yeah two bills that we have to complete today it's going to take a long time so i'd appreciate every member's cooperation mr lewis is chairman before we begin this morning i want to send our congratulations i think the whole body's congratulations to john howard otherwise known as how he and his wife jean gave birth to their baby boy last wednesday night how he is a fantastic young man who has worked in the comedy front office for both for all of our chairman young for myself and for david obi well he's not with us i just thought you all should know about  their grand event today mr chairman my colleagues i do plan to try to be brief for we likely have a full day ahead of us with the consideration of two very important bills first let me recognize the fine work of both mr holder and his ranking member mr latham in preparing the third appropriations bill before us as well as our full committee chairman david obey and his ranking member mr t hard and repairing labor at the members have probably noticed a trend has emerged where bills are written at the subcommittee level in largely a bipartisan fashion if there is apprehension expressed by republican members it level of comedy is a good dissing for both the committee and the house and it ought to be encouraged unfortunately that spirit of bipartisanship rarely extends itself to the full committee hearing room or the as for last week's full committee markup there are some hearing where is my phone last week's full committee markup provides a case in point our chairman is known for encouraging our members to be on time and yet last week  seven p m markup was delayed by more than forty five minutes as democratic members corralled into in a separate meeting room i guess had some pretty clear instructions as to how the process how to go forward the result of that pre market meeting like so many others that preceded this year and this year was striking and i believe sad one more time we had a full committee markup where nearly every recorded amendment vote regardless of the  the issue at hand reflected a partisan divide that has now come to define define this committee even the schedule today has been the result of really essentially strategy or political maneuvering with a contentious bill being placed at the very end of a very long and arduous week when perhaps the chairman feels members may be worn down and out so that limited participation will take place well i think the chairman of my colleagues will find that we are not going to stand idly by while this committee continues to spend spend and spend without regard for the taxpayer or our nation's financial crises it is not my intention to dry out this committee meeting longer than necessary however given this closed rule process by which appropriations bills this year have been is that commitment consider on the house floor this committee is now the only place where members on both sides of the aisle can have their concerns heard therefore it is my intention to let our members exercise it's a right to fully represent their constituents through amendments to both of these bills i didn't  morning to talk only process for the members on both sides know how very strongly i feel about the highly partisan process that now governs the consideration of our spending bills however i did want to share a couple of noteworthy conclusions drawn from the recent congressional budget office c b o's long term budget outlook study first the current recession has proven homeport it is to get and keep america's economy on track united states is in a period of high unemployment negative economic growth and trillion dollar deficits adding to our trillion dollar deficits as we are doing with these spending bills will not put america's economy on a sustainable path just the opposite is true nor will these deficits be tolerated by the public our constituents as rising deficits will lead to rising interest rates and put even greater pressure on small business working families and our overall economy second the obama administration and the majority leadership are now poised to make the budget situation far worse with proposals for a new expensive federal programs such as national health care but let us not forget that the government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take away from somebody while many policy goals may seem important in isolation they must still be paid for in the broader context of the entire budget this is yet one more reason why congress must confront america's budget situation openly and honestly before passing policies that would make this situation even worse recent study ought to be required reading for every american it's disingenuous at best and economically debilitating at worst for this committee and this congress to spend as if there is no tomorrow while claiming to care about fiscal responsibility in closing the bills under consideration by the full committee today represent ten tenth's and eleven twelve annual spending bills this is apt there's absolutely no reason why these remaining bills cannot be considered on the house under open rules there's also absolutely no reason why we could not have taken care of these bills earlier in this week instead of pushing us through the day except for strategic purposes i would remind our colleagues that in two zero zero five each and every appropriations bill was considered under an open rule and the house completed them by june thirtieth we could complete our work far more i could respond by making a political speech of my own but i won't we've got too much work to do i will simply make one observation i find it strange indeed we accepted in full committee twenty four republican amendments the most recent republican a member of the we said was that of the gentleman from ohio mr specifically on the minority do you know david allison and dog and on the majority side david laura lisa alex jeanine andrew and blair my own staff are on th subcommittee