Remarks on the Legislative Agenda for School Construction and Education - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, Oct 30, 2000

October 24, 2000

Well, first, let me thank Glenda Parsons. I thought that she was eloquent, insistent, comprehensive, and enlightening for anybody that hasn't heard about this issue and why it matters. And let me thank Secretary Riley for pointing out that the Federal Government helps States and localities build roads and highways and prisons, and schools are the most important network to the 21st century of all.

Let me thank you, sir, in a larger sense, for nearly 8 years of service now, during which you have reduced the paperwork burden on local school districts and States but mightily increased the level of assistance we are giving them to do the things that work. That's one reason--along with the outstanding work being done at the State level by people like Governor Patton from Kentucky, who is here with us today, and local educators--that the test scores are up, the dropout rate is down, the college-going rate is up. We're moving in the right direction, and Dick Riley deserves his fair share of credit for that, and I thank him very much.

I would like to thank the extraordinary array of Members of Congress who are here, including the Democratic leaders of the Senate and the House, Senator Daschle and Congressman Gephardt. I would like to thank the people from the administration who are here who have worked with us to help to develop this very important proposal, including Secretary Larry Summers and Jack Lew and Sylvia Mathews from the Office of Management and Budget.

I want to thank the people who are here from the DC City Council and the coalition to Rebuild America's Schools, teachers, administrators, architects, members of the construction trades, and many others. And I also want to thank the people who came out here all morning, building our new schoolhouse. We wanted people to have a little red schoolhouse here to emphasize what this is about. And our special guests from Brent Elementary School, let's welcome them here.

The little red schoolhouse behind me was erected as evidence of the commitment of all of us here to give our children the safest and best schools in the world. In its unfinished state, it's also a symbol of the unfinished work still before the Congress. Nearly 2 months into the new school year, the majority leadership still hasn't given a single dime for school construction and modernization, not even enough to build a one-room schoolhouse.

Week after week now, I've been signing continuing resolutions to give Congress more time to work on this year's budget. But the time for tardy slips is over. It's time for the leadership to put progress before partisanship and address at last the needs of our schools and our children.

For nearly 8 years now, we've worked hard to turn our economy around. We've replaced record deficits with record surpluses. We now enjoy the longest economic expansion in history. Today we received even more good news about the economy. According to our Treasury Department and the Office of Management and Budget, the surplus for the 2000 fiscal year is the largest in American history, $237 billion. This is the third surplus in a row, the first time our Nation has done that in 51 years, since 1949, when Harry Truman was President.

It's worth remembering, I think, that when Vice President Gore and I took office in 1993, the deficit was $290 billion. The debt had quadrupled in 12 years. Economists predicted that this year, instead of a $237 billion surplus, we would have a $455 billion deficit. Working together, we turned that around, not by chance but by choice.

Now to the moment at hand. What are we going to do with our prosperity? What are we going to do with our surplus? It is not the Government's surplus. It is the people's surplus. How shall we apply it to our common goals and needs and challenges? I feel very strongly that we ought to first make a commitment to keep the prosperity going by paying the debt down over the next 12 years. to keep interest rates down.

Then I think we ought to take what's left and have a tax cut we can afford, that focuses on sending our kids to college, providing our kinfolks with long-term care who need it, helping working families with child care, and helping all Americans save for retirement, because savings rates are not high enough in our country today. And I think we ought to save some money to invest in education and in health care, in science and technology, in the environment and defense, in the future of America.

So, in other words, there are big opportunities and big challenges out there, but I believe we have to first stay with what got us here: Pay down the debt; strengthen the Social Security and Medicare systems for the aging of America when all people like me, the baby boom generation, become too old to work, and we don't want to be a burden on the rest of you. And we need to then seize this opportunity to take the money that's left to invest in our future, especially in education.

You've heard what has already been said, but I think it's worth reiterating. We have the largest, most diverse student body in history. They are in overcrowded classrooms, but a lot of things are going right in America. Reading and math scores are up; Hispanic and African-American students are taking advanced placement courses in record numbers--over the last 6 years, a 300 percent increase for Hispanic students, a 500 percent increase for African-American students; the college-going rate at a record high, because we have provided more college assistance increase than any time since the GI bill. So a lot of things are going well. SAT math scores are the highest since 1969, when we went to the Moon. But we have more to do. And I want to focus on this today.