Jim Nussle: “Mr. Speaker, let me start by commending the gentleman from New York for what I would have to suggest is a good idea, and…”

“Mr. Speaker, let me start by commending the gentleman from New York for what I would have to suggest is a good idea, and an idea we need to consider in this House of Representatives, we need to consider in the Senate, or in the other body, we need to consider in Washington, as a way to try to empower State and local communities to deal with some very specific problems that I know the gentleman is well aware of. I just also became well aware of them in my own community of Waterloo, IA, where we also are faced with a number of problems involving infrastructure or brick and mortar as they call it, of schools that have deteriorated, and are forming partnerships within their own community. Even without your amendment, they have done this to come together to plan for the future, to figure out ways to share information and resources, and also build back the school system, because they, along with the gentleman and myself, agree that public education is an important foundation for a free society, and particularly one that has gotten us this far in our history.”