success that was congressman don buyer there. onre will be back next week something called the background check acts. we were looking to see if a would be referred to committee having to do with the national emergency declaration. think we saw that. on the line is a senior writer with "roll call." what exactly is happening today in this area? explain for us? necessarily always see when bills are introduced, there is no requirement, certainly there is a public pronouncement of a bill being introduced, but we expect a joint resolution that was supposed to be dropped today by congressman castro from texas basically on behalf of the congressional hispanic caucus and house democrats that would disapprove of president trump's

emergency declaration with , andct to border security his effort to build a wall at the border with mexico. it is a straightforward one page thet resolution that uses law that set up the national is thecy -- the law that national emergencies act that would provide for some extradited consideration in both the house and senate and probably in simple majorities -- and would probably need simple majorities in both chambers. assuming it was introduced today, it will be 15 calendar days for the house committee to report that out and then it will ,e on the floor sometime later either in the end of february or the beginning of march. host: so which committee would

this be going to, and what do you expect from there. caller: it will probably be in armed services committee matter because they are talking about using defense dollars for the national emergency. veryof this is going to go -- everything will go according to script, let us put it that way. we don't expect to see too much of an issue in the house. there were already 216 original cosponsors as of yesterday afternoon. we expect this will get overwhelming support among house supports, not much among house republicans, but it will get more interesting when it gets to the senate, where we have a ready heard senators like who atollins of maine, an event in south portland earlier this week was basically

saying she would be supportive of such a thing if it was clean and did not include a whole bunch of extra provisions, and the draft text we saw circulating saturda wednesday night from speaker pelosi is in fact the kind of thing i think collins should be a will to support. host: and will point out that this is not just one of those sensitive congress resolutions, this would have the force of law, correct? niels: sure. now, because it would have the full force of law and the relevant supreme court precedent on this from the 1980's, this is a joint resolution that has to go to president trump for either his signature or veto. so, we expect that president trump will veto this if it does in fact get the majority in the house and senate and reaches his desk. when we see the vote happening, particularly on the house floor, the number we will be watching

is probably not that usual roughly 218 number of the majority of the house, we are looking to see whether or not this can get new the two thirds vote needed to overcome a presidential veto. host: put this in context as we wrap up with the debate over immigration, the general debate we have been having in this country over presidential power and executive power and authority. this goes in the same basket of opportunities at least for congress, to assert itself against president trump in particular, but frankly, any president in general. they often have avoided having these debates. it was just recently we had the vote in the house and the senate at the end of the previous congress pushing back on u.s. involvement under the trump

administration in the saudi-led war in yemen. that was an unusual vote in its own right, for that to pass, it is something that will probably be passing the senate and ,eaching president trump's desk which i am fairly certain he will veto, as well; but these disapproval measures have been so seldom used, whether it is for war powers or for national emergencies. these are so seldom successfully used instruments but a lot of us are really going back and forth these powers what are and what the rules are for each specific resolution. the human one, head limited -- yemen one had limited debate, so that maybe raid it

ends up again, with that sort of 60-vote problem in the senate. but in general, this is uncharted water for a lot of us and we are all trying to figure it out as you go along. you much asthank always for joining us for an explanation. short, ittion is very says -- joint resolution by the senate and house of the u.s. congress pursuant to section 202 of the national emergencies act, the national emergency declared by the finding of the president in for permission 9844 is hereby terminated. again, it would have the force of law. we understand this will go to the transportation and infrastructure committee. when hearings begin, we plan to be there for the whole process of in committee and on the floor of the house and senate. all of this is happening, we

believe, in the next couple of weeks. we will take a brief timeout from this edition of the washington journal. when we come back we'll be joined by shelley kimball of the military family network, discussing the state of family housing -- military housing in this country. in the meantime, here are some military housing advocates talking about family experience in military housing. >> i first became aware of the crisis at an air force base where termites fell out of light fixtures into our bed. later at camp pendleton, we lived with pervasive mold issues and unjustifiable mobile charges. the housing staff told me -- termites in your home or to be expected because of the region. at camp pendleton, we were inexplicably charged almost $700 for carpet replacement. stains unseenund

