Tom Harkin: “on behalf of my esteemed colleagues Senators Shelby, Campbell, Robb, Heflin, Bingaman, and myself, I offer an amendment…”

“on behalf of my esteemed colleagues Senators Shelby, Campbell, Robb, Heflin, Bingaman, and myself, I offer an amendment to restore the cuts in the Civil Air Patrol budget. The Senate defense authorization bill S. 1026 cuts the Civil Air Patrol [CAP] operations and maintenance by $5 million, from $14.7 million to $9.7 million, a 34 percent reduction. This heavy cut would severely limit the CAP's capability to carry out its search and rescue missions, emergency air transport, counterdrug surveillance, and other important functions. The Harkin-Shelby-Campbell-Robb-Heflin-Bingaman bipartisan amendment to the fiscal year 1996 defense authorization bill restores the CAP budget to the amount approved by the House, the original $14.7 million. The Civil Air Patrol is a nonprofit corporation designated as an auxiliary of the Air Force by public law in 1948. It is mostly made up of over 50,000 volunteers who are mainly ex-Air Force personnel, and who often must fly over large areas of country in their missions of mercy. It is to the credit of the CAP that their volunteers relieve the Government of expense such that only 10 percent of the CAP budget need be used to reimburse the volunteers. Furthermore, the CAP is undergoing a reorganization to replace active duty Air Force personnel with retired fliers who receive only one-half their former pay. This will save taxpayers about $3 million.”