http://www.seattlepi.com/national/article/Republicans-shocked-at-idea-to-block-Navy-from-1060810.php
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WASHINGTON -- An "innocuous" attempt by Rep. Jay Inslee to block the Navy from paying the full electric bill at Vice President Dick Cheney's official residence ignited a searing debate yesterday on the House floor.
Although Inslee's amendment was defeated by a lopsided margin -- 285-141 -- it highlighted the passion and raw politics accompanying energy issues at a time when supplies are short and costs are high. It also foreshadowed what is likely to be a bruising debate next week when the House is expected to consider a broad energy bill.
In dollar terms, Democrat Inslee's amendment was inconsequential, affecting $186,000 out of a spending bill totaling $33 billion.
In political terms, however, it struck like a bolt of lightning.
Republicans complained bitterly that Inslee's amendment was designed solely to embarrass Cheney. House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Tex., rushed to the floor to call it "demeaning." The amendment, he said, "smells like chicken manure."
"This amendment ought to be known as the cheap-shot amendment," said Rep. Ray LaHood, R-Ill.
"This amendment is being offered to try to embarrass the vice president," he said, his voice rising. "You don't have any other way to embarrass him so you trot out this stupid amendment."
Cheney's spokeswoman, Juleanna Glover Weiss, echoed House Republicans, calling it "a gratuitous partisan broadside."
Cheney is the Bush administration's leading voice on energy matters and architect of an energy plan that relies heavily expanding oil, gas and coal exploration to address energy shortages.
The administration, and Cheney in particular, have been sharply criticized in the West for their refusal to take aggressive steps to reining in electricity costs.
Democrats say shifting responsibility for Cheney's electric bill from the vice president's operating budget to the Navy would insulate him from the realities faced by "regular people" who are coping with sharply higher electricity costs. The administration earmarked $186,000 for those costs for the next fiscal year.
"My constituents can't send their bills for skyrocketing electric bills to the U.S. Navy," Inslee said from the floor, noting that cost of electricity has gone up as much as 60 percent for some people living in his district.
California Democratic Rep. Bob Filner, who co-sponsored the amendment, said he wasn't accusing Cheney of being irresponsible. "We're accusing the vice president of being clueless. The administration is clueless about the sufferings of people," Filner said.
Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., scolded Republicans for claiming that the House floor is an embarrassment-free zone. "I regard the right to embarrass each other one of the cherished parts of American democracy," Frank declared.
On one level, the debate was meaningless. As vice president, all of Cheney's living expenses -- including electricity -- are covered by taxpayers. The question was which government agency would have to pay.
The vice president's budget and the Navy had been sharing the cost of electricity at the vice president's residence. That arrangement had the Navy paying $93,300 and the vice president's budget $42,000 last year.
Inslee's amendment was aimed at stopping the administration from using the Navy to pay for electricity at the 33-room mansion. In arguing for the change, the White House said it was permissible because the Navy owns the mansion.
Republicans said the idea of shifting responsibility originated in the Clinton administration. They also said that Cheney's electricity consumption was 25 percent less than former Vice President Al Gore's was.
"This debate today is almost ridiculous," said Rep. Sonny Callahan, R-Ala. "If we think the American people are so dumb they can't see through this charade of an argument, then we don't know them."
Inslee admitted he was surprised by the ferocious tenor of the debate.
"I did not anticipate it would be this political," Inslee said of the provision, which he characterized as "fairly innocuous... I didn't think it would be such an extraordinary request that would get people so lathered up."Excerpt:
Cheney Calls on Navy to Pay Rising Bill to Light His Home
By PHILIP SHENON
Published: July 17, 2001Sign In to E-Mail
Millions of Americans are struggling to cope with sky-high electricity bills for their homes. Among them, it turns out, is Vice President Dick Cheney, the Bush administration's point man on energy policy, whose home is a 33-room mansion on the leafy grounds of the Washington Naval Observatory.
Now, the White House has cited the large and unpredictable energy bills of the vice president's official residence in urging Congress to relieve him of using any of his official budget to pay for electricity. The entire electric bill -- an estimated $186,000 this year -- would be shifted to the Navy, which owns the house.
Mr. Cheney's personal encounter with energy costs came as the White House stepped up efforts today to sell its energy strategy, which has so far not stirred the public as oil prices have fallen from their peaks in the spring. Mr. Cheney and cabinet members fanned out across the country to appeal for support for the strategy in town hall meetings.
Mr. Cheney supports the move to spare his official budget the electric bills. Language to transfer the cost is contained in an appropriations bill that is expected to be debated and approved on Tuesday by the House Appropriations Committee, which is controlled by Republicans.
