Military Construction and Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2017

Floor Speech

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Mrs. LOWEY. I thank the distinguished ranking member of this committee, Mr. Sanford Bishop, for that very generous introduction.

I would like to thank my good friend on the other side of the aisle, Chairman Dent from the neighboring State of Pennsylvania, for his good work and the partnership that he has made to make this an excellent bill. I also want to thank Chairman Rogers for his leadership and, of course, for the hard work of the committee members on both sides of the aisle who are so critical to this process.

Mr. Chair, the fiscal year 2017 Military Construction-Veterans Affairs bill would allocate $81.6 billion in discretionary funding-- $1.2 billion less than the fiscal year 2017 budget request and a $1.8 billion increase above the fiscal year 2016 enacted level--and allow for several critical improvements, including: the further reduction of the veterans' claims backlog, which has dropped from 600,000 to 74,000 in the past 2 years; $7.8 billion to support outreach, prevention, and awareness to reduce unacceptably high levels of suicide and other mental health challenges among our veterans; a greater focus on the gender-specific needs of female veterans, including prosthetics designed for women and enhancing access to both medical health services; a $32 million increase for medical and prosthetic research; $1.3 billion for family housing construction; and strong oversight of the electronic health records system, requiring that the VA meet key benchmarks throughout the fiscal year and improve interoperability with the Department of Defense.

Mr. Speaker, as I close, I want to again congratulate Chairman Dent and Ranking Member Bishop for you are truly outstanding in making this a good, bipartisan bill.

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