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I would assure the Members, in most places of the country, the argument on the side of the Committee on Appropriations and what the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. SKEEN) and the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. KAPTUR) are
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Mr. BONILLA. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
(Mr. BONILLA asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. BONILLA. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. This is a classic case of the proponents of an amendment using misinformation and emotional rhetoric to try to push their cause.
I think I heard the word earlier in one of the arguments in favor of the amendment, the word ``barbaric'' used to describe the animal damage control program that currently exists, also called Wildlife Services, now. I stand corrected.
But I ask my friends who suggest that this program might be barbaric for them to think for a second about children who might be afflicted by wildlife who are bitten by an animal afflicted by rabies.
[Time: 13:15]
When you think of the possibility of the eradication that we try to do in Texas, in Texas, for example, children playing in their yards and in States all across the country and throughout the Southwest, playing in their yards, who might be afflicted by rabies because of some coyote or some other animal that might be crossing through a playground that might be afflicted, I would suggest that that is barbaric for anyone to think that a program that exists to protect the safety of children in playgrounds, that is pretty barbaric to suggest that that program is ineffective.
Also think about we just had a plane crash last week; and although the cause was not a form of wildlife, a flock of geese or birds flying into a plane engine, it is possible that that could occur. This wildlife services program tries to address that problem and keep those passengers safe in areas, many of which are located in the Northeast and in the New England area, tries to keep those passengers safe from any kind of accident like this by providing funds to control those flocks of birds near runways and airports.
Now, I would suggest that it is barbaric for anyone to think that a program like this is not a good program that would protect the safety of families and children flying on airlines. So I would suggest that those who are proposing this kind of amendment, using misinformation and emotional rhetoric, should step back for a second and think about the safety of women and children, families of all ages from all parts of the country who might be harmed if this money is not in the budget, think about that and ask themselves if they could live with an accident occurring at an airport or live with a child dying who was afflicted with rabies because there was not enough money in the budget to support this program.
Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, I do not plan on taking all of the 5 minutes, but I rise in strong opposition. I do not have a dog in this hunt. I do not represent farmers; I do not represent ranchers. I have got mostly a city area in my district.
But I want to tell my colleagues that San Diego is a series of canyons and areas where a lot of people hike, and up in the hills also. This last year we had two women joggers who were killed by mountain lions. We had requested that the Federal Government come in and help manage. Because they have not been able to hunt lions in a long time, these lions are coming into the parks, into where people picnic in private and public areas. A little child was mauled by a mountain lion, nearly died, lost an arm. Another woman was hiking, and the lion not only killed her, it ate most of her before they found her.
California also has this little rodent called, a prairie-dog-type critter, a ground squirrel. We have heard about rabies, but in California this little rodent and the fleas they carry have bubonic plague. Now think of the terror that that word brings in our past history. We need those kinds of eradications, not only on public lands, but on private as well. We cannot just take care of the public lands and then go over and let that menace ride.
So I rise in strong opposition to this. I have flown a jet out at Miramar. To tell my colleagues what an animal, a bird, will do to an airplane, this hawk went clear through my wing and broke the main spar of an F-4 Phantom that I was flying. The airplane was hard down. Luckily, I was able to land the airplane, but it totally destroyed the airplane, one hawk in the thing.
When we talk about public health, we talk about rabies, we talk about plague, we talk about lethal predators; and for this reason, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DEFAZIO).
Mrs. CUBIN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
(Mrs. CUBIN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)
Mrs. CUBIN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DEFAZIO).
I want to talk about just a couple different areas. I represent the entire State of Wyoming. Here is a little history lesson that I would like to give.
A lot of people think that the public lands in the West are all national parks and national forests. Well, they are not. BLM land, or Bureau of Land Management land, makes up about half of the State of Wyoming, and it is owned by the Federal Government. The reason that is public land is because it is land that no one claimed when the Homestead Act expired.
Now, why did not anybody claim that land? They did not claim it because, for the most part, it does not have water on it. It is not very productive. There is alkali on it and sagebrush. It is not productive land, so it was not claimed. No one wanted it. So it was put in trust for the Bureau of Land Management. That is now what is called the public lands in the West.
Now if my colleagues stop and think about this for a minute, if my colleagues think about the ranchers and the public land that they have or the private land that they have, the private land is private because they homesteaded it because it has water on it. Then because there is water on it, there is grass, and there is feed for the cattle.
