they come back for legislative work on tuesday, january 7. the senate is out except for until monday,as january six. as recess continues, cnn out with a poll on people's views of congress. two thirds of people polled in the u.s. say the current congress is the worst in their lifetime, some 70% of people saying that. now live to the house floor. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: the speaker's room, washington, d.c., december 26, 2013. i hereby appoint the honorable fred upton to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. signed, john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the prayer will be offered by the est chaplain, reverend david

geleski, u.s. jesuit conference, washington, d.c. the chaplain: gracious and life-giving god, we come to you today in the midst of the holiday season, a time for joyful gatherings with friends, family members and other loved ones in a time for recalling the blessings we have had received. we are mindful and grateful for the many gives you have bestowed on us, both as individuals and as a nation, especially the gift of freedom, the gift of our abundant natural resources and the gift of opportunities to pursue our hopes and aspirations. we pray for your continued blessings on our country and on those in positions of leadership and governance, especially in this house of representatives. bless all its members with wisdom and understanding to discern how best to serve the people of these united states,

to promote the common good, to provide for our nation's security and to work for justice and peace for all people. amen. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to section 6-a of house resolution 438, the journal of the last day's proceeding is approved. the pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentleman from the good state of maryland, mr. hoyer. mr. hoyer: i ask all members to join me. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays before the house a privileged concurrent resolution. the clerk: senate concurrent resolution 30, resolved, that when the senate recesses or adjourns on any day from

friday, december 20, 2013, through tuesday, december 31, 2013, on a motion offered pursuant to this concurrent resolution by its majority leader or his designee, it stand adjourned until 11:45 a.m. on friday, january 3, 2014, or until the time of any reassembly, pursuant to section 2 of this concurrent resolution, whichever occurs first. and that when the house adjourns on any legislative day from monday, december 23, 2013, through tuesday, december 31, 2013, on a motion offered pursuant to this concurrent resolution by its majority leader or his designee, it stand adjourned until 11:00 a.m. on friday, january 3, 2014, or until the time of any reassembly, pursuant to section 3 of this concurrent resolution, whichever occurs first. section 2, a, the majority leader of the senate or his designee, after consultation

with the minority leader of the senate, shall notify the members of the senate to assemble at such place and time he may designate if, in his opinion, the public interest shall warrant it. b, after reassembling, pursuant to section a, when the senate adjourns on a motion offered pursuant to this subsection by the majority leader or his designee, the senate shall again stand adjourned, pursuant to the first section of this concurrent resolution. section 3, a, the speaker or his designee, after consultation with the minority leader of the house, shall notify the members of the house to areassemble at such place and time he -- reassemble at such place and time he thinks the public may warrant it. b, after per suent to subsection a, when the house adjourns by the speaker or his designee, the house shall again stand adjourned pursuant to the first section of this concurrent resolution.

the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the concurrent resolution is agreed to. for what purpose does the gentleman from maryland rise? mr. hoyer: reserving the right to object. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is reserves -- reserves the right to object. and the gentleman is recognized. mr. hoyer: i thank the speaker. arguably, mr. speaker, this congress is the least productive one in which i served over the last 33 years. both from a humanitarian standpoint and an economic one. this congress has earned the disdain of the american people, irrespective of their party affiliation. i rise, mr. speaker, specifically to express my and the democratic minority's strong objection to adjourning this first session of the 113th congress without extending unemployment insurance eligibility or the 1.3 million americans, including 20,000 military veterans who will lose

that support in just 48 hours. this number, mr. speaker, will increase by 73,000 people on average every week that we continue to block extension. that is both a moral outrage and another connelly inflicted ow -- congressional ly infected blow. the congress has extended benefits. it is sadly consistent with our failure to pass meaningful jobs legislation proposed by the president. it is, sadly, consistent with our failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform which is broadly supported by business, labor, farmers, farm workers and an overwhelming number of religious leaders and members of the faith community.

