♪

frank lautenberg who has gone to his eternal home. for simple one, we ask that he finds peace in your internal embrace. they his life be bound up in the bond of life. they his soul rest in peace and let us all say amen. i ask everyone remain standing in their seats as the family escorts the casket out of the building. the immediate family towards the capitol police will be the procession to the franc and lautenberg rail station in secaucus, new jersey. following the recession well i asked you remain in your seats until the official parties have exited according to the

directions. the senator will lie in repose on thursday on the senate floor for burial at arlington cemetery on friday morning. the memory of frank lautenberg before an internal bossing -- a blessing. amen. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] ♪

♪

>> on thursday, the casket of frank lautenberg was taken to the u.s. capitol. there he lay on reposed in the senate chamber. on friday morning, the burial ceremony was held at arlington national cemetery. he was the last world war two veteran to serve in the u.s. senate.

[taps]

[inaudible]

>> senate colleagues but came to pay their respects. hear some other remarks. >> let us pray. oh god, thank you for being here times.n good and bad we celebrate your wonderful that bring us new victories each day.

on theook at the flowers desk of our friend and brother senator frank lautenberg, we thank you for his life and his legacy. as we mourn his death, send your comfort into our hearts. , and bonnie and his family give them your piece -- peace. let our memory of this good and courageous american inspire us to transcend the barriers that and to work for the good of america. we pray in your merciful name, amen.

>> please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance. a pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic to which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> communication to the senate. of rule onevisions paragraph three i hereby appoint the honorable tim kane, a senator from virginia, to perform the duties of the chair. toi will ask the senate observe a moment of silence to honor frank lautenberg, late

senator from the state of new jersey. >> the senate will observe a moment of silence. if all could please stand. majority leader. >> i have a few matters i must take care of it. said it will resume consideration of the foreign bill.

two roll call votes to the bill. two bills for second reading. title forill read the a second time. operation and maintenance of keystone pipeline and other operations. act clarified thereby complied with an emergency order of the federal power act and so forth and for the purposes. >> i object to both proceeding with regard to both of these matters. the measures will now be placed on the calendar. >> what i learned early this morning that frank lautenberg had died, of course, i became -- barryly barry said said. i served for him for two and have decades here in the senate,

and to see the flowers on his desk, it seems the flowers have barely wilted on the desk behind me. i have a heavy heart. the senior senator from new jersey and my friend, frank lautenberg died this morning as we all know. wifeoughts are with his and children and grandchildren. you people have pinched -- few people in this institution have contributed as much as frank lautenberg. his story was what the american dream is all about. he came from a family of working-class immigrants from europe, russian poland. his parents struggled and i've heard frank talk about how they struggled. they worked so hard and moved around new jersey often.

the frank was 18, during middle of world war ii, he enlisted in the army. he served and i remember frank talking about his experiences. ace he said he was up on power pole and he could see the war going on in his site. -- sight. he talked about the many experiences he had making a better american. he was very proud of his military service. he was the last world war ii veteran having served in the senate. we do not have any world war ii veterans anymore, mr. president. his death is a great loss for this institution in many different ways.

the frank came home from war, he was very smart and was permitted to attend the prestigious columbia university. he did it on the g.i. bill like millions of others. he quickly found his own business, his own company. he did it with two boy who befriends. -- boyhood friends. adp grew into the largest company of its kind in the world. he was so very proud of that. he never hesitated to tell everybody that he became rich. he was a poor boy that became wealthy as a result of people being able to carry out their

dreams. frank wasn't content with his personal success alone. nothing made him more proud than what he did with government and when he served as the head of the jewish federation. he was very proud of that. mr. president, frank lautenberg was known for many things. before he came to the senate, he was elected in 1982, he came the congress the same year that i did. in that three decades since, he has worked on behalf of his state in the country. he retired wants. -- once. he could not stand retirement. he hated it.

he returned to the senate in 2002. he had a remarkable career. i touched upon a few things. his determination that made him successful in the private sector as well as in the senate. mr. president, motivated to his own experience, frank lautenberg, a world war ii veteran recognizing how much this meant to him and he wanted to help the veterans returning from iraq and afghanistan enjoy the same benefits that helped him become so successful. my youngest boy just hated cigarette smoke. and it really made him ill. airplanes, i remember we went

for a procedure or you can smoke everyplace. everybody sucked in that secondhand smoke. frank lautenberg took care of my boy and millions of other people that no longer have to suck in that smoke when they are on an airplane. here's the one more than anybody else who we have to thank for protecting us from deadly secondhand smoke in an air plane. because his legislation banned smoking on airplanes. he was a longtime member of the public works committee. had he not retired for the short period of time that he did, he would have been chairman because he was not there. i got the opportunity to be the chair. he focused on infrastructure,

roads and highways. but of the things he thought would make this country a much safer place was to pass a tricky limit -- a trunking -- drinking limit. a national drunk driving standard. he believed in helping the state of new jersey. that was his first priority. helpingnd priority was the country. and i'm not sure which order they came in. he was focused on the country and new jersey at the same time. womenwanted to make sure and children were protected from gun violence and because of him, we passed legislation to convict domestic abusers. just a few examples of his work in the senate that saved lives. he came out of his sick bed in a wheelchair to vote on gun

legislation. he agreed with a 90 % of the american people. people who had severe mental problems or felons should not be able to buy guns. he agreed with 90% of the american people. he came from his bed to vote with us. he was so happy to be here. he came after that just a few days ago to vote when we needed him again. he tried so hard talking that he wanted to live to be 100. a couple of years ago, i took a big delegation to china. a bipartisan group. a wonderful trip, frank lautenberg, that was his last foreign travel.

been remember, i had not to the great wall of china. it is pretty steep. there are rocks there that have been there for centuries and centuries. because frank was 88 years old, somebody grabbed his arm to help them. he pushed them away. he did not want help from anybody. he was on his own. that was the way he wanted to be. our nation owes a great gratitude for frank for his service. he is always been so kind to me. -- he has always been so kind to me. he appreciated being here. he loved being in the senate. the nation is going to miss his strength and leadership.

the other thing that probably a lot of people do not know about frank lautenberg, his sense of humor. i had him tell the story because nobody could tell the story like him. another reason is that he laughed at his own jokes. he thought they were funny. one of my favorites was about two wrestlers. he would take five minutes or so to tell the story. it was hilarious. nobody can tell it like frank. he had a sense of humor and we appreciated that. even though the united states senate, mr. president, at midnight last night had al franken, there was room for two funny people. prior to his death this frank, al franken

always made us amount and often made us laugh -- smile and often made us laugh. they were funny together and apart. it is with deep sadness that the senate family is going to say goodbye. we will do that wednesday morning. an exemplary public servant and faithful friend. >> the clerk will call the roll. >> next, a presentation of the journalism award. then a discussion of how the human race can avoid mass distinction.

with maria theresa kumar, executive director of the latino, and syndicated columnist. and the stanton center talks about the u.s. and un role in syria. live at 7:00 eastern on c-span. >> when you put on a uniform for a job that is a maintenance job, and this is true if you're building a janitor or a sanitation worker, you are consumed by the roll to the point where it is almost like you are just part of the

background. i will say like a machine. uri to be wearing this uniform. the general world gets to overlook you and it really not see you. i have called that, it is like a club in the place. those people who are fellow star trek dekes will recognize the reference. or harry potter is cloak of invisibility. frustrating and interesting privilege. when i'm with the sanitation reform, i can observe people in ways they did not realize i am observing them. sunday at 8:00 on c-span. >> >> the gerald ford foundation recognizes two journalists for their reporting on the president. this year's winners were hal bernton and john dickerson.

this is an hour. [applause] >> thank you. it is an honor to be here. many years ago dad was here to do this award. he had such a great respect and love for the members of the press and journalism and he had his ups and downs with the press, but he always respected them and counted on them as friends. he wanted that openness and transparency that was so important work in is unique time in the presidency. we have got two winners here. the judges told us we had so many great submissions for the award for the presidency and defense and he said with cannot do the luncheon without having a couple of the honorable

mentions be recognized. i want to start off with that. the honorable mention for the presidency is "politico." can you please stand? [applause] and for defense is intro tillman -- andrew tillman. [applause] it is my honor to present our first award winner, john dickerson, for the reporting on the presidency for the gerald ford award. it was a fantastic series of articles. much of it was about the temperament of what a president has to handle the problems and the pressures once he becomes elected and he spoke about

president obama. he talked about what kind of temperament would he have to handle a war and the capture and killing of osama bin laden and the economy. it made me reflect on dad and what he faced when he was president back in 1974 during vietnam and watergate area -- watergate. the economy was in tough shape. as family members, we don't think about the temperament. you think about your father and his temperament at home and how he handles family issues. i did not see anything in the article about if sasha got bad grades. i know with the dad, i know how even-tempered he was. dade was a night, mom and had a dog, one night the dog woke dad up and had to do his business outside.

he wakes a president up. he gets out of bed. he puts on his robe and slippers. he does what every father does. as he goes out to the diplomatic entrance, the secret service did not know he was leaving the white house at 2:00 a.m. in his bathrobe and slippers. he goes out and he and liberty walks the grounds they do their business -- the dog does his business. he goes back to walk into the white house and the door is locked. [laughter] that is the humanity of being president of the united states. it is not about watergate or dealing with the russians or the chinese, it is about your temperament when you have family issues like that, up. -- come up. it is an honor for us to give this award to john. i wanted to read what the

committee wrote down here. "the judging committee has elected john dickerson of "slate" for distinguished reporting. heing the campaign year, produced an exceptional series of articles on the qualities required of the modern, successful president in a postwar era and the relevance of campaigns and helping voters to decide which candidate has those abilities. experienceecades of reporting in and around the white house, dickerson uses anecdotes and stories. the series covered all aspects

of presidential leadership from inspiration and personal management to temperament and political skills. in the details how details have changed in the digital era. he also provides an evenhanded primer on how those qualities apply to the major candidates. members of the judging committee were highly impressed by his work, ambitious and sweeping and illuminated by an impressive array of examples and stories and offering real insight into the american presidency." it is my pleasure to give this award now. [applause]

