[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book I)]
[February 14, 1995]
[Pages 209-213]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at San Bernardino Valley College in San Bernardino, California
February 14, 1995

    Thank you for that wonderful, wonderful welcome. Thank you, Dr. 
Singer, for your introduction. I know the Secretary of Education, 
Secretary Riley, has already spoken. I'm glad to be here with him. And I 
thank the mayor for being here and Dr. Bundy. And let's give the 
Etiwanda High School Band a hand. Didn't they do a great job? Great job. 
Thank you. When I heard them playing ``Hail to the Chief'' outside I 
thought they'd transported the Marine Band from the White House here, 
they were so great. They were great.
    I'd also like to recognize a couple of other groups that are here. 
First of all, I want to thank the members of our national service 
program, AmeriCorps, who are here. They're over there. And I want to 
thank a representative group of incredible people who just spent about 
an hour with me, talking to me about this institution, how it has 
affected their lives and your community and the remarkable partnerships 
that are being made and the dreams that are being made to come true. I'd 
like for all the people who were just in the little roundtable 
discussion with me to be recognized. They're over here somewhere. Where 
are they? There they are. [Applause] Thank you. They were great. I feel 
that I know a lot more about you now because I listened to all of them, 
and believe me, they put you all in a very good light.
    I want to talk to you today about the importance of this community 
college and education in general, not only to your future but to the 
future of our country, what it means and what we should be doing about 
it. I met a lot of folks already here today that represent what I think 
America is all about, people who are coming together around the idea of 
education without regard to their race, their income, their background, 
what country they were born in, what situation they're in now just 
because they want to make the most of their own lives and make a 
contribution, live up to the fullest of their God-given abilities. And I 
really think that's what we ought to be supporting.
    The reason I worked so hard for the national service program that 
you see all these young people in is because I believe that we ought to 
be helping young people to find ways to earn money for education and 
contribute to the strength of their communities at the same time.
    I ran for President because I was worried, as we come to the close 
of this great century, that we wouldn't be able to guarantee the 
American dream for all people moving into the 21st century and we 
wouldn't be able to make sure America was the strongest country in the 
world, and I believe those are the two jobs the President has to do. And 
I believe the way we should do that is what I have called the New 
Covenant. We should create more opportunity; we should insist on more 
responsibility from all of us; and we should work to build our 
communities at the grassroots level, where the real strength of America 
is.
    Now, there's been a lot of debate in our country now in two separate 
elections, in 1992 and 1994, about what the role of Government is and 
whether Government is bad or good inherently. My answer to you is that 
we need a different kind of Government for the 21st century and that 
your National Government has three major jobs. One is, we should expand 
opportunity while shrinking the Federal bureaucracy and the burden it 
imposes. Two, we should recognize that the Government can't support 
everybody, but it should work to empower people to make the most of 
their own lives. And three, we should work to enhance the security 
Americans feel not only in terms of what goes on beyond our borders but 
here at home as well. More opportunity, more empowerment, more security: 
that is what we should be about in the National Government.
    Now, if you look at what this national service project does, they're 
working in the San

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Bernardino forest, people who are helping to clean up the forest, 
maintain it, strengthen it, keep it there for our children and our 
grandchildren, make sure it's an important resource. Last year there 
were 89 young people in this program in south Texas who immunized 
102,000 infants to help them live, and all of them earned money on their 
education. Sixteen of these young people work at Berkeley, helping 750 
of their classmates to tutor middle-school students. These are the kinds 
of things that are going on all over America, and I think it emphasizes 
what I'm saying. For a small amount of Federal money we have increased 
opportunity with no bureaucracy. This is all done at the grassroots 
level.
    We have certainly empowered these young people to make more of their 
own lives, and we are clearly going to be a stronger country because we 
have more people getting an education and more people preserving the 
environment, making our kids healthier, making our country stronger at 
the grassroots level. That is what I am trying to do. And I want to talk 
to you today about what that means for education in general, and 
especially for community colleges like this one, which are the key to 
the future of the American economy and the ability to preserve the 
American dream for all people.
