Los Angeles Daily News
Jan 1 2005
Valley’s reps look back at victories great and small!w off
By Lisa Friedman
Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — Forget civics class. In the real world of Capitol Hill
politics, only one thing can make a bill become a law: power.
Those who have it — generally members of the majority party and
politicians who stick around Washington long enough — can boast at
the year’s end about all the new laws bearing their imprint.
Those who don’t — more junior or minority party members — call it a
win when they can get a few paragraphs tacked onto a larger piece of
legislation.
So it went for most San Fernando Valley lawmakers looking back upon
the 108th Congress.
Rep. Howard Berman, D-Van Nuys, described the year as one of more
work than accomplishments — both for Congress as a whole and him
personally.
“No one could say this was a productive year. I got some things done,
but nowhere near what I wanted,” he said.
Berman described his 2004 legislative successes — one reforming the
mechanism through which copyright royalty rates are distributed, and
another authorizing scholarships to American schools in Arab
countries as “boring, but important.”
The scholarships, which will go toward helping poor and middle-class
Muslim students attend American-sponsored schools, was included in a
bill overhauling intelligence services but was not funded. Berman had
asked for $15 million.
He called the scholarships “a long-term investment in producing
leaders of the future” and vowed to secure money for them in 2005.
Immigration reform, perhaps Berman’s top legislative priority, ran
into election-year paralysis.
His bill to allow about 500,000 illegal immigrants establish legal
residency, known as AgJobs, had support from more than 60 lawmakers.
Half were Republicans. Yet with a contentious presidential campaign
under way, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist blocked it from coming
to the floor.
Berman said he will reintroduce the bill in January. He said he was
encouraged that President Bush recently renewed his quest for a
guest-worker plan.
“It sounds to me that the White House is interested in seeing if they
can try and solve this problem, and I think Democrats should be
willing to work with them,” Berman said.
Congress also stagnated on another top Berman priority, helping the
movie industry combat piracy. The House passed legislation he wrote
with Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, to increase penalties, but the Senate
did not. The issue is another Berman said he expects to tackle “real
early” in the 109th Congress.
Finally, legislation to restrict some law enforcement measures in the
Patriot Act also went nowhere. But, Berman said, he intended that
bill as more of a “marker” to lay out concerns that should be
addressed when the House debates whether or how to continue the USA
Patriot Act.
Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Thousand Oaks, counts nearly a dozen elements
of the intelligence reform bill as stemming from his office.
They include changing the way the State Department designates foreign
terrorist groups so that it is the responsibility of the group, and
not the U.S. government, to prove the group is no longer engaging in
terrorist acts.
They also include demanding passenger inspections at more foreign
airports and creating a unified system for transliterating names into
the Roman alphabet to help standardize name-based “watch” lists.
“Speaking for myself, we had an extremely productive year,” Gallegly
said.
Gallegly found little movement, however, in his efforts to curb
illegal immigration and particularly to block acceptance of foreign
consular identification cards. He vowed to be on the forefront of
that debate in 2005, as well as efforts to block illegal immigrants
from driver’s licenses.
Another legislative disappointment came in the form of bear baiting.
Gallegly’s bill, which would have banned the practice of setting out
large piles of food and then lying in wait, faced massive opposition
from the hunting lobby. Gallegly said he doesn’t know if he will
re-introduce the bill but noted that some states have started to ban
the practice.
Finally, he hailed the little-noticed passage of the Korean Defense
Service Medal, to be given to members of the armed forces who served
in Korea after July 1954, when the Pentagon stopped issuing the Korea
Service Medal.
Two bills authored by Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, R-Santa Clarita,
made it into law this year.
One places restrictions on the ownership and sales of tigers, lions
and other big cats to anyone other than zoos, exhibitors and those
certified to handle and care for the animals.
Another bill offers grants to states that help individuals with
disabilities to access “assistive technology.”
A leading member of the House Education Committee, McKeon also worked
language into an education bill ensuring that funding increases for
students with disabilities be passed directly to the local level.
McKeon said the measure stemmed from reports that California was
using the money intended for students with disabilities for unrelated
programs, or to help mask the budget deficit.
“That was a good victory for us,” McKeon said of the provision.
Yet with reauthorization of the higher education act and welfare
reform still on the table, McKeon said his 2005 goals remain similar
to the ones he had going into 2004. He blamed the Senate for much of
Congress’ inaction.
“The Senate never even dropped a bill,” he said of the education
measure. “I think they just figured early on they weren’t going to be
able to get it done, so they didn’t even address it. But I think
we’re going to be able to move early next year.”
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena, managed this year to expand DNA
analysis, establish a U.S. trade representative for intellectual
property rights and help hybrid-car drivers save toll money.
He also worked some language on nuclear non-proliferation into the
intelligence bill, including a provision defining the crime of
assembling a radioactive dirty bomb and allowing prosecutors to use
racketeering laws to investigate and prosecute people trading in
nuclear technology.
Schiff, who helped found a Democrat study group on non-proliferation,
said he intends to make that issue one of his top priorities in 2005.
One bill Schiff said he plans to introduce in January will deal a
comprehensive global cleanup of nuclear material in a way he vowed
“goes beyond anything I’ve seen before.”
Schiff failed to secure passage of an amendment recognizing the
Armenian genocide. But, he called language that was approved and
later stripped from a bill at the insistence of House Speaker Dennis
Hastert “a symbolic victory.”
“Given that next year is the 90th anniversary (of the genocide),
we’re going to make a big push.”
Also still lingering is legislation expanding the Santa Monica
Mountains National Recreation Area to include more of the mountains
near La Crescenta, Santa Clarita, Simi and Conejo valleys, as well as
the Arroyo Seco.
“We got very close,” Schiff said. “I’m hoping we’ll find smoother
passage this year.”
Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, counted among his accomplishments
extending a $2,000 tax credit for hybrid-car owners and stopping what
he described as “some really bad Republican ideas.”
One of those measures he worked against was a restructuring of the
federal-state securities regulation, which Sherman argued would
destroy state securities laws. A former certified public accountant,
Sherman also fiercely opposed bills by Rep. David Dreier, R-Glendora,
changing the rules for employee stock options, which Sherman said
would deprive investors of information.
A measure on presidential succession, which Sherman started working
on well before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, received praise
from constitutional scholars and other lawmakers in 2004 but saw no
movement.
Sherman said he plans to reintroduce the bill yet is not getting his
hopes up about passage.
“Just because it’s important does not mean there’s anybody in
Washington that cares a whole lot about it,” he said.
Sherman also said Iran will continue to top his foreign policy
agenda. He managed to work in language promoting democracy in Iran
into the intelligence bill, but said he was still waiting for
Republican leaders to hold hearings on the country’s development of
nuclear weapons.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress