[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 78 (Tuesday, June 16, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H4599-H4603]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  URGING CONGRESS AND PRESIDENT TO FULLY FUND GOVERNMENT'S OBLIGATION 
           UNDER INDIVIDUALS WITH DISABILITIES EDUCATION ACT

  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to 
the resolution ( H. Res. 399) urging the Congress and the President to 
work to fully fund the Federal Government's obligation under the 
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, as amended.
  The Clerk read as follows:

                              H. Res. 399

       Whereas Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children v. 
     Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 334 F. Supp. 1247 (E. Dist. Pa. 
     1971), and Mills v. Board of Education of the District of 
     Columbia, 348 F. Supp. 866 (Dist. D. C. 1972), found that 
     children with disabilities are guaranteed an equal 
     opportunity to an education under the 14th amendment to the 
     Constitution;
       Whereas the Congress responded to these court decisions by 
     passing the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 
     1975 (enacted as Public Law 94-142), now known as the 
     Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (20 U.S.C. 1400 
     et seq.), to ensure a free, appropriate public education for 
     children with disabilities;
       Whereas the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act 
     provides that the Federal, State, and local governments are 
     to share in the expense of educating children with 
     disabilities and authorizes the Federal Government to pay up 
     to 40 percent of the national average per pupil expenditure 
     for children with disabilities;
       Whereas the Federal Government has provided only 7, 9, and 
     11 percent of the maximum State grant allocation for 
     educating children with disabilities under the Individuals 
     with Disabilities Education Act in the last 3 years, 
     respectively;
       Whereas the national average cost of educating a special 
     education student ($12,002) is more than twice the national 
     average per pupil cost ($5,955);
       Whereas research indicates that children who are 
     effectively taught, including effective instruction aimed at 
     acquiring literacy skills, and who receive positive early 
     interventions demonstrate academic progress, and are 
     significantly less likely to be referred to special 
     education;
       Whereas, if the appropriation for part B of the Individuals 
     with Disabilities Education Act (20 U.S.C. 1411 et seq.) 
     exceeds $4,100,000,000 for a fiscal year, a local educational 
     agency may reduce its local spending on special education for 
     such fiscal year by an amount equal to 20 percent of the 
     amount that exceeds the prior year's appropriation so long as 
     the local educational agency is not failing to comply with 
     the requirements of part B of such Act, as determined by the 
     State educational agency;
       Whereas the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act has 
     been successful in achieving significant increases in the 
     number of children with disabilities who receive a free, 
     appropriate public education; and
       Whereas the current level of Federal funding to States and 
     localities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education 
     Act is contrary to the goal of ensuring that children with 
     disabilities receive a quality education: Now, therefore, be 
     it
       Resolved, That the House of Representatives urges the 
     Congress and the President, working within the constraints of 
     the balanced budget agreement, to give programs under the 
     Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (20 U.S.C. 1400 
     et seq.) higher priority among Federal education programs by 
     working to fund the maximum State grant allocation for 
     educating children with disabilities under such Act.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling) and the gentleman from California (Mr. 
Martinez) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling).
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  The Committee will now consider H. Res. 399, a resolution urging the 
Congress and the President to fully fund the Federal Government's 
responsibility under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 
This resolution was introduced by the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. 
Bass) and I am pleased to be an original cosponsor.
  I would like to start out by recognizing the efforts of my friend and 
colleague the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood). He has been 
a leader in helping move this resolution through our committee in a 
bipartisan manner. He has been a strong voice for providing fiscal 
relief to local communities, which not only pay their share of special 
education costs but most of the Federal share as well.
  For those who may not be aware, in 1975, when the original 
legislation was passed, the Congress of the United States indicated 
that over several years they would fund 40 percent of the excess costs 
for special education. Up until 3 years ago, they were funding about 6 
percent. I am happy to say that we got about a 77-percent increase in 
the last 3 years. But it is still a long, long way from the 40 percent 
that was promised for the excess costs of educating a special education 
child.
  This unpaid Federal share means that the local school district has to 
do the funding. It also then means that the local school district has 
to take that money from all other programs in order to fund our share 
of special education. In many districts that is 55 percent of their 
entire budget. And so, I am hoping that we will continue the trend that 
we have had in the last 3 years.
  Unfortunately, when the President sent up his budget, he level funded 
special education. But what level-funding really means is a dramatic 
cut. Because if you consider inflation and then, above all, consider 
the new children who will be coming into special education through 
increased enrollment, it means that we are going to fall way short if 
we would follow his budget.
  I am hoping that with the program that came from my committee, 
dealing with literacy, with family literacy particularly, that in the 
long run we can find a way to eliminate an awful lot of people from 
ever getting into special education. Because, unfortunately, many of 
our special education students today are there simply because they have 
a reading difficulty. There is no reason for that to happen.
  We know now that most youngsters can learn to read. With the family 
literacy program that we are including in our legislative initiative 
from our committee, hopefully we can eliminate an awful lot who would 
normally fall into special education.

