As President Barack Obama neared the end of his FL town hall appearance today on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan, news broke that the economic stimulus bill had successfully cleared the Senate by a vote of 61 to 37.
Now comes the hard part: reaching a deal with the House on the stimulus in time to meet Obama's goal of completing negotiations to get the legislation to his desk for his signature before the Presidents' Day recess on February 16. To help speed up the process, the leadership has opted for a very limited number of senators to be represented in the talks: Majority Leader Harry Reid; Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus and Appropriations Chairman Daniel Inouye. Conferencing for the GOP will be Sens. Charles Grassley, the top Republican on the Finance panel, and Thad Cochran, the top Republican on the Appropriations Committee.
''I know Fort Myers had the highest foreclosure rate in the nation last year,'' Obama said to his town hall audience Tuesday. ``I know entire neighborhoods are studded with foreclosure signs, and families across this city feel like they're losing their foothold in the American Dream...So we are going to do everything we can to help responsible homeowners here in Fort Myers and other hard-hit communities stay in their homes.''
SEIU to Conferees on Recovery Bill: Don't Shortchange Working People
Last week SEIU Local 1984 member Jess Paul was invited to share her story about how she was about to be laid off by the State of New Hampshire.
It happened to her and in today's economy, it could happen to you too if we don't stand together. SEIU members were with President Obama when he was a candidate for President and we're with him now that he is President. That's why our members are in Washington DC, lobbying their congressional representatives on the importance of passing the economic stimulus bill. Thousands of SEIU members this week are making calls, sending emails, and making visits to Capitol Hill to urge House-Senate conferees to complete work on a comprehensive economic plan for working people in America as quickly as they did to bail out Wall Street.
"Now is not the time to allow further job losses or cuts in vital public services, and now is not the time to draw arbitrary limits on the overall size of this legislation," SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger said, referring to differences between the House and Senate versions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that could mean an estimated 600,000 in additional job losses. Burger and SEIU President Andy Stern are calling on Congress and the administration to include in the economic recovery plan:
- significant relief to state and local governments to preserve and rebuild crucial services and good jobs, including the FMAP increase, state stabilization and education funding contained in the House bill;
- major spending on infrastructure projects that are ready to go and others that with help create jobs and bolster local communities in the long-term; and
- spending on innovations in training for health care and energy workers, sectors of our economy that are growing and sustainable and will lead to high-paying careers for workers competing in a global economy.
SEIU is also urging conferees to scale back tax provisions that add to the overall cost of the package but do not provide sufficient stimulus and do not provide targeted relief to working and middle-class families.
Find out more
* Details on the differences between the two stimulus packages
*Check out live blogging from the town hall at WhiteHouse.gov.
* Remarks of President Obama in Fort Myers.
