Transportation, Treasury, Health and Human Services, the Judiciary, the District of Columbia, and Independent Agencies Appropriations Act,2006 - 1
TRANSPORTATION, TREASURY, HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT, THE JUDICIARY, THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, AND INDEPENDENT AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2006 -- (House of Representatives - June 29, 2005)
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Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, this bill is a backdoor attempt to shut down Amtrak, to guarantee an Amtrak bankruptcy. We simply cannot allow it to happen.
Amtrak is one of our most efficient modes of transportation. It provides a vital alternative to our clogged highways. We need to finally start investing adequate resources in Amtrak to allow the railroad to provide stable, reliable service.
We spend approximately $50 billion a year on highways and aviation, but only about $1 billion on Amtrak. We hear that Amtrak funding should be cut because the railroad is not profitable or is inefficient or mismanaged. Amtrak has had its problems, but they are largely a result of being systematically underfunded for 30 years. Deliberately forcing Amtrak into bankruptcy, destroying it, should be unthinkable.
We do not require highways or the air transport system to be self-sufficient or profitable. No transportation system is self-sufficient, and we should not require that of Amtrak either. It is an illusory goal. We should fund our transportation systems because they provide an important public service. They are critical to the economy and a vital part of national security.
On September 11, 4 years ago, Amtrak was the only mode of transportation into and out of New York City. Redundancy in transportation is key for national security. This amendment will restore Amtrak funding to close to last year's level and will avert a shutdown of the railroad. It ought to be adopted. I urge my colleagues to vote for it.
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Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the LaTourette-Oberstar amendment to restore funding for Amtrak.
The FY06 TTHUD Approps bill funds Amtrak at a paltry $550 million-a cut of $650 million from last year's level, which was barely enough to keep Amtrak running. This is simply a backdoor attempt to shut down the railroad-to guarantee an Amtrak bankruptcy. We simply cannot allow this to happen.
Amtrak is of particular concern to me given that my district contains Penn Station in New York City, the largest Amtrak Station in the country. In New York alone, Amtrak carries over 10 million passengers a year, employs over 2,000 New York residents, and contributes over $96 million in wages a year.
Amtrak is one of the most energy efficient modes of transportation. It provides a vital alternative to our clogged highways. We need to finally start investing adequate resources in Amtrak to allow the railroad to provide stable, reliable service. We spend approximately $50 billion a year on highways and aviation, but only about $1 billion on Amtrak. We hear that Amtrak funding should be cut because the railroad is not profitable or is inefficient or mismanaged. Amtrak has had its problems but they are largely a result of being underfunded for about thirty years. Deliberately forcing Amtrak into bankruptcy-destroying it-should be unthinkable.
We don't require highways or the air transportation system to be self-sufficient or profitable, and we shouldn't require that of Amtrak either. We should fund our transportation systems because they provide an important public service, they are critical to our economy, and a vital part of our national security. On September 11, 2001 Amtrak was the only mode of transportation into, or out of, New York City. Redundancy is key for national security, and we must preserve all modes of transportation, including rail.
The LaTourette-Oberstar Amendment will restore Amtrak funding to close to last year's level and will avert a shutdown of the railroad. It is essential that this amendment pass, and I urge all my colleagues to support it.
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AMENDMENT OFFERED BY MR. NADLER
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
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Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, this amendment would increase funding for section 8 housing vouchers for low-income people by $100 million to enable an additional 15,000 low-income families to afford safe decent housing.
To offset this increase, the amendment cuts the working capital fund, a poorly managed computer upgrade program that has been the subject of lawsuits and which the committee criticizes in its report on Page 108. Even with the reduction, the bill would still provide up to $110 million in working capital funds for IT projects.
Please note, the bill provides up to $65 million in working capital funds in 11 accounts scattered around the bill other than the working capital fund itself.
We have a choice, Mr. Chairman. Do we want to help thousands of families obtain safe affordable housing, or do we think it is more important to have a somewhat faster computer upgrade in HUD? If we support American families, we should support this amendment. The need for housing assistance is staggering. All over the country, local housing authorities have long section 8 waiting lists, years long, but are forced to reduce the number of housing vouchers they give out, not because there is not a huge need, but because we are failing to meet the need here in Washington.
In fiscal year 2001, we increased the number of section 8 vouchers by 79,000. For fiscal year 2002, the number of new vouchers dropped to 18,000. In fiscal years 2003, 2004 and 2005 not one new voucher at all was provided for. Rather, the debate concerned how much funding was necessary simply to maintain the same number of vouchers. And so it is again now as we debate the fiscal year 2006 budget.
Despite the committee's assurance that the bill fully funds section 8 voucher renewals, the committee has been flatly wrong in making this assertion in each of the last 3 years; 2 years ago, for example, we passed an amendment to boost section 8 voucher funding by $150 million. The committee opposed the amendment on the Floor arguing that vouchers were fully funded.
Yet the conference report adopted a few months later added $110 million over and above the $150 million we added on the Floor, meaning that the committee would have underfunded section 8 vouchers by over $1 billion while saying the account was fully funded. That was 2 years ago.