>> thank you, steve and all of you at the dickerson table. thank you to the foundation. when i first came to washington, my colleague won the ford award. one of the great honors is being in the company of the journalists who won it before. awardgreat to have this because a it is a gift to model ourselves off. i will not read the 25,000 word series. whont to thank the team helped me put it. the first is the editor of "slate." he has us to take a month out of the year to write besides our daily journalism. that is a dream for any

journalist to do was in their life time. he forces us to do it once a year which is a joy. my two editors are here. michael newman helped me start this project. will dobson bristled at to the ground and made it clear -- wrestled it to the ground and made it clear. pacingd to endure me their offices. "slate" makes the common law of psychiatrist. the women in my life. my mother, the late nancy dickerson, the work that she did. she did it smarter and in high heels. my wife, ann. the editors get to go home at night but she has to deal with the low-level magnets that these kinds of series produced where you have to give monologues and talk about the

presidency. she did not lock me out. i appreciate that. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. dad had such a love affair with the newspaper business. up,member as a kid growing every morning he would start up with a stack of five newspapers. he would have the big national newspapers, the new york times india was finished with his local, hometown paper - "new york times" and would finish with his local, hometown paper. i asked him why. he said the local paper would always tell me if all those big federal programs ever made it

back to my hometown. he read like that until his dying day. he loved picking up a newspaper every morning. it is my honor now to get out to the award for distinguished reporting on national defense. in 2012, it is hal bernton. let me read what the judges wrote. "they were pleased to select hal bernton for the 26th annual gerald ford journalism award luncheon. his article on reverse diagnosis is of soldiers with posttraumatic stress disorder uncovered a multifaceted, complex issue regarding the many challenges that both medical professionals and soldiers face in dealing with the aftereffects of combat.

even though there has been a lot written about ptsd over this past several years, this series uncovered a huge hidden issue area -- issue. the-world effects on military personnel, their families, and the organizations designed to serve them and society at large. is writing approach refreshing and returns to a traditional hard-nosed writing of complex issues coupled with genuine enterprise journalism that personalize the human impact of military actions in afghanistan. the stories were broadly sourced with verified data and written with clarity. this was not just a set of stories. he places the spotlight on

local importance at mccord as -- addressing the that suchion decisions have on veterans -- have as veterans transition into retirement. tracking hidden devices showed his skill at finding a new, unique, human angle on a widely reported issue. withwar winds down millions of veterans returning from service in afghanistan and iraq, the issue of ptsd and how the army and other organizations address its role and implications will be felt for years to come. his distinguished work will help leaders and politicians better understand how complex and difficult ptsd diagnoses is the impact it exerts on the

lives of soldiers and their families. his contribution to that discussion stood out among the many excellent submissions. in the opinion of the judges, capture the essence of the award." [applause] >> this is certainly a very humbling honor. i've been helping to report on the wars in afghanistan and iraq for more than a decade. quite a bit longer than i expected when one of my editors said why don't you help cover the military here back in 2001.

i certainly realized from a lot of my reporting -- a lot of the rules of will dwarf -- wounds of war if we think we get the right care, everything will be all right. one of the inks i am learning as i go on -- things i learned as i go on, things are not all right for some folks. i wanted to note as i got this award that joel ward -- gerald t ford had a big impact on my life when i was out of college. i headed west and was in eastern washington thinking i could get a job picking fruit. jobident ford had the opportunity program. there was a sign of employment

trailer saying we need people to build trails. i took the job. i had a great time. i watch the whole ball, over the cascade. i went east, but i did not want to stay east after that. -- i watched the whole fall come over the cascade. it has been an amazing thing. i want to end by thanking my editors at my newspaper. ise a lot of newspapers, it taken a lot of hits. it remains a very strong and vibrant place to do good work. my editors supported me over and over again when i wanted to go to afghanistan or basically not necessarily stick close to home to report stories.

they really supported me. i really appreciate that area i want to say again, "the seattle times" has endured as a great newspaper. havefe and parents who been supportive of me over the years. thank you so much. [applause] >> thank you. it is now my honor to introduce congressman upton, another proud university of michigan grad. he was first elected to congress in 1987. he represent parts of my dad's district in michigan.

in 2010, congressman upton served on energy and commerce which has jurisdiction over matters concerning energy, healthcare, telecommunications, and manufacturing, and oversight and investigation. prior to his election to congress in 1987, he worked for president ronald reagan in the office of management and budget. family,ll you from our we are very grateful that in march of 2011 congressman upton sponsored a resolution that allowed a statue honoring my dad in the capitol rotunda. the resolution was cosponsored by all 14 members of the

congressional delegation and passed unanimously bipartisan support. it is my privilege to ask fred upton to say a few words about my dad's centennial year. [applause] >> thank you. southve said, i am from west michigan. if you are from michigan, raise your hand. [laughter] i do represent some of the same constituents that president ford represented when he was the republican leader in the house. i can remember a town meeting in a little tackle shop one saturday morning where i had about eight people show up. the proprietor of the shop took me inside and he had a black-

and-white picture and there was jerry ford as a congressman. he had like 80 or 100 boy scouts that had a campfire in the middle and they were circled around him as he was holding court and talking about what it was like to be in the congress. jerry ford was a boy scout. that was for sure. i was a scout, not an eagle. andou hold up your hand recite what a scout does, all of that applied to him. wonderfulto that library in grand rapids where i pass by on friday. of will see that so much their is really tied to scouting from all around the country. and you know, our country needed him right at the right time. watergate, the antiwar pickets in trouble we had and the

double-digit unemployment and inflation, interest rates -- they all were a tough time for the country. he provided the trust. he really did restore the country to where we needed to go because we were torn apart. he was the right guy at the right time. not only did he put the country ahead of his own personal politics, costing him by all estimates the 1976 presidential election, he started the healing that our country so needed. for me, i got to know him a little bit. i went to the white house the

last day he was the president in 1977. i had a number of conversations with him as a member of congress on trade, defense. back then we had cell phones that were as big as your shoe. i would pull off on the road when he would call me. we would talk about our favorite sports team whether it was skiing for the michigan wolverines. this last friday, i spent the weekend with the john dingell who will serve as the longest serving member of congress in our history. amyou know john dingell, i sure that he will be on everybody's top 10 list as one of the most -- one of the greatest members that ever served in the united states congress. friend john about his

jerry ford. he said he was the most honest, decent guy you'll ever meet. onlyought the respect not to the republican leadership in the house but to the presidency in a time where we needed it the most. when you think about it, jerry ford in a ten-month span went from a member of congress to the vice president to the oval office as president of the united states. our country certainly benefited from his unquestioned leadership. from him and his wife, betty. they were a couple because of their steady hands and faith helped to stabilize a country that was so desperately needing the skills and human touch to get out of the crisis that really threatened our 200th birthday.

stretched the fabric to know him. he and betty were public servants from start to finish, pure and simple. he left a wonderful mark on washington and the love and joy of so many people. i'm delighted to know the ford family a little bit. i will tell you, there is not a time that i stroked the capital that i do not give them a big salute. it is really a marvelous statue. if you have not been to the rotunda, to buy very much. -- thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you. moving on to our second speaker today. how many people do you know what worked for president or, nixon, -- ford, nixon, reagan, and clinton?

it is john gergen. his commentary is highly sought after. he is a professor and director for public leadership at the harvard kennedy school. starting with the news hour, he has been a regular commentator on public affairs for some 28 years. in the late 98's, he was -- in the late 1980s, he was an editor. please join me in giving a warm welcome to john gergen. [applause]

>> hello. i know where we have such a big crowd today. word got out that fred was going to bring his knees. [laughter] , but the rest of us have the pressure of each other's company. she is now of age, is and she? -- isn't she? [laughter] i also want to congratulate john for his or this year. for some of you here who are younger, jerry ford may seem like part of the distant past. how luncheon emphasizes relevant his presidency and he remains today. the nixon administration and i remember what it was like to have a war on the press. i remember the wiretaps and the

,ay so many, we should be told kitty graham was wrong. this is a conspiracy by the last -- left to bring us down. a new bob woodward. we had agonizing conversation some evenings about what was theg on, i did pillars of government seemed to be shaken. and might come down. so much of that originated in the president -- tensions of towardty and paranoia the press. one of the reasons that jerry ford was important was he called off that ward. he did have a different view about what democracy is. and understood, of course when you're in government, there are times when you're angry about the leaks. some of these endangered national security. if you look at the balance of

the need for the government to have secrecy versus the imperatives of the first amendment and having a free society, that is often struck in the wrong place. we are going through a time now in which it appears to many of us that the balance has been struck in the wrong place. we have to stay up and say, wait a minute. the press is important. we all live better off when we have a watchdog in the press. we do need watchdogs. we don't need rottweilers. it can go too far. but we need watchdogs. all of our freedoms are protected when we have that area president ford understood that. jerry as first press secretary. they had a falling out over the pardon. -- who becamend a superb press secretary. he in from television land.

the photographer from time magazine who understood the ways one ofpress and became his more trusted advisors. not only did they share a good sense of humor, but ford had a decent and strong core to him. the president valued his advice. tommie difranco is here, one of the previous winners of this can memberas -- i the exact history. we kept trying to learn. would you come out of the present nor can the administration, we would love to have you. he resisted for a long time. he has remained a pillar of the free press for a long time. president ford surrounded himself with people who came out of the press. he did not always agree with what the heck to say. sometimes, there were times when it was extremely uncomfortable. when morley safer interviewed

betty ford. in her wonderful way she said we have an 18-year-old daughter, would i be alarmed if she had an affair? no i wouldn't. president ford was sitting there watching it. this set is going to cost him 10 million votes, he said no, it will be 20 million. the most uncomfortable moments, a vigilant press is important to the success of the republic. ks it isre are leagu appropriate to go after the leakers. to think that we might criminalize reporters for asking tough questions. as we have seen this reason affidavit, that goes way beyond. ought to be balance struck. this is an important moment that we renew in the national

press club, what makes our society work. what goes into a democratic society that makes a vibrant control? -- and whole. i know what the 10 tatian is july in government. know how overwhelming that is. and sometimes go to the press on behalf of the, i was led to inside. the temptation is powerful. the fact that you know there are people out there who will hold you accountable is what ges governments to tell the truth. that is a good thing. [applause] his presidency was the shortest of the 20th century. it is true that jerry ford started out with. -- with some stumbles.

