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This day in New Orleans, we were fighting on two fronts.
We were trying to hold together a delicate confederation of optimism and progress in our
first term, while fighting budget cuts on the national level. We were fighting for the
progress we were making in New Orleans which would have been decimated by federal cuts. In
the face of the so-called Contract with America, everything we worked for here and
nationally could have been lost. So Democratic mayors across the nation appealed to their
communities, where the cuts would be felt the most. It was grass-roots fighting. And
we had to show the president it was important not to capitulate on this issue. -Mayor Marc H. Morial National Budget Awareness
Day In New Orleans Thank everyone for coming this morning, today is a serious day. I want to borrow an analogy the president used when he met with us yesterday. If you look at the traditional fighting on the budget, it was always in big cities, big cities with a host of disadvantaged people with real needs, who stepped up to fight against budget cuts. This time yesterday we had not only mayors of large cities but mayors of small cities. There was a gentleman there, Doug Bolvin from upper Michigan, a predominantly rural county. There were county execs there from Hennison County in Minnesota (which is Minneapolis and its suburbs), not necessarily a poor community. There was a representative there from Hudson County in New Jersey, where Jersey City is located. The point is these cuts are going to affect people. They are going to affect people in big cities, they are going to affect people in small cities and they are going to affect people in suburban communities. So borrowing an analogy from the president, "This is back to school time, and what we must do is educate some people." We could go to Washington and spend our time knocking on doors, traipsing the halls of Congress trying to get a hearing. But we have decided to take this fight to the people of the nation, to go back into the community and into the grass roots. This event is taking place today in 100 communities. Our goal is to provide you with real facts about these budget cuts, not a lot of rhetoric about contracts and balanced budgets. We are all for balanced budgets. "We know, don't we, Councilman Singleton and Dr. Holmes, about balancing budgets?" We cannot deficit spend when it comes to the city, when it comes to the school district, when it comes to the state Legislature. We cannot deficit spend, so we know about balanced budgets, but we also know about balanced minds. We also know about balanced stomachs. We also know about balanced families, balanced children and balanced communities. The president said we had a challenge to educate the American people about the impact of these budget cuts. Up until now there has not been any information. Do you know how this is going to affect this community? Do those of you working with the homeless or with children really know how this is going to affect you? Do you know what this will mean to our school districts? Have you heard what this will mean to public housing in this community? The answer, I know, is "No" because this budget in Washington was part of a back room political deal, a proverbial smoke-filled deal. Some of these votes took place at one o'clock and two o'clock in the morning when the television cameras were gone, when the lobbyists went home, when only the politicians and their staffs were in the room. We are here to shed some light on this blight. As one of my colleagues said yesterday, this represents a thousand points of blight, a thousand ways this will undermine the recovery are making in this community. I want to go over this because we are asking you to take this information and make it part of your conversation. We have a tough job. We have to change the United States Senate. We have to create some support out there because if this does not go down right, we said to the president to use his veto pen, to stand up. "You have got to stand up and put your veto pen on this bill." We do not want to see compromise for the sake of compromise. We also do not want to see a political deal done. We want a budget that is fair. We want a budget that is balanced. We want a budget that protects people and puts people first. In our city a lot of things that are close to us are going to be affected. Community policing. We have had success with community policing. We do not want to just keep community policing, we want to expand community policing. It is saving lives. If you pointed to any other program in this nation that reduced the murder rate in a handful of neighborhoods by over 50 percent, by any budget analysis and fancy language, it would be a program you ought to keep. Yet in this proposed budget, community policing is eliminated. Last summer, we had 3,000 young people working in this community. They were working in offices, they were working on the streets, they were doing environmental work. They were getting a taste of the American free enterprise system. They were learning how to go to work and how to collect a check. They were learning how to grow up with value. Yet you have rhetoric on the right which says these are make work programs. Some of these children do not come from families where daddy owns the business and can give them a job during the summer. Some of these children do not come from families where mama can say, "here, take $100.00 a week as a summer allowance." These children come from families where at 14 and 