[[Page H4600]]

  But now is the time where we thank Mrs. McCarthy, who testified with 
the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. Bass) at our hearing on this a 
few weeks ago. I look forward to bipartisan effort to make sure that we 
eventually get to that 40 percent of excess cost coming from the 
Federal Government.
  This year we should be able to get, for the first time ever, at the 
level where the local schools will be able to reduce their spending on 
special education. When we meet that magic figure, and this year I 
believe we need $300 million to get to that figure, they then can, for 
the first time, reduce their spending on special education. It does 
not, however, allow the state to reduce their spending on special 
education.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I want to start out by saying that I am pleased to rise in strong 
support of this resolution which is before the House. H.Res. 399 is a 
truly bipartisan bill and should meet with the approval of Members from 
both sides of the aisle.
  The chairman a moment ago was I think commendable in commending the 
Members on his side of the aisle that worked very hard for this. But I 
do not think it is any secret that there is no one that has worked 
harder for the full funding of IDEA than the chairman himself, the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling).
  Mr. Speaker, full funding of IDEA is a goal which has been around 
with us for a long time. It has the strong support of all Members in 
this body. As many Members here know, presently the Federal Government 
provides only 11 percent of the excess cost of educating a child with 
disability.
  The goal that we set for ourselves, as the chairman has alluded to in 
1979, in 1975, when Congress first passed IDEA's predecessor, the 
education for all handicapped children, it was to provide 40 of the 
excess cost of educating a child with disability. Unfortunately, 
Congress has been unable to meet this goal despite the hard work of 
many Members from both sides of the aisle.
  With this goal in mind, I believe the strong statements that this 
resolution make is vitally important. Clearly, the needs of children 
with disabilities and the costs associated with ensuring that they 
receive a free and appropriate public education are important factors 
in determining if we are to have a society where all those with 
disabilities and those without have a chance to succeed and become 
economically contributing adults.
  In closing, I want to salute the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Goodling) again, the gentleman from California (Mr. Riggs) and along 
with the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) for their long-
standing efforts to increase funding for this very important bill and 
for the valuable work during the committee process.
  I also want to thank especially the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Greenwood) for his hard work on fashioning the resolution, which I 
believe gained bipartisan support. I urge all Members support this 
resolution.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. Bass) the author of the resolution.
  Mr. BASS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in very strong support of House 
Resolution 399, a resolution that would make the full funding of 
special education a high priority of this Congress.
  I want to thank the distinguished chairman and gentleman from 
California for making this a truly bipartisan resolution.

