Member Spotlight: Rep. Randy Kuhl, NY-29

Chris Barron
(202) 286-4533

(Washington, D.C.) – The Republican Main Street Partnership is pleased to spotlight Representative Randy Kuhl of New York.

“In plain talk, Randy is a quality guy. He crosses the aisle,” said former U.S. Rep. Amo Houghton, Chairman of the Main Street Board of Directors. “He quietly focuses on the big problems, not just for our district but for the country. Not many districts can claim a better representative."

RANDY KUHL (R-NY)

Congressman John R. "Randy" Kuhl, Jr. was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2004 and represents the 29th Congressional District of New York. Rep. Kuhl serves on three House Committees in the 110th Congress and is a member of six subcommittees: On the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee he is on the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management and the Subcommittee on Water Resources and the Environment. On the House Agriculture Committee is serves on the Subcommittee on Horticulture and Organic Agriculture. On the Committee on Education and Labor he serves on the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education and the Subcommittee on Higher Education, Lifelong Learning and Competitiveness.

Some of Congressman Kuhl’s current legislative initiatives include:

VETERANS HEALTH

Rep. Kuhl and Rep. Henry Cuellar (TX) formed the House Veterans’ Mental Health Caucus in June of 2008. Currently the Caucus has 28 congressional members (13 Democrats, 15 Republicans). The caucus brings Republicans and Democrats together to increase awareness of mental healthcare needs of returning veterans, including conditions such as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Brain Injury, treatment options for these and other conditions, job training and readjustment, suicide prevention, and funding needs.

Representative Kuhl has also cosponsored legislation that would improve mental health care treatment for soldiers and veterans and enhance care for military families. The HONOR Warriors Act, H.R. 6268, clarifies that any member of the military who served in Iraq or Afghanistan is eligible for readjustment counseling and related mental health services.

The bill’s provisions would:

Create a scholarship program to educate and train behavioral health care specialists to serve Servicemembers and veterans;

Restore the authority of veterans centers to provide referrals and other assistance upon request to veterans;

Extend survivor benefits to families of military personnel who have committed suicide during the two-year period following retirement;

Provide grants to non-profit organizations to offer services to survivors of members of the Armed Forces and veterans;

Establish pilot programs to better prepare Servicemembers for combat through a focus on improved prevention, early detection, intervention, and treatment of PTSD. The bill sets up two locations for these programs – Fort Carson in Colorado, and Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri.

PTSD is the most prevalent mental health disorder among returning Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) Servicemembers. Since June 30, 2007, several Veterans’ Health Administration facilities around the U.S. have examined a total of 56,246 OEF and OIF veterans for possible PTSD. Of those examined, 48,559 veterans have received a possible diagnosis of PTSD. In addition, three of the most common risk factors for suicide among veterans are PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury, and depression. The Army recently reported that there were 115 suicides in 2007, the highest number since it began keeping records of suicides in 1980. So far this year, there have been 38 confirmed suicides.

ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT

Rep. Kuhl recognizes that our battle for energy independence can be won in a way that improves and protects our environment. He supports utilizing domestic energy sources while investing in alternative and renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, biofuels, hydroelectric, biomass, and nuclear, thus beginning to reduce our reliance on foreign energy sources in the short term and fossil fuels in the long term.

To this end, Rep. Kuhl has introduced a comprehensive energy agenda, which features numerous pieces of legislation including: tax credits for alternative energy research, development, and implementation (the Clean and Green Renewable Energy Tax Credit Act of 2007, the Securing America's Energy Independence Act of 2007, and the Rural Wind Energy Development Act); legislation to generate renewable energy and encourage novel technologies related to the production of energy (GREEN Technologies Act of 2007); legislation to secures unrestricted reliable energy for American consumption and transmission by increasing domestic energy production (No More Excuses Energy Act of 2007). Rep. Kuhl also supports legislation to move the United States toward greater energy independence and security, to increase the production of clean renewable fuels, to protect consumers, to increase the efficiency of products, buildings, and vehicles, to promote research on and deploy greenhouse gas capture and storage options, and to improve the energy performance of the Federal Government. Rep. Kuhl recently introduced the H-HOMERUN Act, which creates a federal direct loan program for homeowners to make energy-efficient upgrades, such as solar panels or geothermal pumps, to their primary residences.”

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The Republican Main Street Partnership (RMSP) is dedicated to promoting and building a pragmatic, thoughtful, fiscally conservative, and inclusive “Governing Majority,” where political debate is encouraged to promote solutions to improve the lives of all Americans. Embracing the full spectrum of center-right ideologies and values in order to build coalitions, RMSP is the largest organization of elected leaders who are in the mold of Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan. For more information on RMSP, visit our website at www.republicanmainstreet.org.