15 they have to learn how to be on their own. This summer jobs program gives young people a chance to mainstream themselves and gives young people an opportunity to see the free enterprise system. Yet this Congress does not want to just cut it, they want to eliminate it. They want to say "No" to summer jobs, but they want to say "Yes" to a seven billion-dollar increase in the defense budget. The whole summer job program does not even cost one billion dollars. Mass transit. How many of you ride the transit system, or how many of you have employees who ride the bus system? How many of you have children who ride the bus system? How many of you own businesses that depend on your customers to get there on the bus? How many of you? This Congress, this Congress wants to cut operating subsidies. There is not a transit system in the entire world that operates at a profit. Why doesn't it operate at a profit? It is not supposed to operate at a profit, because it benefits business. It is a subsidy. It helps people get to work. It helps people get to school. It helps the customers on Canal Street get there so they can spend money. This Congress wants to cut the operating subsidy for mass transit. What is it going to mean? It is going to mean we will be forced to raise bus fares or cut services. We are going to be forced to do some hard reductions in this community, and I am here because we want to tell it like it is. I do not want anyone, if this budget goes down, to say we did not know and we were not afforded an opportunity to battle for these things that are important. We pay most of the money for the transit system in this community, but those federal subsidies are important. The federal government built the Metro System in Washington D.C., built the Marta System in Atlanta, helped build every public transit system in the United States. Our bus system here should not be subjected to cuts while this Congress wants to add seven billion dollars to the defense budget for Star Wars and all kinds of weapon systems we do not need. We have a problem at Agriculture Street. We have an expensive problem at Agriculture Street, an old dump, which is potentially an environmental hazard. There is litigation underway because of decisions made long ago to dump there. There is a price tag to clean it up, a big price tag. We need the federal government to partner with us to do the environmentally responsible thing. Yet this Congress wants to cut the Superfund Program by 30 percent, by 30 percent, by 30 percent, while at the same time giving a seven billion-dollar increase to the defense budget, while at the same time saying that price supports, farm supports and farm subsidies are off limits. Do not touch them, says John Kasige. Why? You know I have farmers in my district. I have farmers in my district. But we have transit riders in this district. We have children who want summer jobs in this district. We have citizens who want to be safe and want to be protected, and they are willing to pay their fair share. They just want a partnership with the federal government to do it. Pres Kabacoff is going to speak in a little bit. We asked him to come because of the redevelopment of the old D.H. Holmes site on Canal Street. It was able to take place because of a 108 loan. Now a 108 loan is not even a direct appropriation, it is just a guarantee program. It does not cost the federal government anything really. They have a reserve. They put a little money on the side. It does not cost a lot. We want to build Jazzland, and we want to provide them with the assistance of a 108 loan because the people of this city want a family theme park. It is bridge financing. We do not provide all of the financing. It is just a portion of the financing. Yet this Congress wants to take a program that created 70,000 jobs last year and reduce it by 50 percent, reduce it by 50 percent. This is a program that benefits business. This is a program that creates jobs. This is a program which is not even a direct appropriation. This is a program that gives some protection to financial institutions and banks. This is a program that allows for public/private partnership to take place, yet this Congress wants to reduce it. How many of you had agencies that are financed or funded in part by the Community Development Block Grant Program? How many of you run departments or agencies that have gotten CDBG funding for certain special projects? This Congress wants to reduce that program by 50 percent. Now you hear a lot of talk about block grants. This is a block grant program. This is one that has been there for 20 years. This is one that works. This has been examined by Harvard and examined by MIT and examined by the Congressional Budget Office and the General Accounting Office; and it works. Yet this Congress wants to reduce this program by 50 percent. We have a homelessness problem in this city. We have a big homelessness problem in this community and there are no easy simplistic solutions. Those who say let's arrest them, every time we put somebody back into jail it costs us $19 a day. Sheriff Foti gets that money every time he arrests them. There is no simple solution. Yet homeless assistance programs under this budget would be cut by 40 - 40 - 40 percent. Four out of every ten dollars that goes to homelessness would be reduced. Now I believe in a strong military and a strong defense, but weapons systems that did not work when Ronnie was president are not going to work while Billy is president. I also believe we have to challenge national security and domestic