there's been many late nights putting this bill together and we would not be here today without their dedication there's been close communication and coordination between minority and majority staff throughout this process and the bill is better for that output recognizing that today may be long and since i'm sure everyone has used the last three days to read the bill i will amazed and keep my remarks s this is a nonpartisan bill that invests in our nation's infrastructure during a transformational period for both the department of transportation in the department of housing and urban development it provides one hundred twenty three billion dollars in total budgetary resources fifty three million below the president's budget request and within the allocation given to our subcommittee by the chairman without hud this bill recognizes that foreclosure rate excuse me within this bill recognizes that foreclosure rates remain high and the current economic climate and weak job market have increased demand for affordable housing for that reason this bill provides forty seven billion and targets most of the one point six billion increase to programs that the previous administration repeatedly attempted to cut or zero out and  not kept up with the need in contrast transportation is a budget in flux largely covering programs that are in transition with major samford service and aviation authorizations pending the billings include seventy five point eight billion in transportation infrastructure investments one point six six billion below the president's request last i want to note that in supporting the  maintain services in rural communities supporting vulnerable populations for investing in the national infrastructure and five ensuring the safety france were taken in conclusion we worked hard to balance many competing needs to produce a bill that reflects the bar partisan needs of transportation and housing i ask for the full committee's favorable consideration so we can move this bill to the floor thank you mis want to thank john doing an outstanding job his leadership and the spirit of partnership on this bill i really appreciate the opportunity to work with him on the issues on transportation and housing one of the quirks in the appropriation committee is a fact that i had never served on a subcommittee and as a new member i really have appreciated all the hearings and the conversations we had and john is and they expire in less than seventy five days there's no bill for only seventy five days even worse the trust fund to pay for all these programs will be in the red in less than no authorizing language i know there's a national infrastructure bank bills out there we haven't heard of any one from the administration so what do you do with the rule i really believe it's a sad situation for all members of the house and all of you to think of amendments that you offered in the past that were accepted or agreed to think of any amendments to the test of time of their homes as well or the taxpayer will be forced to not only pay off their loans to keep them in the house tremendous an unfair burden on the taxpayer in fact the seven hundred eighty one hundred sixty two thousand two hundred fifty dollars with this amendment you'd be able to take out a lot of one hundred fifty two thousand two hundred fifty dollars if you're seventy five goes the amount of loan that you could take out  reason because of certain circumstances all of the most of the rest stops in the state of virginia ninety five eighty one are being closed to being closed on tuesday boarded up there will be no opportunity to get in no truck can get in safety of voters will be negatively impacted by closing a rest areas in virginia the problem goes well beyond the need to use restroom facilities long haul drivers need to stop rest drink caffeine change drivers if they do not have a convenient option they may reported crashes are the direct result of driver fatigue each year resulting in fifteen hundred deaths who else is for the and then a truck driver who happens to reach the hours of service and he's just wiped out last may be down around lady smith on ninety five he's looking for a place to pull and carry perhaps a hazardous cargo load he's looking or she's looking for he or she supports a mom or dad with small who really are saying i have to go to the bathroom i have to go to the bathroom whether you support the amendment or are we there yet and i think about it coming from a state where we have commercial things and recognizing that wherever there have been told there are major commercialization that was a reasonable thing to do i said look if all of the virginia members are suspecting and knowing that there would be a point of order would lie against that because it is appropriat lines as you might expect and it turns out that the authorizing committee has given us a letter indicating their strong opposition to this provision because they know that there is a problem that they want to deal with in a lot of different states and they want to deal with it in a general way in their authorizing bill rather than try to do this in one step here but secondly this would only be a a sense because while the governor of virginia is proposing to close nineteen of forty two i don't have any idea i haven't seen the map it's been only two days ago i finally got a letter from the governor yesterday about it but with no data no match which are are being done what anything about the we haven't had a chance at all to deal with that  level but it's palliative in the sense that our bill will not be in law until the first of october if we're lucky if we're lucky the rest are going to be close in a couple of days that's the word that they're closing them in a couple of days and furthermore the commercialization process cannot be done overnight it would take at least a year or so to do because you have to do permit you have to do new regulations you have to decide what kinds of