[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 51 (Monday, December 27, 1999)]
[Pages 2649-2651]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at Maury Elementary School

December 21, 1999

Emissions Standards for Cars and Sport Utility Vehicles

    Thank you very much. First of all, I would like to thank the 
principal of this school, Dale Talbert, for welcoming all of us here. 
And all the members of the Maury school community, thank you, and thank 
you for the nice sign there. And I want to thank the kids back here for 
being with me and with you today.
    I want to thank Gloria Hackman for the fine statement that she made 
and for 20 years of dedication as a nurse. As a son and the grandson of 
a nurse, I liked hearing her speak. And I also want to say a special 
word of appreciation for the work being done here.
    I want to thank Ed Zechman, the CEO of the Children's National 
Medical Center, for the wonderful work he does every day and, in 
particular, the last 7 years, the work that he and the First Lady have 
done together. And most of all, I want to thank Carol Browner, the EPA 
Assistant Administrator, Bob Perciasepe, and all the other people at EPA 
who worked so hard to make this day come about.
    If you knew how many times over the last 7 years, in how many 
different contexts, Carol Browner had said to me, ``You have got to do 
something to reduce incidents of asthma and other respiratory diseases 
among young children. We've got to keep doing it. It's the biggest 
problem out there most kids face.'' If you had any idea how many private 
encounters we had had on that that led to this happy day, you would be 
very grateful that someone like her is in public service in the United 
States, I'll tell you--thank you.
    Vice President Gore has given me a lot of good ideas, as he always 
reminds me when we're together--[laughter]--but the recommendation to 
appoint her is surely one of the best.
    Let me say another word about Gloria Hackman. She was here speaking 
not only for herself and out of her own experience but in a way for all 
the children and families of this school and schools like it all across 
America and, particularly, on behalf of the children and families who 
struggle each day with the challenges of asthma. I want to commend 
everyone here who is working in the American Lung Association's Open 
Airways program for all that you do to help our children breathe a 
little easier. As these children know only too well, a simple breath of 
fresh air is not something you can take for granted.
    You know, back at the beginning of our century, a little air 
pollution was considered a small price to pay for the bright economic 
future the industrial revolution was bringing us. In countless 
communities, in fact, black smoke billowing from the factory smokestack 
was a welcome symbol of newfound prosperity. It went on a long time. I 
remember when I first entered politics in Arkansas, there was a 
papermill you could smell 80 miles away. And people didn't like it 80 
miles away, but where it was really strong in the community they'd say 
it was the smell of money. And that's what people believed.
    But after a while, the air became so fouled in places like 
Pittsburgh that the streetlights had to be kept on during the day so 
people could see. Businessmen traveling to New York knew to bring along 
a second white shirt, even if they were staying just a day, because by 
the afternoon the first one would be coated with soot. Americans soon 
came to realize that dirty air was not just a nuisance, that it 
threatened their health and their lives.
    In the decade since that realization came to pass, through the 
actions of Government and the ingenuity of American industry, we have 
made tremendous strides. In the last 30 years, we have reduced air 
pollution in the United States by nearly a third, even as our economic 
output has more than doubled. Over the past 6 years alone, 43 million 
more Americans breathe air that meets Federal standards. Every day, 
thanks to these efforts, we are preventing as a society 600 premature 
deaths and 2,000 cases of asthma and bronchitis--every single day. And I 
want to say--I'm going to say this 15 times before I sit down--if you 
have noticed, it hasn't done any harm to the economy. I am very grateful 
for the opportunity that Vice President Gore and

[[Page 2650]]

