House Defense Appropriations Chairman John Murtha, D-Pa., is known as one of the biggest porkers in Congress. He brought home $192 million in earmarks in fiscal year 2008 alone. The
Washington Post investigated one of Murtha's big projects, an airport in Johnstown, Pa. recently named after him, that has received $200 million in federal funding in the last ten years. The airport was also one of the first “shovel-ready” projects to receive stimulus funding in the form of $800,000 to pave a secondary runway.
The Post describes the kind of traffic the John Murtha Johnstown-Cambria County Airport sees on a typical day:
Inside the terminal on a recent weekday, four passengers lined up to board a flight, outnumbered by seven security staff members and supervisors, all suited up in gloves and uniforms to screen six pieces of luggage. For three hours that day, no commercial or private planes took off or landed. Three commercial flights leave the airport on weekdays, all bound for Dulles International Airport.
The lack of passengers makes no difference to Murtha, who personally benefits from the use of the airport while he is campaigning. He claims he is trying to create jobs and attract businesses to the area. But the Post reports the millions being poured into the airport hasn't translated into increased traffic:
The airport's passenger count has fallen by more than half in the past 10 years. When Johnstown native Bill Previte arrived on a recent morning, he lamented that his plane was half-empty and that the terminal was deserted.
"Doesn't it seem kind of ridiculous to have a motorized carousel for the baggage claim when 15 people get off the airplane?" he said. "It's obvious: There's not enough population to justify this place."
Mr. Previte is right, the public funding for Murtha's pet project is ridiculous and unjustifiable. It is the perfect example of why earmarks are wasteful. Instead of consideration being given to the merit and worth of a project, earmarks are funded based on political clout and seniority, which Murtha has in spades.
Earmarks are often the subject of shady dealings and abuse. According to the Post:
[Murtha's] pattern of steering millions in earmarks to defense contractors who give to his campaign and hire his allies as lobbyists is being scrutinized by the FBI as part of an investigation of a lobbying firm led by one of Murtha's closest friends.
The John Murtha Airport is a part of this pattern. Murtha has steered $23 million since 2001 to a defense contractor, a subsidiary of which was recently hired to manage the airport. That subsidiary had also hired a lobbying firm with connections to Murtha’s brother and a former aide.
So while Murtha hands out earmarks to his family and friends while funding a ghost-town of an airport, taxpayers are stuck footing the bill. Will politicians like Murtha ever give up their pork? When pigs fly.
(Watch a related video report, put together over 2 years ago, exposing yet another earmark misstep.)