[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 118 (Thursday, September 28, 2000)]
[House]
[Page H8412]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       KENNY GAMBLE'S ONE-MAN URBAN RENEWAL IN SOUTH PHILADELPHIA

  (Mr. KINGSTON asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. KINGSTON. Madam Speaker, recently I had the opportunity to go to 
Philadelphia, and there I met with Kenny Gamble. My colleagues may 
remember the Gamble and Huff song writing team who produced music for 
the O'Jays and Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. Mr. Gamble is a very 
successful businessman and music producer. He moved back to South 
Philly, his childhood home in the ghetto, and is basically starting a 
one-man urban renewal project.
  It is a very inspirational project. One of the keystones of that is a 
charter school that he started. Four hundred kids are in that charter 
school, with a waiting list of 1,400 children.
  Why is it successful? Because it is run locally with input from the 
teachers and the parents. It is something that all the neighborhood and 
the community can focus on and take a lot of pride in. It does not have 
Washington bureaucrats micromanaging it. It does not have people from 
the State capital in Pennsylvania telling them what to do.
  Madam Speaker, I believe this is a key corner to our education reform 
effort to get people back home interested and involved in the education 
process, because our children and our future are at stake. We should 
all follow Mr. Gamble's lead.

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