Democrats denounced the budget transfer as hypocrisy on the part of Mr. Cheney, who has been accused along with President Bush of doing too little to help consumers cope with a sharp rise in electricity prices in much of the country. They are vowing to block the transfer when the Senate Appropriations Committee, which is controlled by Democrats, considers its version of the bill later this summer.
In a report to the appropriations committees, the White House said that ''the rationale for the requested transfer of responsibility is based on the fluctuating and unpredictable nature of utility costs and the relative small annual appropriation'' for the vice president's residence.
A spokesman for Republicans on the House committee, John Scofield, said that the shift was a ''minor accounting change'' that would simplify federal bookkeeping.
''This is a naval facility, so it's not unusual for them to cover the expense,'' Mr. Scofield said.
A Navy spokeswoman had no immediate comment on the issue.
The appropriations bill also includes a provision that allows the Navy -- on Mr. Cheney's behalf -- to accept from corporate donors or others ''consumable items, or funds for them,'' for use at official functions at the residence. The White House is allowed to accept gifts like food or liquor, but such gifts are barred at the vice president's mansion and other official residences as potentially illegal gratuities.
The White House said in a letter to the House and Senate committees that the donations would ''help relieve the taxpayers of the cost of providing such items.'' The statement listed ''consumable items'' as ''food, beverage, table centerpieces, flowers or temporary outdoor shelter.''
Electricity costs for the vice president's residence are now shared by Mr. Cheney's official budget and the Navy, which maintains the 72-acre observatory site that borders Washington's Embassy Row.
Electricity costs at the residence have jumped in recent years, more than doubling in the three years since a meter was installed on the property.
According to the White House, electricity costs rose from $83,800 in fiscal year 1999 to $136,500 last year to an estimated $186,000 this year. Last year, Congress appropriated $42,600 from the vice president's budget for electricity bills, leaving the Navy responsible for the other $93,900. Asked tonight about comparable figures for the White House, a spokeswoman was not immediately able to come up with them.
By transferring all of the vice president's costs to the Navy, the White House said, there would be no need for the administration to return to Congress to ask for emergency appropriations for Mr. Cheney in the event of ''an exceptional cold winter or hot summer.''
Mr. Cheney was traveling today in Pennsylvania to rally support for the administration's energy plan, which calls for a sharp increase in energy production.
A spokeswoman for the vice president, Margita Thompson, said plans for a transfer of the electricity bills to the Navy began during the Clinton administration. ''This was not Mr. Cheney's idea,'' Ms. Thompson said.
She said it was unclear why electricity bills were rising so sharply this year at the mansion since Mr. Cheney and his wife, Lynne, had done their best to hold down energy use.
Electricity use in the mansion was down by about a third this year over the same period last year, when the residence was occupied by Vice President Al Gore. Regulated electricity prices in much of the Washington area have actually declined this year.
A spokesman for Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee, David Sirota, said that an effort to shift electrical costs from the vice president's office to the Navy was ''a very neat solution'' for Mr. Cheney.
''I think a lot of people would like to have their energy problems solved as painlessly as the vice president is trying to solve his own,'' Mr. Sirota said. ''It would all be a lot easier to swallow if he expressed greater sympathy and more willingness to act on behalf of those on the brink because of high utility prices.''
Some of Mr. Cheney's past comments on that issue could come back to haunt him.
Several weeks ago, Mr. Cheney said consumers should decide for themselves whether or not they wanted to conserve electricity, based on their ability to pay their utility bills.
''If you want to leave all the lights on in your house, you can,'' Mr. Cheney said. ''There's no law against it. But you will pay for it.''
He has also appeared to belittle conservation efforts at times, though he has recently softened that tone. ''Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy,'' he said in the spring.
Democrats said that the move to allow Mr. Cheney to accept food and other gifts for the mansion would open the vice president to new accusations that he is too close to corporate donors and that he is allowing the official residence to be used for political purposes. Mr. Cheney was harshly criticized by Democrats when he allowed the mansion to be used in May for a reception for large Republican donors.
Ms. Thompson, the vice president's spokeswoman, said that the donations would be used only for official functions, like diplomatic receptions, and not for political fund-raisers.
