    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book I)]
    [March 30, 1995]
    [Pages 427-432]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks to Students at Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Florida
    March 30, 1995

        The President. Thank you very much, Bill Lanthripp, for that
    introduction. Thank you, President Paloumpis, and thank you, ladies and
    gentlemen, for making me feel so very, very welcome here today. I also
    want to thank those of you who brought the little children here; it's
    wonderful to see them--that little girl back there in her green dress
    and that little girl there, this young man there; you look great. Thank
    you.
        I want to thank some of my partners in trying to make your future
    better who are here with me, your Governor and Lieutenant Governor,
    Lawton Chiles and Buddy McKay. I thank my friend Congressman Gibbons for
    being here, the speaker of the house, Peter Wallace, and your
    representative, the majority leader of the house, Jim Davis. I thank
    them all for being here.
        I also want to say that I almost got here in time--I got here a day
    ahead of the new mayor's inauguration, so I want to thank, on the next-
    to-the-last day of her tenure, my longtime friend, your mayor, Sandy
    Freedman, for doing such a good job for Tampa. And I want to wish your
    new mayor, Dick Greco, all the best, and I look forward to working with
    you.
        Ladies and gentlemen, if I could start on a more serious note, I
    just had the opportunity to meet at the airport with the families of the
    two Tampa police officers, Mike Vigil and Kevin Howell, who were shot
    and wounded last week. I also had the opportunity to meet an HCC
    student, Mike Meyer, who saved one of those officers' lives because he's
    a certified emergency medical technician. He told the police he was a
    paramedic, and they brought him there. He grabbed his bag and rushed to
    the fallen officers, and he did a very fine job. And I had a chance to
    thank him for that, and it's an encouragement to all of us to learn some
    of the skills that he knows. You never can tell when you will need them.
    I understand that Officer Vigil remains in critical but stable
    condition, but I was just informed by his family that the doctors say
    his chances are now better than 50-50 that he's going to make a good
    recovery.
        I am delighted to be back in Florida. I had the opportunity to spend
    the night at the Governor's mansion last night and to address the
    Florida Legislature today about the challenges facing our country and
    what we're going to do about it. Today I want to talk to you about your
    future. I spend a lot of time in community colleges like this one,
    because I think in many ways this is the most important institution in
    American society as we move toward the next century.
        With all of the challenges we face, we basically know what works.
    What works is educating all of our people; what works is doing what it
    takes to generate more jobs; what works is bringing people together
    across racial and income and other lines; what works is a commitment to
    give more people a shot at the American dream, to grow the middle class
    and to shrink the under class, and to prepare for the future. And that's
    what community colleges do.
        In a very real sense, what I have been trying to do as President is
    to bring that spirit and those ideas into the National Government. I've
    worked for a dozen years as a Governor, in which time I had the honor
    and privilege to spend countless hours in educational institutions, from
    elementary schools to community colleges, to vocational training
    schools, to our 4-year universities. And I found when I went to
    Washington that every reason that I worried about the country when I ran
    for President turned out to be true.
        I ran because I thought this country was on the verge of a new
    century, dominated by the end of the cold war, the emergence of the
    global economy, wealth tied more to knowledge than ever before, when we
    had new opportunities but new challenges, and that Washington was in the
    grip of old-fashioned partisan political rhetoric, dividing us when we
    needed to be united, holding us back when we needed to go forward.
        Now we are all engaged in a great debate which you hear every day on
    the news as you watch events unfold about what your Government should be
    doing in this moment. The old view was that there was a Government
    solution in Washington for every big problem in the country and that
    Government could actually

    [[Page 428]]

