Saturday, January 12, 2013

Sandy Relief Dwarfs Past Aid Packages

Sandy Relief Dwarfs Past Aid Packages
The measure bill includes $150 million for what the Commerce Department described as fisheries disasters in Alaska, Mississippi and the Northeast, and $50 million in subsidies for replanting trees on private land damaged by wildfires.
....Critics are taking the sharpest aim at $12.1 billion in the amendment for Department of Housing and Urban Development emergency block grants.
Any state struck by a federally declared major disaster in 2011, 2012 or this year would qualify for the grants, and that's just about all the states, said Stephen Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group.
Only South Carolina, Arizona and Michigan would not qualify, he said.

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