Mazie Hirono

I want to thank Subcommittee Chair Petri and Mr. Mica for accepting my amendment. The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.

I think, as I mentioned, the hundreds of our local leaders who have converged in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, and they visited all of their Members of Congress, bipartisan, they were to a person supportive of these kinds of grants.

I urge the Committee to authorize robust funding for programs that have proven to be successful in strengthening our local communities.

Helping our children thrive is an investment in our future.

Crafting the congressional budget resolution is a statement of our national priorities.

I urge the committee to authorize robust funding for programs that have proven to be successful in strengthening our local communities and creating greater opportunities for all of our citizens.

CDBG funds have supported economic development, job creation, and facility needs for the most disadvantaged in Hawaii.

Continuing to adequately fund the programs that mean the most to these communities is vitally important to our long-term success.

Crafting the Congressional Budget Resolution is a statement of our national priorities, and I appreciate the opportunity to offer my views on what those priorities should be.

Arbitrarily cutting our Federal spending back to fiscal year 2008 levels... is in my view a meat-ae approach to fiscal discipline.

Another project is the Upcountry Maui Watershed Project, providing water to 170 farmers and ranchers on Maui, and also the Wailuku-Alenaoi Watershed and Lahaina Watershed Projects that prevent flooding on Hawaii and Maui. These long-term…

The most important thing we could do to really turn around our education system in terms of dollars put in and the returns that we get is pre-k, pre-k, pre-k.

I take it that you have concluded that when you provide resources for quality early education, that you certainly set the stage for school success for these children moving forward.

You mentioned Ms. Edwards and about exploration and about meteorologists. Well, the astronaut program, that's a Federal program. We had a wonderful astronaut from Hawaii, Ellison Onizuka, who tragically lost his life in the Challenger…

I am really glad to join the two of you in honoring and acknowledging the work of our Federal workers. ... We need to acknowledge that and honor them.

Every dollar we spend on quality early learning really comes back to us many times fold, up to $17 worth.

I think that there is a growing consensus around the idea of supporting quality early education.

If we underfund the core responsibilities of the EPA, which includes effectively enforcing our environmental laws, we not only undermine job creation, but we are also playing chicken with public health and safety in the future.

We should be putting programs like the SRF at the top of our priority list, and effectively funding the key responsibilities of agencies like yours.

No community can thrive or even survive without clean water and efficient wastewater management systems.

So is the area of coverage one of the ways that you are going to allocate scarce resources?

I think it is a real challenge to really recreate a robust shipbuilding industry in our country.

Shipping and maritime safety and security are of vital importance to the economy and livelihood of Hawaii's people.

Hawaii was the only state in the nation found breaking its state plan obligations.

This accident could have been prevented, but Hawaii only had 11 state OSHA staffers to inspect and enforce worker safety.