Don Young

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the H.R. 4635, the Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2004 Part III is the continuation of the highway construction and highway safety transit, motor carrier, and surface transportation research programs for an additional 10 months beyond the end of fiscal year 2003. This is the fourth extension of the Transportation Equity Act of the 21st Century, which expired on September 30, 2003. In September 2003, we extended these programs for 5 months until February 29, 2004. Since then, we have passed two subsequent 2-month extensions, STEA 2004, parts 1 and 2, and are now facing the expiration of the current extension on June 30. This extension will continue highway transit and highway safety programs for one more month until July 31, 2004. It is the hope of the conferees that H.R. 3550, the 6-year service transportation reauthorization bill, that we will complete conference before the extension expires. H.R. 4635 authorizes almost $27 billion in contract authority to the States to continue the core Federal aid highway program. This bill also authorizes $6 billion to continued grants to transit agencies around the country and other programs of the Federal Transit Administration. It authorizes $306 million for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration for State grants to enforce safety regulation on our Nation's highways and to continue safety inspections at our border with Mexico. And, finally, the bill authorizes $249 million to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for highway safety grants, occupant protection grants, and impaired driving countermeasure grants. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Simmons amendment. I thank my friend from Connecticut for bringing this important amendment to the floor. This amendment will maintain the integrity of the Coast Guard as a distinct entity within the Department of Homeland Security. Section 888 of the Homeland Security Act states that the Coast Guard shall be maintained intact with all of the service's authorities, functions, and capabilities. The Coast Guard has submitted a plan for its research, development, test and evaluation activities for fiscal year 2005 which will concentrate on the development of strategies and resources aimed to improve the service's ability to perform its traditional missions. The Coast Guard's traditional missions include search and rescue, drug and migrant interdiction, marine environmental protection, ice operations and aids to navigation. It is imperative that we maintain the Coast Guard's ability to perform these important traditional missions in addition to the service's homeland security mission. I am concerned that the transfer of research and development funds to the Department will be the first step down a slippery slope that will forever change the Coast Guard's abilities to balance its resources and personnel to carry out its many and varied missions. We must protect the multi-mission nature of the Coast Guard. We should provide funding for Coast Guard research, development, test and evaluation directly to the service in the same manner that we provide all other Coast Guard funds. This is what the law demands and this is the right thing to do. I urge my fellow members to support the Simmons amendment.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to oppose the amendments offered by my colleagues from New York. The amendments that they have offered would significantly increase the likelihood a terrorist incident occurring outside of a major metropolitan area will have disastrous effects. This funding is not solely intended for security to prevent a terror attack, but also for preparedness, in case an event happens. Terrorism can happen anywhere. That is why we must be prepared everywhere. Allocating these funds solely on the risk of terror is just robbing Peter to pay Paul. Large cities and metropolitan areas will be safe and prepared, but nobody else will. We have heard a parade of members that would benefit from a risk of terrorism only allocation. If this allocation basis is adopted, and a terrorist attacks your community, what will you tell them, I'm sorry we weren't prepared, but it's okay, because a few big cities are? Providing for a State minimum allocation is the only way to ensure that every community is prepared. I urge all of my colleagues to think very carefully before supporting these amendments, and to think about what such an allocation would mean if they do not represent a large metropolitan area or have significant critical infrastructure. Most members of this body do not, and therefore most members' districts will not be prepared under this scheme. The Transportation Committee has put forward a proposal that does not require this false choice, between providing for national preparedness and providing preparedness for a select few. When this proposal is considered during the normal legislative process, I urge my colleagues to support this alternative, which prepares everyone for terror attacks. Oppose these amendments that leave most communities unprepared for terror attacks.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I am ashamed of my friend from Ohio. I told him earlier today that he did not even have the courtesy to talk to me about this amendment which affects my State, affects my people. You want to protect American jobs, and you have put 15,000 people out of work since 1980. We had the greatest industry in the State gone to waste because of the environmental community. I am asking for enough timber left, and 4 percent of the total Tongass is all that is available, so I can retain three sawmills to employ about 160 people total with good-paying jobs. And this is not a subsidized forest any more. We pay for these roads. We paid for the activity in the Tongass when we had the bid. That is part of the bid. But this is an easy, cheap vote for somebody from Ohio, somebody who does not know squat about the people of Alaska, and I am disappointed. You are better than that. Announcement by the Chairman Pro Tempore

