For Immediate Release: February 11, 2009
Contact: Cindy Mallette 512-476-5905 or Peggy Venable 512-423-2947

Americans for Prosperity Endorses Blueprint for Preparing Texas Budget;
Encourages Congress to Learn from Texas

AUSTIN - Today at the state capitol, a group of organizations in Texas endorsed a “Blueprint for an Effective State Budget” which calls for fiscal restraint, spending priorities, transparency, performance measures, limiting use of “rainy day funds” and eliminating duplication.

Peggy Venable, AFP State Director, released the following statement:

We at Americans for Prosperity advocate policies that help keep Texas competitive and promote prosperity in the Lone Star State. This blueprint will help keep the Texas economy one of the strongest in the country.

Most Texans use these common-sense guidelines in their own family budgets. While Texans realize that there is no such thing as government money – but hard-working taxpayers dollars, citizens want and expect fiscal responsibility and transparency in government.

But we in Texas stand in stark contrast to what is happening in Washington, D.C.

While many in Congress appear to ignore their constituents as they consider a trillion dollars of debt, more than 360,000 American taxpayers - who are expected to foot that bill – have signed Americans for Prosperity’s www.NoStimulus.com online petition.

Texans are outraged and more signed the NoStimulus.com petition than any other state.

As Congress is poised to mortgage our children’s future and spend-thrift states are lining up for bailouts, Texas may well be a last refuge of fiscal sanity.

Congress could learn from Texas leaders and the Texas legislature.

We at Americans for Prosperity wholeheartedly embrace the blueprint presented today and will work to encourage Congress to follow a similar blueprint rather than spend money we don’t have on things we don’t want.