"Ready to Go" Projects

[southernskye]

The U.S. Conference of Mayors, apparently not wanting to miss out on whatever monies could possibly be thrown to their respective cities by an Obama administration as part of its new New Deal, has hastily thrown together an incredible list of thousands of projects which are "Ready to Go", with info on funding requirements and jobs created by each project.
(See the PDF file for more information.)

Moore , Norman and Tulsa are the only OK cities on the list. I would think OKC would have several road projects that could be funded with this money.

[Kerry]

FYI - Obama has no plans to follow thru on the infrastructure improvements. Even if he did, the feds are out of cash. Job one for Obama is to save the UAW.

[PLANSIT]

^Source?

There is a concerted effort by the MPO in this area to have a list ready for state approval by tomorrow. The state is looking to have their list ready by the first of the year.

[shane453]

I see Ponca City but there are no Oklahoma City projects that I could find on the PDF. Which is weird because OKC (Mick) is a big deal in US Conference of Mayors.

[BDP]

Maybe he's just trying to stay Republican.

[bretthexum]

Good god. Can we have ONE thread without bashing Obama, especially with statements that have no base?

[mecarr]

FYI - Obama has no plans to follow thru on the infrastructure improvements.

What are you talking about? Your statement is completely glib. If you've heard any news beyond what may be on Fox, you'd understand that the main arc of Obama's economic strategy is to invest in this country's infrastructure, including rebuiliding bridges, roads and schools.

[shane453]

Maybe he's just trying to stay Republican.

Well public works is a lot more non-partisan than corporate "bailouts." However, there were some states/cities with serious budget issues clamoring for bailouts, and I'm not sure about something like that- Pay for projects, but don't give any budget correcting checks to local governments from the fed.

----

I bet OKC will be adding some projects to that list before inauguration though.

Tulsa has some interesting programs on there, including

MPOWER Youth (Mayor's Program for Opportunity, Work, Education and Recreation) ‐ Youth job program (ages 16 ‐ 22) in coordination with local companies in manufacturing, green jobs, and construction. Provides at risk youth employment training

and "strategic property acquisition" in the downtown area (we could use something like that for the C2S park)

[jbrown84]

Why is "Heartland Flyer extension to Kansas" listed under Norman?

Other states have dozens and dozens of items and we only have maybe 40 or 50.

[shane453]

^^ Because other states are really extremely desperate, and we aren't so bad off.

[LordGerald]

The list is not complete. The final list will include OKC and OK Co. projects.

[soonerguru]

Kerry,

The Feds may be "out of cash," but it's not stopping them from giving billions and billions of money for bailouts. They'll just print more.

Your post seems bitter and is fundamentally inaccurate. Obviously, you cannot hide your contempt for Obama but our state stands to gain from the stimulus package, as we have three major interstate highways crisscrossing, that's right, right here in OKC. Or maybe you would rather Obama just send that money to other states for their projects? I'm sure Benham Company and many other contractors that could be put to work tomorrow rebuilding these highways would prefer to work WITH the new president instead of sucking their thumbs because their desired candidate lost.

Question: where is Mick in all of this? The OKC Chamber? My friend and I were talking about this just yesterday. Couldn't we consider the new boulevard for this? Or a rail project? The infrastructure money is going to flow. It is a certainty at this point. We need someone making our case for it, NOW! We don't have Ernest Istook to deny it for us anymore!

[LordGerald]

Kerry,

The Feds may be "out of cash," but it's not stopping them from giving billions and billions of money for bailouts. They'll just print more.

Your post seems bitter and is fundamentally inaccurate. Obviously, you cannot hide your contempt for Obama but our state stands to gain from the stimulus package, as we have three major interstate highways crisscrossing, that's right, right here in OKC. Or maybe you would rather Obama just send that money to other states for their projects? I'm sure Benham Company and many other contractors that could be put to work tomorrow rebuilding these highways would prefer to work WITH the new president instead of sucking their thumbs because their desired candidate lost.

Question: where is Mick in all of this? The OKC Chamber? My friend and I were talking about this just yesterday. Couldn't we consider the new boulevard for this? Or a rail project? The infrastructure money is going to flow. It is a certainty at this point. We need someone making our case for it, NOW! We don't have Ernest Istook to deny it for us anymore!

The Chamber and the City are heavily involved. Just because they haven't had a press conference or issued a statement doesn't mean that they aren't working on it. The list ultimately will come from ODOT.

The Boulevard is not "ready to go," so it won't make the list. There are dozens of OKC projects that will be included on the list. Everybody needs to relax and wait until Jan. 20.

