States Riddled With Waste
WASHINGTON—One person’s pork is another’s bacon. Either way, New Hampshire is getting a lot of it this year.
New Hampshire ranked fourth among the states and the District of Columbia in the amount of money it received per person for what one watchdog group derisively calls “pork.” The state catapulted from 21 st place last year, according to the latest Congressional Pig Book Summary released Wednesday by Citizens Against Government Waste, a non-profit group that monitors what it considers to be wasteful federal spending.
While states received an average $31.17 pork per person nationwide, New Hampshire took in $216.34 a person, the report said. Only Alaska, Hawaii and District of Columbia ranked higher. Alaska topped the list at $808.13 of pork per person.
Citizens Against Government Waste defines pork as expenditures added to the president’s proposed budget by members of Congress hoping to do favors for their constituents. In Washington parlance, they are called earmarks.
New Hampshire Congress members took full credit for their successes.
“I am very proud of my work on the Senate Appropriations Committee to secure needed funds for the preservation of Great Bay, keeping our lakes clean and our air pure, as well as keeping Granite State communities safe and law enforcement personnel well-trained and properly protected,” Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., said in a statement.
But, Citizens Against Government Waste blamed the 10,656 projects that Congress earmarked for fiscal 2004 for adding to the record federal deficit, projected to be $521 billion, and the $7.1 trillion national debt. Wasteful spending, the group said, cost taxpayers $22.9 billion in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, up 1.6 percent, or $4 million, from last year.
In the Pig Book, the group itemized 630 projects, which cost $3.1 billion, as “the most egregious and blatant examples” of pork.
New Hampshire Congress members agreed that the deficit must be brought under control, but added that the programs they inserted into appropriations bills were important to their constituency.
“The better we control total federal spending, the fewer earmarks there will be in our appropriations bills. I have voted against budget-busting bills for agriculture subsidies, energy and transportation, and will continue to work to protect taxpayers’ pockets while advocating for New Hampshire citizens,” said Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H.
Rep. Jeb Bradley, R-N.H., said he had not seen the report yet, but that “a number of projects have been secured for New Hampshire this year that will go a long way towards providing for the defense of our nation, protecting our environment and helping to defray the costs of education for local property taxpayers.”
Mark Carpenter, spokesman for Citizens Against Government Waste, said the group is not critical of every individual project it labels “pork.”
“Our objection is how they were added into the budget,” he said. “It circumvents the normal budget process with no regard to how money can be better spent.”
But the group’s president, Thomas A. Schatz, suggested this was not just an issue of process, but of priorities, particularly during wartime. He spoke at a press conference featuring two live pigs and a person wearing a bright-pink pig costume. Along with the Pig Book and accompanying press releases, reporters were offered toy snouts.
“I would like to ask every member of Congress – representatives and senators – to take a good look in the mirror and ask themselves if any of these projects are really more important than protecting the United States of America,” Schatz said.
To make it into the Pig Book, an appropriation must meet one of seven criteria:– it was requested by only one Congress member; it wasn’t specifically authorized; it wasn’t competitively awarded; President Bush didn’t request it; it greatly exceeded Bush’s budget request or the previous year’s funding; it wasn’t the subject of a congressional hearing; or it serves only a local or special interest.
As the chairman of the Senate Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary Appropriations Subcommittee, Gregg secured more than $37 million for the Granite State in fiscal 2004. Some of the items included $6 million for the Great Bay Partnership, a nature conservatory; $3 million for the J-One Information System, intended to improve the criminal justice system; $1 million for the Mount Washington Observatory; $590,000 to reduce milfoil in the state’s lakes; $500,000 for the New England Weather Technology Initiative; and $500,000 to establish the Belknap Regional Special Operations Program.
But New Hampshire’s largest bit of “pork” was $200 million used to refuel the U.S.S. Jacksonville, a submarine docked in Portsmouth.
J-One is an initiative linking various branches of the criminal justice system so they can easily share information, said New Hampshire State Police Col. Frederick Booth.
“I don’t see it as a government waste. I see it as just the opposite,” said Booth. “If anything, this is going to improve efficiency.”
Gregg, who has been particularly critical of increased spending in the face of the ballooning deficit, also has defended the J-One expenditure. “This system will ensure that whether it be an officer on the street or a judge in a courtroom, the information they have is up-to-date and available, and will save valuable time and resources,” he said in a statement last fall.
The observatory, a non-profit organization in North Conway, will use its money to improve research, upgrade equipment and digitalize its information system, said executive director Will Abbott. For 72 years, the observatory has recorded temperature, wind speed, barometric pressure and other meteorological indicators, but much of its equipment is 30 to 50 years old, Abbott said.
“Anybody who would criticize Sen. Gregg as too much of a spender in Congress doesn’t know him very well,” said Abbott. “My experience is that he puts a very high standard on any project that he considers supporting.”
Plymouth State University received $500,000 for the weather initiative. The money is “seed money” to add another faculty and staff member to its meteorology institute, said meteorology professor James Koermer.
Similarly, New Hampshire defends its milfoil project. According to Harry Stewart, the director of the Water Division at the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services, the plant milfoil is carried by boats from lake to lake, clogging the water as it grows 30 to 40 feet tall. Since there is no way to permanently destroy the exotic species, more research is needed on how to control it. So far, New Hampshire has 53 infested lakes, said Joel Harrington, environmental policy director at the New Hampshire Lakes Association.
The state submitted a letter to Gregg requesting $500,000 for research and $90,000 for the Lakes Association to deal with milfoil. The association inspected 26,000 boats last year, saving five lakes from becoming infested with milfoil, said Harrington.
A U.S. Commerce Department spokesperson, who asked not to be quoted by name, said the administration supports a number of the New Hampshire projects listed in the Pig Book.
