[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 17]
[House]
[Page 24293]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                 EDUCATION FUNDING HOLDING CONGRESS UP

  (Mr. GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute.)
  Mr. GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the coach from Georgia for 
sending me in.
  Mr. Speaker, it is great to be here today. Except the problem I have 
is that we were supposed to be finished on October 3. This Congress has 
provided billions and billions of dollars for projects all over the 
country. And yet, what is holding us up? Education funding.
  I want to congratulate my Republican colleagues for saying, we will 
do something for school construction around the country. But what about 
smaller class sizes?
  Five years ago, when the Republicans took control, they wanted to 
eliminate the Department of Education. In fact, they have candidates 
all over the country saying that is what they want to do.
  They are willing to now, instead of abolishing it up here, they just 
want to transfer funds to private schools. Over 90 percent of our 
children get their education through public schools. Let us do not take 
the funds away from them.
  My children went to public schools. They graduated. They went to 
college. They had a great public education. My wife teaches math in a 
public high school in Houston, Texas. We have great public schools. But 
we do not do it by taking money away from them and sending dollars to 
private schools like my Republican colleagues want to do.
  We need smaller class sizes. We need help with buildings. We need to 
work with our local school boards and our State legislators to say, 
okay, what works in Texas, we can help and we will send them funds to 
do it.

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