Bob Wise: “Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. I believe the gentleman from Florida is well-intentioned…”

“Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. I believe the gentleman from Florida is well-intentioned, but I need to talk a little bit about the Appalachian Regional Commission, the ARC. The Appalachian Regional Commission has been a unique adventure for this Government, because what it is is a true joint Federal-State partnership by which there is a Federal cochair nominated by the President, confirmed by the Senate. And there is then the 13 governors create a state cochair. The result is that the 13 governors have equal say with the Federal Government in the disposition of these funds. The governors are the 13 governors that participate in the Appalachian Regional Commission. They make the decisions. So we truly have the local and the State and the Federal working together. The gentleman talked about distressed counties. The fact that many of the counties are doing better, and they are. But that is why over the many years the Appalachian Regional Commission has targeted more and more of its money to the truly most distressed. One-third of the counties, the 400 counties still in the Appalachian region have, for instance, unemployment that is 150 percent of the national average. In 1991, the per capita income in Appalachia was $15,816 or 83 percent of the United States per capita income of $19,000. In 7 of our 13 states in the Appalachian region, more than 20 percent of the children under 18 live in poverty.”