Mark Dayton: “I just want to take their excellent idea and make it even better. My amendment would accelerate their timetable and…”

“I just want to take their excellent idea and make it even better. My amendment would accelerate their timetable and mandate 40-percent Federal funding for the cost of special education in 2 years instead of waiting for 6 years. Why? Because this promise was made 25 years ago when the Federal mandates under IDEA were enacted. Congress then promised the State and local school districts that the Federal Government would pay for 40 percent of their costs. A quarter century later, Federal funding for special education costs average 12 percent nationwide, only 9 percent in my home state of Minnesota. That broken promise affects every schoolchild and every school in Minnesota and, I expect, our entire country. Since every school must provide special education services to every child who needs them, those missing dollars must, in Minnesota, be taken away from other funding for regular education programs. Every student in Minnesota gets shortchanged because the Federal Government has not kept its promise.”