Farm Bill and Nutrition

Floor Speech

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, we appreciate the opportunity to be here tonight to join with my colleagues for this Special Order.

Over the past 3 years, the House Agriculture Committee has been diligently working on the next farm bill, which sets agriculture and food policy for our Nation every 5 years.

As chairman of the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Nutrition, I am pleased that we can discuss this important topic tonight, nutrition, and I want to thank Chairman Conaway for his great leadership and commitment putting forward the best farm bill possible.

Tonight, we are here to talk about the nutrition title, specifically the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which we used to call food stamps. SNAP accounts for 80 percent of spending in the farm bill, and it is an important safety net for low-income families to help ensure that no one in America goes hungry when times get tough. Far too many Americans are living in poverty, and many have been for a generation.

There is no worse feeling for a parent than to see their child go without something as basic as food, yet food insecurity exists for so many. That is why, since 2015, the Nutrition Subcommittee has hosted 21 hearings on SNAP. It has heard from more than 80 witnesses on how we can improve the program and work to end hunger in America.

In fiscal year 2017, SNAP provided 42.2 million Americans with food benefits at a cost of $63.7 billion. That is nearly 21 million households, Mr. Speaker.

In my district, Pennsylvania's Fifth Congressional District, nearly 35,000 households received SNAP benefits for fiscal year 2015. Thirty percent of those homes have one or more people over the age of 60, and nearly half, 45.9 percent, of those homes have children who are under the age of 18.

What this farm bill does is ensure that SNAP benefits continue to be available for those who truly need the help, especially children, seniors age 60 and older, and the disabled, who represent nearly two- thirds of the program's participants.

Unfortunately, though, many Americans may not have the skills necessary to find a family-sustaining job or may have encountered roadblocks while trying to get ahead. This new farm bill makes a historic investment in work programs so SNAP recipients have a chance to learn new skills and climb the rungs on the ladder of opportunity.

Now, this investment will equip States with resources to arm participants with the soft skills--job search skills, certifications, and education--needed to succeed in today's economy, truly, on-ramps to opportunity.

Now we have a unique opportunity to expand funding and resources for these life-changing programs by closing loopholes and improving opportunities for individuals who have been marginalized by a lack of employment, education, or, quite frankly, life circumstances. By doing this, SNAP can provide immediate food assistance in the short term, while also helping those in need learn skills to help them permanently escape poverty.

Now, let me be clear. We are not removing anyone from receiving the SNAP benefits. What we are doing is providing the tools necessary to help individuals escape the cycle of poverty. I believe that there are many pathways to success in life, and sometimes we do need that critical safety net to take care of our families and help us get back on our feet.

With a rebounding economy and an increased focus on workforce development, I know we are going to be able to open new economic doors for many, because all Americans deserve no less.

Mr. Speaker, I am honored to yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Conaway), the chairman of the Agriculture Committee.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership and for leading what has been one of the most transparent processes. The amount of hearings that we have had, over 20 hearings just on nutrition, 80 witnesses--a job well done.

You know, there is a saying that we have always heard. What is it? The doctor knows best. I am pleased to yield to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), another member of the Agriculture Committee, a physician, who really understands health and healthy nutrition.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for being part of this Special Order.

All of the hearings that we had were bipartisan, great bipartisan input into the hearings, and there is nothing in the nutrition title that really hasn't come out as a part of those hearings.

In fact, I know my colleagues, my friends across the aisle, our Democratic members of the committee I have been so honored to work with and be a part of these hearings, they submitted specific priorities for the nutrition title under title IV, and I am proud to say that all those priorities are included within this farm bill.

I now yield to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Crawford), a friend of mine, who is also part of our leadership with the Agriculture Committee, a subcommittee chairman, from the First District of Arkansas.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for being a part of this important Special Order tonight, because nutrition matters and farmers feed.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield to a gentleman from another part of our Agriculture Committee leadership from the State of Illinois. He is the chairman of the Biotechnology, Horticulture, and Research Subcommittee.

