Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 9, 1994 TAG: 9410120038
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The Senate killed legislation Saturday that would have allowed governors to control the amount of interstate garbage flowing into their states.
The House had passed the bill, which was sponsored by Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon. The attempt to get it through the Senate failed when Republican Leader Bob Dole of Kansas objected to the legislation passing by unanimous consent.
By then, most senators already had departed as the Congress was within minutes of adjourning.
The legislation had been the subject of three days of intense negotiations between House and Senate staff members trying to work out differences between separate bills approved by the two chambers.
Sen. Harris Wofford, D-Pa., said an agreement had been reached on a compromise bill that passed the House on Friday night. But he said Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., had put a ``hold'' on the legislation, keeping the Senate from approving it by unanimous consent.
The legislation would have given governors and local community leaders increased flexibility in controlling the transportation of wastes into states for disposal in commercial landfills.
The bill was the ``victim of political obstructionism,'' charged Wofford. Without it, he said, governors have no authority to curb the importation of garbage from other states because that would amount to an interference in interstate commerce.
- Associated Press
Senate OKs bill to protect desert
WASHINGTON - The Senate agreed Saturday to shelter a vast area of the California desert from development and urban sprawl, handing President Clinton the only major environmental-protection bill to pass the 103rd Congress.
The desert bill, which environmentalists had sought for years, took on broader political overtones as Democrats accused Republicans of trying to undercut Sen. Dianne Feinstein's re-election bid by depriving her of a legislative victory.
It creates the largest wilderness area outside of Alaska, putting 6.6 million acres under increased federal protection. Two new national parks will be created, as well as a 1.5 million-acre national preserve in the desert area of southeastern California. The House had passed the legislation Friday.
- Associated Press
House subjects self to laws for workers
WASHINGTON - The House decided it could withstand public pressure no longer and voted to apply worker safety, civil rights and other laws to the thousands of people it employs.
With Election Day just a month off, the House voted 348-3 Friday to change its internal rules and apply 10 worker-protection laws to itself.
But legislation that would have applied the 10 measures to all of the nearly 40,000 employees of Congress seemed dead in the Senate, where it was being tied up by Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska.
Congress has exempted itself from the laws for decades. Lawmakers have argued that because the statutes are enforced by executive agencies such as the Justice Department, presidents could use the laws to threaten members of Congress.
- Associated Press
SEC budget passes after costly delay
WASHINGTON - The Senate approved the Securities and Exchange Commission's budget Saturday after a five-day delay that commission officials said cost the Treasury at least $19.4 million.
The Senate passed the bill by unanimous voice vote a day after SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt Jr. bitterly denounced the political process that caused the agency to curtail inspections of mutual funds and brokerages.
The delay also reduced the amount of fees the SEC could collect from corporations that register securities with the government.
- Associated Press
by CNB