Rick Boucher's to-do-list: balanced federal budget, energy and health care

ABINGDON, Va. – With the nation on course for economic recovery, U.S. Rep. Rick Boucher said, now is the time to fast-track another essential priority: Balance the federal budget.

Speaking to the Bristol Herald Courier on Thursday, Boucher said a balanced national budget, along with energy and health care, tops his list of priorities for 2010.

The Democratic representative from Abingdon has co-sponsored legislation that would create a balanced-budget commission tasked with taking a year-long comprehensive look at federal spending and presenting recommendations. Congress would then fast-track consideration of the proposal, which would be accepted or rejected as a whole, minus the amendments and compromise typically included in the lawmaking process.

“Congress left to its own devices could achieve a balanced budget, but it would take a lot longer,” Boucher said. “And I think the urgency of the need to restore a balanced budget is sufficiently great that an approach such as creating this balanced-budget committee is necessary.”

Under this procedure, Boucher said, “It’s almost certain that the recommendations would be accepted.”

Boucher also said he is hopeful that President Barack Obama will encourage passage of the bill when he delivers his State of the Union address.

Long an Obama supporter, Boucher maintains that the large-scale economic stimulus spending was necessary for economic recovery, but in its wake, he said Thursday, a balanced budget is equally necessary.

Two other critical issues, Boucher said, are the hot topics of climate change legislation and health care reform.

Energy regulation

On a proposed cap-and-trade system, which would cap greenhouse gas emissions and allow carbon-emitting and offsetting entities to trade among themselves to meet the limits, Boucher reiterated his stance: Congress must regulate.

His controversial decision to support and help shape a House bill to regulate greenhouse gas emissions is in the best interest of the coal industry and Southwest Virginia’s economy, Boucher said. His reasoning? If Congress doesn’t regulate, the Environmental Protection Agency will – and it has already begun the process.

Unlike Congress, Boucher said, the EPA can’t consider the damage to industry, the loss of jobs, nor the rising electricity costs that could result from its regulation. But Congress, by imposing a regulatory program for greenhouse gases, can prevent the EPA from adopting regulations that would be much worse for America’s economy.

“It’s now up to the Senate to act, and I’m very hopeful that the Senate will act in the near time frame so that we can create certainty and we can prevent EPA from issuing its own regulations,” he said.

Protecting health care

On health care, Boucher said he stands by his decision to vote against the House bill that passed in November because as written the bill could cause the region’s nonprofit hospital systems to go out of business, severely hampering care delivery.

He said Mountain States Health Alliance, one of the Tri-Cities region’s two nonprofit health care giants, would be unable to continue operations under the House bill. For competitor Wellmont, Boucher said, the bill’s provisions “would be highly detrimental to its ability to continue to operate as it does today.”

Any bill that comes out of the conference to merge the House and Senate versions must not harm the region’s nonprofit hospitals and must benefit those with health insurance as well as those without, he said.

Also, he said, the merged bill must eliminate the special deals granted to a handful of senators in exchange for their votes – such as a provision that would require the federal government to foot the bill for Nebraska’s Medicaid expansion while the other 49 states would have to pay for expansion themselves.

“There is no reasonable basis to provide that kind of discrimination in favor of one state to the disadvantage of the other 49,” Boucher said, “so that provision simply must come out of the measure before it is approved by Congress.”

It’s also important, he said, to eliminate the Medicare reimbursement disparity between urban and rural areas, as health care delivery costs just as much in rural areas as in the cities.

Among other things Boucher said he’s working on:

* A program called “Showcasing Southwest Virginia” that works to recruit companies to the region: Its recent focus has been on data centers, which expand the tax base and bring high-paying jobs to the communities where they locate, Boucher said, and he is hopeful that announcements will be made in 2010 on the location of data centers in the region.

* Federal money is still available for water, wastewater and broadband infrastructure projects, and he plans to help attract some of that cash to Southwest Virginia.

* For the sake of the public interest, whistleblowers on wrongdoing need to be allowed to stay confidential, Boucher said, and he believes 2010 will be the year that federal law allows reporters to keep their sources secret.

n Southwest Virginia’s first veterans’ cemetery, under construction in Pulaski County, is expected to open this fall.

n Boucher said he’s been urging the White House and the EPA to allow surface mining to continue without changes to existing regulations. He said the industry is essential to the region’s economy and the nation’s energy supply.

* While he has yet to make a formal announcement on whether he will seek re-election this year, Boucher said: “When that announcement is made, absolutely no one is going to be surprised.”

Boucher has been in office for a quarter-century, but, he said, he is focused on his work – and the campaign season will come “much later this year.”

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