Led efforts to enact into federal law tariff relief for high-quality fabrics required by Hickey-Freeman to ensure adequate supplies and competitive prices for the Rochester-based suit manufacturer.

Voted for the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which is benefiting Rochester's many exporting firms.

Led 218 Members of Congress in calling on the Government of Japan to live up to its promises to open Japanese markets to American exports of film, photographic paper and other products. Congresswoman Slaughter continues to work for full access to Japan's markets for American film, photographic paper and other products.

Stood up for FMC Corporation and asked the Secretary of Commerce to stop unfair dumping practices that the Chinese were employing.

Pushed for a hard stance in the Doha Round of trade negotiations to not grant tariff concessions on US imports of fiber optics without securing reciprocal market access.

Introduced legislation to extend the temporary duty reductions and suspensions on wool products.

Supports legislation to deter the smuggling of tobacco products into the United States.

Supported additional pressure be put on the EU to abide by the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Information Technology Agreement (ITA). Rep. Slaughter fought to protect U.S. products that are covered by the ITA from unfair tariffs by the EU.

Assisted area companies in lowering trade barriers here and abroad, including:

• Bausch & Lomb
• GRS
• Harris Corporation
• Lapp Industries
• Minor Shoe
• Redcom Laboratories
• Terry Bicycles
• Xerox
• Kaufman Shoes
• Hickey-Freeman

For 2008, Rep. Slaughter secured $500,000 in 2008 for the City of Buffalo small business program. This money helped to further capitalize and expand the Buffalo Economic Renaissance Corporation’s (BERC) Micro and Small Business Loan Program, which provides start-up and expansion loans to local entrepreneurs who often have difficulty accessing support through more traditional sources. With this funding, in conjunction with millions in local matching funds, BERC committed to providing 113 new loans, totaling over $12 million, over the next three years to small businesses for start-ups and expansions.

Rep. Slaughter also secured $100,000 in fiscal year 2008 for the Urban League of Rochester’s Business Development Division to provide guidance and assistance to Jefferson Avenue businesses beginning this summer. Ensuring that Jefferson Avenue businesses flourish is just one component of the effort to completely revitalize Jefferson Avenue. Recently, the Jefferson Avenue community came together to identify priorities for how the thoroughfare should look and function. Soon, University of Rochester graduate students will conduct an economic analysis, city-hired consultants will create street and infrastructure designs, and finally, a master revitalization plan will be created and implemented.

Rep. Slaughter has a strong record of supporting small businesses, she has:

• Voted for The Small Business Contracting Program Improvements Act, which expands and updates small business programs for veterans, women, and minorities.

• Voted for the Venture Capital tax exclusion, to encourage investment in small innovative companies.

• Supported the permanent extension and 100 percent tax deductibility of health insurance costs for the self-employed.

• Supported judicial review of federal agency compliance with regulatory flexibility requirements. This will allow small businesses to challenge in court new regulations that put special burdens on small businesses.

• Voted for the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act, which strengthens the rights of small businesses in tax cases and makes the IRS more customer-friendly.

• Voted for the Small Business Job Protection Act to provide $19 billion in tax and regulatory relief to small businesses.

Rep. Slaughter has secured more than $22 million in federal funding for Rochester Institute of Technology's Center for Integrated Manufacturing Studies (CIMS). Manufacturing is the second largest employment sector in this area and the foundation of this economy.  CIMS was designed to specifically meet the needs of small and medium sized manufacturing firms to help them adapt and adopt new methods to become more productive and competitive in the world market.  CIMS accomplishes this goal by developing state-of-the-art manufacturing techniques and facilities that local companies can use for prototype research and development.  Sharing these facilities allows a wide range of businesses to develop new products without having to build expensive capital facilities before they are ready to go into full production.

As mentioned above, the Congresswoman was able to secure $2.75 million for a Delphi / Rochester Institute of Technology venture to develop a better fuel cell battery, which will help accelerate the application of SOFC technology into stationary and mobile systems within the U.S. Department of Defense. A SOFC is a highly-efficient electrochemical generator that produces environmentally-friendly electricity directly from currently-available fuels. This work builds upon Delphi’s fuel cell development efforts and will utilize CIMS’ state-of-the-art sensors-monitoring technology to evaluate the quality of fuel-cell powered systems. She also secured $2.4 million for a joint program between Logical Images and the Navy to allow them faster recognition and response to disease conditions, improving the quality of care given and overall health of their personnel.

Over the past years, Rep. Slaughter has secured funds for the Centers of Excellence in Buffalo and Rochester. The Infotonics Center outside Rochester and the Bioinformatics Center at the University of Buffalo bring cutting-edge technology and world-class research scientists to Western New York to help solve some of the worlds most difficult problems.  Since 2001 Rep. Slaughter has brought over $18 million dollars to the area for the Centers for Excellence.

During the 110th Congress, Rep. Slaughter introduced H.R. 5469, Waterfront Brownfields Revitalization Act. This legislation provides support to communities seeking to overcome the unique challenges of revitalizing waterfront brownfield properties. It would establish a pilot program to provide local communities with up to $500,000 to assist and showcase communities that are overcoming the challenges of waterfront brownfields. These grants can be used for reuse planning, design and engineering, technical assistance and capacity building, and waterfront brownfields assessment and cleanup. This pilot program will help lay the ground work for the development and revitalization of waterfront brownfields around the country and helps local communities reconnect with their waterfronts after decades of environmental contamination stemming from our nation’s industrial heritage.

