Transcripts For CSPAN3 Energy And Commerce Subcommittee Holds EPA Oversight Hearing 20170918

Coast is experiencing now with harvey and about to hit with another hurricane in the florida coast. First of all, on behalf of the committee, i want to express my sincere sorrow to everyone impacted by the storm. Harvey is one of the worst National Disasters the United States has ever faced and is still too early to tell the full extent of the devastations that has displaced thousands of people. Members of this committee on both sides of the aisle represent constituents experiencing loss and destruction from the storm and our thoughts and prayers are with these families as they begin to rebuild their lives from this national tragedy. During the storm and in the aftermath, epa continues to play a Critical Role in the federal response to harvey. While epa is still in the midst of initial response efforts, its work has only just begun. We look forward to monitoring the agencys response to the disaster and learn the full extent of the Environmental Impact and challenges that lie ahead. The loss and destruction of Hurricane Harvey make todays hearing even more important. The committee has the opportunity to learn about ways to strengthen the epa, including highlighting unimplemented recommendations that may improve epas ability to protect the environment and human health during the Recovery Efforts or future natural disasters. And i go back and reflect on what were about to face in florida. And puerto rico and the disasters that are looming there. The constitution provides congress with the authority to conduct oversight of the executive branch and in partnership with the Government Accountability office and office of Inspector General, we root out waste, fraud and abuse. Make ways to improve epa. And after these recommendations are issued, gao and oig work with the agency to ensure that the epa acts on their findings. Today the committee will learn that even when epa agrees with recommendations, it may take years to implement them and some are never fully adopted by the agency. As a result, many of the open recommendations span multiple administrations, some dating as far back as the bush administration. While epa adopts recommendations at a rate around the federal government average, there are still unimplemented recommendations in many critical areas of the agency. According to the oigs most recent semi annual report to congress, released in may 2017, epa has the potential to save 103. 3 million by implementing recommendations. The semi annual report, some 43 open recommendations with the past two completion dates and 56 with due dates set in the future. The gao will testify that epa has implemented 191 of the 318 recommendations made since 2007 with 127 recommendations still unimplemented. They have highlighted deficiencies, including Information Security posture, Work Force Management and grant administration. For example, epa oig recently conducted an audit focusing on flaws related to the Security Posture during 2015 and 2016. The oig reported think lack an understanding of which contract does the epa have significant Information Security responsibilities or raising questions about the agencys network integrity. The oig recommended the epa develop a process for identifying these contractors. The epa is not expected to implement this recommendation until 2018. Gao and oig have uncovered waste and mismanagement in the grant programs. This is particularly troubling, because grants comprise almost after of the budget. About 4 billion annually. In 2016, gao found that epas grand monitoring practice may impact the agencys ability to efficiently monitor results and increase administrative costs. Additionally, in 2017, the epa did not have the information needed to manage resources effectively. Gao recommendations range from standardized in the formative grant recipient Progress Report reports. All 12 recommendations in these two reports remain unimplemented. These are just some of the reason reports and audits conducts. We will discuss more of them today. Theyve done excellent work to highlight the problems within epa and find solutions to solve these issues. Im grateful for your work. I want to add with things looming in florida and with the trajectori tragedies in texas, we better not find out the epa has dawdled on anything to cause any harm. We know there a a great deal of Water Pollution thats out there. We are concerned about the increase in zika mosquitos in texas. We dont know if some of that has to do with issues with Water Management and other things been the jurisdiction of the epa. We will keep a close watch on all those and see if theres any errors that have occurred in weaknesses or anything causing these problems. So i thank our witnesses for dedication and work to ensure that epa is carrying out its mission. I want to recognize Alfredo Gomez, our witness from gao. A houston native who has two fef ne nephews serving in the Fire Department. We appreciate their service and sacrifice during Hurricane Harvey. I turn to my colleague from florida. Mr. Chairman, thank you for con vo convening this hearing today. The hearing subject while important pales in comparison of the true oversight needed in of the Environmental Protection agency. Epa is and always has been a critical partner to our states and communities back home. Most of what epa does is to support our communities back home in cleaning up polluted sites, helping protect the air we breathe and the water we drink. And i thank them for their work. But President Trump and admin straight pruitt have a different vision. They have have been acting to weaken support that comes through the epa. It is particularly troubling that epa admin straight or pruitt has not appeared before the Commerce Committee to date. This committee has direct oversight of the epa and its unprecedented and unacceptable that the administrator has not appeared before the committee. Now, the importance of the epa is particularly clear as texas learns more about the scope and extent of the destruction caused by Hurricane Harvey. Theres nothing like a Disaster Response that demonstrates how critical toxi critical toxic super fund it. As a floridian i know all too well the devastation that massive hurricanes can bring to homes, businesses and communities. The recovery from such a storm is long, expensive and challenging and our thoughts are with the residents of puerto rico and the Virgin Island and floridians as thaeyre in the path of a another dangerous storm in Hurricane Irma. Hurricane harvey slammed into the gulf coast as a category four. So far it has left at least 60 people dead and billions of dollars in damage and the death toll recovery is likely to continue to rise in the coming weeks. Ranking member of the subcommittee on health, jay green, he represents the city of houston and has seen much of his district flooded. Our thoughts are with him and his constituents at this time. Mr. Gomez, i want to recognize you for being here today for what is surely a difficult time for skpu yoyou and your family. The epa has been a key agency responding to harvey. For this reason this hearing should be a timely and important step in exploring how to strengthen the agency as it supports local responders and begins to assess the possible Environmental Impact of the flooding, tox iic releases. But this is devoted to a much less significant topic. The scope of environmental risk caused by this ongoing crisis while still coming into focus are considerable. People are evacuating through dir di dirty floodwaters. There have also been reports of fires at chemical facilities. Additional reports have suggested possible damage to leaking gas tanks at fuel facilities which if true may pose Environmental Concerns that the epa will need to address. Im particularly concern bd reports of flooding sites and what damage they may have caused. According to epa, 13 of the 41 former and current toxic waste sites in harvey impacted areas have flooded and may have experienced some damage. Additionally the city of houston contains approximately 450 petro chemical plants. News reports indicate these plants have contributed to 74 incidents of excess air pollution since harvey hit emitting more than 1 Million Pounds of Hazardous Substances into the air. Our local communities need the expert of the epa, but the Trump Administration has been working overtime to weaken epas ability to help that. And now its really showing at a time of disaster. The storm also raises ongoing concerns of Drinking Water safety. According to epa 4,500 Drinking Water systems are potentially damaged by floodwaters. After Hurricane Katrina professional staff were on the ground to help. This committee should consider oversight hearings in texas in the near term. But todays hearing rather than focusing on the big picture examines implemented recommendations for epa. At a time when the real issue is the desimation of the epa professional work force proposed by President Trump and administrator pruitt. Yet we respond to the grave environmental and Human Health Risk of Hurricane Harvey and other catastrophes at this time, but the overall epa has never been more important. Mr. Chair than, im deeply troubled by the direction of the agency under the Trump Administration and i implore you and my republican colleagues to conduct true oversight of the damage being done to our bed rock Environmental Protections built through decades of bipartisan work. We need to do it before deep and lasting damage is inflicted across america. The trump epa is waging an aggressive role back of environmental and Human Health Protections through repealing or delaying rule making and attacking fundamental science. The Trump Administration proposed extreme budget cuts that cut to the heart of our local communities and threatened the health and environment of americans in every state. Trump budget would slash epas budget by nearly 2. 