Political Quotes

“it is my pleasure to once again come to the House with the conference report on the fiscal year 1997 emergency supplemental appropriations bill, H.R. 1469. As Members of the House may recall, on April 24 of this year, the Committee on Appropriations reported out the bill, and roughly 2 weeks ago we had the bill on the floor. Unfortunately, we were unable to complete the conference quickly, and we had to adjourn over the Memorial Day recess prior to the completion of this very, very important bill that will provide disaster relief to the citizens of some 35 States. Today we hope to remedy that situation because, after several weeks of negotiating with the Senate on the differences between the House and the Senate versions of this legislation, we have concluded conference yesterday and are able to bring this conference agreement to the House so that the process of providing that very necessary recovery for the vast number of natural disasters that have occurred around the country this year can be maintained. This conference agreement includes $8.9 billion in new spending authority for fiscal year 1997, of which the discretionary portion is fully offset by the rescission of previously appropriated funds and by including other offsets. I might stress, Mr. Speaker, that the conference report, as promised when we debated this issue on the floor 2 weeks ago, is fully, and I repeat fully, offset in budget authority.”