House-passed Measure Also Includes Tax Credits, Unemployment Extensions and Funding for Additional Police, Teachers and Firefighters - Small Business Administration Loans Guarantee Increased

Washington, D.C.--Congressman Eliot Engel voted today to create jobs in our neighborhoods and boost small businesses by redirecting funds originally targeted to saving the economy from the brink of depression last year. The $75 billion in unused TARP money will be used for infrastructure rebuilding, local hiring and other project to boost our local economies. Infrastructure investment will total $48 billion, and hiring and job training will get $27 billion. An additional $79 billion is included to extend unemployment insurance and other programs to help struggling families. The measure passed the full House by a vote of 217-212.

“Congress acted to prevent the immediate collapse of our economy last year, while it is has not fully recovered and there is much work left to do, the threat of widespread collapse has passed. Now we are sending urgent aid to our small businesses and our neighbors who are struggling to either stay in business or to find employment,” said Rep. Engel. “This legislation puts badly-needed funds into our communities and into the American workforce. The previous Administration left us with a plummeting economy and skyrocketing unemployment, we are only now starting to see beginning of a recovery helping for millions of Americans.”

Here are some of the investments included in the legislation:

• Highways and mass transit – Every $1 billion of federal investment in highways creates an estimated 27,800 jobs. The bill invests $35 billion.
• School renovation – investments in construction, rehabilitation and repair.
• Clean water and housing - $2 billion to help build facilities for clean and safe water and $2 billion to build, preserve and rehabilitate affordable rental homes.
• Teachers - $23 billion to help states save or create an estimated 250,000 education jobs over the next two years.
• Police & Firefighters – Investments in hiring and retaining the bravest and finest.
• Job Training - $2 billion towards training programs to support 25,000 more AmeriCorps volunteers and 250,000 youth summer jobs. It also expands college work study jobs for 250,000 students and training for 150,000 people in high growth industries, such as health care and clean energy jobs.

The package also extends initiatives originally in the Recovery Act designed to help small businesses create jobs. It continues the elimination of fees on Small Business Administration loans (SBA) to make them more affordable, and encourages banks to keep lending to small businesses by raising from 85 to 90 percent the portion of a loan that the SBA will guarantee. These provisions have already supported tens of thousands of loans since the Recovery Act was enacted.

In addition, the legislation also helps those hit the hardest by the recession and who are still searching for employment. The bill invests an additional $79 billion in emergency relief for those out of work and struggling to make ends meet. “This not only helps families in great need, but it also generates a demand for goods and services in the community which will help stimulate our local economy,” said Rep. Engel.

The legislation helps those out of work by:

• Extending unemployment benefits through June 2010, enabling approximately one million Americans to retain their emergency assistance.
• Extending Health Insurance for Unemployed Workers (COBRA) through June 2010. There were about seven million Americans who benefited from this provision in the Recovery Act, and this extension keeps hundreds of thousands covered who were scheduled to lose coverage.
• Protecting Health Care Coverage for Millions through Medicaid (FMAP) by extending the provisions in the Recovery Act which enable states to fund Medicaid for six more months, from December 2010 to June 2011.
• Cutting taxes for the families of 16 million children by making the Child Tax Credit available to all low-income working families with children in 2010.

Rep. Engel added, “There is no silver bullet to fix the economy or solve double-digit unemployment. It requires bills such as this to chip away at the problems until we are thriving once more. I applaud President Obama and my colleagues for creating solutions, rather than relying on the same tired plans which got us in this predicament in the first place.”