New York Post: This federal agency spent $4.6M on shellfish in a month: watchdog 2017-01-04_21-47-50

March 8, 2019 08:00 AM
New_York_Post
 

 

2017-01-04_21-47-50

Read_Original_Article2
 
By Shane Galvin
 
What the shell?
 
A federal agency spent $4.6 million on crab and lobster tails in a single month, according to documents.
 
A report from OpenTheBooks.com – a government watchdog – shows the depths of government’s use-it-or-lose-it spending mentality, including the $4.6 million seafood fest financed by the Department of Defense.
 
Outside of luxuriant foods, records shows last year’s federal spending spree included $9,241 on a Wexford leather chair, $7.6 million on workout equipment, $53,004 in China, $11,800 on a tournament-level foosball table, and $672,000 on golf carts.
 
An across-the-board federal agency spending uptick in September – a total of $97 billion in contracts in September 2018 – is an annual tradition as agencies feverishly attempt to spend funds before the end of the fiscal year to hide that they can make do with less the following year.
 
The practice has become more extreme over the years. In September 2015 the agencies spent a mere $60.6 million
 
Open The Books found the Department of Defense spent a total of $61.2 billion, the Department of Health and Human Services $5.6 billion, and the Department of Veterans Affairs $5.2 billion, all in the month of September.
 
On Sept. 27 and 28 overall agency spending exceeded $10 billion per day.
 
"Even the Executive Office of the President under President Donald Trump spent $26.8 million in the final days of fiscal year 2018," the watchdog said.
 
Open The Books came into existence after the passing of the "Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006", which was sponsored by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) and then-Sen. Barack Obama.
 
The report did not make clear who or what the crab and lobster was for, nor who it was consumed by.

 

Back to news
Donate_Button_Red
Sign the Petition