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BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II
(Senate - March 12, 1996)

Text of this article available as: TXT PDF [Pages S1816-S1852] BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill. Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Amendment No. 3473 Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from Iowa and the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania for their work in bringing us to this point on one of the most important aspects of this omnibus appropriations bill, the education amendment. Yesterday we offered an amendment with an expectation that we could restore full funding to the 1995 level. This legislation does that. There was some miscalculation as to the funding level required to bring us to fiscal 1995 levels for title I. As I understand it, the question relating to how much funding would be required to do just that has been resolved. I am satisfied that this does restore the fiscal 1995 level for title I, as well as for the other educational priorities identified in the underlying amendment. So, clearly, this agreement is a very significant development. It ought to enjoy the support of both sides of the aisle. I hope we can get unanimous support for it. It removes what I consider to be one of the most important impediments to bringing us to a point where we can get broad bipartisan support for final passage of this bill. So, again, I thank the leadership of the Senator from Iowa, and certainly the Senator from Pennsylvania. I hope that all of our colleagues can support it. I hope we can work together on a bipartisan basis to reach similar agreements on other outstanding differences related to this legislation, including funding levels for the environment, crime, and technology. We also need to remove the contentious riders the House included in their version of the bill. I believe that if we did that this afternoon, we could put this bill on the President's desk before the end of the week and, at long last, resolve the many problems we have had with these appropriations bills. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Pennsylvania. On this question, the yeas and nays have been ordered, and the clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk called the roll. The result was announced--yeas 84, nays 16, as follows: [[Page S1817]] [Rollcall Vote No. 27 Leg.] YEAS--84 Abraham Akaka Baucus Bennett Biden Bingaman Bond Boxer Bradley Breaux Brown Bryan Bumpers Burns Byrd Campbell Chafee Cochran Cohen Conrad Coverdell D'Amato Daschle DeWine Dodd Dole Domenici Dorgan Exon Feingold Feinstein Ford Frist Glenn Gorton Graham Grassley Harkin Hatfield Heflin Hollings Hutchison Inouye Jeffords Johnston Kassebaum Kennedy Kerrey Kerry Kohl Lautenberg Leahy Levin Lieberman Lott Lugar Mack McConnell Mikulski Moseley-Braun Moynihan Murray Nickles Nunn Pell Pressler Pryor Reid Robb Rockefeller Roth Santorum Sarbanes Shelby Simon Simpson Snowe Specter Stevens Thomas Thurmond Warner Wellstone Wyden NAYS--16 Ashcroft Coats Craig Faircloth Gramm Grams Gregg Hatch Helms Inhofe Kempthorne Kyl McCain Murkowski Smith Thompson So, the amendment (No. 3473) was agreed to. Amendment No. 3467 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the Daschle amendment No. 3467, as amended. So the amendment (No. 3467), as amended, was agreed to. Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to. Mr. HATFIELD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Mr. JEFFORDS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont. Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise today in support of Senator Hatfield's proposal in the omnibus bill before us to remove restrictions on U.S. funding of international family planning. These restrictions are part of the foreign operations bill which was folded into the last CR. Senator Hatfield's initiative is a necessary and welcome step: necessary because the restrictions risk the lives and health of women and children in the developing world; welcome because the United States should not be forced by these ill-conceived restrictions to abdicate its proven leadership in international family planning. Voluntary efforts to limit population growth must remain a principal priority of U.S. foreign assistance. The failure to fund adequately international family planning efforts in the developing world has dire consequences. The restrictions currently on the books will result in 4 million unwanted pregnancies in developing countries. Of these unwanted pregnancies, an estimated 1.6 million will end in abortions. Thus, these restrictions have as a direct and alarming consequence a result contrary to their purported purpose of trying to minimize abortions. The restrictions do not decrease abortions, they increase them. Other statistics speak for themselves. In Russia, a lack of family planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has four abortions over her lifetime. In countries with effective family planning, though, such as Hungary, abortion rates have dropped dramatically. But this debate is not just about abortion. A lack of adequate family planning and population efforts leads directly to a severe degradation of the lives and health of mothers and children. U.S.-funded programs, rather than promote abortion, seek to promote safe contraception, thus allowing women to space their pregnancies, a step crucial to the health of the mother and the survival of the child. If the CR funding restrictions are left in place, 8,000 more women will die in pregnancy and childbirth, including from unsafe abortions, and 134,000 more infant deaths will occur. Inadequate family planning also contributes to dangerous strains on already heavily taxed environments, while unbridled population growth has a serious impact on education efforts in countries where money for such programs is scarce. Such a strain on education is an indirect cost of these restrictions, but one with dire long-term consequences. It is worth emphasizing that prohibitions on U.S. funding for abortions have been on the books since 1973. USAID has consistently sought to prevent abortions by offering viable alternatives, alternatives available only through adequate education. AID's programs are widely recognized as the most efficient and effective population planning programs in the world. These shortsighted restrictions endanger the long-term goals of improving the lot of women and children in the developing world, with potentially catastrophic results. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from the Christian Science Monitor of February 9, 1996. There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Congressional Effort to Curb Global Abortion May Backfire (By George Moffett) Washington.--A Congressional move to limit abortion and family planning may have a dramatic unintended consequence: It could actually cause the global abortion rate to rise. Encouraged by the Christian Coalition and anti-abortion groups, Congress last month made deep cuts in United States funds for family-planning programs abroad. But demographers, and even some anti-abortion activists, are warning that the cuts for family planning will lead to more unintended pregnancies--and that more, not fewer, abortions are likely to result. ``We embraced the probability of at least 4 million more abortions that could have been averted if access to voluntary family-planning services had been maintained,'' Sen. Mark Hatfield (R) of Oregon told his Senate colleagues this week. ``These numbers are as disturbing as they are astounding, particularly to those of us who are faithfully and assertively pro-life.'' The US has been barred from funding abortion services overseas since 1973. But anti-abortion activists in the US urged Congress to cut support for family-planning programs concerned that such programs indirectly promote abortion. ``Population control that has to do with education and the use of contraceptives was not the issue,'' says Rep. Sonny Callahan (R) of Alabama, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that deals with foreign aid. ``The issue is trying to stop the US from providing any money that might be used for abortions.'' ``Our concern is that services for abortion are being provided by family-planning agencies,'' adds a spokesman for the Christian Coalition, based in Chesapeake, Va. Lawmakers trimmed funding for population assistance by 35 percent in a foreign-aid bill that was incorporated into a ``continuing resolution'' to keep the federal government running until mid-March. In addition to budget cuts, the legislation imposes unprecedented restrictions on family-planning programs funded by the US Agency for International Development (AID), AID is now barred from obligating any money before July 1 and only small monthly parcels thereafter process that leaves only 14 percent of the amount appropriated in 1995 available for use in fiscal year 1996, and which, AID officials complain, will confound the process of long-term planning. Republican sources on Capitol Hill say cuts in family- planning funds are part of an across-the-board drive to reduce federal spending. As for restrictions on how the money is spent, says one House source, they reflect the new balance of power in the 104th Congress in favor of those who believe that family-planning agencies promote abortion--a charge family planning advocates hotly deny. Family-planning advocates cite evidence indicating that cuts in family-planning services will lead to sharp increases in abortion. They point to Russia, where the absence of family-planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has at least four abortions over a lifetime. ``The framers of the family-planning language in [the continuing resolution] ensured, perhaps unintentionally, that the gruesome experience of Russian women and families will be replicated throughout the world, starting now,'' Senator Hatfield says. Conversely, where family-planning services have been introduced, as in Hungary, the abortion rate has dropped dramatically. Some 50 million couples around the world now use family- planning services paid for by US government funds. The one- third budget cut could mean one-third that number, or 17 million couples, will lose access to family planning. If funds are not found from other sources, according to projections by Population Action International, a Washington- based advocacy group. ``More than 10 million unintended pregnancies could result annually,'' says Sally Ethelston, a spokeswoman for the group. ``That could mean at least 3 million abortions, at least half a million infant and child deaths, and tens of thousands of maternal deaths.'' Without family-planning services, more pregnancies will occur among younger women, older women, and women who have not spaced pregnancies by at least two years, which is considered the minimum time needed to protect the health of mother and child. [[Page S1818]] The US has taken the lead since the 1960s in funding family-planning programs in poor nations. Since then, global contraceptive use has risen fivefold; fertility (the average number of children born to a woman during her reproductive years) has dropped by one-third; and the rate of global population growth has begun to slow. Even so, the world grows by 1 million people every 96 hours, and the populations of most poor nations are projected to double within 20 to 30 years. AID officials say the cuts will retard the incipient family-planning movement in Africa, where population growth is fastest. ``If this proves to be something that does increase abortion, we'd take another look at our position,'' says the Christian Coalition spokesman. Mr. JEFFORDS. I urge my colleagues to support lifting these restrictions on programs with vital U.S. interests. I yield to the Senator from South Carolina. Mr. HOLLINGS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina. amendment no. 3474 to amendment no. 3466 (Purpose: To provide funding for important technology initiatives with an offset) Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I have an amendment at the desk and ask, on behalf of myself, Senator Daschle, Senator Kerry, Senator Lieberman, Senator Bingaman, Senator Rockefeller, Senator Leahy, Senator Lautenberg and Senator Kerrey, the clerk to please report it. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. Hollings] for himself, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Kerry, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Bingaman, Mr. Leahy, Mr. Rockefeller, and Mr. Kerrey proposes an amendment numbered 3474 to amendment No. 3466. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Amendments Submitted.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this is the technology amendment. I ask unanimous consent that I be able to yield to the distinguished Senator from California, who wishes to make a brief statement as in morning business. Mrs. FEINSTEIN addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California. Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair, and I particularly thank Senator Hollings. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The remarks of Mrs. Feinstein pertaining to the introduction of S. 1607 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. I have been informed by the Parliamentarian, since the Daschle education amendment has passed, that the present amendment on technology needs to be conformed. I ask unanimous consent the Parliamentarian conform it in accordance with the Daschle amendment in the bill as it now appears. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this amendment restores funding for five important technology programs that are significant investments in our country's future. They focus on three critical areas: Economic growth, education, and cost-effective environmental protection. The spending we propose in this amendment is fully offset, and the Congressional Budget Office has scored that offset at providing more than is needed for the programs we restore. The distinguished Senator from Iowa has been the principal sponsor also of the offset, which deals with accelerated collection by the Federal Government. We, as cosponsors, are indebted to him for his leadership. Otherwise, the distinguished Senator from Maryland, Senator Mikulski, has really led the way for our Environmental Protection Technology Program. Specifically, the amendment invests five important technology programs. It restores funding for four of them: A $300 million add-back for the Department of Commerce's Advance Technology Program, which contracts with industry to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies; $32 million more for the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program at the National Telecommunication and Information Administration; an additional $4.5 million for the Technology Administration at the Department of Commerce, including $2.5 million to honor commitments under the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission; and a $62 million addition for the Environmental Technology Initiative at the Environmental Protection Agency, an important effort to develop innovative and cost-effective ways to protect the environment. These add-backs total $398.5 million. In addition, the amendment specifies that $23 million that is already in title I of the committee amendment is to go to the Education Department's Technology Learning Challenge Program. These five programs promote innovative new technologies--technologies, Mr. President, that can improve schools, protect the environment at lower cost, and create new industries and jobs to replace employment lost through never-ending downsizing and layoffs. We must invest now to benefit from those new technologies tomorrow. This amendment does that job. The amendment fully offsets these add-backs through a provision that would significantly improve the collection of delinquent Federal debts. It puts the squeeze on deadbeats who have not repaid money owed to the Federal Government. The Congressional Budget Office has scored this provision as raising $440 million in fiscal year 1996--more than enough to cover the add-backs. Mr. President, I want to turn first to investment in new job-creating technologies. I particularly want to focus on the Advanced Technology Program at the Department of Commerce. The Advanced Technology Program contracts with companies on a cost-shared basis to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies that offer great promise for the Nation but are too untested for the regular marketplace to fully fund. Just as other Federal research and development programs work through companies to develop the technologies needed for Government missions such as defense and space, the Advanced Technology Program works with companies in support of the critical Federal mission of promoting long-term economic growth and job creation. The amendment now before the Senate provides $300 million for the ATP. The $300 million level is significantly below the $341 million available for the program just last year in 1995. Currently, H.R. 3019 provides no 1996 funds for this important program, although the committee amendment's unfunded title IV would provide $235 million to support existing awards. Mr. President, I want to talk about several points in this important program. First, we are talking here about jobs. The Advanced Technology Program supports a vital mission of Government--promoting long-term economic growth. The voters know that America faces tough economic times. Foreign competition remains fierce, American companies continue with never-ending downsizing, and voters are understandably anxious and upset. It is ironic indeed that the Government spends billions in research and development dollars each year for defense security, but we are still debating the R efforts to promote economic security. Increasingly, new industries, jobs, and wealth will go to those who are fastest at developing and then applying new technologies. And if we are to save as many jobs as possible in existing industries, they too need to be technologically competitive. The ATP works to turn promising laboratory ideas into practical breakthrough technologies--technologies that the private sector itself will develop into new products and processes. And, we hope, technologies that American companies and American workers will turn into products before our overseas competitors do so. The Federal Government has long worked with industry to speed the development of important new technologies. Industry-government partnerships helped start entire U.S. industries--from the telegraph and agriculture to aircraft and biotechnology to computers and the Internet. These government investments paid off enormously for the Nation and its workers. [[Page S1819]] We won the race to develop those technologies. But will we win others? I started the ATP because I saw our competitors overseas moving to develop and commercialize American ideas before we could, in areas such as superconductivity. And the race continues. Numerous small ATP winners tell us that their foreign competitors are often no more than 12 to 18 months behind them. This is not surprising. While American firms have difficulty getting private capital for long-term research that will not pay off quickly, other governments invest heavily in programs to support civilian technology. This year, the Japanese will spend $1.4 billion on national technology research programs for industry. The European Union is investing $14.4 billion over 5 years in 20 specific areas of research and technology, and individual European governments are investing additional R amounts to help their economies. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the explosive growth of foreign technology programs, we need not only Defense Department research programs but also economic growth programs such as the ATP. And given the economic insecurity facing the country, we should increase the ATP, not cut it. We need to help American industry accelerate the development of new technologies, new industries, and new jobs. If you want to let other countries win the technology race, then kill the ATP. Second, Congress has a serious obligation to honor our commitments to companies and workers in ongoing ATP projects. The pending bill acknowledged this when it included $235 million in the unfunded title IV of the bill. I commend Chairman Hatfield for including that provision. He put that in so that if Congress can find the money, then fiscal year 1996 commitments to some 200 current multiyear projects will be kept. Our amendment has an actual offset for that $235 million, as well as enough additional money to have a small new ATP competition in fiscal year 1996. Not passing our amendment will, in fact, abruptly reduce the ATP from its fiscal year 1995 level of $341 million to a fiscal year 1996 level of zero--a draconian move that will hurt companies across the country. It will particularly hurt the 100 companies in 25 States that won awards in fiscal year 1995 and now need fiscal year 1996 funding to continue their multi-year projects. These companies have hired staff and committed their own matching funds. Third, I want to emphasize that over the years the ATP has actually enjoyed strong bipartisan support. The law creating the program passed during President Reagan's second term, and the ATP received its first funds during the Bush administration. Mr. Bush's Commerce Department wrote the rules for the ATP, and did a good job. President Bush himself requested budget increases, and in 1992 14 Republican Senators on a defense conversion task force endorsed it. See ``Report of the Senate Republican Task Force on Adjusting the Defense Based,'' June 22, 1992. Unfortunately, in 1994 politics intruded because some Senators worried that ATP grants might be made in a political fashion. But this is the purest program you will find. Expert panels make the decisions-- not the Secretary of Commerce, not the White House, not any Member of Congress. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well under the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The ATP now supports 276 research projects around the country, involving 757 research participants in 41 States. The ATP is not porked, has never been porked, and is not used for partisan purposes. Fourth, the ATP is not corporate welfare. This program is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the ATP is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies also pay half the costs, hardly welfare. Moreover, no ATP funds are ever used to subsidize product development in companies; it supports only development work up to basic prototypes. More than half the awards go to small firms or joint ventures led by small firms. Fifth, both the ATP itself and the larger principle of industry- government technology partnerships enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) about technology partnership programs in general: The NAM believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. . . . In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of federal R spending. The NAM suggests that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. Groups explicitly endorsing the ATP include the Coalition for Technology Partnerships, a group of over 100 companies and other research organizations, and the Science and Technology Working Group, representing over two dozen scientific and engineering societies and other organizations. These groups see the ATP as an important investment in America's future prosperity and strength. In addition, the General Accounting Office [GAO] has conducted two reviews of the ATP in the past year. Despite some assertions to the contrary, they speak highly of the program. GAO found that the ATP had succeeded in encouraging research joint ventures, one of its purposes; that ATP winners did indeed often have trouble getting private funding because the research was too far from immediate market results; and even those companies that would have continued their research without ATP awards would have done so much more slowly or at a lower level of effort. A January 1996 report conducted by Silber and Associates provided further positive comments from industry. Of the companies surveyed, many maintain that the ATP has been the lifeblood of their company's innovative research efforts, permitting them to venture into arenas new to U.S. industry. Sixth, while the ATP is still new, it already has generated some real technical successes--successes that in the years ahead will create jobs and broad benefits for our Nation. Later, I will submit for the Record a detailed list of accomplishments, but for now I want to mention three particular cases. With help from ATP, Aastrom Biosciences of Ann Arbor, MI, has developed a prototype bioreactor that can grow blood cells from a patient's own bone marrow cells. In 12 days, the bioreactor will produce billions of red and white cells identical to the patient's own--cells that then can be injected into the patient to boost the immune system. The benefits from this system will be astounding. Now that the basic technology has been proven and patented, Aastrom has received $20 million in private funds to turn the prototype into a commercial product. With ATP help, the Auto Body Consortium--consisting of eight auto suppliers, with support from Chrysler, General Motors, and the University of Michigan--have developed a new measurement technology to make assembly-line manufacturing more precise. The result will be better fit-and-finish in car production, resulting in lower manufacturing costs and lower car maintenance costs. The new system is now being tested. Diamond Semiconductor of Gloucester, MA, used its ATP award to develop a new, risky technology for helping to reliably use much larger semiconductor wafers--the slices of silicon on which computer chips are built. Diamond Semiconductor's equipment can be used to make 12-inch wafers, holding many more chips than the old 8-inch wafers. Now that the technology is proven, a much larger company, Varian Associates, has invested in turning this system into a commercial product. Finally, there is one other key point. The President supports this program and opposes any effort to abruptly terminate it. It is a fact that when he vetoed the earlier fiscal year 1996 Commerce, Justice, State conference report he cited two main reasons--cuts in the COPS Program and elimination of the ATP. ATP funding is needed in order to get the President's signature and get on with finishing appropriations bills for this current fiscal year. The sooner we resolve the ATP issue, the sooner we get on with solving this protracted budget impasse. [[Page S1820]] Mr. President, the ATP is one of our most investments in long-term economic growth and jobs. For that reason, we need to pass the pending amendment and fund the ATP. INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE ASSISTANCE Mr. President, this amendment also adds $32 million to the current bill's $22 million for fiscal year 1996 funding for NTIA's Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program [TIIAP]. The fiscal year 1995 figure was $42 million. TIIAP is a highly competitive, merit-based grant program that provides seed money for innovative, practical information technology projects throughout the United States. TIIAP helps to connect schools, libraries, hospitals, and community centers to new telecommunications systems. Examples include connecting schools to the vast resources of the Internet, improved health care communications for elderly patients in their homes, and extending emergency telephone service in rural areas. Projects are cost shared, and have yielded nearly $2 of non- Federal support for every Federal dollar spent. Many of the awards go to underserved rural and inner-city areas. In fiscal year 1995, NTIA received 1,811 applications, with proposals from all 50 States, and was able to fund 117 awards. With the recent enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, more communities that ever will be faced with both new information infrastructure challenges and opportunities. Schools, hospitals, and libraries all need help hooking up and applying this technology to their needs. The money this amendment would provide for fiscal year 1996 will enable dozens of additional communities to connect to, and benefit from, the new telecommunications revolution. TECHNOLOGY ADMINISTRATION Our amendment also would add $4.5 million to the $5 million that H.R. 3019's title I provides to DOC's Technology Administration [TA] appropriations account. Of that additional amount, $2 million will help TA and its Office of Technology Policy [OTP] maintain its role in coordinating the new-generation vehicle project, organizing industry benchmarking studies, and serving as the secretariat for the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission. The other $2.5 million is for a new activity endorsed by the Committee amendment's title IV-- actual joint projects between the United States and Israel in technology and in harmonizing technical regulations so as to promote high-technology trade between the countries. ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY Mr. President, I will let others speak in greater detail about two of the programs covered in this amendment--environmental technology and educational technology. But I want to mention them briefly here. The amendment contains a $62 million add-back to support activities under the EPA's environmental technology initiative [ETI]. The program has two main purposes--to help accelerate the development, verification, and dissemination of new cleaner and cheaper technologies, and to accelerate efforts by EPA and state environmental agencies to rewrite regulations so that they do not lock in old technologies. Innovative environmental technologies offer a win-win opportunity--high levels of protection at lower costs for industry. In the process, we also can help a growing U.S. industry that exports environmental protection technology and creates jobs here at home. The $62 million will help with these important activities. In the case of educational technology, title I of the committee amendment to H.R. 3019 already provides additional funds for educational research and technology, and I commend members of the Appropriations Committee for that step. Our amendment would simply clarify that of those funds now in title I of the bill, $23 million is for the highly regarded technology learning challenge grants. This is a competitive, peer-reviewed program. Under this program, schools work with computer companies, software companies, universities, and others to develop innovative software and computer tools for improving basic classroom curricula. The challenge grants are seed money for alliances of educators and industrial partners to develop new computer applications in reading, writing, geometry and other math, and vocational education. In short, we are developing new ways to use computers to improve learning. In the first competition, held last year, the Education Department received 500 proposals and was able to make only 19 awards. Clearly, there are many more outstanding, valuable proposals out there. The $23 million of fiscal year 1996 funding would allow more of these important projects. THE OFFSET: IMPROVED DEBT COLLECTION Before concluding, Mr. President, I want to mention briefly the offset that this amendment provides to pay for these technology program add-backs. As mentioned, CBO has scored this proposal as providing $440 million in fiscal year 1996 funds, more than enough to offset the $389.5 million in add-backs included in the amendment. The offsetting funds come from a upgraded Federal process, created in this amendment, for improving the collection of money owed to the Government and for denying certain Federal payments to individuals who owe such money to the Government. In short, we will not give certain Federal payments to people who are delinquent in paying their debts to the Government, and we will give Federal agencies new authority to collect such debts. The Government estimates that the total amount owed to the Government--including both nontax debt and tax debt--in 1995 was a staggering $125 billion. The Internal Revenue Service already has authority under law to withhold Federal tax returns for delinquent Federal debts, and the Treasury Department's Financial Management Service may hold back certain nontax Federal benefits for delinquent Federal debts. So far, the Treasury Department has collected over $5 billion in bad debt through reductions--offsets--in Federal tax credits. But there is a larger problem. Many other Federal agencies do not have the resources to invest in debt collection, or their mission does not include debt collection, or they face too many restrictions in using the available tools. On March 22, 1995, the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which is composed of agency inspectors general, reported on the need for a Governmentwide system of reducing Federal payments to delinquents. Based on this problem, legislation has been proposed by a bipartisan group of legislators, acting with the support of the administration. In the House, the main bill is H.R. 2234, the Debt Collection Improvement Act, introduced by Congressman Horn, Congresswoman Maloney, and others. The Senate companion bill is S. 1234, introduced by our distinguished colleague from Iowa, Senator Harkin. Finally, a version of this proposal was included in the House version of last year's budget reconciliation legislation, H.R. 2517. So this idea of improving Federal debt collection enjoys strong bipartisan support. As included in our amendment, the debt-collection proposal has several key provisions. First, the Treasury will be able to reduce certain Federal payments to individuals who owe the Government money. Veterans Affairs benefits would be exempt from this offset process. Other benefit payments such as social security, railroad retirement, and black lung payments will reduce after a $10,000 combined annual exemption. Other agencies can cooperate in this process by giving information to the Treasury regarding delinquent debt, although steps will be taken to protect the legitimate privacy of individuals. Second, Federal agencies will have access to the computerized information and can dock the pay of Federal employees who owe the Government money. Third, people who have delinquent Federal debts will be barred from obtaining Federal loans or loan guarantees. Fourth, the Social Security Administration, the Customs Service, and the legislative and judicial branches of the Federal Government will be authorized to use debt collection tools, such as credit bureaus and private collection agencies. Mr. President, this is a sound proposal for collecting money from deadbeats and docking their Federal payments until they pay the funds they [[Page S1821]] owe. It is fair, and it simply improves the process for carrying out debt-collection authorities agencies already have. CONCLUSION Mr. President, America's success at home and abroad is like a stool that rests on three legs. First, our strength and success depend on our military power, which is now undisputed in an age where we are the world's only superpower. Second are our values, of family and country. They are strong and can be stronger still. The third leg, though, is our economic strength. And here we face serious challenges. As the New York Times has recently documented, too many Americans live with growing economic insecurity. Layoffs abound, and many of the jobs that once went to Americans have gone overseas. Accelerating the development of new high-technology industries and jobs is not a complete solution. We also need a vigorous trade policy to pry open foreign markets and reduce unfair dumping of foreign products. We need better education and training for all Americans. We need to make real progress, not phony progress, on the Federal deficit, so that interest rates can fall further. But technology policy is one key step in national economic recovery and strength, and the four programs this amendment supports are key parts of an effective, nonporked national technology policy. We know that earlier technology cooperation between industry and Government has helped create entire American industries--from agriculture to aircraft to computers and biotechnology. Much of Government's support came through the Defense Department, which was appropriate during World War II and the cold war. But now the Berlin Wall has fallen, and now our Nation's greatest challenge is economic, not military. We therefore need to strengthen civilian programs to stimulate technologies important to the civilian economy and civilian jobs. To do less is to condemn our Nation and its workers in the long run to second-rate status and more, not less, economic insecurity. For these reasons, I urge our colleagues to pass this important amendment. Mr. President, at this point I want to make a few additional points about the importance of technology and the Advanced Technology Program in particular. To begin with, we must remember that our strength as a Nation is like a three-legged stool. We have the one leg--the values of the Nation--which is unquestionably strong. We have sacrificed for the hungry in Somalia, for democracy in Haiti, for peace in Bosnia. We have the second leg, Mr. President, of military strength, which is also unquestioned. But the third leg--that of economic strength--has become fractured over the past 45 years in the cold war--intentionally, if you please, because we sacrificed to keep the allies together in the cold war. So we willingly gave up market share trying to develop capitalism not just in Europe, but particularly in the Pacific rim, and it has worked. The Marshall Plan has worked. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, however, now is the time to rebuild the strength of our economy. Our problem is, right to the point, that you can willingly--for national defense, military security--conduct research without any matching funds whatever. You can go right to the heart of it and give out the money. But all of a sudden, Mr. President, when we come to the matter of economic security--which is really the competition now in global affairs--we hear criticism even though the ATP requires matching funds, a dollar of private money for every dollar of Government money we expend. The law requires 50 percent from industry. The track record is 60 percent of the money by industry itself. Yet when they come with it, all of a sudden we hear talk about pork. Let me take up the matter of pork because that is the reason we are into this particular dilemma. The program at hand is working in most of the 50 States with hundreds of different contracts awarded. They are awarded over for 3- and 5-year periods, and they have led into commercialization, which we will soon touch upon. Senator Danforth and I set this up in the late 1980's. I was chairman of the Commerce Committee at that particular time. We wanted to make sure, back in 1988--the Trade Act of 1988 is where it was added--we wanted to make sure that it would not be exactly what is it accused of being today, namely, pork. So we set down various guidelines in the particular measure itself, and it was implemented in a very, very successful way by, I should say, President Bush's administration. No. 1, the industry has to come and make the request. It is not the Government picking winners or losers. It is the industry picking the winner. They have to come with at least 50 percent of the money. Thereupon, the experts in technology and business, including retired executives selected by the Industrial Research Institute, have to peer review the particular proposals. Mr. President, they have to look it over and make sure that the submission would really pass muster. I know it particularly well because my textile industry came with a request for computerization that they thought was unique. But it did not pass muster and was not given the award. They do not have an Advanced Technology Program award. Incidentally, I guess they heard ahead of time about my discipline of not making any calls. I never made a call to the White House or anybody in the Commerce Department in favor of any proposal. I would rather, at the markup of the appropriations bill, have turned back efforts on the other side of the Capitol to try to write in these particular projects. So we have protected the authenticity of the program as being nonpork. Thereupon, having passed peer review, highly ranked proposals have to go to a source selection board. The source selection board are civil servants, as we all know, of no political affiliation. On a competitive basis, they make the decision, not Secretary Brown, not President Clinton, not Senator Hollings, or any other Senator or Congressman, but, rather, that is the way these awards have been made. There have been no violations of it. We are proud of its record. That is why it has the confidence of the National Association of Manufacturers. That is why it receives the endorsement of the Council on Competitiveness, and every particular industry group you can possibly imagine have come forward and said this is the way to do it. That has to do with the pork part. The other part with respect to the long-range financing for long-term technologies has to be understood. Back at that particular time, when we were writing the legislation years ago, Newsweek reported an analysis predicting that maintaining the current hands-off policies toward industry and research, namely, the matter of commercialization of our technology, could cause the United States to be locked into a technological decline. They said, and I quote, that it would add $225 billion to the annual trade deficit by the year 2010 and put 2 million Americans out of work. There are various other articles we had at that particular time, and witnesses. I quote particularly from Alan Wolff: In 1990, a Wall Street analyst commented to a group of U.S. semiconductor executives that the goal of people investing in stocks is to make money. That is what capitalism is all about. It is not a charity. I can't tell my brokers, ``Gee, I am sorry about your client, but investing in the semiconductor industry is good for the country.'' While the individual was stating a truth, obviously, he was touching on a fundamental dilemma confronting U.S. industry today in light of the investor sentiment expressed above. How is a company to maintain the level of investment needed to remain competitive over the long term, particularly if there is no prospect of a short-term or short-run payoff, or foreign competition has destroyed the prospect of earning a return on that investment? That is the points that answers a charge sometimes made with respect to two recent GAO reports. Critics of the Advanced Technology Program quote GAO's statement where it said that half of those who had been given awards, when asked if they would have continued their research without the awards, said they would have continued. But by way of emphasis, these critics do not mention the next GAO finding, namely, that none of them said they would have ever continued as quickly or with the same degree of investment. With Government assistance, they are able to expedite their research and therefore have been able to meet the foreign competition. But note that GAO reported that half the winners said they would not have continued their research without Government [[Page S1822]] assistance. They would have abandoned it. We would have lost valid, good research projects without this Advanced Technology Program. I think the emphasis should be made at this particular time that GAO has made a favorable report, and that the program is doing exactly what was intended to do. It confronts exactly the particular dilemma we find ourselves in with respect to the operation of the stock market. It can go up 171 points one day and come back 110 points the next day. They look for short-term turnarounds and everything else of that kind, and does not focus on the long-term, including long-term technologies. That is why the working group headed by the distinguished Senator from New Mexico, Senator Bingaman, calls for the various securities law reforms. So we can do away, perhaps, with the quarterly report and actually meet the long-term investment competition that we confront, particularly in the Pacific rim. Again, I want to emphasize that expert panels make the decisions, not the Secretary of Commerce. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well in the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The Advanced Technology Program now involves some 760 research participants. It supports 280 projects around the country and in some 41 States. The Advanced Technology Program is not corporate welfare. It is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the Advanced Technology Program is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies must pay, as I pointed out, at least half of the amount when they come and may apply to the Advanced Technology Program. The ATP itself is the larger principal of industry-Government technology partnerships which enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers: The National Association of Manufacturers believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what Federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of Federal R spending. The National Association of Manufacturers suggest that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. The figure we have in the particular amendment is $41 million less than the fiscal year 1995 level--$131 million less than the original 1995 level that existed before rescissions. We propose that there be a cut, not even a freeze. Of our $300 million, we are trying to bring up some $235 million to honor commitments to projects that have already received their awards and now need to complete them. We do not want to cut them off in half completion. Let me commend the distinguished chairman of our Appropriations Committee, Senator Hatfield of Oregon, in realizing and confronting this problem. He did not have the money. He put the $235 million in title IV, but he said, ``Look, if we can possibly find the money in offsets in title IV, then this should be completed.'' It is not a way for the Government to do business and build up the confidence that is so much besieged this day and age. The Government is trying to build up these partnerships and work together in research with industry and with the college campuses. It is wrong to take valid programs that have no objection to them, no pork, no waste, fraud, and abuse, and only tremendous success, and then come with a fetish against them because they appear as pork to some on the other side of the Capitol, and then to walk lockstep like it is part of a contract. We had, in qualifying this program, by way of emphasis, a series of hearings back in the 1980's. We also had soon after that particular time the Competitiveness Policy Council, with many members appointed by President Reagan. He appointed the former head of the National Science Foundation, Erich Bloch, who was designated chairman of the Council's Critical Technologies Subcouncil. They endorsed the ATP. I ask unanimous consent that the critical technology subcouncil listing of these outstanding individuals be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Competitiveness Policy Council Critical Technologies Subcouncil, 1993 Chairman Erich Bloch, Distinguished Fellow, Council on Competitiveness. David Cheney, Staff Director. Membership Eleanor Baum, Dean, Albert Nerken School of Engineering, Cooper Union. Frederick M. Bernthal, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation. Sherwood L. Boehlert, U.S. House of Representatives. Michael G. Borrus, Co-director, Berkeley Roundtable on International Economics. Rick Boucher, U.S. House of Representatives. Lewis M. Branscomb, Professor, Harvard University. Daniel Burton, Executive Vice President, Council on Competitiveness. Dennis Chamot, Executive Assistant to the President, Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO. John Deutch, Professor, MIT. John W. Diggs, Deputy Director for Extramural Research, Department of Health and Human Services. Craig Fields, President and CEO, MCC. Edward B. Fort, Chancellor, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. John S. Foster, Consultant, TRW, Inc., and Chairman, Defense Science Board. William Happer, Director, Office of Energy Research, U.S. Department of Energy. Joseph S. Hezir, Principal, EOP Group, and former Deputy Assistant Director, Energy and Science Division, OMB. Richard K. Lester, Director, Industrial Performance Center, MIT. John W. Lyons, Director, National Institute for Standards and Technology. Daniel P. McCurdy, Manager, Technology Policy, IBM. Joseph G. Morone, Professor, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, School of Management. Al Narath, President, Sandia National Laboratories. Richard R. Nelson, Professor, Columbia University. William D. Phillips, Former Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Lois Rice, Guest Scholar, Brookings Institution. Nathan Rosenberg, Director of Program for Technology & Economic Growth, Stanford University. Howard D. Samuel, President, Industrial Union Department, AFL-CIO. Hubert J.P. Schoemaker, President and CEO, Centocor, Inc. Charles Shanley, Director of Technology Planning, Motorola Inc. Richard H. van Atta, Research Staff Member, Institute for Defense Analyses. Robert M. White, Under Secretary for Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce. Eugene Wong, Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, in August 1992, we also had the National Science Board itself. I will read a couple of things and not put it in its entirety into the Record, which we would be glad to do. But the National Science Board concluded: Stronger Federal leadership is needed in setting the course for U.S. technological competitiveness. Implementation of a national technology policy, including establishment of a rationale and guidelines for Federal action, should receive the highest priority. The start of such a policy was set forth 2 years ago by the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy, but more forceful action is needed by the President and Congress before there is further erosion in the United States technological position. They made the recommendation to expand and strengthen the Manufacturing Technology Centers Program, the State Technology Extension Program, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and I quote, ``Further expand NIST's Advanced Technology Program.'' That was very important, therefore, the National Science Board and its findings at that particular time. Going back to 1987 for a moment, Mr. President, we led off our original series of technology hearings that year with the distinguished entrepreneur, technologist, professor, industrial leader, dean at the University of Texas Business School, Dr. George Kosmetsky, who had helped create the Microelectronics Technology and Computer Corporation down in Austin, TX. We followed his testimony with the Council on Competitiveness. I will read just part of a Council on Competitiveness statement written not long after that particular time. The United States is already losing badly in many critical technologies. Unless the Nation acts today to promote the development [[Page S1823]] of generic industrial technology, its technological position will erode further, with disastrous consequences for American jobs, economic growth, and national security. The Federal Government should view support for generic industrial technology as a priority mission. It is important to note that this mission would not require major new Federal funding. Additional funds for generic technology programs are required. Other Federal R programs, such as national prestige projects, should be redirected or phased in more slowly to allow more resources to be focused on generic technology. Of course, Mr. President, these themes were included and touched upon in our hearings and legislation, and we have been more or less off and running since then. We have, finally, by way of endorsement, the Coalition for Technology Partnerships. It has over 130 members, a combination of companies, trade associations, different companies themselves, such as the American Electronic Association, and several universities that work with industry on ATP projects. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at this particular point a letter from the Coalition for Technology Partnership along with the listing of membership. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Coalition for Technology Partnerships (CTP), Washington, DC, July 6, 1995. Hon. Ernest F. Hollings, Russell Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC. Dear Senator Hollings: The undersigned members of the Coalition for Technology Partnerships respectfully ask for your support of the Advanced Technology Program (ATP). We understand that the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committees will be marking up the FY Department of Commerce Authorization bill in late July. We are concerned by the House Science Committee and the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Subcommittee vote to eliminate the ATP and are writing to outline our views on this essential program. The Coalition for Technology Partnerships applauds your efforts to cut the federal budget deficit and to streamline the federal government, but we caution against sacrificing technology partnerships, such as the ATP, that are essential to our international competitiveness. The ATP has enjoyed wide-spread industry support and participation. The basic mission of the ATP is to fund research programs with a significant potential for stimulating economic growth and improving the long-term competitiveness of U.S. industry. The ATP is already achieving this goal, by cost-sharing research to foster new innovative technologies that create opportunities for world- class products, services and industrial processes. ATP research priorities are set by industry. The selection process is fair, and based entirely on technical and business merit. Half of all ATP awards and joint ventures go to small business directed partnerships. Today, as indication of the success of this program, quality proposals in pursuit of ATP funds far outstrips available funds. The real payoff of the ATP is the long-term economic growth potential for the companies involved with the program, and the creation of new jobs. The ATP is a model of industry/ government partnerships which benefits the nation as a whole, again by leveraging industrial capital to pursue new technologies. Without ATP, these technological opportunities would be slowed, or ultimately forfeited to foreign competitors more able to make key investments in longer-term, higher risk research, such as is the focus of ATP. We urge you to adequately fund the Advanced Technology Program as you begin mark-up of the authorization bill. The ATP is essential, cost effective and timely for the economic growth of our country. Please contact either Taffy Kingscott at 202/515-5193 or Tom Sellers at 202/728-3606 if you have any questions or if we can be of any assistance. coalition for technology partnerships The Coalition for Technology Partnerships has been formed by a group of small, medium and large businesses, trade associations and technical societies on the principle that technology partnerships between government and industry reflect the realities of today's budget climate and technology development mechanisms. Advance Circuits, Inc. Advanced Machining Dynamics. Aerospace Industries Association. Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Institute. Alaska Technology Transfer Assistance Center. American Electronics Association. American Concrete Institute. Amoco Performance Products, Inc. Andersen Consulting. Aphios Corporation. Apple Computer. Applied Medical Informatics (AMI). Arizona State Univ.-College of Engineering & Applied Science. Armstrong World Industries, Inc. Array Comm., Inc. Atlantic Research Corporation. Babcock & Wilcox. BioHybrid Technologies Inc. Biotechnology Industry Organization. Brunswick Composites. CALMAC Manufacturing Corporation. The Carborundum Company. Clean Air Now. CNA Consulting Engineers. Coal Technology Corporation. Columbia Bay Company. Council on Superconductivity. Cubicon. Cybo Robots, Inc. Dakota Technologies, Inc. Dell Computer. Diamond Semiconductor Group. Dow Chemical Company. Dow-United Technologies Composite Products, Inc. Dragon Systems, Inc. DuPont. Edison Materials Technology Center. The Electorlyser Corporation. Energy BioSystems Corporation. Erie County Technical Institute. Fairfield U

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BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II
(Senate - March 12, 1996)

