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LDA NEWS FROM WASHINGTON
March, 2006
DEFICIT REDUCTION ACT (P.L.109-171)
At the start of the second session of the 109th Congress, the House, by a vote of 216-214, passed the Omnibus Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (S 1932) that the Senate had amended and passed before the Winter Break. The bill, which the President signed into law, makes drastic cuts in entitlement programs, including Medicare and Medicaid, student loans, child support services and other safety nets. Also included in the new law are
- the Family Opportunity Act which give access to Medicaid to low -and middle-income families who cannot obtain private health insurance for their child with a significant disability;
- the reauthorization of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) through 2010.
TANF (TEMPORARY ASSSITANCE FOR NEEDY FAMILIES)
The new law reduces some flexibility states now have in implementing their programs. On average, with very little planning time and few resources, states will have to increase the number of families participating in work activities. The small increase in child care funding ($200 million a year) is inadequate to cover the increased work demanded of parents.
OTHER LEGISLATION
Congress has yet to act on the reauthorizations of the Workforce Investment Act, the Higher Education Act, and Head Start. There is not much time for Congressional action. Although committees and subcommittees will still hold hearings, do oversight, and mark up bills, the House schedule calls for only 97 days on the floor in 2006. "The strategy of the majority leadership is getting bills passed, keeping party discipline, and satisfying interest groups means folding legislation into a small number of huge omnibus bills, bringing them up with little notice and less debate, structuring the votes around restrictive rules that limit or forbid amendments, and demanding party fealty on votes that take place by labeling them procedural." (Norman Ornstein, "Part Time Congress", Washington Post March 7, 2006.)
PRESIDENT'S PROPOSED BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2007
On February 6, shortly after the State of the Union Address, the President submitted to Congress his proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2007. As expected, domestic programs are cut to pay for homeland security and tax cuts. In the past, Congress has not accepted all of his proposals. Programs of interest to LDA include:
- Education, Funding for Title I of NCLB is not increased. While there is a slight increase in funding for IDEA Part B, the request (17%) is less than that appropriated in 2005 (18.6%) and 2006 (17.8%) As in last year's proposal, Part C of IDEA and Parent Information Centers are level funded. Also, 42 programs -- including parent-resource centers, vocational education, school guidance programs and drug-free schools-.are eliminated. Funding has been increased to improve math and sciences education in K-12; $100 billion is allocated to America's Opportunity Scholarships, which offer vouchers to attend private schools and expanded tutoring for students who attend poor-performing public schools; and $1.475 billion is allocated for a new program to help at-risk high school students struggling to reach grade level in reading and math.
- Rehabilitative Services Grants to state rehabilitation agencies are slightly decreased. Funding for the Client Assistance Program and the National Council on Disability is decreased. Projects with industry and supported employment are eliminated.
- Labor Funding for the Office of Disability Employment Policy is cut in half and the newly formed demonstration programs eliminated.
- Health and Human Services The greatest shock came from the proposal to eliminate funding and halt the spending of existing monies for the National Longitudinal Study of American Children. The National Children's Study was authorized by the Children's Health Act of 2000 to develop and implement a longitudinal study to follow 100,000 children from preconception to age 21, examining the impacts and influences of many environmental and genetic facts on their health and development. The Study hopes to determine the root causes of many childhood and adult diseases, such as birth defects, injuries, asthma, obesity, diabetes, and behavioral, learning, and mental health disorders. Scientists and community members across the country have been planning how to implement the study since.2000. In 2005, the Study designated the first Vanguard (pilot) centers in seven sites throughout the United States and created a coordinating center to implement the study. In 2006, the Study plans to finalize the protocol in order to commence recruitment of the first participants by the end of 2007. Under the President's proposal all of this activity would end.
FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND
GROWTH MODEL FOR ACCOUNTABILITY On November 18, Education Secretary Margaret Spellings announced that 10 states will be allowed to use a growth-based accountability model which would measure a school's adequate yearly progress by tracking the progress of individual students over time rather than the current system of showing the progress of successive grades of students. Ms. Spellings said the department would not compromise on certain "core principles" of the law, including the requirements that all students reach proficiency in reading and math by 2014, and that schools break down student performance by race, ethnicity, income, disability and gender. On February 21, she announced that fourteen states -Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah have applied for the pilot in this year. Six more — Maryland, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and South Dakota — have asked to apply changes next year.
"THE INDIVIDUALS WITH DISABILITIES EDUCATION ACT: INTERACTIONS WITH SELECTED PROVISIONS OF NCLB". On December 22, The Congressional Research Services issued and updated this report on. It can be downloaded from www.cec.sped.org/pp/pdfs/CRS_NCLB_IDEA_2percent_reg_update.pdf
"STATES TEST LIMITS OF FEDERAL AYP FLEXIBILITY" This study by the Center for Education Policy (www.cep-dc.org) found that the U.S. Department of Education has approved a variety of changes in how states calculate Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), most of which will result in fewer schools labeled as needing improvement. "But the new flexibility has also confounded many educators, policymakers, and the public," the Center report says, "who are finding it difficult to tell whether student achievement is improving based on the number of schools making AYP from year to year." Furthermore, the AYP decisions depend on increasingly complex formulas and statistical methods that vary across all 50 states.
LDA News from Washington is a periodic publication of The Learning Disabilities Association of America, Inc. containing news of interest to the volunteer and administrative leadership of National LDA and its State and Local Affiliates. Written by LDA's Washington Representative, Justine Maloney; Kathy Lawson, Editor. LDA members wishing to be added to the email list may contact Kathy Lawson, at klawson@ldaamerica.org.
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