yesterday i received a letter that is literally signed by 360 different organizations from -- i got to imagine every member's home state that asks us to include this epa regulatory effect relief act of 2011 as part of the conference agreement. what we've got now is, as some before me have said is deceptive. the thing that struck me when i got here is that when we were looking for savings in the house and the senate does it and both parties do it, but we're looking for savings eight, ten years down the road. and we count that as saving money. well, the truth is, we don't know what's going to happen eight years down the road. in fact, the congress eight years from now will decide what's spent eight years down the road. we don't have a clue what's going to happen eight or ten years down the road. so to go eight or ten years down the road and supposedly identify money that is or is not going to be spent is a joke. it's a joke.

it is actually deception. and we need to stop doing it. and i applaud all the folks on this stage. i applaud representative roby for introducing this bill. and i know we've got a lot of work to do to get this passed. i think it's high time that we do it. and as some of my colleagues have said, a good start would be for harry reid to pass a budget. thank you all. >> corey gardner. thank you, martha, senator sessions, for convening this today and to talk about the honest budget act. i'm corey gardner from colorado's 4th congressional district. growing up in a state, we sell farm equipment there. and under the way congress works, if we were to buy a piece of farm equipment today and then decide we were going to pay for it next year, under congress' rules, we'd be saving money this year and could get to buy

another one without paying for it. if we did that in our personal lives if we did that in our businesses, we'd be broke and we'd be in jail. somehow congress, that's business as usual. is time we end the charade and start being honest to the town meetings now in colorado. normally i don't hear from somebody stand up, what about this rescission? what about this budget authority? what about this budget outlay?

what about this chimp or that chimp. you know what they say? washington is spending more money than you have. you are spending money you don't have and the people who are going to pay for it are our children and grandchildren. this -- the honest budget act brings reality to congress. the reality that we are broke and we can't fool the american people because they are on to washington. and it's time that this place live up and live under the same rules that every man and woman in this country has to live under. making their ends meet, meeting their obligations and being honest about money that we don't have.

loss of work days and their number has consistent ln by. they're not looking back. they're looking forward. i remember the debate on acid rain and how many jobs it's going to cost. it didn't. it kept people healthy. 40 to 1. i'd like to have a lot of programs that give us a 40-1 return. $40 benefit for every $1 we spend. that's what the scientific community is telling us. i don't think we have to get into much more of the substance here. it shouldn't be in this legislation. and i hope it never -- it will be no pass legislation that blocks this from occurring. >> mr. chairman, i think the honest point is that these rules do create jobs and they also take away jobs. it's both. certainly it's a very tough role. it's going to create a lot of new jobs and new technologies. it's also going to hurt other companies.

there's no question about it. and so it's really up to us to try to think through all of this, see what's really going on. in my judgment, the new rules of epa has promulgated, make a lot more sense than the first rules. the new rules are not nearly as burdensome. the rules were promulgated in 2011. it would cost, i think, annual basis $2.9 billion. whereas the other rules, the subsequent rules, 2012 at the agencies is considering is about half of that. that's about $1.4 billion. and in the state of montana, there are several forest products plants, you know, plywood plants and particle board plants.

they said it would be more than the annual payroll. that is a capital cost and maintenance cost. it is more than the annual payroll and capitol cost would be extremely difficult to deal with. now, they're not wild about the second set of rules. they can live with them. it's looking at the facts and because epa is going to promulgate this new rule i think in may of this year, it looks like it's going to be what i just outlined. that may be the discretion, it is the better part here.

we do want to tighten up standards. one thing that struck me a little bit, under the law, y'all know this, epa is required every year to come up with the top 12% technologies across the country in this certain category. and pretty soon it's pretty hard to keep coming up with the top 12%. every year the -- pretty soon you get to zero. it's very interesting law that we wrote back then. but that's what the law is. my sense is that it is personal based upon my experience in my state and a bit with the epa over the years that this new proposed rule is going to go probably the fact on which economists this year i think it's may is the better of many

choices. and if that's the case, i just don't know why we need to have a provision in this bill which changes that. and when basically we're here to deal with the payroll tax issue and not take on something that maybe it can be handled in other venues more appropriately. >> i think, senator, i think one of the republican senators might have something to say -- >> if they stop following the 12% year after year -- the costs continue and the costs get more and more and the benefits become less and theoretical. which is why i think this needs to be in here because the costs continue to be real and the benefits get less and less. >> mr. levin. >> we have a pretty tight regimented program here. >> we can do anothernd

