Texas

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PRESIDENT CLINTON AND VICE PRESIDENT GORE’S ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Texas PRESIDENT CLINTON AND VICE PRESIDENT GORE’S PRESIDENT CLINTON AND VICE PRESIDENT GORE’S

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Texas

EXPANDING ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY FOR ALL

Unemployment Down to 4.2%: The unemployment rate in Texas has declined from 7.6% to 4.2% since 1993.

2,112,400 New Jobs: 2,112,400 new jobs have been created in Texas since 1993 -- an average of 269,668 per year, compared to an average of only 153,075 jobs per year in the previous administration.

1,882,700 New Private Sector Jobs: Since 1993, 1,882,700 new private sector jobs have been created—an average of 240,345 jobs per year, compared to an average of just 113,000 private sector jobs per year in the previous administration.

108,700 New Manufacturing Jobs: 108,700 manufacturing jobs have been created in Texas since 1993 -- an average of 13,877 jobs per year. In contrast, an average of only 1,950 manufacturing jobs were created each year during the previous administration.

214,800 New Construction Jobs: 214,800 construction jobs have been created in Texas since 1993 -- an average of 27,716 jobs per year. In contrast, an average of only 6,300 construction jobs were created each year during the previous administration.

Bankruptcy Filings Down 13.7%: Bankruptcy filings in Texas have declined 13.7% per year since 1993, after increasing 14.2% during the previous two administrations.

Homeownership Has Increased in Texas: Homeownership in Texas has increased from 59.3% to 62.9% since 1993.

Homebuilding Up 9.8%: Homebuilding in Texas has increased 9.8% per year since 1993. In contrast, homebuilding in Texas decreased an average of 5.6% per year over the past two administrations.

1.1 Million Have Received a Raise: Approximately 446,000 Texas workers benefited from an increase in the minimum wage—from $4.25 to $4.75 -- on October 1, 1996. They, along with about 697,000 more received an additional raise—from $4.75 to $5.15 -- on September 1, 1997. President Clinton and Vice President Gore have called on Congress to raise the minimum wage by an additional $1.00 over two years.

A $500 Child Tax Credit to Help Families Raising Children: To help make it easier for families to raise their children, the balanced budget included a $500 per-child tax credit for children under 17. Thanks to President Clinton, the Balanced Budget delivers a child tax credit to 2,040,000 families in Texas.

Texan Families Reap Benefits of Deficit Reduction: Public debt is on track to be $2.4 trillion lower in 2000 than was projected in 1993. Debt reduction brings real benefits for the American people -- a family in Texas with a home mortgage of $100,000 might expect to save roughly $2,000 per year in mortgage payments. Reduced debt also means lower interest rates and reduced payments on car loans and student loans.

1.7% Growth in Total Bank Loans and Leases: Texas has seen a 1.7% average growth rate in total bank loans and leases per year since 1993. In contrast total bank loans and leases fell an average 4.9% per year during the previous two administrations.

0.8% Growth in Commercial and Industrial Loans and Leases: Since 1993, Texas has experienced a 0.8% annual growth rate in commercial and industrial loans and leases. In contrast, commercial and industrial loans and leases fell an average of 8.2% per year during the previous two administrations.

EXPANDING ACCESS TO EDUCATION

Over 58,100 Children in Head Start: 58,173 Texas children were enrolled in Head Start in 1999. In FY00, Texas will receive $351.2 million in Head Start funding, an increase of $179.2 million over 1993.

More High-Quality Teachers With Smaller Classes for Texas’ Schools: Thanks to the Class Size Reduction Initiative, Texas received $97.2 million in 1999 to hire about 2,500 new, well-prepared public school teachers and reduce class size in the early grades. President Clinton secured funding for a second and third installment of the plan, giving Texas $105.3 million in 2000 and $131.5 million in 2001.

$91.4 Million for School Repairs: President Clinton fought for and won a new initiative to repair America’s schools, providing $1.2 billion in the FY 2001 budget for urgent school renovation. Texas will receive $91.4 million in school renovation grants.

$38.3 Million for Technology Literacy: This year [FY01], Texas receives $38.3 million, for the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund, which helps communities and the private sector ensure that every student is equipped with the computer literacy skills needed for the 21^st century.

