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Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison Secures Funding for Project ARRIBA March 11, 2009 
Sen. Hutchison Secures $380,000 for El Paso Area ProjectsWASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Texas' senior Senator, today announced the Fiscal Year 2009 Omnibus Appropriations bill includes $285,000 that she secured for the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at El Paso and $95,000 for Project ARRIBA. The legislation provides full year funding for various government departments, agencies and priority programs. "Project ARRIBA and the Center for Border Health Research are important El Paso projects," said Sen. Hutchison. "I am pleased to support such endeavors through this bill." The Center for Border Health Research at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at El Paso will use the funding to hasten clinical testing of promising new treatments for common lung diseases, and improve lung disease outcomes and quality of life for thousands of afflicted Americans. Funding to Project ARRIBA will help provide long term high-skilled training and case management services to eligible El Paso residents who require the occupational skills necessary to access jobs in hard to fill demand occupations that pay a living wage of at least $10.50 per hour. Though Sen. Hutchison is pleased that she was able to secure significant funding for many deserving projects in Texas, she voted against the final bill due to the fact that it grew by more than 8% compared to FY '08 levels, including duplicative and unnecessary spending on 122 projects and agencies recently funded by the Stimulus bill. At a time when American families are facing tough economic decisions, she believes Congress should show spending restraint. Sen. Hutchison introduced an amendment that would have sent the Omnibus back to the Appropriations Committee to reduce the bill to the overall spending level approved by Congress in Fiscal Year 2008, with adjustments made for inflation. While the measure would not have dictated how the Omnibus funding was redistributed to meet the FY 2008 level, the amendment would have required offsets from accounts that have already been funded in the recently-passed Stimulus bill. Sen. Hutchison's motion failed to pass by a vote of 40-55. "My amendment would have told the American people that Congress is ready to show fiscal responsibility," said Sen. Hutchison. "While I'm disappointed that the Senate was unwilling to make modest, common sense cuts and do away with billions of dollars of wasteful, duplicative spending, I worked hard on the Appropriations Committee to ensure as many meritorious Texas projects as possible were able to receive federal funding." |