Federal Budget & Tax

Federal Budget & Tax: News Blog Background

Thursday, August 31, 2006

Rebecca Carr of Cox Newspapers is reporting that West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd has also had an annonymous hold on S. 2590 in addition to Sen. Stevens. I'm immediately inclined to wonder: Is this characteristic of Senators in their 80's?

Unlikely. Here's an explanation from Byrd's press spokesman Tom Gavin for the Senator's hold:

Senator Byrd wanted time to read the legislation, understand its implications, and see whether the proposal could be improved. There was an effort to pass a bill on an important subject without debate just before the Senate recess. Senators have an obligation to their constituents to know what they are voting on before signing off on any proposal

In addition, Byrd has announced he is lifting his hold on the bill. I suppose the slow-down over the last four weeks during the August congressional recess has allowed him sufficient time to read and understand the mammoth seven page bill.

Posted by Adam Hughes, 04:28:05 PM

Hold On One Second...

Rumors are flying that Sen. Byrd (D-WV) also has a hold on S. 2590.

I suppose we need to figure out what Coburn did to him as well?

More at TPMMuckraker.com

Posted by Adam Hughes, 12:59:27 PM

Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Pots, Kettles, and the Ironic Blackness of the U.S. Senate

Earlier today we blogged about Sen. Stevens' (R-AK) "secret" hold on legislation of a fellow Senator - Tom Coburn (R-OK). We speculated that the reason Stevens' office gave for the hold was probably about as accurate as OMB's deficit projections have been over the past few years.

But what is the reason? Obviously, the shenanigans that occurred last fall over the bridge-to-nowhere earmark are a prime suspect as the two players were trading barbs front and center. Coburn offered the amendment to strip the funding for the bridge and divert it to reconstruct the Twin Spans Bridge in New Orleans while Stevens gave an impassioned defense of the funding that would benefit his state and the 50 folks on Gravina Island.

Case closed, right? Maybe not. We already commented on the irony of a bill promoting transparency and disclosure being blocked by a "secret" hold. But the irony of this story doesn't end there. We unearthed this eerily-foreboding Roll Call article from last summer where our two favorite Senators were once again front and center, but with a deliriously ironic twist. This time it was Coburn who, back in March 2005, was putting holds on bills coming out of Stevens' Commerce Committee - one which Stevens himself had written.

Though Coburn did not acknowledge putting holds on all four bills, but he did admit to putting a hold on one of Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens' (R-Alaska) ocean research bills.

But that's not even the best part. The article goes on to talk about how Coburn will use holds as a tool to accomplish his goals whether people like it or not, in addition to "air[ing] his views about wasteful and unnecessary government spending" through his subcommittee chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee - the very same committee that Coburn's database bill emerged from. Seriously folks, you can't make this stuff up.

So, what goes around comes around I suppose. Or, maybe it's...what's good for the goose if good for the gander?

Posted by Adam Hughes, 07:03:14 PM

Sen. Stevens, Come on Down!

It's official - the secret hold on S. 2590 is none other than Sen. Ted "Series of Tubes" Stevens (R-AK). Sen. Stevens is the former chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee and all around Senate curmudgeon. What's interesting about the fact that Stevens put a hold on the bill is his rationale. According to Stevens' spokesman Aaron Saunders, the Senator is worried "that the bill would create more bureaucracy. He wants to see a cost-benefit analysis."

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK)

That explanation seems unlikely given Stevens' track record. What is more likely is Stevens was trying to stick it to Coburn. Stevens is famous for a temper-tantrum he threw on the Senate floor last fall over what he considered was a "betrayal" by his colleagues. Stevens was angry at his fellow Senators - particularly Sen. Coburn (R-OK) - who refused to allow the "bridge to nowhere" earmark to remain in legislation after extensive negative publicity. Stevens even went so far as to say he would resign from the Senate and perhaps even "be taken out of here on a stretcher."

Stevens' office denies the hold was a secret, but you could have fooled me (and a number of highly trafficed blogs). Stevens apparently had objections to the bill for a while, but neglected to attend any of the hearings or markup of the legislation despite sitting on the committee of jurisdiction. How can this be seen as anything other that political payback? There's certainly more than one reason Sen. Stevens might be upset with his Oklahoma counterpart.

Posted by Adam Hughes, 05:02:51 PM

Secret Holder Unmasked

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) has put a hold on S. 2590.

TPMmuckraker reporting:

A spokesman for Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) just confirmed his boss was the man behind the secret hold on the Coburn/Obama spending database bill, which has captivated a segment of the political blogging community in recent days.
"Sen. Stevens does have a hold on the bill," said the spokesman, who would only speak on the condition he not be named.

