The bipartisan committee tasked with improving and modernizing operations in the House of Representatives took a step toward institutionalizing more than 30 of its recommendations on Tuesday. And with the panel set to expire at the end of the year, this may be one of its members’ final opportunities to bring about change.
Four members of the House – two Democrats and two Republicans – introduced legislation to implement 32 of the recommendations advanced by the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress over the past four years. A previous resolution, which included 28 recommendations, passed the House with overwhelming bipartisan support in 2020.
The new resolution includes proposals to update technology on Capitol Hill, increase collaboration, and improve staff recruitment and retention.
The committee was created at the start of the 116th Congress, in January 2019, and tasked with developing recommendations to improve congressional operations, reduce partisanship and create transparency. The committee was renewed for the 117th Congress and will conclude its work at the end of 2022.
“The Modernization Committee has developed and passed 171 bipartisan recommendations that will ensure the House can be more efficient and effective in serving the American people,” said Rep. Derek Kilmer of Washington, the committee’s Democratic chairman. “But our goal is not just to make recommendations – it’s to make change. This Resolution will put institutional weight behind more than 30 of those recommendations and help make sure these great ideas are put into effect.”
The bill was co-sponsored by the panel’s Republican vice Chairman, William Timmons of South Carolina. The House Administration Committee’s chair (Democrat Zoe Lofgren of California and Republican Rodney Davis of Illinois) also added their support to the measure. Their committee would likely be tasked with implementing approved programs.
“This resolution is a step toward implementing changes that will ensure the House can more effectively serve the American people,” Davis said.
The 32 recommendations include:
- Establishing space for bipartisan gatherings of House members in the Capitol.
- Scheduling a bipartisan retreat for lawmakers and their spouses at the start of each two-year congressional session.
- Providing training, during orientation for new lawmakers, to facilitate policy debates and understanding opposing points of view.
- Encouraging committees and subcommittees to test alternative hearing formats to better share ideas in a civil manner.
- Improving committee scheduling tools to avoid double-booking lawmakers.
- Streamline services for procurement of office supplies and sending official mail.
- Developing plans for ensuring continuity of operations in the event of an emergency.
- Making permanent a current, temporary task force that is developing strategies for advancing the House workforce, including mentorship and training programs, tools for evaluating compensation, and improving fellowship and internship opportunities.
- Improving access for disabled people in congressional buildings.
- Reviewing congressional budgets.
“I came to Congress to help fix Washington, and I’m proud of the Modernization Committee’s work to produce 171 recommendations that will help Congress work better for the American people,” Timmons said. “This resolution, a follow-up to the first MODCOM Resolution that passed the House overwhelmingly in the last Congress, seeks to continue that positive momentum by putting an additional 32 recommendations on a path to full implementation.”
The committee will hold its final hearing on Sept. 14, according to spokeswoman Susan Curran. That session will focus on ways Congress can continue its modernization efforts after the committee expires. Members anticipate issuing a final set of recommendations on Sept. 29, focusing on technology and constituent engagement.
All 171 recommendations are available on the committee’s website, broken down into the 116th Congress and the 117th Congress.
Separately, the Congressional Management Foundation announced its annual Democracy Award winners on Tuesday, with two House members honored for their work on “innovation and modernization.” Republican Garret Graves of Louisiana and Seth Moulton of Massachusetts were recognized for their use of technology to meet constituents’ needs and improve office operations.
Old engraved illustration of Ulysses defying the Cyclops.
Odysseus Reimagined: Nolan’s Epic Explores What Makes a True Hero
Who is a hero? More importantly: what is a hero? What attributes are universally admired, inspiring glorious stories, ballads and songs, memorials and movies, all chronicling the hero’s bold adventures?
The Odyssey, a new release written and directed by Christopher Nolan, attempts to answer that question. Based on the ancient tales The Iliad and The Odyssey, written by Homer around 800 BC, the film stars Matt Damon as Odysseus and Anne Hathaway as Penelope, his loyal wife.