I have had to work with Americans in industry and environmental groups 
to make our air even cleaner, from taking actions to reduce powerplant 
emissions and clean the air over our national parks to setting the 
toughest standards ever for soot and smog.
    Again, I say, as with all of our other efforts in the environment 
over the last three decades, America has proven wrong the skeptics who 
claim that the cost of fighting pollution would be ruinous. In fact, 
listen to this, since 1970 the direct benefits of the Clean Air Act--
lower health costs and fewer days work lost, for example--have 
outweighed the cost of the Clean Air Act by more than $1 trillion.
    Still, even as our city skylines emerge from the haze and even as 
millions of Americans are spared from debilitating disease, these hard-
won gains could soon be put at risk. Why? A big part of the reason is 
that we Americans love to drive, and we are driving more than ever. A 
new car rolling off the assembly line today is 95 percent less polluting 
than the typical new car was back in 1970. But there are more than twice 
as many cars on the road today, and the number of miles driven each year 
has grown even faster.
    What's more, fully half the new vehicles sold today are sport 
utility vehicles, minivans, and pickups, which produce 3 to 5 times as 
much pollution as the average passenger car. Driving now accounts for 30 
percent of the total air pollution in America. And unless we take 
additional measures, air quality in many parts of our country will 
continue to worsen in the coming decades.
    That is why today I am honored to announce the boldest steps in a 
generation to clean the air we breathe by improving the cars we drive. 
Working closely with industry, we will ensure both the freedom of 
American families to drive the vehicles of their choice and the right of 
American children to breathe clean, healthy air.
    First, we're setting tough new standards that, over the coming 
decade, will reduce tailpipe emissions as much as 95 percent. Second, 
for the first time, we are applying the same stringent standard to cars 
and to sport utility vehicles, including the largest models. And third, 
because cleaner fuels also are critical to achieving cleaner air, we're 
cutting the sulfur content of gasoline by up to 90 percent.
    These measures will assure every American cleaner air well into the 
21st century. It will prevent thousands of premature deaths and protect 
millions of our children from respiratory disease. It will be the most 
dramatic improvement in air quality since the catalytic converter was 
first introduced a quarter century ago. And manufacturers will be able 
to meet these new standards while still offering the kinds of models 
popular with consumers today.
    I want to say a special word of appreciation for all those that 
worked with EPA in developing this new strategy. I thank the auto and 
the oil industries, the States, the environmental communities, the 
leading public health experts. The issues were not always easy, to put 
it mildly. But working together we have, I am convinced, come to 
solutions that are best for our Nation's health and for our Nation's 
economy. We will continue to work together also--and this is very 
important--to create cleaner diesel fuel, our next big challenge in this 
area. And I will do all I can to expand our efforts with the auto 
industry, which have already borne a lot of fruit, in the same spirit of 
collaboration to provide our consumers with vehicles that are not just 
less polluting but also far more fuel efficient. Yes, you can clap for 
that. [Applause] It won't be long until you'll be amazed what will be 
available on the market on that score.
    It seems impossible to believe, but in just 10 days, we will close 
out a century of remarkable progress on a high note, and we will begin a 
new millennium. We will have new opportunities and new challenges. We--
all of us, I think--wonder what the future holds for our children. As we 
unravel the mysteries of the human gene and search the outer reaches of 
black holes in the universe, there's no telling what's just around the 
turn in the new century. We are very fortunate that we end the century 
and begin the millennium with, really, an unprecedented level of 
economic prosperity and social progress and national self-confidence, 
with the absence of overwhelming internal crisis or external threat. 
This combination of conditions has not existed before, at least in my 
lifetime.

[[Page 2651]]

    But I would argue to all of you that because of the good times, we 
have a peculiar responsibility to think about the big long-term issues 
that will frame the lives that we dream for our children. And we have an 
opportunity to shape the future in a way that perhaps no generation 
before us has ever had. One of the things that we ought to do first is 
to make sure as many children as possible have a full future.
    You know, any of us who have ever been in a hospital delivery room 
know that when a baby comes into the world, the first thing that's done 
is to make sure the infant can draw its first breath. As we embark on a 
new millennium, among all of our other responsibilities, surely it is 
our sacred obligation to ensure that each and every child, from the 
first breath on, will be drawing the cleanest, purest, healthiest air we 
can provide. Today's a big step in the right direction, and I thank all 
of you who have been involved in it.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 12:10 p.m. in the multipurpose room. In his 
remarks, he referred to Gloria Hackman, nurse, Maury Elementary School.