by the net could i under blacklight -- stains unseen by the naked eye. when i disputed the charges, i had no response from the military. thate end brewer advised military families living on the base are essentially powerless in these disputes. during my advocacy and received hundreds of reports from military families of mold growth, rodent and pent infestations, lead and asbestos concerns, cancer clusters in their housing. all of this was too often compounded by the sensitive and sometimes abusive housing staff. with other military families, i have witnessed peeling paint inside and outside the homes at fort belfour, i have felt in the

helplessness of a fellow marine corps spouse as she held her new baby and sobbed as we stood under a collapsing, moldy ceiling in her home at camp lejeune. i listened in horror in camp pendleton as families told of through pacifiers and homes catching fire due to wire issues. i. crawled into an attic at kiefer air force base and measured the intrusion. i. have been to the town halls where families were dismissed and also feared retaliation for reporting their concerns. host: our guest is shelley kimball, research director for the military family advisory network. thank you for joining us. what do you see these days at military housing. shelley: at the military family advisory networks, our mission is to bring the voices of military families and their experiences. with this particular topic, military housing, we tried to

understand their experience. what we are hearing back is that many families experience issues with mold in their homes, pest infestations, structural deficiencies and, how they are trying to find help and find a way to get this repaired and solved. host: the numbers are striking. we will put them on the screen. talked tosurvey and just under 17,000 people living in military housing around the country. respondents had a negative or very negative experience with privatized military housing. 77 companies are referenced, and as we heard, like mold, lead paint, faulty wiring, poor water animals,insects and skunks and squirrels, illnesses with lifelong implications caused by poor housing conditions, requests for remediation were ignored or denied. about the other points, how did

it get to be this way. shelley: we don't know all the details. that is something that all of us who are looking at this, whether it is the senate armed services committee, the housing companies, the department of defense, trying to understand the pathway that got us here. right now our forecasts for all of us is trying to help these families -- our focus is trying to help these families living in a dangerous and unhealthy circumstances. while also trying to understand the path that got us to this point. historyve us a modern on privatization of military housing. when did that start, and in general, how has it been going? shelley: it started about 20 years ago. we understand that the contract lasts 50 years. what we understand is that families -- i can tell you that the reason military families might move to housing and why it is important is convenience,

also, the value. we moved so often, every average.ree years on when he are going into a covenant he and trying to find a place to live, we don't have huge expectations, but we do want to be safe and healthy in our homes. that is what leads our families to military housing. about 70% of military families don't live on military housing, they live on the economy. but for those who choose military housing, it is usually because of needing to be near work, and you're a good school system, or moving so quickly that we just maybe don't know the community very well. viewers, -- advisor let me advise the viewers. we will be hearing from military only in this next segment. please call about the condition of military housing and tell us your stories, things you have experienced or have heard, and what you think is not happening and should be happening in this area. if you live in the eastern are

central time zones 202-748-8000 your number. if you live in the west, the number is 202-748-8001 . again, we are talking about the conditions of military housing and our guest is shelley kimball from the military family advisory network. let us see some pictures on the thatn, the human factor you all are siding. what are we seeing on the screen right now? shelley: this is a family who has some health issues which they attribute to the environment in their home. we had several responses from families who are feeling that. we have heard about doctors environmental fight there's -- environmental factors and tying them to the medical issues. host: from left to right and down below, what are we seeing? shelley: we are seeing ve

nts filled with mold. on the right side, this is carpeting come of it got photos from a military families with we gotarpet photos -- photos from military families with these carpet photos, and how they are duct taping and holding things together on their wall. the heard stories of faulty wiring or outlets falling right out of their walls. host: what is the process for military families to report problems with housing? calley: they would have to maintenance, like you would at any apartment building. you call maintenance and ask them to respond. some of the complaints we hear are that response times, not having someone come, or if they come, they do a cursory glance. pictures, instead of full remediation treatment that would be required for black mold, more simple responses like