He actually did a great job yesterday convening a briefing where he brought in 4-H leaders from all over the country to share their experiences as a part of that great organization.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Pennsylvania (Mr. Thompson) and all of the colleagues that I see on this floor who are part of the Agriculture Committee team--and we are a team.

We are a team that I got to watch work 4 years ago together to pass a bill that the Congressional Budget Office said was only going to save taxpayers $23 billion in mandatory spending. As a matter of fact, that was the largest, single spending cut that was projected in my entire freshman term.

Well, they came back over the recent weeks and told us that they were wrong. Those savings have actually been $111 billion in mandatory spending. This is why good policies matter. The bill that we introduced today is an example of good policies that save taxpayer dollars, but, just as importantly, it helps American families who are trapped in a cycle of poverty.

They have suffered from food insecurity and depend on SNAP to feed themselves and their families; and some of these men and women are capable of working, but they lack the access to adequate skills training to obtain a job that provides meaningful income and a chance to improve their family's future.

We want to change that. Just like we wrote good policy 4 years ago, we have written good policy again because we are going to change that by shifting the antipoverty conversation from one purely focused on benefits to one focused on helping someone climb the economic ladder and developing a strong workforce.

We have created a streamlined, simplified work requirement, paired with meaningful investments in workforce training. This farm bill requires and funds sufficient education and training slots, guaranteeing access to all SNAP participants subject to being able to work.

We have modernized the components of SNAP employment, education, and training to include assessment and case management, include additional options like supervised job search apprenticeships, time-limited volunteer work, subsidized employment, and financial history.

Last week, Caterpillar, in Decatur, Illinois, hosted an event to recruit more welders and machinists. They have jobs available, but not enough people are trained to fill these skilled jobs.

I visited the Bridgestone tire plant in Bloomington, Illinois, last week, and I heard the same thing. Jobs are available, but there is no one to take them.

Our economy is growing; jobs are growing. We must do more to get people the education and training that they need to take these available, skilled jobs and help themselves and help their families.

Mr. Speaker, I again thank my colleague from Pennsylvania.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership and for joining us here this evening.

One of the things I really love about the Agriculture Committee is, quite frankly, what we do. Everyone eats, nutrition matters, and our Agriculture Committee is represented by Members from all over the country, including Tennessee.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. DesJarlais), another member of the Agriculture Committee from Tennessee's Fourth Congressional District.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for being a part of the Agriculture Committee and thank him for his great work on behalf of the folks in Tennessee.

As the gentleman from Tennessee was saying, what we are talking about is, part of the nutrition title is really looking at making improvements to it. We are not really doing anything to people. We want to do things for people. And, quite frankly, for 65 percent of the folks who find themselves in a situation where they are on the SNAP program, or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, I don't want to say nothing is going to change, but it is just going to get better. We are going to get them greater access to healthy foods.

Those are the 65 percent of the folks who are under the age of 18 or over the age of 65, or living with a disability. And so for the 35 percent that find themselves on this program--usually for temporary times--it is because of financial situations. And that is their number one need. They are unemployed, underemployed. Maybe they have been living in poverty for generations.

And, yes, we want to provide that safety net for food, but we want to provide them actually an onramp to opportunity as the gentleman talked about.

We don't force anybody to do anything. If you are able-bodied and you fall within that category, that age of 18 to 59--and I guess if you don't want to take access, take the opportunity for that job training, then you can self-select out of the SNAP program. But why would you want to do that?

What we are investing in, education and training, we are actually guaranteeing a training slot in every State. We are providing the support to the States to be able to do that, to provide--most importantly, I think--case management.

Because case management--the gentleman is a physician as well. I am a rehab therapist and a former manager in rural hospitals, and case management plays an important role helping lead people through the process when they have a time of need. And that is what this bill does.

So from Tennessee to New York, I am really pleased to yield to another member of the Agriculture Committee, representing New York's 19th Congressional District.