Text of this article available as: TXT PDF [Pages S1816-S1852] BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill. Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Amendment No. 3473 Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from Iowa and the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania for their work in bringing us to this point on one of the most important aspects of this omnibus appropriations bill, the education amendment. Yesterday we offered an amendment with an expectation that we could restore full funding to the 1995 level. This legislation does that. There was some miscalculation as to the funding level required to bring us to fiscal 1995 levels for title I. As I understand it, the question relating to how much funding would be required to do just that has been resolved. I am satisfied that this does restore the fiscal 1995 level for title I, as well as for the other educational priorities identified in the underlying amendment. So, clearly, this agreement is a very significant development. It ought to enjoy the support of both sides of the aisle. I hope we can get unanimous support for it. It removes what I consider to be one of the most important impediments to bringing us to a point where we can get broad bipartisan support for final passage of this bill. So, again, I thank the leadership of the Senator from Iowa, and certainly the Senator from Pennsylvania. I hope that all of our colleagues can support it. I hope we can work together on a bipartisan basis to reach similar agreements on other outstanding differences related to this legislation, including funding levels for the environment, crime, and technology. We also need to remove the contentious riders the House included in their version of the bill. I believe that if we did that this afternoon, we could put this bill on the President's desk before the end of the week and, at long last, resolve the many problems we have had with these appropriations bills. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Pennsylvania. On this question, the yeas and nays have been ordered, and the clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk called the roll. The result was announced--yeas 84, nays 16, as follows: [[Page S1817]] [Rollcall Vote No. 27 Leg.] YEAS--84 Abraham Akaka Baucus Bennett Biden Bingaman Bond Boxer Bradley Breaux Brown Bryan Bumpers Burns Byrd Campbell Chafee Cochran Cohen Conrad Coverdell D'Amato Daschle DeWine Dodd Dole Domenici Dorgan Exon Feingold Feinstein Ford Frist Glenn Gorton Graham Grassley Harkin Hatfield Heflin Hollings Hutchison Inouye Jeffords Johnston Kassebaum Kennedy Kerrey Kerry Kohl Lautenberg Leahy Levin Lieberman Lott Lugar Mack McConnell Mikulski Moseley-Braun Moynihan Murray Nickles Nunn Pell Pressler Pryor Reid Robb Rockefeller Roth Santorum Sarbanes Shelby Simon Simpson Snowe Specter Stevens Thomas Thurmond Warner Wellstone Wyden NAYS--16 Ashcroft Coats Craig Faircloth Gramm Grams Gregg Hatch Helms Inhofe Kempthorne Kyl McCain Murkowski Smith Thompson So, the amendment (No. 3473) was agreed to. Amendment No. 3467 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the Daschle amendment No. 3467, as amended. So the amendment (No. 3467), as amended, was agreed to. Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to. Mr. HATFIELD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Mr. JEFFORDS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont. Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise today in support of Senator Hatfield's proposal in the omnibus bill before us to remove restrictions on U.S. funding of international family planning. These restrictions are part of the foreign operations bill which was folded into the last CR. Senator Hatfield's initiative is a necessary and welcome step: necessary because the restrictions risk the lives and health of women and children in the developing world; welcome because the United States should not be forced by these ill-conceived restrictions to abdicate its proven leadership in international family planning. Voluntary efforts to limit population growth must remain a principal priority of U.S. foreign assistance. The failure to fund adequately international family planning efforts in the developing world has dire consequences. The restrictions currently on the books will result in 4 million unwanted pregnancies in developing countries. Of these unwanted pregnancies, an estimated 1.6 million will end in abortions. Thus, these restrictions have as a direct and alarming consequence a result contrary to their purported purpose of trying to minimize abortions. The restrictions do not decrease abortions, they increase them. Other statistics speak for themselves. In Russia, a lack of family planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has four abortions over her lifetime. In countries with effective family planning, though, such as Hungary, abortion rates have dropped dramatically. But this debate is not just about abortion. A lack of adequate family planning and population efforts leads directly to a severe degradation of the lives and health of mothers and children. U.S.-funded programs, rather than promote abortion, seek to promote safe contraception, thus allowing women to space their pregnancies, a step crucial to the health of the mother and the survival of the child. If the CR funding restrictions are left in place, 8,000 more women will die in pregnancy and childbirth, including from unsafe abortions, and 134,000 more infant deaths will occur. Inadequate family planning also contributes to dangerous strains on already heavily taxed environments, while unbridled population growth has a serious impact on education efforts in countries where money for such programs is scarce. Such a strain on education is an indirect cost of these restrictions, but one with dire long-term consequences. It is worth emphasizing that prohibitions on U.S. funding for abortions have been on the books since 1973. USAID has consistently sought to prevent abortions by offering viable alternatives, alternatives available only through adequate education. AID's programs are widely recognized as the most efficient and effective population planning programs in the world. These shortsighted restrictions endanger the long-term goals of improving the lot of women and children in the developing world, with potentially catastrophic results. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from the Christian Science Monitor of February 9, 1996. There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Congressional Effort to Curb Global Abortion May Backfire (By George Moffett) Washington.--A Congressional move to limit abortion and family planning may have a dramatic unintended consequence: It could actually cause the global abortion rate to rise. Encouraged by the Christian Coalition and anti-abortion groups, Congress last month made deep cuts in United States funds for family-planning programs abroad. But demographers, and even some anti-abortion activists, are warning that the cuts for family planning will lead to more unintended pregnancies--and that more, not fewer, abortions are likely to result. ``We embraced the probability of at least 4 million more abortions that could have been averted if access to voluntary family-planning services had been maintained,'' Sen. Mark Hatfield (R) of Oregon told his Senate colleagues this week. ``These numbers are as disturbing as they are astounding, particularly to those of us who are faithfully and assertively pro-life.'' The US has been barred from funding abortion services overseas since 1973. But anti-abortion activists in the US urged Congress to cut support for family-planning programs concerned that such programs indirectly promote abortion. ``Population control that has to do with education and the use of contraceptives was not the issue,'' says Rep. Sonny Callahan (R) of Alabama, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that deals with foreign aid. ``The issue is trying to stop the US from providing any money that might be used for abortions.'' ``Our concern is that services for abortion are being provided by family-planning agencies,'' adds a spokesman for the Christian Coalition, based in Chesapeake, Va. Lawmakers trimmed funding for population assistance by 35 percent in a foreign-aid bill that was incorporated into a ``continuing resolution'' to keep the federal government running until mid-March. In addition to budget cuts, the legislation imposes unprecedented restrictions on family-planning programs funded by the US Agency for International Development (AID), AID is now barred from obligating any money before July 1 and only small monthly parcels thereafter process that leaves only 14 percent of the amount appropriated in 1995 available for use in fiscal year 1996, and which, AID officials complain, will confound the process of long-term planning. Republican sources on Capitol Hill say cuts in family- planning funds are part of an across-the-board drive to reduce federal spending. As for restrictions on how the money is spent, says one House source, they reflect the new balance of power in the 104th Congress in favor of those who believe that family-planning agencies promote abortion--a charge family planning advocates hotly deny. Family-planning advocates cite evidence indicating that cuts in family-planning services will lead to sharp increases in abortion. They point to Russia, where the absence of family-planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has at least four abortions over a lifetime. ``The framers of the family-planning language in [the continuing resolution] ensured, perhaps unintentionally, that the gruesome experience of Russian women and families will be replicated throughout the world, starting now,'' Senator Hatfield says. Conversely, where family-planning services have been introduced, as in Hungary, the abortion rate has dropped dramatically. Some 50 million couples around the world now use family- planning services paid for by US government funds. The one- third budget cut could mean one-third that number, or 17 million couples, will lose access to family planning. If funds are not found from other sources, according to projections by Population Action International, a Washington- based advocacy group. ``More than 10 million unintended pregnancies could result annually,'' says Sally Ethelston, a spokeswoman for the group. ``That could mean at least 3 million abortions, at least half a million infant and child deaths, and tens of thousands of maternal deaths.'' Without family-planning services, more pregnancies will occur among younger women, older women, and women who have not spaced pregnancies by at least two years, which is considered the minimum time needed to protect the health of mother and child. [[Page S1818]] The US has taken the lead since the 1960s in funding family-planning programs in poor nations. Since then, global contraceptive use has risen fivefold; fertility (the average number of children born to a woman during her reproductive years) has dropped by one-third; and the rate of global population growth has begun to slow. Even so, the world grows by 1 million people every 96 hours, and the populations of most poor nations are projected to double within 20 to 30 years. AID officials say the cuts will retard the incipient family-planning movement in Africa, where population growth is fastest. ``If this proves to be something that does increase abortion, we'd take another look at our position,'' says the Christian Coalition spokesman. Mr. JEFFORDS. I urge my colleagues to support lifting these restrictions on programs with vital U.S. interests. I yield to the Senator from South Carolina. Mr. HOLLINGS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina. amendment no. 3474 to amendment no. 3466 (Purpose: To provide funding for important technology initiatives with an offset) Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I have an amendment at the desk and ask, on behalf of myself, Senator Daschle, Senator Kerry, Senator Lieberman, Senator Bingaman, Senator Rockefeller, Senator Leahy, Senator Lautenberg and Senator Kerrey, the clerk to please report it. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. Hollings] for himself, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Kerry, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Bingaman, Mr. Leahy, Mr. Rockefeller, and Mr. Kerrey proposes an amendment numbered 3474 to amendment No. 3466. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Amendments Submitted.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this is the technology amendment. I ask unanimous consent that I be able to yield to the distinguished Senator from California, who wishes to make a brief statement as in morning business. Mrs. FEINSTEIN addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California. Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair, and I particularly thank Senator Hollings. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The remarks of Mrs. Feinstein pertaining to the introduction of S. 1607 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. I have been informed by the Parliamentarian, since the Daschle education amendment has passed, that the present amendment on technology needs to be conformed. I ask unanimous consent the Parliamentarian conform it in accordance with the Daschle amendment in the bill as it now appears. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this amendment restores funding for five important technology programs that are significant investments in our country's future. They focus on three critical areas: Economic growth, education, and cost-effective environmental protection. The spending we propose in this amendment is fully offset, and the Congressional Budget Office has scored that offset at providing more than is needed for the programs we restore. The distinguished Senator from Iowa has been the principal sponsor also of the offset, which deals with accelerated collection by the Federal Government. We, as cosponsors, are indebted to him for his leadership. Otherwise, the distinguished Senator from Maryland, Senator Mikulski, has really led the way for our Environmental Protection Technology Program. Specifically, the amendment invests five important technology programs. It restores funding for four of them: A $300 million add-back for the Department of Commerce's Advance Technology Program, which contracts with industry to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies; $32 million more for the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program at the National Telecommunication and Information Administration; an additional $4.5 million for the Technology Administration at the Department of Commerce, including $2.5 million to honor commitments under the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission; and a $62 million addition for the Environmental Technology Initiative at the Environmental Protection Agency, an important effort to develop innovative and cost-effective ways to protect the environment. These add-backs total $398.5 million. In addition, the amendment specifies that $23 million that is already in title I of the committee amendment is to go to the Education Department's Technology Learning Challenge Program. These five programs promote innovative new technologies--technologies, Mr. President, that can improve schools, protect the environment at lower cost, and create new industries and jobs to replace employment lost through never-ending downsizing and layoffs. We must invest now to benefit from those new technologies tomorrow. This amendment does that job. The amendment fully offsets these add-backs through a provision that would significantly improve the collection of delinquent Federal debts. It puts the squeeze on deadbeats who have not repaid money owed to the Federal Government. The Congressional Budget Office has scored this provision as raising $440 million in fiscal year 1996--more than enough to cover the add-backs. Mr. President, I want to turn first to investment in new job-creating technologies. I particularly want to focus on the Advanced Technology Program at the Department of Commerce. The Advanced Technology Program contracts with companies on a cost-shared basis to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies that offer great promise for the Nation but are too untested for the regular marketplace to fully fund. Just as other Federal research and development programs work through companies to develop the technologies needed for Government missions such as defense and space, the Advanced Technology Program works with companies in support of the critical Federal mission of promoting long-term economic growth and job creation. The amendment now before the Senate provides $300 million for the ATP. The $300 million level is significantly below the $341 million available for the program just last year in 1995. Currently, H.R. 3019 provides no 1996 funds for this important program, although the committee amendment's unfunded title IV would provide $235 million to support existing awards. Mr. President, I want to talk about several points in this important program. First, we are talking here about jobs. The Advanced Technology Program supports a vital mission of Government--promoting long-term economic growth. The voters know that America faces tough economic times. Foreign competition remains fierce, American companies continue with never-ending downsizing, and voters are understandably anxious and upset. It is ironic indeed that the Government spends billions in research and development dollars each year for defense security, but we are still debating the R efforts to promote economic security. Increasingly, new industries, jobs, and wealth will go to those who are fastest at developing and then applying new technologies. And if we are to save as many jobs as possible in existing industries, they too need to be technologically competitive. The ATP works to turn promising laboratory ideas into practical breakthrough technologies--technologies that the private sector itself will develop into new products and processes. And, we hope, technologies that American companies and American workers will turn into products before our overseas competitors do so. The Federal Government has long worked with industry to speed the development of important new technologies. Industry-government partnerships helped start entire U.S. industries--from the telegraph and agriculture to aircraft and biotechnology to computers and the Internet. These government investments paid off enormously for the Nation and its workers. [[Page S1819]] We won the race to develop those technologies. But will we win others? I started the ATP because I saw our competitors overseas moving to develop and commercialize American ideas before we could, in areas such as superconductivity. And the race continues. Numerous small ATP winners tell us that their foreign competitors are often no more than 12 to 18 months behind them. This is not surprising. While American firms have difficulty getting private capital for long-term research that will not pay off quickly, other governments invest heavily in programs to support civilian technology. This year, the Japanese will spend $1.4 billion on national technology research programs for industry. The European Union is investing $14.4 billion over 5 years in 20 specific areas of research and technology, and individual European governments are investing additional R amounts to help their economies. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the explosive growth of foreign technology programs, we need not only Defense Department research programs but also economic growth programs such as the ATP. And given the economic insecurity facing the country, we should increase the ATP, not cut it. We need to help American industry accelerate the development of new technologies, new industries, and new jobs. If you want to let other countries win the technology race, then kill the ATP. Second, Congress has a serious obligation to honor our commitments to companies and workers in ongoing ATP projects. The pending bill acknowledged this when it included $235 million in the unfunded title IV of the bill. I commend Chairman Hatfield for including that provision. He put that in so that if Congress can find the money, then fiscal year 1996 commitments to some 200 current multiyear projects will be kept. Our amendment has an actual offset for that $235 million, as well as enough additional money to have a small new ATP competition in fiscal year 1996. Not passing our amendment will, in fact, abruptly reduce the ATP from its fiscal year 1995 level of $341 million to a fiscal year 1996 level of zero--a draconian move that will hurt companies across the country. It will particularly hurt the 100 companies in 25 States that won awards in fiscal year 1995 and now need fiscal year 1996 funding to continue their multi-year projects. These companies have hired staff and committed their own matching funds. Third, I want to emphasize that over the years the ATP has actually enjoyed strong bipartisan support. The law creating the program passed during President Reagan's second term, and the ATP received its first funds during the Bush administration. Mr. Bush's Commerce Department wrote the rules for the ATP, and did a good job. President Bush himself requested budget increases, and in 1992 14 Republican Senators on a defense conversion task force endorsed it. See ``Report of the Senate Republican Task Force on Adjusting the Defense Based,'' June 22, 1992. Unfortunately, in 1994 politics intruded because some Senators worried that ATP grants might be made in a political fashion. But this is the purest program you will find. Expert panels make the decisions-- not the Secretary of Commerce, not the White House, not any Member of Congress. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well under the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The ATP now supports 276 research projects around the country, involving 757 research participants in 41 States. The ATP is not porked, has never been porked, and is not used for partisan purposes. Fourth, the ATP is not corporate welfare. This program is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the ATP is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies also pay half the costs, hardly welfare. Moreover, no ATP funds are ever used to subsidize product development in companies; it supports only development work up to basic prototypes. More than half the awards go to small firms or joint ventures led by small firms. Fifth, both the ATP itself and the larger principle of industry- government technology partnerships enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) about technology partnership programs in general: The NAM believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. . . . In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of federal R spending. The NAM suggests that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. Groups explicitly endorsing the ATP include the Coalition for Technology Partnerships, a group of over 100 companies and other research organizations, and the Science and Technology Working Group, representing over two dozen scientific and engineering societies and other organizations. These groups see the ATP as an important investment in America's future prosperity and strength. In addition, the General Accounting Office [GAO] has conducted two reviews of the ATP in the past year. Despite some assertions to the contrary, they speak highly of the program. GAO found that the ATP had succeeded in encouraging research joint ventures, one of its purposes; that ATP winners did indeed often have trouble getting private funding because the research was too far from immediate market results; and even those companies that would have continued their research without ATP awards would have done so much more slowly or at a lower level of effort. A January 1996 report conducted by Silber and Associates provided further positive comments from industry. Of the companies surveyed, many maintain that the ATP has been the lifeblood of their company's innovative research efforts, permitting them to venture into arenas new to U.S. industry. Sixth, while the ATP is still new, it already has generated some real technical successes--successes that in the years ahead will create jobs and broad benefits for our Nation. Later, I will submit for the Record a detailed list of accomplishments, but for now I want to mention three particular cases. With help from ATP, Aastrom Biosciences of Ann Arbor, MI, has developed a prototype bioreactor that can grow blood cells from a patient's own bone marrow cells. In 12 days, the bioreactor will produce billions of red and white cells identical to the patient's own--cells that then can be injected into the patient to boost the immune system. The benefits from this system will be astounding. Now that the basic technology has been proven and patented, Aastrom has received $20 million in private funds to turn the prototype into a commercial product. With ATP help, the Auto Body Consortium--consisting of eight auto suppliers, with support from Chrysler, General Motors, and the University of Michigan--have developed a new measurement technology to make assembly-line manufacturing more precise. The result will be better fit-and-finish in car production, resulting in lower manufacturing costs and lower car maintenance costs. The new system is now being tested. Diamond Semiconductor of Gloucester, MA, used its ATP award to develop a new, risky technology for helping to reliably use much larger semiconductor wafers--the slices of silicon on which computer chips are built. Diamond Semiconductor's equipment can be used to make 12-inch wafers, holding many more chips than the old 8-inch wafers. Now that the technology is proven, a much larger company, Varian Associates, has invested in turning this system into a commercial product. Finally, there is one other key point. The President supports this program and opposes any effort to abruptly terminate it. It is a fact that when he vetoed the earlier fiscal year 1996 Commerce, Justice, State conference report he cited two main reasons--cuts in the COPS Program and elimination of the ATP. ATP funding is needed in order to get the President's signature and get on with finishing appropriations bills for this current fiscal year. The sooner we resolve the ATP issue, the sooner we get on with solving this protracted budget impasse. [[Page S1820]] Mr. President, the ATP is one of our most investments in long-term economic growth and jobs. For that reason, we need to pass the pending amendment and fund the ATP. INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE ASSISTANCE Mr. President, this amendment also adds $32 million to the current bill's $22 million for fiscal year 1996 funding for NTIA's Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program [TIIAP]. The fiscal year 1995 figure was $42 million. TIIAP is a highly competitive, merit-based grant program that provides seed money for innovative, practical information technology projects throughout the United States. TIIAP helps to connect schools, libraries, hospitals, and community centers to new telecommunications systems. Examples include connecting schools to the vast resources of the Internet, improved health care communications for elderly patients in their homes, and extending emergency telephone service in rural areas. Projects are cost shared, and have yielded nearly $2 of non- Federal support for every Federal dollar spent. Many of the awards go to underserved rural and inner-city areas. In fiscal year 1995, NTIA received 1,811 applications, with proposals from all 50 States, and was able to fund 117 awards. With the recent enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, more communities that ever will be faced with both new information infrastructure challenges and opportunities. Schools, hospitals, and libraries all need help hooking up and applying this technology to their needs. The money this amendment would provide for fiscal year 1996 will enable dozens of additional communities to connect to, and benefit from, the new telecommunications revolution. TECHNOLOGY ADMINISTRATION Our amendment also would add $4.5 million to the $5 million that H.R. 3019's title I provides to DOC's Technology Administration [TA] appropriations account. Of that additional amount, $2 million will help TA and its Office of Technology Policy [OTP] maintain its role in coordinating the new-generation vehicle project, organizing industry benchmarking studies, and serving as the secretariat for the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission. The other $2.5 million is for a new activity endorsed by the Committee amendment's title IV-- actual joint projects between the United States and Israel in technology and in harmonizing technical regulations so as to promote high-technology trade between the countries. ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY Mr. President, I will let others speak in greater detail about two of the programs covered in this amendment--environmental technology and educational technology. But I want to mention them briefly here. The amendment contains a $62 million add-back to support activities under the EPA's environmental technology initiative [ETI]. The program has two main purposes--to help accelerate the development, verification, and dissemination of new cleaner and cheaper technologies, and to accelerate efforts by EPA and state environmental agencies to rewrite regulations so that they do not lock in old technologies. Innovative environmental technologies offer a win-win opportunity--high levels of protection at lower costs for industry. In the process, we also can help a growing U.S. industry that exports environmental protection technology and creates jobs here at home. The $62 million will help with these important activities. In the case of educational technology, title I of the committee amendment to H.R. 3019 already provides additional funds for educational research and technology, and I commend members of the Appropriations Committee for that step. Our amendment would simply clarify that of those funds now in title I of the bill, $23 million is for the highly regarded technology learning challenge grants. This is a competitive, peer-reviewed program. Under this program, schools work with computer companies, software companies, universities, and others to develop innovative software and computer tools for improving basic classroom curricula. The challenge grants are seed money for alliances of educators and industrial partners to develop new computer applications in reading, writing, geometry and other math, and vocational education. In short, we are developing new ways to use computers to improve learning. In the first competition, held last year, the Education Department received 500 proposals and was able to make only 19 awards. Clearly, there are many more outstanding, valuable proposals out there. The $23 million of fiscal year 1996 funding would allow more of these important projects. THE OFFSET: IMPROVED DEBT COLLECTION Before concluding, Mr. President, I want to mention briefly the offset that this amendment provides to pay for these technology program add-backs. As mentioned, CBO has scored this proposal as providing $440 million in fiscal year 1996 funds, more than enough to offset the $389.5 million in add-backs included in the amendment. The offsetting funds come from a upgraded Federal process, created in this amendment, for improving the collection of money owed to the Government and for denying certain Federal payments to individuals who owe such money to the Government. In short, we will not give certain Federal payments to people who are delinquent in paying their debts to the Government, and we will give Federal agencies new authority to collect such debts. The Government estimates that the total amount owed to the Government--including both nontax debt and tax debt--in 1995 was a staggering $125 billion. The Internal Revenue Service already has authority under law to withhold Federal tax returns for delinquent Federal debts, and the Treasury Department's Financial Management Service may hold back certain nontax Federal benefits for delinquent Federal debts. So far, the Treasury Department has collected over $5 billion in bad debt through reductions--offsets--in Federal tax credits. But there is a larger problem. Many other Federal agencies do not have the resources to invest in debt collection, or their mission does not include debt collection, or they face too many restrictions in using the available tools. On March 22, 1995, the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which is composed of agency inspectors general, reported on the need for a Governmentwide system of reducing Federal payments to delinquents. Based on this problem, legislation has been proposed by a bipartisan group of legislators, acting with the support of the administration. In the House, the main bill is H.R. 2234, the Debt Collection Improvement Act, introduced by Congressman Horn, Congresswoman Maloney, and others. The Senate companion bill is S. 1234, introduced by our distinguished colleague from Iowa, Senator Harkin. Finally, a version of this proposal was included in the House version of last year's budget reconciliation legislation, H.R. 2517. So this idea of improving Federal debt collection enjoys strong bipartisan support. As included in our amendment, the debt-collection proposal has several key provisions. First, the Treasury will be able to reduce certain Federal payments to individuals who owe the Government money. Veterans Affairs benefits would be exempt from this offset process. Other benefit payments such as social security, railroad retirement, and black lung payments will reduce after a $10,000 combined annual exemption. Other agencies can cooperate in this process by giving information to the Treasury regarding delinquent debt, although steps will be taken to protect the legitimate privacy of individuals. Second, Federal agencies will have access to the computerized information and can dock the pay of Federal employees who owe the Government money. Third, people who have delinquent Federal debts will be barred from obtaining Federal loans or loan guarantees. Fourth, the Social Security Administration, the Customs Service, and the legislative and judicial branches of the Federal Government will be authorized to use debt collection tools, such as credit bureaus and private collection agencies. Mr. President, this is a sound proposal for collecting money from deadbeats and docking their Federal payments until they pay the funds they [[Page S1821]] owe. It is fair, and it simply improves the process for carrying out debt-collection authorities agencies already have. CONCLUSION Mr. President, America's success at home and abroad is like a stool that rests on three legs. First, our strength and success depend on our military power, which is now undisputed in an age where we are the world's only superpower. Second are our values, of family and country. They are strong and can be stronger still. The third leg, though, is our economic strength. And here we face serious challenges. As the New York Times has recently documented, too many Americans live with growing economic insecurity. Layoffs abound, and many of the jobs that once went to Americans have gone overseas. Accelerating the development of new high-technology industries and jobs is not a complete solution. We also need a vigorous trade policy to pry open foreign markets and reduce unfair dumping of foreign products. We need better education and training for all Americans. We need to make real progress, not phony progress, on the Federal deficit, so that interest rates can fall further. But technology policy is one key step in national economic recovery and strength, and the four programs this amendment supports are key parts of an effective, nonporked national technology policy. We know that earlier technology cooperation between industry and Government has helped create entire American industries--from agriculture to aircraft to computers and biotechnology. Much of Government's support came through the Defense Department, which was appropriate during World War II and the cold war. But now the Berlin Wall has fallen, and now our Nation's greatest challenge is economic, not military. We therefore need to strengthen civilian programs to stimulate technologies important to the civilian economy and civilian jobs. To do less is to condemn our Nation and its workers in the long run to second-rate status and more, not less, economic insecurity. For these reasons, I urge our colleagues to pass this important amendment. Mr. President, at this point I want to make a few additional points about the importance of technology and the Advanced Technology Program in particular. To begin with, we must remember that our strength as a Nation is like a three-legged stool. We have the one leg--the values of the Nation--which is unquestionably strong. We have sacrificed for the hungry in Somalia, for democracy in Haiti, for peace in Bosnia. We have the second leg, Mr. President, of military strength, which is also unquestioned. But the third leg--that of economic strength--has become fractured over the past 45 years in the cold war--intentionally, if you please, because we sacrificed to keep the allies together in the cold war. So we willingly gave up market share trying to develop capitalism not just in Europe, but particularly in the Pacific rim, and it has worked. The Marshall Plan has worked. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, however, now is the time to rebuild the strength of our economy. Our problem is, right to the point, that you can willingly--for national defense, military security--conduct research without any matching funds whatever. You can go right to the heart of it and give out the money. But all of a sudden, Mr. President, when we come to the matter of economic security--which is really the competition now in global affairs--we hear criticism even though the ATP requires matching funds, a dollar of private money for every dollar of Government money we expend. The law requires 50 percent from industry. The track record is 60 percent of the money by industry itself. Yet when they come with it, all of a sudden we hear talk about pork. Let me take up the matter of pork because that is the reason we are into this particular dilemma. The program at hand is working in most of the 50 States with hundreds of different contracts awarded. They are awarded over for 3- and 5-year periods, and they have led into commercialization, which we will soon touch upon. Senator Danforth and I set this up in the late 1980's. I was chairman of the Commerce Committee at that particular time. We wanted to make sure, back in 1988--the Trade Act of 1988 is where it was added--we wanted to make sure that it would not be exactly what is it accused of being today, namely, pork. So we set down various guidelines in the particular measure itself, and it was implemented in a very, very successful way by, I should say, President Bush's administration. No. 1, the industry has to come and make the request. It is not the Government picking winners or losers. It is the industry picking the winner. They have to come with at least 50 percent of the money. Thereupon, the experts in technology and business, including retired executives selected by the Industrial Research Institute, have to peer review the particular proposals. Mr. President, they have to look it over and make sure that the submission would really pass muster. I know it particularly well because my textile industry came with a request for computerization that they thought was unique. But it did not pass muster and was not given the award. They do not have an Advanced Technology Program award. Incidentally, I guess they heard ahead of time about my discipline of not making any calls. I never made a call to the White House or anybody in the Commerce Department in favor of any proposal. I would rather, at the markup of the appropriations bill, have turned back efforts on the other side of the Capitol to try to write in these particular projects. So we have protected the authenticity of the program as being nonpork. Thereupon, having passed peer review, highly ranked proposals have to go to a source selection board. The source selection board are civil servants, as we all know, of no political affiliation. On a competitive basis, they make the decision, not Secretary Brown, not President Clinton, not Senator Hollings, or any other Senator or Congressman, but, rather, that is the way these awards have been made. There have been no violations of it. We are proud of its record. That is why it has the confidence of the National Association of Manufacturers. That is why it receives the endorsement of the Council on Competitiveness, and every particular industry group you can possibly imagine have come forward and said this is the way to do it. That has to do with the pork part. The other part with respect to the long-range financing for long-term technologies has to be understood. Back at that particular time, when we were writing the legislation years ago, Newsweek reported an analysis predicting that maintaining the current hands-off policies toward industry and research, namely, the matter of commercialization of our technology, could cause the United States to be locked into a technological decline. They said, and I quote, that it would add $225 billion to the annual trade deficit by the year 2010 and put 2 million Americans out of work. There are various other articles we had at that particular time, and witnesses. I quote particularly from Alan Wolff: In 1990, a Wall Street analyst commented to a group of U.S. semiconductor executives that the goal of people investing in stocks is to make money. That is what capitalism is all about. It is not a charity. I can't tell my brokers, ``Gee, I am sorry about your client, but investing in the semiconductor industry is good for the country.'' While the individual was stating a truth, obviously, he was touching on a fundamental dilemma confronting U.S. industry today in light of the investor sentiment expressed above. How is a company to maintain the level of investment needed to remain competitive over the long term, particularly if there is no prospect of a short-term or short-run payoff, or foreign competition has destroyed the prospect of earning a return on that investment? That is the points that answers a charge sometimes made with respect to two recent GAO reports. Critics of the Advanced Technology Program quote GAO's statement where it said that half of those who had been given awards, when asked if they would have continued their research without the awards, said they would have continued. But by way of emphasis, these critics do not mention the next GAO finding, namely, that none of them said they would have ever continued as quickly or with the same degree of investment. With Government assistance, they are able to expedite their research and therefore have been able to meet the foreign competition. But note that GAO reported that half the winners said they would not have continued their research without Government [[Page S1822]] assistance. They would have abandoned it. We would have lost valid, good research projects without this Advanced Technology Program. I think the emphasis should be made at this particular time that GAO has made a favorable report, and that the program is doing exactly what was intended to do. It confronts exactly the particular dilemma we find ourselves in with respect to the operation of the stock market. It can go up 171 points one day and come back 110 points the next day. They look for short-term turnarounds and everything else of that kind, and does not focus on the long-term, including long-term technologies. That is why the working group headed by the distinguished Senator from New Mexico, Senator Bingaman, calls for the various securities law reforms. So we can do away, perhaps, with the quarterly report and actually meet the long-term investment competition that we confront, particularly in the Pacific rim. Again, I want to emphasize that expert panels make the decisions, not the Secretary of Commerce. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well in the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The Advanced Technology Program now involves some 760 research participants. It supports 280 projects around the country and in some 41 States. The Advanced Technology Program is not corporate welfare. It is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the Advanced Technology Program is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies must pay, as I pointed out, at least half of the amount when they come and may apply to the Advanced Technology Program. The ATP itself is the larger principal of industry-Government technology partnerships which enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers: The National Association of Manufacturers believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what Federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of Federal R spending. The National Association of Manufacturers suggest that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. The figure we have in the particular amendment is $41 million less than the fiscal year 1995 level--$131 million less than the original 1995 level that existed before rescissions. We propose that there be a cut, not even a freeze. Of our $300 million, we are trying to bring up some $235 million to honor commitments to projects that have already received their awards and now need to complete them. We do not want to cut them off in half completion. Let me commend the distinguished chairman of our Appropriations Committee, Senator Hatfield of Oregon, in realizing and confronting this problem. He did not have the money. He put the $235 million in title IV, but he said, ``Look, if we can possibly find the money in offsets in title IV, then this should be completed.'' It is not a way for the Government to do business and build up the confidence that is so much besieged this day and age. The Government is trying to build up these partnerships and work together in research with industry and with the college campuses. It is wrong to take valid programs that have no objection to them, no pork, no waste, fraud, and abuse, and only tremendous success, and then come with a fetish against them because they appear as pork to some on the other side of the Capitol, and then to walk lockstep like it is part of a contract. We had, in qualifying this program, by way of emphasis, a series of hearings back in the 1980's. We also had soon after that particular time the Competitiveness Policy Council, with many members appointed by President Reagan. He appointed the former head of the National Science Foundation, Erich Bloch, who was designated chairman of the Council's Critical Technologies Subcouncil. They endorsed the ATP. I ask unanimous consent that the critical technology subcouncil listing of these outstanding individuals be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Competitiveness Policy Council Critical Technologies Subcouncil, 1993 Chairman Erich Bloch, Distinguished Fellow, Council on Competitiveness. David Cheney, Staff Director. Membership Eleanor Baum, Dean, Albert Nerken School of Engineering, Cooper Union. Frederick M. Bernthal, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation. Sherwood L. Boehlert, U.S. House of Representatives. Michael G. Borrus, Co-director, Berkeley Roundtable on International Economics. Rick Boucher, U.S. House of Representatives. Lewis M. Branscomb, Professor, Harvard University. Daniel Burton, Executive Vice President, Council on Competitiveness. Dennis Chamot, Executive Assistant to the President, Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO. John Deutch, Professor, MIT. John W. Diggs, Deputy Director for Extramural Research, Department of Health and Human Services. Craig Fields, President and CEO, MCC. Edward B. Fort, Chancellor, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. John S. Foster, Consultant, TRW, Inc., and Chairman, Defense Science Board. William Happer, Director, Office of Energy Research, U.S. Department of Energy. Joseph S. Hezir, Principal, EOP Group, and former Deputy Assistant Director, Energy and Science Division, OMB. Richard K. Lester, Director, Industrial Performance Center, MIT. John W. Lyons, Director, National Institute for Standards and Technology. Daniel P. McCurdy, Manager, Technology Policy, IBM. Joseph G. Morone, Professor, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, School of Management. Al Narath, President, Sandia National Laboratories. Richard R. Nelson, Professor, Columbia University. William D. Phillips, Former Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Lois Rice, Guest Scholar, Brookings Institution. Nathan Rosenberg, Director of Program for Technology & Economic Growth, Stanford University. Howard D. Samuel, President, Industrial Union Department, AFL-CIO. Hubert J.P. Schoemaker, President and CEO, Centocor, Inc. Charles Shanley, Director of Technology Planning, Motorola Inc. Richard H. van Atta, Research Staff Member, Institute for Defense Analyses. Robert M. White, Under Secretary for Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce. Eugene Wong, Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, in August 1992, we also had the National Science Board itself. I will read a couple of things and not put it in its entirety into the Record, which we would be glad to do. But the National Science Board concluded: Stronger Federal leadership is needed in setting the course for U.S. technological competitiveness. Implementation of a national technology policy, including establishment of a rationale and guidelines for Federal action, should receive the highest priority. The start of such a policy was set forth 2 years ago by the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy, but more forceful action is needed by the President and Congress before there is further erosion in the United States technological position. They made the recommendation to expand and strengthen the Manufacturing Technology Centers Program, the State Technology Extension Program, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and I quote, ``Further expand NIST's Advanced Technology Program.'' That was very important, therefore, the National Science Board and its findings at that particular time. Going back to 1987 for a moment, Mr. President, we led off our original series of technology hearings that year with the distinguished entrepreneur, technologist, professor, industrial leader, dean at the University of Texas Business School, Dr. George Kosmetsky, who had helped create the Microelectronics Technology and Computer Corporation down in Austin, TX. We followed his testimony with the Council on Competitiveness. I will read just part of a Council on Competitiveness statement written not long after that particular time. The United States is already losing badly in many critical technologies. Unless the Nation acts today to promote the development [[Page S1823]] of generic industrial technology, its technological position will erode further, with disastrous consequences for American jobs, economic growth, and national security. The Federal Government should view support for generic industrial technology as a priority mission. It is important to note that this mission would not require major new Federal funding. Additional funds for generic technology programs are required. Other Federal R programs, such as national prestige projects, should be redirected or phased in more slowly to allow more resources to be focused on generic technology. Of course, Mr. President, these themes were included and touched upon in our hearings and legislation, and we have been more or less off and running since then. We have, finally, by way of endorsement, the Coalition for Technology Partnerships. It has over 130 members, a combination of companies, trade associations, different companies themselves, such as the American Electronic Association, and several universities that work with industry on ATP projects. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at this particular point a letter from the Coalition for Technology Partnership along with the listing of membership. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Coalition for Technology Partnerships (CTP), Washington, DC, July 6, 1995. Hon. Ernest F. Hollings, Russell Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC. Dear Senator Hollings: The undersigned members of the Coalition for Technology Partnerships respectfully ask for your support of the Advanced Technology Program (ATP). We understand that the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committees will be marking up the FY Department of Commerce Authorization bill in late July. We are concerned by the House Science Committee and the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Subcommittee vote to eliminate the ATP and are writing to outline our views on this essential program. The Coalition for Technology Partnerships applauds your efforts to cut the federal budget deficit and to streamline the federal government, but we caution against sacrificing technology partnerships, such as the ATP, that are essential to our international competitiveness. The ATP has enjoyed wide-spread industry support and participation. The basic mission of the ATP is to fund research programs with a significant potential for stimulating economic growth and improving the long-term competitiveness of U.S. industry. The ATP is already achieving this goal, by cost-sharing research to foster new innovative technologies that create opportunities for world- class products, services and industrial processes. ATP research priorities are set by industry. The selection process is fair, and based entirely on technical and business merit. Half of all ATP awards and joint ventures go to small business directed partnerships. Today, as indication of the success of this program, quality proposals in pursuit of ATP funds far outstrips available funds. The real payoff of the ATP is the long-term economic growth potential for the companies involved with the program, and the creation of new jobs. The ATP is a model of industry/ government partnerships which benefits the nation as a whole, again by leveraging industrial capital to pursue new technologies. Without ATP, these technological opportunities would be slowed, or ultimately forfeited to foreign competitors more able to make key investments in longer-term, higher risk research, such as is the focus of ATP. We urge you to adequately fund the Advanced Technology Program as you begin mark-up of the authorization bill. The ATP is essential, cost effective and timely for the economic growth of our country. Please contact either Taffy Kingscott at 202/515-5193 or Tom Sellers at 202/728-3606 if you have any questions or if we can be of any assistance. coalition for technology partnerships The Coalition for Technology Partnerships has been formed by a group of small, medium and large businesses, trade associations and technical societies on the principle that technology partnerships between government and industry reflect the realities of today's budget climate and technology development mechanisms. Advance Circuits, Inc. Advanced Machining Dynamics. Aerospace Industries Association. Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Institute. Alaska Technology Transfer Assistance Center. American Electronics Association. American Concrete Institute. Amoco Performance Products, Inc. Andersen Consulting. Aphios Corporation. Apple Computer. Applied Medical Informatics (AMI). Arizona State Univ.-College of Engineering & Applied Science. Armstrong World Industries, Inc. Array Comm., Inc. Atlantic Research Corporation. Babcock & Wilcox. BioHybrid Technologies Inc. Biotechnology Industry Organization. Brunswick Composites. CALMAC Manufacturing Corporation. The Carborundum Company. Clean Air Now. CNA Consulting Engineers. Coal Technology Corporation. Columbia Bay Company. Council on Superconductivity. Cubicon. Cybo Robots, Inc. Dakota Technologies, Inc. Dell Computer. Diamond Semiconductor Group. Dow Chemical Company. Dow-United Technologies Composite Products, Inc. Dragon Systems, Inc. DuPont. Edison Materials Technology Center. The Electorlyser Corporation. Energy BioSystems Corporation. Erie County Technical Institute. Fairfield University-Center for Global Comp

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All articles in Senate section

BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II
(Senate - March 12, 1996)

