Posted on 02/21/2010 7:44:42 PM PST by Rebelbase
GREENSBORO — Gene Brown extended a job offer on Thursday to someone he hopes will be a member of Housing Greensboro’s tiny full-time staff.
This person would oversee the nonprofit’s newest program — making minor repairs to the homes of the elderly or infirm.
It was a job Brown might not have been able to create if not for federal stimulus funding and other donations.
It’s a small — but concrete — example of a new job created with the help of the $700 billion-plus federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, signed by President Barack Obama a year ago last week.
Where’s all that federal cash gone? And, perhaps more important, has it reached the wallets of Guilford County’s 27,000 unemployed?
Signs of the stimulus package’s effectiveness, or lack thereof, in Greensboro have been difficult to decipher.
In many cases, local projects haven’t gotten off the ground. The economy likely will get a boost. It’s just taking longer than federal leaders predicted.
“It’s starting to, but the big stuff for us, and I guess for a lot of folks, is still coming,” said Dan Curry, acting director of Greensboro Housing and Community Development.
“But,” he said, “we don’t have hardly any of the money in hand yet.”
The stimulus act has funded a range of programs, such as new trains and extended unemployment benefits. All were meant to boost the slumping economy and get Americans back to work.
The Obama administration says the recovery act has created or saved about 2 million jobs in the past year. But that figure might not be accurate, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
As of the end of September, projects funded under the stimulus bill had created or saved 640,000 jobs, the budget office said.
Up-to-date numbers are not yet available. But more folks are out of work locally and nationally every month.
In Greensboro, the city has drawn in about $23 million under the stimulus bill.
How many jobs has that created or saved? A grand total of 6.9, according to city accounting. Why so little to show for so much money?
For one, tracking jobs created is complicated. Federal tracking requirements require the city to calculate how many “full-time equivalent” jobs were created. For instance, the city staff says that 22 people put to work part-time preparing a construction site last July is the full-time equivalent of 2.34 jobs created or saved.
“You count pieces of jobs and you put them together,” Curry said. “Whatever that ends up being, that is what you report.”
Then there is the more obvious issue: Money from the federal government isn’t that easy to spend quickly.
Some of the projects thought to have the quickest and most direct job impact were in construction. Yet the Greensboro construction projects — accounting for $12 million in stimulus money — have not gotten off the ground yet, as the city works to comply with all the act’s requirements.
The City Council recently signed off on some of the funds to be paid to the Raleigh-based J.M. Thompson Company to build the new Greensboro Transit Authority maintenance facility.
That might save or create some local jobs among the subcontractors whom they plan to hire for tasks such as the plumbing and electrical work.
“Anytime you can start a construction project in the middle of a recession, it stimulates the economy,” City Councilman Robbie Perkins said.
But J.M. Thompson won’t hire anybody until the paperwork goes through, and the money starts flowing.
Other projects also are in the pipeline, including a variety of community renovation projects, but they won’t count as new jobs until they start.
The stimulus act has helped in other ways.
“If you think about what we’ve actually spent versus received, the real spending has been through the Workforce Development grants,” Assistant City Manager Denise Turner said.
Hundreds of local young people were put to work through a stimulus-funded Workforce Development Board program over the summer. The board also hired full-time, seasonal workers to run those programs and others.
And there was that bright spot in the job arena over at Housing Greensboro.
The burgeoning nonprofit has received more than $100,000 in stimulus funds to put toward renovations on local homes.
Although much of the work will be done by volunteers, the increased workload means director Brown will need a new person to fill out his staff of four full-time, one part-time and two Americorps staff members.
“It’s almost like it’s providing dual benefits,” Brown said. “It’s creating a job and in our case ... we’re serving those in the community with these home repairs.”
The socialist bailout was never intended to stimulate the economy. It was meant to stimulate government expansion for the purpose of sucking wealth out of the private sector to make people dependent on the government!
At over $3 million per job, I wish someone had gotten me one of those jobs.
Were those 6.9 jobs full time, long-term or did they last a few weeks?
and where is the money REALLY going?
They probably paid $10 an hour and lasted a month.
How many people believe that the long term outlook for our economy is rosy, based on make-work jobs caulking elderly people’s frickin’ windows?
Do we even need a show of hands?? I thought not.
This is ridiculous in the extreme, and it is leading us all headlong in to ruin. Anyone who buys this fantasy deserves to suffer through the impending economic collapse.
It contained two watermelon seeds, cornbread mix, and 10 coupons to KFC.
The directions were in Spanish
The money pit.
Officials and celebrants gather to open the International Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro, NC. www.sitinmovement.org From left: Franklin McCain; Rev. Jesse Jackson; US Senator Kay Hagan; Yvonne Johnson; Joseph McNeil; co-founder Skip Alston; NC Governor Beverly Perdue; co-founder NC Rep. Earl Jones; US Assistant Atty. General for Civil Rights Thomas Perez; Jibreel Khazan
Typo...should have read "I Got My STIMULUS Package Last Friday".
These idiots in government think that non-profit companies are the way to go. They think that EVERYONE should work in a non-profit sector.
Liberals view the profit motive as greed.
Conservatives view the profit motive as the best way to incentivize the utilization of scarce resources where they do the most good for the most people.
I agree, Economy is not improving. This stimulus was nothing more than the “robinhood” practice of taking from productive citizens and funneling it to non productive citizens.
In other words, this was “REPARATIONS” since most of the money is going to non profits and local govt agencies who are giving it to low income (black) groups...
8.5 million in grants got 9.3 jobs in my zip.
Not really. The job goes away when the funding stops. The job creates no wealth.
$700 Billion / 640,000 jobs = ?????
Thanks, liberals.
The proof of the pudding will come in March, when many States will release unemployment figures for January and February within two weeks of each other, followed shortly thereafter by Federal numbers for March on April 1st, and State numbers for March 2 weeks later.
Sounds a bit complicated, but in a nutshell, that many real numbers hitting the system all at once is going to raise unholy hell and spell real trouble for Premier Hussein and the rest of his crew over at the Department of Labor and the Pelosi Politburo over on Capitol Hill.
One can only imagine what the Markets here and abroad will think of that much bad news all at once, but all we really need for a full blown collapse of the Dollar is the right trigger.
And let’s not forget that the Israelis are no where near as negligent about their Foreign Policy as Obammy is, and I expect to hear any day now that Israel has bombed the crap out of Iran like they were beating the lies out of a red-headed step child.
I’m taking on odds on how high the spot market on a barrel of oil will reach within 24 hours of an Iranian nuclear test too, which ever comes first.
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