Suspended GSA executive back on the job

The Washington Times ^ | 30 May 2012 | Jim McElhatton

[mandaladon]

More than a month after he was put on leave when a video surfaced showing him joking about the lavish spending — $823,000 — at a taxpayer-funded General Services Administration conference in Las Vegas, a top official at the agency has quietly returned to his job.

David Foley, deputy commissioner of the GSA's Public Buildings Service, was one of the speakers at the convention who has come under sharp congressional scrutiny after an audit uncovered massive waste at the gathering, including a talent show, open bar and red-carpet party.

Introduced before his speech at the conference as a “platinum big leaguer,” Mr. Foley joked at one point with a colleague: “The hotel would like to talk to you about paying for the party that was held in the commissioner’s suite last night.”

Agency sources confirmed Tuesday that Mr. Foley had returned to the GSA after being out on administrative leave. Officials made no public announcement about Mr. Foley’s return. He was placed on leave in April, the same month he apologized in an appearance before Congress for remarks he made in Las Vegas.

“I attempted to make a joke in the context of a talent celebration that I perceived as being similar to a comedic roast,” Mr. Foley told a House committee investigating the GSA gathering.

He also said he wasn’t directly involved in planning for the conference or in any financial or contracting irregularities that surfaced after the GSA’s inspector general issued a report on the gathering this year.

Still, Mr. Foley and other GSA executives and employees from Washington who attended the agency’s Western Regions Conference would have been hard-pressed to miss clear signs of what one organizer boasted to be “over the top” spending.

[HIDEK6]

... or Fuzzy Zoeller.