Historians have puzzled over the “Homeric question,” that is, who was Homer? We know very little about him, not even when or where he was born; seven Greek cities lay claim to him as their native son. Yet, he is considered the “godfather” of national Greek culture, and his stories are among the earliest masterpieces of literature.
Homer is sometimes romanticized as a blind poet who wandered from town to town reciting his stories. But he, who could express so poignantly the tribulations of Odysseus, was not blind to human nature. He keenly wrote of the attributes as well as the paltriness in his characters and the flaws of his great hero, Odysseus.
The Iliad is the story of the final years of the Trojan War, sparked when Helen, the beautiful wife of Sparta’s King Menelaus, was kidnapped by Paris of Troy. Because the kings had initiated a pact to defend one another, Odysseus was drawn into the fray.
After spending ten years fighting the Trojan War and finally achieving victory, The Odyssey tells of Odysseus’s struggle to return to his kingdom, Ithaca. On his way home, he encounters many dangers and delays. He is pursued by the sea-god Poseidon, must surmount Circe’s spell, and overcome the seductive charms of the enchantress Calypso, and his journey takes him another ten years.
Odysseus’s desires and struggles are universal: his longing for home, yearning for an end to his troubles, for rest after a long and difficult journey. His difficulties reflect the immemorial questions of what it means to be loyal, to belong, what it means “to be” at all. Despite his hubris, which manifests in his propensity to court catastrophe without regard for consequences, Odysseus is an authentic hero, noble and admirable, brave and dedicated.
According to the Greek ideal, a true hero must possess physical excellence and moral virtue. He must, as well, embrace his civic duty. Achieving such status requires “paideia,” a good education; “sophrosyne,” moderation in maintaining physical and emotional balance; and “arete,” an allegiance to the state.
Fictional or real, heroes’ deeds resonate through the centuries and shine a light on what is best in humanity, what matters, what will live on despite our mortality.
Is our digital age really so different from Homer’s Bronze Age? Physical beauty is still adulated, as it was then with Helen of Troy, “the face that launched a thousand ships.” (Marlowe) Power is still king, and wealth is still power.
The years of the Trojan War were harsh and violent. But were they more brutal than the times we live in? Although millenniums have passed and we now have different battlefields, Palestine, Ukraine, Iran, etc., the ravages and the wages of war remain the same: death and suffering. Humanity’s currency is the same, and so, too, is our quest for heroes.
Social scientists claim that after three generations most people are forgotten by even their direct progeny, and after four, remembered only by historical records. So, what then does last? What makes a difference? What is truly beautiful and worthwhile in life?
The universal themes embodied and emboldened by our heroes throughout the ages, the faithfulness of their hearts and the courage of their deeds, these last.
The essential qualities of a hero are manifested in Homer’s Odysseus. Steadfast integrity: “Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is that man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another.” His deep compassion: “Yet, taught by time, my heart has learned to glow for others’ good, and to melt at others’ woes.” (Both quotes from The Odyssey.)
Nolan’s movie may have created a more virtuous hero than Homer’s works, but the core of the nearly 3,000-year-old-story is intact and as crucially relevant today as it was then. It is the stuff of life: trauma, survival, relationships with others, finding oneself, deciding what is right, choosing a path forward, sometimes, ultimately leading to the honing of a hero.
Just as Odysseus braved storms, temptations, and trials in search of home, we too face a modern sea of civic turbulence, polarization, mistrust, and the fraying of our shared story.
As we live, we too will write our defining stories. How then might we become modern heroes?
By instigating the third Greek ideal of “arete”; embracing our civic duty. By becoming citizens who are open to reflection and debate, who are willing to act with purpose for the betterment of our nation.
In this journey, the work of renewing our democracy can be its own Odyssey, a voyage calling for integrity, courage, and steadfast commitment. Not to return home as Odysseus so desired, but to preserve our home, for the grand and worthwhile purpose of working toward an ever-better future for our country.
With others, we can shape the next chapter of our nation’s collective story.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."