                              {time}  1615

  The idea came to me as I listened to the State of the Union address 
in January that the President delivered, and he talked about the 
importance of education. And as one who comes from a State like New 
Hampshire which depends on funding for education, 98 percent of the 
funding coming from the property tax base at the local level, nothing 
hits the property taxpayers worse in New Hampshire than special 
education. It really should not be that way, because special education 
originally was mandated to be paid for at the rate of approximately 40 
percent.
  As we heard the chairman and the ranking member mention in their 
speeches, that has been chronically underfunded. Indeed, funding of 
special education has been the mother of all unfunded mandates of this 
government for the last 25 years. I think this resolution is way 
overdue and it should be passed today.
  Let me just point out that in some towns in my State, special 
education costs make up half of the entire education budget for a given 
town. This puts pressure on school district administrators, on 
students, and perhaps most unfortunately on the parents of 
developmentally disabled students in a small community.
  I believe that as Congress sets its priorities for new education 
spending, that fully funding the existing mandates that we have 
outstanding today should come ahead of new education funding for new 
programs in education. Fully funding special education in New Hampshire 
alone would increase funding from $17 million a year to $68 million a 
year. That, Mr. Speaker, would make a significant impact on the whole 
education picture in New Hampshire. I am sure the same is true in every 
other State in the country.
  I hope, Mr. Speaker, that today the House will pass this resolution 
which has been introduced by me, supported by the committee, amended to 
make it as bipartisan as possible, because we all recognize the 
importance of special education firstly; and, secondly, the importance 
of fully funding the Federal Government's commitment to this important 
program.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) who is a strong, strong supporter 
of everything that benefits all the young people of our country.
  Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California (Mr. 
Martinez) for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, as one of the strong supporters of IDEA, I am pleased to 
support this resolution. I want to thank the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling), the gentleman from California (Mr. Riggs), 
the gentleman from California (Mr. Martinez), the gentleman from 
Missouri (Mr. Clay), the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) 
and the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. Bass) for working on this 
resolution. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act represents 
this country's commitment to ensure that all children, including 
children with disabilities, are entitled to a free and appropriate 
public education. I support IDEA and I support more funding for this 
program. This resolution, unfortunately, does not include two 
provisions that I think need to be addressed. Although I support the 
resolution and will vote for it, I wish that it could have addressed 
two issues.
  The most important principle missing in the resolution is that we 
should not take away from other educational programs in order to fully 
fund IDEA. The needs of our public schools remain high and we should 
not rob Peter to pay Paul. In the past, we have seen efforts to shift 
funding from other educational accounts to IDEA without changing the 
bottom line.
  The second principle missing from the resolution is that we should 
urge the localities once the $4.1 billion appropriation mark is 
triggered to spend their 20 percent of relief on education. Under 
current law, localities may use 20 percent of any increase in IDEA 
funding above the trigger to offset their current effort on special 
education. However, this relief can be used for roads, jails, tax 
relief and so forth. There is no guarantee that any of the local offset 
would be used to recycle the money to other educational programs.
  Even more of a concern is that transferring funds from other Federal 
education programs to increase funding for IDEA could actually result 
in a net reduction in total spending for elementary and secondary 
education. If we pursue a strategy of reducing the funding of other 
education programs to fully fund IDEA, we will risk a 20 percent net 
reduction in our investment in elementary and secondary education 
programs at the expense of children, both disabled and nondisabled, 
that these programs serve.
  Mr. Speaker, I strongly support the bipartisan resolution and hope 
that we can continue a bipartisan effort to

[[Page H4601]]