Text of this article available as: TXT PDF [Pages S1816-S1852] BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill. Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Amendment No. 3473 Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from Iowa and the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania for their work in bringing us to this point on one of the most important aspects of this omnibus appropriations bill, the education amendment. Yesterday we offered an amendment with an expectation that we could restore full funding to the 1995 level. This legislation does that. There was some miscalculation as to the funding level required to bring us to fiscal 1995 levels for title I. As I understand it, the question relating to how much funding would be required to do just that has been resolved. I am satisfied that this does restore the fiscal 1995 level for title I, as well as for the other educational priorities identified in the underlying amendment. So, clearly, this agreement is a very significant development. It ought to enjoy the support of both sides of the aisle. I hope we can get unanimous support for it. It removes what I consider to be one of the most important impediments to bringing us to a point where we can get broad bipartisan support for final passage of this bill. So, again, I thank the leadership of the Senator from Iowa, and certainly the Senator from Pennsylvania. I hope that all of our colleagues can support it. I hope we can work together on a bipartisan basis to reach similar agreements on other outstanding differences related to this legislation, including funding levels for the environment, crime, and technology. We also need to remove the contentious riders the House included in their version of the bill. I believe that if we did that this afternoon, we could put this bill on the President's desk before the end of the week and, at long last, resolve the many problems we have had with these appropriations bills. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Pennsylvania. On this question, the yeas and nays have been ordered, and the clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk called the roll. The result was announced--yeas 84, nays 16, as follows: [[Page S1817]] [Rollcall Vote No. 27 Leg.] YEAS--84 Abraham Akaka Baucus Bennett Biden Bingaman Bond Boxer Bradley Breaux Brown Bryan Bumpers Burns Byrd Campbell Chafee Cochran Cohen Conrad Coverdell D'Amato Daschle DeWine Dodd Dole Domenici Dorgan Exon Feingold Feinstein Ford Frist Glenn Gorton Graham Grassley Harkin Hatfield Heflin Hollings Hutchison Inouye Jeffords Johnston Kassebaum Kennedy Kerrey Kerry Kohl Lautenberg Leahy Levin Lieberman Lott Lugar Mack McConnell Mikulski Moseley-Braun Moynihan Murray Nickles Nunn Pell Pressler Pryor Reid Robb Rockefeller Roth Santorum Sarbanes Shelby Simon Simpson Snowe Specter Stevens Thomas Thurmond Warner Wellstone Wyden NAYS--16 Ashcroft Coats Craig Faircloth Gramm Grams Gregg Hatch Helms Inhofe Kempthorne Kyl McCain Murkowski Smith Thompson So, the amendment (No. 3473) was agreed to. Amendment No. 3467 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the Daschle amendment No. 3467, as amended. So the amendment (No. 3467), as amended, was agreed to. Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to. Mr. HATFIELD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Mr. JEFFORDS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont. Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise today in support of Senator Hatfield's proposal in the omnibus bill before us to remove restrictions on U.S. funding of international family planning. These restrictions are part of the foreign operations bill which was folded into the last CR. Senator Hatfield's initiative is a necessary and welcome step: necessary because the restrictions risk the lives and health of women and children in the developing world; welcome because the United States should not be forced by these ill-conceived restrictions to abdicate its proven leadership in international family planning. Voluntary efforts to limit population growth must remain a principal priority of U.S. foreign assistance. The failure to fund adequately international family planning efforts in the developing world has dire consequences. The restrictions currently on the books will result in 4 million unwanted pregnancies in developing countries. Of these unwanted pregnancies, an estimated 1.6 million will end in abortions. Thus, these restrictions have as a direct and alarming consequence a result contrary to their purported purpose of trying to minimize abortions. The restrictions do not decrease abortions, they increase them. Other statistics speak for themselves. In Russia, a lack of family planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has four abortions over her lifetime. In countries with effective family planning, though, such as Hungary, abortion rates have dropped dramatically. But this debate is not just about abortion. A lack of adequate family planning and population efforts leads directly to a severe degradation of the lives and health of mothers and children. U.S.-funded programs, rather than promote abortion, seek to promote safe contraception, thus allowing women to space their pregnancies, a step crucial to the health of the mother and the survival of the child. If the CR funding restrictions are left in place, 8,000 more women will die in pregnancy and childbirth, including from unsafe abortions, and 134,000 more infant deaths will occur. Inadequate family planning also contributes to dangerous strains on already heavily taxed environments, while unbridled population growth has a serious impact on education efforts in countries where money for such programs is scarce. Such a strain on education is an indirect cost of these restrictions, but one with dire long-term consequences. It is worth emphasizing that prohibitions on U.S. funding for abortions have been on the books since 1973. USAID has consistently sought to prevent abortions by offering viable alternatives, alternatives available only through adequate education. AID's programs are widely recognized as the most efficient and effective population planning programs in the world. These shortsighted restrictions endanger the long-term goals of improving the lot of women and children in the developing world, with potentially catastrophic results. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from the Christian Science Monitor of February 9, 1996. There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Congressional Effort to Curb Global Abortion May Backfire (By George Moffett) Washington.--A Congressional move to limit abortion and family planning may have a dramatic unintended consequence: It could actually cause the global abortion rate to rise. Encouraged by the Christian Coalition and anti-abortion groups, Congress last month made deep cuts in United States funds for family-planning programs abroad. But demographers, and even some anti-abortion activists, are warning that the cuts for family planning will lead to more unintended pregnancies--and that more, not fewer, abortions are likely to result. ``We embraced the probability of at least 4 million more abortions that could have been averted if access to voluntary family-planning services had been maintained,'' Sen. Mark Hatfield (R) of Oregon told his Senate colleagues this week. ``These numbers are as disturbing as they are astounding, particularly to those of us who are faithfully and assertively pro-life.'' The US has been barred from funding abortion services overseas since 1973. But anti-abortion activists in the US urged Congress to cut support for family-planning programs concerned that such programs indirectly promote abortion. ``Population control that has to do with education and the use of contraceptives was not the issue,'' says Rep. Sonny Callahan (R) of Alabama, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that deals with foreign aid. ``The issue is trying to stop the US from providing any money that might be used for abortions.'' ``Our concern is that services for abortion are being provided by family-planning agencies,'' adds a spokesman for the Christian Coalition, based in Chesapeake, Va. Lawmakers trimmed funding for population assistance by 35 percent in a foreign-aid bill that was incorporated into a ``continuing resolution'' to keep the federal government running until mid-March. In addition to budget cuts, the legislation imposes unprecedented restrictions on family-planning programs funded by the US Agency for International Development (AID), AID is now barred from obligating any money before July 1 and only small monthly parcels thereafter process that leaves only 14 percent of the amount appropriated in 1995 available for use in fiscal year 1996, and which, AID officials complain, will confound the process of long-term planning. Republican sources on Capitol Hill say cuts in family- planning funds are part of an across-the-board drive to reduce federal spending. As for restrictions on how the money is spent, says one House source, they reflect the new balance of power in the 104th Congress in favor of those who believe that family-planning agencies promote abortion--a charge family planning advocates hotly deny. Family-planning advocates cite evidence indicating that cuts in family-planning services will lead to sharp increases in abortion. They point to Russia, where the absence of family-planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has at least four abortions over a lifetime. ``The framers of the family-planning language in [the continuing resolution] ensured, perhaps unintentionally, that the gruesome experience of Russian women and families will be replicated throughout the world, starting now,'' Senator Hatfield says. Conversely, where family-planning services have been introduced, as in Hungary, the abortion rate has dropped dramatically. Some 50 million couples around the world now use family- planning services paid for by US government funds. The one- third budget cut could mean one-third that number, or 17 million couples, will lose access to family planning. If funds are not found from other sources, according to projections by Population Action International, a Washington- based advocacy group. ``More than 10 million unintended pregnancies could result annually,'' says Sally Ethelston, a spokeswoman for the group. ``That could mean at least 3 million abortions, at least half a million infant and child deaths, and tens of thousands of maternal deaths.'' Without family-planning services, more pregnancies will occur among younger women, older women, and women who have not spaced pregnancies by at least two years, which is considered the minimum time needed to protect the health of mother and child. [[Page S1818]] The US has taken the lead since the 1960s in funding family-planning programs in poor nations. Since then, global contraceptive use has risen fivefold; fertility (the average number of children born to a woman during her reproductive years) has dropped by one-third; and the rate of global population growth has begun to slow. Even so, the world grows by 1 million people every 96 hours, and the populations of most poor nations are projected to double within 20 to 30 years. AID officials say the cuts will retard the incipient family-planning movement in Africa, where population growth is fastest. ``If this proves to be something that does increase abortion, we'd take another look at our position,'' says the Christian Coalition spokesman. Mr. JEFFORDS. I urge my colleagues to support lifting these restrictions on programs with vital U.S. interests. I yield to the Senator from South Carolina. Mr. HOLLINGS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina. amendment no. 3474 to amendment no. 3466 (Purpose: To provide funding for important technology initiatives with an offset) Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I have an amendment at the desk and ask, on behalf of myself, Senator Daschle, Senator Kerry, Senator Lieberman, Senator Bingaman, Senator Rockefeller, Senator Leahy, Senator Lautenberg and Senator Kerrey, the clerk to please report it. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. Hollings] for himself, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Kerry, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Bingaman, Mr. Leahy, Mr. Rockefeller, and Mr. Kerrey proposes an amendment numbered 3474 to amendment No. 3466. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Amendments Submitted.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this is the technology amendment. I ask unanimous consent that I be able to yield to the distinguished Senator from California, who wishes to make a brief statement as in morning business. Mrs. FEINSTEIN addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California. Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair, and I particularly thank Senator Hollings. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The remarks of Mrs. Feinstein pertaining to the introduction of S. 1607 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. I have been informed by the Parliamentarian, since the Daschle education amendment has passed, that the present amendment on technology needs to be conformed. I ask unanimous consent the Parliamentarian conform it in accordance with the Daschle amendment in the bill as it now appears. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this amendment restores funding for five important technology programs that are significant investments in our country's future. They focus on three critical areas: Economic growth, education, and cost-effective environmental protection. The spending we propose in this amendment is fully offset, and the Congressional Budget Office has scored that offset at providing more than is needed for the programs we restore. The distinguished Senator from Iowa has been the principal sponsor also of the offset, which deals with accelerated collection by the Federal Government. We, as cosponsors, are indebted to him for his leadership. Otherwise, the distinguished Senator from Maryland, Senator Mikulski, has really led the way for our Environmental Protection Technology Program. Specifically, the amendment invests five important technology programs. It restores funding for four of them: A $300 million add-back for the Department of Commerce's Advance Technology Program, which contracts with industry to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies; $32 million more for the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program at the National Telecommunication and Information Administration; an additional $4.5 million for the Technology Administration at the Department of Commerce, including $2.5 million to honor commitments under the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission; and a $62 million addition for the Environmental Technology Initiative at the Environmental Protection Agency, an important effort to develop innovative and cost-effective ways to protect the environment. These add-backs total $398.5 million. In addition, the amendment specifies that $23 million that is already in title I of the committee amendment is to go to the Education Department's Technology Learning Challenge Program. These five programs promote innovative new technologies--technologies, Mr. President, that can improve schools, protect the environment at lower cost, and create new industries and jobs to replace employment lost through never-ending downsizing and layoffs. We must invest now to benefit from those new technologies tomorrow. This amendment does that job. The amendment fully offsets these add-backs through a provision that would significantly improve the collection of delinquent Federal debts. It puts the squeeze on deadbeats who have not repaid money owed to the Federal Government. The Congressional Budget Office has scored this provision as raising $440 million in fiscal year 1996--more than enough to cover the add-backs. Mr. President, I want to turn first to investment in new job-creating technologies. I particularly want to focus on the Advanced Technology Program at the Department of Commerce. The Advanced Technology Program contracts with companies on a cost-shared basis to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies that offer great promise for the Nation but are too untested for the regular marketplace to fully fund. Just as other Federal research and development programs work through companies to develop the technologies needed for Government missions such as defense and space, the Advanced Technology Program works with companies in support of the critical Federal mission of promoting long-term economic growth and job creation. The amendment now before the Senate provides $300 million for the ATP. The $300 million level is significantly below the $341 million available for the program just last year in 1995. Currently, H.R. 3019 provides no 1996 funds for this important program, although the committee amendment's unfunded title IV would provide $235 million to support existing awards. Mr. President, I want to talk about several points in this important program. First, we are talking here about jobs. The Advanced Technology Program supports a vital mission of Government--promoting long-term economic growth. The voters know that America faces tough economic times. Foreign competition remains fierce, American companies continue with never-ending downsizing, and voters are understandably anxious and upset. It is ironic indeed that the Government spends billions in research and development dollars each year for defense security, but we are still debating the R efforts to promote economic security. Increasingly, new industries, jobs, and wealth will go to those who are fastest at developing and then applying new technologies. And if we are to save as many jobs as possible in existing industries, they too need to be technologically competitive. The ATP works to turn promising laboratory ideas into practical breakthrough technologies--technologies that the private sector itself will develop into new products and processes. And, we hope, technologies that American companies and American workers will turn into products before our overseas competitors do so. The Federal Government has long worked with industry to speed the development of important new technologies. Industry-government partnerships helped start entire U.S. industries--from the telegraph and agriculture to aircraft and biotechnology to computers and the Internet. These government investments paid off enormously for the Nation and its workers. [[Page S1819]] We won the race to develop those technologies. But will we win others? I started the ATP because I saw our competitors overseas moving to develop and commercialize American ideas before we could, in areas such as superconductivity. And the race continues. Numerous small ATP winners tell us that their foreign competitors are often no more than 12 to 18 months behind them. This is not surprising. While American firms have difficulty getting private capital for long-term research that will not pay off quickly, other governments invest heavily in programs to support civilian technology. This year, the Japanese will spend $1.4 billion on national technology research programs for industry. The European Union is investing $14.4 billion over 5 years in 20 specific areas of research and technology, and individual European governments are investing additional R amounts to help their economies. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the explosive growth of foreign technology programs, we need not only Defense Department research programs but also economic growth programs such as the ATP. And given the economic insecurity facing the country, we should increase the ATP, not cut it. We need to help American industry accelerate the development of new technologies, new industries, and new jobs. If you want to let other countries win the technology race, then kill the ATP. Second, Congress has a serious obligation to honor our commitments to companies and workers in ongoing ATP projects. The pending bill acknowledged this when it included $235 million in the unfunded title IV of the bill. I commend Chairman Hatfield for including that provision. He put that in so that if Congress can find the money, then fiscal year 1996 commitments to some 200 current multiyear projects will be kept. Our amendment has an actual offset for that $235 million, as well as enough additional money to have a small new ATP competition in fiscal year 1996. Not passing our amendment will, in fact, abruptly reduce the ATP from its fiscal year 1995 level of $341 million to a fiscal year 1996 level of zero--a draconian move that will hurt companies across the country. It will particularly hurt the 100 companies in 25 States that won awards in fiscal year 1995 and now need fiscal year 1996 funding to continue their multi-year projects. These companies have hired staff and committed their own matching funds. Third, I want to emphasize that over the years the ATP has actually enjoyed strong bipartisan support. The law creating the program passed during President Reagan's second term, and the ATP received its first funds during the Bush administration. Mr. Bush's Commerce Department wrote the rules for the ATP, and did a good job. President Bush himself requested budget increases, and in 1992 14 Republican Senators on a defense conversion task force endorsed it. See ``Report of the Senate Republican Task Force on Adjusting the Defense Based,'' June 22, 1992. Unfortunately, in 1994 politics intruded because some Senators worried that ATP grants might be made in a political fashion. But this is the purest program you will find. Expert panels make the decisions-- not the Secretary of Commerce, not the White House, not any Member of Congress. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well under the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The ATP now supports 276 research projects around the country, involving 757 research participants in 41 States. The ATP is not porked, has never been porked, and is not used for partisan purposes. Fourth, the ATP is not corporate welfare. This program is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the ATP is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies also pay half the costs, hardly welfare. Moreover, no ATP funds are ever used to subsidize product development in companies; it supports only development work up to basic prototypes. More than half the awards go to small firms or joint ventures led by small firms. Fifth, both the ATP itself and the larger principle of industry- government technology partnerships enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) about technology partnership programs in general: The NAM believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. . . . In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of federal R spending. The NAM suggests that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. Groups explicitly endorsing the ATP include the Coalition for Technology Partnerships, a group of over 100 companies and other research organizations, and the Science and Technology Working Group, representing over two dozen scientific and engineering societies and other organizations. These groups see the ATP as an important investment in America's future prosperity and strength. In addition, the General Accounting Office [GAO] has conducted two reviews of the ATP in the past year. Despite some assertions to the contrary, they speak highly of the program. GAO found that the ATP had succeeded in encouraging research joint ventures, one of its purposes; that ATP winners did indeed often have trouble getting private funding because the research was too far from immediate market results; and even those companies that would have continued their research without ATP awards would have done so much more slowly or at a lower level of effort. A January 1996 report conducted by Silber and Associates provided further positive comments from industry. Of the companies surveyed, many maintain that the ATP has been the lifeblood of their company's innovative research efforts, permitting them to venture into arenas new to U.S. industry. Sixth, while the ATP is still new, it already has generated some real technical successes--successes that in the years ahead will create jobs and broad benefits for our Nation. Later, I will submit for the Record a detailed list of accomplishments, but for now I want to mention three particular cases. With help from ATP, Aastrom Biosciences of Ann Arbor, MI, has developed a prototype bioreactor that can grow blood cells from a patient's own bone marrow cells. In 12 days, the bioreactor will produce billions of red and white cells identical to the patient's own--cells that then can be injected into the patient to boost the immune system. The benefits from this system will be astounding. Now that the basic technology has been proven and patented, Aastrom has received $20 million in private funds to turn the prototype into a commercial product. With ATP help, the Auto Body Consortium--consisting of eight auto suppliers, with support from Chrysler, General Motors, and the University of Michigan--have developed a new measurement technology to make assembly-line manufacturing more precise. The result will be better fit-and-finish in car production, resulting in lower manufacturing costs and lower car maintenance costs. The new system is now being tested. Diamond Semiconductor of Gloucester, MA, used its ATP award to develop a new, risky technology for helping to reliably use much larger semiconductor wafers--the slices of silicon on which computer chips are built. Diamond Semiconductor's equipment can be used to make 12-inch wafers, holding many more chips than the old 8-inch wafers. Now that the technology is proven, a much larger company, Varian Associates, has invested in turning this system into a commercial product. Finally, there is one other key point. The President supports this program and opposes any effort to abruptly terminate it. It is a fact that when he vetoed the earlier fiscal year 1996 Commerce, Justice, State conference report he cited two main reasons--cuts in the COPS Program and elimination of the ATP. ATP funding is needed in order to get the President's signature and get on with finishing appropriations bills for this current fiscal year. The sooner we resolve the ATP issue, the sooner we get on with solving this protracted budget impasse. [[Page S1820]] Mr. President, the ATP is one of our most investments in long-term economic growth and jobs. For that reason, we need to pass the pending amendment and fund the ATP. INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE ASSISTANCE Mr. President, this amendment also adds $32 million to the current bill's $22 million for fiscal year 1996 funding for NTIA's Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program [TIIAP]. The fiscal year 1995 figure was $42 million. TIIAP is a highly competitive, merit-based grant program that provides seed money for innovative, practical information technology projects throughout the United States. TIIAP helps to connect schools, libraries, hospitals, and community centers to new telecommunications systems. Examples include connecting schools to the vast resources of the Internet, improved health care communications for elderly patients in their homes, and extending emergency telephone service in rural areas. Projects are cost shared, and have yielded nearly $2 of non- Federal support for every Federal dollar spent. Many of the awards go to underserved rural and inner-city areas. In fiscal year 1995, NTIA received 1,811 applications, with proposals from all 50 States, and was able to fund 117 awards. With the recent enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, more communities that ever will be faced with both new information infrastructure challenges and opportunities. Schools, hospitals, and libraries all need help hooking up and applying this technology to their needs. The money this amendment would provide for fiscal year 1996 will enable dozens of additional communities to connect to, and benefit from, the new telecommunications revolution. TECHNOLOGY ADMINISTRATION Our amendment also would add $4.5 million to the $5 million that H.R. 3019's title I provides to DOC's Technology Administration [TA] appropriations account. Of that additional amount, $2 million will help TA and its Office of Technology Policy [OTP] maintain its role in coordinating the new-generation vehicle project, organizing industry benchmarking studies, and serving as the secretariat for the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission. The other $2.5 million is for a new activity endorsed by the Committee amendment's title IV-- actual joint projects between the United States and Israel in technology and in harmonizing technical regulations so as to promote high-technology trade between the countries. ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY Mr. President, I will let others speak in greater detail about two of the programs covered in this amendment--environmental technology and educational technology. But I want to mention them briefly here. The amendment contains a $62 million add-back to support activities under the EPA's environmental technology initiative [ETI]. The program has two main purposes--to help accelerate the development, verification, and dissemination of new cleaner and cheaper technologies, and to accelerate efforts by EPA and state environmental agencies to rewrite regulations so that they do not lock in old technologies. Innovative environmental technologies offer a win-win opportunity--high levels of protection at lower costs for industry. In the process, we also can help a growing U.S. industry that exports environmental protection technology and creates jobs here at home. The $62 million will help with these important activities. In the case of educational technology, title I of the committee amendment to H.R. 3019 already provides additional funds for educational research and technology, and I commend members of the Appropriations Committee for that step. Our amendment would simply clarify that of those funds now in title I of the bill, $23 million is for the highly regarded technology learning challenge grants. This is a competitive, peer-reviewed program. Under this program, schools work with computer companies, software companies, universities, and others to develop innovative software and computer tools for improving basic classroom curricula. The challenge grants are seed money for alliances of educators and industrial partners to develop new computer applications in reading, writing, geometry and other math, and vocational education. In short, we are developing new ways to use computers to improve learning. In the first competition, held last year, the Education Department received 500 proposals and was able to make only 19 awards. Clearly, there are many more outstanding, valuable proposals out there. The $23 million of fiscal year 1996 funding would allow more of these important projects. THE OFFSET: IMPROVED DEBT COLLECTION Before concluding, Mr. President, I want to mention briefly the offset that this amendment provides to pay for these technology program add-backs. As mentioned, CBO has scored this proposal as providing $440 million in fiscal year 1996 funds, more than enough to offset the $389.5 million in add-backs included in the amendment. The offsetting funds come from a upgraded Federal process, created in this amendment, for improving the collection of money owed to the Government and for denying certain Federal payments to individuals who owe such money to the Government. In short, we will not give certain Federal payments to people who are delinquent in paying their debts to the Government, and we will give Federal agencies new authority to collect such debts. The Government estimates that the total amount owed to the Government--including both nontax debt and tax debt--in 1995 was a staggering $125 billion. The Internal Revenue Service already has authority under law to withhold Federal tax returns for delinquent Federal debts, and the Treasury Department's Financial Management Service may hold back certain nontax Federal benefits for delinquent Federal debts. So far, the Treasury Department has collected over $5 billion in bad debt through reductions--offsets--in Federal tax credits. But there is a larger problem. Many other Federal agencies do not have the resources to invest in debt collection, or their mission does not include debt collection, or they face too many restrictions in using the available tools. On March 22, 1995, the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which is composed of agency inspectors general, reported on the need for a Governmentwide system of reducing Federal payments to delinquents. Based on this problem, legislation has been proposed by a bipartisan group of legislators, acting with the support of the administration. In the House, the main bill is H.R. 2234, the Debt Collection Improvement Act, introduced by Congressman Horn, Congresswoman Maloney, and others. The Senate companion bill is S. 1234, introduced by our distinguished colleague from Iowa, Senator Harkin. Finally, a version of this proposal was included in the House version of last year's budget reconciliation legislation, H.R. 2517. So this idea of improving Federal debt collection enjoys strong bipartisan support. As included in our amendment, the debt-collection proposal has several key provisions. First, the Treasury will be able to reduce certain Federal payments to individuals who owe the Government money. Veterans Affairs benefits would be exempt from this offset process. Other benefit payments such as social security, railroad retirement, and black lung payments will reduce after a $10,000 combined annual exemption. Other agencies can cooperate in this process by giving information to the Treasury regarding delinquent debt, although steps will be taken to protect the legitimate privacy of individuals. Second, Federal agencies will have access to the computerized information and can dock the pay of Federal employees who owe the Government money. Third, people who have delinquent Federal debts will be barred from obtaining Federal loans or loan guarantees. Fourth, the Social Security Administration, the Customs Service, and the legislative and judicial branches of the Federal Government will be authorized to use debt collection tools, such as credit bureaus and private collection agencies. Mr. President, this is a sound proposal for collecting money from deadbeats and docking their Federal payments until they pay the funds they [[Page S1821]] owe. It is fair, and it simply improves the process for carrying out debt-collection authorities agencies already have. CONCLUSION Mr. President, America's success at home and abroad is like a stool that rests on three legs. First, our strength and success depend on our military power, which is now undisputed in an age where we are the world's only superpower. Second are our values, of family and country. They are strong and can be stronger still. The third leg, though, is our economic strength. And here we face serious challenges. As the New York Times has recently documented, too many Americans live with growing economic insecurity. Layoffs abound, and many of the jobs that once went to Americans have gone overseas. Accelerating the development of new high-technology industries and jobs is not a complete solution. We also need a vigorous trade policy to pry open foreign markets and reduce unfair dumping of foreign products. We need better education and training for all Americans. We need to make real progress, not phony progress, on the Federal deficit, so that interest rates can fall further. But technology policy is one key step in national economic recovery and strength, and the four programs this amendment supports are key parts of an effective, nonporked national technology policy. We know that earlier technology cooperation between industry and Government has helped create entire American industries--from agriculture to aircraft to computers and biotechnology. Much of Government's support came through the Defense Department, which was appropriate during World War II and the cold war. But now the Berlin Wall has fallen, and now our Nation's greatest challenge is economic, not military. We therefore need to strengthen civilian programs to stimulate technologies important to the civilian economy and civilian jobs. To do less is to condemn our Nation and its workers in the long run to second-rate status and more, not less, economic insecurity. For these reasons, I urge our colleagues to pass this important amendment. Mr. President, at this point I want to make a few additional points about the importance of technology and the Advanced Technology Program in particular. To begin with, we must remember that our strength as a Nation is like a three-legged stool. We have the one leg--the values of the Nation--which is unquestionably strong. We have sacrificed for the hungry in Somalia, for democracy in Haiti, for peace in Bosnia. We have the second leg, Mr. President, of military strength, which is also unquestioned. But the third leg--that of economic strength--has become fractured over the past 45 years in the cold war--intentionally, if you please, because we sacrificed to keep the allies together in the cold war. So we willingly gave up market share trying to develop capitalism not just in Europe, but particularly in the Pacific rim, and it has worked. The Marshall Plan has worked. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, however, now is the time to rebuild the strength of our economy. Our problem is, right to the point, that you can willingly--for national defense, military security--conduct research without any matching funds whatever. You can go right to the heart of it and give out the money. But all of a sudden, Mr. President, when we come to the matter of economic security--which is really the competition now in global affairs--we hear criticism even though the ATP requires matching funds, a dollar of private money for every dollar of Government money we expend. The law requires 50 percent from industry. The track record is 60 percent of the money by industry itself. Yet when they come with it, all of a sudden we hear talk about pork. Let me take up the matter of pork because that is the reason we are into this particular dilemma. The program at hand is working in most of the 50 States with hundreds of different contracts awarded. They are awarded over for 3- and 5-year periods, and they have led into commercialization, which we will soon touch upon. Senator Danforth and I set this up in the late 1980's. I was chairman of the Commerce Committee at that particular time. We wanted to make sure, back in 1988--the Trade Act of 1988 is where it was added--we wanted to make sure that it would not be exactly what is it accused of being today, namely, pork. So we set down various guidelines in the particular measure itself, and it was implemented in a very, very successful way by, I should say, President Bush's administration. No. 1, the industry has to come and make the request. It is not the Government picking winners or losers. It is the industry picking the winner. They have to come with at least 50 percent of the money. Thereupon, the experts in technology and business, including retired executives selected by the Industrial Research Institute, have to peer review the particular proposals. Mr. President, they have to look it over and make sure that the submission would really pass muster. I know it particularly well because my textile industry came with a request for computerization that they thought was unique. But it did not pass muster and was not given the award. They do not have an Advanced Technology Program award. Incidentally, I guess they heard ahead of time about my discipline of not making any calls. I never made a call to the White House or anybody in the Commerce Department in favor of any proposal. I would rather, at the markup of the appropriations bill, have turned back efforts on the other side of the Capitol to try to write in these particular projects. So we have protected the authenticity of the program as being nonpork. Thereupon, having passed peer review, highly ranked proposals have to go to a source selection board. The source selection board are civil servants, as we all know, of no political affiliation. On a competitive basis, they make the decision, not Secretary Brown, not President Clinton, not Senator Hollings, or any other Senator or Congressman, but, rather, that is the way these awards have been made. There have been no violations of it. We are proud of its record. That is why it has the confidence of the National Association of Manufacturers. That is why it receives the endorsement of the Council on Competitiveness, and every particular industry group you can possibly imagine have come forward and said this is the way to do it. That has to do with the pork part. The other part with respect to the long-range financing for long-term technologies has to be understood. Back at that particular time, when we were writing the legislation years ago, Newsweek reported an analysis predicting that maintaining the current hands-off policies toward industry and research, namely, the matter of commercialization of our technology, could cause the United States to be locked into a technological decline. They said, and I quote, that it would add $225 billion to the annual trade deficit by the year 2010 and put 2 million Americans out of work. There are various other articles we had at that particular time, and witnesses. I quote particularly from Alan Wolff: In 1990, a Wall Street analyst commented to a group of U.S. semiconductor executives that the goal of people investing in stocks is to make money. That is what capitalism is all about. It is not a charity. I can't tell my brokers, ``Gee, I am sorry about your client, but investing in the semiconductor industry is good for the country.'' While the individual was stating a truth, obviously, he was touching on a fundamental dilemma confronting U.S. industry today in light of the investor sentiment expressed above. How is a company to maintain the level of investment needed to remain competitive over the long term, particularly if there is no prospect of a short-term or short-run payoff, or foreign competition has destroyed the prospect of earning a return on that investment? That is the points that answers a charge sometimes made with respect to two recent GAO reports. Critics of the Advanced Technology Program quote GAO's statement where it said that half of those who had been given awards, when asked if they would have continued their research without the awards, said they would have continued. But by way of emphasis, these critics do not mention the next GAO finding, namely, that none of them said they would have ever continued as quickly or with the same degree of investment. With Government assistance, they are able to expedite their research and therefore have been able to meet the foreign competition. But note that GAO reported that half the winners said they would not have continued their research without Government [[Page S1822]] assistance. They would have abandoned it. We would have lost valid, good research projects without this Advanced Technology Program. I think the emphasis should be made at this particular time that GAO has made a favorable report, and that the program is doing exactly what was intended to do. It confronts exactly the particular dilemma we find ourselves in with respect to the operation of the stock market. It can go up 171 points one day and come back 110 points the next day. They look for short-term turnarounds and everything else of that kind, and does not focus on the long-term, including long-term technologies. That is why the working group headed by the distinguished Senator from New Mexico, Senator Bingaman, calls for the various securities law reforms. So we can do away, perhaps, with the quarterly report and actually meet the long-term investment competition that we confront, particularly in the Pacific rim. Again, I want to emphasize that expert panels make the decisions, not the Secretary of Commerce. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well in the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The Advanced Technology Program now involves some 760 research participants. It supports 280 projects around the country and in some 41 States. The Advanced Technology Program is not corporate welfare. It is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the Advanced Technology Program is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies must pay, as I pointed out, at least half of the amount when they come and may apply to the Advanced Technology Program. The ATP itself is the larger principal of industry-Government technology partnerships which enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers: The National Association of Manufacturers believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what Federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of Federal R spending. The National Association of Manufacturers suggest that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. The figure we have in the particular amendment is $41 million less than the fiscal year 1995 level--$131 million less than the original 1995 level that existed before rescissions. We propose that there be a cut, not even a freeze. Of our $300 million, we are trying to bring up some $235 million to honor commitments to projects that have already received their awards and now need to complete them. We do not want to cut them off in half completion. Let me commend the distinguished chairman of our Appropriations Committee, Senator Hatfield of Oregon, in realizing and confronting this problem. He did not have the money. He put the $235 million in title IV, but he said, ``Look, if we can possibly find the money in offsets in title IV, then this should be completed.'' It is not a way for the Government to do business and build up the confidence that is so much besieged this day and age. The Government is trying to build up these partnerships and work together in research with industry and with the college campuses. It is wrong to take valid programs that have no objection to them, no pork, no waste, fraud, and abuse, and only tremendous success, and then come with a fetish against them because they appear as pork to some on the other side of the Capitol, and then to walk lockstep like it is part of a contract. We had, in qualifying this program, by way of emphasis, a series of hearings back in the 1980's. We also had soon after that particular time the Competitiveness Policy Council, with many members appointed by President Reagan. He appointed the former head of the National Science Foundation, Erich Bloch, who was designated chairman of the Council's Critical Technologies Subcouncil. They endorsed the ATP. I ask unanimous consent that the critical technology subcouncil listing of these outstanding individuals be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Competitiveness Policy Council Critical Technologies Subcouncil, 1993 Chairman Erich Bloch, Distinguished Fellow, Council on Competitiveness. David Cheney, Staff Director. Membership Eleanor Baum, Dean, Albert Nerken School of Engineering, Cooper Union. Frederick M. Bernthal, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation. Sherwood L. Boehlert, U.S. House of Representatives. Michael G. Borrus, Co-director, Berkeley Roundtable on International Economics. Rick Boucher, U.S. House of Representatives. Lewis M. Branscomb, Professor, Harvard University. Daniel Burton, Executive Vice President, Council on Competitiveness. Dennis Chamot, Executive Assistant to the President, Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO. John Deutch, Professor, MIT. John W. Diggs, Deputy Director for Extramural Research, Department of Health and Human Services. Craig Fields, President and CEO, MCC. Edward B. Fort, Chancellor, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. John S. Foster, Consultant, TRW, Inc., and Chairman, Defense Science Board. William Happer, Director, Office of Energy Research, U.S. Department of Energy. Joseph S. Hezir, Principal, EOP Group, and former Deputy Assistant Director, Energy and Science Division, OMB. Richard K. Lester, Director, Industrial Performance Center, MIT. John W. Lyons, Director, National Institute for Standards and Technology. Daniel P. McCurdy, Manager, Technology Policy, IBM. Joseph G. Morone, Professor, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, School of Management. Al Narath, President, Sandia National Laboratories. Richard R. Nelson, Professor, Columbia University. William D. Phillips, Former Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Lois Rice, Guest Scholar, Brookings Institution. Nathan Rosenberg, Director of Program for Technology & Economic Growth, Stanford University. Howard D. Samuel, President, Industrial Union Department, AFL-CIO. Hubert J.P. Schoemaker, President and CEO, Centocor, Inc. Charles Shanley, Director of Technology Planning, Motorola Inc. Richard H. van Atta, Research Staff Member, Institute for Defense Analyses. Robert M. White, Under Secretary for Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce. Eugene Wong, Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, in August 1992, we also had the National Science Board itself. I will read a couple of things and not put it in its entirety into the Record, which we would be glad to do. But the National Science Board concluded: Stronger Federal leadership is needed in setting the course for U.S. technological competitiveness. Implementation of a national technology policy, including establishment of a rationale and guidelines for Federal action, should receive the highest priority. The start of such a policy was set forth 2 years ago by the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy, but more forceful action is needed by the President and Congress before there is further erosion in the United States technological position. They made the recommendation to expand and strengthen the Manufacturing Technology Centers Program, the State Technology Extension Program, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and I quote, ``Further expand NIST's Advanced Technology Program.'' That was very important, therefore, the National Science Board and its findings at that particular time. Going back to 1987 for a moment, Mr. President, we led off our original series of technology hearings that year with the distinguished entrepreneur, technologist, professor, industrial leader, dean at the University of Texas Business School, Dr. George Kosmetsky, who had helped create the Microelectronics Technology and Computer Corporation down in Austin, TX. We followed his testimony with the Council on Competitiveness. I will read just part of a Council on Competitiveness statement written not long after that particular time. The United States is already losing badly in many critical technologies. Unless the Nation acts today to promote the development [[Page S1823]] of generic industrial technology, its technological position will erode further, with disastrous consequences for American jobs, economic growth, and national security. The Federal Government should view support for generic industrial technology as a priority mission. It is important to note that this mission would not require major new Federal funding. Additional funds for generic technology programs are required. Other Federal R programs, such as national prestige projects, should be redirected or phased in more slowly to allow more resources to be focused on generic technology. Of course, Mr. President, these themes were included and touched upon in our hearings and legislation, and we have been more or less off and running since then. We have, finally, by way of endorsement, the Coalition for Technology Partnerships. It has over 130 members, a combination of companies, trade associations, different companies themselves, such as the American Electronic Association, and several universities that work with industry on ATP projects. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at this particular point a letter from the Coalition for Technology Partnership along with the listing of membership. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Coalition for Technology Partnerships (CTP), Washington, DC, July 6, 1995. Hon. Ernest F. Hollings, Russell Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC. Dear Senator Hollings: The undersigned members of the Coalition for Technology Partnerships respectfully ask for your support of the Advanced Technology Program (ATP). We understand that the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committees will be marking up the FY Department of Commerce Authorization bill in late July. We are concerned by the House Science Committee and the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Subcommittee vote to eliminate the ATP and are writing to outline our views on this essential program. The Coalition for Technology Partnerships applauds your efforts to cut the federal budget deficit and to streamline the federal government, but we caution against sacrificing technology partnerships, such as the ATP, that are essential to our international competitiveness. The ATP has enjoyed wide-spread industry support and participation. The basic mission of the ATP is to fund research programs with a significant potential for stimulating economic growth and improving the long-term competitiveness of U.S. industry. The ATP is already achieving this goal, by cost-sharing research to foster new innovative technologies that create opportunities for world- class products, services and industrial processes. ATP research priorities are set by industry. The selection process is fair, and based entirely on technical and business merit. Half of all ATP awards and joint ventures go to small business directed partnerships. Today, as indication of the success of this program, quality proposals in pursuit of ATP funds far outstrips available funds. The real payoff of the ATP is the long-term economic growth potential for the companies involved with the program, and the creation of new jobs. The ATP is a model of industry/ government partnerships which benefits the nation as a whole, again by leveraging industrial capital to pursue new technologies. Without ATP, these technological opportunities would be slowed, or ultimately forfeited to foreign competitors more able to make key investments in longer-term, higher risk research, such as is the focus of ATP. We urge you to adequately fund the Advanced Technology Program as you begin mark-up of the authorization bill. The ATP is essential, cost effective and timely for the economic growth of our country. Please contact either Taffy Kingscott at 202/515-5193 or Tom Sellers at 202/728-3606 if you have any questions or if we can be of any assistance. coalition for technology partnerships The Coalition for Technology Partnerships has been formed by a group of small, medium and large businesses, trade associations and technical societies on the principle that technology partnerships between government and industry reflect the realities of today's budget climate and technology development mechanisms. Advance Circuits, Inc. Advanced Machining Dynamics. Aerospace Industries Association. Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Institute. Alaska Technology Transfer Assistance Center. American Electronics Association. American Concrete Institute. Amoco Performance Products, Inc. Andersen Consulting. Aphios Corporation. Apple Computer. Applied Medical Informatics (AMI). Arizona State Univ.-College of Engineering & Applied Science. Armstrong World Industries, Inc. Array Comm., Inc. Atlantic Research Corporation. Babcock & Wilcox. BioHybrid Technologies Inc. Biotechnology Industry Organization. Brunswick Composites. CALMAC Manufacturing Corporation. The Carborundum Company. Clean Air Now. CNA Consulting Engineers. Coal Technology Corporation. Columbia Bay Company. Council on Superconductivity. Cubicon. Cybo Robots, Inc. Dakota Technologies, Inc. Dell Computer. Diamond Semiconductor Group. Dow Chemical Company. Dow-United Technologies Composite Products, Inc. Dragon Systems, Inc. DuPont. Edison Materials Technology Center. The Electorlyser Corporation. Energy BioSystems Corporation. Erie County Technical Institute. Fairfield U

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BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II
(Senate - March 12, 1996)

