[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 12400]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         SAFE ROUTES TO SCHOOL

  (Mr. BLUMENAUER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, for as long as I have been in Congress, 
I have worked on being a proponent of ``bike partisanship,'' something 
that everybody ought to be able to agree on. That's why I have been 
appalled at the repeated attacks on cycling by the Republican 
leadership. The latest is for the second time, Republican Whip Cantor 
has offered on the chopping block Safe Routes to School. You know, this 
is a program in 6800 schools across the country and has been requested 
by three times that number.
  People know that children under 14, one-third of all their deaths 
occur when a car hits them when they're biking or walking. In my old 
grade school on a very busy street, these grants have reduced crashes 
by 25 percent and pedestrian injuries by 34 percent. This is a 
commonsense program supported by people regardless of their party. When 
children can bike or walk safely to school, we won't be worried about 
300-pound morbidly obese 6th graders and a second rush hour as people 
take their kids to school. And then all our families will be safer, 
healthier and more economically secure.

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