Some of the $700 billion in federal bailout money came home to Island County last week with the announcement that more than $23 million of that sum may be directed at Whidbey Island Bank.

What’s surprising is that Whidbey Island Bank has a sound balance sheet and seemingly plenty of money on hand to help local car buyers, home purchasers and business entrepreneurs.

Now the bank has even more money thanks to the federal government, which hopes that infusing banks with cash will persuade them to lend more and break the credit crunch that is strangling the economy.

Whether making healthy banks even healthier will accomplish this goal is not certain. Whidbey Island Bank says the new money will help it “meet the needs of our customers and the communities we serve,” which suggests it has more lending in mind. Whether they can attract more qualified borrowers is another question. People with good credit and businesses with good cash flow can get money now, but their numbers are dwindling all the time. However, lending standards can’t be lowered‚ that’s what got us into this mess. So the jury is still out on the wisdom of this program.

Whidbey Island Bank also states that the federal infusion will help it “expand our market value.” This is another head scratcher. Why should the federal government help one bank at the expense of another that doesn’t want or doesn’t qualify for the federal financial infusion? This seems like unnecessary governmental interference in the free market.

The money will also “build shareholder value,” the bank states in a news release. Again, is this the job of the federal government? Shareholder value should come from building a successful business without government help. Again, the public can only wonder what’s going on.

Elected officials seem to be trying everything to fix the economy, basically throwing money out there to see what works. Millions of those dollars are coming our way through Whidbey Island Bank. At some point we’d like to know if the program actually works. Banks that take the federal money should have to publicly account for how they use it. Congress should make sure this happens because, after all, it’s our money.