[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 137 (Thursday, September 15, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5687-S5688]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. CASEY:
  S. 1565. A bill to establish the National Competition for Community 
Renewal to encourage communities to adopt innovative strategies and 
design principles to programs related to poverty prevention, recovery 
and response, and for other purposes; to the Committee on Finance.
  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, today over 15 percent of Americans live in 
poverty including 22 percent of our children. 46.2 million Americans 
and 16.4 million children struggle every day to survive in a system 
that is demoralizing and unfortunately does more to maintain people who 
live in poverty than to help them escape. Last year, 2.6 million 
Americans were added to the poverty rolls and 8.9 million have been 
added since 2007.
  This must change. That is why I am today reintroducing the National 
Opportunity and Community Renewal Act. This legislation puts forth some 
new ideas and will grant waivers to ten communities so they can test 
different approaches to combatting poverty. I am not saying this is the 
only path forward or the most suitable path forward. But we must begin 
somewhere and we must take a comprehensive approach. As Robert Kennedy 
once said when talking about tackling the poverty problem in our 
country, we must ``grab the web whole.'' Piecemeal approaches won't 
work.
  I know there are other Senators and Congressmen along with policy 
professionals and academics who share my concern and commitment to 
reducing poverty. I invite people to review this proposal. Let me know 
what you think and if you have other ideas to bring them to the table. 
It is long past time to reinstill our national commitment to the least 
fortunate.
  We must also acknowledge that there is not one answer to helping 
people out of poverty. That is why this legislation is important. It 
will allow communities to pursue innovative approaches to problems 
arising from poverty and avoids a ``one size fits all'' method. This 
legislation also targets individuals and mandates the creation of an 
individual opportunity plan for every household. It also helps address 
the root causes of poverty by giving local communities to design 
programs that fit their community and they would not be restricted by 
the current law.

[[Page S5688]]

These pilots will help us test new ideas and understand how new 
approaches can help lift people out of poverty.
  In closing, I should note it has been almost fifty years since 
Michael Harrington published The Other America and opened Americans 
eyes to the pernicious impact of poverty. While there have been 
improvements made in the ensuing years we still have a long way to go. 
Let us begin anew today.
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