Into the srf . Thats what ive heard many of you say we need to put more money into that program. What do we have to do . How much more money . Can any of you suggest where we have to go with that . I would also add should wish prioritizing the srf money for Rural Communities so were weighting them a little more heavily than the big cities . Sir, youre preaching to the choir here. I think all of us would agree a significantly greater percentage of the srf money should go to Rural Communities and they should be able to access it more quickly. You cant even have a chance of getting the srf money unless you get on the intended use plan. And for a Small Community how do you get on the intended use plan . All of us can tell you thats difficult to do. I mean, do you have the Technical Assistance . Do you have an engineer youre working with, somebody thats going to submit the paperwork . Do you even have a chance to get on the money . And thats a problem. Thats one thing i said in my testimony. We need some assistance just so these small communities can get on the intended use plan which is what they do to prioritize money into the srf. How can we what are some factors that we might be able to weight so a Small Community putting in will be given better consideration than a Larger Community . Any of your thoughts . Mr. Gomez. Well, generally, what g. A. O. Always recommends is that you target federal funds to those communities. So if these are the communities thats one of the areas we could target. Okay. I guess were running out of time. Again, mr. Chairman, thank you very much for bringing this out. I hope we continue to this is for small cities. The big cities have their own issues, but they have the resources and the Critical Mass to be able to take care of it. Our small towns are 400, 500 people. Were struggling. Wed better find it. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentleman from ohio mr. Johnson for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I represent appalachia, ohio and i dont have to tell you folks, probably, how rural that is. I hear the horror stories, many of which youve just heard. I could cite similar cases that my colleague from west virginia, mr. Mckinley, did. Mr. Selman, long before i was elected to congress i served 26 years in the air force and i was stationed in columbus, mississippi. And you know how rural that area is. So ive seen this for a long time. Mr. Gomez. Does the gao track and can you tell us in regards to all urban and rural systems how many municipalities have their systems charged the true cost of providing water to their customers . In other words, how many of them are operating in the red . Thats a really good question. And its always one area thats debatable, right . Whether people are actually paying the true price of what the water cost. I dont believe that we have done work on that. But if we have id have to get back to you on that. Would you take a look at that, please . I think the American People would be interested to know how these small Rural Communities are struggling and many of them are operating in the red as it stands right now because their residents cant even afford the cost of providing the water. What it can also say is epa has estimated that for these Rural Communities if they have to undertake these water and waste Water Infrastructure projects their rates will likely be four times what the urban rate payer would be paying. Oh, absolutely. Its not affordable. And ive got rural areas that are under that exact pressure. They dont have the money, because of the economy. They dont have the money to comply with the epas clean water mandates and system mandates today. And on top of that theyre being leveled with these fines that they also cant pay. Its like trying to get blood out of a turnip. And i know you guys know what a turnip is. Its tough. Let me ask you a question, mr. Newman. Your testimony mentions that the town of como, mississippi has 2 million in waste water needs and 1 million in Drinking Water upgrades it needs to undertake. Whats the operating budget of como . The annual operating budget in the town of como is approximately 150,000 annually. Okay. And whats the average income of como residents . Per capita, about 21,000. Okay. Is raising local water rates a realistic possibility . Its a realistic possibility from a standpoint of operation and maintenance but not from the standpoint of addressing making these upgrades. Thats correct. Yes. And even if you raised the rates operationally and maintenancewise, would it be enough to cover the cost of providing the service . No. Okay. What is their access to or are there limits on other Funding Sources like commercial lending . Thats a doubleedged question because the question itself kind of says why dont you go in debt to provide water. And thats certainly not a principle i subscribe to. But are you considering other sources . By and large the primary source is Rural Development. Primarily because of the grant component. Other options as we have discussed include a state revolving fund. Even commercial lending. However, as is the case with srf, commercial lending is 100 loan and the Interest Rates on a commercial loan is typically going to be layer than the srf. At either case because of the low economies of scale a Community Like como cant afford to borrow the money necessary to make these improvements. They just dont have enough customers over which to spread the cost. Okay. All right. For mr. Newman, mr. Keegan and mr. Selman, what challenges do you have in assessing the Drinking Water state revolving funds and how does that compare with accessing Rural Utility Service funding . Well, ill