I thank the gentleman for being a part of the discussion tonight.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments.

Mr. Speaker, the timing is good for our approach here, isn't it? We have an economy where, for the first time maybe in 10, 15 years, we see wages rising and we see job creation. Even before this most recent economic surge, I guess for lack of a better word to call it, there are an estimated 5 million jobs that are open and available in the United States. These are jobs that most of them do not require a 4-year degree or a 6-year degree. These are jobs that require some skills-based education, maybe a certification, a specialization. It is kind of perfect with what we are looking at.

There is some confusion that is out there. Some people are saying this is creating a brand new level of bureaucracy. I know for a fact that the people I serve with here wouldn't go for anything that is creating more bureaucracy. The fact is we are actually taking advantage of, first of all, the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, WIOA. That is our Career Links. That is where people go today, where if they are unemployed or underemployed, to be able to get a job. That is where employers look to find qualified and trained employees. So we are going to be able to utilize that existing infrastructure.

But community colleges, apprenticeships, and private companies that want to engage in training, there are a lot of opportunities out there for this.

She is a former teacher and leads our chair's Values Action Team which I am proud to be a part of. Representative Vicky Hartzler represents the Fourth Congressional District of Missouri.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her enthusiasm for this.

Congratulations to Joe. Actually, that is a great story.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, for someone who was incarcerated, that is difficult to overcome; but through the programs, it gave a great example of how that occurs.

Contrast that also with what Mr. Faso from New York was saying about those cliffs, what I refer to as poverty cliffs. We try to incentivize folks to do better for themselves. We are making improvements because right now the way the program is, like most of our programs, if you make a dollar more than the limit, an arbitrary limit, the government pulls the rug out from beneath you.

The fact that we are going after some of those, how much assets you can have and the value of your car--the folks who are most at risk need reliable transportation. I am just really proud that we are addressing all that, and I thank the gentlewoman for being a part of all of this.

Congressman Dave Rouzer is a man I am proud to serve with.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I think we are going to see many coming out in favor of this proposed farm bill and specifically the nutrition title.

Two articles came out today. The first one is from USA Today entitled, ``Food-Stamp Work Requirements Will Lift Americans Out of Poverty,'' by our own agriculture chairman, Mike Conaway. He was joined by Lee Bowes who is the CEO of America Works of New York which is a training placement company. Also, there is an article that was published in The Wall Street Journal entitled: ``Working on Food Stamps: A House GOP reform would help the able-bodied get off the dole.''

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record these two articles. [Apr. 12, 2018] Food-Stamp Work Requirements Will Lift Americans Out of Poverty (By Mike Conaway and Lee Bowes)

There is a fundamental link between poverty and work.

Individuals who hold full-time employment (https:// www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2017/ demo/P60-259.pdf) are 10 times less likely to be poor than people who are out of work during at least part of the year.

But not every American has the skills and training needed to hold full-time employment.

Teaching these skills takes time and resources, which is why for so long our nation has taken a piecemeal approach to supporting work and training to help move people out of poverty. Instead, we've focused the conversation on poverty around benefits--on the dollars spent and the meals served.

Benefits are critically important and serve a vital role in the safety net aimed at catching people if they should fall into poverty. But equally important is a focus on helping these same people climb back out of poverty.

That point is underscored by a 2016 poll from the American Enterprise Institute and the Los Angeles Times. Forty-one percent of the poor people included in the survey viewed their circumstances as temporary (http://www.aei.org/ publication/2016-poverty-survey/).

People want to believe the American dream is attainable.

That's why we need to shift the conversation on poverty in this country from one focused purely on benefits to one about improving futures.

And as the House Agriculture Committee releases its new farm bill (https://agriculture.house.gov/news/ documentquery.aspx?IssueID=14904)_legislation that governs the policy for our nation's nutrition programs--that is precisely what we aim to do.

Our proposal is straightforward: help those on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) who are work-capable find employment to support their households.

