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| May 5, 2018 | View Online |
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April 28
FAA Reauthorization: One postscript here on Saturday with regard to the FAA bill that passed last week. My office offered three amendments and cosponsored one more for consideration, all of which were ruled germaine, and at the end of the day, all passed and were included in the bill. Let me highlight just one of those. There’s a one minute video clip below that gives an incredibly brief look at what it did...but what I would argue is that it did common sense, though sadly the most we could get enacted was a study of the problem...rather than change to the problem. All too often, that’s the first step at change in Washington. You get a study by one of the government accounting offices that looks at a problem, and then you use that study as evidence on the House floor to prove that it’s not your opinion but a fact that the question at hand needs to change. It’s once again a reminder of how slowly the wheels of government can work. The amendment ordered a Government Accountability Office study into the airports who divert revenue away from its intended purpose. The point of this amendment is to ensure that federal dollars going to airports are in fact being spent on airports. Take a look above, and tell me if you don’t think this should change….
April 30
May 1
May 3 GAO Waste and Inefficiency Report: “When things don’t work in the government, a new thing is created and the old thing remains.” That’s what Comptroller General Gene Dodaro said to me last week at an Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing discussing the Government Accountability Office’s eighth annual report on waste and inefficiency in the federal government. What that means, essentially, is that inefficiency and duplication seems to be baked into the government cake to a certain extent. It’s one of those things that really frustrates me about the ways in which the federal government wastes taxpayer dollars. That’s where this report comes into play. By highlighting those areas where there is duplication and overlap, the report works to remove it. Indeed, since 2011, the federal government has saved about $178 billion through implementing GAO recommendations...even though only 76% of the recommendations have been fully or partially addressed. If you want to give it a read, here’s the link for it: https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/691514.pdf. This is not to say there’s not huge room for improvement here...the report even suggests 68 action items. Added to those suggested actions that have not yet been fully addressed, this could mean tens of billion in savings! As a member of OGR, I had the opportunity to speak on the report and discuss some of its finer points. If you’ve got a moment, give it a watch.
May 4 Make Schools Safe Again Act: Here are an amazing couple of numbers…45, 39, and 23. Any guesses? 23 is the number of times that Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel acknowledged deputies were dispatched to the Parkland shooter's home over the last six years. 39 is the number of times that the media found that public records showed the deputies had been dispatched over the last six years. 45 is the number of times that the public records show deputies had been dispatched over the last ten years. In addition, the shooter, Nikolas Cruz, was reported for assault at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, had a cousin call the Sheriff’s Department and request they take his weapons from him, and there were a variety of anonymous tips suggesting he might become a school shooter. Yet amazingly, this school and many others across the country have agreements between the county and its local police that encouraged the police to not report or arrest students for criminal activities. These are hardly the lessons that one would want to see taught in school because one of the fundamental lessons in life is that there are consequences for all that we do. We reap what we sow. When our boys went off to school every day, my expectations were pretty simple: learn, study, friends, extracurriculars...essentially, get prepared for life as an adult. If there was an issue at their schools, I anticipated that it would be dealt with appropriately. A student cheats on a test, they get detention. Students get into a fist fight, they get suspended. A student commits a crime, they get expelled...and the necessary authorities are called. All these actions should simply be standard operating procedure...because it would protect both the school and its students. I am certainly one to advocate for second chances, and indeed, I think that allowances can and should be made for kids making bad choices. However, a crime is still a crime no matter your age. In that vein, I recently joined as an original cosponsor of the Make Schools Safe Again Act introduced by Congressman Glenn Grothman. This bill would prohibit agreements between schools and law enforcement agencies that encourage the non-reporting of students’ criminal activities. I put out a press release and share it here.
Around the District...
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