You: Stimulus money wasted on union padding

They: Stimulus money invested in next election

That’s $174 million dollars that went to workers as wages (of which the average Union Dues from wages are approximately 1%), so the Unions are actually lining their pockets with only $1.74 million. The other $172 million is going to hourly workers who immediately put that money back in the market by purchasing goods and paying mortgages.

That really does look wasteful.

Wasteful spending by Governments leads to Politician’s longevity.

Mass. wasteful spending is Democrats’ gain in political contributions so politicians don’t see this as waste, but as necessary spending.

From http://www.stimuluswatch.org the total of cost of all the projects submitted by Massachusetts is $1,072,920,450 and $178,884,000 for Water Stimulus. Much of this is to replace Old Cast Iron and Ancient Asbestos Cement Mains, some are well over 100 years old and were necessary repairs decades ago. Because of these old water mains there has been the overuse of Disinfection and Silica to prevent corrosion. A byproduct of Disinfection is Trihalomethanes and Haloacetic Acits. Some people who drink water containing trihalomethanes in excess of the Maximum Contaminant Level over many years may experience problems with their liver, kidneys, or central nervous systems, and may have an increased risk of getting cancer. I have to wonder if this is any better then an occasional diarrhea from the drinking water. I did find that my Silica is not in compliance Department of Environmental Protection standers, 4560 ug/L. However as I am told continued use of Sodium Silicate for Corrosion Control is successful in complying with the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) lead and copper rule. But when you read the MSDS for Sodium Silicate, causes severe eye burns, causes skin burns, deep, penetrating ulcers of the skin, causes gastrointestinal tract burns, severe pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and shock, inhalation causes irritation may lead to chemical pneumonitis and pulmonary edema severe irritation of upper respiratory tract with coughing, burns, breathing difficulty, and possible coma, prolonged or repeated skin contact may cause dermatitis, inhalation of dust may lead to silicosis. The good part, Health Effects is for undiluted, if diluted Health Effect is reduced. Having to wait this long for repairing the water mains is not good.

But most these water repairs have yet to be approved, what is are road repairs, mostly mill and resurface.

http://www.eot.state.ma.us/recovery/project_list.pdf

But there is a trick to paving the streets in a Massachusetts, law that states that there must be some assurance that the road is not dug up the next day, therein all utilities work must be completed before resurfacing. As this common sense has been ignored so many times before I fully expect the roads to be mill and resurface, and then they will work on the water mains. This would also follow the way the projects are being approved. There is every indication that these projects will follow the tradition of the Big Dig project, estimated in 1985 at $2.8 billion to a staggering $22 billion including interest.

Waste in Federal Stimulus Money in Massachusetts is likely billions more then anyone can predict as it will be in most every state.

But there is some good news, there is some budget cuts….

“Funding for homosexual programs in the schools in next year’s state Massachusetts budget has been hugely derailed”

http://www.massresistance.org/docs/govt09/budget/out_of_conference.html