous consent request that identifies the complete universe of amendments with time agreements on them. Previously, we had not attempted this until we were halfway through the consideration of the bill. There was proper criticism that debate on early amendments was unconstrained, but that debate on later amendments was constrained. In order to treat everyone the same, we are seeing if we can make an agreement at the beginning of consideration of this bill tomorrow. To do this will mean that we will need to know the universe of amendments on the Energy and Water Development bill prior to tomorrow. Therefore, I am asking all Members who may have an amendment to this bill to please file it at the desk and have it printed in the Record by the end of today. Also, if all Members who have amendments could contact the staff on the energy and water development subcommittee with a suggested time for debate on their amendments, we would be able to develop a unanimous consent with the necessary input. I would appreciate the cooperation of all Members in this regard. I thank the Chair.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I want to say that the gentleman from Wisconsin who offered this amendment in my opinion is one of the rising stars of this House and has spoken a philosophy that I have shared ever since I came to this Congress. But I must say that just passing the bills in the House is only the first step. There are many steps in appropriating for this government. Appropriations must pass through the subcommittees, the full committee, and the House of Representatives. But then we have the Senate, which is the next activity, and then we have the conference committees between the House and the Senate, and then we have the negotiations between the Congress and the President of the United States; and then, in all of these negotiations, there must be some flexibility. The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), a while ago gave an example. Let me repeat that. If the House should reduce a particular airplane program by $1 billion, and that $1 billion goes into the lock box; and if the Senate reduces a shipbuilding program, well, the Senate does not reduce shipbuilding programs, let me use another example, some other example in the defense bill by $1 billion, that is $2 billion that goes into the lock box. But when you go to conference, there is negotiating in order to get the House and the Senate to come to the same numbers on the same issues. This amendment, unfortunately, takes away the flexibility that is needed in order to reach these accommodations. Now, if this were a unicameral legislature, only one House, I would say amen to this amendment without any hesitation, because philosophically, I do agree with this. However, we are not unicameral; we are a bicameral legislature, and we do have to have those negotiations. This amendment, in my opinion, would put the Members of the House at a serious disadvantage with our colleagues in the other body. Now, when we get to conference, as I said, there must be considerable negotiations, and oftentimes, Members will approach the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations or one of our subcommittees and say, well, hey, can you add this for me when you get to conference. My friend from California said that the appropriators spend the money. Well, let me tell my colleagues who really spends the money here. Our colleagues in this House of Representatives have requested of the Committee on Appropriations, for fiscal year 2000, over 22,000 projects. So the spending is done by Members of the House and Members of the other body, and they have the right to do this. That is why Members are elected to the Congress, to represent their districts, the interests of their districts, or to represent their philosophical viewpoints. So from a philosophical standpoint, I could not agree more with the gentleman from Wisconsin, but there is a better approach. The gentleman from Pennsylvania earlier this year offered an amendment that I accepted as chairman of the committee, because it set aside a specific amount of appropriated money to go into debt reduction. I am for debt reduction; and I think it is essential that we reduce the debt as rapidly as we possibly can. That amendment by the gentleman from Pennsylvania was something we could work with. But the pending amendment makes the process very unworkable, and I would hope that the Members would reject it.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I first want to congratulate the chairman of the subcommittee and ranking member of the subcommittee for having produced a bill under difficult, severe limitations and to compliment them on the manager's amendment that will be offered to solve some of the problems that were created by the first bill. I rise at this time since the distinguished ranking member has raised the issue of the Capitol Police. We should be very proud of all of our Capitol Police officers. They are very well-trained. They are certainly dedicated to their mission here in the Capitol. But one of the concerns that I have and the Congress has had is the fact that we could bring our Capitol Police force into a more modern age. There is technology available that would make them far more effective than they are today. Congress has provided additional funding to do this. But the previous management of the Capitol Police force, for some reason, just decided not to go ahead and move into the state- of-the-art technology. I think that is a mistake. Just adding more people does not necessarily get the job done if we do not provide the technology that they need to do their job. To give my colleagues an example of what I am talking about, with this bill that we will pass today, there will be 1,241 members of the Capitol Police force. This is a substantial number, but they do have a substantial obligation and responsibility. But compare that to some other cities in the United States. Nashville Davidson, with a population of 510,000 people, has only 38 more sworn police officers than our Capitol Police force. Portland, Oregon, with 503,000 people, only has 962 sworn police officers, compared to our 1,241. Ft. Worth, Texas, with a population of 491,000, has less sworn officers than the Capitol Police force. In my area in Florida, the City of Tampa, which is an extremely large city, has only 916 sworn police officers. These cities tend to get the job done, but most of them have taken advantage of the new technology that we have been trying to get the management of our Capitol Police to employ. And they have not done that yet. The amendment that the managers will offer today will help improve the funding available for our Capitol Police force, and I think that is good. I am a very strong advocate and supporter of that manager's amendment. But I must say that I think, once again, we should be reminding those who administer and manage our Capitol Police force, not the police officers themselves but those in supervisory positions, ought to take advantage of the funding that we have made available for new technology that makes the job easier for those who wear the uniform and guard this Capitol of ours.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I have listened attentively to this discussion between the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey), and I would like to suggest that the complaint that we have used too much time on this bill and the two previous bills is valid. We have used too much time on the bill. But I would offer to my friend from Wisconsin that the vast majority of that time was consumed by your side and most of the rhetoric was pure political rhetoric. Now, we have been very accommodating. We have allowed the debate to go on and on and on on amendments that were truly in violation of the rule and that were subject to a point of order. We did not raise the point of order. We reserved the point of order so you could continue the debate. We have been very accommodating. We have now had an offer for an hour's debate on the Waxman amendment. We have already debated that amendment twice this week. We do not need an hour on that amendment. I suggested 30 minutes, and then the response was, well, 46 minutes. That is nitpicking. Thirty minutes is more than enough on a subject that has already been debated twice. Now, if we can reach an accommodation and if we can reach an agreement that is going to be fair to both sides, then I will agree to it. But if we do not, I will object to it and we will just continue the dialogue for however long it takes. But what is fair is fair. What is fair to that side has got to be fair to my side. And that is the way it is going to be. And if we cannot get a fair agreement, there will be no agreement.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the gentleman would explain in a little more detail about the potential time limits on amendments for tomorrow and Monday? That seemed to be a little vague there.

Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, when does the gentleman plan to propound his unanimous consent request?