it was not prepared to be president. he wanted to be speaker of the house. when he realized he was not going to get there, he told his wife, i am going to retire. i will run again. and then lightning struck and he was pulled in. he did the best he could. there were some stumbles. if you look at the overall record and how he gathered himself together, how it began to understand the job and what he then did. he was the person who understood if you are going to be a strong and effective leader, go out and find people better than you are at what they do. you will have a much better team. if you look back at what president ford did over a very short amount of time, he hired eight at of the 11 new cabinet officers. he replaced eight cabinet a terrificd put in person. one of them is here today, carla hills. from my judgment, my perspective, the 40 cabinet one.

to be the finest cabinet we have seen in modern times. look on for pound, people like ed leyva was over at justice. i thought rumsfeld did a tour of the job at defense in those days. stated. -- jim is in that group. a very fun group of people. over time he touched a lot of things. he did help in the war. america. important for just as importantly, he pursued the helsinki accords. and broughtetente a new relationship with the soviet union would put us on a better path and help to hasten the end the cold war. he also had had a sensible approach to budgetary. you believe you cut taxes by a dollar, cooked but not a dollar. if you have heavy growth, you can't cut taxes, -- you can cut taxes more.

i always thought that the ford approach made a lot of sense. most of all, he brought a healing. sense of integrity returning to the white house. he was a straight shooter. that meant a great deal of difference to americans. thats not just watergate had brought confidence in government crashing down. a whole series of thing stretching back to vietnam, only lying and mendacity. sending kids to their deaths for no particular good purpose. lying about what was happening. watergate came along, the government -- there was a sense in the late 70's that maybe we can no longer govern ourselves. maybe we need a constitutional amendment. maybe we need to reform this and make a more parliamentary system. gerald ford helped put things right. it took a while to get back on the path, but he helped put things right. that was an anonymous competition. result ofis that as a

that, he had such a strong cold, he started coming back to washington on his birthday's in june. this marks another one of those birthdays. he had a reunion every year of all of the people who had worked for him. they were proud that they worked for him. they shared that pride. this is another one. i'm just one of the representatives of got alumni group speaking to you today. that presidentse ford was always "ms. underestimated -- misunderestimated." [laughter] i must tell you that we on the staff underestimated him. i had the experience after he left office, receiving a call

from his office in the afternoon. saying that he had a speech draft, missed speech was posted on two or three days and would like you to read it. they faxed it to me. i read the speech. there was a gorgeous beach. very complex, rich, interesting. a lot of words. it was one of the speeches that just sang. it was just so interesting. but it was not at all the way he spoke. it was not the way we wrote speeches for him. there was a girl you would stumble over the words and not understand it. you have to give him a see spot run speech. i thought you wanted me to turn it into the way he normally

speaks. he called me that night, drawing on his pipe, and you said, did you get the speech? gorgeous beach i said, do you want me to put it more in your style you go i could hear him start to chuckle. i said, i am not sure this is you. i heard him chuckle more and say, this is the first time i have had a pool of silence in which i could write my own speech. i wanted to try it out on you. i realized this man was capable of giving far better speeches to him crap we gave him. [laughter] ,t was embarrassing to think why didn't we understand? i think in the rear view of them history -- rear view mirror of history, we have started to understand. he was midwestern.

90th birthday. president george w. bush was in the white house and generously gave a dinner for him. she and betty were there. president ford said when he got ,p to speak, when i was young my mother 23 basic ways. they have served me well all -- three basic rules. work hard, tell the truth, and come to dinner on time. that just so captures who he is. i want to spend much more time. we will take a few questions. i do want to end with this. for many years, people after , ask, washington served what would george washington do in the circumstances? ,nd that faded and they asked what would a link have done under the circumstances?

the historian said, there is a long time in the american presidency when people told each other, get right with abe. try and make sure you confirm the way you behave and lead. a moral standards you set the lincoln. i would argue now that we have to be thinking about, what would gerry ford do? i think it is very clear that he would be stone on defense. of world war ii as a lieutenant manager. 16 battle stars. he was an artillery gunner. he faced, causes coming across. kamikazis --kam -- coming across. say, do not cut defense. the world is still dangerous.

figure out what your strategy is and make sure you fund it. you can afford it. don't make it exciting in terms of the budgetary wars. i don't think there is any question that he would say, you got to get spending and taxes under better better control and one discipline. this is irresponsible to keep going the way we are. wouldopher must you argue, we have got to get back to a way of governing in which people could work across the aisles. and with respect, understanding, the kind that john dingell had were gerald ford. the kind that tip o'neill -- many of us that worked for tip-n are proud of the reagan relationship. it was important to governing. go back and read tip o'neill's memoirs and what you find is he loved your old ford. he thought it was the perfect person to work with. he could always count on him. i will close with a story. jim, who is no longer with us, but has left us a new book on gerald ford.

in an earlier book, he told a story, which i always found so interesting. when richard nixon was president , he wanted john conley. he had to get them through the senate. he called the leadership of the house and senate. two democrats. senator mike mansfield, and wonderful man. glories andhe honors in the world. when he died, he asked to be. dachshund buried in an unlisted plot in the national cemetery. carl albert was the other. andn called them both in said, we have to figure out who the vice president is.

everybody knew there was a better than 50% chance that eczema not survive in never selecting the next president of the united states. they said john conley. they said, mr. president, do not do that. he is slippery, we don't trust him, not a man of his word. he said, who would you like both gerald said, is put ford in the presidency. he is the manly we trust, we can work across the aisle and we will have a better country. the democrats made him president and that is a remarkable tribute to him. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. i will invite you and chairman upton to join me here and we have a fair number of questions.

some are opposed to one of the specifically in some to both or either. we will start with the most common the new addressed. that is bipartisanship or lack thereof. why has congress becomes a polarized? why is the announcement compromise, and what you see as the biggest road block within congress for legislation getting down? let me just say, when i was in 1987, a member of our ofdership team, secretary the republican conference, she addressed the new freshmen and said, we are republicans and in the minority. it willre good bill

either be defeated or it will get stolen. that is the way that things go. every, i decided that on piece of legislation i would seek out a democratic sponsor and we would try to work to getting son. to get afirst bills, fresh maine colleague of mine, representative of baltimore, and we passed a bill that provided a tax credit for small businesses that had make structural changes to comply with the americans with disabilities act. the black caucus, all the republicans and all of a sudden i was grabbed, and this is a think we're going to move your build. emily did. -- and we did. and he came back and said, you have ruined our reputation. this is not the most important

piece of legislation affecting small business. am big zero and now i time. what if familiarization -- have you done for my reputation? i changed one of the rules in , we take a bipartisan amendments first. they go to the head of the queue. see if we can get some things done. afternoon we will take a major piece of legislation impacting the pharmaceutical industry. john dingell is one of my best supporters. getting that through the market and the intent to have it passed by voice vote a little later this afternoon. look at what we have tried to do. i have always been a policy over politics guide. last congress, we passed 80 bills on the house floor that came out of my committee. all but four or five had democrats court. 40 of them the senate --

resident signed into law. that is not a bad record. that is not a record that people like to hear and talk shows out there. we have to work together. i was at the white house early this morning on mental health conference in there are a lot of great members that care passionately about where our country is headed and how we need to work together. we have divided government, we have to recognize that. i know dave camp on the ways and means committee and my other parts of the intent of attitude. the margin is small. we have 233 republicans in the house. 218 control the house. we have a margin of 15. we have to work together. we have to govern together. >> complex object. money his book describes of the contours of the subject.

you can find many different reasons. you can follow up the middle. when howard baker was there -- usually about three senators representing both sides of the aisle that you can count on to try and work something out. they can often influence the final conclusion. that number has dwindled a great deal. if the redistricting problems in the house. i also think it is partly a cultural issue. where we are as a country and the general should know -- generational changes. world war ii generation was running things. mostly people who had come of age during the war. seven presidents in a row from kennedy through bush senior who were the world war ii presidents, also nor a military uniform. came to washington believing that they were the civic generation. they were strong democrats or republicans, but first and

foremost there were strong americans. it worked together. that has been lost since the veneration of the stage. i don't think it is hopeless. we i do think it means should be electing people like fred, the security represents an we have a generation that is younger that is coming that is very different. i think a millennial's who are coming through now, contrary to put on its cover about this being the me, me, me, generation, narcissistic and lazy, i am a generation that is coming is very idealistic and very hopeful of changing the country. flowing into nonprofits, teach for america, i can tell you what when it is done with that is extraordinary talking and the idealism of young people. the other route we should be youngl about is the people coming back and taking off their uniforms after serving in iraq and afghanistan. , no of those people

question there are mental health issues and some of the veterans coming back. a good number of these people coming back are absolutely wonderful. they are going to restore a spirit of bipartisanship.[applause] >> there is scandals going on at the current white house. i would like to hear the take from both of you on the secret probes that were conducted into the associated press and fox news. is this an infringement? >> i do not know where things are headed on this. i do think there are more than capable chairs and committees that are beginning an investigation of this. we have councils. we haven't oversight subcommittee. we have the lawyers and the capability to ask for subpoenas and information. we need to find out what the truth is.

need to follow the trail and find out where it takes us. i am quite confident you will see that happen on the irs. we will get the answers. as my dad always said, tell the truth the first time, you do not have to worry about it the [laughter] >> i've spoken to this. there is no question in my mind mind that we crossed a line when the fbi filed an affidavit and called mr. rosen a co- conspirator. a criminal co-conspirator. as reporter simply asking questions per you cannot put the press in that situation. that is why it is so important to push back and make sure we get on the right side of this. on the ap, it is hard to assess unless you are there. it does seem excessive. how many people they swept into the net. the government has become very powerful.

what we need to ask is restraint. re-strengthen the use of power. restraint when we send our forces abroad. and restraint in how we treat each other. it seems to me that what the -- what unites the issues and the lack of restraint. people inside government have to treat citizens with a certain dignity and understanding. we have to be respectful of certain standards. it is not just a question of what the laws are. it is a question of what the standards are. [applause] >> from serving in so many administrations, how would you assess the effectiveness of this president's communication in the scandals?

