State Rep. Ben Harbin continues his role as Porkmaster as local assistance grants (the Georgia version of earmarks) are added on in conference committee, hidden from public view until an hour before the budget is voted on:

The spending included 470 local assistance grants that were not revealed to the public until hours before the 2008 legislative session ended. The $6 million in grants were just about the last thing budget-writers add to budget before approving it on the final day of the session.

In addition, lawmakers sprinkled millions of dollars in big-ticket items such as local construction projects throughout the budget, many in the districts of prominent lawmakers such as Speaker Glenn Richardson (R-Hiram), House Majority Leader Jerry Keen (R-St. Simons Island) and Senate Majority Leader Tommie Williams (R-Lyons).

The budget for fiscal 2009, which begins July 1, includes more than $1 billion in local construction projects.

Even Gov. Sonny Perdue, who has not been on the best terms with House leaders, got $2 million for a new library in his home Houston County and $7.3 million for a local horse barn and practice ring.

House Appropriations Chairman Ben Harbin (R-Evans), who helped secure money for his hometown Little League program as well as more than $75 million in projects at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, defended the local spending.

“That money belongs to the taxpayers, and if we can get it into those communities, and it benefits those communities, it benefits the whole state,” Harbin said.

That money does belong to the taxpayers, and they deserve to keep it instead of going to pay for what are nothing more that vote buying projects in legislator’s districts.

Here is an example of some of the projects paid for by your tax dollars:

This year many communities received money to promote tourism, improve parks and restore old buildings. For instance, Jeff Davis County in rural Southeast Georgia got $10,000 in the budget to promote local tourism. The county is represented in the Senate by Williams, and in the House by Majority Caucus Chairman Jay Roberts (R-Ocilla). Alma, another Southeast Georgia town and home to Republican Rep. Tommy Smith, got $8,000 to replace seats at a local theater. Douglasville got $20,000 to help with economic development and tourism. Tybee Island got $30,000 for a theater restoration project.

You can view more of the Local Assistance Grants by looking at the budget, which you can find here. The LAGs begin on page 29. I am not complaining about projects that concern public safety, like funding for police or fire departments…I am point to projects like $20,000 to restore the Baxley Livestock Barn & Arena or $35,000 to renovate restrooms and bathrooms at park in Madison County.

LAGs aren’t the only problem, as the article notes. The budget was full of pork projects in other parts of the budget. And, like I wrote above. The process of adding these projects was not subject to any public scrutiny, as Georgia Republican appropriators used similar tactic of their Democratic counterparts on the national level by inserting the projects in the budget in conference, this was something floated by House Majority Leader Jerry Keen before the 2008 session. This prevents amendments from the floor that could potentially strike some of the more frivolous projects.

There is no transparency in the budget process and Republicans in the state legislature are working to make sure it stays that way.

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Continuing their recent stories on government waste, WSB-TV shows your federal tax dollars at work…researching eye movements while watching porn at Emory University.

WSB will also be doing stories on hidden taxes (this Thursday at 6pm) and how these tax cost us each $3,000 a year and a story on monkey research (next Monday at 5pm), a $1.2 million to study how monkeys interact.

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The full budget request by the Governor is now online at the Planning & Budget office. It’s a very large file (7MB) and 440 pages, but you can download it directly here.

I already posted some of the requests yesterday. This report just goes into more detail.

Let’s just say that the state isn’t getting out of the Hall of Fame business anytime soon:

• $125,000 for the Golf Hall of Fame
• $50,000 for the Civil War Commission
• $50,000 for the Aviation Hall of Fame
• $862,240 for the Music Hall of Fame
• $811,230 for the Sports Hall of Fame

Like I said the other day, we’ll see more, especially in Local Assistance Grants, once the House Appropriations Committee gets their hands on the budget.

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The Club for Growth has release the Senate RePORK card, which measures how individual Senators vote on anti-pork amendments.

Saxby Chambliss voted for 14 our of the 15 (93%) anti-pork amendments brought to the Senate floor, putting him near the top of the list. Johnny Iskason voted for 11 out of 14.

The Club notes:

Only two amendments were successful. The most popular amendment was offered by Senator DeMint to bar the use of funds appropriated for spinach growers in the Iraq Supplemental Bill (Roll Call #123, 03/29/07); it passed 97-0. The other amendment was offered by Senator Coburn to eliminate $1 million for a museum dedicated to the Woodstock Festival (Roll Call #377, 10/18/07); it passed 52-42.

Did you know that it was a responsibility of the taxpayers and the federal government to provide sand on the beaches on San Diego and to give Democrats and Republicans $100 million for their conventions? I can’t see to find important functions of government anywhere in Article 1, Section 8 of the United States Constitution.

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Georgia’s support of golf doesn’t stop at the Golf Hall of Fame:

Golfers pay about $40 to play at Hard Labor Creek, a state park about an hour east of Atlanta. Taxpayers chip in another $5 per round at the money-losing golf course.

That’s a bargain compared with a round of golf at Brazzell’s Creek in Reidsville. Taxpayers subsidize players at the South Georgia course to the tune of $29 per round. And the little-used golf course is undergoing a $3 million upgrade, trading nine holes for 18, paid for by, yup, taxpayers.

