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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1983-07-10 Rep Tom Lewis Gains Respect Among Knowledgable in Washington (Palm Beach Post)SUNDAY, JULY 10, 1983 ;'° Dimension SECTION The Post A Congressman Grows NORM MIN UMW Rep. Tom Lewis Gains Respect Among Knowledgeable in Washington Cox News Service Photo by Bud Newman Rep. Tom Lewis stands in front of the entrance of the House of Representatives side of the Capitol 'He's been out there, he knows what life is all about and nobody can con him ... He just sits there drinking it all in and you know that there are no flies on Tom.' D2—The Post, Sunday, July 10, 1983 Lewis his mouth shut"' on occasions when Reagan seems less than well pre- pared. The only person interviewed who was critical of Lewis' performance so far was Democrat Culverhouse of Fort Pierce, who Lewis beat by about 8,000 votes last November to win the District 12 seat. Most observers, including agree that Culverhouse is itching for a rematch next year. Culverhouse said he hasn't decided whether to run again. "Anything's possible," he said. Culverhouse said Lewis has "put forth an appearance of activity" as a congressman but has shown "no sub- stance" and hasn't been very effective in getting money for district projects, in part because Lewis is a member of the House Republican minority. Specifically, Culverhouse said it was he, not Lewis, who helped get $75,000 into the federal budget for engineering, design of a project to deepen the Fort Pierce port. Culver - house said he contacted Rep. Claude Pepper (D-Fla.), with whom he has a close, longstanding relationship, and that Pepper went to Rep. Bill Chappell (D-Fla.), a member of the House Ap- propriations Committee, who got the money into the budget. "It's either a situation that he (Lew- is) promised them (local officials) something and didn't follow through — and that would be a situation of office incompetency — or he decided not to throw himself into the issue," Culverhouse said, adding that this was the first time since the election he has publicly criticized Lewis' perfor- mance. "The important thing is that Tom Lewis, to my knowledge, had told the Chamber (of Commerce in Fort Pierce) that he would try to do some- thing about it and did nothing," Cul- verhouse said. Lewis acknowledges that Culver - house's call to Pepper helped get the $75,000 into the budget. But Lewis said Culverhouse does not deserve as much credit as he's taking and that Culverhouse's criticisms are "unwar- ranted." "That's a piddling amount of money and We were going to get it in there," Lewis said, adding that he was just waiting for the right moment to move. • Cox News Service Photo by Bud Newman 4-H members Brian Powers, Kayla Albritton, Kristen Madison meet with Lewis in his Washington office "The money would have been there whether he made the phone call or not." Besides, Lewis said;" wot'k''bn the port deepening project can't start un- til the state issues :a9• n!:ilront enta1 permit that is still -.pending; so -there is no rush to get the design funds. "I'm not going.to get into a verbil battle with him," Lewis said of Cu - verhouse. "I'm doing my job as a con- gressman." And so far, Lewis said, he' likes his new job a lot, even with ifs built-in frustrations and limitations. "It's everything ;that I thought it would be," said Lewis, who wa eleefi- ed vice president of the man class of Republicans shortly affer his arrival. Mrs. Lewis agrees. "He still feels a thrill when he feels a part of this congressional (experi- ence) and to know that he is working to shape the future," she said. "I think it is fulfilling. I think it takes a lot more out of him that he thought it would." But other than the fact that Lewis has added a few pounds around the middle and the fact that he has had to switch to a wider shoe because his feet hurt from so much walking back and forth to the Capitol, Mrs. Lewis said she has noticed few changes in her husband since he came to Congress. "He has had some downs," she said. "If he's had a hell of a day, I know he's had a hell of a day and he expresses that ... Ie is up a lot more than he is down." 1 When he's tired or feeling down, she said, Lewis can get snappy and be- come "a little quick to answer." She said her husband needs to get back into playing golf to relax, but that he hasn't had time to play since coming to Congress. And she said she misses the 2-mile evening walks they took together in North Palm Beach or in Tallahassee during legislative ses- sions. She said her husband usually gets home from the office too late to go for walks. Like many newcomers, Lewis said the incredible pace and physical de- mands of the job caught him by sur- prise. He said every day on Capitol Hill is like the frenzied last