Making Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2010--Continued
Floor Speech
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Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise to enter into a colloquy with the chairman, Mr. Inouye, and vice chairman, Mr. Cochran, of the Senate Appropriations Committee, as well as my colleague from Tennessee, Mr. Alexander.
I want to thank my colleagues who have recognized the needs of Rhode Island, which is struggling to overcome the effects of the worst flooding in centuries in midst of the worst economic environment in generations. Indeed, Rhode Island was among the first States to sink into recession. In the last 2 years it has consistently ranked among the top three States in unemployment, with as much as 13 percent of the workforce without jobs. As my colleagues know, Rhode Island has been fortunate for many decades until now to have avoided the kind of major natural disaster damage that has affected so many other States. When those disasters have occurred in other States, there has been no question about the support of the people of Rhode Island or our State's congressional delegation for Federal disaster assistance. I am grateful that in the midst of challenging fiscal environment that the committee, on a bipartisan basis has included assistance for flood-impacted States, specifically Rhode Island and Tennessee. I am particularly grateful for the inclusion of additional community development block grant, CDBG, and economic development assistance, EDA, grant funding, along with a reduction of the non-Federal cost share for FEMA assistance. I also appreciate the challenge of including this funding while trying to stay within the President's top-line request for emergency funding. In the past, the committee has had greater flexibility in responding to emergencies, including in 2008 when over $20 billion was provided to States with major disasters in that year. Given the comparatively limited funding available, I would like to ask the chairman and vice chairman to help clarify the intent of the funding included in the underlying bill, specifically that the intent with respect tothe CDBG and EDA funding provided in the bill is to assist hard-hit communities in Rhode Island and Tennessee. I would ask my colleagues for their support in maintaining this position in negotiations with the House on the final package.
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