Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2012
Floor Speech
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Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chair, I am offering an amendment that reduces the funding for the billion dollar Food for Peace program. Regardless of its perceived merits, our country is deep in debt, and we have problems here in America, particularly rural America, that need to be addressed.
The Food for Peace program has been rightly criticized as a waste of money and ineffective in achieving its stated goals. But the reason for my amendments are more direct: the current budget funding for this program is over $1 billion. We stand today with a $14.3 trillion deficit, and at the same time, we have unmet needs in our own backyards.
My first amendment cuts $200 million from this program and my second amendment sets aside $100 million into the spending reduction account. Then, of the $200 million cut in my first amendment, $100 million each is directed into Rural Development, Title III, here in the United States.
The reason for these amendments is straightforward. Parts of rural America rival parts of some Third World countries where we send tens of millions of dollars. We need to focus on our own people and our own communities before we spend taxpayer money in foreign lands.
One example here in the United States is the area known as the former Bennett Freeze area, an area consisting of 1.5 million acres of Navajo Nation reservation land, where the housing units have been described as ``little more than hovels'' and ``80 percent of the homes have no electricity'' and there are few paved road or communication structures. How do we justify spending $1 billion in foreign countries when we have so many unmet needs in the United States?
The Rural Development loan program would receive additional funding under this amendment, a program that gets high marks for its success; so, too, would the Multifamily Housing Revitalization Program. With millions of people losing homes, they are moving into multiunit housing. This program will help Americans.
It is easy to understand the emotional appeal programs like Food for Peace may have, a program that would be reduced by this amendment. But ultimately, we are using taxpayer money for charity. Improving literacy, reducing hunger, and educating girls in foreign countries are issues that are, in fact, charitable and emotionally appealing, but we have our own literacy, hunger, and gender issues in our country. But at a time when we have a $14.3 trillion public debt, massive unemployment, and rural rates of poverty, illiteracy, and school underperformance, we should focus our money here at home. We owe it to our constituents, the taxpayers, to help them. Certainly one can see that this program has laudable aspirations, but laudable aspirations will not help the U.S. economy or the U.S. taxpayer. The problems in rural America are staggering.
On June 9, 2011, President Obama issued an Executive order to create a commission to study problems in rural America. In the Executive order, the President stated:
``Sixteen percent of the American population lives in rural counties. Strong, sustainable rural communities are essential to winning the future and ensuring American competitiveness in the years ahead. These communities supply our food, fiber, and energy, safeguard our natural resources, and are essential in the development of science and innovation. Though rural communities face numerous challenges, they also present enormous economic potential. The Federal Government has an important role to play in order to expand access to capital necessary for economic growth, promote innovation, improve access to health care and education, and expand outdoor recreational activities on public lands.''
I agree. But instead of just forming a committee to study the problems, problems that are well-known and need no further study, my amendment would do something about it and direct money to the Multifamily Housing Revitalization Account Program for a rural housing voucher program and the Rural Business Program Account, which provides loan guarantees and grants for ``rural businesses development programs,'' including business grants to Indian tribes and rural economic partnership zones for farm and rural development.
Again, instead of just studying the problems of high unemployment, lagging schools, lagging infrastructure and opportunities, let's do something about it. The rural American poverty rate has exceeded the national rate since 2001 by 3 percentage points. The child poverty rate in rural America is 5 percentage points higher than urban-metro areas.
Why can't we invest millions in our rural communities instead? Why should we tolerate poverty, unemployment, and a lack of infrastructure in our rural communities while we send millions and billions of dollars to build up other countries?
In good faith, knowing how hard so many people in my district work and knowing how little they have to show for it at the end of the day, I can't agree to send their money overseas to help others while they suffer in our backyards. Knowing that infrastructure is lacking, this amendment helps start the process of directing our money to the unmet needs here in the United States.
I ask my colleagues to closely consider these amendments.
I yield back the balance of my time.
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Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of my amendment that would cut $100 million from the billion-dollar Food for Peace program and redirect it to the rural American communities, specifically to the Rural Business Development Loan Program. This $100 million will provide resources to rural business development loan programs. Small rural businesses and Indian tribes and community organizations can use these loans to jump-start businesses in our devastated rural comments.
I'll give you one example: the Bennett Freeze.
In the 111th Congress, we lifted the ban on this part of the Navajo Nation last year. This ban prohibited any type of improvement to homes, businesses and livelihoods. As a result of the Bennett Freeze, this area is worse than in many Third World nations.
What we are trying to do is address this need, and we are trying to provide some resources to this group of folks. We need to address the high unemployment by empowering our rural communities. Please vote in favor of this amendment.
I yield back the balance of my time.
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Mr. GOSAR. Thank you, my friend.
I would like to reiterate that there is an issue that we also have to take care of folks at home. For example, I brought up the Navajo Nation in the Bennett Freeze area. This is a treaty responsibility of the United States in which we forbade different groups from even raising to take care of a window pane or create economic certainty. We have to take care of our own, or we'll not be able to help anybody across the world. And that's why I actually rise in support of my amendment.
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