it is, sadly, consistent with our failure to pass a farm bill which could give confidence to those in dire need of help putting food on their family's table that this congress will not abandon them. and ironically, mr. speaker, we do so at the very time that our nation celebrates a message of giving and hope. all this we leave undone. after passing a so-called , whose only mise virtue was it was slightly better than the draconian and irrational sequester, condemned on both sides of the aisle, mr. speaker, as unworkable, unrealistic and ill-conceived. and so a so-called compromise that will be tested in just a few short weeks and which failed to assure that pleark will pay its -- america will

pay its bills in the months ahead. mr. speaker, if i thought objecting to this motion to adjourn by unanimous consent would lead to extension of unemployment for the 1.3 million americans who have been unable to find work or to a house leadership bringing to the floor issues that i've listed, i would object to this house adjourning with so much of the people's work undone. such an , mr. speaker, objection would have no such effect. i and my party deeply regret that reality, and mr. speaker, we will return in january, 2014, urging our republican colleagues to address the needs of so many millions of americans who want us to do the work they sent us here to do. therefore, mr. speaker, sadly,

i withdraw my objection. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman withdraws his reservation. without objection, the concurrent resolution is agreed to and a motion to reconsider is laid on the table. pursuant to clause 4 of rule 1, the following enrolled bills were signed by speaker pro tempore upton on monday, december 23. the clerk: h.r. 623, an act to provide for the conveyance of certain property located in anchorage, alaska, to the national tribal health consortium, an act to amend the policy act of 2005 to modify the pilot project offices of the federal permit streamlining project. h.r. 2319, an act to clarify certain provisions of the native american veterans memorial establishment act of 1994. h.r. 3304, an act to authorize

appropriations for fiscal year 2014 for military activities of the department of defense for military construction and for defense activities of the department of energy to prescribe military personnel strength for such fiscal year and for other purposes. h.r. 3343, an act to amend the district of columbia home rule act to clarify the rules regarding the determination of the compensation of the chief financial officer of the district of columbia. h.r. 3487, an act to amend the federal election campaign act to extend through 2018 the authority of the federal election commission to impose civil money penalties on the basis of a schedule of penalties established and published by the commission to expand such authority to certain other violations and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, pursuant to senate concurrent resolution 30, 113th quong, the house

stands adjourned until 11:00 a.m. on friday, january 3, >> a live look at the u.s. capitol. last week, the architect of the capital, stephen ayres, held a

press conference to provide an update on the $60 million project. >> good morning, thank you all for coming. my name is justin kiefer. i am the senior communications specialist for the architect of the capital, specifically on the dome restoration project. today, mr. ayers will comment on the project and answer a few questions. all that documents, photos, and videos are available on our website. let's present mr. ayers, architect of the capitol.

>> thanks costa -- thanks, justin. thank you all for being here. take you for your interest in the capital dome project. as architect of the capitol, what an awesome responsibility it is to preserve these beautiful, iconic, and treasured buildings the american people and the congress have entrusted to our care. none of them is more important than this beautiful capital dome. i thought today we would talk a little bit about the restoration of the dome. let me start maybe with a little bit of history to set at in context. this is a photograph of when the capitol building was complete and ever went it was complete in 1924. then, of course, westward expansion happened and more senators and more members of congress and the congress outgrew this wonderful capital building. thomas eustig walther came on board and design the extension

to the capital. there have been two domes atop the capital. this first don't by charles beaufinch, architect of the capitol, was made of wood and copper. reading the history, the congress was so concerned about the number of very significant fires in the capitol building at the time and wanted to get rid of that potential fire hazard. that is one of the reasons that led to this new cast-iron and fireproof dome. this is a photograph by thomas eustig walter that he hung in his office while the wings of the capital were under

construction. he was never commissioned to design a new don't but he thought with the capital nearly doubling in length that the old dome was out of scale and also this consensus that we needed to have a much more fireproof capitol building, he designed this new dome and honk this drawing in his office -- and honk is drawing in his office and members of congress would see it and were enamored with it. that quickly led to the first appropriation for the capital dome. here are some of walter's drawings of that wonderful cast- iron dome that he designed to make it look like masonry but it is fully of cast-iron. it is two domes. there is an inner cast-iron dome and outer cast-iron dome. you can see in the drawing on the right that not only are

