Mr. MCCAIN. Mr. President, I congratulate my respective colleagues on both sides of the aisle for successfully completing work on this important spending bill. I regret that I was not able to be here to vote on the final Energy and Water conference report for fiscal year 2000.
The conferees deserve credit for their notable efforts in forging this conference agreement and continuing funding for the Department of Energy, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Bureau of Reclamation and other critical energy programs important to our nation. I am disappointed to say that, just as this final report ensures that necessary functions and programs of the Federal Government are funded, the practice of pork-barrel spending also continues.
When the Senate passed its version of the energy and water appropriation bill just 2 months ago, I found $531 million in low-priority, unnecessary, and wasteful spending. While a half a billion dollars is an incredible amount of pork, it is remarkable that this final conference report has been fattened up with an additional $200 million in pork barrel projects.
A lot of this pork is concentrated in sections of the bill detailing projects to be funded by the Army Corps of Engineers. While I am certainly supportive of our water infrastructure and civil works programs, I am appalled at the process by which the conferees have directed money in these accounts. A majority of the projects do not appear to be funded based on a competitive or merit-based review, but instead funding is clearly directed toward projects which are not requested in the budget and more closely resemble special interest projects.
We sought to curb Federal spending and reduce our tremendous deficit by passing the 1997 Balanced Budget Act. However, because we now enjoy a robust economy and balanced budget, we have detracted from our important goal of spending tax-payer's hard-earned dollars prudently.
A clear example of this fiscal irresponsibility is exemplified by the "emergency spending" bills we have enacted over the past two years. Why did we have to pass these supplemental appropriations bills? Because those areas of the country which are not the recipients of these special interest earmarks are suffering because there is not a realistic chance to compete for federal funding through established normal procedures and guidelines when budgetary spending is based more on parochial actions.
Over the years, I have reported to the American taxpayers the pork-barrel spending that continues through our annual appropriations process. I believe we owe it to the American public to report how we spend their taxpayer dollars. Sadly, the taxpayers will have to shoulder the burden of financing pork barrel projects to the tune of $759 million included in this energy and water spending measure.
I will not waste the time of the Senate going over each and every earmark. I have compiled a list of the numerous add-ons, earmarks, and special exemptions in this conference report. Due to its length, the list I compiled of objectionable provisions included in this conference report cannot be printed in the RECORD. This list will be available on my Senate webpage.