Georgia’s seven state-run golf courses lost $1 million in fiscal year 2006. Since 2002, losses have averaged $941,000 a year.

“It’s pretty ridiculous, isn’t it?” said former state Sen. Robert Lamutt, an east Cobb Republican who railed against golf course spending while serving in the General Assembly. “Is that government’s job? To take [tax money] from me, by force of law, to give to somebody down in South Georgia so they can have a golf course?”

Of course supporters of this type of pork spending say it’s “economic development” and one Republican State Senator defends it:

Supporters say the links serve as economic development tools that attract duffers to rural, economically stunted areas of the state. They note that state parks and historic sites are also subsidized by taxpayers. And, they add, all Georgians deserve the same quality-of-life amenities available to their more urbanized brethren.

“A decision has been made that recreation is a thing of merit for tax dollars,” said Sen. Jack Hill, the Reidsville Republican whose district includes Brazzell’s Creek. Or “we can let the marketplace provide all recreation and we can have private state parks. You can’t separate state parks and golf courses, in my mind.”

Surprise…Sen. Jack Hill is Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Hill was originally elected as a Democrat in 1990. He switched parties a few years ago when it was no longer politically convenient to be a Democrat.

Why are taxpayers subsiding golf courses? The private sector can likely run it more efficiently and for a profit and if the course goes under, there wasn’t a market for it. That doesn’t give the state an excuse to step in. It means that the golf lovers of that area will have to find somewhere else to play.

And…Alan Essig, a left-leaning economist with the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute (of course they are labeled as “nonpartisan” article, nothing could be further from the truth), who seems to believe that Georgians aren’t already overtaxed and that our government doesn’t spend enough money as it is, believes that there is “nothing fundamentally wrong with having publicly funded parks or golf courses.” Alan Essig has never seen a spending program that he didn’t believe was “fundamentally wrong.” Essig represents everything that is wrong with the current view of government.

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Why don’t you head down to the Big Pig Jig in Dooly County during the first weekend in October and demand a free plate of BBQ since your tax dollars went to “improve” the site that hosts the event.

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Chambliss and Isakson voted to strip appropriations for the International Peace Garden in North Dakota, a baseball park in Montana and a wetlands center in Louisana. The amendment, which failed 32-63, was sponsored by Senator Tom Coburn.

H/T: Club for Growth

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US Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) is sponsoring several anti-pork amendments today. The Club for Growth has the list:

1) Earmark moratorium until all deficient bridges are repaired (#2810)
2) Prohibits funding of bike paths (#2811)
3) International Peace Garden in Dunseith, North Dakota (#2812)
4) America’s Wetland Center in Lake Charles, Louisiana (#2813)
5) New baseball stadium in Billings, Montana (#2814)
6) Lakeview Museum in Peoria, Illinois (#2815)

We’ll keeping a close eye on Chambliss and Isakson to see if they support the taxpayers or special interests.

[UPDATE] The earmark moratorium failed 14-82. Chambliss and Iskason voted in favor of the moratorium (and in favor of the taxpayers).

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The Club for Growth has released the RePORK card for 2007, up to this point, which rates Congressman on the fifty anti-pork amendments that have been offered.

Here are some examples of targeted pork projects:

• $1 million to the Center for Instrumented Critical Infrastructure in Johnstown, Pennsylvania
• $2 million to establish the “Rangel Center for Public Service” at City College of New York
• $34 million for the Alaska Native Education Equity program
• $50,000 for the National Mule and Packers Museum in California
• $100,000 for renovation of the Fire Fighters Hall in Columbus, Ohio
• $100,000 for the renovation of St. Joseph College’s theatre in Indiana

Georgia is doing well, or at least as well as one can expect. We have one of the more pro-taxpayer delegations in the country. Westmoreland (50/50), Deal (50/50) and Broun (12/12) are batting 1.000. Price (49/50) and Linder (48/50) aren’t far off. Much praise is deserved for these guys on this front.

Gingrey (37/50) and Kingston (26/50) are lagging, though Kingston has voted for more of anti-pork amendments than anyone else on the House Appropriations Committee.

Barrow (10/50) and Marshall (8/41), like Kingston, leave much to be desired.

Bishop (1/48), Johnson (1/48), Lewis (1/50), Scott (1/50) are very much pro-pork and ordinarily don’t mind spending taxpayer dollars on vote buying projects for themselves or their colleagues. However, they joined the rest of the Georgia delegation in voting to strike a $129,000 earmark for the “perfect Christmas tree.”

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Porkbusters is giving a rundown of earmark requests in the upcoming defense appropriations package. In total there are 1,776 earmarks.

There are 76 earmark requests for Georgia…

• Jack Kingston - 26 earmarks
• Sanford Bishop - 18 earmarks
• Jim Marshall - 10 earmarks
• Phil Gingrey - 7 earmarks
• Hank Johnson - 4 earmarks
• David Scott - 4 earmarks
• John Lewis - 3 earmarks
• John Barrow - 2 earmarks
• Lynn Westmoreland - 2 earmarks
• John Linder - 0 earmarks
• Tom Price - 0 earmarks
• Nathan Deal - 0 earmarks
• Paul Broun - N/A

It should be noted that Jack Kingston (R-1st) and Sanford Bishop (D-2nd) sit on the House Appropriations Committee and have military bases within their respective districts.

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