HAVERHILL — The concrete grandstand and signature brick wall that surrounds Haverhill Stadium. The 30-foot-high flood wall that protects the downtown from the fits and tempers of the mighty Merrimack River. Miles of sidewalks throughout the city.
They all owe their origins to the Works Projects Administration, the late and famous government agency established in 1935 by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as part of his "New Deal" for America.
The WPA, as it is commonly known, was spawned from the Great Depression that began in the late 1920s when about a third of the nation's workers were unemployed. The $11 billion federal jobs program put about 8.5 million people to work over an eight-year period building infrastructure across America.
Today, with the country in one of its worst economic tailspins since those dark days, and its antiquated infrastructure ailing from years of neglect, many believe a modern-day WPA is what's needed to rescue the country.
Something like the WPA, even if it's not quite as grandiose as its predecessor, appears imminent.
Yesterday, President-elect Barack Obama announced a plan he said would create 2.5 million jobs by rebuilding roads and bridges and modernizing schools, while developing alternative energy sources and more efficient cars. He said the goal is to get the plan quickly through Congress after he takes office Jan. 20.
"These aren't just steps to pull ourselves out of this immediate crisis. These are the long-term investments in our economic future that have been ignored for far too long," Obama said in the weekly Democratic radio address.
The president-elect said he has asked his economic advisers to flesh out the recovery plan — one "big enough to meet the challenges we face. ... We'll be working out the details in the weeks ahead, but it will be a two-year, nationwide effort to jump-start job creation in America and lay the foundation for a strong and growing economy."
U.S. Rep. Niki Tsongas, D-Lowell, said the program is sorely needed, as America's roads, bridges, schools, drinking water distribution systems and transit systems are outdated and in deplorable shape, according to a litany of recent studies.
"The question is how big will it be, but most people think it needs to be very big to have an impact," Tsongas said. "Roads, bridges, public transit, and projects aimed at renewable energy and energy efficiency will be the focus. The idea is to fund local infrastructure projects with the goal of jump-starting the economy and creating jobs."
U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., is also pushing a number of bills in the spirit of the WPA. Last week, he introduced legislation to create jobs by turning "America's outdated and underfunded passenger rail system into a world class system.
"Today we are as far from the New Deal as the New Deal was from the Civil War," Kerry said in a recent speech at North Shore Community College. "But even though times are different, we can still learn lessons from those days. And the clearest one is that in tough economic times, the government needs to step up and do what it takes to keep the lights on.
"Now, as then, crisis brings with it an opportunity to invest in rebuilding America," Kerry said. "And if we're living in the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression, why not respond with the greatest national rebuilding since the New Deal?"
Tsongas said "shovel-ready" projects will get first dibs on any federal funding.
Haverhill Mayor James Fiorentini has already begun to prepare for the eventuality of a stimulus bill.
Fiorentini said he received a phone call from an official in Gov. Deval Patrick's administration the day after Obama won the presidency, telling him to start working on a list of construction projects that are "ready to go."
The funding criteria is likely to be "design-ready projects that put people on the street working immediately," the mayor said.
An easel in his office lists a number of infrastructure and construction projects that could benefit from federal money, including a downtown boardwalk, police vehicle maintenance facility, several road and traffic signal redesign projects, a downtown water system rehabilitation project and a number of school and municipal building renovations.
Hunking Elementary and Whittier Middle schools, the citizens center and Haverhill Stadium are all desperately in need of millions in renovations, Fiorentini said. The city's sidewalks also suffer from decades of neglect, he noted.
Lawrence Planning Director Michael Sweeney said that city would use any federal stimulus money to build and improve infrastructure to set the stage for private housing developments along and near Lawrence's many canals.
"We have all these little islands where developers want to build," he said. "But we need new roads and better bridges to these areas, and we need to upgrade our water and sewer systems to accommodate these new developments. These aren't sexy projects, but they are necessary, they are expensive and they would create lots of good union jobs."
Lawrence Economic Development Director Thomas Schiavone said the city could also use the federal money to finish the Gateway project, which involves the revitalization of the former industrial area around Canal Street that serves as an entrance to the city from Interstate 495. The project, which is considered crucial to the economic future of downtown Lawrence, has already received millions in state and federal money, but it still needs more for parking areas and a public park along the Spicket River, Schiavone said.
Methuen Mayor William Manzi said there are some projects that Methuen could potentially use the money for.
One of them would be widening the Howe Street bridge near The Loop. That has been talked about, but it would be an enormous expense. Manzi said he likes the idea of using federal money for public works projects.
"I think it's a good idea on a couple of different levels," he said, adding it would put people to work and address infrastructure needs at the same time.
"I don't expect this to be quite a modern-day WPA," Fiorentini said of a potential federal stimulus bill. "Six percent unemployment isn't the same as 33 percent," he said, comparing the late 1920s and early 1930s to 2008.
Fiorentini, a bit of a history buff, said he has always been fascinated with Great Depression and WPA era.
His grandfather owned the old Roma restaurant downtown and has told the mayor many stories from the 1920s and 1930s about long lines of people waiting outside the restaurant early in the morning for table scraps to feed their families.
"Before Roosevelt's New Deal, there was no unemployment compensation, workers compensation or food stamps," Fiorentini said. "There was no safety net. If you lost your job, you lost your home and starved."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
President's Roosevelt's WPA
Put: 8.5 million people to work
Years: 1935 to 1943
Spent: $11 billion
Buildings: 116,000
Bridges: 78,000
Miles of roads: 651,000
Airport improvements: 800
