Ch-Ching: Utah’s Pork

Posted on April 6, 2006 | Leave a comment

A report has been released by Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW)that takes issue with spending items linked to Senator Bob Bennett, R-Utah, and where more than $97 million of federal spending in Utah has been classified as “pork” in the annual Pig Book released Wednesday by CAGW.

A summary of the report, published in today’s Deseret News, states that Utah ranked 18th in “pork per capita,” six slots higher than last year, according to the report, with $97.6 million in federal spending on a variety of programs or about $39.51 per person. The national average in spending is $30.55 per person.

“Pork-barrel spending illustrates and contributes to the meltdown of spending restraint in Washington,” CAGW President Tom Schatz said. “Instead of averting an impending fiscal crisis, members of Congress are grabbing the spoils to support their own re-election.” The report names 88 items for Utah as pork.

CAGW is in its 16 year of doing the pork reports and donned live pigs and a person in a hot pink pig costume at yesterday’s press conference, according to the D-News.

Highlights of expenditures in Utah, pointing to Bennett who sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee (and is chairman of the Agriculture subcommittee) and the Senate Appropriations Interior Subcommittee:

  • $14.19 million in the Agriculture Spending bill
    – $5 million for the Utah Conservation Initiative;
    – $3 million for the Washington Fields project;
    – $900,000 for botanical research; and
    – $545,000 for advanced computing research and education

  • $300,000 for the Oquirrh Institute (The Oquirrh Institute is currently involved in four areas of concentration: Moving to competency-measured education, improving environmental management, advancing health information and research and enhancing governance through technology.”A total of $500 has been raised from corporations and foundations,” according to the Pig Book. “Taxpayers have ‘contributed’ $550,000 to Oquirrh since 2004.”
  • $13.95 million for Utah projects in the Interior spending bill
    – $4 million for the Utah Public Lands Artifact Preservation Act;
    – $1.5 million for the Bonneville Shoreline Trail;
    – $750,000 for the Range Creek/Rainbow Glass Ranch;
    – $500,000 for a wastewater treatment plant in Eagle Mountain; and
    – $300,000 for wastewater infrastructure improvements for Judge Tunnel in Park City.)
    The Pig Book also takes issue with $1 million added by the Senate to the Defense spending bill for a competency-based distance education initiative with Western Governors University.
    “A close examination of their Web site does not reveal any defense-related missions,” the book said.)

    A spokesperson in Bennett’s office state that CAGW has been “led astray” in its analyses of spending.

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