committee members to participate in between now and the spring. this year is the 40th anniversary of cdbg funds. this has been one of the most successful programs in history as far as funding housing, economic developed, accessibility at the local level with the mayors. we want to make sure we communicate with the country about the importance of this program.

>> we will send the conference and jean will send out a notice with the particular details just more a follow up. this will culminate with an event on capitol hill that will do -- that we'll do in the spring with members of congress and the senate. so i'm announcing that now. i want to get your commitments. i'll stop you before you walk out of the room and headache sure that you join -- and make sure that you join us for that, because we have to headache sure that we protect this program. so with that, as i said, the good news is that cdbg is funded at 3.030 billion in py-14. the house appropriations

committee had recommended funding at $1.6 billion. so we're pleased that that did not happen. all this work that we've done in collaboration with hud is extremely important in the implementation of funds. and in introducing secretary shaun donovan, you all know he's been a fantastic partner to all of us. door's always open, very accessible. and he's really, i think, pushing what we're all pushing for, which is outcome and innovation with the use of these funds. so it's been a real pleasure working with you, secretary, and i know many of the mayors in solving problems at the ground level. we're really pleased that you're here and you're sharing your time with us. and so i'll introduce secretary shaun donovan. thank you for being here, very much appreciate it. [applause]

>> thank you. it's great to be back with all of you. and i just want to start by thanking setti for his incredible leadership. we've gotten to spend a lot of time together not just through his leadership of this committee, but also, you know, i got a call from him saying i found this really innovative thing, what do you think about it? he's just, he's not just talking the talk, he is walking the walk on doing things that are innovative and new, and i really just want to thank you, setti, for your leadership. i also want to say thanks to ralph becker and ed pa allow sky for their leadership as well. you have done remarkable work, i'm always impressed with what you're doing in your town too, so really, really appreciate it. and i see lots of familiar faces around the table. i see some new faces. congratulations to all of you that are just stepping into your roles as new mayors or relatively recent mayors. and before i jump into the work

that hud does, i just want you to know a little bit about me. and that i come from where you all live. and what i mean by that is my job immediately prior to working for the president was working for a mayor. i was the housing commissioner in new york city, and one of the things i fundamentally understand, you know, one of our favorite mayors in new york history used to say there's no democratic or republican way to take out the trash. and i understand that whatever we may do or not do here in d.c., ask there's been a lot of not doing lately, you guys gotta get your jobs done. you, you're where the rubber hits the road. and one of the things i wanted to show you, i'm wearing my new york city manhole cover cuff links today. [laughter] and they are my favorite cuff links because they remind me why

i'm here, that ultimately if the sewer system doesn't work many your town, president trash doesn't get collected, if the snow doesn't get plowed -- some of my recent friends in the northeast know what i'm talking about -- things don't work. and you're on the front lines for that. and i just want you to know that not just for me personally, but for my whole team at hud, many of whom out of local government, we get what you're dealing with and the work that you need to do. and i hope you've seen that over the last five years, that we really made a lot of progress at hud, but we've also got a ways to go as well. so please work with us, give me the good feedback, give me the bad feedback in terms of what's not working, and i would really encourage you in particular to get to know your regional administrator for hud. we have ten regional administrators around the country. we've got a full team in place. just added three more in various

places around the country, and they are great resources for you. sit with our team, understand what we do, and let's build that working relationship. so having said that, let me deal with a number of things that i know are on your mind. and i'm going to start right where setti started which is to talk about our block grants. because i get that ultimately cdbg and home -- and i want to leave home out of this -- are incredibly important resources. i have the largest cdbg and home budgets in the country at my agency, and so i understand how absolutely critical they are. and one of the reasons i do want to make sure we focus on home as well as cdbg is sometimes it doesn't get the same attention. and we should all recognize that we work with 650 of you across the country. those are the participating jurisdictions. we've created 1.1 million

affordable housing units across the country through home. in addition to that, 283,000 people have been able to get rental assistance. and i think particularly at a time -- this is something both for cdbg and home -- it's so important we keep hammering home. for every dollar we put into those programs, we leverage four dollars from somewhere else. so at a time when we're talking about, you know, our fiscal deficits, that is real bang for the buck, and it's an argument we all ought to be making time and time again. now, unfortunately, these programs have been squeezed. and if you think about the fact that home is down almost 50%, cdbg about 25% from when our fiscal crisis started, and so these programs have been squeezed as much as just about

anything else. and as setti said, you know, i think it is a big victory for all of us. and i will tell you i have over the five years, i have never seen better work than i saw this year. partnership between our agency and all of you to really make the case for cdbg and home. and, setti, i give you a lot of credit. your fearless leaders, and ralph, a ton of credit at really martialing the team and making the case this year. and when you go from 1.6 billion in the house bill to 3 billion, that is a real victory. i'd love to see us back up where we were a few years ago, but it is a real victory in the times that we're dealing with. but i also think it's important that we show that we're thinking in innovative ways, creative ways, that we're looking at common sense, smart reforms to these programs that will help us

make the case even better. and so this past year -- and many of you were involved, but particularly new folks may not have been aware of this -- we started a dialogue we called moving cdbg toward where we had 20 different listening sessions with all of you, with grantees, with other stakeholders to get your ideas about smart reforms, how we can streamline, simplify the programs, make them work better. and make sure that we can make the argument that we're using these dollars in as effective and accountable a way as possible. and so, you know, unfortunately -- and you may be aware of this -- we had a washington post series on the home program that was very unfair but really cost us because it's so easy for these programs. we can do a hundred good things, and the one thing that isn't working as well gets put in the press. we've got to make sure that we're vigilant on this and show that we're using these dollars

wisely. so you should expect to see in our 2015 budget a set of proposals around those ideas that came out of the listening sessions. we want to -- and i want to be clear, we're not saying those are ideas, we're tone talking. we -- done talking. we want that to be the beginning of the next stage in the conversation which is to really say how do we make home, cdbg as effective as they possibly can? look, some of these decisions are tough. we're down to numbers now with some of our participating jurisdictions in home and cdbg where we're talking about, you know, 30, 40, 50, $60,000. and it's almost impossible for you all to figure out how to run a program for that, right? just hiring the staff to run it can cost you more than you're getting. and so we have to find creative ways to think about partnering together and doing other things that can help us make these as effective as possible.

so let's not only fight for the dollars, which we want to do, but also fight to make these programs as effective as possible. second thing i just wanted to touch on is the fantastic work that we've all done together around homelessness. and in 2010 this president launched an initiative we call opening doors. and this was the first time the federal government had said we're going to have a strategic plan not just to put a band-aid on this problem, but to actually end homelessness. we set very clear goals that we were going to end chronic and veterans' homelessness by the end of 2015 and family and children's homelessness by the end of 2020. and because we worked together in very innovative ways, approaches like rapid rehousing that with small amounts of money, sometimes it's just one month's rent or a security deposit, we can get folks very

quickly into housing, and it works. we're now seeing close to 90% of those families that with just that small amount of money are successfully housed a year later. very, very innovate i strategy. housing first has been very effective, so many of you are implementing. and we've worked very hard in particular to strengthen our partnership with veterans affairs and to try to make sure that we're bringing together the housing resources with the health care, the other supports that va can provide. and, look, ultimately this shows in the results. during a time when we would traditionally see homelessness skyrocket, not only do we have, you know, very difficult economic circumstances over the last few years more so many families, many, many long-term unemployed, much higher than we've seen traditionally, and hundreds of thousands of veterans coming back from overseas. we've been able to push down family homelessness by 8% in the last three years, chronic

homelessness by 16% ask veterans' homelessness by 24% in three years. so is really, really impressive work. and i want to say there are a set of places, a set of cities and towns around the country that are doing spectacular work on this. and i don't see ralph here yet, but i do want to call out mayor stanton in phoenix, mayor becker in salt lake city. they made a challenge to each other that they were going to get every single chronically homeless vet off the streets, and both of them have done that. and that is just one step toward ending veterans' homelessness completely. and so we're seeing that where you all make this a priority, focus on it, work with us to bring creative resources, you can do remarkable things. and i will just say this: at a time when our trust deficit in

government, particularly the federal government, is just as bad as our fiscal deficit, to be able to say to an american that we have gotten our heros, our veterans off the streets is a very powerful way to say government works. and we can do stuff together between the federal and local level. it really makes a difference in people's lives. so i want to make sure that we're working together, and we're going to be coming back to you asking you all to make commitments about what you can do to end veterans' homelessness and other forms of homelessness, particularly chronic homelessness where we've got a real focus. and so stay tuned. we want your partnershipment we want you to step up and do more on this. i think it's also important that we recognize that, and this comes, again, from my work at the local level, that so often what you see in a federal

partner is, you know, it feels like 18 different agencies with a hundred different programs. and a lot of times we're not so good at being able to deliver those things in a way that you really understand how they come together and where, you know, one plus one doesn't just equal two, it can equal three because we're being smart about how we're bringing those resources together. not to mention bringing you the, you know, best practices that might help you, cutting red tape where you need it so we're not part of the problem. and so one of the things i've been very focused on is how do we create better partnerships across the federal agencies that come together at the neighborhood level, at the city or county level and at the regional level. we've got to do a better job of that, and i really, i want to touch on three specific efforts that are near and dear to my heart and to the president's heart. first, many of you know and, in fact, some of you grabbed me at the door as i was coming in to talk about it.

