Biden: Local government key to education solutions

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Solutions to the nation's daunting infrastructure and education issues will start at the local level, Vice President Joe Biden told thousands of city officials from around the country on Thursday.

"You're doing these things people care about the most," he said.

Biden, who recently put to rest speculation that he would seek the Democratic presidential nomination, spoke at the National League of Cities' annual Congress of Cities.

The vice president never mentioned the race for the White House in his roughly 45-minute address.

Instead, he looked back on his time as a county council member in Delaware and thanked the local government officials for helping to make the Obama administration's economic recovery initiatives successful in dragging the nation out of recession.

"We knew we had to make some very tough and unpopular decisions," he said.

But he said that with the help of governors and mayors, the massive American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was implemented efficiently and with minimal waste.

Biden said that local governments deal with many of the issues that affect residents every day — from power outages to running jails and zoning — but often aren't recognized for that work. He joked that's why he ran for the U.S. Senate after serving as a member of the New Castle County Council in Delaware.

Local government, he said, "is too damn hard, and the people know where you live."

Biden said that the biggest issue facing the nation as it continues to make economic recovery "a resurgence" is education.

He called for free community college, which he said could be funded by cutting tax deductions. Earlier this year, the Obama administration announced a nationwide plan for free community college and touted Tennessee's leadership on the issue with Tennessee Promise.

Biden said that another limiting factor for job growth is infrastructure.

He said Congress is continuing to "kick the can down the road" on highway funding, rather than funding major improvement programs.

The vice president also tied the dire conditions of the country's infrastructure to a discussion about climate change, which he said was an unequivocal scientific fact and the biggest looming challenge facing the world.

In typically plain-spoken fashion, though, he launched into the subject this way:

"How many of you out there don't believe there's no such thing as gravity?"

No one raised their hands.

"Good," Biden said. "Then we understand each other."

He called for buy-in from local governments on initiatives to address climate change.