apnews.excite.com/article/20041014/D85N6DH81.html

Excerpt:

WASHINGTON (AP) - The government agency in charge of airport security spent nearly a half-million dollars on an awards ceremony at a lavish hotel, including $81,000 for plaques and $500 for cheese displays, according to an internal report obtained by The Associated Press.

Awards were presented to 543 Transportation Security Administration employees and 30 organizations, including a "lifetime achievement award" for one worker with the 2-year-old agency. Almost $200,000 was spent on travel and lodging for attendees.

The investigation by the Homeland Security Department's inspector general, Clark Kent Ervin, also found the TSA gave its senior executives bonuses averaging $16,000, higher than at any other federal government agency, and failed to provide adequate justification in more than a third of the 88 cases examined.

My tax dollars for cheese displays and lifetime acheivement awwards for a 2 year old agency.  I'd have no qualms with their public execution.  That's criminal.  I can go to jail if I don't pay those taxes that buy cheese displays.

Thanks for the post but its par for the course.
I would be shocked IF I didnt get screwed.

As long as they continue to feel me up at the airport I'm OK with it!

Good post, thanks for the heads up. This deserves a ream of angry letters. Man this gets me angry!

Boy, I always get pissed when I have to chip in for the "plaque fund", but $81,000?
Wow.
Them's some mighty nice places.

Hey, $500 for a cheese display ain't shit.  

You want the Lombardi/Starr/Favre tri-fecta?  In America's Dairyland you're not getting off the hook for less than a grand.

this kind of stuff goes on EVERYWHERE.  I was a contractor for the USPS Office of Inspector General.  They had all of these offsite wankfests that go on for days, and an annual wankfest where they flew all 700 or so agency personnel to DC from the field offices, and put them all up in a hotel for a WEEK.  They did that every year while they pat each other on the ass and say "job well done" to each other.  One year, they decided to move the event at last minute...and forfeited the $90,000 deposit on the first site because they didnt' give enough advanced notice.  The only ones working for this whole week period are, you guessed it, the contractors lol.  Oh, btw, they pay the contracting company at least DOUBLE their salary in real $$ for every body in the place.  During the boom years, it was closer to 3 times the cost.  

This same organization gives EVERY employee a laptop, a docking station, a palm pilot, and caves in to every silly request for special treatment, like personal printers, LCD screens etc....so it costs about $3000 a pop to set each user up.  At one point, they even spent $5000 of taxpayer money on a treadmill for the boss at the time..but someone came to their senses and they got rid of it.  

They have people in that joint that couldnt' poor piss out a boot  with the directions printed on the heel, all making $70,000 plus a year.  They give themselves "pay for performance", which as best I can figure, is a bonus for doing their fucking jobs lol.  they pride themselves on their "diversity"...50% minority workforce.  Gross incompetence and terrible job performance isn't punished...it's rewarded, since eveyone gets a bonus.  The backstabbing and petty bs that goes on there is absolutely unbelievable.  

Folks, this is the TIP of the iceberg.  What makes this especially scary is that the Inspector General's office is the WATCHDOG organization...so it this kind of stuff is going on there, you got REAL problems lol.  

Now, a bunch of guys, mostly agents, left this place to go to..you guessed it, TSA lol.  

I am still dumbstruck by the knowledge that we can be incarcerated for many years if we fail to fund these vacations for the feds.

Every single federal employee responsible for misusing tax dollars should be publically executed.

I AM SHOCKED!!!!


...well not that shocked.

...Can't go on forever!

Eventually the $ will run out because MORONS like that would not be content with 100% taxation!

George Bush stands for smaller government right?

This kind of stuff is no suprise to those working within the "system". It gets more common the higher up the chain you go. Even in the military.

There is no incentive to saving money. Period. The prevailing mindset is spend what you get every FY, because if you don't, you loose it. Sadly, this is the way it works in fact, too. So, creative ways are found to spend it.

I often wonder how these places get so much money to throw around like this, because everywhere I've been in the military, funds haven't ever been above $100k. Even my present command, which has 200+ people assigned, and which operates four 4 seat tactical electronic warfare aircraft, has only ~$60k to spend per FY on stuff like plaques, office supplies, and the like. Heaven help us if we ever misappropriate our money, either.

Somebody should be getting fired over this. But we all know that won't happen.

Im a gov't contractor and its amazing what is wasted.  We bought $50k in licenses for software that we never used.  One manager actually said "What does it matter we waste money all the time"

Ever since then its ok whatever you want im paid by the hour.  

Quoted: Im a gov't contractor and its amazing what is wasted.  We bought $50k in licenses for software that we never used.  One manager actually said "What does it matter we waste money all the time" Ever since then its ok whatever you want im paid by the hour.

If private companies wer run like the military/government budget we'd be burning cow patties for heat and using pointed sticks to gather food. It is 100% out of control, and the ironic part is the Fraud Waste & Abuse hotline they have set up...Uh yeah, I'd like to report the US Army/Navy/Chari Force/Jarhead Corps  for wasting tax dollars...yeah they cancelled all training for the 3rd quarter and then bought all new office charis @ $600 a pop for the entire office on Sept. 25th.