[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 41 (Tuesday, March 16, 1999)]
[House]
[Page H1274]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              YOUNG PEOPLE WORKING FOR LIVABLE COMMUNITIES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Morella). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) 
is recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Madam Speaker, an important part of what makes 
livable communities is a broad concept of what constitutes the 
infrastructure that constructs them. That means both the natural 
environment as well as the built environment. And most important, it 
also means our people.
  Today I would like to focus for a moment on one of the most important 
parts of the human infrastructure in a livable community, our young 
people. They are a key part in our community in Portland, Oregon, not 
just young people at work learning to prepare for their future careers 
but making real accomplishments as they go.
  This week in Washington, D.C., one of my constituents, Jennifer 
Fletcher, from Grant High School, is being honored by Seventeen 
Magazine for her volunteerism. Jennifer is one of those extraordinary 
young people, although only 16 years of age, who has focused in on 
things that will make a difference in her community, I think in part 
inspired by a movie that was shot at her high school, ``Mr. Holland's 
Opus,'' a Richard Dreyfus story about how a music teacher was able to 
inspire a community to make investments for its future.
  Jennifer has done something that would make any screen writer proud. 
She has founded ``Arts Alive'' in our community in response to funding 
cuts for arts programs at their schools. ``Arts Alive'' is dedicated to 
providing funding for these schools, and she has exhibited 
extraordinary creativity in how to go about it.
  Her most recent accomplishment was to stage a benefit concert. She 
approached her favorite singer, Jackson Browne, to help her in the 
cause. She handled all the details from ticket sales, to securing a 
Portland concert hall, to arranging transportation and hotel 
accommodations for the band. And as a result of her dedication and 
marvelous skills, the concert was a huge success, bringing together 
people in the community to celebrate the arts, to be a part of a larger 
effort, and, by the way, raising almost $100,000.
  I am proud of the difference that Ms. Fletcher has made. I applaud 
her future efforts. But they are just the tip of the iceberg in our 
community. As I look at the Oregon Youth Conservation Corps, which has 
put young people to work improving the environment, hiring at-risk high 
school young people, giving them school credit for their work but 
giving them real-life activities where they were shoulder to shoulder 
with professionals in creating recreation trails, viewing areas, 
restoring watershed, preventing soil erosion, promoting recycling, and 
participating in wetland restoration projects, real work for real kids, 
learning kids, earning while they went.
  In David Douglas High School, I have seen young people solve very 
creatively a transportation problem between two of their buildings by 
creating their own light rail line, converting two buses, laying the 
track, all with volunteers and donated labor.
  The Northwest Service Academy, with 150 AmeriCorps volunteers, 
working with over 10,000 people in the community, dealing with issues 
of storm water runoff, roof drain disconnect, converting hundreds of 
homes to different approaches to solve this problem much more cheaply 
than if we were just building concrete underground cisterns.
  The goal of a livable community through smart growth and careful 
planning is to get more out of our scarce dollars, our land, and our 
people. By harnessing the creative power of our youth, putting them to 
work through education, employment, and environmental activities is one 
of the most creative ways that we can truly make America's communities 
livable.
  And for all our talk about smart growth and transportation 
initiatives and protecting the environment, I hope that we will 
continue to focus on ways to harness our young people to be full 
partners in making our communities livable.

                          ____________________