Ohio GOP rips Strickland and Fisher on the stimulus

Ohio's job crisis is worsening.

601,000 are unemployed.
The state's payroll employment fell by 15,400 jobs just in the past month.
And Ohio's workforce has shrunk to a level not seen since January.

Clearly, Ohio's trajectory is going the wrong way.

So that makes this breakdown of Stimulus projects that much more depressing. The list, organized by the ORP, details the odd investments of your taxpayer dollars as supported by Ted Strickland and Lee Fisher.

• $1 million on road signs to tell Ohioans which highway projects were funded by federal stimulus dollars. (The Plain Dealer, 9/9/09)

• $11 million to outsource an appliance rebate program to a Texas company, which then hired workers in El Salvador. (The Plain Dealer, 7/29/10)

• $145,000 to rent "marble-clad" banquet halls, high-end hotels and conference centers for teacher workshops in Columbus. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/6/09)

• $1.4 million to pay speakers at a Columbus City Schools workshop, including thousands of dollars to a company owned by the former school board president. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/6/09)

• $800,000 for "quiet zones" in North Ridgeville, OH, where the mayor admits the project is "a long way from the top priority." (The Chronicle Telegram, 5/22/09)

• $63,000 for the Ohio Department of Agriculture to buy fish food. (CNN, 1/25/10)

• $4.5 million for Cleveland City Schools to provide "family liaisons" that help parents "find their way through the school district bureaucracy." (The Plain Dealer, 11/06/09)

• Unknown amount of funds to fix curbs on Gov. Strickland's street, which a local TV station calls "one of the most prestigious areas of Central Ohio where million-dollar mansions sit secluded behind well manicured landscaping." (WCMH-Columbus, 8/27/10)

• $500,000 for a consultant to design a recycling campaign for new trash cans in Dayton that use "microchips to track citizen participation." (Dayton Daily News, 2/11/10)

• $300,000 to open and operate a city-owned pool in Youngstown. (Vindicator, 6/12/10)

• $200,000 for a Toledo ship museum to remove asbestos from a 1911 ship. (Fox Toledo, 7/22/10)

• $336,000 to collect and document flowers and plants in Ohio. (WCMH-Columbus, 8/5/10)

• $267 million for home weatherization projects in Ohio, 40 percent of which later failed state inspection. (Columbus Dispatch, 3/14/10)

• $1.5 million to install fencing on an Akron bridge to keep people from jumping. (Akron Beacon Journal, 3/27/09)

Think that money would have been better spent by we, the people?

Me too.