you know about our choice neighborhoods effort. this is the successor to the very successful hope six program. i was just in seattle over the last couple days looking at one of our first five choice neighborhoods. they're doing remarkable stuff, bringing together housing and education and job training and a new light rail line. just remarkable, remarkable work. well, just a couple weeks ago the president announced that we were taking this to the next level with something we call our promised zones effort. and the basic idea there is what we're doing is bringing together a set of what we call our signature community development initiatives; choice neighborhoods at hud, promise neighborhooded at the department of education which is an effort to put in place that many of you may know the harlem children's zone in new york. to take that model where you start looking at kids literally from the time they're in the cradle all the way until they have a career and matching them

up with the help they need not just at school, but throughout the community. that's an effort that's part of it. our criminal justice efforts to make sure that we're bringing public safety into this. we're bringing all of those together, and then we're going to, basically, put them on steroids. and what does that mean? we've picked the first five promise zones, we're going to pick at least 15 more during the rest of the administration. we're asking congress the give us tax centss for hiring and business development there, sort of building on the empowerment zen effort. zone effort. we're also going to give those communities advantages for more than 20 different other competitive programs. we're going to put in place a topnotch federal team from all the key agencies on the ground in that community that's going to make sure that they are getting the help that they need, that i talked about, the partnership. we're going to bring technical

assistance, we're going to bring vista volunteers. all of that is absolutely key. and i want to be -- there are a lot of different pieces to this. what i want to make sure we're clear about is what the goal is, right? the president said this when he announced it last week. we got too many communities of concentrated poverty around this country where no matter how well a kid does in school, no matter how hard their parents work the single most important determinant of that kid's life chances, even their life span, is their zip code. and that's just wrong. we can't let kids growing up in neighborhoods stifle their dreams. and so we gotta make sure that we're bringing all the resources we can together to help do this. now, you may say, well, 20 isn't enough, and i agree. we want to work with as broad a group of you as possible. that's why we're picking many of the finalists who didn't

actually get designated as promise zones and doing more work with them. we're going to be doing choice neighborhoods and promise neighborhoods and burn criminal justice in many more neighborhoods than those 20, but this is a capstone that is representative of what we're trying to do in community development overall. second, at the city level we have our strong cities, strong communities effort. we named ten cities originally. just last week we announced an expansion of this to seven more cities. and, basically, the idea here is at a city level -- the same that we're doing at the neighborhood level in promise zones -- we're going to bring, we want to design sitting with mayors a very specific team that says, hey, if your big issue is expanding your airport and helping the neighborhoods near there like it was in memphis, if it's a port issue, if it's that you've got, you know, a serious problem with food desert and jobs as it was in chester,

pennsylvania, if it's redeveloping the downtown mall as it was in fresno, whatever your key economic development challenges are, we're going to bring all the right folks to sit in your office and be -- they're going to have the back phone, basically. remember the back phone? pick up the red phone be, you call directly to whoever you need to get in washington with that team to try to get those issues resolved. again, not everybody's going to be able to be an sc2, we call it, but we also know we can take some of these best practices and change the way we're working with you overall. just an example of that, we're going to create in the next few weeks, we're going to announce what we call our sc2 national resource network. one of the things i hear so much from all of you is, look, i gotta know what are the best partners, what are the best cities around the country doing on this particular issue. i want to know what's

innovative, what are the best practices. this is a team of folks that you can draw on that are the best practitioners around the country to come to your city and help you design what you're looking to do that's innovative. so it's technical assistance, it's the best practices, and we're going to set it up not so we have to go through some long contracting process, but we have these folks on retainer, basically. you say, look, i need help with this issue. we'll get a team there quickly to help you, help you take that on. and then third and finally, i just wanted to touch on our partnership for sustainable communities at the regional level. we've joined together with the department of transportation, with epa, with the department of agriculture and rural areas, and we have funded 143 planning grants some at the local level, some of the regional level that help you better connect transportation, infrastructure to housing.

for many folks this means putting in regional light rail system, and there have been great examples. salt lake city, where's ralph? salt lake city's a great example of having done that, but there's so many other cities as well that are doing that. with these 143 planning grants, we've reached half the american population. and what it's starting to do is not just better drive growth and development, connect up housing, transportation infrastructure, it's also lowering costs for your citizens. transportation is getting to be, in many communities, more expensive than housing. and when you put those together, average american family spends 52 cents of every dollar they earn just on housing and transportation. if we could help drive down those costs and make your neighborhoods more attractive, create better places to live, you all know that that's a huge part of economic competitiveness right now. more and more, right? the knowledge workers, they're deciding where they want to live, and companies and capital

are following. so if you can create a more livable city where, you know, maybe you've got not just driving, but light rail, you've got walkable communities, you've got exciting downtown things happening or in satellite areas of the city, those are the kinds of things that we're planning and really are economic development strategies. so the key for us is how do we take your plans and put them in reality. and one of the great things that we got done in the budget this year is a big new infusion in tiger grant dollars in the department of transportation because so often that's the implementation money that you need. but we're going to be looking at cdbg and a range of other sources, too, as opportunities to reality implement -- to really implement those kind of plans that we're doing. so as you can probably tell, i could go on for a little bit longer on all the stuff that we're doing. those are just a few highlights of the things that i'm really excited about working with you all on. obviously, i want to make sure

we have some time to hear from all of you and what else might be on your mind. so let me just close by saying thank you. where i started this is that you all are where innovation is happening, you are where the rubber meets the road across our country, and more and more i'm just incredibly impressed with the quality of the work that mayors are doing to make great neighborhoods, great places and to drive our economic growth in this country. and we want to be a partner with you in doing all of that. so thank you. [applause] >> so we should open it up for questions. thank you, secretary. go ahead, mayor. >> thank you. mayor warren, thanks for the all the work that you do on this committee. and i just want to thank the secretary for each year coming here and doing what he's doing. just on a personal note i want to say, mr. secretary -- and i said this to you a few years

ago -- that your leadership's been incredible. we've seen a lot of changes in terms of accessibility in your office, especially at the regional level. those folks for getting things solved when in the past i think that was not always the case, and i think that's important, to build those trust relationships. and especially seeing a really different look and take on overhauling housing authorities across the country which, of course, is always a problem. moving to what i bring up, setti, almost every year, and that's about how entitlement communities receive funds, it's the one place in the central government where, of course, entitlement communities receive dollars for those who may not realize it directly from the federal government. it goes around the normal -- [inaudible] in our country which says dollars go to states and counties first. every mayor in here knows how important that is because you know, as you said, we're where the rubber meets the road. >> not that we don't love our governors. [laughter] >> not that we don't love our governors. the money has a funny way of not going exactly at the same rate

and in the same manner when it goes through two other jurisdictions. >> i never experienced that in new york. [laughter] >> just want to say on the hazmat money, the hazard mitigation funds, disaster relief funds, those unlike normal cdbg entitlements, sometimes even for entitlement communities don't find their way directly to. and so for the last few years i've brought up here and maybe there's a way to do it through a resolution here, mayor, at some point, but to maybe draw some tighter guidelines in that realm so that in emergencies when it's probably most important that this money flows right, we're not circumventing some things that really would be helpful in terms of that money flowing exactly like it does in normal times. mayors know when an emergency occurs where the funds are needed. they're the folks who are the innovators, and they're the folks who, frankly, we're in a world now where metro economies run things, but we're in a world where legally it's still about

dual sovereignty, right? states and the government. i'd like to be able to see the funds flow directly, thank you, and i'll listen to any comments you have. >> so, unfortunately, i've had the duty over the last five years to spend a lot of time on natural disasters, and we've seen, you know, you can argue abstractly about the science, but i'm telling you, when you look in the eyes of a family that's just been hit by a tornado or a hurricane, i mean, i'll never forget two sisters i met in alabama on a visit after tuscaloosa was hit so bad who were sellerring for their mom's -- searching for their mom's pictures and her stuff just scattered through their neighborhood. it is a terrible, terrible thing. and folks aren't asking abstract questions about climate change. they're saying how can we better protect our communities, what can we do to recover. and i do think that this point

