Congressional Black Caucus Report on the Annual Legislative Conference

Floor Speech

CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS REPORT ON THE ANNUAL LEGISLATIVE CONFERENCE -- (House of Representatives - October 01, 2007)

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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I would like to thank the lady from Ohio for convening this Special Order so that we can talk about the great weekend that we had.

The gentleman from Florida, KENDRICK MEEK, did a tremendous job as chairman of the foundation. CAROLYN CHEEKS KILPATRICK from Michigan did a great job as chairman of the caucus; DONNA CHRISTENSEN from the Virgin Islands and G.K. BUTTERFIELD of North Carolina leading the legislative weekend.

We had dozens of important legislative seminars, foreign affairs, armed services and veterans, transportation, health care, education, housing, social services, financial issues, civil rights, voting rights. Every aspect of legislation that you can imagine, we had the nationally recognized experts. They were open to the public, the public had an opportunity for questions and answers and input. These were great workshops. I participated in four of them. The town hall forum entitled ``The Cradle to Prison Pipeline'' that talked about the unfortunate situation where so many of our young people start off and gradually, slowly but surely, get in trouble, drop out of school and end up in prison, and how with appropriate investments, strategic investments we can change that pipeline to a cradle-to-college pipeline, which is so much better for humanity, so much better for our communities, and that we could do that in a cost effective way.

I participated in a budget forum where we had budget experts talk about the fact that in 1993 we began eliminating the deficit. By the year 2000 we had gone into surplus. And, in fact, in 2001, we had a projected $5.5 trillion surplus over 10 years, and how, unfortunately, over the last few years we have converted that $5.5 trillion surplus to a $3 trillion deficit, a swing of $8.5 trillion. And how, with appropriate changes and some of the changes we're trying to make in Congress today, we can change that back to where we have the surplus and save Social Security, invest in health care, education and other important investments.

We had a great workshop on education with the education brain trust. We had one session on desegregation of schools and how, notwithstanding the Seattle and Louisville cases, we can still, with a little hard work, make sure those schools are desegregated.

We focused on the importance of early childhood education and the elementary and secondary education and Higher Education Act. We were able to make sure that we invested appropriately in education to make sure that we have a better community.

We also had another workshop on the judiciary, juvenile justice and the importance of making the choice between reducing crime and playing politics. We need to make sure that we reduce crime. You were very active in law school admissions, to make sure that law schools' admissions policy was not discriminatory.

Great workshops, judiciary, education, budget. The other important workshops. It was a great educational weekend.

Madam Chair, I would like to thank you for your hard work and leadership and also the ability to bring us together so that we could discuss the great work that was done over the weekend.

Thank you very much, and I yield back.

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