Transportation, Housing And Urban Development, And Related Agencies Appropiations Act, 2010

Floor Speech

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Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Chairman, I'm joined in this amendment by Mr. Frank of Massachusetts, Ms. Waters of California, Mr. Watt of North Carolina; and what it actually does is to prohibit the implementation of the Public Housing Community Service requirement that those people who live in public housing are required to put in a certain number of community service hours.

Nowhere do we have where people who find themselves in public housing have to be mandated to do certain hours of volunteer work. Indeed, there's no funds available to enforce this mandate.

The housing authority in the city of New York and other housing authorities around the country think this is a worthless addition and vindictive that is put into the bill.

It does not require section 8 and other people who are recipients of public housing to do this. We have been successful in having it delayed. It should be repealed. We just have not got around to reviewing the entire legislation.

It's not effective. It's not working. It's really an insult to people who donated so much to their country and their community who find themselves in need of housing subsidy, to be mandated, more or less, to provide public service when those people who are able to do volunteer work are doing it anyway.

So I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I say this to my Republican friends that I sincerely wish we had a better balance of parties in this House and in this country. I sincerely wish that the things that we were debating would not be the rich against the poor, but it would be what we could do collectively to make this a stronger country, better educated, better health care, things that we can do to secure us.

It would seem to me that when issues like this come up, that America--you can bet your life--that the minority party, if it concerns the poor, if it concerns people that need some help, if it concerns health, if it concerns education, we can almost depend that they would be walking lock-stock in opposition.

Some of the reasons that they give would appear to be meritorious. But why is it that we always find the opposing party wanting to penalize, wanting to punish, and wanting to show that they have no compassion for those Americans who are less fortunate than themselves?

I do hope that we can find some middle ground, not just to punish the Wall Street activists, which clearly that's rhetorical; but that we can find some way that we can offer something so that the Republican Party would be able to get rid of this terrible stigma they have somehow thrust on them, that if it means compassion, if it means energy, if it means giving a hand out and a hand up, that we can depend on their support.

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Mr. RANGEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Well, judging what the attitude of the gentleman from Arizona believes is national, Federal, or something that should make us proud, I am a little reluctant to debate with him because he has a different idea than I and other Members have.

But I can tell you this: That in the great City of New York, we had immigrants come from all over the world. We have Chinatown, we have Little Italy, we have the Lower East Side, we have the Jewish community. But we also have a place called Washington Heights, and in my opinion, that's where the Statue of Liberty should be, because so many groups came there, raised their kids there and moved to other parts of the city and the country: the Irish, the Italians, Jews, Catholics. But somehow the Dominican Republic is the last one that's had its people come to New York and to America for a better way of life. Unlike most ethnic groups, they didn't have their own Murphy theater, they didn't have a place to go to. They didn't have museums, they didn't have a cultural center. And so it was the community that got together with the not-for-profits. We went to our mayor, we went to our governor, and they came to me. So it was the city, the State and the Federal Government that said, We should anchor a place of culture where kids can go after school, where we have sports, gymnasiums, poets, health care, and some place where the Dominicans can say that in a great country and in a great city and in a great community, they had a place anchored.

So they brought all of these not-for-profits together. We were able to raise money from the private sector, the property was given to us by the city, and we were very, very excited and hoped there would be a place where every Member of Congress, when they have a chance to visit the great city of New York, will say, Show me your city. And we'll take you straight to Alianza Dominicana, and show you that this is the quality of beauty, of culture, that we would hope that you would enjoy as we have so many other centers and museums that we would attempt to show off.

I would want my country and this Congress to be a part of that, and that's why I proudly support this allocation for that purpose.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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