BY JIM BARON

NORTH PROVIDENCE — Rhode Island and its cities and towns will be able to improve schools, repair roads, bridges and other infrastructure and put money in the hands of individuals to kick start the economy and put people to work, if President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus package is passed quickly, Rhode Island senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse said Monday.

Rallying local support at North Providence Town Hall as they waited for their colleagues in Washington to take up the bill that passed the House of Representatives last week, Reed and Whitehouse stressed the measure must pass and pass quickly. They predicted it would become law by the Presidents’ Day holiday.
“This legislation hits all the important areas,” Whitehouse told a late morning press conference. “There is more than $300 million for Rhode Island in traditional highway, transit and water infrastructure” which he said will create jobs.
The stimulus bill is urgently needed, Reed said, because, “We are in the worst financial situation that most of us recall in our lifetimes. We have to move quickly and dramatically and I believe President Obama’s (proposal) is exactly that, decisive, significant and one that would put us back on the road to recovery.”
Reed blamed much of the country’s economic woes on the Bush administration and the Republican majorities in Congress throughout much of President George W. Bush’s term.
“We find ourselves, after eight years of mismanagement at the federal level, poor regulation of financial institutions, an unfunded war and a fiscal plan that generally emphasized tax cuts for the rich to the detriment of building infrastructure and supporting families,” he said, “at a juncture now where our employment situation is perilous, where growth is shrinking and we have to revive this economy.”
More than just the money that will be pumped into the state, or the jobs that will create, Reed said, the stimulus will “provide the confidence we need that we have an administration that will deal with problems ordinary Americans face every day.
Reed said the package includes $77 million for Rhode Island to fund school building renovations and $220 million “to help school systems pay for critical services.” There is $132 million, he added for bridge and road repair, $46 million to improve drinking water and sewer systems and $7 million in assistance for local police departments.
“Throughout this part of the country we have old systems for drinking water and sewers,” he said. “This money will be absolutely essential. You don’t have to drive too far around Rhode Island to find a detour because a bridge is out of use or can’t be used by major trucks.”
Besides those projects, Reed said, there is $342 billion for tax relief and incentives for families and businesses to complement the direct spending. That spending on Food Stamps and Pell Grants and other programs will generate additional economic activity, with the goal of “maintaining and creating 3 million jobs.”
Whitehouse boasted that the bill includes $40 million for Social Security recipients that he initiated and that “unemployment benefits will be extended at a time when that is a grave issue.”
The junior senator said it is “very important” that the state legislature makes sure that $400 million in Medicaid funds “gets spent in ways that help families in Rhode Island rather than on continuing the disastrous economic policy that got us here in the first place.”
But, the two solons warned, that could be difficult in light of the spending caps included in the Global Medicaid Waiver the Carcieri administration negotiated with the federal government at the end of last year.
“The cap as it is construcrted covers both federal and state contributions” to Medicaid, Reed said. “Ironically, as we add more federal money, that could tend to push us up closer to the cap more quickly. That is a problem inherent in the cap.”
Both Democratic senators brushed off GOP criticism that the stimulus bill requires dangerous amounts of deficit spending.
“All through their control of the White House and Congress,” Reed said, the Republicans “had no qualms about deficit spending for the war in Iraq, no qualms about deficit spending for huge tax cuts that benefitted the wealthy. Now, when we are trying to spend money to benefit families across the country, they suddenly discover deficit spending is a problem. I find that more than ironic.”
Asked about prospects for the bill in the Senate, Reed said flatly, “It has to pass. The final contours of the bill may change, but the need is clear and apparent. He said a conference committee of the House and Senate will synthesize the two versions of the package into a single bill that will pass and go to the president for his signature by the middle of the month.
With all that money flowing from the federal government, down to the states, then to the cities and towns and ultimately to project contractors, Reed said there must be strict accountability. He said there is money in the legislation to “hire auditors so the money can be traced.” That way, he added, “the money can go out quickly and be accounted for properly.”