David Obey: “I would like to say that as much as I would like to support this bill, I cannot, for a number of reasons. First of all…”

“I would like to say that as much as I would like to support this bill, I cannot, for a number of reasons. First of all, the Committee on Rules, in the action of this House yesterday, made in order a totally illegitimate amendment to this bill by adding the 300-page housing bill and authorization bill. And I want to read my colleagues something that I just picked up on the press out of U.S. News today. It said that the legislation would raise the income levels of people eligible for public housing. The bill would give greater priority to people making as much as $40,000 to be admitted to public housing, allowing them to gain housing before lower-income families. Since no new public housing is being built, and existing waiting lists are years long, these lower-income families will have no option whatsoever. A total of 3 million low-income people would be denied access to public and federally assisted housing, including 1.8 million seniors and children. It went on to quote Secretary Cuomo, HUD Secretary Cuomo, as saying it is inexcusable that we would take the few units of affordable housing this Congress has allowed to remain and remove it from the grasp of the most vulnerable Americans. This means no housing for America's most vulnerable. I think that this Congress has no business attaching a proposal like that to this bill.”