Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Massachusetts for his leadership, and particularly cite Congressman Sarbanes for his leadership, and my Republican colleague from Virginia, Frank Wolf, who laid out the merits of the case of the Telework Improvements Act. I have spent the last 10 years here in the national capital region encouraging the public sector to follow the lead of the private sector in promoting telework. In my district, for example, AT&T, a private employer, one-third of its workforce teleworks; not because it adds to corporate costs, but because in fact it detracts from corporate costs; not because it takes away efficiency, but in fact it improves productivity. In the national capital region, there is almost no region in the country that lends itself better to telework because of the nature of the white-collar workforce than does this. In the private sector, we are looking at close to 20 percent telework rates, improving productivity, improving retention and recruitment, improving the air quality of this region, and in fact contributing to the bottom line. Unfortunately, in the public sector, we fall behind. We are only at 6 or 7 percent in the Federal workforce, and that is the largest single employer in the national capital region. And we are a nonattainment region in terms of air quality. We can and we must do better. Telework is an important and cost-effective component of efforts to reduce congestion, greenhouse gas pollution, and smog.…”