    Let me give you an example of what we're trying to do in another 
area on security, and then I'll come back to education, because I want 
to make sure that you understand exactly how I'm thinking about this. I 
welcome the call of the new Republicans in the Congress to cut the 
Government, but I--now, wait a minute, you all don't get into a partisan 
fight already; wait until the end of the speech. [Laughter] For the last 
2 years, we've been doing it without any help. I'd like some help. I'd 
like some help. But what is the purpose of this? That's what I want you 
to think about.
    Now, there are now over 100,000 fewer people working for the Federal 
Government than there were the day I took office. We have shrunk the 
Federal Government. If they don't pass a single law this year, we will 
reduce the size of the Federal Government by over a quarter of a million 
because of the budgets adopted in the first 2 years of my term, and 
we'll make the Federal Government the smallest it's been since John 
Kennedy was President.
    Now, what do we do with the money? What are we doing with the money? 
We cut, already, over $600 billion from the deficit, and we're going to 
cut more. I've just sent a budget to the Congress that cuts more 
spending from the deficit. What are we doing with the money? We propose, 
first, to reduce the deficit and, secondly, to increase investments in 
the areas that I mentioned, to increase investments that would create 
more opportunities--jobs; that would empower people more--education; and 
that would enhance security--things like the crime bill.
    If you just take the crime bill, for example, I said when I ran for 
President--I came to California and campaigned--``Vote for me, and I 
will reduce the size of the Federal bureaucracy by 100,000 and we'll put 
another 100,000 police officers on the street.'' And that's exactly what 
we've done, except we reduced the size of the Federal Government by 
270,000 and used it to pay for police officers, prisons, and prevention. 
We passed that crime bill last year with a bipartisan majority. After 6 
years of partisan haggling and scrapping around and people throwing 
words at each other, we actually passed a bill. And since October, we 
have put--but I only was there a year and a half, you understand--
[laughter]--but since October, we've put 16,000 police officers out, 
16,000. And we've got 17 right here in San Bernardino, new police 
officers.
    Listen to this: We did it with a one-page form, eight questions that 
could be faxed in; nobody had to hire consultants. And of all the 
communities in America with police officers, every size, including those 
with just one, one-half of all the communities in America have already 
applied for help under this program because it's a good program, it 
works, and there's no hassle in it. That's the kind of Government we 
ought to have, a leaner, not a meaner Government that makes sense and 
makes people more secure. We're under budget, ahead of schedule, moving 
forward.
    It took 6 years to pass the bill. I started working on it when I got 
elected; we got it done. In only 6 weeks of this new Congress, the new 
majority in the House of Representatives is trying to wipe out the crime 
bill and pass two block grants, to cut back on the money that goes to 
police and to prevention, to put it all in one package, send it to the 
States and say, you all do whatever you want to with it, and to put more 
money into the prison system. Now, here's the interesting thing--wait a

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minute, don't get into a partisan fight, just listen to me make my 
piece. [Laughter] Every police organization in the country, including 
those that are overwhelmingly Republican, has endorsed our position to 
leave it alone and let it work. This is not a partisan issue.
    So the people in the House said, ``I don't care what the police 
said. I don't care what the people working in the community said. I 
don't care what the evidence shows. This is what we're going to do. 
We're determined not to spend any money on prevention. If the States 
want to do it and not put police on the streets, that's their business. 
And here's the money, build the prisons, or else.'' Now, what I believe 
is that we still have a chance to keep this a bipartisan issue. And I'm 
going to do my best to go into the Senate and to work with people who 
understand law enforcement, who will listen to people who are out here 
on the streets every day trying to save these kids and save our 
communities and save our streets and keep this bill intact so we can put 
the police on the street and have the prevention programs.
    But I will not--I will reiterate what I said Saturday--if I have to, 
I will veto any bill that attempts to undermine the commitment that we 
made last year after 6 years. But it need not be a partisan issue. It 
ought to be an American issue. And that's what I say to you about 
education. What are we going to do in this day and time? What is our job 
in Washington that affects you way out here in the Inland Empire when it 
comes to education? What is our job when it comes to helping to raise 
middle class incomes and let people in the under class work themselves 
into the middle class? What is our job, and what is the problem?