spring something on it or just tiling over it. we understand that some of them were scared to complain because of fear of negative impacts on their careers. one congresswoman was asked about military housing, the hearing that happened recently. here's a quick look. >> we know that we have some advertised housing contractors who have not met expectations, and we deal with that base by base. -- one of thehat things that bothered me last week about the hearing was not so much that there were issues with housing. housing is generally better than it was in the 1990's when we went to privatization, but on bases, even where we have had significant problems, major construction and work underway, there were construction deficiencies.

bare minimum is our right to expect prompt and competent maintenance of housing there in. i think there have been some identified issues with that. me last week was that there were a couple of families who said they were afraid of retaliation if they reported a housing problem for their landlord. that the landlord would tell , their boss,er that they were being difficult or something. that really bothered me. that is a leadership issue. as. a result, the chief of staff and byave directed a 100% review the base and wing commanders of housing units where the united states air force -- a 100% review. nothing better than leadership's eyes on whether there is a problem. we have also asked the in specter general to look at our processes for managing housing to see if there are some systemic changes need to make

that was "newsmakers" with air forcelson, the secretary. that will be sunday at 12:30 p.m. shelley: i think getting out there and seeing housing is phenomenal. the families want someone to come and look at this and know real.t is as far as the idea of concern for richer vision, i don't think members of the senate armed services committee could have been clearer about the fact that there will be no tolerance of that. and the leaders of the services, absolutely. i think everyone is in agreement that retribution for reporting something like this will not be tolerated. i am absolutely gratified to hear that richard is in centerville virginia. rich, thank you for joining us. what would you like to say? caller: thank you for taking my call.

a house in jacksonville, north carolina, and i was shocked to find out after the last storm, when talking to people don't dare, that there are retirees and federal workers living in the housing at camp lejeune. when i was in the marine corps, sacrosanct. if you were on active duty, you got an opportunity to live there. now with privatization, it is i think ifines, -- you follow the money on this privatization, he will find out that somebody in a congress or the senate or whatever, supported this whole thing, and we wound up in a situation where money is driving the housing. 20% of the have housing set a side where it is constantly being reworked, like it used to be, so that when there is damage to her house, a

young family does not have to suffer through what these folks are doing. i don't know why, maybe c-span can get, a dig into this whole thing and get some of these people on their in congress with their political allies in the private sector and get somebody held responsible for this. when i found out that there were retirees and federal workers living in active duty housing, i thought -- i thought my head would fall off. helley? shelley: you make a good point that there are civilians in private people living in military housing. from what i understand, they only do that when housing is not full. even in our research, we found. that there were civilian department of defense employees living in housing, but those families are also experiencing the exact same thing that military families are

experiencing with the housing conditions, they are having a hard time, too from washington dc, annie. good morning. thank you for taking my call. i would like to ask the speaker, what is the yearly military budget? what is a budget of the given to the military? what is a division of our tax money that goes to the military in this country this year? shelley: i don't know the figure exactly off the top of my head i think it is $700 billion. is other thing that important to understand about military housing, the allowance for housing goes to the housing management. one of the things you have heard it discussed even among the senators was the idea of allowing families to withhold

their housing allowances if they are having some kind of trouble. a military family doesn't have the same leverage about the average civilian renter might have to say that if they are not getting things repaired, to say -- i will hold back my money. so there has been. talk of that housing allowance being withheld or somehow being used as leverage to get the secretary ofthe defense for sustainment, robert mcmahon, who we will hear from in a moment, wrote in a usa today about all of this. but since privatization has began, they have spent $32 billion. can you put a price tag on what goingded now forward? shelley: having heard so many families stories, i think right now we are looking at the issue, knowing that it is a national issue. respondents from all

across the country. now we are trying to figure out the price tag but we don't know yet.it is it will take a being in every single home, visits, checking what needs to be done and how much it will cost. host: here is the assistant secretary of defense for sustainment at the hearing. >> reconnect what we have to do significantly better. livedose of us who have in military housing before privatization, and i lived in nine different base-owned in my military career, we know privatization was the right decision and the quality of privatized housing is significantly better than when dod managed it. but for more than 70% of our current military population who did not experience the poor housing conditions of the past, this is what they know and expect us to get it right 100% of the time. as you know, 70% of our military members live off-base.