6 billion, reduce the professional work force there by over 3,000 employees and the damage will be done to our air quality, diesel admission reduction, laead safey and it goes on and on. There is favoritism towards certain businesses. This is not acceptable. This is what needs oversight. The ongoing crisis unfolding on the gulf coast demonstrates the dangerous of the Trump Administrations extreme assault on Environmental Protection. Mr. Chairman, we want to work with you to make sure the epa implements the work force and contractor recommendations but if were serious about ensuring that the agency is able to protect human health and the environment, then we must Work Together to conduct true oversight. The fundamental damage being done to this agency and our neighbors back home. Thank you. Thank you. I recognize the chairman, mr. Walker. I thank the gentleman. Just in response to my friend from florida, our committee staff, the oversight committee, has worked dill jeigently throut the last several weeks in Clear Communication with the agencies involved in the hurricane. This hearing was put together before harvey had a name. So we will do our oversight, continue to at the appropriate time. I anticipate there will be a delegation and well go and hold hearings. Or do appropriate review. Im one when theres an emergency going on, tries to stay out of the way of the First Responders and let them do their job. And so at the right time well do that. And we will have administrator pruitt before our committee sooner rather than later. I share frustration that theres been a long delay in getting some of these positions filled. Partly by our friends in the senate, but the time has come for these agency heads to come to our committee and they will. Now, as to this hearing, i appreciate subcommittee chairman murphy having this and his opening comments. We care deeply about whats happened in texas. We care deeply about whats about to happen in florida. My own district is on fire. Much destruction going on there. All these things matter. You want to talk about air quality . We could use your support on some of our forestry legislation to reduce the fuel loads so we dont poison people with fires and destroy wautersheds. We know these Recovery Efforts will continue for years. Recovering from any disaster whether its Hurricane Harvey or irma or destructive wildfires burning out of control in the west requires coordination at every level of the government and the epa is a critical part of. That challenges facing the epa are significant but i hope the Agency Seizes upon the lesson its learned in response to previous natural disasters such as hurricanes katrina and sandy. Todays hearing is the first opportunity to hear from the office and the Government Accountability office regarding any outstanding recommendations that if implemented could enable the agency to better achieve or do its job better. Well also examine some of the areas of concern that have been identified and commented upon by the oig and the gao but whose recommendations remain unimplemented by the epa. We should be miendful that many of the recommendations span multiple administrations and therefore represent longstanding challenges for the agency. For example, weve learned the epa has failed to complete an agency wide workload analysis in more than 20 years. Similarly both oig and gao have consistently identified issues that generate serious concerns as to whether epa has knowledge of or adequately monitors the activities of its contractors and grant recipients despite the significant portion of the agencys annual bud yet thats awarded to third parties. Addressing these issues will increase prans pairible that americans want to help the environment for themselves and their communities and id like to thank alan larsen and Alfredo Gomez from the gao for providing testimony and to expand upon their organizations findings. Id also like to thank mr. Gomezs nephews who i understand are serving the houston Fire Department. Thank you for their work as First Responders who bravely have assisted so many of their fellow citizens during Hurricane Harvey. Im looking forward to productive discussion this morning regarding actions epa can take which will enable the agency to better accomplish its core mission. I recognize Ranking Member mr. Pallone for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Its been a week and a half since Hurricane Harvey hit texas. As the scope of the environmental disaster only begins to become known thousands remain displaced, their homes and businesses flooded. I know firsthand the devastation caused by such National Disasters. In 2012 my district was hit hard by hurricane sandy. I never have seen worst damage area in our area for the lifetime. Homes flooded, businesses lost. Our nation is now experiencing historic levels of destruction and loss on the gulf coast in the wake of Hurricane Harvey. Our fellow members of congress including five members of the texas delegation are working hard with federal state and local officials and First Responders to help those affected by the storm and as the cleanup continues many brave environmental and Human Health Risks exist. In the days since hur harvey came a shore, weve seen mass releases of toxic pollute ants into the air and flooded Super Fund Sites. Im deeply concerned of the potential risk to rue mhuman he. This committee must work to understand the impact some of these facilities may have on Public Health. The Trump Administration recently delayed amendments to the Risk Management program which included safety requirements for companies who store large quantities of dangerous chemicals. The Environmental Issues resulting from the hurricane also underscore the need for robust implementation of the Emergency Planning and community right to know act. Communities have the right to know important details about the type and amount of harmful chemicals released in their neighborhoods. All of these risks underscore the need for a strong and capable epa. Today were discussing recommendations by the epa Inspector General and the Government Accountability office regarding the epa and want to thank our witnesses for their testimony and work on these recommendations. However, i would argue that recommendations from proving epas performance are part of a much wider need to ensure that the agency is high performing, efficient and effective in accomplishing the agencys mission by protecting human health and the environment. Over the last six months theyve been doing everything to operate in secrecy. Administrator pruitt has no into in transparency. The trump epa has proposed aggressive cuts to environment and Human Health Protections. Dismissed scientists from important Advisory Boards and proposed severe budget and staffing reductions at epa. These actions taken in totality serve to directly undermine the agents ability to protect human health and the environment. A ro best and effective epa is key in responding to natural disasters like Hurricane Harvey. Epa currently has 133 personnel supporting the response efforts for Hurricane Harvey and is established a unified command with state and local partners. That number is going to increase dramatically in the coming weeks. At its peak after Hurricane Katrina about 1,600 epa staff and contractors worked in the Gulf Coast Region assisting with response and cleanup activities in addition to thousands of additional epa employees supporting response efforts from epa headquarters and Regional Offices around the country. With the employee cuts and buyouts, we need to ensure the epa will actually have the employees in place to conduct this critical work. So mr. Chairman, i want to work with you to make sure we have a robust and effective epa. The committee must contact an active oversight of the agency, particularly Drinking Water, infrastructure and regulation, clean air protections and the impacts of Climate Change. We must also conduct ongoing over sight over epa and other agencys effort to assist the gulf coast rebuild. The Trump Administrations ongoing efforts to weaken Environmental Health protections, attack fundamental science and also to propose extreme budget and staff reductions will do nothing in my opinion but undermine epas efforts to protect human health and the environment. Not only with regard to Hurricane Harvey but in so many other areas. I am concerned and i hope that we can Work Together. Again, thanks to everyone and yield back. Looking forward to your comments to the panel. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank the gentleman for his comments. I ask you unanimous consent that the members written open statements be introduced in the record. Without objection the documents will be entered into the record. Id now like to introduce our panel for todays hearing. First mr. Alan larsen. He is the counsel to the Inspector General for the Environmental Protection agency. We also have mr. Alfredo gomez who serves the Natural Resources and environment for the Government Accountability office. Thank you for being here today and providing testimony. We look forward to the opportunity to discuss recommendations made to the epa. Youre aware were holding a hear and have the practice of taking testimony under oath. Do you have any objection to taking testimony under oath . Seeing none the chair advises you under the rules of the house, rules of the committee youre entitled to be advised by counsel. Do either of you desire to be advised by counsel today . Neither one has asked. In that case, please rise, raise your right han. Ill swear you in. Do you swear the testimony you are about to give is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Both have answered in the a t m affirmative. I ask each of you to give a five minute summary of your written statement. Well begin with you, mr. Larsen. Could you turn your microphone on, please. Thank you. Pull it close to you. Am i on now . Yes, you are. Thank you. Good morning again, chairman murphy, representative castor and members of the subcommittee. I am alan larsen, counsel to the Inspector General for both the Environmental Protection agency and the chemical safety and hazard investigation board. I thank this committee for highlighting the importance of acting on unimplemented oig recommendations. As you know, an office of Inspector General cannot direct an agencys actions. Our influence is through our recommendations which can result in substantial cost savings and major improvements in agency programs. But only if an agency chooses to implement them. Our oig undertakes a risk based work planning process to determine which issues we will review during the coming year. Our plan, however, is always subject to change as we inevitably receive hotline requests and con congressional requests. We conduct those reviews and issue final reports which generally will include one or more recommendations to address our findings. As required by the Inspector General act, the epa o, girig publishes a list of recommendations. Our most recent cited 43 recommendations with past due completion dates and 56 with future dates notably potential cost savings for the unimplemented recommendations listed amount to over 100 million. Now i will briefly discuss some of the oigs recommendations to the epa that remain unimplement the. You will see that some are quite recent. I highlight them because of their potential impact. In july, 2017, we completed a review of the processes the epa uses to verify that Agency Contractors have the training needed to protect the agency from cyber attacks. We found that the epa is unaware of the number of contractors who require specialized training. The oig recommended that the epa emplement a process to maintain a listing of contractor whose require the specialized training and that the Agency Report this to its chief Information Security officer. While the agency has committed to implement a process for verifying that Agency Contractors are appropriately trained, our recommendation remain it is unimplemented posing a continuing risk to the agencys information, data. Through another audit completed in august of 2014, we looked at the agencys oversight of Cloud Computing initiatives. We found that the epas lack of oversight over vendors resulted in missed opportunities for significant savings. The epa paid over 2 million for services that were not fully rendered or did not comply with federal requirements. We recommended several corrective actions to the agency such as improves its policies and informing documented cost benefit analysis. To date the agency has not fully implemented all of our recommendations. In april of 2017 we completed a review of puerto ricos state revolving funds based on a hotline complaint from the epa. The epa reported that the Puerto Rico Government Development Bank did not have funds to honor a combined balance of approximately 188 million. The oig determined that over 774 million is at risk due to puerto ricos financial crisis and that the restoration of funds in the near future is highly unlike lie. The oig recommended that the epa evaluate options to restore the viability of the revolving funds or implement new strategies better seated to the needs of puerto rico. While the agent has committed to considering future approaches to Grant Funding, the oigs recommendation is as yet unimplemented. These are just a few of the examples of oigs recommendations to the agency. We will continue to work actively with the epa and Keep Congress fully advised regarding actions to address our recommendations. Accomplishing our work requires sufficient appropriate funds from congress. Our funding clearly represents a fruitful invest ment for the american taxpayer as the oig returned 22 for every dollar given to us in fiscal year 2016. While im aware that this is not an proerp yagzs committee i respectfully ask for any help you can provide us. This concludes my prepared statement. Im happy to answer any questions. Thank you, mr. Larsen. Mr. Gomez, youre recognized for five minutes. Thank you. Good morning. Im pleased to be here today to talk to you about the status of recommendations gao has made to the Environmental Protection agency. As you know, the mission of the epa is to protect human health and the environment. We have conducted reviews focused on various aspects of epas operations such as managing grants, Work Force Planning, and its programs and through these reviews we have made numerous recommendations to improve epas performance and the efficiency and effectiveness of its operations and programs. My Statement Today will focus on two main areas. First the status of epas implementation of gaos recommendation since fiscal year 2007 and how these recommendations relate to epas operations and programs. Two, examples of benefits realized by epa and others based on our work. As part of our process, we followup on recommendations we have made and report on their status to congress. Agencies also have a responsibility to monitor and maintain accurate records on the status of our recommendations. We now followup with epa twice a year to determine the extaet to which our recommendations have been benefited. We consider them when they have taken action to address the issue or defish iciency that wee identified. We found that of the 318 recommendations we made to epa, they had implemented 191. The remaining 127 recommendations remain open or not implemented. Just to give you some more information, more recommendations that we made over four years ago, that is recommendations from fiscal year 2007 to twe2012, epa has implemented 77 . For recommendations within the last four years, since fiscal year 2013, epa has implemented 34 . Experience has shown that it takes time for some recommendations to be implemented. For this reason, we actively track each unaddressed or open recommendation for four years. The 318 recommendations weve made fall into six broad categories. Such as managements and operations, water related issues, and environmental con tam nation and cleanup n. January, 2017 we reported an epa management of grants to states, local governments and others which make up almost 50 of the agencys budget. We found that epa does not have sufficient information about the workload associated with these grants. Subsequently the agencys not able to effectively and efficiently allocate staff across its offices and regions to manage these grants. Because the agency did not know its grants workload, it sometimes has to shift staff from other Mission Areas to address the work. We recommend that epa collect and analyze data about grants management of workloads and use these data to inform staff allocations. Epa agreed with this recommendation and has initiated steps to address it and we will