go to mr. levin and then come back. >> i leave my comments to the third round. i don't know if -- all right, so the two of you will split the second round. i don't know about you, mr. van holland. >> and chairman -- is this on? there we go. i think it's on. chairman, to me i'm going to keep this drum beat going. we've got work to do and we're on the clock. today's the second of february, we have 27 days before our authority expires to extend the pay roll tax cut for 160 million working, tax paying americans, to extend the insurance benefits for up to 5 million americans who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own and to make sure that some 48 million seniors in our country continue to have access to the doctors they've come to count on under medicare.

but the little secret that all 20 of us know in this room that most americans don't know is that we really don't have 27 days. in the house we have no more than 13 legislative days left before the end of this month. and so at least on the house side and i suspect the senate is fairly similar in terms of the number of voting legislative working days that you will have, we're down to about 13 days of actual work to be done before the clock runs out, not on us because i dare say the 20 of us aren't going to feel the effects of failure but the 160 million working tax paying americans who won't get the tax -- payroll tax cut extension, the almost five million americans who are desperately looking for work, lost their jobs through no fault of their own and 48 million seniors, who expect to be able to go to their doctor. as i said at the very beginning, there are some areas where i think we have found the sweet spot.

those three items that we've mentioned, there seems to be clear agreement that we should extend those. there are some areas where there is clear controversy. we touched on some of those yesterday with regard to these changes to the unemployment insurance programs with the short time we have when some of these ideas have been out there for quite some time. we should do those that are common sense, the improvements that we can all agree on. but we should not let controversial items put at risk the lifeline that 160 million working families are counting on, the lifeline that desperate -- some 5 million desperate americans are counting on so they can continue to make the search for a job and 48 million seniors who are wondering what the heck did i do to be caught in a situation where i may not be able to go to my doctor anymore. so i would really encourage us with not 27 but maybe no more than 13 legislative days left before the clock runs out on us that we focus on the sweet spot and that's getting the work done

that most americans expect of us. and i know that there are issues both ways and it is a bipartisan issue in some respects. but i don't think we're going to resolve it easily, the 20 of us, because this has been going on for quite some time. i would urge us to refocus on the three things that americans expect us to get done. i really urge that movement. >> mr. brady. >> we'll go to the third round. >> thank you. let me talk about some of those extraneous workers. evaville texas, 1,483

population, i checked this morning in the forest of southeast texas. major employer is a paper mill hires 700 workers, union workers with the steel workers. they produce paper products. this morning in you stop by starbucks or put a juice box in your kids' lunch, you're probably familiar with what they produce. they compete internationally, very tight margins. for many years they would barely breakin. they have a plant manager jim, they've worked with the union, they've streamlined themselves, they're as productive as anywhere in the country and now they are profitable. in fact, not only are they profitable but almost half of everything they produce they are

competing and selling and winning in china. one out of every two union workers at that mill is competing and winning in china. one of the ways it became competitive is became self-efficient. they used renewable energy, biomass, wood chips, debris from the forest floor, which keeps it healthy and byproducts of what they produce. they're completely self-sufficient. american factories using union workers, competing and winning in china. but this rule so poorly written and rushed through jeopardizes that plant and these jobs for two reasons. one, it puts it in a timetable an expense they can't afford, about $20 million to update and upgrade these two boilers with their lines. secondly, the regulation is so poorly written that those wood chips and forest residue is considered to be incinerator waste, not biofuel, not fuels and renewable fuels. so that waste will either go to

a land fill or it will stay on the forest floor where it either becomes pro sides either risk of fire or more disease. it makes no sense to move forward with this rule. the house provision is pretty common sense. it says, look, let's take a little more time to get the rule right and then let's give just a little more time for plants like this to upgrade. and in this case talking with the plan manager, it allows them to update the first one, evaluate the results and do a partial upgrade. they'll hit the standard but they'll do it without becoming uncompetitive in this global marketplace. and they'll be able to keep using renewable energy. the point of that is these workers aren't extraneous to this discussion. they're concerned about the payroll tax because they want to have a payroll. they want to be on it. they don't want to be in the unemployment line. they want to stay competitive world wide. and my thought is we've had so many speeches in congress and the state of the union