for the 30% to live on-base, i am prepared to offer them a safe, quality home. privatized housing runs at about 85% come those are 2017 numbers, we, as we said before, must and do should do better. partners andith my counterparts in february to talk about the issues we face. it became clear to me from the meeting that we need to focus on three areas -- improve communication, improve upon -- host: a little more about what ,he assistant secretary said writing on that point -- we will increase opportunities for ongoing collective communication and improve our response times

to concerns, to ensure that military families living in safe.ized housing are the greatest asset is our people and we can and will do better. how encouraging is that to you? shelley: incredibly. i would have to say the responsiveness after seeing and hearing these stories has been see.y phenomenal to i think this idea of making sure families are heard is imperative. our response rate on this survey was overwhelming and i attribute that to the fact that families just wanted to be heard. they wanted their stories told. host: we go now to the next caller from texas. caller: i am retired air force that got out a few years ago and my career was all over the world. i only spent two years inside the united states.

the air force is there to take care of the troops, that is the first line of defense. his old job, if the troops are not happy and they are not taking care of, they can't do their job, especially with deployment. take some pictures, simple pictures, go and knock on his door, give them a phone call. this is elevating all the way to a dod level, first shirt are not doing their job. of for sure should come down into the shops, and they should know their troops. apparently, this is not , you know, if this needs to be elevated up to a squadron commanders level, and all the way up to the base level to get it done, do it.

sit until itn't goes all the way to a dod level. .ost: thanks, jim shelley: i think we all agree, it shouldn't have to go this far. it shouldn't have to get to this level to get our families the need.ance they i think coming this far, it means we will drill down and figure out where the issues with communication from the command line to the housing and maintenance, and families? i think this will be resolved, but it did unfortunately have to get to this level. host: reggie knight is calling from norfolk, virginia. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i have a question for your guest. are any of those privatized programs being done under the federal low income housing tax credit program? shelley: i don't know. i know that our fee structure

comes from the basic allowance for housing0. host: why do you ask, regina? caller: that may be the source of your problem, because they are giving private investors a for allegedly putting in money and investing in low income housing and rather than put that money into the housing, they are taking a tax break. but they are not putting it in. so you might want to look into that. kimball?lley shelley: absolutely. i think there are many factors we are all trying to capture and understand so that this does not happen again and we can make sure that our families are living in safe housing. host: what are the implications? if you were to read the policy

-- something happens in my unit, how do i go about getting it fixed about being scared and afraid, and get a quick result for my family? theley: i think that complete command structure here once to hear these stories and wants to know. we are all in agreement and that we don't want this happening, but if for example a series of military families are not feeling heard in that command armedure, the senate services committee hearing, members of congress participating were incredibly vocal about wanting to hear themselves. so at this point i think, telling your story to anyone who will listen is good so we can get it fixed. another point of this structure, an agency like mine that is a nonfederal entity, nonprofit, not connected to those lines, we are always here to listen and help and try to understand what is happening. we are always ready to hear the story. host: when did you start your work, this military advisory

family network? shelley: on this particular issue. >> in general? shelley: we are a five-year-old nonprofit and we have always focused on convening and bringing together partners who are part of these issues so we can work together. we believe strongly in that. we also start everything we do families.ary we have an advisory board made of military families from across the country and we are in our third core port of those groups. we make sure our ears are to the ground, listening to the stories and understanding military life from those frontlines. also, when we hear something from our advisory board, it comes to me and i research it, looking at it from a much larger national level to see what we are hearing. that is what happened here, a perfect example of what our group does. host: reuters put together a study on this about two years ago and pointed out a lot of this.