Last year, the conference report provided $89 million more for voucher renewals than did the House bill. Yet just 2 months after the approval of the conference report, the Department, HUD, acknowledged that even the conference report fell $568 million short of funding all voucher renewals.
Now the committee, once again, says it is fully funding section 8 voucher renewals. But the President, President Bush tells us that to renew all existing section 8 vouchers, we would need $314 million more than the committee thinks is necessary. So the committee understated by $1 billion, by $568 million, and now by $314 million in each of the last 3 years.
We all understand that the budget is extremely tight and that many programs are facing cuts. Our amendment therefore does not seek the $314 million above the committee amount that the President would recommend. It seeks merely to restore $100 million. This is less than the bare minimum of what is needed.
The amendment will not enable us to provide vouchers to any more families than receive them now, but it will allow us to continue to help 15,000 families who are now being helped. It enables us to avoid throwing 15,000 poor families out on the street. That is our choice. The section 8 housing voucher program provides safe affordable housing to approximately 2 million American families in urban and rural communities in every State across our country. These vouchers are often the only resource for low-income families confronted by our Nation's affordable housing crisis. Once again, the choice is, will we force an existing 15,000 families who are now living in safe decent housing out on the street because we do not have the money to renew their vouchers? Or will we slow down a computerization program for the bureaucrats at HUD? That is the choice. I hope we will elect to help the low-income families meet their critical housing needs by supporting this amendment. I hope everyone will vote yes on the Nadler-Velázquez-Frank amendment.
Mr. Chairman, I will also at this time include in the RECORD a chart which documents the 11 different accounts in which funding for the working capital fund is squirreled away, so that people do not think that our offset takes too much money away from this program. And I will include in the RECORD a letter in support of this amendment signed by nine religious organizations representing Catholics, Jews, Lutherans, Presbyterians and Methodists.
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Mr. Chairman, the conscience of this Nation is asking for this amendment. I ask this House to agree with that and to adopt this amendment.
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Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. DAVIS of Alabama. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and let me say that I also appreciate the work of the distinguished chairman from Michigan in bringing some order from the recommendation of the administration on this bill, but I have to make a couple of comments.
First of all, as I said before, look at what we have done on Section 8. We have hundreds of thousands of people on waiting lists, hundreds of thousands, waiting 8, 9, 10 years for decent housing for Section 8 vouchers. As recently as 2001, we increased the number of Section 8 vouchers by 79,000. In 2002, we increased it by 18,000. Since then, in 2003, 2004, 2005, we did not increase it by one, not by one. Instead, we debated, are we funding the existing number of vouchers, and this is what we are debating again now. I wish we were debating increasing the number of vouchers.
The gentleman from Michigan says Section 8 is fully funded. Well, I do not think it is, but even if it were, we should be increasing the number, and if we are wrong, and we are increasing the number by a few, that is the right thing to do, but the fact is, look at the history here.
Two years ago, the committee said we were fully funding Section 8. We added to that an amendment of $150 million. The conference report added $910 million above that, and that is what was necessary to fully fund it, $1 billion above what the committee said was fully funded. Last year, the conference report added $89 million above what the House did, $89 million more than what the committee said was necessary to fully fund existing Section 8, and HUD later acknowledged during the year that that did not fully fund it. It was $568 million short, and a huge number of people lost their vouchers.
Now the committee once again says it is fully funded, but the President says we need $314 million more to fully fund it. This amendment would give $100 million of the $314 million the President says is necessary to fully fund it, and again, what do we mean by fully fund? Not kick people out on the street, not increase by one, not shorten the waiting list. So we ought to be doing that.
Finally, let me say that we are told that the offset would leave only $45 million in its computer account. The fact is the co-committee has been very ingenuous in squirrelling away money in different accounts. I have here, and I submitted for the RECORD earlier, the list of all the places in the bill where money is squirrelled away. There is a total of $230 million. If we take $120 million away, as we will, that will leave $110 million for this purpose, which is enough for the computer upgrade program that they are talking about. Again, are we in favor of people having decent housing, or are we in favor of a somewhat faster computer upgrade at the Department?
Do not believe bureaucrats when they tell us that all will be lost if they do not get all the money they need. We should know better than that.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, Republicans many of them support this amendment. We passed a similar amendment 2 years ago with Republican support; 170 Members have signed a letter in support of this amendment, including many Members from the other side of the aisle. They voted for the same amendment 2 years ago.
I urge everyone on both sides of the aisle to vote for this amendment, to indicate that the very least we can do is not reduce the number of people who have the assistance, who are having decent housing. If we value family values, if we value decency in providing people with the ability to have decent housing, we will support this amendment, and the damage will be mitigated. It is not as much as the President wants, $314 million, but at least it is a third of that. Unfortunately, we could not find more offsets.
So I thank the gentleman for yielding. I thank the chairman. I urge everyone to vote for this amendment.
The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler).
The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes appeared to have it.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
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