Speech #990031435

Chairman. this is a simple amendment. It seeks to eliminate section 108(A) of this bill which. unintended result. I think. would have been to deny those of us on the Judiciary Committee in this House the flexibility to reduce what are totally unacceptable welfare dependency rates among the refugee population. Unfortunately. as we established the refugee program to assist those who had fled what occurred in Southeast Asia. we made a decision to try and not duplicate the alreadyexisting spending mechanisms or beneficiary mechanisms. and as an unintended result. we have exposed those who come here almost as their first exposure to the welfare system. For this reason. and others. we have had a welfare dependency rate that is astronomical. particularly when you realize what population we are talking about. a population of people who are basically family oriented. work oriented. goal oriented. and certainly not coming here with a predisposition toward welfare. Unfortunately. at the present time. nationally. for those who are. as they call. time eligible. that is. who have arrived in the United States within the first 3 years. their welfare dependency rate at present is 53.8 percent. In my home State of California. unfortunately. where 40 percent of the total refugee population now resides. unfortunately the dependency rate there is 85.4 percent of those people within the first 3 years of having been here in the United States. There is a host of problems that these people face. but there is no reason why we should increase the problems that they face when they come here. As a result. those of us on the Immigration Subcommittee. those of us on the full Committee on the Judiciary. have tried to work with the voluntary agencies in order to promote some sort of understanding among ourselves. that is. with the voluntary agencies. with the State and local gov. ernments. with the Federal Government. as well. to try and move these people in a manner which will not make welfare so enticing and in fact will not make welfare dependency almost a mark of how you become acculturated to the American experience. As I said before. that was not the intention of the Congress or this administration or previous adminiL3trations. In fact. we acted out of a spirit of help for these people. also out of a spirit of saving money by not duplicating already existing systems. And. unfortunately. as I said. we have had this welfare dependency result. I believe that the excision of this section of the bill will result in an ability for us to work. I might say that just within the last week I have reached an understanding with the voluntary agencies. with their umbrella organization. as to proper language that we adopted in the refugee authorlatlon bill Just this week. which I think will go a long way toward solving the problems that I know we all wish to solve.