Jon Tester

We have seen a dramatic increase in overdoses among Native American tribes.

That would be really good because, who you reach out to is going to make a difference, in terms of what the take-up rate is.

So, how are you doing that? Are you working through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA)?

Are you going to increase your prevention and treatments efforts in Indian country?

A hospital in a little town up there said that somewhere between 70 to 80 percent of the pregnancies they saw resulted in children born drug-addicted.

Do any of you have metrics, as far as that goes, or metrics on the connection to poverty and drug abuse?

But, increases in amphetamine?

You have seen decreases in those?

I would also like to know if you have seen an increase within the four States that have legalized it--or if you have seen a problem in the hiring practices of the Federal Government.

I appreciate your guys' commitment to the country. I very much do. And for those of you who served, your service to the country. And thank you for being here today.

I do have some issues that are more parochial.

Over approximately a 5- to 6-year period, so we would expect a return on investment.

Even more concerning, you note that a number of facilities slipping from poor to failing is going up instead of going down.

If the same thing would have happened there on private property, would it have been 2 years for the cleanup under the same circumstances? I hope not.

You guys are three branches of the same arm, and it really kind of worries me on different things.

I think the services can each tell you what they need to spend above what they could right now.

If we do another round of BRAC, will it improve readiness or will it take away from our readiness?

Correct me if I'm out of bounds here, you should have a short- and long-term plan for facilities.

Thank you, Doctor. I appreciate your leadership. From one Montanan to another, thank you very much for that.

We appreciate Senator Tester's commitment to working collaboratively with Tribal Colleges to addressing our collective mission of improving the lives of our students through higher education and moving American Indians toward…

I also want to acknowledge Chairman Barasso, Vice Chairman Tester, and Senator McCain for introducing legislation specific to improving the educational outcomes of Native students.

The SAFETY Act that I introduced would require the department and OMB to come up with a ten year plan to get all the BIE facilities, not into fantastic condition, but good condition.

The bottom line is in a lot of these schools, you could be a top notch student or have a top notch teacher but if the conditions are not there to learn, the classrooms just are not adequate.

You have my applause for that.

I have introduced the RAISE Act today. This bill is a start toward a more responsible and responsive agency.