Under this proposal, work-capable SNAP recipients will need to work for at least 20 hours per week. That can take a variety of forms they can work, participate in a work program, or participate in a SNAP employment and training (E&T) program. This bill makes a significant investment in training and case management to guarantee access to an E&T slot to anyone who wants one.

But to ensure this investment yields results, we're also making these work requirements mandatory. No more loopholes that create disincentives to work.

We are equipping states with resources to arm participants with the skills, certifications and education needed to succeed in today's economy.

And that's a critical point, because our economy is supporting more jobs and a higher standard of living for ALL Americans. Jobs that were once unavailable are now at an individuals' fingertips if aided with the proper training and skill set.

SNAP recipients want to be beneficiaries of this economic growth. They want to take advantage of opportunities and meet the needs of our nation's businesses.

It is also important to note that for nearly two-thirds of SNAP recipients (https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/able- bodied-adults-without-dependents-abawds-rules) who are currently exempt from work-related programs, nothing will change. That group includes seniors, those who are mentally or physically disabled, children and various other individuals who would not be subject to our proposed modifications to work.

But for work-capable adults, if they want to receive benefits, they'll be expected to work. And if they don't work, they are self-selecting to remove themselves from the program.

People will try to demonize what we are doing here and say that this proposal is too much, too fast, too soon.

They will try to claim that this bill is about kicking people out of the program to save money. But that couldn't be further from the truth.

Under this work proposal, only an individual who chooses not to participate in a guaranteed E&T slot will lose eligibility for SNAP.

Others will claim that these modifications aren't needed because most SNAP recipients who can work, do work (https:// www.cbpp.org/snap-households-with-working-age-non-disabled- adults-have-high-work-rates-6). And under our bill those individuals can have the peace of mind that their benefits will not be compromised.

While critics will say SNAP isn't meant to be a jobs program, we believe these modifications can support nutrition for families in need while also creating new opportunities that emphasize work and independence and provide the resources needed to move people forward.

Advocating for the status quo has never and will never lift someone out of poverty.

That's why we need to begin to define success differently-- not by how many people we serve, but rather how many people we aid in climbing the economic ladder. ____ [Apr. 11, 2018] Working on Food Stamps (By The Editorial Board)

A common refrain from businesses is that they can't find enough workers. The unemployment rate is a low 4.1%, but one reason for the shortage are government benefits that corrode a culture of work. So credit to House Republicans for trying to fix disincentives in food stamps amid what are sure to be nasty and dishonest attacks.

House Agriculture Chairman Mike Conaway on Thursday will introduce a farm bill, though food stamps absorb much of the cost. More than 40 million Americans are in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the official name for food stamps, and the figure is up from about 17 million in 2000. The size of the benefits has also increased, and the program cost has exploded to about $70 billion a year.

More Americans need assistance during recessions like 2008, but the question is why so many have stayed on food stamps even amid the long expansion. The American Enterprise Institute's Robert Doar in 2014 compared the post-2008 recovery to the recession in the early 1980s. If folks had left the program at similar rates to the 1980s, food stamps would have had 36 million beneficiaries by 2013. Instead there were 47.6 million.

One result is that many Americans haven't returned to the labor force. Enter the House's first proposal: A 20 hours a week work requirement for able-bodied adults, ages 18 through 59. This usually elicits panic about child labor or single moms, but the requirement does not apply to seniors, children, the disabled, or anyone who cares for a child under six or is pregnant. That exemption covers roughly two-thirds of everyone on food stamps.

The folks subject to the work rule have many ways to satisfy the requirement, including apprenticeships that could contribute to higher earnings later. States will have to offer access to training programs, which can also count as work. The bill stipulates case management and other techniques to help people transition off assistance.

Food stamps already has a de minimis work rule for some participants, but states have applied for waivers and exemptions that have diluted it. Yet the results of real welfare work requirements in states have been encouraging, including former Governor Sam Brownback's reform in Kansas. A Foundation for Government Accountability paper last year noted that Kansas tracked 6,000 families who moved off welfare and went to work in 600 different industries. Incomes on average more than doubled over a year.

