ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, May 31, 1996 TAG: 9605310023
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: Associated Press
``THERE'S NO WAY that we could or would agree to that. ... They're asking for a blank check,'' says a senior adviser to the U.S. secretary of education in response to the Virginia Board of Education's no-strings-attached demand.
Federal education officials said they will reject the Virginia Board of Education's demand for federal Goals 2000 education money with no strings attached.
Michelle Easton, chairwoman of the board, said the government's response proves that Goals 2000 was never the unconditional windfall its supporters claimed.
``The federal officials and supporters of this program repeatedly said this is a no-strings-attached federal program,'' Easton said Wednesday. ``We just asked them to affirm that. So I guess this proves it's a strings-attached program.''
The board voted 6-2 last Thursday to ask the U.S. Department of Education to allow the state to use about $6.7 million in Goals 2000 money for computer equipment, with no restrictions placed on the state.
But Mike Cohen, senior adviser to the U.S. secretary of education, said Tuesday the board was asking too much.
``There's no way that we could or would agree to that,'' Cohen said. ``They're not asking for a block grant. They're asking for a blank check.''
State Superintendent of Public Instruction William Bosher refused to comment, saying he had received no official word from the federal Education Department.
Gov. George Allen and the state board, which is controlled by his appointees, have repeatedly criticized the Goals 2000 program as unwarranted federal meddling in local education affairs.
A spokeswoman for Lt. Gov. Don Beyer, a supporter of the program, said the decision from the federal government was not surprising.
``The expectation was there was no way the U.S. Department of Education could go along with the board's resolution,'' she said. ``It went way beyond Goals 2000 and would have prevented the state from even doing some rudimentary record-keeping.''
Beyer said Tuesday at a news conference in Arlington that the board's resolution amounts to a ``poison pill,'' assuring the federal government's rejection.
``It is clear the board was simply setting up the U.S. Department of Education to turn down Virginia's application,'' he said.
Virginia is the only state refusing to participate in the program. New Hampshire, which had been holding out, agreed Wednesday to allow individual school districts to apply directly for the money.
More than 90 local school divisions in Virginia have backed taking the Goals 2000 money, as have the Virginia Association of Counties, the Virginia Education Association, the Virginia Association of Counties and the Virginia Association of School Superintendents.
Allen vetoed a provision in the next budget that would have forced him to apply for the federal aid. The federal Education Department has said the money could be used for teacher training, instructional materials or curriculum development.
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