Political Quotes

“I thank the Chair. I say in response to my colleague from Minnesota, be careful about relying on the Tufts study. The officials in charge of public assistance in my State and other States have pointed out some rather serious flaws in that study. We all share concerns about assuring there is adequate transportation, adequate day care, child care, for people moving from welfare to work, and I am not here to debate that amendment. At the appropriate time, we will review that amendment. What I wanted to call to the attention of my colleagues is the fact that yesterday my good friend, the distinguished chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, Senator Chafee, along with Senator Baucus, Senator Gramm, Senator Byrd and the very distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Domenici, announced agreement on funding levels for the highway authorization for the next 6 years. It will be $171 billion for highways. Let me explain what that means for my State of Missouri. Under the formula that was passed out of the committee as a committee amendment today, Missouri would receive $3.6 billion--that is billion dollars-- compared to $2.4 billion that Missouri received over the last 6 years of the 1991 transportation bill. Missouri's average allocation per year would be around $600 million, as opposed to the $400 million the State was receiving under the old. That is tremendous progress.…”