committing to american manufacturing here at home. well, here we have a common sense opportunity to actually protect those types of jobs and about 20,000 of those american pulp and paper manufacturing jobs here in the united states with just a thoughtful pause get the regulation right, give those company just an inch more time to do this. i think this is a critical part of this provision. yield back. >> senator baucus. >> i yield to senator reed for two minutes. >> mr. chairman, one of the issues here i think is what rule are we talking about, the original rule that was proposed or the rule that has now been revised extensively with collaboration from industry and is much more focused. as the subcommittee chairman for the appropriations committee that responds to the epa, i had the occasion to listen to lots of proposals with respect to epa jurisdictions the last year.

with respect to issue we concluded, these are the both republicans and democrats, house and senate, the conferees are encouraged by the outcomes of epa's reconsideration of the boiler mack rule and offer no redirection regarding boiler mack standards. it includes additional flexibility with respect to biocourse and the last time we bicamerally took up the issue, epa was making progress. i think we should let them continue to make that progress and deploy a rule that's effective. with that i would yield my time back. >> i yield. we have about three minutes left. i'll give it to senator cardin. >> i just want to reinforce what senator reed said and congressman brady's point.

he was referring again to the original rule. we were in agreement that we wanted more time to get that rule right. well, we got the time in the consultation with the industry and the biomass issue that congressman brady said has been corrected in the revised rule. >> i think we have is a little time left. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i've gone through the original rules, i've gone through the rules from december and i know what geena mccarthy had to say who works at epa. the rules were poorly written and rushed through. the new december epa rules are more complex, they've added more categories and when you break through category by category, the costs overall when you total up the whole thing actually goes up.

there are about 1.5 million boilers in the united states, i think about 14% of them are going to be covered by the new rules, we're talking 200,000 boilers. the costs are going up. and the job losses are the biggest thing that i continue to look for and look at the letters that all the members of congress got with lists of all the companies that are talking about how they're going to either lose jobs, have to close down, just like the story that we heard about the small company in the small town in mr. brady's district. this is the real issue here. if we're talking about extending unemployment insurance for hard working americans who have lost their jobs to add to that list is going to make our job here that much more difficult, make the cost of this entire proposal much harder to deal with in the cost for american families tremendous both in terms of lost jobs as well as in lost income. thank you, mr. chairman. >> mr. levin. >> the chairman and i and you've agreed will give everybody a chance to say a few words.

we don't have this formal allocation of time. >> we have about seven minutes left on the clock on this issue. so it's your time. >> so we'll be brief. there are a few of us who wanted to speak. you want to go first, miss schwartz? allison, you want to go and then henry. >> hearing this conversation, i come into this debate as someone who believes very strongly that we can have a strong economy and strong environmental protections. i don't think it's either or. there are jobs created to repair these boilers and to bring them up to grade and those are real jobs as well. there have been modifications made by the epa, the rules have been responsive, they've tried to work to compliance costs and to increase flexibility and responsive to some of the concerns that were raised. but i also think that at this particular moment in time for

this conference committee, this kind of debate should be taking place somewhere else, gone through regular orders was suggested has already been taking place in the house and some rules have changed. the senate has not had its opportunity to go through those kind of rules and they could. and, again, we are really -- should be focused right now. we should be focused on the three major issues before us. i think we've talked about that but i will just reiterate it that the payroll tax made a commitment to continue the payroll tax cut for 160 million americans. those who are -- millions of americans who are on extended unemployment who want good jobs and want to get back to work but are struggling right now are counting on us. we literally have just a week to get the work done and of course access to doctors for 40 million seniors and more coming online, it's a huge issue. it's a huge amount of work to get done, the substance and to get to pay for it.