allow these gentlemen to elaborate, but one of the issues, and i think we touched on it as well, youve got more help in applying with r. U. S. As opposed to srf. The cost of applying for srf, you may have to utilize services from a consultant which adds to the cost. And thats typically not the case with the Rural Development process. Okay. Mr. Selman. Weve been able to use some srf money. Our engineer takes whatever they allow as that consultant amount. Whatever they allow for an attorney, an engineer or whatever. He does the paperwork for whatever that is. And theyve got that specified in the loan. And weve been able to i know certain regions. Maybe not. But weve been able to take advantage of sfr money. Weve been having trouble getting money through Rural Development. Thank you, mr. Selman. My time has expired. But mr. Keegan, do you want to respond . Weve had trouble accessing funds from either program. In new york state a lot of funding goes to communities that have some sort of citation, some problem with their system. Engineers work very hard to keep our systems smooth running. So were sort of at the bottom of the pile. Thank you very much. Mr. Chairman, Rural America knows how hard it is to get blood out of a turnip. And i appreciate you having this hearing so that we can shed some light on how difficult it is to do this. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And i thank my Ranking Member and my vice chair, who is trying to lead this charge too. Last but not least, mr. Kramer from the rural state of north dakota. Youre recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman, from illinois and Ranking Member from new york for acknowledging Rural America and for reminding us there are other rural places that are better known or their urban centers. Its good to have an alliance. My colleagues or my constituents with the north Dakota Rural Water Systems Association would be very proud of all of you. Youve done a great job today and i felt right at home, even with the unusual accents. But its a reminder there are some things we Work Together on and that are very important. And i wont i wont delay except to tell you that i hear a lot about the Circuit Rider Program from our folks and i think you raise a very important issue. I think its incumbent upon us now as policy makers and eventually appropriators to look for opportunities to prioritize some of the programs you talked about within the context of the entire act. And given the constraints, financial constraints we have, we do have to be a little bit creative but certainly we can reprioritize. I want to just ask for maybe a little bit of elaboration on one point. I got the gao report was fantastic frankly. And i think it was its nice to see the alphabet soup as my constituents often refer to it and see that theres both recommendation, findings and then response by multiple agencies that have to have a tendency perhaps to create extra burden by virtue of requiring sort of uniform processes but not in a uniform way. The uniform preliminary engineering report template i think is a great tool. And i think at a time when our constituents are looking for an efficient effective government this is a good example. And i raise it because i wonder how many more times we could duplicate this throughout the system. One of the frustrations ive seen in the last two years here is not just with epa and usda Rural Development. Certainly in fact there are many others have more. I just hope we could as a house, as a congress, and as Public Officials at every level look for more of these times of opportunities. The public could go wild. That makes perfect sense. Because right now they look at it and im sure you all do, you mean i have to hire the Engineering Firm to dot exact same thing for another agency and pay them . I guess mainly what i want to say is thanks for that. I will want to be monitoring that very carefully, see how it works out. And i know you will as well, mr. Gomez because i think therein lie the nuggets of opportunity to demonstrate functionality of government in a way that people expect of us that that we probably havent done so well. Thank you. And we are tracking that, by the way. Its part of our tracking that we do every year because we want to make sure that those agencies are making progress and that its helping the communities in need. Thank you for that. And again thanks to awful you. And i will leave some time on the clock and not and just thank you for being so patient to hang around with me this long. Thank you. I yield back. Gentleman yields back his time. Looks like were about gone. Do you have anything else you want to say and take an opportunity . Thank you, mr. Chair. I just want to commend the entire panel. I think what you shared with us is not only great insight but advocacy for what is a very high priority. And youve done it through that front line experience. It provides an extra bit of impact i think on the decisions that are made here. But thank you for reinforcing what we have understood to be a problem, and this is a very high priority problem i would think for the country. So thank you very much and i was impressed by all the statements that youve made and the responses youve provided. I want to thank the Ranking Member for those comments and thank you for being here. I think its just going to energize us to try to ive kind of asked mr. Tonko and mr. Harper to now get together and try to see where theres similarities and agreement so we can kind of move Forward Together and you can see theres a lot of areas in our country that are kind of left behind just because theyre small. Its not a political statement. Its just the