[Kerry]

Change you hope to believe in. I am not bitter about Obama being President - he is going to be just as ineffective as I thought he would be. Let me ask you though - where are these millions of construction workers going to come from? This is not 1935 when 90% of the work force worked in labor oriented trades. Todays workers exist in the information age. Do you think the 35,000 people being laid off from Bank of America with college degrees are going to start building roads?

1. We don't have the money
2. We don't have the workers.
3. Even if they built all of the road, bridges, and water projects - what are we going to do when they are done - just keep building more.

BTW - I hope you don't really believe the Fed is just printing more money to cover the costs. If they did that then inflation would go through the roof and we would be back in the Carter years.

[USG '60]

Inflation WILL go through the roof........darn it.

[venture]

All i see from those complaining are just...well complaints. What are you ideas to fix this mess? Right now Oklahoma isn't hurting, but there are many areas with 8-10% or more unemployment rates with people that are will to work and do whatever they can to feed their families. You would be amazed what happens when things get desperate. If rebuilding the nation's infrastructure is the way to help get us through this downturn, then so be it.

Things will catch up to us here before too long, and hopefully you aren't in the position of worrying about being laid off or how to pay your bills next month.

[Superhyper]

I find it interesting that everyone makes the (correct) point that rebuilding infrastructure is good for generating jobs, but no one mentions the fact that we actually need to rebuild our infrastructure just for the sake of doing so. Crumbling bridges, collapsed highways, and slow-as-molasses rail service do not make for a thriving first world economy. As for you Mr. Kerry, i'm glad your crystal ball has such impeccable accuracy that you can make such bold statements. I suppose you saw the morbid disaster of the last 8 years coming too? Give the guy a chance, he's not going to be perfect, but neither would anyone else. I don't see you or anyone else throwing out any better ideas.

[Kerry]

All i see from those complaining are just...well complaints. What are you ideas to fix this mess? Right now Oklahoma isn't hurting, but there are many areas with 8-10% or more unemployment rates with people that are will to work and do whatever they can to feed their families. You would be amazed what happens when things get desperate. If rebuilding the nation's infrastructure is the way to help get us through this downturn, then so be it.

Things will catch up to us here before too long, and hopefully you aren't in the position of worrying about being laid off or how to pay your bills next month.

My plan for getting us out of the economic crisis - tax cuts across the board: personal income taxes, corporate taxes, capital gains taxes. The country needs cash flow - not low interest loans, bailouts, make work jobs, etc. Until capital is freed up we will never recover.

[PLANSIT]

My plan for getting us out of the economic crisis - tax cuts across the board: personal income taxes, corporate taxes, capital gains taxes. The country needs cash flow - not low interest loans, bailouts, make work jobs, etc. Until capital is freed up we will never recover.

Give the man a job! Haha

[Midtowner]

With my student loans, I hope we have massive inflation.

When I'm making $100,000/hour, my massive student loan debt won't seem so massive.

Of course, a loaf of bread will probably cost $5,000 or so.... at least we can get rid of those damned pennies!

[mecarr]

My plan for getting us out of the economic crisis - tax cuts across the board: personal income taxes, corporate taxes, capital gains taxes. The country needs cash flow - not low interest loans, bailouts, make work jobs, etc. Until capital is freed up we will never recover.

Seriously? More tax cuts? Why is tax cuts Republican's answer for every problem? We definitely need a economic stimulus. However, people and businesses are afraid to spend and invest right now. Thus, government needs to start spending money on things that create jobs, like projects relating to infrastructure.

[Kerry]

Seriously? More tax cuts? Why is tax cuts Republican's answer for every problem?

Because tax cuts work every time they are tried.

The problem with government spending is 3 fold. First, when the government spends money the money supply shrinks by about $2.30 for every dollar it spends. When the private sector spends that same dollar the money supply increases by about $4.50.

Second, government spending doesn't contribute to the GDP. When I buy a Whirlpool washing machine the purchase goes into the gross domestic product. An item was manufactured and sold. When the government taxes me the federal government doesn't produce anything in exchange for the money. A recession is when we have negative economic growth for 2 quarters. How are we going to get out of the recession if the government keeps driving down the GDP?

Third, at what point does the federal government stop paying for the make work jobs. After the great depression the make work jobs lasted 10 years until WWII (and some are still going strong). Are we going to be providing make work jobs until 2019 or longer?

Take a look at world history. Which countries do better, ones with high taxes or ones with low taxes? Even Obama said today that tax cuts were going to be part of his $trillion stimulus plan and already backed of his "tax the rich" pledge. Obama might be a lot of things but he isn't stupid.

[jbrown84]

If we're going to do New Deal 2.0, let's bring back the CCC and have them upgrade our National and State parks, which are in dire need of improvements.