But do my colleagues know what else? There is grass and feed and water for the wildlife as well. I am talking about deer and antelope, elk, moose, bear, and all of those kinds of species that we regard very highly that we want to take care of.
Well, the USDA predator control, or Wildlife Services Program is there to protect that wildlife as well. So I think that the gentleman from Oregon's opposition to this comes from the fact that private landowners are helped by this service on their private land. But when my colleagues consider that 80 percent of the wildlife out there, the deer, antelope, elk, and so on is on private land.
And yet the public is the owner of that wildlife. I think it is our responsibility, since we are the owners of that wildlife, to help take responsibility in caring for them.
Another point I want to make, in Gillette, Wyoming, and Campbell County, we have a serious problem with rabies. Rabid skunks have gone into the City of Gillette, Wyoming, and this program is helping us with that problem.
A cougar in Casper, Wyoming, was spotted just last week very near a playground. People in a city like Casper do not necessarily have the expertise to be able to deal with this without the help of this program. So it is very shortsighted to cut this program. It is a matter of public health, and it should also be a matter of public conscience.
Mrs. EMERSON. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, I want to also rise in opposition to this amendment that would severely undermine the USDA's Wildlife Services Program. While I do not have a district out in the West but rather in the Midwest, it is very rural, and it is very big, and the fact of the matter is this program is a critical resource for the farmers and ranchers in my district who face the threat of crop and livestock damage.
As a matter of fact, wildlife causes as much as $1.6 billion in damage to agriculture each year. Given the fact that our farmers, right now their entire
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I also want to make another point which is often overlooked. Our farmers and ranchers are among the best stewards of the land anywhere. They are our best conservationists. Their land provides wildlife habitat. Their production methods promote wide stewardship of that land. So let us not point the finger at the family farmer and rancher when, in fact, they are doing good things for the environment and things that are good for the American consumer.
I oppose the amendment, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.
Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Bass-DeFazio amendment. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services program spends millions of dollars annually to kill more than 100,000 coyotes, foxes, bears, mountain lions, and other predators in the Western United States. Although there are non-lethal alternatives. Wildlife Services chooses to shoot, poision, trap, and even club to death both target and non-target animals. This taxpayer subsidy gives ranchers a disincentive to seek alternative methods of livestock protection that might be more effective.
The USDA predator control methods are non-selective, inefficient, and inhumane. Aerial gunning, sodium cyanide poisoning, steel-jawed leghold traps, and neck snares are Wildlife Services' killing methods. These techniques have been known to kill pets and endangered and threatened species. Much of the killing is conducted before livestock is released into an area, with the expectation that predators will become a problem. However, killing wildlife to protect livestock is effective only if the individual animals who attack livestock are removed. Targeting the entire population is needlessly cruel, wastes taxpayer dollars and can be counter-productive. Studies have shown that predator populations reduced through indiscriminate killing produce larger litters to compensate and quickly rebuild to equal or greater than pre-controlled levels.
With this amendment, the Wildlife Services' program would be funded to assist with non-lethal predator protection services and in cases to protect human and endangered species lives. I urge my colleagues to support the Bass-DeFazio amendment.
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment, which curtails the funding for what was formerly known as the Animal Damage Control program.
This amendment cuts $7 million in funding for the Department of Agriculture's inappropriately named ``Wildlife Services'' program. I say that it is inappropriately named, because the program does nothing to serve in the best interests of wildlife. It is, instead, a program whose purpose is to help farmers cope with natural predators who may prey on their livestock . While I believe that helping farmers is a laudable goal, the problem is that the way this program is administered, little help is provided and much damage caused.
Each year, this program indiscriminately kills 90,000 coyotes, foxes, bears and mountain lions. It is indiscriminate because there are few controls to ensure that the animals being slaughtered are tied to attacks on livestock . Oftentimes, young cubs are caught and killed, and on occasion, even a domesticated dog or cat will be mistakenly felled. This is simply not appropriate--and it should be stopped.
Wildlife Services is cruel because Wildlife Services still insists on using barbaric methods to handle these animals--including poisons, snares, and leg-hold traps. Sometimes, these animals are simply clubbed to death. Harp Seals are not the only animals that need protection from this brutal practice. We can do better than this--humane animal control techniques exist in our modern world. We can relocate animals that have caused problems.
