Wednesday, February 04, 2009

Woah. "Senate Amendment to Bar Museums From Any Economic Recovery Funds"

From an email from AAM via the RCAAM


Senate Amendment to Bar Museums From Any Economic Recovery Funds
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) has introduced an amendment to prohibit any funds in the economic stimulus bill from going to museums.

The language of the amendment, (Amendment No. 175, as filed) is, "None of the amounts appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used for any casino or other gambling establishment, aquarium, zoo, golf course, swimming pool, stadium, community park, museum, theater, arts center, or highway beautification project, including renovation, remodeling, construction, salaries, furniture, zero-gravity chairs, big screen televisions, beautification, rotating pastel lights, and dry heat saunas."

This amendment may be offered as early as Wednesday, February 4. Call your Senators TODAY and urge them to vote NO on the Coburn "Limitation of Funds Amendment No. 175." To reach your Senators, call the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121 and ask for your Senators' offices.

Please call today!


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I am not entirely certain how museums, zoos and aquaria are lumped in with casinos and golf courses, but I certainly hope this amendment is defeated!

3 comments:

Larissa K. said...

Sadly this is my senator who is sponsoring the amendment. *Hangs head in shame*

Not to defend but I think there is something sparking this amendment that we are just not being told. By the wording it seems like there might be some "pork" (gosh I hate that term) in the stimulus package for stupid things like zero-gravity chairs, big screen TVs, etc that this amendment is trying to get rid of. Unfortunately it's affecting possible money for a group of institutions because of it.

Lynn Bethke said...

I agree that there are elements of the amendment which are reasonable - the zero-gravity chairs - but the big screens could be legitimately used for museum programming. But lumping in legitimate public institutions seems a bit too far to me.

nbalike said...
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