Jeffords's Special-Ed Plan Revived

As power shifts, Democrats press for full funding.

By Susan Milligan, Globe Staff, 6/4/2001

WASHINGTON - Newly empowered by the defection of Republican Senator James Jeffords, Senate Democrats take control this week with plans to push for a project he has championed for more than a quarter-century: a special-education program that would funnel as much as $100 million yearly to Massachusetts.

Local school boards around the country have long been fighting for the program, the cost of which is now heavily borne by property taxpayers. In Maine, advocates estimate that full federal funding of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA, could reduce property taxes as much as 5 percent.

The White House and Republican leaders in Congress have argued against committing the federal government to paying its legally mandated 40 percent share of the program. Although Jeffords and other supporters forced a voice vote on the Senate floor last month in favor of the plan, it appeared unlikely that a Republican Congress would include the measure in the final education bill and in the appropriations process.

But with Senate Democrats set to retake the helm this week, ''I'm absolutely convinced'' the $181 billion over 10 years will be approved, said Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts and the incoming chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

Kennedy suggested that the Democrats would hold up passage of the Bush administration's education bill, one of the president's top priorities, until the GOP agreed to fund IDEA.

''They're going to have to listen to this [debate on education priorities] for two or three weeks,'' Kennedy said. ''They can make a deal, [or] do they want to keep listening?''

The GOP-led House did not include the money in its education bill for budgetary reasons. ''You'd be hard-pressed to find a single member of Congress who doesn't believe in full funding of IDEA,'' said David Schnittger, Republican spokesman for the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. But ''the trick is doing it within the confines of a fiscally responsible budget. There has to be some sobriety about the process.''

The issue underscores the impact of Jeffords's decision last month to leave the GOP and become an Independent, tipping control of the Senate from the Republicans to the Democrats. As the new majority, Democrats have an enhanced ability to fully fund the program, and not incidentally offer a legislative thank you to their new best friend, Jeffords.

Jeffords will make his institution-shaking decision official at the end of the day tomorrow, and Democrats are already making wish lists of the legislation they hope to get approved with their new power.

The conservative House leadership is sure to block some Democratic initiatives, and in the still closely divided Senate, the new Democrat majority will be forced to accommodate its more conservative members.

However, there are some issues that were being held up simply because Senate GOP leaders would not allow them to come to the floor, Senate Democratic committee aides said.

For example, the Democratic version of the Patients' Bill of Rights will now be the working blueprint of the bill. Supporters of an ''innocence protection act,'' meant to exonerate innocent death row inmates with DNA technology, are also likely to get a hearing under the new leadership of Senator Patrick Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, on the Judiciary Committee.

The IDEA program, Republicans admit, is hard to vote against, because no member wants to go on record appearing to oppose help for disabled children. Bush, Kennedy said, would also find it politically difficult to veto an education bill with IDEA money.

Jeffords made full funding of IDEA, a program to help communities pay for court-mandated education of disabled students, a condition of supporting President Bush's tax and budget plan. When the White House balked, Jeffords withheld support for a $1.6 trillion Bush tax cut and ultimately left the GOP after his relationship with his party further deteriorated.

Where Republicans are furious, Democrats are grateful. Kennedy will make sure that Jeffords is included on the conference committee negotiating the education bill, a Senate Democratic aide said. The Vermont senator had complained to Kennedy before his defection that the GOP was not involving him in the education bill talks, even though Jeffords was chairman of the education committee.

It is not clear whether Jeffords's party switch will help him prevail in another of his legislative priorities, the Interstate Northeast Dairy Compact, which sets milk prices throughout the region. The incoming chairman of the Agriculture Committee is Iowa Senator Tom Harkin, and Midwestern farmers have historically criticized the Northeast compact as unfavorable to the Midwest.

There have also been reports that the White House or GOP leadership might try to scuttle the Northeast compact. But two Democratic representatives from Maine, Tom Allen and John Baldacci, sent a letter to Bush cautioning him not to retaliate against Jeffords by holding up the compact.

Jeffords's dramatic departure from the GOP has heightened attention to the IDEA program, and advocates hope the move will make the difference in getting their money.

''The Jeffords jump has certainly put the spotlight on the issue,'' said Edie Miller, executive director of the Vermont School Boards Association. ''Now that they [federal lawmakers] are talking about surpluses, why are they not keeping promises made?''

IDEA was originally passed in 1975, after the US Supreme Court ruled that all children were entitled to ''free and appropriate'' education in public school districts, but it has never been fully funded. Current federal funding covers about 14 percent of the cost, school board executives say, far short of the 40 percent mandate. Local school boards are being squeezed.

Boston is spending $130 million this year to educate disabled children, nearly a fourth of its $600 million general funds budget, said schools Superintendent Thomas W. Payzant.

''We've had to use these dollars to educate the special-ed students,'' he said. ''It means we can't do as much in general education as we would like to do.''

Further, there are more students classified as ''special needs'' than before, up to 6.2 million from 4 million in 1975, according to the Families and Advocates Partnership for Education, a Minneapolis-based group.

Increased diagnoses of children with learning disabilities, such as attention deficit disorder and dyslexia, have contributed to the increase, along with better prenatal care that has resulted in longer lives for children who once might not have survived birth, said Glenn Koocher, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees.

''If you want to provide tax relief to more citizens, fund the special-education program,'' said Christopher Lockwood, executive director of the Maine Municipal Association.

Lockwood estimated that with full federal funding, Maine, which depends heavily on property taxes to fund school budgets, would see a 5 percent cut in property taxes.

This story ran on page A01 of the Boston Globe on 6/4/2001.
© Copyright 2001 Globe Newspaper Company.

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