Date: 1995-12-21
Speaker: DE LA GARZA (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. I regret exceedingly that I cannot vote for this conference report for a multiplicity of reasons. I. like many of my colleagues. came here willing and wanting to reform welfare as we know it. as it is being called here. Unfortunately. this legislation does not do that. Mr. Speaker. in my estimation. it is used as a camouflage to go after programs we do not like. We are using the budget. We are using welfare reform to shut down programs that we do not like. I am more concerned. and I feel it very sincerely and I feel it in my heart. that we are targeting people that we do not like. That is what we are aiming at. My colleagues can call it welfare reform. call it what they want. I can take my colleagues to the neighborhood. I can take them to the State. I can take them to the region. and. I can show them that this is targeting at its best people that they do not agree with. areas that they are not concerned about. : Mr. Speaker. I have a lot of need in my district. Everyone I meet wants to cut fraud and abuse. This does not give the State the tools to reduce fraud and abuse. My Republican colleagues are just shifting it over to the State. We took it over because the States had not done that. Now. Mr. Speaker. a little bit about the conference. I say it with frustration and sadness. I never went to a conference committee meeting. except the initial meeting. I was not even asked to sign the report. I do not know who decided. I do not know where they met. I do not know when they met. I do not know when they put it in writing. Mr. Speaker. I am the ranking member of the Committee on Agriculture that has a section of this bill. Mr. Speaker. I wanted to talk. also. about the aliens. legal aliens. There is a Congressional Medal of Honor winner. Jose Francisco Jimenez. who died serving this country who was not a citizen. Lance Corporal Jimenez was a Marine killed in Viet Nam in 1969. He lived in Phoenix. was a Mexican citizen. but in the Untied States legally. My colleagues on the other side would aim at him and all people like him. Shame on those who want to target people that cannot defend themselves. Mr. Speaker. House Democrats and Republicans. Senate Democrats and Republicans. and President Clinton share a common goalall agree that welfare reform is urgently needed. Reform is needed not only for the recipients of welfare. who many times are trapped in a. cycle of poverty from which they cannot escape. but also for the American taxpayers who deserve a better return on their investment in our future. Currently. the American people lack confidence that many of our welfare programs. as they are currently designed. are really benefiting the recipients. This lack of confidence should not be translated into the idea that the American public is unwilling to spend any money on the needy. In fact. a recent Nielsen survey finds that 95 percent of Americans rate hunger and poverty issues equal to the issues of health care and a balanced budget. The lack of confidence in our welfare programs comes from the perception that waste. fraud. and abuse permeates many programs. These allegations need to be addressed in order to restore the confidence of the American people. However. we must be sure that we are addressing legitimate allegations and not some headline catching editorial writer whose. hidden agenda is not program reform. but program elimination. It should be interpreted as a desire by the public to make sure that these programs are effectively designed and monitored to be effective and eliminate waste. fraud. and abuse. We must remember that our goal is to reform welfare in order to move people toward selfsufficiency. Reform by itself is a hollow word. Reform for reforms sake is meaningless. We arent OMB. CBO. or GAO. We cant work in the vacuum of numbers only. We cannot let the bureaucrats with the green eye shades determine what path reform will take. We are Members of Congress. It is our responsibility to put faces with these numbers. We must interject the human element into the process in order to ensure that real need is addressed in welfare reform. We must ensure that our children and the aged and disabled are not left unprotected. We must remember that a dollar spent now can actually result in saving thousands of dollars later. if we help produce a future tax paying citizen. We must determine the policy that will move people toward selfsufficiency. This must be a policydriven bill. not one that is driven by empty. faceless numbers that are wrong as many times as they are right When we look at these many programs designed to help the poorest of the poor. we must have the wisdom to be able to distinguish between those programs and policies that are working and filling a legitimate need and those that are not. We must not get wrapped up in the idea that just any reform is good reform. We must be deliberative and compassionate. We must have reform that meets the numbers. and not numbers that de-. termine the reform. When I go home to the 15th District of Texas every weekend. I am returning to one of the poorest areas of our country. an area where unemployment is in the double digits and newly arrived immigrants are searching for the American dream. Lest anyone think that there is no real need for many of these programs. one out of every two children in my district is living in poverty. My constituents dont want a handout. They want jobs. They want economic development. They want the American dream. These are the people we must help. These are the people for whom we must redesign these programs to help them achieve their desire of becoming successful citizens. I am particularly concemed about what this bill will do to the Food Stamp Program. our frontline in the fight against hunger. It will jeopardize the nutritional status of millions of poor families because of a basic misunderstanding of how the program works. The perception is that this program is out of control. that hundreds of thousands of families are added to the food stamp rolls every. month. The reality is something very different. Over the last year. as the economy has improved. food stamp participation has actually dropped by over 1 million people. This vital program is clearly filing a very real need. If the need isnt there. the program doesnt continue to expand. but if the need is there. the program is there to meet it. The block grant provisions in this bill will set funding at levels well below that necessary to feed hungry families in times of recession or if food prices increase. If block grants had been chosen by all States in 1990. the Food Stamp Program would have served 8.3 million fewer children.. The funding cap imposed by this bill will put hugeholes in the nutritional safety net. A cap takes away the flexibility to accommodate a decrease in a familys welfare benefits and the resultant increase in food stamp benefits. Efforts to raise the cap in the future by a wellintentioned Congress will be virtually impossible. requiring an offsetting tax increase. a cut in another entitlement. or an emergency designation. To assure adequate nutrition and the good health of our poor families. the calculation of food stamp benefits must take into account extremely high housing expenses. The conference report limits this calculation. leaving poor families with children who pay more than half of their income for housing with less money to buy food. The provision will result in more hungry children. We all want families on welfare to be self sufficientthey want to be self sufficient. But. the way to make families self sufficient is not to deny them food stamps after 4 months. Eighty percent of the ablebodied recipients between the ages of 18 and 50 receive food stamps on a temporary basis already. they leave the program within a year. What these people need most is the opportunity to workjob training. or a job slot. This bill simply kicks them off the program. without a helping hand to find a job. Let me say once again. that we must reform these programs without the draconian cuts in funding. The goal should be to get more poor people into the work force. not to simply cut funding. By the year 2002. this bill will reduce benefits to families with children by 15 to 20 percent. Such cuts are unconscionable. Finally. I must express the serious concerns that I share with my friends on the Congressional Hispanic Caucus about the provisions denying benefits to legal immigrants. Legal immigrants who work hard. play by the rules. pay taxes. and contribute greatly to our communities and society should not be denied access to social services when they fall on hard times. or when their sponsor falls on hard times. By denying benefits to legal immigrants. we will be shifting the responsibility to the States without any assistance from the Federal Government. State health care costs will increase as well as the costs to run State general assistance programs. I am shocked and saddened at the meaning of these provisions. The American people are not meanspirited. They do not want children to be poor and hungry. This bill will push 1 million children below the poverty line. How can we allow such a thing to happen? I urge Members to remember that we are reforming the programs that impact the most vulnerable of our constituents. We must remember the faces of the poor and hungry of our Nation. We must vote against this misguided attempt at welfare reform.