Text 4158, 308 rader
Skriven 2007-03-01 23:31:08 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (070301d) for Thu, 2007 Mar 1
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President Bush Visits Samuel J. Green Charter School
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For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary March 1, 2007

President Bush Visits Samuel J. Green Charter School New Orleans, Louisiana

˙˙Presidential Remarks
˙˙Audio

˙˙˙˙˙ In Focus: Hurricane Katrina

3:44 P.M. CST

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. (Applause.) Thank you all. Please be seated.
Dr. Tony, thank you very much for your kind introduction. God, I love the
smile on his face. (Laughter.)

Think about this: You can play recess outside in a garden. Those are the
two things I was good at at school -- (laughter)

-- eating and playing. (Laughter.)

But I really appreciate you inviting me over. Somebody said, well, why did
you come to Samuel J. Green Charter School in New Orleans, Louisiana, when
there are other places to go? Well, the answer is, there's nothing better
than being in the middle of a bright spot, a place that just shines with
optimism, in a part of the world that has gone through some really
difficult times. And so I'm here to herald success -- success for today,
and equally important, success for the future of this important city.

And I thank you all for giving me a chance to come. There's nothing more
illustrative of the issues that this community faces than to think that
that blue line represented water and destruction. And yet, we're now dry,
we're on dry land, recovering. And so I've come back to New Orleans,
Louisiana, to remind people that the federal government still knows you
exist, still knows you have issues, and wants to work with your leadership
to address those issues. (Applause.)

I know the Picard family is here. Thank you for coming. Gaylen was the wife
of Cecil, who helped guide Louisiana's schools through the worst of the
storms. He has passed away. I'm honored to be in your presence. I know that
you miss your good man, as does the people of New Orleans. He was a person
that served your community with a lot of class. And I know he would be
proud of places like Green, that are setting high standards, strong centers
of excellence, making sure every single child gets an education. Thanks for
being here today. It means a lot. (Applause.)

Sorry Laura is not here. She and I, by the way, spent some of our youth
here in New Orleans. I really don't want to go into all the details of --
(laughter) -- but we know something about the town. And it's a great place.
And she loves New Orleans, as do I, and we've got a lot of friends here.

I want to thank Robin Jarvis, the superintendent of the Recovery School
District, for joining us. I appreciate very much -- (applause.) I want to
thank some of the elected officials who have joined us here at the school
with whom I had lunch earlier, starting with your Mayor. It's good to see
you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate your time. A pleasure to be here. (Applause.)

The Mayor and I have gotten to know each other -- (laughter) -- in a
positive way. (Laughter.) In a positive way. It's interesting, you know,
having two strong-willed people who got thrown into a deal we didn't ask
for. I'll tell you an interesting story about the Mayor. The first time I
ever met him, we came in Air Force One right after the storm hit -- a
couple of days after, I think it was. The Mayor was a little irritable.
(Laughter.) He hadn't had a shower. (Laughter.) So I came off the plane. I
knew I was dealing with a good man when I looked in his eyes and he was
able to maintain a certain sense of humor in the midst of all the trauma.
And so I sent him up the stairs for him to take a shower on Air Force One.
(Laughter.)

Everybody -- yes, I was about to say -- (laughter) -- the President of the
New Orleans City Council, Oliver Thomas, thanked me then and he thanks me
now. Good to see you, Big O. (Applause.) I have spent enough time down here
where I call him, "Big O." (Laughter.) He calls me, "Little G." (Laughter.)

I'm proud to be with your Lieutenant Governor. Mitch, thanks for coming,
appreciate you being here. (Applause.) I flew down today from Washington --
am I flying back with you all, too? Yes. Flew down today with the Senator,
David Vitter, and Congressman Bill Jefferson. Andrea, good to see you.
Thanks for coming. (Applause.) I think they want a ride back.

We had lunch today with a lot of the parish presidents -- and Ray and
Oliver and Mitch and David and Jeff -- talking about the issues. Oh, by the
way, my friend, Don Powell -- he's from Texas, I'm from Texas, and --
(applause.) He made the mistake of answering the phone call when I called
him. I said, I need somebody to come down here to help the good folks break
through the logjams to make sure that that which we intend to do gets done.
And the Czar -- we call him "Czar," Don Powell -- and I can't thank my
buddy enough for taking on a tough job. If you were to sit at the table
with us, you'd see how tough it is -- "So-and-so has the responsibility
here," "No, you've got the responsibility" -- it's a lot of this. And our
job is to make it this, straightforward. That's what we're here to do.

