WASHINGTON — With special projects totaling $203 million, U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye topped other senators in the amount of special funding added to the defense spending bill, which the Senate could take up this week.

The Hawai'i senator's largest projects include $27.5 million for a Hawai'i-based health program, $24 million for the Maui Space Surveillance System and $20 million for a new Arizona Memorial museum and visitor center, according to a Taxpayers for Common Sense database.

Steve Ellis, vice president of the watchdog group, said they put together a database of the bill's special projects, also known as earmarks, to help make the federal budget transparent to the public and let people know where politicians are spending taxpayer money.

"We have been pretty prominent critics of the earmarking process as a whole because it is the politicians picking the winners and losers rather than actually making funding decisions on the basis of merit," Ellis said.

The group's database showed Inouye, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, and Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, the top Republican on the subcommittee, with the most in earmark spending from the defense spending bill.

Mike Yuen, spokesman for Inouye, said the number of Hawai'i-related projects reflects the state's strategic location in the Asia-Pacific region.

"Given the sizable presence of military personnel in Hawai'i, Sen. Inouye knows the importance of programs that support our men and women in uniform and our nation's readiness," Yuen said.

U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka, also D-Hawai'i, has another $21 million in 10 special projects as part of the bill, including $6.5 million for continued research on the dumping of chemical weapons off O'ahu shores in the 1940s.

The special projects' money is part of a $459.3 billion spending bill for the Defense Department's operations, purchases and maintenance next year, about $3.8 billion less than President Bush's budget request.

The bill contains 936 special projects, also called earmarks, worth a total of $5.1 billion.

Inouye, who has 26 individual projects, and Akaka also teamed up on an additional $11.5 million in earmarks, including $6.5 million for a network of telescopes to more accurately track space information for the Air Force.

The Maui surveillance system, the University of Hawai'i and the Maui computing center also would receive an additional $11 million to continue developing new large-aperture telescopes.

The $20 million for the new Arizona Memorial would be a major boost for the $52 million project. The museum is sinking and must be replaced to prevent the loss of historical documents and memorabilia from World War II.

The state already has kicked in $500,000 for the Arizona project, with an expected 14 months of construction slated to begin in December.

After the defense bill receives Senate approval, negotiators will work out the differences between the House and Senate versions of the bill for final congressional approval.

Reach Dennis Camire at dcamire@gns.gannett.com.