National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012

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AMENDMENT OFFERED BY MR. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. I have an amendment at the desk, Mr. Chairman.

The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will report the amendment.

The Clerk read as follows:

At the end of the bill (before the short title) insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used for the new construction, purchase, or lease of any building or space in the District of Columbia except where a contract for the construction, purchase, or lease was entered into before the date of the enactment of this Act.

The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Texas is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. GOHMERT. Under this amendment, no funds would be made available by this act for the new construction, purchase, or lease of any building or any space in the District of Columbia except where a contract was entered into before the date of the enactment.

Now, in the District of Columbia right now, the Federal Government had exactly 304 leases at the start of this year. These leases cover more than 23.6 million square feet. This bureaucracy has grown beyond the bounds of being reasonable.

The Federal Government, in addition to the 23.6 million square feet that it leases, also owns 109 buildings in the District of Columbia, and that doesn't even include all of the Department of Defense buildings because those are administered by other than the GSA. The 23.6 million square feet come at a cost of around a billion dollars every year to the taxpayer.

Here we are in financially troubling times, and we need to send a message back to America we know you're tightening your belts. We know that States and municipalities are having to tighten their belts, and we get it here, also.

The Appropriations Committee and the chair is to be applauded. They have done a wonderful job on this bill. There is an amount zeroed out for new building space in a specific area of this bill. It takes that good step and goes one step further and says no funds made available in this act can be used in any way for construction, for lease or building out any space in the District of Columbia.

It also should be noted that every cubicle, every desk we add in the District of Columbia ends up requiring States and municipalities to add space there. They have to put somebody in that space, because every time we add a desk with a bureaucrat behind it in the District of Columbia, they have to justify their existence. They have to create requirements for people back in the States or in the municipalities to respond so that they can justify their existence in the District of Columbia.

The Federal funds that might be used for new construction or new leases to add to the 23.6 million square feet of space already under lease and the 109 buildings, not even including the Department of Defense buildings, that money could be better spent reducing the Federal deficit or protecting our homeland in other ways.

Let's let America rebound. Let's let America build back before we build or lease one more square foot in Washington, DC.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

The CHAIR. The gentleman is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, this amendment would prohibit any funds in this bill to be used for new construction, purchase, or lease of a new building or space in Washington, D.C., in fiscal year 2012, the life of this bill. If adopted, this amendment, as I read it, would or could do several things.

First of all, it would not allow DHS to renew leases in the Washington, D.C., area, which means the leases would lapse, leaving DHS employees without offices to work in, and subjecting the Federal Government to lawsuits because the lessors would have no choice but to begin litigation for damages, to include costs to evict and lost rent.

The amendment might require DHS to break current construction contracts due to a lack of funds if a new purchase or lease is required. It would not permit the GSA to condemn facilities that the DHS occupies if that were necessary. Therefore, it would force DHS to maintain occupancy until follow-on leases might be executed in 2013, or further down the road, or alternative space could be identified and prepared for use.

The amendment, as I read it, might not permit DHS even to reconfigure its current facility space to provide seats for the new staff being hired, particularly for some of these new functions that are going to require reconfiguring, such as cybersecurity and intelligence missions.

And then we need to ask, Mr. Chairman, what happens if a DHS facility in D.C. has a fire or a flood and we can't use it? This amendment would prevent, as I read it, rebuilding if a new construction contract was required as part of that rebuilding, as of course it might well be.

So the questions just go on and on. This is not a well-advised or wise amendment. It's far-reaching. It has negative implications. I urge its rejection.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DICKS. I move to strike the last word.

The CHAIR. The gentleman from Washington is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. DICKS. If I could ask the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert), the sponsor of the amendment, a question.

Why just the District of Columbia? You know, there are Federal buildings in Virginia and Maryland, surrounding the whole area. Why just the District of Columbia?

Mr. GOHMERT. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DICKS. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. GOHMERT. Well, the intent is that since this is where so much construction and leasing has been done, that that's where it needs to stop, that the bureaucracy here in Washington has expanded to the point that this was a good place to draw the line. If the gentleman is wishing to extend that across the country, you know----

Mr. DICKS. I am not interested in that. I just want to make that clear. But I was interested why just the District of Columbia when this whole area here has many different government buildings, both in Maryland and in Virginia, which are proximate to the District of Columbia?

Mr. GOHMERT. If the gentleman would like to add those to this amendment, I would be glad to accept that.

Mr. DICKS. Let me also ask the gentleman on the point that Mr. Price made about leases: Do you see that a situation would occur that if a lease is expired once this amendment was enacted and signed into law--I doubt that it will be--but that an agency couldn't redo a lease? And what would you do in that situation if you couldn't build office space or you couldn't lease office space? You would have to leave the District of Columbia.

Mr. GOHMERT. If the leases were appropriately drafted, then normally they would have an option for additional time. That under this amendment would mean that that was a contract entered into prior to the enactment of this bill. So that wouldn't be a problem. If it is a major lease expiring, then heaven forbid but they would actually have to come back to Congress, and it would be a form of sunset, for them to justify why they need to have a new lease. I think it's a great way of having oversight over groups that don't have their own building. We've leased a massive 23.6 million square feet of space. Let's sunset some of that or otherwise justify why you need another lease.

Mr. DICKS. Reclaiming my time, I feel that Mr. Price has the better argument here, and I urge defeat of this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

The CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

The question was taken; and the Chair announced that the noes appeared to have it.

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

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