You know, I came down here and spoke and I said the federal government will
be involved. And I said we're going to put money on the table to help
follow that through. And I believe we have, with $110 billion. That's not
to say there may be more money needed for the Gulf Coast, but $110 billion
is a lot. And now the question is, are we going to be able to spend it
wisely? Can we get it done? Can we get it to the people that need help?

Just so you know, of the $110 billion, $86 billion of that has been
obligated -- in other words, it's out the door. But only $53 billion has
been spent. And so part of the day today we talked about if the money is
out the door in Washington, where is it and how come it hasn't been out
farther? And that's one of the things that we're going to continue to work
on, to make sure that obligated money ends up in somebody's pocket, so it
helps.

I know housing is a big issue here. The Mayor talks about it, Oliver talks
about it a lot, the Lieutenant Governor is concerned about it. You know, I
made a conscious decision when we began the rebuilding effort to say I want
the local folks running the programs. I felt you would get a better
response and a response more tailored to the needs of the local citizens if
the local folks were in charge. That was the case in Mississippi and in
Louisiana. And I felt like the housing program that was devised by the
folks in both Mississippi and Louisiana was a really interesting solution,
a creative way of saying to people, we're going to help you rebuild your
homes so that people will actually come back to New Orleans, and those who
are here will have money to rebuild their homes and those who are outside
the state will receive incentives to come back.

And one of the issues we have to work on is to make sure that the money
that has been sent from Washington to fund the Road to Recovery program,
the home program, actually gets spent. I don't know if you know this or
not, but there is $6.2 billion that has been sent down; $50 million has
been spent. And so we have an obligation, all of us involved with this
process, to work to make sure that people begin getting that money so they
can get back to living their lives. (Applause.)

One of the issues that we talked -- spent a lot of time about is
infrastructure. And Louisiana has had -- now had $4.6 billion sent from the
federal government. And actually, it's your money, so we're sending your
money back to you -- about $4.6 billion and about $2.5 billion has not yet
been spent. I guess what I'm telling you is, is that, first of all, there
is money in the pipeline that I hope will help improve lives. And if it is
stuck because of unnecessary bureaucracies, our responsibility at the
federal, state and local level is to unstick it, is to make sure that it
keeps moving. (Applause.)

The reason I herald this, and the reason I want to come to a school like
this, it's important for the taxpayers from around the country who paid the
bill to understand where we are in the process and to realize there's some
really positive things taking place with the money that I believe the
country has been generous about. In other words, when you go to Congress
and say, we need $110 billion to help the people in the Gulf Coast,
somebody has got to pay. That's the taxpayer. And the taxpayers come from
more places than just Louisiana and Mississippi. It is the collective
effort of the country as a whole. And I'm proud of the generosity of our
citizens, and I want them to know that while it is still difficult work
here, progress has been made. And there's more to be done.

The economic recovery here -- I was talking to the Mayor about Mardi Gras,
a subject I know a little bit about -- I remember most of them. (Laughter.)
He said it was up to about 80-something percent capacity. In other words,
it's not 100 percent, it's not as good as people would like it, but things
are beginning to happen.

One of the things that you've got to continue to work on, and we want to
help you at the local level, is in the criminal justice matters. It's
important for the society to say loud and clear, there are consequences for
crime. And there's got to be a -- (applause) -- there can't be any doubt in
somebody's mind that this is a consequential society if you want to be able
to walk your streets safely.

And so I know the Attorney General was down here the other day. He briefed
me personally on working with the local folks on -- for the federal
government helping, what really is a local responsibility. And yet, we want
to help. We want to make sure your criminal justice system does it's job so
that citizens feel safe and tourists feel safe to come. It's a big
responsibility we have. To the extent that we can help, we will.

One of the things that the Mayor and I have talked about is extending tax
relief to businesses doing jobs here in the New Orleans area. Why? Because
we want the entrepreneurial spirit to remain strong in this part of the
world. And one way to encourage strong entrepreneurship is to say, there's
a tax benefit for investing in this part of the country. There's certain
things you can look at to determine how well an economy is doing.

Take a look at your port. It's coming back. It's strong. Commerce is
beginning. And this is -- it doesn't seem like much to you all since you're
so close to it, but for a fellow who was here and remembers the port being
completely shut down, it's pretty good progress.

Now, there's more to be done, I fully understand that. The Senator spent a
little time up there on Air Force One, right up there in the presidential
cabin, talking about levees, making sure that the case is continually made
about strengthening these levees. I hear him. I hear him. We have said,
we're going to bring the levees up to -- stronger than ever. We're making
progress there. I told the Senator I understand there's still more work to
be done. And I want to work with Congress to the best we can to get money
to continue meeting the obligations we set.

