Trust me, you’ll never find a federal bureaucrat staying in a Motel 6; the government has voluminous tables for lodging and per diem rates at various locations around the country, so employees know how much they’ll get for lodging and meals, without having to dip into their own pocket.
During my civil service days, I worked with a few “masters of the travel universe,” who knew how to bilk every penny out of their travel compensation. One former supervisor got herself assigned to a D.C.-based “working group” that met three days out of every month. She always stayed at the Ritz-Carlton in Tyson’s Corner; flew down on Monday, group “met” Tuesday-Thursday and she returned on Friday. An entire week lost on a three-day meeting of marginal value.
Incidentally, this same woman was also part of a NATO working group, so she was off to Europe three times a year as well. One TDY to Norway cost the taxpayers $6,000 for an eight-day trip. Her group spent three years working on an unclassified threat guide that was absolutely worthless, but she was hardly concerned about the actual “work” produced by the team.
Her deputy preferred a more diverse approach; he would (essentially) sign up for any conference or meeting that would get him out of the office. As the group’s budget POC and set travel expenditures for the fiscal year, ensuring that his travels (and those of his boss) were fully funded. At one point, he was TDY 40 weeks out of a year. Not all of his trips filled the entire week, but his time on the road surpassed his time in the office.
Naturally, no one said a word about this abuse of taxpayer money. Plenty of underlings were trying to curry favor with the “tourists,” for bonuses, promotions, or to fund their own trips.
As for the DHS contract with this particular hotel, it would be interesting to know how recently it was signed, and for what period. By my rough calculations, $150,000 would cover a room for over 1,300 nights. Judging from the number of vehicles in the garage, it looks like DHS has booked most of the hotel for an extended period. I’m wondering if the contract predated the trouble in Ferguson and the hotel hosts DHS agents on a wide range of missions in the St Louis area.
Something very fishy about this and it goes well past anything in Ferguson.
Something very fishy about this and it goes well past anything in Ferguson.
You mean IS, I think...