For Immediate Release
July 15, 2009
Contact:Luke Esser
425-460-0570
Wash. State Ferries Receive No Funding from Federal Porkulus Bill
“We have the largest ferry fleet in America and we didn’t get anything. I don’t get it.”
--Gov. Christine Gregoire, Seattle Times, July 15, 2009
Bellevue, WA…In response to a front page Seattle Times report today detailing how the state with the “No. 1 ferry system” in the nation received almost nothing in a just-announced federal allocation of ferry funding, WSRP Chairman Luke Esser issued the following statement:
"Patty Murray and Christine Gregoire are two of our state’s most notorious advocates for big government, and big government spending. The bloated federal Porkulus Bill (a.k.a. the “Stimulus Bill”) was rammed through Congress earlier this year with Murray helping lead the charge in the Senate. But so far, only pennies of the big bucks Murray promised and Gregoire hoped to steer back to Washington State have materialized. Back in February, the Gregoire Administration bragged that they could get a half to a third of the total ferry funding laid out in the Porkulus Bill. Now, however, the reality is that Skagit County got one small project and the Washington State Ferries received absolutely nothing. It’s time to reform out-of-control government spending and our broken budgeting processes, but we won’t get any real reform as long as Murray and Gregoire remain at the helm.”
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