Reforming Congress

FY 2010 Appropriations Requests

I am pleased that President Obama and the House leadership are taking earmark reform seriously.  We live in the information age and there is no reason why taxpayers shouldn’t have open and unfettered access to see how their tax money is being spent before it is actually spent.  Subjecting earmarks for private companies to a competitive bidding process is a huge improvement over the current system, as is requiring offices to post ALL earmarks online 48 hours before a vote.

While this is a good start, further reforms are absolutely necessary if we are truly going to rid the earmark process of cronyism and corruption.  Today, I handed President Obama a letter outlining three such reforms:

• Adding teeth to the guidelines to hold lawmakers responsible
  when they violate the rules

• Reviewing past earmarks to make sure that money was spent
  exactly as Congress intended

• Incorporating all lawmakers’ earmark requests into a single
  searchable database so interested parties don’t have to
  search 535 different websites.

To inject additional accountability into the process, in my district I have convened a Citizens Oversight Panel to review, in public forums, all appropriation requests that come into my office.  By including constituents at the earliest stages of the decision-making process, I hope to show that - at least in the 12th District of California - politics and favoritism play no part in deciding which requests are worthwhile projects for our communities and our country.