The House proposal includes other good ideas, notably eliminating ``broad-based categorical eligibility.'' This is a notorious loophole that declares someone eligible for food stamps because he received a brochure on heating assistance or a number for a hot line. The bill retains cross- eligibility that allow the truly needy to qualify for multiple programs without redundant asset tests.

The politics of all this are tough. The House Freedom Caucus will pan such changes as ``welfare reform lite.'' The Senate won't want to take hard votes in an election year. Yet this isn't a budget slasher and merely reorients money and incentives. That will make it harder for Senators to pretend this ``guts'' the program, as some falsely said about Medicaid last year.

Democrats have attacked the plan with packaged lines that the GOP will kick millions off the rolls. The work rule doesn't bounce a single person. One irony is that the left says work requirements are misguided because most recipients already work. Then why fight a requirement?

Those who stop receiving benefits because of a work requirement will fall into two categories: They refused to work or train for work. Or they found a job and no longer need assistance, which is supposed to be a success story. The GOP's work requirements--explained accurately--poll well with the public because Americans think working is a fair trade for helping those who have fallen on tough times.

The program is supposed to be ``supplemental,'' but progressives have transformed it into a permanent entitlement. The GOP's 1996 welfare reform was an historic success, and fixing food stamps is a chance to do it again.

The Congressman is a man I have been really pleased to serve with. He has been a Bible study buddy of mine. He represents Georgia's Eighth Congressional District and actually chairs the Subcommittee on Commodity Exchanges, Energy, and Credit.

Mr. AUSTIN SCOTT of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for yielding. As we have talked a little bit, the question is: How do we help people get off of government programs? Not kick them off but give them a path off the programs.

I think one of the things that has not been talked about enough is the fact that the current system is a trap, and the harder people work and the more they make, sometimes the less they have.

So what we have done in our farm bill that is coming up is to change the assets that a household can have and remain on the SNAP program until they graduate off the SNAP program.

Under current law, households without an elderly or disabled member could not have counted liquid assets above $2,250. Households with an elderly or disabled member could not have liquid assets above $3,250.

These dollar limits should have been annually indexed for overall inflation and then rounded down to the next $250. But our bill raises the asset limits for an eligible household from $2,250 to $7,000. I want to say that again: $2,250. That asset limit is raised to $7,000 for an eligible household consisting of at least one elderly or disabled family member. It moves from $3,250 to $12,000. We want people who are out there doing the best they can to have the ability to work hard, save some money, and continue to improve their lives.

We also exclude in this legislation the first $12,000 in the value of any licensed driver's vehicle in a SNAP household from the applicant's assets for purposes of eligibility determination. For many people on the SNAP program, they have to travel a long way to work or to get groceries, and we want them to be able to have that vehicle to get them there, especially in rural areas like the 24 counties that I represent. So excluding these vehicle assets is another benefit that we give to people in helping them have that avenue to graduate off of the SNAP program.

Our bill also permits SNAP applicants to maintain up to $2,000 in a savings account. That is $2,000 that will not count towards the $7,000 asset threshold. So again, we are trying to help people who work hard, who do the best they can, be allowed to save some assets so that they are very comfortable when they graduate off of the SNAP program.

One other thing I would like to point out: Resources of a household member who receives SSI or PA benefits, those benefits are excluded as well. Under our current farm bill, SNAP recipients are caught between a rock and a hard place: You work hard, you save a little money, you invest in a vehicle, and you get kicked off the program.

Our farm bill actually fixes a lot of those things that people who want to graduate off of the SNAP program need fixed. So I am very pleased to be a supporter of this bill, and I think that this bill moves the law in a great direction to help those people who are out there actually working and doing the best they can graduate off of the SNAP program. And these asset threshold increases, along with the incentives to work, I think, move our legislation in a very good direction. And I am looking forward to having the vote on the floor and supporting this.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. I thank the gentleman for his leadership and for being a part of the Special Order.

