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Some regional projects will benefit from federal earmarks Date published: 3/14/2009
BY EMILY BATTLE
The Fredericksburg area will see at least $9 million from the federal spending bill that President Obama signed earlier this week, according The Fredericksburg Area Museum and Cultural Center will get $190,000 for exhibits and educational programs. Germanna Community College will see $285,000 for training and equipment for the nursing program at its Locust Grove campus. Stafford County will receive $150,000 for a stormwater management study. These are just a few of the local funding requests that were granted in a $410 billion spending bill that has been criticized by both Republicans and Obama as being flawed. At issue have been "earmarks," the spending requests that members of Congress insert into a bill. Obama has been criticized for approving the bill with its $8 billion in earmarks, despite having campaigned against the practice. The president said this week that he hopes to launch measures to reform the process in the future. Most of the earmarks that will come to the Fredericksburg area were requested by Rep. Rob Wittman, R-1st. Wittman voted against the spending bill, saying it represented too large an increase in federal spending. He also said he was concerned that the bill's approval process included no wholesale means of vetting the roughly 9,000 earmarks it includes. Rep. Eric Cantor, R-7th, also voted against the bill. Cantor submitted no earmark requests, and has criticized Obama for signing the spending bill. Virginia Democratic Sens. Mark Warner and Jim Webb both supported the bill. Wittman has said several times in the past that he looks for three criteria when constituents ask him to make funding requests: They need to be for public use, have broad support from their communities and include a state or local match. Wittman submitted $139 million worth of appropriation requests for fiscal 2009, according to his Web site, but only a fraction of those were funded. Wittman requests that didn't get funding in this budget include $3 million for a riverfront park in downtown Fredericksburg. City officials have estimated the park will cost $4 million--money they don't have--and the city's Economic Development Authority is now discussing contributing a small amount to try to get work started. Wittman also requested $8 million for a new Interstate 95 interchange between the Rappahannock River and State Route 3 in Fredericksburg, and $2 million for a new I-95 interchange at U.S. 17 in Spotsylvania. Only the Spotsylvania interchange ended up in the budget, and it will receive only $95,000 in 2009. Fredericksburg Area Metropolitan Planning Organization administrator Lloyd Robinson said he knew some local officials had been advocating for funding for the Spotsylvania interchange, so he was not surprised to see it receive an earmark. The interchange is one of the priority interstate projects in FAMPO's 2035 Long Range Transportation Plan, passed several months ago. However, two other I-95 interchange projects were scored at a slightly higher priority level: the Fredericksburg interchange near Celebrate Virginia, and one in Stafford at Courthouse Road. --Reporters Kelly Hannon and Pamela Gould contributed to this report. Emily Battle: 540/374-5413
Read more stories about Fredericksburg Date published: 3/14/2009
We saw the study. Where's my blue or yellow line metro stop in downtown Fredericksburg?
If you say all earmarks are bad, then what you're really saying is that the
existing bureaucracy is perfectly adequate at assessing and addressing our
needs at the local level. I say no! No one is for the dumb earmarks -
Woodstock Museum, hog odor studies, etc. But good earmarks are necessary
because we cannot trust the executive branch departments to do their job
efficiently. It takes a Congressman to get projects moving. I'm for earmarks as
long as all the details are made public. Wittman did good.
How abouth using some of the money so that the Fall Hill bridge can be widened. Why is Fredericksburg City being left out?
Not a stupid idea, keep up. The reason for the circle is to alleviate the traffic and pattern due to BRAC which is adding additional jobs, which means more people, which means additional traffic.
what a stupid, waste of money. we need traffic solutions, not problems.
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