>> i think this president has a capacity to be one of the finest communicators we have had. the speech in philadelphia he gave during the 2008 campaign, -- would be a star injury. entry. i think this president has often inspired in the way he has addressed people, especially the young. we should respect that. he should be given credit for that. i think on the question of what has been apparent, i think there have been more effective in campaigns than governing.

they have been a little ham- fisted on whether it is benghazi, or some of the irs. one of the things you learn in damage control, i started with watergate. one of the first things you learn is it really is important to get your story out fast. but first it is important to get your story straight. understand what it is you are dealing with. you have to do -- and it is not ways easy.

things get so riled up so quickly. lawyers will not be present when you debt with some of these questions. they didn't tell you couldn't release that. now they are so heavily lawyer, there is a political side of the house that has to push back and read we have a responsibility here. >> one question on current events and congress, the public has expressed a disinterest in the impact of sequestration on national defense. why is that? how do you get this perception problem solved? >> a couple of things. i got my stripes working for ronald reagan, who cared about the deficit. a lot of battles. one of the primary reasons i ran for office. you might remember in the early 1990s, or early 1980s, across the board cuts if congress did not do its work. i was in the first meeting with graham and rugman.

that was how this thing was devised. in the house, i was a member of the supercommittee. in the house, i was on the supercommittee. it broke my heart that we didn't get it done. it really did. we got a group of 12 people. we had an equal number versus a majority that really wanted to come out with a solution. done democrats, some republicans. at the end, they said we will do the sequestration. that will force congress tried to come up with something to get it done. at the end of the day, it did not work. we passed two different bills with real offsets to the sequester. it didn't get anything out of the senate.

i can remember sitting with leon panetta when president obama was sworn in. the house and senate leadership, leon panetta, i served with him when he was in the house. i said you guys are not going to less -- let the senate. it is coming. at the end of the day, this is not the best way to do it. it isn't. we wanted to make the individual departments, but their own choices, set their priorities without to deal with these different things.

it ended up they took money from the airport improvement fund to offset those layoffs that otherwise would have come. we have got to get serious about the deficit. the fiscal cliff issue was resolved. that kicked it automatically. revenues are up. the sequester was going to kick in automatically must we came up with an offset. the senate failed to take action. it is not going to change for the balance of this year. i am hopeful that we can sit down, as republicans and democrats, and figure out the path that we have to be on, including entitlements. gerry ford for old -- were president, 10% of the budget. today it is a third. >> we're almost out of time. before wrapping up, let's get a couple of housekeeping matters to take care of. our upcoming luncheon speakers. wednesday, june 6, the u.s. agriculture secretary.

then, the former ceo of hewlett- packard, who serves as chairman of 360. i like to present our guest today with our traditional coffee mugs. [applause] >> this is in accord with the house standards. >> you can accept any gifts you could drink in one sitting.

>> i will not tell you the value. i am quite sure it is within congressional ethics. thank you to our guest for being here today. i would like to thank our national press club staff, including our journalists institute. here is a reminder, you can find more information about the club at our website. press.org. if you'd like a copy of today's program, you can find it there. thank you for coming. we are adjourned. >> next discussion about the -- how the human race can avoid distant -- extinction. poor health, first lady ida mckinley also suffered from epilepsy. because of that, her husband would sit next to her at state dinners. if she had a seizure, human ts isd her face from gues a large handkerchief.

despite her health problems, chicago's first lady, even attending the 1921 -- 1901 pan- american exposition. we will look at her as if included our first season on first ladies. a discussion on how to convert urban spaces into biological organisms. separation and environmental destruction. this is about 45 minutes.

these are events where more than 70% of species on the planet die out over a time of one million years. it is short in geological time. it is quite long in human time. most of these have been caused by climate change area did there is a lot of evidence mounting now that humans may be about to enter a new mass extinction. partly the proof is that we are seeing climate changes.

part of the proof is we're seeing elevated extinction levels among animals. more animals going extinct there we might expect over the past couple of centuries. the evidence is mounting that we are looking down the barrel of this kind of disaster. the question is, how should we as humans respond? that is what i am interested in tackling. host: you write in your piece to safeguard the future of our urban cities, our cities must be sturdier, healthier, and more alive. you call the my biological city. what do you mean? guest: i am talking about the fact that cities are a place where most people will be living over the next coming centuries. already already happy world's population lives in in cities. the u.s. estimates that by 2050, 67% of the worlds population population will be living in cities. those numbers are much bigger for developed countries. cities are also a source of a huge amount of our gdp. some estimate up to 85%. these are very important areas

to focus on if we want to see the future of humanity progress. one of the proposals that i make, and that a lot of scientists and designers are making as well, is that we need to be pushing our cities toward being more survivable. that can mean something as simple as being prepared for disasters like earthquakes and floods, and mudslides. that can mean reengineering buildings that already exist. making emergency evacuation plans more widely available to the populace, so people know what to do. looking to the future, one of the things i do in my work, you also are looking at changing the materials that we make cities

out of. that is where the biological city idea comes in. right now, in research labs, we're seeing the development of what are called self-healing or smart materials. things like c meant that can heal itself -- things would cement that can heal itself. the idea is to create cities that are sustainable. we you not have to keep knocking things down and building new things. we have structures that are robust against damage, but robust against the ravages of time. again looking toward the future, part of the city will involve new kinds of fuels, like biofuels that might be grown in and around cities. >> we are talking with and about her "discover magazine" article. if you want to call lynn, republicans are at (202) 737- 0002. we will get to your questions and comments in just a second. will our cities look any different than they do now?

guest: that is a good question. when you are looking ahead to 50 years from now, if we start using more biomaterials and self-healing materials, probably cities would look a lot the way of they do now pray the difference would be a bridge developing a crack, that bridge crack would seal itself up. my sea scars on your bridges or buildings. over time, like 100 50 years out, a far horizon, the horizon we are looking at, you might start to see cities that look like they are covered in vines, or covered in algae. it is a good chance at the cornerstone of the future city might be something like a genetically engineered algae that can do anything from provide fuel, to provide water purification, and even provide lighting.

instead of burning fossil fuels to have your lights on at night, you might just have algae that glows at night. cities might start to look something like a real win -- ruin. outside you would have these scarred concrete, but inside you would have high-tech internet and total access to awesome developed technology. it looks very natural me outside. we would still have all of our modern conveniences on the inside. >> the title of the piece is "how to death proof the city to safeguard the future." the book, how humans will survive a mass extinction. many of you have guessed from listening to her, you're the founding editor of a science website.

io9.com guest: you can find everything from stories about the latest scientific innovations to the latest star trek movie. host: let's get to our first phone call. you are on the air. caller: good morning. i am interested in knowing how annalee could revise a city like detroit, michigan, which is dying from within. it has lost over half its population since 1980. i noticed grave urban decay in

that city over the last couple of decades. how would she resolve that situation for detroit in particular? guest: it is a good question. detroit is always given as the example of a classic city in decline. it is the case that if you look at how cities function over the long term, and you look at a city like istanbul, which is existing for thousands of years, the way that i city serve size survives is by constantly changing not just its urban layout, but the kinds of economic production that it engages in great it changes the relationship it has with other cities, and other nations around it. detroit, in the short term, is looking at some tough times. i think that over the long term, will have to happen is detroit will need to have new industries developing order to revitalize

the city. under the new relationships with the cities around it. it is not something that can happen overnight. it has to be part of a long-term plan to revitalize that city. it always come back to cities have to be flexible when it comes to the kinds of industries that they are promoting, and that they are cultivating. just like an ecosystem needs adversity, cities also need diversity in terms of their economic productivity's. one of the problems with detroit has been that it has been focused tightly on one particular industry. the first thing that needs to happen is that versification. host: what is the role of the government in safeguarding cities, preventing the mass extension of urban areas? guest: the role of the government is twofold.

one is, i feel the role of the government is to put money into organizations like the national science foundation, and the department of energy to allow scientists to do the kinds of research that will allow us in 50 years or 100 years to lose our dependence on fossil fuels, lose our on materials that are heavily polluting, and the have awful byproducts. also, it is the government's role to participate in coming up with better city planning. that city planning is everything from how the city is designed for people, to how the city invests in businesses. i think -- i did not mean to say that the government should control all the businesses in the city. are the government's role should be to help nurture that economic diversity. that could be part of the long- term plan. they should never be a plan that we depend on one particular type of way for people to make a

living. host: you write about in your book, and it is featured in the piece, subterranean cities. can you explain? guest: when you're looking at mass extinction, a huge global destruction event, one of the possibilities for the human future is that we would have to move underground. the kinds of disasters that might cause that would be a radiation disaster, which is may be caused by war, by an industrial accident, they be caused by nearby star exploding and shooting gamma rays and our hemisphere. it actually has happened in earth's history. it sounds and michael bay movie, but it could happen. it is something we need to think about. in that case, if you want to be protected against radiation, a great way to do that is to have a couple of feet of rock between you and the radiation source. underground cities are such a appealing idea for coping with

that kind of disaster. what is interesting is, a lot of our futuristic stories about living underground depicted it as this horrific life. we're all going to mutate mutate, and we will become terrible fascists will be move underground pray that is not be the case. the happen underground cities historically they have thrived and have been quite a statically pleasing. for example, when i was researching, i went to central turkey, where there are a number of underground cities that were built at least 1500 years ago by people who were suffering from marauders coming into their cities, and killing people, and stealing things. they were able to get down beneath their houses, and create cities that were in some cases able to hold up to 20,000 people.

