Speech #980163983

Now. back with relatives in the Philippines. and with his U.S. social security check-(earned legally through long years of labor)-of $236 a month. he lives comfortably. His monthly social security check translates into about 1.650 pesos and is more money than the local physician makes. This humanitarian and taxsaving program to help immigrants who desire to return home to rejoin their families has been successful in repatriating over 70 elderly Filipinos to the Philippines from Hawaii. The BalikBahay program. now known as REPATRIA. is presently extending its services to Alaska. Washington. and California. Over the years this program has been in operation. its main stumbling block has been the cost of transportation. Many immigrants have been assisted in reestablishing contact with their families in the Philippines and are eager to return but cannot pay the plane fare. Mr. President. my bill would direct the Attorney General. through the Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to conduct a study to determine how many elderly. indigent immigrants in the United States wish to return to their native countries. The study would examine the costs and benefits of a Federal program to finance the transportation costs of returning such immigrants to their native countries and the options for financing such a program. In addition. the advantages and disadvantages of requiring the Federal Government to insure. through certification by an appropriate agency of the home country. that a repatriated immigrants health and welfare will be protected would be examined. Finally. the use of the BalikBahay program as a model for a similar Federal program or the expansion of the program with Federal funding would be explored. Congressman EDwARD RoYBAL of California has introduced identical legislation in the House of Representatives.