importantly more did not happen in those two years of that brought us to the table today? shelley: thank you to reuters, they have been doing amazing work at speaking to families and really seeing how this works. we are wondering if perhaps it was sort of the localized stories and not understanding the big picture until right now, until we did our national study. we fielded the study over one week which as a researcher, to get that many responses is shocking. thatit did for us was show i looking at the geolocation of all of these responses, it is everywhere, not just localized. it is not a rare situation, we are seeing it all over. host: on the line from harrison, michigan. caller: good morning. thank you. thank you, shelley, for going to bat for our military families.

what you are bringing up and what is going before the senate now touched a nerve. this for approximately two years. myself and my family, we did not have the mold issues, we had excellent maintenance, but what i did experience is more of a financial hardship. also knowing other families who had financial hardships, the charged unfairly, kind of being locked in knowing that the company that was not the military running base housing, they had their finger on you. they can back it into a corner and say, if this is the amount -- oh, this is what you os owe,his is the amount you this is what you owe us.

i stayed on a particular base, and i would say that maybe 30% of the units were condemned. we did have neighbors who complained about that, they made -- they went to the office, to the private companies, they didn't get anywhere, and it was just the runaround. runaround after runaround, after run around the people who were active duty and lived on base, after they served for many years, they experienced hardship. chargede still being out of their bank account every month. so there are a lot of different aspects to what we're seeing now. so i thank you for what you are doing. i am going to look up your website and see where i fit in, and other stories and other families who i know of.

i appreciate what you are doing for military members and for people who have served. host: thank you for calling, candace. any response? shelley: absolutely, thank you so much, candace, for your comments. what you are saying is similar to what we are hearing. i still have a lot of data to go through and we will be doing so in the next few months. some of those charging issues are in there. i don't know the depth of it that i'm hearing similar stories in interviews with family members about charges for overages, for things, families feeling that they didn't have any recourse, and often, if you think of the family, they are on their way out to get to the next. nation they have to set up shop quickly and bit them have the luxury of time to fix these issues in between those moves, so they do feel stuck. host: marty calling from summerville, south carolina. caller: my husband and i were

retired marines, and back in the 70's when we lived in military housing, through the 80's and there were units that were so magnificently maintained. has sinceaughter married and marine, and when visiting her on military bases, it is absolutely appalling and embarrassing to see the condition of these homes, from the mold and the cracks. she has a horrible problem with utilities, bugs, just regular maintenance, power washing, anything. the quality is terrible. the safety is not good in the neighborhoods. they are not patrolled. the only thing they are good at

is making sure you don't have any pitbulls in your yard. other than that, it is deplorable, and i am excited to be watching the show today and finding out about your open eyes asian, so that i can pass this on to my granddaughter -- -- finding out about your organization, so that i can pass this on to my granddaughter. they are tearing down good quality homes and putting up cardboard boxes. it is awful. i just want to thank you for what you are doing and i hope that the congress will hear you. of references to your website. tell us what you we will find at military infamilyadvisorynetwork.org? shelley: at the top of the website, there is a banner to link to this topic.

we have a lot of other programs, programs for financial literacy and helping families with that. we have a way for you to communicate with us there. have programs about food insecurity among military families, a lot of support service programming and information about to reach of the support that families need. ist: shelley kimball research director at military family advisory network. a coast guard spouse, army sister and air force daughter. do you do have an experience you can tell us about in military housing? >> like the previous color, lived in military housing in the 1970's and 1980's. my dad was in the air force. >> as a coast guard spouse, we have lived on the economy, not in coast guard housing. >> my brother, who retired after

30 years in the army, his family lived in a lot of military housing along the way and we are no stranger to military family life or housing? ? . host:. host: there was this piece posted yesterday, housing survey -- it isry quarters talking about the mainland u.s.. do have anything about overseas? shelley: we do have overseas respondents in the survey. but it was valuable to be looking at. once we get through this data to understand the depths of the issue, we will be able to look at everything we have by location. i will be a what to look at housing in international locations, too. host: how many contractors were involved in privatizing military housing? shelley: i don't know. i know that we had 35 responses companies.gement we knew some of the bigger ones,

but i always leave on open ended questions so that people can tell me, because i know that i don't know everything. we ended up with about 35. these companies also partner. families, itlitary may be challenging to understand who even manages your housing. i really had to peace through it, and i do this for a living, working through these kinds of problems. so i think that will be part of too. host: at the armed services committee hearing last week, which you can watch on the c-span.org, republican member mike brown talk to a group of them in the hearing room, the contractors. let us hear what they had to say. >> did this come to a surprise to any of you? up as probably a surprise about eight or nine months ago. as we peeled it back, it became a bigger and bigger challenge.

i am not panicked to be here today, though i will not say that this is the happiest experience of my life. this is not where i ever wanted to be, getting into this business. i thought we were here committed to taking care of service nation.who defended our again, the idea we have let them down is disturbing to me, and i am here to try to -- ask, after: the me he found out a couple of days ago that you would be coming in front of us, if there was one critical issue that you said, i know they will hit us on, what was top of the line that had to be fixed now? >> the interfacing with the residents? >> communications with our residents and partners. >> the sharing of communications, so that everyone is informed and has the same information set.

>> i think for me, it was allowing invoice for the resident. i think the senator hit on it, they don't feel like they have a place to go. figure out a process where they feel they are represented when issues come up. host: shelley kimball, where did you hear -- what did you hear from the contractors? shelley: perhaps these stories were not reaching them, but i think for our families, we need maintenance help. they need somebody to come fix the problems and respond. what we are hearing from families, they need the outlet to be heard, but they also practically need someone to come and fix the mold or the structural issues. so i think they would be calling for more maintenance help. host: let us go back to phone calls, virginia from oklahoma city, good morning. caller: good morning. have been watching this ever since the election got out of

hand. 2014, i was in my suv and ran over, and i had hurt surgery. i wasjust come out of -- run over by an suv and i just got out of hospital. i feel that the law has been violated against me. i have family in the military housing.e my i love everything that they are doing. if it took me to lose my housing for them to get better, i agree with everything, but a person's life should not be on the line for it. what shelley was saying earlier, sometimes, it throws me into a bind, because before my disability started, my bills or where they were met. i had three obligations. i had three obligations needing

to be paid in a new what i had done, and in a government letter, when they gave me my three security, these obligations were truthful to give me the money to move, because i was in unaffected apartment that had mold in it that was constantly keeping me in and out of the hospital. so i can understand that -- i just don't know -- i just don't run over the system, that is what i am saying. the military. like i said, i had family in the military. but if it took me to lose my section eight to put military family in better housing, i am fine with that. the benefit to take care of yourself. therefore,, --i have no

reason to disrespect the military in no way. i don't appreciate being a target. host: thank you for calling. any thoughts? ? shelley: thank you so much. i think it is hard for all of us to absorb the fact that our families sacrifice and they shouldn't worry about safe, healthy, houses to live in. the: let me read to you opinion of the editorial writers that "usa today." one of the defense officials right -- there is evil in privatization of government functions. those improvements were lost at some point after the military began selling off housing stock 1990's.