$730.1 Million for Students Most in Need: Texas receives $730.1 million in Title I Grants (to Local Educational Agencies) providing extra help in the basics for students most in need, particularly communities and schools with high concentrations of children in low-income families [FY01].

Turning Around Failing Schools: Texas will receive $19.8 million in Title I Accountability Grants. President Clinton created the accountability fund to help turn around the worst performing schools through such measures as overhauling curriculum, improving staffing, or even closing schools and reopening them as charter schools.

$656.6 Million in Pell Grants: This year [FY01], Texas will receive $656.6 million in Pell Grants for low-income students going to college.

Expanded Work-Study To Help More Students Work Their Way Through College: Texas will receive $48.1 million in Work-Study funding in 2001 to help Texas students work their way through college.

Nearly 11,800 Have Served in Texas through AmeriCorps: Since the National Service program began in 1993, 11,772 AmeriCorps participants have earned money for college while working in Texas’ schools, hospitals, neighborhoods or parks. [through 2/00]

Tuition Tax Credits in Balanced Budget Open the Doors of College and Promote Lifelong Learning: The balanced budget included both President Clinton’s $1,500 HOPE Scholarship to help make the first two years of college as universal as a high school diploma and a Lifetime Learning Tax Credit for college juniors, seniors, graduate students and working Americans pursuing lifelong learning to upgrade their skills. This 20% tax credit will be applied to the first $5,000 of tuition and fees through 2002 and to the first $10,000 thereafter. 402,000 students in Texas will receive a HOPE Scholarship tax credit of up to $1,500. 490,000 students in Texas will receive the Lifetime Learning Tax Credit. [fully phased-in FY2000 estimate]

Expanded Job Training to Texas’ Dislocated Workers: President Clinton's FY 2001 budget would triple funding for the dislocated workers program over 1992 levels. Texas received $84.3 million in 1999 to help 49,940 dislocated workers get the training and reemployment services they need to return to work as quickly as possible. In FY 2000, Texas will receive over $74.7 million to provide job training services for dislocated workers.

FIGHTING CRIME AND VIOLENCE

Crime Falls 15% in Texas: Under the Clinton-Gore Administration, America has experienced the longest continuous drop in crime on record. Since 1992, serious crime in Texas has fallen by 15%. Violent crime and property crime has also declined by 18% and 14% respectively.

Crime Has Dropped Sharply in Major Cities: In Dallas, between 1992 and 1997, serious crime, as indicated by the crime index, has declined 23%, with a 46% drop in murder and a 51% drop in robbery. In addition, serious crime has also declined 47% in Fort Worth, 32% in Beaumont, 46% in Odessa and 31% in Wichita Falls. The murder rate has fallen 52% in Beaumont, 47% in Brownsville, 45% in El Paso, 57% in San Antonio and 91% in Wichita Falls. [1992 and 1997 Uniform Crime Reports]

Juvenile Arrests Down in Texas: Texas’s juvenile murder arrests have decreased 61%. [FBI, Uniform Crime Report, 1992 and 1997]

5,214 More Police: The President’s 1994 Crime Bill has funded 5,214 new police officers in communities across Texas. [through 1/01]

McAllen and El Paso Will Receive Targeted Funding to Hire More Community Police: McAllen and El Paso were selected as pilot cities for the President’s new effort to target high crime neighborhoods. The pilot program will provide full funding for new officers by waiving the usual matching requirements. McAllen and El Paso will deploy new officers to help meet the unique needs of their communities, such as combating gangs or targeting drug "hot spots."

Reducing Crime with Drug Courts: Working to reduce drug-related crime in Texas, the Clinton Administration has awarded a Drug Court grant to the community of Dallas. The Administration had previously awarded grants to a number of Texas communities including: Conroe, Houston, Austin and Laredo. Drug courts use the coercive power of the criminal justice system to combine drug testing, sanctions, supervision and treatment to push nonviolent, drug-abusing offenders to stop using drugs and committing crimes.

$78.7 Million to Combat Domestic Violence: Through the Violence Against Women Act, Texas has received approximately $78.7 million in federal funds to establish more women’s shelters and bolster law enforcement, prosecution and victims’ services. And in October 1999, Prairie A&M University was awarded nearly $450,000 to help address sexual assault, domestic violence, and stalking on campus. [through 9/2000]

Nearly $4.2 Million in Grants for Battered Women and Children: In FY99, Texas received nearly $4.2 million in HHS’s Family Violence Prevention Program grants to assist women and children fleeing domestic abuse.

$34.9 Million to Keep Drugs & Violence Out of Texas Schools: Texas received $34.9 million in FY01 for the Safe & Drug Free Schools Program, which invests in school security and drug prevention programs.

MOVING TEXANS FROM WELFARE TO WORK

496,746 Fewer People on Welfare: There are 496,746 fewer people on welfare in Texas now than there were at the beginning of 1993 -- a 63% decrease. [through 6/99]

Child Support Collections Up 178%: Child support collections have increased by nearly $448 million—or 178% -- in Texas since FY92. [through FY98]

Encouraging Responsible Choices -- Preventing Teen Pregnancy in Texas: Since 1993, President Clinton and Vice President Gore have supported innovative and promising teen pregnancy prevention strategies, with significant components of the strategy becoming law in the 1996 Personal Responsibility Act. The law requires unmarried minor parents to stay in school and live at home or in a supervised setting; encourages "second chance homes" to provide teen parents with the skills and support they need; and provides $50 million a year in new funding for state abstinence education activities. Efforts are making a difference, adolescent pregnancy rates and teen abortion rates are declining. And between 1991 and 1997, teen birth rates declined 9.1% in Texas.

$185.6 Million for Texas Welfare-to-Work: In 1998 and 1999, Texas received a total of $146.9 million in Federal welfare-to-work state formula grants, helping Texas welfare recipients get and keep jobs. In addition, in 1999 and 1998 a total of $38.7 million in competitive grants were awarded to Texas localities to support innovative welfare-to-work strategies. Part of the President’s comprehensive efforts to move recipients from welfare to work, this funding was included in the $3 billion welfare to work fund in the 1997 Balanced Budget Act.

Helping People Get to Work: Through the Access to Jobs initiative, the Clinton-Gore Administration is working with communities across the country to design transportation solutions to help welfare recipients and other low-income workers get to and from work. Dallas/Ft. Worth, Houston, Galveston, Bryan, Abilene, Kileen-Temple, and Lubbock have received a total of $2.5 million this year to fund innovative transit projects.

INVESTING IN TEXAS’S HEALTH

Health Care for Nearly 50,900 Uninsured Texas Children: In 1997, President Clinton passed the largest single investment in health care for children since 1965 -- an unprecedented $24 billion over five years to cover as many as five million children throughout the nation. This investment guarantees the full range of benefits that children need to grow up strong and healthy. Two million children nationwide have health care coverage thanks to the President's plan, including 50,878 in Texas. [HHS, Health Care Financing Administration, FY99 SCHIP enrollment data]

Helping Over 706,000 Texas Women and Children with WIC: The Clinton Administration is committed to full funding in the Special Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC). In FY99, Texas received $335.6 million in total WIC grant funding, helping 706,297 women, infants and children in need receive health and food assistance, 103,300 more than in 1994. [through 8/99]

More Toddlers Are Being Immunized: As a result of the President’s 1993 Childhood Immunization Initiative, childhood immunization rates have reached an historic high. According to the CDC, 90% or more of America’s toddlers received the most critical doses of each of the routinely recommended vaccines in 1996, 1997, and again in 1998 —surpassing the President’s 1993 goal. In Texas in 1998, 91% of two-year olds received the vaccines for diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis; 88% received the vaccine for polio; 90% received the vaccine for measles, and 91% received the vaccine for Haemophilus influenzae B, the bacteria causing a form of meningitis.

Funding for HIV/AIDS Assistance Programs: In FY 2000, Texas will receive over $18.7 million in Ryan White Title II formula grants. This funding provides people living with HIV and AIDS medical and support services. Also through the Ryan White Act, Texas will receive nearly $38.2 million for state AIDS Drug Assistance Programs (ADAPs), which help those without insurance obtain much needed prescription drugs. There has been a tenfold increase in ADAP funding in the last four years, up from $52 million in 1996 to $528 million in 2000. [HHS, Health Resources and Services Administration, 4/7/00]

