Critics are questioning the
timing and motives behind Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley's move to change
the wording in a spending bill so an indoor rainforest and educational
center may be built not just in Coralville but anywhere in the state. Grassley
will not comment about what he called "anonymous" critics on web-logs or
"blogs" on the Internet, but he defends the 50-million dollars in federal
funding for the project -- which still has no home.
Grassley says: "Where the
rainforest was going to be was never an issue about the Congressional appropriation.
That obviously came because of the strong support the project had in Iowa
and the value of the project to economic development in Iowa, the creation
of jobs, the educational benefits of it and the environmental benefits
of it." Developers of the rainforest project broke off negotiations last
week with Coralville leaders and are considering other locations. Grassley's
changes in the bill were made and signed by President Bush last month,
before Coralville was out of the running.
Grassley explained why he
made the changes. "I wanted to make sure that the private money was going
to be raised and so recently, I put restrictions on the use of the federal
tax dollars to make sure that there (were) incentives and people would
follow through with the promise of donating of private funds," Grassley
says. Under those restrictions, backers of the rainforest project have
to raise 50-million dollars over the next two years or they'll lose whatever
remains of another 50-million being put up by the federal government.
Grassley says: "My relationship
with it has been entirely related to the wise expenditure and the matching
expenditure aspect of the federal dollars." Rainforest project officials
say as many as nine Iowa communities are now in the running for the proposed
200-acre, 180-million dollar facility. Former Iowa Governor Robert Ray
and Ray's former chief of staff, David Oman, are leading the push for the
rain forest project. Ray, Oman and Grassley are all Republicans.
_______________
Naturally, Radio
Iowa is talking about us and this post which featured the change in language
that Weasel Grassley engineered for Con Man Oman and Filthy Ray:
Isn't it strange that
no major media outlet in Iowa had a story about the language change by
Grassley? It took this blog to carry on about it until anybody noticed.
And thank you, Radio Iowa, for noticing.
As for fauxscal conservative
Grassley's comments about it being a big economic development and job creation
vehicle, that's simply a joke. This project won't be built for $180 million
and it won't get over a million visitors a year. Good luck with them ever
raising any private money, since Oman and his gang of fraudsters have had
six years to raise money and done jack squat. It's going to be a giant
boondoggle for all taxpayers in one form or another, but Grassley seems
hell-bent on padding his buddy David Oman's pockets. A hungry reporter
or two needs to find out why.
The Quad City Times also
harshly questions the continuation of this project.
And also note that Waterloo
can't do a minor stadium upgrade without a 75% cost overrun. What happens
when you apply that to a $180 million project?
