SAN ANGELO, TX—Congressman August Pfluger (TX-11) convened local officials, financial institutions, and service organizations in San Angelo for a roundtable to discuss financial assistance programs available to help support federal workers and service members amid the Democrats' government shutdown. Following the roundtable, Congressman Pfluger led the participants in a press conference to broadcast the available resources.
Read Rep. Pfluger's remarks, in part, from the press conference as delivered:
We just had a meeting with these leaders that you see here with me today, and I'm going to mention some highlights of the type of community help that is coming to our military personnel and to our federal workforce.
It includes loans from the banks and from the credit unions, 0% interest loans, to cover the paychecks that would have been coming in, should those paychecks be missed. It includes help with late fees on payments, mortgage deferrals, and car payment deferrals. The city of San Angelo Mayor Thompson has an announcement. I'm going to let him talk about what the city of San Angelo is going to do, but it is going to help alleviate some of the financial burden. It also includes assistance from the United Way, and we'll get into more details, but they are providing gift cards, gas cards, energy assistance programs, clothing assistance programs, food assistance programs, and more. None of our federal workforce and military personnel are going to go hungry, and we're going to make sure that in this community, we come together to support them in the right way.
In just the one hour that we met, we raised nearly $200,000, which will be distributed throughout the federal workforce and our military personnel to those who need it the most. Angelo State University has also pledged $85,000 in tuition assistance for our military and federal workforce. And we're going to tell you how you can help.
If you're a local business or a restaurant, or you're here in town and want to help out, we're going to give you that information. But the bottom line is that during a government shutdown, it's stressful on a lot of people who have stepped up to do something, whether it's keeping our country safe in uniform or helping teach some of those intelligence classes as a government civilian or serving in a variety of different agencies and entities this community, you will not find a better community on the face of the earth that grows in a partnership with the base, with Goodfellow and with our federal workforce that is there to stand by him in times of need. And I'm sorry to say that now is a time of need, and I hope we can get past this government shutdown quickly. I hope we can move past that and get back to normal, but in the meantime, we've got a great community that is willing to step up and has already done that.
I got a couple of speakers that I want to introduce to you, but before that, let me tell you who was at the meeting today. Texas State Bank, First Financial Bank, City National Bank, 1st Community Federal Credit Union, First National Bank of Mertzon, The Bank and Trust, and the Bank of San Angelo, many elected leaders, including Judge Carter and Mayor Thompson, the United Way of San Angelo, the Concho Valley Community Action Agency, Atmos Energy, AEP, San Angelo Association of Realtors, and several others who are just willing to come together.
The story here in San Angelo is that we've always been a place where we help our neighbors in times of need. That happened this summer during the floods. It happens whenever there's any sort of emergency, and I'm looking at this situation as an emergency. I'm proud to be surrounded by people who don't need a phone call, who are immediately right here to help.
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