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Where There's a Cause, There's a Caucus
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| Contributor | CBlock941 |
| Last Edited | CBlock941 Apr 05, 2007 09:13am |
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| Category | News |
| Media | Newspaper - Washington Post |
| News Date | Thursday, April 5, 2007 03:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Every morning in Washington, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) rides his rusty red-orange Trek bicycle to work on Capitol Hill, a reminder of one of the first things he did when he came to Congress in 1996: create a bike caucus.
With 165 members, the bipartisan Congressional Bike Caucus promotes the use of bicycles as a substitute for cars -- a way to exercise, reduce fossil fuel emissions and improve travel patterns. The caucus shepherded $4 billion for trails, bike paths and pedestrian facilities in a big transportation spending bill in the last Congress.
"I have saved hundreds of hours of time. I have burned thousands and thousands of calories instead of gallons of petroleum and, after 10 years, have probably saved $50,000," said Blumenauer, who also chairs the Congressional Trails Caucus.
The bike caucus is just one of the zany-sounding groups that lawmakers have created on Capitol Hill to advance niche interests in Congress. There's no trick to creating a caucus -- or "congressional member organization" -- in the House, where it takes just a letter to the Administration Committee. Nearly 300 have registered. The Senate has far fewer groups, and they don't register at all. |
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