continue to monitor epas actions to make sure to figure out what the status of the regs are. We have also identified many benefits such as program and process improvements based on epa taken actions on our recommendations. For example, we issued several reports on Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure issues. In particular we reported on Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure needs of rural and small communities. We found some communities face application requirements such as separate environmental anal ses for each program applied for. We recommended that epa and the department of agriculture Work Together with state and other officials to develop guidelines to assist states in developing uniform environmental analses and they have done so. In summary, our recommendations provide a Good Opportunity to improve the governments fiscal position, better serve the public, and make Government Programs more effective and efficient. Epas implementation of our recommendations will help the agency continue to improve its performance and the efficiency and effectiveness of its operations and we will continue to work with congress to monitor and draw attention to these important issues. Chairman murphy, congresswoman castor, members of the subcommittee, this concludes my statement. Id be happy to answer any questions. I also wanted to add thank you for your words of support to my family in texas and my nephews but also all the other families in texas. Thank you. Thank you, ill recognize myself for five minutes for questions. Your organizations have highlighted epas failures to perform adequate work force and workload analysis of being an area of concern and correction by the agency which has not occurred. Mr. Gomez, could you explain hows failure grant hinders its ability to respond to natural disasters like hur harvey and irma . So what weve talked about in our work looking at Work Force Planning and grants management is that its really important for the agency as you said to have good information on workload. Data on workload is important because the agency doesnt really ensure that it has the right people in the right places with the right skills and competencies to accomplish the mission of the agency, whether that is to focus on areas that are short term or long term. We want to make sure that the agency has that information, it is something that the agency has struggled with for decades. So we continue to make those recommendations. I know the ig has made recommendations in the past. We think thats really important. Again, to ensure that it has the right people and the right places with the right skill sets and the right locations. Mr. Larsen, could you comment on how it affects our ability to respond to these hurricanes. The igs work i think is directly aligned with the gaos work in this area. Weve issued reports with recommendations as of july of this year. The agent has responded to and acted on the last of the open recommendations. However, for the last several years including the current, management challenges report that we gave to the agency, we continue to highlight Work Force Planning as a challenge that the agency needs to address. I guess the simple answer to your question, mr. Chairman, is that if the agency doesnt know what its work requirements are, it cannot assign and align people to those requirements. And we are urging them to, as mr. Gomez says, identify the data that allows them to make those comparisons and align their work with their work force. We often find the weakness system a time of challenge. Every year since 2015 the gao has sent a letter highlighting priority recommendations and considers them critical to the mission protecting the human health. As it responds to Hurricane Harvey special prepares to respond to Hurricane Irma are there any high private recommendations that could have im one of the High Priorities right now that need to be done . This high priority letter that weve sent to epa weve done that since 2015. What weve done is really look at the recommendations that gao has made and identified those areas that we saw as high priority either areas that gao has identified as high risk. We have a number of recommendations that are focusing on Water Infrastructure. I think one of the priority recommendations that we think does have relevance to harvey and other future disasters is the area of Water Infrastructure. For example, weve done work looking at how small and rural utilities use Asset Management which is a really important tool to understand what infrastructure these utilities have, perhaps where the areas are in that infrastructure that are vulnerable or at high risk so that when a disaster does take place, theyre better prepared both to respond to it, but also if they have to rebuild they can rebuild with resilience in mind. Were made a number of recommendations to epa, getting epa to work with the department of agriculture to come up with better guidelines and information and to encourage the states and the utilities to use Asset Management. Small utilities are challenged because they dont have the Technical Expertise but we should do whatever we can in the federal family and others to help these communities better prepare for these disasters. Finally in june of 2007 they released a report on Hurricane Katrina that made several recommendations on enhancing Disaster Response. One of these recommendations is still open after ten years. Why is that recommendation still open . What was it and is it going to affect how things are in texas, louisiana, florida and puerto rico . What we did is we were looking at epas response to katrina and also to the subsequent cleanup. One of the recommendations that we kept open over the years was we had recommended that epa work with other federal Land Management agencies, dhs and fema, to better coordinate responses to cleanup. The reason we did that is because we found in the work that National Wildlife refugees, which there are several in louisiana, had been contaminated and the contamination lasted over a year. So there was not really good planning to come together and clean up that contamination. Some of the refuges were closed for over a year. Congress passed the post katrina act which put in place Better National preparedness and also the response framework of which epa has a key role in responding to Hazardous Waste and oil spills. So in theory we expect that epa is putting in place, for example, in florida any response thats needed as the hurricane may come to that region. So were going to look at that recommendation based on whats happened now and potentially close it because we think it might address what we had been talking about. My time expired. Ms. Castor, youre recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you again, gentlemen. The as the agency goes forward to implement what has not been implemented to date, it would seem that the Trump Administrations kind of assault on the professional staff there and personnel would have a real impact on the ability to follow through with your recommendations. The Trump Administration has still failed to provide nominees for almost all Senate Confirmed leadership positions at epa. Most administrator positions are also without leadership including epa region six in dallas responding to Hurricane Harvey. The Trump Administration, a lot of this, we can blame a lot on the senate, but you cant put too much blame on the senate because the Trump Administration has not nominated people for deputy administrator, assistant administrator for the office of chemical safety and pollution prevention, the chief financial officer, the assistant admip strart for environmental information, international and tribal affairs, land and emergency management, research and development and water. Do you all agree that when you dont have folks in charge that it is it complicates the ability of the agency to follow through with your recommendations . Well, the short answer is yes. The longer answer is we have career people who remain in place who do carry out the work of the agency. But as you indicate, the statutory mandates remain in place and its up to the agency to figure out a way to carry out those mandates. It is more difficult if you dont have the leadership. I would agree that its important to have all the staff that you need at all levels of the agency to carry out its mission. Mr. Gomez, you said that jao meets with folks at epa every six months. Have you met with administrator pruitt . Is it typical that you would meet with the administrator or leadership to go over recommendations from gao . So what our controller general likes to do is meet with all of the new cabinet secretaries and leaders was other offices. Gao is in the process of scheduling a meeting with secretary with administrator pruitt and i would go to that meeting as well. But that has not been done here in the