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I will do the best I can. I have been here long enough to know when I am out of line; but when I am out of line, I am right. In 1980, most of you were not here. The gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks) was here. We made an agreement. We said we could have logging in the Tongass. That was an agreement made by the environmentalists, made by those who proposed it; and we lost, as I said, over the years, 15,000 jobs. Members talk about outsourcing, Members talk about losing American jobs. What we are doing on this floor by the gentleman's amendment is taking the jobs away from the American people that live in this great Nation and this great State. I am asking my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this amendment. It is ill thought, ill conceived and wrong totally. Where it came from I know. I am ashamed that somebody got in bed with those that advocated over the years of putting us out of business, the people. This is not about big timber. They are all gone. These are local people that need that timber to maintain those jobs, to make sure we have a different economy in southeast Alaska. So I am asking my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this ill conceived, ill thought and very rude amendment.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 3550) to authorize funds for Federal-aid highways, highway safety programs, and transit programs, 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 Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I recognize this motion to recommit is one I support. It is a motion that will I think make the bill's purposes be specifically spelled out. And I would suggest that what the gentleman, the ranking member, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) said, this is a working instrument, bipartisan, by all Members of both sides of the aisle who have worked very long and hard to arrive at a decision and passed a bill which we believe is a very good piece of legislation. But we requested going to conference. It is because of the differences, as usual, between the Senate and the House, as it should be. It is my hope, with the cooperation we have had in the past, we will be able to talk to the Senate and convince them that we are in the right position at the right time. I will say, everybody knows where we came from, to begin with, it is a considerable amount of more money than passed the House. The Senate does have more money in the bill, and it is now our job to try to reach a decision to do what is best for this great Nation of ours in our infrastructure. I have to stress that, and infrastructure is the key to our economy. Infrastructure is what makes all other things work in this legislative body. Without good transportation, we are unable to provide the monies for Medicare, Medicaid, prescription drugs, border patrol, Social Security, all those good things we talked about. The only thing that drives that is infrastructure that makes people and product move. So we believe that we have a good piece of legislation. On the House side, it passed overwhelmingly, the largest single vote that any Congress has ever voted on a transportation bill. It was done in this House. We had less negative votes than any other time. And, again, we passed it over to the Senate. They rejected it. We rejected what they sent us, and now it is up to us to ask for this conference. I am hoping that the Senate and House Members will work together, collectively, and we will arrive at a very rapid solution to this very, very important issue to this great Nation. Again, I want to stress to Members that may be watching in their offices is this is a friendly motion to instruct, one which I support; and if there is a vote, and I expect to ask for a vote, I will ask for a yes vote. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I yield what time he may consume to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. LaTourette), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings and Emergency Management, a member of the conference.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I have no other speakers at this time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments the gentleman has made, and he knows this has been a joint effort. The gentleman has worked well with us, and I can assure him that we are on the same page; and as we go to conference, there will be some differences of opinion, but I think if we stand shoulder to shoulder, our policy will prevail. Now our problem is to try to get the money to take and implement that policy, and that is going to be our responsibility, and I think we can do it. I am very positive about it. I always have been, always will be because it is the right thing to do, and we will continue our efforts; and I thank the gentleman for his comments.