of where the money goes is very, very important. and we have for the first time ever no administration has ever done this before, we have taken the cdbg/dr money, the disaster recovery money, and we've awarded it directly to jurisdictions for the first time. and as mayor maddox knows, he's been a beneficiary of that, we don't always get formula right exactly, but we are willing to listen and go back and make sure we do that. one of the challenges is just capacity too, right? and we want to make sure we have jurisdictions that are getting 100, 500 times more cdbg money than they've ever gotten before, and so we do want to work -- in some cases we're working with the state, making sure places are getting -- but a lot of cases now we are making direct awards to cities, to counties to make sure that they are able to

benefit directly from that. so i agree that the problem you're going to have on a lot of the fema dollars like hazard mitigation grants is that their rules are much stricter than cdbg. cdbg was already flexible. we've been able to get congress to give us even more flexibility in recent rounds on the dr money, but it would really take changing the stafford act to make progress on some of the fema dollars. and that's, you know, you know how likely it is to get something through congress these days. so i think it's very important that if you want to be sort of surgical about that, the you've got some very specific -- if you've got some very specific changes to bring that forward, i'd be happy to work with craig fugate and the new secretary of dhs, jeh johnson, to focus on that. >> appreciate that answer, secretary. what we can do, mayor, is also we could sort of follow up if there's a group of mayors from this committee that are interested in going to the

second level of that question, perhaps we can connect with the appropriate staff from whatever agencies and see what our next steps might be. so finish. >> [inaudible] >> we talked before. >> okay. we will -- let's to that. we'll make sure we do that. if i could be the bad guy, because we've got to keep going here, one more question because we have two other agenda items. i apologize out there. go ahead. >> thank you. secretary donovan, thank you for taking my question. and it's kind of simple, but -- [inaudible] city of north chicago. and we to have a va hospital -- >> mic, please? >> sorry about that. but we do have a va hospital in our town, and, you know, the homeless problem that exists through that, you know, it does affect not only our up to, but our county -- our town, but our

county. and i me you spoke on, i think it was called having first program? >> housing first. >> housing first. could you expound on that a little bit more? i know through our cdbg funding we are able and we have gotten a grant, and one of the grants is to actually establish 20 new homes within our town and do do0 new rehabs. and we wanted to try to bring that program or some programs through our town to help homeless and the va. >> yeah. and i would just point out barbara poppy, laura are here from our u.s. interagency council on homelessness, and they lead the coordination that cuts across hud, va, hhs, all the different agencies that are involved, education. but, look, housing first is finish it may sound simple, but it's been pretty revolutionary. and the basic idea is what we used to say was, you know, you have a long-term and generally

men homeless on the streets, single individuals, substance abuse problems, maybe mental health issues, and the old approach was to say, look, we're going to put you this a treatment program -- in a treatment program, we're going to try to get you medication you need, and if you do well when you sort of graduate from that, the next step is to get into housing. and what we figured out is that we had it exactly backwards. that, in fact, it's going to be incredibly difficult for folks to kick their or habits -- kick their habits, be able to overcome whatever challenges they have of if they're not housed first. and by the way, it's much more expensive to let somebody live on the streets than to house them. when you think about the amount of time -- there's a great article in the new yorker a few years ago called "million dollar

murray" that was about a vet who, you know, great guy, got to know the police well because he was in and out of jail. he would get sober, he'd get a job, and then things would fall apart again. when he passed away on the streets, these two police officers went back, and they figured out that the state of nevada had spent a million dollars on this guy. and so what we've done is to change that and say let's move folks directly from the streets into housing as quickly as possible. and structure around that housing the supports that they need. and lo and behold, what we find is they're much more likely to be successful in dealing with whatever challenges they have, being able to get back to work, whatever it is. if we start with housing. and i'll tell you, there's some initial resistance to this because they said, wait a second, they're struggling, you know, they're still drinking or, you know, they've got substance

abuse issues, you're going to put them in a house? and by the way, having done enough of these community meetings, go tell neighbors that you're going to locate this housing in their communities, right? [laughter] but what is amazing about this approach is that it works. and it has become the standard approach now. it is saving money, it is changing lives, and it's something that we can work with you on. i was just in seattle, as i said, and they're doing this all over the mace, and the community reaction -- all over the place and the community reaction has been great because they have full-time security. they really are dealing with the challenge of taking folks off the street and housing them in a way that's being successful. it's something that the va has taken up. we've been using hud vouchers through a program we call vash. we get 10,000 of these vouchers every year, and it has been very, very powerful in helping us. the housing first approach plus this rapid rehousing idea which is for many folks they need help

just getting into housing with a down payment -- not a down payment, you know, a security deposit or a month's rent, even a utility bill. those two strategies together have been very powerful. and we have, hud has very flexible resources that can be used to do both of these things. and we have a great team at usich and hud that can help you exactly how to figure out how to do them. >> mr. secretary, we're so appreciative of the fact that you've taken your time to be here with us. >> couldn't miss it. >> just a few quick points just to wrap up on this. you clearly listened very closely to us when you did these listening sessions. i heard back the answers and suggestions you made all throughout your presentation. so you walk the walk as well. we appreciate it. and i also appreciate the interagency work that you're doing and getting away from the silos of government with

transportation and hhs and other agencies. and the va as well. because it makes it better for mayors when they can go to one place. you're talking about creating a livable, sustainable city for all of us, so we're appreciative of that as well. thank you very much for being here. >> my pleasure. great to be -- good to see you all again. [applause] >> what i'd like to do is move on to our next order of business, if i could. our next speaker is bob annibale, bob leads citigroup's initiatives and partnerships supporting community development and micro finance through financial inclusion, as is the building, neighborhood revitalization and microenterprise development. he leads citi's global

commercial relationships with microfinance and community institutions to expand access to financial services with particular focus on developing innovative platforms for scaling access to finance and savings through partnerships and correspondence. based in london, welcome back sits on -- bob sits on a number of committees including the fdic chairman's committee on economic empowerment and the world's bank cgap executive committee. bob will speak on innovative public/private partnerships. bob? >> thank you. thank you very much, mayor. and i'll speak -- try to be brief so we can get back to your programming. and in a way, this follows so tightly to what secretary donovan said. and i think of it as a bit of an evolution in the way we at citi and i think, i hope, other financial institutions that work on community development can are increasing hi heading. and part of -- increasingly heading. and part of that is you know for years housing has been a

cornerstone of the work that many banks have done in community development. and for citi it's been an anchor. i mean, we are not by far the largest bank in terms of footprint in the united states, but we're the largest arranger of affordable housing in the united states. and part of that, i think, in terms of the work that many institutions have done have been for years also supported by the community reinvestment act which many of your cities have benefited from. but many haven't as well where need is enormous. and as important as it is, a 30-year act that sometimes traps funds in geographies where it may well be and is needed, but we can't go often beyond that. and i think it's very important thinking in terms as we are of the evolution of the interagency discussions about how that can happen so that institutions go where do and do this sort of investing where there's greatest need, not just where there's a regulatory incentive or requirement, for that matter, to do it. but housing's been, for us, a

cornerstone of our work. secretary donovan when he was in new york, certainly, we worked enormously with him in building innovation. but it's been one of the things about community development has been that it has been in many ways siloed. they might have worked on housing in one area, education in another, health care in another approach, and very often it was directly with community organizations not necessarily even in consultation or in alignment with mayors' offices or the cities themselves. we found ourselves evolving a lot of what we've done the last few years. from moving from only housing, for example, to saying we need community care centers and health centers, to working with groups in california getting fresh food into many of the areas across the state and into many urban areas or charter school financing in your inner city areas that go multiple cities. it's been about moving beyond our core which began as housing. but i think what we looked at most of all were the

opportunities to work with mayors' offices in building programs that are more scaleable and that can reach across the geography of a city. that meant, of course, bringing in our nonprofit community partners. they deliver so many services, they lead to many of our geographies. but doing it in alignment and in partnership with says has proven to us to get a lot greater scale and to begin replication. it's also taken us beyond our own footprint where citi may be present or not and into other cities where the need is there but strong community organizations exist. and they, too, are in partnership with the mayors. i think mayors' offices have become for us really idea centers as well. where should we be putting our resources, both our business resources and our philanthropic resources when it comes to community development? some of those areas about aligning our work with that of public policy priorities. and, yes, that comes at a national level, but it's so much more important for us to drill

