What’s the stimulus doing for us?

State economy — Mike Auman of the governor’s Economic Recovery Executive Team explains stimulus spending Tuesday at a Newberg City Club meeting

  • By: David Sale  
  • Published: 2/5/2010 2:35:07 PM
   Wondering where all that stimulus money is going? The state of Oregon is putting the answers on the Internet.
   “It’s about creating citizen involvement in government,” said Mike Auman of the Governor’s Economic Recovery Executive Team, a nine-member committee tasked with tracking stimulus funds across the state.
   Auman spoke to the Newberg City Club Tuesday on how the state government had allocated its share of the federal funds. Oregon is slated to receive $3.9 billion over the next three years. Of that total, $1.9 billion is entitlement spending for existing, ongoing programs (such as unemployment benefits) and the remainder goes toward loans and contract spending.
   To date, Auman said, the state of Oregon has received and spent about $757 million in stimulus funds, the majority for the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services. Locally, the Newberg School District also received $3.6 million in stimulus funds, which among other uses has allowed it to retain 18 employees.
   “People want to know when the armored truck is arriving, but the Recovery Act doesn’t provide seed capital or discretionary spending for the governor’s benefit, which has been a misperception,” Auman said.
   Instead, those seeking competitive grants or contracting opportunities have to contact the appropriate state or federal agency, and comply with applicable accounting and transparency laws. To date, Oregon has received $1.7 billion through such contracts, grants and loans — $436 million of that going toward some 500 construction bid awards, in construction areas such as transportation, safe drinking water and sewer and irrigation projects. “Everyone wants the landmark project, but a lot of the stimulus uses aren’t very visible,” Auman said.
   Meanwhile, local city and county governments can also apply for stimulus funds directly to pay for projects of their own. In Newberg, these include $764,225 for repairs and upgrades to Newberg’s Fire Station 20 and $90,000 for resurfacing city streets. As a whole, Yamhill County is undertaking nine stimulus projects to repair and upgrade streets and water mains, with a total budget of $5.6 million.
   What City Club members were most curious about, however, was the Recovery Act’s effect on unemployment in Oregon. Noting the debate over whether federal spending was creating new jobs, member Marge LeMaster said: “I’m looking for a number I can believe in.”
   Statewide, Auman said, stimulus funds have saved or created 8,300 jobs over the past three months, 5,000 of them teaching positions — but that the federal and state governments were not tracking cumulative job gains.
   “It’s a quarterly figure,” he said. “It’s just difficult to distinguish between ‘created’ and ‘saved’ — if a company hires back a worker they had to lay off, which is it? Also, because a lot of hiring is for construction-based work, we don’t expect these jobs to be permanent, but (they will) lead to an overall increase in commercial activity and wages.”
   Onvia, a consulting firm for government contractors, estimates that stimulus spending has resulted in a net increase of 44,000 jobs statewide in Oregon. Unemployed workers, meanwhile, totaled 209,576 Oregonians as of December (holding steady at 11 percent of total population from previous months).
   This in turn suggests that jobs “saved or created” in Oregon by stimulus funds have only met around 21 percent of the total employment need — but whether those wages will provide a larger boost to the economy through consumer spending remains to be seen, as does the effect of future rounds of stimulus spending.
   Federal data on stimulus projects, grants, job creation and auditing is available on-line at www.recovery.gov. Detailed information for the state of Oregon is available on the Web site oregon.gov/recovery. Both sites present the information in a searchable, interactive, map-based format.
Information for contractors wishing to apply for projects funded through stimulus dollars is listed on the Oregon Procurement Information Network (orpin.oregon.gov), the state’s main database for contracting information.

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LolitaB from amherst
2/6/2010 2:37:48 AM

Once economic 'recovery' finally is underway (capitalist economies constantly react to circumstances, thus are dynamic not static, and can't technically recover because there is no true status quo) the first thing that's going to happen is that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates. If you're looking for mortgages or large loans of any kind, get it now before the federal funds rate gets raised, which is going to affect all credit markets. There will also be an increase in the cost of goods and services – everything from oil, breakfast cereal to payday loans. The rise in rates might be negligible, but it will happen.



 
bradybrenda from newberg
2/9/2010 3:21:08 PM

Isn't this money just more debt that will have to be paid back someday, somehow and by someone?
 
dmbprogsv from newberg
2/10/2010 7:12:51 AM

progresiveisum Woodrow Wilson and the Roots of Modern Liberalism you want to see what they have done to america ...read all about ...you will see why we are where we are at...
 
dmbprogsv from newberg
2/10/2010 7:16:52 AM

capitalisum is the greatest thhing that has EVER happened in the world..period.hands down ..look around ,,then take llok at europe...how is is we are the most advanced nation in the world?...peopole we have to get rid of these pople ..they hate america...they gave us the fed. the IRS, constitutional law, that how the judges throw out our votes, welfare, and this economy..we have been hog tied for over a century ..had enough?..i have

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