Block Grant Assistance Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. SOTO. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, today I rise in strong support of H.R. 662, the Block Grant Assistance Act of 2023.

I am a proud cosponsor of this bill, along with my fellow Floridians, including Mrs. Cammack, Mr. C. Scott Franklin, and Ms. Wasserman Schultz. I thank Chairman Thompson and Ranking Member David Scott for their assistance in moving this bill to the floor in a fairly expedited fashion.

The bill authorizes the Department of Agriculture to utilize block grants to provide funding to States and territories to assist agricultural producers with losses due to natural disasters in the calendar year 2022. This does not address future disaster assistance. It simply allows USDA to get the money already appropriated to producers in our home States sooner, although we should look at that going forward as a longer-term reform.

Why is this important? Hurricane Ian devastated both southwest and central Florida. A category 4 storm hitting on September 28 of last year, it was tied for the fifth strongest hurricane ever to make landfall in the United States.

Less than 2 months later, on November 10, 2022, Hurricane Nicole made landfall near Vero Beach, Florida. Nicole devastated parts of our east coast.

The devastation was horrific, and the impact on Florida citrus and other segments of our agriculture industry has been devastating. My colleagues from Florida and other impacted areas were grateful for Congress' support in the omnibus.

However, with losses to the citrus industry of somewhere between $416 million and $675 million, we need help quicker for these losses. The citrus industry is responsible for $6.8 billion in revenue and 33,000 jobs in Florida, including in Florida's Ninth Congressional District. Our Florida Department of Citrus and Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services have utilized the block grant authority previously to help deliver assistance to our cattle and timber producers, as well. However, the money hasn't gotten there yet.

I applaud our Agriculture Secretary Vilsack for making a promise. He came down to Polk County in central Florida, met with citrus growers, and promised them he would get the money to these hard-fighting growers throughout central and south Florida.

He also came to the Agriculture Committee, as my colleague Mrs. Cammack mentioned already, making that same promise, if we gave him the statutory authority to do that. Today, on the House floor, we made good on our role in helping Secretary Vilsack's promise.

Citrus faces a lot of challenges. Citrus greening continues to wreak havoc on our yields. We have new and promising pesticides that are working out, but we have a long way to go to get back to the heyday of the mid-2000s.

Citrus is also America's vitamin C source. We can't afford to export this critical set of nutrients to foreign producers. We need to protect it right here at home. This iconic Florida crop is critical for now and into the future.

Madam Speaker, I stand here today and ask my colleagues to support this critical bill and join me in voting ``yes'' on H.R. 662. I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. SOTO. Madam Speaker, I have no additional speakers and yield back the balance of my time.

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