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“SCHEDULE” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Transportation was published in the Senate section on pages S8161-S8162 on July 28, 1997.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
SCHEDULE
Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, for the information of all Senators, it is my hope that the Senate will be able to make a great deal of progress this week. We have a number of votes that already have been agreed to and we have several bills that we may be able to consider before the week is out.
Today it had been my understanding that we would be able to begin consideration of S. 830, the Food and Drug Administration reform bill. I understand that there would be an objection to proceeding to that measure at this time. I certainly regret that. I don't understand why that is the case. I had been told on Friday that, after a lot of laborious negotiations, agreement had been reached.
Certainly we need to pass this legislation. There are very few organizations in this city that are more in need of reform than the FDA which, for years, has been bureaucratic; it has been dilatory; it has delayed access for the American people to medical procedures that clearly should have been approved earlier, that are available in other countries, including Great Britain; they delayed approval of drugs that could mean a great deal of comfort to Americans. At the same time, they have been over trying to push into other areas where they really have no business. So, to say the least, I have a very low regard for the FDA, and they are long overdue for reform.
This legislation has been pending in the Senate both last year and this year. The chairman of the committee of education and labor has reported that bill out. Negotiations have been underway with a number of Senators, including Senator Mack, Senator Frist, Senator Kennedy, and I presume Senator Durbin, and I thought that all had come to resolution. But it appears now that we will not be able to go forward with it at this time. But we will continue to look for an opportunity to get that done this week.
As all Senators are aware, this is the last week of legislative business prior to the August adjournment for our State work periods. There are a number of important issues that will be considered this week, including the conference reports on the budget, Balanced Budget Act of 1997, and the Tax Relief Act. I get a lot of inquiries about that, will we do it or not? Have we reached an agreement with the administration or not?
Negotiations continue; they continued throughout the weekend. There were communications on Friday, meetings on Saturday, a number of communications back and forth between the Congress and the administration all through the day yesterday, all the way up until about 9:15 or 9:30 last night, and there are negotiations underway now with the exchange of paperwork as to exactly what these issues may mean. Some of them are pretty complicated, in terms of the formulas that will be used--how do you define a benefits package where the States and the Governors and the legislators have the maximum flexibility in providing the services for the needs of the children in their respective States? But I would have to say, I think we are very close. I continue to be relatively optimistic.
I must say, this agreement on both the spending bill and the tax relief package is worth having. I hope we will continue to try to come to a conclusion today, if at all possible.
We will be completing work also this week on the Commerce, State, Justice appropriations bill as well as the Department of Transportation appropriations bill.
Previous agreement was entered into also last week to complete action on S. 39, the tuna-dolphin bill, early this week. So we expect that sometime in the next 2 days we will have a 30-minute time for debate and possibly a recorded vote, but a vote of some sort on the compromise that was worked out on that issue last Friday.
At 5 p.m. this afternoon, the Senate will begin consideration of the Transportation appropriations bill. We hope to get most of the work done on that appropriations bill tonight, done tonight. There will be no rollcall votes today.
Tomorrow morning the Senate will be scheduled to have a series of votes, or we were scheduled to have a series of votes with debate beginning at 8:30 and votes occurring, I believe, beginning at 9:30, on the Commerce, State, Justice appropriations bill, but we understand that there is a memorial service for Justice Brennan that will be held on Tuesday morning, so it may be necessary to delay these votes and, as always, Members will be notified exactly when that will be. There will be some stacked votes, I don't know right now whether it's 2, 3, or 4, with relation to Commerce, State, Justice. But it will be later in the morning or in the early afternoon, so we can accommodate Senators who would like to attend the memorial service. Then we can complete action on the bill.
I had hoped we would have agreement on the spending and on the tax relief bill early enough that we could actually get started on it on Tuesday morning. It looks like we will not be able to do that, but we still want to get the final votes on the State, Justice, Commerce appropriations bill as soon as we can and be prepared to move swiftly to the budget agreements once they are reached.
I thank all Senators for their cooperation. I know this will be, again, a hectic week. But I believe we can complete 2 more appropriations bills which will put us at 10, leaving only 3 that we would have to work on when we return in September. That is an incredible pace, and I am very pleased with the cooperation that we have had in getting that done. I hope we can continue that. We also, again, hope to complete action on two or three other bills; most important, the budget agreements. When that is completed, of course, we would then have an opportunity to turn to the Executive Calendar also.
Mr. President, I would like to hear from the distinguished Senator from Vermont as to what is the state of negotiations regarding the Food and Drug Administration reform package. I know he has worked very hard on it. We hope to get that done this week. I would be glad to hear his impressions of how we are going to do that.
Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I would be happy to enlighten the body as to where we stand. It is my understanding we have an agreement. However, it appears an objection will be raised if we try to move forward at this time. So, I would just alert everyone that I believe we have an agreement and that we will be able to move forward this week.
There are, as is always the case when you go to bring a measure forward, people who decide suddenly they want to be involved in the process. We will try to accommodate them. I know there are several Members who are out of the country right now and will be back later today. So, I don't intend to call up the FDA Act at this time, but I will, with the indulgence of the President, move forward, I suppose as in morning business, and discuss where we are on the bill.
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