A BlueNC blogger is defending Sen. Walter Dalton's spending bills.

Noting the recent attack by the N.C. Republican Party on Dalton's $277 million in requested appropriations, BlueNC blogger Blue South writes that only the $14 million for the Cleveland Correctional Center is directed at his own district:

Now Linda Daves has attacked Dalton for Pork spending, but if you look of the 277 million, only 14 million would directly benifit Dalton's district, while many would benefit his along with every other rural district in the state. And there is of course no gurantee that bill will get passed or folded into the budget.

Blue South also writes that the bills would benefit "education, jobs and biofuels."

Sen. Walter Dalton is seeking more than $277 million in state spending.

The Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor has sponsored nine bills and co-sponsored 18 bills seeking appropriations in the upcoming state budget. A longtime state senator, he is serving an advisory role on the budget in the short session.

Dalton is the primary sponsor on bills totaling $208 million: $135 million for grants for local water and sewer projects, $20 million for the N.C. Rural Economic Development Center, $16 million for stem cell research, $14 million for the Cleveland Correctional Center, $10 million to provide services for the developmentally disabled, $5.8 million to help provide high-speed Internet access, $3 million for biotechnology training, $2.5 million for construction at historically black colleges and $2 million for small business entrepeneurship initiatives.

Among the larger appropriations bills he is cosponsoring: $44.7 million for Smart Start early childhood intiatives, $9.5 million for 4-H camps, $3 million for home foreclosure prevention, $3 million for loans for biotechnology start-ups, $1.6 million for a dropout prevention program in Durham and Vance counties, $1.4 million for water resource management and $1.25 million for biotechnology education.

He's also seeking a number of appropriations under $1 million: Teach for America, state GIS improvements, veterinary medicine teaching and research, a statewide infection control program, a literacy program, Kids Voting, a Teacher Cadet Program, an early chilhood initiative, a youth golfing program and a health information management study.

Previously: Sen. Kay Hagan seeks $48 million in state spending.