few days of the Florida Legislature. "The thing that I learned to do was say no (to all the invitations and de- mands on his time)," Lewis said. "You just have to recognize that you have to structure your time so that you can be effective in those areas you want to be. "I thought I would have the mental challenge, yes, but I did not think I would have the physical challenge," he said. "It used to tire me out." Lewis, the former chief of jet engine testing at Pratt & Whitney Aircraft, is no dummy and no one questions his intellectual capacity to handle the job. Yet, even he admits that the sheer volume and complexity of issues he must deal with can be overwhelming. "There is more thrown at you than I feel the most intelligent person could comprehend," he said. "I think you'd become a raving maniac if you tried to absorb it all." Lewis said he thinks "five terms would be enough" for him, if the vot- ers approve. That would make him 68 when he retires from Congress in 1992. As Lewis continues to adjust to life as a congressman, he has credited his decade as a state legislator with giv- • ing him a big jump over other fresh- men without similar experience. It also gave him an understanding of the appropriations process, he said, and made issues such as agriculture, gov- ernment operations and transporta- tion easier for him. His science back- ground helps him on the Science and Technology Committee. But he said in areas like foreign affairs, "I can only scratch the surface on that and I rely on the expertise of other members." To help keep in shape — and per- haps to help work out any frustrations or anxieties — Lewis has started tak- ing karate lessons twice a week in the House gymnasium. "It's good exercise," he said. "If gives you a good mental attitude." And, he noted, "you may have to wind up protecting yourself up here one day and you better be ready to do it." Fear for their safety helped con- vince the Lewis' to rent an apartment in Crystal City, a concrete canyon of apartments, condominiums and hotels along U.S. 1 in Arlington, Va., only a couple miles from the office. They originally thought about renting in Capitol Hill's residential section, but decided the integrated neighborhood's mix of high-priced, renovated town- houses and more rundown dwellings was not safe enough. Mrs. Lewis said she didn't want to live where people had iron bars on their windows and big dogs for protec- tion. Their Crystal City apartment is se- cure and close to the subway, which Lewis said he usually takes to work. Lewis said his most special moment in six months as a congressman came when he and about eight others were called to the White House to meet with Reagan prior to the House vote on funding for the controversial MX mis- sile. "The most impressive thing to me was sitting at the Cabinet table at the White House with the president and the vice president and Gen. (John) Ves- sey (chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and the secretary of defense ... and debating the MX, because I was an undecided vote on that," said Lew- is, who voted for MX funding. "Here I am sitting with the most powerful man in the world," Lewis said. "I wasn't overwhelmed, but I never thought I'd be here having this kind of discussion." He said that White House visit helped convince him that "Hey, what I do here really does count." After six months in Washington, others are beginning to notice that as well. How Lewis Has Voted By Bud Newman Cox News Service WASHINGTON — During his first six months in Congress, freshman Rep. Tom Lewis has voted for: • Funding for the MX missile, which passed. • Funding for the American Conservation Corps, a - conservation jobs program opposed by President Reagan. The bill passed. • An extra $325 million to improve science and math instructions in the public schools. The bill passed. • The so-called Social Security rescue bill to help-,• ensure solvency for the retirement system's trust funds by speeding up already scheduled payroll tax increases and gradually raising the retirement age to 66 after the year 2000. The bill, which evolved from the recommendations, of a presidentially appointed task force on Social Security;" passed. • The $4.6 billion emergency jobs and recession relief bill, which passed. • An amendment making the goal of U.S.