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Health & Fitness

Restore the White House Tours

This may be part of the reason the president's popularity is falling like a rock.

I went to College in Washington, D.C.

My freshman year at George Washington University in 1971, I lived in Calhoun Hall about seven blocks up from the White House. That year a cheap/free, but fun date was taking the White House tour and visiting the U.S. Capitol.

With the White House tour, I loved the fact, that at the end of the tour, you walked out the White House front door right through the giant pillars, down the driveway and out the front gate. It gave me civic pride.

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Now the White House tours are being ended due to sequester and I believe this is wrong. Families go to visit D.C. two or three times in a lifetime, school trips perhaps once. To deny them access to this historic venue due to a $70,000 a week cost is an insult.

I am sure the president’s dog, Bo, costs the country more than that a week somehow. (BTW I have a beagle named Bo, this is not about dogs.)

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I emailed Congressman Tim Bishop’s Washington, D.C. office and very timely Brian Beedenbender, Congressman’s Bishop District Director, emailed me back saying, “I understand your concern regarding the cancellation of the White House tours. Our office received a notification that the White House had cancelled tours as of March 9th and until further notice. The notice indicated that the cuts were as a result of the sequester. Apparently, the tours require overtime for Secret Service agents and it saves more than $70,000 a week. The Congressman has long been saying that the sequester's indiscriminate cuts are not the answer. It has real effects on Americans including school funding, funding for TSA agents, the military, and of course, White House tours. He continues to advocate for a more balanced approach that will not harm the middle-class and allow the government to continue to provide essential services.At this moment, the White House has remained firm in its position on the cancellation of the tours despite requests from many Congressional offices.”

I pressed on emailing back, “...is he (Congressman Bishop) In favor of Closing the WH Tours for the reasons you stated, or should the administration experts find a way to keep the White House open to tours for constituents who travel with family to see their government and facilities, perhaps once or twice in a lifetime?”

Again Brian Beedenbender’s was quick with the reply.

“The Congressman has never been in favor of the sequester being enacted. He believes that it should have been replaced by a balanced approach of cuts and revenue that would not impact middle class people and essential services. The indiscriminate cuts will result in cuts to workers at 106th Rescue Air Wing at Gabreski Airport, reductions in Title I aid to local schools, reduced staffing at the Fire Island National Seashore, cuts at Brookhaven National Laboratory, and cuts to departments such as the Treasury, which oversees the Secret Service.The Congressman is not in favor of eliminating White House tours any more than he is in favor of cutting aid to local school districts. He has been working with the Department of Education on the implementation of their cuts to reduce the impact as much as possible, and is hopeful that similar work can be done to bring back tours of the White House.”

OK I like Tim Bishop but please hear me Timmy… Call the President and tell him to fix this now. Luckily somehow the US Capital tours are still running, they found the money post sequester. RESTORE THE WHITE HOUSE TOURS.

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