Doug Bereuter: “I rise in opposition to the Fields amendment. I am not quite sure what the gentleman is attempting to add but I think I…”

“I rise in opposition to the Fields amendment. I am not quite sure what the gentleman is attempting to add but I think I am right in understanding some of the things that he is eliminating. He is eliminating, as I understand it, the exceptions which begin on page 15, subparagraph B, and specifically on lines 22 through lines 24, and on to page 16, lines 1 and 2. He is eliminating the exception for local housing and management authorities that own or operate less than 250 public housing units, including any authority that does not own or operate public housing. We have had substantial debate on this issue. This Member has strong objection from his own State--for example, from the city of Omaha--to in fact requiring, in contrast to State law, that a resident be a member of the public housing authority. But I certainly have strenuous objections to the smaller housing authorities also have this requirement. I think my colleagues should know that in my State, for example, we once had the second largest number of public housing units in the country. We started quite early in the process. Many of them are for senior citizens. A great many of them have less than 30 units across the whole State. That is especially true in my district and in the district of the gentleman from Nebraska [Mr. Barrett].”