    help people with big problems. Well, we know that that's not exactly
    right; they're not one-size-fits-all, Government knows best, out of
    Washington. And we know that there are great limits on how much
    Government can help people to fulfill their abilities.
        The new rage is to say that the Government is the cause of all of
    our problems and if only we had no Government, we'd have no problems. I
    can tell you, that contradicts evidence, history, and common sense. Now,
    the truth is--so the question is, what are we going to do? I can tell
    you what my view is, and it is different from either extreme.
        I believe we need a Government that doesn't pretend to be a savior
    but that doesn't sit on the sidelines. I believe in a partnership. I
    believe that the National Government's mission at the end of this
    century is as follows: Number one, we ought to be creating opportunity
    and demanding responsibility. Number two, I think we ought to be doing
    everything we can to empower the American people through education for a
    lifetime to make the most of their own lives. Number three, I believe we
    ought to be enhancing the security of the American people, not only by
    making the world a safer place but by making our streets and our schools
    and our homes and our workplaces safer places. And number four, I think
    we have got to dramatically change the National Government to make it
    smaller, less bureaucratic, less meddlesome, but still helpful to move
    this country forward.
        Now, if you look at the record in creating opportunity, we have
    brought down the deficit, we have expanded trade, we have increased our
    investments in new technology, and in the last 2 years our Nation has
    produced over 6 million new jobs. The unemployment rate in Florida has
    dropped 3 percent from 7.4 to 4.3 percent. We are clearly moving forward
    and creating more opportunity.
        If you look at the empowerment issue, we have increased investments
    in education, everything from expanding Head Start to expanding the
    efforts of States to make apprenticeships for people who don't go to
    college, to dramatically--and I mean dramatically--increasing the
    availability of scholarships for middle class people to get a higher
    education.
        If you ask, well, what have we done on security, well, look around
    the world. We are making progress in troublesome areas of the world like
    the Middle East, in bringing peace, and Northern Ireland. We have made
    agreements with Russia and with other countries in the former Soviet
    Union to drastically reduce the number of nuclear weapons. And for the
    first time since the dawn of the nuclear age, there are no nuclear
    missiles pointed at the children of the United States of America.
        Now, if you ask what have we done to reduce the size of Government--
    and I want to compliment Governor Chiles for his leadership in this.
    Florida is one of the--really, the groundbreaking State in America, I
    think, in slashing unnecessary regulation, and I congratulate him on
    that.
        What are we doing in Washington? Well, we've reduced the size of the
    Federal bureaucracy by 100,000. We're going to reduce it by 270,000 over
    5 years. It'll be the smallest Federal Government since John Kennedy was
    President of the United States.
        We have reduced the Government deficit so much that if it weren't
    for interest on the debt incurred in the 12 years before I showed up,
    we'd have a surplus today, not a deficit in the Government account.
    We're paying our operating bills.
        We're now giving Government regulators the authority not to fine
    people the first time they make a mistake. And Carol Browner, from
    Florida, who's the head of the EPA, has opened up an office in which
    people, good, honest business people can go and say, ``Look, I'm afraid
    I'm in violation of some environmental law,'' and instead of getting a
    fine they'll get 6 months to fix it. We have changed the rules so that
    now if somebody makes a mistake in good faith, our Federal agencies have
    the right not to fine people but to say, ``You keep the fine if you'll
    spend it in fixing the problem, making the workplace safer, making the
    environment cleaner.''
        So we are moving forward. With this new Congress, we are finding
    some areas of agreement that are quite important. I signed a law that I
    campaigned for President to support that applies to Congress all the
    laws they put on the private sector. I think it's high time.
        I signed a law the other day which limits the ability of the
    Congress to impose upon State governments and local governments so-
    called unfunded mandates, requiring them to raise your taxes because of
    something people in Washington want, instead of what you decided the
    mayor should do or the Governor and the State legislature should do. And
    it's high time.

    [[Page 429]]

