WASHINGTON   –  U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (MO-08) marked the one-year anniversary of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, also called the stimulus, today by saying that the measure has done little of what it was intended to accomplish.

“Still today, the transparency measures for how the stimulus is being spent are not as complete and accurate as they should be, and a great deal of the money that was supposed to provide a boost to our economy is still on the shelf,” Emerson said.

Some 80 percent of the stimulus funding remains unspent, while more than half has not been obligated to any specific future use.  Stimulus money has been reported as spent by the federal government in zip codes and congressional districts which do not exist.

“I’m still extremely angry about the accountability measures in the stimulus, and I think many, many Americans are equally angry with the poor return our economy has gotten on this $800 billion in new spending.  I’m glad I voted against the stimulus more than a year ago, but I am also very disappointed in the results.”

According to Emerson, the huge amount of money, if it should have been spent at all, should have been directed towards other priorities.

“For starters, we have let stimulus money sit idle while Congress has neglected to act on the five-year transportation bill, legislation that would mean jobs for every state in the country and a renewal of the transportation infrastructure our economy relies upon,” Emerson said.  “If we would have taken up the transportation bill instead of the stimulus, it would have passed with overwhelming support and the effect on our economy would have been far more impressive.”

The Eighth District Representative also said she is disappointed that workforce investment and job training programs have not received better attention from the Administration, in particular the WIRED grant program from the U.S. Department of Labor. 

“We have good grant programs in place today that rely on regional organizations who know how to do job training very well.  They have strong relationships with colleges, universities and other providers of job training and continuing education.  The programs they are using have already proven to be successful, but the stimulus went in a completely different direction and other workforce investment grant programs are being allowed to founder and die.”