Earmarks: Taylor, Childers

Hattiesburg American - Plenty of local earmarks for Pine Belt

Don't sing the funeral dirge for the golden age of earmarks just yet. It's alive and well, as evidenced by a $410 billion House appropriations bill passed Wednesday.

The bill featured $7.7 billion spread over about 9,000 earmarks - all pet projects handpicked by congressmen to receive taxpayer dollars.

Southern Miss will be well cared for under the current bill, gaining at least $6.2 million that includes $1 million each for forensics research and equipment for the Innovation and Commercialization Park, according to a press release from Sen. Thad Cochran's office.

Other earmarks for the Pine Belt include $31.5 million for the Richton Strategic Petroleum Reserve site and $1.9 million for Fourth Street construction.

The presence of so many earmarks in the bill has rekindled an ongoing debate about the ethicacy of such earmarks however.

"Earmarks are corrupting, even if not all earmarks are corrupt," said Brian Riedl, a budget analyst at the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation.

Steve Ellis, vice president for Taxpayers for Common Sense, a Washington-based, non-partisan watchdog, said that while he does not flatly oppose earmarks, he believes the system is "fundamentally broken."

"The system has become more about political muscle than program merit," he said.

But local legislators disagree, citing that they champion the interests of their constituents.

Rep. Gene Taylor, a blue-dog Democrat who brought home $57 million in earmarks in 2007, said the powerful economic presence of defense contractors in his district makes him particularly sensitive to their interests.

"I know more about South Mississippi than President Obama, and I also know more than some faceless bureaucrat," he said.

He said he champions their requests only upon measuring them against military needs.

"I'm willing to go bat for the right program in the right place at the right time," he said.

The University of Southern Mississippi Earmarks

School of Nursing, $1.522 million
Forensics/DNA research and education enhancement, $1 million
Innovation and Commercialization Park, $1 million
Alternative fuel cell membranes for energy independence, $951,150
Early Stage Entrepreneur Development, $570,000
Mississippi rural law enforcement training, $400,000
Math and Science Literacy Enhancement Project, $285,000
Marine Composite Workshop Development, $238,000
Karnes Center for Gifted Studies, $238,000

Pine Belt Earmarks

Hattiesburg Fourth Street construction, $1.9 million
Richton Strategic Petroleum Reserve site, $31.5 million

DeSoto Commercial Appeal - Childers lands $8 million for district; DeSoto misses out because of no request

Rep. Travis Childers, though still a newcomer to the congressional funding game, appears to have learned well based on the $8 million secured for his district in the $410 billion Omnibus Appropriations bill approved by the House Wednesday night.

Missing from the list of district-wide projects on the list, however, are any from DeSoto County.

Still, the House bill includes $8 million for a host of projects throughout Mississippi's sprawling First District, ranging from $3.49 million for the second phase of construction at the National Center for Natural Products Research to $38,000 for improvements to the community center in the city of Amory.

Nowhere on the list, though, is money for projects in populous DeSoto County.

Childers spokesman Dana Edelstein said Thursday the explanation is simple: Childers didn't receive any funding requests from DeSoto County.