Burgess Owens: “for the past few years, the American people have, through numerous focus groups and polls, sent a strong message to all…”

“for the past few years, the American people have, through numerous focus groups and polls, sent a strong message to all elected officials. Government must do more to improve education. Government at every level, the local level, the State level, and at the Federal level must do more to improve education. Now we are finally approaching the closing days of the 106th Congress, the scandal of this session of Congress is that, despite the existence of a $230 billion Federal surplus, to date, the Republican majority has refused to respond to the clear demand of the American voters. The Republicans have chosen to move in the opposite direction. Republican inaction is sabotaging the Federal effort to improve our schools. Even long-standing programs, such as ESEA Title I have not been reauthorized by this Republican-controlled Congress. Only destructive proposals are being placed on the negotiations table by the Republicans. Publicly funded school vouchers and block grants are two of the most dangerous Republican proposals on the table. Both of these radical programs will hasten the demise of the public school systems in our Nation. We call on President Clinton to rule that block grants and vouchers are nonnegotiable items in the end game negotiations that are now beginning to take place. Title I block grants are nonnegotiable. We refuse to accept a situation where block grants would return the power to the States using Federal money to decide how Title I will be spent.”