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May 30, 2007
Abstinence education debated at hearing, in play during budget
By Gintautas Dumcius
State House News Service
STATE
HOUSE, BOSTON, MAY 30, 2007…..Just because Gov. Deval Patrick said he wouldn’t
apply for federal funds for abstinence-based sex education programs doesn’t mean
lawmakers won’t pass a bill banning future applications, a top House lawmaker
said Wednesday.
“It’s still in play,” said Rep. Peter Koutoujian
(D-Waltham) of a bill that went before his Joint Committee on Public Health this
morning that drew a Bush appointee, conservative activists and several children
and parents to testify in opposition.
The bill (H 1172) prohibits state
agencies from applying for any federal grant for abstinence education. The bill
is sponsored by Rep. Ruth Balser, a Newton Democrat and has 27
co-sponsors.
While admitting Patrick’s move renders the bill moot, Balser
said lawmakers could still pass the bill. New Jersey, California, Ohio,
Wisconsin, Maine, Rhode Island, Montana, and Connecticut have already rejected
the program.
“We could move the bill as an affirmative statement
supporting the governor’s actions,” she said.
Patrick’s pass on the
$700,000 grant in his budget proposal was mirrored in the Senate budget, though
the provision remains in the House budget.
Bill supporters who cheered
Patrick’s move say the program is too restrictive and emphasizes the failure
rates of condoms and other birth control measures. Federal guidelines are due to
become more restrictive, they add, and current guidelines contradict testimony
provided by a Bush administration official who appeared at the
hearing.
But Brian Golden, regional director of the federal Department of
Health and Human Services, said the program offers abstinence education “in
conjunction with” a comprehensive sex education program, and doesn’t prohibit
conversations over other forms of sexual education. Nor does it emphasize condom
failure rates, he said.
School systems have to seek the program, he said,
conceding that some programs don’t work as well as others. “We think that any
system that wants it…should have that opportunity to elect it,” Golden, a former
state representative, said.
The only approach that has proven to work is
comprehensive sex education, said Angus McQuilken, Planned Parenthood League of
Massachusetts spokesman, who dropped by the hearing but did not testify. Polls
show parents support fuller sex education by an overwhelming margin, he
added.
“These programs put young people at risk by denying them
information,” he said.
But Paulea Mooney-McCoy said she opposes the
legislation and supports the program because of her 13-year-old daughter
Nyasha.
“I’d like her to get the whole message, the facts, so she can
make an informed decision,” she told the committee. “And I’m not alone in that
feeling as a parent.”
For his part, Koutoujian said he didn’t believe it
was “inherently wrong” to teach abstinence, but said he had to hear from both
sides on how it’s affecting sex education overall before personally making up
his mind any further on the issue.
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