Posted on 12/15/2004 5:46:25 AM PST by RebelBanker
The State Highway Administration purchasing official who paid $26.99 a can for windshield de-icer that costs about 97 cents at retail is still on the job and still has a government-issued credit card, lawmakers learned yesterday.
SHA Administrator Neil J. Pedersen told the General Assembly's Joint Audit Committee that the employee and others who paid exorbitant amounts for janitorial and maintenance items have not been disciplined because of a pending criminal investigation.
Pedersen said they have retained their credit cards - which were used to purchase such items as toilet bowl cleaner at 16 times its retail cost - because they need the cards to do their jobs.
That explanation floored Del. Charles E. Barkley. "It doesn't make sense for these employees to have credit cards," the Montgomery County Democrat said.
"I will take that advice and consider it," Pedersen replied. At yesterday's hearing, Pedersen had to explain three separate cases in which the procurement practices of his agency have come under the scrutiny of law enforcement. Besides the purchases of overpriced goods, auditors briefed the committee on possible violations of state law involving consulting contracts worth $750,000 and maintenance shop work worth $190,000.
(Excerpt) Read more at baltimoresun.com ...
Arrogance writ large? There must be a reason why this guy is "in your face".
Obviously he should be doing something else.
I am sure this "purchasing official" is paying these over inflated costs for services and goods to family members and friends businesses. Probably getting a good kickback too.
One of the cases involved a series of transactions at Springfield Hospital Center, where purchases included 100-watt light bulbs for $3.89 each - six times retail...
Not necessarily a good example...specialty light bulbs could cost this much.
$27 for de-icer, though, smells like kick-back.
I'd bet a year's worth of my FR contributions they were plain-vanilla A-lamps, or at most, 130V rated A-lamps.
"My wife and mother-in-law worked for the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration a while ago. They both told me that black employees could do pretty much whatever thay pleased without any fear whatsoever of disciplinary action"
Believe it!
Par for the course in Maryland.
What a $h!thole.
It's the same on the Left Coast. Los Angeles Unified School District and King-Drew Medical Center, an L.A. a County Hospital, operate the same way as MD, SHA. Black Americans, in these circumstances, have an extreme sense of entitlement.
May be. But I was supposing that a 'hospital center' would also have high-style decorator lighting and/ or locations that require shatter-proof bulbs.
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