Hunting for $1 billion of stimulus spending in rural Illinois.

"Excuse me, sir, we're looking for the FutureGen site," I said from the driver's side.

The man was on the right side of the street, deep in his backyard. He wore a loose-fitting gray tank top and looked north of 60 years old. "What? I can't hear you."

Yet I could hear him just fine. I leaned over to the passenger side of the car. "Do you know where the FutureGen site is?"

"What?" he said with an exasperated cup of his ear.

We sheepishly waved and continued back from whence we came. A desolate driving range beckoned, and we pulled in for Dave to hit some balls while we thought things through. An entire town is about to receive a billion dollars of stimulus money three years in the making, and nobody knows where it's supposed to go. The plant will become the town's economic identity. Yet for now it's a background detail to the pace of daily life. FutureGen is here, but it's not actually anywhere.

Enter Steve, a traveling businessman from St. Louis who keeps a bag of golf clubs in his trunk. We told him our story, and he mentioned his colleague Rick, who serves on Mattoon's City Council. A business card is given, a BlackBerry is taken out, and an e-mail is sent. Rick points us to David, public works director for the city of Mattoon. This was a lead.