00 HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 14 01 Requesting passage of federal legislation to aid children and their families. 02 BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA: 03 WHEREAS the United States has a higher percentage of children in poverty than 04 either western Europe or Canada; in 1989 one out of five American children lived in poverty; 05 and 06 WHEREAS the United States does not have a national health program that provides 07 medical care to virtually all of its population, unlike 21 other developed nations; and 08 WHEREAS one in four students in the United States will not graduate from high 09 school with his or her peers and another one of those four students will graduate, but will be 10 deficient in basic skills and work habits; and 11 WHEREAS the Congress has considered legislation, known as KIDSNET and 12 originally introduced as H.R. 3147 during the 102d Congress, that would address the problems 13 of children in poverty by authorizing full funding for the Head Start program, the Childhood 14 Immunization program, and the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program; and 01 WHEREAS KIDSNET seeks to expand coverage of the Head Start program, the 02 Childhood Immunization program, and the WIC program to include all eligible persons by 03 1996 by exempting these programs from the discretionary spending limits imposed by the 04 Budget Enforcement Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-508) in order to allow the Congress to appropriate 05 more funds for these programs without requiring new revenues or offsets; and 06 WHEREAS participants in the Head Start program show significant immediate gains 07 in cognitive ability, self-esteem, achievement motivation, and social behavior and are less 08 likely to fail a grade in school or to be assigned to special education than children who are 09 never enrolled in the program; and 10 WHEREAS childhood immunization programs have caused significant declines in the 11 incidence of the major diseases of rubella, mumps, polio, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, and 12 meningitis; and 13 WHEREAS participation in the WIC program reduces fetal deaths by one-third, 14 reduces by up to 25 percent the number of premature births among high risk and minority 15 mothers, improves the diets of pregnant women and children, brings more women into prenatal 16 care earlier, and improves the likelihood that children will have a source of regular medical 17 care and be better immunized; and 18 WHEREAS the cost of KIDSNET (up to $9,800,000,000 by 1996) is dwarfed by the 19 long term costs to the nation in welfare payments, poor job performance, remedial education, 20 lost economic opportunity due to illness and early death, special education programs, and other 21 programs that can be avoided if KIDSNET is implemented; 22 BE IT RESOLVED that the Alaska State Legislature respectfully requests the 23 Congress to act expeditiously in passing legislation implementing KIDSNET; and be it 24 FURTHER RESOLVED that the Alaska State Legislature respectfully requests the 25 President of the United States to support KIDSNET and to sign the appropriate legislation into 26 law as soon as possible. 27 COPIES of this resolution shall be sent to the Honorable George Bush, President of 28 the United States; the Honorable Dan Quayle, Vice-President of the United States and 29 President of the U.S. Senate; the Honorable Robert C. Byrd, President Pro Tempore of the 30 U.S. Senate; the Honorable Thomas S. Foley, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives; 31 and to the Honorable Ted Stevens and the Honorable Frank Murkowski, U.S. Senators, and 01 the Honorable Don Young, U.S. Representative, members of the Alaska delegation in 02 Congress.