We only have a couple of weeks left in this legislative session and rather than attempting to impress voters with a long record of accomplishment, the strategy of the Senate leadership seems to be to avoid doing much of anything. That said, it is an Albany tradition to always seem to save most of the legislative work – for better or for worse – for the last few days, so I haven't completely given up hope that we can still get some important legislation passed.

Before the session began, I outlined a number of key priorities – issues that I hoped the pressure of a hotly contested election season might prompt action on – one of which was the Healthy Teens Act (S1342). This year the bill passed the Assembly on March 17 by a vote of 130 to 14, and passed the Senate Health Committee May 20 by a vote of 13-4. This is the farthest the Healthy Teens Act has ever come in the legislative process.

The Healthy Teens Act will create a system for providing grants to schools for the purpose of developing age appropriate, medically accurate sex education. The legislation also stresses that curricula be developed that encourages communication about sexuality issues between parents and their children.

Proper sex education is a necessary part of any school curriculum. We don't want our children to trade false information in their school yards and cafeterias. They all talk about sex; and the data below proves that a huge percentage have sex before they graduate High School. We need them to get the facts that can protect their lives from sexually transmitted disease and avoid unwanted pregnancy.

Presently New York schools have no requirement to teach students any sex education, be it abstinence or contraception. Even if a school chose to implement a sex education program there is no dedicated line of State funding. Some schools do teach sex ed but only at the discretion of the school district.

The most recent study by the Center for Disease Control shows some staggering statistics:

- 1 in 4 teenage girls between 14 and 19 years old has contracted at least one of the most common STIs (human papillomavirus (HPV), chlamydia, herpes simplex virus, and trichomoniasis). African Americans teens were at the highest risk with almost 50% having contracted an STI.
- 40,000 of New York's teens will become pregnant this year, among the highest rate in the nation.
- 60% of high school seniors in New York will have sex before they graduate.

This explosion of sexually transmitted disease and teen pregnancy will only worsen if Senator Bruno doesn't move this legislation now. We need a policy in this state that teaches our youth to make responsible decisions when they are thinking about becoming sexually active. Age-appropriate sex education will ensure that New York's teens are getting the information they need when they need to be learning it.

The distractions of the fall of Eliot Spitzer and the change of Governors during the session have made this a particularly difficult year for advancing a substantive legislative agenda. But now that those distractions have passed, we still have plenty of time to make this a session marked by accomplishment rather than by inaction.