Text of this article available as: TXT PDF [Pages S1816-S1852] BALANCED BUDGET DOWNPAYMENT ACT, II The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill. Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Amendment No. 3473 Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from Iowa and the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania for their work in bringing us to this point on one of the most important aspects of this omnibus appropriations bill, the education amendment. Yesterday we offered an amendment with an expectation that we could restore full funding to the 1995 level. This legislation does that. There was some miscalculation as to the funding level required to bring us to fiscal 1995 levels for title I. As I understand it, the question relating to how much funding would be required to do just that has been resolved. I am satisfied that this does restore the fiscal 1995 level for title I, as well as for the other educational priorities identified in the underlying amendment. So, clearly, this agreement is a very significant development. It ought to enjoy the support of both sides of the aisle. I hope we can get unanimous support for it. It removes what I consider to be one of the most important impediments to bringing us to a point where we can get broad bipartisan support for final passage of this bill. So, again, I thank the leadership of the Senator from Iowa, and certainly the Senator from Pennsylvania. I hope that all of our colleagues can support it. I hope we can work together on a bipartisan basis to reach similar agreements on other outstanding differences related to this legislation, including funding levels for the environment, crime, and technology. We also need to remove the contentious riders the House included in their version of the bill. I believe that if we did that this afternoon, we could put this bill on the President's desk before the end of the week and, at long last, resolve the many problems we have had with these appropriations bills. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Pennsylvania. On this question, the yeas and nays have been ordered, and the clerk will call the roll. The assistant legislative clerk called the roll. The result was announced--yeas 84, nays 16, as follows: [[Page S1817]] [Rollcall Vote No. 27 Leg.] YEAS--84 Abraham Akaka Baucus Bennett Biden Bingaman Bond Boxer Bradley Breaux Brown Bryan Bumpers Burns Byrd Campbell Chafee Cochran Cohen Conrad Coverdell D'Amato Daschle DeWine Dodd Dole Domenici Dorgan Exon Feingold Feinstein Ford Frist Glenn Gorton Graham Grassley Harkin Hatfield Heflin Hollings Hutchison Inouye Jeffords Johnston Kassebaum Kennedy Kerrey Kerry Kohl Lautenberg Leahy Levin Lieberman Lott Lugar Mack McConnell Mikulski Moseley-Braun Moynihan Murray Nickles Nunn Pell Pressler Pryor Reid Robb Rockefeller Roth Santorum Sarbanes Shelby Simon Simpson Snowe Specter Stevens Thomas Thurmond Warner Wellstone Wyden NAYS--16 Ashcroft Coats Craig Faircloth Gramm Grams Gregg Hatch Helms Inhofe Kempthorne Kyl McCain Murkowski Smith Thompson So, the amendment (No. 3473) was agreed to. Amendment No. 3467 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the Daschle amendment No. 3467, as amended. So the amendment (No. 3467), as amended, was agreed to. Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to. Mr. HATFIELD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Mr. JEFFORDS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont. Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise today in support of Senator Hatfield's proposal in the omnibus bill before us to remove restrictions on U.S. funding of international family planning. These restrictions are part of the foreign operations bill which was folded into the last CR. Senator Hatfield's initiative is a necessary and welcome step: necessary because the restrictions risk the lives and health of women and children in the developing world; welcome because the United States should not be forced by these ill-conceived restrictions to abdicate its proven leadership in international family planning. Voluntary efforts to limit population growth must remain a principal priority of U.S. foreign assistance. The failure to fund adequately international family planning efforts in the developing world has dire consequences. The restrictions currently on the books will result in 4 million unwanted pregnancies in developing countries. Of these unwanted pregnancies, an estimated 1.6 million will end in abortions. Thus, these restrictions have as a direct and alarming consequence a result contrary to their purported purpose of trying to minimize abortions. The restrictions do not decrease abortions, they increase them. Other statistics speak for themselves. In Russia, a lack of family planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has four abortions over her lifetime. In countries with effective family planning, though, such as Hungary, abortion rates have dropped dramatically. But this debate is not just about abortion. A lack of adequate family planning and population efforts leads directly to a severe degradation of the lives and health of mothers and children. U.S.-funded programs, rather than promote abortion, seek to promote safe contraception, thus allowing women to space their pregnancies, a step crucial to the health of the mother and the survival of the child. If the CR funding restrictions are left in place, 8,000 more women will die in pregnancy and childbirth, including from unsafe abortions, and 134,000 more infant deaths will occur. Inadequate family planning also contributes to dangerous strains on already heavily taxed environments, while unbridled population growth has a serious impact on education efforts in countries where money for such programs is scarce. Such a strain on education is an indirect cost of these restrictions, but one with dire long-term consequences. It is worth emphasizing that prohibitions on U.S. funding for abortions have been on the books since 1973. USAID has consistently sought to prevent abortions by offering viable alternatives, alternatives available only through adequate education. AID's programs are widely recognized as the most efficient and effective population planning programs in the world. These shortsighted restrictions endanger the long-term goals of improving the lot of women and children in the developing world, with potentially catastrophic results. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from the Christian Science Monitor of February 9, 1996. There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Congressional Effort to Curb Global Abortion May Backfire (By George Moffett) Washington.--A Congressional move to limit abortion and family planning may have a dramatic unintended consequence: It could actually cause the global abortion rate to rise. Encouraged by the Christian Coalition and anti-abortion groups, Congress last month made deep cuts in United States funds for family-planning programs abroad. But demographers, and even some anti-abortion activists, are warning that the cuts for family planning will lead to more unintended pregnancies--and that more, not fewer, abortions are likely to result. ``We embraced the probability of at least 4 million more abortions that could have been averted if access to voluntary family-planning services had been maintained,'' Sen. Mark Hatfield (R) of Oregon told his Senate colleagues this week. ``These numbers are as disturbing as they are astounding, particularly to those of us who are faithfully and assertively pro-life.'' The US has been barred from funding abortion services overseas since 1973. But anti-abortion activists in the US urged Congress to cut support for family-planning programs concerned that such programs indirectly promote abortion. ``Population control that has to do with education and the use of contraceptives was not the issue,'' says Rep. Sonny Callahan (R) of Alabama, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that deals with foreign aid. ``The issue is trying to stop the US from providing any money that might be used for abortions.'' ``Our concern is that services for abortion are being provided by family-planning agencies,'' adds a spokesman for the Christian Coalition, based in Chesapeake, Va. Lawmakers trimmed funding for population assistance by 35 percent in a foreign-aid bill that was incorporated into a ``continuing resolution'' to keep the federal government running until mid-March. In addition to budget cuts, the legislation imposes unprecedented restrictions on family-planning programs funded by the US Agency for International Development (AID), AID is now barred from obligating any money before July 1 and only small monthly parcels thereafter process that leaves only 14 percent of the amount appropriated in 1995 available for use in fiscal year 1996, and which, AID officials complain, will confound the process of long-term planning. Republican sources on Capitol Hill say cuts in family- planning funds are part of an across-the-board drive to reduce federal spending. As for restrictions on how the money is spent, says one House source, they reflect the new balance of power in the 104th Congress in favor of those who believe that family-planning agencies promote abortion--a charge family planning advocates hotly deny. Family-planning advocates cite evidence indicating that cuts in family-planning services will lead to sharp increases in abortion. They point to Russia, where the absence of family-planning services has made abortion the chief method of birth control. The average Russian woman has at least four abortions over a lifetime. ``The framers of the family-planning language in [the continuing resolution] ensured, perhaps unintentionally, that the gruesome experience of Russian women and families will be replicated throughout the world, starting now,'' Senator Hatfield says. Conversely, where family-planning services have been introduced, as in Hungary, the abortion rate has dropped dramatically. Some 50 million couples around the world now use family- planning services paid for by US government funds. The one- third budget cut could mean one-third that number, or 17 million couples, will lose access to family planning. If funds are not found from other sources, according to projections by Population Action International, a Washington- based advocacy group. ``More than 10 million unintended pregnancies could result annually,'' says Sally Ethelston, a spokeswoman for the group. ``That could mean at least 3 million abortions, at least half a million infant and child deaths, and tens of thousands of maternal deaths.'' Without family-planning services, more pregnancies will occur among younger women, older women, and women who have not spaced pregnancies by at least two years, which is considered the minimum time needed to protect the health of mother and child. [[Page S1818]] The US has taken the lead since the 1960s in funding family-planning programs in poor nations. Since then, global contraceptive use has risen fivefold; fertility (the average number of children born to a woman during her reproductive years) has dropped by one-third; and the rate of global population growth has begun to slow. Even so, the world grows by 1 million people every 96 hours, and the populations of most poor nations are projected to double within 20 to 30 years. AID officials say the cuts will retard the incipient family-planning movement in Africa, where population growth is fastest. ``If this proves to be something that does increase abortion, we'd take another look at our position,'' says the Christian Coalition spokesman. Mr. JEFFORDS. I urge my colleagues to support lifting these restrictions on programs with vital U.S. interests. I yield to the Senator from South Carolina. Mr. HOLLINGS addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina. amendment no. 3474 to amendment no. 3466 (Purpose: To provide funding for important technology initiatives with an offset) Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I have an amendment at the desk and ask, on behalf of myself, Senator Daschle, Senator Kerry, Senator Lieberman, Senator Bingaman, Senator Rockefeller, Senator Leahy, Senator Lautenberg and Senator Kerrey, the clerk to please report it. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. Hollings] for himself, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Kerry, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Bingaman, Mr. Leahy, Mr. Rockefeller, and Mr. Kerrey proposes an amendment numbered 3474 to amendment No. 3466. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Amendments Submitted.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this is the technology amendment. I ask unanimous consent that I be able to yield to the distinguished Senator from California, who wishes to make a brief statement as in morning business. Mrs. FEINSTEIN addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California. Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair, and I particularly thank Senator Hollings. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The remarks of Mrs. Feinstein pertaining to the introduction of S. 1607 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'') Mr. HOLLINGS. I have been informed by the Parliamentarian, since the Daschle education amendment has passed, that the present amendment on technology needs to be conformed. I ask unanimous consent the Parliamentarian conform it in accordance with the Daschle amendment in the bill as it now appears. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, this amendment restores funding for five important technology programs that are significant investments in our country's future. They focus on three critical areas: Economic growth, education, and cost-effective environmental protection. The spending we propose in this amendment is fully offset, and the Congressional Budget Office has scored that offset at providing more than is needed for the programs we restore. The distinguished Senator from Iowa has been the principal sponsor also of the offset, which deals with accelerated collection by the Federal Government. We, as cosponsors, are indebted to him for his leadership. Otherwise, the distinguished Senator from Maryland, Senator Mikulski, has really led the way for our Environmental Protection Technology Program. Specifically, the amendment invests five important technology programs. It restores funding for four of them: A $300 million add-back for the Department of Commerce's Advance Technology Program, which contracts with industry to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies; $32 million more for the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program at the National Telecommunication and Information Administration; an additional $4.5 million for the Technology Administration at the Department of Commerce, including $2.5 million to honor commitments under the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission; and a $62 million addition for the Environmental Technology Initiative at the Environmental Protection Agency, an important effort to develop innovative and cost-effective ways to protect the environment. These add-backs total $398.5 million. In addition, the amendment specifies that $23 million that is already in title I of the committee amendment is to go to the Education Department's Technology Learning Challenge Program. These five programs promote innovative new technologies--technologies, Mr. President, that can improve schools, protect the environment at lower cost, and create new industries and jobs to replace employment lost through never-ending downsizing and layoffs. We must invest now to benefit from those new technologies tomorrow. This amendment does that job. The amendment fully offsets these add-backs through a provision that would significantly improve the collection of delinquent Federal debts. It puts the squeeze on deadbeats who have not repaid money owed to the Federal Government. The Congressional Budget Office has scored this provision as raising $440 million in fiscal year 1996--more than enough to cover the add-backs. Mr. President, I want to turn first to investment in new job-creating technologies. I particularly want to focus on the Advanced Technology Program at the Department of Commerce. The Advanced Technology Program contracts with companies on a cost-shared basis to speed the development of new breakthrough technologies that offer great promise for the Nation but are too untested for the regular marketplace to fully fund. Just as other Federal research and development programs work through companies to develop the technologies needed for Government missions such as defense and space, the Advanced Technology Program works with companies in support of the critical Federal mission of promoting long-term economic growth and job creation. The amendment now before the Senate provides $300 million for the ATP. The $300 million level is significantly below the $341 million available for the program just last year in 1995. Currently, H.R. 3019 provides no 1996 funds for this important program, although the committee amendment's unfunded title IV would provide $235 million to support existing awards. Mr. President, I want to talk about several points in this important program. First, we are talking here about jobs. The Advanced Technology Program supports a vital mission of Government--promoting long-term economic growth. The voters know that America faces tough economic times. Foreign competition remains fierce, American companies continue with never-ending downsizing, and voters are understandably anxious and upset. It is ironic indeed that the Government spends billions in research and development dollars each year for defense security, but we are still debating the R efforts to promote economic security. Increasingly, new industries, jobs, and wealth will go to those who are fastest at developing and then applying new technologies. And if we are to save as many jobs as possible in existing industries, they too need to be technologically competitive. The ATP works to turn promising laboratory ideas into practical breakthrough technologies--technologies that the private sector itself will develop into new products and processes. And, we hope, technologies that American companies and American workers will turn into products before our overseas competitors do so. The Federal Government has long worked with industry to speed the development of important new technologies. Industry-government partnerships helped start entire U.S. industries--from the telegraph and agriculture to aircraft and biotechnology to computers and the Internet. These government investments paid off enormously for the Nation and its workers. [[Page S1819]] We won the race to develop those technologies. But will we win others? I started the ATP because I saw our competitors overseas moving to develop and commercialize American ideas before we could, in areas such as superconductivity. And the race continues. Numerous small ATP winners tell us that their foreign competitors are often no more than 12 to 18 months behind them. This is not surprising. While American firms have difficulty getting private capital for long-term research that will not pay off quickly, other governments invest heavily in programs to support civilian technology. This year, the Japanese will spend $1.4 billion on national technology research programs for industry. The European Union is investing $14.4 billion over 5 years in 20 specific areas of research and technology, and individual European governments are investing additional R amounts to help their economies. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the explosive growth of foreign technology programs, we need not only Defense Department research programs but also economic growth programs such as the ATP. And given the economic insecurity facing the country, we should increase the ATP, not cut it. We need to help American industry accelerate the development of new technologies, new industries, and new jobs. If you want to let other countries win the technology race, then kill the ATP. Second, Congress has a serious obligation to honor our commitments to companies and workers in ongoing ATP projects. The pending bill acknowledged this when it included $235 million in the unfunded title IV of the bill. I commend Chairman Hatfield for including that provision. He put that in so that if Congress can find the money, then fiscal year 1996 commitments to some 200 current multiyear projects will be kept. Our amendment has an actual offset for that $235 million, as well as enough additional money to have a small new ATP competition in fiscal year 1996. Not passing our amendment will, in fact, abruptly reduce the ATP from its fiscal year 1995 level of $341 million to a fiscal year 1996 level of zero--a draconian move that will hurt companies across the country. It will particularly hurt the 100 companies in 25 States that won awards in fiscal year 1995 and now need fiscal year 1996 funding to continue their multi-year projects. These companies have hired staff and committed their own matching funds. Third, I want to emphasize that over the years the ATP has actually enjoyed strong bipartisan support. The law creating the program passed during President Reagan's second term, and the ATP received its first funds during the Bush administration. Mr. Bush's Commerce Department wrote the rules for the ATP, and did a good job. President Bush himself requested budget increases, and in 1992 14 Republican Senators on a defense conversion task force endorsed it. See ``Report of the Senate Republican Task Force on Adjusting the Defense Based,'' June 22, 1992. Unfortunately, in 1994 politics intruded because some Senators worried that ATP grants might be made in a political fashion. But this is the purest program you will find. Expert panels make the decisions-- not the Secretary of Commerce, not the White House, not any Member of Congress. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well under the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The ATP now supports 276 research projects around the country, involving 757 research participants in 41 States. The ATP is not porked, has never been porked, and is not used for partisan purposes. Fourth, the ATP is not corporate welfare. This program is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the ATP is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies also pay half the costs, hardly welfare. Moreover, no ATP funds are ever used to subsidize product development in companies; it supports only development work up to basic prototypes. More than half the awards go to small firms or joint ventures led by small firms. Fifth, both the ATP itself and the larger principle of industry- government technology partnerships enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) about technology partnership programs in general: The NAM believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. . . . In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of federal R spending. The NAM suggests that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. Groups explicitly endorsing the ATP include the Coalition for Technology Partnerships, a group of over 100 companies and other research organizations, and the Science and Technology Working Group, representing over two dozen scientific and engineering societies and other organizations. These groups see the ATP as an important investment in America's future prosperity and strength. In addition, the General Accounting Office [GAO] has conducted two reviews of the ATP in the past year. Despite some assertions to the contrary, they speak highly of the program. GAO found that the ATP had succeeded in encouraging research joint ventures, one of its purposes; that ATP winners did indeed often have trouble getting private funding because the research was too far from immediate market results; and even those companies that would have continued their research without ATP awards would have done so much more slowly or at a lower level of effort. A January 1996 report conducted by Silber and Associates provided further positive comments from industry. Of the companies surveyed, many maintain that the ATP has been the lifeblood of their company's innovative research efforts, permitting them to venture into arenas new to U.S. industry. Sixth, while the ATP is still new, it already has generated some real technical successes--successes that in the years ahead will create jobs and broad benefits for our Nation. Later, I will submit for the Record a detailed list of accomplishments, but for now I want to mention three particular cases. With help from ATP, Aastrom Biosciences of Ann Arbor, MI, has developed a prototype bioreactor that can grow blood cells from a patient's own bone marrow cells. In 12 days, the bioreactor will produce billions of red and white cells identical to the patient's own--cells that then can be injected into the patient to boost the immune system. The benefits from this system will be astounding. Now that the basic technology has been proven and patented, Aastrom has received $20 million in private funds to turn the prototype into a commercial product. With ATP help, the Auto Body Consortium--consisting of eight auto suppliers, with support from Chrysler, General Motors, and the University of Michigan--have developed a new measurement technology to make assembly-line manufacturing more precise. The result will be better fit-and-finish in car production, resulting in lower manufacturing costs and lower car maintenance costs. The new system is now being tested. Diamond Semiconductor of Gloucester, MA, used its ATP award to develop a new, risky technology for helping to reliably use much larger semiconductor wafers--the slices of silicon on which computer chips are built. Diamond Semiconductor's equipment can be used to make 12-inch wafers, holding many more chips than the old 8-inch wafers. Now that the technology is proven, a much larger company, Varian Associates, has invested in turning this system into a commercial product. Finally, there is one other key point. The President supports this program and opposes any effort to abruptly terminate it. It is a fact that when he vetoed the earlier fiscal year 1996 Commerce, Justice, State conference report he cited two main reasons--cuts in the COPS Program and elimination of the ATP. ATP funding is needed in order to get the President's signature and get on with finishing appropriations bills for this current fiscal year. The sooner we resolve the ATP issue, the sooner we get on with solving this protracted budget impasse. [[Page S1820]] Mr. President, the ATP is one of our most investments in long-term economic growth and jobs. For that reason, we need to pass the pending amendment and fund the ATP. INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE ASSISTANCE Mr. President, this amendment also adds $32 million to the current bill's $22 million for fiscal year 1996 funding for NTIA's Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program [TIIAP]. The fiscal year 1995 figure was $42 million. TIIAP is a highly competitive, merit-based grant program that provides seed money for innovative, practical information technology projects throughout the United States. TIIAP helps to connect schools, libraries, hospitals, and community centers to new telecommunications systems. Examples include connecting schools to the vast resources of the Internet, improved health care communications for elderly patients in their homes, and extending emergency telephone service in rural areas. Projects are cost shared, and have yielded nearly $2 of non- Federal support for every Federal dollar spent. Many of the awards go to underserved rural and inner-city areas. In fiscal year 1995, NTIA received 1,811 applications, with proposals from all 50 States, and was able to fund 117 awards. With the recent enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, more communities that ever will be faced with both new information infrastructure challenges and opportunities. Schools, hospitals, and libraries all need help hooking up and applying this technology to their needs. The money this amendment would provide for fiscal year 1996 will enable dozens of additional communities to connect to, and benefit from, the new telecommunications revolution. TECHNOLOGY ADMINISTRATION Our amendment also would add $4.5 million to the $5 million that H.R. 3019's title I provides to DOC's Technology Administration [TA] appropriations account. Of that additional amount, $2 million will help TA and its Office of Technology Policy [OTP] maintain its role in coordinating the new-generation vehicle project, organizing industry benchmarking studies, and serving as the secretariat for the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission. The other $2.5 million is for a new activity endorsed by the Committee amendment's title IV-- actual joint projects between the United States and Israel in technology and in harmonizing technical regulations so as to promote high-technology trade between the countries. ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY Mr. President, I will let others speak in greater detail about two of the programs covered in this amendment--environmental technology and educational technology. But I want to mention them briefly here. The amendment contains a $62 million add-back to support activities under the EPA's environmental technology initiative [ETI]. The program has two main purposes--to help accelerate the development, verification, and dissemination of new cleaner and cheaper technologies, and to accelerate efforts by EPA and state environmental agencies to rewrite regulations so that they do not lock in old technologies. Innovative environmental technologies offer a win-win opportunity--high levels of protection at lower costs for industry. In the process, we also can help a growing U.S. industry that exports environmental protection technology and creates jobs here at home. The $62 million will help with these important activities. In the case of educational technology, title I of the committee amendment to H.R. 3019 already provides additional funds for educational research and technology, and I commend members of the Appropriations Committee for that step. Our amendment would simply clarify that of those funds now in title I of the bill, $23 million is for the highly regarded technology learning challenge grants. This is a competitive, peer-reviewed program. Under this program, schools work with computer companies, software companies, universities, and others to develop innovative software and computer tools for improving basic classroom curricula. The challenge grants are seed money for alliances of educators and industrial partners to develop new computer applications in reading, writing, geometry and other math, and vocational education. In short, we are developing new ways to use computers to improve learning. In the first competition, held last year, the Education Department received 500 proposals and was able to make only 19 awards. Clearly, there are many more outstanding, valuable proposals out there. The $23 million of fiscal year 1996 funding would allow more of these important projects. THE OFFSET: IMPROVED DEBT COLLECTION Before concluding, Mr. President, I want to mention briefly the offset that this amendment provides to pay for these technology program add-backs. As mentioned, CBO has scored this proposal as providing $440 million in fiscal year 1996 funds, more than enough to offset the $389.5 million in add-backs included in the amendment. The offsetting funds come from a upgraded Federal process, created in this amendment, for improving the collection of money owed to the Government and for denying certain Federal payments to individuals who owe such money to the Government. In short, we will not give certain Federal payments to people who are delinquent in paying their debts to the Government, and we will give Federal agencies new authority to collect such debts. The Government estimates that the total amount owed to the Government--including both nontax debt and tax debt--in 1995 was a staggering $125 billion. The Internal Revenue Service already has authority under law to withhold Federal tax returns for delinquent Federal debts, and the Treasury Department's Financial Management Service may hold back certain nontax Federal benefits for delinquent Federal debts. So far, the Treasury Department has collected over $5 billion in bad debt through reductions--offsets--in Federal tax credits. But there is a larger problem. Many other Federal agencies do not have the resources to invest in debt collection, or their mission does not include debt collection, or they face too many restrictions in using the available tools. On March 22, 1995, the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which is composed of agency inspectors general, reported on the need for a Governmentwide system of reducing Federal payments to delinquents. Based on this problem, legislation has been proposed by a bipartisan group of legislators, acting with the support of the administration. In the House, the main bill is H.R. 2234, the Debt Collection Improvement Act, introduced by Congressman Horn, Congresswoman Maloney, and others. The Senate companion bill is S. 1234, introduced by our distinguished colleague from Iowa, Senator Harkin. Finally, a version of this proposal was included in the House version of last year's budget reconciliation legislation, H.R. 2517. So this idea of improving Federal debt collection enjoys strong bipartisan support. As included in our amendment, the debt-collection proposal has several key provisions. First, the Treasury will be able to reduce certain Federal payments to individuals who owe the Government money. Veterans Affairs benefits would be exempt from this offset process. Other benefit payments such as social security, railroad retirement, and black lung payments will reduce after a $10,000 combined annual exemption. Other agencies can cooperate in this process by giving information to the Treasury regarding delinquent debt, although steps will be taken to protect the legitimate privacy of individuals. Second, Federal agencies will have access to the computerized information and can dock the pay of Federal employees who owe the Government money. Third, people who have delinquent Federal debts will be barred from obtaining Federal loans or loan guarantees. Fourth, the Social Security Administration, the Customs Service, and the legislative and judicial branches of the Federal Government will be authorized to use debt collection tools, such as credit bureaus and private collection agencies. Mr. President, this is a sound proposal for collecting money from deadbeats and docking their Federal payments until they pay the funds they [[Page S1821]] owe. It is fair, and it simply improves the process for carrying out debt-collection authorities agencies already have. CONCLUSION Mr. President, America's success at home and abroad is like a stool that rests on three legs. First, our strength and success depend on our military power, which is now undisputed in an age where we are the world's only superpower. Second are our values, of family and country. They are strong and can be stronger still. The third leg, though, is our economic strength. And here we face serious challenges. As the New York Times has recently documented, too many Americans live with growing economic insecurity. Layoffs abound, and many of the jobs that once went to Americans have gone overseas. Accelerating the development of new high-technology industries and jobs is not a complete solution. We also need a vigorous trade policy to pry open foreign markets and reduce unfair dumping of foreign products. We need better education and training for all Americans. We need to make real progress, not phony progress, on the Federal deficit, so that interest rates can fall further. But technology policy is one key step in national economic recovery and strength, and the four programs this amendment supports are key parts of an effective, nonporked national technology policy. We know that earlier technology cooperation between industry and Government has helped create entire American industries--from agriculture to aircraft to computers and biotechnology. Much of Government's support came through the Defense Department, which was appropriate during World War II and the cold war. But now the Berlin Wall has fallen, and now our Nation's greatest challenge is economic, not military. We therefore need to strengthen civilian programs to stimulate technologies important to the civilian economy and civilian jobs. To do less is to condemn our Nation and its workers in the long run to second-rate status and more, not less, economic insecurity. For these reasons, I urge our colleagues to pass this important amendment. Mr. President, at this point I want to make a few additional points about the importance of technology and the Advanced Technology Program in particular. To begin with, we must remember that our strength as a Nation is like a three-legged stool. We have the one leg--the values of the Nation--which is unquestionably strong. We have sacrificed for the hungry in Somalia, for democracy in Haiti, for peace in Bosnia. We have the second leg, Mr. President, of military strength, which is also unquestioned. But the third leg--that of economic strength--has become fractured over the past 45 years in the cold war--intentionally, if you please, because we sacrificed to keep the allies together in the cold war. So we willingly gave up market share trying to develop capitalism not just in Europe, but particularly in the Pacific rim, and it has worked. The Marshall Plan has worked. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, however, now is the time to rebuild the strength of our economy. Our problem is, right to the point, that you can willingly--for national defense, military security--conduct research without any matching funds whatever. You can go right to the heart of it and give out the money. But all of a sudden, Mr. President, when we come to the matter of economic security--which is really the competition now in global affairs--we hear criticism even though the ATP requires matching funds, a dollar of private money for every dollar of Government money we expend. The law requires 50 percent from industry. The track record is 60 percent of the money by industry itself. Yet when they come with it, all of a sudden we hear talk about pork. Let me take up the matter of pork because that is the reason we are into this particular dilemma. The program at hand is working in most of the 50 States with hundreds of different contracts awarded. They are awarded over for 3- and 5-year periods, and they have led into commercialization, which we will soon touch upon. Senator Danforth and I set this up in the late 1980's. I was chairman of the Commerce Committee at that particular time. We wanted to make sure, back in 1988--the Trade Act of 1988 is where it was added--we wanted to make sure that it would not be exactly what is it accused of being today, namely, pork. So we set down various guidelines in the particular measure itself, and it was implemented in a very, very successful way by, I should say, President Bush's administration. No. 1, the industry has to come and make the request. It is not the Government picking winners or losers. It is the industry picking the winner. They have to come with at least 50 percent of the money. Thereupon, the experts in technology and business, including retired executives selected by the Industrial Research Institute, have to peer review the particular proposals. Mr. President, they have to look it over and make sure that the submission would really pass muster. I know it particularly well because my textile industry came with a request for computerization that they thought was unique. But it did not pass muster and was not given the award. They do not have an Advanced Technology Program award. Incidentally, I guess they heard ahead of time about my discipline of not making any calls. I never made a call to the White House or anybody in the Commerce Department in favor of any proposal. I would rather, at the markup of the appropriations bill, have turned back efforts on the other side of the Capitol to try to write in these particular projects. So we have protected the authenticity of the program as being nonpork. Thereupon, having passed peer review, highly ranked proposals have to go to a source selection board. The source selection board are civil servants, as we all know, of no political affiliation. On a competitive basis, they make the decision, not Secretary Brown, not President Clinton, not Senator Hollings, or any other Senator or Congressman, but, rather, that is the way these awards have been made. There have been no violations of it. We are proud of its record. That is why it has the confidence of the National Association of Manufacturers. That is why it receives the endorsement of the Council on Competitiveness, and every particular industry group you can possibly imagine have come forward and said this is the way to do it. That has to do with the pork part. The other part with respect to the long-range financing for long-term technologies has to be understood. Back at that particular time, when we were writing the legislation years ago, Newsweek reported an analysis predicting that maintaining the current hands-off policies toward industry and research, namely, the matter of commercialization of our technology, could cause the United States to be locked into a technological decline. They said, and I quote, that it would add $225 billion to the annual trade deficit by the year 2010 and put 2 million Americans out of work. There are various other articles we had at that particular time, and witnesses. I quote particularly from Alan Wolff: In 1990, a Wall Street analyst commented to a group of U.S. semiconductor executives that the goal of people investing in stocks is to make money. That is what capitalism is all about. It is not a charity. I can't tell my brokers, ``Gee, I am sorry about your client, but investing in the semiconductor industry is good for the country.'' While the individual was stating a truth, obviously, he was touching on a fundamental dilemma confronting U.S. industry today in light of the investor sentiment expressed above. How is a company to maintain the level of investment needed to remain competitive over the long term, particularly if there is no prospect of a short-term or short-run payoff, or foreign competition has destroyed the prospect of earning a return on that investment? That is the points that answers a charge sometimes made with respect to two recent GAO reports. Critics of the Advanced Technology Program quote GAO's statement where it said that half of those who had been given awards, when asked if they would have continued their research without the awards, said they would have continued. But by way of emphasis, these critics do not mention the next GAO finding, namely, that none of them said they would have ever continued as quickly or with the same degree of investment. With Government assistance, they are able to expedite their research and therefore have been able to meet the foreign competition. But note that GAO reported that half the winners said they would not have continued their research without Government [[Page S1822]] assistance. They would have abandoned it. We would have lost valid, good research projects without this Advanced Technology Program. I think the emphasis should be made at this particular time that GAO has made a favorable report, and that the program is doing exactly what was intended to do. It confronts exactly the particular dilemma we find ourselves in with respect to the operation of the stock market. It can go up 171 points one day and come back 110 points the next day. They look for short-term turnarounds and everything else of that kind, and does not focus on the long-term, including long-term technologies. That is why the working group headed by the distinguished Senator from New Mexico, Senator Bingaman, calls for the various securities law reforms. So we can do away, perhaps, with the quarterly report and actually meet the long-term investment competition that we confront, particularly in the Pacific rim. Again, I want to emphasize that expert panels make the decisions, not the Secretary of Commerce. Several States that have no Democratic Senators or Governor do very well in the ATP, including Texas and Pennsylvania. The Advanced Technology Program now involves some 760 research participants. It supports 280 projects around the country and in some 41 States. The Advanced Technology Program is not corporate welfare. It is not a handout to deadbeats. The purpose of the Advanced Technology Program is not to subsidize companies but to contract with the best companies to develop technologies important to the Nation as a whole. Companies must pay, as I pointed out, at least half of the amount when they come and may apply to the Advanced Technology Program. The ATP itself is the larger principal of industry-Government technology partnerships which enjoy solid support and excellent evaluations. In terms of industry's views, I want to quote first an important July 1995 policy statement by the National Association of Manufacturers: The National Association of Manufacturers believes that the disproportionately large cuts proposed in newer R programs are a mistake. R programs of more recent vintage enjoy considerable industry support for one simple fact: They are more relevant to today's technology challenges. In particular, partnership and bridge programs should not be singled out for elimination, but should receive a relatively greater share of what Federal R spending remains. These programs currently account for approximately 5 percent of Federal R spending. The National Association of Manufacturers suggest that 15 percent may be a more appropriate level. The figure we have in the particular amendment is $41 million less than the fiscal year 1995 level--$131 million less than the original 1995 level that existed before rescissions. We propose that there be a cut, not even a freeze. Of our $300 million, we are trying to bring up some $235 million to honor commitments to projects that have already received their awards and now need to complete them. We do not want to cut them off in half completion. Let me commend the distinguished chairman of our Appropriations Committee, Senator Hatfield of Oregon, in realizing and confronting this problem. He did not have the money. He put the $235 million in title IV, but he said, ``Look, if we can possibly find the money in offsets in title IV, then this should be completed.'' It is not a way for the Government to do business and build up the confidence that is so much besieged this day and age. The Government is trying to build up these partnerships and work together in research with industry and with the college campuses. It is wrong to take valid programs that have no objection to them, no pork, no waste, fraud, and abuse, and only tremendous success, and then come with a fetish against them because they appear as pork to some on the other side of the Capitol, and then to walk lockstep like it is part of a contract. We had, in qualifying this program, by way of emphasis, a series of hearings back in the 1980's. We also had soon after that particular time the Competitiveness Policy Council, with many members appointed by President Reagan. He appointed the former head of the National Science Foundation, Erich Bloch, who was designated chairman of the Council's Critical Technologies Subcouncil. They endorsed the ATP. I ask unanimous consent that the critical technology subcouncil listing of these outstanding individuals be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Competitiveness Policy Council Critical Technologies Subcouncil, 1993 Chairman Erich Bloch, Distinguished Fellow, Council on Competitiveness. David Cheney, Staff Director. Membership Eleanor Baum, Dean, Albert Nerken School of Engineering, Cooper Union. Frederick M. Bernthal, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation. Sherwood L. Boehlert, U.S. House of Representatives. Michael G. Borrus, Co-director, Berkeley Roundtable on International Economics. Rick Boucher, U.S. House of Representatives. Lewis M. Branscomb, Professor, Harvard University. Daniel Burton, Executive Vice President, Council on Competitiveness. Dennis Chamot, Executive Assistant to the President, Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO. John Deutch, Professor, MIT. John W. Diggs, Deputy Director for Extramural Research, Department of Health and Human Services. Craig Fields, President and CEO, MCC. Edward B. Fort, Chancellor, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. John S. Foster, Consultant, TRW, Inc., and Chairman, Defense Science Board. William Happer, Director, Office of Energy Research, U.S. Department of Energy. Joseph S. Hezir, Principal, EOP Group, and former Deputy Assistant Director, Energy and Science Division, OMB. Richard K. Lester, Director, Industrial Performance Center, MIT. John W. Lyons, Director, National Institute for Standards and Technology. Daniel P. McCurdy, Manager, Technology Policy, IBM. Joseph G. Morone, Professor, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, School of Management. Al Narath, President, Sandia National Laboratories. Richard R. Nelson, Professor, Columbia University. William D. Phillips, Former Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Lois Rice, Guest Scholar, Brookings Institution. Nathan Rosenberg, Director of Program for Technology & Economic Growth, Stanford University. Howard D. Samuel, President, Industrial Union Department, AFL-CIO. Hubert J.P. Schoemaker, President and CEO, Centocor, Inc. Charles Shanley, Director of Technology Planning, Motorola Inc. Richard H. van Atta, Research Staff Member, Institute for Defense Analyses. Robert M. White, Under Secretary for Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce. Eugene Wong, Associate Director of Industrial Technology, Office of Science & Technology Policy. Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, in August 1992, we also had the National Science Board itself. I will read a couple of things and not put it in its entirety into the Record, which we would be glad to do. But the National Science Board concluded: Stronger Federal leadership is needed in setting the course for U.S. technological competitiveness. Implementation of a national technology policy, including establishment of a rationale and guidelines for Federal action, should receive the highest priority. The start of such a policy was set forth 2 years ago by the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy, but more forceful action is needed by the President and Congress before there is further erosion in the United States technological position. They made the recommendation to expand and strengthen the Manufacturing Technology Centers Program, the State Technology Extension Program, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and I quote, ``Further expand NIST's Advanced Technology Program.'' That was very important, therefore, the National Science Board and its findings at that particular time. Going back to 1987 for a moment, Mr. President, we led off our original series of technology hearings that year with the distinguished entrepreneur, technologist, professor, industrial leader, dean at the University of Texas Business School, Dr. George Kosmetsky, who had helped create the Microelectronics Technology and Computer Corporation down in Austin, TX. We followed his testimony with the Council on Competitiveness. I will read just part of a Council on Competitiveness statement written not long after that particular time. The United States is already losing badly in many critical technologies. Unless the Nation acts today to promote the development [[Page S1823]] of generic industrial technology, its technological position will erode further, with disastrous consequences for American jobs, economic growth, and national security. The Federal Government should view support for generic industrial technology as a priority mission. It is important to note that this mission would not require major new Federal funding. Additional funds for generic technology programs are required. Other Federal R programs, such as national prestige projects, should be redirected or phased in more slowly to allow more resources to be focused on generic technology. Of course, Mr. President, these themes were included and touched upon in our hearings and legislation, and we have been more or less off and running since then. We have, finally, by way of endorsement, the Coalition for Technology Partnerships. It has over 130 members, a combination of companies, trade associations, different companies themselves, such as the American Electronic Association, and several universities that work with industry on ATP projects. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at this particular point a letter from the Coalition for Technology Partnership along with the listing of membership. There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: Coalition for Technology Partnerships (CTP), Washington, DC, July 6, 1995. Hon. Ernest F. Hollings, Russell Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC. Dear Senator Hollings: The undersigned members of the Coalition for Technology Partnerships respectfully ask for your support of the Advanced Technology Program (ATP). We understand that the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committees will be marking up the FY Department of Commerce Authorization bill in late July. We are concerned by the House Science Committee and the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Subcommittee vote to eliminate the ATP and are writing to outline our views on this essential program. The Coalition for Technology Partnerships applauds your efforts to cut the federal budget deficit and to streamline the federal government, but we caution against sacrificing technology partnerships, such as the ATP, that are essential to our international competitiveness. The ATP has enjoyed wide-spread industry support and participation. The basic mission of the ATP is to fund research programs with a significant potential for stimulating economic growth and improving the long-term competitiveness of U.S. industry. The ATP is already achieving this goal, by cost-sharing research to foster new innovative technologies that create opportunities for world- class products, services and industrial processes. ATP research priorities are set by industry. The selection process is fair, and based entirely on technical and business merit. Half of all ATP awards and joint ventures go to small business directed partnerships. Today, as indication of the success of this program, quality proposals in pursuit of ATP funds far outstrips available funds. The real payoff of the ATP is the long-term economic growth potential for the companies involved with the program, and the creation of new jobs. The ATP is a model of industry/ government partnerships which benefits the nation as a whole, again by leveraging industrial capital to pursue new technologies. Without ATP, these technological opportunities would be slowed, or ultimately forfeited to foreign competitors more able to make key investments in longer-term, higher risk research, such as is the focus of ATP. We urge you to adequately fund the Advanced Technology Program as you begin mark-up of the authorization bill. The ATP is essential, cost effective and timely for the economic growth of our country. Please contact either Taffy Kingscott at 202/515-5193 or Tom Sellers at 202/728-3606 if you have any questions or if we can be of any assistance. coalition for technology partnerships The Coalition for Technology Partnerships has been formed by a group of small, medium and large businesses, trade associations and technical societies on the principle that technology partnerships between government and industry reflect the realities of today's budget climate and technology development mechanisms. Advance Circuits, Inc. Advanced Machining Dynamics. Aerospace Industries Association. Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Institute. Alaska Technology Transfer Assistance Center. American Electronics Association. American Concrete Institute. Amoco Performance Products, Inc. Andersen Consulting. Aphios Corporation. Apple Computer. Applied Medical Informatics (AMI). Arizona State Univ.-College of Engineering & Applied Science. Armstrong World Industries, Inc. Array Comm., Inc. Atlantic Research Corporation. Babcock & Wilcox. BioHybrid Technologies Inc. Biotechnology Industry Organization. Brunswick Composites. CALMAC Manufacturing Corporation. The Carborundum Company. Clean Air Now. CNA Consulting Engineers. Coal Technology Corporation. Columbia Bay Company. Council on Superconductivity. Cubicon. Cybo Robots, Inc. Dakota Technologies, Inc. Dell Computer. Diamond Semiconductor Group. Dow Chemical Company. Dow-United Technologies Composite Products, Inc. Dragon Systems, Inc. DuPont. Edison Materials Technology Center. The Electorlyser Corporation. Energy BioSystems Corporation. Erie County Technical Institute. Fairfield University-Center for Global Comp