Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, H.R. 2220, introduced by Representatives Guest, Webster, and Pence, requires the General Services Administration to secure congressional authorization before it can exercise a prenegotiated purchase option in an operating lease. Currently, OMB rules stipulate that a lease cannot be scored as an operating lease if it contains a prenegotiated bargain-price purchase option. Operating leases allow agencies to budget their rent outlays annually, whereas capital leases require the agency to budget, upfront, the entire net present value of all rental obligations it will incur over the duration of the lease term. Unless GSA has full, upfront appropriations in hand, the agency must rely on operating leases that can be paid for year by year. But preventing an operating lease from containing a prenegotiated bargain-price purchase option means that if GSA wants to acquire the building at the end of the lease, the agency must pay fair market value instead of being able to negotiate a sales price at the beginning of the lease. In essence, the Federal Government ends up paying for the building twice, once when it leases the building and once when it purchases the building at the end of the lease at the current market rate. The scoring rules are designed to ensure that ownership risk stays with the lessor and that the lease isn't a mechanism by which the government finances its ownership of the property.…”