$787 billion - that was the price of the stimulus package that congress passed back in February. Now over 8 months later US Senator Tim Johnson and other local area leaders sat down to discuss how and if the stimulus package is helping our area.

Local mayors, leaders of the Sioux Falls School District, and a leader of local law enforcement joined Senator Johnson Saturday morning to talk about the impact the stimulus package has made on state and local communities...

Johnson said, "Fact is that 3.5 million workers have been put back to work or have kept their jobs."

The 3.5 million jobs he mentioned is the national number of jobs saved or created according to the White House, but skeptics have questioned where some of the money of the package has been allocated. Sioux Falls Mayor Dave Munson wants to assure residents that locally the money is being spent wisely...

He says, "The money that is going to South Dakota to Sioux Falls to Lennox and to surrounding areas has been used in a very positive way to help tax payers at the end of the day."

Some skeptics are also those out of work. The unemployment rate nationally is 9.8 percent; and some experts, and now the president, expect it to pass 10 percent by next year. This morning the senator answered the critics who say that the stimulus hasn't done anything for them.

He said, "They are all benefiting directly or inderectly from the stimulus money. It's going into schools, to highways, the water systems, police, law enforcement and so on."

The senator also said the stimulus legislation cut taxes for middle class families, created jobs and invested in important infrastructure at time when states were short on money.

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