they had stables, and wineries, and public meeting areas. every person who had a house above ground also headquarters below ground. they managed to live in the cities for months at a time. they had ventilation shafts. that was how they did it. it was a way for them to ward off attacks. a similar thing could be done now if we were to repurpose mining shafts, repurpose train tunnels, or start building underneath our homes, which is happening if i many cities that are high density. partly the underground city is a purely defensive idea. what if there is a terrible

disaster? where would we go? partly it is a way of thinking about how we use our space. how do we become more efficient at using space? there are actually a lot of designers, and architects who think about how do you make an underground city a place to live it doesn't feel like you are about to turn into one of the science fiction mutants. one tip i wear -- one tip i will share, the biggest problem people have is that they feel like everything looks the same. like they are always walking down halls look exactly the same. the number one recommendation for building an underground city is creating neighborhoods. create areas that look really dramatically from from each other. so people have a sense of being in a civilized nation nation, or in a city. instead of feeling like they are in a giant underground bunker. host: if you're wondering why we are talking but underground, and only is writing for "discover magazine about death proofing a city. it is based on her new book read

book. let's go to van, a democratic color. caller: this is an 86% black city. they stopped hiring blacks. i was worried about whether the qualification was there or not. i began to ask questions. they couldn't work out here. he question my intelligence the came to the railroad when i was 19 years old.

host: tie this to to what we are talking about. guest: you are talking my desperate -- death proofing the city. they are getting all the jobs to white people. [inaudible] host: what about social issues impacting the area of our cities? guest: it is a huge issue. racism has been a huge problem in our cities in the past. certainly in the labor force. going forward, we're going to start seeing new kinds of social issues emerge, where we need to be thinking about how can communities work together to make cities healthier? both economically, in terms of making sure the actual population in the city is

getting jobs in the city, and is getting fed in the city, but also in terms of how do you think about a city as an organism? cities are going to very likely be a locust for future pandemics. people are in such close quarters. people think of that as a health problem among or as a science problem. it is actually much more a social problem. we need to get people working together to get things like vaccinations to protect their neighbors. not just to protect themselves, but when you get vaccinated, you prevent the disease to being passed on. by the same token, we need to be thinking about how the cities of emergency services would coordinate in order to get vaccines people, or if it is too late, how to get their pc people

to deal with pandemics. i think that it is tempting to look at a city to always think of the city as one part of it just engineering and infrastructure, and scientific stuff, and then over here, totally unrelated to that, all of the social issues, like our caller was bringing up. around labor, how neighbors treat each other, around jobs allocated. those are issues that are absolutely connected. as we move into the future, part of the goal of having a living city is going to be cities that career -- care for the people who live in them, down to feeding those people. as city of the future needs to have farms so that city is

providing food. not necessarily for free. the food is local, nearby, so that you do not the situation where there are people starving. the city needs to become much more of a coherent social organism. host: you are right in the discover magazine, feeding a hungry city with a skyscraper that features solar powered farms on the outside of that. you're right that cities of the future might be themselves by creating forms inside in enormous skyscrapers, where every floor is a greenhouse. all the water would be recycled. the structures would be designed to be carbon neutral. guest: that is definitely one possibility. there are a lot of people who believe that we will have these skyscraper farms. that is a fantastic idea. it is certainly demonstrating what i am talking about, the idea of a city that can filled itself -- feed itself. cities would be designed to be very high density at their centers, where most people live. instead of having suburbs surrounding the city, instead of having a kind of urban sprawl,

all of those areas would be farms. those farms would be feeding into the economy of the city. there is a famous urban theorist who said that the goal for city designers, and city planners, should be that everything that a city is importing should eventually become as something the city is producing. that is absolutely the case with food. especially as we are going into the future, food is going to become a political issue. it is going to be in a river issue. -- an urban issue.

host: we will hear from jonathon next. caller: can you hear me? i do like c-span. i enjoy. thank you for your guest. you are on track. i want to run for political party in michigan him up because what you are saying -- you are on the money. people should listen. you can probably help yourself if you listen when people talk. you say a lot of stuff going on that i can say. i do not like the governor --5 [inaudible] sent sunday 65, everything is gray. detroit has been going downhill since 1965. it is just getting trashed. i think people can work together on a plan. host: i'm going to leave it there.

guest: i think this is the case that we need to be working on unger term plans for cities. part of the reason why you see a city fall into decline, whether it is destroyed or another place, is because of the fact that we do not have these long- term plans for keeping our cities diverse, information sure that we have an idea of where the city is going, and how it is going to evolve over time. host: on twitter, vivian says -- any thoughts about natural disasters like we saw in oklahoma? how a city prepares for that in the future?

guest: this is the moment when we would hope that oklahoma would in fact go in the direction of building structures that are going to be more disaster proof in the future. part of the reason i use the term death proof to describe the cities, is precisely this kind of moments. to think about, what was it about the city that was a problem during a disaster, that is likely to strike again? something like tornadoes in oklahoma, that is a slamdunk in terms of the fact that this is going to, dinh -- going to come again. i live in san francisco. earthquakes are the big issue. there's a going to come again. how do we design our city to be robust against that?

i think that is where people, consumers need to be thinking about what kinds of homes can i build? there are ways of talking to architects and engineers, getting information about what you want to build read -- build. when developing roads, and other kinds of public infrastructure, they also need to be thinking about that, and consulting with engineers, and finding out how can we build buildings that have adequate underground shelters? how can we build buildings that can be robust against strong winds? all of the country, there are labs where engineers of looking at this grade when they have a huge warehouse with a build a structure, and blow incredibly strong winds of the structure to find out what kinds of homes and buildings are robust against that. we actually have that data. as the beautiful part.

the big part, the big problem is getting that scientific data, getting engineering into the hands of people who are willing houses, cities are planning how they want to design the sitting, and make sure that is that connection between innovation in the lab, and innovation in the city. host: sandy, in d.c. caller: do you have any ideas about the concept of space colonies as an alternative response to mass extinction? my own instinct of reaction is that space colonies could lead to a/an bird -- slash and burn strategy.

i would rather see investment in earth. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013]

hopefully both of these proposals will be put in the house water bill, and i would

like your take on both of them. thank you. >> thank you, congressman. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general, thank you very much for the work that you and the men and women in the core do. it's extraordinarily important across the nation, and i believe we have some issues on the missouri or one of the rivers this morning with some levee breaks, so the protection of our population from flooding is of utmost importance. it certainly is in my district. i represent 200 miles of the in california. for us here on the dais, we have a responsibility. we just took $250 million out of your budget for this year in sequestration and asking you to do more. i don't think that's responsible for us to do such a thing, but we did it. hopefully we can replace that

money and more. the ear mark is an issue. we've had many discussions about that in this committee, and we really need to get at that. it's something that's very, very important. we have the responsibility, and we've foregone that responsibility by eliminating our ability to direct projects, and i would -- i think we all know that. we have the courage to revisit and overcome the earmark. specifically, general, you mentioned the 408 in the previous question. we have a 408 issue on the levee project, the feather river program, about 40 miles of levee, utmost important to yuba city and the surrounding communities. i know this is being processed, and i thank you for the work that's being done in getting that 408 approved and out of the way. there are no issues, but if there's a further delay, we will miss this year's

construction on a section of the feather river levee that has broken twice in the last 40 years. earlier, many lives were lost. this is a shanghai bend portion of that. i ask for your attention to at, and if possible, conviction action on it so that project can get underway. there's no federal funding involved here, it's a local program and state. beyond that, there are going to be many issues that the water bill that's been passed by the senate only authorized those projects that have a report at the time of enactment, which will probably cause projects that are important to members of this house and maybe some senators to be delayed as was discussed a moment ago for some period of time until there's a new water bill. i think we ought to take a very close look at that.

general, your comments on this would be appreciated. how can we overcome that particular problem where we would be dependent upon a chiefs report until there's a new water bill, which could be years in the making? the gressman, both chairman and the minority had talked about that in their opening statements when the water resource development act started in the 1970's, it was under the impression that it would happen every two years. it hasn't. that's the method to authorize water resource projects. i won't comment on the senate, on the senate piece, but getting back to regular water, as mentioned by the minority member, probably is the approach. >> i suppose that wasn't a fair question for you. that's a question for us, i suspect, so my apologies.

i'll let it go. if you'll just take a quick look at the project on the feather river, the 408 issue is before you and your shop, and quick review, all of the issues were addressed in the earlier review, and if you can pop that out, it would be very helpful and we can get that project underway. in anticipation of next year, particularly on the shanghai bend, thank you very much. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> we'll take a close look at it. it hasn't made it to headquarters yet. i'm expecting it later this month. >> first, general, california has been in the president's budget, has been well -- not well cared for, but there are many, many projects, and i want to thank the corps and the men and women in the corps on their work in those projects throughout california, and we

really appreciate it. >> the floor is yours. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'm from northeast wisconsin, including the cities of green bay and appleton, so right on the shore of lake michigan. i apologize in advance if my questions are redundant from something you heard here before. i had to step out for about 10 minutes, and somebody else might have talked about this, but i've heard a lot of comments today about how do we speed things up, how do we make this more efficient, how do we actually get them? based on your testimony today, it sounds like a project typically begins with a reconnaissance study, which, when that's done, initiates another study, which is six steps,. concurrently going on, there's another study. there are a series of check points during the study to make sure you're applying with laws, and then after that, there's a quality review of the study.

after that, there's an agency technical review of the quality review, and then an external peer review. the commander performs a quality assurance review on documents that they're going to transmit to core headquarters, which then performs a 45-day policy review in advance of the civil works review. cwrb says it's sufficient, there's an agency review. after the state and agency review is done, the report of the chief of engineers is finalized and processed in a final package that includes the agency responses to that. a signed report of the chief of engineers transmits a recommendation to the assistant secretary of the army for civil works. it then goes to there, upon

recreate of the report of the engineers, shall review and provide any recommendation regarding the project to congress within 120 days. the asacw prior to transmital of a chiefs report that congress is responsible for determining the recommendations of the chief of engineers are complying with army policy, including applicable laws, executive orders and regulations, which entails an additional review to make sure that there's no unresolved issues. in addition, at the end of this, if you say in addition, then the office of management and budget under executive order 12,322 reviews the proposed project for cannot a with the prince prells and guidelines -- with the principles and guidelines. i'm glad that they're reviewed. i'm assuming some of these are and red by law, that men women up here are making you do all these reviews. some of them are probably your efforts to make sure that

things are done right, but it seems to me that we've created a system of review that is now handcuffing the court from doing things that your core competencies should be able to do without these layers. and i'm wondering, is there a lack of confidence in your teams that you require all these reviews, or how do we get to a place where we can actually streamline these players to move forward, which would save the taxpayers and work would get done, which would boost our economy? >> thank you, congressman. it sounds like you've got our process down, and if you're looking for -- no. is a difficult challenge to move a report through all of the processes, which is why the chief of engineers has adopted our planning modernization process as part of his campaign plan so that we can do a chiefs report in three years.