we may choose to sad something about extenders, that's a discussion we'll have later. but right now given the response, given the opinion about whether you can have a strong economy and strong environmental protections, our history shows we can have both and we should. i think we should be leading this way and i believe we should not even be having this discussion and including the boiler mack legislation that's written in this legislation. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. i think there are still some issues outstanding, though, on this matter. one affects especially in my part of the world the northwest because we use a lot of biomass in our boilers. my understanding as of a docket from february 1st, so i think this would come after the revised rules, that the biomass materials are still not listed

as fuels. now, if you're in a plywood manufacturing plant like one i toured in medford recently, they have three boilers, they use the scraps from the pie wood in a very efficient system to help generate the power they use and they told me when i was there that because of the uncertain at the they may have to retool the boilers at the cost of a million or two apiece and they have three of them. the way they run their plant is not at the peak efficiency, which is how epn measures their emissions but they go up and down as the material goes through. so they're not convinced they could meet the current rules on the books and now with the revised rules not including biomass materials, it could mean that those could be regulated under the onerous and stigmatizing incinerator rules. so we are here about extending the unemployment benefits. the house passed a bill to do that for a year. we're here to make sure seniors can see their physician. house passed a bill to deal with that and pay for it for two

years. and the middle-class tax cut. but we're also here it figure out how to not send more manufacturing job overseas. in the last three years we've seen manufacturing employment fall to eye lowest level in the united states, and we've shed 600,000 jobs in the last three years in the manufacturing sector. by the way, a lot of the pollution we're talking about trying to reduce here comes across from countries that we're trying to compete with in the west coast, china. and that's where a lot of the airborne mercury and all comes from. we're shifting these jobs offshore, the data are pretty clear. if i were in the boiler installation business, i'd like to have the government pick me as a winner. when i was in radio broadcasting, i would have loved it if the government said hey, for everybody in business, you have to buy so many radio ads. i guess having been a small business owner for 22 years and dealt with rules and regulations from the federal government, i got to tell you, it's hard just to sign in front of those

payroll checks every month and keep the business going. i think this is an important issue, i'm glad we're discussing it here, it is controversial. we all want clean air and health bull you can't keep shifting these jobs overseas. i yield back, chairman. >> all right. we don't have a lot of time left. i'm prepared to move forward on to the next issue. our positions are pretty clear here, unless there is some objection here. >> mr. waxman wants to speak. >> why doesn't we do quick closings from the house democrats and do the senators

want to make a quick closing comment? why don't we do one last round of quick closing comments. senator baucus. >> well, i think most everything's been said. >> i would agree. >> i didn't hear uncle. i was waiting for uncle but i didn't hear uncle. >> i have nothing else to add. >> all right. >> mr. waxman, if you want to briefly and then i'll go back over to mr. upton. >> thank you, mr. chairman. members, in 1990 we passed a law saying deal with these toxic air pollutants. took 21 years for epa to come up with a rule in 2011. there was a lot of controversy about this rule and epa is hearing from the industries and members of congress are hearing from the industries. and a lot of what members are hearing about no longer valid. mr. brady talked about wood chips not being allowed to be burned. well, that's been changed. the senator baucus and senator grasso talked about rules being

changed and standard being changed. it's the first time standard for waste incinerators and boilers are being scheduled. we've never had any standard. epa wrote to the senate on january 18th that the epa can and will use legally available and longstanding tools to address compliance concerns that boilers and incinerators subject to the rules may have as a result of the court decision and they're still talking to the industry, revised won't even finalized until april or may so that the argument is that industry can't comply with these rules doesn't make sense. we don't know what the final

rules are going to be. therefore i don't think ought to take the action now to say you can't adopt rules. after 21 years we're dealing with a problem and the problem is not choosing winners and losers in the boiler manufacturers or the boiler operators, it's to protect children. children who are exposed prenatally to neurotoxin mercury and it's to protect others from toxic air pollutants. let the senate hold a hearing on it and get the final information and see if people who sign on as co-sponsors believe that the bill is necessary because i think a lot of people will say the bill is no longer necessary, and i certainly don't think we ought to adopt it in this conference. >> chairman upton. >> i just want to say a letter that we received this last week from the brotherhood of carpenters and joiners.

bottom line is that existing rules do not allow adequate time for review in compliance. not only do many of these facilities not have the capital to comply, the labor force to address this is limited. several of these serve as cornerstones of our rule communities. in a study that was released just last week prepared bit council of industrial boiler owners, they still claim that the cost is going to be over $14 billion, a little bit less with the revised rules than it was before, but still impacting as many as 228,000 jobs. this is not something we should turn our backs on. i yield back. >> thank you. now let's turn to our final topic of the day. the house provision that would extend for an additional year through 2012, 100% bonus depreciation, sometimes referred to as expensing. as my colleagues know, this is