nature of our country. I really appreciate the involvement of my colleagues too. So thank you. I need some business to do. I ask unanimous consent that all subcommittee members have five legislative days to submit Opening Statements for the record. Without objection so ordered. Also unanimous consent in asserting a letter from dr. Ralph jones and a letter and report from the Environmental Working Group without objection. So ordered. And remind folks that members of the committee have ten days to submit written questions for the witnesses to be included. You may get some as followup. Wed ask you that answer those, or return those if you can. And that is without objection. The promotion of a drug actually starts 7 to 10 years before a drug comes to be market. And it is not ill reellegal legal to market a disease. Drawing companies have sometimes exaggerated the importance of certain conditions or exaggerated the importance f a burglar mechanism of a drug. And blanketed medical journals and other venues where the the messages that are approximate meant to prepare the minds of the clinicians to accept a particular drug and also to prepare the minds of consumers to accept a particular condition. Sunday on cspans q a. The committee on Homeland Security will come to order. Committee is meeting today to hear testimony on violent islamist extremism, and the threat of foreign fighters and homegrown terror. I now recognize myself for an opening statement. Today at the first hearing of the House Committee on Homeland Security in the 114th congress, id like to take a moment of silence to remember all those who lost their lives at the hands of isis, especially americans james foley, Steven Sotloff and most recently kayla mueller. These victims are the reason why we are here today. We must keep these barbaric terrorists out of the homeland to protect the American People. This hearing will also assess the urgent and growing threat of terrorist recruiting and inspiring americans. We need to accurately define the threat. And that is violent islamist extremism. And recognize that it is spreading like wildfire around the globe. These fanatics want nothing less than destruction of our way of life, and now their ability to match words with deeds is growing at an astonishing rate. In recent years, their safe havens have proliferated and their ranks have swelled. In many ways, we are no longer talking about terrorist groups. We are talking about terrorist armies. Isis now controls a territory the size of belgium, governs millions of people, draws on billions of dollars in revenue, and commands tens of thousands of foot soldiers. And they are brutal. Their latest act of barbarism was on full display with a horrific murder of the jordanian pilot. This evolving islamic terrorist landscape has given rise to the dual threats of foreign fighters, returning to the United States and home grown terrorism. The recent terror attack in paris and other attacks and plots in belgium, germany, the uk, australia, canada, and here in the United States, are proof that the threat has surged and that the enemy is dead set on attacking the west. This map behind me shows a surge in isis linked terrorist plots over the last year alone. As mr. Rasmussen notes in his testimony, more than 20,000 fighters from over 90 countries have made their way to the battlefield to join al qaeda, isis and other extremist groups, making this the largest convergence of islamist terrorists in world history. That number continues to grow despite months of air strikes. Up to 5,000 of these fighters are westerners, many of whom are able to travel into the United States without obtaining a visa. And more than 150 american citizens have attempted to or succeeded in getting to the battlefield, and we know that some of them have already returned to our shores. You can see this flow depicted in the graphic behind me. But extremists do not need to travel overseas in order to become a threat to our homeland. Though hollywoodlike propaganda today videos and social media and through that means islamist terror groups are inciting their followers and potential recruits to wage war at home. Both isis, and Yemenbased Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, have called for westerners, including americans, to wage individual jihad in their home countries, and its working. Isis social media also gives step by step instructions on how to get to the fight and how to return. Following the attacks in paris last month our European Partners have been busy uncovering new terrorist cells and disrupting imminent plots. Also just recently here at home, the fbi arrested an ohiobased isis sympathizer who was intending to attack the United States capitol with pipe bombs. Im worried about our ability to combat this threat abroad, but also here at home. I wrote to the president recently, and raised concerns that we still have no lead agency in charge of countering domestic radicalization, and no line item for it in the budgets, in key departments and agencies. Im also concerned that the few programs we do have in place are far too small to confront a threat that has grown so quickly. Today i hope to hear how the Administration Assesses the danger posed by foreign fighters, particularly westerners, and the threat of homegrown terrorism here in the United States. More importantly, i hope we will hear about how the administration is responding, and how plans to ramp up its response to those challenges. This morning, i would like to welcome all of our witnesses, but especially mr. Rasmussen, with the National Counterterrorism center, in his first appearance before congress after being confirmed as director. An