Senator Claire McCaskill was in St. Joseph, Friday to offer some help in receiving federal grants.

The packed seminar was an all day event held at Missouri Western. It was meant to teach small businesses, municipalities, county government, school districts, and hospitals how to competitively go after federal dollars. .

McCaskill says there is federal money, but we need to make sure we're competing for it rather than doing it through earmarks.

The senator believes people were relieved to hear the amount of money that was going to be coming into Missouri through water projects, sewer and road projects and making buildings more energy efficient.

McCaskill says that the economic recovery package is all a very wise use of tax dollars, especially at this time of job loss.