property managing executives, including lincoln, their contractor, has vowed to do better. it is not good enough, testifies families suggest that housing allowances paid the landlords to in tune of $3.9 billion 2018, be withheld on a case-by-case basis until the problems are fixed. a fine idea. says, congress should make sure no money is building theto border wall under presidents national emergency declaration. what do you make of those comments? shelley: as far as giving families some sort of financial leverage to make sure this housing is livable, i think the families need something to help them. one thing i keep remaining myself also is that not every part of military housing is terrible. respondents 15% of

say that they have had positive to very positive experiences. i think we often need to look at those places and figure out who is doing good things, so we can use that as a model of improvement. host: the new york times had a story a couple of days ago -- trump diverts military money for the wall for the emergency fund, they write that his plan to send billions dollars more for the border wall than congress approved of, before spending that money, trump should tap money from other defense funds. there are talking about military construction money, about $250 million or something like that. what are your thoughts on that approach. ? shelley: we are not an advocacy organization, so we went to make sure that military families and the effects of any spending on military families lives are looked at. host: let us go to tina in

massachusetts. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to follow up on the earlier lady tried to call about the quality of base housing. when i was in the marines at paris island, the housing was very clean and well kept. . upon transfer to camp smith in hawaii, enlisted personnel enjoyed -- had an apartment with , dishwasher, washer and dryer, beautifully cap up. enlistedjust for personnel, let alone the more elaborate housing that officers have. i am so sad to hear about this deterioration. it is really -- the housing was one of the beautiful benefits of being in the military and i am really sad to hear how things have just deteriorated.

that is really all that i wanted to say. thank you for what you are doing. int: let us go to meg maryland. caller: i have a couple of .hings i would like to know these contractors that do the housing, are they required also to follow all the military laws, as far as housing? because of the contractors were somehow exited out of following laws as far as housing? host: let me try to get an answer to that and that we can come back. shelley: we are trying to see what they are responsible for, but we think they are required to follow those laws. host: what else do you have , med? >> i am a former contracted

sdm rpee, i was a specialist, and our ton of military laws that have to be followed when the military has any people in a research protocols. that data is crucial be collected so that it can be presented to congress and others. i am wondering, are these military families actually enrolled in for the calls themselves? are they considered research subjects? since your person here is considered a research director? shelley: no, they would not be considered research subjects in sense.me academic i will tell you that our research protocol was a purpose to sample much more qualitative and nature. there was no kind of

experimental hypotheses. butsatisfaction ratings were returned with our research are -- we looked at how it compares to the data collection the contractors are doing to try to understand the satisfaction figures. we know that in the contracts, they are required to provide satisfaction ratings back to the dod to make sure families are doing ok, and because we had opposed satisfaction ratings, we know that there are members of congress who want to drill down into the methodology to see how they are collecting information, compared to someone on the outside like our organization. host: leonard in fayetteville, north carolina. caller: hello. of --.prior employee as of tuesday, i lost my job, i and four other employees.

were management and some were maintenance. i am wondering why they are targeting people who work for them to try to make them feel like it was awful, why they are in the situation they are in. we do we. what we are told to do in order to keep our job, and if you go against that, it will be something happening. i have 10 years of experience with that company and what thesetly military wives are talking about, because i have spoken to them myself. host: leonard, what did they tell you when you lost your job? leonard: they brought up an incident that happened back in november about -- i was repairing someone's garage door or i spilled some paint something in the garage and that i did not tell them about it. i didn't tell management, but i

told mightiest supervisor about what happened. so they let me go. about one hour later, i got a phone call from the some guy that worked me out of the job that he was let go plus two other supervisors. wondering what can i do? host: what do you think your next move will be? leonard: i'm thinking about -- i did talk to a lawyer yesterday to find out exactly what i can do, because, after 10 years of working there and spending my time there, i am 67 years old, and i have put time in the military and everything. it is a shame how those people were treated. host: leonard, thank you for sharing your situation with us. any thoughts? shelley: first of all, thank you for calling in. one of the issues.

