First Responders a Focus of Lame Duck Session for Tierney
WASHINGTON, Nov. 13, 2002–As the new Congress gets ready to move in, Rep. John Tierney, D-Salem, is set for a party leadership change and looks forward to resolving issues like distributing money to emergency “first responders,” ensuring that people have adequate health insurance and increasing funds for higher-education Pell Grants-subjects he says are important not only to him but to his constituents along the North Shore.
“I have supported Nancy Pelosi from the beginning,” Tierney said. Rep. Pelosi, of California’s 8th District, was expected this week to win an election to become the new Democratic Leader in the House, succeeding Rep. Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri.
Pelosi is an effective new face who will help straighten out the party, he said.
“She’s a strong leader…. She understands what needs to be done.”
Tierney, a member on the House Committee on Government Reform, said that for years he has stressed the importance of first responders-the people working at the local level who are the first to respond to emergencies.
“We have repeatedly stressed the importance of getting the money out to them,” he said in an interview Wednesday. “It’s important to the communities.”
In a July statement on the issue, Tierney said: “Whether the targets are ports, nuclear power plants, office buildings or landmarks, our local first responders need to know how they will receive intelligence communications and what resources they will have to help them act on this information in order to protect the American people.”
Tierney said in Wednesday’s interview that the money for the first responders has been appropriated but has not been “spent in any significant amounts.”
Some other issues on Tierney’s agenda include healthcare and education.
Pell Grant funds for college aid must be increased, said Tierney, who sits on the Education and the Workforce Committee. Families must have the opportunity to be able to afford a higher education, he said.
Tierney also plans to focus on retraining and educating people in the workforce. “We have to take care of people displaced by new technology or the economy,” he said.
He added that health care will be another topic of concern for him in the new Congress. “We have to find a way to make sure people have adequate and affordable coverage,” he said. The money is there, he said, but is not being managed and allocated very well.
Even though he is moving up in seniority, Tierney, who will begin his fourth term in January, said that he plans on staying with his committee assignments.
“We’ll have to see what develops,” he said. But being on these committees is “a good place to be” for his North Shore constituency.
Published in The Salem News, in Massachusetts.