first we have not scheduled it yet. Youre just like the energy and Commerce Committee. It has yet to see the epa administrator. Gentlemen, theres a very disturbing press report that came out just a few days ago that the epa has taken the unusual step of putting a political operative in charge of vetting hundreds of millions of dollars in grants the epa distributes annually. A seeni assigning the funding decisions to a former Trump Campaign aid. Has competitively awarded grants to nonprofit organizations. It really does appear like this is being politicized. It says this is from the Washington Post on september 4th. Early th earlier this summer on the same day they voted with republicans on voting down a Health Care Bill epa staffers were instructed to halt all grants to the Regional Office that covers alaska, washington, oregon and ohio. That hold was quickly narrowed to just alaska and remained in place for nearly two weeks. The former bush epa administrator said this is out of the ordinary. We didnt do a political screening on every grant because many were based on science and political appointees dont have that kind of background. Have you all opened any kind of investigation into whats happening here yet . Weve read those reports. Weve not received complaints from congress so far or from members of the public or from organizations about this. If you could, or if you would, id offer a general and a specific answer to your question. Quickly because i have one more question. Okay. The general answer is epa has always been a lightning rod. We get complaints on the one hand that epa is ignoring its statutory obligations and allowing let me i thank you for that. You have i believe opened an investigation last week into administrators pruitts travel because it is so out of the ordinary that he has tit say officials in the epa office of Inspector General notified Agency Leadership that pruitt was in oklahoma or in route for nearly half of his first three months. But the problem is that it looks like hes been using taxpayer funds for this excessive travel. How long will it take for the oig to get to the bottom of this investigation . Maam, in our world, we distinguish between investigations and audits and its probably a distinction most people dont care about. But we are doing an audit. They tend to take longer. Were going to look not only at the specifics of mr. Pruitts travel but the robustness of the controls that govern travel generally and whether theyre sufficient. Thank you very much. Chair recognizes mr. Griffith for five minutes. Let me followup on that real quick. Correct me if im wrong, but an investigation means youre looking into something that might have wrongdoing and an audit means youre checking into the money to see whether or not we need to put different parameters around it. Would that be a Fair Assessment . Generally. Investigations tend to look at crimin criminality. This is not either of those. This is just an audit to see what we can do better. Its also going to look at whether there were violations of agency requirements. Okay. All right. I appreciate that. Thank you. Let me get down to where i was going to go initially. That would be that i am concerned about the work force and the workload questions, epa office of Inspector General reported epa has not conducted work lad analysis in over 20 years lake making it difficult to implement and allocate its budget effectively. I guess what im looking at is weve heard talk today about a few months where positions arent filled but here were looking at 20 years, both republican and democrat administrations, that have not at the epa gone in and looked at their workload analysis. And then we see with Hurricane Harvey that we had 13 super fund sights that were affect the. Am i not correct that if we had performed a work lad analysis over time that, not saying all 13 of them would have been cleaned up, but we might have more of these super funds being cleaned up . And were talking about harvey so much now but i remember testimony in a previous hearing in a different subcommittee where they were talking about a site in st. Louis who hadnt been akcted on in decade z as a well. Can you help me out, if we had a workload analysis so we can say these are the worst ones in lets put people there. Im happy to take answers from either. Ill give my short answer and mr. Gomez can respond. My short answer is its difficult to draw a direct line between the lack of a work force plan and a specific failure to be able to cover something. I think we can all say that you knew more precisely where your requirements are and how many people and what kinds of people you need to address those, you would probably have a better result, but i cant draw a direct onetoone correlation. Mr. Gomez. I would just pivot from that last comment. I think that our point on our work, on Work Force Planning has been exactly that point. To understand, again, whefrom d, where your people are and what skill sets you need, what location you need them in so you have a better sense. If that is that you focus on cleaning up Hazardous Waste sights. Do a work force analysis would hopefully help dow that better. It would help us as legislators as well, although this is not an appropriating committee, we hear all the time folks need more money but if i know you need more money to respect Rural Communities and Rural Communities with water and wastewater help those communities instead of send idiots down from the alabaster towers in washington, heres what you have to do. That creates big problems. If you had a workload analysis, we might be able to figure out where we could appropriate the money more advantageously to prevent problems before they happen, whether it be after a hurricane or when youve got a serious problem like we had in flint michigan or issues in my very rural mountainous district where theres problems we dont know how to solve and were afraid to ask for fear that instead of coming in to help us theyll just come in and try to punish folks who are trying to do the best they can under limited circumstances in a rural area. So i do appreciate that as well. So thank you and thank you for putting that in both your oral and your written testimony. Sir, i have one more comment responsive to your question. That is our oig office of Program Evaluation similar to audits has a current project under way looking at super fund Work Force Planning. Well keep skyou and your staff informed the progress of that effort. I greatly appreciate that very much. You know, were just beginning the Hurricane Harvey efforts and that will continue for years and the Environmental Impacts that are already occurring and yet to be seen and we talked about the Super Fund Sites there. Is there anything that you see that is not being done by the epa currently in i know its really early in the Hurricane Harvey area that we ought to be concerned about . Ill give my answer. Its always a dilemma for us. As chairman walden said, you dont want to wade into the middle of the cleanup effort. On the other hand, you dont want to wait so long that your efforts are valueless. So were always trying to figure out when it is that we get into it. I guess what i fall back on is the Natural National response framework that mr. Gomez alluded to and it does give certain responsibilities to the epa. We cannot mandate that epa take any specific steps. After the fact i think we would evaluate whether they took the appropriate steps under the framework. But i dont see a role for the oig jumping in right now in the middle of a cleanup effort. Thank you. Unfortunately my time is up and i yield back. Thank you. Mr. Fal lolone, youre recogniz for five minutes. I heard my colleague talk about Super Fund Cleanup in reaction. In reality there is no super fund. I have had a bill for years to try to get the super fund, the trust fund, if you will. Theres a Super Fund Program but theres essentially no super Fund Trust Fund to pay for anything. That, back when the republicans first took to congress, i know its ancient history now with newt begin rich gingrich, it ex begged him and democrats begged him to renew it and he refused. We still have the bill out there and i would ask at any time if our chairman or the speaker would allow us to reauthorize a super Fund Trust Fund. Because then we would have the money to do these cleanups. On an annual basis i go before the appropriate because thats the only way to get the money and ask for more funding and we always get significantly less than what we ask for. Its nice to talk about Super Fund Cleanup but the reality is its been you know, it was essentially stopped by the republican congress. And not to say that, you know, theyre totally to blame, but they scertainly were the ones you bring it up any time and ill support you passing it in committee on are on the floor. I wanted to thank the epa oig for recently accepting the committees