Pork Alert:  Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Bill

(Washington, D.C.) — With record high oil and natural gas prices, members of Congress should be focused on conserving energy and money.  However, Senate appropriators have expended enormous amounts of time and taxpayer dollars pouring 735 pork projects totaling $1.5 billion in the fiscal 2006 Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Act.  The bill, which could go to the Senate floor today, is flooded with 618 unrequested Army Corps of Engineers projects costing more than $1.3 billion, and 117 “congressionally directed” energy projects worth $172.5 million.

Here are some of the projects included in the bill:

• Walkin’ in high cotton and not forgotten.  Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) plucked $176.8 million for projects in his state, including:  $113.3 million for Yazoo River and Basin projects; $3.5 million for Pascagoula Harbor; $2.5 million for the Jackson State University Bioengineering Complex; $1 million for Mississippi State University bio-fuel application; and $1 million for hydrates research at the University of Mississippi.
• California Screamin’.  $87.7 million worth of projects will be flowing to the state of Senate Energy and Water Appropriations subcommittee member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), including:  $30.9 million for the American River watershed modifications; $7 million for Upper Newport Bay ecosystem restoration; and $500,000 for the Arnold Palmer Prostate Center at the Eisenhower Lucy Curci Cancer Center.
• Celebrating Fat Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday…  Senate Energy and Water Appropriations subcommittee member Mary Landrieu (D-La.) grabbed $81.4 million for the Pelican State, including:  $16.6 million for the J. Bennett Johnston Waterway (which received $11.5 million in fiscal 2005); $1.3 million for Barataria Bay; and $500,000 for the Louisiana Immersive Tech Enterprise Program at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette.
• Stevens’ Folly.  Seward’s icebox has become a pork playground built by taxpayer dollars.  Senate appropriator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) snatched $76 million from the lower 48 (and Hawaii), including 44 Corps of Engineers projects totaling $67 million.  Pork projects include:  $13 million for Nome Harbor improvements; $1.6 million for Unalaska Harbor; and $1.5 million for Alaska wind energy research.  At a June 27, 2005 hearing, Sen. Stevens stated that there are senators “who really do not know the history of the development of this relationship between Alaska and the Federal Government with regard to the resources of our State.”  With each spending bill, the relationship becomes clearer and clearer.

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, mismanagement and abuse in government.