David Thomas: “I wanted to come back this afternoon--I talked some this morning--to talk about this bill. It is a very important bill…”

“I wanted to come back this afternoon--I talked some this morning--to talk about this bill. It is a very important bill to us. It is one that provides an opportunity for us to have local television in rural areas. There is great support for this idea. We are trying to find a way to put it into the proper perspective in terms of the lending of money to guarantee loans that will cause this to happen--I agree with the chairman--where we have 80 percent of a loan guaranteed by the Federal Government, but that the remaining 20 percent be done in the private sector without further guarantees by the Federal Government, by the taxpayers, so there is that sharing of risk and that incentive to continue to be very careful with these kinds of expenditures. There is no question that this is a somewhat risky operation, something that is new and technically different. The conversation we are having currently, of course, is to provide an opportunity for CFC, the Cooperative Finance Corporation, to be a participant. CFC was formed in 1969 by the Rural Electric Cooperatives and provides private capital. I have worked with it a great deal, having been manager of a rural electric association in Wyoming for a number of years. CFC was not created by the Federal Government and does not receive Federal funds. This is a private corporation.”