Political Quotes

“A majority of this body--myself included--just voted to table both the Landrieu and Jeffords amendments, each of which have the laudable goals of increasing funding for disadvantaged and special education students. The problem with both amendments is that they rob Peter to pay Paul. Both amendments reduce the amount of funding in Title VI, which has been substantially increased this year. The distinguished Chairman, the Senator from Pennsylvania, has indicated that the $2.7 billion allocated for Title VI this year is for the continuation of our class size reduction efforts and for funding, for the first time since the 1950's, a massive school modernization effort. The effect of these amendments is simply to reduce the number of new teachers schools can hire or reduce the money they'll have available to fix fire code violations or upgrade old schools with new technology. That's not the answer. What we ought to be doing is making a greater overall investment in public education. I have co-sponsored a bill to increase the amount of Title I funding from $8 billion to $12 billion in this year alone, and I have co-sponsored a bill that puts us on track to fully fund our federal commitment to IDEA within ten years. Our economically disadvantaged and special needs students deserve more of a commitment from the federal level, but they also deserve small class sizes and safe, modern schools.”