Bush budget proposal comes up short

President Bush's $2.23 trillion budget proposal for the 2004 fiscal year contains a host of tax breaks, a move toward privatizing services, elimination or consolidation of programs and only modest increases for a handful of domestic programs that are not defense-related.

Although the budget provides for a 5.8 percent increase for the U.S. Department of Education, this increase is misleading, says AFT legislative director Charlotte Fraas. What sounds like good news--$1 billion increases for Title I and IDEA, respectively, $75 million for reading programs and $100 million for mentoring initiatives--doesn't really tell the whole story. When all programs under the No Child Left Behind Act are added together, the proposal provides $9 billion less than Congress authorized for 2004 and is $199 million below the amount needed to maintain current services, Fraas explains.

Federal assistance to higher education also is in jeopardy under the Bush proposal. The administration's proposed $1.9 billion increase for the Pell program does nothing to boost the maximum Pell award of $4,000. Instead, the funds will satisfy the shortfall from prior years. While modest increases are targeted for institutions that serve high proportions of minority and disadvantaged students, other higher education programs are being cut (student loans, for example) or level-funded (TRIO, GEAR UP, Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, Teacher Quality Enhancement grants, to name a few).

The proposal eliminates 45 federally funded initiatives, most notably the Comprehensive School Reform program and federal support for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Of particular concern is the administration's inclusion of more than $758 million in education voucher and choice proposals and tuition tax credits. Nearly half the funds ($301 million) can be directed to private schools, with the remaining funds provided for public school choice, charter schools, and magnet schools programs.

"It is just plain wrong that the president's budget does so little for America's neediest students while providing another round of indefensible tax cuts that would benefit America's wealthiest citizens," says AFT president Sandra Feldman.

"It is particularly unconscionable that the president's budget proposal includes hundreds of millions of dollars for unproven voucher and tax credit schemes but inadequately funds the No Child Left Behind Act, which received strong bipartisan support because of the president's promised 'substantial' and 'sustained' funding increases."