Congress to Campus answers community’s questions about social security, health care

A town hall meeting Tuesday night provided Milledgeville citizens an opportunity to question issues of debate in the 109th Congress with former U.S. Congress Members.

Democrat Martha Keys and Republican Bill Barrett attended the meeting at Georgia College & State University as volunteers for Congress to Campus, a program from the Center for Democracy & Citizenship which pairs former bipartisan Congress Members for college campus visits nationwide. The meeting, entitled “Hard Choices Facing the 109th Congress: Social Security, Health Care, Faith-based Funding, and International Relations,” was open to both GC&SU students and surrounding community members.

Congress to Campus was co-sponsored by GC&SU’s Law and Society Student Organization, American Democracy Project, Student Government Association and The Paul Coverdell Institute.

“I believe this provided a wonderful opportunity for people to participate in civil dialogue about democracy and to experience democracy in action,” Paul Coverdell Institute Director Gregg Kaufman said. “The program brought public servants of national stature to our community and brought the community and university to grapple with major political issues.”

Barrett said Congress to Campus provides a successful way to prove that bipartisan Congress members can work together.

Members of the audience were asked to submit questions for Keys and Barrett on selected topics prior to the meeting. Moderator and GC&SU Government and Sociology Chair Michael Digby then addressed the questions in the meeting.

Attendees solicited concern about a social security crisis in the United States. Both parties were asked about the urgency of reforming the program.

“The crisis is not all that serious right now, but we’ll have a serious crisis in the near future,” Barrett said. “By 2018, the outcome of Social Security will be greater than the income, and from there it will continue to get worse.”

Keys, who sits on the national Social Security Advisory Board, agreed that changes need to be made in the system but also said she does not feel there is an immediate crisis.

Baldwin County resident Nancy Hanses said she attended the event to hear what the former Congress Members had to say about the future of social security.

“I have nine more years to work before I retire and I’m wondering if there will be a whole lot of adjustments to the social security as President Bush wants to change it,” Hanses said. “I’m worried about President Bush. I’m not in favor of his policies.”

Concerns were also expressed about how the federal government will handle an increase in cost of health care and simultaneously be able to improve current social security problems.

“For a country as wealthy as ours, our system is very bad,” Keys said.

Barrett added that health care issues will be an expensive problem to fix, but said it is an issue that must be addressed.

Other partisan concerns included questions about the constitutionality of Faith-based Funding. Both parties stressed the importance of ensuring that public funds are not used to promote religion.

“It has not been found unconstitutional. Right now it’s working, and working very well,” Barrett said.

Questions from the audience also addressed issues of international relations, questioning the government’s levels of priority. Discussions included relations with the Middle East, Russia, North Korea, Europe, Cuba and China.

“We seem to improve our relations and then something changes over night,” Barrett said in a discussion about China. “We should continue our relationship with China and continue to convince them they’re the answer to the North Korea situation.”

Upon conclusion of the meeting, Keys made an announcement to let community members know Congress to Campus participants are not paid for campus visits. She said they participate as a public service, which she believes to be important work.

Keys and Barrett also visited classrooms, spoke with student organizations and discussed issues with student leadership cohorts and SGA during their visit.

“The future of our community lies in the people that are here–in all of these students,” Keys said. “If we did anything to get people to become active, then we’ve accomplished something.”

This article originally appeared in the Baldwin Bulletin.

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Mar 4 2005. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry