Mr. PLATTS. Mr. Chairman, I will quickly just say that I am honored to have joined with the gentleman from Connecticut in offering this amendment. I want to commend him for his leadership both in the State legislature and now here in Washington on issues important to our Nation's youth.
I also want to reference I am the ranking member of the Healthy Families and Communities Subcommittee of the Committee on Education. And our chairwoman, Chairwoman McCarthy, has been a great leader this year on issues dealing with juvenile justice and the needs of our youth. And I just appreciate the efforts here in trying to strengthen our juvenile justice system and our treatment programs so that our youth get the services, the treatments they need as well, as the appropriate imposition of justice based on their age and stage of development. And that is what this amendment sought to do.
I very much appreciate the chairman of the subcommittee and the ranking member for their efforts in addressing the funding needs of this area and their efforts to work with the gentleman from Connecticut and me and others as we go forward to strengthen the funding for these very important programs so we can do right by the youth of our Nation and help those who are troubled and get into difficulties with the law to be treated and be rehabilitated and, as the title of the underlying act, the Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Act, to prevent delinquency in the years to come.
So, again, I appreciate the gentleman from Connecticut's leadership on this issue.
