Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2020

Floor Speech

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Ms. MOORE, Mr. Chair, I rise to thank the chair and ranking member for including my amendment to increase funding to help low-income households replace lead pipes in this en bloc amendment.

Even with the plus-ups in this bill for a number of programs within the EPA's State and Tribal Assistance Grant account, and I thank the subcommittee and full committee for their work there, the amount of resources we are providing pales considerable in comparison to the need to address water infrastructure needs.

Let's just look at this program that I am amending today. The program is authorized at $60 million. Even after the subcommittee provided a $5 million boost (and I thank the chairwoman for that), it still is only funded at a third of the authorized level.

This is a critical program because grantees are able to provide aid to low-income homeowners to replace lead service lines. Unfortunately, those households most affected by this problem often have the fewest resources to replace the pipes.

Recent media reports indicate that the EPA may be finally closer to issuing its new lead in drinking water regulations.

And while better and stronger regulations help, we won't regulate our way out of the lead poisoning crisis that is afflicting our communities.

We must put our funding where our mouths are. We must help get the lead pipes out of the ground and help homeowners get them out of their homes. We must ensure children get tested and treated, if they need it. We must ensure that homes with lead paint get remediated. And all of that takes funding--there is no substitute for that funding.

Just this past weekend, the city of Milwaukee had the honor of hosting the Great Lakes Governors and Premiers, the chief executives of what would be the third largest world economy if you added up the GDP of the individual states and provinces.

At the top of their agenda was addressing how to provide clean drinking water for the over 105 million residents of the Great Lakes region on both sides of the international border. According to the Governors and Premiers, the Great Lakes region contains the highest concentrations of lead service lines in the United States.

I want to echo the call of the Great Lakes Governors & Premiers for the federal governments ``of both the U.S. and Canada to provide appropriate resources . . . to support the accelerated replacement of Lead Service Lines.'' They also called for a comprehensive approach that leverages ``a variety of funding sources and flexibility to match the right tool with each project.''

This bill moves us forward--no question. The THUD bill that we are tackling later this week also provides increased funding for HUD's housing lead control programs. But we need to start taking much bigger steps if we are ever going to get to the point where all children will be safe from this scourge.

That's the goal of this amendment. And I thank the chairwoman for her support.

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