Political Quotes

“I rise in support of the Impact Aid Technical Amendments to H.R. 914. I have long been a supporter of the Impact Aid Program, and I believe these amendments add necessary clarifications to ensure the integrity of the section 8002 funding disbursement. As we all know, States and localities provide approximately 94 percent of education funding in the United States. The largest source of this funding is local property taxes. When a school district loses 10 percent of its taxable property, the local schools are severely impacted. In 1950, Congress responded to this problem by creating the Impact Aid Program. The 1950 statute requires that the Federal Government reimburse each section 2 school district for each year in 'such amount as * * * is equal to the continuing Federal responsibility for the additional burden with respect to current expenditures placed on such school district by such acquisition of property.' The meaning of this language is very clear to me--the Department of Education should reimburse each section 2 school district by the amount which the Federal presence negatively impacts the school district. My district in Illinois is home to a number of school districts eligible for assistance under section 8002. These funds help guarantee that the quality education they provide to their students will not be adversely affected due to the loss of tax revenue on federally-owned property.”