[WardFive] Fw: PRESS RELEASE: Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton on the Retirement of Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson

 

Albrette "Gigi" Ransom
Commissioner, ANC 5C12

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: "McCrary, Scott" <Scott.McCrary@mail.house.gov>
To:
Sent: Tuesday, December 4, 2012 1:50 PM
Subject: PRESS RELEASE: Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton on the Retirement of Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                      Contact: Scott McCrary

   December 4, 2012                                                                            o: 202-225-8050

 

 

 

Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton on the Retirement of Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson

 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today released the following statement on Rep. Jo Ann Emerson's (R-MO) decision to retire.

 

"Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson's plan to retire will be a loss felt throughout the Congress.  She has earned bipartisan respect for her strong, intelligent, and collegial leadership as chair of one of the most important and complicated appropriations subcommittees, the Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government.  I especially thank the Chairwoman for consistently treating the District of Columbia, one of several matters under her jurisdiction, with dignity and respect.  Jo Ann stuck solidly to her mission and never sought to impose her views on the city undemocratically.  Instead, Congresswoman Emerson, who was born in the District of Columbia, helped fund the city's major priorities, many that have been particularly helpful to the city.  Among them were the D.C. Tuition Assistance Grant program (DCTAG), which has doubled college attendance in the District, and HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention, as the city has fought to recover from a soaring infection rate, caused in part by an inappropriate rider that once banned the city from spending its own local funds on needle exchange programs.  By resisting efforts to re-impose that rider, Jo Ann Emerson is responsible for saving many D.C. residents from contracting HIV or from dying from AIDS.  The chairwoman's success while serving in Congress predicts that she will be successful in whatever she chooses to pursue.  We in the Congress, and the District, will miss her firm and fair guiding hand."

 

http://www.norton.house.gov/

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