things are going to allow and what you're not going to allow and most of the rest there is along the interstate a reas are relatively small they provide rest areas sometimes they certainly do try to take care of the bathroom problems that have been discovered that have been alluded to by the gentleman from virginia all along the line but there are a lot of the ones the commercialized areas on our nature tollways and wherever and we haven't even had a chance to see what the presidents are although we know that there has been at least  one allowance for such things but it went through the authorizing committee at another time in any case all of that said it would take a long time to get through and to get any money coming up for what is apparently yes that effort to save about ten thousand or ten million dollars in the closure of nine out of forty three rest areas so it just doesn't have it cannot have an patrick no mr kingston mr kingston no mr kirk mr la recipients can be spent by any of the agencies in the jurisdiction of this subcommittee we know that so far about seventy billion dollars worth of funds under the tar been voted down several different times coming back like some kind of a penny i can't remember exactly what the what the terminology is but this would ar decision about anything that happens to tarp money in one place and do no other places as i say it has been defeated on several occasions and i urge my colleagues to repeat it again a commission to deal with the growing debt and deficit just came out yesterday if you haven't read it the congressional budget office came out with an estimate that says our current fiscal path is unsustainable all i ask and the reason i  weekly address on july eleventh the president said the recovery act was not designed to work for months it was designed to work overtime i would make it that that is not a stimulus that's  what i want to do is take some of that money pay for the expenditures we have today the american people who have taken notice in this plan and i think it's important that we start to regroup american people massive government spending has not worked in the past we billion by two thousand and eight because of the bailout that i did not support the deficit jump to four point five trillion dollars but in this congress this year with this administration we've now surpassed that high watermark with a one point underway i think we can safely say that none of our states can afford to forego what they're old by the federal government one other part of this actually that the amendment no hearings to my knowledge we never in the bill grant transfer authority to the secretary of transportation to move two billion dollars from this four billion dollars pot of money into the bank i think before we grant unilateral transfer authority or large sums of money i think we ought to have a chance to know a little bit about maybe what this bank actually is and year the two billion dollars that were allowed to be transferred by the secretary wouldn't happen and the fiscal year two thousand and eleven appropriations cycle so if in fact it is authorized next year we would have an opportunity at that point to put money into the bank sided if it was beneficial if we actually knew what this bank is all about the one billion as president requested but i think this is extraordinarily important we make a down payment in this bill with these extra funds to fund the projects that are currently underway throughout the country  is part of this amendment but i don't agree with the policy and i oppose the and then first of all first of all just to put away the infrastructure doesn't goes into the red early in august and it will be substantially in the red throughout the rest of this fiscal year related to what we might do in this bill could do anything about the cash flow related to the trust fund and the movement of monies to pay for work that is being done and all of our stake in the intervening period that basically belongs with the author zing committee to figure out how to do that so this bill this action cannot cover our problem for the movement of money in the last couple of months of this year because  our bill cannot be back until the end of the fiscal year about the first of october if we're lucky enough to get it into place by that and then that number two number three is that it takes money from something that is the first and most important major initiative in transportation since the interstate system in the nineteen fifties and sixties year five months ago in the are on the program and our secretary our new secretary our former colleague in this committee has has i'm going to quote him it's time to look beyond our highways and then invest in public transportation services like rail which will enhance regional mobility and reduce our carbon so on the energy issue the passenger rail uses less energy than other less than cars per passenger mile and that's a very significant energy improvement but we have also the data from our what's already happened on the eight billion dollars rail programme the first preliminary pre applications are now in the pre application program came in with after you take out probably the duplications and and things that are ineligible at least seventy billion dollars worth of requests for the first round of pre application so there is an enormous pent up demand because we haven't done anything on high speed rail in the past until this time until that are a bill earlier this year put that out and all over the country we've got people who are trying to get into the game in the midwest forty seven applications for thirteen billion in the west one hundred eight applications for their building billion that comes over one hundred billion dollars of application for the first round of this and passenger rail system compared to those in europe and in asia but the president went on to say in his initiative that we would do a billion dollar five years