Missouri Projects For The Stimulus Bill

UPDATE:  I need to clarify the link - the link is to the Mayor's request for funding.  This is how the money is doled out later.  To read the actual text of the House and Senate Bill (something few Senators have the time or inclination to do, head over to ReadTheStimulus.org.

You want to be helpful?  Missouri's political blogosphere is pretty thin - there's not much sense of community, and the biggest names are political consultants whose, objectivity makes the New York Times look positively professional. You heard me.

Enough with the snark.  This link takes you to the "stimulus" bill, and the projects requested by Missouri.  If you start on page one, it seems pretty normal.  Shovel-ready projects include roads, police cruisers, and other actual infrastructure projects.  Read further.  We need to showcase just exactly what Nancy Pelosi and David Obey wrote and are trying to cram down our throat. 

And since the press is still in full-on Obamania, someone has to do some real reporting.  Let's start with the city of Florissant.

Florissant wants $40 million for a new Municipal Court Building.  They claim it's worth 3,000 jobs.  It's a highly inflated number - Unless these are part-time positions, you're talking about $13,000 a year per job, which backs into about $9,000 in wages, assuming materials are free and no company takes a profit. 

Florissant also wants $35 million for a Music Hall of Fame.  Critical, critical infrastructure.  Another inflated job total at 2200, but far less defensible in terms of stimulus.

In total, I count $179 million for Florissant, whose population is 50,000.  That's a stimulus for someone, alright.

Jefferson City has a reasonable list of requests - almost all infrastructure - but something is lacking.  Any detail or thought on what they're doing. It's like someone said - we need some money - throw together everything you think we could use and send it to Congress.  Which is exactly what happened.

Here's an example.  Street construction.  5,000,000. 50 jobs.  Remember - this is a bill voted on in Congress.  The House passed it.  If passed by the Senate and signed by Obama, it has the force of law.  Do you feel good about how they are going to spend this money?

Clayton asks for about $10 million. Pretty reasonable requests, although it seems Clayton and St Louis County and the state of Missouri would be better suited to fund these projects than someone in Idaho.  We'll leave that argument for another time.

Columbia has a long list of projects.  Most of it is construction, but they have one whopper in there.  $35 million for Street, Intersection, and Sidewalk Reconstruction.  Total jobs?  10.  Those are the most highly paid construction workers I have ever seen.  Are we hiring superheroes to do the work?  Was any thought put into this, or was the "emergency nature" of the recession the result of such shoddy planning?

Kansas City.  Wow.  The projects are too long to go into on this post - but Kansas City is asking for $830,000,000.00.  Now that's what I call deficit spending!  There are going to be some rich Democratic donors for 2012 (Only 10% of the stimulus bill will be spent in 2009, so the money won't be available to refund Democratic election campaigns until the 2012 cycle).

Pine Lawn, MO, population 4,200, may win this competition. $156.75 million in requests. Makes Kansas City and Florissant look like pikers.  It includes Mainstreet Development, A Youth Center, A $5 million maintenance building to handle all these projects, and some police officers and police cars thrown in at the end.  At $91,000 per household, this is the clear pork winner.

St Louis I'll get into later, but it starts with $83,000,000 in parking and streetscape improvements, and goes down from there.  Those condos aren't going to sell themselves, folks!

I would strongly urge all my fellow bloggers to go through this bit by bit.  This giant piece of dung is being jammed down our throats without debate or amendment, and it's the first major failure of the Obama administration (not even two weeks in).  It will pass in al its porculus glory if we don't expose it to the light.  All four Missouri Congressional Democrats voted for this bill.  I'll give $100 to any of them that bothered to read just the Missouri projects before voting on it. 

Note something else about this bill.  Cities that asked for money?  Clayton, Ellisville, Columbia, Jeff City, Kansas City, Pine Lawn, Florissant, and Wellston (who only asked for a few extra police officers).  If this is truly a stimulus bill, how come the only places it addresses are politically connected cities, and nowhere in the rural areas?

What about Hannibal, Kirksville, Joplin, Cape, Springfield, Maryville, or the hundreds of smaller towns out there?  How can anyone in good conscience look at this bill and conclude that it has value.  Two answers - they didn't look, and they don't have consciences.  Get to work, folks.  If you'd like to link this post, please add the anchor text (missouri stimulus projects).  And send me your links!