Congresswoman Pelosi Announces Congressional Arts Winner from the 8th District; House Passes Small Business Jobs Bills

Congresswoman Pelosi Announces Congressional Arts Winner from the 8th District
I am proud to announce Claire Kowalewski Marsh as the winner of the 29th annual Congressional Arts Competition from California’s 8th Congressional District. Claire, a rising senior from San Francisco’s School of the Arts, won this year’s competition with her oil painting entitled “Blue Bottle.”

Congresswoman Pelosi congratulates Claire Kowalewski Marsh for her winning painting, which will be seen by thousands of visitors who walk the halls of the Capitol each day.

Since 1982, the annual Congressional Art Competition has provided an opportunity for high school students across the United States to exhibit their creativity and compete for a chance to represent their congressional district and exhibit their artwork in the Capitol. This year’s local competition was hosted by the San Francisco Unified School District during the annual Young at Art festival, displaying more than 2,000 pieces of art at the DeYoung Museum located in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park.

House Passes Small Business Jobs Bills
This week, the House took action to create American jobs and stand up for small businesses with the passage of the Small Business Jobs and Credit Act and the Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act. These bills will create hundreds of thousands of jobs in a fiscally responsible way – both are fully paid for and comply with our new pay-as-you-go budget law.

As the engine of our economy, small businesses have been responsible for creating two-thirds of the new jobs over the last 15 years. Though there are strong signs of economic recovery, many small businesses still face tight lending standards, with 45 percent of small businesses seeking loans unable to get their credit needs met in 2009.

The Small Business Jobs and Credit Act and the Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act will leverage up to $300 billion in loans for small businesses through a $30 billion lending fund for small- and medium-sized community banks, which focus on lending to small firms, and $2 billion for innovative state lending programs that support small business. This responsible investment of taxpayer dollars will generate substantial private bank financing, and is estimated to save taxpayers $1 billion as banks repay these funds over 10 years.

Please feel free to forward this information to your family and friends. To learn more about these efforts, to express your views, or to sign up for email updates, please visit my Web site. I am now on Twitter https://twitter.com/SpeakerPelosi.