request to review the propriety of the use of taxpayer funds for travel to and from his home state of oklahoma. I know that weve already mention ds th mentioned that. Unfortunately trump has launched proposed significant cuts to epa budget and staff that threaten to undermine the agencys ongoing efforts to protect human health and the environment. Mr. Gomez in your testimony you that the gao has made 318 recommendations to epa since fiscal year 2007 including 49 recommendations focus ed on environmental contamination and cleanup. These include taking actions from cleanup management at Hazardous Waste sites. My question is is that correct and how might gaos recommendation regarding enhancings response to disasters inform the agencys ongoing response to Hurricane Harvey . That is correct. Again, as i mentioned earlier, one of the areas where we see epas recommendations contributing to the response in harvey and other future disasters is in the area of Water Infrastructure. Where weve recommended that epa work with states and others to really assist the small communities. Weve all heard that in texas there were many Water Systems that were under boiled water notices and then over 50 systems i believe were actually shut down. So we think that its really important in the area of Asset Management which is a really important tool for these utilities to use to understand, again, what they have, what are the areas that are vulnerable so they can address them and they can use funds to then build them or restore them and again building and resilient so theyre better prepared. I think thats the one area where i would sort of call attention based on our recommendations where theres some immediate benefit. Thank you. I dont want to keep repeating all the budget cuts the Trump Administration has proposed to the epa. Buyouts, all kinds of things that would result in fewer employees. And that could include hundreds of positions in epas region six headquarters in dallas where ploys are currently responding to Hurricane Harvey. So let me ask you about these proposed cuts to your office, to mr. Larsen. How are current and expected budget limitations impacting Staffing Levels and the ability of epas office of Inspector General specifically, how are they impacting our ability to conduct audits and investigations if you will. Thank you for that question. Its a serious challenge to us. We have had to cut our work force year by year by year and we are down from 360 or so down to 270. And we anticipate having to go fewer than that based on the most likely budget scenarios. If the original president s Budget Proposal were to be adopted by congress, wed have to cut very substantially the amount of work we did. As you know, we gave you a fairly detailed planexplanation where those cuts would occur, which offices, what kind of projects. What we do is on an annual basis plan for the work that we would hope to do based on how much value the project would bring in terms of cost savings or changes in how epa does business. We will have to do many fewer such projects in any given year based on the likely budget outcomes. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Col liplins, you are recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Maybe im going to go down a little bit different road. Really talking about mr. Gomez, if i look back over ten years and im looking right now just in the environmental area and looking at the suggestions you made for spill preventage, none of which have been implemented, so i guess the question is this. Youre doing these audits, making these recommendations. Do you priority size them in some way with any kind of ranking system, like one star to five stars . And when you see Something Like this and now ten years have gone by, could i assume these would have been considered perhaps lower priority . And then at some point do you go revisit that with machisomeone say its been ten years and you havent done any of these things . Or are these just thrown into the hopper and then kind of catch as catch can they work on these, they dont work on those. Im trying to wrap my mind around the day by day, year by year interaction between your agency and those folks that are supposed to implement it to make sure high priority things are done and, you know, squeaky wheel that youre kind of jabbing at them, why didnt you get this done and so forth. Could you maybe just help us all maybe a little better understand how that all works, the interaction. Sure. So first of all, i just want to say that we take recommendations to epa very seriously. And so what we do is we have a process in place where were actively following recommendations that weve made in the last four years. What can happen to some of the older recommendations is if we learn from the agency that either theyre not going to implement it or that we make an assessment that, you know, things have changed or its no longer a priority, well go ahead and close it as not implemented. There are recommendations that are old, older than four years that were still keeping track of. We have an indication that epa is still working and we hope that they actually do take action. We can go back at any time and open up any old recommendation that was not implemented. If we think its important or others have brought it to our attention. Our recommendations and the status of the recommendations are public so you can go to any of our reports. You can click on the recommendation status. You see what the reg was and what the status was. We do have the status that is a rec letter that we send to the agencies and other offices calling attention to recommendations that we see as a high priority. And for epa weve identified those recommendations that deal with the high risk area of managing toxic chemicals and then some of the recommendations that deal with Water Infrastructure and also pollution of our waters. So that letter can also change year from year if we go through the history and identify other recs that we think are important. I also mentioned that we work with epa sort of in an ongoing basis as were doing audits, but formally we go to them twice a year with a long list of all our recommendations to say here they are, theyre still open, let us whats happening, let us know which we can close. We do that twice a year formally. But were in contact with them throughout the year. Thats very helpful, because i think sometimes we may not understand how that all works and think you just throw it in and go on about your business and i think its actually reassuring to me certainly for one that youve got it sounds like pretty good interaction. Would you say that . Yes. That youre making them aware, theyre listening. Its back and forth. Right. There are some recommendations where the agency would disagree with those. So we may be at a point where they disagree, we disagree. We still think its a good recommendation. And so theres some like that. Those might be closed as not implemented. Epa has taken our recommendations seriously and they want to they want to close them out. They want to do what were saying. Its just in some cases some of our recommendations might take a little longer to do f. Were recommending an i. T. System be revised or a new i. T. System be put in place that may take longer than if we just recommend the agency use existing web tools to provide better information to the public. We dont see that as taking a long time or it shouldnt take a long time. I appreciate that overview. That was very helpful for me. Mr. Chairman, i yield back the balance of my time. I recognize ms. Clark for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I thank our Ranking Member ms. Castor and i thank our witnesses for joining us today. Like mr. Pallone, my district in new york sustained very substantial damage as a result of super storm sandy, so im very sensitive to the conditions on the ground in houston as well as concerned about the rest of hurricane season, quite frankly. And so standing up a robust operation with the epa i know is critical at this time. There have been a number of reports about unfolding Environmental Concerns stemming from harvey right now and so mr. Larsen, i recognize that your role at epa may not directly involve you in Emergency Response efforts. However, to the extent that youre able, could you please inform us of the epas role in responding to unfolding environmental threats. Sure. As mr. Gomez alluded to earlier, i think the primary set of responsibilities the epa has here stem from the National Response framework which came after some of the earlier na natural disasters. That means that epa has a responsibility as a support agency for certain functions and its got a primary responsibility for certain functions and the areas where we would expect to see epa involved are assessing and addressing fuel shortages, monitoring public Water Systems, securing Super Fund Sites, and