Harold Volkmer: “my amendment addresses the definition stage of the bill with regard to Federal intergovernmental mandates. Under that…”

“my amendment addresses the definition stage of the bill with regard to Federal intergovernmental mandates. Under that definition, a mandate is any provision in legislation, statute, or regulation that would impose an enforceable duty upon States, local governments, or tribal governments, except--and this is a very large exception--the exception is a condition of Federal assistance or a duty arising from participation in a voluntary Federal program except as provided in subparagraph B, where you have such things as AFDC and other entitlement programs that are not within the exception. Now, what does that mean? That means basically, Mr. Chairman, that whenever we have a bill coming down, whether it is a Federal highway bill, I can put any mandate on that bill that this Congress or anybody else would like to put on it, and it does not have to do with Federal highways, it just means a condition of your getting your Federal highway funds that you are going to have to abide by if you want your Federal highway funds. If we set up a grant program and the States necessarily are going to have to utilize that money in order to perform a certain function of government, and then we could put any type of mandate on that. Now, that is going to be happening, for those of you that may be listening, that is going to be happening in a couple of weeks. You are going to have that type of mandate. We had it last year in the crime bill.”