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Stimulus-jobs count in Colorado overinflated

Burt Hubbard
The Denver Post
John Leyba, The Denver PostWestminster received $150,438 in stimulus money to improve Lowell Boulevard near West 78th Avenue.
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Click on the computerized map of the state of Colorado on the federal government’s stimulus-spending Web page, and it displays 8,094 full-time jobs created or saved in the state.

It’s a number that is inflated by at least 1,000 jobs, the result of confusing reporting requirements, inaccurate reporting and, perhaps, overreaching at some reporting agencies.

A Denver Post analysis of federal data found:



• Englewood-based TeleTech Government Solutions listed the equivalent of 635 full-time jobs credited to Colorado created by recovery funds used to set up call centers on the conversion to digital television. Only the equivalent of 34 of them were filled in Colorado. The rest are scattered across the country.

• The city of Westminster reported that its $150,438 contract for road work on Lowell Boulevard would create 117 jobs. That would equate to $1,286 per job. The city said the estimate is based on anyone who will work on the project, even if it was for only one day. No federal officials told the city to convert to the number of full-time-equivalent slots, an official said.

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• Two child-development centers – one in Colorado Springs and the other in Saguache County – reported they had created or saved more than 292 jobs combined. However, the money – totaling about $650,000, or $2,226 a job – was used to give employees cost- of-living raises. Only three new jobs were created.

For more of this Denver Post story: http://www.denverpost.com/ci_13751141


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