The battle over earmarks
Redmond company may get $2.5 million
By Keith Chu / The Bulletin
Published: May 01. 2010 4:00AM PSTWASHINGTON — With an election looming, Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. House are battling over who will be toughest on federal pork. But there’s one thing they both agree on: Earmarks that benefit for-profit companies need to go.
But while House members said cutting back on that pork will eliminate the potential for corruption, most U.S. senators haven’t signed on to the earmark restrictions. Oregon’s senators have requested tens of millions of dollars worth of earmarks for for-profit companies, including at least three in Central Oregon.
One local company that would be affected by an earmark ban is WaveTech Engines, a one-man Redmond firm that’s trying to develop a new, highly efficient engine. The company has a design that’s gotten good early reviews from technical advisers, but it hasn’t been able to get the funding to turn the design into a marketable product, said owner Brad Raether.
“The problem the WaveTech engine has in today’s financial markets is it’s really hard to get funding to bring technology to fruition,” said Raether, 52.
Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, both Oregon Democrats, jointly submitted a $2.5 million earmark request for WaveTech, to be included in the Defense spending bill, which is in the process of being crafted in the Appropriations Committee. That committee’s members make the final call on what earmarks are funded.
A consultant with experience pitching military earmark requests recommended asking for the earmark, Raether said. Raether hired the consultant at the recommendation of one of WaveTech’s advisory board members, he said.
“There’s a lot of earmarks that are a lot of wasted time and everything else,” Raether said. “There are some earmarks, I believe, you put some money into it and it’s going to benefit people way beyond what the cost is.”
Current federal law requires lawmakers to post their earmark requests online.
Abuses
U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Portland, who is quick to defend the earmark process, said this week that it makes sense to eliminate earmarks to for-profit companies this year.
“Given some abuses in the past, I think it’s reasonable,” Blumenauer said.
Those abuses include hundreds of millions steered by the late Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., to defense contractors with ties to former Murtha staffers. Those contractors in turn, sent thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to Murtha, who died in February.
That’s a far cry from the case of WaveTech’s earmark request. Federal contribution reports show that Raether hasn’t given money to Wyden or Merkley.
For the past several budget cycles, Rep. Greg Walden, R-Hood River, has only requested earmarks on behalf of nonprofit groups and local governments in Oregon. He was first among the state’s congressional delegation to make his earmark requests public.
Walden couldn’t be reached for comment this week, but, like nearly every House Republican, he’s pledged not to request earmarks this year. He’s asking Democrats to reduce the federal budget by the amount that would have gone to pork barrel projects.
Overall, the dollar value of congressional earmarks has fallen in recent years, according to Citizens Against Government Waste, a nonprofit that campaigns against earmarks. The 2006 spending bills included 9,963 earmarks totaling $29 billion. That number fell by 32 percent, to $19.6 billion, by last year, the group found.
Potential
Raether has produced three prototypes that run on compressed air, but has yet to build a gasoline or diesel-powered model. That will take money, and lots of it, he said.
Brad Tillock, owner of EngSim, an Illinois firm that conducts stimulations of mechanical designs, said Raether’s engine has potential.
“I see many of these inventor types come to me with different ideas,” Tillock said. “Most of the time they don’t have anything. He does have something.”
Whether or not the engine delivers a 50 percent fuel savings remains to be seen, but the potential is worth exploring, Tillock said.
“There’s enough there ... that I see it being really worthwhile to try to build one that will really make power.”
Raether explored applying for competitive funding from the Pentagon, but ultimately didn’t, because most of the grants would have given ownership of Raether’s idea to the Defense Department, he said.
“We didn’t feel comfortable with the compromises,” he said.
Raether has also collected letters of support from Economic Development for Central Oregon, a University of California-Davis professor and the Central Oregon Community College automotive department coordinator.
Wyden spokeswoman Jennifer Hoelzer said the engine’s potential to improve fuel efficiency justifies federal funding.
“Increased fuel economy is a huge goal at DoD not just because it saves money ... but because it frees up logistical supply lines which endanger American soldiers,” Hoelzer said. “We believe that if a community in the U.S. is going to develop and ultimately manufacture technology to protect our troops and make their vehicles more efficient, then we will do whatever is appropriate to see that it happens in, and that those jobs come to, Deschutes County.”
Merkley said on Thursday that he was impressed by the engine’s potential fuel savings after an earlier visit to the WaveTech facility. He declined on Thursday to defend the earmark request.
“I don’t want to get into a public discussion, earmark by earmark,” Merkley said. He added that he’s also referred the company’s design to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon’s tech research wing.
The whole question could very well be rendered moot, though, if Congress doesn’t pass a budget and spending bills this year. Given the compressed legislative calendar caused by congressional elections this year, it could instead opt for a “continuing resolution,” which largely maintains spending at current levels and usually includes a very small number of earmarks.
“It’s a question mark,” said Blumenauer, about whether the normal budget process will go through.
Keith Chu can be reached at 202-662-7456 or at kchu@bendbulletin.com.
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