Rural hospitals and health care facilities provide critical medical services to the people of their communities, and we must do something to ensure that they have the resources they need to continue serving the people of Arkansas.  In May, during National Hospital Week, I announced my co-sponsorship of a number of bills to aid rural hospitals and health clinics, and on Wednesday, I was pleased to join a bipartisan group of members of the House and Senate, including Senator Blanche Lincoln, in introducing the Rural Health Care Improvement Act of 2001. 

What we’re asking for with this legislation is a level playing field for Medicare reimbursements.  Sixty to 70 percent of hospitals’ business comes from Medicare.   Additionally, insurance companies largely base their reimbursement rates on the Medicare rate, so in the big picture, this bill goes a long way toward saving our rural hospitals. 

This legislation not only boosts reimbursement rates for our rural hospitals, but it also helps rural hospitals and rural health clinics pay for labor costs and capital improvements, purchase new equipment and technology, and support the ongoing process of expanding telehealth networks to underserved rural areas.  Finally, it addresses the needs of home health agencies, which allow seniors to the opportunity to live independently at home while receiving important health services. 

We need affordable, accessible rural health care for people across south Arkansas and across America.  If there was ever a need to put progress before partisanship, that need is when it comes to rural health care and saving rural hospitals.  I am determined continue working to make sure that we do just that.

As temperatures across the country heat up and this summer’s travel season begins, our nation finds itself in the midst of an energy crisis not seen in two decades.  While my constituents in south Arkansas have not had to face the electricity shortages that California has seen, we, like all Americans, have been strapped by the dramatic rise in oil and gas prices.    

The hard working families of south Arkansas already struggle to make ends meet.  Many of my constituents come from very poor and rural areas, where they depend on their cars or trucks to get to and from their jobs, or where they have large tractors and equipment to tend to their farms.  When already faced with the costs of feeding their families, paying their electricity bills, and paying for expensive prescription drugs to stay healthy and get well, they simply cannot afford these high gasoline costs.  I believe we must act to bring these prices down, and we must do it now.   

Since this most recent increase in gasoline prices began, I along with many of my colleagues in Congress have written letters to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham as well as President Bush asking them to come to the aid of gasoline consumers by aggressively lobbying OPEC (the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) to increase the production of oil—or as Bush suggested last year, “open up their spigots”—to help alleviate this problem.    

Just last March, OPEC decided to cut oil production by 4%, or 1 million barrels a day, and indications show that the agreement to reduce production has already been implemented.  In fact, since January, OPEC has announced plans to take 2.5 million barrels a day worth of crude oil out of the world oil markets.  In testimony before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, the Department of Energy’s Energy Information Agency (EIA) concluded that OPEC production cuts are “largely responsible” for the current high gasoline prices.   

I was disappointed to learn this week that OPEC ministers signaled that they will reject a plan to increase oil production to offset a new embargo by Iraq on sales to Western countries.  I think it is wrong that Iraq or any handful of foreign countries can place this undue burden on American consumers.  

In addition to pressuring OPEC to increase production, we must also work with U.S. oil producers to increase their dangerously low levels of oil inventories.  Our nation lacks the refinery capacity to keep up with current demand for oil and gas.  We should work to streamline regulatory requirements to facilitate investment in new refineries and other improvements to our energy infrastructure, and I urge the Administration to work to with our current domestic refineries to increase their inventories of refined gasoline.  

But we cannot stop there.  We need a balanced, proactive national energy policy—one that serves as an energy plan for the future that not only increases energy production, but also decreases energy demand.  We must work to decrease our dependence on foreign oil through conservation, renewable energy, and energy efficiency programs.  

In the short term, we should look at ways to guard our consumers against potential price gouging by the big oil companies.  For our home heating oil consumers, we should also look at incentives to encourage consumers to make energy efficient improvements to their homes, and we must make sure that we fully fund the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP).  The money we invest in this program will be put right back into the economy through lower heating and fuel bills.    

In May, President Bush announced his Administration’s plan to address our nation’s current energy crisis, a plan that calls for major increases in oil and gas production in the United States.  I agree with the Administration that we need to increase production, but I believe their proposal is a plan for the past that seems to cater to the big oil companies.    

I am disappointed that their plan does not do more to support programs to increase research and development in new energy technologies that increase conservation and alternative and renewable fuel sources to reduce our oil dependence.  This may not be an immediate answer, but it is certainly important for the long-term as fossil fuel sources diminish.  Surely, if we can create the technology to send a man to the moon, we can develop a crop that our farmers can grow that can provide an efficient and affordable alternative source for fuel.  

Our current energy situation is a complicated problem with no easy answers, but it is of critical importance to the people of south Arkansas and across America.  The sooner we take action, the sooner we can see results at the pump.  I urge my colleagues to support a balanced, proactive, and bipartisan solution to this crisis so that we can bring relief to our hard working families. 

The $24 million in funding includes $10 million for the Ouachita and Ozark National Forests to remove downed trees, clear roads and trails, prevent wildfires, and plant new trees; $10 million for private tree farmers through the National Resource Conservation Service; and $4 million for capital repairs and maintenance within the National Forest Service.   

“This much needed funding will greatly assist the forest service as well as our local timber owners as they continue working day-in and day-out to recover from the damage caused by the ice storms,” Ross said.  “I am pleased that the committee recognized the importance of this funding for our state.” 

 “The approval of funds today is really the adoption of the legislation we introduced in March,” Hutchinson said.   “This important money will help complete the recovery of the state’s forests and reduce the risk of wildfires so that Arkansans can enjoy our national forests this summer.” 

“The approval of these supplemental funds is good news for Arkansas forests,” Berry said. “The proper maintenance of our public land requires considerable effort and expense, and this appropriation is much-needed and much-appreciated.” 

“This money will go a long way towards restoring the natural beauty of the Ouachita and Ozark National Forests to pre-ice storm condition and protecting what remains from the danger of wildfires,” Snyder said.   

Ross, along with Hutchinson, Berry, and Snyder, introduced stand-alone legislation in March to provide $63 million in federal funds for ice storm cleanup within Arkansas’s forests.   

The Fiscal Year 2001 Supplemental Appropriations bill, which includes the funding, is expected to be approved by the full House of Representatives next week.