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Colin Powell urges Congress to expand GI Bill

BY MARTIN C. EVANS | martin.evans@newsday.com

May 9, 2008

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Colin Powell, speaking at the City College of New York in Harlem Thursday, urged Congress to expand the GI Bill, saying vets returning from Iraq and Afghanistan deserve the same chance to get an education that their grandparents did after returning from World War II.

The position of the former chairman of the joint chiefs and the former secretary of state puts him at odds with President George W. Bush, his former boss. Bush has threatened to veto legislation that would expand the GI Bill because he says it is too expensive. Administration officials have also said the bill would encourage military personnel to leave the service to pursue an education.

Veterans who have served in the past decade say the current GI Bill provides so little money that they often must further delay college careers already put off by years of military service.

"For someone coming back after serving in Iraq or Afghanistan for two or three or four tours of duty, they need to catch up quickly, and we need to help them," said Powell.

Congress is considering two versions of federal legislation that would expand the GI Bill, which was enough to pay for tuition, books, housing and other living expenses when President Franklin Roosevelt signed it into law in 1944. Today, however, it covers only half of the more than $17,000 per year it costs for tuition, room and board at a typical campus of the State University of New York.

"America got that money back in spades," Powell said of past U.S. spending on the GI Bill. "It's an investment that has paid for itself many times over."

Powell said he favors legislation introduced by Virginia Sen. Jim Webb because it would pay for a larger share of a veteran's education costs than does a rival bill.

The Webb bill would cover the cost of tuition at any public college in a veteran's home state, and would pay a monthly stipend equivalent to housing costs there. A House version of that legislation is expected to come up for a vote next week.

Powell, whose 2002 testimony before the United Nations helped make the case for sending U.S. troops to Iraq, said he does not share concerns that boosting education packages for returning vets will persuade troops to leave the military.

Don Gomez, a CCNY student who served two tours in Iraq, said many soldiers who join the military service as debt-free teenagers return as married adults with children, but without a college degree.

Gomez, 26, said the GI Bill is so cumbersome and inadequate that many veterans take on jobs rather than return to school, jeopardizing their educational advancement.

"If you want to get an education, you are basically at the mercy of others to pay the cost of school, because you just don't have it," said Gomez, who said he lives with his parents in Bellerose, Queens, because the $1,251 per month he receives during the academic year is not enough to pay both school-related expenses and housing.