down to the local level. and that's where it's important that within all of your offices there are teams that we can work with. there are teams that are so good that as a change of administration, we're finding amongst our best talent coming out of city administrations because some of the innovation that has been introduced is something we think we can replicate and we should scale. i would say one of the areas if we look across what does it mean then, and i think the secretary also spoke to the idea of the place focus, of really listing specific areas of greatest needs with alignment and coordination between the kinds of community development programs we all bring in. so when i think of that, one of the areas we've been working a lot around, for example, working with small microentrepreneurs and small business, getting finance to them. we worked with mayor emanuel and the chicago team op building the chicago -- on building the chicago microfinance institute. how do you replicate the work that ax onand other important groups are working on in san

antonio, san diego, new york and many other cities are doing across other institutions in the city? how do we bring scale to that? and in many ways, it takes the leadership of the mayors' offices as well as strength of those organizations for us to be able to do that. and i know a thurm of you cities are doing that too. the urban manufacturing alliance, a really interesting organization. i saw mayor lee spoke in one of your earlier committee meetings on technology. inner city groups that are creating new jobs, new businesses very often by young entrepreneurs, but that movement around urban manufacturing again, a new concept of manufacturing from old, heavy industry has got great momentum. and we're working now having begun with that in new york and in san francisco to find a whole network of cities. and they're very well aligned with mayors' offices in trying to generate that. to us, that linkage to the mayor's office, to the few nice

palties really brings the opportunity to make sure we are going to reach greater scale. it also brings you the opportunity to show private funding that corresponds to public money you want to put at work there. and that's reaching 22 cities, the urban manufacturing, at this point. then another thing was about linking cities' procurement contracts well jill small minority -- eligible small minority businesses. it wasn't just enough to get small businesses certified, whether they be minority, women-owned or otherwise to bid for contracts, we actually needed to be sure they were getting certified for the right contracts and getting the support to meet the challenges that there is in public procurement appropriately. you have many fiduciary roles. not easy for smaller businesses often to become suppliers to cities. one of the areas we've been doing that in los angeles, a ram called bridges to -- [inaudible] success with the university of southern california. >> in working with the housing department in the city of los angeles is getting a number of the small businesses not just certified, but in a position to

successfully bid or collaborate on bids, and they're getting contracts. and i think that's also keeping some of that work in the city itself which, of course, is open for wider tendering in most cases. but the opportunity for small businesses in your own municipalities to have that access. so very focused programs around that which we have found in los angeles a great success. another focus area that many of you talked about and it came up, mayor de blasio brought it up and others will too, unemployment. and particularly for us the longer-term and the older communities, and when we mean older, we mean people who are in their 50s who are out of work after working for decades who are particularly having a hard time getting back into the job market. and long term being used as an expression of anyone working who hasn't worked for 27 weeks or so is not a very long time for someone who might have worked 30 be years, many of whom are

qualified whose industry has moved. and they need something different than youth coming into the job market or others. and we're working with a group called platform to employment, and i began working on it, we saw the mayor of bridgeport really was the advocate for this that convinced us it mattered, and it would work and bring in some of those long-term residents who have been -- when we saw unemployment going down, you know, we see it recently, the numbers dropping, the headline numbers, we know that this group has remained in between, has not seen jobs for that, the long-term unemployed. ..

how do we work through the schools to give youth whose parents are eligible for nationality and, therefore, they would get it, get the resources they need to do that. we tried to build out a program with the city of new york for the commissioner of immigrant affairs. i want to lead with the idea that this holistic approach, it's much greater by working with mayors and mayors offices. we hope we work many more with you. in the past we afford more directly with strong organizations in your communities by aligning it with a broader programs that you have in your own community develop and. it is meant we have had more space. we see that in the problems those in san antonio, los angeles have been reported. we will focus resources to aggregate as the secretary said, to make those zones true successes. look forward to working with

more acute in geographies we been in and where we haven't been, but on examples we can replicate and to leverage private sector partnership with mayors and your offices, with those of civil society we can make the greatest scale and impact. thank you. >> thank you very much, bob. appreciate that. [applause] >> so we are here at the community to housing committee, an ambitious committee. we like to try to fit as many substantive issues weekend in an hour. it's who we are. what we're going to do, i'm going to introduce kerry grannis. she will make a brief presentation and we can end opened up to questions. as he introduced kerry, many of you were in our committee meeting at our annual meeting in las vegas, and you had a chance here from the women's union, beth babcock, who tal talked abt social mobility.

we know in our cities, and it doesn't matter what kind of city with what kind of demographic year end, the biggest issue of our time is this issue of social mobility, intergenerational, social mobility. how do we ensure that we are giving all people an opportunity to move from poverty, to middle-class and beyond. and how do we do it? there's a lot of new thinking around the country that is happening. they are science behind what is happening. what i wanted to in these meetings is to allow as we conduct our committee meetings, allow for some of the best ideas and thinking that should come in to answering these questions, coming into our committee meetings. so we had as i said at the last meeting we had a great presentation on how those movements are happening. i want to allow kerry despicable bit on the brookings

institutions report on some benchmarking are doing around the building and things we should look for from the city standpoint. associate director of the center on children and families at brookings institution, in addition to leading ccs work with state and local government, social mobility, her research interests include letters a and education at all levels from preschool to post-secondary. prior to her work at brookings she taught at george washington university northern virginia community college. she holds a ph.d in american literature. and she will speak on a strategic framework for improving intergenerational mobility. kerry. >> thanks so much, mayor warren. i know time is short so i will be brief. as mayor warren mentioned, intergenerational mobility december talking about how we can delink the circumstances of a child's birth from their later outcome. that's what our project is

about. whether the circumstances at birth are about parents income, about the zip codes, as secretary donovan mentioned, or about parents education, we want to make that link less about destiny. politically, we know that americans respond more to the idea of opportunity than they do to inequality, for instance, for better or for worse. but the problem is while everyone supports the idea of opportunity like they do jobs or growth, we don't know how to measure opportunity as well as we did jobs and growth where we have official numbers. what we are trying to do is put together a way to do that, away to have an official measure. i'm going to not even bother with some of these slight. i'm happy to talk to you to get in touch with your staff and tell you more about this, it will be -- what we know is your chances by reaching middle class by middle age which we measure about 300% of the poverty line, they vary greatly depending on your family background, race,

gender a little bit. that's the end of the story. but how do we get there? how do we improve the number of children who are reaching middle class white middle aged? as everyone here has talked about, mobility happens over the entire lifecycle. what we're looking at his benchmarks at each stage and help predict whether or not a child is likely to move to the middle class or beyond as an adult. we have talked to experts in each of these fields and come up with a series of normative and predictive benchmarks that incorporates both academic standards as well as behavioral and social standards. we look at early childhood and middle childhood, great school, about reading skills, math skills that we know some of the strongest predictors of how you're going to do in high school. in high school, for instance, our benchmark is whether or not you graduate with decent grades, without being convicted of a

crime and without becoming a teenaged pair. right now the average nationwide is about 48% of reaching that benchmark. -- teenage parent. that varies greatly from city to city. the good news is that we know that if you reach these benchmarks, you are likely to do well. even though there is great variation in who is reaching the benchmarks by family income, the good news is that if you manage to reach all these benchmarks you have just as good a chance of being middle class by middle age as people are born to better off families. the problem is too few are doing that. so just two quick things. one is that we know that success builds upon the success. so for instance, school readiness, if you're ready for school come you're much more likely to be successful in middle childhood and so on and so forth. and, in fact, you can see in this chart here that if you're ready for school, you have a 76% chance of doing well in middle

childhood. whereas if you're off-track when starting school, that chance is almost half as much, 41%. so why am i here talking to you about the? we think that you can use these benchmarks in your cities in a couple of different ways. first of all we think you can use it to set goals. where are you in terms of measuring opportunity in your city and where do you want to be? can you use this to institutionalize a framework of opportunity, a way of thinking about it that holds people to account annually in terms of reporting on progress against these goals? third, i think that this framework is useful in evaluating policies and programs. not only do your policies and programs that have good evidence of effectiveness but you also won't policies and programs that are going to impact of these indicators that are going to help opportunities in your cities. finally, i just want to reinforce the notion that we

heard today already which is that multiple interventions at multiple life stages are going to be the way to move the needle. there's not going to be one silver bullet that solves this problem once and for all. we have done some simulations with our model where we find that intervening once as we heard from various preschool evaluations may be a little bit disappointed. may have a that effects, may not do all we want to do that intervening again and again programs for building parenting skills, programs for high quality preschool as well as some school reform programs over and over again what we see is that it costs about $25,000 per student did you end up with $130,000 benefit in lifetime income. so that's just a little bit of a taste of what we're working on but i'm happy to talk more with you in the future about this and how we can build it into your cities. thanks so much. >> thanks, kerry. [applause]