Posted by Craig Jennings, 03:05:05 PM

Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Who Is The Secret Holder: From 100 Down to 5

TPMMuckraker, with the help of GOP Progress and porkbusters.org (who originally started the tally), has narrowed the list of possibilities of the "secret hold" on S. 2590 in the Senate to five candidates (in fact, in the time I took writing this post, the list narrowed from eight to five):

Of those five, two are former Chairman of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee and could have more of a reason to be sheepish about disclosure of how the government spends its money than the others (they are long-time Sens. Byrd and Stevens btw).

Keep your eye on TPMMuckraker's running tally of denials of the hold as the secret Senator is unmasked - maybe sometime later today!

Posted by Adam Hughes, 05:46:18 PM

More Transparency on Katrina?

A year ago today, of course, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. I don't have much to add to all that's been said so far, except for that we don't really know how the federal government has been spending the money it allocated for the relief and recovery effort.

Amy Liu, a researcher for the Brookings Institute who's been tracking the recovery for the last year, should know what the federal government has been spending the money on. But as she said on the Tavis Smiley show in July, nobody really does.

Tavis Smiley: So, let me ask whether or not Brookings or anybody else, to your knowledge, has any idea of how much of that 100 billion the government did not allocate back to itself, but really does have a chance of landing and being used on the ground in the rebuilding effort in New Orleans.

Liu: Tavis, I wish I could answer that question, but it’s so hard to track that money. But I will have to say that I think we’re only now beginning to see money being spent on the actual rebuilding effort. A lot of that money, I have to say, has gone to the emergency response right after the storm. And only now are we seeing money go into infrastructure building, into housing, and into job creation. And again, I hope that that money can be seen hitting the ground very soon. But I agree with you. The recovery and the evidence on the ground is still very thin.

By almost all accounts, the recovery has not been going well. More transparency on how the money's been spent would help the public hold public officials accountable for what they've done wrong. And maybe more pressure on the administration would speed the recovery, once the anniversary is over and the media spotlight shifts back other matters of national importance.

Posted by Matt Lewis, 04:25:17 PM

Secret Hold Update

TMPmuckraker has a handy-dandy tally of senators who have been cleared of being the secret holder.

Their tally includes senators cleared by Porkbusters, GOP Progress, and TPMmuckraker. It also includes a list of senators who have refused to answer queries about the hold or who have not issued a denial.

Posted by Craig Jennings, 11:05:20 AM

Friday, August 25, 2006

Katrina Contracts: One Year and $8.75 Billion Shy

Yesterday, the U.S. House Government Reform Committee’s Minority Staff Special Investigation Division released a report on waste, fraud and abuse in procurement spending in response to Hurricane Katrina.

The report, requested by Reps. Henry A. Waxman, Dennis A. Cardoza, David R. Obey, John S. Tanner, Eleanor Holmes Norton, and John F. Tierney, examines 19 Katrina contracts, collectively worth $8.75 billion, with significant overcharges, wasteful spending, or mismanagement.

According to the report, only 30 percent of these contracts were awarded with full and open competition and over 47 percent were awarded on a sole-source basis.

The highlights:

Full and Open Competition is the Exception, Not the Rule. As of June 30, 2006, over $10.6 billion has been awarded to private contractors for Gulf Coast recovery and reconstruction. Nearly all of this amount ($10.1 billion) was awarded in 1,237 contracts valued at $500,000 or more. Only 30% of these contracts were awarded with full and open competition.
Contract Mismanagement Is Widespread.Hurricane Katrina contracts have been accompanied by pervasive mismanagement. Mistakes were made in virtually every step of the contracting process: from pre-contract planning through contract award and oversight. Compounding this problem, there were not enough trained contract officials to oversee contract spending in the Gulf Coast.
The Costs to the Taxpayer Are Enormous. This report identifies 19 Katrina contracts collectively worth $8.75 billion that have been plagued by waste, fraud, abuse, or mismanagement. In the case of each of these 19 contracts, reports from the Government Accountability Office, Pentagon auditors, agency inspectors general, or other government investigators have linked the contracts to major problems in administration or performance.

What has the Administration learned in the year since Bush praised Brownie? The report provides this clue:

"Earlier this month, the Federal Emergency Management Agency awarded new contracts worth over $1 billion to several of the same companies implicated in the wasteful Hurricane Katrina response."

Posted by Dana Chasin, 01:15:18 PM

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Indentity of Secret Holder Remains a Mystery

The quest to smoke out the Senator who is placing a "secret" hold on legislation to create a free, searchable, online database of all federal grants and contract continues today with a Cox News story that appeared in the Houston Chronicle. The story quote's OMBW own Gary Bass as saying:

It really is outrageous to do this in the dead of night as Congress is recessing. The public has a right to know how the government spends money.

Porkbusters 'Who's the Secret Holder?' page now lists 27 Senators as having publicly denied placing a hold on the legislation. If we assume a cosponsor of the bill would not place a hold on it, we can add in an additional 15 Senators, giving us 43 Senators. That means there are only 57 who could be placing the annonymous hold.