In April, the EPA selected the Village of Youngstown for a brownfields cleanup grant worth $110,000 for hazardous substances. Hazardous substances grant funds will be used to clean up the Youngstown Cold Storage site at 701 Nancy Price Drive. The site was once used to wash, store, and pack locally grown apples. Buildings and soil on the site are contaminated with volatile organic compounds, PCBs, metals, and inorganic contaminants. Grant funds also will be used to support community outreach activities.

I supported H.R. 1 because it both addresses the urgent problems facing our local and national economies, and builds the foundation for real, sustainable growth. This bold recovery plan is designed to create and save jobs; help state and local governments with their budget shortfalls to prevent deep cuts in basic services like health, education, and law enforcement; cut taxes for working families and invest in the long-term health of our economy. With the enactment of this legislation – which passed the House on February 13th, 2009, and was signed into law by the President on February 17th – we have taken a vital first step towards putting our economy back on track.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will:

Create or save 3.5 million jobs over the next two years: Based on an analysis by the Council of Economic Advisers, the legislation will meet the goal of creating or saving at least 3.5 million jobs over the next two years. Jobs created will be in a range of industries from clean energy to health care, with over 90% in the private sector.

Provide direct relief to working and middle class families: The package includes a Making Work Pay tax credit for 95% of workers and their families. In addition, the package provides direct relief for families by expanding unemployment insurance and offering payments to Social Security beneficiaries and veterans. These provisions make up nearly 40% of the package while the vast majority of the remainder is provided in state fiscal relief and investments that also benefit working families.

Prevent Teacher Layoffs, Make Key Education Improvements and Help Make College Affordable: The largest investment in education in our nation’s history, this package provides aid to states to prevent teacher layoffs, invests in the Head Start and Early Head Start programs, provides a new higher education tax cut, and increases college affordability for more than 7 million students by funding the shortfall in Pell Grants and increasing the maximum award level by $500.

Double renewable energy generating capacity over three years: It took 30 years to reach current levels of renewable energy production. This package will double that level over the next three years – enough to power 6 million American homes.

Create a Clean Energy Finance Authority and Renewable Tax Credits that together will leverage an additional $100 billion in private investment in the renewables sector: The finance authority will provide loan guarantees and other financial support to help ease credit constraints for renewable energy investors and catalyze new private sector investment.

Make a $150 billion investment in our nation’s infrastructure – the largest investment since the interstate highway system in the 1950s: It includes historic investments in public transit and high speed rail, an unprecedented effort to upgrade or nation’s electricity grid, and a new initiative to expand broadband coverage throughout the nation. The development of high-speed rail in Upstate New York is one of my top priorities because it will not only address our woeful lack of transportation options but also create good-paying jobs throughout the region.

Protect health care coverage for millions of Americans during this recession: The legislation provides a temporary increase in the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage so that no state has to cut eligibility for Medicaid and SCHIP because of budget shortfalls. This investment will protect roughly 20 million people whose eligibility might otherwise be at risk. It will also generate considerable state economic activity, jobs and wages. Additionally, it will modernize the health care system by catalyzing the adoption of health information technology by 2014, saving us billions of dollars, reducing medical errors and improving quality of care.

Enact the most significant expansion in tax cuts for low- and moderate-income households ever: Under current law, a family of four earning the minimum wage currently lives below the poverty line. Under the plan, that family will be lifted out of poverty by a combination of an $800 Making Work Pay tax credit and $1,200 from an expanded child tax credit. All told, more than 2 million people would be lifted out of poverty by this plan.

This legislation represents the most ambitious effort to stimulate the economy in our nation’s history. Accordingly, the President has made it clear that every taxpayer dollar spent on our economic recovery must be subject to unprecedented levels of transparency and accountability. He has identified five crucial objectives for Federal agencies to ensure that:

• Recovery funds are awarded and distributed in a prompt, fair, and reasonable manner;
• The recipients and uses of all recovery funds are transparent to the public, and that the public benefits of these funds are reported clearly, accurately, and in a timely manner;
• Recovery funds are used for authorized purposes and every step is taken to prevent instances of fraud, waste, error, and abuse;
• Projects funded under the recovery legislation avoid unnecessary delays and cost overruns; and,
• Programs meet specific goals and targets, and contribute to improved performance on broad economic indicators.

I strongly encourage you to visit Recovery.gov, a website that lets you, the taxpayer, figure out where the money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is going. This is your money, and you have a right to know how it is being spent. You can also download from my site a list of specific projects in the 28th District funded by ARRA, which will be updated as new stimulus money reaches the district.

The New York State Department of Transportation has a searchable database of all recovery programs in the state, and a helpful map to see where funds are being used to improve New York's transportation infrastructure.

For information on grants funded by the Recovery Act, you can check http://www.grants.gov/ and http://www.doleta.gov/grants/.

The University of Rochester has a helpful page summarizing its funding from the ARRA.

If you have questions about the new reporting requirements for funding recipients, please visit Recovery.gov

One Year Anniversary Fact Sheets

• Rochester
• Rochester Project List
• Buffalo
• Buffalo Project List
• Niagara Falls
• Niagara Falls Project List

Recent Recovery Spending in the News

• Stimulus Funds Advancing Science in Buffalo, Rochester New York
• Resurfacing work on Route 31F under way
• Civic Center will sport green roof