these working drawings of the time am a are really pieces of artwork today. they are beautifully drawn and water colored as well. he received an initial $100,000 appropriation for the dome. he quickly commenced design and construction work. here is the cast-iron dome being constructed in the midst of the civil war. i'm sure you know the story that during the civil war, the contractor and the supplier of the cast-iron and the builder was notified that they could no longer be paid for their work and they should stop work. with over one million pounds of cast-iron sitting on the ground in front of the capital, they decided they were going to continue working. president lincoln picked up on that fact and made a great analogy that if the construction would continue, so will our union. as we commence this restoration of the dome, it has not and done in 50 years. this is a photograph of the last restoration of the dome from 1959-1960.

you can see the red color of the priming material that was used at the time that -- and the dome was scaffolded at the same time that the east front was extended. we have been studying the condition of the dome and studying the condition of the various cracks for well over 10 years. i reflect back in 1991, there was a major water leak into the rotunda that led to an intensive study of the condition of the dome that led to a master plan for dome repairs in the mid- 1990s and during that time, there was some three or 400 cracks we were able to identify. we were inspecting it every two or three years and the number of cracks grew and grew. as late as 2012, there were nearly 1300 cracks and broken

and missing pieces of the cast- iron shell of the dome. it's important to note that these were water leaks into the dome and water and cast-iron does not work well together. that process of water incursion and cast-iron continues to rust and rust and make conditions worse. with nearly 1300 cracks and we see the pace of cracking and deterioration accelerating, we thought it was important now after 50 years to intervene and do some preservation work on the dome. here is a few images -- the kinds of things you can see if you hung from the outside of the dome. these things are very difficult if not impossible to see from the ground. you see many of these pieces in

front of you and very significant cracking of the cast-iron panels and ornamentation. here is a piece of an acorn, a decorative piece, that is on the capital dome and some of the decoration around the acorn that has fallen off. we have well over 100 pieces that have fallen or we have taken off the dome to keep it safe. another example of a series of cracks, many of them from previous repairs in 1959 or 1960 and many of them from just the accelerated deterioration from the cast-iron and water process. you can see here some of our inspection work ongoing. we have been doing that for many years now, very carefully watching and monitoring the

condition of the dome and taking pieces off before they would fall to ensure the safety and security of our employees as well as visitors to the capital. we have awarded a construction contract. we did that in october of this year. work is commencing. like any project, as you might do in your home, it is the planning and preparation that probably takes as long as the work itself. our contractor and our team and our team of consultants has been working for a couple of months now, working out the details, awarding subcontracts, making [inaudible] , and making methods of work in that process will continue through the winter months and we would expect to see scaffolding, visible scaffolding going up

this spring. i wanted to show you how these repairs might be made. how would you fix the crack on a piece of cast-iron that is 250 feet up in the air? you can see in the video we are using was called a lock and stitch technique. we will actually drill out the crack and tap each of those drill holes and put in a pin and a series of pins that stitch along the crack and perpendicular to the pins we will put in a series of locks that hold that stitch together. we worked extensively with contractors as well as the national institutes of standards and technology over the course of 10 years to evaluate welding techniques, a wide variety of welding, a wide variety of repair techniques and finally found that this particular technique was the strongest as well as the technique that was most viable when you are working in conditions well over 200 feet in the air.

this is what the dome will actually look like when it is scaffolded this spring. there will be a work area on the north west front of the capital and then a scaffolding built up and bridged over the west front terrace, then network platform built around the base of the dome on the roof of the capital building. then you will see scaffolding going up, rings of scaffolding from the base of the paristol though the [inaudible] these are the sections actual -- actively being worked at the time and they will be taken off 11 or 12 or 13 layers of lead they spain's and that has to be contained -- led-they stood -- led-based paint and that really moved around the dome over the course of two years as we undertake that work. this is what it will look like at night.

