Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I hope we can find ways to work together to advance what has been done here and to advance specific legislation that will help reduce the number of children that suffer from abuse and neglect. I must note, though, that at the same time this legislation was approved in our committee, under the Republican budget, the Social Services Block Grant was terminated. I hope that is not done by the Congress as a whole. The Social Services Block Grant is a major source of funding for prevention of child abuse and neglect today, used by State and local governments to focus on prevention with far too little focus on prevention overall. One of the major conclusions of this Commission on Child Fatalities is that we focus our attention so much on the end, after the abuse has occurred, and not on the beginning, to try to prevent abuse. We need to focus on prevention. So at the same time this bill was approved, that support was cut. Hopefully, Congress will reject the bill to eliminate the Social Services Block Grant and we can come together to find more resources to do what must be done to prevent us from just lurching from one tragedy to another and help stabilize and support families working to see that children are protected. I thank the gentlemen again for their effort. {time} 1415”