And Congress probably wonders why their approval rating hovers in the low single-digits.
(WaPo) — A U.S. senator from Alabama directed more than $100 million in federal earmarks to renovate downtown Tuscaloosa near his own commercial office building. A congressman from Georgia secured $6.3 million in taxpayer funds to replenish the beach about 900 feet from his island vacation cottage. A representative from Michigan earmarked $486,000 to add a bike lane to a bridge within walking distance of her home.
Thirty-three members of Congress have directed more than $300 million in earmarks and other spending provisions to dozens of public projects that are next to or within about two miles of the lawmakers’ own property, according to a Washington Post investigation.
Under the ethics rules Congress has written for itself, this is both legal and undisclosed.
The Post analyzed public records on the holdings of all 535 members and compared them with earmarks members had sought for pet projects, most of them since 2008. The process uncovered appropriations for work in close proximity to commercial and residential real estate owned by the lawmakers or their family members. The review also found 16 lawmakers who sent tax dollars to companies, colleges or community programs where their spouses, children or parents work as salaried employees or serve on boards.
Some lawmakers pursued earmarks near properties that they or their family members were preparing for commercial development.
In the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas,Rep. Rubén Hinojosa (D) sought an earmark in 2008 to widen a 1.5-mile stretch of road next to property his family was developing.
After taking office in 1997, Hinojosa remained as a one-fifth stock owner and consultant to his family’s longtime food processing plant, H&H Foods, in Mercedes. The lawmaker also co-owned, through a separate family partnership with three brothers, 3.7 acres of vacant land between the plant and Mile 1 East along U.S. 83.
In December 2006, his business, Hinojosa Enterprises, asked the city of Mercedes for permission to subdivide the property into three lots. In 2007, officials in the town of 15,000 asked Hinojosa to secure congressional funding to widen that stretch of Mile 1 East, a two-lane road that city officials said had grown clogged with traffic to a nearby outlet mall.