(Washington, DC, February 14, 2007) — Delegate to Congress Donna M. Christensen spoke before the House Budget Committee today, decrying budget cuts proposed by the Bush administration to the territories and to minority health programs.

Appearing before the Committee chaired by Chairman John Spratt on Thursday afternoon, Delegate Christensen said that the president’s budget was “woefully out of sync with the American public, as are his policies and priorities.”

Pointing to the findings in the recent GAO report, Delegate Christensen said that the economic conditions in the U.S. territories have languished over the past 10 years. “Each of them continue to suffer from high unemployment and unstable economies,” she told the panel. Christensen pointed to the decrease in funding to the Technical Assistance account in the Office of Insular Affairs. “The one account which can be useful to help improve their condition, should not be decreased as it is in the President’s budget,” she said. “I believe that more resources should be devoted to better respond to the needs of our U.S. territories,” she said.

Delegate Christensen also encouraged the Committee to work with the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico to provide for the full cover-over of excise taxes as are due to the territories.

Delegate Christensen who chairs the Congressional Black Caucus’s Health Braintrust called on the Committee to “prevent the healthcare crisis that now exists from becoming a catastrophe.”

She emphasized that it will require a change in the healthcare and health spending paradigm that has been allowed for far too long in this country. “We have to set a new direction, to change course, to alter the old tried and failed approach and instead focus on expanding coverage, increasing access, improving quality, cultural and linguistic competence, and improving the social determinants of health in poor, rural and communities of color.”

She said that top health funding priorities should include Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP for the states and territories, the rebuilding of the healthcare infrastructure in New Orleans, programs that give children a healthy start, HIV/AIDS funding, and provide increased access and equity to mental health and substance abuse treatment, that empower communities to develop systems that better meet their healthcare needs and support wellness.

Delegate Christensen said that improving health care is “an investment that we cannot afford not to make.”  “It will either take ending tax cuts for the wealthiest among us and cutting the excess fat out of a Defense budget that pays for billions in waste, or it will take increasing our debt or slowing our achievement of a surplus, but it must be done.”