How is it that we can build an internationally-sponsored space station yet we cannot find a way to treat our animals humanely? Do we need to spray poison in the face of animals that can contaminate other animals, or even humans, it comes in contact with afterwards? Must we kill not only the offending animal, but also every innocent scavenger that happens upon its corpse?
This program has been ineffective, and roundly criticized for decades. It was fully reviewed by advisory committees under the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Carter Administrations--each of which suggested numerous reforms, but none have been adopted. The General Accounting Office (GAO) similarly released a report in 1995 that found the program to be largely ineffective.
Studies have shown the coyotes have adapted to our killing techniques much better than we have adapted towards more humane methods of predator control. Despite a 71% increase in funding for these programs between 1983 and 1993, coyotes have compensated for the culling of their species by simply having more pups. Surely, we have been out-foxed here--and it is time to stop the United States government from behaving like Elmer Fudd flailing blindly at nature to no avail.
We are smarter than this. This House is smarter than this. Therefore, I urge my colleagues to support this sensible and humane amendment being offered by Congressmen DEFAZIO and BASS.
The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DEFAZIO).
The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes appeared to have it.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote, and pending that, I make the point of order that a quorum is not present.
The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to House Resolution 185, further proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DEFAZIO) will be postponed.
The point of no quorum is considered withdrawn.
Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, I rise to strike the last word.
Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk that I do not intend at least at this time to present. But the tenor of the amendment, Mr. Chairman, would have prevented Agriculture Secretary Glickman from instituting a new Federal milk marketing order system that would put thousands of dairy farmers out of business by lowering the price paid to farmers for their milk by hundreds of millions of dollars.
On March 31, 1999, Secretary Glickman announced his final decision on the Federal milk marketing order reform process that was required under 1996 Freedom to Farm Act. Unfortunately, his decision to adopt what is referred to as a modified Option 1-B has the effect of lowering Class I differentials for milk to virtually all regions of the country with the exception of the upper Midwest.
Can my colleagues imagine passing a policy, an agricultural policy that would harm the entire country except for perhaps two or three States. It defies logic.
The Secretary of Agriculture's decision flies in the face of broad bipartisan congressional multiregional support for Option 1-A. Congressional intent behind milk marketing order reform in no way anticipated this action by the Secretary.
My amendment also would have continued existing law, meaning that it would allow the continuation of the Northeast Dairy Compact. There has been increasing support for similar such compacts around the country as a way to protect against and otherwise prevent the harm that would be done by the Secretary's proposal and the havoc that it would cause in dairyland all across the Nation.
So, Mr. Chairman, rather than offer the amendment at this time, I would like to enter into a colloquy with several of my colleagues. I see the gentleman from Texas (Mr. COMBEST), chairman of the authorizing committee, the Committee on Agriculture, here; and I appreciate the gentleman coming down to participate in this discussion today.
Would the gentleman from Texas (Mr. COMBEST) agree that the Department of Agriculture's recommendation of a modified version, Option 1-B, is unacceptable to the majority Members of Congress and more importantly the majority of American dairy farmers and would therefore have to be modified through the regular legislative process?
Mr. COMBEST. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. WALSH. I am happy to yield to the gentleman from Texas.
Mr. COMBEST. Mr. Chairman, I would certainly be able to say yes just indicative of the fact that there is a bill to implement a different policy that I think has almost half of the Members of the House that are cosponsors of the bill. Certainly with the interest and concerns among the dairy industry, the Committee on Agriculture is certainly going to be looking into this in very short order.
Mr. WALSH. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I appreciate the gentleman's statement and clarification of
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Mr. COMBEST. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will yield, I would indicate to the gentleman, who has been a strong advocate of a dairy policy in this country and with a great deal of interest in this, there is a bill which has been introduced that will be the vehicle on the 24th of June for a hearing in the Subcommittee on Livestock and Horticulture that is chaired by the gentleman from California (Mr. POMBO). Very shortly after that, there will be markup on that bill, and that bill will then move to full consideration.
Given the fact that there is a recognition of some timely concern here without the Chair's being, I believe, able to give individuals total assurances about exactly what that final product would be, the vehicle that will be used for hearing purposes and for markup I think will be very much in line with the interest of the gentleman from New York (Mr. WALSH) in the dairy program.
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