Sen. Harkin: Hearing to Review FY2010 Budget Request for the Dept. Of Education

June 3, 2009 -- “Good morning. The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education will now come to order.

“I want to start by welcoming Secretary Duncan. I have met Mr. Duncan a few times now, and I chaired his confirmation hearing on the HELP Committee, but this is his first appearance before this subcommittee. So today, Mr. Secretary, we get to talk about money.

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“Every year when Congress considers the President’s budget, you hear people say it’s a critical moment in the Nation’s history. In hindsight, some of those moments were probably more important than others. But I would submit that when it comes to education, this is truly one of them.

“The Recovery Act will add almost $100 billion to the Nation’s education system – the largest one-time investment of education funds in our history. That’s on top of more than $60 billion in the regular Fiscal Year 2009 appropriations bill.

“There’s never been this much Federal funding in the Nation’s schools before, so we in Congress and the Education Department have a special responsibility to make sure the money is used wisely. Funding of this scale brings enormous opportunities, both to help pull our economy out of the recession and to encourage new innovations in the way we educate our students. But if we’re not careful, the money can also be squandered. Therefore, we’ll spend part of today’s hearing talking about the implementation of the Recovery Act so far, and what the Department plans to do with the rest of the money in the months ahead.

“We will also consider the President’s request for the Fiscal Year 2010 budget. There is much to admire in his proposal. I am especially pleased by his plan to end entitlements for financial institutions that process Federal student loans, and switch to direct lending instead. This plan will save billions of dollars a year that can be reinvested to help poor and middle-income students get a college education.

“The President’s budget also puts real money behind the effort to improve our Nation’s high schools, some of which are really nothing more than dropout factories. And at the other end of the education spectrum, the budget request makes a strong investment in early learning.

“One area that is not addressed in the President’s budget is school repair. The last-minute decision to remove funding designated for that purpose in the Recovery Act was, in my opinion, an unfortunate mistake. This money would have created jobs, met a pressing educational need, and avoided long, out-year funding commitments.

“But even though the funding was pulled from the Recovery Act, the need for better school facilities grows with each passing day. I recently introduced the School Building Fairness Act of 2009, and I intend to include money for this purpose in the regular fiscal year 2010 appropriations bill.

“I look forward to hearing Secretary Duncan’s testimony about the President’s budget, but first I yield to Senator Cochran for an opening statement.”

Source: Senator Tom Harkin