CDC’s piece of stimulus not likely to create jobs

WASHINGTON — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will directly get $300 million and a piece of hundreds of millions more in other funding as part of the economic stimulus package signed Tuesday by President Barack Obama.

But it’s not nearly what the DeKalb County-based agency was expecting or hoping for out of the package.

And despite the stimulus package’s emphasis on job creation, the CDC funding probably won’t create many jobs in metro Atlanta — if any.

The federal CDC will get $300 million to oversee immunization programs for under-insured children and other Americans.

The CDC also expects to get part of another $650 million for community-based wellness programs, as well as a piece of $50 million set aside for programs aimed at reducing infections inside hospitals.

But while the money will be administered through the CDC in Atlanta, it will go to health providers around the country — and so likely will any new jobs created by the programs, CDC spokesman David Daigle said.

The CDC was in line to get millions more that would have benefited Atlanta much more directly.

Earlier versions of the economic stimulus bill would have set aside $426 million for construction of facilities at the CDC — money that probably would’ve ended up in the pockets of construction workers and others in the Atlanta area.

The CDC was hoping to use some of that money for a new building, Building 24, at its Clifton Road campus.

Plans for construction of that building are now on hold, Daigle said.