The Bushes Promote Literacy
While the Budget Threatens RIF
The same week the Senate took up President Bush’s education budget under which the nonprofit literacy organization Reading Is Fundamental would lose all its federal funding in 2002, the President appeared with his wife, mother, and father at a Houston fundraiser promoting family literacy, the Houston Chronicle reported April 26.
Education Department spokeswoman Lindsey Kozberg disputed critics’ claims that President Bush was being hypocritical for trying to kill federal funding for RIF—a 35-year-old program that has given 200-million books to needy children. The group could apply for funding through state-level grants if officials could show it is effective, she said in an April 25 Associated Press report.
RIF President William Trueheart said the program’s purchasing power would be reduced if it had to compete for state-level grants. “We would not be able to function effectively; it would kill us,” he said. Trueheart said he hoped Congress would reinstate the money. “We genuinely believe that the Bushes are still very, very supportive of the good work we have done,” he said in the Chronicle.
Both the president’s wife and mother had served on the advisory council of the threatened program: Laura Bush resigned after she became first lady, and Barbara Bush remains an honorary advisory council member and was also a program board member.
On April 24, Laura Bush was announced by Librarian of Congress James Billington as honorary chair of Telling America’s Stories, LC’s national campaign to promote reading. The 2001–2003 program involves schools, libraries, and museums to stimulate public interest in books, reading, literacy, and libraries.
Posted April 30, 2001.
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