assessing conditions at Major Industrial facilities. Very well. Mr. Gomez, how will gao evaluate the epas efforts to respond to the environmental threats posed by hurricane season, Hurricane Harvey being the most recent example . Gao in the past, we looked at the katrina Recovery Efforts. That was something we did. Were happy to assist congress in any reviews or we will look at anything you would like us to do as a result of Hurricane Harvey. What roles do you envision your office will be playing to ensure that federal money that epa contributes to cleanup be safeguarded from fraud and abuse . Were trying to do two things, one is epa oig specific work. The one thing i wanted to mention is the organization of igs across the federal government, what sigi has learned in the past, and has had a Disaster Assistance working past, which means that the various agencies are going to have to play a role here. So epa will be participating in that effort, this agency wide ig, or government wide oig effort to make sure that everybodys doing what they need to do and not duplicating each other. For ourselves, well probably be looking at fraud issues, that could take the form of investigations that we distinguished earlier, that is was there criminal activity going on or was there sloppy practice with regard to contracting. So those are the areas that we are seeing fairly early in getting involved in. And given that post harvey cleanup will be lengthy and costly and im assuming that if were hit with irma and other hurricanes coming down the pike, what will your office be examining . Whatever Congress Asks us to do, at least what we have seen from whats becoming clear in texas with the superfund sites and all the Water Infrastructure systems that are down, that maybe those are areas where potentially we could look at, but again, we could have discussions with anyone in congress whos interested in having gao look at the response efforts. I cannot emphasize enough that we need to address any environmental threat s imposed n people in the region. My thoughts are with the people of houston and we want to make sure that they have what they need to get back to normal. Thank you for your system here, mr. Gomez. I would like to start with you, your written testimony mentions that in 2015, the epa ordered approximately 2. 9 billion or nearly half of its budget to important projects such as repairing aging wood or infrastructure, improving air quality and cleaning up Hazardous Waste sites. My question is would you please elaborate on the weaknesses that gao itsified in epas chief management procedures. And have these inefficiencies contributed to to the wasting of grant money or made it more difficult for recipients to use Grant Funding for its intended purposes. Thank you for those questions. We have done a body of work on grants management and that particular report, what we looked at, also were looking to see for recipients for example where they are doing duplicative reporting. So we identified a number of places where there were duplicative reporting by the recipients so we have recommend that the epa identify all those places and try to do away with that duplication so our recipients arent having to spend additional time andry sources. So thats one area where we called attention to it and really for epa also to streamline it. Were calling attention to those places where people can do away with duplication where they can carry on with the grants and not do a lot of reporting. Mr. Larsen, do you have anything to add to the line of questioning that i posed to mr. Gomez relative to the management of grants . I wish i did. As representative clark noted, im an expert in some areas, not so much in others. But what i would be happy to do is organize and get back to you and your primary findings that we have had in those areas. Thank you mr. Chairman, thank you to our witnesses for taking time to join us this morning, we have heard about the epas roles in the emergency responsibility roles like Hurricane Harvey and you coordinate efforts with fema and state and local. Im interested in your efforts to coordinate with tribes and what have you done to reach out and engage tribes with your efforts in Hurricane Harvey . So far, we have not reached out to anybody, as i said, you know at this point, we dont want to run to the battlefield while the battle is under way, the sigi effort that i alluded to earlier is going to coordinate among the tribes and the states. I think its important to take back to this group the role that the tribes have in their vifrlt during natural disasters as well and reaching out to them and coordinatincoordinating. Some tribes actually have equipment and technology that can gale help the emergency responsibility, as we have seen in my district. We have seen the indians using helicopters and other technology in coordination with the Fire Department to put out wildfires. So i think you should coordinate with tribes because they can be very, very helpful for the region. Given the oigs Lessons Learned in in an area where the ig might consider additional audit work . Sure. We have unfortunately had katrina, we have had superstorm san sandy, we have learned from both. Among the things that we learned were that the coordination between epa and the corps of engineers wasnt necessarily what it could have been or should have been. Coordination with state and local officials probably could have been done better. We have addressed those to the agency this time around. Youll see better coordination, most likely well be coming in and seeing whether or not that occurred . Are you prepared to assess that, on whether or not those recommendations were followed . Our recourses are constrained so that would be a high priority for us. If you were to pick a number one barrier for you to do your jobs, with epa either involved with conation or protecting water and infrastructure, et cetera, so that its not con tom natured, what would that barrier be. I dont mean to sound dense, but are you talking about epas response . Or the evaluation of the epas response. What would you say would be the epas barrier in doing its job. Youre putting me in a position of speaking for them, but i would think its resources, people and money. I would say in the areas that were seeing unfolding, right, which is in Water Infrastructure and in the superfund sites at least in texas that are flooded is making sure they have enough people on the ground to respond to those two immediate areas where potentially there are risks involved. So i would say if that is a barrier that they should have enough folks there to address it right now. In my view, youve already got the substantive procedures in place. They need the people and they need to policy determination to carry forward. Could something be done better . Youre saying that the diagnosis is the lack of funding, lack of people. So the treatment is the next step. So you cant just diagnose a problem and walk away, you have to act on it and give the treatment to the patient. So the treatment is the policies and funding that bring people in the longterm Public Health recuperation. I have disaster training in my background, i did a fellowship at harvard in the humanitarian Disaster Response so thats where im speaking from. Thank you very much. I yield back. R i now recognize ms. Brooks. I would like to thank you for your work to improve the epa. We have been very focussed on the people, and agencies are not just agency, they are just people. And as my colleagues have noted, it is about the people. But i am concerned that this agency for a long period of time has not accepted your recommendation when it comes to people. And when it comes to their workforce. In 2010, gao issued a report recommending the epa establish mechanisms to establish workforce planning, which is people, placement of people. But the recommendation is currently closed and unimplemented. So mr. Gomez, why was this recommendation pleased before epa was able to implement it if you know . Again, we track recommendations for four years and if we have an indication that the agency is not going to do it, we close it as implemented. We have also done some research work. But also workforce issues in particular, which is a large part of so we are going to look to see how much of a rpriority that is and what they are going to do. We have been talking about its basically about data, they dont have good information on the type of work that each of their groups is doing across offices and across regions, so if you dont have that data, you dont ensure that you have the right people in the right places with the right skill sets, to accomplish the information thats needed. It sounds like these are problems that you have dealt with for years, this is not new, is that correct . Thats correct. Do you have any idea of how much funding goes to private sector work. In our 2010 report, we