and i don't disagree with anything that mr holder said you can take a ton of cargo from washington d c to new york city for one gallon of diesel fuel that beats the pants off of all other modes of transportation but what mr latham i think is attempting to get out we also have a big problem with the highway trust fund and no one is going to exhibit the political courage to get it done i was horribly disappointed by president bush he got terrible advice from o m b as most presidents i think do and they started the bidding at two hundred fifty six billion dollars for a six year highway program when the country was screaming for four hundred billion dollars we delivered that bill on our committee two years late and it cost highway projects and people to be out of work all across the country sadly i think that although the administration is chang they apparently have the same guys and gals working on b because i think that president obama has received horrible advice and rather than dealing with the shortfall that exist in the highway trust fund they are punting it until after the next election eighteen months when our former colleague the distinguished secretary of transportation attempted to fix the problem and say we have to look at other things because clearly the dwight eisenhower excise tax on fuel isn't going to keep this fund afloat and he said i know how about vehicle miles traveled they shut them down and we're not going to talk about revenue raises we're not going to talk about how to fix the problem this amendment since you can't spend the money before the first of all over starr has to reauthorize the highway bill that's not till after the next election and if if there's an if he does get the state infrastructure bank which is a great way to go stated structure banks are a monopoly they multiply have a multiplier effect you still can't spend the money during this period of time and i think thousand spain denmark and austria somewhat similar to our population they spent an average combined total annually of forty two billion dollars from the president for a billion dollars to create a system that could cost up to forty two billion dollars we have eight billion dollars out there in the stimulus bill for the same purpose but no money is going out the door not stimulating the as they require this requirement this is the record of this committee dictating how we are spending our discretionary dollars for the second time in as many years the congress is being called upon to bail out the highway trust fund because the receipts to the trust fund are not giving up with the authorized spending last year we had to provide eight billion dollars to the trust fund to keep it solvent this year will need to provide as much as twenty billion dollars to keep it solvent through the fiscal year this is no longer a trust fund when the taxes paid by the users cannot support the program created by the authorized we the committee should not be held hostage to continually coming to the rescue of a of a trust fund obviously is spending at levels that cannot be sustained i would word urge that all of us read pages seven through ten on this report report before us very eloquently describes the history and situation we find ourselves in my management would allow the committee in consultation with the a position of providing billions of dollars in the treasury to solve this problem so that mr chairman i appreciate your support serving for this committee for this committee as a whole the purpose of this amendment would significantly reduce the chances of this bill actually passing the house of this committee to amend the rules of the house simply isn't this is a discussion that's going to take place the leadership level should be done in the context of surface transportation reauthorization to be involved in that committee our committee the leadership of the  something that hypothetically might happen a year down the road and they may have completely expanded the secretary on the basis of all this pent up demand will have obligated probably all of that money manner that provides the most effective use of those precious resources and we've devoted almost a billion dollars in this bill fifty percent increase over all nine  regardless of what shape that package winds up being and we must increase the capacity of the health care system in order to deal with whatever reforms are passed so we have  two point two billion dollars for community health centers five hundred thirty million to her to expand training programs across the health professions one hundred thirty five ways innovation fund seventy five million to  supplement state health access sixty five million for state high risk insurance pools in addition we provide thirty one billion dollars of the national institutes of health we do not do one thing that the administration did the administration and in my view this was a very large walk down the wrong road what the administration did was to try to break the longstanding practice of this committee in never allowing politics to interpose its judgment against the scientific judgments that practice of simply appropriating what we hope are adequate funds but not not spelling out how much must be spent on each individual disease that would substitute political erstands the long term ramifications of the massive amount of spending incurred since january the stimulus bill that was passed nearly eight hundred billion dollars of money we don't have the interest to it that we will have to pay to the chinese and the saudis and other foreign governments that the cost of that bill alone will exceed one trillion dollars to put the bill in perspective it is larger than the entire discretionary budget passed by congress  measure that means at least a thirty five percent increase in labor health and human services funding funding for the popular programs like regular grants to local school districts pell grant special education medical research