IIB 
110TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 2707 
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 
JULY 31, 2007 
Received 
AUGUST 3, 2007 
Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and 
Pensions 
AN ACT 
To reauthorize the Underground Railroad Educational and 
Cultural Program. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
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SECTION 1. UNDERGROUND RAILROAD EDUCATIONAL AND 
CULTURAL PROGRAM. 
(a) PROGRAM
ESTABLISHED.—The Secretary of 
Education, in consultation and cooperation with the Sec-
retary of the Interior, is authorized to make grants to one 
or more nonprofit educational organizations that are es-
tablished to research, display, interpret, and collect arti-
facts relating to the history of the Underground Railroad. 
(b) GRANT
AGREEMENT.—Each nonprofit edu-
cational organization awarded a grant under this section 
shall enter into an agreement with the Secretary of Edu-
cation. Each such agreement shall require the organiza-
tion— 
(1) to establish a facility to house, display, and 
interpret the artifacts related to the history of the 
Underground Railroad, and to make the interpretive 
efforts available to institutions of higher education 
that award a baccalaureate or graduate degree; 
(2) to demonstrate substantial private support 
for the facility through the implementation of a pub-
lic-private partnership between a State or local pub-
lic entity and a private entity for the support of the 
facility, which private entity shall provide matching 
funds for the support of the facility in an amount 
equal to 4 times the amount of the contribution of 
the State or local public entity, except that not more 
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than 20 percent of the matching funds may be pro-
vided by the Federal Government; 
(3) to create an endowment to fund any and all 
shortfalls in the costs of the on-going operations of 
the facility; 
(4) to establish a network of satellite centers 
throughout the United States to help disseminate in-
formation regarding the Underground Railroad 
throughout the United States, if such satellite cen-
ters raise 80 percent of the funds required to estab-
lish the satellite centers from non-Federal public and 
private sources; 
(5) to establish the capability to electronically 
link the facility with other local and regional facili-
ties that have collections and programs which inter-
pret the history of the Underground Railroad; and 
(6) to submit, for each fiscal year for which the 
organization receives funding under this section, a 
report to the Secretary of Education that contains— 
(A) a description of the programs and ac-
tivities supported by the funding; 
(B) the audited financial statement of the 
organization for the preceding fiscal year; 
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(C) a plan for the programs and activities 
to be supported by the funding as the Secretary 
may require; and 
(D) an evaluation of the programs and ac-
tivities supported by the funding as the Sec-
retary may require. 
(c) AUTHORIZATION
OF APPROPRIATIONS.—There 
are authorized to be appropriated to carry out this section 
$3,000,000 for each of the fiscal years 2008 through 
2012. 
Passed the House of Representatives July 30, 2007. 
Attest: 
LORRAINE C. MILLER, 
Clerk. 
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