Posted by
Craig Westover on Friday, January 23rd 2009
The Star Tribune Tuesday reported this week that the Minneapolis Fire Department is hosing cold water on a long-sought-after federal grant of $1.3 million dollars. Minneapolis’s turning down the grant provides an insight in the actual cost of all that “free” federal money the state’s congressional leaders like to boast about. It also creates a teachable moment.
The $1.3 million Minneapolis has been seeking is a Homeland Security Department grant that would enable the city to add 12 firefighters to the ranks. The catch is the grant requires that the city gradually increase its share of the cost of the additional firefighters. Over five years that comes to a total of $3.8 million. If the city fails to keep the newly hired employees on the payroll for five years, it must repay the grant.
Across the nation, Federal aid to state governments increased from $286 billion in fiscal 2000 to an estimated $449 billion in 2007. It is the third largest item in the federal budget after Social Security and national defense. Funds are distributed through some 800-plus programs. But all that money isn’t free — to the feds or to states like Minnesota and cities like Minneapolis.
Cato Institute director of tax policy studies, Chris Edwards tells us the theory behind federal aid to states is that federal policymakers can design and operate programs in the national interest to efficiently solve local problems. In practice, politicians see federal grants as just another subsidy for their states – not a tool to pursue broad national goals. Federal grants stimulate overspending by states, require huge bureaucracies to administer and come with a web of complex regulations that limit state flexibility.
Consider the process: We taxpayers send tax dollars to Washington where they are divided among some 800 federal programs and administered by thousands of employees. We also send tax dollars to St. Paul where administrators write grant applications to the federal government. No small task. The “Weed and Seed” school anti-drug program, for example, has a 74-page application kit that references 1,300 pages of regulations for schools to follow. The Grant applications are sent to Washington, where more bureaucrats evaluate them. If Minnesota is lucky enough to receive a grant, to get back some of the money we taxpayers sent to Washington in the first place, it comes with strings and usually a requirement for matching funds. Hence the problem for Minneapolis.
The inefficiency of the federal grant program is obvious, but there are also other insidious aspects affecting the state. Federal grants disrupt priority planning at the state level, encourage states to overspend on programs, create inefficient distribution of funds to states, burden states with regulation that inhibits innovative ideas, dilute the attention of elected officials from serious issues to competing for funds, and enable the federal government to usurp legitimate state functions.
Our GOP senator-in-limbo states on his web site that one of his “most important duties as your Senator is to secure federal funding for worthy Minnesota projects and initiatives.” One doesn’t find that duty listed, however, in the U.S. Constitution. Perhaps, and I’m just saying perhaps, that mentality is why our purgatorial senator is on the verge of becoming a fallen angel.
Taxpayer Dollars are Yours Too
The Star Tribune Tuesday reported this week that the Minneapolis Fire Department is hosing cold water on a long-sought-after federal grant of $1.3 million dollars. Minneapolis’s turning down the grant provides an insight in the actual cost of all that “free” federal money the state’s congressional leaders like to boast about. It also creates a teachable moment.
The $1.3 million Minneapolis has been seeking is a Homeland Security Department grant that would enable the city to add 12 firefighters to the ranks. The catch is the grant requires that the city gradually increase its share of the cost of the additional firefighters. Over five years that comes to a total of $3.8 million. If the city fails to keep the newly hired employees on the payroll for five years, it must repay the grant.
Across the nation, Federal aid to state governments increased from $286 billion in fiscal 2000 to an estimated $449 billion in 2007. It is the third largest item in the federal budget after Social Security and national defense. Funds are distributed through some 800-plus programs. But all that money isn’t free — to the feds or to states like Minnesota and cities like Minneapolis.
Cato Institute director of tax policy studies, Chris Edwards tells us the theory behind federal aid to states is that federal policymakers can design and operate programs in the national interest to efficiently solve local problems. In practice, politicians see federal grants as just another subsidy for their states – not a tool to pursue broad national goals. Federal grants stimulate overspending by states, require huge bureaucracies to administer and come with a web of complex regulations that limit state flexibility.
Consider the process: We taxpayers send tax dollars to Washington where they are divided among some 800 federal programs and administered by thousands of employees. We also send tax dollars to St. Paul where administrators write grant applications to the federal government. No small task. The “Weed and Seed” school anti-drug program, for example, has a 74-page application kit that references 1,300 pages of regulations for schools to follow. The Grant applications are sent to Washington, where more bureaucrats evaluate them. If Minnesota is lucky enough to receive a grant, to get back some of the money we taxpayers sent to Washington in the first place, it comes with strings and usually a requirement for matching funds. Hence the problem for Minneapolis.
The inefficiency of the federal grant program is obvious, but there are also other insidious aspects affecting the state. Federal grants disrupt priority planning at the state level, encourage states to overspend on programs, create inefficient distribution of funds to states, burden states with regulation that inhibits innovative ideas, dilute the attention of elected officials from serious issues to competing for funds, and enable the federal government to usurp legitimate state functions.
Our GOP senator-in-limbo states on his web site that one of his “most important duties as your Senator is to secure federal funding for worthy Minnesota projects and initiatives.” One doesn’t find that duty listed, however, in the U.S. Constitution. Perhaps, and I’m just saying perhaps, that mentality is why our purgatorial senator is on the verge of becoming a fallen angel.