Matt Freed/Post-Gazette
	Marc H. Morial, National Urban League president and chief executive officer, welcomes President George Bush yesterday at the 2003 National Urban League Conference. Bush praised government cooperation with faith-based institutions during a 25-minute address to the delegates.
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Two weeks after bypassing the national convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, President Bush addressed the National Urban League conference here yesterday in what some saw as a gesture to mend fences with black voters.

Bush said the economy was showing signs of improvement. He urged Congress to approve languishing legislation to help low-income Americans and those having a hard time finding work.

He vigorously defended education reforms enacted during his administration and praised the work of faith-based community groups and charities.

"Our nation has come a long way, and we have a long way to go. We will not stop, we will not tire until we extend the great promise of America to every neighborhood of America," the president told an audience of about 1,500 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown.

The address drew polite applause from conference participants, but some later criticized it as a generic campaign speech.

"It was important that the president came,'' said Esther Bush, president of the Urban League of Pittsburgh. But asked if the appearance raised his stock among blacks, she said, "I don't really have an answer to that."

"I thought it was an excellent campaign speech,'' Alma Jones, a conventioneer from Springfield, Ill., said in a skeptical tone.

Denise Rixter, a black entrepreneur from Atlanta, judged the crowd's response as "not extremely enthusiastic but positive." She said they backed the president's $15 billion global AIDS initiative but thought America should do more to fight the disease in Africa.

John Bugg, vice president of the Baltimore Urban League, graded Bush's speech a C. "He addressed a lot of issues that we had really come to listen to, but it wasn't anything we hadn't heard before."

The president singled out local faith-based charities and their volunteers.

He cited the work of North Hills Community Outreach, helping Royal Patterson, a Sharpsburg painter who lost his livelihood after 27 years because he could no longer climb a ladder.

"They gave him food. They gave him bus passes. They helped him to get a new job,'' Bush said. Patterson was hired as a security guard and his wife, Darlene, works at a grocery store.

Matt Freed/Post-Gazette
President George Bush is projected on a video screen as he works the crowd yesterday after addressing the 2003 Urban League conference at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.

The president also praised Xavier Williams, a local Urban League board member, for his work at a New Jersey agency called Inroads that matches young Hispanic and African-American men with mentors and internships in business.

Williams, a vice president of sales with AT&T, recently moved to Cranberry.

Williams met Bush at the airport. "He thanked me for volunteering and told me to keep up the good work,'' Williams said.

The president noted that the economy has been sluggish since he took office. But, he said, in recent days government reports have signaled that the tide may be turning.

"A lot of economists are beginning to forecast a better tomorrow," he said.

He cited encouraging recent figures on home sales and retail sales and said inflation remains low.

"We saw a problem and we dealt with it straight up," Bush said, referring to the tax cuts passed in his presidency.

He said that Congress had not yet acted on legislation he favors to extend to the working poor tax credit checks of $400 per child. The measure is bogged down in major differences between the House and Senate versions.

Bush also prodded Congress to pass legislation to improve job training opportunities, specifically $3,000 "re-employment accounts" for job-seekers to use on training, child care or transportation.

"Congress needs to help those who are having trouble finding work," he said.

His most sustained applause came when he gave an impassioned argument for education reforms he has enacted. Some of his lines dated to 1999, when he began running for the presidency, but Bush sought to give his words fresh urgency by jabbing the air with an index finger as he declared: "We must challenge the soft bigotry of low expectations."

As the applause rose, Bush leaned toward his audience and said, "And you know what I'm talking about. ... We simply have got to stop shuffling our students from grade to grade!"

Bush received only 9 percent of the black vote in the 2000 election.

The Urban League, which receives government funds, has been more restrained in its criticism than the NAACP, which Bush has shunned during his 2 1/2 years in office.

It was Bush's second trip in a week, and the 21st of his presidency, to Pennsylvania, a state he is working hard to capture in next year's election. Bush spoke for about 30 minutes but did not plan to meet otherwise with Urban League leaders.

Tim Stevens, president of the Pittsburgh NAACP, saw Bush's appearance as an effort to soothe ill feelings and said it was a gesture of goodwill that the president publicly recognized Jackson in his speech.

"Maybe to 'dis' two black organizations back to back wouldn't be appropriate. I think his presence was more than appropriate. You have to give him some credit for that. He did come,'' Stevens said.