that members of congress really want to hear, they really want to hear your stories. i think this is absolutely something to share with your representative. we are still fact-finding, still trying to understand the full story here. that may be an outlet for you. . host: we have about four minutes left with our guest. john from wisconsin. caller: john. you callingown are from? john: i am calling from medical on wisconsin. my question was, what geographical area in the united states are most of these places that need repair? answer,fore we get an john, why do you ask? john: i don't believe we have anything up north in wisconsin that is like about. probably most of it is in the west and south of the country. host: can help with that

information? shelley: that is something that we will be able to look at as you look at the data. i can tell you that most of our responses came from the places about.talking we had a heavy contingent in california, texas, florida, virginia, but also places where we have a lot of saturation of military families. sense of what is next for your organization in with of pushing this issue the people you need to push it with. where do you go from here? shelley: we are looking at trying to understand the better.tion rates find the locations which we consider hotspots, where we are fighting the bigger issues. a lot of people responding about particular topics, so that we can pinpoint where there are issues of mold, where there are issues of lead and infestations,

charges, so that we can look at every single spot and know what is happening in the area. that is a party for us for the next two months. so that we can communicate that back to the senate armed services committee and to the services, so we have a plan in place. host: and once you do all that, how might follow up work to make sure what you are finding is actually being acted upon? shelley: i think that is something all of us are looking at. i know that the lines of communication will always be open to our military families to back.d because we have those locations, we will be a little go back in and do surveys, research, focus groups, to see if the needle is moving. host: you mentioned the senate armed services committee. has there been a similar hearing in the house? shelley: not that i have heard, but i know that the senate armed services committee is taking this very seriously.

trying to understand the depth of what we are working with. host: here is a tweet from a viewer -- how is military housing in such a bad shape with the annual increases in the military budget? is it because it is not going to what it is needed, it is going to the military contractor? part of the equation is that the basic allowance of housing is based on location, number of people in your family, rank, a lot of pieces in that number. that number has an effect on markets, on rental markets, housing markets in particular areas. there are a lot of pieces going here. but we also know that there is a range of housing is that in communities who may have really great houses in one section and less great ones in others. so for us the ability is figuring out what happens in every house? shelley. alabamake from allison,

-- anniston, alabama. beler: years ago, we used to faulted for having a draft. draft.t have a so these politicians will go to washington, their sons and daughters and cousins go to college and not the military. so they don't have people screaming in their personal phones, we need help. on the the poor are suffering. we need a draft back, it would solve the veterans issues, the housing issues, a lot of problems. host: perspective from mike. reaction? shelley: i think the key that i will take from mike's comment is the idea of being heard and making sure that even if someone has not served or their family member has not served, we can all be empathetic to someone else's experience. families. military making sure we all understand the military family life and that there are places for all of us.

shelley kimball is research director for the military family advisory network. one more look at that website, it is militaryfamilyadvisorynetwork.or g. their organization is five years old. thank you very much for joining us. shelly: thank you. host: >> in 1979, c-span was a public service by the cable companies.

you continue to bring unfiltered coverage of congress, the white court, publicreme policy events in washington dc and around the country. >> the house will be an briefly. during that time, democrats filed a resolution would block the national emergency proclamation on the southern border. this allows them to use money that was not authorized by congress to build a border wall. that will go to the transportation infrastructure committee. the house is expected to pass the resolution. to senate would be required vote on the measure within 18 days. follow live on c-span. you can watch the senate on c-span2.

thege will will talk about growth of executive power. he's been a critic of president trump. you can see this live from george mason university in virginia. >> c-span has live coverage of the national governors association winter meeting. with the chairay steve bullock on building the workforce of his future. commentator dan jones on criminal justice reform and innovative strategy. j.p. morgan chase chair jamie dimon on the intersection of public policy and the modern economy. by the coverage continues sunday at 9:00 as governors headed to capitol hill.

they discuss education policy. watch the meeting live this weekend on c-span or listen with the free c-span radio out. next discussion on plans to withdraw from afghanistan. we will hear from the consequences. it's hosted by the center for national interest. >> i'm the editor of the national interest. it is my pleasure today to host a talk based on the cover story of the national interest called withdrawal pains. focusing on what would occur if the united states were in fact to withdraw from afghanistan.