[venture]

Kerry thanks for the response. Too often people on here when challenged just do nothing but fling the same crap they always do.

I agree with you as far as tax cuts go that do help out. I think we've all see how the bailouts didn't do what they were suppose to. The grand "public" hope was giving the banks money they would feel safe to loan money again. Instead, all they are doing is using it to pay down debt or to sit on the cash and haven't opened their pockets at all. Honestly, the banking situation was done completely wrong. I'm not wanting to get into a debate on crap home loans and stuff. However, they should have forced a complete overhaul of these institutions much like they want from the car makers.

1 - Secure getting lines of credit open again for those that can afford it.
2 - Get lines of credit flowing for new or growing small businesses.
3 - Refine the personal and small business banking system. Look everyone is responsible for balancing their checking account and such. However, even I have run into an issue where a check hit twice, taking my account too low to cover bills done on autopay. What resulted was those lovely NSF fees for a couple bills, and some fast food charges using my bank card.

Expanding a bit on this last point. Right now in that situation you are going to get hit with a fee for each charge, no matter the amount, that is anywhere from $25 to $39 each. One of the charges I had was for Sonic for like $8. That meal ended up costing me almost $40. The banks consider these NSF coverages as courtesies and pretty much instant loans. If i'm trying to charge something to my credit card that is over because a payment hasn't it, i'm required to call them and ask them to let the charge go through. Checking cards...not so much.

So my solution there would be to eliminate all these courtesy NSF coverage programs and require the customer to give verbal authorization to have the charge go through. I'm pretty good at know to the penny what I have available, some don't...but really things shouldn't be setup to make it easy for people to mess up. The other thing would be restricting the amount of the NSF fees. It can be no more than 100% of the total amount of the transaction up to $39 and it is capped there. If the bank doesn't want to offer coverage above that, that is their choice. Banks of course would hate this because, especially now, they are making TONS of cash on these fees.

The other point I made is the credit lines for small business. I work two jobs. One is for another company, the other is my own. I could be doing so much more if a line of credit was available for me. Unfortunately this company is fairly new and I shy away from doing any personal guarantees - I learned that lesson fast about 15 years ago with my first company. So I just make do with what I can, and hold off on any expansion abilities until the cash is on hand first. Not really a bad thing.

Last part I'll hit on is the tax stuff. I like Obama's idea for cutting taxes for everyone making less than $200K/yr. Right now i'm in that bracket and it would help me. When I jump over that, which only takes one unexpected large deal in my line of work (computer/software wholesale/resale)...I still won't mind since if I'm making more, I expect to pay more. Will I be happy about it, probably not.

I have always liked the idea of a simplified tax code that gets us away from double taxation. I don't really like that I'm losing about 25% of my gross pay off the bat. Then another 7% or so for anything I buy. If i wanted to buy a third of my pay right away, I would be donating it to a charity that I know will use it for something good. Not so much that it goes to help bailout people making 10-100x what I am that don't really worry about any of their bills day to day.

But alas these are the choices in our lives and I picked my path and wouldn't do any different. However, back on topic a bit, if we are stuck in the situation of the government blowing a ton of China's money...then if it is going to go to rebuilding roads, railroads, the power grid, etc...and it puts Americans back to work - go for it.

[PennyQuilts]

I'm also wondering who is going to be doing all this work on the infrastructure. A lot of young people who aren't working aren't working for a reason - criminal background, drug use (and presumably there will be drug tests to get the jobs). In my work, some of my kids try to get into Job Corps, which is a domestic program a little like Peace Corps only in the US. Sounds great but to tell the truth, I hate seeing my kids go in. It is full of thugs. Those are the kids who can't find a job. Some of my kids do okay but the majority just end up hanging with their thug friends and drop out, eventually.

If a young person has a strong back and a clean record, they are usually working, anyway, for more money than the government can provide. The older people who have lost their jobs are less likely to be the ones to get out and dig ditches but they could if they wanted to, I guess. Just how much money is the government planning on paying these folks? We don't have money for big salaries on a grand scale.

Face it, there were a lot of promises made that got people excited that their lives were going to get better because it would be laid out for them like a banquet - they were going to get jobs, their mortgages covered, student loans in place, etc. I don't know how in the world this is going to be paid for unless people are willing to work practically for their keep. We simply aren't in a Great Depression economy where people lack a safety net for such things as food and shelter and are willing to work just to have a roof over their head and a chicken in the pot. People these days want electronics, McMansions and movie tickets. You really can't compare their wants with the CCC ers's needs. Most people "depending" on a public works program don't even bother to grow a garden to help defray their domestic food costs.

I posted on another thread that I needed coffee and was cranky this morning. I have had coffee but I am still cranky...