WASHINGTON — Members of Congress no longer may be able to direct federal money to projects back home because of a moratorium on legislative earmarks, but that hasn't stopped them from trying.
A coalition of budget watchdog groups says that in the absence of earmarks, the legislative tools that let members attach pet projects to bills, lawmakers appear to have found a backdoor method: special funds in spending and authorization bills that allow them to direct money to projects in their states.
"We thought we'd gotten rid of earmarks," said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group in Washington that is part of the coalition. "But it looks like Congress has just moved on to other methods that are less transparent than the old way, like creating these slush funds."
The latest example, the groups say, is the recently passed budget for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Budget documents show that Congress included 26 different funds — totaling $507 million — for the corps to spend on various construction, maintenance and other projects that were not included in President Barack Obama's budget or the final spending bill.
The funds were financed by reducing money for projects included in the president's budget request and adding $375 million to the corps budget, documents show.
Congress also gave the corps criteria to use in selecting projects and instructed it to report within 45 days about how it intends to spend the money from the funds, according to the budget documents. On Monday, the corps will release the list of projects it plans to finance.
The watchdog groups, which include the conservative National Taxpayers Union and Americans for Tax Reform, note that the 26 new corps funds add up to nearly the same amount as the earmarks in the 2010 budget. The funds are listed in the House and Senate joint report that accompanies the spending bill, but they are not in the text of the bill, one of the ways Congress used to add earmarks.
And despite a big budget deficit and calls to reduce government spending, lawmakers actually added more to the corps budget than the Obama administration had requested.
Critics say the special funds in the corps budget are the latest example of members of Congress trying to circumvent the earmark ban to funnel money to their districts, in the form of corps engineering projects. In the absence of earmarks, lawmakers have tried pressing agencies for money or in some cases threatened to tie up Congress if projects are not financed.
For example, in 2010 Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham threatened to block Obama administration appointments unless money was provided for a harbor dredging project in his home state of South Carolina.
Will Hollier, a lobbyist and former congressional staff member, said the financing maneuver used for the Army Corps of Engineers might simply be Congress' way of adjusting to the new realities in Washington.
"I think Congress is now starting to see that they simply can't give up their responsibilities and leave everything to the administration," Hollier said. "It's their way of trying to be relevant in the post-earmark era."
Last year, the House Armed Services Committee created a $1 billion special fund in the defense authorization bill that allowed members to add amendments that directed money to projects in their districts. Lawmakers said the amendments were not earmarks because recipients would have to compete for the money.
But a report by the staff of Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., found that 115 of the 225 amendments added had previously been earmarks. Several of the amendments were added by freshman Republicans who had campaigned against earmarks. The fund was heavily criticized, and the amendments were stripped from the bill.
Robert Dillon, a spokesman for the Senate Energy and National Resources Committee, which overseas the Corps of Engineers, denied that the agency's budget had been derived through earmarks by another name.
"These are not earmarks," Dillon said. "Unlike earmarks, the funds are not directed to a particular project by a single member of Congress."
The funds, he added, were for projects that were not in the president's budget or had not been adequately funded. "The president sent over his budget, and Congress disagreed with some of his funding priorities," Dillon said.
But Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense said Congress had added other criteria, like the number of jobs provided, which makes it easier for members to force the corps to pursue what he called questionable projects that were previously financed only through earmarks.
John Paul Woodley Jr., a former Defense Department undersecretary who oversaw the corps, said it was unusual for Congress to use added jobs as a criterion for corps projects.
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