tranquility within our borders. It is called poverty. It is called disease. It is called homelessness. And it is called joblessness. It is called young people who want hope and opportunity, who do not want a hand-out, but a hand up. It is called young people in schools who want a good education. They want to be educated in a safe air-conditioned environment. There are things we must have in this community. All of you here are leaders in your own right, and this is the greatest challenge that we face. These cuts are deeper than even the days of Ronald Reagan, when we were told that the budget would be balanced. We were told that the wealthy would get a tax cut, and it would trickle on down to the bottom. The result was that the deficit quadrupled. The result was that for the first time since 1945, the gap between the wealthiest Americans and the poorest Americans got larger. The result was that in many parts of this country you had a recession, you had a banking crisis, you had a crisis among financial institutions and you had a real estate crisis. That was the result. We need to have long memories as we examine this. We need to realize that this is the same old grits fried over. We need to start calling our United States Senators. John Breaux and Bennet Johnston need to get a whole lot of calls from us. Congressman Bob Livingston needs to get a whole lot of calls from us. He is chairman of an influential committee that will hear the bill. We are here, the mayors and the county execs. We support a balanced budget. And we understand the budget must be re-engineered and re-tooled. We accept some cuts, but we are saying the people in our cities and counties should not bear the brunt of those cuts. A political agenda, not economic agenda is at play here. Part of these cuts are going to finance a tax cut for the wealthiest Americans. You know what Americans who make less than $25,000 a year are going to face with this budget? A tax increase. A tax increase. Why? Because the earned income tax credit, which benefits people who make under $25,000 a year, will be reduced. So you have a tax increase for working Americans; a cut in direct subsidies and direct programs that benefit working Americans and poor Americans; a huge tax cut for the wealthiest Americans. What you have is Robin Hood working in reverse. Let's take from the poor and the working and redistribute the wealth. There is nothing like the facts, nothing like shedding light. I am tired, and I think you are tired, of a lot of rhetoric about balanced budgets with no facts. I think you are tired, and I am tired, of not knowing the real impact of these cuts. We can change this by affecting the course of the United States Senate. There are Democrats and Republicans, and I stress Democrats and Republicans, in the United States Senate who want a balanced budget. But they want a balanced budget that has balance to it. They want to re-engineer and re-invent, but they also do not want the cities and counties to take the brunt of these cuts. So today, as leaders we need to be educated. Today, as leaders we need to be armed with facts. Today, we need to go back and begin talking to our friends. Jefferson Parish is going to be affected. They get CDBG funds. Jefferson Parish gets summer jobs and a subsidy for its transit system. Let's not make the mistake that this is just New Orleans. This is going to affect the whole region. It is going to affect government and school districts. A whole host of people are going to be burdened by what we face. I want to ask you to take this sheet, xerox it and pass it out. Pass it out to members of your organizations, pass it out to members of your congregations. This is a fact sheet on how we believe these cuts are going to impact New Orleans. I also want you to know we do not stand before Congress with a tin cup. After all, we are the taxpayers. We are sending the money to Washington. We just want our fair share back. Even if I am not homeless, homelessness affects me. Even if I don't happen to live in a neighborhood with a drug dealer on the corner, it affects me. Even if I might not have a child or a grandchild in the public school system, the failure of the public school system affects me. If I am not going to get a direct job from a new development funded by the 108 loan program, it is going to affect me, because the more jobs the less crime. The more jobs the less young people who are locked out and left out. If I do not have a child who participates in the summer jobs program, its elimination will affect me. Because it just means there are going to be more youngsters out there on the corner, on the streets, with nothing positive to do. Everybody has to pay his fair share. We have to get the message out that this is one community, and this is one nation, and we are tired of the division. We are tired of the us against them, we are tired of all that old rhetoric. We want some fairness in this fight. We want to balance this budget, but everybody has to pay her fair share. There should be no sacred cows, and there should be no cows that are going to be completely gored. Right now we are the cow and our head is on the chopping block. Some people might say just reprioritize. Hocus pocus dominocus. If it ain't there, it ain't there. Two and two do not equal seven; never did. We need to say those kinds of things in this community. Let's get with it, let's fight for a fair federal budget. New Orleans, we have a lot of work ahead of us. Let's get to it. Thank you. |
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