Tobacco Plan Will Cut Smoking and Premature Deaths by 40% in Texas: The Clinton Administration’s tobacco proposal, combined with the recently enacted state tobacco settlements, will cut youth smoking and resulting premature deaths 40% in Texas by 2004. Between 2000 and 2004, 218,100 of Texas’ youth will be kept from smoking and 69,800 will be spared a premature tobacco-related death. [Treasury Dept., 2/99]

8,060,000 Americans in Texas Cannot Be Assured They Have Patient Protections: Even if Texas enacted all the protections in the Patients’ Bill of Rights, 8,060,000 people in Texas cannot be assured they have the comprehensive patient protections recommended by the President’s Advisory Commission. This is because the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) may preempt state-enacted protections. That is why the President has called on Congress to pass a federally enforceable patients’ bill of rights so that everyone enrolled in managed care may have a basic set of protections. Notably, 3,900,000 Texas women are in ERISA health plans and are therefore not necessarily protected. Women are particularly vulnerable without these protections because they are greater users of health care services, they make three-quarters of the health care decisions for their families, and they have specific health care needs addressed by a patients’ bill of rights.

PROTECTING THE ENVIRONMENT

11 Toxic Waste Sites Cleaned Up: Since 1993, the EPA has completed 11 Superfund toxic waste clean-ups in Texas. The sites are located in Grand Prairie, Bridge City, Texas City, Friendswood, Crosby (2), Houston, Lamarque, Conroe, and Odessa (2). That's nearly twice the number of sites cleaned up during the previous two administrations combined. [through 3/1/00]

$58.8 Million in Safe Drinking Water Funding: This year [FY00], thanks to President Clinton, Texas will receive $58.8 million for the Drinking Water State Revolving Funds to provide low-interest loans to municipalities to build, improve, and prevent pollution of drinking water systems.

Revitalizing Brownfields Projects in Texas: As part of the Clinton-Gore Administration’s efforts to clean up Brownfields, the EPA has awarded grants to communities in Texas—Dallas, Houston, Austin, Brownsville, Galveston, Grand Prairie and Laredo—for environmental clean-up and economic revitalization. In addition, the Rio Grande Council of Governments, TX & NM, which includes six counties in western Texas, will benefit from a Brownfields grant. These projects are intended to jump-start local clean-up efforts by providing funds to return unproductive, abandoned, contaminated urban properties to productive use.

SPEARHEADING URBAN AND RURAL RENEWAL EFFORTS

Revitalizing Texas’ Communities: The Rio Grande Valley was designated an Urban Empowerment Zone in 1994 and was awarded $40 million to create more jobs, housing, and economic opportunity for area residents. Houston was designated an Enterprise Community in December 1994 and was awarded $3 million for similar job-creation efforts. It was later declared an Enhanced Enterprise Community and was awarded an additional $25 million. In addition, Dallas, El Paso, San Antonio, and Waco were each designated Enterprise Communities, and were awarded $3 million each for urban renewal efforts. In 1999, El Paso was designated a New Urban Empowerment Zone, San Antonio was named a Strategic Planning Community, and Uvalde was declared a Rural Enterprise Community.

Expanding the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Will Help Develop 11,700 To 14,000 New Affordable Housing Units in Texas Over the Next 5 Years: Last year, the President and Vice President pushed for a 40-percent expansion in the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit. This year, the President and Vice President will try again to enact tax incentives to develop affordable housing. In Texas alone, this proposal would mean an additional 11,700 - 14,000 quality rental housing units for low-income American families during the next five years.

PROVIDING DISASTER RELIEF

$460.7 Million in Federal Emergency Assistance: Since 1993, Texas has received $460.7 million in disaster relief. This includes $21 million for Tropical Storm Charley, Tropical Storm Frances and fires in 1998, and $166 million in assistance to recover from devastating floods that affected the Houston area in October of 1994. [FEMA, 2/29/00]

EXPANDING FUNDS FOR TRANSPORTATION IMPROVEMENT

Over $5.8 Billion in Federal Highway Aid: Since 1993, Texas has received over $5.8 billion in federal highway aid, including $23.2 million for emergency relief in response to natural disasters and $200,000 for scenic byways. These funds have helped generate nearly 262,904 jobs. [through FY99]

$955.2 Million in Aviation Funds: From FY93-FY99 Texas received over $955.2 million in Airport Improvement Program funds to help build and renovate airports, and, when necessary, to provide funds for noise abatement to improve the quality of life for residents who live near airports.