John Myers: “this subcommittee did support the SSC up to its final blow. It is not quite as simple as has been presented here today.…”

“this subcommittee did support the SSC up to its final blow. It is not quite as simple as has been presented here today. In settlement for the SSC, the Federal Government agreed to a two-pronged approach, which this subcommittee opposed for quite some time, not so much the cash settlement with Texas but the fact that that $65 million is not left in the account, not at all. It was placed in escrow. It can be spent as far as this committee is concerned only for one purpose, the construction of the cancer treatment facility. The subcommittee is not opposed to that by any means, but we did not feel that we should tie up the money. Texas should still have the right yet today to spend that money any way they wanted to. So it is not quite like leaving the money there so it can be spent any way it wants to. It was committed. When I was a trust officer some years ago, when something was put in trust, we had to fulfill that trust. We could not change that agreement by anyone. We tried to say, just take the $210 million and give it to Texas. DOE would not accept that. With an agreement with the authorities in Texas, they said the only way we can do this is to give the State of Texas $145 million in cash, which they got, and then place $65 million for this cancer center, for which we were told Texas probably would never vote. They wanted to bypass the system in Texas to obligate the money; am I not correct on this point? Now I think there is a serious legal question.…”