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to pay tribute to the men and women in blue who have given the ultimate sacrifice. Every year, thousands of law enforcement officers from all corners of our Nation come together to hold a candlelight vigil at the National Law Enforcement Officers' Memorial at Judiciary Square. Spouses, children and even those who just want to say thank you come together to honor the over 16,000 heroes whose names have been inscribed on that marble wall. These heroes are law enforcement officers who lost their lives in the line of duty. Today, I pay my respects to these heroes and to share the sorrow as we remember and honor them for their unselfish commitment to protect and serve. We honor their lives and all they have done to make our streets a safer place for us to live. Last year, 145 law enforcement officers gave their lives in the line of duty. Today, I would like to recognize and honor a fellow Alaskan: Officer John Patrick Watson, who gave his life Christmas Evening, 2003 while responding to a possible domestic dispute call. Officer Watson, an eighteen-year veteran of the force and resident of Kenai, Alaska was shot to death with his own weapon, allegedly by one of the individuals on whose welfare he was checking. Officer Watson is the first member of the Kenai Police Department to lose his life in the line of duty but his loss was not in vain. He will be remembered for his commitment to his job, his friends and most of all his family. He along with the other fallen members of the law enforcement community share a special bond with one another. They will be regarded as heroes, a bond they will share for eternity. It is only fitting that we celebrate their lives not for the way they died, but for the way they lived. Officer John Patrick Watson went to work on Christmas Day as a hero and that is the way he will always be remembered. I pray for his wife Kathy, his daughter, six stepchildren and his family in Michigan. Officer Watson is a true Alaskan Hero.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker. I rise today to introduce H. Res. 618, a resolution commemorating the 101st anniversary of Jack London's inspirational novel, The Call of the Wild. Originally published in installments from June 20th to July 18th 1903, The Call of the Wild is considered a uniquely American narrative, recounting the trials and tribulations surrounding the Klondike Gold Rush of the Yukon Territory in Canada, which impacted the District of Alaska and Washington State during the 1890s. This classic of world literature contributed to the spirit of exploration and discovery that swept the United States in the early part of the last century and led many others to explore what is now the great State of Alaska. One of the most widely translated and published works by an American author; The Call of the Wild has not been out-of-print in the past century. Born John Griffith London in 1876 in San Francisco, California, the author began working during his adolescent years at various labor- intensive jobs, which included pirating for oysters on the San Francisco Bay, and serving on a fish patrol to capture poachers. It was his strong desire to escape the prospect of adult life as a factory worker that motivated him to begin his career as a writer. A restless spirit and strong sense of adventure led Jack to leave his native California in 1897, with his brother-in-law, James Shepard, to join the Klondike Gold Rush. His experiences that winter spent in a cabin by the Klondike river provided much of the rich material for his most well renowned novels, The Call of the Wild and White Fang, both of which became inspirations for full-length feature films. He went on to produce over fifty volumes of work in his lifetime, which included novels, short stories, and political essays. His literary portrayals of adventure and frontier life, unparalleled in their time, helped mark him as a truly great American author and seminal figure in turn-of-the century social history. The Call of the Wild, which remains London's most celebrated work, tells a story through the eyes of Buck the dog, half St. Bernard, half Scotch Shepard. Captured from his comfortable life on an estate in California's Santa Clara Valley, he is sold to dog traders who ship him north to the Klondike to serve as a sled puller. Surrounded by inexperienced and cruel masters, Buck must learn to survive the realities of the harsh winter. The Call of the Wild is a tale of travel, transformation, and adaptation, filled with Darwinian undertones of survival and written in a naturalistic style that London is so often praised for. As a young child, my father read this moving novel to me on many occasions. Filled with recollections of adventure and exploration, I too, as a young man left my home in California to explore a world full of budding possibilities. These notions led me to a land less discovered, the Last Frontier, the State of Alaska. What I found when I arrived there was an untold potential for greatness for the land and its people, an inspiring setting for leadership and representation. Had it not been for the spirit of Jack London's experiences that he eloquently shared with the world--and me--in The Call of the Wild, I might never have journeyed to this great state that I have called home for more than 47 years and have had the great honor to represent, here in Washington, for the past 31 years.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I yield the other body 1 minute.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his remarks. Let us move forward. Let us try to legislate. Let us do our job. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Petri), the chairman of the subcommittee, who has done an outstanding job traveling across this country explaining our bill.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I hope everybody that is standing around will listen for a few moments as a matter of courtesy, because I have to refer back to one of the former speakers from New Jersey who said we had plenty of time on this bill, and we should have done better. I can tell my colleagues, we have done everything we could possibly do, because we had to really write three different bills, which is very difficult to do, because the numbers kept changing and kept floating. But every time we had to change, the staffs on both sides, on this side and that side, majority and minority, had to go back and rewrite most of the legislation each time. So at this time I would like to acknowledge not just the work of the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Lipinski) and the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Petri), but those who really did the work: Levon Boyagian, Graham Hill, Jim Tyman, Joyce Rose, Mike Lamm, Sharon Barkeloo, Melissa Theriault, and Ryan Young. He is not my son, either; he is no relation. Also, Debbie Gephardt, not the daughter of the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), either; Patrick Mullane on the gentleman from Wisconsin's (Mr. Petri) staff. They were the real behind-the- organization workers. Also my chief of staff, Lloyd Jones; Liz Megginson; Charlie Ziegler; Mark Zachares; and Fraser Verrusio, Debbie Callis and John Bressler. I would also like to thank the minority staff. I can tell my colleagues with sincerity that the minority staff, because the majority staff would come to me and say, the minority staff is not working with us; and the minority would say the majority staff is not working with us but, in the long run, we all got together and solved, I think, a lot of very serious, contentious problems and philosophies and where this bill was headed. I also want to thank David Heymsfeld, Ward McCarrager, Clyde Woodall, Ken House, Katherine Donnelly, and Art Chan. On the staff of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Lipinski), Jason Tai. There are many others, and would I like to thank all of the members of this committee that worked with me and have stood by me; and those that object to provisions in this bill, they have my assurance that I am going to try to make sure that we solve those problems in conference. I have been one that does not weaken very easily when it comes to working with the other body. And if we stand shoulder to shoulder, I think we can solve those problems that have been brought to the floor. We hope to do so. I am confident we can. Again, I am extremely grateful for those who put all the time in, 4 o'clock in the morning, 5 o'clock in the morning, and back here, like today, at 9 o'clock in the morning. This is a large legislative package, and we could not have done it without the hard work and dedication of professional people, I want to stress that, professional people; and for that, I extend my sincerest thanks. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Again, we are about to close this very long 2 days. We will have a series of three votes: the Bradley amendment vote, the Kennedy amendment vote, the Isakson amendment vote, and motion to recommit, and then final passage. Again, I can suggest to most of the Members of this House that this has been a long, trying time, but one which I take great pride in. Regardless of what my colleagues read in the two rag sheets in this body, and they are constantly reporting and trying to divide this House, to try to pit one against the other in different fashions, we have overcome that and I think have come out with a very good piece of bipartisan legislation. Yes, there are some that do not agree with it, and I understand that. But overall, if we believe in the national transportation system, and I want to stress, the national transportation system, H.R. 3550, the $275 billion does not completely do the job, but it is the nearest thing we can do at this time. I will say right up front, a motion to recommit is very attractive, but it should not be done because it does break the budget against the budget resolution that passed the House; and it does, in fact, send a message to the Senate, but it does not accomplish the goals that I am trying to achieve, and that is to pass legislation so we can make a step forward, a step forward to the progress that is necessary to get our country moving, to keep this country moving, to make sure our people and our products move. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that during further consideration of H.R. 3550 in the Committee of the Whole, a period of further general debate contemplated in a previous order of the House of March 30, 2004, may be in order before the conclusion of the consideration of the bill for amendment.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, yes, that is correct.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that in the engrossment of the bill, H.R. 3550, the Clerk be authorized to correct section numbers, punctuation, and cross references, and to make such other necessary technical and conforming changes as may be necessary to reflect the actions of the House.

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska

Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.