Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the gentleman from California for yielding. I would like to thank him, also, for his leadership in this issue. I rise today in support of the Senate amendment to H.R. 1722, the Telework Improvement Act. This legislation will foster the use of telework by Federal agencies by ensuring that each agency has a telework policy, and that employees are informed about their eligibility to telework. This bill would ensure that those Federal employees who are eligible to telework are able to do so, with an emphasis on enhancing agency operations and productivity. Virginia's First District is home to thousands of Federal employees, many of whom commute hours each day. Despite the fact that there are such numerous benefits to teleworking, such as reduced traffic congestion and energy consumption, cost savings, competitive hiring and retention, readiness and emergency preparedness, many Federal agencies continue to underutilize telework. The snowstorm last winter, as we have heard referred to today, which closed the Federal Government several days is a good example of how teleworking programs can achieve cost savings. We saw during that time that 30 percent of our Federal workers actually teleworked during that snowstorm, achieving $30 million daily in reduced costs for that Federal workforce being offsite. As Representative Wolf so stated there, that, I think, is a great example of the potential savings that can be achieved through teleworking.…”