    You know, if anybody told me 2 years ago that we would be able, in 
the space of 2 years, to bring the deficit down over $600 billion and 
have a hand in creating almost 6 million new jobs, I would have been 
very happy to hear that. In 1994, we had the best year for economic 
growth in a decade and the first year in a long time when all 50 States, 
including California that's been through so much, had economic growth. 
What is the problem?
    The problem is, a whole lot of people have jobs but their incomes 
aren't going up. They don't feel secure at work. They're afraid they 
can't keep their health insurance, or they don't have it now. We had 8.5 
million people worried about their retirement until we passed a reform 
of the retirement guaranty system late last year. So in this global 
economy the good news is, there are more people in America becoming 
millionaires than ever before. That's good news. The good news is, there 
are more people with an education doing exciting things than ever 
before. The bad news is, if you don't have the skills you need, you can 
work harder and harder and harder for less and less and less, right?
    So when you have a good news-bad news story, you have two choices. 
You can tell a joke about it, but if you're President, that doesn't seem 
to be a particularly good option. [Laughter] The other choice you have 
is to try to make more good news and less bad news. And the only way to 
do that, I would argue to you, is to make sure we give all of our people 
access to the education and training they need to compete and win in 
this global economy, so when they work harder, they'll be rewarded for 
it and not punished for it. That is what we have to do.
    Now, I want you to focus with me just for a minute, therefore, on 
two big issues, what we ought to do in this year and what we should not 
do. I think we ought to give some tax relief to hard-working middle 
class people who haven't felt the benefit of the recovery. But the 
question is, what kind, and will we pay for it? I do not think we should 
increase the Federal deficit. That's been a big problem. We've gotten it 
down. We ought to keep bringing it down, not exploding it.
    Secondly, I think that the best tax relief is embodied in what I 
call the middle class bill of rights because it rewards work and family. 
It gives tax relief for people raising young children, and it gives tax 
relief for the cost of all education after high school, which I think is 
important. You think about it, you can deduct the cost of interest on 
your home if you have a home. But in the information age, if you don't 
have an education, you may never get to a home. So why shouldn't we let 
people deduct their education costs? It's a good investment. We also 
propose to let more people get an IRA, an individual retirement account, 
and withdraw from it tax-free for the cost of education. I think that's 
what we ought to be doing.
    And finally, I had a lot of questions earlier about unemployment; 
one gentleman talked about his father being unemployed. We have scores 
of different Federal training programs that you have to wonder, are you 
really qualified

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for or not? And what we propose to do is to create a ``GI bill'' for 
America's workers by taking 70 of these programs, putting them in one 
big pot and saying, ``If you're unemployed or if you're working for a 
really low wage and you're eligible for Federal help, instead of having 
to figure out how to enroll in one of these programs, qualify, we'll 
send you a voucher. Show up at this community college. We'll send them a 
check.'' That's the way it ought to be done.
    We're also taking the savings from cutting out all of these 
programs. In the Education Department alone, Secretary Riley has 
abolished 13 programs, reduced 38 others, and consolidated 70 more, in 
the Education Department. We took the savings and put it into more funds 
for Head Start, more funds for apprenticeship programs for people who 
don't go on to 4-year colleges.
    I met a young woman today, and a police officer who is working with 
her, who's in one of these programs that we now see people desperately 
trying to set up all over the country, training young people in high 
school, giving them work experience, letting them see what it's like, 
giving them a chance to look forward to a job in the workplace.
    You know, not everybody has to go to a 4-year college, but everybody 
needs to get out of high school and have access to at least 2 years of 
further education. And one way to do it is to abolish the artificial 
distinction between learning and work by bringing the workplace into the 
school, the education into the workplace, and doing it everywhere in 
America. So we've put some more money into that.
    The other thing we have sought to do is to make available college 
loans on better repayment terms and lower costs to more people, through 
the so-called direct loan program.
