The U.S. Department of Transportation unveiled a new interactive “Voices of the Recovery Act” Web feature to share the stories of workers on Recovery Act projects across the country. Through the online map, visitors can click on videos of construction workers around the country employed on Recovery Act-funded construction projects.
Using their own words, workers across America talk about what the Recovery Act has meant to them in tough economic times for the construction industry. Workers employed by a transportation funded Recovery project can submit their own videos by posting their story on YouTube and emailing a link to [email protected].
“The Recovery Act is not only creating jobs, but doing so with a level of transparency and accountability never been seen before in the federal government,” says Vice President Joe Biden. “ ‘Voices of the Recovery Act’ ” is one more way in which the American people will be able to see their tax dollars at work helping to turn the economy around and put the country back to work.”
“Thanks to the Recovery Act, there are tens of thousands of people at work on infrastructure projects today who would have been unemployed otherwise,” says U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “These are the stories of those people, and they can tell you in personal terms about the impact the Recovery Act has had on keeping transportation projects alive and our economy moving.”
Over the past 19 months, LaHood has visited dozens of projects across the country, talking to workers like the ones featured in these videos. The videos illustrate the broad geographic reach of the Recovery Act, from Maine to California. The map soon will contain additional stories as the Recovery Act continues to put workers across the country back on the job.
DOT has made $48.1 billion in Recovery Act funds available for highway, road, transit, rail, bridge and airport construction and repairs, as well as small shipyard grants nationwide; $39.3 billion already has been obligated to fund more than 14,600 approved projects in 53 U.S. States and Territories. The “Voices of the Recovery Act” map can be viewed at www.dot.gov/recovery/voices.