I am now pleased to yield to a former chairman of the full Agriculture Committee and currently the Judiciary Committee chairman, who obviously has a lot of experience in this area and with agriculture. And so it is my pleasure and privilege to yield to the gentleman from Virginia's Sixth Congressional District (Mr. Goodlatte).

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Chairman Goodlatte, thank you for your leadership and your mentoring. Greatly appreciated.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time remains.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Excellent. I will take advantage of that opportunity. If we have some other Members who come in, I will yield to them.

The nutrition title for me, personally, is important. When I was just starting out in life, I had graduated from Penn State, I was working with people facing life-changing disease and disability, and married. We were pregnant with our first son, Parker, and so it was during that first pregnancy. And I was making, I think, maybe a whopping $8,000 a year working full time.

There wasn't a time when we visited my parents or Penny's parents, my wife's parents, where we didn't come back with a bag of groceries. People do that. Families step in and they help. We did what we could, but we always came home with a bag of groceries.

We also found ourselves WIC eligible. The Women, Infants, and Children program is not under the farm bill. That is on the Committee on Education and the Workforce side.

But we know what it was like. It was difficult, actually. It was embarrassing to be able to use that voucher, but it was important that Penny and our unborn son at that point, now a 30-some-year-old dad with two boys of his own, got the nutrition that they needed. So I have been there, I have experienced that, and I know how important nutrition is.

Nutrition title, for me, I kind of relate it to, Mr. Speaker, what I would say is the worst part about living and growing up in a rural area, outside a small town, that everybody knew your business. I would be out playing with my brother and my sister, and if I did something wrong, when I got home, mom and dad already knew about it.

But the best part about living in that rural area, in rural America, is that everybody knows your business. I have a cousin, and about a month and a half ago their house burned to the ground. It was a terrible fire. They were lucky to get out. They just barely got out of the house. Yet, as the fire was just breaking through the roof of their home and the volunteer fire department was on the scene, they were surrounded by loved ones, friends, neighbors, and strangers who were there to offer their assistance, whether it was their love, their support, money, clothing, whatever, all kinds of things.

That is what the nutrition title is. Nutrition title is about helping neighbors in need, whether those neighbors live in the most densely populated city or whether they live back on long country lanes. So that is why I'm so proud of the bipartisan work we have done up to this point, because there is nothing, again, in this nutrition title in this farm bill that wasn't a part of all those, over 21, hearings that we had.

Some of the things that are in there, in fact, are some of the priorities. I enjoy working across the aisle in a bipartisan way. I dedicate myself to that. So I was pleased to see my Democratic colleagues who communicated their four priorities into this bill to the committee.

Their first one was to incentivize nutrition education and healthy eating through a continuation of the Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive Program, what we call FINI. I am pleased to report that the Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018--that is what we are calling the farm bill--which includes the nutrition title, Title IV, maintains the FINI Program and enhances it with a technical assistance center allowing for best practices in operations and delivery to be housed and used for current and future grantees.

Additionally, the bill provides $275 million for FINI over the life of the farm bill, actually establishes a baseline funding of $65 million a year, allowing for expansion of opportunities to bring together stakeholders from the distinct parts of the food system to foster understanding of how they might improve nutrition and the health status of participating households and the people who live in those houses.

Their second priority, which I am pleased to report on, was--and I appreciated them putting this forward; it was important--to maintain our commitment to food banks with adequate funding for The Emergency Food Assistance Program. You just heard the former Agriculture Committee chairman, Mr. Goodlatte from Virginia, talk about TEFAP.

The farm bill increases TEFAP, funding for our food banks, by $45 million. We have been funding it at $15 million. It goes to $60 million and directs $20 million of that in a very innovative way, that funding, to establish a farm-to-food bank program in all States. It allows States to access agriculture surplus products directly from the farmers. The freshest of foods is the way I like to look at it. What a great enhancement, Mr. Speaker.