that's his requirement to us, and we're moving forward with putting those together. what that means at the beginning of the process, we bring the three levels, the headquarters of division, and the district and the nonfederal sponsor together, and we go through to make sure that we're scoping the project realistically. if it's a flood control project, what are the solutions to solve those? let's look at the policy level issues at the beginning of it as we're putting -- as we're scoping the project and bringing it forward. >> can i interrupt just a second? is this process the same for all projects, or is there a difference between a flood management project, which seems to be fairly complex and maybe dredging the harbor in green bay, wisconsin, which seems pretty simple to me. >> the process is the same. if the project is going through to get authorized by congress, they have to go through this

process to get it. now, if it's a smaller, small project, we have continuing authorities program for those projects that are $5 million and less, and that's an abbreviated, some people say abbreviated process, but i think trying to get to a chiefs report in three years is a key item that we're working on. to get through all of those hoops and hurdles that you just mentioned, and i call them hoops and hurdles, but they are a good policy reasons on why we do a lot of those, particularly state and agency review and public review, because there's things that we might not have looked at as we're doing the engineering analysis. we're looking to get those things completed now in three years. >> i would encourage you, the ability that you can, to let us know what we can do to help you to streamline this process, whether it's concurrent review system or something, because this is hugely expensive to the

taxpayer, and the delay is even more costly to the economy. thanks again for being here. i don't mean to be critical, i'm just trying to get my arms around getting a better policy moving forward. with that, i yield back. >> thank you, mr. chairman. as i've recently had the pleasure of welcoming your crew from new england, my zrkt a couple of weeks ago, which made people very excited to have our core day, and you have an excellent crew and want to thank you. reply grandfather helped build locks and dams on the mississippi back with the corps in the 1940's, so long history. n the past, as has always been mentioned, congress appreciatized projects in the program. given that that is now now happening and we're much more restrict in that, i'm concerned that the program is oversubscribed heavily. can you talk to us a little bit about how the corps prioritizes

projects in the continuing authorities program at this point? how many programs are currently projects in the queue, for example? >> in the continuing authorities program, there is -- it is oversubscribed in trying to get to those projects that are closest to being complete, appreciatizing those, funding those at the highest that we can for capability reasons and then bringing them into a conclusion, and then going to the next one down on the list is the best way that with the capping of the cap program, that's the best way i know to go through it, get them to completion, then go down and get the next one. instead of lots of projects with limited funds, let's just ork down the list. >> i have a big project in my

district in connecticut that has match funding coming in from e.p.a. on some elements, stuff coming in from the state government on a variety of different issues. is that something that would receive additional priority, because you already have committed funds, h.u.d. funds and elsewhere. >> it would certainly be included in the thought process in regards to prioritization, but again, i don't know where that project is and how close it is to completion, so i would have to look at that. but certainly having more people at the table contributing funds to a particular project is something that we're looking forward to in the future. what we're looking forward to, putting a budget together sometime in the future on a watershed approach, right now we look at project by project, and sometimes a project may have negative impacts in another area, so we're looking at how to look at all of the water resource needs in a

watershed. we would bring in all the federal agencies, nongovernmental and local governments, and try and figure out how to work on solving the water resource needs from a watershed approach. >> well, i am very grate to feel hear that, because we are not in the water stress regions of california, but rather, these issues on watersheds, where if one community does one project, you can actually just aggravate issues further down stream with flooding issues. we're working very hard in connecticut, for example, for restoration of streams. well, that's come in conflict with levee reerments in areas from 50 years ago, and we're having a great deal of tension around that. knowing a watershed approach would actually be extremely helpful for a district like mine. in new england, we are sadly with increase of severe weather events, which was my previous hearing. we were hearing about severe weather events on the science committee, that we're going to see more of this, and we're

going to see more rapid downpours, putting stress on watersheds that previously didn't have flooding. and now they are. so again, we share concerns about inadequate funding, making your job difficult, making your task and our shared task of ensuring the safety of our communities and citizens, putting them at risk. i look forward to working with you. thank you for your service. i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you. r. rice? >> thank you, sir. thank you for being here today. i had the opportunity to meet with general walsh, and your decades of service, distinguished service, an honorable and bright man who's done a lot for our country, and ur work on this project is critically important. i don't think there's anything more important than keeping our nation competitive with the rest of the world.

i think we're failing a little in that regard, not because of your efforts, but because of ours. infrastructure is the key to that. it's so hard to find the infrastructure dollars, and we have these processes and regulations in place that require these studies that you have to undertake, then a lot of those infrastructure dollars end up being diverted into the study rather than into digging ports or laying asphalt or building levees. so that is my key concern, but i listened to the processes that were run out, and i realize that we've got an incredible amount of work to do n that regard. certainly we have to protect the environment, about the we also have to protect our economy. so anything we can do -- i think we've placed you in a

vice. ou're caught between congress, encouraging you, pushing you to make things happen more quickly and trying to satisfy the laws that we have, in fact, put in place. so i feel for you. i know you're in a tough spot. and i appreciate your efforts to do both. and i just want to know what we can do to help you accomplish that. >> congressman, i think the recognition that infrastructure is key to the -- key to the future of being competitive is going to be very important. lots of times when we talk about infrastructure, we talk about roads, rails and runways, and sometimes we forget to talk about rivers. as a nation, as we address the infrastructure issues of the future, we need to also recognize that fourth r as we move forward. the american society of civil

engineers released their report a month ago that said that our nfrastructure is a d and not getting well fast. so i don't know how much it will be a challenge to remain competitive as we move into the future, as other people are beginning to develop their water resources, such as brazil, india, china, and others. and so i think as a nation need to recognize that the infrastructures are tremendously important and not so much an expense, but an investment on future benefits. >> i completely agree with you. to use those same words, when i look at projects like the port of miami, which have taken over a decade for approval and don't involve any federal dollars, and when i look at the fact that the panama panel will be open in a year and a half and we're only going to have two ports on the east coast that can take them, baltimore and

norfolk, i recognize that we have got to get ourselves out of the way and get these infrastructure projects built, because if they drop the cost of transporting a container by 10% and we can't take these ships, then we're placing our american businesses at a competitive disadvantage, and we will lose real american jobs. we've got to work ourselves out of this conundrum, simplify this process. i so appreciate the fact that you've put yourself into this with this 3 x 3. my only encouragement is we get it to a 1 x 1, because when i think about the fact they've been working on this miami port project for 13 years and you mentioned brazil and india and china, i wonder how many reports have been deepened in those areas in that 14-year period, and even if we started digging today, that miami port project would not be completed by the time the panama canal is

open. so it is a real serious crux issue for this country, and i look forward to your suggestions on how we can deal with it. thank you very much, sir. i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you, congressman. >> gentleman from north carolina, mr. meadows is recognized. >> thank you, chairman davis, and thank you, general walsh, for being here. i don't want to address any specific projects, but i do want to go back and follow up on what the gentleman from south carolina was hitting on, and it is about the speed of those projects. we never kill a project. we just study it. the problem is we study it and study it and study it until it eventually goes away or gets defunded or people holler so much that we've got to do something about it. with the three by three

process, you know, i see a lot of our problem being more regulatory in administrative law versus just laws that are dedicated by congress. and so what i would ask you to comment on specifically is, what regulatory agencies do you see, whether they be federal or state agencies, are creating the most burdensome regulatory compliance issues that you're having to deal with in order to get some of your studies done so that we can get construction to actually happen? >> well, sir, we work with all the federal regulatory agencies, state regulatory agencies. >> so if you could eliminate one, which one would it be? >> i don't know that i would eliminate the omission of any agencies out there. certainly, and i know you moit agree if you have traveled to a lot of international places, some places that don't put as much effort in their

environment, their water, is just deplorable. our environmental laws were put in place and have significantly helped our environment. >> you're saying you wouldn't change any of them? what i'm trying to find out, what are the regulatory things that you're having to deal with, that if you were in my position, you'd say, well, let's get rid of this, and you're saying every regulation and every policy that we have out there right now as an ultimate good, i think your good was it's good policy, so you're saying you wouldn't get rid of anything to speed up the process? >> at this point, as we go through the regulatory processes, people are looking at the things that were authorized by congress for them to look at if they're talking from a federal perspective. from the state, certainly the

state historic preservation is something that we need to look ats with we go through a particular project, and i think to look at things from a historical perspective is important, and we should be doing that as well. so i can't think of something at i would say this is the red cluster that i should ask you to ignore. >> not a single federal regulation that you would get rid of? >> not one that i would tell you now, sir. >> are there any other agencies that you would prefer to be under your purview where you don't have to work with somebody from a different agency so you can streamline the process that way? >> i think the laws of the land have put these agencies and processes into place -- >> let's assume that we can change the laws. what would you change? >> i wouldn't -- i wouldn't be able to put that out to you

right now in regards to change. we work very closely with our regulatory agencies so that we can respond to their requirements and meet the national goals from an environmental point of view. >> all right, and so, if we give you additional time, can you come up with recommendations that you can submit to this committee, or are we just going to be -- going to have these kind of feasiblity studies that are sitting here in front of me forever that 90% of the people don't read anyways? i mean, what can we eliminate to streamline the process? >> what we're looking at now is, begin, bringing in the three levels of the core of engineers to look at a project at the scoping mechanism. so what we're looking at, how do we scope it realistically, look at what -- and so i think that's what's really going to drive a smaller project volume than what you see there to what

i'm looking at is probably a 100-page report that we can bring over here to congress. so i think we can streamline from that perspective. but having our report go through veermental state and agency review i think is important to meet all of the needs of a particular project. >> all right. so i'm out of town, and i'll yield back this last question. am i to understand there's not a single regulatory act or agency at this point that you would do away with to streamline the process? >> no, sir, i wouldn't -- i would not be able to provide a list of those things that were put in place by law and that i have to abide by. >> all right. i thank the chair's indulgence. i yield back. >> the gentleman from long island, new york, is recognized for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to pick up where the

gentleman from north carolina ust ended. i thought there was an excellent job of delineating the process, the over overwhelming majority of which has been imposed on you by us. i guess i want to ask the specific question, and i know you can't answer it now, but i do know that as we are preparing for 2013, there have been conversations at the staff level about how we can try to streamline the process. can i ask you come back to us not now, but in writing, with whether of the 21 steps, are there any specific steps that we could either eliminate or consolidate with other stops, or are there blocks of steps that we can either eliminate or consolidate as we look to go forward here?