fully fund IDEA without jeopardizing our investment in other 
educational programs.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
California (Mr. McKeon), one of my great subcommittee chairmen.
  Mr. McKEON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.Res. 399 which calls 
upon Congress and the President to fulfill our commitment to some of 
our Nation's neediest children, those with disabilities.
  For too long, Washington has shirked its responsibility to provide 
our local school districts with the funds necessary to carry out the 
expensive mandate created with the enactment of the Individuals with 
Disabilities Education Act.
  In my home State of California, the cost of educating an estimated 
610,000 children with disabilities is a staggering $3.3 billion. But 
the Federal Government contributes only $413 million, which translates 
to only 12.5 percent of the total cost. This, after saying that they 
would fund 40 percent of the cost.
  Even more alarming is the impact of this Federal mandate on our local 
school districts. For example, the Federal Government picks up only 5 
percent of the estimated $7.6 million price tag for educating the 
nearly 1,200 children in the William S. Hart High School District, the 
district I served on the local school board in my congressional 
district.
  To make matters worse, the President level-funded IDEA in his fiscal 
year 1999 budget while calling for $20 billion to fund a laundry list 
of new Federal education pet projects.
  If the President would first fund the special education mandate, 
which was the responsibility of the Federal Government years ago when 
this bill was passed, our communities would have the funds to do the 
things the President proposes, such as building new schools, hiring 
more teachers, reducing class size and buying more computers. I say the 
first thing that we should do is fully fund the IDEA bill, and I urge 
my colleagues to support this resolution.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood), the gentleman who helped shepherd the 
bill through the committee.
  Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me 
this time.
  Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that here in Washington sometimes 
education becomes a subject of controversy, when most Americans would 
look at us as politicians and say, what could be controversial about 
education.
  We all know that there is nothing more important in the world than 
that our precious children receive the best education that they can so 
that they can make the most of themselves in every way and that we can 
compete as a nation against every other country in the world as they 
educate their children.
  Of even less controversy, if that is possible, is the notion that 
children who have particular challenges, whether they are children with 
mental retardation or they have social or emotional problems, whether 
they have learning disabilities, speech impediments, what have you, 
that we as a society want to go overboard and do more for those kids 
than we do for other kids, if that is possible, because of the 
challenges that face them. None of that is controversial. We are all in 
support of that. What does get controversial is when we talk about 
whether it is the Federal responsibility or the State responsibility or 
the local responsibility to support certain aspects of education, and 
that is in fact very controversial.
  Most Republicans feel very strongly that the States should determine 
the curriculum, should determine the basics of education and that the 
localities should run the schools and make the decisions about hiring 
and firing and how they want to run their local school districts. But 
the President has proposed Federal responsibilities that would be new. 
He has proposed that the Federal Government get involved in school 
construction, that the Federal Government get involved in hiring 
teachers.
  Back to what is not controversial, IDEA is not controversial. The 
Congress 23 years ago said we have got to give these kids everything we 
can give them, the school districts are mandated to do that, and just 
last year, I believe it was, we reauthorized IDEA, I think with maybe 
one negative vote, if not unanimously, I think it was one negative vote 
out of 435 of us. This proposal, the Bass proposal, says let us put all 
the controversy aside and let us do what we agree on, let us finally 
fully fund special education, take this enormous burden that we have 
imposed on the States and shoulder our fair share as the Congress, and 
then the beautiful part of it is that every school district in America, 
so relieved of this burdensome Federal responsibility, has the 
opportunity to make a specific local decision what to do with the money 
it would have otherwise had to dedicate to special education and if 
they need a new roof, put a new roof on; if they need to hire new 
teachers, do that; if they need computers, do that.
  This, I think, is a complete win-win proposal, that we help the kids 
in America who need special education, who need special attention, help 
them the most and then at the same time free up every locality, every 
local school district in the country to then tailor-fit its budget to 
its particular needs.
  I urge support of the Bass resolution.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to respond to the gentleman from Pennsylvania who 
just spoke. I want to make it very clear here why the Federal 
Government is involved in this. I do not think the Federal Government 
has ever in any of the legislation we have passed tried to set 
curriculum for local schools. In fact, we very much have stayed away 
from that.
  The fact is that local schools and local school districts were not 
educating these disabled children. There was a court case that went to 
the Supreme Court, where the Supreme Court found that there were 
millions of young children throughout this country that were disabled 
who were not receiving a vital education; more importantly even unequal 
education. They were being pushed into back rooms and basement 
classrooms, sometimes not even being dealt with at all. As a result, 
the court found that these children were entitled to a full and 
meaningful education.
  And so then Congress acted, because the local districts and school 
districts would not. But they did not set any curriculum. What they did 
was tell the local schools that they would have to educate these 
children. But in doing so, they recognized one of the main reasons why 
a lot of these local school districts and local jurisdictions did not 
educate these young people was because it was much more costly to 
educate them.
  The Federal Government, in recognizing that it was much more costly 
to educate them, then developed the idea that there was a certain 
burden, a responsibility, you might say, that the Federal Government 
had, not putting a burden on the local school district other than that 
they were mandated by the Supreme Court action that they had to educate 
these children. That was the burden, not what the Federal Government 
did. The Federal Government then decided that they would fund 40 
percent of this.
  Now that becomes the crux of the situation we are in today and why we 
need legislation that decries the lack of funding on the part of the 
Federal Government for this particular program. We are only trying to 
get to that 40 percent that was initially agreed to that has never been 
attained, and, as many of the speakers here today have said, there has 
only been 11 percent ever reached in totality for that funding; I think 
that that is why we are here today.
  But I want to make it very clear, the Federal Government is trying to 
alleviate, or we as Members of Congress through this resolution are 
trying to alleviate a problem that was created basically initially by 
the lack of education of these young people in those local districts.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Kansas (Mr. Snowbarger).
  Mr. SNOWBARGER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me 
this time.

[[Page H4602]]

  Mr. Speaker, I rise to express my strong support for House Resolution 
399. I am pleased to be an original cosponsor of this responsible 
legislation. In 1973, Congress created the original special education 
program that mandated States to provide equal education for all 
students. Congress then pledged to pay 40 percent of the increased 
costs incurred for complying with this new Federal law and promptly 
reneged on its end of the bargain.
  Since the inception of the Individuals with Disabilities Education 
Act more than 20 years ago, Congress has paid for less than 10 percent 
of the costs we promised we would assume. It is high time for Congress 
to correct this problem and ease the burden this mandate places on 
States and local school boards.