I'm real proud of another thing that's happened as a result of Democrats
and Republicans working together -- it actually happens sometime in
Washington, D.C. -- and that is that bill I signed that will enable more
federal revenues to come down here to restore the wetlands. (Applause.) I'm
a strong proponent of the restoration of the wetlands, for a lot of
reasons. There's a practical reason, though, when it comes to hurricanes:
The stronger the wetlands, the more likely the damage of the hurricane
[sic].

And so we've been working together on behalf of the city. I do want to
spend a little time on education. I like a system that is willing to
challenge the status quo when the status quo is failing. And one of the
reasons I've come to this school is that it represents a group of citizens,
including your principal and your parents and the teachers and the
citizens, who said, we're tired of mediocrity in the school system. It is
not acceptable to have children trapped in schools that will not teach and
will not change. It is not acceptable to the great city of New Orleans,
Louisiana, to have a failing school system.

And so the storm came and it did terrible devastation, but it gave a great
chance for renewal. And one of the areas where renewal is most evident is
in the school system of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the charter system like
right here at Green, where people said -- (applause.)

There are now 31 charter schools in this city, as I understand it. That's
up from eight. Charter schools, to me, say innovation, individuality. You
know, the No Child Left Behind Act -- and I am a very strong supporter of
it; I look forward to the Congress reauthorizing the bill -- believes in
setting high standards, local control of schools, and accountability. And
the reason accountability is important is, in order to solve problems you
have to measure the problem, you have to know what the problem is. You
can't guess, particularly when it comes to the life of a child. You can't
guess as to whether or not a child can read or write and add and subtract.
You must measure to know.

And so we said, in return for federal money, we expect local districts and
states to measure, to have tests. The principal, the good Doc asked me to
go into the 4th grade class and say to the kids, "Good luck on the test
tomorrow." That was music to my ears, because you don't know whether or not
a child is reading unless you test.

And the interesting thing about No Child Left Behind which is vital is that
when we find a child falling behind, there is extra federal money for that
child to get up to speed early, before it's too late. It's a good piece of
legislation, and it fits in with the philosophy of this charter school.

If you're interested in changing a school system that hasn't worked, please
insist upon a couple of things: high standards, for starters. If you demand
low standards, you're going to get bad results -- I call it the soft
bigotry of low expectations. If you want to have a school system that
works, insist upon measuring so that a parent will know whether or not the
curriculum is meeting their child's needs. These parents, by the way, are
satisfied parents. I don't expect the principal to have brought unsatisfied
parents, but nevertheless -- (applause.)

If you're interested in a school system that works, when you find
excellence, herald it. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to lend my
voice to herald this school. By the way, a good school is one that
generally has an educational entrepreneur as its head; somebody who is
flexible -- rigid enough on the standards, but flexible enough to meet the
standards; somebody willing to say, well, we tried this curriculum and it
hasn't worked, let's make sure that we focus on the children, not on the
process and get a curriculum that does work.

One of the things -- and by the way, New Orleans is blessed not only with a
strong public school system now that you've got charters in it, but you've
got some great parochial schools, too. And these schools, like this school,
were quick to start up after the storm. They knew their mission and they
knew their charge.

I am very conscious that this community is going to require more schools.
And the government has a role to play. We're spending quite a bit of money,
federal money to help you rebuild the schools. And Margaret Spellings -- is
the Secretary of Education -- I know has been down here, and I know she
understands the responsibility we share. As a matter of fact, there's been
about $450 million allocated for the New Orleans school system. I would
strongly -- and by the way, some of that money is flexible in use. And what
I would strongly urge you to do is to use some of the unspent money to
recruit and attract teachers, because in order to make sure that the school
system is full -- you've got 40 teachers -- you need more? Yes. He needs
more.

The housing issue, obviously, is important. But it's also important to be
able to use some of this money available to find educational pioneers that
want to come down and lend their expertise to help rebuild a school system.
There's no doubt in my mind that the school system that you're going to
rebuild is going to be a great school system, because you've given it such
a great start. Charter schools work. It makes a lot of sense.

And so I've come to Green to say, thanks to -- thanks to the citizens of
New Orleans who pay attention to the quality of education; thanks to the
parents of this school who set an example by being involved; and thanks to
the leadership. Doc, you're running a good show here. I'm proud of your
job. (Applause.)

Thanks for letting me come by. I'm honored to be back down here. I'm
reminded of the New Orleans Saints football team, that -- (applause) --
here's a team that a lot of people didn't give much hope for, did they,
when the season started. And it -- it rose. It became a national story. It
was a factor in the championship. The same thing is going to happen to the
city. You got work to do. You got work to do. I'm going to keep coming down
so long as I'm the President. And after I'm the President, I'm going to
slide in incognito. (Laughter.)

God bless you all. Thanks for coming. (Applause.)

END 4:05 P.M. CST

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