More than 900 North Texans attend workshops

Dallas, TX – Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson today hosted two economic recovery workshops in Dallas.  The first workshop, the “Roadmap to Recovery” workshop, was designed to educate North Texans on how to access economic recovery funding.  Representatives of financial organizations and federal and state agencies discussed funding opportunities and answered attendees’ questions.  The second workshop, the “EBJ Highway to Recovery” workshop, was targeted to female, minority and veteran small business owners and focused on state transportation economic recovery projects.  More than 900 North Texans attended the workshops.

“I was the only member of Congress from North Texas to vote for the economic recovery package,” Congresswoman Johnson said during the first workshop.  “I held this one-stop workshop to educate my constituents on how to apply for and receive federal funding.”

The “Roadmap to Recovery” workshop had more than 750 attendees and was composed of three panels of speakers and a question-and-answer session.  John Podvin, an attorney at Haynes and Boone, LLP, discussed the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) and the newly-created Public-Private Investment Program (PPIP).  Other panelists included representatives of the Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Greater Dallas, the Dallas Small Business Development Center and the following federal agencies:

• Internal Revenue Service
• Taxpayer Advocate Service
• Texas Department of Transportation
• U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
• U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
• U.S. Department of Labor
• U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
• U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
• U.S. General Services Administration
• U.S. Small Business Administration
• U.S. Social Security Administration

Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert also spoke at the first workshop.

At the “EBJ Highway to Recovery” workshop, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) provided a 45-minute overview of economic recovery projects in North Texas, and TxDOT and the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) held one-on-one sessions with workshop participants.  Approximately 200 North Texans attended the workshop.

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U.S. Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson is the highest-ranking Texan on the House Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure and a senior member of the Science Committee. She represents the 30th Congressional District of Texas, which, includes Downtown Dallas, Fair Park, Oak Lawn, Old East Dallas, Pleasant Grove, & South Oak Cliff; all of Balch Springs, DeSoto, Hutchins, Lancaster & Wilmer and parts of Cedar Hill, Duncanville, Ferris, Glenn Heights and Ovilla.