GOP Calls It Pork but Democrats Call It Bacon : Republicans say stimulus plan is payoff to mayors, busts budget. Rivals insist projects will help communities.

Republicans charge that President Clinton’s $16.3-billion stimulus package proposes funding for pork-barrel projects like indoor swimming pools and ice skating warming huts. Democrats insist the projects are important improvements for low- and middle-income Americans, and represent only 1% of the total package.

The disagreement is one reason the GOP has stalled Clinton’s economic stimulus plan.

The projects would be funded under the government’s Community Development Block Grant program, which provides money to local governments for improvements to aid low- and moderate-income people or to prevent “slum and blight” conditions. Democrats insist the Administration’s proposal would create about 60,000 jobs and meet many needs in poor neighborhoods.

The program would receive an additional $2.5 billion, atop the $4 billion already budgeted for this year, if the stimulus bill is passed as written. To speed the projects, the Administration proposed easing federal oversight--a step Republicans, who have supported the program since its inception in 1974, claim opens the way for greater abuse.

“It will create few, if any, jobs and is full of boondoggle ideas, pie-in-the-sky ideas and payoffs to the big city Democratic mayors who supported Clinton,” said Eric Ueland, research and communications director of the Senate Republican Policy Committee. “It is true that CDBG was a Republican initiative. . . . But we oppose it now because it will be a program that will be abused.”

Republicans say they want strict accountability for new spending.

“The dispute is much more significant than some silly projects,” said Sen. Hank Brown (R-Colo.). “The key is that this spending breaks the budget without paying for it.”

The additional $2.5 billion would go to communities according to a formula based on population, poverty and housing need. California would receive an additional $104 million, and Los Angeles would get $49 million of that.

Republican opposition stems in part from a 1,600-page list of projects eligible for grants compiled by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Brown reviewed the list and found 54 projects totaling $105 million that he deemed wasteful. Among them were the construction of a new movie theater in Columbus, Ohio; resurfacing tennis courts in Florence, Ala., and building an ice skating warming hut in Manchester, Conn.

Democrats and other supporters argue that the projects on the mayors’ list were only examples. They say the bill makes no mention of grants for specific programs.

“The list was done just to indicate that there were indeed projects that could be done quickly,” said Eugene Lowe, assistant executive director for the U.S. Conference of Mayors. “But the projects in the book are not necessarily the ones that cities would pursue. . . . “

“I cannot begin to tell you what this will mean in California, in areas such as South Los Angeles and San Francisco and East Palo Alto and Oakland and Fresno and Modesto and Sacramento,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said in recent Senate debate. “What better way to jump-start a stagnant economy than to invest in our infrastructure, also in the transportation, in housing and the schools we need?”

Democrats also argue that an amendment by Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) restores a greater degree of federal oversight, requiring the Office of Management and Budget to review the proposed uses of the money.

“People choose what to focus on, and the Republicans have chosen to ignore this amendment,” said a member of Byrd’s staff. “Given that there are so few dollars to go around, it is in the interest of all communities to fund only the projects with the highest priority.”

The Los Angeles mayor’s office recently completed a formal proposal for how it would spend the additional $49 million, paring down the spending from a list of $650 million worth of projects.

“The money is very desperately needed,” said Wendy Greuel, assistant to the mayor.