Posted on 01/19/2004 2:08:34 PM PST by RJCogburn
In his State of the Union address, President Bush is expected to propose new job-training grants for community colleges to help prepare American workers for today's economy — a key issue in November's presidential election.
In his address to Congress and the nation Tuesday night, Bush plans to announce at least $120 million in grants, administered by the Labor Department, to enhance work force training programs at community colleges, education officials said Sunday.
All of the major broadcast networks and the cable television networks planned to broadcast the speech live Tuesday night.
The president is expected to expand on the plan in a speech Wednesday at Owens Community College in Toledo, Ohio, a re-election battleground state that Bush has already visited more than a dozen times.
"They are not putting the money into the Department of Education, they're putting it in the Department of Labor — the signal there is to focus on work force training activities," said Terry Hartle, senior vice president of the American Council on Education, a trade association of 1,800 two- and four-year colleges and universities.
"I guess they think that training and retraining remains essential as we continue to see the erosion of American jobs, especially manufacturing jobs," Hartle said. That is a particular problem in such states as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan.
Job growth is expected to be an important issue leading up to November's presidential election and Bush could be vulnerable. The economy has lost about 2.3 million jobs since he took office in 2001, giving him the worst job-creation record of any president since Herbert Hoover.
White House aides declined to comment on the proposal Sunday. "We'll let the president make his speech on Tuesday," spokesman Taylor Gross said.
Gross said Bush worked on his speech for a couple of hours Sunday afternoon after having lunch with national security adviser Condoleezza Rice; Harriet Miers, deputy chief of staff for policy; and Karen Hughes, a former White House official and one of Bush's closest advisers, who flew in from Texas to help with the address.
George R. Boggs, president and chief executive officer of the American Association of Community Colleges, which represents 1,200 schools, said the grants would be targeted to workforce training programs in high-demand occupations, such as health care.
"Of course, on the national scheme, it's not a great amount, but it's certainly enough to help some of our colleges develop capacity for these programs, so we would be very supportive of this proposal," Boggs said.
Ohio state Sen. Randy Gardner, a Republican, said he was told that the economy and job training would be the topic of Bush's visit to the community college in Toledo. "Community colleges in Ohio are very much job training and retraining oriented and Owens is considered a leader," he said.
BINGO !
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