        And we're about to get agreement--we passed a line-item veto, which
    most Governors have, which allows a President to go into a big bill,
    where a lot of pork-barrel spending might be hidden with a lot of good
    things so you can't afford to veto the bill, and find the pork. And
    we're going to get that passed soon. And that's a good thing.
        But there still are some disagreements. And the American people,
    without regard to their party, will have to be heard on these
    disagreements, because you have to decide what you think the main
    mission of our country is. Is the main mission to make sure there is no
    Federal Government, or is the main mission to grow the middle class,
    shrink the under class, and support family and community and the future
    of this country? I think that is what the main mission of this country
    is.
        And let me give you some ideas. With all the cutting of the budget
    we have done--and last year, I gave the Congress the first budget in 25
    years that cut defense and domestic spending together. Only medical
    costs went up because of inflation. Everything else was cut. But I did
    not cut, within that, education. We increased our investment in
    education. Why? Because--look around you--it is the future of America.
        So are we going to grow the middle class, shrink the under class,
    and be a safer country if more poor little kids go through Head Start? I
    think we are. Are we going to grow the middle class if more kids who get
    out of high school but don't want to go to college at least get 2 years
    of some kind of training afterward in a community college, that type of
    thing? I think we are. Will we be growing the middle class and shrinking
    the under class if every person who wants to go to college can get a
    college loan at a lower cost and a better repayment schedule? I think we
    are.
        So this is a big decision we have to make in Washington. Let me give
    you a clear, explicit example. I recommended that we could save some
    money and do a better job by our young people if we changed the college
    loan program, because it was a big bureaucracy. You know it was a
    guarantee, so the Government would guarantee a loan a bank would give
    you. The bank charges a fee; then if somebody doesn't pay it back, the
    bank gets 90 percent of the money from the Government. So they never
    sue, because the lawyer fee would cost more than 10 percent. Right? We
    were spending, when I became President, $1.8--$2.8 billion a year of
    your money for delinquent loans, because people weren't paying their
    student loans.
        Colleges and universities were complaining all over America that the
    paperwork was driving them bananas to process the student loans. The
    students were complaining that they couldn't get the loans in a hurry.
    And then when they had to repay them on a 10-year schedule, if you
    borrowed a whole bunch of money, you couldn't take a job that you might
    want if it has a salary so low you could never make your loan repayment.
    And it didn't just apply to people in what you call public service jobs.
        Yesterday in Atlanta, I had an economic forum, and I had two married
    medical students, a husband and wife from the University of Florida,
    come and testify. They are 4th-year medical students. They will owe
    $140,000 when they get out of medical school. You say, ``Well, doctors
    make a lot of money.'' They do, but not when they're residents. Right?
    They were going to literally have to spend one-half of their income,
    combined, paying off their students loans while they're residents
    working 60, 70, 80 hours a week. Under our plan, they can pay it off as
    a percentage of their income. So when they start making money, they pay
    more. But now they get to make a living and work and become doctors.
    It's a better system.
        So how does this affect you? Today, 40 percent of American
    institutions are eligible to participate in that. What I said is, let's
    let everybody participate. We'll cut the fraud rate. We've already taken
    it from $2.8 billion down to $1 billion a year. We've cut the fraud by
    nearly two-thirds. We'll cut the cost of the program. We'll loan more
    money to more students. We'll be less trouble to the institutions of
    higher education, and the deficit will go down because we'll save $6
    billion. That was my proposal.
        Now, here is the other proposal in the Congress. The other proposal
    is: Leave the banks with the money; cap the number of colleges that can
    participate at 40 percent; and instead, make students start paying
    interest on their loans while they're in college--add $2 billion a year
    to the cost of college.
        Audience members. No-o-o!
        The President. To me, I don't think you have to be Einstein to
    conclude that does not make sense. Let's stay with our program. Let's
    save

    [[Page 430]]

    money and educate people and not go back to charging people more for
    student loans.
        Let me tell you something else. There's a lot of talk about tax cuts
    in Washington today. There is a limit to how much we can cut taxes
    because the deficit's big. We need to keep bringing the deficit down.
    But I believe we should have a modest tax cut for middle class people,
    targeted to raising incomes and increasing the wealth of the country
    over the long run. Don't just write people a check. Give people who are
    playing by the rules some incentives to do more. That's why my bill says
    let's give people a tax deduction for the cost of education after high
    school. Get more people to get educated and do that. Why? Why? Because
    it's just like the GI bill after World War II: Everybody who goes to
    school is going to make a higher income and pay more taxes and run the
    deficit down and run the wealth of the country up. And if we keep it
    disciplined and small, we can afford it.
        But we can't afford just to go out here with these huge tax cuts
    with the deficit of the country as big as it is. The reason the Florida
    economy dropped in unemployment by 3 percent is that we brought the
    deficit down and increased our investment and expanded trade. So we got
    interest rates down and business opportunities up and generated more
    jobs. The most important thing is to keep the American people working
    and get their incomes up. And that's what we have to do.
        Now, you will see these debates over and over and over again. I want
    to mention two more, because they affect you. We're having a big
    argument about what to do about crime. Well, we finally passed a tough
    crime bill last year. Your mayor helped us pass it. Your Governor, your
    attorney general, your law enforcement official helped us pass it.
        And what that crime bill does is it says--first of all, it was
    virtually written by law enforcement officials--it says that we should
    have the National Government do three things to help bring the crime
    rate down: Help the States build more prisons so we don't let dangerous
    criminals out too soon; help local communities give kids something to
    say yes to and not just something to say no to, so we prevent crime and
    keep people out of trouble; and have a 20 percent increase in the police
    forces of the country so we can catch criminals and prevent crime. Those
    are the three things we did.
        Now, the Congress has proposed to reduce the amount of money we're
    spending on the crime bill, but require the States to spend more on
    prisons and spend less on police and prevention, and tell the
    communities, do whatever you want to with the money. And I'm opposed to
    that, and I want you to know why. Violent crime has tripled in the last
    30 years, and we have to do something about it--all kinds of violent
    crime. I just announced last week that the former attorney general of
    Iowa, Bonnie Campbell, is going to head the first-ever division of the
    Justice Department on domestic violence, violence against parents and
    children. We have to do something about this.
        Now, in 30 years, violent crime triples, but the police forces of
    the country increase by only 10 percent. You don't have to be a genius
    to figure out that there's some connection between a huge increase in
    crime and nearly no increase in the police force. How are they supposed
    to do what they're doing? Not to mention how much better armed the
    criminals have become--right?--which is part of the problem with these
    fine police officers.
        Now, we know also that one of the good news stories that often does
    not get told in this country is--I have seen this with my own eyes--
    there's city after city after city where the crime rate has gone down
    because of strategies that have been adopted, like some of the
    strategies adopted right here in Tampa. When you put people out and you
    deploy police in the proper way and they work with people in the
    community, they not only catch criminals quicker but they also deter
    crime. I have seen it all across America. This is a good deal. Florida
    has already been awarded funds for more than 960 police officers, 18 of
    them right here in Tampa. We don't need to tamper with the crime bill.
    We ought to stay with it and implement it.
        I'm just going to give you one last example, because we have to
    decide what kind of country we're going to be and what we're going to do
    together. These young people that were introduced over here, the
    AmeriCorps volunteers--and they clapped and I was glad to see them--
    they're part of our national service program. It's a program basically
    to bring the idea of the Peace Corps to the streets of America. It's a
    program designed to say, ``If you will work, essentially, for minimum
    wage for a year, we'll give you about the equivalent college education

