Note update at bottom.

Government spending remains a political hot topic. The Obama administration is spreading billions of dollars to seed economic recovery. Critics say the largesse is throwing the country deeper into deficit and debt.

Attempts to restart the economy, like the recession itself, are local stories. Look around and you will see federal money flowing into local schools and agencies. Are you taking stock of who gets what and how they spend the money?

The Obama administration touts 30,000 jobs tied to $787 billion in stimulus spending. The Associated Press' reporting shows that number is overstated, at least by 5,000, due to counting errors by agencies and contractors that get the money. How many jobs have stimulus dollars created in your community?

If your newsroom is still getting its hands around this story, several online resources can help. The Associated Press Managing Editors are repeating Webinars this week and next to guide journalists to the stimulus dollars where they live.

It's raining stimulus stories

Federal stimulus stories indeed are everywhere.

States are using the money to ease their own budget problems. Ronnie Ellis, CNHI's Kentucky statehouse reporter, recently described how federal stimulus money has contributed $303.4 million to the state's Medicaid system and is expected to give $486 million more. The infusion allows Kentucky to shift money to blunt the recession's impact on other departments.

The story plays out locally, as well. Schools are using stimulus dollars to shrink class sizes, buy computers and improve services for students with disabilities. Schools in Cleburne, Texas, which educate 6,800 students living about 30 miles south of Fort Worth, plan to spend $4.3 million.

A jobs program used $83,000 in stimulus money to teach 10 teenagers and 20-somethings in Sharon, Pa., how to build a house. The team is refurbishing a house to be rented to a low-income family.

Stimulus resources

How do you follow the money where you live?

APME's Web site gets you started with links to online resources such as FedSpending.org, which tracks federal projects and programs, and Stimulus Watch, which reports on projects in line for stimulus money.

APME's Stimulus Watchdog project is reprising free, one-hour Webinars for journalists working in AP member newsrooms. This week's sessions are scheduled for noon and 3 p.m. EST Thursday. More are scheduled for 9 a.m. EST and noon Tuesday, Nov. 17.

Registration for the Webinars is required.

Note (Nov. 25, 2009): I've corrected this entry to remove references to projects at Susquehanna University unrelated to the stimulus package. Stimulus spending is creating 85 jobs in the Susquehanna River Valley in central Pennsylvania, reports The Daily Item in Sunbury. But an unrelated program supported by state borrowing is putting up $4.5 million for site development work for a 75,000-square-foot science building at the university, according to Gov. Edward Rendell's office. That project creates or affects more than 200 jobs, says Gerry Cohen, a university spokesman. Federal spending bills unrelated to the stimulus allot $1.1 million for equipment for the building.

The university has seen some of the stimulus, albeit indirectly. President Obama's plan pumped $200 million into the federal work study program, which steered $65,713 to work study at the university, according to Stimulus Watch.