[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 14534]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        THE EDA ELIMINATION ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Kansas (Mr. Pompeo) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POMPEO. Mr. Speaker, since coming to Congress 9 years ago, I have 
sadly relearned that the government in Washington D.C. only grows and 
grows and grows. When Democrats and many Republicans, too, come to the 
floor of the House and talk about spending cuts, they are often talking 
simply about slowing the rate of growth of government. There is seldom, 
if ever, any real discussion about cutting the size of the Federal 
Government or about eliminating an entire program or agency. But today, 
with $14.8 trillion in debt, we can't continue to simply slow the rate 
of growth. We've got to cut it, and we've got to get rid of some 
things.
  As a first step this week, I will proffer a bill that will eliminate 
the Economic Development Agency. It's part of the Department of 
Commerce and was established in 1965 as an element of President 
Johnson's Great Society. For over 45 years, the EDA has spent billions 
on local projects, not national projects, trying to pick winners and 
losers amongst various projects by region, industry, and community. 
Much like a stimulus bill or earmarks, the EDA provides loans and 
grants to pet projects of the administration in power.
  In 2008, the EDA spent $2 million on the Harry Reid Research and 
Technology Park at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Just last year, 
it spent $25 million on the Global Climate Mitigation Incentive Fund. 
This year, the agency will spend almost $300 million of taxpayer 
dollars. Now, this might not sound like a lot of money sometimes here 
in Washington, D.C., but in Newton, in Independence, in Wichita, and in 
Goddard, Kansas, that's still a lot of money.
  I want to take just a minute to talk about the EDA. Most folks in 
Congress and most folks back in Kansas will have never heard of it. I 
had not before I entered Congress. It provides these grants and loans 
to projects it selects all over the country. At its very core, the EDA 
is nothing more than a giant wealth redistribution machine. It takes 
money from people in one place and at one time and redistributes it all 
across the country for inherently local projects.
  For example, it gave $2 million to the ``culinary amphitheater,'' 
wine tasting room, and gift shop in Washington State. It gave $350,000 
to renovate a theater in Colorado. In 2011, it gave $1.4 million to 
build infrastructure development so that a steel plant of $1.6 billion 
could be built in Minnesota. Like the vast majority of projects, that 
steel plant would have been built without Federal taxpayer dollars. It 
was a $1.6 billion project helped by the Federal Government to the tune 
of only $1.4 million.
  Our even bigger problem, however, is with EDA. It's duplicative. It's 
just one of at least 80 Federal economic development agencies. HUD and 
Ag and HHS all have economic development grants as well.
  Second, it's ineffective. It typically provides a very small part of 
any given project. The GAO reports that most of its financing did not 
have any significant effect on the success of projects and produced, at 
best, inconclusive results and, in some cases, may even detract from a 
more flexible workforce.
  Third, this is an incredibly wasteful agency. It was identified by 
GAO as one of the agencies that ought to go away. Indeed, a recent 
inspector general audit of 10 projects totaling $45 million showed that 
29 percent of the grant money had been wasted due to various violations 
of EDA grant requirements. Four of the 10 projects EDA funded in that 
group were never completed.
  Finally and perhaps more importantly, this is not the role of the 
Federal Government. As the Cato Institute has written, the Federal 
Government has no business trying to direct economic activity through 
politicized subsidy vehicles like the EDA. We've seen that with bad 
outcomes, like with Solyndra, only too recently.
  Every great journey starts with a single step. This is a small 
agency, but it's time for the first time in decades that we eliminate 
an entire program, an entire agency, so that it cannot continue to grow 
and grow and grow as part of our Federal Government. I would ask my 
colleagues to support the EDA Elimination Act.

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