[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 51 (Tuesday, April 30, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H1750-H1751]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     HONORING YOUTH NEED PRIME TIME

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Keller). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I come today to this Chamber having had an 
extraordinary morning in east central Indiana. At my side was the 
conference chairman for the Republican majority of the Congress, J.C. 
Watts, who is, among other accolades including Orange Bowl hall of 
famer, a football player and one of the best known members of this 
institution nationally. He is a man, as I learned today, deeply 
committed to the least of these and to coming alongside those in 
community, not sadly, Mr. Speaker, often associated with the Republican 
Party in this day and age, but a community that is nonetheless deeply 
in need of attention and, specifically, legislative attention by this 
Congress.
  Today J.C. Watts and I traveled to the west side of Anderson into, 
Mr. Speaker, a ramshackle house, dilapidated, the floors creaking 
beneath us, an old refrigerator humming in the back room full of Cokes 
and snacks. We stood before some 30 people, teenagers, largely minority 
young men and women, all of them from disadvantaged families, each of 
them from one degree or another in trouble with the law, in trouble at 
school. And all of these students gathered as this football player-
turned-Congressman and as this talk show-host-turned-Congressman stood 
in front of them extolling the virtues of the leader of that 
organization, Youth Need Prime Time, Thomas Jackson; the work that he 
had done in that place and in lesser places, Mr. Speaker, over the last 
16 years, touching the lives of some 3,000 young people in one of the 
most disadvantaged areas of the Sixth Congressional District of 
Indiana.
  I heard J.C. Watts as he spoke about the lies on the street, having 
grown up in a disadvantaged black family himself. His father, Buddy, 
having not ever gone to school beyond the second grade, J.C. Watts was 
able to speak with authority to these young people about the lies of 
believing that it will never happen to me, believing that the rules of 
law and the rules of nature will never catch up with them and least of 
all the long arm of the law.
  I saw those young people, Mr. Speaker, with rapt attention as they 
listened. But my heart nevertheless went out to the leaders of that 
organization who make it, Mr. Speaker, hand to mouth, barely paying the 
rent, barely having the resources to run the organization as it has 
impacted so many lives since 1986.
  And my mind wandered to the legislation that we passed in this House 
almost now a year ago, legislation known as the Community Solutions 
Act. It was legislation commonly described as the faith-based 
initiative

[[Page H1751]]

that would encourage charitable giving, expanding charitable choice to 
include faith-based organizations just like Youth Need Prime Time; and 
saying to these organizations that they would be allowed to compete for 
Federal grants in the areas of housing, job training, child welfare, 
child care services, crime prevention programs and the like.
  As I looked this morning into the eyes of Shorika, a 14-year-old girl 
who had made a decision, Mr. Speaker, to say yes to life, bringing a 
small child into the world even at that tender age, I thought of the 
frustration of a system that discriminates against ministries like 
Youth Need Prime Time simply because on occasion they mention God, on 
occasion they have a Bible study or have a cross on the wall.
  So I simply rise today to speak of an extraordinary experience with 
J.C. Watts, a man of extraordinary voice in our party. But I also 
think, Mr. Speaker, of the critical need for this Congress and this 
government to amend the laws of this Nation, to come alongside 
organizations like Youth Need Prime Time, to courageous men like Thomas 
Jackson and his family and the volunteers that are there every day of 
the week, day in and day out, coming alongside some of the most 
troubled and disadvantaged young people in the district that I serve 
and saying that not only is the American dream alive, but it is alive 
for them if they will but have the faith and the self-sacrifice and the 
determination to reach it. Let us in this Congress extend the faith-
based initiative and come alongside the least of these.

                          ____________________