Patty Murray

It is absolutely vital to us.

The proposed budget resolution included a deficit neutral reserve fund for rural counties and schools.

The commitment from the Senate Budget Committee provides a great step forward toward securing the government's financial commitment to rural, public land counties.

Last week Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray made continued funding of the PILT program and the reauthorization of SRS a priority.

We wish to thank Senator Murray, Budget Committee Chair, who has always supported Counties and Schools.

I would back up the Senator and urge Senators to, please, finish this product, move on to our budget next week, and get that done. Then we can get to the point that America will respect the work of this body and not lurch from crisis to…

I thank the Senator from Maryland. First of all, let me just say it is truly a pleasure to be on the floor with the chairman of the Appropriations Committee. I just remember when the Senator and I were here back in 1992, the Year of the…

Tom really captured the best of Washington State. He embodied our State's hard-working, honest, Western spirit.

Over the next few weeks, both chambers of Congress will be debating fundamental choices about our country's direction and what kind of nation we will leave to our next generation.

It's a commitment that I have strongly supported, and I want to thank the chairman for his continued and passionate leadership on this issue.

Mr. Chairman, I'll just thank Governor Markell for all of his work on this issue and this is an incredibly important hearing.

Emphatically, yes. We, in Utah feel this service is so critical that we decided to divert direct client service money to fund these positions when the Social Security WIPA funding went away.

DOD must do its part in resolving these fiscal challenges.

I heard from Yakima school district in my State. They have a free and reduced price lunch-rate at 83 percent. They told me it would impact them with a $1.6 million budget cut.

Cuts to military and domestic spending will result in significant job losses across our country.

We cannot shirk our responsibility to move forward to replace it with something that is balanced and fair.

So implementation of the sequestration would not only have a direct impact on the housing programs, but on the job market, the other folks, but the confidence factor at this time, when we are very fragile as well, will have a huge----

I think it is important for all of us to step back and remember sequestration was never written into the bill to be implemented.

To take away stability--the least we could do in tough economic times is give people stability and predictability so they can manage.

For many long-time educators, this is the toughest financial situation they have been in, in 20, 30, 40 years.

It was put into the bill simply to force us as Members of Congress to come together on a balanced, thoughtful approach on how we deal with our national budget.

Negative Impact of Larger Class Sizes

Again, other countries aren't doing this. This is not what South Korea is doing. They are investing more.

My constituents tell me consistently that they expect me to come here to sit down with others who disagree with me and find solutions.

I think if we got into that kind of situation, I think, immediately, there would be panic and bedlam.