>> yes, sir. >> thank you. i appreciate that. i think that would be very helpful for all of us as we try to work our way through this process. the other thing i just want to sort of emphasize a point that i made earlier, and then ask a question about that. when you were asked questions about the project in california and the senator's concerns about how long it's taken, your response was that -- i'm summarizing your response, but basically the funding stream was uncertain, which delayed the project, and that there was then -- i won't say a disagreement, but some lack of consensus with your local cost share partner in terms of the right way to undertake the project. is that correct? >> yes, sir. >> ok. so the project that long gestation period, and two of the problem we've been talking about, which are funding and cost share partner, have either insufficient funds or a different idea on how the project should go forward.

>> that significantly impacts the duration of a project. >> here's my question. we now have -- i represent eastern long island. i have about 300 miles of coastline, including 75 miles of atlantic coast. we now have $5.3 billion through the sandy supplemental that will go to the corps to repair sandy-related damage and mitigate against further damage if we are to get another storm of the same intensity of sandy. now, that's a lot of money. will that not give us an opportunity to see how the corps can work through a process when the funding stream is guaranteed, and at least in this particular case, for fire island, reformulation study area projects, the local cost share, federal government is going to take 100% of the cost share. that will give us a mechanism or probably a living example

for us to see how the corps process works, when it's adequately funded, right? >> yes, sir. >> ok. and we also had that opportunity with katrina, right? we've gotten an awful lot done in a relatively short period of time with katrina. >> yes, sir. the three things we had at katrina was full federal funding, an abbreviated, and a commitment from the nation to get it done in a short amount of time. >> i guess what i'm saying is i want to make sure we keep our eye on the ball, that we're all talking about regulatory agencies and 21 steps. by the way, i don't mean to diminish the importance of those, but we can eliminate all of that, and if we give you funding year after year after year, projects are going to take a hell of a long time to get done, correct? >> that's correct. >> thank you very much. i really appreciate your work, and i wsh you well in your retirement. thank you very much. >> thank you, sir. >> hello again, general. i left off my line of questioning, i ran out of time.

didn't give you an adequate time to respond to some of those questions, so i'd like to reiterate a few of them. first off, can you give me an estimated time of when you think the 408 permit process for the southwestern illinois flood prevention district might be all issues settled and offered? >> circumstance the last time i looked at that was about three months ago. i'd have to get an update from that. three months ago, we had not et had the submission from the local -- from the local sponsor, so i couldn't give you an answer, because we hadn't gotten his submission, and i don't know if we've got that yet, so i'll have to go back and look at it and certainly can have one of my staff call your staff later this week and tell you where we are in that process. >> thank you. >> that particular issue had us

look at 408 issues, both minor 408 and major. if it's a minor 408 issue, they can resolve it locally. if it's major, it has to come to headquarters for our review. last time i worked in that particular project, we decided that it was a major 408. but again, if the submission had to change, then it may be minor, but i don't know the details. >> thank you very much for that. i know the locals have also requested to use a project labor agreement on one portion of construction on the wood river cutoff wall project in wood river, illinois. do you have an estimated time of when a decision will be made and whether or not that request will be granted or denied? i think it's still out for cement, and as far as the cement period closes, the district commander will make a decision and i'll have to have

staff get back with you later this week on the time frame, because i'm not familiar with that. >> ok. hank you for that. another one is our public-private partnership act, the wind act, which i think could give the corps some valuable tools to move projects that are essential right now up and down the mississippi river, in and around my district that are essential to my constituents' jobs and our local economy. can you comment on how you think that piece of legislation or that language in the senate and the language that's in our bill, how could it possibly affect some of the large infrastructure projects that you may be working on in the future throughout this country?

>> congressman, generally we don't make comment on pending legislation, so i won't comment -- ither the senate or your >> but it's a good bill. >> your bill as well. i think, and we're working on how to use public-private partnerships in the future. certainly our hydro power systems are running at about 89% efficiency. i think there's a lot, if we had more investments in our hydro power system, bring the february as up from 89% to normal industry standards, which is about 98%, if we can't fund that out of the general fund, then let's bring in a public-private partnership, fund the difference and figure ut a way for him to pull his investment out of that, out of that particular project.

i've got guys working on trying to figure out how to do public-private partnership in future, urces in the and it hasn't developed far enough along for me to share yet. >> ok. i have another bill, the mississippi river navigation act, that know you can't comment on, so let me ask you, can you comment on how further study, more navigation tools for the corps and forecasting improvements could help the corps prevent further problems like we saw last year during a low water on the mississippi when it comes to navigation? >> certainly we have a project that's called nesp, navigation ecosystem sustainment program, that's working on the upper mississippi. we're trying to figure out how to forecast green prices 50 years from now, and that's challenging to do and put together a decent cost benefit

rash yo on that, but we are still looking at what kind of tools can we use to pull that together. so we're working that. regards to floods and droughts, you know, the beginning of this year, we're in the flood stage, and we're briefing everybody that needs to be briefed. and two months later, we're in a drought stage and we had to blow up the pinnacles down in the st. louis area, and now we're in flood stage again. i don't know, certainly working with the director of the national weather service, i don't know if the climate tolingses were giving us this variability in the last four months. i don't know that we have a tool that can do that, but certainly we're working with what i call the fusion cell between the corps of engineers, the national weather service, and the usgs to figure out how and where should we be investing resources so that we

can have a better predictability on water and water resources. >> well, thank you very much for those comments. i'm concerned about the flooding that's going on right now. i understand that you have to deal with a wide variety of issues with floods. thank you for all your district service and helping to fight the floods along the mississippi right now. my heart goes out to the hard work they're putting in on a daily basis. we want to give you more flexibility to be able to address those situations, which is why i put that bill forth. so if that's something we can do to allow you to come in and address emergency situations, i think we should work together to make that happen. now my last line of questioning has to do with en from a structure. as i mentioned before, i've been working with your local districts for upwards of 16 years, and we've talked about upgrading large lock and dam

projects along the mississippi and illinois. her comments from the corps that even if we were to fully fund those projects that are authorized, it would take upwards of 40 years to complete the projects. can you comment on the length of time that you think it will take to actually upgrade the locks and dams along the mississippi and illinois rivers? >> right now, the founding stream is restricted with the inland water trust fund, which the -- which generates about $80 million a year, and out of the general fund comes another $80 million, so $160 million a year to do the major work on the locks and dams. with that small funding stream, we're just not going to be able to keep up with the infrastructure that needs to be repaired.

there's a lock in louisiana, and it's 89 years old. as you go through that and the lock's open and close, you can see the concrete falling off the lock walls into the river. we're not going to get to that at this current funding stream for another 15 years, so it's going to have significant impacts on our infrastructure with the funding stream as it's currently structured. >> i completely agree, which is why we have our wind legislation that we're hoping to pass. i'm concerned, too, about this. i think the corps had the best intentions to build this, and to come in as close to budget as possible, but going from $775 million on a seven-year construction cycle to $3.1 billion, we've got some issues when it comes to large infrom

structure projects. what has the corps learned in constructing that project that we can then take away to ensure that we don't hit those limits again or exceed them again? >> one of the issues that we're having with the olmstead lock and dam, again, is the amount of financeding that we can bring to that project. it's million a year, just a struggle to put together an efficient program to get that complete. what we've demonstrated down in louisiana is you give us -- and mr. bishop already talked about that, and the same thing for hurricane sandy, full federal funding, and we can go get it accomplished. in this case, we're taking federal funding and moving forward at this little amount

each year. the other piece, we dent put together a good cost estimate when we put the project forward. what we're looking at now is we put together a center of expertise on cost reviews at walla walla. so every big project we have, we send it to walla walla, and they make sure we're doing a fair job saying how much it's going to cost as we move these projects forward. this particular project, we will be pulling them in off of this project, and right now we have three shifts. we'll be pulling them off at the end of the year because there's not enough authority for to us put any more funds in that project, so it will have a significant impact on the benefits that were supposed to be derived from this project because of the funding, because of funding authority at this point. >> well, i hope we can work

together to come up with that issue and make sure that project is completed. i want to thank you again, general. thank you, mr. brown, for being here. thank you jim grier for being here too. he pointed you out this time. thank you all for attending this hearing, and the hearing is adjourned. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> in poor health, the first lady mckinney suffered from epilepsy. because of that, her husband, president william mckinley, would sit next to her at dinners, so when she had a seizure he would shield her face. despite her health problems, she traveled as first lady, even attending the 1901 pan american exhibition, where her

husband was assassinated. we'll look ago the life of ida mckinley as we conclude the first season of our series on first ladies, live monday night at 9:00 eastern on c-span and c-span3, also on c-span radio and c-span.org. >> on wednesday, experts on wind storms told congress that not enough is being done to promote safe building codes and more federal dollars would help that effort. two house and science subcommittees hosted the hearing. this is about an hour and 15 minutes. >> good morning, everyone. this is committee will come to

order. good morning. welcome to today's joint hearing entitled federal efforts to reduce the effects of windstorm n. front of are you packets today, and the written testimony, biographies and disclosures for today's witnesses. before we get started, since this is a joint hearing, i want to explain how we'll operate procedural so will all members understand how the question and answer session period will be handled. the chairman and ranking members of the research and technology subcommittees will be recognized first, then we'll recognize members of the two subcommittees in order of seniority on the full committee, and those coming in after the gavel will be recognized in order of arrival. i recognize myself for five minutes for an opening statement. we'll focus on how we can reduce the impact of debilitating storms. even with forecasting and awareness, these storms can be unexpected and leave a trail of destruction in their paths. in addition to literally destroying lives, these wind

storms shut down entire economies or regions during the time it takes to rebuild. structures, while more resilient than they used to be, are still often not built to sustain high winds or storm damage that may follow these storms. building codes, practices and performance standards can help. but oftentimes retro fitting an existing building is simply too costly given the relatively small risk of a direct hit of a windstorm. federal agencies currently conduct research and development to help inform the resilience of building in communities, but is not clear how each agency is conducting unique work that is not duplicated by another agency. i believe that a coordinated mechanism would help shed light into what is going on at the federal level and how we can -- how it can be strengthened to ensure better coordination. every year, the federal government funds disaster relief, but supplemental appropriations when states are

hit particularly hard by unexpected disasters. i believe that we need to be more responsible about planning how to deal with natural disasters. i'm curious to hear from our witnesses, if they believe better research could cut down on the dollar figure. since the time that my colleague introduced his windstorm research bill in late april, several midwestern states have endured significant damage and loss of lives from powerful tornadoes. i would now like to yield to the representative for him to share some background on that legislation. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and i appreciate you holding this important hearing today. one of the things that we know about wind, particularly in west texas where i'm from, wind can be your friend or it can be your foe. out in west texas right now, my congressional district, for example, probably has the largest concentration of we understand production for electricity really in the world. that's a time when it's our

friend. but where it can be our foe is obviously when we've seen these deadly tornadoes that have occurred in texas and oklahoma and other states recently, and over the history we've seen where hurricanes and wind storms and tornadoes have caused a tremendous amount of property damage, but more importantly, it's caused a loss of lives. i think it's estimated that every year there's about 80 deaths and 1,500 injuries. i think in 2011, there was 551 fatalities. this is not particularly a good year, and unfortunately, we're kind of off to a rough start this year. so what makes sense is to take research and technology and figure out ways to incorporate into our construction techniques a way to protect both the people that have has been at a time those far settle, but also to protect and

mitigate the damages. the chairman mentioned it costs billions of dollars worth of damage. and if we can mitigate that, it's obviously saving that money not only for the taxpayers, but the people that own those properties. 'm particularly delighted to see the great panel that we have today, particularly my od friend for a long time, from texas tech, for his pioneering work on the mitigation of wind. with that, there's reason that i introduced in 2004 the national windstorm impact reduction act basically to try to coordinate all of the research that's going on and mack sure that wonderful things i feel very strongly about is that it's one thing to do the research, but then we have to commercialize and use the research. i think one of the things we've seen is a lot of the research that has been done across the country has been able to be

commercialized, and i'm hopeful to hear more about that today. but basically there's another thing that i think is important, and that is to make sure that we're fshtly using the taxpayers' money. so many times we've seen in agencies, everybody kinds of has their turf, and since the we understand issue has a lot of dvent parts to it, it makes sense to make sure there's coordination going on among the various participants that are involved in that. and so this bill, i think, is going to help protect lives. i think it's going to reduce property losses. but more importantly, also make sure there's good coordination so that when we do come up with good ideas, that we can make sure we commercialize them and utilize that information in the future. and so, mr. chairman, thank you so much for having this important hearing, and i look forward to hearing from these witnesses. >> thank you. we have a panel of witnesses before us who can articulate what it will take to cut down on the economic impact and lives lost from these storms.

i would like to extend my appreciation to each of the witnesses for taking the time and effort to appear before us today. we look forward to your testimony. i now recognize miss wilson for her opening statement. >> thank you for holding today's hearing on the national windstorm impact reduction program. or nwirp. i'd also like to recognize the ranking member on our committee nwirp directs four federal agencies to conduct coordinated research and development on the nature of wind storms, their effects, and on ways to mitigate their impact. the program also calls on these agencies to make sure this research is translated into practice. this work has led to advances in monitoring the design and construction of buildings and

increased awareness and preparation by the public, but there's still much more to be done. regrettably, consideration on this program is timely, as our thoughts and prayers go out to the people of moore, oklahoma, who are putting the pieces back together after a massive tornado ripped through their community just two weeks ago. as a floridian and survivor of hurricane andrew, i know firsthand that natural hazards are a leading threat to americans' economy and americans' lives. in recent years, americans have seen flooded subway stations in new york city, earthquake damage in the nation's capital, the great american city of new orleans submerged under water, unimaginable devastation in joplin, missouri, and now entire nabbeds in oklahoma flattened to -- and now entire neighborhoods in oklahoma flattened to the ground. there hasn't been a record number of zasters in the united

states over the last two years, and 2011 was the deadliest year on record for tornadoes with over 550 fatalities. while we cannot stop a hurricane or a tornado from happening, we should do all that we can to make sure our communities have the tools they need to respond and recover from such an event. we as a nation must invest in preparedness and resilience. study of fema's programs have shown that for every dollar we invest in mitigation activities, we save $3 to $4 in recovery costs. nwirp has the potential to dramatically bolster the resiliency of our communities and reduce the costs associated with disaster recovery. unfortunately, experts have expressed concern that insufficient funding has negatively impacted the implementation of the program, and we are missing out on low-cost mitigation opportunities.

because of this, die have some concerns with the legislation we're considering today. first, the bill cuts the authorization levels for the program by 14%. second, it locks in this lower funding level for the duration of the bill. we don't have any reason to believe the agencies need any less money to carry out the responsibilities we assigned them the last time we authorized this program. when we consider the devastating losses that have plagued the united states recently, this course of action seems irresponsible. that is why i introduced the bipartisan version of the natural hazard risk reduction act, which will provide the program with an authorization level more appropriate to the task. this legislation passed the 111th congress and also reauthorizes the national earthquake hazard reduction program. while they are different, there

are also commonalities and occasions where we should leverage resources. this committee has an important role to play in helping americans prepare for and recover from all natural hazards. by reauthorizing both of these programs, we can minimize the number of americans who are harmed or killed by natural disasters or who have to face the challenges of putting their homes, businesses, and communities back together. i look forward to working with my colleagues to make our communities more disaster resilient. thank you again, mr. chairman, for holding this hearing, and thank you to the witnesses for being here today. i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you, ms. wilson. the chair recognizes ms. johnson for an opening statement. >> thank you for holding today's hearing to examine the

national windstorm reduction program. the last few years have been devastating years for natural disasters in this country. we experienced the deadliest and most destructive tornado season in u.s. history in 2011. unfortunately, the trend continues this year with massive tornadoes in oklahoma and in my home state of texas. we've also had earthquakes in areas that don't usually experience earthquakes, including virginia and oklahoma . there was wide spread destruction and death along the eastern seaboard. this committee has an important role to play in minimizing the number of americans who are harmed or killed by natural disasters or who have to face the challenge of rebuilding their homes, businesses, and communities. by reauthorizing the national windstorm reduction program, we can reduce the vulnerability of

our communities to disasters. therefore, my fellow texan has been a champion in this work and he has introduced legislation to reauthorize this important program. i want to express my support for the legislation recently introduced by congresswoman wilson, which i'm cosponsoring, the national hazard risk reduction act of 2013. we authorize both the wind-related program and the national earthquake hazard reduction program. believe we need to take a multiple hazardous approach to disaster mitigation, and this would link these two critical programs to the establishment of a single interagency coordinating committee, creating opportunities for synergy among the various research activities. i also don't believe we should prioritize one hazard program over another, as they're all

important to the producing communities that are resilient o any and all disasters. as a result, i hope as we move forward with legislation, we consider all of the hazard program within the committee. and finally, it is clear that other agencies have not gotten the resources they need to carry out all of the responsibilities assigned to them by the congress. thus i'm concerned by what's proposed in the legislation that is the topic of today's hearing. we simply can't afford to have these agencies miss opportunities to implement low-cost mitigation. in the end, strong and effective hazard reduction programs will not only save lives and properties, but also provide us with meaningful cost savings. thank you, mr. chairman, and i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you, ms. johnson. if there are members who wish to submit additional opening

statements, your statements will be added to the record at this point. now i'd like to introduce the witnesses. our first witness is dr. ernest keyswing, a professorful civil engineering at texas tech university, an executive director of the national storm shelter association. he has had a long career with texas tech university, serving as chairman of the civil engineering department, and as an associate dean of engineering for research. he leads the storm shelter research effort within the wind science and engineering research center at texas tech. dr. keyswing received his m.s. in mechanical engineering from texas technological college and an m.s. and ph.d. in applied mathematics from michigan state university. our second witness is deborah bayland. the general counsel and senior vice president for public policy for the insurance institute for business and home safety.

she has also worked with the american insurance association and the university of colorado's advisory committee for the hazard center. she graduated with a j.d. from harvard law and a.b. degree from princeton university. thank you. our final witness is dr. david privet, an assistant profe at the university of florida. he has been with the university of florida's department of civil and coastal engineering since 2007. his research focuses on the mitigation of extreme wind damage to low rise construction. he's a member of the american society of civil engineers, on the board of the american association for wind engineering, and a member of the u.k. wind engineering society. dr. prevatt received his ph.d. from clemson university. welcome. our witnesses should note open testimony is limited to five minutes each, after which members of the committee have five minutes each to ask

questions. your written testimony will be included in the record of the hearing. i now recognize our first witness for five minutes. >> thank you. distinguished committee members, i thank you for the opportunity to be here. y done a good job of -- you've done a good job of outlining both the problem and potential solutions and point to one of the major problems that we face in not only lack of funding, but lack of continuity in funding to do the research we need to do. not just the loss of lines, but the anxiety -- loss of lives, but the anxiety that comes from severe tornadoes and hurricanes. i will speak primarily on storms -- storm shelters or safe rooms. i