James Oberstar: “The City of Marquette kept its part of the agreement, conveyed property to the Coast Guard for $1, and now is going to…”

“The City of Marquette kept its part of the agreement, conveyed property to the Coast Guard for $1, and now is going to be stuck with the bill. The problem is that the way the transfer worked out, the statutory PAYGO rules preclude inclusion of past conveyance in calculating the cost of the bill. We simply got hung up with our own legislation, our own PAYGO rules to reduce the cost of government, but now we are in the position of possibly increasing the cost of government to a local unit of government, the City of Marquette. The city's contribution to the Coast Guard cannot therefore be calculated into the cost of this bill. I look forward to the day when we will be able to work this out in a different setting.”