Bush Unveils Plan for Senior Tutors

George W. Bush unveiled a new plan Friday for encouraging older Americans to serve as tutors and mentors for children--and raise scholarship money in the process.

Under Bush’s “silver scholarship” program, senior citizens could volunteer as tutors in after-school programs in exchange for $1,000 educational scholarships funded by the federal government. Senior citizens who volunteer at least 500 hours a year would be eligible for the scholarships, which they then could pass on to their children, grandchildren or other children in need.

Using a senior citizens’ center here as the backdrop for his remarks, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee said, “Today’s elderly are the healthiest, most energetic, best-educated generation of seniors in history,” and many are eager to help.

But in terms of actual cost to the federal government, the plan was reminiscent of the inexpensive, politically popular programs that President Clinton effectively spotlighted in easily winning reelection in 1996. These programs included modest tax breaks for college tuition and relatively small retraining grants for displaced workers.

Bush’s program would be a pilot project, limited to 10,000 senior volunteers nationwide, and would be spread over five years. Its estimated cost would be about $10 million, an almost minuscule amount amid overall federal spending.

He also proposed increased funding for the Senior Corps, a federal program supporting senior volunteers, from the present $183 million a year to $250 million a year. The funding increase--while small in fiscal terms--would permit a 50% increase in the number of seniors taking part in the program, he said.

Both proposals fit his message of “compassionate conservatism.” Perhaps more important, they offered an affordable way to show support for senior citizens and potentially offset concern about his plan to change the funding of Social Security.

Accordingly, Bush began his pitch at the senior center by declaring that his commitment to them “begins with keeping our Social Security system safe and secure.”

Bush has proposed allowing younger workers to divert an as-yet-unspecified part of their Social Security payroll taxes into individual accounts they could invest in the stock market for their retirement. Al Gore, the presumptive Democratic presidential candidate, has denounced the plan, saying it could undermine Social Security’s future.

With such criticism clearly in mind, Bush said Friday, “When I’m president, your Social Security will be safe . . . and I’m not going to let any politicians in Washington, D.C., scare you into thinking otherwise.”

He also reiterated his intention to seek some form of prescription drug benefit for low-income seniors and to promote greater access to modern medical technology and treatment methods.

Bush called today’s senior citizens members of “the great generation, the generation that learned firsthand the meaning of duty to country.”

He noted that his father, former President Bush, had served in World War II and that he has “a mother who’s still incredibly active--and is still telling me what to do.”

That remark got a burst of applause from his listeners. Bush added: “And just to reassure you, most of the time I’m doing it.”