>> i'm going to open up for any questions. one thing to think about our next steps particularly with kerry's presentation, we've got multiple agencies providing different programs. you heard secretary donovan, how do we when we interface with the federal government, looking us in these benchmarks, how do we best sort of make sure that whatever resources are coming in are addressing the needs in our cities. i will stop there. yes. >> i'm from baton rouge. our key question has been a governor that basically over 10 years ago sent out a mandate that they would be preachy education for all children in louisiana. we're not even at the 50% mark right now. and then you have like the local school system that has its own jurisdiction. they set up their rules and then the things that she was talking

about absolute fall into that pattern. so how do you an end to to to try to get out of the quagmire we find ourselves in now? >> that's a great question. i don't know if kerry wants to enter. i can take from our standpoint i think from a mayor's standpoint my suggestion would be as we all know, people are looking to mayors and cities right now as engines for innovation. i think that's becoming more and more apparent. i think the federal government is noticing. i think certainly certain state jurisdictions are representing that. i think within this committee we can begin as we look at these benchmarks you may be model some of these in our own cities. and go to state and federal jurisdictions to say, here are the benchmarks we want to set. here's how we are trying to get there. how can you help us get there versus how can the state help us

set this. so i think we have an opportunity i think to set the frame. if that makes sense. >> you have three separate bodies. the city is not in charge of the school system. >> within your schools, yes. >> that creates all of the problems. >> that's a good question. some jurisdictions schools are separate from the municipal side. i know all of us are in different pockets. i think we're going to have to be creative about how we do that with their own jurisdictions. i don't know if someone wants to jump in on it but i think that's worthy of further discussion within our committee. >> that's exactly what you're talking about, whether schools are separate from municipalities but i think you can use your bully pulpit to really push innovation even on the education front. and so we have to think outside the box figure out how we can use our positions as mayors to

really drive this innovation. so even when we don't control events like i don't control any city of allentown, bill, i don't think you to either, pittsburgh, i think the only one in pennsylvania is philadelphia some input into the school district. so yes the our destinies are linked together, and if they are not in sync, it will have a detriment impact on both of our communities. but i think we can drive innovation just by the very presence of our bully pulpit as mayors. >> a lot of the signs is showing that the question is what goes on before the child enters the two of the school, what is going on in that families, that household? how is that family or that parent managing their children, their finances, their job scenario? above the background in research issuing that is what we have not

focused and been created with all the sources we are spending. so while the education system may be separated, and it is the most jurisdictions, a city can really focus in on that aspect. so i wanted to add that. in addition to working with the school department. >> i would just say on that you may want to -- business in your community can have a chiming. pre-k, the huge challenge, the lack of it, it's incredible disrupted to families who are both working and who don't have that opportunity to return back to work very often and how much longer on. i think we see that, i see with my colleagues very often. navy people fall out of a job market longer than it would have without preachy. -- pre-k. spent i have a question instead of it. we do something where we, not all education -- we know we have a lot of interest in different

athletic programs. we tie educational advancement to the grade point average to the program. wiki free tutoring. we just hired six teachers. we are hiring seven more just to provide to kids who need academic help. you can educate them be involved in education, influence that even if you're not actively involved in school system. >> i will chime in and say the idea that education isn't on in schools and it's important to the research we're doing and others are doing is showing that preschool while important is almost too late in many cases, that we need to be talking about the most important teaches that kids have which is parenting and the importance of parenting early, early early on is really setting children up in a way that may be easier to access than preschool. >> i just want them what you're talking about, what we did in allentown is we have committee schools so we partners, one of

the things we did was we pushed some of the private sector to funding support mechanisms within those specific urban schools to really push some innovation. as mayors we can do a lot. you don't control the system but you can do a lot to influence. >> that's not what a good but that's not what's happening in baton rouge. again, you have a governor that refused after mandating that every child gets a preschool education that has never funded preschool. you are now left to depend upon head start, and head start has a preschool component and a regular component, but they have a waiting list that is unbelievable. so there's no bully pulpit here because the school board would tell you to go to hell if you try to intervene in what they deem as their business. and as far as the education

piece, you know, again and going to go back to the point you made, what is happening in the home, and it is going to give you one example. young lady, 14 years old, comes home. her mom works, single mom. her boyfriend comes in that afternoon, her mom fixes the dinner. then after dinner and she does some of her homework, she goes to sleep. after imam goes to sleep, this jackass then goes into the room of the daughter and has sex with the daughter. she gets up the next morning and tells her mom, this is what is happening. we have something wrong in our household. then imam -- the mother virtually culture of life. in many cases these kids run away from home and also skips school. and in the last part is simply

this. the stats have also shown that if a child can't read by the time he or she is four years old, more than likely they're going to be a subject of the criminal justice system. and i think everything really needs to be put on the table. this is a very comprehensive peace we have to look at because we can see the violence that is occurring among youth, and then even mothers pimping their daughters, sons, you know, having their sons go out and rob stores on their behalf. and there's a whole slew of things going on out there that's not just this easy cookie-cutter answer. >> yes, and i appreciate the. i'm going to have to wrap. i appreciate your comments very much, because again, what we have to get creative about is just that question. what is happening with that come in at home, what is happening with that parent, what is happening with the child, where and how are we setting those

households opt for success. the adults in the household as well as the children. and that's what this report speaks to. there are some great programs and ideas out there that are happening now on a smaller scale, we'll try to scale it up. i'm going to make sure that we have access to those as part of what i want to do in this committee. so that's great. so i'm going to, unfortunately, because we've been so ambitious we're going, trying to fit a lot of thinking. we're going to have to wrap up. what i'm going to do is make sure that the various presentations, if we can, in some way are circulated around to the committee members, and contacts for those so that you all have them and you can follow up independently. we also will be in communication with you in regard to the cdbg advocacy program. we're going to use the web, going to be doing anything in

the spring. we're going to need your help in making sure that congress and the senate hear our voice on that for the next budget, in particular using the bully pulpit of the 40 year anniversary of cdbg. so we will be asking your help. thank you very much for your participation this afternoon. look forward to working with you. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> i realize the tax reform and entitlement reform will not be easy. the politics will be hard for both sides. none of us will get 100% of what we want, but the alternative low cost us jobs, hurt our economy, visit hardships on millions of hard-working americans.

let's set part interests aside and worked to pass a budget that replaces reckless cuts with smart savings and wise investments, and let's do it without the brinksmanship that stresses consumers and scares off investors. the greatest nation on earth, the grace nation on earth cannot keep conducting its business by drifting from one manufactured crisis to the next. [applause] we can't do it. >> let's agree, let's agree right here right now to keep the people's government open and pay our bills on time and always uphold the full faith and credit of the united states of america. spent watch president obama deliver this year's address. our preview program starts live tonight at eight eastern with the president at nine followed by the response from republican

conference chair, and jewelry action by phone, facebook and twitter. the state of the union tonight live on c-span, c-span radio and c-span.org. >> now, a form on nato and u.s. foreign policy with comments from two members of the senate foreign relations committee. republican john mccain from arizona and connecticut democrat christopher murphy. from the cis -- csis, this is a less than an hour. >> with my colleague who runs the program at csis. was in about half an hour, so speaking with sinners and then we'll open it up for some questions and answers. let me begin with a very open ended question to both of you and made will start on that. nato is approaching yet another summit that we're at a

crossroads as we always say, but this time we certainly have one in terms of the afghanistan mission. there are significant concerns about where nato is going in terms of funding. the u.s. is rebalancing to the pacific. with all of these different factors at play, what are you seeing that gives you the greatest hope and the greatest concern with regard to realignment? >> well, i'm trying to think. but i think csis and john hamre who've i've had admiration for and appreciation for for many years, had humble beginnings on a senate staff. unfortunately, has forgotten that unpleasant extremes. has gone on doing great things as csis has and i'm very happy to be here. i think probably the greatest hope is the fact that it remains

a viable, ever increasing. i think we have reasonable candidates for growth of nato. i think it remains stability in the world. and i think that despite our complaints that we have that are justified, about the amount of fundingcome and i'm sure we may talk about that in the future, there's only two countries, poland and norway, that have increases in spending. it's still remains one of the most remarkable and enduring phenomenon of the 20th and now 21st century. and people all over the world look to nato as both a model and an inspiration. in any other alliances i think

it would be based on that model. my greatest concern, go back to spending. we also go back i think to reluctance on the part of nato, which is reflection of the countries that they represent, of being involved anywhere to do anything. i appreciate what happened in libya, and i think it was quite impressive that we were able to take out moammar gadhafi without committing troops on the ground. but what i see what's happening in syria and i see ranging from mali to a number of other countries throughout the middle east, and we see, frankly, our secretary-general seems to be compelled every morning to get up and tell the world that under no circumstances will nato be involved in anything.

i don't know where he got that disease. and it does worry me about the viability of nato in whether they will ever again intervene. example, i'm not saying that nato should intervene in syria. there's 8000 people who were ethnically cleansed and that move the president of the united states and nato to intervene there. i think in retrospect, all of us, by the way it was a hell of a debate in the senate come in retrospect we are all glad you did it. the last few days, 11,000 people have been documented to be tortured, murdered, starved to death, and there hasn't even been a comment much less any concern on the part of our european friends and nato partners. that's very disturbing to me. >> well, thank you to john and csis are having as well. is really an honor to be here

with senator mccain in my new role as chairman of the subcommittee on foreign relations. i'm learning a lot from john and others. i won't endeavor to recite again what i think senator mccain has laid out as the successes here. this is the model for common defense. it's not a coincidence that there's still a long line of nations seeking to join nato, because it still offers tremendous benefits. i think the greatest overused word in washington and diplomatic circles is pivot these days. still, when there is a trouble anywhere around the world, the first place the united states turns is to our nato allies, and they are the first to respond. i would add a couple additional concerns to those that have been raised by senator mccain. clearly funding is at the top of the list, as is the willingness

of european nations, given tight budget, to step up to the plate, make the resources available. but i will add two new ones, which is first the issue of integrating our counterterrorism work into the mission of nato. now, we've seen obviously a major dustup over the revelation regarding u.s. surveillance techniques, but it is frankly i think forced us to toggle bit about what our true counterterrorism partnership is going to be, and whether it's going to simply be individual bilateral basis, whether it's going to go to easy you are weather can be a more central organizing premise of nato going forward which also speaks to the second challenge which is as the eu stands, greater ability to speak with a common voice on issues of national security and defense. it is likely going to become even more problematic for the united states to figure out whether the proper venue for an

individual conversation about the future of national security iis better house and nato are better housed in the eu. so the ability of this triumvirate to figure out a new team in the kitchen moving forward i think is one of the challenges, but, frankly, and opportunity as well. the eu is going to bring capabilities to unite -- that we are some good talking to nato, or through nato. >> can i just make a comment? i admire senator murphy a lot, and he and i shared a memorable experience not long ago when went to ukraine and were present and watched a couple, 300,000 people demonstrating for a country that is free of russian influence and can be part of the european community.

i don't know what's going to happen there, and things are very tenuous, but it was a remarkable experience for us to be able to see that incredible outpouring of people in whether that is like this today. >> and notwithstanding the somewhat tortured history of the ukraine with nato and eu, the desire of the ukrainian people to have a european facing future is a manifestation of the success of both the eu and of nato. so you want to talk about the success that nato has delivered, it is present on the streets of kiev and throughout the ukraine today spend i promise you it is not about joining the eu. it was about being a european nation, whether it be the music, the culture, the economy, whether it be getting rid of corruption. it's because they are making that desire manifested in a way

that sacrificed already a rather large amount. >> you both take me beautifully into the next question, which is going to be ukraine. senator murphy, when you both were there in december speaking to the protesters you said to the ukrainians protesters, you are making history. if you are successful the united states will stand with you every step of the way. how does the u.s. tangible support ukraine during these difficult days? i would love your reflections on that and what we've been witnessing over the last 28, 48 hours. the second part of my question to you both, senator mccain, you mentioned the growth of nato. secretary clinton said in chicago in 2012 that chicago would be the last summit osha's not an enlargement some of. there is real concern that the summit in wales will not address enlargement. what does nato signal to

georgia, to ukraine come to those countries that do want to come into nato but yet nato politically is exhausted and may not see where enlargement fits into the picture? i would welcome your reflections on both the ukraine and enlargement. >> i will take the first step onto big topics, but i've had a fairly short diplomatic history, but i have never seen anything like what i saw that afternoon. we had the chance after speaking to about have them into 1 million people and had a meeting with a small group of some of the young leaders of the movement and cindy mccain said it was really remarkable because as much as there's a giant portrait of least we were there of -- this is a large and our political gathering, a group of largely young people to try to represent a cross-section of ukrainians who just want control of their government, a feeling that there will is expressed in

the halls of leadership, that there's clean government that it isn't just a means to enrich political leaders and the friends and cronies. it was a remarkable place to be. the question you asked is what does the u.s. do. i think we have to admit that there are limited tools at the united states has and there are some expectations that the united states is going to deliver the salvation for the ukrainian people. that may be too high a bar but there are definite things we can do. we can speak with a clear voice and i think we've done this in this situation. perhaps better than in others. assistant secretary was on the ground as soon as it was probably possible to do so. cindy mccain and i were there to deliver a bipartisan message. we passed the resolution in the senate expressing our sentiments to stand with the ukrainian people. we have begun to use some fairly series diplomatic tools like visa restrictions that may send an even clear message to the

regime. that unanimity of sentiment coming from the highest ranks of the united states government has had an impact on the situation on the ground. on the issue of enlargement i know that people are worried that some high expectations may not be met, and when you go through the list of countries, there's an individual reason why each country may not want to be where they want it to be a year or two ago, whether it be the nammain issue in macedonia or te continued security concerns on the borders of georgia, but we should continue to keep our eye on the prize. because if you have a series of summits that don't add to the membership and it has a chilling effect on those who want to be part of nato. and, of course, this is a much bigger issue than just uniting in a common defense. this is about a signal that these nations into the world won he joined one of the most reputable, esteemed, political and military bodies that they are ready for economic prime time as well so we want to be

able to keep that light shining. >> strong statement by our secretary of state. continues to do an outstanding -- an outstanding job. it's hard for us americans to understand how important it is to these people, the backing and support of the united states of america, its government and people. we had a hearing in the foreign relations committee on ukraine. i was there with several other people who were in the resistance. one of them is disaffected. he said the hearing came up at 4 a.m. and all of us watched it. really? anyway, but the point is, it matters to them just as it mattered when ronald reagan said tear down this wall. just as it mattered when president reagan mentioned the

name and it reverberated throughout the gulags. it matters to these people that the united states of america, republican and democrat, executive and legislative branch speaks out in their behalf. one of the most moving things in my life, and i've had a long life, was when chris and i were standing there and these hundreds of thousands of people began chanting thank you, thank you, thank you. it was very moving. so we cannot underestimate the importance of the moral suasion of the united states of america and our allies. what i would like to see is the eu, they have been kind of back and forth. they have not been steadfast. it sort of backed off. i would like to see a commitment from the eu to say, look, if abmc happens, we are in. in the same way with the imf.

i don't think, frankly, we've seen as much of a commitment from that you as we might there. so i think that's very important. in nato enlargement, i have a special feeling for georgia. i have a special affection. i was there many years ago and you couldn't walk down the street without a security guard because there was so much lawlessness. it was one of the most corrupt governments in all of europe. and i watched this incredible revolution that took place, and the amazing things that have happened, including fair and free election, even if the elections were not the result i may have wanted. but the fact is they have been pretty good so far. so here we have a country that, frankly, is occupied why russia.

their occupied by russia. every once in a while the russians move the fence another 100m or two. it's clear that putin views georgia as he does ukraine, as he does love you, estonia and lithuania as part of -- and i think one of the really great signals we get sent this to move forward with the georgia membership in nato. and by the way, my friends, they have more troops in afghanistan as a percentage of net population than any other country in the alliance. and they've lost some of them. so i think that we should appreciate already the contributions they have made to nato before they even were on the path for membership. >> for the countries in eastern europe that are nato members building on those last points

from both of you, they are obviously looking for the substantiation of that u.s. signal as commitment to the transatlantic alliance, and, of course, made a signal over all of its commitments to security of eastern europe. so i'm wondering if you can each provide your thoughts in a period of, you know, challenge to the united states, with other competing priorities to include often in times like this we call for u.s. troops to come home as opposed to being deployed abroad. i wonder what your thoughts are about what the u.s. could do tangibly to signal to europe our continuing commitments on the military side? >> well, let me say that this is part of a scenario that's been going on since the early 20th century as far as the republican party is concerned. the isolation is come home,

fortress america versus the internationalist. you could go back prior to world war i, prior to world war ii, lindbergh, america firsters, after world war ii the eisenhower wing of the party, you can take it all the way up to today where we have the wing of our party would use dedicated to cutting foreign aid. we were at a town hall meeting today and i said, how many of you in this room think that 30% of our budget is foreign aid? most of them would raise their hand and think it is more. and there is, with hard economic times, there is obviously a tendency to wonder whether we are expanding their tax dollars wisely. that debate is going on in the republican party right now. and it will play out in the campaign for the nomination of our party. and so we will have to see, but i would also like to see more