                              {time}  1630

  Over the past 20 plus years more than $115 billion should have been 
provided to the local schools to pay for this unfunded mandate. This 
$115 billion would have provided necessary funds to cover increased 
special education costs and would have allowed our locally-elected 
school board members to direct their State and local funding to pay for 
local priorities instead of unfunded federal mandates.
  While I cannot do anything to reverse decisions made before I became 
a Member of this body, I believe we now have the opportunity to act 
responsibly to remedy this negligence. The failure of Congress to live 
up to our end of the bargain is a disgrace. Passage of this legislation 
is a good start toward correcting this problem.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support House Resolution 399.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman 
from California (Mr. Riggs), another one of our subcommittee chairs.
  Mr. RIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for 
yielding this time to me, and I want to join the gentleman and several 
other colleagues in rising to support this important resolution that is 
more than symbolism. It is critically needed and, I think, very urgent 
legislation, and I want to salute my good friend, classmate of sorts, 
the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. Bass) for his leadership on this 
particular issue.
  I can tell my colleagues that as one of the principal authors of last 
year's IDEA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act 
legislation, the so-called IDEA amendments of 1997, that I believe that 
this resolution, the Bass resolution, is the next logical step in 
fulfilling the promise of these amendments which were intended to 
improve the educational opportunity and the educational outcomes for 
children with disabilities, and I regret to say, because this 
legislation is very much bipartisan in nature, it was approved and 
advanced to the committee process on a voice-vote basis beginning in 
the subcommittee that I chaired, that I just regret that this 
legislation is at least necessitated in part because of the President's 
budget proposal to the Congress to level fund the IDEA program at a 
rate that I do not think will keep pace with inflation. And not wanting 
to read too much into the President's budget proposal, but I have to 
wonder how he can justify level funding or nominal increase in funding 
for IDEA on the one hand with his proposal for a host of new programs, 
additional categorical programs funded by Federal taxpayers on the 
other hand, particularly when the latter, the proposal for all these 
new programs, and I know they all sound well, and I am sure they have 
all been focused grouped and that they are in part politically or poll 
driven, but that proposal assumes this windfall of Federal revenue 
resulting from settlement of the tobacco class action litigation, and I 
do not think that there is any Member in this body who can really make 
that assumption because that legislation at the present time is 
obviously problematical.
  But back on the point, IDEA works. It is not some new untested 
program like so many of the ones that the President has proposed. As 
the gentleman has pointed out, since IDEA was enacted in 1975 the 
number of children with disabilities who have gone on to college has 
tripled, and the unemployment rate for individuals with disabilities 
who are now in their 20s is almost half that of other individuals who 
do not benefit from IDEA.
  Other speakers have testified about the fact that IDEA remains a 
largely underfunded federal mandate, sort of the mother, if my 
colleagues will, of all unfunded mandates imposed by the Congress on 
state and local educational agencies, and we need to address that 
problem, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) spoke of the 
trigger or threshold of 4.1 billion, and that figure is reachable this 
year, and it would in turn free up local and State education funding 
for other worthwhile activities.
  So I say let us support the Bass resolution, let us make good on that 
long overdue promise to State and local educational agencies. Let us 
tell the President, no, we will not turn back on school children with 
disabilities, and we will not leave local taxpayers to foot the bill 
for special education.
  Support the Bass resolution. Make IDEA funding a top and not the top 
priority for education.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  First of all, I am proud to say that Pennsylvania was ahead of the 
Federal Government when it came to IDEA. However, that too was a court 
decision, before they got around to making that decision on the Federal 
level. But for 20 years I sat in the minority asking the majority both 
in the Committee on Education and Labor and on the Committee on the 
Budget along with the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee) to please 
fund the 40 percent promised. We've got to make sure we understand we 
are talking about the 40 percent of excess costs. We are not talking 
about 40 percent of the costs for special education. We are talking 
about 40 percent of the excess costs to educate a special education 
student in relationship to a student in general education. It is the 
only curriculum mandate from the Federal level. It is important that 
everybody out there listening understands that, because we get blamed 
for every curriculum problem that they may have in a local district. 
The only federal mandate as far as curriculum is concerned is special 
education.
  I told the President on several occasions that if he wants a legacy--
if he wants a positive legacy in education--the way to get it is to 
make sure that he works with us to fully fund that 40 percent of excess 
costs.
  I am happy to say that we are here in a bipartisan effort. Everybody 
wants to make sure that we not only help the special education child. 
What I do not want to see happen, and what is beginning to happen 
because parents of students that are not in special education are 
beginning to say ``Where is our money going that we want for this and 
that?'' The school district has to say, ``Well, we have to fund what 
the Federal Government mandated.'' So it is a bipartisan effort to make 
sure that we carry our share of the special education financial burden. 
I am happy to support Congressman Bass' resolution, I would hope that 
we could get a hundred percent of the entire Congress supporting this 
resolution, since it is a bipartisan effort.
  Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H. Res. 
399, a resolution urging Congress and the President to fully fund the 
Individuals with Disabilities Act, or IDEA. I want to commend the 
gentleman from New Hampshire, Mr. Bass, for all his hard work and 
efforts in bringing this important resolution to the floor today.
  In 1975, when Congress passed the original IDEA bill, it made an 
historic commitment to support children and families with special 
education needs. At that time, Congress also committed the Federal 
government to providing 40 percent of the funding for the IDEA mandates 
on local communities. Today, the Federal government provides a mere 9 
percent of the necessary funding. And for Fiscal Year 1999, President 
Clinton's budget flatlines IDEA funding. This is shameful.
  It is incumbent upon us here in Congress to maintain our financial 
commitment to IDEA, and to provide the money our schools and 
communities need to provide services to individuals with disabilities 
and their families. If the President provided IDEA with the full 40 
percent in Federal funding, local schools would have more money to 
spend on other initiatives, including school construction, hiring new 
teachers, decreasing class sizes and buying more computers.
  By passing this bill today, we reinforce our commitment to providing 
the means to educate the students who need our help most. I urge my 
colleagues to vote for this bill, and