You Can Help Unveil The Secret Holder
Call the Capitol Hill switchboard (202.224.3121) and ask to be transfered to your Senators offices an ask them if they put the secret hold on S. 2590. When you get an answer, send me a note at ahughes @ ombwatch.org to let me know about it.

Posted by Adam Hughes, 11:14:23 AM

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Secret Hold in Senate Blocks Transparency Effort

While the inner-workings of Congress can often be full of illogical, ironic, and bizarre happenings, the latest behind the scenes buzz on Capitol Hill (and in the blogosphere) certainly takes the cake. OMB Watch has been supporting S. 2590 (see here and here for some of the BudgetBlog's coverage), a bill to create a free, searchable, downloadable database of all federal grants and contracts information. This effort is supported by progressives and conservatives, and nearly everyone in between, and has the support of a varied and eclectic mix of Senators.

But it seems there is at least one Senator who is not so wild about disclosing to the public how, on what, and with whom the government spends its resources (think Duke Cunningham). And the best part of it is the Senator (or Senators) in question has put an anonymous hold on the legislation, preventing it from passing unanimously.

Because the bill is widely supported in the Senate (both Party Leaders are cosponsors), the bill's author, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), decided to attempt to fast track the bill through the Senate before the August recess and pre-election pressure push it off the Senate's plate altogether. Passing non-controversial legislation by "unanimous consent" is a common process that helps the Senate save time and still allows a single Senator to stop the bill by objecting.

But the irony of a "secret hold" being used to stop a bill promoting transparency and disclosure of government information was too much for many in Washington to take - and an effort launched by Porkbusters to expose the secret Senator has taken off through the blogosphere. While the approach used by Porkbusters - called a "desperate manhunt" by the Wall Street Journal (apparently they thought the female members of the Senate should not be included in such a tongue-in-cheek reference) - may not be the preferred method of congressional staffers, it certainly is raising the profile of the issue, and hopefully turning up the heat on the anonymous Senator.

Check out the Porkbusters Secret Holder page for updates as the public attempts to shed light on a secret effort to stymie government transparency.

Posted by Adam Hughes, 07:12:08 PM

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Quote of the Day

ThinkProgress brings us this quote from House Appropriations Chair Jerry Lewis (R-CA):

There is a misunderstanding, particularly in the media, that earmarks are "out of control," said Lewis, who is chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

Here's the punchline (from a May 11 article in the Los Angeles Times):

Federal prosecutors have begun an investigation into Rep. Jerry Lewis, the Californian who chairs the powerful House Appropriations Committee, government officials and others said, signaling the spread of a San Diego corruption probe.
The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles has issued subpoenas in an investigation into the relationship between Lewis (R-Redlands) and a Washington lobbyist linked to disgraced former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Rancho Santa Fe), three people familiar with the investigation said.
[...]
The government is looking into the connection between Lewis and his longtime friend Bill Lowery, the sources said. Lowery, a lobbyist, is a former congressman from San Diego.
As chairman of the Appropriations panel, Lewis has earmarked hundreds of millions of dollars in federal contracts for many of Lowery's clients, one of the sources said.

Posted by Craig Jennings, 02:44:00 PM

Friday, August 11, 2006

Contract and Grants Database Legislation Gets State Support

Legislation to create a free, searchable database with government information on all federal grants and contracts picked up the endorsement of Republican Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels last week (Daniels is a former Director of the Office of Management and Budget). Daniels sent seperate letters to Indiana Senators Evan Bayh (D) and Richard Lugar (R) urging them to support the bill.

Interestingly enough, Daniels' letter highlights the importance of the proposed database not to decrease funding and root out waste, fraud, and abuse (although he does mentin that) but as a tool for states to be able to identify and compete for additional federal resources. Daniels' - who we believe has a good head on his shoulders - certainly understands the myriad positive aspects of this database.

In addition, the bill received an official cost estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. CBO expects the legislation to cost $15 million over the next five years.

Posted by Adam Hughes, 10:22:24 AM

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Katrina Woes

The 1-year anniversary of the Katrina disaster is coming up, and the New Republic is featuring the plodding recovery effort in its most recent issue. From the editor's take on it (free registration required):

While some money has flowed to the shores of the lower Mississippi, this sense of national purpose has been completely absent. Reconstruction has proceeded aimlessly and without leadership. Mayor Ray Nagin hasn't even issued his grand plan for the city yet. (That is scheduled for the end of this year.) The municipal authorities who could make the city livable are starved for funds. Despite needing $2 billion in repairs following the storm, the city's water and sewage system has received a mere $32 million loan from Washington. Meanwhile, the feds have completely stiffed the city's bankrupt power company--which may pass $700 million in losses and rebuilding costs on to consumers, essentially requiring them to pay $100 more in utility costs each month for the privilege of living in a semi-habitable city.

Sigh.

This as news comes that FEMA housing contracts that were supposed to cost the government $400 million may now total $3.4 billion, for the same work that the contractors originally agreed to do.

Posted by Matt Lewis, 10:42:14 AM

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