presidential leadership as to our america's role in the world, and i would like to see more of us who were in republican party who are internationalists maybe do a better job of explaining that we may want to leave the middle east, but the middle east is not going to leave us. and that's what happens today in damascus matters. what happens today in mali matters. what happens today across the broad measure passionate middle east is received the rise of al qaeda and radical islam who are dedicated to our extinction. and when, if and when they obtain the capability do so, they will attack europe and the united states. so i guess what i'm saying is that we need to fight this battle and have this debate openly, honestly and respectfully, and i'm confident

we can win again. >> jon and i found all sorts of common ground recently, but they will come to no surprise to him that i can do congress as someone who ran on the premise of withdrawing from iraq. and one thing i think to be careful of is not to confuse those of us have come to congress in the last half decade on the premise of reduced roles in places like iraq and afghanistan with isolationism. in fact, native is the exact kind of multilateral partnership that many of us want to reinvest in. and i think it probably bears repeating that over and over again because we knew that the debate in congress is just about how fast we get out of afghanistan, or whether or not we commit any kind of military resources to syria, it masks the fact that there is actually more support here for the trans-atlantic military relationship than you might otherwise belief.

>> just one more to add to his point, i forgot to say that americans are disillusioned because of iraq, and they don't see the light at the end of the tunnel in afghanistan. and that has contributed enormously to this withdrawal america to answer to interrupt. >> that's right. they also, they also understands more than many people may give them credit for that the alliance is not there any longer. so they sort of wonder why do we contribute as much as we do when we have a very different threat. and so those are challenges but opportunities, because despite all the furor about the new sort of isolationist in congress, i think they're plenty of people who still want to engage in this relationship. i would just add one caution to something that is often offered as the first panacea to what may build a relationship, and that's

trade agreement. trade agreement is incredibly important to i supported and i speak as someone who hasn't voted for a lot of trade agreements in my time and i think this one is both economically justifiable but geopolitical game changer. that can't answer the questions going forward about the future of our political military relationship. we have the questions you're going to seek to enter the course of the next 24 hours on the future of nato and the future of interoperability and a smart defense. i hope we get a trade agreement, but that can't be our only answer because that is not a substitute for the very important military partnership that still has to occur. and it can certainly answer some of the concerns that europeans have over whether we are still series about the transatlantic relationship, but it can't be the beginning of the and. >> i think we are turning now sort of south. senator mccain, you brought us toward libya and mali. on friday morning we had the

french minister here and he gave really i think a realignment of french strategy towards us a hill. is nato southern strategy, it's time for nato to more purposely turn south. .. keep the conversation with the french defense minister. i appreciate very much what the

french are doing and they have largely succeeded so far though it is a long way from over. we have to look at africa and what is happening all across in tunisia, very good news for their progress but egypt is very depressing, and i would like to see much more nato involvement, simply french particularly in the area of training and equipment. if there's anything a lot of african nations needed is expertise on border patrol and they also need training and help in the technicalities of counterterrorism, no matter which country you look at. and i just throw in in the second battle of volusia, we

lost 96 marines and soldiers, 600 wounded, and now we see in our vehicles driving around volusia --falujah i know a lot of people who lost their numbers, hard for me to look in the eye and tell them their son's death was not in vain and it is a total failure of american policy when we withdrew completely from iraq. anybody tells you that we wanted to leave a force behind is not telling you the truth because we were over is there. we agreed to have a residual force remain behind. iraq is now an abject failure and is spilling over into syria and it has become a haven for al qaeda and it is an abject failure of american foreign

policy and i am not sure that i can look the parents of those 4,000 brave americans who gave their lives and tell them it was worth it because in the words of david petraeus we won the war, we lost the peace. >> one of the things john said earlier, if we ignore regional conflicts, ignore increasingly ungovernable territories, we and the europeans do that at our peril and africa is the best and closest for the europeans which i am saying about training is the most important thing, the smallest investment with the biggest return because it is one thing to make a small scale temporary investment, trying to quell local disturbance and quite another to commit yourself to a larger scale endeavour. africa is going to be the place

where nato and you are going to have to figure out who leads and the future of their interoperable the because reports coming out we may be seeing the potential larger e.u. force moving forward that could pay dividendss but it will confuse of full bid of the question of leadership as to whether nato or the e.u. is going to be playing the leading role in europe's faith and the transatlantic's faith in africa. >> i want to conclude our portion before we go to the audience with the question about the state of the union address which is tomorrow night. i am wondering from each of the beginning with senator murphy what you would most want to hear in the state of the union with regard to the nato alliance or even specifically to the nato mission in afghanistan. >> it is important to note as we think about the signals we can

send that are more than symbolic. the president is going to be in europe and brussels, that will be important and we hope there are some announcements that can come out of that so i would hope you would reference that trip and give a little bit of context in the state of the union speech. i am someone who came out very early on in the house of representatives to say we should expedite our troop withdrawal from afghanistan but i do see the merit in continuing to allow training mission and counterterrorism mission, the suggestion that that has to be a minimum of 10,000 troops as we heard in the last couple days will be a hard sell to a lot of americans who i don't think believe withdrawal meant 10,000 troops being left behind but a lot of fuss entertain that

conversation about whether we can sell to our constituents there is a reason to have in the medium term some continued mission there. i will say -- you saw this absolute outpouring over syria, to me i'd describe it as the supermarket moment when your constituents are so angry about something that they shout out what they believe across the supermarket to you because they are that passionate. only happened twice, health care and syria in the time i have been in congress but it does speak to the fact that if we are going to have a sizable force on the ground in afghanistan the president, either tomorrow night or in some follow-on speech or public relations effort is going to have to give a really good reason for the american public why that is absolutely necessary. >> i agree very much with what chris had to say.

i would like to hear the president emphasized trade agreements both in both sides of the world's. i think is very important. it is kind of sad the we have really not made much progress and this is one of those issues where the president speaking forcefully may be able to overcome the parochial interests of both republican and democrat base but i also like to hear the president talk about his vision for america's role in the world. i would like to hear him talk about the we don't intend to send americans in harm's way, we know the american people are weary and we know the sacrifice, but there are great dangers in the world. there are great threats to everything we stand for and believe in and these threats have to be made -- met collectively, unfortunately sometimes painfully. it doesn't mean come as i say,

arming or sending troops on the ground because americans as chris said on not ready to do that. there are so many ways we can be involved and engaged and we should exercise every one of those options, if all of north africa goes and it won't, but if this slaughter drags on in syria and syria/iraq area becomes as it is a base for al qaeda, if egypt becomes -- i predict right now it will become a base, insurgency, you can't alienate 30% of the population the way they have vance not expect more bombs to go off as went off the other day, we can exercise a lot of leadership, and frankly when we do it, nato or in conjunction

with our european friends it has all the more impact, we still stand for all those things america is all about and finally, our interests, our values, our values are our interests, and when we portray that simple slogan, we eventually pay a very heavy price. of like to hear the president talked about not only the obligation but the privilege of being still the most important nation in the world. >> let me add one thing. he will cover this but he of course has to talk about the issue of counterterrorism surveillance and has a message clearly he is going to first and foremost a letter to the american people about a new path forward but hope he spends a few moments delivering a message to the european partners.

some of us would see it go a little bit further but if we don't get this right, figure out the future of counterterrorism and surveillance activities between the united states and european allies, all our other defense cooperations rendered virtually meaningless. what is important is if he delivers that message we deserve to expect honest responses. i don't think we have gotten that in every case. as we know in this room lot more cooperation happening than european partners left on. if we are willing to come to the table and say we give europeans new rights when looking at political espionage, partners to also admit strong counter terrorism properly monitored surveillance programs, and their constituents's interests and citizens interests in our citizens' interests as well.