[[Page H4603]]

when the time comes, to support full funding for IDEA.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to express my 
opposition to H. Res. 399, the resolution calling for full-funding of 
the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA). My opposition to this act 
should in no way be interpreted as opposition to increased spending on 
education. However, the way to accomplish this worthy goal is to allow 
parents greater control over education resources by cutting taxes, thus 
allowing parents to devote more of their resources to educating their 
children in such a manner as they see fit. Massive tax cuts for the 
American family, not increased spending on federal programs, should be 
this Congress' top priority.
  The drafters of this bill claim that increasing federal spending on 
IDEA will allow local school districts to spend more money on other 
educational priorities. However, because an increase in federal funding 
will come from the same taxpayers who currently fund the IDEA mandate 
at the state and local level, increasing federal IDEA funding will not 
necessarily result in a net increase of education funds available for 
other programs. In fact, the only way to combine full federal funding 
of IDEA with an increase in expenditures on other programs by state and 
localities is through massive tax increases at the federal, state, and/
or local level.
  Rather than increasing federal spending, Congress should focus on 
returning control over education to the American people by enacting the 
Family Education Freedom Act (H.R. 1816), which provides parents with a 
$3,000 per child tax credit to pay for K-12 education expenses. Passage 
of this act would especially benefit parents whose children have 
learning disabilities as those parents have the greatest need to devote 
a large portion of their income toward their child's education.
  The Family Education Freedom Act will allow parents to develop an 
individualized education plan that will meet the needs of their own 
child. Each child is a unique person and we must seriously consider 
whether disabled children's special needs can be best met by parents, 
working with local educators, free from interference from Washington or 
federal educrats. After all, an increase in expenditures cannot make a 
Washington bureaucrat know or love a child as much as that child's 
parent.
  It is time for Congress to restore control over education to the 
American people. The only way to accomplish this goal is to defund 
education programs that allow federal bureaucrats to control America's 
schools. Therefore, I call on my colleagues to reject H. Res. 399 and 
instead join my efforts to pass the Family Education Freedom Act. If 
Congress gets Washington off the backs and out of the pocketbooks of 
parents, American children will be better off.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling) that the House suspend the 
rules and agree to the resolution, H. Res. 399, as amended.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor 
thereof) the rules were suspended and the resolution, as amended, was 
agreed to.
  The title of the resolution was amended so as to read:

       Resolution urging the Congress and the President to work to 
     fully fund the Federal Government's responsibility under the 
     Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________