''It's official use only, and the gifts would become the property of the Department of the Navy,'' she said. ''It allows you the perfect opportunity to display American wares -- Florida grapefruit, California raisins, Texas chili.''
http://articles.sfgate.com/2001-07-18/news/17608800_1_power-bills-white-house-navy
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Cheney electric bill sparks a row / House panel votes to get Navy to pay it
July 18, 2001|Zachary Coile, Chronicle Washington Bureau
Vice President Dick Cheney is traveling the country pushing an energy plan based on new supplies. Associated Press photo by Keith Srakocic(07-18) 04:00 PDT Washington — 2001-07-18 04:00:00 PDT Washington -- Faced with rising electricity costs at his official residence, Vice President Dick Cheney is doing what every California consumer would love to do:
passing his power bill to the Navy.
The White House is pushing a plan -- approved yesterday by a House committee -- to require the Navy to pay for electricity at the vice president's official residence, a 33-room mansion at the Naval Observatory.
The Navy estimates the cost for power at the residence will be $110,821 this year.
White House officials portray the transfer as a simple accounting shift. The Navy has long paid the lion's share of utility costs at the mansion, which sits on Navy property. Now, it will pay all the utility bills for Cheney and his wife, Lynne.
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But Democrats seized on the issue as a case of hypocrisy by the vice president, the administration's point man on energy, to ask the Navy to pay his electric bills while the White House opposes price caps and other Democrat- sponsored measures to lower power bills for consumers in California and elsewhere.
"It's the height of insensitivity on the part of the Bush administration, " said Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, which approved the move yesterday on a 33-to-29 party line vote. "Instead of passing an energy bill to help America's families,
Dick Cheney is passing on his electric bill to the Navy."
Democrats are threatening to try to block the budgetary transfer on the House floor. The Senate Appropriations Committee, controlled by Democrats, may try to block the move when it considers its version of the bill later this summer.
The controversy comes at a bad time for Cheney, who is crisscrossing the country selling a White House energy plan that critics say has focused too heavily on increasing energy supply without focusing enough on conservation.
It also comes as the Defense Department, under Bush's defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, is pushing a series of energy conservation measures, including one that would require soldiers living on military bases to pay power bills based on newly installed electric meters at their housing unit. Currently soldiers pay rates
on metering for the entire base community.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_One_Observatory_Circle
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Number One Observatory Circle is the official residence of the Vice President of the United States.
Located on the northeast grounds of the United States Naval Observatory in Washington, DC, the house was built in 1893 for its superintendent. The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) liked the house so much that in 1923 he took over the house for himself. It remained the residence of the CNO until 1974, when Congress authorized its transformation to an official residence for the Vice President. The congressional authorization covered the cost of refurbishment and furnishing the house.
Before that time, the Vice President lived in his own home, but the cost of providing security for these private residences had become prohibitive.
Although Number One Observatory Circle was made available to the Vice President in 1974, three years passed before a Vice President lived full-time in the house. Vice President Gerald Ford became President before he could use the house, and his Vice President, Nelson Rockefeller, primarily used the home for entertaining since he already had a residence in Washington. Vice President Walter Mondale was the first Vice President to move into the house. Every Vice President since has lived there.[1]
The Vice Presidential mansion was refurbished by the United States Navy in early 2001, only slightly delaying the move of then Vice President Dick Cheney and his family.
[edit] Architecture and decoration
[edit] Queen Anne style
The house is built in the Queen Anne style popular in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Hallmarks of the Queen Anne style are an asymmetrical floor plan, a series of rooms opening to each other rather than a common central hall, round turret rooms, inglenooks near fireplaces, and broad verandas wrapping the ground floor, all of which are found at Number One Observatory Circle.When the house was constructed, its exterior was faced in terracotta brick. The wood trim was painted in a warm putty-gray, and the wooden porch in a combination of the putty-gray and white. Window frames and mullions were painted the same gray, and shutters were painted olive green. The interior was furnished mostly with the personal furnishings of the Naval Observatory Superintendent, and later those of the Chief of Naval Operations. Period photographs of the interior show middle-class nineteenth-century furnishings in a variety of styles, including Eastlake. Walls were covered in patterned wall-papers.
By the first decade of the twentieth century, Victorian-style architecture had begun to fall out of fashion. Many houses that were originally built in brick, or in wood with complex painting, were simplified and "colonialized" by being painted white. This frequently happened inside as well as outside, and substantial wood millwork of mahogany, quarter-sawn oak, American chestnut and walnut were often painted over in white to "lighten" rooms and make them feel more contemporary. In 1961 the exterior of the house was painted white, the color it still retains.
