Bill Clinton: “Well, I don't know that I'm familiar enough with the project. I do believe we need to continue to improve our…”

“Well, I don't know that I'm familiar enough with the project. I do believe we need to continue to improve our infrastructure. Secretary Slater and I have argued that we should not underfund mass transit and urban transportation. And indeed, in the transportation bill I sent to the Congress, we asked for several hundred million dollars more directly targeted to help people on welfare who are required to go to work, get to where the jobs are if their jobs aren't within walking distance. Only about 10 percent of the people on public assistance own their own cars. And we believe we need more investment in mass transit in the cities. So--and I don't think it should be an either/or situation. And in terms of contracting, I support affirmative action programs generally in employment, in education, and in economic development. And I've done everything I could to fix what were the generally recognized shortcomings of some of the programs, to graduate out the firms that may not need it anymore but to continue it where I think it is appropriate. So I continue to support that. And I think it is a mistake for us not to have initiatives to help create minority-owned businesses. I think we should--as a matter of fact, let me just back up and say, when I was in San Francisco at the mayors conference not very long ago, I said to them that I thought we ought to develop a private-sector, job-related model for high unemployment areas in our cities and--because there was no way the government social services could ever create enough economic opportunity for people. And I thought, if we couldn't do it when the national unemployment rate was the lowest in 23 years, when could we do it? So I think we need to do more to help people organize and start their own businesses, to help build economic clusters of activity, to help give people models as well as opportunities to work, to see that we can do this. I don't think we're doing nearly enough in this area, and I think we have a new opportunity to do it because the unemployment rate is low in the Nation. As I've heard Reverend Jackson say for 20 years, the biggest undeveloped market in America are the poor unemployed and underemployed people in our inner cities and our rural areas. Now is the time we should be creating more businesses there, not having fewer businesses. That's what I believe. Affirmative Action Mr. Thomas. Mr. President, Eric Thomas with KGO-TV in San Francisco. Mr. President, your scholarship proposal notwithstanding, there is still an assault on affirmative action in this country. In my home State of California, in the wake of Proposition 209 and last year's vote by the University of California Board of Regents, minority applications and enrollment in the UC system this year are down. There will be not one new black student enrolled at the prestigious Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California this fall. What specific programs, scholarship program notwithstanding, do you propose to stem this tide and make sure that there is diversity in higher education in this country?”