>> we will never listen in on angela merkel's phone ever again. >> absolutely. i hope for a good warm-up act because the tough questions are about to come. we are ready to turn to our audience. we have 15 minutes for questions, we have microphones. i ask that you wait for the microphone to come, identify yourself, no comments. let's go to questions so we can get some good answers. before we begin we would like to turn to deputy supreme allied commanders transformation, say just a few words and bring the microphone out there. thank you. >> supreme commander of the mission. much stronger. two reasons, first and foremost,

and in many places, and strong political will, and transformation, individual presidency and in the u.s.. and the forum recognized tomorrow in terms of a forum to do that and a new perspective, in the future summit. and how you learned this forum, with contribution. and close to nato.

the role of nato, for 65 years, successful and our narrative is not as good as nato was in 65 years. nato is about consensus. would use a today nato is consensus? >> that nato is -- >> consensus. >> it is not an issue of contention. the worry is an issue that is vanishing from conversation? and elementary education of new members of congress as to the

importance, and anxiety over the fact the united states is contributing in the range of 75% of overall costs and anxiety over the issues, counterterrorism. and for members of congress that have come here in recent years there is basic instruction to the importance of this alliance. >> the only concern i think is with sequestration and continued reductions across the board. there's a disproportionate share because when they did sequestration they exempted a lot of other branches of government and it is going to put a strain on our ability to bear as much of the burden as we do financially.

i think the libyan experience was instructive in many ways. it showed that there is a lot of good capabilities that nato had but also showed that nato was lacking in a whole lot of areas including weapons, refueling capability, reconnaissance capabilities, a lot of various that were revealed as being sorely lacking even in a relatively short conflict as libya. we ought to take a lesson from that. there is goodwill towards nato but we do need to maybe take some of our newer colleagues traveling that haven't had much experience because there is nothing like being there to focus and look forward to coming

to brussels and visiting with a lot of our allies. >> i explain it this way. if you have been in congress in the last ten years most of congress has been there for six years, this has been a time of enormous economic strain so your constituents force you to spend the vast majority thinking about domestic subjects, a time of two war is committing tens of thousands of american soldiers and so the portion of your brain they you can reserve for foreign affairs is bent on afghanistan and iraq and by the way you have to spend a little time thinking about the middle class as well. just hasn't left the lot of room, a time of great domestic economic turmoil to think of the trans-atlantic relationship so here's the opportunity, the opportunity that the economy is getting better slowly, both wars are over or winding down, trade agreement is forcing people to think about the importance of

the relationship as it has to do with our economic security movement moving forward and as much as we can regret that there hasn't been a lot of focus this is a moment at which the oxygen each member of congress has is available in a larger way for this conversation. >> thank you. let's take three questions. we will have won their. microphone is coming your way and we will bundle them, take the first one and move around. >> thank you very much for all of your leadership on foreign policy. in a recent op-ed for the hell i argued the role of congress in the name dispute between macedonia and kathless hicks -- and greece, encouraging both greek and estonian prime ministers to meet to discuss their differences to resolve them in order to give macedonian -- what do you suggest and can you make some encouragements to

both sides to resolve their differences? >> wonderful. we have a question right here, thank you. >> thank you, senators. jamaica great bipartisan panel and i appreciate your time with us. i work for the sprints committee on national legislation and i prepared this question earlier. air force chief of staff general maurice schwartz stated without financial by ins from nato money for the nuclear integration with the tactical nuclear bomb should probably realign other priorities and their recent on the best that cut funds for an f 35 nuclear capability and since the u.s. is moving away from an f 35 nuclear role considering european fighter jets capable of deploying will be retired and the f 35 might not be able to carry the be 61 our nato partners won't be able to

deliver is that bomb in the future and carry out their nuclear mission. its share nato allies as general schwarzkopf about financially contribute to modernizing the be 61 or should the u.s. remove the peace 61 from europe. >> one question over there. >> a quick question to both gentlemen. give your verdict of the first five years of the european position -- what you expect for -- what you hope in putting out that position because it was particularly glorious. >> name recognition issue, nuclear capability and your thoughts on e.u. representatives for foreign affairs. take a step first.

>> i will claim a lack of education on the middle of these topics except to say as that general issue, the future of expense allocation we are going to ask our european partners to do more. six part of the most damaging elements of sequestrations of the department of defense will be able to manage these cuts but no doubt if we want to commit ourselves to the projects that have been planned weekend see 40% reductions in european defense budgets as we have seen. we can't allow for this essentially at the within the european populist to believe counterterrorism is just something the united states worries about so this has got to change. and a couple big notches on her belt so far. the agreement in the balkans is something she invested an enormous amount of time in, it is not the end solution, it is

the beginning of a solution. and it played out as expected and her great long work on trying to keep an open line of communication with iran will hopefully get us to a place in which we have a diplomatic solution and to your question on macedonia how to get to a point in which you have an enlargement and that is the quickest way to get to the enlargement some because it is likely that is the only thing standing in the way or the only important thing standing in the way of macedonia joining nato or getting on a path way to joining and so i take your comment seriously and we will examine this weekend's summit and some other venues for a way that we can try to get two sides to talk a little bit more. >> you want to try? any comments on that?

>> i do not share my friend's opinion of kathryn afton. on the case of macedonia and even when we are briefed time after time, how important a name is to our greek friends, so either we continue to hope that this will be resolved but to have the name macedonia be of such offense to our friends in greece is something i fail to comprehend. i will admit maybe i am not that bright. as far as the f 35 is concerned it has been one of the great scandals of recent acquisition history. cost overrun after cost overruns after cost overrun, trillion dollar weapons system finally getting operational, but still experiencing great difficulties. if there is ever an argument for

defense acquisition, if there is ever an argument that this is completely unacceptable to the american taxpayer and makes it difficult for me and people like me who are strong advocates of defense spending, when you waste tens of billions of dollars on a weapons system that still is not proven. we have to have -- and god knows we have tried, we passed a bill a few years ago that was not only for acquisition in the pentagon, now we have gerald ford, now over $2 billion original cost. how do i go back to arizona and tells them, what could they do with $2 billion? i don't know whether what we are

going to do about another specific issue, we may not have enough after the 5s to do it because we still haven't proven their systems and that is a source of embarrassment for me to is a strong defense advocate. >> i think we have time for one more question. right here, thank you. >> this has been a great event, thank you all. the naval postgraduate school, this is for john mccain. what structural changes would we have to make in our civil service system to work for peace overseas, and they can't build the peace because they need additional skills. how would you suggest we alter the kind of personnel that would be available for that? >> that is an excellent

question. as far as our state department is concerned, i have been very impressed with the men and women who come in to the state department and served around the world. chris wood agree countries that i visit with rare exception i am very impressed particular early with the young men and women who are serving in the state department. i won't say that about every ambassador who is a large contributor to the campaign but that is bipartisan disease that these things happen. we have to make it more attractive in that i meet a lot of young people who work in the pentagon and they feel frustrated because they don't see a result of the hard work they put in. we may have to look at a better

reward system rather than longevity in many of these areas particularly in the defense department in my view and finally i would like to be able to tap into these brilliant, incredible geniuses that reside in california and attract some of them. if we had done that in the case of obamacare, might not have had the difficulties in the rollout and i have talked to some of them who have said the same thing so maybe some of this work we need to contract out but with what has happened with security and forces in afghanistan and iraq contracting out has gotten a bad name. contracting out to do other tasks might be something we should explore. >> i will use this as an opportunity to register one of my pet peeves.

i think we have seen a large scale outsourcing to the department of defense to our coverage agencies, and it is difficult to integrate the state department in to dangerous places like iraq and afghanistan at a time when regions are unstable, but it is difficult to try to build up that kind of diplomatic capacity within the dod in a short time and i would argue is that we have handed over far too much military and diplomatic authority to our covert agencies making it very difficult for those of us who sit on important committees like foreign relations but not on intelligence to figure out places like pakistan and syria. if we want to have a conversation about putting power back into diplomacy we have to admit the we have seen a large scale shift in diplomatic activity away from the agency that knows how to do it best.

>> i agree, a good example of that, stovepipeing, is that we hear from ed snowden, revelations -- we are never briefed on ed snowden's revelations, and all those that may be confined to the intelligence committee it hampers our works, the foreign relations committee and the armed services committee. so i think that is one of the problems. i am not a fan of a lot of the contract think as far as security is concerned. >> this has been an incredible event for many reasons but wide-ranging and notable for everyone in the room and those watching from beyond the rim how

incredibly wonderful the bipartisan spirit find by bipartisanship and we often feel lonely. >> if i looked like senator murphy i would be president of the united states. [applause] >> thank you to senator murphy and senator john mccain. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> the senate continuing work on a bill that makes changes to a 2012 federal flood insurance law, the chamber will recess at 12:30 until 2:15 eastern time says senators can attend a weekly party lunches. they will gather in the chamber

before proceeding to the house for president obama's state of the union address. watch live coverage on c-span beginning at 8:00 eastern. live coverage on the senate floor on c-span2. the chaplain: let us pray. eternal god, you are always right, just and fair. we sing of your steadfast love and proclaim your faithfulness to all generations. today, inspire our lawmakers to walk in the light of your countenance. abide with them so that they will not be brought to grief, but will avoid the pitfalls that lead to ruin.