[edit] 1974 renovation
The 1974 renovation replaced and updated building systems and increased the size of several rooms by removing internal walls. As a part of this renovation, interior trim was painted white and the walls a palette of mostly neutral colors. Little consideration was given to historic preservation with interior or exterior spaces, and no attempt was made at restoration of any interior space to its appearance at the period of construction or early use. The 1961 era white paint on the exterior was retained. Second floor shutters, which appear in an 1895 photograph, were reinstalled.[edit] Interior furnishings
Most of the furnishings placed in the house following the 1974 renovation were twentieth century copies of either colonial or Federal style pieces. A notable exception was a bed placed in the house by Nelson Rockefeller. The bed was designed by artist Max Ernst. Called the "cage" bed, the headboard had the form of a Greek pediment, and the baseboard a lower version of a pediment. Sculptural foliage similar to olive or laurel leaves wrapped around the posts. The seal of the Vice President of the United States was incorporated into the headboard. The Rockefellers twice offered the bed permanently to the house but it was turned down both by Vice President George H. W. Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle. On visiting Barbara Bush at the house, Mrs. Rockefeller offered her the bed, and Mrs. Bush responded "you are always welcome in this house, but there's no need to bring your own bed." The Rockefellers did leave a lithograph called "The Great Ignoramus," several antique Korean and Japanese chests, and nearly a dozen other pieces.When the Mondales occupied the house, Joan Mondale introduced more saturated upholstery and wall colors and contemporary art. Like the Rockefellers, the Mondales brought some Asian antiques into the house. The Bush family, working with interior decorator Mark Hampton, used a palette of celadon, lime, and light blue. The Quayles removed the lime green and used off-white. The Gores oversaw a complete redecoration, the addition of a new dining-room table, new furniture for the library, and a substantial renovation of the grounds and porches to make them more suitable for outdoor entertaining. Immediately before the Cheneys moved in, some needed work on the air conditioning and heating was performed and the interiors were repainted. The Cheneys brought several pieces of contemporary art into the house.
The three-story brick house—completed in April 1893—is compact, 39 by 77 feet (12 × 23 m), with 9,150 square feet (850 m2) of floor space. On the ground floor are a reception hall, living room, sitting room, sun porch, dining room and small pantry, and lavatories added later to the north side. The second floor contains two bedrooms, a study, and a den. The third floor attic was originally servants' quarters and storage space. The kitchen was placed in the basement, along with a laundry room and other storerooms.
[edit] Underground bunker
On May 17, 2009, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift reported that Vice President Joe Biden revealed that there is an underground "9/11" bunker under the house.[2] It was speculated that the bunker was built in December 2002 when neighbors complained of loud construction noises. Elizabeth Alexander, the Vice President’s spokesperson, explained the following day, “What the vice president described in his comments was not — as some press reports have suggested — an underground facility, but rather, an upstairs work space in the residence, which he understood was frequently used by Vice President Cheney and his aides."[3]http://www.taxpayertreasurehunt.com/index.php/Residence_of_the_Vice_President_Operating_Expenses
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Residence of the Vice President Operating Expenses
From Tax Payer Treasure Hunt - Obama's Costs & Presidential Spending
| This page is for the amounts designated to Residence of the Vice President Operating Expenses. |
|---|
Contents[hide] |
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Total Operating Expenses for the Vice President's Residence (2008)
| Expense Amount: $320,000 |
| Year of Expense: 2008 |
| Expense Details: Total Operating Expenses for the Vice President's Residence for 2008. |
Source Details:
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| Creation Date: February 1, 2010 |
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Total Operating Expenses for the Vice President's Residence (Budget estimate 2010)
| Expense Amount: $330,000 |
| Year of Expense: 2010 |
Expense Details: Committee recommendation 2010 (passed by the House July 16, 2009).
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| Source Type: Other |
| Source Details: Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2010 (Placed on Calendar in Senate)"Official Residence of the Vice President operating expenses", http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c111:1:./temp/~c111r3IlFi:e40925: H.R. 3170: Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2010, http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-3170 |
| Source URL: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c111:1:./temp/~c111r3IlFi:e40925: |
| Creation Date: April 9, 2010 |
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Total Operating Expenses for the Vice President's Residence (2009)
| Expense Amount: $323,000 |
| Year of Expense: 2009 |
| Expense Details: For the care, operation, refurnishing, improvement, and to the extent not otherwise provided for, heating and lighting, including electric power and fixtures, of the official residence of the Vice President; the hire of passenger motor vehicles; and not to exceed $90,000 for official entertainment expenses of the Vice President. |
| Source Type: Other |
| Source Details: Omnibus Appropriations Act, 2009 (Public Law, March 11, 2009), "OFFICIAL RESIDENCE OF THE VICE PRESIDENT OPERATING EXPENSES" http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ008.111.pdf |
| Source URL: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ008.111.pdf |
| Creation Date: April 9, 2010 |
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