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“EMERGENCY RELIEF” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Transportation was published in the Senate section on pages S181 on Jan. 22, 1996.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
EMERGENCY RELIEF
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, during the course of the past few days, I have been touring Pennsylvania looking at very, very extensive damage from the heavy snows and from the flood.
Earlier today I came from Harrisburg, where I was present with my colleague, Senator Santorum, looking over the tremendous damage which has been inflicted at several points from the swollen Susquehanna River. It is a very distressing sight. The walk bridge which spans the Susquehanna from Harrisburg over to the island has been destroyed in part. Many houses have been destroyed. My staff director of northern Pennsylvania, Tom Bowman, in Potter County, has several feet of water in his basement. His furnace is ruined. Appliances are ruined. And that is characteristic as well and has been going on over all of the State.
On Saturday early, I flew to Pittsburgh, where I met Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge looking at the tremendous devastation and destruction which is present there. At Three Rivers Stadium, at the confluence of the three rivers in Pittsburgh, water was all the way up to the Hilton Hotel and was extraordinarily serious.
Later on Saturday, I saw the swollen Susquehanna in Wilkes-Barre, where some 100,000 people had been evacuated, and the flooding had spread through Pennsylvania, and what a very, very serious situation it is.
As of this morning, only 6 counties had been declared disaster areas in Pennsylvania, which I found just a little surprising. On Saturday, I talked to Mr. James Lee Witt, who is the FEMA national director. Mr. Witt was on the job and promised to have the emergency declaration promptly executed. And, in fact, it was done on Sunday morning, with some question, some misunderstanding, perhaps, about how fast the facts and figures got through. But as of this morning, only 6 counties had been declared a disaster area, and 19 counties were added. Yet, we do not have all the appropriate counties identified.
In western Pennsylvania, Beaver County, immediately north of Allegheny County, was not declared a disaster area. I can attest personally to the disaster there. Nor was Greene County so declared. It is important that those counties be extended, and that the Federal emergency relief be moved in there very expeditiously on temporary housing, on the grants that are available, on the low SBA loans which are available, and on the extension of unemployment compensation when people lose out on their work because of this flood damage.
I might share with you one factor as to how serious the situation is. I declared this with my distinguished colleague, Senator Santorum. But on the banks of the Susquehanna earlier today, Senator Santorum said that he hoped FEMA would be ``liberal.'' But I quickly modified that to
``moderate.'' There we have the ``L'' word from Senator Santorum. May the Record show a smile coming to the face of the distinguished Presiding Officer. But it is that serious that a call has been made for that kind of treatment by the Federal management corps.
As I have earlier today on some of the radio networks, I would like to repeat the 800 number which people can call for assistance. They can make application by telephone. It is 1-800-462-9029. I will repeat that. It is 1-800-462-9029, where applications can be made on the phone.
Yesterday, I also talked to Secretary of Transportation Pena, who has advanced $1 million for highway cleanup and bridge cleanup, and urged that a more realistic figure be assessed because of the tremendous damage done to the highways and bridges in Pennsylvania.
Last year, the Congress appropriated $6.4 billion largely for the earthquakes in California but also for emergencies such as are now plaguing Pennsylvania and many other States in the mid-Atlantic area where we sustained a snowfall 2 weeks ago today of 30 inches. In Philadelphia, it measured 30.7 inches. And then with the high temperatures last Thursday into the sixties, with the tremendous melting and flooding, there is a very serious situation indeed. So I urge FEMA and the Department of Transportation to take all action possible to bring relief to those people who are in need of emergency assistance.
I thank the Chair, and in the absence of any other Senator in the Chamber, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bennett). The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SANTORUM. I thank the Chair.
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