Washington briefs

By Chris Casteel

Published: January 6, 2007

WASHINGTON — Rep. Mary Fallin said she was warned about the sticker shock she might experience when looking for a place to live while Congress is in session.

But she still was surprised.

"It's expensive!” she said. "Man!”

Fallin, R-Oklahoma City, will be living in an apartment in Arlington, Va., just across the Potomac River from the U.S. Capitol, in an area close to the Pentagon and the Ronald Reagan National Airport.

According to the Web site apartmentratings.com, monthly rent for one-bedroom apartments in Arlington average between $1,349 and $1,953.

Fallin's new salary may take some of the sting out of the cost of living.

House members make $165,200 a year, nearly twice what she made as Oklahoma's lieutenant governor last year. But she now has housing costs in two cities.

Like many lawmakers, Fallin is sharing her part-time digs here. She is rooming with a fellow female pioneer. The first woman lieutenant governor in Oklahoma history — and the second congresswoman from the state — will share space with the first woman to reach the rank of general in the Oklahoma Air National Guard, Maj. Gen. Rita Aragon.

Aragon, who, like Fallin, is a Pottawatomie County native, spends about half of her time at the Pentagon, where her work focuses on Air National Guard personnel issues.

Rep. Tom Cole, R-Moore, chosen by his GOP colleagues last month to restore House Republicans to the majority, announced Friday the National Republican Congressional Committee is $14.4 million in debt after losing 30 seats to Democrats in November elections.

Cole inherited the debt when he became the committee chairman, and he appointed three GOP House members Friday to head up a "debt retirement program.”

"The reality here is that we have a large debt, but the good news is that we are going to do everything possible to pay it down quickly,” Cole said. "We have a plan and we need each Republican member's help … No one will invest in us unless we invest in ourselves.”

The National Republican Congressional Committee reported in December that it had spent nearly $126 million in 2006 helping GOP candidates for the House.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee reported that it had spent $107 million in 2006 and had $10 million in debt.

Democrats won control of the House in November and officially took the reins on Thursday after 12 years in the minority.

Rep. Dan Boren, D-Muskogee, voted against his party's majority last year more than any other member of the House, according to a new study by Congressional Quarterly.

It was the second year that Boren, a freshman in the 2005-06 Congress, topped the list of House members who voted most often against his party's position.

In the 2006 session, Boren voted against the position of the majority of Democrats nearly 46 percent of the time. That was up from 41 percent in 2005.

That means he voted with the Democratic majority 54 percent of the time in 2006.

Congressional Quarterly, a weekly magazine that covers Capitol Hill, does an annual study measuring "party unity.” The 2006 study examined 541 votes in the House and 279 votes in the Senate and looked at how individual members voted when a majority of their party opposed the majority of the other party on an issue.

In interviews about his voting record, Boren, the only Democrat in the seven-person state congressional delegation, has said repeatedly that he came to Washington to represent the views of his eastern Oklahoma district.

Two Oklahoma members voted with the Republican majority 98 percent of the time: Reps. Frank Lucas, R-Cheyenne; and Ernest Istook, R-Warr Acres, who was serving his last year in the House. Rep. John Sullivan, R-Tulsa, voted with the GOP majority 97 percent of the time, while Rep. Tom Cole, R-Moore, voted with his party 96 percent of the time.

In the Senate, Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Tulsa, voted with the GOP majority 94 percent of the time, and Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Muskogee, 92 percent of the time.