Faced with a congressional freeze on earmarks, two U.S. representatives from Jacksonville found a novel path to House approval for a $35 million project at Jacksonville's port.
The city and port have lobbied intensely for a fix at Mile Point, the place where strong cross-currents from the Intracoastal Waterway hinder passage of big cargo container ships through the federal ship channel at the port.
But the lobbying kept running against the congressional ban on earmarks, the term for Congress directing federal money for specific local projects.
Corrine Brown, a Democrat, and Ander Crenshaw, a Republican, threaded the needle by quietly getting House approval for authorizing the Army Corps of Engineers to do the Mile Point project.
But the authorization stipulates only local and state money — not federal dollars — would pay for it. If the Senate agrees to that approach and likewise supports the amendment, it would be a case of Congress finding ways to move local projects forward despite the earmarks ban.
Brown recalled that before the House voted, she and Crenshaw agreed there was no need to call attention to the measure, inserted as an amendment into a defense spending bill.
"I said, 'I hadn't really planned on talking about it because you don't want the others to know what you're doing,' " Brown said of their conversation.
"The Bible says there's a time and place for everything," Crenshaw said of the strategy. "In politics you learn that's true as well. Sometimes it's best to speak up. Sometimes it's best to keep quiet."
It's not a secret now. Crenshaw and Brown both issued news releases after the House passed the measure, and they have called on the Senate to follow suit.
Crenshaw said because the amendment rules out federal money for the project, it complies with House rules and his opposition to earmarks. Although he has supported earmarks for the port in the past, he voted for the earmark moratorium in 2010 and, like fellow Republican Rep. Cliff Stearns, will support continuing the moratorium if re-elected.
Brown favors lifting the moratorium. She argues port projects go through extensive Army Corps of Engineers studies, and after the corps determines projects are justified, congressional representatives should have the power to direct federal funding to them.
She said representatives best understand the needs for their districts, and the port "can generate thousands and thousands of jobs in Jacksonville."
Both said they would still go to bat for local projects by asking agency administrators to fund them.
Before the moratorium, House and Senate members used earmarks to direct money toward local projects in their home districts: roadwork, transit upgrades, military base improvements, restoring sand to eroded shorelines, local government services and nonprofits.
Historically, most corps projects were done through earmarks. Jacksonville Port Authority officials want Congress to end the earmarks ban, arguing it cuts off a major source of funding for ports.
In light of the ban, JaxPort has been looking for alternative, private sources of money. State Rep. Lake Ray, R-Jacksonville. has said the state will pay for Mile Point. But Jacksonville still will need to kick in several hundred million dollars to deepen the ship channel.
Jacksonville attorney George Gabel, who heads the Chamber of Commerce committee that promotes international trade, said the backlash against earmarks has gone too far.
"We're falling behind the rest of the world," Gabel said of spending on transportation projects. "We're limping along. Congress, as far as I'm concerned, needs to do its job and not be afraid of any criticism that one community might be favored over another."
Two government watchdog organizations opposed to earmarks differ on whether the Mile Point amendment pushed by Brown and Crenshaw is an earmark.
Taxpayers for Common Sense policy analyst Josh Sewell said it's an "authorization earmark" and it doesn't belong in a defense bill.
"This isn't a national security issue," he said. "This is navigational infrastructure."
He said the right way to authorize port projects is through a water resources development act, but Congress hasn't figured out how to assemble such a bill without using earmarks. The last water act was passed in 2007.
Tom Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, took a different tack. He said Mile Point isn't an earmark because it rules out using federal money. He said that should be the precedent for future water projects — Congress should have a role in authorizing them after federal studies, but local and state governments should pay for construction.
"In our view, it's a better way to approach these types of expenditures," he said.
U.S. Rep. John Mica, whose district includes St. Johns County, said the lack of earmarks has made it harder as chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to win passage this year of a new transportation bill.
But he said he is confident Congress can pass a bill with the rules currently in place. The previous major transportation bill had 6,300 earmarks in it, but the current legislation has none, he said.
He said Congress might reconsider earmarks in 2013 by establishing requirements for public vetting of them.
"There would be no 'airdrops,' " he said. "Those were earmarks that were not in a House bill, not in a Senate bill, and suddenly appeared without hearings. That's what upset people."
With ban on earmarks in Congress, Jacksonville's politicians get creative (Florida Times-Union)
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