State may get $138 million in federal bill

WASHINGTON -- One man's pork is a lawmaker's bread and butter.

That's how lawmakers responded to criticism from a government watchdog group that analyzed the massive spending bill before Congress.

Missouri lawmakers inserted 176 "earmarks" worth $138 million for projects back home in the omnibus spending bill, Taxpayers for Common Sense reported. The bill finances 11 Cabinet-level departments and many other agencies, and it contains more than $10 billion for home-state projects.

Watchdog groups and smaller-government advocates say the earmarks add up -- $23 billion last year -- and that the funding is based on political muscle, not on the projects' merits.

"I always call it a free pass to get in the front of the line," said Keith Ashdown, the taxpayer group's vice president of policy.

Earmarks are only a tiny part -- 1 percent -- of federal spending. Other funds for similar projects get distributed through formulas set in law or by decisions made by federal officials.

As earmarks go, money for bridges and roads is more useful than money for Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, said Brian Riedl, a budget analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank.

"However, decisions on which bridges and roads to fund often are made by campaign contributions and lobbyists rather than by merit, so we can't guarantee that the best road projects are funded."

Missouri would get plenty of money for bridges and roads from the bill, which sets aside money ranging from $1 million for the Flintlock Road overpass in the Kansas City suburb of Liberty to $240,000 for an access ramp in Scott City.

But not all Missouri earmarks are for bricks and mortar. For example, $800,000 would go to Kansas City's Negro Leagues Baseball Museum to renovate the Buck O'Neil research and education center and for exhibits at the Double Play Action Center.

Federal funds have played an important role in the Negro Leagues museum and in reviving the historic 18th and Vine jazz district, where it's located.

'Me first' attitude

Ashdown allowed that museums are important.

But "this is something that definitely should be awarded on a competitive basis," he said. "This 'me first' phenomenon is slowly degrading the whole appropriations process."

A "me first" attitude is an appropriate description of so-called pork-barrel spending. The term "pork-barrel" probably comes from the practice of handing out salt pork to slaves, who sometimes rushed the barrel to get a share. Congress members began regularly referring to "pork" after the Civil War.

Most earmarks are added by members of the House and Senate appropriations committees. Missouri has two members on those committees -- Sen. Kit Bond and Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, both Republicans.

Bond and Emerson work closely with local leaders to determine which projects to seek funding for.

"The transportation needs of my district -- for example, the four-lane construction of Highway 60 -- are pressing matters that require Congress' special attention," Emerson said.

"What one person calls pork, another calls a job or a safer road or an improvement to their community," she added.

'Every ounce' of seniority

Bond's spokesman said the senator uses "every ounce of his seniority to see that Missouri continues to get its fair share of federal money."

"These funds have a real and positive impact on the daily lives of Missouri families and are critical investments in Missouri's future," said the spokesman, Rob Ostrander.

Missouri would get $24 per capita under the bill, based on the census and the taxpayer group's analysis. Kansas would get $30 per capita. Illinois would get $26 per capita. This is meager compared to the states of the top Senate appropriators, Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, and Robert C. Byrd, D-W.V. Sparsely populated Alaska would get $764 per person; West Virginia, $209.

However, those figures don't include perhaps the largest source of Missouri's federal funds -- the defense bill, which already passed.

Taxpayers for Common Sense reported that 27 other states and the District of Columbia would get more earmarked funds under the bill than Missouri.