June 2006 | Editor’s Note
College Financial Aid
Last month we told you about a Paul Revere effort by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) to alert college students about impending changes to financial aid, which include slashing grants and rising interest rates. Currently students face a July 1, 2006 deadline to consolidate loans and lock in lower rates. After that, they are at the mercy of a 6.8 percent rate for students and a 8.5 percent rate for their parents. Under the current rules, any student loans after July 1 can’t be consolidated or renegotiated.
However, there is potential help on the horizon. The “Reverse the Raid on Student Aid Act of 2006,” a new bill introduced by Durbin and Rep. George Miller (D-CA) would slash interest rates in half on college loans and save the typical student borrower $5,600.
In May, reportedly dozens of college graduates and parents organized by the Campaign for America’s Future marched through Congress in graduation caps and gowns and paid a visit to the offices of House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) to present a petition that, the group said, contained more than 15,000 signatures calling for Congress to slash interest rates on college loans and increase student grant aid. For information visit ourfuture.org.
Mercury
The state’s First Lady Patti Blagojevich headed up a baby-buggy brigade in Chicago to push for support of the governor’s plan to reduce mercury. The group marched on the State of Illinois Building, where the Illinois Pollution Control Board will begin hearing on Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s proposal to reduce by 90 percent mercury from Illinois coal plants by the year 2009.
The plan still needs to go through a tough rulemaking process and a lot of industry opposition. High levels of mercury have been linked to neurological damage, decreases in IQ levels and behavior disorders. Tell your state lawmakers you want to clean up the mercury now. For more information, visit environmentillinois.org.
— Editor
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