Copyright 1999 The Atlanta Constitution
The Atlanta
Journal and Constitution
June 13, 1999, Sunday, Home Edition
SECTION: News; Pg. 12A
LENGTH: 1192 words
HEADLINE:
ON WASHINGTON: THE GEORGIA CONNECTION;
A weekly report on the people and
activities linking Georgia and Washington.;
Isakson: Tests of abortion drugs
OK
BYLINE: Ernie Freda, Rebecca Carr, Ken Foskett, Mark
Sherman, Staff
SOURCE: AJC
BODY:
In his first abortion-related vote in
Congress, Rep. Johnny Isakson (R- Ga.) was one of 40 House Republicans last week
who opposed a ban on Food and Drug Administration testing, developing or
approving abortion-inducing drugs.
The ban, an amendment to the spending
bill for agricultural programs, squeaked through 217-214 as the other seven
Georgia Republicans in the House voted for it. Georgia's three Democrats voted
with the freshman Republican.
Isakson said it would have been
irresponsible of him to vote to prevent the FDA from doing what the agency "is
all about," making sure drugs are safe before they are offered for sale.
But he acknowledged that the real issue underlying the vote was abortion
rights. "I believe that individual women should be able to choose," Isakson
said.
The same amendment passed the House last year by a larger margin,
223-202. The Senate never voted on it.
Norwood racks up huge tab for
mailings
A study by the National Taxpayers Union listed Rep. Charlie
Norwood (R-Ga.) as the seventh-biggest spender among his 435 House colleagues
for using all his $ 882,000 office allowance, partly for frequent mailings.
The Augusta resident spent nearly 14 percent of his office allowance
last year on mailings to his far-flung 10th Congressional District --- a big
jump from 1997, which was not an election year.
Norwood's mail operation
is his third-biggest expense. "We have members saying we're just campaigning,"
said John Walker, Norwood's chief of staff. " But part of legislating is to let
the people know what's going on."
Not just for farmers
The House
Democratic campaign committee jumped on farmer-friendly Rep. Saxby Chambliss
(R-Ga.) after he voted with other Republicans last week to cut $ 102 million
from the $ 14 billion agriculture appropriations bill for fiscal year 2000.
"In the midst of a national farm crisis, Representative Chambliss has
chosen to gut agricultural funding by more than $ 100 million," said John Del
Cecato, spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
Democrats think they can beat Chambliss next year and would like to
damage his standing among farmers. But the cuts that Chambliss and every other
Georgia Republican supported did not come from programs that provide direct aid
to farmers. Instead, the money came from such programs as agricultural research
and rural housing.
Even there, the word "gut" hardly applies, said
Chambliss chief of staff Rob Leebern. The government would spend $ 375 million
on rural housing and just under $ 800 million on research, Leebern said.
Push for justice funding
With juvenile and criminal justice
systems being a major expense for big urban counties, Fulton County Commission
Vice Chairman Michael Hightower went to Washington as part of a large contingent
of county officials seeking a reformulation of federal funding in those areas.
The National Association of Counties' Large Urban County Caucus is
trying to push forward the Juvenile Accountability Incentive Block Grant bill,
still in committee, which puts greater emphasis on counties containing cities
with higher crime rates, which forces greater criminal justice expenses on the
counties.
To that end, Hightower, a former president of the National
Association of Counties, met Thursday with Sens. Paul Coverdell (R-Ga.), Max
Cleland (D-Ga.), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Rep. Bill Young (R-Fla.), chairman of
the House Appropriations Committee.
"Our goal is to shift more moneys to
counties, which spend a tremendous amount on the criminal justice process, such
as court and jail system operations," Hightower said.
Defense of Title I
A Georgia education official was among those testifying Thursday before
Congress on whether government's biggest education program for poor children
should be continued despite its shortcomings.
Known as "Title I" because
it is the first program in the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education
Act, the $ 8 billion-a-year program will expire unless it is renewed
within the next 15 months. More than 45,000 public and private schools with high
numbers of poor children use Title I funds for programs that range from extra
tutoring to computer-based instruction.
"Title I has been a colossal
failure," testified Roan Garcia-
Quintana, director of Title I programs for
the state Department of Education. "No discernible difference could be found (by
a massive study in 1997) between children who received Title I services and
children of equivalent backgrounds who did not participate."
"But,"
Garcia-Quintana stressed, "I don't want Congress to dump Title I. I want them to
overhaul it."
Rep. William Goodling (R-Pa.), chairman of the House
Committee on Education and the Work Force, agreed. "It will be reauthorized. The
only question is what can be done to improve it," he said.
Slave Grave
Project
It was rare for slaves to be buried within a white family
cemetery, but such a graveyard exists on Hogback Mountain overlooking the Toccoa
River. The Slave Grave Project, a racial reconciliation ceremony featuring Rep.
Cynthia McKinney (D-Ga.) and the Rev. Fred Craddock, an Emory University
professor emeritus, is being held this afternoon (3-5 p.m.) at Mineral Bluff
First Baptist Church on Ga. 60 in Fannin County.
The crumbling burial
ground, a walled area containing graves of the Dickey family and about 30
slaves, dates back to 1842, a legacy of North Georgia settler Hannah Dickey. The
graveyard is still intact, thanks to its remoteness, but the slave markers are
of fieldstone and can be dislodged by hand. McKinney, main speaker at the event,
hopes to see the graveyard restored.
Intern is a cadet
Rep. Mac
Collins (R-Ga.) welcomed Sean Foster to his Washington office for a three-week
internship. Foster, from Griffin in Collins' 3rd District, is a cadet at West
Point slated to graduate next year with a degree in politics. He received his
U.S. Military Academy nomination from Collins.
HERE AND THERE
Rep. John Linder (R-Ga.) met with Loganville resident Russel Leboff, who
was in Washington on Tuesday to receive a Cellular Telecommunications Industry
Association award for his use of a wireless phone while going to the aid of a
woman injured in a serious traffic accident.
Chambliss and Rep. Sanford
Bishop (D-Ga.) are participating today at a reception at the Colquitt County
Arts Center honoring volunteers in the Communities in Schools program.
Senators OK'd Coverdell's resolution to compel the government to
continue its investigation into the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers housing
complex in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 U.S. Air Force members and wounded about
500 more.
VERBATIM
From a letter by Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) to
Army Lt. Gen. Leon Leponte, commanding officer of Fort Hood, Texas, expressing
outrage at the Army's passive support of Wicca as a "minority" religion:
"Please stop this nonsense now. What's next? Will armored divisions be
forced to travel with sacrificial animals for Satanic rituals? Will Rastafarians
demand the inclusion of ritualistic marijuana cigarettes in their rations?"
GRAPHIC: Photo
Not ducking the issue: Rep. Charlie
Norwood defends his mailing costs, saying he must keep his constituents
informed. / RICK McCAY / Washington Bureau
Photo
Michael Hightower
LOAD-DATE: June 13, 1999 
