Political Quotes

“the committee bill makes significant reforms to the Crop Insurance Program. The bill reduced the statutory loss ratio to an actuarially sound 1.0. By doing this, we were able to include a provision by Mr. Neugebauer that makes additional crop insurance available, which has to be paid for, which will lessen need for disaster assistance. Mr. Neugebauer's provision is similar in many respects to the administration's crop insurance plan. The committee bill increases premiums for the catastrophic level of coverage. We authorize the USDA to renegotiate the standard reinsurance agreement every 5 years. The committee bill specifically authorizes data mining to ensure compliance with rules of the program. The committee bill also reduces the reimbursement rate by 2 percentage points. These are significant changes that make the program more actuarially sound and make the program more responsible with taxpayer dollars. Additionally, the committee-passed bill authorized an additional 1 million acres in the GRP land to protect sensitive grasslands in this country. While we all would like more money for many programs, this is a carefully balanced approach. I think we have done a good job of balancing the needs of both commodity producers and those that would like to preserve native grasslands. I strongly oppose this amendment.”