Oink

The transportation funding bill recently signed by President Bush contains so much pork and wasteful spending, the bill itself should oink.

Every year, the people of this nation are treated to billions of dollars of questionable road improvements on the taxpayers’ dime. All of them contained in that year's transportation funding bill. And both parties are guilty of exploiting this convenient trough from which they can bring home the bacon to their constituents.

The most ridiculous example of this style of profligate spending is the $2.3 million being used for landscaping along the Ronald Reagan Freeway in California. President Reagan vetoed a transportation-spending bill he deemed to expensive in 1987, so I can only imagine how chagrined he would be at the thought of such a bill being passed out of a Republican controlled congress.

Other shining examples of this kind of waste include a $220 million bridge in Alaska to connect a town of 50 people to the mainland, leases to the Apollo Theater in New York, another half-billion dollars in seat belt enforcement grants,

There are a few projects funded that will help our state in the long-run. Ten million dollars were earmarked for the Inter-County Connector. What do the residents of Anne Arundel County get out of this pork-laden bill? We get money to:

• Construct the Broadneck Peninsula Trail
• Construct Phase 1 of the South Shore Trail in Anne Arundel County from Maryland Route 3 at Millersville Road to I-97 at Waterbury Road
• Upgrade MD 175 in Anne Arundel County between MD 170 and BW Parkway

It strikes me as curious, given the need for transportation improvements in the Baltimore area, that so much money was earmarked for non-highway related funding projects. I like scenic trails, however I do not think that federal dollars should be spent on their construction, never mind those dollars being spent in lieu of more necessary projects. Did anybody tell Congress that Fort McHenry has a visitor's center? Because the construction of one is earmarked funding in this bill. And I have yet to understand how a pedestrian bridge and parking garage at Coppin State falls under any federal transportation guidelines.

The Federal Government has a necessary role in modern times in the funding of transportation projects. The Interstate Highway System, as well as the secondary National Highway System is important parts of our infrastructure. They are important to our national defense as well as the continuation of interstate commerce. Members of Congress should focus on those important aspects of transportation in America, and leave the parking garages, the trails and the beautification to state and local governments.