Representative Sutton Speaks in Support of the 21st Century Green High-Performing Public Facilities Act

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the gentleman for the time and for the clarification about the nature of this rule.

I rise today in support of the underlying legislation, H.R. 2187, the 21st Century Green High-Performing Public School Facilities Act, a bill that was considered, discussed and passed already once by this House in the last Congress.

This bill will improve the foundations of our education system and modernize our buildings to reflect the environmental realities before us.

We know all too well that our treasured school districts are struggling to make essential improvements during these challenging economic times.

It's critical that we improve our schools to ensure that students have a healthy and safe environment to learn and develop the skills necessary to compete in today's workforce.

By facilitating the development of sustainable schools, our students will have a healthy learning environment that will naturally promote environmental literacy.

It's also essential that our schools are structurally sound and updated with the needed safety measures that will protect our youth from today's threats.

And Mr. Speaker, I am particularly supportive of a measure that was included last Congress when this bill passed the House.

That measure included an initiative which I championed that will allow schools to use funding from this bill to improve their building infrastructure with the necessary security measures and security doors.

I am pleased that my provision remains in the current bill.

And let me tell you why it's important. Brunswick High School in my district is the largest single-level high school building in Ohio, stretching a quarter of a mile from end to end with 60 entrances.

As you can imagine, this presents a difficulty and a challenge for teachers and administrators in security.

But with this provision, the district can use the funding to update the high school's entrances to meet today's security needs.

I am also proud that this legislation includes a "Buy American" provision.

This provision will require that steel, iron and other manufactured goods used for the construction of these improvement projects are produced right here in the United States.

The economic downturn has taken a toll on U.S. manufacturing - including the steel plants in my congressional district - and we need to put Americans back to work doing the work that America needs to have done.

This bill also contains Davis-Bacon protections requiring that contractors who build these projects pay their workers the local prevailing wage, which is so important to ensuring that workers are able to provide for their families. This is about families.

Mr. Speaker, in these challenging economic times, important and innovative legislation such as this will go a long way to creating new opportunities for America's students and workforce.

I urge a yes vote on the rule and the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.