-Soviet arms control negotiations an agreement to scrap two existing nuclear warheads for each new one deployed instead of seeking a freeze on nuclear weapons. The amendment failed. • A bill to repeal the law establishing a withholding tax on interest and dividend earnings as of July 1. The bill —a similar version of which Lewis had filed himself — passed. • Extra funds for meals programs for older Ameri- cans. The funding was approved over the president's ob- jections. • An amendment to prohibit the Environmental Pro- tection Agency from imposing sanctions on communities that have failed to meet air quality standards set under the Clean Air Act. The amendment passed. • A bill to provide $101 million in military aid and $150 million in economic aid to Lebanon and to require the`" president to seek authorization from Congress to extend U.S. participation in the multinational peacekeeping force stationed there. The bill passed. • An amendment to delete $56 million from the budget for various water projects in Colorado. The amend- ment failed. • An amendment allowing the use of funds by the Defense Department to manufacture components of bina- ry chemical weapons, but barring their final assembly" until after Oct. 1, 1985. The amendment failed. • An amendment to delete $127.5 million in start-up,; money for the Los Angeles subway system. The amend- ment failed. • A motion to recommit the Transportation Appro- priations bill back to committee with orders to cut all programs by 4 percent. The motion failed. • A bill designating 2.33 million acres of national forest land in California as wilderness area. The bill passed. • Amendments to reduce Fiscal Year 1984 funds for the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities by $40 million, bringing them back to 1983 levels. The amendments failed. • An amendment to reduce Department of the Interi- or funding by 4 percent across the board. First adopted and then killed on a subsequent vote. During his first six months in Congress, Lewis has voted against: - •,Continued government funding of the Clinch River Breeder Reader nuclear project in Tennessee. The fund- ing was deleted. WA nuclear freeze, which passed the House in amend- ed form:'Lewis also supported several amendments — some af`which passed, some of which did not — designed to weaken the freeze resolution during House floor debate. •. An amendment requiring that 75 percent of the diScrettotiary finds in the jobs bill be spent in areas of high unemployment: The amendment passed. ,;*At tirtendment to the Social Security bill to raise the retirementage gradually from 65 to 67 after the year 2000,-to delete provisions decreasing benefits beginning in that year and to raise payroll taxes in the year 2015. The a dinept pasgd, ' A **Intent ent to raise the Social Security payroll at3 of a45ercettt for both employers and employees, effective in the year 2010 instead of the long-term benefit cuts and tax increases in the Social Security revision bill. The amendment was defeated. • A bill designating 1.13 million acres of national forest .land , in- Oregon as federal wilderness. The bill ar passed.- • A bill to authorize $760 million this year for a temporary loan program to help unemployed homeowners make their mortgage payments, plus $100 million next year for emergency shelter for the homeless. The bill passed:;. '• Bills to provide more than $70 billion in the next federal fiscal year, beginning Oct. 1, for the Department of Housing and Urban Development and 17 independent agencies, for the Department of Transportation, for the National Science Foundation, for civilian research and development programs at the Department of Energy and tor the Securities and Exchange Commission's operations. Al, four bills passed. •,Amendment to increase money for the Environ- i'sientaI Protection Agency next year by $219 million. The. avtendments passed. •`; ,;bill to=authorize grants to local school district to i,elp offset the costs of desegregation. The bill passed. CA bill to extend the Follow Through program to provide educational, health, nutritional and social services to disadvantagedchildren who previously had been en- rolled inPr•ograms like Head Start. The bill passed. • An amendment to eliminate $910,000 in office exper es for -.former Presidents Nixon, Ford and Carter but lvitgthem money for pensions. The amendment passed. . Ar, amendment to prohibit the use of federal health ' Benefit 304 to- pay for abortions unless the life of the mother is endangered. The amendment passed. _ A l,apietPdment to delete $19.4 million for procure- r(t kr a' t''anti-satellite missile. The amendment failed. • An amendment to delete $6.2 billion for procure- ment of the B-1 bomber and another amendment to bar multi -year procurement contracts for the B-1 bomber. Both amendments failed. • An amendment to delete $671 million for procure- ment of Divar anti-aircraft guns. The amendment failed. • An amendment to delete $432.8 million for procure- ment of Pershing II missiles. The amendment failed. • A bill to cap at $720 the amount an3bne can receive from the 10 percent tax cut scheduled to go into effect July 1. The bftI passed, but was killed by the Senate. Cox News Service Photo by Bud Newman Lewis during his karate class held in the House gymnasium