did look at contractors and at the time there were 6,000 contractors at epa. So what we also found in that report was that contractors were not part of epas planning either. Were not incorporated. So and we learned from epa recently that theyre still not incorporated in their planning and that what we think they should do. Have they agreed recently to take all of those thousands of contractors into account in their plans . So far we have not, last is it fair to say and am going to ask you, mr. Larsen, relative ive always been very concerned about information kurt issues and for the ig, thats what you focus on as well. And there are a number of contractors as i understand, and if some bad actors were wrong, you know, wrongdoers want to wreak a bit of havoc in m systems, they could certainkouco it through information technology, could you talk to us about the lack of understanding at epa relative to access to Sensitive Data and what you have found about the information or lack of information about the knowledge of epa and those access to Sensitive Data . Sure, i think what we talk about is risk as opposed to actually problems that have manifested, we have not investigated an Insider Threat where an individual breached his obligations and created our ability. What were talking about is if we dont address the vukts, then the potential is out there, so thats what we have been looking at and if we find that the agency doesnt know how serious a problem that is and they dont havent taken mitigate the potential risk that we have identified. And thaftt was just in your july 17 issue that the agency just gave you . Yes. Thank you, i yield back. First i want to express our deepest condolencesa a s to the people that are suffering from Hurricane Harvey, people have witnessed this day by day reporting with deep concern and sadness for the folks who are enduring. Epa has therefore and Important Role to play, and the remeet yags needed and these storms dont know from republican or democrat so it ought to be a universally agreed to approach that we take here in washington, but that can only be done if the epa has the resources and personnel to do so. Assessing 13 existing superfund sites that were flooded amend could be damaged. The wastewater locations that were shut down, assist with private testing for wells, and proposals to weaken, or even eliminate Regional Offices, beyond that i have to believe its tremendously demoralizing to the staff at the agency, many of whom offer their lifetime career to the agency. So i want to thank you mr. Gomez and mr. Larsen for being here this morning. The work proposed by epa sadly this administration, the Trump Administration is aggressively working to dismantle the epa, to regulatory roll backs, extreme budget cuts and staff elimination. These are foolish cuts, especially when we see these natural disasters right before our very eyes. In march of 2010, which concluded that the agencies have efforts have, i quote, particularly fallen short in aligning the agencies are at risk of not having the appropriately Skilled Workforce they immediate to effectively achieve their missions. Are you generally familiar with that report of 2010 . Yes. Mr. Gomez, did epa take action to address that . They have not yet. Will they be doing anything with respect to workforce planning. That os still an out workforce plan and its strategic funding. Thats about a 31 reduction, and proposed reducing the workforce by some 3,800 employees, nearly 50 programs to protect our air and water, deal can Climate Change were listed for cuts. Mr. Gomez in your testimony today you noted that the march 2010 report found that the ability of federal agencies to a achieve their mission depends in large part on whether they can sustain a workforce that possesses the workforce, knowledge and kiskill and other competencies. We can all be secure about how extreme the budget cuts proposed are and that the staffing reductions proposed would undermine epas ability to establish its mission especiallily in the fay especially in the face of disasters. This is the most foolish approach to an agency that was put in place by president nixon, to ensure safe water to drink and clean air to breathe. So i do appreciate the work youre doing to draw the attention of the American Public to these cuts and to the essential elements that these agencies require in order to respond fully and effectively to their mission. And with that, i yield back. I would like to thanks all those who participated in this hearing. We felt it very important to get on the record for epa to hear, we expect them to take care of these issues, to fill those positions that are needed to take some accounting of whats going on because we will be asking more and tougher questions about what has happened in terms of preparedness and response here. None of us want to see any loss of life or property caused by some problems with an agency fulfilling their duties as you have outlined them for us. So thank you for your observations and your comments today. I remind members they have 10 Business Days to submit their questions for records and i ask all witnesses to promptly respond to their questions and with that, this committee is adjourned. President trump met with israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this afternoon for an evening of work with the united nations, they briefly talked with reporters. Thank you very much, its great to have Prime Minister netanyahu with us today, a friend of mine for many years. Its a real honor, i have to say, were going to be discussing many things, among them peace between the israelis and the palestinians. We are giving it an absolute go, i think theres a good chance for it to happen. Many people say theres no chance whatsoever. I actually think with the capability with b. B. And the other side. I think israel would like to see it and the palestinians would like to see it. And i can tell you that the Trump Administration would like to see it. So were working very hard and well see what happens. Historically people say it cant happen, i say it can happen. I just want to say again mr. President , its an honor to have you here. Mr. President , its great to see you again, i want to say that under your leadership the alliance between america and israel has never been stronger, never been deeper, i can say this in ways that people see, and ways that they dont see, so i want to thank you for that. Equally, i look forward to discussing with you how we can address together what you rightly call the terrible nuclear deal with iran and how to roll back irans growing aggression in the region especially in syria, as you said, we can discuss the ways we can seize the opportunity between israel and the arab world, i think these things go together. And we look forward to talking about how we can advance, finally were going to be speaking tomorrow at the u. N. And i want to say that under President Trump, americas position towards israel and the u. N. Has been unequivocal, its strong, its got both clarity and conviction and i want to thank you on behalf of the people of israel, and israels many friends around the world. Thank you plmr. President. And as you all know this is the jewish new year this week. I want to wish you and people everywhere, a happy, healthy new year, thank you mr. President. Youll be seeing us very soon. Thank you, everybody, well see you this afternoon, thank you. The u. S. Senate today is working to finish up the 2018 Defense Authorization bill, setting programs and policy for the coming years. The series of votes is planned for about 5 30 eastern today. U. S. House is not in session this week, members return september 25, to take up faa reauthorization and chip, the Childrens Health insurance program. Funding for those programs end at the end of the month. Hillary clintons new memoir, what happened. And we cspan will have live coverage beginning at 7 00 p. M. Eastern. Its that time of year to announce or 2018 video competition. This years theme is the constitution and you and were asking students to choose a provision of the u. S. Constitution and create a video illustrating why it is important. Our competition is open to all middle school and High School Students grades 6through 12. Students can work in groups of up to three and produce a 5 to 7 minute video. 100,000 will be awarded in cash prizes. 5,000 will go to the student or team with the best overall entry. The deadline is january 18, 2018. Help spread the record for student filmmakers. Go to our website studentcam. Org. Former Obama Administration education secretary john king was a keynote speaker at a conference of urban School Superintendents, he talked about the socalled school to prison pipeline and Early Childhood education, the event was cohosted by aasa, the School Superintendents association. This is just over two hours. Good afternoon, everyone. I would like to thank you