much of the work will be happening at night and that's what it will look like. the first thing that you will actually see is this protective piece of fabric going up inside the rotunda. we will build a covered loft way on the floor of the rotunda to protect our visitors and guests and staff as they go about moving back and forth through the rotunda as we install this canopy system. this canopy system will stay in place for the duration of the project. you will still be able to see the apotheosis of washington, the beautiful paintings in the rotunda will be covered for a few weeks as this is installed but then they will be opened back up once it is installed. this is a safety measure, a protective measure, as work is going on on the outer shell of

the dome. this ensures that nothing can happen to anyone inside the dome. that is the first thing you will see in the next month or two after that, we will continue the planning and preparation process and construct the laydown area on the north west front of the capitol and then scaffolding will commence in the spring of 2014. with that, i am happy to try to answer any questions any of you may have. yes? >> how are you going to ensure that the $50 million appropriated for this will be the budget and you will not go

over? >> the best way to ensure that a project stays on schedule is ensuring you have a great plan up front. the time you invest in the planning stage equals the success on the ultimate construction project. we have a really good plan in place. we have a great contractor, a great team of consultants and i think, more importantly, we were able to do a pilot project, the first phase of this, as you may recall, the skirts of the capitol dome was done a year ago. during that pilot and first phase project, we think we learned and mastered how to fix it. we learn the things that could come up that we may not anticipate. we folded all of those lessons learned into our contract today. we are pretty confident that we can get it done in two years and certainly done before the next residential inauguration. >> can you guarantee you will not go over budget? >> guarantee is a big word.

we are pretty confident, i will give you that. thank you. >> a lot of the damage seems to be to the ornamental decorations. is the structure itself sound? has any of that actually fallen off? >> i will address the second question first -- none of the pieces have actually fallen. through our inspections, we have been able to take these pieces off before they actually fall to the ground. none of them have fallen. if they would, they would puncture holes in the upper roof of the capitol building. we have been very deliberate about taking them off before they fall to the ground. the capital is in great structural condition. we have looked at it and had our structural engineering team look at it on several occasions and studied it extensively. it is in great structural condition. it is not in any way unsafe at all. the pieces you see are really ornamental pieces as well as

pieces that create water leaks. it is this water leak that is the real problem. water can get in and it causes continued rust but also water can get in and damage the beautiful frescoes and paintings that are in the rotunda. yes? >> it's one of the most recognizable landmarks we have. what was your concern about how it would look during the renovation project? what additional life do you think you give to the structure by doing this? >> it is one of the most if not the most recognizable symbols across the globe. we were very careful to select a contractor that was going to carefully scaffold the dome. we are not going to do anything that is too artistic.

we think it's that or to spend the money more wisely on repairing the specific cracks and making the best use of the money that has been provided to us. if you saw the images, i think the scaffolding does not look bad. so -- it is certainly not going to be great over the next two years but when we do take the scaffolding back down, the quality of materials that are used in today's construction processes are much better than they were 50 years ago, the epoxies and polyurethanes -- we will get more than 50 years out of this restoration than we did out of the previous one. yes ma'am? >> do you have the name of the contractor?

>> that contractor is turner- smoot, a joint venture between two construction companies. >> what is the status of the funding? have all the monies been appropriated? >> yes, the money has been approved and it is in hand. >> can you talk more about the process of repairing the cracks? you talked about drilling out a damaged area and putting in a pin in the pin would be made out of what material? >> it is steel. i will use a piece of an example. as an example, for a crack like this, there are a series of drill holes. the entire length is drilled out but it is drilled and tapped in a very specific order. you may start here and here and here and here and then you go through a successive series of pin insertions. in the end, the entire length of this crack has a series of pins that create a stitch. these pins are then ground down, smooth but the surface, and then there is a series of locks that

go perpendicular to the stitch this way. they are drilled out and embedded into both sides of the cast iron, ground down, and epoxied and polyurethaned. >> was the contract put out for bid? >> yes, we advertise our contracts on federal business opportunities website and multiple contractors bid on the job. >> number two, what risk are you seed your plan? nothing is perfect but what are you most worried about? >> when you scaffold such a large building, to me, it is the scaffolding system that is probably the riskiest part of this. secondly, a few of the things we learned on the construction of the first phase of this, the skirt phase, is that the