    This is an amazing thing. I want you all to--this is an amazing 
thing. When I became President, I discovered that we were spending about 
$3 billion a year in your money because of people defaulting on their 
college loans. I discovered we were spending a fortune because the 
college loan program was a guarantee program. So you'd go to a bank, and 
if you qualified, the bank would give you a note. And if you didn't pay 
it back, we'd give them the money. So they didn't have much incentive to 
see that you paid it back, because we were going to give them the money.
    And we discovered if we started loaning the money to people 
directly, these good things would happen if it could be properly 
managed: We discovered we could loan the money sometimes at lower 
interest rates and always at lower fees. We discovered that we could 
give people a lot of options about how they repaid it so that when you 
get out of school, if you take a job that doesn't pay much money and 
you've got a lot of loans, you could pay it off as a percentage of your 
income instead of having to pay an amount you couldn't afford to pay. We 
discovered we could cut the bureaucratic paperwork and hassle for the 
colleges by more than half. And we discovered, miracle of miracles, if 
we didn't have to pay a middleman and we started collecting on these 
student loans, we could actually lower the cost to the taxpayers.
    It almost doesn't make sense: lower costs to students, lower costs 
to taxpayers. But this plan has already saved in the budget about $5 
billion, and if we can send it to all colleges and universities in the 
country, it can lower the deficit by $12 billion and lower the cost of 
loans to every student in America with a student loan. That's one of the 
most important things we have done, and we need to do it.
    Now, here's the political problem that you need to be a part of. 
We're having a big debate up there: Everybody wants to cut the size of 
Government, everybody wants to reduce the deficit, and everybody has got 
a different idea for a tax cut. But some people in the new Congress 
believe that one of the ways they can reduce the deficit is by 
increasing the cost of student loans to people who don't have to pay 
interest on the loan while they're in school now. You know about the 
loan subsidy; a lot of you are probably eligible for that. That will add 
20 percent to the cost of student loans.
    I'm against it. That is not the way to cut the budget. That is not 
the way to pay for a tax cut, to increase the cost of going to college 
to people. We need more people going to college at lower cost, not fewer 
people going to college at higher cost. And I hope you will support 
that.
    The other idea--this is unbelievable to me--is we got this program 
working to lower the deficit, lower the cost of student loans, and there 
are some people in the Congress who want to limit the number of students 
in this country who can get these direct loans to 40

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percent of the colleges in America. Why? Because the people that are in 
the middle who get the money don't like losing it. I mean, it's not a 
bad deal: I loan you money; you don't pay me back; I get a check from 
the Government. But it didn't work very well.
    Secretary Riley, since he's been there as Secretary of Education, 
has cut the cost to the taxpayers of college loan defaults from $2.8 
billion a year to $1 billion a year. We're collecting the loans. We're 
doing it right, and we ought to keep going.
    So what I want to ask you to do is, without regard to your party, 
and maybe--especially if you have never voted before--I want to tell you 
something: You've got a big stake in this debate that's going on in 
Washington. And it is a good and healthy debate in some ways. We do need 
a less bureaucratic, more creative, more entrepreneurial, more flexible 
Government in Washington as we move into the 21st century. We do need 
more responsibility put down to the State and local levels. What's the 
best institution you know? The community college. Nobody from Washington 
is telling you what programs to have, what to do, who to sign up for--
nobody. You're doing this. It's a community-created institution. We do 
need to change the nature of the Federal Government. We do have to keep 
cutting Federal spending.
    But the key to our future is whether we educate everybody, so we 
don't need to cut investment in education. And we do need to do things, 
I will say again, that enhance security, empower people to make the most 
of their own lives, and expand opportunity. That is education, 
education, education. We should not turn back on it.
    Thank you very much. God bless you. We need your help. Please 
support it. Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 5:45 p.m. in the Snyder Gymnasium. In his 
remarks, he referred to Dr. Don Singer, president, San Bernardino Valley 
College; Mayor Tom Minor of San Bernardino; and Stuart Bundy, 
chancellor, San Bernardino Community College District.