    [[Page 431]]

    benefit of the GI bill, if you'll help us to deal with our security
    problems here at home, help to volunteer and to rebuild America here at
    home.''
        Now, there are those who say, ``Well, we can't afford this. It's too
    expensive.'' We have 20,000 young Americans in AmeriCorps today,
    thousands of more who want to get in, who want to work for minimum wage
    and earn this education credit and build up our country. There are more
    people in AmeriCorps today than ever served in the Peace Corps in any
    single year in its history since President Kennedy started it, because
    the American people are dying to get out there and do something to lift
    this country up.
        Let me just give you a couple of examples. Two years ago, just 89 of
    our volunteers immunized 104,000 infants in poor areas in Texas. Believe
    me, they paid for the whole program in that one year. Here in Florida
    after the hurricane, our volunteers, working with Habitat for Humanity,
    built 75 homes, and they built them quicker and better because of that.
        These AmeriCorps volunteers are from Pinellas County. They're
    members of three local law enforcement agencies involved in community
    police departments, the Clearwater department, the St. Petersburg
    department and the county sheriff's office. They're working together to
    make what I just talked to you about, community policing, a reality, to
    make the streets safer. They're out there doing things that uniformed
    officers don't have to do that lower the crime rate and make people
    safer. That is what we ought to be doing. I think it is worth the
    investment.
        I'm cutting spending as quick as I can. We've cut more spending in
    the last 2 years than had been cut in a month of Sundays, and I will cut
    more, and I will work with the Congress to cut more. But it is not right
    to cut out AmeriCorps. We should be lifting up young people like this
    and giving them a chance to serve.
        So I want you to be a part of this. America needs to work like the
    community colleges work: People get in, and they're just judged based on
    their merit, and everybody gets a fair shot. And you know if you
    conclude the course, you've got a good chance to get a job and a better
    chance to live out your dreams. That's the way this country ought to
    work. It ought to be flexible, unbureaucratic, changing to meet the
    needs of a changing society, but it requires a partnership between the
    public sector and the private sector.
        Your Government in Washington, I am doing my best to change it to
    make it more like this. But we are creating opportunity, we are
    empowering people, we are enhancing our security, and we are downsizing
    this Government. We are making America a better place together. And I
    urge you to enter this debate and tell everybody that you can, we do not
    need more of the old-fashioned, hot air, partisan political rhetoric. We
    need a strategy to move this country forward.
        And let me say this in closing, I got a letter the other day from a
    guy I went to grade school with. And he said, ``You know, Bill, one of
    the problems that you're having as President is that you're living out
    your dream. But too many people our age are living with broken dreams.''
    I ran for this job because I wanted all the people my age to be able to
    live their dreams and because I want you younger people here to be able
    to look forward to a life that is full and rich as the one I've enjoyed.
    And those of you that are young and don't have any children yet, I want
    you to think about having children with an atmosphere of excitement and
    hope and conviction that your kids will see America's best days. And I'm
    telling you, if we will keep our heads on straight and think about how
    we can pull together instead of how we can be driven apart, we will do
    that.
        God bless you, and thank you.

    Note: The President spoke at 2:34 p.m. in the gymnasium at the Dale
    Mabry Campus. In his remarks, he referred to William Lanthripp,
    president, Dale Mabry Campus Student Government Association; Andreas A.
    Paloumpis, president, Hillsborough Community College; and student John
    Meyer.

    [[Page 432]]