The third priority I am pleased to report on that is a part of this farm bill that they communicated was to promote the use of cutting-edge technology to ensure that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, retailers and recipients have secure, reliable, and efficient benefit processing. The farm bill introduces the concept of a national gateway, which is a system modernization that gives the USDA real-time oversight over the flow of transactions. It helps control costs.

It allows USDA to develop more tools to ensure integrity, assist in controlling access to individuals' payment information, and it sets the stage for the USDA to handle future developments in payment technology. With that increase in accountability, in those rare instances where fraud and abuse may occur, it allows for identification of that. And we incentivize States. States are now able, when they actually identify fraud, to keep a greater amount of that money that is recovered, although it has to be reinvested back into the nutrition title.

It is about to go for more program integrity, to make sure we are doing a better job of serving the needs of our neighbors who find themselves in those circumstances.

And finally, the last one was to continue to encourage States to collaborate with business and education leaders to provide innovative employment and training solution opportunities and programs. That is what we have been talking about this evening, largely. It is about the workforce solutions. This was put forward by my friends across the aisle that I am proud to serve with, the Democratic members of the Agriculture Committee. This was their goal.

We were able to do that. We have provided significant attention and considerable investment to improve SNAP workforce and education development services for recipients. I appreciate what they put forward as a part of this process, and I appreciate the fact that we have stepped up and we see this as a part of the text of this farm bill.

The updates to employment and training include best practices taken from beneficiary, industry, and State feedback. It includes interim education and training pilot reports. It partners with the workforce- to-innovation opportunity works that are already in place across our communities and our counties all across this great country. And it heightens emphasis on public-private partnerships and nutrition education and also allows recipients to continue to receive a supportive suite of services to address both food insecurity and upward mobility.

That is what we are trying to achieve. We want to make families food secure. We want to provide them access to the rungs on the ladder of opportunity.

Mr. Speaker, we have also done something for populations very near and dear to my heart as the dad of an Active Duty soldier, and that is, when individuals join the military later in life, they tend to enter with a spouse and a couple of kids, and it is hard to support a family on a private salary. Most privates are usually 18, 19 years old. They don't have that family support, and they do fine.

In fact, we just provided all of our military a 2.9 percent pay increase, the largest in over a decade. But for those who are joining later in life, it is difficult. Their families live off base and they get a basic housing allowance to help pay for that, but in the past, basic housing allowance, 100 percent, with no contribution, no assistance, counted towards their eligibility for the SNAP program. They need that SNAP program to be able to make sure that their family gets support.

We have addressed that by providing moneys that would go toward an allowance, more or less, that would go towards to help them to truly to be able to receive those benefits and to be eligible for the SNAP program.

And so I am just so thankful for, really, the good bipartisan work that we have done up to this point, with all these hearings--over 100 hearings on the farm bill, as a whole; over 20 hearings for the nutrition title, title IV of this farm bill. We had over 80 witnesses. There is nothing in this farm bill that didn't come out there. There were some rumors of something about a Harvest Box, which was a terrible idea. That is not a part of the farm bill, never had any intentions of including that as a part of the farm bill.

I am appreciative to all the hard work that has gone into the bill, preparing this at this point, and I look forward to next week, next Wednesday. We will be marking this bill up in the Agriculture Committee. And I am pleased at the timing too. Normally, when we talk about reauthorizing the farm bill, we are 6 months, 12 months after it expired.

Quite frankly, we can't afford to do that. The farm income has been down for 4 years now, and this total farm bill is so important to providing for a robust rural America, and that is important to every American. Because without a robust rural America, people everywhere, including the cities, will wake up in the dark, in the cold, and hungry, because that is what the people of rural America, those farm families, provide for each and every one of us.

So, Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate the opportunity to be joined by so many colleagues tonight on this topic, and I thank you for your attention.

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