Motion to go to Conference on H.R. 1, American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

Floor Speech

MOTION TO GO TO CONFERENCE ON H.R. 1, AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACT OF 2009 -- (House of Representatives - February 10, 2009)

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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Madam Speaker, I strongly support an economic stimulus bill that will produce jobs that actually put people to work, especially in the private sector. H.R. 1 does not do that.

The notion that we need to expand State and Federal public employee rolls with a massive dollar increase in existing and entirely new domestic programs is not what my constituents back home want. My constituents are losing their jobs on Main Street and on Wall Street. The value of their homes has been reduced. Some teeter on the brink of forfeiture. Families' savings and investment accounts have been savaged.

And in this context, the House leadership proposes a bill that guarantees a burst of state and Federal hiring: bureaucracies that will undoubtedly handcuff small businesses with more rules and more regulation.

What's wrong with this picture?

As an illustration of what's wrong with the bill, let's look at the energy and water portfolio. Frankly, more funding has been proposed in H.R. 1 than could be possibly spent intelligently and effectively.

Under the bill, the budget for Department of Energy grants and loans explodes to $30 billion. This sum alone is greater than the entire budget for the whole Department of Energy last year. Instead of being our premier R&D agency, DOE will become a grants-manager for tens of billions of borrowed money, much of it spent in expanding the Federal workforce. And what's left will expand State governments. Little will filter down to people who actually work with their hands, actually make things more efficiently, and advance technology.

This is all a recipe for more dysfunction for government acquisition systems that can barely handle their own workloads today. Are the State governments prepared? Their manpower is down, and those who might provide oversight and accountability are walking the unemployment lines as we speak.

My colleagues, remember Katrina: Poor planning, shoddy execution, noncompetitive contract awards, abuse of contractor flexibility, inadequate oversight, a climate for waste, an open invitation to fraud and corruption.

Madam Speaker, there are many reasons to oppose H.R. 1. Those who do not remember the lessons of Katrina are bound to repeat those mistakes. In the meantime, we're missing a precious opportunity to create real private sector jobs and prevent layoffs.

I've heard from my constituents in New Jersey. They want a stimulus package, but they don't want this one.

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