WASHINGTON–After approving nearly $3 trillion in new federal spending since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, some members of Congress have begun asking a question that has also been raised by some CU executives: where is the money going and where’s the oversight?
As CUToday.info has reported, including here,one early analysis has found the Paycheck Protection Program—which represents approximately $650 billion in federal spending—recipients have included companies with sufficient cash to be buying other companies at the same time they have received funds, companies that have been subject to federal investigations and fines, companies that had significant access to other forms of financing, even though they weren’t supposed to, and even the Los Angeles Lakers of the NBA.
With all that spending and more spending projected, “the hangover has set in,” said Politico in its analysis.
‘Rising Angst’
“The sprawling CARES Act, and its similarly rushed companion bills, has fueled rising angst for lawmakers,” Politico reported. “They’ve been bombarded with complaints about breakdowns in the small-business lending program, loopholes that have allowed large companies to snatch cash meant for smaller operations and administrative failures that have delayed stimulus checks to struggling American households…And it’s all occurring without the oversight operations meant to confront these problems as they arise.”
During a meeting on Capitol Hill, Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA) said, “Our constituents have a lot of questions about where the hell this $3 trillion is going and why it isn’t coming into their pockets.”
Many lawmakers have been pushing for fixes in the PPP, which has CUToday.info reported here, is plagued by glitches even as they approved another $310 billion for round two of the program.
“Fraudulent actors go to where the money is, and this is where the money is right now,” Rep. Rob Woodall (R-GA), was quoted by Politico as stating. “So I absolutely think that we have to redouble our effort to make sure that these dollars aren’t wasted.”
Promises Not Kept
Added Rep. Pete Stauber (R-MN), “Promises were made in the CARES Act that made small businesses believe they would receive their loans in a timely fashion. Instead, some received a fraction of what they were promised and many others received nothing at all.”
Politico noted it isn’t just financial institutions such as credit unions and banks attempting to sort through messy aspects of all the federal stimulus, hospitals and other health providers, farmers, airlines, universities and others are dealing with issues of their own. Then there are all the Americans who are searching for their missing stimulus payment of approximately $1,200, or wondering how the amount they received was calculated.