Our congresswoman, Lois Capps, has worked tirelessly trying to get funding for the Santa Maria River Levee project.

Meanwhile, she has spearheaded legislation that would keep all of us living in Santa Maria from paying for flood insurance - at a cost of $1,200-$2,000 a year, depending on who quotes the cost of the insurance - while the levee gets repaired.

While some may consider funding for the levee project pork-barrel spending, and advocate all  pork spending should be eliminated, I am very grateful to Congresswoman Capps for all she has done for Santa Maria residents by continuing to push for this funding, pork or not.

While our federal government continues to spend great sums of money on and in other countries, the people in Santa Maria are fortunate to have a representative who cares about local people.

Joann Marmolejo

Santa Maria

July 16, 2008

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